Friday Fun (Featuring More Ass Than Usual):
Truth be told, it is a nice ass. Jailbait ass, yes, but a nice ass. And if the photo actually showed President Barack Obama checking out junior delegate ass at the G-8 summit, it might be worth a word or two. But it doesn't. It shows a frozen moment when Obama was turning his head. (Nicolas Sarkozy is another matter - that's a man scoping out la booty.)

The response of some on the right is an ejaculatory spray of spooge as if Matt Drudge just got a picture of Barack Obama getting a blumpkin from a tranny whore in the men's room of the Buenos Aires airport (or, for Drudge, "Tuesdays"). Over at Ann Althouse's joint, there's a post that's gotta be a parody, for if it is not, then an "Althouse" must be "a place where people never get laid," for she details a comparison of the body language of Obama and Sarkozy that says, "The foot closest to the woman, like Sarkozy's, is planted and aimed forward, but the other steps off in the direction of the woman, bending the knee upward into a bit of a crotch-squeeze and forming the base of a dramatic tilt of the entire body into a flexible S-shape that leans toward the woman."

At least one of Althouse's commenters just decided to go full retard with racism. Max says, "Sarkozy is thinking, 'I go home to Carla and you go home to The Beast of ACORN!' There’s our leader doing what he does best – community booty organizer. The only ghetto mannerism missing is his unconscious hand clutching his boy-brain (crotch) in MJ fashion!" It's like the charming Freeper discussion detailed over at Kos about Malia Obama wearing a t-shirt and shorts.

The point here, as ever with the conservative commentariat, is not that they're having fun. It's that it's fun about a lie. When we in Left Blogsylvania laughed our asses off at Bush's stupid facial expression when he couldn't open a Chinese door or when he massaged the shoulders of the leader of another country, it was because he actually did those things. (And, well, that motherfucker did look like a chimp.)

It's just kind of pathetic, this desperate attempt to mock Obama, as if catching him in a butt glance will mitigate the myriad sins of the Republicans. It's like seeing a limping frog trying to get to a quickly drying puddle.

However, if Obama had been checking her out, well, c'mon, can you blame him? Look at that ass.

Easy Predictions: No One Will Apologize to Nancy Pelosi:
Some things are just cut and dried, no matter how much others try to complicate, obfuscate, or bloviate. So, just to get this right:

On May 14, 2009, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi accused the CIA of lying about who was told what when at which briefing on waterboarding. She added, "They mislead us all the time." "They" is the CIA; "us" is the Congress.

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, who, it needs to always be mentioned, scampered away from Congress in disgrace, said back in May, "To have the person third in line to be president say that the CIA misleads us all the time is so utterly irresponsible and such an attack on the men and women who are risking their lives...that she disqualifies herself for being speaker of the House."

Fox "news" host Bill O'Reilly barely said (in an "interview" with Gingrich), "The unintended consequences of the Speaker of the House basically saying to the world, hey, the U.S. government is corrupt. You know, the CIA is a bunch of liars. And they misled the Congress and all of these terrible things, that's got to play out in a much bigger - you know, much more important role than just Pelosi versus the CIA."

Also on Fox "news," Sean Hannity said that Pelosi is "undermining our national security. She's emboldening our enemies, and it is reckless and irresponsible for somebody in that position."

There's endlessly similar blustering in print, on the radio, and on TV.

Here's a letter from yesterday, June 26, 2009, to CIA Chief Leon Panetta from seven Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee: "Recently you have testified that top CIA officials have concealed significant actions from all Members of Congress, and misled Members for a number of years from 2001 to this week. This is similar to other deceptions of which we are aware from other recent periods." This is vague because the House members are dealing with classified material.

Or, in other words, "They mislead us all the time." Oh, by the way, the "us" there could also be the American people.

Was Palin Really Treated That Badly?:
Somewhere, you know the Clintons are laughing their asses off at Sarah Palin punking out of politics. And that'd be even as they shake their heads listening to bullshit pundit after bullshit pundit declare that poor Sarah Palin and her poor kids and her poor husband were treated oh-so-very cruelly by Katie Couric and the Bloggers.

John Fund in a "people are too stupid have too much information" column in the Wall Street Journal: "Everyone in the family was weary of endless personal attacks, including mean-spirited suggestions on liberal blogs that all of her children should have been aborted and that she would run on a presidential platform promoting retardation."

Kathleen Parker, in a "go the fuck away, Sarah" column in the Washington Post: "Undoubtedly and understandably, Palin is weary of the fray. The crucial turning point was the attacks on her family. No one can honestly make the case that the Palins didn't take more heat than other public families."

Shit like this is on an endless loop on CNNMSNBCFox. It's pick and choose the most fucked-up stuff some commenter on Daily Kos wrote while insisting that the beleaguered Palins were treated worser than the worstest any family has ever been worstly treated in the history of worstness. Oh, and Tina Fey hurt her feelings.

Fuck them and fuck her. Sure, people are gonna say mean shit about her. Sure, Andrew Sullivan might get a bit obsessed over whether or not Trig's Palin's kid or not. And if a candidate preaches abstinence but her daughter gets knocked up before marriage? That'd be kind of relevant. But the mainstream media, for the most part, when it wasn't jacking off about how mavericky this moose-huntin' twit was, questioned whether or not Palin was smart enough or experienced enough to be vice-president. Hey, those are legitimate lines of inquiry, even if George W. Bush took them off the table for a few years.

And as for who's been treated worse?

Whether or not Bill and Hillary Clinton had Vince Foster murdered was discussed on mainstream news channels, not just dismissed as sheer madness. Elected Republicans made jokes about Chelsea Clinton's awkward adolescent looks. And when someone investigates Sarah Palin and talks about the shape of her vagina and how she sucks a dick, then we can even begin to talk about who is treated unfairly. It wasn't just some cranky-ass blogger. It was the way the national media functioned: as a nonstop Clinton attack machine. The Clintons fucking took it all, like Rocky against Apollo Creed, man, in Rocky II.

And all this shit was even before blogs existed. What kind of fucktarded shitstorm would have cycloned through the nutzoid right and the 24-hour news networks, desperately trying to fill time until the world ends, if blogs had been around? Oh, right, ask Barack and Michelle Obama about birth certificates, Bill Ayers, and secret Muslim terrorist agendas.

Palin got a taste of it, like a particularly intense amuse bouche. And, as the Rude Pundit said yesterday, if she were truly the honest person her plummeting number of supporters believe she is, she would have simply said last week that she couldn't take it anymore and everyone can kiss her ass. But, hey, maybe Rachael Ray needs some competition.

Radio Bonus: The Rude Pundit on The Stephanie Miller Show:
Yesterday, the Rude Pundit chatted with Stephanie Miller on her daily, syndicated radio show. Have a listen as they talk oh-so-gently and compassionately about Sarah Palin, Mark Sanford, and more:

Powered by Podbean.com

(Major props to rude reader Rick S. for the audio clip.)

Palin Not Fade Away:
There's only one way that Sarah Palin's resignation as governor of Alaska might have provoked any sympathy whatsoever: if she had just admitted she was in over her head. If Palin had gotten up in front of Miked Duck Lake or wherever the fuck she was, and said, "Okay, look, ya got me. I was an overly ambitious dink who actually tricked people into taking me seriously as a political leader. Who'd've thought it would have worked so well? It was fun last year, talkin' to all those crowds who thought that 'folksy' was a substitute for 'competent,' but lemme tell you, Alaska, America, it ain't. And now that I've realized it, I've decided the best thing I could do is to get out before I do any more damage." It's basically a variation on the "Shit George W. Bush Should Have Said in 2002" speech. And it's pretty much what she actually said, but she didn't have the guts to say it, spinning it instead as bad ol' government and mean ol' media people chasin' her away from what she loves.

Hell, even if she had said, "Governoring is boring and I'm sick of people buggin' me for stuff. I'm headin' to L.A. to make shitloads of money, fuckers," it would have been more honest.

At this point, though, Michael Jackson's funeral has more dignity.

What's most depressingly predictable is the number of defenders she has among people not on her payroll. There's insanity abounding when you read or hear anyone contort themselves in order to justify all the time and effort they've put into attempting to make us believe that Sarah Palin is anything more than that fun one-night stand they keep texting over and over to see again. All of them just keep saying stupid shit that only the desperate speak. And none of it deserves any more of a response than a silent stare, wondering if the speaker is going to hurt themselves or others.

William Kristol, who, it should always be noted, was Alan Keyes' campaign manager, writes, "Why is it more admirable to run for national office while a sitting governor (or senator), spending a fair amount of time out of your state (or away from Congress), necessarily neglecting or delegating some of your duties -- than to turn the office over to your constitutional successor so your constituents have someone working full time on their behalf?" Reading Kristol's pathetic whine of a column is like taking pleasure in watching a man eat a shit sandwich and pretending it's fine ham.

In the Washington Times, Tony Blankley, a man who looks like he just ate a whole meatball sub, writes, "And though many a conventional politician might be seen as a quitter if he resigned from office -- I have a very strong hunch Mrs. Palin is constitutionally incapable of being seen as a quitter. Because she is not. She is constantly taking on the biggest challenge on her horizon." You got that logic? If anyone else quit, they'd be a quitter. But if Palin quits, she's not. Thus Tony Blankley finally achieved his goal of licking his own asshole.

Over on MSNBC's Morning Starbucks, Mika Brzezinski, who always looks like she's just aching for a spanking, said yesterday that if Palin were a man, we wouldn't be judging her so harshly for resigning. She's wrong on that account, but she's right that we'd treat a man differently. We'd call him a "pussy." (Bonus points: Brzezinski declared that she's not a feminist.)

Even if Eugene Robinson is right that we should blame John McCain for inflicting Palin on the nation like a diseased dude who doesn't tell his lover that he's got the herp, the real responsibility rests squarely with the people of Alaska who, like people all over the nation, elected the person who soothed their greed nerve best. Selfish people will, ultimately, behave selfishly. And the morons among us will reveal their true intelligence.

Standing in hip boots in some other damn body of water, Palin was interviewed by various and sundry networks, and she declared, "I am not a quitter; I am a fighter." Goddamn, there's two more words she doesn't know the definition of.

Pictures of a Tea Party:
It was the Fourth of July in Red State America, 2009. The Rude Pundit had celebrated by eating various kinds of grilled meat, and, yet, he still felt empty inside, like he needed to be among people who knew the meaning, the true meaning of this day. So he read about the local tea party going on in a local park, even though it was hotter than Satan's taint outside. After asking if any of the other carnivores wanted to go with him, alone he headed out.


In the park, there were about a hundred or so people gathered in the three strips of shade provided by the trees. The Rude Pundit walked through, looking at signs that proclaimed the people present disapproved of socialism, liberalism, and Barack Obama.


This gentleman's sign expressed his desire to not be anally raped, although he seems a bit ambitious in how low he could bend.


In case you can't tell, it's an image from the end of the film Planet of the Apes, with Charlton Heston on his knees before a ruined Statue of Liberty. That's President Obama's face as an ape. The Rude Pundit asked the man who was carrying it if he had gotten it off the internet. "No," the man said, "I made it myself."


Actual conversation (in play form):
RP: Did you make that yourself?
Man in Colonial Drag: No, Betsy Ross made it.
RP: (pause) So...um...General Washington?
Man: No, but I'm proud to be one of his aides.
RP: (thinking about an AIDS joke, but wanting to survive the day) Well, Ms. Ross did a fine job. Can I take your picture?

The man would later lead the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance, in front of a band's drum kit that had a confederate flag dangling from it. A woman in costume would sing the National Anthem. Another man would read from the bible. It was really a catch-all kind of event.


Inside the air-conditioned rec center gym, another 200 people or so gathered to watch a John Birch Society video about how communists take over the country. Not pictured are the people in the bleachers. Some long-haired dude in what looked like a buccaneer's coat told us at the end that the event was not sponsored by the John Birch Society, but that he just thought the video was informative.

There were tables with all kinds of information about health care, abortion, taxes. The Rude Pundit heard one table attendant hold forth on how fascism was more widespread than communism, but that we need to be cautious about both. It didn't make sense then. It doesn't make sense now. But the people he spoke to were nodding.


Much like that sign there, which says, "46 million without health insurance...who are they kidding? 9.7 million are not even Americans." How do you argue with someone who can't even admit that the stat is over 46 million Americans? You don't.

No, instead you sigh, thinking that it's too hot a day. You debate in your mind whether or not this is a real movement or just a bunch of people who too readily believe all the goddamn lies they're fed. You get a free sno-cone (sour apple flavor). You listen to the costumed kids sing, "God Bless America." You leave when the band starts to cover Lee Greenwood's fucking song. You go to see fireworks downtown after the local symphony plays. You hear that people around here don't put pro-choice or pro-Obama stickers on their cars because they'll get keyed. You know this is America, too, yes, and, unlike the tea partygoers, you recognize it because, even as they celebrate a so-called "revolution" and hope for another, some things never change.

On with Stephanie Miller This Morning:
The Rude Pundit is on The Stephanie Miller Show at 9:30 a.m Eastern, 6:30 Pacific. It oughta be big fun in the morning, like rolling over to your lover at dawn for one more...okay, maybe not that good, but still, damn fun.

You can listen online.

Because It Has to Be Said (Sarah Palin Resignation Edition):
In the 21st century, only complete fucking morons actually write multiple exclamation points into their political speeches. Jesus Christ, it's like a letter from a high school freshman girl about that cute senior.

(An earlier posted version apparently contained numerous words in all caps. One looks forward to the release of the shaky crayon draft.)

George Washington Would Kick Teabaggers' Asses:
The Rude Pundit is down in dwindling Red State America for the Fourth o' July this year. For shits and giggles, he'll be heading to a local Tea Party tomorrow, where people who honestly have no fucking idea about the history of the nation will gather and sacrifice goats to Fox "news," hoping that the blood will please the gods and their extraordinarily low taxes will be even lower.

Since those like the aforementioned mad Glenn Beck and his fellow nutzoids pick and choose what the nation's founders actually said and believed, with Beck's repeated reamings of Thomas Paine falling on the "what the fuck?" side of things, here's something from George Washington himself that'll fuck up a teabagger's day. It's from an April 5, 1783 letter Washington wrote to the Marquis de Lafayette - you know, that French bastard without whom the American Revolution would have probably failed:

"We now stand an Independent People, and have yet to learn political Tactics. We are placed among the Nations of the Earth, and have a character to establish; but how we shall acquit ourselves time must discover; the probability, at least I fear it is, that local, or state Politics will interfere too much with that more liberal and extensive plan of government which wisdom and foresight, freed from the mist of prejudice, would dictate; and that we shall be guilty of many blunders in treading this boundless theatre before we shall have arrived at any perfection in this Art."

You got that? Washington feared that the states would fuck up the unity of the nation, that a nation fails if people are allowed to have each of its local bullshit take precedence.

"In a word that the experience which is purchased at the price of difficulties and distress, will alone convince us that the honor, power, and true Interest of this Country must be measured by a Continental scale; and that every departure therefrom weakens the Union, and may ultimately break the band, which holds us together. To avert these evils, to form a Constitution that will give consistency, stability and dignity to the Union; and sufficient powers to the great Council of the Nation for general purposes is a duty which is incumbent upon every Man who wishes well to his Country, and will meet with my aid as far as it can be rendered in the private walks of life; for hence forward my Mind shall be unbent; and I will endeavor to glide down the stream of life ‘till I come to that abyss, from whence no traveller is permitted to return."

Tell that to your favorite member of the teabag brigade: George Washington would tell them they're idiots. That's what you should do this July 4th weekend: make a conservative cry. It wouldn't be hard. They're on the edge of tears constantly these days.

Oh, by the way, the Marquis de Lafayette was also pushing for the freedom of slaves. Washington continued, "The scheme, my dear Marqs. which you propose as a precedent, to encourage the emancipation of the black people of this Country from that state of Bondage in wch. they are held, is a striking evidence of the benevolence of your Heart." But, because Washington was by no means perfect, he added, "I shall be happy to join you in so laudable a work; but will defer going into a detail of the business, ‘till I have the pleasure of seeing you."

Of course, Washington didn't get around to that business.

The Rude Pundit on the Radio and in SF:
A couple of announcements first:
The Rude Pundit will be a guest on The Stephanie Miller Show on Monday, July 6 at 9:30 a.m. Eastern, 6:30 Pacific, and other times in-between. Check your local radio stations and/or internets for listenability. If you've never heard her before, she's an ass-kicker (and you like it). Oughta be a big time.

And the Rude Pundit will be in San Francisco on Sunday, July 26 at 7:30 p.m. at the Community Music Center for an event around his book, Staged Action: Six Plays from the American Workers' Theatre. Scroll down a bit on the event link. More details soon.

Why Glenn Beck Needs to Be Repeatedly Cock-Punched (Common Sense Edition):
No, no, not because he's the Mormon mad hatter who pollutes the cesspool known as Fox "news" even more than Steve Doocy or Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity, like the e coli in the turds floating in the water. And not because he let go unchallenged the assertion by Michael Scheuer, oozing in the guest chair like a hairy cyst, that al-Qaeda needs to blow the shit out of Someplace, USA in order for the nation to see that paranoia and bugfuck militarization is the only path. And not because Beck's smug, pudgy face, like Karl Rove mated with a scrub brush, seems to demand routine beatings.

No, it's because the profit-mongering prophet of American doom, who claims his new "book" (if by "book," you mean, "a large-fonted, white-space-filled stream of consciousness vomit that'd make James Joyce in his Finnegan's Wake days say, 'That makes no fucking sense'"), titled Common Sense, is based on Thomas Paine's pamphlet of the same name, just threw the badass founder under the bus.

Stirring the big pot of stupid that is his research, Beck ranted last night about some damn French book called The Coming Insurrection, which, Beck says, is "a call to arms for violent revolution, authored anonymously by a French group called the Invisible Committee who want to bring down capitalism." Now, you may say that it seems capitalists are doing a good enough job bringing down capitalism so completely that, like watching Jerry Lewis attempt to clean dishes, it's probably best to just stay out of the way, but then again, you are probably not a fucking moron. (And if you are, let the Rude Pundit say to you, "Yes, pudding is tasty.")

Before we get all high-mindedly upset that Beck would dare condemn one group for calling for violence for political change while allowing that gelatinous mold spore known as Michael Sheuer spit forth, let's put that aside and instead concentrate on this (follow the bouncing ball for a moment - it will lead you to the desire to punch a man in the taint): Beck says at one point, "This is the anti-Common Sense, where I call for peaceful protest." He's referring to his Common Sense, not Paine's.

In his Common Sense, Beck includes the entirety of Paine's because that way he doesn't have to write as much. And he frames Paine's 1776 publication in this way: "Paine asked simple questions and encouraged his fellow citizens to look at America's problems and its future with fresh eyes and a healthy dose of simple logic." Then, on page 90 of his "let's all join hands and return to a day that never existed" pile of tripe, Beck says, "This is not a call to arms or violence." He does not note that Paine's was a call to violence, if necessary. In his book, that is, where he tries desperately to claim Paine for himself. Because it suits his purpose. Because he's a manwhore.

So last night, while blubbering about this new book from France (thus automatically making it evil), Beck said, and this needs to be quoted in full not because the context makes it clearer - it makes it head-slappingly hilariouser, "This book has not even been released in this country yet. It has been passed hand to hand and via the Internet, much like the pamphleteers in pre-revolution America. Thomas Paine was one of them. He issued a call to arms. I am not doing that. You are an idiot if you start shooting people — all that does is delegitimize the cause. Be like Ghandi, like Martin Luther King."

The reason Glenn Beck ought to be cock-punched repeatedly is because you can't model your allegedly anti-violence book after someone trying to rally Americans to violence in rebellion and then, when trying to make another simple-minded point, hang that very person out to dry by comparing him to the authors of what you just called "a dangerous leftist book." In other words, you can't support Thomas Paine and support Gandhi (that's Fox's misspelling of the name above). It pretty much means you don't understand either.

But, fuck, if you're Glenn Beck, you're crazier than a shit fight at a monkeyhouse, and if it'll sell more of your shit and boost your ratings among the apes, then who the fuck cares if it makes any logical fuckin' sense.

(Oh, and even though this appears to call for violence against Glenn Beck, it is not a call for violence against Glenn Beck. See how that works?)

Mark Sanford's Line in the Twat:
So now we know: Mark Sanford likes anal. Totally and completely, he loves both taking the journey down the Hershey highway and being the road. Indeed, from his interview yesterday with AP, one can only infer that as long as he kept his cock away from other women's cunts, he felt safe that he wasn't betraying his wife or his mistress: "There were a handful of instances wherein I crossed the lines I shouldn't have crossed as a married man, but never crossed the ultimate line" with everyone not Argentinean.

So if you diagram a female body, one can assume where the lines were firm and where they were a bit fuzzy. Tits? More of a dotted line. Lips? No line at all. Such is the way for crawfishing politicians of all stripes. It's not that there's a vaginal wall, per se, but a kind of selective force field that prevents penile penetration, but allows fingers, tongues, and implements of various sorts. That went for all non-spouses except one, about whom Sanford actually said, "I will be able to die knowing that I had met my soul mate," a line that should automatically be accompanied with a ceremonial "handing over of the balls."

As the South Carolina governor said, comparing his other female encounters with his affair with Maria Chapur, "Without wandering into that field we'll just say that I let my guard down in all senses of the word without ever crossing the line that I crossed with this situation." Beware the fields you can wander into on a woman's body, motherfuckers, they're not just myths.

With Sanford being all kinds of little bitch about his affair - trying to justify it by saying shit like, "This was a whole lot more than a simple affair, this was a love story. A forbidden one, a tragic one, but a love story at the end of the day," and offering that he is "trying" to fall back in love with his wife - without being man enough to just divorce his wife and move on with the women he is presumptively in love with, it's not that big a leap to assume that there was no line on the assholes of the other other women.

Indeed, if one wants to consummate with a woman and yet not violate any of her pentrative lines, the simple solution, and an obvious one, considering that Mark Sanford appears to be a bottom, even moreso than fellow South Carolinian Lindsey Graham, then probably Sanford offered up his own asshole to the women he met while going to "blow off steam" on male-only ventures to South America and elsewhere, as he told AP.

Yep, one can imagine that across the Andes and up and down the Amazon, from nothernmost Colombia to the southern tip of Chile, the people in the cities, the slums, the villages, are all familiar with the gulping, yowling sound Mark Sanford makes when he's fucked in the ass by a dildo, when a women he met dancing at some plaza took him back to her bed and he said, "Put on this strap-on. I'm married. With a mistress. There's lines I can't cross. Those lines are over your pussy. But don't worry. I'll ream your anus next."

In the deepest rainforest, in the hut of a tribe that has had little or no contact with the outside world, children ask their father, "What is that strange noise, like the sound a tamarin makes when it's getting eaten by a jaguar?"

And the father, probably with some long, sharp bone through his noise and a haircut like Moe Howard, will look sadly at his young ones and say, "That is the sound of a man crushing his own soul while something slams his prostate and makes him cum buckets." Of course, the sounds of birds, bugs, and jabbering monkeys would drown it out eventually.

(By the way, Dan Casey over at the Roanoke Times is running a contest with real prizes and shit. It's simple: Predict the next politician to go hiking the Appalachian Trail. Check it out.)

Scenes from a Drawdown:
Constructed with an opinion, offered without comment:

"Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki declared Sunday a national holiday. Iraqi TV stations have been running a countdown logo — 'Two days till June 30' — on all programming."

"Fireworks continued to light up the sky over Baghdad into the early hours on Tuesday, after thousands of Iraqis, an unprecedented number for a public post-war event, attended a party in a park where singers performed patriotic songs.

"'All of us are happy - Shias, Sunnis and Kurds on this day ... the Americans harmed and insulted us too much,' Waleed al-Bahadili, an Iraqi attending the celebrations, told the AFP news agency.

"Many Iraqis ignored an appeal by Tariq al-Hashemi, the Iraqi vice president, to stay away from crowded places during the US pullback, after more than 250 people were killed in bombings over the past 10 days."

"Speaking as a military parade marking the event was held deep inside the heavily fortified Green Zone, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said, 'The national united government succeeded in putting down the sectarian war that was threatening the unity and the sovereignty of Iraq.' He made no mention of the American military’s involvement in fighting here for the last six years, and more than 120,000 American troops remain on Iraqi soil.

"The military parade in the Green Zone on Tuesday — at the official monument to the unknown soldier — was attended primarily by Iraqi reporters and dignitaries. The public could not reach it because of extensive security restricting access to the area. Several American news organizations were also barred, including two television news networks and The New York Times, on the grounds that they did not have the appropriate badges. This seemed in part intended to signal that the Iraqi authorities were in charge."

"On June 30 major companies - including Exxon, Shell, BP and Total - will gather at Iraq's oil ministry in Baghdad for a two-day meeting to take part in the first bidding round for oil service contracts."

"An oil consortium led by British Petroleum has won a contract to develop a large oil field in Iraq, as dozens of international firms compete for the rights to the nation's oil and gas reserves. BP, along with China's CNPC, secured the contract for the Rumaila oil field on Tuesday, the largest of Iraq's six oil fields on offer to foreign and state-owned companies."

"Later this year, Iraq is due to offer another set of fields that are even more appealing since they are undeveloped."

"The 130,000 U.S. troops who remain are now tasked with supporting Iraqi troops and police, and will be unable to launch operations in the cities without Iraqi consent. A small number of Americans will stay in the cities to train, advise and coordinate with the Iraqi security forces."

Photos That Make the Rude Pundit Want to Down a Bowl of Soup with a 40 of Malt Liquor:


That's Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner there dishing out food to the homeless at the So Others Might Eat soup kitchen in DC last Thursday.

Geithner and other Treasury officials worked there for an hour, making it, officially, the least he could do.

Feel free to supply stimulus-related jokes. Bailout humor that mentions gruel is also welcome.

Clarence Thomas Wants to Yank on Pubescent Panties:
There's porn websites devoted to what Savana Redding experienced when she was a 13-year old at Safford Middle School in Arizona. Yep, child molesters unwilling to make the commitment, you can read stories and see fantasy photos and videos (using adults as children) where some poor girl is accused of having drugs or a weapon on her and is forced to strip in front of school officials. Usually, it's followed by a spanking or a lesbian three-way because nothing, apparently, gets an adolescent girl wetter than getting naked in front of older women and (most of the time) men. However, real life ain't a porn fantasy. That little girl doesn't want to fuck you, Humbert Humbert, and, in fact, grown ups horribly scar kids all the time.

Based on the info of a single student, fearing that she was carrying prescription strength Ibuprofen, maybe even, horror of horrors, Naproxen, Redding was brought to the school nurse's office and told to strip to her underwear in front of the nurse and another administrator. She was then ordered to pull out her bra and panties and shake them to make sure she wasn't hiding pills there. One imagines that the female administrator then told the tale of the strip search to the male principal. Redding, now 19, describes the search as the "most humiliating experience" of her life. No pills, by the way, were found. Do you feel filthy yet?

Still, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas thought that not only was this search eminently reasonable, but that the courts have no right calling "bullshit" and a violation of the 4th Amendment, as an 8-1 majority did. That's right: Antonin Scalia, a man who thinks torture is cool and gay sex isn't, thought the search was unreasonable. Fuckin' Samuel Alito, who once was the sole judge of three to say that an unwarranted (in that there was no warrant) strip search of a 10-year old girl was a-okay, thought that the Redding search was unreasonable. Every other justice did by Thomas.

Dahlia Lithwick said she had "never seen Justice Clarence Thomas laugh harder" than during the oral arguments on this case when Justice Breyer said that, during clothes changing in gym, "people did sometimes stick things in my underwear." And Thomas's dissent is about as disturbing as thinking of Clarence Thomas howling at laughter at Steven Breyer's young ass being violated.

Thomas blames Redding's behavior off school grounds as one excuse as to why the search was reasonable: "Several weeks later, another student, Jordan Romero, reported that Redding had hosted a party before the dance where she served whiskey, vodka, and tequila." He then goes on to try to demonstrate that the majority is wrong in saying, in essence, "Um, it was fucking ibuprofen. What the fuck?" For Thomas, a rule is a rule, motherfuckers, and if a school district has some hysterical-ass regulation about prescription drugs on campus, then there's no difference between something that you can get over the counter (remember: prescription strength ibuprofen is just like over-the-counter, but bigger. Solution? Take more over the counter ones) and oxycontin.

And he gets off on the panties: "Redding would not have been the first person to conceal pills in her undergarments," after which he cites a number of cases from his personal porn stash of Hanes-hideaways, ending with, "Nor will she be the last after today’s decision, which announces the safest place to secrete contraband in school." Yes, and if you can't take a glance at 13-year old snatch now, who knows what'll happen next? It's a slick slope to anarchy.

Thomas gets all DARE by talking about drug problems in school, but even he says, "Admittedly, the Ibuprofen and Naproxen at issue in this case are not the prescription painkillers at the forefront of the prescription-drug-abuse problem." And then, in a total bullshit moment, he tries to demonstrate how those drugs might be dangerous, which amounts to something like, "Well, you can sharpen them and stab someone."

"Preservation of order, discipline, and safety in public schools is simply not the domain of the Constitution," Thomas says, and yet here we are again. And, finally, after time and again saying that students have no rights, whether it was the days of locker search cases or piss tests or whatever, the Supreme Court has said that there is actually a last frontier they are not willing to cross, conservative and liberal, everyone except Clarence Thomas, who, one suspects, was sad that Redding's panties weren't presented as exhibit A.

Mark Sanford Gets Some:
If you've ever fucked an Argentinean woman, you'd understand what he was going through. (Ah, Vera, if you ever make your way up here from Cordoba again, give a call.)

Let's give a bit of credit where it's due. Unlike so many other men (and, c'mon, it's always men), not only did South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford (R [unless you're Fox "news," which can reassign parties based on morality]) have the obligatory confessional announcement, but he stood there and took his lumps from the press. In his epic preface to his admission that he disappeared for five days because he was balling a woman in Argentina, Sanford said, "I guess where I'm trying to go with this is that there are moral absolutes and that God's law indeed is there to protect you from yourself, and there are consequences if you breach that. This press conference is a consequence." And he lived the consequence, taking questions, pathetically trying to explain that his deep desire to plunge his cock into the cunt of a woman not his wife was based on love (which it may very well have been), but ultimately nutting up and owning his fuck-up almost as far as he could at the moment.

Look at the end of the press conference. The poor bastard didn't want to stop talking, even after he had said,"Last question." It was as if his words would stop the bleeding, but they were not made of gauze, and eventually he had to be halted and led off by his staff, who, no doubt, were wondering what the fuck they were going to do with their lives. And Sanford looked utterly lost. If it was possible to eke out a turd of compassion for the man who was willing to starve his state's schools to make a political point, it was then. To read the emails between him and Maria the Mistress is to look at what real people say when they stumblingly, embarrassingly, try to reveal the confusing intensity of the urges of the heart and genitalia.

But, mostly, truly, fuck him. Chalk up another public dive for a repressed Christian conservative dickwad who had to have his midlife crisis in public. Republicans might as well change their motto to "We're probably fucking around on you."

It helps that Sanford was a self-righteous bag of douche about marriage all along, calling on Bill Clinton to resign, condemning gay marriage, putting himself out there as a model for husband and father. As he told closeted homosexual Steve Doocy on Fox and Friends on March 8, 2007, "My wife and I have four young sons, great little boys, but we're kind of focused on those guys. And then the rest of the day you've got your day job. And so like I say, we have our hands more than filled right here." Sounds like a man who's got his priorities straight, no?

Then there was his comment on Congressman Bob Livingston's confession of an affair during the Clinton impeachment process: "The bottom line, though, is he still lied. He lied under a different oath, and that is the oath to his wife. So it's got to be taken very, very seriously." That was from CNN's Crossfire on December 18, 1998.

And there's the very real possibility that his affair, which he says began only as a friendship eight years ago, consummated over a year ago, literally fucked away his chances to be John McCain's vice presidential candidate. On MSNBC on September 2, 2008, Norah O'Donnell asked, "You were vetted to some degree, right?" To which Sanford coyly responded, "Well, my wife and my kids vet me everyday." Yep, to push this narrative a bit further, Sarah Palin may have been inflicted on the lower 48 because Mark Sanford was busy going gaucho down on his mistress's pampas.

Yeah, he's done. For now. His wife said she tried to get him to stop fucking around. He didn't. And thus we see him, the man who thought he was confidently standing up to the bad federal government, reduced to asking for forgiveness from everyone in his life.

He should have resigned then and there not because he was advancing South Carolina's trade in his semen with Argentina, but because he abandoned his state while in office. He was willing to possibly give Livingston a pass because he didn't betray the oath of office, but, he said, Bill Clinton lied under oath and therefore should be out. Considering the violation of the trust of the people of South Carolina, who deserve to be able to at least know the governor is reachable during his brief time in office, Mark Sanford should have said that he's packing his shit up and leaving the job to the Republican lieutenant governor, who Sanford choked up for upon mention.

It's not the sex and it is the sex. All Bill Clinton asked of us when he didn't resign was to believe that he wouldn't lie about sex if ever asked under oath again. David Vitter asks us to believe that he won't be fucking hookers. Mark Sanford asks us to believe that he won't ever run off again. If you were a bettor, what's got the best odds?

There's more to this, of course. When we get to the red Corvette and the blow he snorted off Maria's tits, will anyone be surprised? Or when we get to how he misused the state's funds to keep the whole thing secret? Is any of this surprising anymore when it comes to the moral gatekeepers of this nation?

Don't Buy the Right Wing's Argument on Obama (Continuing Yesterday's Discussion):
Every day, the Rude Pundit receives a couple of emails from people writing to mythical addresses, like "suckbarackstaint@youfuckintool.net" or some such shit. They're all about how we were such blind idiots for voting for President Obama because, they say, he's busy betraying everything they want. Yesterday, the Rude Pundit advised a bit of patience with the Obama administration as it opens the windows of the White House and looks out at the destruction left behind by the Bush administration. And, of course, people took offense, as if there's nothing between silence and screaming.

Here's the deal: urging the left to pull back some doesn't mean we don't push for our causes; it doesn't mean we simply roll over like we're being attacked by grizzlies, squinch our eyes shit, and hope that when we open them, the scars and wounds won't be too bad. It's not the activism. That never ends, no matter who's in the Oval Office. It's not pointing out when Obama looks like he's heading towards "screw you guys." No, it's this early hysteria and declarations of the failure of a not-six-month-old administration that the Rude Pundit is replying to.

If, as other problems are addressed, Obama is ignoring your pet one, well, fuck, remember: when he made all those shiny promises initially, he wasn't facing down an economy that's pushing unemployment into double digits.

The Rude Pundit is not naive. He knows well how this can all go to shit. He saw it with Bill Clinton, when some on the left at first mistook the moderately conservative Arkansas governor for a liberal. Essentially, it was buying the propaganda that the right was spewing about Clinton-as-hippie, just not to the purpose that they were spewing it. We went with their storyline because we wanted it to be true just so we could say, "Yeah, fuck you; in your face, assholes." It was exactly what conservatives wanted. If Bill Clinton didn't live up to your expectations, it's because you were too inundated with shit that fed your hopes, not the reality, and it allowed the right to control the storyline.

So the Rude Pundit wasn't naive when he voted for Obama, either. He never expected everything to be solved. And if you ever thought Obama was some bleeding heart liberal, then you were just a pawn of the right's remarkable ability to define the terms of the argument. You bought into their bullshit line. He is more liberal, yes, than anyone in a long, long time, But Obama's heart ain't draining.

None of this is to give Obama a pass. There have been fuck-ups, most prominently on gay rights issues and on issues of government transparency. These are not to be taken lightly. And when Obama's made explicit promises with timelines (as with Gitmo), he should be held to them (although you can bet that every seemingly firm date he mentioned in a campaign speech had a conditional clause near it - this is politics, motherfuckers).

Declaring Obama is "like Bush" or "as bad as Bush" because he hasn't immediately rescinded everything that bastard did is foolish. Maintaining the status quo on something for the time being is not the same as making it worse. (And, again, on things like transparency, where Glenn Greenwald has argued persuasively that Obama is going down the Bush path and laying new track, we should be upset.)

Patience is not endless. It's not like the recent Ted Rall cartoon that has Obama supporters hoping year by year that Obama will change as the country slips into dictatorship. Of course, we can't be idiots. But, hell, Rall already called on him to resign. Such sentiments, at this point, this early, are useless, with so much actually accomplished, with discussions occurring on issues like health care and, yes, gay rights, in ways that were unimaginable less than a year ago.

You will not get everything you want, dear progressive Obama voter. But you need to decide what's the tipping point and when. If you've already reached it, then your support was chimeric to begin with. And the next three and a half years are gonna seem awfully long.

Barack Obama Is Not Afraid of You and He Will Kick Your Ass:
Disagree how you will with Barack Obama on some pretty serious issues (are we really debating whether or not to release a Gitmo detainee held because we mistook the video of him being tortured by al-Qaeda for him being trained as a suicide bomber?). Wonder who the fuck he's pleasing when it comes to some other issues (dude made some pretty explicit damn promises on the campaign trail when it came to Don't Ask, Don't Tell, among other shit). Accuse him of whatever you like, yell at him about whatever you like, call him a dirty smoker. But the man is trying to be a goddamned alchemist in transforming a vat of shit into a gold bathtub.

We're impatient, yes, yes, we are. The deluded who thought they were getting beautiful Barack to ride in on a giant stallion and slay the big, bad Bush machine are impatient. The realists who knew they were getting a really damn smart, slightly left of center guy in Obama and not an avenging liberal, they're impatient, too.

What the Obama administration has to do is the governing equivalent of having a threesome with hot-looking conjoined female twins attached at the vagina. Before you can even get to the fucking, you gotta separate them, make sure they have functioning pussies, and wait for them to heal. In other words, you gotta get back to "normal" before you can get to "awesome."

Or, in even otherer words, it's gonna take a fuck of a lot of work to get us back to zero, to the way things were before George W. Bush came in and pissed on our beds, raped our dogs, tied us up, set the house on fire, and left without calling 911. And then, once it's back to zero, we can talk about how it gets better. Doesn't make any of us less impatient and it doesn't excuse some of the shit Obama's doing (like continuing to argue the Bush administration side on cases left over from it), but we gotta recognize that the circumstances are: "We're fucked - can we be un-fucked?"

So at his news conference today, we got the Obama we elected, the cool, can't-be-fucked-with man who has answers up his sleeve that will make you wonder how the fuck he did that. To listen to his takedown of whiny ass insurance companies is to think that the man really does want to trick Americans into universal health care. And his exchange with Major Garrett of Fox "news" was a model for anyone going on that network: reject the premise and tell them how and where they can go fuck themselves.

Immediately after, on the CNNMSNBCFox, they were talking about how the man should have shown more anger when condemning the violence in Iran. But that misses the point entirely. By not getting all unhinged and finger wagging and stumblefucking into saying stupid shit like "With us or against us," Obama maintains strength.

We're five months away from the worst presidency in our history, heading in the opposite direction, thank Christ, Allah, whoever, or no one. But objects in the mirror are closer than they appear, motherfuckers. This ain't apologia and it ain't deluded belief. Just like we can yell that Democrats who oppose Obama's policies are forgetting that people who voted for the man knew what they were getting, so can we say to the jittery on the left that, despite the fact that getting fucked over is a very real possibility, we need to remember that we who voted for him also did so on the basis of trusting his judgment.

Time and again today, Obama kept telling us to be patient - that the health care debate was ongoing, that "we don't know yet how this thing is going to play out" in Iran, that we need to see how the first stimulus works out before talking about another one. Or, to put it simply, chill the fuck out.

Late Post Today:
Back in a bit with Obama's news conference in the very soggy Rose Garden.

Photos That Take Us Beyond Neda:


Near the Iranian consulate in Istanbul yesterday, protesters show photos of the now-famously dead Neda and others killed and injured during protests in Tehran.

From a purely American perspective, selfishly so, this uprising in Iran has stabbed a hole in heart of any and all arguments for bombing that member of the axis of evil. Indeed, if it succeeds, nearly the entire raison d'etre for much of the right wing in this country, from the colonialist neocons to the "bomb Iran" yahoos, will be gone, flushed away like blood on the pavement of Tehran.

If, as George W. Bush says endlessly, freedom and democracy are what people desire, what Iran is showing that it has to come from the citizens, not from the imposition of conquerers in denial. Even if they fail, the marches will have humanized a people who have been demonized by our leaders for decades. And once that happens, the discussion of murdering thousands of them by us is over.

A New Gig for a Rude Favorite:
Yeah, yeah, it's a rare thing to give special linky goodness here, but the Rude Pundit's been reading DarkSyde at various and sundry blogs for years now. He's still the science writer at Daily Kos, and now he's got another gig, writing science policy posts over at the Examiner.com. It's geeky (and smart) as hell, but it'll get your head straight on shit what you hear in the news. And, hey, it's got his real name.

Check him out.

Finally, the End of the Tale:
The final part of this year's Rude at Bonnaroo epic, "Dawn of the Roo," has been posted. The horror, the horror.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

George W. Bush: Tan, Rested, Still a Total Dick:
Sometimes in this life you don't know whether you want someone to shut the fuck up or talk themselves blue. For instance, when your ex-husband is trying to tell some hot chick at a bar why he broke up the marriage. That fucker's gonna dig himself a deeper and deeper grave. Only a wave of very human pity would make you wish him to just be quiet, to not reveal things about your intimate moments, but as he describes how he felt stifled in the marriage, how he was looking for other "experiences" with other people, how he makes himself seem more and more like a selfish cockhole, there's just pleasure in experiencing the way he's burying himself alive.

That horrible, dirt-choking death spiral was on display last night in Erie, Pennsylvania, as former President George W. Bush (a phrase that's still worth savoring) spoke to the Manufacturer and Business Association meeting about...well, shit, something or other about how he sees the world. Bush vowed not to criticize President Barack Obama, which would be true if he hadn't criticized President Barack Obama.

Yes, in that squinty, smirky, cuntish way of his, Bush told the crowd, regarding the health care plan debate, "I worry about encouraging the government to replace the private sector when it comes to providing insurance for health care." About Gitmo, he said, "I'll just tell you that there are people at Gitmo that will kill American people at a drop of a hat and I don't believe that -- persuasion isn't going to work. Therapy isn't going to cause terrorists to change their mind." And when asked if Obama's policies were socialistic, Bush hemmed and hawed and said, "We'll see." You see what he did there? He said, "I'm not going to criticize my successor," which makes him seem like a mensch, and then he makes vague policy attacks that mask the criticism. It's lummox magic, the hoodoo of the mildly brain-damaged, like tricking a cat with a feather, and the crowd lapped it up like so very much spilled milk.

Others are already taking apart the fucktardery and general hypocrisy of Bush's speech and Q&A. There were other lines that were head-shake worthy, like the un-self-aware, ""Clearly, there's a level of frustration on the Iranian streets. It looks like it's not a very fair election." Yep, if anyone knows an unfair election when he sees it...

Mostly, though, what should frustrate all of us is that without the threat of prosecution hanging over his sunburnt head (seriously, dude, melanoma much?), we're going to have to deal with his nattering little passive-aggressive swipes. He doesn't have the guts to go full force into debating the policies because that would require knowledge of more than just the executive summaries, or "shit-what-people-told-me." He feels free when he should feel pursued. People paid $1500 a table for this shit. It's like rewarding a fat lion for wiping out an entire herd of gazelle.

Why Doesn't Jesus Want Us to Have a Health Care Plan?:
The Rude Pundit continues to be a member of the Super-Duper Prayer Team of the Family Research Council (motto: "The voices in our heads tell us that queers are icky") under a nom de rude. Every week, he receives orders on what he should spread his prayer seed on, and this week is especially meaty. Amidst all the prayers about us needing to afear the gays and their unholy desire to get married just like real people, there's this: "Last week, Senate Democrats began circulating the first draft of Sen. Kennedy's proposal for a sweeping government health care system. The Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee is scheduled to hold public 'markup' sessions to finalize details on the bill in mid June. Of particular concern are the provisions for 'reproductive health services,' which is code language for federally funded abortion. The Senate Finance Committee will have its say, then the full Senate."

This is followed by how we need to pray: "May those who pray mount a prevailing effort to prevent this socialistic plan to take permanent control of over 17% of the American economy. May the American people and their representatives wield their power to reject this effort, as they did in 1993-94." Now that's a goddamned precise prayer. It makes a soul wonder what percentage of the American economy is the upper limit for we prayer warriors. And watch for abortion payments to become the screeching right's last stand on health care until they demand that all fertile women must carry frozen embryos before Orrin Hatch agrees to let the government pay for a few people's antibiotics.

This is followed by a list of bible verses that give us guidance on our prayers, a way to put more sticky notes in our home gospels. Like, on stopping health care reform, we should read Hosea 6:1-3, which says, "Come, and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up/ After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight/ Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth." Or, in other words, the FRC seems to be saying that we shouldn't give a shit about doctors because an invisible sky wizard will heal us if we're willing to let his voice be in our heads. Why is it always three days with this bastard?

One might think that Jesus would want doctors for the poor because he's only one dude with the superpower of healing. And that shit's gotta wear a guy out.

In the Ten Minutes Between Jet Planes:
The Rude Pundit is between flights and only has time for a few words before being trash compacted into his seat.

This morning, driving to the Nashville airport, he was listening to mad, mad Glenn Beck's radio program. Here was the first half-hour of the show: Beck reading a letter from a listener in Arizona listing the dozen or so things that need to be done to make America a good place "again" - by the time the Arizonan got to some nutzoid babble about the threat to America posed by ACORN and the repetition of the phrase "we are coming for you," while insisting it wasn't about violence, the Rude Pundit was ready to give Arizona back to Mexico. ("Fuck it, here, have fun.") This was followed by an ad for Beck's forthcoming book, which he has titled, in a move so hubristic it made Donald Trump go, "Goddman, that fucker's a narcissist," Common Sense, a la the Thomas Paine revolutionary pamphlet. This was followed by Beck warning us about the collapse of civilization and the need for gold, which was, of course, an ad for a company that wants to sell you gold. And the Rude Pundit was a half-hour older.

And the Rude Pundit wondered: is this how we were during the Bush administration? Prostrate to our anger? Unwittingly giving our opposition as much ammunition as they needed?

The answer to that, and more, starting tomorrow. Fuck, gotta get to the plane.

Correction: In a previous incarnation, this post contained a screw-up in saying "Obama administration" instead of Bush. That's what you get when you're in a sweaty North Carolina airport.

Late Post Today:
Sending a love message from this phone. Gotta see a man about a jet plane. More unsustainable rudeness this afternoon.

A Moment of Peace Before Wading Back Into the Shit:


On a two-lane country road, some-fuckin'-where in small town Tennessee this morning, on his way back from the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, the Rude Pundit encountered this man walking alone. After driving past him once, we turned around to find out what the hell was going on. Why? Because that's what you do. Because you are human. And when an old man with patchwork robes, long white beard, and a homemade crucifix on a staff crosses your path twenty miles out of any place you've ever heard, you stop and find out what's going on.

The Rude Pundit jumped out of the car and walked up to him. He said his name was Pilgrim George and that he walked the world, that he'd been through 41 countries, and that he was on his nonstop walking pilgrimage because God had told him to do it. He talks to all who wish, he owns almost nothing, he lives off the kindness of strangers.

After asking to take his picture, the Rude Pundit handed Pilgrim George some money. George asked if we had water, and we handed him two, a cold one from the ice chest and another one for later. He thanked us, blessed us, and went on his way.

In an era when all the fake Christians palm off their violence, their bigotry, and their hateful speech as being a case of God-mind reading, whether it's in shootings at clinics or Glenn Beck trying to convince us that small violence is an indicator of the hellish endtimes to come, and no matter where you stand on religion and Gods, it's encouraging to know that a man can put on tire tread bottomed sandals and wander the earth in order to ask us to be better people.

(Still feeling the hippie vibe and deep, bone-rattling exhaustion from the fest. Tomorrow, fuck peace and love.)

Personal Day (Music Festival Edition):
Right now the Rude Pundit is in a hippie cooperative mudpit paradise surrounded by towns where there's as many Confederate flags as American. Yesterday he led a group of sweaty, half-dressed, half-painted campers in creating a machine that makes the sun. Today he'll lead them to the fountain to act out "taking a shower." He's half-mad from lack of sleep, good dope, and better beer. He was more or less held hostage by Triumph the Insult Comic Dog at 2 a.m. while the puppet ass raped Ernie from Sesame Street. He's not sure that was real, which is scary. What's scarier is that if it's not real, then he's hallucinating buttfucking puppets.

So while the Rude Pundit is incredibly enraged at what's going on with the right's reaction to the Holocaust Museum shooting, he'll wait 'til Monday to offer anything more than a barely articulate "Whafuck?"

And he'll defer to his Rude at Bonnaroo blog for the day. That'll be updated all weekend.

A Few Random Observations on the Killing at the Holocaust Museum:
1. Damn, James W. von Brunn hit the nutzoid racist trifecta: he killed a black security guard at a museum about the slaughter of Jews run by the federal government. Somewhere in southern Idaho, they're already building a statue to that motherfucker.

2. In a statement that was instantly condemned by the Society of American Retards as "so stupid that it raises the bar for us - we hope Michele Bachmann comes through again," Von Brunn ally John de Nugent said, "The responsible white separatist community condemns this. It makes us look bad.” On a quick glance, there's about five things wrong with that comment, but mostly it just makes you want to dye de Nugent's skin and toss him naked on the Mexico side of the Rio Grande and tell him, "Okay, make it home."

3. You can read from many others how much Republicans are hominah-hominah-ing to cover their asses about attacking the DHS report on right-wing extremism. Instead, let's leave with this, from Storm Front, the go-to white nationalist forum. It's a little poem. The poem is really a "who give a fuck" kind of thing. But the comments will make your stomach turn inside out:
A poem from user Meadman:
"Stand up and be counted
for race and for nation
awake the Lion heart
and damn all integration.

"Stand up and be counted
Defenders of the right
And proud we`ll stand in this great land
Through history and might."

Comment from NederlanderJurrien: "Powerful poem. Did you right this one yourself? If so, good job!" Misspelling all NJ's.

Response from Meadman: "Yes I wrote it some years ago and it sounds fantastic when the kids recite it as a song!"

Thus it all continues.

(The Rude Pundit is at the Bonnaroo Music Festival. You can follow his adventures among the hippie zombies at Rude at Bonnaroo. And on Twitter.)

In Brief: Quotes That Reassure the Rude Pundit That We're Fighting Idiots:
From yesterday's Washington Times (motto: "Moonies, Republicans, what can we say? We love authority"): After a ranting litany of much-repeated generalities about Democrats and how they're oppressing the poor, poor Republicans who just wanna do their jobs, Andrew "No, the Hollywood Gossip Shit Is Just to Make a Living" Breitbart wrote, "[I]n a two-party system, the GOP will not survive if it doesn't accept the fact that the Democrats are its enemy and that it must begin to play for keeps. That means finding another Lee Atwater - only meaner - and not apologizing when we get him."

The Rude Pundit doesn't begrudge the advice - he gave much the same to Democrats. But, Andrew, dude, you motherfuckers had another Lee Atwater. His name was Karl Rove, and he made his mentor Atwater look like a fluffy kitten caressing Democrats with a dandelion. Rove fucked up your precious GOP, man, by preventing Republicans in Congress from acting like they were in Congress and not just open mouths for Cheney's dick. So, maybe, and, really, take this advice as if it's coming from someone who thinks your party is as worthless as a used condom on a gravel road, you should probably figure out how to claim a post-Bush ass kissing identity before you give the party over to Atwater III.

(Bonus quote, from Frank "My Bald Head Is My Mood Ring of Rage" Gaffney, on Obama's speech in Cairo: "[T]here is mounting evidence that the president not only identifies with Muslims, but actually may still be one himself." That's from today's Washington Times. It's like a newspaper written from under a giant lunatic's taint.)

(Tip o' the rude hat to Fark's politics page for the heads up on the quote.)

The Rude Pundit, Teacher of Hippies:
Starting Thursday, the Rude Pundit will be teaching theatre exercises to the unwashed, barely-clothed concertgoers at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, TN. He'll be working with three other teaching artists out of the Academy tent in Planet Roo (where you can also do drumming, painting, and loads o' stuff when you want to give your ears a break).

The theatre classes are:
Thursday, June 11 from 4-5:30 pm
Friday, June 12 from 6:30-8 pm
Saturday, June 13 from 10:30-noon
Sunday, June 14 from 3-4:30 pm

If nothing else, c'mon by and give a hello and maybe some water, for Chrissake. Or maybe stay and play.

(Still figuring out if/when to do a beer tent rude hook-up.)

The Lakhdar Boumediene Case: Why Incremental Change Is Politics Over Ethics:
From the prepared testimony of paranoid journalist Steven Emerson, who sees angry Muslim terrorists everywhere he looks, and general paranoiac Jonathan Levin to the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, July 31, 2003: "According to one news report from Sarajevo, Boumediene Lakhdar and Nechle Mohamed, two Al-Qaeda members arrested in 2001 for planning terrorist attacks against the U.S. and British Embassies in Sarajevo, were administrators for the Red Crescent." Several times in other situations, it was stated as fact that Lakhdar Boumediene was an al-Qaeda member, which would be true if he had been an al-Qaeda member. But he was not. And he wasn't planning jack shit.

But he was sent to Gitmo for almost eight years to be interrogated in our delightfully enhanced way after a year in custody in Bosnia. It's a little like being kicked in the nuts and then being put into a small room with hungry rats. In fact, it was almost exactly like being kicked in the nuts and then being put into a small room with hungry rats. The rats in this case would be the enhanced interrogators (which sound like they have chemically-enlarged dicks, but probably the exact opposite is true).

The Gitmo torturers weren't even looking for him to confess to what he had been arrested for in the first place. No, they decided he knew something about Osama bin Laden and were gonna abuse him until he gave something up. He eventually lied to stop the mistreatment. And then, after court decision after court decision, including a by-the-fingernails 5-4 decision by the Supreme Court, Boumediene was freed. He's living in France now, with his family and his kids who are learning just who the fuck he is, which you can be damned sure ain't who the fuck he was nearly nine years ago.

What we've learned about Barack Obama as our President is that he works incrementally, bit by bit. It's sort of like the way you can act when you're fucking some guy's virgin ass. The kind, caring lover does it gradually, shoving his lubed, condomed cock in bit by bit, taking several fuckings to actually get to the point where the muscles are stretched and ready to take the whole sausage.

So Obama gets us used to something slowly, holding back and holding back while moving ever so intently forward. Obama operates on the idea that we'll get used to shit as we go along. Look at what's happened today. An accused terrorist has been brought to the United States from Guantanamo. He's here now, on our soil, looking all dark and third-world, like he just wants to fillet him some 'Mericans. Ahmed Ghailani is a safe choice because he's not associated with 9/11 or any attack on U.S. soil. If all goes well, if he's convicted and locked up without doing movie shit like breaking his chains, grabbing a gun, and going on a multi-state killing spree, then Obama will have thrust enough to allow more prisoners to be brought over and really tried. And at some point it will just be boring and we will have moved on to whatever is going on with Jon and Kate, tuning out the news noise.

Again, it's the way Obama governs, for the most part. Very deliberately, with gathering momentum. It's the way he operated his campaign. It's what he's doing with gay marriage and other issues. You render the unusual quotidian so that nobody notices that change has occurred until it's pointed out to them. Rather ingenious in its own reluctant way, mitigating political opposition and building support for a policy by dint of its ordinariness and obviousness.

We can (and will) argue about this approach. But there's times when you just need to bend some willing but nervous partner over, shove your cock in, and get to fucking. Sure, there'll be that gasp, the pain, but, goddamn, sometimes it's just the right moment, and for both of you, there's nothing but good times ahead. Pop that cherry - don't slowly drip the juice out.

And when it comes to Gitmo, the number of Boumedienes is unknown. The Algerian himself was only released, finally, last month, well, well after he had been described repeatedly as among "the worstest of the worstest that ever worsted a worst" or whatever torture lovers are saying now about people who have been convicted of nothing.

The moral, ethical, and legal imperatives of action far outweigh the political risk in just fucking closing Gitmo already (Obama's got less than eight months to do it to live up to his stated goal post-campaign). As Boumediene said, "The first month, okay, no problem, the building, the 11 of September, the people, they are scared, but not 7 years. They can know whose innocent, who's not innocent, who's terrorist, who's not terrorist. I give you 2 years, no problem, but not 7 years."

It's hard to argue with a man who can say that to us after how we treated him.

In Brief: Gingrich Among the Pagans:
What a pandering sow fucker is Newt Gingrich. Somebody actually told this tubby bottom feeder that people want nothing more than a Newt Restoration. Those people have lied to the former Speaker of the House, who was run out of the Congress like a whipped whelp. But there he was, white-capped like a snowy turd mountain, at the Rock Church, which is not, sadly enough, a church for, you know, rock, but has the motto of Jesus, the Drama Queen Campfire Singalong Christ: "Growing in God's Word together, we worship, we serve, we laugh, we cry, we learn and we reach out to our world with life-transforming truth."

And Gingrich was appearing at a forum called "Rediscovering God in America," as if God was discovered here once before. Gingrich said, "I think this is one of the most critical moments in American history. We are living in a period where we are surrounded by paganism."

Fucking great going, you manipulative cockmonger. Gingrich told a bunch of people who get off by masturbating with Christ's toes that American is pagan, which can only lead to missionaries heading out into the pagan jungles of the USA to convert people like us with bones in our noses. But, fuck, if the economy continues its header into the void, it might be time to break out the giant pot and put it on the fire and get ready to dance around the stew.

(Today the Rude Pundit is traveling to Tennessee, to the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.)

Late Post Today (Pagan Edition):
The Rude Pundit is busy worshiping mad deities and will be back after he's finished sacrificing this virgin right here (not to any volcano, you know).

Weekend Housekeeping: Bonnaroo, Book, Etc.:
1. The Rude Pundit will be returning to the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival as part of the Academy. He'll be teaching the good hippies guerrilla theatre, as he did two years ago, when he helped create an uproar at the mushroom fountain over the gouging price of lemonade. (As odd as that sounds, it's totally real and not acid trip residue.)

No, he won't be performing this year. But if you're there, come on by the tent at Planet Roo and get your activism on before heading off to that TV on the Radio set. Schedule for the Academy to be posted soon.

Which means that the Rude at Bonnaroo blog will be active again, starting on Wednesday.

And, for those so inclined, he'll be doing the Twitter thing from the festival, probably mostly talking about drugs, bugs, and tits.

Send an email if you'll be there. If there's enough readers hanging out, maybe we'll do a Rude meetup at the beer tent.

2. This week, the Rude Pundit announced his first book, Staged Action, an edited volume of plays from the workers' movement of the 1920s and 1930s. It's available from Amazon. Buy it to learn about a part of American and theatre history that's been forgotten and to read some kick-ass plays.

Updated - ADD Friday (Or "Are You Conservatives Fucking Kidding?"):
To end another bipolar American week (shootings over here, calls for peace over there, unemployment up, unemployment claims down), the Rude Pundit's just got a couple of random things related to how the right views Barack Obama:

On the one hand, you've got this from John McCormack at the blog of The Weekly Standard (motto: "Providing steady income for the Kristol family for decades now") on how the Obama administration reacted to the shooting at a U.S. army recruitment center vs. how it reacted to the shooting of Dr. George Tiller: "The contrast between Obama's statements is striking: He's 'deeply saddened' by the murder of a U.S. soldier, but 'shocked and outraged' by the murder of an abortionist? The murder of a U.S. soldier is a 'senseless' act of violence but the murder of an abortionist is a 'heinous' act of violence?

"Obama musters up moral outrage to denounce the wicked deed committed in Kansas, but seems almost resigned to the tragedy or 'man-caused disaster' that occurred in Arkansas."

Really? No, fuckin' really? McCormack quotes Michelle Malkin to back himself up, but fuck her. So you're apparently obligated to make moral equivalencies where none exist, and, if you said something about the Tiller murder, you have to comment on the shooting of Private William Long, who was killed, and Private Quinton I. Ezeagwula in Little Rock, Arkansas, by Abdulhakim Muhammad, who is, you know, Muslim. So here goes: the Rude Pundit just thought that Muslims all around the country slapped their foreheads in unison and yelled, "Oh, c'mon" upon hearing of the shooting.

So Obama doesn't condemn a shooting fast enough for some conservatives, and yet there's this horribly frightening essay from David Horowitz, a man who loves the smell of his own shit so much that he's bottled his filthy toilet water to spray on himself during the day. In Salon, the piece, titled, "Fellow conservatives, admit it: Obama gave a great speech," almost seems to be subversive in how much Horowitz aligns Obama with George W. Bush. The Rude Pundit has never been under any illusions that Obama was anything but a vaguely center-left politician, and he'll say more soon about what's driving some on the left to near madness. Still, and all, reading Horowitz's piece gave him a clenched, nauseous feeling he hasn't had in, oh, nearly five months.

There are conservatives the Rude Pundit wouldn't mind being in bed with. But he doesn't want Horowitz to even touch the corner of the sheets.

Update: Hey, McCormack, suck on this: "President Barack Obama has tapped an anti-abortion activist to a senior Health and Human Services 'faith-based' position just a week after the murder of prominent abortion doctor George Tiller." You win, cockbreath.

Given the choice between words of outrage over a shooting or an appointment with real policy significance, which one would you choose for your side?