Crazed wingers hoping Osama bin Laden can save America
... by attacking us, preferably with a "major weapon." Seriously. You know, when you get called out by people at the Free Republic and Little Green Footballs, you know you're on the wrong track. Here's crazy Glenn Beck and his Fox News guest, former head of the CIA's Bin Laden unit (seriously...) and self-described "lifelong Republican," Michael Sheuer, who appears to have been driven mad by the revocation of Bush-era rendition, torture and domestic spying policies. (And note how Beck does his best to channel Osama's thoughts):
... if you think Michelle "Internment Camps" Malkin and her crowd really care one iota about the people of Iran. After all, we're talking about Michelle Malkin -- probably the only brown person ever published by the white supremacist site Vdare, who has never demonstrated any emotion toward Muslims outside of the narrow chasm between hatred and loathing -- theoretically being in favor of people who are out yelling "Allahu Akbar" -- a phrase that is an anathema to people like her. No, I'd guess that the wingers are really after with all their carping about Iran is a plan they can reproduce, and thereby pretend that at long last, they're freedom-fighters, too: fighting Barack Obama (of course) ... maybe even in the streets! Witness this interesting comment thread on Malkin's latest supposedly heartfelt Iran post:
On June 24th, 2009 at 2:56 pm, MrOlympia said: I reckon somebody is studying the Iranian situation so when he has to deal with it here…….his brown shirt Besij will be much better prepared. He knows many United States citizens are armed, therefore he will have to be even more brutal.
There are millions of us with military training (only 20 years, 22 days, in my case) who do not consider ourselves to be released from our oaths. There are hundreds of thousands in the active military who understand and honor their oaths. If civil war comes, and that is what you are postulating, the Constitution will win, in my opinion.
Hope is not a plan; not all change is good. WE are the civilian national security force!If you have any doubts as to why the Founding Fathers included the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights, watch the Teheran coverage. “Who will be our George Bush?” The resistance is here; the resistance is now. RESIST!!!!!!!!!
ECS
Ladies and gentlemen, I think we may have spotted the next lone gunman. Hopefully someone who knows this weirdo "Elm Creek Smith" will keep one eye on his gun stash, and 911 on speed dial. And what's really scary is that his comments aren't all that far from the recent nuttiness Twittered by Florida's very own Marco Rubio.
By the way, on the not really giving a crap about Muslims but shooting their mouths off anyway front? Throw in the right wing local politicos who probably couldn't find Iran on a map, or think Barack Obama is a Muslim, and probably can't stand Muslims as a rule anyway ... or all three combined. Say ... I wonder if my old pal O'Neal Dozier is a member of the Southeastern Broward Republican Club ...)
Classy Palinites hold miniature 'fire Letterman' rally
I think at its peak, the angry crowd rallying outside David Letterman's show swelled to about 40 people, all defending Sarah Palin and the virtue of her ... well one of her ... daughters. A sample of the class level:
New York Magazine videographer Jonah Green was one of those press members, and he captured a disturbing video of several of those protesters in hate-filled rants against the CBS "Late Show" host.
Among the more alarming lines of attack -- particularly given that the rally was held because Letterman supposedly made a joke about Sarah Palin's teenage daughter Willow -- was that Letterman's son Harry was born out of wedlock (he recently wed Regina Lasko after dating for over a decade).
"Should we talk about his son?" one protester asked Green. "I believe his son was born out of wedlock. I believe there's a term for that."
"Is someone making jokes about his child?" asked another. "Especially, you know, when he had a daughter out of wedlock himself" (he didn't; 5-year-old Harry is his only child).
"How dare he?" asked yet a third, the most offensive of all. "When he has a bastard son, and a slut for a wife" (Letterman's wife Lasko has kept a notoriously low profile).
...they watch Fox News, hate socialism, and think that Letterman "rapes children with his mouth." Oh, and they really, really like Jay Leno.
Watch:
Okay, so wasn't the best part the tall guy who tried to throw a sistah-girl body wave at the black lady who he said thinks she "knooooow so much!"??? Classic.
James Von Brunn: another right wing nut acting out
This time in New York, at the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C., where an Obama-hating anti-Semite white supremacist shot an (African-American) security guard to death as former Defense Secretary William Cohen and his wife Janet Langhart Cohen watched (or heard.) The interracial couple were preparing to enjoy a reading of her play about racial tolerance, in which Anne Frank has a theoretical dialogue with Emmett Till. Go figure. The attacker is named James Von Brunn. I'll bet you can take a good guess what's on his radio dial and reading list... His former wife had this to say about him:
The ex-wife of the racist who stormed the U.S. Holocaust Museum described him as an abusive alcoholic whose hatred against Jews and blacks "ate him alive like a cancer."
"It's all he would talk about," the ex-wife said of James von Brunn, 89, who was wounded in a firefight with museum guards.
"When I questioned him, he would get very angry and abusive."
..."He would talk about what the world would become in 20 or 30 years - that most of the country would be governed by black governors and that the Jewish people owned the media," the ex-wife said.
"That's why I divorced him - because he was eaten alive with a cancer with this matter."
Von Brunn is also apparently part of the Obama "Birther" movement: the wingnuts who question Barack Obama's citizenship ... still ... (led by their godfather, Rush Limbaugh) He even wrote a book about his ... um ... complaints... And his writings further reveal him to be adamantly pro-Bush and pro-Sarah Palin:
The gunman was identified by law enforcement officials as James W. von Brunn, who embraces various conspiracy theories involving Jews, blacks and other minority groups and at one point waged a personal war with the federal government.
... Officials and others who track conspiracy theorists have long been familiar with Mr. von Brunn, whose latest address is believed to be in Eastern Maryland, in part because he maintains a Web site. (Wednesday night, only an archived version of the site was available.) He has claimed variously to be a member of Mensa, the high-I.Q. society; to have played varsity football at a Midwestern college, where he earned a degree in journalism; to have been a PT boat commander in World War II; and to be a painter and an author.
Mr. von Brunn has also claimed to have been victimized by a court system run by Jews and blacks.
Before Wednesday, he was best known to law enforcement officials for having walked into the Washington headquarters of the Federal Reserve System on Dec. 7, 1981, with a bag slung over the shoulder of his trench coat. A guard chased him to the second floor, where the Fed’s board was meeting, and found a revolver, a hunting knife and a sawed-off shotgun in the bag.
Mr. von Brunn, who lived in Lebanon, N.H., at the time, told the police he wanted to take board members hostage to focus news media attention on their responsibility for high interest rates and the nation’s economic difficulties. He was convicted in 1983 and served several years in prison on attempted kidnapping, burglary, assault and weapons charges.
Hm ... guns ... anti-government paranoia ... federal reserve conspiracy theories ... white supremacist movement... hey, remember back when the righties got all hot and bothered about this?
The Department of Homeland Security is warning law enforcement officials about a rise in "rightwing extremist activity," saying the economic recession, the election of America's first black president and the return of a few disgruntled war veterans could swell the ranks of white-power militias.
A footnote attached to the report by the Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis defines "rightwing extremism in the United States" as including not just racist or hate groups, but also groups that reject federal authority in favor of state or local authority.
"It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single-issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration," the warning says.
(U//LES) Rightwing extremists are harnessing this historical election as a recruitment tool. Many rightwing extremists are antagonistic toward the new presidential administration and its perceived stance on a range of issues, including immigration and citizenship, the expansion of social programs to minorities, and restrictions on firearms ownership and use. Rightwing extremists are increasingly galvanized by these concerns and leverage them as drivers for recruitment. From the 2008 election timeframe to the present, rightwing extremists have capitalized on related racial and political prejudices in expanded propaganda campaigns, thereby reaching out to a wider audience of potential sympathizers.
(U) Exploiting Economic Downturn
(U//FOUO) Rightwing extremist chatter on the Internet continues to focus on the economy, the perceived loss of U.S. jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors, and home foreclosures. Anti-Semitic extremists attribute these losses to a deliberate conspiracy conducted by a cabal of Jewish “financial elites.” These “accusatory” tactics are employed to draw new recruits into rightwing extremist groups and further radicalize those already subscribing to extremist beliefs. DHS/I&A assesses this trend is likely to accelerate if the economy is perceived to worsen.
Sounds about right ... Thanks, Michelle! BTW Ms. Malkin is strangely silent on Von Brunn today, preferring to devote her entire site to stupid posters opposing "Obamacare." UPDATE: Malkin did post about the shooting after all. But she claims, nonsensically, that Von Brunn was NOT, I repeat NOT ... a right winger. And this link-friend of Michelle's takes it one step further ...
Let's give the last word to the one good thing Fox News has going for it: Shep Smith, who reveals that the winger extremists are starting to creep him out, too...
As the right wing nuts react... Meanwhile, Irregular Times keeps tabs on the equally scaryFReepers...
After quizzling like a girl and nearly wetting his pants on "The View" yesterday when he was called a lying sack of dog mess for making up an Amtrak fable about Whoopi and Barbara ... and once he had repaired to the safety of his radio studio and was no longer actually in the room with them, our once-again feisty friend Harold Hill Glenn got all feisty and tore into those women like only a real man would ... when the women aren't there (ahem.)
So... Feherty's sorry he maligned U.S. troops by calling them homicidal maniacs who'd shoot the House and Senate leaders if they got into an elevator with them. This after his network, CBS, said this about his idiotic D Magazine column:
"We want to be clear that this column for a Dallas magazine is an unacceptable attempt at humor and is not in any way condoned, endorsed or approved by CBS Sports."
... and the PGA Tour said this:
"David Feherty is an insightful and sometimes humorous commentator for CBS Sports' golf coverage," the PGA Tour said in a statement. "However, his attempt at humor in this instance went over the line, and his comments were clearly inappropriate. We hope he will use better judgment in the future."
Sometimes humorous? Ooooh snap! To the apology! The now contriteself-reflective job jeopardized golf analysts said this yesterday:
"This passage was a metaphor meant to describe how American troops felt about our 43rd president," Feherty said in a statement. "In retrospect, it was inappropriate and unacceptable, and has clearly insulted Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid, and for that, I apologize. As for our troops, they know I will continue to do as much as I can for them both at home and abroad."
Ah. Well, that makes it all better... (eyes rolling) Apparently, Feherty, who hails from Northern Ireland, has spent the odd Thanksgiving in Iraq, and from that, gleaned that all 160,000 odd troops there both adore former President Bush, and harbor homicidal attitudes toward Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, which even out-weigh their dislike for Osama bin Laden. With that kind of insight, shouldn't he be president of CBS Sports by now? And since Al Franken has been to Iraq with the USO probably more than Feherty, can we glean that he has special insight into how many troops think Rush Limbaugh is a big, fat idiot?
To the firing, CBS, and quick! CBS Radio had no problem firing the "sometimes humorous" Don Imus for calling a group of lady basketball players Ho's, and CBS News jettisoned Dan Rather for getting hosed on some memos while reporting on the still not unproven tale of Dubya's sweet Texas Air National Guard deal. Given their track record on employee vocal discipline, I don't see how they get away with keeping Feherty on the payroll.
Meanwhile, in one of the saddest ironies possible, an actual soldier, suffering from the stresses of the actual war, opened fire yesterday and killed four of his fellow troops in Iraq. Our prayers are with all of the families of the dead, including the family of the shooter, who took his own life.
As Keith Olbermann pointed out last night, the guy who wrote this idiotic piece in D Magazine (a magazine which hosts a slathering, groupie-ish George W. Bush love letters page, works for CBS Sports, which is to say he works for CBS News. Per Politico's Glenn Thrush:
Even if this was off the cuff, it's not going to go over well with the sports bosses at CBS.
The network's golf analyst, David Feherty, writing a column in D Magazine about the George and Laura Bush moving to the Dallas area, says U.S. soldiers would shoot Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid:
"From my own experience visiting the troops in the Middle East, I can tell you this, though: despite how the conflict has been portrayed by our glorious media, if you gave any U.S. soldier a gun with two bullets in it, and he found himself in an elevator with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Osama bin Laden, there’s a good chance that Nancy Pelosi would get shot twice, and Harry Reid and bin Laden would be strangled to death."
By the way, how can it be "off the cuff" when a guy took the time to write it, spell check it, presumably read it over, and send it to an editor, who presumably read it, approved it, and posted it on the magazine's website? Come on, Glenn... In any case, the unbelievable piece of right wing scholarship was caught by Media Matters, which is bad news since Media Matters rarely just reports and then leaves stuff alone. They follow up. Just ask Don Imus. In short, the commentary has very likely put Mr. Feherty's future at CBS in doubt.
Feherty is the same genius who last week thought it would be a hoot to ask Tiger Woods if he "felt like a loser." Not exactly the way to get ahead at CBS, I'm thinking. ABC, maybe...
Great Britain bans the Weiner. And the Weiner threatens to make like a liberal and sue, but only after calling the U.K. minister who "named and shamed" him and 15 other undesriables, a "witch." Specifically, Savage said:
"Well, I don't know who this pork eater is, but I have a question for her. I hear she is the Home Secretary of the former England. When has this witch heard my show, since it's not syndicated in England? When has this witch listened to my program in England? And which show or shows is she referring to?"
Savage told The Chronicle in an exclusive interview this morning that he was shocked to learn the news that he was included in the British government's first-ever list of nearly two dozen people from across the globe who are banned from entering the nation for allegedly fostering extremism or hatred.
... The list of high-profile banned visitors was released by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, who published 16 of the 22 names of people banned from the country since October. They include Muslim extremists, jailed Russian gang members and an Israeli settler.
Smith cited "public interest" reasons for not disclosing the other six names, but said that the country wanted to establish what kind of standards it would set in allowing in foreign visitors.
"I think it's important that people understand the sorts of values and sorts of standards that we have here, the fact that it's a privilege to come and the sort of things that mean you won't be welcome in this country," Smith told Britain's GMTV.
... His companions on the British list include Stephen "Don" Black, who founded a white supremacist Web site in Florida, and preacher Fred Phelps, who leads an anti-gay church in Topeka, Kan., and who has been to San Francisco numerous times to mount anti-gay protests.
Others on the list: Yunis Al-Astal, a Hamas lawmaker in Gaza, Egyptian cleric Safwat Hijazi, Israeli settler Mike Guzovsky, who has been accused by British authorities of being linked to military training camps.
Two leaders of a Russian gang, Artur Ryno and Pavel Skachevsky, were also barred; they served more than a decade in Russian prisons for racially based murders of 19 people, according to the Associated Press.
Savage told The Chronicle that being included in such a crowd is no laughing matter -- and he is now preparing legal action against Smith, he said.
"This lunatic ... is linking me up with Nazi skinheads who are killing people in Russia, she's putting me in a league with Hamas murderers who kill Jews on busses," he said. "I have never advocated violence ... I've been on the air 15 years. My views may be inflammatory, but they're not violent in any way."
as the right declares free speech to be dead. Do they know that our Constitution doesn't apply in the mother country? Meanwhile, on his radio show today, Lou Dobbs declared that he actually likes the "coming to this country is a privilege" bit. I see a new take on illegal immigration coming!
From the Nut Files: I thought Glenn Beck was crazy, until I heard Alex Jones
So this weekend, I'm driving along, and this being South Florida, there was absolutely NOTHING worth listening to on the radio. I happened to pop over to the business station (Salem owns it, so really I should be boycotting it just based on WorldNutDaily alone, but that's just how slim the pickings are around here...) and what did I hear? The Alex Jones radio show. You know, Alex Jones: the guy from InfoWars and PrisonPlanet, and at one time, a leading purveyor of alternate 9/11 theories (and apparently, a David Koresh devotee, too.) Well ... um ... I had become increasingly convinced that Glenn Beck has gone insane, his Obama Derangement Syndrome having finally driven off the cliff of sanity (him, and all his winger friends...) but now that I've heard Alex Jones, who is a screaming, shrieking, conspiracy theorizing HOT MESS (hell, even the FReepers think he's nuts...) I'm ready to re-admit Beck to polite society. Okay, almost ready...
In a nutshell, Jones believes:
1. The government IS preparing to put us all in prison camps (even Beck has backed off that one) and that Glenn Beck's "investigation" of the supposed FEMA camps was a classic case of misdirection, since Beck is clearly a decoy employed by THEM...
2. The government IS spreading these so-called "chem trails," which I had only previously heard from religious cultists (including a very dear friend of mine who is caught up in one of those Yahweh cults.) And the latest iteration of this horror is the Obama administration's cover story -- fighting global warming by cooling the atmosphere.
3. The governmetn IS preparing to confiscate everyone's firearms.
4. The government is run by Satan worshippers who are operating as part of a one-world secret society based alternately at Jordan Grove and the Bilderberg group.
5. The U.S. has already handed over American sovereignty by a one-world currency, and is preparing to be complicit in the creation of a worldwide DNA database that is being accomplished through arrests at which DNA is taken, the "forced" immunization of our children, including teenaged girls who are being induced to be vaccinated with Gardasil, and on and on, all of which I believe have been previous plots on "The X Files."
It goes on from there, complete with black helicopters, and all the nuttery that has become, unfortunately, more and more common AM talk radio -- only Alex Jones combines the SS-like shrieking of Michael Savage with the mind-numbing conspiracy craziness of, well, Alex Jones. Throw in pathetic true-believer callers, like the young man who called in this weekend, saying he was a college student who was recently laughed down by his class for trying to present the chem trails evidence to his teacher and fellow students, then throw in Jones' literal screaming, at the top of his lungs: "YOU'RE ALL SHEEP!!! THEY'RE COMING TO GET YOU!!!!!" and you've got the craziest damned thing I've ever heard on the radio, including Glenn "Harold Hill" Beck.
And that's saying something.
I must admit I paid only vague attention to Jones (and never heard his radio show) during the Bush years, when he was accusing the Bushes of everything from participating in the JFK assassination, to plotting the New World Order and being complicit in 9/11. Crazy people probably sound less crazy to you when you share a common foe (and the idea that the Bush administration had either foreknowledge or some part in 9/11 is not an implausible theory.) But now that I've heard him, Jones' demeanor alone makes everything he writes or says incredible (meaning not credible, not "incredible.") He really ought to take some medication. Hey, maybe he could borrow some from Rush Limbaugh...
Police seized 22 rifles and handguns this month from the home of a South Beach waiter after co-workers alleged he planned to gun down beachgoers from atop a condo tower, then trigger car bombs, court records show.
No charges have been pressed against Timothy Allan Svec, 44, a waiter at the Pelican Hotel restaurant.
Miami Beach detectives, working with federal authorities, are investigating.
The confiscated guns were legally owned as part of Svec's private collection, according to his lawyers, Sebastian J. Balliro and David Seltzer.
So what was Mr. Svec planning, you ask?
In late March, two employees at the Pelican approached a vacationing police officer from Tinton Falls, N.J. to complain that Svec had made threats to ``randomly kill people in South Beach using automatic weapons.''
''They described him as unstable and capable of carrying out his threats,'' Miami Beach police Detective Luis Estopinan wrote.
About two months ago, the employees explained, Svec told them he planned to go to the Continuum building in the 100 block of South Pointe Drive.
''From the rooftop, he was going to shoot at people on the beach,'' the warrant said. ``As people ran away from the beach, he was going to set off car bombs to effect those fleeing from the beach.''
Svec also talked of ``driving a van loaded with explosives onto Lincoln Road with the intention of detonating self and causing human casualties.''
TALK OF BOMBS
Svec had shown the men brochures depicting his weapons, and also said ''he had bomb-making capabilities and had a grenade,'' the warrant said.
On April 6, Beach detectives and agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives raided Svec's small, one-bedroom house in the 200 block of Michigan Avenue.
Among the weapons seized: a .22 cal. Ruger carbine, a 9mm MAC-10 machine pistol, several antique rifles and a custom long-range rifle with a scope and no serial number.
And you need a Ruger carbine for ... what exactly?
Dick's Army: the toooootally spontaneous 'tea parties'
The ones in South Florida are backed by Clear Channel and James Crystal Radio. Go figure! Meanwhile, one wonders just how much money Dick Armey's corporate underwriters are doling out for today's events... funny tea bag moment so far: the news reporter on right wing NewsRadio 610 this morning gushing that "thousands" of people are expected to attend the tea parties, across the entire country. Thousands, huh? Not exactly the Million Man March, is it?
On Tea Party day (stop laughing, you!) ... it's fitting that we find out that the election of our first black president has touched off a rise in right wing nutcases:
In a report made public today, the Department of Homeland Security warns that the recession and the election of President Obama are "fueling resurgence" of right-wing extremist groups that are seeking new recruits, especially returning veterans.
The intelligence assessment suggests that veterans make attractive recruits because of "combat skills and experience" that could boost the "violent capabilities" of radical right groups. Further, it says that any possible new restrictions on gun ownership, combined with vets' trouble reintegrating into their communities during a bad economy, "could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks."
"The high volume of purchases and stockpiling of weapons and ammunition by right-wing extremists in anticipation of restrictions and bans in some parts of the country continue to be a primary concern to law enforcement," the report states.
But DHS "has no specific information that domestic right-wing terrorists are currently planning acts of violence," spokeswoman Sara Kuban told Fox News. The assessment was issued last week to law enforcement. A similar assessment on left-wing groups was issued earlier in the year.
How does DHS define "right-wing extremism'? It writes that it "can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration."
What's really funny, is how quick right wingers are to claim ownership of right wing extremism, by calling the report an attack on conservatives. I guess it takes one to know one.
When we were in D.C., I was told that there were some 800 right wing/racist/extremist groups under surveillance by the FBI and Secret Service. And gun nuts have been a-stock-pilin of late, worried that Barack was sending the black helicopters over. So what to make of the report? Not surprising, unfortunately. Hell, the Palin rallies were attended by a rise in right wing extremism, and I expect that at least some of the "tea parties" will be, too. I await the Youtubes...
BUMP... Jon Stewart eviscerated the wingers tonight last night, pointing out the irony of their sudden fear of fascism and dictatorship (which he said they're probably mistaking for losing an election...) given their support for the warrentless wiretapping, foreign invasions, secret detentions, torture and squashing of dissent by the previous administration. (Spoiler alert: conservatives don't do irony. I think it kind of goes over their heads.) Waiting for the video to post on "The Daily Show" site.
Glenn Beck's 9/12 project is calling on all bunker-dwelling Bud drinkers to arm themselves with buckshot and await the call to revolution. Well. This guy may have answered the call:
PITTSBURGH – A gunman wearing a bulletproof vest and "lying in wait" opened fire on officers responding to a domestic disturbance call Saturday, killing three of them and turning a quiet Pittsburgh street into a battlefield, police said.
Richard Poplawski, 23, met officers at the doorway and shot two of them in the head immediately, Harper said. An officer who tried to help the two also was killed.
Poplawski, armed with an assault rifle and two other guns, then held police at bay for four hours as the fallen officers were left bleeding nearby, their colleagues unable to reach them, according to police and witnesses. More than 100 rounds were fired by the SWAT teams and Poplawski, Harper said.
They were Eric Kelly, a 14-year veteran of the force and married father of three daughters, and a pair of two-year department veterans, partners Stephen Mayhle, a married father of two daughters, and Paul Sciullo III, who was engaged to be married.
One friend, Edward Perkovic, said the gunman feared "the Obama gun ban that's on the way" and "didn't like our rights being infringed upon." Another longtime friend, Aaron Vire, said he feared that President Obama was going to take away his rights, though he said he "wasn't violently against Obama."
... Vire, 23, said the gunman once had an Internet talk show but that it wasn't successful. Vire said his friend had an AK-47 rifle and several powerful handguns, including a .357 Magnum.
This is the third mass shooting with an automatic weapon in a month, that we know of, and not counting the epidemic of street sprayings by AK47-wielding street gangs all over the U.S., including here in Florida, not to mention south of the border, where American guns are fueling the drug wars (a fact which by the way, is the current rationale for the right's Obama-baiting.) By the way, all three recent mass murderers bought their assault weapons the NRA way: legally. Which brings us to our buddy Beck. As one Pennlive commenter points out re Poplawski:
So he straps on a bulletproof vest, causes a domestic disturbance, and lies in wait for the cops to arrive so he can unload all of the assault weapons against agents of the government.
Sounds like the calls of Glenn Beck and other prominent conservatives for armed revolution are getting through to some mentally imbalanced folks.
And the weepy 9/11 family hater is hardly alone in advocating armed revolution by his winger followers. Crazy-train conductress Michelle "Re-education Camp" Bachman, Sean Hannity and others are doing the same thing. Hell, at this point, Rush seems the sane one! Media Matters has a chilling rundown of the right wing/Fox News call to arms.
And sure, maybe our Pittsburgh gun-man didn't open fire and kill three family men because he thinks the Beckster wanted him to, but then again...
as Neiwert noted this morning, the conservative Pittsburgh Tribune-Review ran a story just three days ago about "speculation that President Obama might pull the trigger on tighter regulations for gun ownership." The article quoted a gun-store salesman raising the specter of a "confiscation of firearms" from the government.
Not that nutty gunmen read the morning paper ... right? The bottom line is, the right has been whipping up pretty scary anti-Obama hysteria since the campaign, when supporters of GOP standard-bearer John McCain, or more correctly, of his gun-totin' running mate Sarah Palin, felt compelled to scream "terrorist!" and "Kill Him!" at campaign rallies. Now the right, on talk radio, online, and on Fox News, is whipping this small but scary crowd of AM radio devotees into a brand new frenzy, complete with literal calls to get "armed and dangerous" to fight the president of the United States. On its worst day, you never heard that about George W. Bush from the left.
Look, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that with all the other crap going on, from the economy and job loss to the usual stresses of life, compounded by this kind of rhetoric, some crazies are going to take the rodeo clown's rantings deadly seriously.
NewsBusters conveniently catalogs the I think, pretty obvious reaction from the sane part of the blogosphere here. Meanwhile, the Beckster says "who??? ME???" and then he and Newsbuster editor, Noel Sheppard actuallyentertain the crazy gunman's beliefs, advising that President Obama could stop the killings tomorrow, if he just reassured the crazy gun nuts that the black helicopters aren't coming...
SHEPPARD: But I think one of the -- but I think one of the other aspects here is: Under the current administration with a Democrat-controlled Congress, knowing what Obama's positions were, as a senator and also as an Illinois senator, is it an irrational fear of any gun owner at this point --
BECK: No.
SHEPPARD: -- to think that gun laws are going to be changed? The answer is no!
BECK: No! It's not irrational at all. They have said it.
... BECK: Well, OK, look, if the president wanted to calm people down, but there's no reason to in the first place because what we're talking about is a crazy man on Saturday.
But if he wanted to calm anybody who had any fears he would have said, "This is such a tragedy and let me reassure, the 2nd Amendment is the 2nd Amendment, and I will not infringe on those rights in any way, shape, or form. But he won't say that because he can't say that. Because he will slowly but surely take away your gun or take away your ability to shoot a gun, carry a gun. He will make them more expensive; he'll tax them out of existence. He will because he has said he would. He will tax you gun or take your gun away one way or another.
So to sum up: Glenn's advice to the president is that he respond to this incredible tragedy by defending the Second Amendment? Only on the right, folks.
Related Beck talking point: When an illegal immigrant shoots a cop, well, that's a whoooole nother matter. Nothing "not irrational at all" about that...
If you can believe it, the segment AFTER Frank Gaffney's on "Hardball" last night was even crazier than the Gaffster. It featured one of the dyed-in-the-wool right wing crazies, whom I lovably call the AWMSGN (Angry White Male Survivalist Gun Nuts.) Charles Blow of the New York Times profiled them last Saturday, and appeared on the segment. His take:
My read: They’re apocalyptic. They feel isolated, angry, betrayed and besieged. And some of their “leaders” seem to be trying to mold them into militias.
Now watch the segment, and ask yourself, how did the Nutters of Appalachia manage to recruit a guy named Gottlieb, and does he feel entirely safe among them...
If you haven't noticed, because you're one of the smart/lucky people who's gotten XM (as I did for one brief and shining week recently when I drove a rental car,) the AM dial has become pretty much the sole province of angry white male survivalist gun nuts and die-hard sports talk addicts too broke to get XM. ... And since I too am too broke to get XM, it will henceforth be my job to tell you what the AWMSGNs are talking about.
On Friday, I heard my first round of chit-chat, fresh off the talk radio morning prep: the Chia Obama. Todd Schnitt was opining about it on our Clear Channel winger talk outlet with his callers, who were expressing consternation that they could no longer find the product at their local Walgreens, the chain apparently having banished it from their shelves as a potentially racist product not in keeping with the chain's corporate image (or maybe as just plain tasteless.) As Walgreens is the lone retail distributor of Chia-fare (a product that dates back to the 1970s,) now, one can only purchase the Chia Obama online. And who is buying said Chia? Apparently, wingers. Lots of them! There are the wingers who are angry that Obama won ... the wingers who want to teach their kids to make fun of the president (in revenge for all those Dubya "chimp" references...) and the wingers who are burning that 90 percent of the world loves the guy, and hates (slash "fears and is disturbed by") them. Huh. Go figure.
So this morning on a really creaky AM station I used to do a show on (1470 AM) a winger host whose name I can't remember actually interviewed the founder of the Chia enterprise; a septugenarian whose company, Joseph Enterprises, also sells The Clapper! Mr. Chia was very disheartened that Walgreens misinterpreted his product, which he meant as a tribute, not an opportunity for 40-something white guys living in their mother's basements and stockpiling semi-automatic rifles in her garage while fine-tuning their AM radios on the shortwave and surfing Little Green Footballs on pirated Internet connections using a 1993-era IBM PC, to grow a green afro on the Negro. A sample/paraphrased clip from the show:
RIGHT WING HOST I CAN'T REMEMBER THE NAME OF: Don't you think it's a little disrespectful to turn the president into a Chia-pet?
CHIA GUY: He's not a Chia pet!
The Chia guy also pointed out that he is a Republican, but voted for Obama.
That's your AWMSGN update for this morning! Have a great day, and tune in tomorrow!
The NYTimes profiles Beck, and includes this pretty good summation:
The conservative writer David Frum said Mr. Beck’s success “is a product of the collapse of conservatism as an organized political force, and the rise of conservatism as an alienated cultural sensibility.”
“It’s a show for people who feel they belong to an embattled minority that is disenfranchised and cut off,” he said.
Believe it or not, there are still some Republicans out there who, like the old southerners who have never quite accepted the Confederates' capitulation at Appomattox, similarly can't accept an election that happened more than three months ago. And of course, they're right here in "Flawrida!" First up: a floor fight in the State Senate yesterday between a black South Florida legislator and a crazy lady from Brandon who can't accept that Barack Obama is president. From the Palm Beach Post politics blog:
Democrats and Republicans got into a heated verbal brawl ... over a public campaign finance bill in the Senate Transportation and Economic Development Committee. Some GOP senators railed against President Barack Obama’s reversal about taking public money to finance his campaign, just stopping short of calling the president a liar and refusing to refer to him as “president,” instead calling him “Sen. Obama” or “Candidate Obama.”
Democratic Sens. Chris Smith and Tony Hill grew fidgety as the anti-Obama rhetoric escalated but spilled over after Republican Ronda Storms refused to let the matter drop.
“I understand that some are uncomfortable with Candidate Obama’s faiilure to keep his word and those of us who did not support him calling attention to that,” Storms, R-Brandon, said. “I can completely understand they don’t want to talk about the messiah having a flaw but the messiah has a flaw.”
That pushed Smith, who previously tried to limit discussion on the proposed constitutional amendment (SJR 566) by asking for a vote, over the edge.
Smith said he was concerned that the debate was about federal campaign laws and not the state laws included in the bill.
“Don’t pi** on me and tell me it’s raining. I know what you were doing and I called you on it,” said Smith, whose district includes part of Palm Beach County.
Smith got a reprimand from the committee chairman for his trouble. Storms? Not so much. And Storms is not alone. The Florida Democratic Party chairwoman, Karen Thurman, is out with a statement slamming Storms and adding this:
Today, Congressman Bill Posey from Melbourne drafted legislation designed to fan the rumors on the extreme fringe of the Republican Party questioning President Obama's citizenship. These rumors are completely false, but they just won't give up. Congressman Posey should be focused on creating jobs and jumpstarting the economy, but it seems he's only obsessed with pandering to the right wing.
Floridians need our leaders to be focused on how to crate more jobs, expand healthcare and fix the economy, not pander to fringe elements. Florida Democrats fighting against these smears and working to elect leaders that will work for all of us.
The Posey funhouse legislation, as described by Politico, is yet another birtherfringe attempt to swat at Barack Obama's repeatedly proved American citizenship. The bill, "amend(s) the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to require the principal campaign committee of a candidate for election to the office of President to include with the committee’s statement of organization a copy of the candidate’s birth certificate, together with such other documentation as may be necessary to establish that the candidate meets the qualifications for eligibility to the Office of President under the Constitution." But as Politico points out, even had the bill been law in 2008, that wouldn't have been enough to satisfy the right wing wackos questioning Obama's nationality. (Spoiler alert: it's a racial thing!)
Anyhoo, Kudos to Chris Smith, who's one hell of a nice guy, and rightfully stood up for reason (and not peeing on people.)
More proof that as they become more irrelevant, right wingers are also becoming angrier, and scarier. Case in point: over at RedState, which used to be home to the less extreme wingers (compared with the truly sick people at Free Republic or LGF, or this crazy lady, for example,) they're saying things like this (and not getting banned):
At a press conference announcing the arrests, Holder also suggested that re-instituting a U.S. ban on the sale of assault weapons would help reduce the bloodshed in Mexico, where last year 6,000 people were killed in drug-related violence.
U.S. officials have a responsibility to make sure Mexican police “are not fighting substantial numbers of weapons, or fighting against AK-47’s or other similar kinds of weapons that have been flowing to Mexico,” Holder said.
This man and the rest of the un-American and anti-American people in power need to be legally stopped in their tracks before they incite an armed insurrection that will get thousands upon thousands of Americans jailed and/or killed.
Before WHO incites an "armed insurrection?" You??? Right wingers have shrunk in number in this country, but increased in rage and disconnectedness from either reason or reality. They are already on record supporting totalitarian "solutions" like domestic spying, pre-emptive war, mass deportation and torture. Now, they want unrestricted access to assault weapons and are threatening "armed insurrection?" These people are just plain scary... and dangerous.
Punkdified: Rick Santelli blames his wife for fearing Robert Gibbs
The former derivatives trader, who Gibbs pointed out, probably doesn't live anywhere near the "losers" who are going under after losing their jobs and homes, is what many wealthy Wall Street wags are: a punk who's better at sniping on television than answering questions. Watch Matt Lauer take him down, and catch him in a lie, as Santelli throws his poor wife under the bus; denying he accused the president's spokesman of threatening him, and then pawning the fear of a pudgy press secretary of on her:
Santelli, I think you're on about minute 14. Enjoy the last one.
Santelli's scared... or: some revolutionary HE turned out to be
Um ... who could possibly be afraid of Robert Gibbs? Answer: Rick Santelli, the Bourgeois Baron himself, and would-be leader of the Chicago Tea Party. Now, our friendly neighborhood "real American" Wall Street capitalist says he's terrified ... terrified, I say! ... of the guv'ment:
Meanwhile Bobby Jindal was on MTP this weekend, and still trying to convince thinking people that his state doesn't want to take the stim money. By the way, Jindal's argument is that he has to look out for the business owners and "taxpayers" of Louisiana, which is why he doesn't want unemployment insurance help from Uncle Sam. In other words: screw the broke. Jindal represents the "winners."
SC's Mark Sanford is trying to boost his GOP star power by saying he doesn't want the money either, (unless of course he DOES want the money...) to which I say, "make my day." (Paul Begala agrees. Any Republican governor or Senator who doesn't want the money should just leave it on the table (and good luck getting re-elected.) Arnold Schwarzenegger, who the Daily Beast reports nearly left the GOP over his insistence on pragmatism, said on "This Week" that the Obama administration can "give the money to Cali." And Charlie Crist, who did a great job on MTP and looked incredibly reasonable, hammered home the fact that he's in office as a public servant, not a party servant, and he answers to the people of Florida, not the GOP. If the Republican Party had any brains left (which it apparently doesn't,) it would be more Arnold and Charlie, and less Bobby, Mark, and crazy Shelby.
I won't hold my breath.
[Sunday shows guv recap here.) BTW, Sanford has offered a stimulus plan of his own: he will pray for the unemployed.
The rest of the story: Sheriff Scott used work email to threaten a teacher
Speaking of Mike Scott, last month, the Lee County Sheriff may have also used his sheriff's department email to make veiled threats:
Sheriff Mike Scott was criticized near and far for mentioning Barack Obama's middle name, Hussein, during an Oct. 6 Republican rally at Germain Arena.
hree days later, while guest lecturing at Florida Gulf Coast University, outspoken Unitarian minister Wayne Robinson chastised Scott for inciting bigotry and hatred.
Among the 35 students in Donna Roberts' Environmental Humanities class was sophomore Lindsay Scott - the sheriff's daughter.
"I was absolutely stunned," said Robinson, who didn't learn until after the class ended that Lindsay Scott was present. "I would have never said that if I knew she was there. It's an unfair platform to speak about someone's father."
A visibly shaken Lindsay Scott, 20, left the room in tears.
Robinson and Roberts, adjunct instructors at FGCU, e-mailed letters of apology within 24 hours.
Sheriff Scott said he doesn't have a problem with Robinson, who simply was exercising his First Amendment right to free speech.
But, Scott objects to an e-mail Roberts sent Robinson just seven minutes after apologizing to his daughter on Oct. 9:
• Donna Roberts to Lindsay Scott (8:09 p.m.): "I want to express how terrible I feel about what happened today in our class. You must have felt awful. I am so very sorry."
• Donna Roberts to Wayne Robinson (8:16 p.m.): "I was glad you said what you did. ... Guess we can't hide who we are ... nor should we."
So how did Scott get the second note? Because Robinson accidentally included the text in the email thread to Scott's daughter. Oops! So what's a right wing, rather scary looking sheriff to do? Threaten the teacher, of course!
He reported the incident to FGCU administration, albeit after having to contact "15 different people in 15 different departments" to file a complaint, he said.
"Nobody is going to lie to me or my kids," Scott said.
... Robinson has taught part time at FGCU since 2006, also serving as a guest speaker in some courses. The topic in Roberts' class was the impact of religious views on the world, and Robinson was discussing feelings of men and women from the opening chapters of Genesis. He then moved to religious perceptions, and because Scott's controversial speech was still in the news, Robinson issued his opinion.
"I said that incites racism and bigotry," Robinson said. "It was a very obvious attempt to relate Barack Obama to Saddam Hussein, and also the 9/11 attacks. All of those involved were Muslim, so he was connecting Barack Obama to that."
Robinson and Scott have spoken and e-mailed each other, and all is good. Robinson said he voted for Scott in the general election.
But Roberts later sent a message to her supervisor saying it was "extremely awkward and unethical" that Scott contacted her, used his work e-mail account to do so and closed by saying "you and your superiors at FGCU have not heard the last from me." Roberts took that as a threat.
"To be honest, I have been feeling vulnerable since seeing his name appear in my FGCU inbox last Sunday," Roberts wrote Oct. 17 to Glenn Whitehouse, chairman of the department of communication and philosophy. "I had a friend escort me to class yesterday."
Scott signed all of his e-mails "Mike Scott," not "Sheriff Mike Scott."
Should Obama use his middle name during the swearing in? Yes he should
Five reasons Barack Obama should go right ahead and do his swearing in using his middle name:
1. It will drive right wing talk radio nuts. And who doesn't love that?
2. It will drive the right wing blogosphere nuts. And again, what's not to love?
3. It will drive racist, right wing nut-jobs like Lee County Sheriff Mike Scott nuts. Hello??? How much would I love to see this guy go down on the misuse of his office, and then for Obama to use the name HIMSELF at his swearing in? A whoooole lot.
4. It will strike a blow against the stupidity of considering an Arabized name to be some sort of curse, as if just having Eastern lineage is criminal. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Barack Obama's name. And it's time Americans got over their absurd, paranoid fear of all things "foreign."
5. It will be a fitting invitation for Obama into the interconnected world. Face it. There are millions of people with the name Hussein. And some of them -- a very small number -- have equally paranoid fears of America. What better way to announce to the Muslim world that the war against them is over, than for Barack Hussein Obama to take his oath of office on the Bible, using his full, given name?
Well, the bird has met its demise (even without Sarah Palin looking on,) the tryptophan has kicked in (I overslept and had to do my radio show by phone this morning, but Roland Martin was great! And those two glasses of wine didn't help!) ... and I'm going to make it through Black Friday without having to tramp through a mall (I refuse. Sorry, kids.) So now, since I've been skipping out on my blogging duties of late, here are ten things I think we can all be thankful for:
#1. Sarah Palin. She brought so much joy and laughter during the campaign, with her kooky vocab and inability to articulate her thoughts in anything resembling adult English. And she put the nail in John McCain's campaign coffin (sorry if that sounds like an age joke,) ensuring, even if he really couldn't have done so anyway,) that he wouldn't win. Thus, Sarah helped spare the country from four more years of Bush-like policies, along with the spectacle of herself playing a Bizarro World, Hilbilly Princess Di to McCain's doddering Charles. You betcha!
#2. John McCain. When he wandered in front of that camera during the town hall style debate, he made my year. Serioiusly. And by so debasing himself during the campaign, McCain has all but ensured that his rehabilitation will involve helping Barack Obama get much of his domestic agenda through the Senate. Thanks, Grandpa! (And thank Joe the Plumber for us when you see him next. Oh, that's right, you're not gonna see him again, because he's irrelevant.)
#3. Steve Schmidt. What a maroon. See #s 1 and 2 above.
#4. Right wing talk radio. Those of us who already thought you were irrelevant blowhards just weren't getting through until you called the Senator from Illinois a terrorist, Marxist Socialist and America elected him anyway. Thanks guys! By the way, Glenn, are you serious about seceding? If so, let me know what the rest of us can do to help you along.
#5. American voters. Well, 52 percent of them, anyway.
$6. Barack Obama. Yes we did.
#7. Tina Fey. See #1 above.
#8. David Letterman. See #2 above.
#9. Fox News. See #4 above. And what will you do at those press conferences now?
and last, but not least...
#10. George W. Bush. No, seriously. Had he not been such a rotten president, we might not be here, on the brink of positive change. And he's been damned funny to listen to over the last eight years, even as he was screwing up the world.
Oh, wait! One more thing! I'm also thankful for this video. Enjoy!
You really do need to see this. Lloyd Marcus -- the black guy in the cowboy hat in the "Thank You Sarah Palin" Internet ads? Witness his song and video stylings -- first, reworking the Florida state song, "The Old Folks at Home" without even using the phrase "old darkeys!"
And here's Lloyd singing about 9/11, as some Youtuber sets his "music" to the most tasteless video I think I've ever seen...
Here's Lloyd singing to the object of his affection: Sarah Palin. (Doesn't he know they call that "race mixing" in Palinworld???
And here's Lloyd singing a song that might be a bit more fitting for his ... um ... talent level and ideological makeup: "Desperado..."
Hey, are you thinking what I'm thinking??? Joe the Plumber - Lloyd the county fair/street corner/political rally singer DUET!!!
What happens when someone who thinks Sean Hannity delivers the news meets the most accurate poll cruncher in politics (or baseball?) Calamity, that's what.
It all started when a rather surly winger named John Ziegler commissioned a poll for his "documentary," which is aimed at proving that Obama voters were too uninformed to know that their candidate is a fake Muslim, un-Christian terrorist, just like Fox News said he was. Ziegler got poor John Zogby (perhaps he played the "Z" card) to conduct what amounted to a push poll, prompting Zogby to post the following disclaimer on his website:
"We stand by the results our survey work on behalf of John Ziegler, as we stand by all of our work. We reject the notion that this was a push poll because it very simply wasn't. It was a legitimate effort to test the knowledge of voters who cast ballots for Barack Obama in the Nov. 4 election. Push polls are a malicious effort to sway public opinion one way or the other, while message and knowledge testing is quite another effort of public opinion research that is legitimate inquiry and has value in the public square. In this case, the respondents were given a full range of responses and were not pressured or influenced to respond in one way or another. This poll was not designed to hurt anyone, which is obvious as it was conducted after the election. The client is free to draw his own conclusions about the research, as are bloggers and other members of society. But Zogby International is a neutral party in this matter. We were hired to test public opinion on a particular subject and with no ax to grind, that's exactly what we did. We don't have to agree or disagree with the questions, we simply ask them and provide the client with a fair and accurate set of data reflecting public opinion." - John Zogby
Ziegler then released a popular Youtube video, in which he sets up various Obama voters, most of them black, to look foolish because they could only remember bad things about Sarah Palin, but not ancient bad things about Joe Biden or untrue bad things about Obama:
Enter Nate Silver, the poll number cruncher extraordinaire. He called Zogby & Ziegler out on the push poll:
Most of the questions on the survey take the form of a multiple choice political knowledge test, stating a "fact" to the respondent and asking them which of the four major candidates (Obama, McCain, Biden, Palin) the statement applies to. Questions include the following:
"Which of the four [candidates] said his policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket?"
"Which of the four [candidates] started his political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground?"
"Which of the four [candidates] quit a previous campaign because of plagiarism?"
"Which of the four [candidates] won his first election by getting opponents kicked off the ballot?"
As should be obvious, the veracity of several of these claims is -- at best -- debatable, yet they are apparently represented as factual to the respondent. It is not clear whether the respondent is informed of the "correct" response after having had the question posed to him.
There was also a question: "which of the four candidates said "I can see Russia from my House?" The correct answer? Tina Fey. Seriously.
Which brought the former talk radio host out in Ziegler, who got so mad, he called Silver up, for an on the record interview. It didn't go well:
NS: Do you stand by all the statements in the survey as being unambiguously true? JZ: I stand one hundred percent by the notion that there is absolutely zero ambiguity as to what the right answer is to any of the questions. With the one exception of the Palin-Russia-Alaska question which we asked the way we did for a very specific purpose which was to try and gauge the Tina Fey Effect which I think we did in a very effective manner which was what was actually said by Tina Fey, everyone attributed to Sarah Plain. But for purposes of scoring Obama supporters’ answers we counted Palin as a correct response.
NS: What was the right answer to that [Palin] question? JZ: The technically accurate question [sic] is that none of the four people said that, but we counted it as correct if they said Sarah Palin.
NS: Why would you commission a survey question with no correct response? JZ: The purpose of the question, you pinhead, was we wanted to determine the Tina Fey Effect.
NS: Were the interviews conducted by telephone or online? JZ: How can you ask a question like that and pretend that you have any clue what you're writing about! That's unbelievable that someone could write what you did! That is unbelievable that you wouldn't know that it's a telephone or an online poll and that you went on my summaries of the questions before the questions were even released!
NS: We’ve heard reports from our readers that very similar questions had been asked in an online format. There was no online component at all? JZ: That is correct, which you would have known if you had looked at the information. Before you called this a push poll -- you don't seem to know the definition of a push poll. How do you have this website?
NS: Is the complete interview available anywhere -- complete results for the interview? JZ: Yeah if you had done your research it is all online, every question, all the cross-tabs. Man, you're never going to post this [transcript], are you? ...
Um ... yes ... he was going to post that transcript. (Ahem).
So let's review: John Ziegler doesn't do well on the telephone, and he thinks that the mainstream media would do better to follow the lead of talk radio hosts when presenting news and information in advance of an election. By the way, if you keep reading the transcript, Ziegler also reveals that he's pretty confident Obama is a Muslim, and not at all confident that the president elect accepts Jesus Christ as his personal savior.
For "Joe the Plumber," it's Social Security: no. Welfare: hell yes!
He doesn't want no damned Social Security. Nope, Samuel Joseph "Not Actually a Plumber" Wurzelbacher will take his government dole before he's all old and wrinkly and retired, thank you very much. Via Crooks and Liars and the suddenly interesting Alan Colmes:
Colmes: Do you really doubt that Barack Obama's loyalty to the United States?
Plumber: Ah...to a Democracy "yes," I mean, right back to the, as far as the Socialism issues, spreading the wealth around. I mean, Alan that is right out of Karl Marx.....Webster dictionary...government health care...
Colmes: You don't think he's loyal to our country?
Plumber Joe: To democracy? He's proposing a lot of changes that could change the core of America, don't you think?
Plumber Joe: Was it patriotic for Joe Biden to say "take my money and give it to other people? That's patriotism?
Colmes: Well, let me ask, you were on welfare once, was that taking somebodies else's money and giving it to you?
Plumber Joe: Paid into welfare. It something to be used, not to be abused like it often is.
Here's the video:
And there's more: Now, it seems, our favorite welfare recipient/non-plumber/country music legend in the making is forming his own "watchdog group," to hold President Obama accountable. That'll do, Joe. That'll do. (Oh, and "Joe's" cool new website for his exciting new venture will also promote his new book! ... which should be a nice stocking stuffer for Dittoheads everywhere (but psst! Get a ghost writer, Joe! Your command of the English language leaves something to be desired...)
The McCain campaign is in a huff over a statement from one of the three "wise men" John McCain claimed in that Rick Warren confab that he would consult in the White House if he were to become president: Georgia Congressman, and civil rights icon, John Lewis, who on Saturday ripped into the McCain-Palin ticket, accusing the campaign of "sowing the seeds of hatred and division." Referring to 1960s-era Alabama Gov. George Wallace, Lewis said in a statement on Saturday:
"As one who was a victim of violence and hate during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, I am deeply disturbed by the negative tone of the McCain-Palin campaign. What I am seeing today reminds me too much of another destructive period in American history. Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.
"During another period, in the not too distant past, there was a governor of the state of Alabama named George Wallace who also became a presidential candidate. George Wallace never threw a bomb. He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who only desired to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed one Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama.
"As public figures with the power to influence and persuade, Sen. McCain and Governor Palin are playing with fire, and if they are not careful, that fire will consume us all. They are playing a very dangerous game that disregards the value of the political process and cheapens our entire democracy. We can do better. The American people deserve better."
"Congressman John Lewis' comments represent a character attack against Governor Sarah Palin and me that is shocking and beyond the pale. The notion that legitimate criticism of Senator Obama's record and positions could be compared to Governor George Wallace, his segregationist policies and the violence he provoked is unacceptable and has no place in this campaign. I am saddened that John Lewis, a man I've always admired, would make such a brazen and baseless attack on my character and the character of the thousands of hardworking Americans who come to our events to cheer for the kind of reform that will put America on the right track.
"I call on Senator Obama to immediately and personally repudiate these outrageous and divisive comments that are so clearly designed to shut down debate 24 days before the election. Our country must return to the important debate about the path forward for America."
Clarifying his remarks later Saturday, Lewis said his statement "was a reminder to all Americans that toxic language can lead to destructive behavior."
"I am glad that Sen. McCain has taken some steps to correct divisive speech at his rallies. I believe we need to return to civil discourse in this election about the pressing economic issues that are affecting our nation."
Obama's campaign said Obama "does not believe that John McCain or any policy criticism is any way comparable to George Wallace or his segregationist policies" but said Lewis was "right to condemn some of the hateful rhetoric."
So here's the thing. The McCain campaign is brimming with fake outrage over Lewis' remarks, but then the same day, what we can now call "the trouble" happens again...
The Iowa Independent reports that a minister who spoke at John McCain’s rally in Davenport, IA today injected a divisive statement into his invocation. Here’s what Pastor Arnold Conrad said:
I would also add, Lord, that your reputation is involved in all that happens between now and November, because there are millions of people around this world praying to their god — whether it’s Hindu, Buddha, Allah — that his opponent wins, for a variety of reasons. And Lord, I pray that you will guard your own reputation, because they’re going to think that their god is bigger than you, if that happens. So I pray that you will step forward and honor your own name with all that happens between now and election day.
"While we understand the important role that faith plays in informing the votes of Iowans, questions about the religious background of the candidates only serve to distract from the real questions in this race about Barack Obama's judgment, policies and readiness to lead as commander in chief." - Wendy Riemann, Midwest Regional Communications Director
Righto...
And McCain has another problem. What Rep. Lewis said isn't even the first time someone has raised the possibility that McCain and especially Sarah Palin, are systematically bringing the nut-jobsout of the woodwork. Chris Matthews has said it, as have David Gergen, Joe Klein, Bob Shrum and any number of commentators and analysts, some of whom I've chronicled here. Just this weekend, right wing talker Mike McConnell compared the McCain-Palin rallies to excursions into "Hooterville," and suggested that the only people still attending, and still interested in Bill Ayers, are people named "Jebediah and Jethro." And McCain has apparently realized himself that he's got to begin walking the crazies back from the grassy knoll. And McCain's troubles with his angry mob of followers are now an international story. No backing away from it now.
Here at home, just today, we have Frank Rich opening his column like this:
IF you think way back to the start of this marathon campaign, back when it seemed preposterous that any black man could be a serious presidential contender, then you remember the biggest fear about Barack Obama: a crazy person might take a shot at him. ...
Is what John Lewis said any more jarring than that? I think not.
An update on that church shooter in Knoxville, Tennessee. ThinkP has a peek at his reading list:
Jim Adkisson, the man who shot two people to death in a Tennessee Unitarian church this week because he was angry at “liberals and gays,” had an array of right-wing books at his home. Inside his house, “officers found ‘Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder’ by radio talk show host Michael Savage, ‘Let Freedom Ring’ by talk show host Sean Hannity, and ‘The O’Reilly Factor,’ by television talk show host Bill O’Reilly.”
What, no Coulter??? Ann, you're clearly losing your touch!
pscyhotic radio host Michael Savage sounded defensive and almost whiney last week when I tuned in for a few minutes to hear if he would comment on the backlash from his "autistic kids are brats who need to be told to stop acting like morons" rant. He's got reason to whine:
A group of seven Mississippi talk radio stations owned by Telesouth Communications has dropped Michael Savage’s nationally syndicated radio program over comments the host made last week suggesting that nearly every child with autism was “a brat” of inattentive parents. “Michael Savage’s comments about autistic children were beyond inexcusable and are unacceptable,” the station group said in a statement posted Tuesday on its Web site, supertalkms.com. The cancellation follows the decision on Monday by Aflac, the insurance company, to pull its advertising from the show. On his Web site, Michaelsavage.com, the host posted a letter on Monday in which he iterated the central point he said he had been trying to make on his July 16 program: that autism is too often misdiagnosed in the cases of children, or falsely diagnosed, at least partly as a means of wringing resources. “Let the truly autistic be treated,” he wrote. “Let the falsely diagnosed be free.” On July 16, Mr. Savage, above, referred to autism as “a fraud, a racket,” and asserted that what “99 percent” of children with autism most needed was a parent willing to tell them things like, “Don’t act like a moron.”
The radio wack job has also lost affiliates in Virginia and Cleveland, and the duckie isn't the only advertiser that's heading for the hills:
Six more major companies have yanked ads from Michael Savage's talk-radio show after he branded autistic children "brats."
Home Depot, Sears and Budweiser all withdrew their support from the fiery hatemonger's program, along with Direct Buy, Cisco and Radio Shack, according to Autism United.
Even Annheuser Busch, which has given so much to Weiner's friend John McCain via the missus, is saying "Savage who?"
UPATE: According to Allaccess.com, here's how it went down in Cleveland:
SALEM Talk WHK-A/CLEVELAND is dropping TALK RADIO NETWORK's MICHAEL SAVAGE in the wake of the controversy over SAVAGE's comments about autism, according to the CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER. The paper's JULIE E. WASHINGTON reports that the station has a contract to carry SAVAGE through 2010 but that station manager MARK JAYCOX told her "This guy's a knucklehead, and I want to get rid of him."
And Autism United isn't sitting back waiting for other sponsors to walk:
"We are going after each and every advertiser that hasn't dropped him yet," said Evelyn Ain, president of Autism United, who joined angry parents in a protest on Wall Street Friday.
"We are doing this in all states and really hoping that more people will immediately drop out supporting him. We are going after every angle."
Get him, guys. If anyone deserves to lose his radio gig and wind up sleeping in his car, it's Savage. It's one thing to go after politicians, but autistic kids? Come on. I know conservatives hate the defenseless, but wingers also believe in free market consequences, so let's let Savage get to know the market first hand. And for anyone on the right who might be tempted to defend Savage, this is what he said:
“I’ll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it’s a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out. They don’t have a father around to tell them, ‘Don’t act like a moron. You’ll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Act like a man.”
Certifiable filmmaking nut-job David Bossie in an undated photo.
From the man who brought you Willie Horton and "The Clinton Chronicles", and the director of the critically acclaimed cinematic tours de force "Fahrenhype 9/11", comes the film that will take down the Obama phenomenon: Hype: The Obama Effict. Here's how the website describes the film:
Citizens United Productions examines the phenomenon that is Barack Obama. HYPE: The Obama Effect examines the Junior Senator from Illinois and his record. Is he the new Kennedy or recycled Jimmy Carter? Is he the one who will finally change Washington, or will challenges like the Tony Rezko trial reveal politics as usual? Is he the uniter the country begs for, or a liberal divider? HYPE: The Obama Effect seeks the answers.
Including interviews with political leaders, media experts, and social commentators, HYPE provides the in-depth analysis that can only occur in a full-length feature documentary. HYPE goes to Illinois and interviews those who know the Senator's record as a state legislator. Go on the road with the campaign and experience the enthralled crowds as they are consumed by the HYPE. Washington insiders analyze Senator Obama's Senate record, his views on abortion, his statements on the second amendment, his plan for a troubled economy, and his foreign policy-will the US be safer or will the US become a bigger target? Will Senator Obama's actions match his eloquence in the toughest job in the world, or will his rapt and motivated crowds be left with little substance at the end of the day? HYPE: The Obama Effect lays out the truth.
"Hype" is the latest video hit job by a very disturbed guy named David Bossie, who heads the aforementioned Citizens United, and whose past credentials include creating those fake Bill Clinton-Gennifer Flowers audiotapes and getting fired as chief investigator for fellow nut-job Dan Burton's House Government Reform & Oversight Committee back in the 1990s. More about Dave:
Bossie started his political career (almost) innocently enough in 1988 when he served as the National Youth Director of Senator Bob Dole's unsuccessful presidential campaign.
In 1992, Bossie was working for the right-wing organization Citizens United (the group that "invented" Willie Horton). As executive director of Citizens United chairman Floyd Brown's "Presidential Victory Committee," he used taped conversations allegedly between then-Governor Bill Clinton and Gennifer Flowers as part of an advertising and "800" number scheme to smear Clinton. The tapes have since been discredited because they were edited and doctored. A direct mailing from Citizens United using this material was made to look as if it were an "official" mailing from Bush campaign -- and the Bush people alerted the FEC to the mailings in an effort to stop them!
Bossie spent a great deal of time in 1992 in Arkansas, digging dirt on Clinton. David Corn reports in the May 6, 1998 issue of Salon that "at one point, Bossie got into a fistfight in Arkansas with a private detective who claimed Bossie had welshed on a $10,000 payment for anti-Clinton material."
That same year, Bossie harassed the family of a suicide victim. "An anonymous and untraceable letter" was faxed to some 30 news organizations "claiming Clinton had had an affair with a former law student who committed suicide 15 years ago," an "emotionally distraught young woman, seven-months pregnant" named Susan Coleman. Only after the fact of the fax campaign did Bossie attempt to contact the family for "confirmation," and did so in a repetitive and unrelenting manner suggestive more of harrassment than fact-checking. Bossie, with help from former Washington DC police officer James Murphy, went so far as to follow Susan's mother to a hospital in Augusta, Georgia, where her husband was seriously ill and recovering from a stroke. They "burst into the sick man's room and began questioning the shaken mother about her daughter's suicide." (Source: CBS News, July 13, 1992, quoted at The Allodium web site)
Not long into the Clinton Presidency, Citizens United produced the video "Clinton Chronicles," based largely on dirt Bossie had been digging in Arkansas. The video, filled with a plethora of factual errors and uncorroborated or disproven rumors, has been almost completely discredited.
By 1994, Bossie found himself working for Senator Lauch Faircloth -- and his penchant for self-promotion was already showing. Bossie claimed that Citizens United had fed Whitewater information (much of which turned out to be misleading, incomplete or untrue) to "the top fifty major publications, networks, and editorial boards... We've provided the same material on the Hill both on the House and Senate side."
So what about his erstwhile co-producer and director, Alan Peterson? He's a sometime actor/director/producer (and by "sometime," I mean he's done each of those things once.) IMDB Pro lists just three credits for him: an acting turn in the 2007 mega-hit "The Haunting of Marsten Manor," the 2004 answer to the hugely successful Michael Moore flick, "Fahrenheit 9/11," entitled ... wait for it, "Fahrenhype 9/11" which he directed, and his lone producing gig (and while Moore may have grossed about $150 million or so domestically and more than $220 million worldwide, Peterson's "Fahrenhype" was released straight to DVD...!) and 1999's memorable "Fortune Cookie," if you remember movies you've neither heard of nor seen.
One other interesting aside to Peterson's film, from a 2004 Mormon movie site (yep, they have them...)
REVIEW OF LDS-MADE DOCUMENTARY FAHRENHYPE 9/11 - NOW ON SALE NATIONALLY (DEBUNKS MOORE) - This documentary is on the shelves at my local Dallas Blockbuster. I'm assuming it is widely available.
LDSFilm.com mailing list subscriber offers the following comments and enthusiastic review of the new documentary "FAHRENHYPE 9/11":
With all the front page newspaper coverage of Michael Moore's controversial visit to a Utah campus I'm am pleased to tell you of something special that I came upon by accident that SHOULD BE FRONT PAGE NEWS -- a brand new DVD timed to be released the same day as Moore's sick FAHRENHEIT 9/11 -- a documentary (which is really a documentary) by filmmaker Alan Peterson with the title, FAHRENHYPE 9/11.
This is a Documentary that is intended to counter act the distorted images of Moore's outrageous work. The DVD says: "You knew it was a lie . . . Now you'll know why . . . Unraveling the truth about FAHRENHEIT 9/11 and Michael Moore" And that is exactly what it does. And it does so by letting many of the people who were misused in Moore's film speak for themselves. These people tell how they really feel and speak of how shocked and disgusted they were to see how they or their loved ones were used in the context of Moore's revisionist approach to truths.
Years ago, while serving in the US Army in Germany, a fellow worker, knowing I was a member of the LDS Church, handed me a paper back he had just finished reading by Irving Wallace, The Twenty-Seventh Wife, supposedly telling the true story of Ann Eliza's forced marriage to Brigham Young. As I read it I knew it was full of lies, but Wallace had carefully listed footnotes of his historical sources on each page. When I returned home to Salt Lake after my service I came upon Hugh Nibley's newly published work, Sounding Brass. Bro. Nibley took Wallace's work apart point by point, discussing every resource that he sighted. It was a joy to have someone so knowledgeable counter-act the out and out lies that were being offered as historical truths.
And so it is with FAHRENHYPE 9/11 -- it destroys Michael Moore's distortions and out-and-out lies one by one. When you get through seeing and hearing what Dick Morris (political consultant to Pres. Bill Clinton); Zell Miller (Democratic Senator who recently made the news by speaking out for Pres. Bush at the GOP convention); Ed Kock (former mayor of New York and life long Democrat); Ann Coulter (author of Treason and Slander); Peter King (New York Congressman and member of homeland security); Steven Emerson (terrorist investigator and author of American Jihad); plus people who appeared in Moore's film, such as the school teacher who was present when Pres. Bush received the news of the Twin Towers, the Oregon State Trooper who in Moore's film appeared to be blaming Pres. Bush for budget cuts, and most moving of all, the young soldier who lost his arms in Iraq and expresses his hurt at Moore's false use of him in his film -- if after hearing all of these (and many more) you still feel Moore's film is a courageous and noble thing -- then I have a bridge in New York that I will sell you cheap!
... um... I think they meant Ed Koch... PAGING MITT ROMNEY !!! and Dr. Freud...! As for other Bossie friends, try Newt Gingrich, the man who once fired him in embarrassment.
Most people with good sense know that Michael Wiener (Savage) is a dumbass. His latest tirade probably won't cost him, any more than his previous ones. Still, Media Matters is giving it a go. They report, you decide if anything can actually be done about it.
On July 16, the No. 3 syndicated radio talk show host in the country, Michael Savage, made the following statement on autism:
"Now, you want me to tell you my opinion on autism? ... A fraud, a racket."
Savage went on to say:
Now, the illness du jour is autism. You know what autism is? I'll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it's a brat who hasn't been told to cut the act out. That's what autism is.
What do you mean they scream and they're silent? They don't have a father around to tell them, "Don't act like a moron. You'll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don't sit there crying and screaming, idiot."
Autism -- everybody has an illness. If I behaved like a fool, my father called me a fool. And he said to me, "Don't behave like a fool." The worst thing he said -- "Don't behave like a fool. Don't be anybody's dummy. Don't sound like an idiot. Don't act like a girl. Don't cry." That's what I was raised with. That's what you should raise your children with. Stop with the sensitivity training. You're turning your son into a girl, and you're turning your nation into a nation of losers and beaten men. That's why we have the politicians we have.
During the same broadcast, Savage also attacked those in "the minority community" who suffer from asthma. He stated: "[W]hy was there an asthma epidemic amongst minority children? Because I'll tell you why: The children got extra welfare if they were disabled, and they got extra help in school. It was a money racket. Everyone went in and was told [fake cough], 'When the nurse looks at you, you go [fake cough], "I don't know, the dust got me." ' See, everyone had asthma from the minority community."
I find it amazing that anyone can listen to this guy. He literally screams into the microphone, and I suppose he appeals to the angriest of the Angry White Men. It's more than likely that his hyperbolic rants are part of an act, the way Rush Limbaugh's seems to be. But while I can listen to Limbaugh and laugh at him, including his glaring factual errors and stupid voice timber, Savage is literally unlistenable. Literally. Anyhoo, if you want to give complaining to your local station a go, here's the link.
Oh, and did I mention that his son's middle name is Goldencloud?
By the way, I wonder what John McCain thinks about the Wiener's commentary? (Hat tip to Political Byline, which discovered this little gem in April.)
I mean in today's political climate, you ARE judged by the company you keep...
Media Matters has made much of a WorldNetDaily poll that shows that 6 in 10 WorldNetDaily.com readers believe that the New Yorker magazine cover cartoon depicting the Obama's as terrorist wannabes "isn't too far from the dangerous truth about the Obamas." (Another 12 percent said the poll is "funny, because there's some truth in it." The poll results so far, with just over 3100 votes:
The image isn't too far from the dangerous truth about the Obama family
59% (1866)
Funny, because there's some truth in it
12% (391)
Hilarious, it's perfect satire
7% (218)
It will do what it's designed to do: sell magazines
7% (215)
The image will only add to the massive publicity Obama receives while McCain remains in the shadows
6% (195)
Tasteless and offensive
3% (97)
This is character assassination, literally and figuratively
1% (42)
Other
1% (34)
It's obvious the New Yorker wants Obama to win
1% (26)
Everyone should boycott the New Yorker over this huge insult
1% (25)
There's no such thing as bad publicity
1% (22)
This is probably a joke and is not intended to hit newsstands
0% (12)
It's obvious the New Yorker wants McCain to win
0% (5)
That certainly confirms the fears in some media quarters that the New Yorker cover will be read as satire, only by the intelligent. And then there's that one in ten Americans who still say they believe Barack Obama is a Muslim. My guess is that they say that, or really think they believe it, because "Muslim" is their consciences' way of saying "nigger" without having to use the word out loud. Just my theory. I'd guess there's not much you can do with anyone who actually reads WorldNetDaily, and thankfully, there are more normal people, who have accepted the country's entrance into the 21st century, than there are Harriet Christian throwbacks in America.
Still, I do believe that the 8-10 percent gap between the generic Democrat performance against a generic Republican and Obama's single-digit poll lead is mostly attributable to white respondents who can't bring themselves to support a black candidate, but who aren't necessarily going to admit as much to a pollster. Obama has to hope that those voters don't become the deciders in older demographic, blue collar states like Pennsylvania, Florida and Michigan.
Meanwhile, the cartoonist defends himself. My article about the flap, which includes interviews with Industry Ears media watchdog Paul Porter and political science guru Dr. Ronald Walters, hits newsstands on Thursday.
The hysterical over-reaction by Camp McCain and their hacks in the blogosphere to Wes Clark's statement about military service not being a qualification to be president (duh...) continues. This time, Orson Swindle, a Vietnam vet who was a McCain cell-mate in the infamous Hanoi Hilton, and a former FTC chair, launches a REAL attack on the military service of a fellow veteran: Wes Clark. During the second McCain conference call on this non-story in two days, Swindle said the following (courtesy of TPM Muckraker.)
"General Clark probably wouldn't get that much praise from this group. I can't speak for them, but we all know that General Clark, as high-ranking as he is, his record in his last command I think was somewhat less than stellar."
Huh? While no thinking person believes that Wes Clark, who has repeatedly praised McCain's Vietnam service, was demeaning that service, or McCain himself, Swindle's comments were a direct shot at Clark, the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO. What about "his record in his last command" is Swindle referring to? And isn't THIS, the textbook definition of "Swiftboating"??? Perhaps we should ask McCain surrogate and official SwiftBoat Veterans smear merchant Bud Day.
TPM has audio of the call, as well as the following response to the attack on Clark from the McCain campaign:
It certainly was not an attack on his service - no one would ever disparage that. Everyone honors Gen. Clark's service and sacrifice -- he's literally bled for our country. It was about policy disputes.
Except that it WAS an attack on Clark's service, again, completely unlike the comments Clark made about McCain. And by the way, the same McCain aide that sent TPMM the statement, sent this link to a 2004 National Review story disparaging Clark's service as the head of NATO. Go figure. ... But don't look to the righties to notice the irony. They are completely incapable of irony, or shame. (By the way, according to the Hot Air Blog, on that same conference call, Miss Lindsey Graham said that “Nobody expects John to be elected because he was a POW." Is Graham now going to be attacked on the right for essentially saying what Clark said?)
Clark has continued to defend himself, and well he should. Wes Clark gave 34 years of heroic service to the United States Army and to this country. He came back wounded from Vietnam and stayed in the service, making it his career, at great sacrifice to himself financially, and to his wife and son. Simply stating the obvious: that being shot down during wartime is not an automatic qualification to be president, is nothing like taking the shot at a man's actual service that Swindle did.
BTW, let's see if the media goes as ape-crap over the Swindle remarks as they have over Clark.
I really think we're witnessing the fiery, sputtering end of the conservative movement. They've gone from Bush-worshiping idolaters to utterly insane. These people are so off the rails, they've even accused Jim Webb of "coordinating" a conspiratorial attack on McCain. Absolutely, breathtakingly, unbelievably insane.
"If John McCain believed that serving your country in uniform in wartime made you a better president, he would have endorsed John Kerry against George W. Bush."
If you want to get a glimpse of the sheer psychosis of the right wing mind, click here to read the ravings of a particularly alarmist winger who predicts that if Barack Obama becomes president, literally, all hell will break loose. Note that he includes "high gas prices" as one of the calamities. Clearly, this guy is a bicycler... What's really scary, is that he is not at all unusual.
Excuse my French, but these people are NUTS!
To be fair, many on the right are simply frustrated that Obama simply will not fade away. Few actually like John McCain, but their only hope of shoe horning him into the White House is for the mainstream media to take Obama down ... hard. That's not happening as yet, so they're down to attacking his new political director (Patrick Gaspard, with whom I worked back in my ACT days, and who, contrary to RedState, really isn't all that scary, and who as field director ... and I'll go slowlhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gify for the wingers, didn't direct or implement financial policy for ACT ...), sputtering on about "victory in Iraq," whining that the media are turning Obama into an icon, and writhing in agony as once again, the popular culture trends against them. This video has got to be particularly galling:
Ironically, neither the press nor the Obama campaign find their relationship quite so cozy. In fact, quite the opposite. And yet, the myth persists with righties, who apparently haven't noticed their candidate's eight-year media free ride.
By the way, not ONE pro-McCain article today on RedState. Very sad, but proof that the GOP will make the election all about Barack, with John McCain merely along for the ride.
Fox News "analyst" Liz Trotta has it in for Barack Obama ... or at least, she did:
During an interview on Fox News between anchor Eric Shawn and contributor Liz Trotta about the "assassination" comment by Sen. Hillary Clinton, Trotta mistakenly refers to Obama as Osama. "The vast right wing conspiracy blame has been undermined by her evasions, by her outright lies if I may say, by her pandering, by her race baiting, and now we have what some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Osama," she said.
Shawn corrected Trotta just as she herself realized she said the wrong name, and they simultaneously said, "Obama." Then, Trotta appears to attempt to make a joke about the gaffe. "Well, both if we could," she says, and laughs while Shawn says, "Talk about how you really feel." He then changes the subject.
Well, now, Trotta has said sowwy, but only when asked (by Bill Hemmer), after a full segment of truly ironic Hillary explication.
John McCain makes it a two-fer, chucking both Pastors Hagee and Parsely -- his "spiritual adviser," no less -- over the side. So I guess now he's got to pick Huckabee, or risk having all the right wing nutters sit on their hands in November...
Well, he wasn't so bothered by the "God smote New Orleans because of the gays" comments (btw why are the media so surprised at this? It's not like offending gays is going to hurt a guy with Republican voters...) and he let ride the notion of the Catholic Church as "The Great Whore." But Pastor Hagee finally got served the divorce papers by John McCain with the latest nut-ball rant uncovered on the Internets. ABC blogs as follows:
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., this afternoon rejected the endorsement of Pastor John Hagee after a sermon was publicized in which Hagen suggested Adolph Hitler and the Holocaust were caused by God so as to bring about the creation of the state of Israel.
A source close to McCain told ABC News the Arizona senator thinks these sentiments are crazy, and that back in February when the campaign accepted Hagee's endorsement, no one on the campaign, and certainly not McCain, had any idea that Hagee believed these types of things.
“Obviously, I find these remarks and others deeply offensive and indefensible, and I repudiate them," McCain said in a statement. "I did not know of them before Reverend Hagee's endorsement, and I feel I must reject his endorsement as well."
Hagee had quoted the book of Jeremiah saying, "Behold I will bring them the Jewish people again unto their land that I gave unto their fathers. Behold I will send for many fishers and after will I send for many hunters. And they the hunters shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks."
Hagee suggested that Hitler as a hunter, and as a result of the Holocaust, Jews had been brought back to the land God gave unto their fathers.
Feel free to enjoy the Hagee nuttery by clicking here.
So .... um .... John McCain's prized endorser, Pastor John Hagee, thinks Adolph Hitler was a hunter, sent by God ... you know what? Why don't you just read it yourself:
John Hagee, the controversial evangelical leader and endorser of Sen. John McCain, argued in a late 1990s sermon that the Nazis had operated on God's behalf to chase the Jews from Europe and shepherd them to Palestine. According to the Reverend, Adolph Hitler was a "hunter," sent by God, who was tasked with expediting God's will of having the Jews re-establish a state of Israel.
Going in and out of biblical verse, Hagee preached: "'And they the hunters should hunt them,' that will be the Jews. 'From every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks.' If that doesn't describe what Hitler did in the holocaust you can't see that."
He goes on: "Theodore Hertzel is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew who at the turn of the 19th century said, this land is our land, God wants us to live there. So he went to the Jews of Europe and said 'I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel.' So few went that Hertzel went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the holocaust.
"Then god sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says -- Jeremiah writing -- 'They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,' meaning there's no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don't let your heart be offended. I didn't write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel."
Yeah. The HuffPo has the audio, too. Can't wait that long? Here you go.
So John, care to re-visit not repudiating the endorsement you worked so hard to get?
Left wing talk radio is buzzing about the Bill O'Reilly vintage rant from his "Inside Edition" days. Apparently a teleprompter really can bring you down... but on the Youtube, CBS Entertainment (probably with a little help from a new O'Reilly rant, followed by insane threats and stalking) has ordered the offending clip pulled down. Well, we found one enterprising webpreneur (Break the Matrix) who's still got it:
Watch, and enjoy, but also remember: this guy is free, unsupervised, and unmedicated...
Bill O'Reilly doesn't want to lead a "lynching party" against Michelle Obama ... unless...
Meanwhile, the Factor man's producer defends O'Reilly's commentary, and gets a sympathetic hearing from this guy at Conde Nast. Question: if David Shuster had to apologize and take a two-week suspension for using the words "pimped out" to describe a Senator's daughter, why, pray tell, is it a.o.k. for O'Reilly to go up the offensiveness Richter scale about 400 times with this remark about a Senator's wife? And while I was not a member of the "fire Imus" club, the overwrought reaction to his remarks, versus those of a fellow radio / cable TV personality, looks even more absurd now.
I guess the moral of the story is, right wingers can get away with saying justaboutanything.
DU is jumping with the news, so far unreported on the MSM, that Air America's Randi Rhodes was mugged and assaulted outside her Park Avenue apartment:
Randi Rhodes was mugged on Sunday night on 39th Street and Park Ave, nearby her Manhattan apartment, while she was walking her dog Simon.
According to Air America Radio late night host Jon Elliott, Rhodes was beaten up pretty badly, losing several teeth and will probably be off the air for at least the rest of the week. At of late Monday night we have not able to locate any press accounts of the attack and nothing has been posted on the AAR website.
snip
Elliott was extremely agitated when he reported on the incident. He opened his show by saying "it is with sadness that tonight I inform you that my Air America colleague Randi Rhodes was assaulted last night while walking her dog near her New York City home." Pointing out that Rhodes was wearing a jogging suit and displayed no purse or jewelry, Elliott speculated that "this does not appear to me to be a standard grab the money and run mugging."
"Is this an attempt by the right wing hate machine to silence one of our own," he asked. "Are we threatening them. Are they afraid that we're winning. Are they trying to silence intimidate us." Some of blog posters also expressed concerns that the attack on Rhodes was hate crime. Other posters warned that we need more facts before any judgements are made.
More on the attack -- which seems especially suspicious -- from Talking Radio:
Attacks on liberal talk radio stations and their hosts are not a new thing. About a month ago a gunman fired a shot through a window at the studios of KPFT, Houston’s, Pacifica station narrowly missing a DJ who was hosting music show at the time. There is currently a $10,000 reward offered to anyone who identifies the shooter.
This is not the first politically motivated attack on KPFT. More than 35 years ago, the Ku Klux Klan blew up the station's transmitters twice within the Houston station's first year on the air.
Also, according to a blogger on Democratic Underground, Thom Hartmann said on his Friday show that his auto repairman, after replacing his windshield, pointed out to him that he had three bullet holes in his car.
ThinkProgress has the lowdown on RedState.com's Campaign For a Sick Kid Free America, and the support the right's smear campaign against a LITTLE KID is garnering from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue:
Much of the far right’s smear campaign against 12-year old SCHIP recipient Graeme Frost was driven by the right-wing blogosphere. One blog in particular, Redstate, featured especially vitriolic comments. A poster there wrote of the Frost family:
If federal funds were required [they] could die for all I care. Let the parents get second jobs, let their state foot the bill or let them seek help from private charities. […]
I would hire a team of PIs and find out exactly how much their parents made and where they spent every nickel. Then I’d do everything possible to destroy their lives with that info.
Rather than distancing themselves from the smear campaign, the White House today decided to embrace RedState and reward the blog with an official White House posting. In a post entitled “Democrats’ SCHIP Budget Gimmick,” Nicholas Thompson, a staffer in the White House’s Office of Strategic Intiatives, rallied the conservative troops around Bush’s hard-line stance, reminding them that “we are less than one week” from Congress’ veto override vote.
All in all, the Graeme Frost case is a perfect illustration of the modern right-wing political machine at work, and in particular its routine reliance on character assassination in place of honest debate. […] Leading conservative politicians, far from trying to distance themselves from these smears, rush to embrace them.
So is RedState embarrassed by their nasty little poster? Signs point to "no."
By the way, our fair poster, Mbecker, also sought to elucidate "the real question":
do we have anybody holding elective office who's man enough to beat these people to death with this info or not? And can we please get an IRS audit of this family. I really want to know how they paid $40k in tuition, over $15k in mortgage payments, payments on their commercial property, bought food and clothes on a combined income of $45k!
Hang 'em. Publically. Let 'em twist in the wind and be eaten by ravens. Then maybe the bunch of socialist patsies will think twice.
Aren't conservatives wonderful?
The argument is often made that conservatism is the politics of the heartless, while liberalism is the politics of the unrealistic. RedState is proving the former point, mightily.
They want Americans to be in lock step behind George W. Bush so desperately, they're actually wishing for another 9/11-style attack on the United States. Unbefreakinglievable. These wackos need to get into a time machine and go back to the Soviet Union, from whence their sick, leader-worshipping, fear-obsessed ideology came.
I've heard a lot of B.S. from Michael Savage, perhaps the craziest loon on right wing radio. But this ... THIS takes the cake:
SAVAGE: If we don't wake up in this country, to summarize, the Muslim extremists who are marching in the streets of Europe will be marching in the streets of America. And they will massacre you as sure as I'm standing here, unless you understand what's at stake. They will massacre you unless you understand how they see the world, and what's at stake.
They will never assimilate in America. Never, in a million years, will they assimilate and permit their son Ahmed to marry another man. Never in a million years will they permit their daughters to become prostitutes like the vermin on Sunset Boulevard who puke on themselves and are held up as role models by the media.
Never in a million years will they subjugate themselves to permit a shrike like Barbara Boxer to use a fishwife mouth on them. Never in a million years. Don't you understand how they see the world? I do, which is why most of them listen to the show and love me.
Wha??? Hang on ... Michael Savage, the right wing stalwart who considers himself more American than you, or me, or damned near everyone else, also considers himself to be THE go-to guy for Muslim extremists who like talk radio??? So, can we consider him the Islamofascits' anchor man?
Yeah, you don't know that. The enemy himself probably listens to this show and says, "My God, if more of America was like this guy, I probably wouldn't even want to overthrow the country. I'd have nothing to overthrow. I'd be proud to be part of it. But the country that he rails against, the things going on in this country that this man rails against, are the very things that disgust me."
