He's Got The Beat ... Off

From PacMan to "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" (recommended if Sean Penn's recent visit to Baghdad got on your nerves) to the Go Go Girls and Flashdance, it's been a warm bath in pop-cultural reminiscence. I'd forgotten that there was once a sitcom, "Small Wonder," where the star was a young girl who was actually a robot. I forgot that pale blue jacket I wore in 1985, how racy "Porky's" was, how cool Chevy Chase used to be, and how some of my first erotic fantasies were built around the "Dukes of Hazzard" (don't ask).

Dude, she wasn't actually a robot.

I Want David Edelstein's E-Mail Address

From a review of The Two Towers:

"If I have misspelled or mischaracterized any of the above, please send corrections to eatme@Idontgiveashit.com."

Roger's Remedial Reading Course

As a public service for those whose wit fraction is well below one half, Roger Ailes, in association with Dictionary.com, is proud to introduce a new feature which focuses on the fundamentals of the English language.

pla�gia�rize

v. pla�gia�rized, pla�gia�riz�ing, pla�gia�riz�es
v. tr.

To use and pass off (the ideas or writings of another) as one's own.
To appropriate for use as one's own passages or ideas from (another).

v. intr.

To put forth as original to oneself the ideas or words of another.

li�bel
n.

A false publication, as in writing, print, signs, or pictures, that damages a person's reputation.
The act of presenting such material to the public.
The written claims presented by a plaintiff in an action at admiralty law or to an ecclesiastical court.

Whaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

Full disclosure: This happened to me when I integrated four words from a Jackson Browne song into a piece I posted on my blog. Another blogger accused me of plagiarism, and the unmerited charge spread across the Web at frightening speed.

As any conspiracy theorist knows, falsehoods take on an authority all their own on the Internet. So when bloggers willfully defame those with professional reputations to defend, that is a serious breach for which they should be held accountable.

Blogging is one of the best things that has ever happened to freedom of expression and the press, and we should make every effort to protect its scrupulous practitioners. But freedoms come with responsibilities. Common journalistic standards of accuracy and fair play exist for good reasons, and bloggers, like the rest of us, must abide by them. By drawing attention to libelous Web content, the Australian case may force them to. -- Norah Vincent, the latest self-identified victim of a hate crime

Ms. Vincent also remarks that the "blogosphere" is full of "vengeful ravings of half-wits who will say anything, especially about established journalists and writers, just to attract more attention to their sites."

It's Norah's pyschosis, we just live in it.

At least it's nice to see that Norah is in favor of integration.

Hate Crimes

Conservatives have discovered hate crimes.

They've also discovered that they are the victims of those crimes.

Pat Buchanan declares Trent Lott "the victim of a hate crime."

Paul Craig Roberts declares Confederate soldiers and their descendants the victims of "a hate crime." Because, you know, the Confederacy wasn't about persecuting and torturing blacks, and "free blacks had fewer rights than slaves in the South."

Pat and Paul want so badly to be persecuted you can't help but hope their wishes come true.

My Advice to MSNBC

Drop the "News Channel" gag. As long as you have Tweety, Imus and Barnicle on your roster, no one's going to buy that line anyway.

Reality television is the rage, and you've already got your next star on the payroll. I can picture it now:

Fade in - Music: Santa Monica, by Everclear.

Fade in - Exterior: A southern California split-level

Fade in - Title: The Dornans

Like their infamous father, the Dornan kids are class acts. When Bob lost his rematch with Loretta Sanchez in 1998, the entire family shined. On TV, an angry Bob branded Sanchez a "serial adulterer." Daughter Kate and her thug boyfriend made a derogatory remark about Republican Senate candidate Matt Fong and then got into fistfights with tiny, old, Asian Republican onlookers. Although she smelled like booze, we�re sure Kate was her naturally pleasant self when she screamed from the stage, "It�s not over yet, Loretta. We�re coming after you bad. Do you hear me?" Bob�s namesake, Bob Jr., later took a long gulp of his Budweiser and told a Weekly reporter that the Asian Republicans didn�t understand "class" like the Dornan family. Said Junior Dornan, "I told them, �Man, you aren�t nothing but low-class assholes, so shut up.�"

Roger's Mail Sac

The readers of Roger Ailes are so smart that they could write this blog by themselves and improve it many-fold. Here are excerpts from just a handful of the e-mails I've received that didn't come with an offer of a university diploma.

The Scarlet Pimpernel (not that one) offers the timely reminder that "War is good for the economy like cannibalism is nutritious." Certainly more Bartlett's-worthy than anything that's come out of Geo. Bush's mouth since ... forever.

Ripley from the old MWO boards calls our attention to Tucker "Faye" Carlson indulging in a bit of code-talking to his fellows in the white people's party:

CARLSON: Don Opasik (ph) of Pittsburgh writes, "I was devastated by the news that Al Gore has withdrawn from the 2002 (?) presidential race. The Republcian Party has lost a significant contributor to George Bush's reelection. I guess that leaves Al Sharpton." [Para.] You know, it always goes back to Al Sharpton, and I'm glad it does.

Meanwhile, mw keeps the pressure on that Confederate cracker, Robert Stacy McCain, by pointing us to a series of peevish e-mails sent by McCain to a webbloger who challenged him on his smears of anti-war activists. Freeper McCain now has been MIA from the Moonie Times website for almost three weeks, since November 29, for those keeping track.

skippy the bush kangaroo carbon copies us on his corrective epistle to Howard Kurtz, reminding Howie that "it was atrios and his blog echaton who broke, rode, and reported the lott story, far ahead and far more than any conservative blogger." I sure hope Howie doesn't go Steno Sue and e-mail "my" employer, Rupert Murdoch.

And, finally, a reader named SPERM teases us with a reference to "that well-known Washington folklore about what the baseball bat on Thurmond's desk was for." I must admit I've never heard that legend. Spill, oh wise seed.

Dick of the Week

Congratulations to B-1 Bob Dornan, whose apparent motto is "Beatin' Beats Cheatin'":

DORNAN: Chris, there�s a double standard at play here that I accept as a compliment. When Jesse Jackson says �Himey Town�, when any of them do something that should be apologized for, has Clinton really apologized for Monica
Lewinsky? Not really. No matter what they do, they get this-they get a free ride. I accept our double standard. Adultery...

INGRAHAM: Right.

DORNAN: ... counts in the Republican Party, and when one of us says something that can be twisted like this, he�s got to make a clear apology...

Just The Facts, He Lied

Q Were you able to follow-up on the New York Times story that you have a new disinformation campaign going on, or being planned against the allies?

MR. FLEISCHER: I've looked into this, and let me say to you there is widespread recognition throughout the administration that the United States has an important role in the world in better communicating America's message of hope and opportunity. It is important that it is a message that is shared throughout the world, in friendly nations and other places, as well. The President has an expectation that any program that is created in his administration be based on facts, and that's what he would expect to be carried out in any program that is created in any entity of the government.

[later]

Q Ari, what's the President's reaction to former Vice President Gore announcing that he's not going to run?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, this is an internal matter for the Democratic Party, and somebody will emerge from the Democratic field who will ultimately seek to raise taxes on the American people, but that's a decision that the Democrats will make as they select a nominee.

Q He didn't have a personal reaction at all, I mean, when he heard yesterday? What did he say?

MR. FLEISCHER: No, I think the President is rather busy, focused on the job that he was elected to do by the American people.

And, yet, Ari is still employed.

A heart-warming story for those who enjoy a chuckle every time John Muhammad's membership in the Nation of Islam is mentioned.

Loathsome Dunne

The loathsome Gary Condit has sued the loathsome Dominick Dunne over comments he made on the radio show of the loathsome Laura Ingraham. The Fresno Bee reports.

Remember when this was important?

Illiteracy, The Silent Shame

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Now we are going to take you live to the Roosevelt Room at the White House, where every year President George Bush and, of course, the first lady read holiday stories with children at the White House. Let's listen in.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Have you ever heard this one? It starts with "'Twas the night before Christmas?"

(CROSSTALK)

G. BUSH: ... night before Christmas, when all through the house -- not even a mouse. Nobody was stirring. Kind of quiet, wasn't it?

You better read that, because I can't see.

Hesiod points out that Bush's father awarded Strom Thurmond the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1993.

The four freedoms: Freedom to segregate. Freedom to hate. Freedom to terrorize. Freedom to lynch.

Her Invitation Must Have Gotten Lost In The Mail

Remarking on the idiocy of Frank Luntz, Joe C. reminds us that "the unexpurgated Thurmond biography, 'Ole Strom,' by Jack Bass and Marilyn Thompson, ... revealed the energetic politician's paternity of a black daughter out of wedlock many years ago."

So that's why Strom was so concerned about the integration of swimming pools.

Mickey Two-Fer Tuesday

Little Mick has done a complete one-eighty on the Lott story. Last Friday, he credited Sully and Instapundit with "taking the lead" on Lott's tribute to Strom Thurmond. Later the same day, he rewrote his comment to include Atrios and Tim Noah, without telling his readers about the rewrite. Now Mick says, "It was a string of pro-Democrat bloggers -- Atrios, Josh Marshall, Tim Noah, to name three -- who immediately started whaling on Lott. (The conservative bloggers -- Sullivan, Frum, and Goldberg -- began pummeling Lott a day or two later)."

Kaus's dishonesty is astounding. After his lie is pointed out, he reverses his position, covers up his original claim and now argues the exact opposite.

Kaus also has an actual article on Slate. It's all about cars and nostalgia for high school sex. If you buy a 'piece and play your cards right, Mick, you can get Bob Greene's old job.

Atrios joins the rank of other famous Sids:

Sid Vicious

Sid Dithers

Siddhartha

Sid and Marty Kroft, and

Sid Downanshutthefuckup

Congrats, Sid!

It's official. Hardball is no longer a television show, it's a lunatic asylum. On Monday, the patients in group therapy were Frank Luntz, Pat Caddell, Howard the Duck, Nooner, Bill Bennett and Pat Buchanan. Except for Mario Cuomo, they're all certifiable head cases.

Take Frank Luntz, identified by Matthews as an "anal cyst...." er ... "analyst of public opinion." His conclusion: If Strom had been President in '48, we wouldn't have "the moral decay of the country" we have now. None of that "acceptance of certain types behavior" so rampant nowdays. Luntz wasn't even talking about what Lott was thinking, he was voicing his own opinion.

MATTHEWS: ... because you�re an analyst of public opinion. We�re going to have a poll in a few moments about what�s going on here. He was asked by Ed Gordon, a very effective, I thought, interviewer tonight on Black Entertainment Television. What problems were you talking about when you said we wouldn�t have them if we�d voted for a segregationist back in �48. What do you believe he thinks those problems are that we�ve avoided or that we�ve incurred because we didn�t vote racist back in �48?

LUNTZ: It has to do with problems that we�ve had over the last eight or nine years. I don�t want to speak...

MATTHEWS: He said we wouldn�t have these problems if we had voted for Strom Thurmond in �48 for president, a segregationist who ran against Harry Truman. What is he talking about there?

LUNTZ: I think that some of the issues that he�s talking about, quite frankly, and I don�t know if he would agree or disagree, but I think some of it has to do with Bill Clinton and the things that happened in the 1990s, the moral decay of the country. The acceptance of certain types of behavior. If...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) come on.

LUNTZ: ... you-if you...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: He said it in the context-this is why the man is in deep trouble and probably...

FINEMAN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: ... will lose his leadership job. He said we wouldn�t have had all the problems over the years. That�s a long-term statement about the direction of American social life and racial existence, all the way back to 1948 because of that vote.

LUNTZ: But he was making-it wasn�t the issue of the problems. It was the issue of a compliment. He was trying to say something nice to a 100-year-old man. Chris, this is Washington. You know how tough Washington is. Washington isn�t hardball. They are-the meanness and the partisanship and the negativity in this town, you know, is damn rough...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: And you believe he�s clean on the charge of racialism?

LUNTZ: Without a doubt...

MATTHEWS: OK.

LUNTZ: One hundred percent.

Unlike the South, the lie about Strom will rise again. In fact, it already has.

Has Sully been reading his own work?

"Some of the sanctimony is now beginning to bug me.... And the blithe assumption of moral superiority is equally galling."

Meet Your Liberal Media

Hardball guests, Friday, December 13, 2002, "David Gergen, Howard Fineman, Carl Jeffers, Terry Jeffrey, Joe Scarborough, James Woolsey, Mike Barnicle, Bob Dornan."

Now there's a group of guys Trent and Hootie wouldn't have any trouble showering with.

A Hot TP

According to the NYPD, those inventive folks at the right-wing New York Sun have found another way to manufacture news:

A CRIME reporter for the New York Sun has been arrested for setting two rolls of toilet paper on fire in a Greenwich Village bar. According to a criminal complaint, cops said a witness saw William Mauldin run out of a bathroom after the fire was set at Caf� Creole on MacDougal Street near Minetta Lane at around 3:30 a.m. Saturday. Mauldin was charged with attempted arson and reckless endangerment.

As if New York's Finest didn't have enough on their hands with John Fund.

Snitch Gets It (No, Not The D.T.s) Chris may be a disgrace on matters of the 21st Century, but he's got the Confederacy dead to rights:

The Confederacy, under the leadership of Jefferson Davis, schemed to destroy the Union. It openly solicited the military support of foreign powers in order to do so. It attempted to assassinate a Republican president and may eventually have succeeded. It issued arrogant and disgusting orders for the execution of prisoners of war, without discrimination as to shade or color. It instated censorship, and it instated mandatory (if sectarian) religion. There isn't a "white" person in the country who should not spit upon its treasonous and hateful memory. There would be no such place as "America" if the bloody stars and bars had carried the day.

Spit It Out, Frank, And Move On With Your Life

Joshua M. Marshall caught this gem on Hardball:

Basically, [Pollster Frank] Luntz said that the "problems" Lott was talking about, which voting for Strom Thurmond would have avoided, were Bill Clinton's moral and sexual lapses. If ever there was a statement so ridiculous that the speaker deserved to be laughed out of three dimensional space, buddy, this is it.

(For those playing along at home: Remember, Frank Luntz is the "independent" pollster; Pat Caddell is the "Democratic" pollster.)

Also, be sure to read Marshall on the South Dakota Vote Fraud story, where the fraud turns out to be false and perjured affidavits submitted by Republican operatives after the election.

The Moonie Times is running a "Nobles and Knaves of the Year" contest. Not trusting its readers' ability to think independently, the paper is only allowing votes for persons and organizations who have already received the award in its weekly column of the same name.

What if you don't think that Hootie Johnson is noble for "defending tradition and privacy at Augusta National Golf Club," or that Nickelodeon is knavish "for airing a special on homosexual parenting"?

Well, I guess you can always nominate the Reverend Sun Myung Moon for his view that "the country that represents Satan's harvest is America" or Robert Stacy McCain for putting a positive spin on slavery.

Send your votes to crousseaux@washingtontimes.com with "Nobles Contest" in the subject line.

But hurry, "Entrees must be received by Dec. 28." You can wait until Jan. 4 to submit a main course or dessert.

Fucking illiterates.

Meet Your Liberal Press

Suck-up-to-conservatives-at-the-expense-of-the-truth-week continues with this drivel from The New York Times:

Conservatives Led the Way in Criticizing Lott's Remarks

The lie is now officially received wisdom.

Debra Saunders Develops Sullivan-Kaus Syndrome

A Daily Howler take-down of a most deserving target:

Meanwhile�yes, we quoted Debra Saunders accurately in last Friday�s HOWLER. The San Francisco Chronicle subsequently changed the on-line version of her column without noting that a correction had been made. Many readers went to the link and thought that we had doctored her quote. Sorry�that�s the sort of thing Saunders does.

The original quote:

The second result was political. Then-Sen. Al Gore, and later an independent campaign supportive of then-Vice President George Bush, ran TV spots on Horton during the 1988 presidential election. Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis lost.

The doctored one:

The second result was political. Then-Sen. Al Gore used the furlough program against Dukakis in the 1988 presidential race. Later an independent campaign supportive of then-Vice President George Bush ran spots on Horton. Dukakis lost the presidential race.

A journalist lying and then covering up. At least as reprehensible as a politician stealing newspapers, one might say.

Saunders, the Bay Area's biggest embarrasment, has written a book on Gore. Is this lie in there too?

12/17 -- Somerby's Update: Saunders invokes a ridiculous "I ate my own homework" defense.

(For the clinicians who first discovered Sullivan-Kaus Syndrome, click here.)

Grand Old Police Blotter, Pee Wee Thurmond Edition

The state Senate is not considering any action to remove Sen. Jerry Thomas, R-Franklinton, arrested this week during a raid on an adult video and book store in New Orleans, Senate President John Hainkel said Thursday.
...

Thomas was arrested Tuesday and charged with lewd conduct, which can include exposure of genitals, intercourse, masturbation, urination or defecation in a public place or where the act is likely to be seen by another person, according to the municipal code.
...

[Lousiana] Gov. Foster said Thursday that Thomas "is a good man who was in the wrong place. It is totally out of character. He's a decent person as far as I stand."

The Governor obviously was standing far outside shooting distance.

Monosyllablic Mick Little Mickey Kaus proves he's as competent at counting syllables as he is at reporting. Which is to say, not at all.

Slander

Howie Kurtz is an abomination. In an article aptly titled "A Hundred- Candle Story And How To Blow It," Kurtz blows it:

It wasn't until Lott apologized last Monday night that such newspapers as the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today took note of the matter. In the meantime, Lott was pummeled by a number of online Weblogs -- particularly by conservatives who agree with him on many issues -- in a way that helped force the story into public view.
...

By Monday, with the mainstream press still largely snoozing, Web writers were leading the charge. Andrew Sullivan: "Either they get rid of Lott as majority leader or they should come out formally as a party that regrets desegregation and civil rights for African-Americans." Joshua Micah Marshall: "The real question is why this incident is still being treated as no more than a minor embarrassment or a simple gaffe." National Review Online's David Frum: "What came out of his mouth was the most emphatic repudiation of desegregation to be heard from a national political figure since George Wallace's first presidential campaign."

Says Glenn Reynolds, the Tennessee law professor who jumped on the story in his InstaPundit column: "The guy's majority leader. Reporters, as opposed to bloggers, depend on him for access. The hinterlands are full of bloggers who don't care whether Trent Lott is nice to them or not. That makes them different from the Washington press."

For those wishing to ask the Washington Post to hire a real reporter:

ombudsman@washpost.com


kurtzh@washpost.com


Update: Sorry, but the higher-ups at the Post, such as Len Downie, don't like to be bothered by you common riff-raff. That's the best I can do.

On The Cutting Room Floor

As interesting as what Vice President Gore did on Saturday Night Live is what he didn't do. In addition to rejecting a sketch about farting, Gore

rejected material that could be interpreted as disrespectful to former president Bill Clinton. He also dismissed a joke about Mr. Bush and cocaine as "unfair."

It's a shame Gore won't be restoring honor and dignity to the White House in January 2005.

Gore Will Not Run in 2004; Press Scrambles To Manufacture Lies About Other Democrats

Meet Your Liberal Press

"Lloyd Grove: I think [Senator Trent Lott] is not so much bigoted as culturally sheltered--odd in a man with such a wordly job."

The Early Reviews

"In my professional opinion, Al Gore's mental illness is rapidly worsening. He now displays full-blown schizophrenia. For several minutes, Gore actually believed he was Republican Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott." -- Charles Krauthammer, M.D.

"As an entertainer, I can say Al Gore is a complete bomb as an entertainer. Not once did he refer to Tom Daschle as "Puff" or "that anti-American traitor." He never called Walter Mondale "Mondull" or called himself "Algore." That is pure comedy gold, my friends." -- Rush Limbaugh

"Gore's racist caricature of Trent Lott was a carefully-crafted ruse designed to hide the facts that Al Gore, Sr. was a leading segregationist and that Gore himself had sexual relations with several of his father's slaves." -- The Washington Times, Sean Hannity and about thirty others

Wes Pruden Discovers That Glenn Reynolds Is A Tool Of Jesse Jackson

Mr. Lott, who has a gift for putting his foot in his mouth, spoke the evil words at Strom's birthday party on Wednesday.... But nobody in Washington noticed or cared until Jesse Jackson read about it in the Chicago papers and went gleefully to work.

Phase II Bonus Points to Wes for the "Abe Lincoln was a racist too" defense.

p.s. Yes, I know Reynolds isn't in D.C.

Here is the Bush quote that Sully wants in Bartlett's:

Every day our nation was segregated was a day that America was unfaithful to our founding ideals.

And which ideal was that, Dubya -- The Three-Fifths Compromise?

Yes, I know the arguments that the Founders' rhetoric of liberty and equality provided an intellectual foundation for civil rights movements, that MLK called upon the nation to put the ideals of the Founders into practice, etc, etc.

But instead of -- or even in addition to -- recalling the more ancient generation which did not practice what it preached, why not recall the generation of activists and average citizens -- many still living, some gone and some killed for their troubles -- who, unlike the Founders, fought the Thurmonds and Lotts of this country to end segregation.

If Bartlett's needs a quote, the pure and undiluted original serves much better than Dubya's pale copy:

When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. ... But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt....

Update: Edited per this comment.

Naming and Shaming

As Twisted Little Mick says "Always announce bad news on Friday." He might add the corollary, always change your blog entries on Friday night, when no one's looking.

Without comment or admitting error, Mick has rewritten the P.P.S. to his Friday morning entry. It now reads:

"The only downside I can see to Lott relinquishing his leadership post is the revival of 'blogger triumphalism' that will follow. Though blogs (e.g. Atrios, Josh Marshall, Tim Noah, Sullivan, and Instapundit) took the lead in blasting Lott -- while the NYT 's Guilty Southern Liberal Howell Raines, hilariously, was asleep at the switch when a real 60's-style civil rights controversy came along -- wouldn't Lott eventually have gotten into big trouble for his remarks even if the Web didn't exist?" (Emphasis added.)

Atrios and Noah weren't there yesterday morning, as I noted in yesterday's comment. Now they are.

Mick also adds an "update" which quotes John-John Podhoretz' column, which properly credits Atrios. But we all know the real reason for the change: Kaus reads Roger Ailes and does Roger's bidding.

Like the mighty Howell Raines, who can make cabinet officials withdraw from country clubs that have earned his wrath, the mighty Roger Ailes can make "journalist" Mickey Kaus rewrite his "files" to reflect the truth.

Now that's blog triumphalism ... nay, blog transcendence ... at its finest.

It's nice to see that his son's attempt to murder someone hasn't distracted American Conservative Union President David A. Keene from kibitzing on the new Bush economic team.

Says David, "you'd have to have a hole in your head to select Stephen Friedman head the NEC.... Bush must be crazier than my kid with a loaded handgun during rush hour."

Keene also has also taken up Dick Armey's crusade against video surveillance of intersections, and is making like a civil libertarian. Wonder why?

Idiot Of The Week

Despite all of the coverage Sen. Trent Lott has received, nobody has raised the obvious question: What kind of president might Strom Thurmond have been? My guess is that he would have kept us out of the Korean War, thereby sparing the lives of 50,000 young Americans. As president, he would have had little to say about racial segregation on the national level. That was still essentially a state and local matter in 1948.
Perhaps he will run for the office again in 2004. He is still eligible.

JOSEPH SOBRAN
Burke, Va

Hank Yankers

"This is a moment of disappointment for me, of course," [Kissinger] wrote. "My hope is that by the decision to step aside now, the joint commission can proceed without further controversy."

For you and nobody else, Henry.

A Correction

Digby has pointed out significant flaws in the chronology provided by my previous comment. My chronology underemphasizes the leading role of Atrios in uncovering the Lott story, and also misstates the timing of Atrios' reporting. These facts are significant, and there is never a good excuse for inaccuracy. I apologize for these errors, and am rewriting the comment accordingly. (And also to correct the numerous typos.)

Wheels Go 'Round and 'Round In The Circle (Jerk) Game

The second most offensive thing about the Lott story is the rush of right-wing bloggers to orally copulate themselves and their cohorts for "breaking" and "leading" on the Lott story. This is utter shite, and it's all over the web: Some jackoff named Ken Layne claims that "right-wing bloggers were all over this, immediately." Twisted Little Mick claims that Joshua Marshall, Sully and Glenn Reynolds "took the lead," but the story would have been covered in the traditional press anyway. And Sully uses the story to raise some quick cash (or lolly, as they say back home), by publishing some snivelling synchophant's comment that "you and Josh Marshall have been leading the discussion" (See below.)

Of course, with the exception of crediting Joshua Marshall, who did real reporting on the story, these are all lies.

The chronology goes like this: Lott made the speech on Thursday, December 5, which was aired by C-SPAN. ABC (via The Note) published it on Friday, December 6, and Tim Noah in Slate linked to The Note the same day. The Washington Post provided extensive coverage on Saturday. (The Moonie Times, meanwhile, covered the story on Friday by whitewashing the event, omitting any mention of Lott's racist remarks. NPR, on Weekend Edition, also broadcast an excerpt from Lott's speech without mentioning the racist statements.)

Among weblogs, Atrios had the story first, on December 6. Joshua Marshall commented on the story a couple of hours later, without mentioning a source. "Instapundit" then came along and simply agreed with what Marshall and Atrios said. The usual wingnut circle jerk then began, with Instapundit's toadys linking to him, him linking back to them, and none of them adding any substance. (They all admitted legal segregation was bad, though, bless their little hearts.) Sully didn't get around to the story until early Monday morning, long after practically everyone else with a blog, left and right, had said something about it.

So righty bloggers did not break the story. They jumped on a moving train, driven by portions of the major media and many liberal bloggers.

But have righty bloggers led the charge since then? As Al Gore, Sr. said to Strom Thurmond, "Hell No!"

Atrios provided more than a half dozen links to the Dixiecrat platform and Lott's history and ties to the CCC. Marshall found Lott's amicus brief on behalf of Bob Jones "University." Real reporting. Sully's first comment was about how moral he is because he beat the New York Times and Bush in condemning Lott. (He failed to mention that the liberal blogs -- and ABC, CNN and the Washington Post -- were all way ahead of him.) Instapundit did his usual half-assed job of linking to other bloggers who were merely re-posting the story. Neither Sully nor Instapundit did any reporting whatsoever.) The wingnut blogs have since moved on to their true concerns, damage control for the Republican Party and ensuring that the Pubes don't lose their slim Senate majority.

There you have it. Little Mick, Ken Layne and Sully's reader are lying sacks of shit. You heard it here first.

Update: JB Armstrong of the comprehensive MyDD also reported the Lott story very early on the 6th. As JB correctly states here, the most important thing is not which left/liberal blogger noted the story first. But I wanted to make the correction for accuracy's sake, particularly because my original comment was inadequate in detailing Atrios' role apart from the timing issue/non-issue.

Update Update: I had the Update in the wrong place, so I've updated the Update by moving it. Stay tuned for further Update developments.

Wheels Go 'Round And 'Round In The Circle (Jerk) Game

The second most offensive thing about the Lott story is the rush for right-wing bloggers to orally copulate themselves and their cohorts for "breaking" and "leading" on the Lott story. This is utter shite, and it's all over the web: Some jackoff named Ken Layne claims that "right-wing bloggers were all over this, immediately." Twisted Little Mick claims that Joshua Marshall, Sully and Glenn Reynolds "took the lead," but the story would have been covered in the press anyway. And Sully uses the story to raise some quick cash (or lolly, as they say back home), by publishing some snivelling synchophant's comment that "you and Josh Marshall have been leading the discussion" (See below.)

Of course, with the exception of crediting Joshua Marshall, who did real reporting on the story, these are all lies.

The chronology goes like this: Lott made the speech on Thursday, December 5, which was aired by C-SPAN. ABC (via The Note) published it on Friday, and Tim Noah in Slate linked to The Note the same day. The Washington Post provided extensive coverage on Saturday. (The Moonie Times, meanwhile, covered the story on Friday whitewashing the event, omitting any mention of Lott's racist remarks. As did NPR, on Weekend Edition.)

Among weblogs, Joshua Marshall had the first mention of the story I could find, on December 6. Atrios also had the story then. "Instapundit" then came along and simply agreed with what Marshall and Atrios said. The usual wingnut circle jerk then began, with Instapundit's toadys linking to him, and adding nothing of substance. Sully didn't get around to the story until early Monday morning, long after practically everyone else with a blog, left and right, had said something about it.

So righty bloggers did not break the story. They jumped on a moving train, driven by the major media and liberal bloggers.

But have righty bloggers lead the charge since then? As Al Gore, Sr. said to Strom Thurmond, "Hell No!"

Marshall broke Lott's amicus brief on behalf of Bob Jones. Atrios provided more than a half-dozen links to the Dixiecrat platform and Lott's history and ties to the CCC. Real reporting. Sully's first comment was about how moral he is because he beat the New York Times and Bush in condemning Lott. Instapundit did his usual half-assed job of linking to other bloggers who were merely re-posting the story. The wingnut blogs have since moved on to their true concerns, damage control for the Republican Party and ensuring that the Pubes don't lose their slim Senate majority.

There you have it. Little, Ken Layne and Sully's reader are lying sacks of shit. You heard it here first.

Another "Augusta" For The Moonie Times

Joshua Marshall has an informative post about the virulently racist Council of Conservative Citizens' amicus brief in Commonwealth v. Black, the cross-burning case. Perhaps the most disturbing news is that the author of the brief, one Edgar Steele, is licensed to practice law in the State of California. Should being a contemptible prick disqualify an otherwise qualified applicant from becoming a member of the Bar? Perhaps not. Maybe, though, a little publicity about Mr. Steele's views will cause him to feel unwelcome in the Golden State, and send him back to Idaho faster than a flaming crucifix up the ass.

What A Fool Believes

But this story gets out on the blogs - I think you and Josh Marshall have been leading the discussion - and now it is impossible to stop. The blogs give legitimacy to the other papers. They create the momentum, and the big boys can jump on. Do you think that the NY Times would be running articles on this if InstaPundit had not?

The Dems have chosen a safe but solid line-up for their seats on the 9-11 commission. TBogg reports and comments:

For the Democrats, Mitchell's replacement by Lee Hamilton was a good choice, as were their other choices of :

retiring Rep. Tim Roemer, D-Indiana, who spearheaded the creation of the independent commission; outgoing Sen. Max Cleland, D-Georgia; former Clinton Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick and prominent Democratic lawyer Richard Ben-Veniste.

What remains to be seen is who Bush and the Republicans choose as their additional committee members. John Danforth is their usual "go-to-guy" If the names Ed Meese or James Baker come up, you might as well flush the report right now.

Hamilton, Cleland and Ben-Veniste are beyond reproach; Gorelick will undoubtedly be the target of wingnut smears just for being within 5,000 miles of the Clinton Justice Department. But one can't hope for much from the commission with Kissinger in the chair and a Republican veto on every decision.

I'd like to see Danforth on the commission in one of the Republican slots, just to piss off the wingnuts who hate him for his Waco report. But the Administration can do a lot worse than Meese or Baker (who would probably think working with others on a commission was beneath them, anyway). Think Joe DiGenova, David Bossie, Chris Ruddy. Think Dick Armey. Most likely, Bush will pick five noncontroversial nobodies to keep the commission off the front pages as much as possible. But the game is rigged, and there's no way Bush can lose.

Roger Ailes is not a major follower of organized sports, but nevertheless recommends this column on the loathsome Charlie Hustle.

Another Southerner

SEN. BILL FRIST (R), TENNESSEE: "He's not a racist. I've known Trent well the last eight years. The spin to this and the interpretation of this, I think, is abhorrent."

(Link via David Ehrenstein, at Eschaton.)

John Fund, In Phase I

Mr. Lott's remarks will be a bludgeon with which to beat the Republican Party mercilessly. Morton Kondracke made this clear on Fox News Channel. "This will be endlessly repeated and used to increase the base vote, the black vote in elections from now on," he said. Adds Newsweek's Howard Feinman, appearing on CNBC: "I spent a good bit of last week in Louisiana, where the African-American vote really turned out to re-elect Mary Landrieu. The black politicians are feeling a sense of empowerment now, and they see an opening here with Lott, and they're going to drive it. -- Abuser John "Thumb" Fund

"Damn you, Lott! You've empowered black voters!"

William F. Buckley Must Go

"Some good men thought it wrong to go to war to end slavery, or to go to Congress to end Jim Crow." -- Buckley, in today's Wall Street Journal

.

Crouching Tiger, Unhidden Grand Dragon

Lott might survive all this. He is not black. If he were, and if he had associated with a racist black organization, the media would have pressed his pants while he was wearing them. [Para.] In the name of true equality brotherhood, I wish Brother Lott a daily hot iron or two. He would then better understand the Negro. -- Stanley Crouch, proving that blacks are intellectually superior to Michael Kelly

Nino's Sex Tips

"Surely one can burn a cross in the sanctity of one's bedroom." -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia

Is Scalia trivializing racism and mocking individual freedoms, or merely reminiscing about the night Eugene was conceived?

(Trick question. We all know the answer is "both.")

Un-American Conservatives

Pat Buchanan and his business partner are both anti-semites. What a surprise.

But where's the coverage? The story's only been in the Washington Post -- in a gossip column -- and TAPped.

I guess the media can only handle one bigot at a time.

Now, Trent Lott's Hate Does Not Bother Me....

Does your conscience bother you?

I have two questions for the "Trent Lott Must Go" crowd:

Why?

and Where?

Why should Trent Lott go? Because he is an embarassment to the Senate?

But he's not. The Senate didn't elect him. The people of Mississippi did. And he's not a Senate leader. He's the leader of the Republican Party in the Senate.

Doesn't embarass me in the slightest. He's your problem, RNC, you clean up after him.

The "Lott Must Go" cries from the right are disingenuous at best. Because they don't really want him to go anywhere. All the talk is about Lott resigning his leadership position. No one is calling for him to resign from the Senate. Why? His comments make him unfit to lead the Republicans, but not unfit to vote with them on matters every matter of national importance? Bigotry is okay on the back benches? The real reason is because Lott's resignation from the Senate might further narrow the Republicans' majority, particularly if his replacement was picked by Mississippi's Democratic governor. The right had no trouble with Lott-sponsored judicial candidates, like Charles Pickering, and they certainly won't have any problem with Lott voting to put similiar Bush nominees on the federal bench. They don't really want him gone.

And look at the leaders of the Lott Must Go movement. Andrew Sullivan, who takes a paycheck from a paper edited by bigots even bigger than Lott (including Robt. "God Bless Trent Lott" McCain). And Jonah Goldberg, whose mother runs a internet message board for racists. These men are hardly entitled to claim the moral high ground.

Update: I rest my case. The wing-nuts are calling for Lott to step down as leader, but at the same time practically ordering him not to do a Livingston.

Hey, wouldn't it be funny if Dick Cheney was building an underground disco at his residence at the Naval Observatory?

No, not at all.

The Talking Points Have Been Issued

And it goes like this: Yeah, segregation might be bad, but the real harm from Lott's comments is that it leaves the GOP vulnerable to unfair and despicable criticism.

Exhibit "A": "Plainly America would not have been well served by the triumph of the segregationist Dixiecrats at a moment when the civil rights movement was coming into its own," says the Wall Street Journal editorial page. "Such a reading gives short shrift not only to the black struggle for equality, but also to the history of both Mr. Thurmond and the GOP. Mr. Lott played right into the hands of opponents who are eager to paint the Republican Party's Southern ascendancy as nothing more than old-fashioned bigotry."

Exhibit "B": "Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott has inadvertently provided ammunition to those who would perpetuate the blood libel against conservatism in general and the Republican Party's Southern-based expansion in particular � that it is tainted by bigotry."

That's Phase I. The second phase, already planned: Liberals and Democrats are the real racists. (The Moonie Times jumped ahead in the progam on this one.)

Among Friends, Extra-Special Moral Equivalency Edition

The Editor-In-Chief of the Washington Times, Wesley Pruden, welcomes his newest columnist:

A big day for kink, shorn of stigma

...[T]he Blair government, to Tory applause, is about to adopt "gay marriage," without the shoes and rice.
...

The Supreme Court's new sodomy case revisits settled law that the state has a legitimate interest in prohibiting unnatural sexual relations. The government's lawyers could argue, but probably won't, that sodomy is a public-health issue, as sodomy in the age of AIDS is a worldwide health hazard, like smoking (but, unlike smoking, highly contagious). Two decades on, nearly all the heterosexual AIDS cases are either dirty-needle druggies, children who inherited the virus, or women dumb enough or unfortunate enough to live with druggies. The government might lose this time; the Supreme Court could reason that government snoops have no place in anybody's bedroom, homo- or hetero-.

To soften the blow against actual marriage, the Blair government announced that it would act boldly to prohibit bestiality, or what its practitioners call "zoosexuality." ... This puzzles some British pundits, who do not understand why the government wants to make some unnatural sex a crime, and not others...

Once upon a time, in a land and in a century far away, we did not have to concern ourselves with these sordid topics, once unfit for discussion in genteel mixed company. Ah, the golden days of pre-Clintonian innocence.

Well, he may be your Editor-in-Chief, Andrew, but thank goodness he's no Howell Raines.

Southern Man

The previous comment (the one immediately below) refers to the subject of the brilliant investigative journalism of in the current New York Press. Signorile has exposed Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor of the Moonie Times, as a diehard racist and apologist for slavery. The evidence cited included McCain's posting of anti-black and anti-gay messages on the Free Republic messageboards, under the screenname "BurkeCalhounDabney."

After the column was published online, McCain and/or his allies leapt into action and deleted all evidence of their Southern Pride from the freeper boards. Seems the big-talking bigot wasn't all that ready to defend his racist views.

Fortunately, McCain hasn't been able to delete all of his idiocy from the web. Comments such as this remain: "And so we look at the South, and we see a region where -- even under slavery, even during segregation -- black and white have generally lived together in harmony."

I can't say this is a complete surprise. I've mentioned Wes Pruden's racist past and present before. And, as I wrote this past weekend, "The Moonie Times' Augusta is, of course, the rehabilitation of the Confederacy and Southern racists."

What will come of this? Most likely, nothing. How can editor-in-chief Pruden possibly discipline his underling for sharing the exact same views as he does? And the righty bloggers have already exhausted this year's quota of intramural criticism on their Replace Helmet Head campaign. The mainstream press will never call on McCain (or the Times) to defend McCain's vile views.

Romenesko has linked the story as a sidebar, and hopefully that will generate some feedback in the letters section. Those who wish to make their views known the Father's disciples can write to: letters@washingtontimes.com. Those wishing to cancel their subscriptions can write to the more appropriately named customer service address: shite@washingtontimes.com. (Seriously.)

If anyone else has anymore information regarding the Times' love affair with rednecks and racists, please feel free to forward (as well as to places where it's more likely to be read).

Run Away, Dixieland!

Like a true Son of the South, Robert S. McCain, Esq., gets his ass kicked by a Northern gentleman and runs away like the coward he is.

Bozo Emasculates Himself Too

"In fact, no one cares whether one golf club somewhere is still males-only." -- Brent "Smackdown" Bozell, demonstrating the perils of recycling Mickey Kaus instead of following the news.

There Aren't Enough Hours In The Day

If only I had the time:

Good column on Whoraldo, if you can get past the white print on a black background.

Todd Lindberg decries a left-wing "hatchet job on John Poindexter, Elliott Abrams and Henry Kissinger."

And a tribute to the biggest Dick in the House.

Oh well, the jokes really write themselves.

The Moonie Times' High Journalistic Standards

The Moonie Times' response to "LottO'Hate" is quiet interesting. First, Moonman Greg Pierce rewrites the Lott quote to make Lott look like even more of a racist prick:

At the party for the retiring Sen. Strom Thurmond, Mr. Lott said that "the United States would have been better off had Strom Thurmond won his 1948 presidential campaign."

Of course, that is the clear meaning of Lott's quote, but not the actual words he used. So the Times undercuts Lott's "poor choice of words" lie... er ... defense.

Pierce then proceeds to lift entire portions of the AP write-up on Lott without attribution.

Honor Among Traitors

To the Editor:

Re "Abrams Back in Capital Fray at Center of Mideast Battle" (front page, Dec. 7):

With regard to Elliott Abrams's participation in our talks in New York on the recent Iraq inspection resolution, the suggestion by an unidentified official in your article that I was upset by Mr. Abrams's interventions is simply untrue.

To the contrary, Mr. Abrams was a welcome member of our negotiating team and made a most valuable contribution to the process. Our personal relations have been and remain excellent.

JOHN D. NEGROPONTE
New York, Dec. 8, 2002

Unrepentant

Says the Grand Toupee of the Aryan Brotherhood: "My comments were not an endorsement of his positions of over 50 years ago, but of the man and his life."

Which would, of course, include an endorsement of his positions of over 50 years ago.

Never let it be said that Roger Ailes lacks empathy. Why, I put the "ass" in compassionate conservative. And, in that spirit, here's my contribution to solving Sully's alleged financial crisis.

No need to thank me.

Remember, Andy: if you give a man a Fisk, you're an insufferable asshole, but if you teach a man to Fisk, you've created a whole new asshole.

Apology Not Accepted

They may be that stupid in Mississippi, but we're not.

Emasculation: Kausfiles!

Once again, Little Mick ends the day just a little smaller than he started it. This morning, Mick wrote:

This is too good to be true, but Bush's pick for Treasury Secretary, John W. Snow, appears to be a member of the Augusta National Golf Club. ...The New York Times editorial page will soon be calling for Snow to refuse to stimulate the economy until Augusta National admits women. ...

But the Times never got the chance, because Snow quit the Club just hours after Kaus's gloat was published.

The incident demonstrates just how impotent Mick is. The Times' reporting on the Augusta controversy makes it impossible for a Cabinet nominee to retain membership in a discriminatory club and remain a viable candidate. Meanwhile, Kaus's constant whining has done nothing to dethrone the hated Raines, and his cheap shots demonstrate just how irrelevant he is.

The Cult of Personality

The Moonie Times publishes yet another column citing Trent Lott's remarks at the Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday party (or Pre-Roast, as I like to call it), without mentioning Lott's endorsement of segregation and vile race hatred. I wonder just how many Moonie reporters were in attendance at the big bash? As mw points out in the comments here, Strom and the Mindwashing Messiah have been fast friends for over 30 years.

John Leo to Sully: Drop Dead. Will this column cause a dissolution of friendship between the anti-P.C. pals? Or will Sully praise Leo's forthright attack on Howell Raines' most recent P.C. crusade.

Sully to Roger Ailes: Drop Dead Not surprisingly, Sully has quickly rejected Roger Ailes' call for openness and integrity at his website. And demonstrated his ignorance of the term "intramural" to boot. Sully excerpts one hand-picked letter which is marginally critical of him (on the crucial issue of whether Tim Noah has a sense of humor) and another from a law school student who (partially) disagrees with him on the Defense of Marriage Act, then pats himself on his glutes for his "intra-mural" integrity. It seems all those other critical e-mails got accidentally deleted by "Reihan Salam."

Meanwhile, today's Times publishes several letters in which the correspondents disagree with the views of recent opinions on the paper's op-ed page, as well as many from readers who agree.

A Reader Wipes So why does the Times alone need an ombudsman? Here's the "devastating critique" from a Sully bootlicker ... er ... reader:

The newspaper that more than any other influences coverage in every other paper, whose copy is often picked up and run in local papers around the country, has a special trust and responsibility by virtue of its authority.

Now there's some right good logic-in': By virtue of its success and influence, the Times "has a special trust and responsibility" to readers. What Sully's reader cannot fathom is that the people who buy the paper do so because they like and trust its editorial judgments; the same goes for the editors who pick up the Times' syndicated stories. Those people create the Times' influence, not the other way around. No one forces them to buy the paper or, in the case of other publishers, the paper's articles. Readers aren't idiots, and they don't throw down a dollar each day to have their intelligence insulted. Editors and publishers of other papers are, or at least should be, even more savvy on news content. The Times' "responsibility to the readers," if there was any, would seem to be to keep doing what makes the paper successful among its readers.

Mystery Date Sully's correspondent describes him or herself as a reporter "at a very large Times rival," one with a "vey [sic] conservative line." (I wonder which one that could be.) He/she compares the (percieved) "church and state" position of the Times to those at the four unnamed papers he/she's worked for. He/she then goes on to slam the Times for liberal bias on the news pages, using such content-neutral phrasing as "Clintonian" and "maddening liberal self-righteousness."

It's clear the writer's own integrity can't be questioned. Literally. Because our fearless correspondent has forgotten to leave a name -- even while trying to impress us with his/her personal integrity and assuring us that what the Times does never happens at any other paper. To be fair, Sully claims he reprints the e-mail without names, "because the point is the debate itself." But the writer's entire point is based on his personal observations as "a reporter" and not "the debate itself." So "the reporter" should either stand behind his/her observations, and his/her own work, or not allow it to be published anonymously.

Twisted Little Mick

Diminutive hater Mickey Kaus is crowing over the fact the CSX Chairman John Snow, Bush's likely appointee to replace Paul O'Neill "appears to be a member of the Augusta National Golf Club." Says Kaus, "This is too good to be true."

It turns out Kaus' objection to the Times' coverage was not its excessiveness, but the fact that the Times was on the wrong side of the issue. It's nice to see Trent Lott isn't alone in his celebration of bigotry and exclusion.

Remember those folks who were castigated by such moral giants as Fred Barnes and Peggy Noonan for booing Trent Lott at Senator Wellstone's memorial service?

Turns out they were right.

"He's at it again! Howell Raines and Pravda are once again trying to ram their radical, anti-American agenda down our throats. Will we again be forced to endless biased articles in service of Raines' personal crusades? Will dissenting voices again be silenced by the Times' power-crazed P.C. thug? Stop ginning up 'stories' on your latest radical hobby horse, Comrade Raines, and write more about the heroism of our fearless President! And thank Father that we won't be reading any of this nonsense in the Washington Times."

Sully's Good Idea:

Why not appoint an ombusman from outside the Daily Dish to respond on a weekly basis on the main page to criticisms of Sully's ravings? It's what the Washington Post does. My suggestion: ask Sully Watch and Smarter Andrew Sullivan. They're on to Sully's bullshit and no fools. The Dish has got to stop acting like the Vatican and open itself up to scrutiny and debate. Hey, Sully. Shut me and all the other critics up, for Pete's sake. And do your huge ass a huge-ass favor as well.

Update: As Smarter Andrew Sullivan points out, the misspelling of "ombudsman" is from Sully's original.

What Mini-Mick is reading today, with his pants around his ankles:

This

This and

This.

And after he finishes cleaning up (which should be in about February 2003), he can spend more time on his John Kerry and Gary Condit obsessions.

My only question would be is why the Times doesn't have more women sports writers.

Those following Atrios' excellent coverage of the Trent Lott's most recent declaration of racial hatred shouldn't be surprised by the Moonie Times' reporting on the controversy:

"Senate Republican Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi, who was learning to walk when Mr. Thurmond was participating in the D-Day invasion of France in World War II, couldn't help but notice the significance of yesterday's snowstorm. 'I always said that Strom wouldn't leave until the Capitol froze over, and darned if he didn't,' he said."

Reporting, as in not reporting. Not one word about Lott's endorsement of Strom's racist presidential platform, or even Strom's own history as a bigot. Further proof of the Moonie Times' dedication to its missions of rehabilitating the racist South and putting lipstick on racist pigs.

Beyond that, the article is the usual crap about Strom being a horny old fart and, get this, "outliving communism." (Imagine the outrage from Dickie Scaife and Bozell the Clown if the Washington Post printed that.)

The Roger Ailes Enemies List has been updated.

(Look right... there ya go.)

....now if I could only figure out how to get rid of that big grey space and change the colors without fucking up the whole thing.

So Much For Concern For The Victims Of Crime

"The son of a prominent Washington, D.C. conservative leader is scheduled to attend a hearing in federal court later this month after being arrested and charged with shooting at a driver. ...

Keene's father, besides being chairman of the [American Conservative Union], is also on the board of directors of the National Rifle Association, which said the group's thoughts and prayers go out to the Keene family, according to NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam.

'This matter is in the hands of law enforcement and if any laws are broken, it has to be dealt with just like any other case,' Arulanandam said. 'Celebrity parents have to deal with these issues all the time and during this difficult time, our hearts go out to the parents.'" (Emphasis added.)

Yeah, that's it! Screw Keene's intended victim, the "celebrity parents" are the real victims here. Just imagine their suffering. Just imagine the attorneys fees. It's ... heartbreaking.

How about that bit of spin? -- "if" any laws are broken. The NRA can't even begin to imagine that shooting at another motorist might be illegal, at least when a white boy from a conservative family is involved.

And in what universe do celebrity parents "deal with" their kids attempting to murder someone else "all the time?" Are the offspring of Hollywood liberals going on kill sprees which their friends in the liberal media cover up? Even the demon seed of George and Jeb haven't gone this far.

The Grand Old Police Blotter: More Gun Nuts, More Crimes Edition:

D.C. resident David M. Keene engaged in a driveby shooting, targeting another motorist and missing the other driver's head by inches. As a TBogg link reveals, Keene is the spawn of one of the NRA's board of directors.

Several questions remain unanswered:

Young Master Keene, aged 21, was driving a gray, late-model BMW. Was it Daddy's car?

Is that an NRA sticker on the rear window?

Will Keene be booted out of the NRA for his poor aim?

And who will be the first wingnut to demand the death penalty, as in the case of Young Master Malvo?

Hoosier Daddy? Whilst searching for stories on Grand Exalted Kleagle Lott, I ran across a message board for Hoosiers and those who love them. Surprisingly, it doesn't seem to overrun by wingnuts and other droolers. (Yet.)

From "That's All Right, I Can Hear You" To "La La La La LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA... Henry!! MAKE THEM STOP!!"

Families of Sept. 11 victims fear that the White House will block their effort to get former Sen. Warren Rudman of New Hampshire on the new commission investigating the attacks.

They consider Rudman the only well-qualified Republican sufficiently independent of his party and the White House to do a thorough job on the commission, Stephen Push, a spokesman for the families, said Friday.

``At issue is whether this commission is going to have any teeth,'' he said. ``Having one independent Republican will make all the difference.''

Push said the families believe Rudman is being blocked because of opposition from the White House.

``For some reason the administration has been fighting this (the commission) ... from day one. I assume they're worried about criticism they didn't heed those earlier warnings'' of an attack, he said.

(via Associated Press.)

All Those You Can Leave Behind

So Paul O'Neill and Lawrence Lindsey have been pushed out of the Administration for failing to turn shit into sunshine.

"Administration officials conceded in private conversations that Mr. O'Neill had first lost the confidence of the markets and then gradually of senior White House officials, especially his initial champion, Vice President Dick Cheney."

No, the markets have lost confidence in Bush, and with good reason. You'd have to be insane to think the combination of deep tax cuts and paying for an invasion of Iraq will be good for the economy.

I wonder which masochist will sign on to take the next fall for Bush's failures. And what was/will be done to ensure O'Neill and Lindsey won't go DiIulio on Bush's ass.

Amerika's Paper Finds Its Augusta

Update: The link has been fixed, I hope.

Update: Yes, it has.

And here's an excerpt:

"A Vanderbilt University professor has stirred outrage in Dixie by declaring that Confederates were 'cowards masquerading as civilized men' who should have been executed at the end of the Civil War.

'Every Confederate soldier deserved not a hallowed resting place at the end of his days but a reservation at the end of the gallows,' Jonathan David Farley, an assistant professor of mathematics, wrote in a commentary in the Tennessean, Nashville's largest newspaper....

Allen Sullivant, chief of heritage defense for the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV), said Mr. Farley is 'entitled to his opinion, even one that's based on misinformation, ignorance and bigotry.'"

The Moonie Times' Augusta is, of course, the rehabilitation of the Confederacy and Southern racists.

And here's further proof of the obsession: Farley is again castigated in today's Times, with the following drivel:

There's little doubt that leaders of the Confederacy miscalculated when they chose war with the Union, and even less question that the Confederacy's soldiers were supporting the wrong values. But the deeds of nobility and honor were as common among the men in gray as they were among the men in blue.

Oh, really? I guess we'll be seeing Wes Pruden's praise for the noble warriors of al-Qaeda and Iraq next.

Sullywatch With The KO

"But it would only be fair to point out that the Times under Raines, at least to our knowledge, has not published anybody who has gotten the paper sued by saying a city official was indicted who never was. It has not published a pseudo-academic apology for racism covertly funded by a eugenicist think tank. It has not started the career of someone who would invent a conference of hackers that everyone who even looks at an issue of, say, 2600, would know is a fantastic invention."

More Mona-Mania: Mona also thinks that CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, Time, Newsweek, The Washington Post and the Chicago Tribune are part of the "liberal media." Diagnosis: Advanced Ashcroft's Dementia.

Nooner Discovers Another Kind Of Snow

Another steaming pile of stream-of-consciousness writing from the 12-step school of narcissistic prose.

Someone must have told Peg to "write what you know."

Kaus Career Suicide Watch, Day 6

Yes, the New York Times has published more about the Augusta National Golf Club story than I care to read about. The nice thing is, though, the Times literally has hundreds of other articles I can read instead. In the case of Midget Mickey Kaus, his entire output for days on end is the Times' Augusta coverage. His obsession with Howell Raines is pathological, and pathetic. A Fray contributor sums it up nicely:

And when I think about Mickey's psychological well-being, the first words that come to mind are: "Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder"

All the classic signs are present. He's utterly fixated on bashing the New York Times over and over again, to the point where the repetitive behavior has begun to alienate his readers. He will twist completely unrelated subjects back to the topic of the New York Times. When an important news item occurs, Mickey devotes his bandwidth to critiquing the Times' coverage of the event instead of offering any shreds of insight on the news itself.

We also see clear signs of denial and transference... as he has now launched a long and tiresome thread denouncing the NYT for being obsessed with criticizing the all-male membership policy at Augusta, while neglecting to mention that the Times would have to lead with Augusta stories for a month in order to match the number of pieces Kaus himself has written criticizing the editors of the Times.

It's time to stop the madness, Mickey. Pop some prozac... self-medicate with cannabinoids... pay some high-priced shrink $300 an hour to talk about your sexual hang-ups... whatever. Just make sure that one way or another, you seek help.

My first words would be "Chronic Masturbator," but six of one, half dozen of the other.

Piss and Mona

Milk Dud Mona Charen rewrites a Scaife press release on the "most outrageous statements" of the "liberal media" in 2002. As you'd expect, it's pretty thin gruel.

From that left-wing rag, Time Magazine "Gun rights advocates have been emboldened by an administration that is sympathetic to their cause. The closeness was underscored by the fact that the military-style gun used in the sniper attacks � named, unfortunately for the White House, Bushmaster XM15 � was manufactured by a company owned by Richard Dyke, a Bush fund-raiser."

Such bias, pointing out facts! Hell, what weapons manufacturer hasn't give money to Bush?

Next is Candy Crowley pointing out that Ted Kennedy is a liberal! And an effective legislator!

Shocking! (Is it necessary to dig out those links out Crowley's Dem bashing, or are we all up to date on that?)

From the home of Jackie Judd, John Stossel and George Fwill, here's Baba Walters: "For Castro, freedom starts with education. And if literacy alone were the yardstick, Cuba would rank as one of the freest nations on Earth. The literacy rate is 96 percent."

Quoting Castro! And pointing out that Cuba is not one of the freest nations on Earth! Talk about bias!

And foreign enemy Peter Jennings: "Attorney General John Ashcroft today talked about the foreign nationals who have been questioned by law enforcement in many parts of the country since November. The Justice Department planned to interview 5,000 foreigners, most of them Arabs or Arab-American. Now Mr. Ashcroft says he wants another 3,000 interviews. Many of those already questioned say it was terrifying that they were, in their words, 'victims of ethnic profiling.' "

Such a flagrant display of ... reporting the news!

The only quote containing any point of view is from Sy Hersh: "We have an attorney general that [sic] is, I don't know, how would you describe him, demented?"

Without context, it's hard to say what Hersh is commenting upon: Ashcroft's phobia of calico cats and naked bronze breasts, his association with Confederacy-loving loons, or his maniacal loathing of the Bill of Rights.

In any event, as TBogg and Bob Somerby point out, it's the right-wing media that's practicing psychiatry without a license en masse.

If that's the best Moaner and the MRC can do, Scaife's gonna be one pissed-off pimp.

Update: John "Thumb" Fund makes my point for me. He writes: "....as Candy Crowley, CNN's senior political correspondent, observes, 'mostly what we've heard [from the Democrats] is whining' about the election results." The "liberal media" lie is so blatant that even an abusive, lying prick like Fund acknowledges it.

From Tony Blankley's Komedy Korner: "The much-respected journalist Mickey Kaus...."

Why is it that so many wingnuts who profess their undying love for Condoleezza Rice can't be bothered to spell her name correctly?

Witness: Mona Charen, Ward Connerly, Lt. Criminal Oliver North and Benjy Shapiro (a repeat offender).

Pat Buchanan Joins The War Against Saddam

"[Harvard President Lawrence] Summers is declaring that homosexual sodomy, even orgies, in the dorms at Harvard are protected social conduct, fully consistent with the moral character expected of students. Harvard's moral values are now the values of the San Francisco bathhouse.

"Harvard's code is now based on Summers' values, which hold that the old moral code of Christianity, which teaches that sexual relations between men are unnatural and immoral, is 'abhorrent and an affront to the values of our university.'
...

"If Harvard is educating America's leaders, this country is not Slouching Toward Gomorrah, we are sprinting there."

Oops... wrong Saddam.

Roger Ailes welcomes all those visiting by way of signorile.com and the New York Press. And many thanks to Michelanglo Signorile for his mention. (Again, the credit should to the intrepid mw.)

A word of explanation for any particularly dense Dildoheads who've wandered this way: This site is not affiliated with any tubby, malodorous Republican mouthpiece or the Weekly World News of basic cable, the Fox "News" Channel. I wouldn't hire Sean Hannity or Geraldo Rivera if they paid me. But everyone is welcome here. Even Dildoheads.

The Creativity of Dildoheads

During his July 20, 2001, radio show, [Rush] Limbaugh spent a significant amount of airtime drawing comparisons between Daschle and Satan.... " Shortly after the show aired, mail addressed to "Tom 'The Devil' Daschle" began arriving at the senator's fifth-floor office.

In November 2001, the conservative lobbying organization American Renewal unveiled newspaper ads featuring photos of Daschle and Saddam Hussein placed side by side.... Envelopes addressed to "Tom 'Saddam' Daschle" soon appeared in the daily mail.

In February 2002, ... a number of Republicans -- most notably Trent Lott and Dick Cheney -- accused Daschle of aiding the enemy and of being irresponsibly unpatriotic. This time, letters addressed to "Tom 'Osama' Daschle" joined the steady stream of mail arriving in Daschle's office.

How proud their court-appointed guardians and therapists must be!

More Left-Wing Homophobia, At Townhall.Com

"The big rally was in defense of the transgendered - men who live as women and women who live as men. Old-guard protesters called out the names of every transgendered person in the United States murdered because of his, her or its sexual ambiguity." -- Suzanne Fields, enjoying a hearty chuckle at the expense of murdered Americans

Kvetcher On The Right

Wee Mickey Kaus is once again the spoiled adolescent, railing against "phonies" like Senator John Kerry. Here's the cogent critique of Kerry: "There's a metal plate in the back of his head -- under all the glued-on 'hair' -- that they open up and stick screwdrivers in when he gets back to his office." And just a few days earlier, Kaus was complaining about "high-school sneering." Kaus is so bitter and obsessed that he surpasses Holden C. and enters into Mark David Chapman terrority.

Wm. Safliar says Henry Kissinger is the perfect man to lead the 9/11 investigation because he is such a skilled liar that he will know when others are lying. Using similar logic, he recommends James Trafficant for Director of the F.B.I., Bernie Ebbers as Chairman of the S.E.C. and Roy Cohn's corpse to replace William Rehnquist as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

He also wants Dan Quayle on the 9/11 commission. Seriously.

Jeb And The Cuban Terrorists

(Via Buzzflash, and endorsed by Snitch himself.)

It's Me, It's Me ... President Ernest T.

"There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus. What you've got is everything, and I mean everything, being run by the political arm. It's the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis." -- John DiIulio, slandering the residents of a fictional North Carolina town.

Unfortunately, what will be lost in the rush to compare Bush to Goober and Gomer are the important points that every single action of the Bush administration is driven by partisan politics, and that Bush is the tool of Rove.

That is not news to anyone outside the toady press corps; the news is that a conservative, former Bush ally is willing to tell the truth.

A post on the Democratic Underground message board says Drudge is reporting on his radio show that John Kerry "has his hair done."

What can this mean?

Kerry's given Mike Taylor a job?

He likes a nice egg shampoo?

The Measure Of A Kaus

Here's some photographic evidence that might put an end to the question of Little Mickey's physical stature. He's taller than Jeffrey Katzenberg, smaller than Clinton.

Memo to Mick: Whoever told you the Trenchcoat Mafia look suits you did not have your best interests at heart.

(Photo via Law Meme.)

Frum Hell

"Did you know David Frum had a blog? It's as excellent as you'd expect (i.e. it's excellent)."

Yes, that's Little Mickey Kaus trolling for more hits, or clicks, or links or whatever.

Exactly how excellent is Frum's blog? As you'd actually expect, it sucks on ice.

The former Bush speechwriter, who got shitcanned when his idiot wife blabbed about how David, rather than Dubya, coined the ever-so-clever "Axis of Evil," has been reduced to insulting the intelligence of NRO readers. Typical of his insights is the following:

Frum quotes an article from a "left-wing sociologist" who says the Gores' new book, Joined at the Heart, is insufficiently critical of divorced parents. The sociologist writes that "[i]nstead of deploring the ubiquity of divorce and part-time parenthood, the Gores applaud the �explosion of new family forms and novel solutions to age-old problems.� ... So we meet Mitch and Cindy, Pat and Todd, Josh and John, and Minh and Thanh, people they�ve talked to, and whose households, we are told, suggest the different kinds of family life that lie ahead..... �To be sure, it would be inaccurate to say that the Gores are �pro-divorce.� No one is. ... [But] their general position is that marital break-ups deserve understanding rather than reproof or disapproval. ...."

From this review, Frum, who admits he hasn't read the book, concludes: "In 1992, Gore told us that if he ever became president, he would dismantle the American economy in the name of environmental regulation. Ten years later, he is ready to execute similar destruction on the American family." Frum states that Al Gore is "moving hard to the left ... on family and social policy."

Are you following the logic? Gore thinks that divorced parents deserve understanding, so he's ready to "execute ... destruction on the American family."

Excellent!

Just wait until Frum reads the chapter where we meet Bob and Liddy, Newt and Jackie and Marianne, and Ronnie and his Mommy.