Howard Kurtz, Motherflacker

Let's see Howie the Putz spin this one:

In his 2012 best-selling non-fiction [sic] book Killing Kennedy, O'Reilly writes on page 300 that as a "reporter knocked on the door of de Mohrenschildt's daughter's home, he heard the shotgun blast that marked the suicide of the Russian ... that reporter's name is Bill O'Reilly."

O'Reilly repeated this lie on FNC, so he can't blame the dude who actually wrote the books.

Howie's greatest sit-n-spins: 

I've said O'Reilly dispute boils down to semantics. Christian Sci Monitor called '82 Argentine protest "battle zone"

The perils of professional flackery, indeed. Must be hard when you've hit rock bottom and there's nowhere left to go, Howie.

Rubbin' Update

Here's the rub parlor that Schock used for a fundraiser, according to reports.

It's no bondage-themed nightclub of Michael Steele infamy.  It's also in Baltimore, not in Peoria.  And since it has only three therapists, charging $130 per 90 minutes of rub, it must have been a long and boring fundraiser.

Schock and Massage

I'm schocked... schocked! to see that the G.O.P. is using rubbin' as a 'raiser:

The donor planes include an Italian-made Piaggio twin-engine turboprop owned by Todd Green of Springfield, Illinois, who runs car dealerships in [Representative Aaron] Schock's [(R-IL)] district with his brother, Jeff. Todd Green told a Springfield newspaper that Jeff - a pilot and campaign contributor - and Schock have been friends for a long time.

The AP found that Green's plane traveled to at least eight cities last October in the Midwest and East Coast, cities where Schock met with political candidates ahead of the midterm elections. His Instagram account's location data and information from the service FlightAware even pinpointed Schock's location on a stretch of road near one airport before Green's plane departed.

Campaign records show a $12,560 expense later that month to Jeff Green from a political action committee associated with Schock, called the "GOP Generation Y Fund." That same month, the PAC paid $1,440 to massage parlor [sic] for a fundraising event.

There are at least fifty rub joints in Peoria, according to Yelp. Prices generally range from $20 for a chair massage to $125 for a full hour's rubbin', tip not included. So anywhere from 10 to 72 constituents got the glad-hand treatment in exchange for raisin' green to fill Schock's coffers.

Whether this story has a happy ending is anyone's guess.

Dowd's Ghostwriter Rewrites History

Maureen Dowd's latest attack on Hillary Clinton is framed as an attack on JEB (not Jeb).  It takes her five paragraphs to bash Secretary of State Clinton

Like the Clintons, the Bushes drag the country through national traumas that spring from their convoluted family dynamic and then disingenuously wonder why we concern ourselves with their family dynamic.

Without their last names, Hillary and Jeb [sic] would not be front-runners, buoyed by networks of donors grateful for appointments or favors bestowed by the family.

In Dowd's mind, receiving blow jobs from an adult intern is as traumatic as illegal wars, hundreds of thousands of needless deaths, torture as national policy, war profiteering and the destruction of the economy. (That's not a joke; it's a statement of fact, confirmed endlessly in Dowd's drivel over the past decade.) And in Dowd's mind, Hillary was getting blown too.

Dowd correctly asserts that JEB is not responsible for his brother's crimes, but is responsible for seeking counsel from GWB's criminal co-conspirators. (Dowd gives an inexplicable pass to bin Laden family bag man and happy Jew-fucker James Baker.)  But then she inexplicably ejaculates:

If he wants to reclaim the Bush honor, Jeb [sic] should be holding accountable those who inflicted deep scars on America, not holding court with them.

How can there be any Bush honor to reclaim when it was the President Bushes who were -- as well as employed -- the war criminals in the first place?  How could citizen JEB hold accountable the war criminals in any event?  And when has Dowd ever demanded actual accountability from any Bush, ever? 

Dowd repeats the canard that GWB was merely stupid rather than both evil and stupid, arguing that cronies of Bush the Elder, including Cheney and Rumsfeld, "absconded" with GWB's presidency.  (GWB as the real victim of Iraq was the same tale Dowd told in 2012, and she's recycling that tale now.)  She also claims Paul Wolfowitz was merely a naif. None of these bogus beliefs could restore "Bush honor," even if it had ever existed.

Dowd excuses the Bushes' crimes by psychobabbling about dysfunction where greed, malice and corruption easily explain everything.  And she believes that suction and torture are equally evil.

A Greasy Kind of Love

Rudy Giuliani loves America in exactly the same way that Bernie Kerik and Judith Regan love America:  

Certainly, that is what happened in 2001, when Ms. Regan had a messy affair with Bernard B. Kerik, the former police commissioner and aide to Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York City (then a future presidential hopeful).

At the time, Mr. Kerik was writing a memoir for ReganBooks, and he spent months hooking up with his mistress/publisher in an apartment near ground zero that had been reserved for use by 9/11 rescue workers.

All of which was revealed in hilarious detail during Mr. Kerik’s unsuccessful bid for Homeland Security chief in 2004. It didn’t exactly put Roger Ailes, the chairman and chief executive of Fox News and a close friend of Mr. Giuliani’s, in a good position. (Mr. Kerik and Mr. Ailes declined requests to comment for this article.)

The kind of love that picks your pocket and leaves nothing but a greasy stain. 

Up the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

In a blatant attempt to steal traffic from alicublog, Roger Ailes announces its predictions for the winners of the 2015 Academy Awards, aka the "Oscars."  To make this feat seem even more impressive, I have seen almost none of the films or performances nominated, and my predictions are based almost solely on my intimate knowledge of show business phonies and accounting fraud.

(By the way, Oscar, Oscars, and gold-plated vibrator are in the public domain and can be used by anyone for any purpose, at any time. For free. Legally.  Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.)

Best Mot Picture:   Boyhood
Best Director:  Richard Linklater
Best Actress:   Julianne Moore
Best Actor:      Michael Keaton
Best Supp Actress:  Patricia Arquette
Best Supp Actor:  J.K. Simmons
Best Orig Screenplay:  The Grand Budapest Hotel
Best Adapted Screenplay:  The Theory of Everything
Best Cinematography:  Birdman
Best Animated Feature:  Big Hero 6
Best Foreign Lang Film:   Leviathan
Best Documentary:   Last Days in Vietnam
Best Everything Else:  One of the nominees 

You could take these predictions to the bank, except the banks are closed on Sunday. 

A Clown, A Turd and 9-11

Rudy Guiliani.

Buh-Bye O'Reilly

This story will never go anywhere if O'Reilly is smart enough to keep his trap shut.  If O'Reilly says nothing, his silence will confirm the truth but he'll never be challenged.  If he's stupid enough to open his yap and repeat his lies today, he may actually hang himself.  

But he's not stupid. 

In the past, O'Reilly lied about his sexual predation, paid millions to silence his victim (and probably paid FOX's legal costs too) and FOX just rode it out.  

The predator will keep quiet, and his apologists will too, because they know O'Reilly won't back them up if they vouch for the scumbag. Howard Kurtz likely has already made an orange jumpsuited appearance in the fat man's office, on his knees, promising that he won't say shit.

Pre-Posting Update:  I'm completely wrong. O'Reilly really is that stupid.

Batman and Hawkins

There's a lot to ridicule in this post by John Hawkins, who "hired" one of his site's contributors, "Jay Batman," to research how much money given to "big name" wingnut PACs actually went to candidates or candidate advocacy. Apparently the Godamn Batman wrote "a 170 page report" that we don't get to read (perhaps because it's just screen printouts from OpenSecrets.org), but in which the GDBM concluded that many right-wing PACs are stone cold ripoffs.

In other words, dog bites man.

Bulbs dim and bright have picked up on the story.

Among the "big name" offenders Screamin' Jay Batman fingers are a draft Ben Carson PAC which has no affiliation with Carson and thus sucks $$$ away from Carson's own PAC (not investigated), Sarah Palin's SarahPAC, Madison Project, which attacks wingnut candidates from the right, the "Tea Party Army" (total expenditures, $25,000) and a couple of anti-immigration PACs that couldn't manage to scrape up $325,000. If you suspect Hawkins or his "partner" -- who had previously worked or "dealt" with three of the 17 studied PACs and reportedly is involved with her own (not investigated) PAC(s) -- might have a hate-on for some of the hand-picked PACs they criticize, I'm afraid I couldn't disabuse you of that notion.

Hawkins also negates his premise that he investigated "17 conseravative PACs" by asserting that one of the 17 -- the second most fiscally responsible one, per Hawkins' metric -- accepts money from unions, and is therefore "generally hostile to conservative Republicans."

The takeaways are (1) Hawkins is not to be trusted, even when he's telling some part of the truth and (2) don't flush your money down SarahPAC or any org with Tea Party in its name.

Update: At RedState (no link), Oly, Son of Olaf, says Hawkins' report is great, except for its criticism of the PACs upon whose teats Olafson suckles. For Olafson, a dollar spent on Olafson is never wasted.

Roger On The Road

Spent a night last week at a hotel that actually had a landline phone attached to the wall next to the toilet in the bathroom.  Whoever thought that that was a good idea?

I umderstand that this was not entirely uncommon twenty-five years ago, before cell phones, but whoever thought it was a good idea twenty-five years ago?

I wouldn't touch that thing if I was dying of a heart attack on the crapper.

Happy Valentine's Day

From Roger Ailes, your part-time lover.

Those of you who don't follow Roger Ailes on Facebook missed this romantic gem:

Russians are Red
Stalin is too
Let's Comintern
Me, and then you

It falls apart if you realize that Stalin was a Russian, so don't think about that. 

Republican Family Values: Three Tons of Some Edition

"But [Rep. Blake] Farenthold [(R-TX)] did admit that he was propositioned by a woman to be part of a 'threesome.'”

The proposed threesome involved Farenthold, the woman and a wafer-thin mint. Or, more realistically, the woman proposed a threesome between Farenthold, Chris Christie and Mike Huckabee.

Representative Farenthold is being sued for gender discrimination in an action alleging sex sexual harassment and gender discrimination. Of course his response included a dubious attestation as to his sexual attractiveness.

Rods and Sods

Dim-bulb Rod Dreher sniffs:

Clarence Thomas tells the truth:  a majority of the US Supreme Court has probably made up its mind already on gay marriage, before they hear the first oral argument.

Leave aside the fact that in 95-plus percent of cases, federal appellate judges have made up their minds before hearing oral argument.  Ignore Roddy's grammatical incompetence. The fact is that the justices who have already made up their minds on marriage equality include Pubes Thomas, Fat Tony Scalia and Sammy "The Bullshit" Alito. 

What really chaps Roddy's ass, and not in the good way, like his daddy used to, is not prejudgment.  No, it's his belief that a majority of justices believe equal protection means equal protection. He's not bent out of shape that Scalia waived his "Constitution Hates Fags" placard twelve years ago.  He's just sore that his privilege might no longer be enshrined in law.

Rod's already got his hammer out so he can be the first to nail himself to his cross if the decision doesn't go his way.  

The More You Know

The real tragedy of the Brian Williams story is that MoDo had to preempt her planned column detailing her experimentation with S & M, tied to the theatrical release of 50 Shades of Grey, in order to rub out 500 words on the death of serious journalism.  

The Andrew Sullivan Decade and a Half, Part 2: Bush Lied, Sully Complied

Vile Sully, September 30, 2002:

So at a crucial juncture in American diplomacy, this Democrat [Congressman Jim McDerrmott] is saying that Bush is a liar and a cheat – and in Baghdad! The only word for this is vile.

Vile Sully's post is entitled "Whose Side They Are On." 

The truth:  Bush lied. 

Update 2/9:  Corrected date from 2012 to 2002. But technically I was right, because 9/11 changed everything.

The Nightly Schmoe

Regular readers of this blog -- both of them -- will know that my esteem of Brian Williams was never very high. I labelled him a talking wigstand long ago in the previous decade, back when Howie Kurtz was fawning over Williams and Bob Somerby was less "we -- as in you -- liberals suck" all the time.

So I couldn't care less what NBC does with Brian Williams, who got caught blowing his own horn. It's hilarious to see wingnuts portray the Limbaugh-loving cheerleader for the invasion of Iraq as a left-winger.  But whether NBC keeps Williams for profit's sake or cans him in response to demands by wingnuts who care nothing about the truth matters not to me.

The Andrew Sullivan Decade and a Half, Part I: Genocide Is Painless

As Andy Sully spends the next few months blogging about his retirement from blogging, let's review some of the deeply rational thoughts he'll be withholding from us:

From Time Magazine, August 2006:

There is something terribly sick within the Muslim mind at this moment in history. It is Nietzsche's ressentiment, but with God re-attached. We should indeed fear these people for the hideous carnage they can wreak for the sake of their God. But we should never let our fear overwhelm our contempt for them - their sickness, their evil, their petty insecurities, their inability to live meaningful lives and their attempt to assuage this by murdering others in God's name. Yes, they evil [sic]. But they are also pathetic, miserable excuses for human beings.

This is the mind of a man -- because each human being has her or his own mind -- who believes (whether he admits it or not) that the only thing wrong with ISIS is that its members don't kill themselves after they slaughter every Muslim living.

The Wonder Bread Years

Meeeegan McArdle waxes dishonest about having to live among the poors, in an article entitled "When Bread Bags Weren't Funny."  McBargle starts out talking about Joni Ernst's bags, but then switches to Noonan's bags.  She then writes, with her usual slight of dishonesty::

I am a few years younger than Noonan, but I grew up in a very different world -- one where a number of my grammar school classmates were living in public housing or on food stamps, but everyone had more than one pair of shoes.... 

Joni Ernst, who is just a few years older than me, had a much more affluent childhood than the generation that settled the prairies, and more affluent still than the generations before them. But in many ways, she was much poorer than the people making fun of her on Twitter, simply because so many goods have gotten so much more abundant.

A few, a few! ... Gesundheit.

A few seconds on Google will tell you that McBargle is actually 22 years younger than Peg, and only 2.5 years younger than Ernst, despite McBargle's construction to the contrary. One difference is more than 8 times the other.  The difference between Nooners and McBargle is the difference of a generation.

Also dishonest is McBargle's assertion that Ernst grew up poorer than the people making fun of Ernst on Twitter, who, for all McArdle knows, are Ernst's age or older and grew up without the annual farm subsidies that Ernst's family recieved.  McArdle is comparing the imagined wealth of Ernst's critics today to Ernst's financial condition as a child, as if Ernst died in her ninth year.

And let's not mention McBargle's pretense of attending school with children from the projects, except to note that McBargle attended the Riverdale Country Day School (current annual cost for K-12: $45,600). (Perhaps she'd claim that she was forced to attend class with charity cases  -- "I said 'a number," not how many" -- who had the nerve to take a free ride in first class even though they had two pair of shoes to their names.)

What McBargle really gets wrong, however, is why Ernst and Nooners spoke about bags. It wasn't, as McBargle insists, to remind us "how much poorer we used to be" or "the immense difference between [prior generations'] living standards and ours." Ernst told her story as preface to the claim that "These days though, many families feel like they're working harder and harder, with less and less to show for it," as if the olden days were Nirvana compared to now (or since Obama ruined the economy). Nooners likewise used the story to illustrate how America -- and Americans, by which she means Americans who lunch with millionaires -- suck now.  Ernst and Nooners weren't telling their constantly bitching wingnut audiences to quit bitching because things are so much better now.

Bottom line:  McArdle will always be a joke.

Bong Hits For Jeb-us

No one is surprised that Jeb Bush was a member of the Old Choom Network. And a small businessman to boot.

We know Rand smoked Paul Pot, and the munchies certainly would explain Chris Christie.

Mike Huckabee undoubtedly smoked corn tassels and drank from a jug marked "XXX," and Ben Carson could write his own prescriptions.

Scott Walker, Bobby Jindal and Marco Rubio were totally straight edge.