Monday, January 29, 2007
They Can't Take a Joke...
Watching the right-wing try to do everything they can to invent smears against Hillary Clinton would be amusing if their attempts weren't so transparently pathetic.
The latest example involves a joke she made, and desperate efforts to completely misrepresent it. I'm sure you've seen the reports. In response to a reporter's question, she said, "Do I have experience in dealing with evil and bad men?", then paused for effect.
Naturally, the wingnuts have jumped all over it, first mocking her for not answering, then claiming that her joke was a reference to her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Which is totally unmitigated horseshit, and it only takes two seconds to figure out why. Has Hillary dealt with evil, bad men before? Hell yes, several times. And it would take an idiot to not realize that her silence was a reference to Ken Starr, Rush Limbaugh and all the Republicans in Congress who tried to bring her husband down; as well as a possible reference to Richard Nixon and Company. After all, Hillary was one of the attorneys involved in drawing up impeachment papers in that case.
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The latest example involves a joke she made, and desperate efforts to completely misrepresent it. I'm sure you've seen the reports. In response to a reporter's question, she said, "Do I have experience in dealing with evil and bad men?", then paused for effect.
Naturally, the wingnuts have jumped all over it, first mocking her for not answering, then claiming that her joke was a reference to her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Which is totally unmitigated horseshit, and it only takes two seconds to figure out why. Has Hillary dealt with evil, bad men before? Hell yes, several times. And it would take an idiot to not realize that her silence was a reference to Ken Starr, Rush Limbaugh and all the Republicans in Congress who tried to bring her husband down; as well as a possible reference to Richard Nixon and Company. After all, Hillary was one of the attorneys involved in drawing up impeachment papers in that case.
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Saturday, January 13, 2007
Got Nothin'
I'm having major flashbacks to college politics this week. You know what I'm talking about. The business majors (largely conservative) would act like drunken asshats and give less than a damn about propriety when they were holding student office -- but as soon as someone from the liberal arts (largely, well, liberal) wound up in power, the least twitch, nose-pick or fart was trumpeted across the front page of the school newspaper as the latest scandal.
And so it is now that the fratboys have been kicked to minority status and OMG - A WOMAN!!! is now speaker of the house for the first time. The shit parade of trumped up, distorted, non-existent charges against the Democrats continue to bubble up from that cesspool of Republican spin.
A brief list, then, of the High Crimes and Misdemeanors, as documented by the shrill bastards of the Rightwing media -- and how they're all lies, damn lies and bullshit.
The difference is, this time, the teflon coating is on another party, and short of catching Ted Kennedy on video sodomizing a cub scout in the Senate cloak room, then wiping his dick on the Bible, there's nothing to see here. It seems that the Republicans are as blind to the message of the last election as the Democrats are.
The message was this: we were tired of the party in power, and their lies and bullshit and warmongering. We put another party in power to fix things, to end the war, to cut the balls off of this Administration and reverse the course of the downward spiral this country has been in since March 2003.
No amount of Neocon whining and foot-stomping is going to get through to the majority any more. We're watching your lies and spin, and we're going to spin them right back in your faces and expose them as the horseshit they are.
So -- bring it on. Follow the example of your president and just make shit up to suit your agenda. It just makes it easier for us to pop the bubble of your delusions in public, and shove your sorry asses further to the margins, so that, by the election of 2012, you'll be a footnote, the sane half of your party that splits off will be partly in charge, and Americans will have fled the mainstream for third parties in droves long since.
The more you keep it up, the more likely you're going to have to use the phrases "President Pelosi", "Madame President Clinton" and "President Obama" -- and choke on them as you do.
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And so it is now that the fratboys have been kicked to minority status and OMG - A WOMAN!!! is now speaker of the house for the first time. The shit parade of trumped up, distorted, non-existent charges against the Democrats continue to bubble up from that cesspool of Republican spin.
A brief list, then, of the High Crimes and Misdemeanors, as documented by the shrill bastards of the Rightwing media -- and how they're all lies, damn lies and bullshit.
Claim: "NANCY PELOSI EXEMPTED HER DONORS AT STARKIST TUNA FROM THE MINIMUM WAGE LAWS!!!"Clutching at straws really are the words here. There is not a substantive shred of anything in any of the charges the rightwing echo chamber (aka Fox News) is trying to pump into the zeitgeist as reality right now.
Facts: 1) The tuna canners in question work in American Samoa. 2) Wage rules in American Samoa are determined by a committee of the department of labor, not by congress. 3) The Samoan Representative himself has said that raising the minimum wage there to US standards would be a disaster, seeing as how it would suddenly elevate a large proportion of unskilled workers to levels equivalent with the Samoa upper middle class, and allow Thailand to undercut the industry.
Truth: Nancy Pelosi would have had to specifically instruct Congress to create a special exemption and/or rewrite other major portions of Federal Law for the minimum wage bill to even pertain to American Samoa. Far from pandering to a contributor, she was just passing a law for the benefit of Americans already covered by the minimum wage.
Claim: BARBARA BOXER WAS REALLY MEAN TO CONDI, BECAUSE CONDI HAS NO CHILDREN!!!
Facts: During hearings, Boxerpointed out that neither she nor Condoleeza Rice have relatives involved in fighting in Iraq; Boxer's children are too old and her grandchildren are too young, and Rice has no children. Boxer then asked, how would the prosecution of this war be different if the people in power (Boxer, Rice, et. al.) had close relatives who were put in danger -- would the "surge" (aka escalation) happen?
Truth: If Condoleeza Rice couldn't handle this question, then she has no business being Secretary of State. She was not blind-sided; she was not the recipient of a low-blow. She was confronted with a question based on the facts. She dealt with it. The wingnut pussies, however, had to jump on it like Boxer had farted in Church. And, anyway, it was a hundred times more gentle than any of the questions asked of Bill Clinton after the wingnuts insisted he talk about Monica, live, on camera, on national TV.
Claim: NANCY PELOSI DOESN'T KNOW HOW TO TELL TIME! Her "first hundred hours" ran out a long time ago.
Facts: The first hundred hours isn't counted literally on the clock; if it were, it would have been over after four days and four hours. If it pertained to Congressional working days, it would be over in two and a half weeks (Democratic time) or three and an eighth weeks (Republican time).
Truth: The "hundred hours" are based on debate and legislative time spent on the six specific bills the Democrats promised to pass. It doesn't include declarations for "National Elvis Day" or tons of special declarations Congress Critters read into the record for their constituents constantly. It doesn't include time for study, or time spent on matters other than those six bills. And, ultimately, the "first hundred hours" is more a metaphor than a reality -- and, if this is the best the Republicans can do as a complaint, then they are clutching at straws.
The difference is, this time, the teflon coating is on another party, and short of catching Ted Kennedy on video sodomizing a cub scout in the Senate cloak room, then wiping his dick on the Bible, there's nothing to see here. It seems that the Republicans are as blind to the message of the last election as the Democrats are.
The message was this: we were tired of the party in power, and their lies and bullshit and warmongering. We put another party in power to fix things, to end the war, to cut the balls off of this Administration and reverse the course of the downward spiral this country has been in since March 2003.
No amount of Neocon whining and foot-stomping is going to get through to the majority any more. We're watching your lies and spin, and we're going to spin them right back in your faces and expose them as the horseshit they are.
So -- bring it on. Follow the example of your president and just make shit up to suit your agenda. It just makes it easier for us to pop the bubble of your delusions in public, and shove your sorry asses further to the margins, so that, by the election of 2012, you'll be a footnote, the sane half of your party that splits off will be partly in charge, and Americans will have fled the mainstream for third parties in droves long since.
The more you keep it up, the more likely you're going to have to use the phrases "President Pelosi", "Madame President Clinton" and "President Obama" -- and choke on them as you do.
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Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Rest in Peace, Bring Your Own Shovel...
Okay, first of all, let me say this: Gerald Ford was the last Republican President that I actually liked. He was socially liberal and fiscally conservative; he just might have been elected to office in 1976 had he not made one major mistake.
And that mistake is the thing that the idiot pundits are now touting as his strong suit: Pardoning Nixon. In retrospect, big mistake. Had Ford had any balls (and/or not sold out to become president) he would have demanded a Congressional Investigation of Watergate, let the chips fall where they would have, and to hell with the consequences. By pardoning Nixon, he did not heal the country. Rather, he swept the truth under the rug. He buried the truth, just as he did as a member of the Warren Commission. And, by his direct inaction, he created the situation under which we're stuck with this damn Imperial Presidency today.
So, Rest in Peace, Gerald Ford. You were one of the few good ones. Except that you sold your soul at the wrong time, and then did not repent during the next thirty-odd years. During any time between 1980 and late 2006, you could have told the truth. Given that you gave a half-assed truth in a 2004 interview only upon the caveat that it not be revealed until you died, I have to knock you down quite a few pegs on the Good Leader board.
Honestly -- once you failed to be elected as president in 1976, you had nothing to lose. If you had any honor at all, you would have spilled everything you knew; if not during the 80s, then at least post 9/11, in an era that, clearly, things you hated were happening.
You were the last Republican President in this country to do no intentional harm; but, by your silence for the last thirty years, you have perhaps done more harm than good.
Forgiving Nixon was your first mistake. Not telling us what you knew before you died was your second and, despite all the pious soundbites of this weekend, your greatest mistake.
The truth is buried with you today -- many truths are buried with you today. And, in that, you fail your country in death, even as you mostly served it in life.
Requiscat en pace, President Ford. Even as you leave the rest of us no peace by your passing.
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And that mistake is the thing that the idiot pundits are now touting as his strong suit: Pardoning Nixon. In retrospect, big mistake. Had Ford had any balls (and/or not sold out to become president) he would have demanded a Congressional Investigation of Watergate, let the chips fall where they would have, and to hell with the consequences. By pardoning Nixon, he did not heal the country. Rather, he swept the truth under the rug. He buried the truth, just as he did as a member of the Warren Commission. And, by his direct inaction, he created the situation under which we're stuck with this damn Imperial Presidency today.
So, Rest in Peace, Gerald Ford. You were one of the few good ones. Except that you sold your soul at the wrong time, and then did not repent during the next thirty-odd years. During any time between 1980 and late 2006, you could have told the truth. Given that you gave a half-assed truth in a 2004 interview only upon the caveat that it not be revealed until you died, I have to knock you down quite a few pegs on the Good Leader board.
Honestly -- once you failed to be elected as president in 1976, you had nothing to lose. If you had any honor at all, you would have spilled everything you knew; if not during the 80s, then at least post 9/11, in an era that, clearly, things you hated were happening.
You were the last Republican President in this country to do no intentional harm; but, by your silence for the last thirty years, you have perhaps done more harm than good.
Forgiving Nixon was your first mistake. Not telling us what you knew before you died was your second and, despite all the pious soundbites of this weekend, your greatest mistake.
The truth is buried with you today -- many truths are buried with you today. And, in that, you fail your country in death, even as you mostly served it in life.
Requiscat en pace, President Ford. Even as you leave the rest of us no peace by your passing.
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