In 1995 the British journalist and historian Gitta Sereny published the biography Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth, which examined the disconnect between his exculpatory statements during and after his war crimes trial at Nuremberg and the historical record. Sereny, although personally fond of the Third Reich's Minister of Armaments, found that he was nowhere near as innocent as he claimed to be during the last thirty-six years of his life.
Barack Obama is waging his very own battle with truth, and he's doing it within the context of a presidential campaign. Just this week, he has renounced not one, but two major pledges that he made during the primaries, the most recent of which was made just three months ago. It would be a stunning thing to see from an average politician. It is all the more so coming from an almost deified "change agent" espousing a fuzzy and vague brand of "hope."
During the Ohio primary, Hillary Clinton created a great stink regarding NAFTA and her intention to "renegotiate" it to protect American jobs. This was interesting, in so far as most of the lost jobs are more of a consequence of the rise of India and China and the self-defeating stupidity of the American labor and business communities. NAFTA became a catch-all for all the bad American economic choices of the last forty years.
No one was particularly surprised that Hillary would do this. The Clintons have a richly deserved reputation for doing and saying anything to win, regardless of how asinine those assertions are to anyone with a modicum of education. To almost everyone's surprise, Obama decided to compete with the Clintons on who could be tougher on trade, saying that he would use the "hammer" of withdrawing from the treaty to strengthen America's advantage. Not surprisingly, the Clintons won, crushing Obama in the Ohio primary.
Just on NAFTA alone, I was glad to see it and almost wished that one of them was telling the truth and won the presidency on the strength of such a platform.
The Clinton and Bush administrations have made it clear to both Canada and Mexico that the word of an American president is not to be trusted. Of NAFTAs three partners, the United States has been in violation of the treaty most frequently and most unrepentantly. And when that has been the finding of the NAFTA arbitration panel and the WTO, the Clinton and Bush administrations have ignored their rulings.
I've written about how Canada was essentially raped in the softwood lumber dispute before. Worse is the treatment that Mexico has received. 15 years after NAFTA specifically called for the access of Mexican trucks to American roads, the US Congress and Bush administration continues to stall on it, going so far as attempting to pass a law prohibiting it. No reasonable person can be expected to long deal with a partner who only adheres to the parts of a deal that benefit them and lie about or ignore the provisions that don't.
I was great supporter of both the US - Canada Free Trade agreement and NAFTA, so much so that I voted exclusively on those issues in the federal elections of 1988 and '93. To this day I don't regret that support. What I regret is the way that the United States government has conducted itself for the last sixteen years. I voted to partner with the United States of 1941-92, an internationalist nation that stuck it's word and honored its obligations. That country has effectively ceased to exist regarding trade issues.
In his memoir, My Years as Prime Minister, Jean Chretien explains the pressures an American president faces in trade disputes from individual senators when trade becomes an issue. A senator can - and often does - exert pressure on other parts of a president's agenda to force violations of treaties to get their way. And that's what created the softwood lumber dispute. Senators from the American northwest didn't like actual competition and forced the Clinton and Bush administrations to implement protectionist and illegal measures.
Especially priceless was President Bush's reaction when the WTO ruled against the United States. He said that he "would welcome" further negotiations on the matter with Canada. You know, I'm pretty sure that Charles Manson would have "welcomed further negotiations" with the Los Angeles District Attorney's office after he was convicted on 9 counts of first degree murder, but life doesn't work that way. Furthermore, the American government had no problem banning Canadian beef over Mad Cow concerns, but cried to the fucking heavens with other countries banned US beef for the same reason.
I would love like nothing else for an American president to come to Ottawa and demand a "renegotiation" of NAFTA to protect the environment and labor standards. I'd tell him or her to repeal Taft-Hartley and adopt Canada's. I'd also have a few things that I'd like to renegotiate myself. These would include the provisions that demand that Canada supply the United States with energy and fresh water at the previous year's levels, even if Canadians face a domestic shortage. Just to be a prick, I'd demand that the Americans allow Mexican trucking on their roads as NAFTA clearly calls for.
If that president refused, I'd use the "hammer" of opting out. I don't give a shit what pressures a president faces from his Senate or domestic opinion. If the United States can't be relied upon to keep its word, no one should give a fucking inch in dealing with them. No treaty at all is better than a selectively honored one.
Why would anyone renegotiate something that one party isn't complying with in the first place? Wasn't that the justification for invading Iraq?
The fact is that when Prime Minister Mulroney negotiated free trade with President Reagan in the eighties, Canada was being strangled by an out of control deficit and smothered in debt. We negotiated from a position of weakness. That's no longer true. Canada is now the only G8 country operating with a budget surplus and is rapidly paying down its debt. Oh, and we have all the oil now.
It is now believed that there might be more oil in western Canada than in the Arabian peninsula. If you believe President Bush's assertion that "America is addicted to oil" and know how the phenomenon of addiction works, you know that a junkie doesn't dictate the terms of a drug buy to his or her pusher. Can you think of another reason why Saudi Arabia, home of 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers and the source of the overwhelming majority of terrorist money for decades, isn't a target on the War on Terror?
I'm still a free-trader. I'm just not sure that we can trade freely with the United States when it is incapable of trading honestly or fairly. As Senator John McCain pointed out yesterday in Ottawa, Canada is the single largest export destination for 36 of the 50 United States. That will almost certainly continue to be the case whether that trade is free or not. But while, say, Michigan cannot negotiate a free trade deal with China, India or the European Union, Canada can.
I'm sick to fucking death of being targeted by assholes like George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton because they want to please their domestic idiots. If you want to "negotiate," then let's do it. If you want to threaten to opt out of NAFTA, I'm at the point where I'm willing to do it first. Yes, I'll lose jobs in the process, but you'll lose ten times as many. And you'll lose your guaranteed access to oil and water in the process. Anyone who has read me for any length of time knows that I'm a great proponent of the American doctrine of mutually assured destruction.
Barack Obama, who once vowed to use the "hammer'' of opting out of NAFTA to force the renegotiation of the trade pact, now says he will seek change through dialogue if he is elected U.S. president.
The presumptive Democratic nominee says in the upcoming edition of Fortune magazine that campaign rhetoric can sometimes get "overheated and amplified," and he denies he would move to unilaterally reopen the trilateral trade deal.
(...)
"I'm not a big believer in doing things unilaterally," Obama said in the Fortune interview. "I'm a big believer in opening up a dialogue and figuring out how we can make this work for all people.''
Hmmm, turns out that the famous Canadian embassy memo wasn't as false as Obama spun it to be, was it?
At a debate in Cleveland in the final days of the Ohio primary campaign in March, Obama agreed with Democratic rival Hillary Clinton when she said the six-month opt-out clause should be invoked on NAFTA to force changes.
"I think we should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to ensure that we actually get labour and environmental standards that are enforced," he said.
But every time Obama alters his statements on NAFTA, he lends credence to a Feb. 8 memo describing a meeting between his economic adviser, Austan Goolsbee, and George Rioux, Ottawa's consul-general in Chicago.
The Canadian memo, which was leaked to The Associated Press, said Goolsbee told Rioux that Obama's campaign remarks about NAFTA should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy.
American assholes decrying Canadian interference in the US primary process caused an unimaginable amount of shit in Canadian politics. The "Obama memo" led to an investigation of the Prime Minister's Office and, indirectly, the resignation of the chief of staff. And now we learn that the memo was largely correct.
What said assholes need to learn is that if American candidates are going to use foreign nations to their political benefit, those nations reserve the right to respond. And we'll do so in your precious fucking primary system if it becomes necessary. If Stephen Harper's staff was behind the leak of the Obama memo - which it almost certainly was - my respect for them just went up about fifteen notches.
After 15 years of being fucked over by the Clinton and Bush administrations, we should cut any other candidate who tries it off at the knees whenever possible. Whoever actually leaked that memo to CTV and the AP should be awarded the Order of Canada and a loving, sloppy blowjob from our super-hot Governor General.
American politicians have shown absolutely no reluctance in using every weapon in their arsenals for decades now. I see no reason why foreign governments shouldn't involve themselves in the electoral process if they continue to be used as a tool for American liars and scumbags getting elected. Besides, it isn't like the United States is entirely innocent in inserting itself in the democratic political process of sovereign nations.
If an American candidate says one thing to a foreign government and another thing to the American people, that foreign government has an obligation to its own people to point that out. So long as American politicians are going to present themselves as the model of openness and democracy, they shouldn't be allowed to hide behind diplomatic niceties as they screw their neighbours. I only hope the Mexicans start doing the same thing.
To use Obama's own pilfered phrase from The Untouchables, Canada brought a gun to his NAFTA knife fight. And you know what? We kicked his fucking ass. We know a little bit about "the Chicago way" our own selves.
Senator Barack Obama announced Thursday that he would not participate in the public financing system for presidential campaigns. He argued that the system had collapsed, and would put him at a disadvantage running against Senator John McCain, his likely Republican opponent.
(...)
“The public financing of presidential elections as it exists today is broken, and we face opponents who’ve become masters at gaming this broken system,” Mr. Obama said. "John McCain's campaign and the Republican National Committee are fueled by contributions from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs. And we’ve already seen that he's not going to stop the smears and attacks from his allies running so-called 527 groups, who will spend millions and millions of dollars in unlimited donations."
Mr. Obama had pledged to meet with Mr. McCain following the primaries to attempt to work out an agreement on financing the campaigns. That meeting never took place, aides to Mr. Obama said, because a meeting between lawyers for the two sides was not fruitful. "It became clear to me that there wasn't any basis for future discussion," said Robert Bauer, the general counsel for Mr. Obama’s campaign.
Let there be no doubt at all, Obama is completely full of shit. His lies in justifying his decision are nothing short of mind-blowing.
John McCain has a long-standing histoy of wanting to restrain 527s. The problem is that the law won't let him. He actually did speak out against the evil and wrong Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, but since he wasn't on the ballot, the law didn't apply to him. A 527 is a tax-exempt organization and is therefore precluded from having any communication or coordination with a campaign. That's a matter of federal law.
If McCain were to even attempt to honor Obama's conditions, he'd be committing a felony and Obama knows that. You'll also note that Obama hasn't called on Democratic 527s like MoveOn.org or America Coming Together to hold their fire. Obama doesn't also point out that 15 of the 20 largest 527s in the 2004 cycle were alligned with Democrats
That goes double for Obama's assertion about McCain controlling the RNC. Under current law, the nominee is prohibited from coordinating with the national committee. That was just one of the campaign finance laws that President Clinton broke during the '96 campaign that led to McCain-Feingold in the first place.
If it were up to me, McCain-Feingold would have been avoided because the national parties and presidential candidates wouldn't get public money at all. Obama's right, but for all of the wrong reasons. And he's going to get away with it because so-called conservatives are so fucking dumb.
As much as conservatives like to bitch about campaign finance regulations, they never stopped taking public money to finance their campaigns, did they? Public financing is nothing more than welfare for rich white guys who want to rule the world. But as conservatives never fail to remind other welfare recipients, that money comes with strings attatched. Since recipients of the former AFDC program surrendered their Fourth Amendment rights, why in the fuck shouldn't the DNC and RNC surrender their First Amendment rights?
"Good government" shitheads love to say that campaign finance legislation is necessary to prevent things like bribery. What they overlook is that bribery is already a crime. As a matter of fact, it is already written into the Constitution as an impeachable offense. If conservatives were people to be taken halfway seriously, they would renounce "preventative" law enforcement measures across the board as opposed to the ones that just effect them at the ballot box.
If Republicans weren't completely full of shit, they wouldn't protest campaign finance laws as they accept public money. Wasn't "making government live by the same laws the people do" a part of the goddamned Contract With America?
If anything, Obama is taking the more conservative position on campaign finance. It would be better if he pledged to return his matching money from the primaries, though.
That doesn't mean that he isn't a duplicitious motherfucker, because he is. So far as I know, he has supported every reform law since Watergate but now refuses to abide by them. Obama is taking a prticularly rich "destroying the village to save it" position on public financing. It didn't work in Vietnam and it won't work in general elections. And thank Christ for that. I hope that all campaign finance laws are destroyed as a result.
If Obama believes that the system is "broken," he would do something other than abandon it to fix it, although that's pretty much the position the government has taken on New Orleans. The fact remains that Obama wants to save the city by watching it sink.
But Obama couldn't have picked two better issues to lie about. Every sensible adult thought he was lying about NAFTA and no one gives a shit about campaign finance, given what hypocrites Republicans have been about the system.
This guy's a pro, make no mistake about that. The only question is how stupid his adherents in the "new politics" movement are going to feel once they finally realize that Barack Obama was never one of them after all.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: LiesBy: The Rolling Stones From:Some Girls
As you might have notice, I have a minor affection for US political campaigns. They tend to embody everything that's wrong with the human spirit, and any given campaign could take no fewer than five of the seven deadly sins and put them on a bumper sticker. The messier a campaign is, the more I tend to love it.
Perhaps my favorite race of all time is the 1990 Texas gubernatorial race. The candidacy of one Clayton Williams, the Republican nominee. Not only did he make every conceivable mistake in politics, he seemed to glory in it. It was truly beautiful thing to watch and I still smile when I think about it. It reminds me of a more innocent time when Texas politicians could be moral and political disasters without winding up president of the United States.
If I remember correctly (and I'm far too lazy to find a verifying source), Williams kicked off his 1990 campaign by proudly stating that he hadn't paid taxes at all the previous year. There are few ways to establish your "common man" bonafides better than that.
Things only improved with Williams reached out for the women's vote. This was important because the Democratic nominee was the late Ann Richards, who was thought to have a political lock on broads. When asked what his strategy against Ms. Richards was, Williams replied that he would "head her and hoof her and drag her through the dirt" just as he would the cattle on his ranch. And if you know women like I do, you know that they love nothing better than to be compared to a pack of steer.
But Mr. Williams was nothing if not a helpful ally to broads in the war of the sexes. He was full to the brim of helpful advice to women everywhere. Particularly on the touchy subject of rape. On that, the prospective governor couldn't be more helpful. "As long as it's inevitable," Williams opined, "you might as well lie back and enjoy it."
Even though that advice correlates closely with what experts on sexual assault tell us - with the notable exception of the part about enjoying it - women were less than appreciative of Clayton's sound advice. And it allowed the Richards campaign to run this ad endlessly.
What disturbs me the most about Williams' comments is the expression of hope that Richards hadn't started drinking again. That was strategically stupid in that Texans are nothing but enthusiastic about electing dry drunks to high office. Ann Richards, as we know, was succeeded by George W. Bush, who had actually been arrested for drunk driving. If Lindsay Lohan were only willing to move to Austin, she would have a bright future in Texas politics. She's certainly more fun than Rick Perry and more pleasing to the eye.
But the dreams of Clayton Williams were dashed, the way was cleared for the Dark Age of Bush, and we are all poorer people for it. I hope everyone remembers that the next time they get their panties in a knot about rape jokes.
Worst of all, Williams left us to suffer the consequences of what we had done as President Bush heads us and hoofs us and drags us through the dirt. Had Williams won, he would have almost certainly been renominated in 1994. Without that first election in Texas, Bush would never have been elected president. I hope all those busybody women's groups are happy.
Missing Claytie as I have, I was thrilled to learn last night that the McCain campaign brought him back from obscurity. Everyone else, however, was less enthusiastic.
John McCain should have been fundraising in the Texas oil patch yesterday alongside his good friend Clayton Williams. In the town of Midland, Republican heavy-hitters were lined up to sign some equally weighty cheques for their man's presidential campaign.
Instead, the candidate was busy trying to salvage an already shaky reputation after America's female voters had been reminded of derogatory remarks that "Claytie" Williams made about women and rape nearly 20 years ago. While running unsuccessfully against Ann Richards for governor, the Texan was overheard comparing rape to the weather: "As long as it's inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it."
Following the resurrection of this and other off-colour remarks, the McCain campaign decided abruptly to cancel the fundraiser at Mr Williams's lavish Midland home. The campaign is also promising to hand back the $300,000 (£150,000) Mr Williams has already raised for the McCain campaign as it tried to contain the damage.
Mr McCain's spokesman, Brian Rogers, said: "These were obviously incredibly offensive remarks that the campaign was unaware of at the time [the fundraiser] was scheduled."
As I've often stated in this space, I've long been a great admirer of Senator McCain. I can't say the same about his campaign staff. They should clearly be set on fire and thrown down an elevator shaft.
How can anyone with even a passing acquaintance with politics be "unaware" of Williams' remarks? Those remarks were famous and students of political history giggle and masturbate when thinking about them to this very day. I'm a schmuck and I don't know much about anything, but if I'm familiar with Clayton's colorful past, how can million dollar campaign consultants not be? Haven't these fucking people ever heard of Google or Wikipedia?
That's actually a serious question. If Team McCain can't vet the potentially controversial people they attract, what would a McCain administration look like? Would Jeremiah Wright be in charge of the faith-based initiative program? How about Richard Ramirez as Attorney General? How would they explain that to, say, the Senate? "The nominee's conduct was incredibly offensive, but we were unaware that he raped and murdered all of those folks. As you know, the campaign didn't spend much time in Los Angeles and AC/DC endorsed Senator Obama."
I still think McCain is going to win, and win pretty handily. But that's not because his team is so scary smart. The fact is that Obama, his quoting of Sean Connery in The Untouchables" notwithstanding, is prone to saying stupid things and is demonstrably incapable of taking a punch.
But McCain better get is shit together quickly because it is possible to throw away a perfectly good election. Just ask Clayton Williams.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: Rape Me By: Richard Cheese From: Lounge Against the Machine
Tonight Senator Barack Obama effectively secured the Democratic presidential nomination and for this he should be congratulated. He barely pulled it off, but he managed to trump the entire establishment of his party, who had spent the last eight years lining up to anoint Hillary Rodham Clinton the next president of the United States.
Unfortunately, tonight was the best night of Obama's life. It's all downhill from here.
Actually, it's been downhill for some time now. If you believe as I do, that Obama had the nomination wrapped up in February, you realize that he's wasted four months dicking around with playing nice. Worse, he couldn't put away a woman who half the country not only dislikes, but actually loathes. That doesn't auger well for a general election.
And what happened in those four months? His defeats outnumbered his victories rather quickly. Other than in North Carolina, he couldn't score knockout punches anywhere, while Clinton pulled them off in West Virginia and Kentucky. And she did it while driving her own negatives into the stratosphere. Were it not for his early commanding lead and the strategic incompetence of the Clinton campaign, Barack Obama would not be the nominee tonight.
Back in 1960, Richard Nixon was studious about not going negative on John Kennedy and lost by one tenth of one percent of the vote. Had Nixon gone negative on Kennedy - and exploited the health issues that Lyndon Johnson brought up before Democratic convention - Nixon likely would have won.
The moral of this story is that, in politics, nice guys finish last. Hillary went negative on Obama and Obama almost immediately stopped winning. Not only that, Obama started losing by bigger margins that he ever had before. Barack Obama barely won a beauty contest against someone who was determined to get ugly.
And in campaigning the way she did, Hillary essentially set up John McCain's lines of attack for him. You'll see GOP and 527 ads painting Obama as an elitist liberal, lacking in both experience and judgement. And if you liked seeing Jeremiah Wright on TV as much as I did, you're in luck this summer and fall.
The worst part is that while Obama was trying to be everybody's best friend, large segments of Clinton's base grew to hate him. And while the hundreds of thousands of Democrats who suggest that they'd rather vote for McCain or stay home are full of shit, what if just 5% of them aren't? That could very well leave a mark in November. McCain, on the other hand, remains acceptable to almost everyone. That's why nominating him was the smartest thing the GOP could have done.
As the Clinton campaign can't stop saying, and current polling indicates, That Obama is going to have an uphill battle winning states like West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Michigan might be a problem, too. You see, Detroit has a hip, dynamic, young Democratic black mayor who talks about hope a lot. He'll be going on trial for perjury just as people start paying attention. By the way, Michigan was much closer in '04 than it should've been.
If Barack Obama loses West Virgina, Pennsylvania or Michigan, he'd have to make them up by winning Sweden or something. If he loses all three, there's no saving him in the Electoral College. Ohio and Florida aren't going to matter as much this year as everyone thinks they are.
There is one unlikely strategy that would fuck with the Republicans in a big way. That would be playing hard for the South. If you look at Obama's numbers in Virginia, Georgia, Alabama and both Carolinas, they are impressive and they are intimidating.
The black vote that won him those states aren't going to win them in the general, but it could tighten them up enough that the McCain campaign has to spend resources there that it can't spend in states like Ohio, Florida and the aforementioned West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Michigan. And since the Republican Party has the approval rating of you're average unreconstructed pedophile, the Democrats are going to have far more resources to play around with.
But a hard drive in the South by a black candidate would be such a ballsy move that I don't think that he'd try it. If he did that and still lost Pennsylvania and Michigan, he'd be laughed out of politics forever. Plus, given his newness on the national scene, it would be an open question as to whether the DNC would cooperate with a strategy that's just crazy enough to work.
The unpopularity of the GOP can actually end up helping McCain much more than any one is currently pointing out. With the Republicans having no hope of winning back the House and facing the likely prospect of a filibuster-proof Senate, swing voters might feel safe enough to vote for McCain without allowing "Bush's third term." And Americans tend to like divided government. It keeps both sides from doing anything too crazy.
Let's forget all this nonsense about putting Hillary on the ticket right now, okay? It simply isn't going to happen. This isn't 1960 and Hillary Clinton isn't LBJ. Furthermore, after sixteen years of Al Gore and Dick Cheney, the vice presidency isn't the office it used to be. It's far too powerful to occupy it with someone you don't trust. And the Clintons would demand even more influence than even Cheney has now.
Hillary believes in her heart of hearts that Obama can't beat McCain and she's probably right. Why then would she want to go down with a sinking ship? Does she really want to be the 2012 version of John Edwards or Joe Lieberman? Would anybody?
Expect Hillary to do for Obama what Ronald Reagan did for Gerald Ford or what Ted Kennedy did for Jimmy Carter; as little as they can possibly get away with. She wants to be positioned as the "I told you so" candidate next time out and that can't happen if the two of them spend the next five months on a fucking wedding cake together.
But this is truly Barack Obama's night. He came up against almost impossible odds and prevailed, if only on points. I personally think that he's a good man and an adequate campaigner. But I don't see a scenario where he becomes the next president of the United States.
But let's let him have the best night of his life. He deserves at least that.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: Loser By: Beck From: Mellow Gold
SEXISM MAKES GERALDINE FERRARO ANGRY. YOU WOULDN'T LIKE GERALDINE FERRARO WHEN SHE'S ANGRY
Geraldine Ferraro was supposed to make history. After all, she was the first woman to be nominated for vice president on a major party ticket way back in 1984. As the first female vice president, Ferraro was going to change things, as this is what Democrats always promise to do. And to be fair, Democrats often do change things, the meaning of the word "is" is just one example.
But then something funny happened. Ferraro turned out to be a spectacularly bad politician, her husband was doing business with the fucking mafia, and the definition of the word "loser" was changed to prominently feature Walter Mondale's name and photograph. The Mondale / Ferraro ticket was humiliated in ways that anyone who hasn't worn a gimp suit and a ball gag can never truly understand.
Ferraro presents herself as something of a fairy godmother to Hillary Rodham Clinton, which only seems fair because they both define themselves by what's between their legs. Without their vaginas, they are nothing. It is almost impossible to come to any other conclusion given their recent statements.
Indeed, it was that attitude that got Gerry shitcanned from the Clinton campaign just shy of three months ago. She said "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept".
The problem wasn't so much that Ferraro said that as much as it is that she said it in public, where people who aren't Bill Clinton could hear her. Which is unusual, because everybody knows how much fun it has been to be a black man throughout American history. Christ, why didn't she just go further and say "Look, I know those people couldn't vote for the first 191 years of our history and die of things like sickle cell anemia and lynching, but they sure can dance and that has to count for something, doesn't it?"
Of course, pointing that out was terribly sexist and Ferraro has had her knickers in a knot about it ever since. She has launched a virtual jihad against those who would dare to vote against a woman. Fatwas have also been issued against the sexist media from Geraldine's asexual perch at Fox News.
Sexism, she tells us, is all around us. There's no escaping it, which also explains why women won't stop laughing at the size of my penis.
Yesterday, the former member of Congress from Neverland laid out her argument in a Boston Globe essay that's easily one of the top ten silliest things I've ever read.
Here we are at the end of the primary season, and the effects of racism and sexism on the campaign have resulted in a split within the Democratic Party that will not be easy to heal before election day. Perhaps it's because neither the Barack Obama campaign nor the media seem to understand what is at the heart of the anger on the part of women who feel that Hillary Clinton was treated unfairly because she is a woman or what is fueling the concern of Reagan Democrats for whom sexism isn't an issue, but reverse racism is.
The reaction to the questions being raised has been not to listen to the message and try to find out how to deal with the problem, but rather to denigrate the messenger. Sore loser, petty, silly, vengeful are words that have dominated the headlines. But scolding and name calling don't resolve disputes. The truth is that tens of thousands of women have watched how Clinton has been treated and are not happy. We feel that if society can allow sexism to impact a woman's candidacy to deny her the presidency, it sends a direct signal that sexism is OK in all of society.
Among the words I would have included in the above cited headlines are: "shrill," "ruthless," "bitchy," and "cuntish." I'm frankly shocked that I haven't been hired by a major metropolitan newspaper yet. But the journalism industry is biased against white guys with shaved heads, potty mouths, overactive libidos and teensy peckers. Everybody knows that.
Ferraro says twice in those two paragraphs that Hillary was "treated unfairly" but never explains how or gives examples of that treatment. Is the fact that enough people didn't vote for her evidence of sexism? Would it have been racist if Obama lost and Hillary won? If so, why isn't Bill Richardson taking to the streets on behalf of overweight Hispanics named Judas?
If there really are women out there who think that Hillary's defeat (which actually occurred several months ago by any mathematical standard) is evidence of sexism, then those women are idiots and proof that the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution should probably be reconsidered.
When the primaries started, Senator Clinton and, presumably, Congresswoman Ferraro were fine with the Democratic Party's proportional allocation of delegates which has been the party rule since 1972. Now they argue that the only the popular vote should matter. In the beginning of this mess, they approved of not seating Michigan and Florida because they were "rogue states" under the party rules. Now "every vote should be counted" and disagreeing with that is comparable to slavery.
Allow me to suggest that if a white male candidate tried either one of those maneuvers, he'd be laughed right out of politics. Yet, Hillary Clinton hasn't been. Instead, she's being touted as the next majority leader of the United States Senate as I write this. Not bad ... for a girl.
If the Democratic Party establishment and its primary voters were sexist, do you really think that Clinton would have been the presumed presidential nominee for eight fucking years? I somehow doubt it.
The fact is that Hillary and her demented husband ran the single most incompetent primary campaign in my memory. The entire endeavor was predicated on the premise of inevitability, which is neither sexist nor particularly democratic. It was the devine right of the Clintons to return to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Clinton '08 was lazy, stupid and given to irresponsible spending in ways that have probably shocked even Al Gore. The delegation of resources was staggering in ways that indicated hubris, stupidity, or both. Clinton '08 raised a quarter of a billion dollars and is currently in debt up to their tits. Hillary ran her campaign in pretty much the same way that President Bush has run the federal government.
And that's fine when you're running against a halfwit like Chris Dodd. But Barack Obama, rightly or wrongly, quickly became far more than just another candidate, he became movement - closer to a personality cult, really - unto himself. That's a much tougher race to run.
That she didn't prevail isn't evidence of sexism as much as it of arrogance and a breathtaking lack of organizational skill. The allegations of sexism are a desperation play and not a particularly effective one. But don't tell Geraldine Ferraro. She's having fun.
That sexism impacted Clinton's campaign, I have no doubt. Did she lose a close election because of sexism? I don't know. But I do know that it will never happen again as long as women are willing to stand up and make sure that it is just a one-time bad experience.
Does that mean substandard candidates will henceforth win for no reason other than gender? That'll make for an interesting general election campaign. If Hillary couldn't beat Obama without flashing her weeping cooter for the world to see, John McCain would beat her directly into hell without breaking a sweat.
People like Ferarro seem to insist that the problems facing female candidates are almost entirely due to male sexism. Yet, study after study reveals two important facts. First, women are not as likely to run because they don't like doing things that are required in politics, such as asking strangers for money and going negative on opponents.
Secondly, women are far less likely to vote for women candidates than are men. In fact, Hillary has only consistently beaten Obama among women without college degrees and those over 65. Men aren't sexist against female politicians, women are.
And decrying sexism in the same sentence as the name Clinton is rich with irony. The candidate's husband is known to have at least once met a woman for the first time, dropped his pants and implored her to "kiss it."
When that woman had the temerity to file a civil rights lawsuit that their administration's legislation expressly provided for, both Clintons stood aside as their depraved minions excoriated her motives and morals. That pattern was repeated almost endlessly throughout the Clinton administration.
That same administration passed a welfare reform bill that was absolutely brutal on single mothers, the majority of whom are white, and Hillary has yet to comment either way on it.
Hillary, Geraldine Ferraro, and the women's movement generally never spoke out against the public or private treatment dished out upon women by President Clinton. But they sure took care of Bob Packwood, perhaps the greatest champion the women's movement ever had in the United States Senate, didn't they?
Packwood's private behaviour was probably not as bad as Bill Clinton's (Packwood was never accused of an actual rape), but the prices the two men paid couldn't have been more different. Packwood was ruined and Clinton left office with a 63% approval rating, due almost entirely to women. Packwood admitted to chronic alcoholism, which in no small contributed to his actions, and went into treatment after his resignation from the Senate. Clinton is on the record as saying that he treated women the way he did "because I could."
But Bob Packwood committed the unpardonable sin of being a Republican. That this isn't something that NARAL mentions in their dinners honoring Ted Kennedy, who is so enlightened that he won't even open a woman's car door for her, doesn't make it any less true.
The fact is that the women's movement does absolutely nothing for women and hasn't in a long time. It is, however, very good for the Democratic Party. Or is it?
Geraldine Ferraro won't rush to point this out to you, but she was hardly the most qualified candidate for the vice presidency in '84. She was in Congress for less than five years, represented one of the safest Democratic seats in the country and did virtually nothing when she was there. Walter Mondale wasn't looking for someone who could assume the presidency, he was looking to "make a statement."
If qualifications meant anything, Mondale would have chosen Gary Hart or Sam Nunn. Both are men that everyone would have recognised were capable of being president if it became necessary. They also would have made Ronald Reagan actually work for the states of Georgia and Colorado. But Hart and Nunn lacked the most important qualification of all in 1984: a vagina.
The fact is that qualifications mean nothing in American politics. Ferraro wasn't qualified, and neither is Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. Neither, for that matter, was George W. Bush. Christ, the governor of Texas can't issue a pardon without getting eight other people to agree with him.
Ferraro is taking an intellectually interesting position here: It's wrong to vote against Hillary Clinton because she has a snatch (although there's absolutely no evidence that anyone has), but it's perfectly appropriate to nominate Ferraro herself for high office for no other reason than her possession of same.
Here's another fact. Hillary Clinton has received more primary votes than any other Democratic candidate not named Barack Obama in American history. Again, she raised a quarter of a billion dollars, more even than President Bush did in either of his races.
Ms. Ferraro stated early on in her dopey editorial "That sexism impacted Clinton's campaign, I have no doubt," yet presents no evidence that it did. She goes on to say "Did she lose a close election because of sexism? I don't know." If you don't know, isn't it safer and less divisive to assume that it didn't, especially since you're not presenting any compelling reason to think that it did? Does losing 19 primaries and caucuses in row make an election close? And isn't being divisive the GOP's job?
What Ferraro and Clinton are seeking isn't equality of opportunity or even equality of outcome. They couldn't be clearer that they want to win for no other reason than they used to bleed from their fucking crotches on a regular basis as that's the only qualification for office Ms. Ferraro mentions in her article.
Geraldine Ferraro has essentially come out and asserted something that I never would: that women can't win in a fair fight. And when you consider that Benazir Bhutto was twice elected in a place as sexually backward as Pakistan, where honor killings aren't unheard of, it tells you something about her opinion of America.
Which is her right. I just wish that she didn't have to be such a bitch about it.
Right upfront, I'd like to apologize to Dewey in Toronto. She's one of my favorite readers and I know that she's tired of reading "about the Hilary, Obama, OR John McCain." Unfortunately, I have a headache and I can't think of anything new and adorable to say about my penis right now.
Besides, Hillary is having a great week of making news for insanely stupid statements.
It all started out innocently enough when Senator Clinton spoke to the Washington Post and blamed her continuing humiliation on misogyny. You see, people named Clinton don't lose, there are conspiracies that spring up and take what is rightfully theirs.
In an interview after church services in Bowling Green on Sunday, Clinton for the first time addressed what women have been talking about for months, what she refers to as the "sexist" treatment she has endured at the hands of the pundits, media and others. The lewd T-shirts. The man who shouted "Iron my shirt" at a campaign event. The references to her cleavage and her cackle.
"It's been deeply offensive to millions of women," Clinton said. "I believe this campaign has been a groundbreaker in a lot of ways. But it certainly has been challenging given some of the attitudes in the press, and I regret that, because I think it's been really not worthy of the seriousness of the campaign and the historical nature of the two candidacies we have here."
Later, when asked if she thinks this campaign has been racist, she says she does not. And she circles back to the sexism. "The manifestation of some of the sexism that has gone on in this campaign is somehow more respectable, or at least more accepted, and . . . there should be equal rejection of the sexism and the racism when it raises its ugly head," she said. "It does seem as though the press at least is not as bothered by the incredible vitriol that has been engendered by the comments by people who are nothing but misogynists."
Let's see, Hillary has had a former president of the United States compare Barack Obama's campaign to that of Jesse Jackson, despite the fact that all the two have in common is skin color, and had the governor of Pennsylvania say "You've got conservative whites here, and I think there are some whites who are probably not ready to vote for an African-American candidate." She herself has said that she has the support of "hard-working Americans, white Americans."
Yet, this race is just as much about sexism as it is about racism. Right.
If some dickhead yelling "Iron my shirt" is "deeply offensive to millions of women," then millions of women are fucking retarded. "Iron my shirt" and comments about the former First Lady's cackle and floppy titties had nothing to do with either the Obama or Republican campaigns. Every controversial statement about race has come from either Hillary herself or her closest supporters.
If nothing else, and she now has zero chance of being elected president this fall, Hillary Clinton has made George Orwell proud. The black man has an unfair advantage and her use of the race card has been trumped by some vague, untraceable sexism. All Hillary needs now is an endorsement from O.J. Simpson and her candidacy will have been made complete.
Precisely what does pointing out Bobby Kennedy's assassination have to with anything in 2008? Other than being a particularly nasty "get well soon" card to Ted Kennedy, not much. Essentially, she's saying "Hey, Ted, sorry to hear that you've got 'the flu,' but things don't generally end well for your favored presidential candidates. Just sayin'. "
Senator Clinton likes to hide behind the history of Democratic primary politics. In 1968 and 1992, the California primary was in June. In June of 2008, the Democratic primaries will be over. Furthermore, RFK announced his candidacy on March 16, 1968 - four days after the New Hampshire primary. His campaign lasted a full 82 days. Clinton and Obama announced for president in February 2007, a full 11 months before New Hampshire.
Hillary lost the presidency in February and she knows it. If she doesn't, she's far too stupid to even work at McDonald's, let alone become the leader of the free world.
But the fortieth anniversary of Robert Kennedy's murder is coming up in less than two weeks. To your right, you'll see the cover of the current issue of Vanity Fair, which lauds Kennedy's ill-fated campaign. Inside its pages is an almost hallucinatory sycophantic excerpt of a forthcoming book.
Before I go further, I should explain my views on Robert Francis Kennedy. He was perhaps the most evil man in American history. He was a soulless Nazi dressed up in liberal clothing, no more and no less. The only moral objection that any student of history can have with his shooting is that it wasn't immediately preceded by a trial before a jury of his peers.
People forget that Kennedy was a supplicant of the monstrous Joseph McCarthy and isn't remembered as such only because he was bettered in bureaucratic warfare by that hateful pervert, Roy Cohn. Even after McCarthy was denounced by the United States Senate and his bloated, drunken corpse was lowered into the ground, RFK was the only national figure to attend his funeral.
People forget that Bobby was the go-between for his brother's 1960 campaign and the murderous Sam Giancana's crime family to secure the support of the United Mine Workers in the West Virginia primary. Kennedy then turned on Giancana in particular, even as he was co-operating with the Kennedy administration's illegal plans to murder Fidel Castro.
If there was a conspiracy in the murder of John F. Kennedy, it almost certainly involved either Cuba or the mob, both of whom his brother and attorney general betrayed. You'll remember that the Cuban Missile Crisis ended with an American pledge not to invade Cuba. Instead, the Kennedys accelerated plans to assassinate Castro, using the Mafia for plausible deniability.
People forget that Bobby was a prime planner in the Vietnam war and instrumental in the coup against, and murder of, Ngo Dinh Diem, just 20 days before President Kennedy's own assassination in Dallas. Once Diem had been dispatched to the great beyond, American humiliation in Vietnam became unavoidable.
Kennedy made President Johnson's life a nightmare for following the very policies that he was responsible for in his brother's White House. That made his self-righteousness all the more galling and explained why Johnson hated him with such intensity.
People astonishingly like to remember Robert Kennedy as a champion of civil rights, but they forget that he resisted his brother mentioning it very much and had authorized wiretapping Martin Luther King, Jr. Kennedy never bothered to disabuse his perverted dwarf of a minion, J.Edgar Hoover, that King was a communist and a traitor.
People remember Kennedy's '68 campaign as some kind of act of courage, but forget that he only announced his candidacy after Eugene McCarthy softened President Johnson up in New Hampshire. The only thing that RFK accomplished in running was ensuring the nomination of Hubert Humphrey. Primaries accounted for only a third of the convention delegates in 1968 and the party establishment, particularly LBJ and Richard Daley, would never have tolerated a Kennedy nomination. All he did was deny the nomination to McCarthy.
And he was murdered in June, which is somehow Hillary Clinton's reason for staying in a race that she lost months ago. Indeed, the only way she can win the Democratic presidential nomination is if someone shoots Barack Obama to death.
Like most Clintonian clarifications, Hillary's doesn't hold water. She was discussing why she hasn't suspended her campaign yet and said "We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California." There are few other things that a remark like that can mean. She's counting on that uniquely American penchant for political assassination to save her career. Remember, the Clintons never say anything by accident.
Granted, I think her motives are more subtle than do most commentators. I think that if enough people are reminded that a President Obama faces the very real prospect of being murdered, they might not vote for him. A number of primary voters have already said that they have considered his personal safety in deciding who to vote for. If Obama loses in the fall, the nomination is hers in 2012.
But the nomination was supposed to hers in 2008, wasn't it? She had all of the money, all of the institutional support and that made her the prohibitive favorite. And she threw it all away. And in doing so, she managed to reinforce every negative perception people ever had of her. I started saying four years ago on this blog that Hillary Clinton would never be the nominee for precisely those reasons. I just happened to think that she would have lost to Al Gore.
Worse still, she even allowed Keith Olbermann to be right about something for once.
Robert Francis Kennedy was sleazy in a way only approached by his early mentor, Joseph McCarthy. But Hillary Clinton is RFK's natural heir in that she, too, will do anything to win. Like Bobby, Hillary is utterly without an ounce of decency.
And she might well yet win.
Easy Listening of the Day: Man in the Box By: Alice in Chains From: Facelift
A STRANGE & SAVAGE LOOK INSIDE THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF CLINTON
As the Soviet Red Army stormed across Poland toward the German border in the spring of 1945, Adolf Hitler called Albert Speer to the fuhrerbunker beneath his ruined Chancellery. Hitler ordered Speer to commence a "scorched earth" operation that would ruin Germany's remaining industry and civil infastructure, thereby complicating any Allied occupation. If Hitler could not keep Germany, Hitler reasoned, Germany would not be worth having.
Despite being far more of a monster than he would ever admit in public, Speer knew that the scorched earth policy would do nothing to forestall that fall of the Third Reich and serve only to cause further needless suffering among the German people. In perhaps the only courageous act of his life, Speer defied Hitler and ignored his twisted and useless order.
Adolf Hitler spent his final weeks unaware of Speer's treachery and spent his remaining days ruminating darkly that he was surrounded by "incompetence and disloyalty," a line so perfect that I've been using it in my own professional life for years now. On April 30, Hitler committed suicide in his bunker and a week later, peace returned to Europe. And we all lived happily ever after.
There is no Albert Speer in the inner circle of Hillary Rodham Clinton. There is no one who would dare suggest that there is a greater good unattached to her own future. If the Democratic Party cannot be hers, they think, better that the Democratic Party be destroyed.
There's something about the House of Clinton that inspires the same brain-damaged loyalty that Hitler inspired. When President Clinton was being impeached for High Crimes and Misdemeanors, many of the same monsters who surround Hillary declared him "one of the great presidents in American history" despite the wealth of evidence to the contrary and basic common sense.
The same cultish devotion extends to Senator Clinton and it is even more baseless. To argue that Hillary Clinton would be an excellent president or has any presidential experience at all is to argue that only Juanita Jordan was capable of leading the Chicago Bulls to the playoffs after Michael retired.
Even though her dreams lie in ruins now, still smouldering from the destruction wrought in North Carolina and Indiana, her minions continue plotting their final scorched earth plan of attack from their very own bunkers in Washington and New York City. The Democratic Party, which elected Bill Clinton nine times and Hillary twice, must now be crushed in the cause of her own dashed hopes of restoration.
Hillary can count on her dwarfish lackeys in ways that Hitler could never count on Speer. To judge by the Sunday morning talk shows today, Terry McAuliffe and his demented deputies are preparing to tear the house down on top of themselves and leave it as monument to their own shattered dreams and everything that's truly ugly and wrong about the human spirit. They will finish what the Reichstag fire of 1938 began.
If you support John McCain as I do, you see the cancer of the Clintons destroying the body politic of the Democratic Party as nothing less than a beautiful thing. There will come a day when poems and songs are written about it and school children will learn of the glorious days in which we live. "A place called Hope" is being rapidly evolved into an ideaology of death, and decay assumes the scent of roses in spring as the good ship Clinton sinks, taking everything they ever proclaimed to love to the ocean floor with it.
In their nightmarish vision of governance, a season in hell for the party and one nation under McCain is far better than even one day of an Obama administration. Any world without at least one Clinton at its center is a world better off destroyed. Even today they refuse to admit that their bridge to the 21st century intersected perfectly with George W. Bush's road to nowhere.
All that is left to Hillary now is the professional collection of mutants that she calls a staff and a bedraggled army of "hardworking, Americans, white Americans" determined that Barack Obama's message of hope is drowned just as surely as the offspring of Andrea Yates and this is the only thing left that gives them joy.
I resisted comparing Clinton '08 to the final days of the Third Reich for months if only because it seemed unfair to the Nazis, who, while desperately wrong and unspeakably evil, at least fought for something they truly believed in. Instead, they campaigned on a platform of slightly more statist Bushisms and find themselves wrapped in a cocoon of their own KKK rhetoric and no other option than to destroy everything around them.
Why are they embracing a racist strategy? Because they're getting the same level of support from African Americans that President Bush did in 2004. Better for them the final fortification of elderly Aryan Volk, the same people who defended Berlin during the last days of the war.
The Democratic Party has always been a choice between cancer and polio, and the Clintons are to the party what the Sex Pistols were to music, a brief burst of nhilistic fury. And now they are choosing the "no future" option.
During those last deperate days in the bunker, Hitler is said to have admitted knowing that war as lost at Stalingrad. But he fought on and millions died needlessly to feed his messianic and craven hubris. The same can be said of Bill and Hillary Clinton. Any adult with a passing familiarity with basic math knew this race was over at the end of February when Barack Obama won 18 primaries and caucuses in a row. The Clintons are political professionals. They knew it was over then, too.
In this case, the Hitler analogy is apt. And this video might be the single most hilarious thing I've seen in a quarter century of following politics.
There aren't very many 53-year-old stroke victims that I'd like to have incredibly dirty sex with, but I have to admit that Cindy McCain is right at the top of that list.
Back when the presidential primaries were something other than a fatalistic freak show for mutants like me, there was a great deal of attention given to Jeri Thompson. While Mrs. Thompson is endowed with might very well be the most formidible jugs on earth, I still prefer Cindy.
The reasons for this are many for they are legion. First, John McCain isn't a congenital loser like Jeri's husband. Second; although Fred was only the race for about a month, he managed go through something like three campaign managers. This was reportedly due to Mrs. Thompson being a world-class pain in the ass. Third, Cindy doesn't look as beaten up in the face at 53 as Jeri does at 41. Fourth and finally, Cindy McCain is worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $100 million.
Mrs. McCain is also a woman of some character. During the 2000 South Carolina Republican primary, a group of mouthbreathing vermin surrogates of the Bush campaign politicized her past addiction to prescription drugs and levelled viciously unspeakable and racist slurs against her adopted daughter, Bridget. That she didn't exploit her endless financial resources to have the then-governor of Texas assassinated speaks very well of her indeed.
Furthermore, you have to admire someone who has come back from a near-fatal stroke just four years ago to the degree that you wouldn't know that she'd been ill at all without being told. That takes a phenominal amount of hard work and incredible personal courage. Regardless of partisan interest, I think we can all join together in saluting Cindy McCain for that. She might be just as tough as her husband, which is no small feat.
Also, she's hot and worth $100 million dollars. I did mention that, didn't I?
As much I appreciate attractive women with great cans and mondo bank, I also appreciate that they can pose a political problem for their office-seeking spouses. Anyone who doubts that should ask John Kerry how much Theresa, Queen of Mars, "helped" in back in 2004.
But there's a significant difference between Cindy McCain and Theresa Heinz Kerry. Whereas Theresa refused to shut the fuck up about literally swimming in ketchup profits, Cindy has kept her "fuck you money" close to her beautiful, beautiful chest. She's actually been pretty shy about the fact that she could single-handedly buy and sell any four members of the Bush family.
Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of voters are lacking in "fuck you money." And they tend to be awfully nosey when it comes to people who have an abundance of same.
And that's where tax returns come in. Americans in particular have something that comes awfully close to a fetish when it comes to poking through the finances of their ruling class. If you're a candidate who doesn't disclose your tax returns, you very quickly find yourself shit upon from a great height.
Dwight David Eisenhower very nearly decided not to run for president at all because he had no desire to tell the public what he had been paid for his memoir, Crusade in Europe. Of the modern presidents, only Lyndon Johnson's financial dealings have risen to the level of possible serious criminal conduct, that arising from his wife's purchase of radio and television stations as he manipulated the FCC from the senate majority leader's office to make those stations profitible beyond reason. If today's disclosure standards were in place then, LBJ would have gone to prison instead of the White House.
Financial disclosure has become little more than a voyueristic exercise that makes asshole voters feel better for absolutely no reason at all. Furthermore, it accomplishes absolutely nothing. To my knowledge, there has never been a corruption prosecution arising from disclosure requirements but there is no paucity of corruption. Disclosure requirements are one of the things that keeps smart people out of politics and it should be abolished immediately.
Of course, that'll never happen. We love humiliating those who govern us too much for that to ever happen.
Cindy McCain says she will never make her tax returns public even if her husband wins the White House and she becomes the first lady.
"You know, my husband and I have been married 28 years and we have filed separate tax returns for 28 years. This is a privacy issue. My husband is the candidate," Cindy McCain, wife of Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting John McCain, said in an interview aired on NBC's "Today" on Thursday.
Asked if she would release her tax returns if she was first lady, Cindy McCain said: "No."
Mrs. McCain is in a unique position to refuse disclosure. You almost never see political spouses who file seperately from the candidate, so it almost never becomes an issue.
If you want to know what Senator McCain made last year, he'll be pleased as punch to accomodate you. He reported $405,409 in income for 2007 and paid $84,460 in federal income taxes. If you'd like to know what Cindy made, she'll very politely insist that you go fuck yourself.
Cindy's wealth is primarily inherited, so there's very little chance of a conflict of interest. And even if there was one that involved her husband, it almost certainly wouldn't come out in financial disclosure. As a member of Congress, Randy "Duke" Cunningham filed disclosure, too. According to that, Duke was as pure as the driven snow. Except that he wasn't.
Oh, and there's the small matter that Cindy McCain isn't running for a goddamned thing. In a perfect world, Mrs. McCain would hit whoever asks her about financial disclosure in the face with a vodka bottle.
Of course, things aren't going to work out that way. She's going to release her tax returns eventually. The only question is when and whether she makes it easy or hard. But make no mistake, she will end up doing it.
The Democrats have already started their clarion calls for "openness."
Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said Cindy McCain's refusal to release her tax returns gives the appearance of a double standard on the part of her husband.
"What is John McCain trying to hide?" Dean said in a statement. "Throughout this campaign, he has acted like his own calls for openness and accountability apply to everyone but himself. Now he thinks he can bring that same double standard to the White House."
This is patent horseshit and Howard Dean is either lying or too stupid to know the difference. You'll notice that one of his candidates, Hillary Rodham Clinton, categorically refuses to release the donor list to her husband's presidential library until after she's sworn in as president.
Now, some very real questions have been raised about the donors to the Clinton Library. Denise Rich, as you might remember, was reported to have made a $450,000 donation at the same time that President Clinton was considering a pardon for her ex- husband, the fugitive and traitor, Marc Rich. The Clinton Library (as opposed to his charitable foundation, which the Clintons keep playing bait and switch with) received any number of donations from people with business before the Clinton administration.
Howard Dean, like liberal fuckheads everywhere, is trying to have it both ways. Cindy McCain is a private citizen who has never held public office. Hillary Clinton is a sitting US Senator and the wife of a former president. If there's a public interest in disclosure, any reasonable person would argue that there's a far more compelling argument for disclosure from the Clinton Library.
Furthermore, under the Presidential Libraries Act, the William J. Clinton Presidential Library is owned and operated by the National Archives and Records Administration. The federal government is now a party to any and all funds that are or were raised by the former president and that makes the case for disclosure all the more compelling.
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are sponsoring legislation that would compel disclosure of all donations to presidential libraries - just in time to complicate fundraising for the George Walker Bush Presidential Library. But she refuses to disclose the Clinton Library's donors before the election and Howard Dean doesn't see that as something worth mentioning.
But they'll beat the shit out of Cindy McCain endlessly and continue to keep as much of the Clintons dealings with a federally governed property as secret as they possibly can without committing a felony. The hypocrisy is fucking stunning.
Unfortunately, that's a complicated argument to make and doesn't quite fit in a 30 second ad or a bumper sticker very well - certainly not as well as "What's Cindy Hiding?" It's not fair and it's certainly not right, but it is what it is. This isn't a fight that the McCains are going to win.
Hillary got her ass kicked at Democratic debates for months over her refusal to release her tax returns before she won the nomination. Buckling to pressure, she relented and we all learned just how much lucre Bill pulled in over the last seven years. The same thing is going to happen to Cindy McCain and the McCain campaign has to know that. They can't afford to take a hit like that for months on end.
Sadly, Mrs. McCain has little other option over the long run but to cave. But I wish she didn't have to and hopefully someday someone will actually stick to an adamant refusal and tell people to mind their own fucking business once and for all.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: It's the Money That Matters By: Randy Newman From:Land of Dreams
As much as I question the assertion that either one of the Clintons are actually human, hearing this has got to hurt.
"She has run a valiant campaign. And she will remain an influential voice in the American future," he said.
But Obama has won the nomination "by any practical test" and is very close to a majority of the pledged delegates, said McGovern, who is 85. Obama moved within 200 delegates of clinching the nomination with his split decision on Tuesday of a win in North Carolina and a narrow loss in Indiana.
It's time to unite the Democratic Party, he said.
"Hillary, of course, will make the decision as to if and when she ends her campaign. But I hope that she reaches that decision soon so that we can concentrate on a unified party capable of winning the White House next November," he said.
When the only guy in history to lose 49 states to a ticket that had to resign in its entirety 21 months later tells you that the jig is up, it is the better part of wisdom to listen. Senator McGovern isn't considered an expert on much, but getting crushed like a bug is something that he seems to have invented. His advice should be studied very closely by Hillary. However, few people have accused Hillary Clinton of wisdom. An almost reptillian survival instinct, yes, but not wisdom.
That's not to say that she's stupid by any stretch of the imagination. She certainly is not. Being a woman who half the country wants to his in the mouth with a vodka bottle and getting as far as she did speaks to a not inconsiderable level of intelligence. She knows that a Clinton restoration is now mathematically impossible.
What Hillary also knows is that a Democratic nomination that isn't hers should be devalued beyond recognition for whoever does eventually win it. She knows that if she can't be president, neither can Barack Obama. After all, he's not the kind of person you want answering the phone at 3 am, now is he?
There are any number of reasons why Hillary is still in this race after Tuesday's pathetic perfomance and all of them are ridiculous.
Some folks think that she's staying in the race in the hope that some new and explosively damaging scandal erupts around Obama. No serious adult would risk their reputation and tens of millions of dollars and the unfounded possibility that there's another scandal lurking out. The only dumber thing a serious adult could do would be to continue giving such a person money. If the good Reverend Wright didn't destroy Obama, nothing will. At least not in the primaries.
Former Clinton punching bag George Stephanopolous seems to think that Clinton is trying to bully her way into the vice-presidential nomination. On the other hand, Stephanopolous is only two feet tall and can be safely ignored as all short people should be. Hillary is far too self-important to take the number two slot and she's already the presumptive 2012 nominee if Obama loses in the fall.
Furthermore, Obama isn't crazy enough to have anyone who has spent the last three months suggesting that he's unqualified to be president anywhere near him after the convention.
Even though the Clintons are congenital liars, I take them at their word about staying in the race, at least for another week or so.
The Clintons - and Bill in particular - are serious students of political history. And they know that West Virginia is up next week. Visions of 1960 must be dancing through their demented heads right about now.
The 1960 West Virginia primary is where the unholy Kennedy forces completely ruined the dreams of Hubert Humprey forever. Every dirty trick in the book was utilized in acheiving that dark goal, and sure that Bill and Hill have each and every one of the committed to memory.
If Hillary's victory in Pennsylvania was based on throwing "the kitchen sink" at Obama, West Virginia will be where the rest of the plumbing comes out.
"I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on," she said in an interview with USA TODAY. As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."
"There's a pattern emerging here," she said.
Yes there is, Hillary. Yes there is.
In case you're wondering why Hillary would say that to USA Today, you have to appreciate who actually reads that paper. USA Today's core demographic is illiterate white people who buy it because it's so colorful and shiny. In advertising, this is called narrowcasting your message. It would look bad for Clinton '08 to buy space in White Power Weekly, so USA Today is the next best choice.
But the strategy of blackening Obama up some has been the raison d'etre of the Clinton campaign of late. If white Democrats weren't naturally predisposed against voting for a black man, Hillary, Bill and Ed Rendell are going to do their damndest to convert them to the "dark side."
There is a pattern here, but not the one Hillary wants you to notice. But South Carolina and Pennsylvania sure make it hard to overlook.
The fact is that Obama can hurt Hillary badly with both blacks and liberal Democrats by bringing up the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, which hurt single mothers - who are disproportionately black - and making Hillary either endorse it or further distance herself from her still-popular husband's legacy.
This isn't about winning for the Clintons anymore and hasn't been for some time. The math isn't there for Hillary to get the nomination and, barring the revelation of Obama's involvement in a sex crime, the super delegates are not going to start the second Civil War.
This is about making Obama unelectable and giving Hillary a clean shot at President McCain four years from now. Obama could use welfare reform to destroy her future in the party, but he's too married to his intellectually empty "hope" platform to do it. that precludes him from engaging Clinton's scorched earth strategy like he should.
And that's precisely why Hillary's going to win in the long run. She's going to spend the next week or so turning Barack Obama into Amos and/or Andy, withdraw before the convention, and give McCain the presidency, knowing that she's perfectly positioned to run again in four years when everybody forgets just how ugly her tactics were.
If you were wondering why I think that Obama is going to get crushed in the fall, it isn't because he's got "the Wright Stuff," although that doesn't help. If he can't beat a shrill, evil, twat of a woman like Hillary decisively, there's no saving him from the Republicans in the fall.
Unless the press reports that John McCain is running a crime family that isn't the Republican Party, this election is pretty much over.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: Piss Up a Rope By: Ween From: 12 Country Classics
JESUS MAKES YOU DUMB: JEREMIAH WRIGHT, JOHN HAGEE & PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS
For the last forty years presidential campaigns have essentially been little more than an episode of Seinfeld, fundamentally about nothing. The last campaign where serious issues were discussed in something approaching a seious manner was in 1964. Say what you will about the candidates, but the election itself was about the permanence of social security, the role of the federal government in guaranteeing the civil rights of the citizenry and the wisdom of sending an ICBM into the Kremlin men's room.
Since then, campaigns have been about generic "crime," the death penalty, the pledge of alliegence, gay marriage, and fucking flag pins. The one thing that all of these things have in common is that they have nothing at all to do with the executive office of the president. As a matter of fact, the pledge and flag pins have nothing to do with anything.
Voters - American ones in particular - don't like issues because they make your head hurt. It's much easier and much more fun to get angry about bullshit. It doesn't matter that the United States is $9 trillion dollars in debt and that its military and foreign policies are effectively crippled and everybody's losing their fucking houses, at least it doesn't matter as much as what Barack Obama's goddamned minister said.
We're now well into the sixth consecutive week of the most important debate in America: whether or not Jeremiah Wright is a nut. Judging by column inches in the newspapers of record, television time and space devoted by the biggest of the big dog blogs, you cannot come to any conclusion other than Wright is the most important man in the country. Thankfully, the United States isn't at war or anything.
To be fair, the preoccupation with goofy religious nonsense in this campaign didn't begin with Wright. Much was made about Mitt Romney's magic underpants during the Republican primaries. The fact that Romney is a Mormon seemingly mattered far more than did the fact that Romney is an asshole and a borderline idiot.
I'll admit a bias here. I think that Jeremiah Wright is endlessly entertaining. Do I think that he's a lunatic? Sure I do. But insane people are often fun to watch and I need something to occupy my time with between Charles Manson's parole hearings. I have discussed this with my future bride, and when the day comes that we get married, we want Reverend Wright to conduct the ceremony. This is because I'm the most romantic man ever.
Am I shocked that Wright believes that the US government created the HIV virus and is ultimately responsible for 9/11? Not really. Wright also believes that Jesus is, as Sarah Silverman put it, magic. Faith is predicated on believing implausible things with no logical foundation whatsoever.
I don't make any distinction between worshipping the Zombie Christ and thinking that Louis Farrakahn is a swell guy. Both are incredibly silly assertions. On the other hand, Farrakhan made a pretty cool calypso record and Jesus didn't, so Farrakhan wins! I know for a fact that calypso exists, which I can't say about ressurection.
You know why Jeremiah Wright has been on television so much? Because Jeremiah Wright is entertaining as hell. He yells. He dances. He imitates marching bands from Florida and Michigan. He says shit that convinces you that he's completely lost his mind. And of the four, George W. Bush has only been really good at the fourth.
Even though Obama is still the presumptive Democratic nominee, Wright has essentially destroyed his chances of winning a general election. Unless the senator actually shoots his former pastor in the kneecaps, his name will forever be tied to America's chickens coming home to roost.
And I think that's unfortunate for two reasons. First, there are several perfectly logical reasons to vote against Barack Obama if people would only take the time to pay attention. Second, what happens to America's chickens if they don't come home to roost? Will they roost in Scandanavia? Or will they roost with the terrorists? If the chickens roost with the terrorists, don't the terrorists win? I think about these things so you don't have to.
I know that there are any number of asshole Republicans who are exhibiting no small measure of glee over the media obsession with the Wright story. This is because Republicans can be stupidly short-sighted when they smell blood in the water.
Like most of you, I remember Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson getting together on September 13, 2001 - three days after the attacks of 9/11 and three days before Wright made his comments - and said the following;
''What we saw on Tuesday, as terrible as it is, could be minuscule if, in fact, God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve.''
Mr. Robertson responded, ''Jerry, that's my feeling. I think we've just seen the antechamber to terror. We haven't even begun to see what they can do to the major population.''
A few moments later Mr. Falwell said, ''The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the A.C.L.U., People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America, I point the finger in their face and say, 'You helped this happen.' ''
To which Mr. Robertson said, ''Well, I totally concur, and the problem is we have adopted that agenda at the highest levels of our government.''
God allowed America's enemies to give them what the country probably deserved. Not radically different than what Wright said, is it? But everybody focused on the part about "the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the A.C.L.U., People for the American Way," as if Norman fucking Lear was the 20th highjacker, and they overlooked the first part. Liberals took Robertson and Falwell's comments as an attack on themselves because liberals are narcissitic shitheads. But they were an attack on America.
But President Bush never cut off either one of those ghouls and John McCain gave the commencement at Falwell's clown college just before Falwell had the good grace to finally fucking die. The GOP kept going to their poisoned wells long after they proved themselves to be every inch as treasonous as Jeremiah Wright. They campaigned on their dopey shows, received their emissaries at the White House and spoke at their hamburger universities.
If I know journalists as well as I think I do, they're using the Wright story to tee up a full-bore assault on evangelical retards in the name of being "fair and balanced." Journalists are godless heathens to be sure, but they happen to be particularly antagonistic toward conservative fairy tales.
All the way back in 1993, Bush remarked that "heaven is open only to those who accept Jesus Christ," which leaves Muslims and Jews in a rather precarious position. Fortunately for Bush, he was only running for governor then and the approximately 12 Jews and Muslims in the Lone Star State weren't going to vote Republican anyway. It was only in 1999, when he was preparing to run for president, that he sought absolution from Abe Foxman and the Anti-Defamation League.
Then there's John McCain's relationship with John Hagee. Reverend Hagee runs one of those Wall-Mart churches in Texas and believes some incomprehensibly dumb things.
And he's even got a minature whore for his "Whore Church" pointer. Awwww. John Hagee is fucking adorable!
Don't get me wrong, he's right about the "Whore Church" and Catholic anti-Semitism, but that's beside the point. There are 40 million Catholics in the United States and they constitute the single largest voting bloc there. Republicans would very much like to continue their recent trend of narrowly winning the Catholic vote. But the immigration debacle is going to crucify them with Hispanics and seeing John McCain holding hands with the likes of Hagee certainly isn't going to help with the rest of them.
Hagee also called Hurricane Katrina "the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans." because the city was planning a gay pride parade. Do serious people actually believe shit like that? I thought saying things like that got you in a straightjacket and not presidential politics.
When presented with Hagee's quotes, McCain distanced himself from them. However, just two weeks ago, McCain said to George Stephanopolous that he was "glad to have his endorsement." After the Obama / Wright conflageration, that isn't going to fly for very long. The press knows that and I think McCain does, too.
Look, I think John McCain is the first decent human being to run for president since Bob Dole 12 years ago and he doesn't want to attack Barack Obama's faith, particularly when the media and Hillary Clinton are doing it for him. I think, like the first President Bush, that he would like to avoid a presidential election becoming a stupid debate about an invisible man who lives in the sky.
Idiot bloggers are screaming for McCain's head because he won't jump on the Jeremiah Wright gravy train of glory. That's why I call them idiot bloggers. John McCain has been in politics for a very long time and is savvy enough to know that the second he attacks Wright, he opens himself up to questions about his relationship with Hagee and the ghost of Jerry Falwell returns to haunt him.
The stupid pricks in the GOP's evangelical base hate McCain and he isn't real fond of them either. But, while I disagree with his assessment, he feels he needs those jackals and doesn't need the hassle of throwing an evil crank like Hagee under the bus.
I'm not sure that's true. If any Republican can win without evangelicals, it's John McCain. Furthermore, it isn't like those assholes are going to vote for Obama. The worst thing that can happen is that they stay home. McCain is already on the record calling Falwell and Robertson "agents of intolerance" and Obama wrote a book about how wonderful Wright is. If it the argument stays at that level, McCain wins.
But McCain was almost killed by his little pantomine of kissing Falwell's ring at Liberty University last year and I'm not sure that the Lazarus act works twice. If Hagee becomes an issue - and the New York Timesstarted the ball rolling this morning - he can't do any less than Obama did in denouncing him personally without getting killed.
Let's quit pretending that Obama isn't already the nominee. At this point, Hillary Clinton is little more than a highly effective McCain surrogate. As time goes by, it is increasingly clear that McCain can beat Obama with independents and what I like to call "Ed Rendell Democrats" who cower in fear at the prospect of voting for a brown person.
But if this campaign becomes an inspid Ecclesiastical debate, all bets are off and you're likely looking at a President Obama. After all, religious psychopaths who publicly indentify with the Republicans outnumber those who identify with Democrats by about a hundred to one. The only thing saving McCain from answering questions about his strange relationships with lunatics is Howard Dean's insane "50 state strategy" that adorably assumes that the Democrats have a shot in the South. When the eventual nominee takes over the DNC, I assure you that this will change.
I know that this little missive is going to piss off any number of my readers, including several of my friends. But faith is a private thing and is best left that way. If you insist on making that faith a spectacle in your elections, I reserve the right to mock both it and you mercilessly.
I'm also not dumb enough to say in public that Jeremiah Wright is any better or any worse than John Hagee. Does anybody seriously believe that if Barack Obama becomes president that he'll establish a black republic, go on television and say that the United States deserved 9/11, or establish a federal Department of Chicken Roosting? Really? I certainly don't think that John McCain is going to go on a whore church tirade although it would be awfully funny if he did.
I love the United States and its people with all of my heart. I've spent the better part of my life studying the country and its politics. But Americans have this highly distrubing quirk that makes their elections about God even more than the fucking Iranians do. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad didn't get elected president because he was closer to Allah. He got elected because he promised to kill more Jews.
Maybe Obama's pastor hates America. His plumber might, too. So the fuck what? In the end, making your elections about your religion is like my making my blog about my cock. And I'd never do that. I'm far too classy.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day:GodBy: John Lennon From:Plastic Ono Band
State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration by James Risen Finished, Thursday 19 January 2006
A Simple Twist of Fate: Bob Dylan and the Making of Blood on the Tracks by Andy Gill and Kevin Odegard Finished, 23 January 2006
Grits: An Intimate Portrait of the Liberal Party By Christina McCall-Newman Finished, 17 March 2006
Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architechts of American Power by David Rothkopf Finished, 6 April 2006
Strategery: How George W. Bush is Defeating Terrorists, Outwitting Democrats and Confounding the Mainstream Media By Bill Sammon Finished, May 10, 2006
George Wallace: American Populist By Stephan Lesher Finished, June 15, 2006
Secrets of the Kingdom: The Inside Story of the Saudi - U.S Connection By Gerald Posner Finished, June 20, 2006
Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan By Robert D. Kaplan Finished, June 27, 2006
Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus By Rick Perlstien Finished, July 4, 2006
Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson And His Times 1961-1973 By Robert Dallek Finished, August 10, 2006
Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential By James Moore and Wayne Slater Finished, October 7, 2006
The Fall Of Baghdad By Jon Lee Anderson Finished, October 31, 2006
The Way It Works: Inside Ottawa By Eddie Goldenberg Finished, November 12, 2006
Child Of God By Cormac McCarthy Finished, November 18, 2006
Right Side Up: The Fall Of Paul Martin And The Rise Of Stephen Harper's New Conservatism By Paul Wells Finished, December 8, 2006
The Private Life Of Chairman Mao By Dr. Li Zhisui, Translation By Tai Hung Chao Finished, December 14, 2006
Exile On Main Street: A Season In Hell With The Rolling Stones By: Robert Greenfeild Finished, February 21, 2007
"Work Hard, Study ... And Keep Out Of Politics!" Adventures And Lessons From An Unexpected Public Life By: James A. Baker, III with Steve Fiffer Finished, March 7, 2007
Supreme Conflict: The Inside Story Of The Struggle For Control Of The United States Supreme Court By Jan Crawford Greenburg Finished, March 14, 2007
Imperial Life In The Emerald City: Life Inside Iraq's Green Zone By: Rajiv Chandransekaran Finished March 18, 2007
Memories Of My Melancholy Whores By: Gabriel Garcia Marquez Finished, March 21, 2007
Guests Of The Ayatollah: The First Battle In America's War With Militant Islam By: Mark Bowden Finished, April 4, 2007
Screwjack By: Hunter S. Thompson Finished, April 19, 2007
State Of Denial: Bush At War, Part III By: Bob Woodward Finished, April 22, 2007
31 Days: Gerald Ford, The Nixon Pardon, And A Government In Crisis By: Barry Werth Finished, May 6, 2007
At The Center Of The Storm: My Years At The CIA By: George Tenent with Bill Harlow Finished, May 28, 2007
No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner By: Robert Shrum Finished: July 1, 2007
Chief of Staff: Lyndon Johnson and His Presidency By: W. Marvin Watson with Sherwin Markmarn Finished: July 12, 2007
Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power By: Robert Dalleck Finished: July 17, 2007
1912: Wilson, Roosevelt, Taft & Debs - The Election That Changed The Country By: James Chace Finished: August 5, 2007
Becoming Justice Blackmun: Harry Blackmun's Supreme Court Journey By: Linda Greenhouse Finished: August 20, 2007
President Reagan: The Triumph of Imagination By: Richard Reeves Finished: September 20, 2007
Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush By: Robert Draper Finished: October 1, 2007
Harper's Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power By: Tom Flanagan Finished: October 9, 2007
Full Circle: Death and Resurrection in Canadian Conservative Politics By: Bob Plamondon Finished: October 17, 2007
My Years As Prime Minister By: Jean Chretien Finished: October 23, 2007
The Thumpin': How Rahm Emanuel and the Democrats Learned to Be Ruthless and Ended the Republican Revolution By: Naftali Bendavid Finished: October 25, 2007
Not A Suicide Pact: The Constitution in a Time of National Emergency By: Richard A. Posner Finished, October 29, 2007
Slash By: Slash and Anthony Bozza Finished: November 1, 2007
The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star By: Nikki Sixx and Ian Gittin Finished: November 2, 2007
Clapton: The Autobiography By: Eric Clapton Finished: November 5, 2007
Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet By: James Mann Finished: November 13, 2007
Miami and the Siege of Chicago: An Informal History of the American Political Conventions of 1968 By: Norman Mailer Finished: November 15, 2007
Memoirs: 1939-1993 By: Brian Mulroney Finished: December 3,2007
Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperalism By: P.J O'Rourke Finished: December 4, 2007
The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 By: Lawrence Wright Finished: December 11, 2007
The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11 By: Ron Suskind Finished: December 19, 2007
Cheney: The Untold Story of America's Most Powerful and Controversial Vice President By: Stephen F. Hayes Finished: December 25, 2007
When Trumpets Call: Theodore Roosevelt After the White House By: Patricia O'Toole Finished: January 1, 2008
America's First Dynasty: The Adamses, 1735-1918 By: Richard Brookhiser Finished:January 7, 2008
The Road By: Cormac McCarthy Finished: January 9, 2008
The Conviction of Richard Nixon: The Untold Story of the Frost/Nixon Interviews By: James Reston, Jr. Finished" January 11, 2008
Write It When I'm Gone: Remarkable Off-the-Record Conversations with Gerald R. Ford By: Thomas M. DeFrank Finished: January 15, 2008
The Bush Tragedy By: Jacob Weisberg Finished: January 18, 2008
When All You Have Is Hope By: Frank O'Dea with John Lawrence Reynolds Finished: January 21, 2008
Confessions of a Political Hitman: My Secret Life of Scandal, Corruption, Hypocrisy and Dirty Tricks That Decide Who Gets Elected (and Who Doesn't) By: Stephen Marks Finished: February 8, 2008
The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court By: Jeffery Toobin Finished, February 18, 2008
The Architect: Karl Rove and the Dream of Absolute Power By: James Moore and Wayne Slater Finished, February 21, 2008
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln By: Doris Kerns Goodwin Finished, February 26, 2008
Post Office By: Charles Bukowski Finished: March 6, 2008
Factotum By: Charles Bukowski Finished: March 7, 2008
Women By: Charles Bukowski Finished: March 10, 2008
Queer By: William S. Burroughs Finished: March 12, 2008
To Live's To Fly: The Ballad of the Late, Great Townes Van Zant By: John Kruth Finished: March 17, 2008
Twenty Thousand Roads: The Ballad of Gram Parsons and His Cosmic American Music By: David N. Meyer Finished: March 24, 2008
W.A.R: The Unauthorized Biography of William Axl Rose By: Mick Wall Finished: April 4, 2008
Deception: Pakistan, the United States, and the Secret Trade in Nuclear Weapons By: Adrian Levy & Catherine Scott-Clark Finished: April 21, 2008
The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq By: George Packer Finished: May 5, 2008
Worse than Watergate: The Secret Presidency of George W. Bush By: John W. Dean Finished: May 7, 2008
Clinton in Exile: A President Out of the White House By: Carol Felenthal Finished: May 12, 2008
Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America By: Rick Perlstein Finished: June 2, 2008
Infidel By: Ayaan Hirsi Ali Finished: June 11, 2008
The People's Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy By: Joe Mathews Finished: June 20, 2008
The Strong Man: John Mitchell and the Secrets of Watergate By: James Rosen Finished: June 30, 2008
American Spy: My Secret History in the CIA, Watergate & Beyond By: E. Howard Hunt w/ Greg Aunuapu Finished: July 4, 2008
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA By: Tim Weiner Finished: July 16, 2008
The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder By: Vincent Bugliosi Finished: July 21, 2008
War by Other Means: An Insider's Account of the War on Terror By: John Yoo Finished: July 25, 2008
Your Government Failed You: Breaking the Cycle of National Security Disasters By: Richard A. Clarke Finished: July 31, 2008
The Persian Puzzle: The Conflict Between Iran and America By: Kenneth M. Pollack Finished: August 13, 2008
The Human Factor: Inside the CIA's Dysfunctional Intelligence Culture By: Ishmael Jones Finished: August 19, 2008
Havana Nocturne: How the Mob Owned Cuba ... And Then Lost It to the Revolution By: T.J Enjlish Finished: August 25, 2008
Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia By: Ahmed Rashid Finished: Sepember 9, 2008
The Case Against the General: Manuel Noriega and the Politics of American Justice By: Steve Albert Finished: September 25, 2008
Condolezza Rice: An American Life By: Elisabeth Bumiller Finished: October 10, 2008
Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America, 1789-1989 Michael Beschloss Finished: October 13, 2008
What People Are Saying About skippy
"hands down, Canada's most underrated blog" Damian Penny, The Undisputed Dean of Canadian Political Bloggers. Posted at Daimnation , Saturday October 21, 2006
"You can count on “Skippy” to make you think in different ways about familiar issues. You can also depend on him to be rude, offensive, and outrageous – if you're offended by completely uninhibited sexual imagery (and imagination!), don't read Skippy – but your prudery will keep you from an often interesting perspective." Posted On: Jamulblog, July 12, 2007
"Your Maximum Leader is beginning to think that the less he posts, the better Skippy’s political posts are. Indeed, your Maximum Leader even thought (just a few short moments ago) that if your Maximum Leader just stopped blogging all together would Skippy just keep on writing enough good material for two blogs? (Admittedly one of those blogs would be an X-rated social commentary/diary site and the second a remarkably well-informed and insightful political commentary site…)" Posted On: Naked Villainy, September 18, 2007
"I love your writing. few could pull off sarcastic humor and self-loathing like you do. You've turned self-disgust
into an art form." Posted By:Ophelia July 19, 2003
"hahaha um, not funny" Posted By: Ophelia July 17, 2003
"This is not fucking funny." Posted By: Bee August 21, 2003
"I join Bee in saying that this isn''t funny AT ALL. jesus christ, Skippy." Posted By: Ophelia August 23,
2003
"You are obiviously being kept down by the Mud People." Posted By: DrReverend August 21, 2003
"I''ll give you $50.00 if you kill yourself." Posted By: DrReverend August 19, 2003
"Last time I read this blog." Posted By: Dave, October 24, 2003
"I think you should stop talking about killing yourself and ACTUALLY kill yourself. For fuck's sake, everybody is
tired of hearing about how you might, just do it or face the fact that you are too pathetic to even kill yourself."
Posted By: A Caring Guy, October 25, 2003
"If Joey Ramone were alive today he'd probably shit in your mouth." Posted By: DrReverend November 11,
"When you're good, you're good. When you're bad, you're even better. See you in hell." Posted By: Anna
November 11, 2003
"Skippy, if you can prove to me that giving head and swallowing will without a doubt keep lung cancer and heart
disease at bay, you've earned yourself a BJ." Posted By: Mary Magdalicious, December 5, 2003
"Wow...you know nothing about politics." Posted Dr. Reverend, December 26, 2003
"You are a dick and should think seriously about killing your stupid blog - go get a job, you big fag"Posted
By: Princess Paragonian, December 29, 2003
"You have a, how shall i say.... appealing 'tough', yet gently gay look." (Univited PM) Posted
by:Jus20012002, January 2, 2004 .
"I hope jesus doesn't kick you in the nuts."Posted By: Mary Magdalicious February 2, 2004
"Stumbled on to your blog by accident and i must say alot of the stuff had me in stitches. Love it" Posted
By:Jeremy February 4, 2004
" .....sick."Posted By: Bee February 7, 2004
"Hey Skippy, you ever consider running for public office in the states? I know some people in the West Virginia state
government and our Senator can't live forever.Hell, even Strom, Thomas-Jefferson-Fan, Thurmond died
eventually.Posted By: Ford W. Mavrick, February 9, 2004
Wow, for someone who is so opinionated, you really don't know shit about American or Canadian culture. You appear to
know even less about history." Posted By: Dr. Reverend February 13, 2004
"Your blog's the best I have come across in a long time. I may not agree with all you say but the verve with which
you say it and the humour and irreverance is terrific. These days when the media just reproduces the handout from central
control, blogs like yours do a great deal to form informed opinion in a democratic society. Thanks. Keep it up."
Posted By:Anandan February 13, 2004
"SKIPPY pities ME? Where's my noose?" Posted By: Kilgore Trout March 22, 2004
"Jesus Skippy. Now Allah is going to kick you in the nuts" Posted By: Mary Magdalicious March 22, 2004
"I could make one that says "Skippy has a small penis" although his cock is superb. Posted By: Bestest Pussy March 23,2004
"Cunt sucking is for bitches.You're considered one of the girls because you dress like one. Posted By: Dr. Reverend March 24, 2004
"John Malkovich is one sexy bastard. I have such a thing for him. And I never realized til now, Skippy, how much you resemble John Malkovich...this, by default, makes you also one sexy bastard. See how that works?" Posted By: Zombie March, 26, 2004
"Too bad you live up north. It could have been beautiful.
Ever since I started coming here and saw your pic I wondered why you weren't getting more action. You are not a bad looking guy at all.
Maybe the girls are just...well, that's enough kindness for one day." Posted By: Serenity March 26, 2004
"Hell, if they make gay marriage legal, I'll marry you..." Posted By: Outpatient March 26, 2004
"You look creepier than the REM faggot. But he looks much more like a homersexual." Posted By: Dr. Reverend March 27, 2004
"Skippy, your hits will go up again if you post pictures of your man nipples. Lots of man nips." Posted By: Mary Magdalicious April 15, 2004
"What the fuck? You turning faggot? Posted By: Dr. Reverend April 16, 2004
"Sometimes it gets to be just a little too much. Sharing, that is." Posted By: Bee May 23, 2004
"I'll give you $5.00 if you make the fucking font you use on your blog bigger.
I'll give you $50.00 if you stop fucking writing about American politics.
I'll give you $500.00 if you fucking kill youself." Posted By: Dr. Reverend May 26, 2004
"Of course women like jerks.
Why the fuck do you think they like me?
I guess you've learned nothing from me over all these years." Posted By: Dr. Reverend May 29, 2004
"Sometimes a bitch just has to die." Posted By: Ford W. Maverick May 29, 2004
"It looks like we have more in common than the swastikas carved in our foreheads."Posted By: Dr. Reverend May 29, 2004
"This might be a shallow and 'Waiting-for-Godot-like' comment but...you seem to have not only brains but also beauty." Posted By: Nietzscheswife June 7, 2004
"Skippy, you are such a twisted bastard. Seriously. Why haven't we had sex yet?"Posted By: 0phelia June 25, 2004
"Just found your site. I find some of the things you say quite disgusting. And really quite enjoyable,so keep up the good work."Posted By: Big Al June 28, 2004
"I've read most of your blog. I'd say that so far it's the best I've come across, and believe me, I've seen a few. It's funny, well written (except for the spelling...) and interesting. There will always be those few idiots who just don't get it. It's useless to get worked up about it." Posted By: Johnny June 30, 2004
"Skippy... Go for the facial tattoo. I dig em', and fuck what those other bitches think. You can always bite their tits off if they back talk you." Posted By: Mary Magdalicious July 1, 2004
"Go fuck yourself up your butt." Posted By: Reek Stankleberry July 6, 2004
"Well if ass-fucking won't keep Satan away, I just don't know what will." Posted By: Dr. Reverend July 7, 2004
"dude, you're killing me. keep it up." Posted By: Son of Nixon July 22, 2004
"Are you always either naked or in a suit?" Posted By: Rehella July 22, 2004
"That person should speak for himself or herself. 'Cause you really are that much of a cunt, skippy." Posted By: Kilgore Trout August 4, 2004
"I've read you for a long time but have never commented before. That isn't a slight to your great writing ability, it's mainly because I don't want to be seen here!" Posted By: Paul August 4, 2004
" Dead on. Bulls-eye. I take back what I said about you being a cunt. For now." Posted By: Kilgore Trout August 4, 2004
"Know what, Skippy? You're alright." Posted By: Anna August 18, 2004
"Excellent work. Damn you for being so dead on." Posted By: The Maximum Leader August 24, 2004
"Skippy, fuck the puppy idea. Try getting a monkey that smokes. That will get you laid." Posted By: Mary Magdalicious August 27, 2004
"As to the beard - I like the clean shaven better - and what's wrong with a bald head? Bald heads are hot on some guys - unfortunately most can't pull it off * sigh * You look like you can pull it off though and that's a good thing - not a bad.
BTW, love your blog. I saw it in my referrers and thought it was just a random hit. Then I started reading and found you to be hilarious - it was only after about 10 posts that I noticed you linked me. I was more than flattered - linked by someone I was about to link anyway - awesome. Thanks" Posted By: Kinky August 27, 2004
"Fuckin' Goy bastard." Posted By: Dr Reverend December 19,2004
"Who does a guy have to sleep with to get one of his Skippy quotes pasted to the sidebar?
Great googly-moogly." Posted By: Smallholder December 20, 2004
"Are you a child molester or what's the story?" Posted By: Fukinator, December 28, 2004
"Sick dude." Posted By: DCayer December 29, 2004
"You officially suck." Posted By: Sorry, January 22, 2005
"I heart you, Skippy" Posted By: Karinsky, January 25, 2005
"As I've stated before, you were quite skilled in bed and I had no need to fake any of my multiple orgasms." Posted By: 0phelia, June 30, 2005
"I love Skippy. I swear I do. The only blogger more twisted than me." Posted on: Velociworld, July 26, 2005
" You are so fucking ignorant about America. And while the American people ARE stupid, so are you." Posted By: Bill Lassiter, August 2, 2005
"How can you not love a man who hates himself so viciously?" Posted on: It's All About De , August 31, 2005
"If I wasn't positive that all Canadian men had tiny penises, I'd be all over that Skippy." Posted On: It's All About De
"I've seen pictures of you and I'd say you're fuckable." Posted By: Joan, September 29, 2005
" I love your posts on Canadian politics even more than I love your posts on porn.
And I love your porn posts.
Why the hell do you waste all this talent on the internet? Write a book or something, goddammit! Posted By: Cliff S., November 17, 2005
"Let it never be said that underneath your self-cavilling, bitter (yet strangely egomaniacal) surface that you never take the time to give the people what they want. Even if it's just one people. Gawd bless you, Skippy! Posted By: Locke, November 18, 2005
"Wow! I don't know that I've ever been flattered and yet somewhat revolted at the same time... It's an interesting sensation." Posted By: Dewey in Toronto, December 1, 2005
"Very often, debating you is like playing whack a mole: You pop up some premised assertion moles, I pull out my mallet and start whacking, then you pop up more premised assertion moles - which are mostly or completely unrelated to the original moles I was whacking at. Your stock of moles seemingly stretches into infinity. And yet, an endless supply of moles does not equate to cogent argument.
Very often, debating you is like speaking to a salesman who will not answer a particular direct question, and instead flies off on the flight of rhetorical splendor known as "baffling them with bullshit." I'm impressed with your rhetorical skills, and your IQ, and your accumulation of knowledge. I'm impressed that I'm the American citizen, yet you might have a more thorough knowledge of the American Constitution than I. And yet, these impressive things are not substitutes for cogent argument."Posted By; gcotharn, December 21, 2005
"Besides, you seem to think you're the least respectable person I know. While you're often right, you're wrong on that count. Careful, I might out YOU as a nice guy. Or something." Posted By: Dewey In Toronto, December 27, 2005
"I've been to Toronto. The most dangerous thing I saw there was an 11 foot tall red head with shaved balls."Posted By: Judy, December 31, 2005
"There was this "Caught on Tape!" video I watched back in my highschool days where one of the scenes shows two people starting to cross the railroad tracks. One looks up at the last minute and sees the train, the other does not. In the commercial, it cuts away just before the train does its thing, but the video...
Your blog is like a twisted version of the video. We know the train is going liquify you in shocking gory fashion, but that's why we keep coming back. It's so much more fun that we both know the train is coming and you still gleefully walk into its path...and we love you all the more for it." Posted By:Locke, January 13, 2006
"Fuck. I'm hooked." Posted By: DeAnna, January 14, 2006
"Your Maximum Leader has found Skippy's commentary more insightful and interesting than anyone elses. So now he supposes that Skippy will go back to writing about porn and strippers he meets in the subway." Posted By: The Maximum Leader on Naked Villainy January 24, 2006
"Slightly crazed is fine, but with the beard you look like a total nutjob. If you ever hope to get laid again, for fuck's sake, Skippy, NEVER, EVER grow a saddam beard. You're welcome."Posted By: The Lady O, 28 January, 2006
"Maybe we should get married. My readers could support us by purchasing my worn panties and you could be the panty pimp." Posted By; Joan 28 January 2006
" I know it must be hard for you...being objectified by women all the time. But come on, how can they really help themselves? Have you seen yourself lately? Your pheramones preceed you into a room (as does your crotch). Don't blame it all on them...you did choose to leave your house. :D" Posted By: Joan, 3 February, 2006
"Skippy, you sarcastic twerp." Posted By: Arwen, 8 February 2006
"Just so you know.. if I had to choose between Moussaoui or Skippy.. You'd win. Even if I know what an asshole you are. Posted By; Judy, 13 February 2006
"I'd be willing to sign a legal document stating that is IS ok, in fact, to masturbate whilst thinking of me." Posted By: DeAnna (Who seems unaware of my reputation as an outlaw) February 24, 2006
"Feel free to masturbate while thinking of me...actually, do you need some of my panties to help you with that?" Posted By: Joan, February 24, 2006
"I blame myself for this. I have been too lenient with you. Your Godless behaviour must come to an end. You will receive a severe beating this weekend and I am contemplating removing your testicles." Posted By: Dr. Reverend, February 24, 2006
"Just remember skippy, the US never threw a fit when you smuggled your own personal WMD over the border twice a year. After all, it wasn't like you were hiding in your pants or anything.
All's fair in love and war, so to speak." Posted By: Judy, April 4, 2006
"Wow...nothing hotter than a man willing to issue fatwas for pussy." Posted By: Joan, April 16, 2006
"You sir, are a brilliant writer." Posted By: Judy, May 4, 2006
"I think I'm falling in love." Posted By: DeAnna, May 11, 2006
"THIS IS THE MOST DIABOLICAL FALSITY YOU HAVE EVER ENGAGED IN!!!!
I was intending to kick you in the face upon our next meeting, but now it's obvious that I must douse your scrotum in kerosene and set your testicles aflame. Alas, it is the only way you will learn." Posted By: Dr. Reverend, May 12, 2006
"And i would like to commend you on some excellent blogging. This particular story would normally warrant a few cryptically humorous lines and a link. To an ordinary blogger. But you managed to wring an essay of New Yorker-esque proportions out of it. That takes talent. Your beautiful young friend is right. I see big things for you in the future." Posted By: Annika, June 4, 2006
" I like a man who will unabashedly tell someone his penis size because hes unashamed. Thats hot.
*raises hand* I'll take that 6.5, thank ya" Posted By: Kinky, June 6, 2006
"Elvis, like skippy, is the very definition of rock and roll. Posted By: Rube, June 10, 2006
" I'm beginning to think you're the only good man left in the world, skippy. WTF?" Posted By: By: DeAnns, June 11, 2006
"Just so everyone knows.
Skippy does indeed, taste like bacon.
And, any guy who doesn't know cum tastes good to real women, is clueless." Posted By: Judy, July 2, 2006
"There was a British columnist whose work was described as 'a suicide note in weekly installments.'
This blog is sort of like that." Posted By: Gadfly, July 6, 2006
"Jeez, Skippy. Sometimes I really hate coming here." Posted By: Cynlee, July 18, 2006
"Someone needs to throttle you with a riding crop...truly!" Posted By: Joan, July 18, 2006
"Holy mother of god. I just had an orgasm. It's official: I'm devoting the rest of my life to you, skippy." Posted By: DeAnna, July 19, 2006
"Skippy, sometimes I'm not quite sure of your sanity, but you are without a doubt the baddest morning news reading, quiz show hosting, talent introducing PIMP in the motherfuckin' blogosphere." Posted By: Shank, July 19, 2006
