Sunday, April 27, 2008

Former GOP White House counsel chokes on sheep balls

Maybe it was just one. Surely he wasn't trying to swallow more than one ...

Former senator Paul Laxalt's all male, annual lamb fry dinner at the Georgetown Club tends not to be an especially raucous affair. The 28th dinner the other night, prepared as always in Basque style in honor of Laxalt's heritage, featured the usual delicacy of the night, lamb's testicles, which are said to have unusual medicinal qualities.

And while some of the tuxedoed and slightly aging pols and pals -- including Vice President Cheney, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), former House Republican leader Bob Michel, retired Marine Gen. P.X. Kelley, former GOP chairman and now lobbyist Frank Fahrenkopf, former Veterans Affairs secretary and former ambassador to the Vatican Jim Nicholson, and legendary lobbyist Bill Timmons -- don't move as fast as they used to, they can still hop to it in an emergency.

And they did when White House counsel Fred Fielding appeared to be choking -- not on the featured delicacy, we are assured. Ron Kaufman of Dutko Worldwide (and a volunteer for Mitt Romney's campaign) and then Ed Rollins (who played a lead role in Mike Huckabee's bid for the White House) took turns trying the Heimlich maneuver to dislodge it. Rollins brought over a chair to stand on for extra leverage, one guest said.

There's some disagreement about what happened next. One attendee said Rollins popped the obstruction out, another said Fielding eventually swallowed it. Well, either way ...

Oh I see now the article says he wasn't gagging on a lamb's testicle. Perhaps it was his conscience, then...

Sunday Funnies






Friday, April 25, 2008

Rush's Riots

Steven D speaks for me:


I guess Chicken Hawk Supreme Limbaugh wants to re-live his youth from 1968 when the "rioting" at the Chicago Convention (caused mostly by the Chicago Police) likely cost Hubert Humphrey the election. An election where the the victory of a Republican, Richard Nixon, guaranteed that an unpopular war would continue for another 7 more years, with an ever-increasing death toll among both Americans and Vietnamese.

Of course, no one should be surprised that Limbaugh would take this tack. He's long been the pilonidal cyst on the American body politic. Almost single-handedly he created the conservative racist, politically incorrect talk show format, where defamation of one's "enemies" is standard operating procedure. He went after Hillary and Bill Clinton mercilessly in the 90's, pushing conspiracy theories that one or both of them had Vince Foster murdered. And more recently he's shown he's an equal opportunity smear merchant by playing racist ditties like "Barack, the Magic Negro" during his radio program.

Nor has he been reluctant to use eliminationist language on his show towards liberals and Democrats, and anyone else he deems worthy of his scorn, from feminazis to AIDS patients. But this is a new low, calling for specific incidents of violence at a major political party's convention. The man who cheered on the mass arrests of peaceful demonstrators (and innocent bystanders) at the 2004 Republican Convention, who gloried in the news that we were torturing the bad guys at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib (even as he cynically refused to call it torture), now wants to see riots. Now encourages riots.

And how many of his flock of wingnut sheep will take the opportunity to become agents provocateur in Denver? How many will attempt to ignite the very violence for which Limbaugh is an advocate? We already know that his listeners have participated Operation Chaos, where he commanded them to vote in Democratic primaries for Hillary Clinton so that the nomination battle between Obama and Clinton would continue, and thus weaken the Democratic Party's chances in the Fall. This is merely the next step in his attempt to influence the elections.

With all the problems facing this country, most if not all of them the result of the Republican party's domination of all three branches of our government, but especially the executive branch, this is what prominent conservatives promote. Chaos, violence, hate, bigotry and eternal war. Our soldiers and Iraqis are dying every day, food shortages are occurring around the globe (even in the United States), energy and food prices are on the rise, unemployment is up as are foreclosures, and our financial system teeters on the brink of a calamitous fall, and this is what Rush Limbaugh spends his time pontificating about.

He's the right wing media's version of Emperor Nero, divorced from reality, fiddling while less fortunate Americans than himself, fat and happy with the millions of dollars generated by his caustic brew of hatred, spite and ill will, slowly burn. Ten percent of Ohioans are on food stamps and he merrily calls for riots at the Democratic convention. What kind of man does such a thing? For there is a word that describes this type of person and I don't mean sociopath, for that gives Rush an out, makes his foul deeds the result of a diminished moral capacity. No, the word is one any right-wing conservative ought to recognize since they use it themselves so often. That word is traitor. Rush Limbaugh is an evil toad and a traitor to democracy, to our Constitution and to our nation. He doesn't participate in the violence he glorifies, but he is its primary advocate on the right, and for Bush's wars as well. So convinced of the righteousness of "his cause" he willingly appeals to the worst sides of our nature, hoping to inspire others to do the deeds he lacks the spine to do himself.

In that way he is not much different than Osama bin Laden. Both have their devoted, fanatical followers, both are extremists, and both believe that violence in pursuit of their cherished ideals is a "right deed" as the Stoics would say. Both promote wars that kill thousands.

The biggest difference? Rush doesn't have to live in hiding. He can live the "good life" of the top .0001 % of the wealthiest Americans, even going on "sex tours" to poverty-stricken countries with bags of Viagra to assist his enjoyment of all the delectable young girls available to perverts like himself. He can illegally obtain and abuse prescription narcotics, yet avoid any prosecution for his crimes. Yes, it's a wonderful life if you are Rush Limbaugh, knowing he is completely free from the consequences of his actions, no matter how heinous they may be.

Too bad for the rest of us we are not so lucky.


Inciting a riot is a felony
in nearly every state, including Colorado. Will Limbloat be prosecuted, even if they happen? Don't count on it.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Slogging on

And slugging it out for another month and half, perhaps longer.

Fifty-five -- forty-five is a number that breathes another wisp into Mrs. Clinton's sails, while not helping her in the delegate count enough to make her continuing campaign anything but that of a spoiler.

(The) margin in Pennsylvania was probably not sufficient to alter the basic dynamics of the race, but it made clear that the contest will continue.


The media meme became all about the point spread and the over/under was seven or eight points, even as much as ten. So Clinton met those expectations, and the result is that Obama's inability to land the knockout blow is officially a sign of weakness. Since Iowa, he shows little ability to attract white voters with incomes under $50,000, the so-called blue-collar voter. These are likely the people -- also known by their aged label of Reagan Democrats -- who would abandon him in the fall.

If that's not enough cause for concern ...

“This is exactly what I was afraid was going to happen,” said Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat who has not endorsed anyone in the race. “They are going to just keep standing there and pounding each other and bloodying each other, and no one is winning. It underlines the need to find some way to bring this to conclusion.”

And:

“We have problems going both ways, but that is going to get healed,” saiid Joe Trippi, who was a senior adviser to the presidential campaign of John Edwards, who quit the race earlier this year. “If it doesn’t get healed, we have problems.”

Next up: Indiana and North Carolina on May 6. Speaking of both Edwards and NC, Howard Fineman stated (during MSNBC's election coverage) that Elizabeth Edwards would be campaing with Hillary in North Carolina. Take that for what you wish, but my perception is that, if accurate, it changes the game to Clinton's advantage in a state where Obama is expected to make up for the delegate-count and popular-vote losses he suffered last night.

Update (from elsewhere around the 'sphere): Since Greg brought it up, I wonder what the internals are on the Dunder-Mifflin voting bloc. Martha and Bradley are celebrating -- and soliciting; Neil and jobsanger point out the obvious. Hal live-blogged the results. And Jerome has nine suggestions for both campaigns in the post-Pennsylvania wrap-up.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Happy EarthDay


Earth Day -- April 22 -- each year marks the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970.

Among other things, 1970 in the United States brought with it the Kent State shootings, the advent of fiber optics, "Bridge Over Troubled Water," Apollo 13, the Beatles' last album, the death of Jimi Hendrix, the birth of Mariah Carey, and the meltdown of fuel rods in the Savannah River nuclear plant near Aiken, South Carolina -- an incident not acknowledged for 18 years.

It was into such a world that the very first Earth Day was born.

Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson, then a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, proposed the first nationwide environmental protest "to shake up the political establishment and force this issue onto the national agenda. " "It was a gamble," he recalls, "but it worked."

At the time, Americans were slurping leaded gas through massive V8 sedans. Industry belched out smoke and sludge with little fear of legal consequences or bad press. Air pollution was commonly accepted as the smell of prosperity. Environment was a word that appeared more often in spelling bees than on the evening news.

Earth Day 1970 turned that all around.



Here's information on Earth Day at the Houston Zoo.