Birthday Fundraiser: In Which Writing About Disastrous Events Becomes the Distant Memory of an All-But-Forgotten Era

Busy, busy this week so I shan't burden you with a week of birthday fundraiser stuff.  Just one day.  Longtime readers will recognize this post as one I bring out every now and then around this time of year like favorite holiday decorations.

It's a reminder about how very much that tempus just keeps fugiting along. How quickly things that poured out of the keyboard in reaction to white-hot scandal and ruin decades ago have become barely remembered flickers peering out from a dim and distant past.

It's also why my wife and I added our No Fair Remembering Stuff podcast to our burgeoning media empire.  To remind people (especially people who do not want to be reminded and get very cranky when you try) that the trajectory of the Republican party that led to the Tea Party and MAGA and Trump and all the rest of the appalling situation we are in today was long and clearly-marked and they were only too eager to go along with all of it until it was far, far too late. 

So here's the tip jar.  

And here's the post.  From October 1, 2005.

And of course, happy Halloween and Samhain to all who celebrate:

Quoth the Hammer

Nevermore.

With all respect to Edgar Poe, who's work I love and admire without reserve...

Once upon a bender bleary, while I pondered, weak and beery,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,


With my nod on, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
(Actually more like a serious bitch-slapping),

...smacking at my chamber door.
”WTF," I mumbled, "I’m on vacation! Ask Dick; he runs the nation.
Get off my ass and let Karl do it," I loud and soddenly swore.

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak September,
And every fucktard, camp-following member had been given his sinecure.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to borrow
Chinese cash or some “Aw Shucks” Charisma from the the lost Gipp-er,.
For the Smilin’, Beguilin’ Monster who could sell our Republican Manure,
Dead and gone forevermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each voting booth curtain
Thrilled me---filled me electoral delirium tremens throughout all of 2004;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood bleating,
" 'Tis some Pioneer Contributor, or Halliburtoning Corporate whore
Or another dimwit frat rat trollop sporting a Santorum coiffure

...This it is, and nothing more."

The Stoli shooters grew stronger; and hesitating no longer,
"Dicky?" said I, "Condi? Or is that Turdblossom? I recognize the spoor...
But the fact is, I was drinkin’, getting good and stinkin’
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you." Here I opened wide the door;---
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into the darkness peering, long I stood there, snarling, sneering
Jerking off to Armageddon dreams no one ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken –- no Condi or other token --
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "2004?",
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word," 2004!"
Merely this, and nothing more.

Back into my bottle turning, all the Jim Beam I’d guzzled burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, something louder than before,
"Surely," said I, "surely, that is Rumsfled with a briefing.
That will disassemble that bitch Sheehan’s beefing.
Let my heart stop Cheneying a moment, and this mystery explore.
" 'Tis just old crazy Rummy, and nothing more."

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a hiss and splutter,
In there stepped a mangy Hammer, of the Mandate days of yore.
Not an ounce of sense made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But with Death Skull grimance, perched above my chamber door.
Shat upon a bust of Nixon, just above my chamber door,
Shat, and sat, and nothing more.

This Sugarland turd was so badly freaking, into my pants I went leaking,
Shocked by the deranged and murderousness of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy Majorityhood be shorn and shave," I said, "you are still craven,
Ghastly, grim, and wretched Hammer, rampaging like a rabid boar.
What the fuck do I do now that my assassin's been shown the door?"
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

Much I marveled as this insanely ranting Dale Gribble spoke so plainly,
Though it’s answer little meaning, little veracity bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Would not projectile hurl upon seeing this two-legged offal above his chamber door,
A Christopathic beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
That can’t say shit but "Nevermore."

But the Hammer, a skulking minor demon, spoke only of his venom
Hissing that one word, as if his soul were stabbed with skewers.
Nothing further then he uttered; his heart was tightly shuttered;
Til I scarcely more than muttered, "How can I enjoy this Dewars?
Who shall ram my mandate now, through Congress' sewers?"
To which DeLay said, "Nevermore."

Like the thousand promises I’d broken, his word was oily spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store."
Bred from drooling Texas losers, friend of low-wattage crooks and boozers
Partied fast and kneecapped faster, till his lies one burden bore ---
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never---nevermore."

But the Hammer still berserking looked into my dank soul smirking,
So Karl broke it down for me in little words of two syllables, no more.
”Your polls are a’sinking, on ice your lies are stinking
Iraq and Katrina the public are finally a’linking, and now comes this loony Texas hoor -
This grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous Sugarland hoor
So guess what he means by "Nevermore"?”

And the media scrum grew denser, now fueled by a Grand Jury’s censure
Wrought by a righteous prosecutor who ain’t taking this shit no more.
"Wretch," I cried, "now it’s all for nothing. For nothing I cheated Albert Gore.
So get me three fingers of two-cents-plain that I may forget by apotheotic 2004!
Drink and drink and puke and drink and forget my apotheotic 2004!
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore!"

"You For-Profit, agenda-killing jag off" said I, "Faith-based pimp of Abramoff!
By that Dobson that bends us over -- by that God we both abhor--
Is there in the cushions where we shine our asses, even one dime of my political assets?
A whiff of my miracle Mandate year, which Pope Gregor named 2004 ---
My moment on the Mountain, COBOL programmers call Y2K-plus-four?
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

"Shut up you fucking loser!" I shrieked, upstarting --
"Go back to offing roaches you salad tossing, Albatrossing spore!
Leave no poo stripe as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my binginess unbroken! Leave me a political Debtor!
Take thy dick from out my mouth, and take thy form from off my door!"
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

But the Hammer, never quitting, still is sitting, still is shitting
Down the throat of my Dead Mandate, my ghost of 2004;
And his eyes still have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming.
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my Mandate from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted---nevermore!

Some Birthday Week Reposts: It’s the Return of the Great Trumpkin, Charlie Brown!

From eight years ago.  

Also an abbreviated birthday fundraiser :-)

There they were -- all the good little Trumpshirts out there in the sucker patch, waiting for Julian Assange to rise up and fly through the night to deliver Donald Trump into the White House and save them horrors of Hillary Clinton.

And the knew Assange would come because they have the most sincere sucker patch in all the land!

See, they genuinely believe every batshit, racist conspiracy theory flapping around inside their empty heads -- even the conspiracy theories that directly contradict other conspiracy theories.  These meatheads, genuinely and deeply believe all of it and, as the world knows, there is nothing Julian Assange respects more than a chump's sincerity.

Thene moon rose.  They settled in.  And they waited...

..and waited...

...and waited.

Until, at last (From Crooks & Liars):

WikiRolled! Assange Makes Crazy Uncle Liberty Stay Up Late; Pimps Book

They were promised that Killary and that Kenyan in the White House would be de$$troyeed at 3am sharp! Benghazi! 9/11! Baby parts!

Apparently it was all a marketing test by the Ecuadorian Embassy refugee Julian Assange, to see just how many rubes with the word "deplorable" in their Twitter handle were willing to drink caffeine after dinner for the purpose of making libruls mad...

The reaction was both swift and hilarious:

But don't worry about them wising up. 

Being chumps is not a hat they put on and take off depending on occasions and circumstances. 

 

"Chump" is who they are. 

 

And falling for the same lying grifters over and over and over again is what they do.

Eight years later and they're nothing but eight years deeper into their chumphood.

Burn The Lifeboats

Birthday Finale Two-Fer: The How, The Why and The What Next.

Don't forget the goggles.

(h/t The Vault of the Atomic Space Age)

In October of 2015 I provided this Helpful Guide For "Reasonable" Conservatives Who Are Somehow Only Now Starting To Figure Out That The Republican Party Is Irredeemably Insane.

Six years earlier, in September of 2009, I had written a long, well-received piece that explains how and why the Republican party had become irredeemably insane.  Which you are free to forward along to any Never Trumper who still maintains that the rise of a monster like Trump was somehow completely unforeseeable and had nothing to do with them

Anyway, on October 25 of 2010, just when I despaired of having something cool to post that day, I found that reader Ben Riddle has taken it upon himself to turn the text of my 09/11/08 "Like a Virgin" post into a narrated, two-part, pre-election special video.

Part I: The Public Record..."Because he had a 'D' after his name..."

Here is Part II: Like a Virgin

Once again, many thanks Ben.

Oh, and Conservatives, if you ever wondered why the Left finds you loathsome beyond redemption and thinks your ridiculous Teabagger Movement was at once hilarious, tragic and obscene, this is why.

On This Day in 2008 -- The Past Is Never Dead. It’s Not Even Past.

That post headline?  That's a quote by William Faulkner, from his 1951 novel "Requiem for a Nun".  Seemed appropriate since today's birthday fundraiser trip down memory lane is from this very day, October 29, in the Year of Our Lord 2008.

On this day 15 years ago. the Age of Obama had not yet begun.  The presidential election was still six days away.  Donald Trump wasn't even a speck on the Republican horizon.

And yet what was I writing about on this blog on that day? 

Litmus tests and the fracturing of the GOP over its embrace of a lunatic.

Republican preparations to declare the upcoming election "rigged" if they lost.  Rigged at the hands of a shadowy organization called ACORN.

The elevation of boot-licking fealty to the Lords of Flag and Bible as the cardinal Republican virtue.

The specter of government shutdowns and relentless Republican obstruction used as tactical weapons.

And after they ground the government to a halt, Republicans scuttling over to the Sunday Shows where they would tearfully blame Democrats, and the complicit media would gobble it up like the last slice of birthday cake.

This is what many of us saw leering over the horizon in 2008, before a single vote was cast for the Kenyan Usurper.

So the next time you hear a Never Trumper bleating about how no one could have predicted that the Republican party could ever end up in such a dark place, send 'em around here to have a chat with me.

Now, from exactly 15 years ago,  I bring you, "Understanding the Right #3.  For the record, this was the third is a multi-part series I ran back then in understanding the Right.  If you're interested, Part #1 is here.

Understanding the Right #3    

[ORIGINAL VIDEO NO LONGER AVAILABLE]

Omertà.

A rule or code that prohibits speaking or divulging information about certain activities, especially the activities of a criminal organization.

For those who have only lately found a seat at the American political circus, let me assure you that this is nothing new:

GOP Draws Internal Battle Lines Around Sarah Palin
Jason Linkins
October 27, 2008 04:19 PM

With the GOP looking more and more set to fracture as the possibility of electoral defeat looms, the cannibals' knives are out. Consider this quote, via Yglesias:

Jim Nuzzo, a White House aide to the first President Bush, dismissed Mrs Palin's critics as "cocktail party conservatives" who "give aid and comfort to the enemy".

He told The Sunday Telegraph: "There's going to be a bloodbath. A lot of people are going to be excommunicated. David Brooks and David Frum and Peggy Noonan are dead people in the Republican Party. The litmus test will be: where did you stand on Palin?"

Hold it now. They're serious about going all in with the Palin loyalty test? Uhm...apparently so! Nuzzo adds:

He said: "Win or lose, there is a ready made conservative candidate waiting in the wings. Sarah Palin is not the new Iain Duncan Smith, she is the new Ronald Reagan."

Yowee. So, for the sake of Sarah Palin -- who many conservatives correctly assessed as the candidate-born-yesterday -- a whole slew of Republicans-in-good-standing are going to be thrown under the bus? That's a serious civil war, or rather, a war betwixt the Serious and the Un-Serious. Keep in mind that Palin's critics are not marginal figures in the conservative movement. We're talking the aforementioned Brooks and Noonan and Frum, and we're adding Christopher Buckley, George Will, Kathleen Parker, Colin Powell, Charles Krauthammer, Matthew Dowd, and for the sake of argument, we'll throw in Chuck Hagel, Andrew Sullivan, and Christopher Hitchens, even though I hesitate to pin any of them to any sort of doctrinaire conservative group.

This is, indeed, a "bloodbath," and for what? A distinctly semi-pro Alaskan governor who's more or less made the charisma-free Tim Pawlenty look like What Could Have Been?
…

Since the very beginning, the lords and ladies of the Pig People at the top of the Money Party pyramid have recognized one and only one cardinal value.

Loyalty.

Unswerving, dog-obedient loyalty.

It is the only coin of their realm.

Bankrupt an entire country? Shit happens.

Hijack flag and Bible to sleaze your way into power? High fives all around.

Lie America into a disastrous war? Wev.

But publicly show anything less than boot-licking fealty to the Lords of Flag and Bible…

                           [ORIGINAL VIDEO NO LONGER AVAILABLE]

Remember that Oliver North is a traitor, liar and war criminal, but he defended the Don, and was paid off with sweet gigs at the Fox News Plantation.

That G. Gordon Liddy is a thug, convicted felon, hardcore fascist and domestic terrorist who has been well-rewarded and befriended by Party elders and financiers.

That Bush 41 himself did not precipitate out of thin air, but instead stayed more fiercely loyal to Richard Nixon for longer than just about anyone else in the Republican Establishment.

...
After a second unsuccessful bid for the Senate in 1970, Bush served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations (1971–72) and in 1972 was named chairman of the Republican National Committee by President Richard M. Nixon. He traveled the country for 20 months defending Nixon and the GOP against the widening Watergate scandal, which brought the president close to impeachment. Staunchly loyal almost to the end, Bush urged Nixon to step down on Aug. 7, 1974.
…

And for his sins?

Envoy to China

Gerald Ford, Nixon's successor, appointed Bush to be Chief of the US Liaison Office in the People's Republic of China. Since the United States at the time maintained official relations with the Republic of China on Taiwan and not the People's Republic of China, the Liaison Office did not have the official status of an embassy and Bush did not formally hold the position of "ambassador", though he unofficially acted as one. The time that he spent in China—14 months—were seen as largely beneficial for US-Chinese relations.

Director of Central Intelligence

In 1976, Ford brought Bush back to Washington to become Director of Central Intelligence. He served in this role for 355 days, from January 30, 1976 to January 20, 1977.

The loyalty litmus test is why GOP Brain Caste has stopped worrying about this election. Instead, they’re making up their “Naughty” and “Nice” lists, sharpening their blades for a Night of the Long Knives, and stacking the deck for the next election. Spinning a tangle of lies around ACORN and building the narrative that 2008 was stolen by dirty Liberals and their scary Negro henchmen.

The irreplaceable Billmon has it all here:

With the prospect of a bone-crushing election defeat staring them full in the face, the diehard rump of the conservative movement is already busy fashioning a narrative to explain the dissolution of its world -- the one that Ronald Reagan built and that George W. Bush (with an assist from Wall Street) has thoroughly trashed.

And the emerging story line appears to be, roughly, that ACORN did it.

Given the underlying proclivities of the modern conservative movement (Sarah Palin division) we should have understood that sooner or later it would come to something as absurd as this. Failed authoritarian movements needs scapegoats the way fecal coliform bacteria need a steady supply of raw sewage, and this one has a lot of failures that need explaining.

The remarkable thing, of course, is the right's effort to make the ACORN boogie man do double duty: responsible not only for the looming "theft" of American democracy (per John McCain) but also for bringing the US and global financial system to its knees (per any number of conservative quacks economists and cranks pundits).

You have to admit: That's a damned impressive revolutionary track record for an obscure group of community organizers operating on a shoestring budget. I mean, who needs the Red Army when you've got ACORN and the Community Reinvestment Act?

It would be easy to dismiss this lunacy as a manifestation of what the social scientist Richard Hofstader called the "paranoid style" in American politics. And some liberals have already made the connection. As far as the grassroots hysterics are concerned(i.e. the sort of people who are obsessed with the kerning and font size on Barack Obama's "alleged" birth certificate) this is no doubt true.

But I think by now it's also very clear that the GOP high commmand -- as far back as the Twin Cities white power rally, if not before -- deliberately adopted the demonization of ACORN/community organizers/the poor as a proxy for the hatred that no longer dares to speak its real name (except at the occasional Sarah Palin rally).
…

And with the Right’s “Loyalty Uber Alles” centrifuge now kicking in the afterburners, if you think that the last eight years were twisted, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet. Because with another Aggrieved White Conservative myth bolted into place, the entire Hatespeech Establishment will be thrown into high gear, ranting to the Pig People 24/7 that Barack Hussein Obama isn’t really the legitimate President.

Which means the 1990s all over again, on Hulk/gamma/radioactive-spider/mutant juice.

You think one government shutdown was fun? Try one a week.

Hell, Newt Gingrich was loudly lobbying for a shut down over oil drilling as recently as two months ago --

Gingrich Threatens Government Shutdown

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich "indicates his party is seriously considering another shutdown threat to force a vote on offshore oil drilling in September," CNN reports.

"The precise maneuvering of a shutdown threat is complicated, but it revolves around the fact that key government spending bills expire when the fiscal year ends September 30 and Congress must vote next month to keep the government operating."

Said Gingrich: "Are [Democrats] really prepared to close the government in order to stop drilling? Because I think the country will find that to be a suicidal strategy."

-- and rather than stuffing a rag in his mouth and packing this vicious, little ratfucker off to internal exile, the wingnuts proudly trot out their Party’s Elder Hatesman every time a network news camera flickers to life.

In the year to come, Monday through Friday expect the Republican Party to filibuster every single bill that comes to a vote that doesn’t funnel tax money to billionaires, after which they'll sprint to the MSM Saturday and Sunday to whine about the “do nothing” Congress and the failed Obama Administration.

While the desperate Shills of Fake Centrism like Cokie Roberts, Tom Friedman, David Broder and David Fucking Brooks run frantically in panicked circles begging Liberals to please, please, pretty please bend over and say “Thank you, Rush, may I have another!”

And why?

Because they sold their souls to the Big Media Store years ago, and know if they don't loyally hit their marks and deliver their Quisling lines, this is what will be waiting for them --

[ORIGINAL VIDEO NO LONGER AVAILABLE BUT I'M PRETTY SURE THIS WAS IT]

 

-- when they get home.

Steve Schmidt: The Only Surprise Is That Anyone Is Surprised

Since my birthday is drawing near and I don't want to eliminate the possibility that some of the people who scolded me so hard about trusting Never Trumpers (because they're our allies now, and something something World War II and Stalin) may feel moved to hit my tip jar...I shall heroically refrain from dwelling on the absolute raft of shit I took from my Liberal supervisors about not trusting Never Trumpers.  Especially Never Trumpers that:

1. Scoff at the idea of contrition or penance or humility or any of that stuff, but instead feel it is their God-given right to slide directly from paid-media gigs trashing Liberals like us...to paid-media gigs calling Donald Trump a poopy-head. 


2. Continue to revise their pasts to either absolve themselves of responsibility for the mess we're in now, or just pretend their pasts never happened.


3. Continue to pat themselves on the back for being the only people savvy enough to see the warning signs of trouble in their Republican party...30 years too late.


4. Continue to burnish their non-tribal, independent, True Conservative bona fides by continuing to shit on the same Liberals who have been warning them for decades about the trajectory their party was on.

Nope.  You won't catch me doing any of that.

Instead, I'm going to save all of us a lot of time and effort with this one weird trick.

On the subject of Steve Schmidt setting himself up to extract every nickel from Dean Phillips' doomed run for president -- 

I've platformed Steve Schmidt on my podcast and my show & today I want to apologize for doing so. Had I known this would happen, I would've never given him a platform. His involvement in Dean Phillips' campaign is unforgivable & a betrayal of democracy.

— Victor Shi (@Victorshi2020) October 27, 2023

Because Steve Schmidt is the opposition. ALways has been. Always will be. Disliking Trump doesn't make him an ally or a decent person. https://t.co/BaWjEHzRdf

— William K. Wolfrum (@Wolfrum) October 27, 2023

-- instead of boring you with a buncha new stuff,  allow me to direct you to anything I wrote in 2019 about the Howard-Schultz-to-Steve-Schmidt Fund Transfer Project (see the list of examples below).  Then mentally cross out the name "Howard Schultz" and write in the name "Dean Phillips" and voila.  

Because it's exactly the same scam.

Because that's how Steve Schmidt makes his living.  

What I continue to find depressing is how many people simply cannot get this very basic fact through their fucking heads.  

So how does Schmidt do it?  Continue to be trusted as a credible ally despite practically screaming that he isn't?

Because, to slightly misquote Ned Beatty in Network, "He's on television dummy."  

In case you hadn't noticed, MSNBC has built an entire industry out of rehabilitating the reputations of Republican scoundrels, and all it takes for Schmidt to win his way back into the hearts of credulous Liberals is for Chris Hayes to officially welcome him back, or Joe Scarborough to put him back in the lineup, or Nicole Wallace to put her arm around her old pal Steve and reintroduce him to the audience as one of the good guys. 

Which is exactly what I predicted would happen during Schmidt's first fuck-my-principles cash grab back in February of 2019.

Thank you your Honor, and ladies and gentlemen of the jury.  I would say that I await your swift and just verdict, but I think we all know exactly what that verdict will be.  After taking Howard Schultz for every nickel he can, sooner rather than later Mr, Schmidt will be welcomed back into the loving and lucrative bosom of the Insider's Club.

Because, as I may have mentioned once or twice, the Insider's Club has only two rules:

There's a Club.

You are not in it.

And, right on time, it is exactly what happened eight months later.  

WATCH: Steve Schmidt returns to MSNBC https://t.co/auvb7C6zKz #inners

— All In with Chris Hayes (@allinwithchris) October 19, 2019

Which, if you're inclined, you can read about here, "When You’re a Schmidt, You’re a Schmidt All The Way"

Anyway, as I said, if you're interested, dip on down to my archives and read anything I wrote about Schmidt back in 2019 and just swap around the names of the suckers he's conned into buying his snake oil.  

Some choices include:

Steve Schmidt Launches New "Bullshit Walks" Podcast

Steve Schmidt, Tucker Carlson and Jill Stein Walk Into Howard Schultz's Bar...

How To Make $525K In Eight Weeks

Time For Steve Schmidt to Start Stealing Office Supplies...

The Riders of the Purple Wage*

And since Steve Schmidt's last triumphant return from infamy to the sheltering bower of MSNBC happened in late October (and since, unlike Steve Schmidt, I am currently sans wealthy idiots willing to give me hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for me encouraging their delusions) , let's also call this post part of the "trip down bad memory lane" birthday fundraiser I am in the middle of.  

Behold, a Tip Jar!

So, is there a lesson here?

You bet there is.

The lesson is, as long as he has the medium of television on his side, there will continue to be a Steve Schmidt fan born every minute.  

And two to take 'em.

Birthday Fundraiser Day Three -- Boys and Girls and a Bouquet of Dead Links

 

Every now and then (more then than now and more's the pity) I wander off the political dog track and write about other stuff.  Such as this minor post from October of 2007, which is notable for a few things.

First, not (much) about politics.

Second, there's a link to Blue Gal's blog from before we were even dating!

Third, there are a lot of dead links.  Cannablog.  James Wolcott's Vanity Fair blog.  The Midwest Teen Sex Show.  Susie Bright is still blogging, but has moved on to Substack.  Most of my older blog posts carry deadlinks to blogs which are no more: each a small reminder of how depopulated the once-robust Liberal blogosphere has become.

Anyway, from before the Before Time I bring you:

Boys and Girls

and Stuff.

There is no subject more fundamental, complex, or sticky with naughty possibilities, so why not ease out of your weekend with some yummy-good writing on the subject;

From Drunken Boxing Master, James Wolcott explaining how the dark lord of Fox shake-shake-shakes up a cocktail of tits and disinformation to sell it's brand of Star Spangled Wang Spanking Fascism to the droolers:

"This week Fox News launched its new business channel, a bunny hutch for babewatchers with the lovable, hapless Neil Cavuto serving as the Charlie's Angels Bosley figure. The stock market greeted the arrival of Fox Business News with an elegant swan dive climaxing with Friday's 360-point splat.
..."

To that Blue Gal's exquisite tone poetic meditation on "It's a woman/man thing. We wouldn't understand."

Which begins:

"Seeing as I'm probably already on double-secret probation from certain concerned feminist blogger's collectives... for my panties, references to titty-fucking, not to mention my occasional admiration for things George Will has said, I might as well come clean and admit the rest..

1. I love the blog Hot Chicks with Douchebags, the sole purpose of which is to deride scenes like this:
..."

and doesn't stop until you're sore in all the good places.


To the drop-forged, steel-honed edge of cool that is the "Midwest Teen Sex Show" (another h/t to Susie Bright for finding and sharing this treasure)...

...where the fearless wisdom comes episodically and hidden deep inside Teh Funny

...where you will learn all about Important Subjects like The Older Boyfriend and Gym Class (where, yes, towel-snapping will make you gay)

...and where you will find all of your War On Christmas shopping needs have been pre-fulfilled with an ample selection of "Thanks Masturbation!"


family fun-wear.

And all of this you can explore while enjoying this mesmerizing Jane Siberry video


which, if you labor in the vineyards of the blue-nosed or the tight-assed, is sadly not entirely work-safe, and which I never woulda found if whig over at Cannablog hadn't pointed the way.

Birthday Fundraiser Day Two -- Dry-Heave Politics With Peggy Noonan

Once again I descend the rickety stairs down, down, down into my archives to retrieve another moment lost to time.   This time the date is October 23, 2008 and the person is Peggy Noonan playing Tone Cop who is terribly angry at (see if this sounds familiar)  those liberals and those win-at-any-cost Democrats who are silencing debate in this country. 

Plus, they're also being rude about it!

 

Keep Drinking

Eventually you'll believe anything

Except, of course, the simple truth.

In fact eventually you will sound exactly like this…

From Media Matters

Peggy Noonan, meet Bill O'Reilly
by Eric Boehlert

Peggy Noonan is pained about the state of public debate in this country. The longtime Wall Street Journal columnist and former Reagan speechwriter longs for a time when dignity flourished and political dissent was embraced. Lecturing with signature certainty in her latest column, Noonan bemoans the loss of "civic grace, democratic grace, the kind that assumes disagreements are part of the fabric, but we can make the fabric hold together."

After all, she laments, "Free speech means hearing things you like and agree with, and it means allowing others to speak whose views you do not like or agree with."

Peggy Noonan may be anguished, but at least she's sure who is to blame. It is liberals, those win-at-any-cost Democrats (and worse, celebrities!) who are silencing debate in this country. Plus, they're also being rude about it.

The way Noonan sees things, it's inquisitive, open-minded conservatives who are grappling with the hard questions, eager for public debate and a civilized, wide-ranging dialogue. They're the solemn protectors of dissent in this country, particularly vigilante about shielding unpopular opinions during wartime.

All of which begs the questions: Has Noonan ever watched Fox News where Bill O'Reilly tells guests to "shut-up" and unfurls insults, all while compiling an "enemies list"? Has she tuned into right-wing talk radio, which is designed to be hermetically sealed in order to keep dissenting voices off the air? And has Noonan ever read the right-wing war bloggers, who, as a rule, question the patriotism of anyone who speaks up against the war in Iraq?

Noonan's attempted maneuver about grace and free speech is clunky, but it's not unfamiliar. She's simply mimicking a popular right-wing attack that happens to be a classic Rovian, jujitsu thrust, which is to acknowledge your own weakness -- unhinged hatred for liberals and bullying desire to muzzle dissent -- and relentlessly project it onto your opponents, arguing that they're the ones who have blinders on and are driven by partisan rage. Consequently, Republican pundits pretend it's high-minded conservatives -- gentlemen and women who prefer the Queensbury Rules of intellectual combat -- who are trying to cling to a fading notion of poise and civility in the public square.

Where to begin? You could start with Media Matters for America's catalog of graceless attacks made by the likes of O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh, who owe their careers to their willingness to assault political opponents and stomp on minority viewpoints. In terms of Noonan herself, travel back to last year's Terri Schiavo right-to-die controversy and try to find the grace hidden in the insults Noonan hurled against anyone who disagreed with her radical notion that Congress needed to overrule the rights of Schiavo's husband and keep Terri alive via legislation. To Noonan, her opponents had a "bizarre passion" for death, were "unstable," "unhinged," and "red-fanged and ravenous." She warned that they were paving "the low road that twists past Columbine and leads toward Auschwitz."

…
As for Noonan's allegation that it's liberals, not conservatives, who actively despise dissent, blogger Glenn Greenwald did an efficient job of demolishing that talking point, noting, as just one of many examples, that "David Horowitz has built his career over the last several years on his campaign to limit academic freedom through legislation."

Or how about the Fox News pundits in late March 2003 who were attacking journalists who raised legitimate questions about the early military progress of the invasion into Iraq. At Fox, that public discourse was slapped down as "disgraceful," "idiotic," "stupid," and "moronic."
…

While I agree with Boehlert’s analysis – his dissection of “method and opportunity” -- I disagree with his take on the motive for Noonan’s crimes. His assertion that “She's simply mimicking a popular right-wing attack that happens to be a classic Rovian, jujitsu thrust…”

Her actions may well have the effect of mimicking Rove’s pathology, but there is no reason to think that the cause of her now-complete detachment from Reality isn't that she has simply and finally gone insane.

That her whispery, dolphineering, Jebus-conjuring blather and Locked Ward Stare into a Universe that does not exist would look and sound exactly as they do from inside four padded walls and tied into five-point restraints, instead of in front of the cameras and microphones of the national press.

Because once you have fallen too far into darkness, the thought of having to face the reality of the carnage that gapes at you from your rear view mirror becomes your ultimate horror.

Your cage of rats.

You mash on the gas, piling more of the same onto the disasters you have already sired (the Hair of the War that Bit You, so to speak) but no matter has fast you flee or how loud you screech, the only thing protecting you from your Room 101 primal dread is a tissue of lies that grows more brittle and translucent with each passing day.

Because now the heaps of corpses you have stacked out to the horizon are bringing down the roof beams.

The ruin and penury in which you have happily collaborated in press so hard against that last onion-skin of perfidy that the blood now oozes freely through.

What is coming next is beyond doubt, as are the names and faces of the authors, axe-honers and axe-wielders who have stampeded the entire 21st century into this abattoir.

Because chaos and nightmare is and always was

the real Project for a New American Century

And there was a moment, long ago -- who can say exactly when? -- that you knew beyond any doubt that all that have sworn by is a fraud and all you believe is a lie.

But you couldn’t muster the courage to face the music you yourself composed.

Because once you knew better – once you galloped on past that checkpoint beyond which you can not possibly, plausibly argue that you were misled or were just too stupid or credulous to figure our what was really going on – and you keep on going in the direction of evil while spouting scripture and wheezing on and on about righteousness, you were lost.

Possibly forever.

Part of the symptomology of the wildfire cancer that has now swallowed your soul is the volume and fever with which you now say the most despicable and deranged things.

You denounce patriots as traitors, back war criminals as heroes and denounce as misfits and Compulsive Bush Haters the level-headed realists who warned you this was all coming. You lie and lie and lie about crazy shit. Obvious shit.

Because Rove is has no conscience, what he does doesn’t bother him, but to follow him -- to survive after trading in your soul for protection from the consequences of your lies -- you have had to slowly cut yourself off from anything having any spiritual nutritional value. You live now, under siege, in the battle-bridge of your own skull, sustained only by swallowing lies regurgitated down to you from above which you, in turn, puke into the mouths and hearts of the rank and file below.

At long last – after clearing a path to One Party Power by projectile vomiting unhinged hatred in anything that stood in their way – there is nothing left in the Republican belly but the sour aftertaste of that fiery cask-strength rage that has kept them warm and voting for so long.

At long last, nothing left but the pathetic gibbering of Dry-Heave politics.

Birthday Fundraiser Day One -- If You Wait By The River Long Enough...

(Me on my 6th birthday, some numbers of years ago)

...you will see the urgent events of the day fall so far down the memory hole that you start a podcast called No Fair Remembering Stuff in the hopes of salvaging a few fragments of that vanishing past.

So, in that spirit, here is my seasonally-appropriate riff on "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe from...holy hannah...18 years ago.   It references many characters and events about which you may not have heard, but I assure you, they were a Big Deal back during the Devonian Era, and they all formed part of the mighty confluence of Republican perfidy and madness that led directly to Donald Trump.

Quoth the Hammer

Nevermore.

With all respect to Edgar Poe, whose work I love and admire without reserve...

Once upon a bender bleary, while I pondered, weak and beery,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, 

With my nod on, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
(Actually more like a serious bitch-slapping),

...smacking at my chamber door.
”WTF," I mumbled, "I’m on vacation! Ask Dick; he runs the nation.
Get off my ass and let Karl do it," I loud and soddenly swore.

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak September,
And every fucktard, camp-following member had been given his sinecure.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to borrow
Chinese cash or some “Aw Shucks” Charisma from the the lost Gipp-er,.
For the Smilin’, Beguilin’ Monster who could sell our Republican Manure,
Dead and gone forevermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each voting booth curtain
Thrilled me---filled me electoral delirium tremens throughout all of 2004;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood bleating,
" 'Tis some Pioneer Contributor, or Halliburtoning Corporate whore
Or another dimwit frat rat trollop sporting a Santorum coiffure

...This it is, and nothing more."

The Stoli shooters grew stronger; and hesitating no longer,
"Dicky?" said I, "Condi? Or is that Turdblossom? I recognize the spoor...
But the fact is, I was drinkin’, getting good and stinkin’
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you." Here I opened wide the door;---
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into the darkness peering, long I stood there, snarling, sneering
Jerking off to Armageddon dreams no one ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken –- no Condi or other token --
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "2004?",
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word," 2004!"
Merely this, and nothing more.

Back into my bottle turning, all the Jim Beam I’d guzzled burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, something louder than before,
"Surely," said I, "surely, that is Rumsfeld with a briefing.
That will disassemble that bitch Sheehan’s beefing.
Let my heart stop Cheneying a moment, and this mystery explore.
" 'Tis just old crazy Rummy, and nothing more."

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a hiss and splutter,
In there stepped a mangy Hammer, of the Mandate days of yore.
Not an ounce of sense made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But with Death Skull grimance, perched above my chamber door.
Shat upon a bust of Nixon, just above my chamber door,
Shat, and sat, and nothing more.

This Sugarland turd was so badly freaking, into my pants I went leaking,
Shocked by the deranged and murderousness of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy Majorityhood be shorn and shave," I said, "you are still craven,
Ghastly, grim, and wretched Hammer, rampaging like a rabid boar.
What the fuck do I do now that my assassin's been shown the door?"
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

Much I marveled as this insanely ranting Dale Gribble spoke so plainly,
Though it’s answer little meaning, little veracity bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Would not projectile hurl upon seeing this two-legged offal above his chamber door,
A Christopathic beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
That can’t say shit but "Nevermore."

But the Hammer, a skulking minor demon, spoke only of his venom
Hissing that one word, as if his soul were stabbed with skewers.
Nothing further then he uttered; his heart was tightly shuttered;
Til I scarcely more than muttered, "How can I enjoy this Dewars?
Who shall ram my mandate now, through Congress' sewers?"
To which DeLay said, "Nevermore."

Like the thousand promises I’d broken, his word was oily spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store."
Bred from drooling Texas losers, friend of low-wattage crooks and boozers
Partied fast and kneecapped faster, till his lies one burden bore ---
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never---nevermore."

But the Hammer still berserking looked into my dank soul smirking,
So Karl broke it down for me in little words of two syllables, no more.
”Your polls are a’sinking, on ice your lies are stinking
Iraq and Katrina the public are finally a’linking, and now comes this loony Texas hoor -
This grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous Sugarland hoor
So guess what he means by "Nevermore"?”

And the media scrum grew denser, now fueled by a Grand Jury’s censure
Wrought by a righteous prosecutor who ain’t taking this shit no more.
"Wretch," I cried, "now it’s all for nothing. For nothing I cheated Albert Gore.
So get me three fingers of two-cents-plain that I may forget by apotheotic 2004!
Drink and drink and puke and drink and forget my apotheotic 2004!
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore!"

"You For-Profit, agenda-killing jag off" said I, "Faith-based pimp of Abramoff!
By that Dobson that bends us over -- by that God we both abhor--
Is there in the cushions where we shine our asses, even one dime of my political assets?
A whiff of my miracle Mandate year, which Pope Gregor named 2004 ---
My moment on the Mountain, COBOL programmers call Y2K-plus-four?
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

"Shut up you fucking loser!" I shrieked, upstarting --
"Go back to offing roaches you salad tossing, Albatrossing spore!
Leave no poo stripe as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my binginess unbroken! Leave me a political Debtor!
Take thy dick from out my mouth, and take thy form from off my door!"
Quoth the Hammer, "Nevermore."

But the Hammer, never quitting, still is sitting, still is shitting
Down the throat of my Dead Mandate, my ghost of 2004;
And his eyes still have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming.
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my Mandate from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted---nevermore!

Birthday Fundraiser: Remember When All the Very Serious People Tried to Make “Partyism” a Thing Because David Brooks Said So?

 

In which I sick my hand into to toxic goo of the Forbidden Past of late October 2014 -- just eight months before Donald Trump oozed down the escalator and into the hearts of the GOP voters -- to remind us all that... 

Against Vapidity the Blogs Themselves Content in Vain

You cannot budge the needle on anything until you find a means of influencing the influencers.

From The Twitter, here is a partial list:

.@nytdavidbrooks writes about why partyism is wrong: http://t.co/YQgJIHF7Le
— No Labels (@NoLabelsOrg) October 28, 2014

David Brooks is excellent on the personal morality of those who make different political choices. http://t.co/LBWFaC07uq
— Justin Wolfers (@JustinWolfers) October 28, 2014

David Brooks on the danger and immorality of political partyism http://t.co/P2Fic5jcWB
— Weremichael (@MichaelRWear) October 28, 2014

Interesting. (Actually, I could tell you some stories!) -> Why Partyism Is Wrong http://t.co/RVzDxNgTxN @nytdavidbrooks
— Jimmy LaSalvia (@JimmyLaSalvia) October 28, 2014

Why partyism is not good. http://t.co/pJwS54g6so
— Cass Sunstein (@CassSunstein) October 28, 2014

NYT David Brooks' column about “partyism" helps explain the roots of hyper-partisanship we see in Washington today. http://t.co/6afYJHay37
— Olympia Snowe (@OlympiasList) October 28, 2014

David Brooks is in his prime these days. Why Partyism Is Wrong. http://t.co/wMhkW5BBTf
— Jay Kirsch (@jaykirsch) October 28, 2014

Why Partyism is Wrong http://t.co/sGpUQQeuDz @nytdavidbrooks http://t.co/sGpUQQeuDz
— Ron Fournier (@ron_fournier) October 28, 2014

Politics is not a Manichaean struggle between Light & Dark. And other important points. Recommended. http://t.co/fa4VyGUdNb
— Ritu Chaudhry (@TheRituChaudhry) October 28, 2014

Partyism as Prejudice http://t.co/85NviXimjO
— W Bradford Wilcox (@WilcoxNMP) October 28, 2014

I think a lot of people who have mentioned me today should read this. "Why Party-ism is Wrong" - http://t.co/tPWK2kWh1n
— Audrey McCann (@auddiemac21) October 28, 2014

The always wise David Brooks against 'partyism' http://t.co/rS3dPXha6S #nytimes
— Andrew Phillips (@andrewphil) October 28, 2014

Sigh.

Told ya: the Both Siderist zombie lie never dies.

And speaking of unholy things which refuse to stay in the ground no matter how hard you wallop 'em with the shovel...



...from The Wrap (h/t alert Tweeter @brendanl79)

David Gregory Joins Yahoo's Growing Editorial Bench Alongside Katie Couric

David Gregory is getting back in the news game, this time digitally.

The recently ousted “Meet the Press” moderator will join Yahoo's coverage of the midterm elections, the company announced Tuesday.

Gregory will join host Katie Couric and contributors Matt Bai, Mike Allen, and political commentator Grover Norquist for network's coverage on November 4th.

...

Since his departure, he's been at work on a book about his Jewish faith and been on the speaking circuit. He also moderated a panel discussion at an event held by non-partisan political group “No Labels.”

So...he's a blogger now?

Well great; there goes the fucking neighborhood.

This is why remembering the past can be perilous.

Because it gets to be dizzying when you see, over time, how often the same hacks and grifters have pissed the same claptrap into the same Snake Oil bottles and sold it to the same chumps as Cutting Edge Political Wisdom, over and over again.

 

I Am The Liberal Media

Birthday Fundraiser: Let's Talk About The Word "Irredeemable"

(Me on my 6th birthday, many years ago in a far-off land.)

Two different people I spoke with tonight saw the right-wing reaction to the Pelosi attack and used a word I used just yesterday in a conversation: "Irredeemable."

We are all redeemable in the eyes of God, but as a political term, I understood, and it worries me.

— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) October 29, 2022

On the one hand, it's always encouraging when the slower kids start to catch up to where we America-hating, terrorist-loving, Libtard scum have been all along.

For example. From me 17 years ago, about a minute after I started this little blog:

The problem is that there are section of this country – entire states -- that are simply, irredeemable rotten. Where the locals are so fucking gone, live in such a cesspit of bigotry, ignorance and Biblical Justification for being stupid and bigoted that perhaps there is nothing for us to do for them but seal the intellectual borders and let the Disease of unreconstructed Wingnut Confederate Ideology run its terrible course.

Granted we will be deprived of some of our finest NASCAR drivers and grabby-handed Christian con men...

The good news is, as loud at the Ultras are, and as long a shadow as they cast, they are nowhere near a majority in this country. To win they and the Moderates have to lean against each other like two drunks running a three-legged race, and we should take a lot of hope in that.

Consider the obvious fact that we Lefties were, for example, just about 100% right about everything regarding Iraq, and the Bush WH has been shown to be just about 100% wrong in every aspect and in every detail...

Not exactly a popular opinion to be staking out during the height of the Dubya Administration. 

From me in 2007:

And the thing is, even after all of that – decade after decade after surreal decade filled with Big Haired Slunkmeat Bible Molesters -- I don’t despise them.

I really don’t.

I despise the irredeemable, ineducable, dumbass legions of this country that blindly follow them, believe in them, vote as they are told, and hate as they are told.

Who will gleefully follow their false prophets and demagogues to war, to ruin and, eventually, to global annihilation.

In a civilized nation -- one where the 27%-ers are shunned instead of pandered-- these Post Modern Elmer Gantrys would be nothing but another clutch of public transit Bible Screamers: spurned and perhaps pitied by decent citizens and driven off with flung curses and pocket change.

This is exactly why the whole of the Right -- from their “Fuck Everyone But Me” ideology to their degenerate perversion of genuine Christianity -- ultimately cannot be saved.

We cannot co-exist; in the end, they and all of their meatheaded darkness need to be electorally and culturally bulldozed into a pit and covered with quicklime.

Because neither our generous nation nor the Christian faith will ever be safe until people like this are considered a joke.

A bad joke.

A memory of a bad joke.

From me in 2011, on the occasion of Arianna Huffington doing what she had planned to do all along: cashing out by cashing in on all that "citizen journalism" that she had conned chumps into handing over to her for free

I wonder which of her books about corporate cruelty -- "Pigs at the Trough" or perhaps "Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream"? -- Ms. Huffington offered as a lovely parting gift to the 900 journalists and others who were sacked in order to fund her AOL windfall.

I also wonder which of her books on the villainy and irredeemable insanity of the Right -- "Fanatics & Fools" or "Right Is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe" -- she offered as a lovely Welcome Wagon token to the irredeemably bent, lunatic fringe Right wing propagandist Andrew Breitbart as he was brought on-board the Huffington Pose Post as a front-page contributor? (Having enticed Bloody Mary Matalin into coming on her dreadful radio show to espouse the virtues of civility and Centrism, and spent a chunk of her winter canoodling at Davos with our Ant Overlords,

Me again, in 2012:

More than enough years of Conservative treachery and treason clearly visible as far as the eye can see for anyone with a functional cerebral cortex and a conscience to figure that the GOP is an irredeemable shitpile of bigots, Christopaths and plutocrats, who will never stop hag-riding this country from one disaster to another until they are driven to political extinction.

You might remember in 2016 when Hillary Clinton had the guts to tell the simple truth about the MAGA meatheads -- "Now, some of those folks – they are irredeemable, but thankfully, they are not America." -- and took all kinds of shit from all the Very Serious People including, of course, David Fucking Brooks.  

On Meet the Press.  Above the chyron, "Basket of Deplorables? -- How Will This Impact Clinton?"  

Mr. David Fucking Brooks (along with Mr. Tom Brokaw, another multi-millionaire professional Both Siderist and co-owner of the state Montana), elected to kill irony outright and bury it in a shallow grave by whipping himself into a high dudgeon and lecture Hillary Clinton on the unseemliness of a rich person such as herself using her fancy-schmancy college-graduate language to tell the plain, hairy. ugly truth about the Trumpkins:

DAVID BROOKS: You know, first, it was a terrible week for politics. We've had a race to the bottom before, but this was, like, at speed, like, who's Usain Bolt speed to the bottom, these two. I was struck by another sentence in that quote about the deplorables, that they are "irredeemable."

There's a reason no religion believes that. Because if you believe people are irredeemable, you're saying they somehow lack redeemable souls, they are somehow in a lesser category of human beings and that's just a dark, dark world view. And that's always been the risk with Clinton. As President, she can be very hardworking, very effective, very efficient, but there's a dark world view that is semi Nixonian lurking in there.

... 

DAVID BROOKS: People, even the people that say repugnant things at Trump rallies, are complicated and they're driven by complicated fears and anxieties to sometimes do some things, sometimes do beautiful things. And so, the truism that you hate the sin, but don't hate the sinner applies to politics just as well and she was hating the sinner.

Yes, this is the same David Fucking Brooks who somehow managed to forgot that he spent pretty much the entire Dubya administration getting paid handsomely by Bloody Bill Kristol to dismiss us dirty, disreputable, terrorist-loving, "netroots" scum as 100% irredeemable.

And what would a fake debate over the application of the word "irredeemable" be without some Bush Regime Dead Ender using their commanding position in the media to dismiss the entire issue with a wave of their all-purpose, all-occasion Both Sides Do It magic wand?

From Peter Wehner in The New York Times (emphasis added):

Moderation, then, is out of step with the times, which are characterized by populist anger and widespread anxiety, by cross-partisan animosity and dogmatic certainty. Those with whom we have political disagreements are not only wrong; they are often judged to be evil and irredeemable.

...

The concern some of us have is that even before Mr. Trump set foot on the political stage, America was becoming a bit more like the Sahara or the Arctic Circle than a temperate zone; that moderation was passé in both parties and that no politician would defend it as a political virtue...

From me again, in 2017:

The GOP That Failed 

 

Meditate on this.

Republicans have elected the two worst presidents in modern history, back-to-back.

They obediently supported those Failed Presidents long after any sane person could see that they were irredeemable fuck-ups.  

They used the collective might of their Pretty Hate Machine and their infinite capacity for Strategic Forgettery to mercilessly slander apostates and heretics and lobotomize out of existence the myriad pustulent hypocrisies that make the rest of the world look at them in grim and horrified amusement.

They spent the eight year interregnum between their Failed Presidents fighting like mad dogs to sabotaging and slander any attempt by President Obama to clean up their disasters.  They pissed on every olive branch they were offered.  They mocked normal political compromise as cowardice. And to survive the onslaught of a which they could no longer comprehend, they burrowing ever deeper into the Breitbart News Dumpster for comforting lies and conspiracies.

They have proudly thrown their lot in with the worst scum in the country over and over and over again.

They have  passed the point of no return.

As I said at the top. on the one hand, it's always encouraging when the slower kids start to catch up.

On the other hand, these slower kids really, really don't like it when you remind them --

-- that we dirty, disreputable Liberals got there long, long ago and, for our sins, were universally mocked and dismissed as alarmist crackpots by these very same slower kids.

I Am The Liberal Media

A Very Special No Fair Remembering Stuff Birthday Fundraiser: They Knew. They All Knew.

(Me on my 6th birthday, some numbers of years ago, in another country.)

This year, for my birthday fundraiser and in honor of the "No Fair Remembering Stuff" mission statement of this joint, I've gone down to the cellar and uncorked a rare and special vintage for you.

A rich and full-bodied post I bottled 13 years ago this week, and which has aged either wonderfully or terribly depending on your perspective.

I laid it down as a hedge against the day when the raging shitpile of bigots and imbeciles that is the modern Republican Party would finally kick the doors off the basement lab where Serious and Sensible Conservatives (and their collaborators in the mainstream media) had been hiding them and begin to rampage across the land in plain view of the general public.

As hedge against the day when those same Serious and Sensible Conservatives (and their collaborators in the mainstream media) would swear on the bones of Saint Ronald Reagan that they had no idea that there even was a basement lab, much less what kind of monsters were being cooked up therein.  That the rise of Trump and discovery that the GOP base was a deranged mob of bigots and imbeciles had been a completely unforeseeable tragedy -- a spontaneous disaster in which they played no part and for which the shared no blame.

Except, nah.

From October 27, 2009, this is "Nobody Left But The Crazies".

 

File Under Gresham's Corollary: "Bad crazy drives out everybody.".

From MediaMatters:

Kristol: GOP's future "center of gravity" lies with Beck, Limbaugh

October 27, 2009 8:05 am ET by Media Matters staff

From William Kristol's October 27 Washington Post column:

Obviously, many Republicans and conservatives -- and lots of moderates and independents -- will be grateful to Mitch McConnell if he can stop ObamaCare, and to Jon Kyl if he can induce the president to embrace a stronger foreign policy. But it's unlikely that the minority party in Congress will be the source of bold new conservative leadership over the next three years. Even if Republicans pick up the House in 2010, the party's big ideas and themes for the 2012 presidential race will probably not emanate from Capitol Hill. 

The center of gravity, I suspect, will instead lie with individuals such as Palin and Huckabee and Gingrich, media personalities like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, and activists at town halls and tea parties. Some will lament this -- but over the past year, as those voices have dominated, conservatism has done pretty well in the body politic, and Republicans have narrowed the gap with Democrats in test ballots.

Kristol began working out years ago what the last, few fusspot remnants of the Old GOP seem to only now be dimly perceiving: that there is absolutely nothing left inside the Party of Lincoln but crazy, and if you want to hang onto those sweet-sweet “Conservative pundit” paydays, you’d better cozy up to the rabid Cheney Regime Dead-Enders most ricky-tick.

Of course this will remain an ongoing, toxic disaster for the country until the cultural backwash that is the Party of God is universally repudiated, stamped with a fluorescent HazMat symbol big enough to be visible from orbit, and buried under a mile of electoral concrete (I have said elsewhere and only half in jest that President Obama's biggest job will turn out to be saving the GOP from itself.)

But as a freelance ontologist (“Will Visualization Information For Food’), I appreciate the 30 years of dedicated effort it took for Hate Radio charlatans, Christopathic multimedia colporteurs, FoxNews harlequins and all of their various elected finger puppets to gather together the nation’s bigots, yahoos and moral imbeciles under one political roof.

So way to go Rush! UR doin’ it rite!

And for no additional charge, here's let me pour you a sipper of this mellow dessert wine I laid down just a few days earlier, on October 23, 2009.  In this post I noted that George Will -- yes that George Will -- had taken up his quill to write an ooey-gooey love-letter to Minnesota's Craziest Political Escapee, Michele Bachmann.

Yes that Michele Bachmann.

Here is Mr. Will:

"... Some of her supposed excesses are, however, not merely defensible, they are admirable. For example, her June 9 statement on the House floor in which she spoke of "gangster government" has been viewed on the Internet about 2 million times. ..."

At the time I irresponsibly speculated that:

Will has come to terms with the fact that his Movement has now been swallowed whole by the yahoos and bigots that the GOP spent the last generation recruiting as foot soldiers. 

And if he wants to keep drawing a paycheck as "Conservative columnist, George Will" he'd better learn to cozy up to Unwashed Crazy.

Well it's 13 years later.  

George Will remains gainfully employed by the Washington Post where he still oozes bile onto its pages every week.

Without breaking stride, Bill Kristol has morphed from Trusted Fox News contributor and founder of .the Weekly Standard to Trusted MSNBC contributor and founder of The Bulwark  

And I'm still at this keyboard, pretty much every day, remembering things that men like Will and Kristol very much want everyone to forget.

I Am The Liberal Media