Disorderly Content

I thought I was past outrage at politicians and their tendencies toward mendacity. But I guess I'm not, or at least that I underestimate their capacity for invention. I refer to President Obama's not-State of the Union speech, and the Republican response from that rising star, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. During his response, which can be appreciated only for the hamfisted crapfest it was, Jindal told a powerful anecdote about government bureaucracy run amok during the Katrina disaster and how he backed up the local sheriff when he told those same bureaucrats to stuff it. Except... turns out it didn't happen. And we know it didn't happen because the sheriff, now sadly deceased, didn't tell the story the way the Gov did. And because the Gov was nowhere near New Orleans at the time the events happened or, in this case, didn't happen. But why let that stop him? Making stuff up worked so well for President Reagan, who never could tell the difference between movies and real life. And if Republicans are going to keep invoking Reagan as the epitome of all that is good and holy in public policy (ignoring a few inconvenient details like Iran Contra, the state of the economy and ballooning deficits), then why not emulate his tendency toward fiction?

Gosh, Bobby. You're almost as entertaining as Sarah Palin...

It's a small thing, but maybe a sign of what's to come. Kottke.org points out that with the new administration we have a new robots.txt file for the White House website. The old one had more than two thousand lines of exclusions from search engines; the new one has one. Think they'll be more transparent than the old gang about more than their website?

The White House website gets updated.

What's the fun of kicking Conservatives, when they're so busy doing it themselves? From Talking Points Memo we have The Top Dozen Insights of Conservatives, 2008. Read them and weep. Or laugh. I plan to do both.

I first discovered Neal Gabler when he and Jeffrey Lyons attempted to replace Siskel and Ebert on PBS, an experiment that was mercifully brief. I next ran into him through his wonderful book, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood, which explains the movie business's origins in Yiddish theater and its audience amongst the lowest of the low. One of his more interesting claims was that the Hollywood Blacklist was as much anti-semitic as it was anti-Communist, perhaps even more. Gabler returns to the era of McCarthy and the Witch Hunt to explain the basis for the modern Republican Party. In an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times, he draws a line not from Barry Goldwater's abortive 1964 campaign but instead that selfsame Senator Joe McCarthy. If he's right, we haven't seen the last of vicious slime like Sarah Palin, even as I expect Heronner and the First Dude to fade from sight before much more time has elapsed.

This is proof positive that a picture really is worth a thousand words. Beautiful.

As I type this, ABC is calling 297 electoral votes for Senator, now President-elect, Obama. God, I can't believe I just wrote that. It feels amazingly good, not just because the better man won but because he did it by following the high road. John McCain became George Bush in his attempt to pull out a win. No, he became worse than even George Bush and Turd Blossom ever dared, and there wasn't much they wouldn't do. And that will be his legacy.

As for our new President-to-be, I know we're going to have moments of disappointment and frustration. The honeymoon won't last. But at least we can hope for inclusiveness and honor. And, if the Senator from Arizona will forgive the use of his catchphrase, at last some straight talk.

(Thanks to Joho the Blog for the link.)

I'm a procrastinator, but not about voting. Truth be told, I stopped down at the county offices a couple of weeks ago and cast my ballot. But now I'm not so sure I did the right thing. These guys have me thinking that maybe I should have given McCain my vote. It's kind of a mitzvah.

If you haven't voted yet, rush out and do so. It's important, even if you're leaning toward the other guys.

After all the claims of how ACORN was perpetrating the greatest voter fraud in election history, it's entertaining to read that such rhetoric is based on a singular lack of anything resembling proof. As reported in ProPublica, McCain advisor Ronald Michaelson admits as much:

“Do we have a documented instance of voting fraud that resulted from a phony registration form? No, I can’t cite one, chapter and verse."

Not one? Isn't at least a little evidence a minimum requirement for policies that will disenfranchise thousands of voters? I guess not.

Sent to me by a friend. It isn't often that one of these email things is worth passing along. This is one of those times...

Dear Red States:

If you manage to steal this election too we've decided we're leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood.

We get Intel and Microsoft. You get WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss.

We get 85% of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama.

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22% lower than the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms.

Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't show pictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq , and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80% of the country's fresh water, more than 90% of the pineapple and lettuce, 92% of the nation's fresh fruit, 95% of America's quality wines, 90% of all cheese, 90% of the high tech industry, 95% of the corn and soybeans (thanks Iowa!), most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88% of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92% of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100% of the tornadoes, 90% of the hurricanes, 99% of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100% of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38% of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62% believe life is sacred unless we're discussing the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44% say that evolution is only a theory, 53% that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61% of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals then we lefties.

Finally, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they grow in Mexico.

Peace out,

Blue States

If any of your McCainiac friends try to convince you that Joe Biden's misstatements are a big deal, point 'em at this:

Geeze, that's gotta hurt...

I went down to the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters at lunch today and cast my ballot. Why wait until the last minute, especially when the day job might call me out of town unexpectedly? So I was feeling satisfied about my participation in the process when I read this post in the Huffington Post. Read it, and tell me if it doesn't suddenly get dusty in the room.

It's twoo, it's twoo, the Republicans were right all along! And not a small fry either, as The Los Angeles Times reports.

What a pity he wasn't committing fraud for the Democrats...

Update 10/20: The RNC had to cancel a press conference about voter fraud in New Mexico after ACORN was able to show that the 28 supposedly fraudulent voters were in fact nothing of the kind. (Thanks to TMP Muckraker for the story.) Obviously somebody at the RNC failed to get the memo from the California Repubs: the only way to be sure there's fraud is to pay for it yourself!

I had a pretty loud disagreement with a couple of my coworkers after the first Presidential debate. The subject was Barack Obama's performance, and whether he was tough enough on John McCain. They argued that it was foolish in a debate to agree with your opponent, that you never, ever give any ground. I wasn't so sure. No, I lie; I thought they were dead wrong. By agreeing before he stated his points of disagreement, Obama was showing a willingness to find common ground. It was, and here's a word I haven't heard in a while, statesmanlike.

But it was also more. It was, as Marlene H. Phillips' article in The Huffington Post suggests, what is required of a black man who would be accepted in a (mostly) white world. She compares Obama to Jackie Robinson, and points out that it wasn't just Robinson's skill and drive as a baseball player that permitted him to break the color barrier; it was also his dignity in the face of the hostility and abuse that would accompany his notoriety. It was essential that Jackie Robinson be better, calmer, more serene, more dignified than white players to be acceptable to a white audience. And it is just as essential for Barack Obama to be accepted and approved of as President by a largely white electorate, both during the campaign and, as looks increasingly likely, after he takes office. It's not remotely fair, but it's necessary. I'm just pleased to see that he's up for the challenge.

If Richard Nixon was defeated by the advent of television debates back in 1960, we may remember the 2008 election as the advent of YouTube. Case in point, some of John McCain's greatest hits from last night:

YouTube: the gift that keeps on giving...

How can I argue with Hayden Panettiere? She's adorable, and she supports John McCain.

Okay, maybe only one of those is true...

It wouldn't be the first time I've flogged a deceased equine, but I have to admit to a fascination for the trainwreck that is Sarah Palin. This latest incident comes from her interview with that terrifying muckraking journalist, Katie Couric. Couric, ambusher she is, had the nerve to ask journalism major Palin what newspapers and magazines she reads. Palin's quick and clever reply: most of them. But Couric wasn't done. Having set her trap, now she sprung it.

"What specifically?", she asked.
"Um, all of them."
"Can you name a few?"

And believe it or not, she couldn't. Not one. Not a single newspaper or magazine. Not the Times, or the Journal, or the Post, or the local Anchorage paper, or Time or Newsweek or USA Today. This Woman Who Would Be Veep couldn't come up with a single news source, likely because she doesn't read a single one.

Amazing.

Paul Krugman lets John McCain tell you why he's exactly the worst possible candidate for this moment in time:

"Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation."

Yep, can't argue with all that innovation in banking. We'll be paying for it for generations...

While watching Democratic convention coverage while waiting for my flight home tonight: does anyone else think that Caroline Kennedy is what Ann Coulter would look like if she had a soul?

How am I supposed to feel about scamming fundraisers, when the people they're scamming thoroughly deserve it?

What more is there to say?

I was using the Merriam-Webster dictionary site a moment ago, in response to an online debate about whether an assassin is evil if he enjoys killing rather than merely goes ahead with it. I wanted to draw a distinction between a psychopath who enjoys killing and a sociopath who feels nothing either way about the life of another. So imagine my surprise to discover that at least according to M-W, there's no difference: they define sociopath and psychopath as synonyms, and sociopathic as covering both antisocial and asocial behavior. Live and learn, I guess.

But that's not what caused me to blog. No, that was the McCain For President banner ad taking up a lot of space on the listing for sociopathic. I'm sure that's just a coincidence.

I watch the Hillary Clinton campaign with mixed feelings: largely bemusement mixed with disbelief and growing contempt. How can one so Democratic be so determinedly undemocratic? After everyone agreed that Michigan and Florida would be punished for moving their primaries up, Hillary and her advisors seem willing to leave no stone unturned (and we all know what's under those stones) to violate that agreement. The latest comes via Talking Points Memo, and concerns Harold Ickes' suggestion that by coopting a majority of the Credentials Committee at the convention, she could force through a rules change and get the delegates seated. This of course comes after remarks from her campaign staff that the will of the voters doesn't really matter; after all, what does winning primaries prove anyway?

My appreciation, and indeed my respect, for both Clintons has been withering away since this campaign started. As in a limbo contest, the chorus keeps repeating, "How low can you go?" And I keep wondering how much of a party will be left if Hillary has her way. I can't ever imagine voting for John McCain, but sitting the election out? Suddenly that's a real possibility.

Mike Huckabee is a postive guy. He's so positive that he can't bring himself to run a negative ad targeting Mitt Romney, although he did show the ad to the collected press to make sure they knew how negative he wasn't being. Which I guess is the point of this blog post by Robert J. Elisberg of the Huffington Post, which explains how he wrote and then discarded a negative piece about Mr. Huckabee, and of course had to include the discarded post so we'd all know how negative he almost was. You can't ask for fairer than that, can you?

Stephen Collins (yes, that preacher guy from 7th Heaven) blogs an interesting and frightening factoid on his Huffington Post blog: the percentage of Americans who approve of George Bush is the same percentage who think Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream. That number, in case you haven't been paying attention, is 28%. Which is too high for comfort in both cases.

"America, America, oh how I fear for thee..."

In case you're still unclear on the whole Ironic thing, this is ironic. Rain on your wedding day, not so much.

If you've been trying to make sense of the Department of Justice, both in their handling of the US Attorney purge and in general, there's an article on Law.com that goes a long way to explaining how we got to where we are. Daniel Metcalfe, a senior DOJ attorney who retired a few months ago, explains how the Bushies and the career attorneys work together, and how they don't. It's a cautionary tale for a whole bunch of reasons, not least as a lesson in what happens when you put children in charge of adults.

Ronald Reagan asked the question. Well, Fredric March asked it first, in The Bridges at Toko-Ri, but I won't quibble. Given the antics (for lack of a more venomous word) of the Bush Administration, one can only ask that same question, albeit with a difference in tone. But now we have an answer, at least as applies to the Department of Justice. Where do we find such men? We find them at Regent University, Pat Robertson's response to a legal education establishment that values competence and legal orthodoxy over... well... orthodoxy. Yes, it's true; the Bush Administration has hired 150 graduates from Pat Robertson's concept of law and justice. 'Splains a lot, don't it?

But read Bill Maher on the subject. He's both wittier and much, much angrier about this rewarding of loyalty over ability (to say nothing of morality) than I could ever be over one more proof point that if you aren't heartsick, you just aren't paying attention.

Sent to me by a friend; the original is at www.adbuzz.com/bushbuzz.htm: