Today's Hoot, er wait a sec

Polipundit:

If you want a really, really good laugh, then read this. At first, I thought it was satire.

Darn, it turned out to be only Dana Milbank reporting from Bizarro World, as usual. You know - that's the planet where John Kerry wore his magic hat on his Christmas Eve mission to Cambodia. But I have a question: Doesn't this cream puff count as a Democrat political contribution? Oh, I forgot. The Washington Post is part of the exempt media.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:05 PM -

 
Freak show news



I feel like Greg Gutfeld:

No one sent me the email about it being ALL-CINDY FRIDAY, and now I feel like a wallflower at an orgy. A BIG FAT HAIRY WALLFLOWER. It's like showing up at a costume party, and everyone but me came dressed as a blood-sucking ghoul!

But I will give it a shot...

Greg thinks it's all about the "Chief Brody slap", but I tend towards the "media whore" explanation:

Cindy Sheehan's son was killed in Iraq. She's a grieving mother. Last year, the President met with Mrs. Sheehan, comforted her, and grieved with her. At the time, Mrs. Sheehan thought the President had done well and appreciated him. Enter August, no major news, and a media still smarting over the President's re-election despite everything they threw at him. Cindy Sheehan returns entering stage right -- this time a left wing media whore in the form of a grieving mother.
...
I have no use for Mrs. Sheehan. While Casey's grandparents, aunts, uncles, and numerous cousins having issued a statement saying Sheehan "now appears to be promoting her own personal agenda and notoriety at the the expense of her son's good name and reputation," the media and the left allow and encourage Mrs. Sheehan to do what the others have been so inept at doing -- keeping an anti-war, anti-Bush story alive through the August news slumber. Concurrently, the media and the left ignore those parents of the fallen who are offended by Mrs. Sheehan, support the President, or otherwise recognize that Mrs. Sheehan's actions discredit and undermine the work so many fallen soldiers works hard for. Those people just do not make the story flow like the left wants.

The remarkably humorous bit of all of this is that while Mrs. Sheehan is using the body of a dead soldier to get her fifteen minutes of fame, Mrs. Sheehan is letting that body be used by Michael Moore, Code Pink, the DNC, and the media to extend their fifteen minutes of fame.

(Follow-up here.) And yes indeed, they're all coming out of the woodwork:

Cindy Sheehan has now been squatting in a roadside ditch near President Bush's Crawford, Texas ranch since August 6. And every day more aging hippies, professional grievance-mongers, and underemployed liberal arts majors show up with their backpacks and banjos to join her. Squatting in ditches, sleeping in pup tents, and sitting around a campfire at night yodeling "This Land Is Your Land" is after all the anti-war protesters idea of nirvana.

Not to worry - they apparently do have portapotties:

The bad guys hang at the Crawford Peace House, a dump of a house that looks like Hippie Central with dozens of cars, vans, SUVs and campers parked on the grass. Add portable toilets for ambience and you get the picture.

Regardless, they've been busy prepping ole Cindy for her star turn:

Ms. Sheehan's new friends in the peace mob have stuffed her with more soundbites than she can rattle off at any one single event...

although she sometimes slips and reflects their bizarre manias:

Am I emotional? Yes, my first born was murdered. Am I angry? Yes, he was killed for lies and for a PNAC Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel. My son joined the Army to protect America, not Israel.
...
Sheehan said she considered Lynne Stewart her Atticus Finch, the lawyer who defended an innocent Black man accused of rape in the book and film "To Kill A Mockingbird."
...
We have no Constitution. We're the only country with no checks and balances. We want our country back if we have to impeach George Bush down to the person who picks up the dog sh-t in Washington! Let George Bush send his two little party animals to die in Iraq. It's OK for Israel to have nuclear weapons but we are waging nuclear war in Iraq, we have contaminated the entire country. It's not OK for Syria to be in Lebanon. Hypocrites! But Israel can occupy Palestine? Stop the slaughter!

Woohoo! But no sweat, her new "pals" who are controlling her bookings will keep her on message and the fawning mainstream media will lap it up. They better because ole Cindy craves more attention:

Her latest complaint, as reported in the Washington Post, is that "the mainstream media have not paid enough attention to her cause." Hmm... I just checked "Google News" and found almost 1,800 items referring to her. That same mainstream media normally greets the completion of a major construction project in Iraq with zero items. Sheehan may be vicious or highly disturbed, but she knows how to play the mainstream media like a fine musical instrument -- not that the MSM don't want to be played.

I hope it's a comfort to her when her current bosom chums discard her like an empty tofu package, but I suspect she'll need even more help than she currently does. Damian at E-nough sums it up:

Ms. Sheehan is a sad character. We commiserate the loss of her son. Her grief has made her unstable, but what has made her shameless? What has made her vain? Surely it was not grief that made her stupid? It is a sin that newspapers, Democratic Congressmen, and the peace mob are using her for the usual fun.

Indeed.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:15 AM -

 
Get her on the Supreme Court

Judge reluctant to rule on global warming:

NEW YORK (AP) - A federal judge expressed reluctance about beginning judicial oversight of pollution issues that affect global warming as she heard arguments Friday in a complaint brought by eight states against some of the nation's largest power companies.

"Why should I do something that Congress and the president have decided they don't want to do as a matter of policy?" Judge Loretta Preska asked lawyers for the states.

She must have missed the Activist Judiciary class at law school.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said the states would prove that the five power companies are responsible for 10 percent of the nation's carbon dioxide emissions.

Er, so what, Dickie? Someone will always be responsible for 10% of the nation's carbon dioxide emissions. Maybe even you.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:45 AM -

 
He actually came out and said it!

Ace - At Least He's Honest: Lefty George Monbiot Admits Contradiction Between Left-Liberalism and Patriotism:

He doesn't understand, according to the subhead, why he should love his own country (Britain) any more than any other country.

Which is, you know, the whole problem in a nutshell. I've said it ad nauseum, but left-liberals believe their attachment to their country is a thing of pure happenstance, and should not therefore engender any sort of love of country. Global progressives consider themselves global citizens, and their loyalties are not primarily national, but transnational and ideological, a loyalty and affection for a worldwide (anti-nationalist) progressive/socialist solidarity movement and not to any particular country.

Which is their right. But I grow weary of them claiming that I should not question their patriotism. Most are not so forthright to admit this, but they are not patriots, at least as patriotism is conventionally understood.

Of course, the version of this mania that afflicts the developed world is that their country is not merely just unimportant, but always wrong.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:25 AM -

 
Now we know what Sandy was doing at the National Archives!



Andy McCarthy:

Given this turn in 9/11 Commission events, it is again worth asking: Why has the public not been told at this point what was in the classified documents that Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger illegally pilfered from the archives during preparation for his Commission testimony (as well as President Clinton’s) – some of which he destroyed (although there are said to be other copies)? The 9/11 inquiry was said to be so significant to the public’s understanding of intelligence failure that the Commissioners famously forced a Presidential Daily Briefing from the CIA (one of the most sensitive documents generated by government) to be declassified and unsealed so that Bush’s National Security Adviser, Condi Rice, could be asked about it publicly. Why haven’t we been able to see for ourselves what Berger took?

Just asking.

Number 1 in the series is here. Gosh, this is just like "Where's Waldo!"

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 3:04 PM -

 
We're so sensitive

Military Bans the Term 'Warrior':

Just think. With one stroke of a pen, Adm. Keating changed my perception of the North American aerospace defense network from a high-tech and reliable weapons and intelligence command into a bunch of whimpering pussies. After learning of this latest politically correct infestation at the commanding officer level, I immediately felt less safe.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:27 AM -

 
Fun with Sid Vicious!

No, not the "musician"! It's Hillary's favorite flying monkey, Sidney Blumenthal, the inventor of the term "vast rightwing conspiracy." Wondering what ole Sid's been up to lately? Check out On Sullivan and Blumenthal posted on August 11, 2005:

Eight months ago, in its December 2004 issue, the Washington Monthly printed a lengthy profile of Bob Novak by Amy Sullivan. This morning, Salon printed a lengthy profile of Bob Novak by Sidney Blumenthal. There were some striking similarities between the two.

Ruh Oh! Here's a lightly edited example from the article to give you the flavor:

Amy Sullivan
Swiveling in his chair, Novak went on the attack -- "It looks like the ambassador [Wilson] really doesn't know who leaked this to me"--punching back against the challenges of his guest, Rep. Harold Ford (D-Tenn.) -- "Do you know whether my source was in the White House? Do you know that at all?"

Sidney Blumenthal
Swiveling back and forth in his chair, he engaged in a show of bravado. "It looks like the ambassador [Wilson] really doesn't know who leaked this to me," he said. He turned to a guest on the show, Rep. Harold Ford of Tennessee, and asked, "Do you know whether my source was in the White House? Do you know that at all?"

Naughty Sid!

The Salon piece does include a link to the Washington Monthly piece, and Blumenthal attributes one quote to Sullivan's work. The attribution and link were not included in the original piece, but were added sometime after.

That was sure swell of him. You ever notice a certain aroma around the Clintons and all their hangers-on?

(Hat tip: Brothers Judd)

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:15 AM -

 
It's a start



Hat tip for the bumpersticker design to an FR poster. And lest we forget how responsible Jamie was and why, check out How Chinagate Led to 9/11:

But the picture is much bigger than that. The Gorelick memo, which blocked intelligence agents from sharing information that could have halted the September 11 hijacking plot, was only the mortar in a much larger maze of bureaucratic walls whose creation Gorelick personally oversaw.

It’s a story the 9/11 Commission may not want to hear, and one that Gorelick – now incredibly a member of that commission – has so far refused to tell. But it is perhaps the most crucial one to understanding the intentional breakdown of intelligence that led to the September 11 disaster.

Nearly from the moment Gorelick took office in the Clinton Justice Department, she began acting as the point woman for a large-scale bureaucratic reorganization of intelligence agencies that ultimately placed the gathering of intelligence, and decisions about what – if anything – would be done with it under near-direct control of the White House. In the process, more than a dozen CIA and FBI investigations underway at the time got caught beneath the heel of the presidential boot, investigations that would ultimately reveal massive Chinese espionage as millions in illegal Chinese donations filled Democratic Party campaign coffers.
...
It was this web of investigations that led Gorelick and Bill Clinton to erect the wall between intelligence agencies that resulted in the toppling of the Twin Towers. The connections go on and on, but they all lead back to Gorelick, the one person who could best explain how the Clinton administration neutered the American intelligence agencies that could have stopped the September 11 plot. Yet another high crime will have been committed if the September 11 Commission doesn’t demand testimony from her.

The article was from 2004. You don't remember ole Jaime testifying, now do you?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:59 PM -

 
Hey, hey, it was the monkeys!



Go visit The Anchoress. And Captain Ed, TKS, Strata-Sphere. But for real enjoyment go to RedState and scroll on down to the part about Dietrich Snell, the one man coverup crew.

If the graphic seems a little obscure, see this.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:12 PM -

 
Today's Pondscum Chronicles

From Oraculations - FULL COURT PRESS BY THE LEFT MAY DOOM US IN IRAQ:

For a rundown on the onslaught of hate Bush, hate Amerca Hollywood output with appropriate pix go here to a great site. (More specifically, check out this post. -ed.)

This onslaught of major Hollywood star studded Leftist propaganda will end the Iraq war and may end us as a meaningful world power. Check out the link. It's a shocker. There is a full court press by the Left and they absolutely control the media. The solution is presented on the site as well. My only contradiction here is that movies with an opposing point of view will never make it out of the current Hollywood and no star will appear.

Just one of the beauties from the post referenced above:

“American Dreamz.” This ’satire’ from Universal Pictures deals with Pakistani suicide bombers out to kill the US president. The film stars Hugh Grant, Richard Dreyfuss, Willem Dafoe and Mandy Moore. According to writer-director Paul Weitz (American Pie ), “The film is a comic examination of … cultural obsessions” like the War on Terror “and how they can anaesthetise us to the actual issues of our day.”

Gosh, I hope no one drops an airplane on ole Paul or blows him up with a nail bomb. But it's OK, I guess, since it seems that he has plenty of his own anesthesia.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:19 PM -

 
Ruh Oh!

3 Wives Greet British Man After Surgery:

LONDON - Some people bring flowers, others bring balloons. When Melvyn Reed's three wives showed up to visit him at the hospital, they brought an unexpected curtain call to his years as a double bigamist.

British police confirmed that after Melvyn Reed woke from his triple bypass heart operation earlier this year, his complicated marital affairs took a turn for a worse. All three of his spouses had turned up at the same time, despite his efforts to stagger their visits.

Media reports say that, upon realizing that something was amiss, the wives held a meeting in the parking lot, and learned that they were all married to the same man.

More details by following the link and in the Telegraph:

Despite the exposure of his triple life, Reed has moved back in with his first wife, in Kettering, Northants.

A neighbour of the couple told yesterday's London Evening Standard: "He used to be away quite a lot. He did used to say he had a property in the North, perhaps in Doncaster. We used to joke that maybe that was where his girlfriend lived.

"Once we saw him leave the house by himself at 9am on Christmas Day. Who leaves their wife first thing in the morning on Christmas Day?"

A neighbour of Reed's second wife, who is now living in Isleworth, west London, said: "Melvyn seemed nice enough, an ordinary bloke in his 50s, balding and with a paunch. Not three wives material, that's for sure."

You've got to admire the guy's energy, not to mention his cash flow.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 11:59 AM -

 
The Corzine and Katz story just gets better

In the ongoing saga (see 1, 2) of Jon "Goofy" Corzine and his union boss hottie, Carla Katz, Eric Fettmann in the NY Post (registration required) provides some new details in SO MUCH FOR 'MR. CLEAN' :

In 2003, during the course of their relationship, Corzine loaned Katz $470,000 — about $100,000 more than she needed to buy her ex-husband's share of a 19th-century Hunterdon County farmhouse.

That's good news. Carla and her school teacher hubby only had an $800K country estate - I was getting suspicious there for a while.

Though he insists everything was above board, it later turned out that Corzine had made two other sizable personal loans to women — but the one to Katz was the only one he didn't report on his U.S. Senate disclosure forms. (The senator maintains those loans actually were business investments.)

Woohoo! You could say the loan to ole Carla was an investment too.

And it now turns out that the home Katz bought isn't her primary residence. She spends most of her time in a posh Hoboken waterfront apartment — and Corzine has apartment two floors up.

Maybe Corzine — a former Wall Street whiz with a net worth closing in on $260 million — is correct, and this is all a case of lavishing some significant bling on his honey.

Er, investment sounds better than "significant bling."

But it's still a problem, as The Record's Mike Kelly noted. Suppose Corzine were the CEO of a major company who'd secretly lavished a $500,000 gift on a woman with whom he'd been involved and who headed the union representing the company's workers — and the shareholders found out. Forget about conflict of interest — Corzine would be out of a job even faster than he was ousted as head of Goldman Sachs back in the '90s.

Wait - there's more financial hijinks!

Then there's his financial partnership (a bid to buy the Nets and keep the team in Jersey) with real-estate tycoon Charles Kushner. The soon-to-be-convicted Kushner was brought down in a tawdry scandal involving tax fraud and sex. Ironically, he'd been the key link between then-Gov. Jim McGreevey and his lover, Golan Cipel, whose hiring as a key state homeland security official ultimately led to the governor's resignation.
...
This much is certain: Corzine will have a tough time selling himself as the knight on horseback to clean up Jersey's squalid politics if he keeps insisting that such things are no one's business but his own.

Hit the article for more of Goofy's financial pratfalls, but the Goldman Sachs ouster reminded me of this New York magazine article:

Corzine was so humiliated that he couldn’t bear to go to the office, even though he was determined to stay on for several months to see the public offering through to its conclusion. So, according to someone who knows him well, he developed an unusual routine. He’d get up every morning, put on his suit, step into his waiting limo, and ride from his house in Summit, New Jersey, to downtown Manhattan. He’d have his driver park in front of Goldman’s offices at 85 Broad Street—and he’d work from the backseat of his car. He’d have secretaries bring whatever he needed down to him.

Wotta guy!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:51 AM -

 
Thank you Jaime Gorelick


'POST-IT' BLUNDER

Military spies were forced to slap "stickies on the face of Mohamed Atta" and other 9/11 hijackers — despite knowing where they were in the United States — because Pentagon lawyers barred them from telling the FBI the fiends could be tied to al Qaeda, a GOP lawmaker charges.
...
I'll tell you how stupid it was — they put stickies [like Post-it notes] on the faces of Mohamed Atta on the chart that the military intelligence unit had completed and they said you can't talk to Atta because he's here" legally, Weldon charged.

Another reason for the Pentagon lawyers' actions, Weldon said, was a pre-Sept. 11 barrier that prevented the FBI and U.S. spy agencies from sharing intelligence — a practice the 9/11 commission criticized last year in its final report.

Jamie Gorelick, a deputy attorney general under former President Bill Clinton and a commission member, codified the separation between investigative and intelligence agencies in a 1995 memo.

Another one of "Nero" Clinton's boffo crew - fiddling while the nation's enemies gather.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:19 PM -

 
That'll come in right handy!

Jumping the Couch:

Many of you have probably heard the expression "jump the shark" used to describe the moment when a television show has doomed itself to mediocrity and series cancellation ...

Well, thanks to Tom Cruise, we now have a new term for when someone (celebrity or otherwise) appears to have completely lost their mind.

Gosh, these days you can use it any time an official representative of the Democrat party stands up to speak!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:33 AM -

 
Must have been tough on his preconceptions

Poll Turned Around And Bit Him On His Bitten Part:

What American Indians are offended? As far as I know, the vast majority, over ninety percent, don't find such things offensive at all. Of course, the perpetually aggrieved and the professional activists do, but they aren't very bright, as evidenced by the surprise of Adam Clymer, former NYT reporter aptly immortalized by Dick Cheney as "a real asshole," when, in his new function as director of the survey, he discovered this universal lack of Native American indignation...

One gets tired of observing that sports teams are, for obvious reasons, not named after the contemptible or figures of ridicule.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:26 AM -

 
They're funny that way

If it wasn't for double standards, they'd have no standards at all...:

When the Patriot Act was debated (and recently re-debated), its critics (and the New York Times was quite prominent) spoke how the government could use that Act to do things like check my library records, my video rentals (much like was done against Clarence Thomas), and various and sundry other things.

But I think I'm more frightened of what the New York Times might do to me, given the precedent they are setting with the Roberts case.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:14 AM -

 
I'm feeling so much better!

Intrepid supersleuth Mohamed ElBaradei is on the case. The best part is the way these UN wankers keep a straight face.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:57 PM -

 
Never too early to get started!

Doug from Upland has been busy dreaming up JEANINE PIRRO Campaign Commercial - No. 1:

SCENE - Jeanine Pirro's office. She is taking a call.


Pirro: Good morning, may I help you?


Seng: Yes, this is Ng Lap Seng. I would like to contribute to your Senate campaign.


Pirro: That's fine, I'll get you in touch with my campaign finance director. Wait. From where are you calling?


Seng: Macau


Pirro: Macau? Hey, aren't you the international criminal businessman who deals in murder for hire and prostitution and slavery of very young women?


Seng: Why, yes. But what's your problem? That didn't seem to bother you before.


Pirro: What are you talking about?


Seng: When I gave you hundreds of thousands of dollars, made 10 trips to the White House, and posed for pictures with you and your husband. I once sat at your table for dinner.


Pirro: To whom do you think you are speaking?


Seng: I thought I was calling Hillary Clinton. Isn't this Senator Clinton?

"A little water clears us of the deed," eh Hillary?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:03 PM -

 
Trouble in River City!

Oil-for-Food Arrest Linked to Bolton Arrival at U.N.:

(2005-08-09) -- Just eight days after John Bolton's recess appointment as U.N. Ambassador, the world body's credibility took a nosedive as corruption charges were leveled against top officials involved in the $64 billion Iraq oil-for-food scandal.

With one arrest yesterday and more expected shortly, experts naturally noted the connection between the arrival of the gruff American diplomat and the crisis at the United Nations.

"We warned President Bush against picking Bolton," said one Senate Democrat, "and now look what's happened -- criminal allegations in the world's most credible organization."

It's Scrappleface, but these days it's always hard to tell.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 5:48 PM -

 
Today's bizarre story

Whistleblower broke secret of Russian sub and 'saved men's lives':

PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMTCHATSKI, Russia (AFP) - Without an anonymous phone call by a tearful woman to a local radio station, the world may have heard too late about the Russian submarine stranded in the Pacific to save its seven crew...

Lots of strange doings in the story, but how about this one?

When the worried family tried to find out from the navy what the chances were of seeing their loved one again, a military psychologist arrived. "This is Russia -- pray!" he told Miloshevsky's wife Yelena...

Aside from Breshnev spinning in his grave over the religious angle, it doesn't seem like things have changed much.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 3:30 PM -

 
Today's Hoot!

Not Al Franken 'splains all in Big Al’s Sexatopia Saves Air America:

Okay, look. Here’s what happened. We had this guy from Guam running Air America, and he borrowed money from an organization that runs camps for underprivileged kids, and he said he needed it because he had brain cancer, but it really went to pay for Air America. It paid for air time and limos and vegan deli platters for the green room and all the other stuff we needed to keep the network running.

I had absolutely no idea. I want that to be clear from the start. I mean, why would Air America need to borrow money? Finally…FINALLY…we have a liberal voice in the media. I figured people would flock to it, after putting up with the conservatives at Fox News and The New York Times and The Washington Post and The Village Voice. I figured we’d make tons of money, selling ads to PETA and IKEA and Bubba Burgers and whatever. Because people were starving for liberal news coverage.
...
There’s a problem, because apparently, we’re not selling a lot of ads. Apparently, our liberal target audience likes to talk a lot about how they want to hear liberal commentary on the radio, but when push comes to shove, they’re tuning in Rush Limbaugh and trying to get past his call screener so they can get on the air and call him a big fatass. So our ratings…they’re not good. And advertisers…these greedy corporations…I’m sorry, I know I’ll get in trouble for this, but these greedy capitalist corporations refuse to buy ads unless they think people will actually hear them and buy their products.

This is what’s wrong with the country. Everybody wants to make a profit. Nobody is willing to do stuff just because it’s the right thing to do. I mean, okay, so you buy ads on Air America, and nobody buys your product. So what? At least people get to hear Randi Rhodes connect the dots.

Er, I'll pass. But that's water down the hydroflush and Al has a solution:

Oh, God. Oh, God. How many more minutes do we have? What? A hundred and fifty-eight? Oh, God.

Look, I’ll get the money, okay? Here’s…I have an idea. I have an idea to get the money. I’m going to use the Internet. It worked for Howard Dean, right? Okay, here’s what I’ll do. I happen to have–I can’t believe I’m admitting this–I happen to have a number of provocative pictures of myself, which I took to send to Fidel Castro. I don’t want to get into a rehash of how he took advantage of me when I was a lonely bicurious college student. I don’t want to go back over that. But anyway, I thought I could rekindle his interest, so I talked to Helmut Newton, and he agreed to shoot a few pictures for me. Well, Fidel couldn’t be bothered to respond. You know, I’m a big important dictator, so, you know, I don’t have time to respond to the short boy with glasses and a broken heart who’s been carrying a torch since 1968. And the pictures are pretty good. There’s a little retouching, because I had this…this rash…anyway, they’re not bad at all.
...
So what I’m thinking is, I’ll open an image site. You know, you pay a monthly fee, and I put up photo sets, and you get a password, and you go in and look. And maybe–I’m just brainstorming here–maybe I have streaming webcam sessions, and I chat with my members, and maybe if they PayPal me while I’m online, I show a little extra skin. You see what I’m saying? Strictly R-rated, you understand. You know, not like animal acts and so on. Not at first. And I call it “Big Al’s Sexatopia.” What do we owe these kids? Nine hundred grand? That ought to take a month, tops. And if we really need to, we can have Randi do some guest appearances. I’ve seen her in a bikini, and as long as we airbrush the stretchmarks, I think she’ll do great.

We'll get back to you on that, Al. In the meantime, keep your pants on! Randi too.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 3:19 PM -

 
It seems an odd strategy

Mark Steyn - Democrats' new strategy: Almost winning:

The other day an official with a British teachers' union proposed that the concept of "failing" exams should be abolished. Instead of being given a "failing" grade, she said, the pupil would instead be given a "deferred success."

Oh, sure, you can scoff. But evidently the system's already being test-piloted in Howard Dean's Democratic Party. That's why the Dems' Congressional Campaign Committee hailed their electoral failure in last week's Ohio special election as a triumphant "deferred success." As their press release put it:

"In nearly the biggest political upset in recent history, Democrat Paul Hackett came within just a few thousand votes of defeating Republican Jean Schmidt in Ohio's Second Congressional District."

Of course, there was another odd feature of the race:

Hackett was like a fast-forward rerun of the Kerry campaign. He was a veteran of the Iraq war, but he was anti-war, but he made solemn dignified patriotic commercials featuring respectful footage of President Bush and artfully neglecting to mention the candidate was a Democrat, but in livelier campaign venues he dismissed Bush as a "sonofabitch" and a "chicken hawk" who was "un-American" for questioning his patriotism.

Pretending not to be a Democrat? I guess it's a stealth strategy! Or more aptly, a Trojan Horse strategy.

And as usual this nearly winning strategy lost yet again -- this time to a weak Republican candidate with a lot of problematic baggage. Insofar as I understand it, the official Democratic narrative is that Bush is a moron who's nevertheless managed to steal two elections. Big deal. Up against this crowd, that's looking like petty larceny. After the Ohio vote, Dem pollster Stan Greenberg declared that "one of the biggest doubts about Democrats is that they don't stand for anything." That might have passed muster two years ago. Alas, the party's real problem is that increasingly there's no doubt whatsoever about it.

Note to Hillary - lying about it won't cover it up.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:57 AM -

 
Today's Hoot!

Right Wing News:

It's always fun to go moonbat gigging in the fever swamps of the Democratic Underground, find comments from a few choice loonies, and serve them up for entertainment.

But sometimes, you don't even have to work that hard because the moonbats charge right out of the swamp, yowling at the top of their lungs, and practically beg everyone to see how crazy they are. So it was at Saturday's "march to commemorate the Voting Rights Act of 1965."

There certainly were some primo specimens on display. Has Harry Belafonte been smoking the bananas again?

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 11:41 PM -

 
Isn't that special!



E-nough!:

I was looking for toilet paper and found this, commissioned by the Palestinian Authority...

It's nice to see that they are putting the loot they collect from the EU and UN to good use! I also have to admire the intestinal fortitude of anyone who would drink from a utensil with Ole Fishface's greasy visage on it. Of course, before they got the cup they were probably using the toilet.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:49 PM -

 
Pondscum alert!

Investor's Business Daily: Profile CAIR:

Finally, after years of mainstream media’s blinkered unwillingness to report the truth about CAIR, a glimmer of light breaks through.

Standby for the high pitched whine of the terror apologists.

And speaking of pondscum, how about the self appointed media elite like James "Shmoo" Wolcott and Nick "Tin Foil Beanie" Coleman? I guess it's tough not having a whiff of a clue, but they sure are bitter.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 4:46 PM -

 
More Corzine and Katz fun!

The NY Post offers a few more tidbits today in Not Just a Pretty Face:

The woman at the center of New Jersey Sen. Jon Corzine's latest political brouhaha is no shrinking violet — she's a well-educated, hard-driving, tough-talking rabble-rouser.

Tugboat Annie?

But one thing Carla Katz, boss of New Jersey's most powerful union, won't sound off on is the controversy surrounding the $470,000 loan-turned-gift she got from wannabe-governor Corzine, who's also her former boyfriend.

Ruh Oh!

"She shouldn't have to explain herself to anyone," said a worker at West Trenton-based Local 1034 of the Communications Workers of America, where, as president, Katz advocates for 16,000 members — including 9,000 who work in New Jersey government jobs.

"Believe me," said the staffer, "Carla Katz is not afraid to say what she thinks. It's her job to fight for people. But this is a private matter."

Being a "union staffer" means you're waiting for your turn at the gravy train of union management.

The tall, tanned brunette met the rumpled, bespectacled Corzine in 1999, when he was still married to his childhood sweetheart, Joanne, and Katz was married to Larry McKim, an artist and high-school teacher.
...
Her father had served for 10 years as mayor of Edgewater Park, N.J., and in 1982 Katz — armed with a bachelor's degree from Rutgers — launched her own political career, joining the CWA as an organizer.

By 1999, she was Local 1034's president.

Charming, I'm sure. I wonder what you major in at college to become a union goon, er boss?

Katz divorced in 2001. Corzine divorced in 2003 — with his ex-wife claiming the campaign had a "noxious" effect on their marriage.

Corzine loaned Katz the $470,000 in 2002 so she could buy out her ex-husband's share of their 19th-century farmhouse on 10 sprawling acres in Hunterdon County.

She and her husband, the high school teacher, had a one million dollar country estate? Union bossing and high school teaching must pay well!

In December 2004 — months after he and Katz split up, and just before he announced his gubernatorial run — the senator, whose wealth is estimated between $85.8 million and $261.5 million, forgave the loan.

Katz — whose annual CWA salary is $99,950 — couldn't afford to repay him, said Corzine.

Though property records still show the farmhouse as her legal address, Katz now lives in Hoboken's Hudson Tea Building — the same swank, riverfront building as Corzine.

Woohoo!

Rents on the loft-style units run from about $2,500 to $4,950; amenities include a health club and floor-to-ceiling windows with sweeping Manhattan views.

So somewhere between 30 and 60% of ole Carla's gross salary goes for non-deductible rent payments. Quite a load, since she presumably is still paying off the mortgage on her half of the country estate. I wonder if she has another source of income besides the poor union workers. And John Corzine.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:08 AM -

 
There really is a reason for cheerleader jokes!

Cheerleader Chant Leads To Driver Involved In Crash:

A team of cheerleaders attending a camp in Ann Arbor did what came naturally after witnessing a crash on Wednesday afternoon.

The Lincoln High School varsity cheerleading squad turned a license plate number into a cheer when a man driving a pickup truck involved in the collision fled the scene, according to the Ann Arbor News.

"We just started to chant it so we'd remember it and help them get the guy," senior captain Kimmie Ostrowski told the paper.

Apparently there was a paper and pencil shortage.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:26 AM -