This is my Spamcatcher Mark II. It is an imperfect beast but I have grown attached to it.

Someday Tom Waits will cover this song.

Although it'll be hard to beat the original...

American Praetoriani

“In Russia we only had two TV channels. Channel One was propaganda. Channel Two consisted of a KGB officer telling you: Turn back at once to Channel One.”

-- Yakov Smirnoff

First, this from Media Matters.

Matthews offers walk-and-chew-gum explanation for why media don't adequately cover McCain

During MSNBC's coverage of the May 6 Democratic primaries, Chris Matthews, Tim Russert, Dan Abrams, and Rachel Maddow discussed how the media, in Matthews' words, "completely ignore [Sen.] John McCain's problems."

But in purporting to explain "the way the media works," Matthews, who anchored the primary coverage and hosts MSNBC's Hardball, offered the dubious suggestion that it is not possible for the media to cover both the Democratic primary and McCain adequately, asserting: "[A]s long as we focus on the fight between [Sens.] Hillary [Clinton] and Barack [Obama], and perhaps more recently just on Barack's problems, it blocks the sun -- the media, the public's attention -- from the problems that are obviously incipient and coming to be at some point with McCain." Liz Cox Barrett, who noted MSNBC's coverage in a May 7 post at the Columbia Journalism Review's daily blog, described Matthews' explanation of "how the media works" as "Can't Walk and Chew Gum."
...

And this.

Russert noted media's lack of scrutiny of McCain over Hagee, other issues, but not Russert's own McCain "grace period" on Hagee

As Columbia Journalism Review staff writer Liz Cox Barrett noted, NBC Washington bureau chief and Meet the Press host Tim Russert responded to Imus by saying: "You know, if there was video of Hagee, it makes all the difference in the world. It's interesting." But, in fact, there is audio of televangelist and McCain supporter John Hagee asserting in 2006 that "New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God" and that "Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans."

Hagee -- whose endorsement McCain sought and recently said he's "glad to have" -- defended those comments on April 22. Russert also said: "I don't think -- the Hagee thing, McCain has not been questioned in great scrutiny by that -- scrutinized about that, or a lot of things. I mean, he's been -- really been given this grace period to go around the country, unify his party, raise some money, put a campaign together, and he's benefited from enormously. There's no doubt about it."

However, Russert failed to note his own role in the disparate scrutiny given McCain over the specific issue under discussion -- Hagee -- compared with that given Obama over Wright.
...

Then this from the NYT.

Pundits Declare the Race Over
By JIM RUTENBERG

Very early this morning, after many voters had already gone to sleep, the conventional wisdom of the elite political pundit class that resides on television shifted hard, and possibly irretrievably, against Senator Hillary Clinton’s continued viability as a presidential candidate.

The moment came shortly after midnight Eastern time, captured in a devastatingly declarative statement from Tim Russert of NBC News: “We now know who the Democratic nominee’s going to be, and no one’s going to dispute it,” he said on MSNBC. “Those closest to her will give her a hard-headed analysis, and if they lay it all out, they’ll say: ‘What is the rationale? What do we say to the undeclared super delegates tomorrow? Why do we tell them you’re staying in the race?’ And tonight, there’s no good answer for that.”

It was not exactly Walter Cronkite declaring that the Vietnam War would end in stalemate. But the impact was apparent almost immediately, starting with The Drudge Report, the online news billboard that is the home page to many political reporters in Washington and news producers in New York. It had as its lead story a link to a YouTube clip of Mr. Russert’s comments, accompanied by a photograph of a beaming Mr. Obama with his wife, Michelle, and the headline, “The Nominee.”

...

There are, of course, a thousandy-thousand other example that one could cite, but now see if you notice any, oh, let's say similarities between the roles that our modern Villagers arrogated to themselves -- selective and wildly biased coverage, power-whoring, and a penchant for making sweeping, declarative statements regarding matters about which they have no business pretending certainty -- and this from Wikipedia:

The Praetorian Guard (Latin: PRÆTORIANI) was a special force of guards used by Roman Emperors. Before being appropriated for the use of the Emperors' personal guards, the title was used for the guards of Roman generals,

Following the death of Sejanus, who was sacrificed for the Donativum (imperial gift) promised by Tiberius, the [Praetorian] Guards began to play an increasingly ambitious and bloody game in the Empire.
...

With the right amount of cocktail weenies and "access"money, or at will, they assassinated emperors, bullied their own prefects, or turned on the people of Rome. In 41 Caligula was killed by conspirators from the senatorial class and from the Guard.

The Praetorians placed Dubya Claudius on the throne, daring the Senate to oppose their decision.

During 69, the Year of the Four Emperors, after the emperor Galba failed to provide a donative for the Praetorians, they transferred their allegiance to Otho and destroyed Howard Dean assassinated the emperor. Otho acquiesced in the Praetorians' demands and granted them the right to appoint their own prefects, ensuring their loyalty. After defeating Otho, Vitellius disbanded the guard and established a new one sixteen cohorts strong. Vespasian relied in the war against Vitellius upon the disgruntled cohorts the emperor had dismissed, and reduced the number of cohorts back to nine upon becoming emperor himself.

As a further safeguard, he appointed Roger Fucking Ailes his son, Titus as the Big Giant Head of Fox News Praetorian Prefect.
…

As long as the Villagers remain a-squat over our media, operating the enormously powerful megaphones we lend them like small town cops in hillbilly country running a fucking speed trap, we will never get the politics or the leaders our times demand.

Edwards Endorses Obama

From the NYT.

Edwards Endorses Obama

By Jim Rutenberg and Julie Bosman

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina who bowed out of the presidential race in January, endorsed Senator Barack Obama at a rally here tonight.

“The reason I am here tonight is because the Democratic voters of America have made their choice and so have I,” Mr Edwards said.

Officials announced the news of Mr. Edwards’s endorsement shortly after Mr. Obama landed here late this afternoon. The campaign timed it to coincide with the start of the major evening newscasts, which would have otherwise focused on Senator Hillary Clinton’s landslide victory in West Virginia, which raised new questions about Mr. Obama’s strength with white working class voters.

Mr. Obama’s campaign is hoping the endorsement will be a big step toward the party’s coalescing around Mr. Obama as the Democratic nominee.

Mr. Edwards began by paying tribute to Mrs. Clinton. “It is very, very hard to get up every day and do what she’s done,” Mr. Edwards Mrs. Clinton. “It is hard to go out there and fight and speak up when the odds turn against you. What she has shown is strength and character.”


The endorsement ended months of speculation over Mr. Edwards’s preference in the Democratic nominating contest, during which he mostly stayed silent and close to home in Chapel Hill with his wife, Elizabeth.
...

In other words...

Our First Lady of Fatima

And thus it was, on the Thirteenth of May in that Year, did Our First Lady did appear to the masses of West Virginia supporters and Clinton Atavists Activists and confided to them the Three Secrets of the Hillary.

1. White people wont vote for the black guy. We'll make sure of it.
2. Math doesn't count, but Florida and Michigan do. Because,
3. Rules are for little, non-Clinton-type people.

Welcome to Denver

One Possible Future

One in which Senator Clinton has this played as she daintily picks her way through the rubble to accept the Democratic Nomination

on the 178th ballot.

West Virginia

Meanwhile, the Bush Wedding Kegger

lasted all night and well into the next morning.

Sunday Morning Comin’ Down

“But then why does she keep saying stupid, divisive things?” edition.

They only had time to run off one script this week before the Great MSM Mimeograph broke down, so everyone had to share.

Like watching a thousand bad high school drama clubs simultaneously stage

"A Streetcar Named Desire".

Badly.



On “Face the Nation” Bob Schieffer asks Terry McAuliffe.

Schieffer: So, is Hillary is now running as the candidate of white people?

McAuliffe: She didn’t mean it that way. That’s not what she thinks.

And so forth.



On “Fox News Sunday” David Axelrod (Obama campaign manager) handled Wallace like a veterinarian handling a diarrhetic hamster.

Wallace: I know you’re going to say that Hillary Clinton has the right to stay in and run as long as she wants, but I don’t want that answer!

And we’re off…

Wallace (regarding Hillary’s “I’m the candidate of hard-workin’ Whitey!” comments): Why aren’t the words well chosen whether they’re offensive or not.

Axelrod: I’m sure Senator Clinton didn’t mean to conflate “hard working” and “white”.

Wallace: Oh didn’t she? Isn’t she really a nasty, race-baiting troll?

Axelrod: No.

Wallace: C’mon! Fight with her! Throw mud! Fight!Fight!Fight! You gonna throw your filthy, elitist money at her? Maybe buy her off with a job offer?

Axelrod: She hasn’t asked and we haven’t offered. I don’t think Senator Clinton is looking for a deal. I don’t think she’s looking for a cue or signal from us, and I think it would be demeaning to suggest otherwise.

Wallace: As regards her campaign debt, isn’t it true your people would be outraged if you paid her off!

Axelrod: No one is suggesting that. Shit, we need that money to bury you fuckers.

Wallace: Please fight her! Puhhleeeze! Say she’s a broke loser and needs to be bailed out. Say she’s stupid and racist! Gimme something here!

Axelrod: Fuck off, tiny clown.

Wallace: Isn’t it true that Michelle Obama hates Hillary Clinton and wants nothing to do with her being Vice President?

Axelrod: False. There has been no discussion. We have made no offers. They have made no offers.

Then, Howard Wolfson (Clinton campaign advisor)

Wallace: Why does Hillary keep saying mean things about Barack Obama?

Wolfson: West Virginia is a Key State. Everything starts on Tuesday in West Virginia.

Wheee!

Wallace: But aren’t you weakening the Party?

Wolfson: No. We’re bringing in new people. A million new voters. Well, Obama brought in 999,990 of them and we brought in 10, but still…

Wolfson: West Virginia is a Key State. Key. Key State. If Senator Obama wants to win, he needs to beat her in West Virginia. Because West Virginia is a Key State. Did I mention that? It’s the Keyingest!

Wallace: So you’re 20 million dollars in debt. What about having your Rich Uncle Barack help her retire her debt.

Wolfson: Fuck you. That’s way premature, and there have been no conversations. This is not about debt, or who the veep will be. Its about winning primaries and beating John McCain in the Fall.


On “Meet the Press” Punkin Haid Russert dutifully repeats the same interview -- almost syllable for syllable -- that everyone else is doing.

Punkin Haid: But Senator Clinton can’t overtake Senator Obama in the delegate count.

McAuliffe: It’s highly unlikely.

Punkin Haid: No, it’s impossible you doodiehead, (Takes out NBC’s abacus and rapidly flicks the beads around.)


McAuliffe: Meh.

Punkin Haid: Can you count?

McAuliffe: …"Highly unlikely."

McAuliffe: Anything can happen in politics, Timmy. Anything. In fact, wherever Big Russ is right now, I’m sure he’s looking down from Heaven, drinking a scotch, reminding us that, in politics, anything can happen.

Punkin Haid: Big Russ is alive and well and sitting in a Barca-Lounger right now wondering if you’re drunk.

McAuliffe: Meh.


driftglass: Is it true that to appease your hard-core base you have sunk all your nickels into one, last attempt to destroy Senator Obama regardless of the cost to the Party, and about which this random video clip

is not meant to imply anything at all?


McAuliffe: Look, driftglass, I’ll tell you what. These fine people will concede

just as soon as...

...as...

...just as soon as...

...leprechaun puppies start being born.

Yeah. That's it. Leprechaun. Puppies.

In New Orleans!

Sure. Absolutely.

When leprechaun puppies start being littered in New Orleans, we'll totally drop right out, throw our support to Barack Obama, and you'll not hear another peep out of us until 2009.

Bwahahahahahahah...

What?


Oh fuck me.





On “This Week” . Same back-and-forth as everywhere else.

George Stephanopoulos: Is Hillary a racist bint?

Reid: No. She didn’t mean what she said.

driftglass: You know, she and her husband have been doing that kind of a lot lately, this blurting out really stupid, inflammatory shit and then shrugging it off when they get called on it.

It has me a little worried.

Do think maybe it’s some kind of disorder? An freak outbreak of “Reagan Democrat” Coprolalia up in Chappaqua perhaps?


Anyway…

Reid: Obama’s going to do just fine in rural America.

Then, Carly Fiorina: failed Hewlett-Packard CEO and New McCain Surrogate.

Fiorina: John McCain hated Don Rumsfeld before it was cool!

Stephanopoulos: What about this stupid idea of a gas tax holiday?

Fiorina: It’s a great idea!

Stephanopoulos: But we can’t find a single economist who thinks it’s a good idea.

Fiorina: Fuck economists. Economists argue about theory. They’re idiots.

driftglass: And in that short exchange, perhaps the reason Ms. Fiorina failed so dramatically at HP has come loping into view.

And perhaps this question – “Do you think consulting professionals who labor mightily and after years of education to understand the consequences of economic actions is Teh Stoopid?” – will start being asked during HP CEO interview.

Then, onto the Round Table

Cokie: Everyone is so sexist and so disrespectful of poor Hillary.

Donaldson: No, people are god damn fucking tired of the fucking Clintons. They’re saying “We alibied for you all during the 90s.” We carried water for you people until our arms fell off. You don’t OWN the White House, and now that we have an alternative we’re gonna jump on it.


Then they all got giggly and braided each other’s hairpieces and played Vice Presidential Mystery Date

For several days

Cokie: Obama needs a Bible-thumping, gun-toting, white guy from a swing state.

Donaldson: So…someone who disagrees with him on everything?

Cokie: No, but someone who represents the people she’s carrying.

And so it went yawningly on and on.

Unremarkable really...until one notices that none of them are even bothering to speculate about what sort of veep Hillary Clinton should choose.

Ruh roh.

So here lies the mortal remains of the Clinton 2008 campaign.

Requiescat in Puerto Rico

The Whistle

Of the Headsman's Ax.

From the Huffington Post

New York Times Layoffs Update: 15 Newsroom Staffers Get The Ax

The New York Post's Keith Kelly reports that the New York Times wielded the ax yesterday, laying off 15 involuntary staffers after not enough people accepted voluntary buyout offers:

The New York Times is laying off 15 journalists after the company acknowledged it fell short of its goal of getting 100 people to take voluntary buyout packages.

The axing is the first-ever mass firing of journalists in the paper's 157-year history.
...

Insiders said the business and national desks were spared, while the metro desk, particularly its suburban bureaus, were hit.

Read the entire New York Post article here or read Executive Editor Bill Keller's memo to staff below, courtesy of the New York Observer Media Mob:

Colleagues:


A little over two months ago, I told you that we would have to reduce staff within the newsroom by roughly 100 jobs given the difficult financial challenges facing our business and the deteriorating national economy.


Our hope, as you know, was that we could trim our payroll by encouraging enough volunteers to accept buyout offers. While the overwhelming majority of our reductions did indeed come from volunteers, we have been forced to resort to a relatively small numbers of layoffs to meet our assigned goal. (We are not going to discuss numbers or the details of the staff reduction, nor will we be releasing a list of names.) All of those who are leaving will do so with a financial cushion that should carry them to other endeavors or to retirement, but that will not eliminate their sense of loss, or ours.

…

Yadda yadda yadda.

Having been through firings and layoffs and buyouts (oh my!), I can attest to the fact that it is a hear-sickening time; outside of divorce and death, nothing can blow such a massive, ragged hole in a person’s sense of identity and self-worth as getting fired from a hard-won, professional position, especially in hard times and with no place to land.

Suddenly you are in enemy territory, under-armored and far from safety. Suddenly everything you thought was secure is at risk, and everything you thought was enduring starts looking terribly brittle and paper-thin.

So when I read this piece, I could not help but notice that while the NYT cries poor-mouth and gives members of the working press their walking papers for the first time in 157 years, not one of Gotham’s most notorious Neocon stooges and hacks (who, for reasons that passeth all understanding, the Gray Lady keeps ferociously cuddled and coddled in her lavish bosom) --

Not The Piddler



Not The Mad Flatter




Not even The Fucker

-- will be hearing the whistle of the headsman’s axe.

UPDATE: Apparently there is one more, late-breaking NYT layoff:

"Arthur Sulzberger Jr., chairman of The New York Times Company, and his wife, Gail Gregg, have decided to separate, they said in a statement issued Friday. Mr. Sulzberger, 56, who is also publisher of The Times, and Ms. Gregg, also 56 and a painter and writer, said the decision to end their marriage was amicable."

I wonder how many copy-boy's and -girl's salaries that early retirement package is going cost?

As of this writing, however, The Piddler, The Mad Flatter and The Fucker are all still safely ensconced in their lavish sleeper cars aboard Pinch Sulzberger's Neocon gravy-train.
...

Happy Mother's Day.

Yeah, this was pretty much our house, although these guys seem to have not yet discovered explosives

So this goes out to the best mom going.

And to all the moms out there who know that son-wranglin' makes rodeo clownin'

look like toe-dancin'.

Mislead Racer

(Or "Crock GoGoGo" if you're a purist.) (click for larger)

Because we are approaching another moment in American history when a certain number of people will line up to vote to have Bright!Bright!, screaming, meaningless shapes and colors and pretty lies divorced from reality and physics flung into their eyes at high velocity for another four years.

They will do this based on a toxic and childish (not childlike) sense of nostalgia for better days that never were, and a great love of blowing up people and things that make them nervous in spectacular ways wherein they themselves are never at any risk of injury or discomfort.

And queuing up next to them to vote are a certain number of people who think this witchbag of village idiots, voyeurs and vampires can never again be allowed to run our country.

And our job is to make sure that the latter so massively outnumbers the former that 2008 will not be so much an election as an extinction event.

June, 2008

After comparing scars, weary Democrats pour themselves a drink and try to figure a way to get along again.

Which is just about when the thudding coming from below decks reminds them that the real fight isn't over.

The real fight hasn't even started.

R.I.P. Mildred Loving

Mildred and Richard Loving were the brave couple who took their basic human rights to court to challenge Virginia's primeval marriage laws.

The Great State of Virginia (Motto: "Virginia is for lovers") told them to fuck off, so the Lovings -- being good citizens -- took it to the highest court in the land.

Mildred passed away today.

Mildred Loving, matriarch of interracial marriage, dies

By DIONNE WALKER, Associated Press

Mildred Loving, a black woman whose challenge to Virginia's ban on interracial marriage led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling striking down such laws nationwide, has died, her daughter said Monday.

Peggy Fortune said Loving, 68, died Friday at her home in rural Milford. She did not disclose the cause of death.

"I want (people) to remember her as being strong and brave yet humble — and believed in love," Fortune told The Associated Press.

Loving and her white husband, Richard, changed history in 1967 when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld their right to marry. The ruling struck down laws banning racially mixed marriages in at least 17 states.

"There can be no doubt that restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the equal protection clause," the court ruled in a unanimous decision.

Her husband died in 1975. Shy and soft-spoken, Loving shunned publicity and in a rare interview with The Associated Press last June, insisted she never wanted to be a hero — just a bride.

"It wasn't my doing," Loving said. "It was God's work."
...

Why should you care?

Because the Loving Decision took place in 1967. Not 1867.

Because in the memory of those still living today -- in state after state after state, and dug in like ringworms at every level of the federal government -- the cowards, criminals and traitors of the Ku Klux Klan and their racist fellow travelers

ran the world.

Because in the memory of those still living, this was America:
A land your town's untouchable mayor, clean-cut sheriff and respectable businessmen by day,

could also be hooded terrorists who murdered with impunity by night.

And that the lesson that many learned under the brutal tutelage of that era was, if you want to survive, you can sit and reason those who are reasonable. But when dealing with the degenerate and violent grandchildren of the Confederacy,

a firmer hand is often required.

Because when you note the language of Loving v. Virginia, you cannot help but notice that for far too many, the essential message that God has personally conferred a mantle of superiority on Conservative White American Christian Heterosexual Male has remained virtually unchanged.

And the direct, cultural decedents of the preachers and politicians who delivered this bible-wrapped filth are still alive and well and leading the Republican Party under the same banner, but now it has a new coat of paint called "Same Sex Marriage" (shamelessly citing one of my previous posts here):

...I commend to your attention the opening lines of the June 12, 1967, Loving v. Virginia decision, which gets referred to a lot in Left Bloggylvania, but not cited verbatim nearly often enough for my tastes, because here is how it begins (Emphasis added):

"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix."

The law in Virginia as it read provided...

"Punishment for marriage. -- If any white person intermarry with a colored person, or any colored person intermarry with a white person, he shall be guilty of a felony and shall be punished by confinement in the penitentiary for not less than one nor more than five years."

And the penalty for leaving the State to evade the law was...

...If any white person and colored person shall go out of this State, for the purpose of being married, and with the intention of returning, and be married out of it, and afterwards return to and reside in it, cohabiting as man and wife, they shall be punished as provided in § 20-59, and the marriage shall be governed by the same law as if it had been solemnized in this State. The fact of their cohabitation here as man and wife shall be evidence of their marriage."

What more needs be said?

When the cultural Gladys Kravitzes on the Right stomp into the public square dragging Gay Marriage along behind them, this is what’s really on the menu: Their insatiable appetite to impose their witchbag of hate, squeamishness and childish idiocy on everyone else in the Universe for no reason other than they are hateful, squeamish, childish idiots.

And since there is absolutely no quantifiable harm they can point to (In Loving, the “harm” cited was found in the language of Naim v. Naim which “concluded that the State's legitimate purposes were "to preserve the racial integrity of its citizens," and to prevent "the corruption of blood," "a mongrel breed of citizens," and "the obliteration of racial pride”…), time and again -- from slavery, through Jim Crow, through “Loving” and now with Gay Marriage -- you see the same democracy-loathing Red Statists thumping the same Bible, from the same pulpit, to the same squealing mob of culturally malnourished knuckleheads.

Generation after debased generation the disease is passed on, because regardless of where this moral cancer has geographically metastasized over the years, the continuous line of divinely-sanctioned White Male Christian Supremacy that runs from “God, Nooses and Negroes” to “God, Guns and Gays” comes straight out of the spiritual heart of the old Confederacy.
...

So why should you care?

Because while it is true that things really have gotten more tolerant and more free since the days of the Loving Decision, the bad news is, a frighteningly large fraction of the American public thinks that's actually a bad thing.

Malacandra Rocks

The Clintons in 1992:


"It's the economy, stupid."


The Clintons in 2008:


"Economists are stupid."

-- Malacandra, commenting here 05/05/08

Sunday Morning Comin’ Down

Down among the ads for laxatives, copiers, Viagra, hair dye, sleeping pills, banking, and anti-Jimmy Leg drugs (Ask your Doctor!) we had a little Mouse Circus today.

First came our Local Fox Nonsense, wherein our local Fox stooge opined that…

“It was a good idea for Hillary to go on the Bill O’Reilly Show.”

And

“They have one thing in common: they’re both polarizing figures.”

And

“The DNC has avoided Fox. Democrats wouldn’t debate on Fox. But the road to the White House leads through all media outlets. If you want to run an inclusive campaign, you have to go on Fox.”

No. You. Don’t.

If you believe you can appeal to racists and pinheads on the off-chance that seven of the 20 million people who hate you on a molecular level might be so swayed by your excellent poesy so completely that they rethink their political dogma between the laxative and Jimmy Leg commercials and jump out of the wingnut clown car…then you go on Fox.

But that comes with a helluva price tag, because Fox is a whorehouse.

Period.

Here are little flavor crystals from this week’s Exciting Episode!

Wallace: Here’s an ad where some guy in some state is being slammed for not denouncing Reverend Wright, who he has never met. Doesn’t that mean Obama is radioactive, what with his Crazy Pastor and all?

Wallace: We’ll give you plenty of time to bash McCain….

Wallace: The Left Wing of your Party….

Wallace: The MoveOn.org said blah-dee-blah…

Wallace: The Daily Kos is calling you yadda-yadda…

And so forth.

What is fascinating about Fox is, no matter how long a shadow they cast, Rupert’s empire is shot through with a deep-rooted and impossible-to-paper-over inferiority complex that crawls along right under their skin and erupts at the slightest provocation.

So if you work at Fox and are, say, a Steve Doocy-like simpleton, you are probably too stupid to notice that you work in a whorehouse. But if you are not a Steve Doocy-like simpleton, then you cannot fail to notice that you work in a sewer and your co-workers are CHUDS.

And you tend be a bit touchy when someone points out that your $10,000 suits positively reek of CHUD and sewage.

But what takes the stink off of you better than a water-canon full of Old Spice?

Having the people you make a living slandering and sliming come on your show to “engage” you.

On Fox, you could hear the oily gloat gurgling in Chris Wallace’s throat as Howard Dean smacked him around. The smacking around couldn’t have hurt much: after all this time Wallace is numb to it. Now he’s like some cop’s kid who make Very Big Money pimping: it is not enough to get rich doing something loathsome; he now also demands the respect of his father’s peers because, well, he peddles flesh really, really well!

And every time a Dean or Obama or Clinton sets foot on Fox property they serve only to legitimize Fox as a genuine network, and its army of Neocon marionettes as real journalists.

Which, in turn, is what allows a sociopath like Bill Kristol to parlay his gig as grinning, blood-soaked propagandist for a neofascist junta into fame, money and credibility on the Op Ed page of the New York Times.


On “Meet the Press” and ”The Chris Matthews Show”

After 168 hours of Reverend Wright, I stopped watching.

Sigh.

And a thousand years later,

tourists were still visiting the site.

“You mean their high priests dragged their best and brightest to the top of the pyramid and cut their living hearts out?”

“Yes.”

“But…why?”

“One theory is, they worshiped ridiculous and terrifying Gods which they came to believe they had to appeased to make the crops grow and the rain fall.

But no one knows for sure”

On “This Week” , the Hillary Clinton Town Hall Show (with guest emcee D.J. Lil’ George).

And after hearing this...

Clinton: For the last seven years we’ve seen Washington D.C. policies coming from powerful people and elites…

And this…

Clinton: I’m not going to put my lot in with “economists”.

And this…

Clinton: We gotta get out of this mindset that the “elite opinion” that only sides with big munnies.

A new drinking game emerges: The “Take a shot every time Hillary Clinton says ‘elite’” Game.

But be careful.

First, the Junior Senator from New York has belly-flopped so brazenly into the deep end of the anti-intellectual pool, you’re gonna very quickly find yourself casters-up-drunk before church.

Again.

Second, if she really, really believes that people who actually go to "school" and study "things" closely and then get "jobs" in their "field of study" are exactly the sort of people who cannot be trusted, then say hello to the 2009

Clinton Cabinet.


Later, Hillary spotted one 'a them pointy-headed, smarty-pants elite “scientists”, shook off her Jimmy Leg,

and ran him down like a dog.

Ah Iz Yore Fren!

New Rule: The Statute of Limitations for continuing to refer to people by obsolete political designations is now officially a quarter of a century.

Period.

So now, after 28 years of watching a certain swath of the American public shit where they eat, piss where the drink, set their mullets and buzz-cuts on fire on the fumes from their own bathtub libertarian moonshine, and then run in shrieking circles blaming Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton for the fact that their lives are a feculent horror of ignorance, fear and superstition we can now officially stop calling these life forms “Reagan Democrats”.

They are “Republicans”.

Also cretins.

Guess Who's Running For President?

This movie was released forty years ago.

Forty.

In that time, children have become fathers. Fathers have become grandpas. And grandpas have gone to their graves.

And yet between fathers and sons -- and white-haired pastors and dark-haired parishioners -- we cannot seem to stop having the same, fierce argument.

Over and over again.