The Worst of Humanity

I know secondhand the seriousness of blood clots because some close to me suffers from them.  They are a serious medical condition, regardless of their location.  I don't believe I have a right to claim moral superiority because of connection to someone who suffers from that condition, or that I would have such a right if I suffered from it myself.

In any event, It's not possible to think less of Glenn Reynolds than I already do.

The Special Relationship

Margaret Thatcher and Jimmy Saville

Gun Fight at the K Street Corral

A gun is introduced in the first act: 

Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.

The coup lasted all of six days. By Sept. 10, Armey was gone — with a promise of $8 million — and the five ousted employees were back. The force behind their return was Richard J. Stephenson, a reclusive Illinois millionaire who has exerted increasing control over one of Washington’s most influential conservative grass-roots organizations.
...
“This was two weeks after there had been a shooting at the Family Research Council,” said one junior staff member who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. “So when a man with a gun who didn’t identify himself to me or other people on staff, and a woman I’d never seen before said there was an announcement, my first gut was, ‘Is FreedomWorks in danger?’ It was bizarre.’ ”

Bottom line: After Dead-Dick Dick's armed takeover, the wingnut who owns the Cancer Treatment Centers of America promised Dick $400K a year for 20 years to return the reins of impotence to Matt Kibbe.

Maybe the unnamed aide can share a cell with David Gregory.

via LGM.

Update:  Simple arithmetic corrected.

Fools and Their Money

Romneybot/National Reviewdomite Kevin Hassett, speaking of his love of America:

That prompted a tall, extremely tanned blonde named Kay, from Old Greenwich, Connecticut, to ask Hassett, the co-­author of the 1999 book Dow 36,000, “So what do we do with our money?”

He recommended investing in real estate in another country, maybe in Central America somewhere. A woman to Kay’s right wrinkled her nose: How about a Western country? “Okay, if Europe is what you want, go to Poland,” he said optimistically. “Go to Krakow, buy a house for $50,000, and it’s going to be like Paris in a few years.”

As we drained the Pinot Noir, Hassett gave his audience the insider’s view of the Romney campaign, describing how its election-monitoring software crashed on November 6 and Obama was probably behind it, “because those guys are so evil.”

The table grumbled in assent.

“The thing we have to understand is, these are people who don’t have any morals,” said Hassett. “They’ll do anything. I’m one of their No. 1 targets. I mean, they really want me bad.”

Read the whole thing, if only to find out who wore "lime-green pants embroidered with pink swordfish and [a] navy polo shirt with white piping on the collar."

And enjoy the veal.  NR already did.

King William's College General Knowledge Paper 2012

Enjoy.

It's Very Far

Moneychangers Win The Templeton

So who should win this year's Templeton?

The John M.Templeton Biblical Values Award is named after John M. Templeton who answered God’s call to intertwine his work as a money manager and his Christian faith. By using his investing talents to helping [sic] ordinary people and practicing biblical values in the market place, John M. Templeton serves as a model to all business executives of faith.

The John M. Templeton Biblical Values Award is given annually to the nationally recognized business executive who most fully integrates Biblical values and work.

Mitt Romney, Dan Cathy, Sheldon Adelson....  This year's competition seems especially tough.

You can vote in comments, or at the link above.

Grand Old Police Blotter: BYUOB Edition

Crapo drinks Maypo and Cuervo, gets blotto:

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — Senator Michael D. Crapo of Idaho was arrested early Sunday and charged with driving under the influence in a suburb of Washington, D.C., the authorities said.

Mr. Crapo, a Republican, was pulled over after his vehicle ran a red light, the police in Alexandria said. He failed field sobriety tests and was arrested about 12:45 a.m., said a police spokesman, Jody Donaldson, and then was taken to the Alexandria jail and released on an unsecured $1,000 bond about 5 a.m.

The police said Mr. Crapo, who was alone in his vehicle, had registered a blood alcohol content of 0.11 percent. The legal limit in Virginia is 0.08 percent.
...

In Congress, Mr. Crapo has built a reputation as a staunch social and fiscal conservative. It has been expected that he would take over the top Republican spot next year on the Senate Banking Committee.
...

Mr. Crapo grew up in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and was named a bishop in the Mormon Church at age 31.

He is a lawyer who graduated from Brigham Young University and Harvard Law School.

Eeing a Mormon Republican seems like a good reason to drink, but that's no excuse for getting behind the wheel.

The Contest for Stupidest Romney Has Now Closed

“He wanted to be president less than anyone I’ve met in my life. He had no desire to . . . run,” said Tagg, who worked with his mother, Ann, to persuade his father to seek the presidency. “If he could have found someone else to take his place . . . he would have been ecstatic to step aside. He is a very private person who loves his family deeply and wants to be with them, but he has deep faith in God and he loves his country, but he doesn’t love the attention.”

Either Taggg thinnks someone is stupid enough to believe this story, or Tagggg believes it himself.  Either way, Taggggg is now officially the stupidest Romney ever.

Lush In Pissing Match With Corpse

The wingnut blogosphere's Golden Shower Goddess has filed suit against a necrophiliac enthusiasts' website, Breitbart.com:

The suit says that difficulties managing the Breitbart “media 'empire'” or ideological conflicts or both had spiked the working relationship, creating a “increasingly hostile” work environment. When Loesch tried to terminate her work agreement in September, Breitbart refused and extended the agreement by a year, the suit says.

Breitbart.cοm LLC refuses to allow her work to be published and “sabotages” her attempts to find work elsewhere, the suit says.

The suit basically alleges that the Loesch's access to the Breitbart sites have been cut off, and that she has therefore been denied the opportunity "to earn a living as an Internet editor or otherwise." But the complaint is evasive as to whether the Loesch is being paid per her contract, and does not allege a count for breach of contract. It thus appears that Corpsebart.com LLC is paying her but refusing to publish her yellow journalism, or let her edit its other crap, and she wants out for a better paying gig. (Is WhizBang! still around?) Although paying her to do nothing wouldn't be denying her the opportunity "to earn a living as an Internet editor or otherwise."

If the lawsuit doesn't work out, she can always piss on Breitbart's corpse. 

Update (12/22):  Confidential to Rick Moran and the Daily Choler -- Lush isn't suing "for $75,000," her shyster's reciting the magic words to get into federal district court.  (And the magic words are "in excess of $75,000.")  As to whether Lush's hack has done it correctly, if Corpsebart hires a mouthpiece with more brains than Ben Shapiro, she or he chould have some fun with the pleading filed by Lush's hack.

The Neocon Smear Machine

Robert Wright on the Neocon Smear Machine:

I should have put "pro-Israel" in quotes, because, as I've said again and again, people who are "pro-Israel" in a right-wing sense of the term favor policies that are, in my view, bad for Israel. And that's especially true of the group I'm talking about now: not neocons in general (many of whom are honorable people who fight clean and don't make ad hominem attacks), but the subset of neocons (Kristol, Rubin, Stephens, et. al.) who try not just to counter arguments they disagree with but to stigmatize the people who make them. This subset of neocons -- the neocon smear machine -- has long prevented an open and honest American discussion of Israel, and as a result America, the country with the most influence over Israel, has indulged Israel's worst, most self-destructive tendencies.
...

In case you don't know who Abe Foxman is, he's the guy who believes that, though Jews can build synagogues wherever they want, and Christians can build churches wherever they want, Muslims shouldn't build mosques wherever they want. (This may sound like a bigoted position, but it's grounded in respect for relatives of 9/11 victims, whose anguish, says Foxman, "entitles them to positions that others would categorize as irrational or bigoted.")

The other thing you should know about Foxman is that he's head of the Anti-Defamation League. So far as I can tell, that means he's opposed to defamation unless the target is (1) a Muslim who aspires to build a mosque in the wrong place; or (2) someone whose views on Israel don't meet with his approval -- in which case he'll personally do the defaming.

The only thing Wright doesn't mention is that the Neocon Smear Machine is financed in substantial part by anti-Semites like Rupert Murdoch.  Which is one reason why I say that people like Bret Stephens aren't pro-Israel, they're only interested in their own power and influence.

Robert Bork has died.

How Can You Tell When The NRA Is Lying?

Its p.r. flack is writing:

"Out of respect for the families, and as a matter of common decency, we have given time for mourning, prayer and a full investigation of the facts before commenting:"

How much respect and decency does the NRA have?

This much:

While the NRA has not responded to media inquiries and stopped all social media activity, NRA News, a show owned and operated by the NRA, has continued to broadcast online. The topic of the broadcasts has been the Newtown shooting, and hosts and guests alike have said directly that the shooting should not be blamed on guns.

... 

"I don't think the issue is an issue; I don't think the issue is parenting, or Hollywood, or guns, or rap music, or young men.... It is the foundational stuff... whether it's a lack of love, a lack of empathy for others, an apathy," Edwards said.

On Monday, NRA News host Ginny Simone led her program with "the national debate about the need for tougher gun laws," during which both she and her guest, National Review columnist John Fund, stuck to anti-gun control talking points.ore commenting.

The NRA spent most of the past weekend communicating with their whores, ordering them to lay low and reminding them what happened to Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock when they spoke their minds.

More on McArdle

For those who are stupid enough to believe that Meeeegan McArdle can tell the Constitution from the holes in her head, but not too stupid to read altogether, this article will be of considerable assistance.

Money quote: 

“Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill,” Justice Scalia added. Government buildings in general could still ban guns. And the court said it had no quarrel with “laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.”

It hardly needs to be explained to anyone of average intelligence that there is nothing in the United States Constitution which forbids legislation prohibiting people licensed to own and use a firearm from selling, giving or bequeathing that firearm to a person who is not licensed to do so (the examples given being felons and the mentally ill). 

Your first clue that McArdle doesn't know what she is talking about is that she can't bother to get simple facts straight from news articles written at a fourth grade level, even though that is part of her job.  McArdle is no more capable of understanding a Supreme Court opinion than she is of writing a blog post which doesn't demonstrate what a dolt she is, at great length.

Update (12/19):  Link fixed.

Pisher Stephens

Right-wing toochis lecher Bret Stephens has set his sights on former United States Senator Chuck Hagel because Hagel took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Stephens simpers:

"I'm a United States Senator, not an Israeli Senator," Mr. [sic] Hagel told retired U.S. diplomat Aaron David Miller in 2006. "I'm a United States Senator. I support Israel. But my first interest is I take an oath of office to the Constitution of the United States. Not to a president. Not a party. Not to Israel. If I go run for Senate in Israel, I'll do that."

Read these staccato utterances again to better appreciate their insipid and insinuating qualities, all combining to cast the usual slur on Jewish-Americans: Dual loyalty. Nobody questions Mr. Hagel's loyalty. He is only making those assertions to question the loyalty of others.

Hagel's statement is so unremarkable it's unremarkable.  He's not describing anyone else; he's not speaking about Jewish-Americans.  (Everywhere I see this quote, I never see the question or statement to which Hagel is responding.  How convenient.)  Perhaps Stephens can explain who Hagel's criticizing with "Not to a president.  Not to a party." -- All presidential voters?  All partisans?

The real reason Pisher Stephens hates Hagel is because Hagel doesn't show single loyalty to the neocon death cult agenda. Stephens isn't loyal to any country in the sense of wanting what's good for any country.  Like almost every other Smacky winner, he only cares about ensuring that others fight the wars he fantasizes about.  

John Judis explains the source of Pisher's malice:

The attempt by the Republican Jewish Coalition and The Weekly Standard, which still holds a special grudge against Hagel for opposing the Iraq war, may not succeed in derailing Hagel’s nomination. AIPAC has been quiet to date on Hagel’s potential nomination, and J Street, its liberal counterpart, has actively backed Hagel, who spoke at its 2009 conference. So has Aaron David Miller. [The Staccato Code is imperceptible to the human ear -- RA]  One key indicator of Hagel’s chances at confirmation will be whether John McCain speaks out in his favor. The two men used to be very friendly –Hagel was the co-chair of McCain’s presidential campaign during 2000 – but fell out over the Iraq war. If McCain backs Hagel, then Obama may be willing to risk the controversy that the pro-Netanyahu groups are likely to foment. But if the Republicans coalesce against Hagel, as they did against Susan Rice, Obama may worry that the nomination fight will overshadow his efforts to evade the fiscal cliff.

Peter Beinart piles on:

A guy named Ronald Reagan said so in 1981, when AIPAC and the Israeli government were lobbying against America’s sale of AWACS surveillance planes to Saudi Arabia. “It is not the business of other nations to make American foreign policy decisions,” Reagan told the press. Was Reagan implying that AIPAC—a largely Jewish organization—was doing the business of “other nations” and thus disloyal to the United States? Luckily for the Gipper, Stephens didn’t write a column back then.

Again, it's all about single loyalty.  Stephens doesn't give a fuck about the people of Israel, and he certainly wouldn't fight for them.  He's all about shutting up people who oppose his lunatic fringe war agenda. 

Shut Up and Learn to Die With It

Apropos of my last post, Meeegan McArdle has raised her empty head and spewed the following:

Lanza seems to have been fond of violent video games, and spent hours playing them.

What does this even mean?  Hours per what?  Day?  Week?  Lifetime?  And McArdle offers no evidence, no link, to support her claim.  The linked WSJ article says he was a frequent customer at GameStop; it does not disclose his purchases. The claim appears to derive from a couple of U.K. e-rags (not cited by McArdle) which offer no source for the assertion.

Based on that alone, the Deadly Beast has committed media malpractice and deserves to disappear from the face of the web.

Of course, there's more.

Lanza tried and failed to buy a gun, presumably for use in the attack.  Lanza's mother seems to have been the registered owner of the guns he had, and may have been killed to get her guns. 

Again, no proof of any of this.  Reports from authorities are that Mrs. Lanza was found in her bed with multiple gunshot wounds to her head from one of her own guns.  Yet McArdle wants her readers to believe that Mrs. Lanza's son dispatched her by some means not involving a firearm, then gained access her guns and desecrated her corpse with a few rounds to the head.  

More:

Lanza shot everyone at least three times, according to the medical examiner.  If anyone tried to play dead, a commonly recommended strategy, it didn't work.  

If only those 6 and 7 year olds had thought strategically.  And, again, the reports are to the contrary.

McArdle claims it "br[oke] my heart to even type those details."  Imagine how she'd feel if she'd tried for accuracy.

She also omits other details, such as Mrs. Lanza's trips to the shooting range to encourage her  troubled son to handle lethal weaponry.  All in all, McArdle appears to be making large parts of the story up for her own purpose -- which is to argue against gun regulation.

You see, Adam Lanza was not only an "anxious sad sack" but also an unstoppable killing machine:

He had all the mental health resources he needed [sic] -- and he did it anyway. The law stopped him from buying a gun [sic] --and he did it [sic] anyway. The school had an intercom system aimed at stopping unauthorized entry -- and he did it anyway.

And if you can't stop one particular person, then there's no reason to even try to pass a law which might address some other circumstance.  Just shut the fuck up and learn to play dead.

We couldn't, for instance, make it a crime for a person licensed to own or carry a firearm to provide access to a weapon to a person who wasn't licensed to do so, or a minor, or an incompetent person.  We couldn't also legislate civil penalties, and impose liability, for such a thing.  (The right to keep and bear arms includes the right to give them away to any felon or nut - look it up.)  We tried something like that with vehicles, and no unlicensed person or minor was ever deterred from driving because of such laws.  Never happened; never will.  

Meeegan knows that won't work, so she doesn't even mention it.

But she is generous enough to offers a solution that don't interfere with her libertarian pals'  holy jollies.

My guess is that we're going to get a law anyway, and my hope is that it will consist of small measures that might have some tiny actual effect, like restrictions on magazine capacity.  I'd also like us to encourage people to gang rush shooters, rather than following their instincts to hide; if we drilled it into young people that the correct thing to do is for everyone to instantly run at the guy with the gun, these sorts of mass shootings would be less deadly, because even a guy with a very powerful weapon can be brought down by 8-12 unarmed bodies piling on him at once.  Would it work?  Would people do it?  I have no idea; all I can say is that both these things would be more effective than banning rifles with pistol grips [sic].  

You know, with this new fangled social networking, I'd bet it's just as easy to round up a flash mob of bum rushers as it is to gather a group of libertarian tw*ts to prance around the Jefferson Memorial. 

We can also slash public education budgets even further, so any future Adam Lanza will think twice before risking the risk the wrath of an overcrowded classroom.  

Profit!

We Have to Put Future Procreation By Republicans On The Table

This article asserts that both of Adam Lanza's parents were/are Republicans.  (It's from the Telegraph, so who knows if it's true.)  So where is the call for a conversation about the role Republican copulation plays in our culture of violence?

The same article also asserts that Adam Lanza was a fan of violent video games.  No evidence is offered.  Lanza left school in the tenth grade, probably four or more years ago.  He reportedly is a loner with no friends and an aversion to social interaction.  His mother is dead, and his father and brother aren't talking.  No one has found an online presence.  Reportedly, a/the computer in his home was trashed, and police aren't saying what they found, if anything, in the home.  I haven't seen the claim that Lanza was into violent video games attributed to anyone (either with a name given, or speaking anonymously).  

It seems that the people currently talking about video games and "Hollywood" (purveyors of such products as this and many like it) are playing one of two angles: Either they want to distract people from gun legislation, or they figure gun legislation is inevitable and want their pet hard-on to ride its coattails on a wave of "do something."  Examples of these folks are Tom Ridge (see below), Joe Scarborough, Chuck Todd and Nooners.

Apart from the lack of a connection to the present matter, the focus on video games and popular culture is wrong for a more fundamental reason.  People, mentally ill and not, kill based on the Bible all the time.  See, Andrea Yates, Scott Roeder, David Koresh, George W. Bush, &c.  The Bible doesn't make them kill any more than video games make people kill. (It might be argued give people better hand-to-eye coordination, but nothing beats the skillbuilding you get from a trip to the shooting range with mom.)  So get back to me about video games, Chuckles and  Morning Joe, when the next items on your hit list are "the Bible" and "the Glenn Beck Show."

Like video games and other words and images, guns don't cause people to shoot other people.  Unlike video games, guns propel projectiles which can destroy human organs rapidly, from a wide variety of distances.  Which is why children should be protected from guns and their users by society as a whole, and from crap video games and television and movies from their parents and guardians.

Separated At Birth

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei; Governor Mike Huckabee

(link)

God was in Sandy Hook Elementary School. This is something dicks like Huckabee refuse to understand.

Background: here.

Latest Victims of the Video Game Industry, According to Former Director of Homeland Security Tom Ridge

Charlotte Bacon, 6

Daniel Barden, 7

Olivia Engel, 6

Josephine Gay, 7

Ana Marquez-Greene, 6

Dylan Hockley, 6

Madeleine Hsu, 6

Catherine Hubbard, 6

Chase Kowalski, 7

Jesse Lewis, 6

James Mattioli, 6

Grace McDonnell, 7

Emilie Parker, 6

Jack Pinto, 6

Noah Pozner, 6

Caroline Previdi, 6

Jessica Rekos, 6

Avielle Richman, 6

Benjamin Wheeler, 6

Allison Wyatt, 6


Rachel Davino, 29

TEACHER

Dawn Hochsprung, 47

SCHOOL PRINCIPAL


Nancy Lanza, 52

MOTHER OF GUNMAN


Anne Marie Murphy, 52

TEACHER

Lauren Rousseau, 30

TEACHER


Mary Sherlach, 56

SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGIST


Victoria Soto, 27

TEACHER

(Ridge statement here.)

Terrible News Today

Flipping through last night's cable coverage of the massacre in Connecticut, I saw that FOX News's coverage was relatively sane (admittedly I only saw a few minutes at a time).  Hannity and Van Susteren didn't have on any of the usual talking assholes who are their regular guests, and their presentations focused on facts.  (I've read FOX also had on that inbred cracker Mike Huckabee, who believes that a well-off Connecticut suburb is a hotbed of Satanism, whose brats deserve to die.)  But the usual fantasies of union thugs, evil teachers, FEMA camps &c. were not on obvious display last night. 

 Most likely, the dolts at FOX aren't bright enough to make that stuff up on the fly, during a breaking news event, and they'll be back wallowing in the sewers with the right-wing bloggers by Sabbath's end.  I won't be surprised to see Steven Crowder in Newtown, attempt to "dialogue" with grieving parents by shoving them come Monday morning.  For now, though, the cretins may just be following their boss's orders:

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has called on United States lawmakers to ban automatic weapons following the Connecticut school massacre, alluding to Australia's response to the Port Arthur massacre.

The News Corp chairman used the social media platform Twitter to express frustration at the easy availability of automatic and semi-automatic guns in his adopted country.

'Terrible news today,' he tweeted. 'When will politicians find courage to ban automatic weapons? As in Oz after similar tragedy.'

One could point out that the aged lizard hasn't used his American organs to promote such an agenda -- just the opposite.  FOX has used, and almost certainly will again use, the spectre of a gun grab to elect and re-elect Republican candiates.  However, even a stopped dick can be right twice a day.  People of conscience should follow Rupert's advice and vote all the NRA whores, of both parties, out of office.  

Here's God's divine plan, according to Mike Huckabee: 

Medical Examiner H. Wayne Carver II spoke with reporters on Saturday afternoon and said that all of the victims have been identified. He said that most of the schoolchildren who died were first graders and died of multiple gunshot wounds....

The children: Charlotte Bacon, Daniel Barden, Olivia Engel, Joseph Gay, Ana M. Marquez-Greene, Dylan Hockley, Madeleine F. Hsu, Catherine V. Hubbard. Chase Kowalski, Jesse Lewis, James Mattioli, Grace McDonnell, Emilie Parker, Jack Pinto, Noah Pozner, Caroline Previdi, Jessica Rekos, Avielle Richman, Benjamin Wheeler, Allison N. Wyatt.

The staff: Rachel Davino, Dawn Hochsprung, Anne Marie Murphy, Lauren Rosseau, Mary Sherlach, Victoria Soto.

Update (12/16): Another explanation is that FOX & NRA & Friends are running scared.  Wishful thinking?  I hope not.

Update II (12/17): Eric Boehlert documents FOX's history as an organ of the NRA.

You Don't Need More Evidence That Glenn Reynolds Is A Worthless Piece of Shit

But here it is anyway.

Because There Are No Reasons

Don't kid yourself.  There will never be a cure for all mental illnesses and we will never stop mentally ill people from harming other people. I'm all for helping the mentally ill, and searching for solutions, but there won't ever be a cure for mental illness any more than the life span of humans will ever in the future extend an another 10 years.

We can make mentally ill people less dangerous, to others, if not to themselves.

The problem is that everybody thinks an attack by a mentally ill person won't happen to them. Almost all of them are right. And who gives a shit about other people?

New Media Suicide Watch

Attention former employees of Newsweak -- you lost your jobs so that your employer could bring this to the masses:

Fish Spatula  This is a weird little item, especially for someone like me, who doesn’t actually like the taste of cooked fish.  (Don’t yell at me, it seems to be genetic; my sister has the same aversion, even though both my parents love fish).  I don’t quite recall how we acquired this, but now I wouldn’t do without it.  It’s obviously designed for transporting your delicate fish from cookware to plate, but it’s good for any oversized item.  I wouldn’t say I get it out every day, but I can say that when I’ve needed it, I’ve really needed it--it’s helped me lift a layer cake without breaking it, move the Arnold Schwarzenegger of capons to a serving platter, and otherwise solve tricky jobs that could easily have gone very badly indeed.  Probably especially great if you actually like fish.

You won't believe what Suderman uses it for.

The relatively less uninteresting thing is that even though MeeCardle has the same crap on her list every year, she apparently pens a different description of the same crap each year.  Must be something in her contract.

I've taken the liberty of removing the income-generating amazon.com link from the selection quoted above.  Anything to hasten the inevitable death of the Beast with All Hacks.

MoldOld Reveals How Her Column Is Created

"MY college roommates and I used to grocery shop and cook together. The only food we seemed to agree on was corn, so we ate a lot of corn."

This also explains why it takes three days.

The Romney Curse Continues

"Hello Manny. I ran for president. I lost," Romney told the fighter, according to Pacquiao publicist Fred Sternburg.

Romney told Marquez, "I would have won if I was a Latino."

Update: Meanwhile, on the latest episode of People Unclear on the Concept of a Boxing Match: "Marquez feinted left and threw one of the most vicious short rights in recent boxing history, hitting Pacquiao flush in the face and sending him to the canvas, right in front of Mitt and Ann Romney’s ringside seats ('I couldn’t believe it, he went down right in front of me!' Ann said later.)"

Why Can't Wingnuts Read?

 Over at Depends Media, Rick Moran's XXL adult undergarments are in a twist:

What is it about the liberal education monolith that so despises our cultural heritage? The bastardization of our history, the assault on values, the trivialization of profound truths that have defined western civilization for 500 years — there is a price to be paid in developing incomplete citizens; ignorant of the arts and unaware of the giants on whose shoulders they are supposed to stand. 

What caused Rick to write that incomplete run-on sentence?  This article at the U.K. Telegraph website, which originated from God knows where:

A new school curriculum which will affect 46 out of 50 states will make it compulsory for at least 70 per cent of books studied to be non-fiction, in an effort to ready pupils for the workplace.

Books such as JD Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye and Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird will be replaced by “informational texts” approved by the Common Core State Standards. Suggested non-fiction texts include Recommended Levels of Insulation by the the US Environmental Protection Agency, and the Invasive Plant Inventory, by California’s Invasive Plant Council.

The new educational standards have the backing of the influential National Governors’ Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, and are being part-funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Jamie Highfill, a teacher at Woodland Junior High School in Arkansas, told the Times that the directive was bad for a well-rounded education.

“I’m afraid we are taking out all imaginative reading and creativity in our English classes.

“In the end, education has to be about more than simply ensuring that kids can get a job. Isn’t it supposed to be about making well-rounded citizens?”

Supporters of the directive argue that it will help pupils to develop the ability to write concisely and factually, which will be more useful in the workplace than a knowledge of Shakespeare.

Now, if Moran had a brain and 30 seconds worth of curiosity, he could've found out what the Common Core State Standards Initiative had to say about its standards: 

The standards mandate certain critical types of content for all students, including classic myths and stories from around the world, foundational U.S. documents, seminal works of American literature, and the writings of Shakespeare. The standards appropriately defer the many remaining decisions about what and how to teach to states, districts, and schools.

Of course, Moran could have realized the article was bunk without ever leaving the Telegraph website. Mandating 70 percent of the total school curriculum be non-fiction (you know, history, math, science, homosexual indoctrination, &c.) doesn't mean the replacement of any particular book. It means that up to 30 percent of the curriculum can be fiction. It's hard to imagine any non-religious high school or junior high where more than 30 percent of the textbooks used in any school day are works of fiction.

A non-brain dead Moran would also realize that National Governors' Association, which is dominated by Republican governors, isn't part of the "liberal education monolith."
Anyone with third grader's critical thinking ability would question the credibility of an article published at the Telegraph's website, particularly when the article quotes someone speaking to "the Times."

This is the standard m.o. of the wingnut blogger.  Find an article that superficially supports one of your deepest prejudices, and cite the article as proof of your delusion without bothering to check if the article is accurate, or facially credible, or even if it actually supports your premise. 

Another one of the Initiative's standards states, "[t]he ability to write logical arguments based on substantive claims, sound reasoning, and relevant evidence is a cornerstone of the writing standards, with opinion writing—a basic form of argument—extending down into the earliest grades." Moran was out sick on the years that was taught.

Nasty, Brutish and Short

To paraphrase Sayre's Law -- wingnut infighting is so bitter because the i.q.s are so law.

His Job At Newsweak Is Probably Safe

Greasy-wigged non-journalist Howard Kurtz gets catty:

Meanwhile, the "winning" team--the pundits at MSNBC--got to pay a private call on the president on Tuesday. Rachel Maddow, Ed Schultz, Lawrence O'Donnell and Al Sharpton were big Obama boosters during the campaign. (Arianna Huffington also joined the soiree.) A White House statement said the president had met with "leading progressives" to talk up his economic plan. Progressive they are indeed, but wouldn't they rather be known as journalists?

Given that they're a talk radio host, a former talk radio host, a civil rights activist and a Senate aide turned television scriptwriter -- and they're all pundits, as Kurtz himself writes -- why would they "rather be known as journalists?"

Did Howie the Putz sniff about journalistic integrity when President-Elect Obama met with partisan television pundits George Fwill (ABC), BoBo Brooks (PBS) and Billy Kristol (FOX)?  Did he whinily inquire as to whether FOX's Sean Hannity wished to be thought of as a journalist when W. Bush met with Hannity in the Oval Office?  Has the Putz ever lofted similar snark at anyone who ever spoke with a right-wing pol off the record (say, Tim Russert with Dick Cheney)?

The most amusing thing is that this comes at the end of Putz's post about the relationship between FOX News and Karl Rove, in which Rove is billed as a "political commentator" and in which the Putz says nary a word concerning American Crossroads.  Wouldn't Rove rather be known as a "political kingmaker?"

The Weakest Link

"A source calls the layoffs 'a bloodbath' and estimates that half the editorial staff [of Newsweek] will be gone."

Yet MeeCardle is still there. 

Moral: You can't get blood out of a turnip.

Extremist Makeover: House Edition

Did you know Catfood Commissioner-For-Life Paul Ryan is a compassionate conservative?  According to a trial balloon floated in the Republican organ PoliticHo, he is indeed!

Campaign sources tell us that within days of being named Romney’s running mate, Ryan began agitating to reach out to people living in disadvantaged, at-risk communities, arguing internally that Republicans are badly served when they seem to be talking only to rich white people and advancing an agenda that benefits primarily the well-off. He contended that the real victims of the war on poverty — the poor — don’t trust Republicans and might be less suspicious if they got the sense that the party cared about them or was sympathetic to their needs.

The response from Romney aides: Forget it. Romney advisers decreed that there was no obvious political constituency for those ideas that was winnable by Republicans and that it was off-message for a campaign preaching a broader economic message. With two weeks left in the campaign, Ryan finally gave a civil society speech at Cleveland State University, one of his favorite moments of the campaign. But the speech was too late and was drowned out.  

You'll recall that Sarah Palin-with-a-heart was so dedicated to the poor that he even offered to re-wash their dishes in the presence of the media.

Even PoliticHo (in the personages of stenographers Slappy Ho and VandeHo) has trouble keeping an older straight, white face telling this tale:

Ryan held his tongue as long as he was on the ticket but on Tuesday night will say what he has been wanting to say for months — but which, to be fair, he has seldom said during the course of his political career.

But the 'Ho assures us it must be true because don't worry your pretty little heads

Top Republicans tell us Ryan tried to push his ideas for a more creative “war on poverty” during the presidential campaign but was muzzled by nervous Nellies at Mitt Romney’s Boston headquarters who didn’t see an immediate political payoff. So Ryan seethed when the “47 percent” tape emerged, convinced that the impact was worse because the campaign had no record on issues relating to inclusion or poverty, exacerbating the out-of-touch image that the hidden camera cemented.

If only Mitt Romney had listened to these selfless sages who refuse to take credit for their brilliant strategy -- he assuredly would've won the under $50K voters as well.

Missing from this fantasy on ice is a response from Romney, his advisers, or his Nellies.  But dead men contradict no narratives.

Meanwhile Marco Rubio's setting in motion a plan that's sure to please: "Rubio’s Senate chief of staff is Cesar Conda, an expert policy mechanic who worked in the George W. Bush White House as an economic adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney."  A no-bid defense contract in every pot is the new trickle-down Laffer curve.

Tippi Hedren and Tyler Too

If Fat Bastard was serious about getting Petraeus to run for President, he'd have thrown in a FOX News Blonde or two.

Rough Boys

Much wingnut ado about Pete Townsend declaring himself a "neo-con."  Much less wingnut ado about the rest of the quote, "I like the idea of America as the world’s police force, and then we don’t have to do it.’’

Haviing someone else kill and die for you -- that's the true definition of a neo-con.

Still, Gary Glitter is the ultimate neo-con.

Dick Army Loses Nominal Head

It was a matter of principle (sic - principal).

Upd ate (12/5):  I told you so.

Advice for the Cluelorn

In a last-ditch effort to save her phony-baloney job at The Daily Beast, Meeegan McArdle has assumed her new role as Agony Ayn.

She is soliciting pleas from troubled souls via mcmeganmoney@gmail.com .  (No, seriously.)   Correspondence cannot be entered into.

Simonize 2016

Roger el-Simon y Simon will tell you how the Republican Party lost in 2012 -- It let the EMESSEM ask its candidates questions in their primary debates:

The Republicans certainly did their best to prove [they were fools] in election 2012.

And how were they fooled? The last election was arguably over and done before the real battle started when the mainstream media overtly and covertly made mincemeat of the Republican candidates during the primary debates, effectively neutering them [sic] for the main event.

Well, except for, momentarily, Newt Gingrich, who provided the one intellectually stimulating moment during that tedious and seemingly interminable series of events when he called the media out. That, unfortunately, could only be effective once.

You will be unsurprised to learn that el-Simon y Simon identifies exactly no questions or techniques the dastards posed to emasculate (Simonize?) the G.O.P. he-men and Michele. It is artilce of faith that Republican failures are the fault of someone else, who tricked the party establishment into not being wingnutshit-crazy enough. 

el-Simon also fails to explain how voters will view the debates without EMESSEM involvement -- perhaps a paid subscription to PJTV!

el-Simon ain't just whinin', however.  He proposes a solution:

One approach might be to start with a list of intelligent right-of-center people who will ask reasonable questions eliciting substantive responses. You can find them in abundance at such places as the National Review, the Weekly Standard, Breitbart.com, Townhall.com, HotAir.com, RedState.com, and, to be self-serving, PJMedia.com. There are plenty more, including, naturally, the Wall Street Journal opinion pages.

(Another approach might be to run candidates who advocated reasonable political agendas and could articulate those agendas in an intelligent and articulate manner.  But don't tell Rog.)

I like this idea, because it ensures that next Republican primary will include an extra layer of bitter allegations between the Allen West and Scott Walker factions, as each side accuses the third-rate bloggers of being RINO apologists for their opponent. And that those battles will be fought in utter obscurity.

The good news for el-Simon is that he won't be alive to see the 2016 elections.

Deadweight

Aiming to cut costs in an increasingly troubled advertising environment, The New York Times announced on Monday morning that it would offer buyout packages to newsroom employees. While the primary goal of the buyout program is to trim managers and other nonunion employees from its books, the company is offering employees represented by the Newspaper Guild the chance to volunteer for buyout packages as well. In a letter to the staff, Jill Abramson, executive editor of The Times, said she was seeking 30 managers who are not union members to accept buyout packages. 

She stressed that the paper had been reducing as many newsroom expenses as possible, like leases on foreign and national bureaus. But the hiring The Times has done in recent years to help make it more competitive online has restored the newsroom to the same size it was in 2003 — about 1,150 people. 

Start with the entire op-ed lineup except Krugman. Save more money - don't offer them buyouts. Terminate them for gross incompetence. Dowd can collect Social Security and Douthat can become a sperm donor. Friedman can sell appliances....

These buyouts are not being offered to members of the editorial department. Andrew Rosenthal, the ditorial page editor, wrote in a note that “we, too, have made reductions to our expenses to meet our share of this burden, but we are not going to be offering buyouts in the Editorial Department at this time.”

Like I said, just can them. And whoever hired Douthat too.

Where Are They Now?

Ever wonder what ol' whats-his-name has been doing? Me neither, but the Washington Post apparently cares.

One longtime counselor contrasted Romney with former vice president Al Gore, whose weight gain and beard became a symbol of grievance over his 2000 loss [sic]. “You won’t see heavyset, haggard Mitt,” he said. Friends say a snapshot-gone-viral showing a disheveled Romney pumping gas is just how he looks without a suit on his frame or gel in his hair.

Don't count on that, anon. counselor:

Over Thanksgiving, one of Romney’s five sons, Josh, his wife and their four children packed into a single bedroom at the Spanish-style villa on Dunemere Drive here. One friend said they ordered their turkey dinner from Boston Market, the home-style restaurant chain, because there were too many kids running around the house to bother with cooking a feast.

Meanwhile, Paul Ryan is undergoing 'roid detoxification at a private clinic in Green Bay.

None Dare Call It Reading

Joe Queenan takes it easy on Ayn Rand:

"Atlas Shrugged” is moronic beyond belief, though it just narrowly edges out “The Fountainhead.” Rand is a fascist and a creep, either of which could be forgiven. But she also cannot write. 

And so are her fans. 

All Fail The Conquering Zero

Thor Thorassson has rejected the universal uproar demanding that he primary Saxby Chambliss. Thor thays that he can't afford the pay cut, and then offers this incoherent tearjerker:

In December of 2006 my wife lay dying. She had six months to live. We talked in ways we never talked before about what it would be like when she was gone. She said she had seen me grow in my role at RedState as a catapult, launching others into the arena to do the fighting while I stood on the outside assisting and fighting. My role is that of the catapult still. I’ve been in the arena. I’m meant to be on the outside helping. I am more useful to the ideas I believe in and the cause I love being where I am. I have a television presence, a well listened to radio show on the largest talk radio station in the nation, and RedState itself.

Luckily, my wife got a reprieve. She had been misdiagnosed. But I won’t put her or my family through something like that when I don’t even view it as my calling.

So Thor's wife wasn't actually dying, she was the victim of medical malpractice. But as she lay not dying, Mrs. Thorassson recalled the days when her fat manchild was a fat child, endangering other children by mounting the teeter-totter. And that little big man grew up to be a Palinesque city councilmember, Clark Howard's warm-up act (when there's not a basketball game preempting him) and a CNN stooge. 

But why can't Thorassson at least endorse Moe Lane for the Senate seat?

Let's Have The Best Christmas Ever

Grand Old Police Blotter: Staats' Rights Edition

A Tennesee gun nut even more loathsome than Glenn Reynolds:

Tennessee Republican Brad Staats, a losing congressional candidate earlier this month, was arrested early Sunday morning on a domestic assault charge after police responded to a call from his wife claiming that he slapped her.

According to a report in the Nashville City Paper on the police affidavit, Staats denied his wife Bethany's account of the incident, but said that "he pushed his wife ... down onto a bed then left the location.”

The affidavit, also notes, however, that "Ms. Staats did have a red mark on her left cheek consistent with her statement." The Tennessean got a hold of Staats on Monday, who told the outlet that the situation was “not what it appears to be.”

Staats ran in Tennessee's 5th Congressional District on a "family matters" platform that stressed traditional values and Second Amendment rights. He drew national attention in October after posting a photo of his handgun to his Facebook page, alongside a message "welcoming" President Barack Obama to Tennessee. He denied that it was meant as a threat.

Brad is lucky his wife wasn't armed.

Here's some further background on Brad:

Brad received Baccalaureate of Arts in English Literature from Oral Roberts University with a second degree in Music. While continuing his education at Florida State University, Brad was offered an opportunity to perform on Broadway and travel with their touring group. His performances include well known hits like “Phantom of the Opera,” “Evita,” “Smokey Joe’s Cafe” and even performed at Dollywood [sic].

With the birth of his first child, Monet, Brad decided that “show business” and the type of family life he wanted were not compatible. He changed careers and decided to settle down, raise a family and begin a business career.

Of course, Brad is a staunch defender of "traditional marriage."  I suspect Dolly would kick Brad's ass.

And naming his firstborn Monet Staats might not have been a great idea either.

Erick Erickson, Socialist

In a screed aptly titled "The Incestuous Bleeding of the Republican Party," Red State's Oly Olafson has laid the blame for the failure of the Romney campaign on incestuous party hacks who made more off the election than he did.

If money is the root of all evil, for the Republican Party evil is located on the fifth floor of 66 Canal Center Plaza, Alexandria, VA 22314.

Strip away the candidate and coalition and it is on the fifth floor of 66 Canal Center Plaza where the seeds of Mitt Romney’s ruin and the RNC’s get out the vote (GOTV) effort collapsed — bled to death by charlatan consultants making millions off the party, its donors, and the grassroots.

Strip away the bullets and the bleeding, and Abe Lincoln died of boredom at Ford's Theater.

And damn those collapsing seeds!

This is like putting the fox in charge of the hen house. The fifth floor of 66 Canal Center Plaza reveals a tangled web of incestuous relationships among Republican consultants who have made millions all while the GOP went down the tubes. Here the top party consultants waged war with conservative activists and here they waged war with the Democrats. On both fronts, they raked in millions along the way with a more fractured, minority party in their wake. And they show no signs of recognizing just how much a part of the problem they are.

Why the fact the consultants made millions off the election is troubling isn't clear from Yumpin' Yiminy's screed. (And they didn't necessarily "make" millions -- they were paid millions and spent it hiring employees, conducting research, creating ads, etc., like any other enterprise.)  Erickson isn't claiming that Romney would have pulled off a victory if he'd only had those extra millions.  Instead, he appears to be claiming that the pencil-necked flacks didn't pander enough to the true believers.  Yet Erickson gives no examples to support his claim.  Surely he's not stupid enough to believe that the most rabid Obama-haters stayed home because Mitt wasn't enough of a pro-rape birther.

The only rational explanation is that Erickson believes that Karl and the Kochs didn't share enough of their largess with him.

Finally, despite all his pious posturing, Erickson doesn't know his Bible very well.  Contrary to his intro, it's the love of money which is the root of all evil.  But if he acknowledged that, Erickson would have to stop fleecing his own flock, and disavow the G.O.P. immediately.

Behind the Red Whores

It took four PoliticHos to pen this exclusive insider account of ... nothing:

Behind the Susan Rice meeting meltdown

In just two quick meetings on Capitol Hill, Susan Rice may have blown up any goodwill she had with the very senators she’ll need for confirmation if she’s ever tapped as the next secretary of state.

Over the past two days, four key Republican senators have emerged from private meetings to blast the United Nations ambassador’s explanation about what happened during and after the deadly attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

It's not clear what Rice said behind closed doors to anger all these senators, but it’s obvious the meetings went badly and this was hardly a nominee-in-waiting charm offensive.

Shorter PoliticHos: "We don't know what the fuck happened, but we'll pretend it was the Ambassador's fault.  And we'll call this inside information."

The Three Douchebagateers (McCain, Graham and Ayotte) said they had more questions before the meeting than after. As far as can be gleaned from the article, the PoliticHos didn't get around to asking the 3Ds what those questions were, whether those questions were actually posed during the meeting, or how those questions were or weren't answered. The PoliticHos did get one anonymous elephant to assert that the 3Ds "were so incensed after their powwow with Rice because they felt she was not being straight or candid with them about Benghazi." The PoliticHos then forgot to ask this anonymous GOP asshole why the 3Ds felt that, and what the factual basis for that feeling was.

It would be fine for PoliticHo to write that the 3Ds came out and bitched after their meeting with the Ambassador, but failed to give any substantive explanation for their bitching.  It would also be fine for PoliticHo to report that the 3Ds refused to explain their complaints or, alternatively, that the PoliticHos were two stupid or cowed or corrupt (or all three) to ask for explanations. 
Either the 3Ds explained themselves, or they did not.  But the article doesn't provide that explanation, or any excuse for the failure to report it.

The only "behind" in this article is the four PoliticHos bending over and taking four up the ass for the GOP.  (And not in a good way.) 

Reasons to Be Thankful

Number one: You're not Thomas Sowell.

Kid Kidneys took the stage from Palo Alto to Los Angeles the other day, and landed in one of them new-fangled boardin' houses:

Recently, at a well-known luxury hotel in Los Angeles, I found that something as simple as turning on a television set can require a phone call to the front desk, and then waiting for the arrival of a technician. Then it took another phone call to get a list of which of the dozens of channels were for which networks.

Why the turning on of a television set should be anything other than obvious to a newly arrived hotel guest is apparently a question that never occurred to the people who ran this hotel. Nor did it apparently ever occur to them that someone just arriving from a journey might want to be able to relax, instead of having to cope with complications that the hotel could easily have avoided.

Just pay for the damn porno, Tommy, and don't pretend you couldn't understand the remote just to get your $16.95 back.

Even more confusing for Tom was the Ablutio-Tron 3000:

The next morning, in the shower, I found myself confronted with a dazzling array of knobs and levers, none of which provided any clue as to what they did. The lever rotated and four of the surrounding knobs both rotated and tilted forward and backward.

Tommy called down for a technician on this occasion too, but the hotel was on to him by this time.

Tommy then gets his personal bathrobe stolen and laundered, then bitches about how different lamps have different types of switches, and then flashes back to a problem he had with a hotel light switch "years ago." After a great while, he moves down the coast, to San Diego, where his woes continue in a new venue:

Later I had to fix a toilet that kept running after being flushed. I once had a toilet like that at home, so I knew what to do. But I replaced my malfunctioning toilet at home, unlike the hotel.

So if he didn't replace the crapper, which is what he did when he had the same problem at home, how did he fix it? Or is he bragging that he accomplished a temporary fix, but wasn't stuck with replacing the toilet? Either way, the story makes no sense. Why didn't he just ask for another room?

Link via Sadly, No!.

Update (11/26):  Name of fictional futuristic shower corrected.

Jock Sniffing In The News

Maureen "MolDold" Dowd has a painfully painful column comparing the Washington D.C. Football Club's quarterback Robert Griffin to President Obama.

Spoiler Alert: Obama compares unfavorably to Griffin.

The column also features cameos by Extenze pitchman Jimmy Johnson, Tiger Woods, Joe Paterno and an (uncredited) Joe Lieberman, who is quoted as saying:

As a Democratic senator recently told me: “If only the president would have us over to the White House sometimes and talk to us, it could really help. When Bill Clinton called and asked if he could have my vote, I was more prone to do it because we had developed a rapport.”

MolDold's column reminds me of the Joe Theismann ad for Super Beta Prostate, wherein Joe allows, "And no matter what stadium I broadcast from, I always had to find the closest bathroom...."  Joe, did you really think that  your need to urinate frequently would vary depending on which stadium you were in?

Grand Old Police Blotter: Hiram Lewis and the (Good) News Edition

Some wacky goings on in the Black Lung State:

Hiram Carson Lewis IV, 41, was arrested over the weekend on a warrant alleging he had threatened Clay County Sheriff Randy Holcomb. Holcomb is a witness against Lewis in a previous case alleging Lewis shot and wounded a man at Lewis' home in Procious.

Lewis, a lawyer and an Iraq War veteran, ran unsuccessfully for the office of attorney general in 2004 and ran unsuccessfully in the 2006 Republican primary to challenge U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va. He again ran for attorney general in 2008, but was edged out in the Republican primary by Dan Greear.

According to a criminal complaint on file in Clay County Magistrate Court, Lewis went to Holcomb's camp in Procious on Oct. 28 and asked the sheriff to go to the Clay County prosecutor's office to help drop charges of malicious wounding and wanton endangerment filed against Lewis in June.

According to the criminal complaint, Lewis told the sheriff on Oct. 28 that he might have to sue over the criminal charges, and allegedly threatened to sue Holcomb as well.

Lewis then allegedly told Holcomb that the sheriff and State Police Trooper B.E. Young were the only witnesses left to testify against him in the June criminal case. A third witness, former State Police Cpl. M.L. Bailey, was shot and killed by a suspect in Wallback in August.

Lewis, who runs a Christian-based organization called Elk River Ministries, allegedly told Holcomb that Bailey had been shot "because of spiritual wrongdoing done to him," according to the criminal complaint.

Lewis says he wasn't trying to intimidate Holcomb, but was only inquiring as to whether Holcomb had been saved.  Some people just don't like being proselytized, I guess.

As for the underlying charges:

On June 13, Lewis was charged with wanton endangerment and malicious wounding for allegedly [sic] shooting Steven Bogart in the leg at Lewis' home in Procious.

Lewis said he shot Bogart after Bogart kicked the door in despite repeated warnings not to come into the house. Bogart said Lewis had invited him to stay at the house in exchange for carpentry work, and wasn't doing anything wrong at the time he was shot.

Jesus was a carpenter, but if He tried to kick Hi Lewis's door down, Lewis would've shot a cap in His ass too.

Okay, so usually these are a lot funnier. (The death of Corporal Bailey is of course tragic.)  The idea that a former candidate for the job of top law enforcement official in the state would let some dude live in his house in exchange for home repairs is almost there, but there's something .... missing.

Wait.  I know what it is:



Reminder:  All persons charged with a crime are innocent until proven guilty.

The End of The Bamboozlement

Reality has set in for Allen West:

After nearly two weeks of legal and electoral jousting, Mr. West, 51, conceded on Tuesday to his Democratic challenger in the Nov. 6 election, Patrick Murphy, a political newcomer from South Florida. Mr. Murphy, 29, won the race, in St. Lucie, Martin and northern Palm Beach Counties, by 1,904 ballots, or 0.58 percent of the vote.

“While a contest of the election results might have changed the vote totals, we do not have evidence that the outcome would change,” Mr. West said in a statement on Tuesday morning. “Given the extremely high evidentiary hurdles involved in a successful challenge, I will not ask my generous supporters to help fund a drawn-out, expensive legal effort with little chance of success.”

No word on whether West intends to return the $4 million left unspent after the election:

West’s $21 million as of Nov. 8 was the most raised by any U.S. House candidate, except for Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, who was also running for president. But West spent money almost as fast as he raised it.

His $17 million of spending was the third highest total, behind only Bachmann and House Speaker John Boehner.

So Republicans spent $42 million or more backing a whackjob of color and a female whackjob.  Wonder why the G.O.P. isn't trumpeting those accomplishments in response to claims that the party's isn't diverse?

The Ghost of John Derbyshire Pinches A Loaf

From The Corner: 

Twinkies may have fueled generations of late-night writing and homework binges by journalists and students, but what was purer or more uplifting than the snow-white perfection of “Wonder Bread”? What else more perfectly reflects America in the 20th century, its rise of supermarket consumerization, the growth of suburbs, the promise of efficient mealtimes? I know we’re a low-carb, health conscious, seven-grains society now, but without the hope of redemption implicit in Wonder Bread, I fear dark days ahead.

Self-parody, to be sure, but is it witting or unwitting? You make the call.  (Hint:  The author was a Romney advisor.)

Don't tell Mikey, but Wonder Bread was the original Nanny Bloomberg, and not that pure:

During the 1940s, Continental Baking began adding vitamins and minerals to Wonder Bread as part of a government-sponsored program of enriching white bread which was notoriously deficient in vitamin and mineral content, to combat certain diseases. Known as the "Quiet Miracle", this development is credited with greatly reducing the incidence of the diseases beriberi and pellagra.