Maybe it's 1960

In the mythology of American politics, the 1960 presidential election between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy is remembered as a watershed moment: TV vaulted the charismatic JFK to the White House as his sensible policy positions and high rhetoric soared above the petty, sweaty, dodgy vision of Nixon and his tired party.

But in fact, both candidates were riding high throughout the campaign. Nixon was polling ahead until the 11th hour. The final vote margin, probably padded with thousands of fraudulent votes on both sides, was razor thin.

What's interesting right now isn't the facts, but the mythology, created after the fact by many of the same media figures who had brought the handsome Kennedy to the public's attention only to be rebuffed by Americans who were not yet trained to respond to pretty candidates on television instead of traditional assholes like Nixon.

This year's election offers a disparity that I can't quite figure out. My eyes and ears tell me that Obama is way ahead. The conspiracy theories swirl: who are these pollsters and who are they calling to get these "all tied up" numbers? Will the vote be rigged in Ohio and Florida? After all, no one has shown that the Diebold loopholes have been closed. Bush isn't really going to voluntarily step down, is he?

But just as in 2000 and 2004, the media has a big, self-appointed part to play in the time we have left before November 4. To wit: it needs to keep up the illusion that it is out front of the politics of change in this cycle, and that America is at war with itself and struggling as never before to choose a path.

The American press is so lazy, so unfulfilled, so desperate to manufacture its very own, yearly watershed moment, that it will try to keep this election close until the last moment. The press wants a 1960 of its very own.

Boo!

Let's step away from the election for just a moment, long enough to enjoy this page from baseball-reference.com.

Glenallen Hill: still making people laugh well into his retirement.

This is actually more funny because if you sponsor a page (as this Lollipop Gang fellow has done), you don't pay a flat fee, but rather you are charged based on the number of people who view the page (thus, super-popular players cost more to sponsor). So tell your friends.

Another Bullet Gone

It also occurs to me that Palin has so many nagging ethics issues, if not outright crimes, dogging her in Alaska (which is apparently the home state of crooked politicos), that the McCain campaign has forfeited not only the experience issue, but now also the ethics charge. Obama may have been as dirty as any Illinois pol, and he certainly was a good buddy of Tony Rezko, and he met Bill Ayers a few times (but not, unfortunately, to plan any terrorism -- and besides, George Bush has proven through his refusal to acknowledge them that there aren't any domestic terrorists), but how can McCain or Palin, assuming she even knows who Bill Ayers or Tony Rezko are, get to that now? They can't. D'oh!

What were they thinking?

Word on the street, also, is that the GOP might turn its convention into an actual telethon to raise money for hurricane relief.

Think about that.

The man who wants to hold the highest government office in America might hold a telethon to help victims of a natural disaster.

What, pray fucking tell, does John McCain think the federal government does?!? As president, would he have a bake sale to fund Medicare? Will we recycle aluminum cans so the soldiers can have body armor? How about pony rides to fix that bridge in Minnesota? Do I hear "dunk tank?"

Watch the GOP telethon!

There's something weird about beginning a major party's convention on Labor Day. Aside from, I mean, the fact the the Republican Party is anti-labor and has beaten mercilessly the American worker for about 8 years running.

No, what's weird is that I don't think most Americans watch much TV, read many newspapers, or surf the internet over the holiday weekend. There's anecdotal evidence of this (just about every cable network is running marathons of some sort, a sign that they're not expecting many viewers and they're not going to throw away new programming on those few friendless jerks who are watching). My newspaper today is full of crap, so obviously the publisher didn't think anyone would bother to read it. Most major media-types have taken three days off.

And yet, McCain made his big VP announcement yesterday (travel day), in front of a less-than-full house, I might add. And while that announcement might be getting kicked around a bit by the skeleton crew media who didn't get the weekend off, it's not likely to be remembered by most citizens come Monday. This is bad, because it means that nobody is anticipating Palin's introduction at the convention. She is already returned to the role of the unknown Republican. Given her nothingness as a candidate prior to 24 hours ago, the McCain bozos can't afford to let the public forget about her for an entire long weekend. Then, there is that big-ass hurricane to worry about -- you know, the one that's going to re-destroy the city the Chimp promised, super-duper seriously promised he'd fix three years ago. Not enough spotlight to go around, Sarah, sorry.

This pick continues to baffle me. The more anyone even scratches the surface of Ms. Palin, the more scum sprays forth. Even our lazy, stupid media cannot fail to report on her shortcomings, because as near as I can tell, that's all there is to her. Obama and Biden can safely just ignore her and it will make no difference. And, Jesus Revenge Christ, wait until Hillary Clinton hits the trail and gets after Palin for being a right wing hack and a tool of the patriarchy. Holy shit. She'll wish she'd stayed home with Track and Trig (those are actually the names of two of her kids. Really.).

And hey, one more thing: if she's been such a beast in fighting the oil companies in Alaska, how did her husband land a $120,000 part-time job with BP? That's like Ralph Nader asking Chevy for a free Corvair for the wife and kids.

Nonsense In Print

This has to be the worst piece of writing I have ever seen on the subject of sexual tension in politics. The Stranger is a gay-ass paper in gay-ass Seattle, fronted by gay-ass advice columnist Dan Savage, who is a genius. But (and this has come up before on this blog) what are gay-ass people and their gay-ass sympathizers supposed to do to make progress in their struggle for equal rights when at every opportunity their "friends" in the media wallow in cock fantasies that only reinforce the notion that being gay = sexual obsession?

In Your Faces, Republicans!

Sarah Palin, huh? She has...eh...both eyes. There, I've said something nice, so now I can say anything at all. That's how the axiom goes.

I reckon all the GOP toadies who were just yesterday screeching about how inexperienced and mysterious Obama is will be shutting the fuck up...now.

My dad raised this question this afternoon and it resonates more the longer I think about it: who is watching her baby? Sarah Palin had a baby about 6 months ago, and it has severe Down Syndrome (44 years-old = rotten eggs = chromosome malfunction). Her husband is heading back to work on the North Slope at the BP refinery. She is now the go-to distraction for the McCain campaign and will be flitting all over the country (and some places, like Alaska, that aren't part of any known country), getting her knees dirty for Dirty John.

So, who is watching her baby?

If this is supposed to pull in the undecided women voters ("look! She probably has a vagina under there! I have a vagina, too!!"), then woops.

Perhaps it is a given at the highest-levels of Republican politics that no one raises their own children.

Doing the math

It takes 270 electoral votes to win the presidency. By my hasty count, Obama needs only 32 more electoral votes to clinch it. All this bullshit about how close the race is in PA, OH, MN and so on is just that -- bullshit. I prefer the BBC's analysis (which amounts to, "don't be stupid").

By my estimation, Obama has 238 votes in the bag. Here's how I count things up: Obama is going to win IL, NY, and CA (107 electoral votes). He will also win WA, OR, MN, and WI (why? Because Democrats always do! Don't listen to Wolf Blitzer, look it up!) (38 electoral votes; total of 145).

Obama is also a sure bet to win VT, MA, NJ, DE, RI, DC, MD, and I think, NH (54 electoral votes; total of 199). I'll just assume that Connecticut wants to continue to act the fool for Joe Lieberman and so I am not going to award its electoral votes to Obama. I would also, just to be safe, assume a 3-to-1 split in Maine (the only state to award by proportion) for Obama. That brings the total to 202.

Then, let's just assume that the western states will all continue their stellar records of voting for big assholes that look like most western Americans. Obama, by my reckoning, will not win a single state east of California and west of Missouri. Oh well. Maybe we can build, and then detonate, several nuclear power plants in Utah or something.

I also do not believe Obama can win in the South, yet. Maybe in four years. Maybe. But, for the sake of argument, let's say that he does not win a single southern state. Not Florida. Not NC. Not VA. And, despite Robert Byrd's best crankering, not even W. VA. Duh, light switch?

So, needing 68 electoral votes to win, and running out of options, what's left on the map? Indiana. Um, no. As we have often noted here, we have never seen so many rebel flags as during one 3-hour drive through the CornBuckle, where the schools don't teach history, or else the historians don't have maps.

Iowa? Maybe. But I wouldn't count on it. Iowa is a flaky place full of flaky people, and though Obama was stellar there during the caucus, that was a caucus. And, you cannot trust a young, first-time voter not to get baked and sleep through election day. Hey, that's a great idea for a movie. I wonder if anyone has ever made that film...

I like Missouri to go to Obama. This is tenuous, I guess, but Missouri has trended left since the Clinton days and it has a large bloc of active minority voters. Also, the religious nuts couldn't get John Motherfucking Ashcroft elected there over a dead guy, so McCain's chances with the same batshit demographic are poor to say the least. So, the tally is now up to 213 electoral votes.

Hawaii goes to Obama. Yay. 217 votes.

Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan are what's left. I believe Obama is going to win PA, so that's another 21 electoral votes and gets him to 238.

So, the speculation begins:

If Obama wins Ohio and Michigan, he gets to 275 electoral votes and he wins.

If Obama wins Ohio and Iowa and Connecticut, he gets to 273 electoral votes and he wins.

If Obama wins Michigan, Iowa, and Connecticut, he gets to 270 electoral votes and he wins.

If Obama wins either Michigan or Ohio and gets just one southern state, like Virginia, and loses Missouri, he gets to 272 electoral votes and he wins.

If Obama gets his likely votes and wins Missouri, Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, and Connecticut, he gets to 290 electoral votes. If he wins Florida (not impossible), it's a landslide and he gets 317 electoral votes.

Looks promising, no?

Two things jump out from yesterday's front section of the Wall Street Journal (yes, I read the paper a day late, thereby covering the weekend since there is no Sunday edition): Democrats are doing a terrific job of getting across how angry they are, and Republicans are shitting themselves. When shills like the WSJ staffers can't think of any way to make Democrats look weak, then the attack has been well and truly joined.

Page one has the headline "Shaky Economy Challenges Ambitious Obama Agenda" (how did the economy get all 'shaky,' anyway? I guess Wally knew he couldn't sneak more McCain proclamations about how great the economy he doesn't understand is, what with the 250-point drop in the stock market sharing page space.). It bears noting that the WSJ's lead piece on the first night of the Democratic National Convention has the incredibly insipid message that Obama's aiming high but potentially faces a budget pinch (like not having the money to spend ever stopped a Republican!). That's a sign of deflation among the GOP's biggest backers.

Page two: "Wary of Marginalization, Liberals Push Priorities": yeah, you wish, Gerald F. Seib. Jerry has his panties all in a twist because, in Denver, all the wings of the Democratic Party have arrived and are actively trying to lobby one another to support a wide array of causes. The party platform, it is noted, is deficient--or, we might say, it is overly broad and yet also omits large ideas. But unlike the GOP, which lets the business/raider wing run the country (into the fucking ground) and only allows the religio-crazy wing out of the cellar/closet every four years or so, the Democrats are actually making progress through friction, compromise, debate, and change. We talk to one another -- not always with respect, as I have proven -- but I care deeply about the people who have, say, the mental defect that makes them enjoy Ralph Nader's abortive forays into politics. I want those people to get help, and from within our party. And, anyway, Hillary Clinton declared equal rights, civil rights, and gay rights to be cornerstones of the party's policies last night. So, fuck the platform. If the homos are in, everything's in.

Pages four and five are all convention coverage: Michelle Obama's speech (hey, she's smart and articulate, and kind of looks like a hybrid of Sigourney Weaver and Jane Fonda...in other words, she makes Republicans go all watery inside), how the delegate vote is fixed so that a key state gets to put the candidate over the top, Barack's "average-guy credentials" (what, Michelle doesn't own a multi-million dollar beer distribution business??). But best of all, this line from an article that also notes that insane/blasphemous/heretical Republicans have been standing outside Invesco Field in Denver for 2 weeks, praying for rain on the night of Obama's speech: "The potential downside:" (of having 80,000 people in a frenzy over Obama during the convention) "the larger-than-life scale could aid Republicans in their quest to portray Obama as a celebrity candidate..."!

I'm not sure what they're hoping to convey to the reader with ideas like that. A "celebrity" candidate -- this from the Reagan party? The Arnold party? The Giuliani party? Shut the fuck up.

God forbid, apparently, that voters should actually like the candidate they support, or support him too enthusiastically! How low-class and vulgar! The GOP attracts the natural aristocracy, you know, and if voters can't appreciate that and willingly give their votes to their superiors, well then they've been duped by a media creation! I think this line of "reasoning" (the WSJ's, not mine, which is unassailable) reinforces that which cannot be said often enough: Republicans don't care a whit for markets, which is really what elections are all about -- the crafting of a product and the selling of it to a receptive and desirous public -- they care about cabals that can engineer benefits for the members of the cabal. Thus, the GOP will settle for McCain picking his VP at the Nutter Center in Ohio (which is a basketball arena for the Horizon League's own Wright State Raiders), a 12,000-seat venue, instead of the 80,000-seat Cleveland Browns stadium, which would look ridiculous not least of all because it would still only have about 10,000 people in it, because McCain is at the head of a small but powerful network of lobbyists, image makers, donors, and fixers, and he doesn't give a shit about my vote or yours. Like the cops in Chinatown, he wants to skate by, like most Republicans, by doing as little as possible.

Celebrity candidate, indeed! Obama enjoys the support of tens of thousands of Democrats and that means he's somehow defective. John McCain can't get retirees to stop gumming their carrots long enough to watch him do his dinner theater re-enactment of his misremembered POW years -- but Obama is too popular! says the wounded peacock. Bad news for McCain: what he's peddling doesn't sell, and the popular vote really is a popularity contest (it has "popular" right there in the name, John). Triple-bad news: Obama is increasing his electoral vote lead across the nation, except in POWsylvania and POWida and POWxas. He may yet POW those areas and get the POWs he needs to POW the POW in POW POW POW.

And finally, the most pathetic but humorous group of all: the GOP crybabies. Some fairy named William McGurn, writing for a feature he calls "Main Street" (which either makes him a reactionary fucktard, or else a comedy genius on the sly), writes that "Democrats Made No Room on Abortion." Two things, McGurn: one, you are ostensibly writing on behalf of pro-life Democrats like Bob Casey (don't do us any favors, shithead), but on Tuesday when this came out, Bob Casey hadn't spoken yet at the convention. He did so last night, and what do you know? He didn't have an issue with Obama on abortion. Wow! It was almost like...like...your whole article was a meaningless bait, or else directed entirely at an audience so dumb that it is already sewn-up for McCain. And, item two, good. Hillary Clinton's speech last night drove home the point that Democrats don't have to compromise on a fucking thing. We're winning. (Clinton, by the way, masterfully took for herself the title of representative for every woman in the Democratic Party, thus ensuring that Obama, should he be elected, will have to go through her if he wants access to them. It was fiendish but brilliant.) She did not plead or cajole, or ask, she took it as a given that Democrats are Democrats, and any GOP asshole who is looking for signs otherwise should curl up and blow away.

See, we don't have to "make room on" abortion. Clinton was the anti-compromise candidate (you may recall that I support her based on the potential for her to cause Republican blood to run in the streets), and her speech reaffirmed that even out of the race, she has injected a little steel into Obama and has opened his eyes to the futility of compromising with people who don't care to let you live decently, much less speak to you. There was no compromise last night at the convention, and this is the best and only kind of "take it or leave it" politics for the Democrats. In times like these, when as she said, the nation itself hangs in the balance, you can get on the bus or you can drown in the mud. There is no second-guessing during an election.

Conservatives are pissing themselves in fear. The end is nigh for their "dream ticket" and their fantasy-made-flesh in GW Bush, and they haven't learned a damn thing. To our credit, we don't appear to be trying to reach them this time around; re-education comes after November. As frightening as it sounds, that's what it will take to make the unrepentant conservatives talk sense again.

But in the meantime: Kill, kill!

**By the way, the Wright State Raiders' mascot is a wolf. What is up with that? It makes almost as little sense as John McCain's mascot being the "Maverick," which I think is some kind of gay Scientologist fighter-pilot.

Why Can't We Be Better?

Ted Sorensen, erstwhile speechwriter for JFK and all-around badass, just spoke at the convention and...my...God. The man is incredible. He's slow (and, about 80 years old, it appears) and speaks deliberately, but his command of not only the language but also the necessary tone and inflection of public speech is majestic. He even ended with a poem. A fucking Poem! About Obama! It was awesome. Get it on YouTube (because I KNOW it wasn't shown by CNN or MSNBC, because they were almost certainly in a tight shot of their respective empty-headed anchors, who were blathering about nothing while an American treasure named Ted Sorensen was kicking out the fucking jam down on the floor. Sorry, convention time makes me a little stupid.

And Sorensen was followed by Mike Honda (I love his cars!). He was corny. Boo, ethanol!

It's Official

C-Span viewers -- and more importantly, callers -- are too dumb to live. We just watched the Democratic convention coverage and now there's a call-in hour and one of the first callers was from North Carolina. The lady said, "Michelle Obama is an Ivy-League-educated woman with massive debts, who left a job at a law firm she didn't agree with, to go do altruistic work. And that's fiscal irresponsibility and makes me worry about how they would run all these big-spending govenrment programs they want to do, if they can't even pay their own debts."

Um, what? Helping people is stupid. Making money is good.

Put down the phone (and the tequila), Sue Myrick! You fascist bitch!

When Did

When did the left master the short-and-sweet soundbite? Finally, our creativity is being put to use and may even supplant Democrats' most often used line of attack, the meandering point that contains too much obscure and incomprehensible data and goes on way too long. I think there were some Kerry bumper stickers in 2004 that actually had a paragraph break in them. True story.

McCain's VP

I'm calling it: Lindsey Graham. What can I say, I have a gambling problem.

So...Tired...

So voters are hearing "too much" about Obama, eh? And they feel "more favorable" towards McCain lately? Could those two things be due to the fact that the Democrats' "master plan" thus far has been to talk incessantly about Bush and very seldom about McCain? The GOP's big retard author, Jerome Corsi, who is a bigot and a fool in equal measure (and nothing else), is focused on Obama, not Clinton or Reid or Pelosi. But the Democrats' biggest literary "surprise" this summer is Vincent Bugliosi's book on prosecuting GW Bush for murder. Can that not wait until after he's out of office, Vinny? Would it be too much to ask for the Obama supporters and the Democrats in general to get after McCain?

Too much about Obama. Nothing about McCain. What could be the result of that?

No! No! NO!

No, you dummy!

"Still, Obama and McCain are at a statistical dead heat, and so the election will be decided by undecided voters."

WRONG. Presidents are elected by the Electoral College, not the popular vote, asshole! Why can't anybody remember this simple fact at any time before election day? Polls are for shit, Zogby is for shit, and come November, suddenly all we'll hear about is electoral votes, and then everybody will be all "well, Obama never really had anything to worry about."

Think before you do something stupid.

Pop v. Soda

Ever wonder where the "wrong" people live? Here you go.

Langdon Alger

Cenk Uygur, who I still think is a fake person and that name is an anagram of something, has written a nice, angry little piece about "esoteric, feel-good bullshit change." Guess who it's directed at?

Beyond the whole "hope for a better nation" platform, Obama's people need to realize that without retribution -- what we might call "justice" -- first, there can be no progress. Several years ago, when Gerald Ford died, it was pointed out on this very blog that his pardon of Nixon was not only the wrong thing to do, and just as venal as anything Nixon himself had done, and further damaged the nation by virtue of the fact that Ford tried to package his misguided idiocy as a Band-aid for the public psyche; but that the pardon signaled to assholes like our current president that committing crimes and lying to the public will be excused. The failure of anyone in the government to bring Nixon his just share of punishment for breaking the law meant that Nixon himself was essentially correct: presidents are above the law. And, thirty years on, we have a criminal for a president. It doesn't take a C- Yale graduate to figure that out.

Other people apparently had the same idea.

No "truth and reconciliation" commissions, please. We have courts. We have, or had, laws. Everyone answers to the same standards, or else we live in a de facto monarchy, where the aristocracy can choose not to acknowledge the civil government. That is, laws are only for the citizens, not the living gods. Fuck that!

On to campaign strategery: what is up with the Republicans? Not to sound like a broken record, but have McCain's people been watching the last two presidential elections on tape or something? First, they're bungling through an online campaign that would make the absolute shittiest left-wing internet site blush (don't look at me). In addition, they're reneging on every promise they ever made, from cutting off media access to going super-negative (albeit, with nonsensical ads that are of debatable effectiveness). But really, when you think about how deeply invested the Republicans' extended network of surrogates is in having more GOP fucktardism in the White House, you have to wonder why they're blowing their collective wad in August. Gore and Kerry ran strong through the summer, too, and then whatever edge they had evaporated after the conventions -- largely due to the fact that the Republican garbage (sorry, redundant) that ran Bush's campaigns waited until very late in the game to actually do any campaigning. It wasn't just a cynical hunch that voters have short attention spans; that plan is a great one to avoid wearing out your likely supporters (hell, there's nothing they can do until November...give 'em a mental break), reverse any bounce from the other guy's convention, and take advantage of last-minute shifts in toss-up states (or, if you're Bush, pay off the Diebold people to rig it for you in Ohio).

What do the McCain people have? Noise. Pointless, ill-timed noise. And like all noise, it should be filtered and then mostly ignored. Jerome Corsi (how it he not being sued for libel? Or at least, shouldn't the Simon & Schuster imprint be sued for knowingly publishing false information?) is making some news, but who will remember anything he wrote in 3 months? Corsi used up whatever value he had with the Swift Boat book, which came out in August 2004. Kerry did a shit job of countering it, yes; but the book also hit shelves after the Democratic convention in July. Anyway, it would appear that few people give a good goddamn what Jerome Corsi wants to lie about this week, as his publisher and some big-time GOP donors account for the majority of the book's "sales" so far.

And where the hell is Karl Rove? On the Op/ed page at the Wall Street Journal. He's really making some hay for McCain over there, you can be sure! On second thought, the whole vaunted, supposedly-fearsome Rovian smear machine (which is and always has been just some immature boys pandering to our worst beliefs) is on the sidelines. Or it's asleep. Or it's just not very effective anymore, because nobody can sell another Republican presidency. Incidentally, what if the GOP jackinapes are right, and the public really does feel "safer" from terrorists with a lying, adulterous, drunk, lazy, stupid, corrupt, sadistic Republican at the helm? If the voters then elect a Democrat, aren't they really saying "we'd rather be dead than have you represent us"? Anyway, as far as Rove, Obama is smart to let sleeping retarded dogs lie.

Save up your money, Barack. You have a big lead in the electoral vote count right now and you're guaranteed to win IL, NY, and CA in November. Just OH or PA, plus a few states like MO, KY, VA, NC, NV or the like will put you over the top.

And then John McCain can go off and die, finally, just as beaten and broken-down as he was in 1973. Or, divorce Cindy and shack up with one of the purportedly underage Chinese gymnasts. Surely a gruesome car accident can be arranged for her so McCain has an excuse to wander.

So That's How It's Done

It has been a mystery to me that McCain represents Arizona in Congress, despite his never having lived there -- in the real, not technical, sense. Owning property does not a citizen make, says I. But, thanks to this tabloid story from the UK's Daily Mail, I know now that you just have to be banging someone from Arizona and you are qualified to run for Congress there. People out west sure are retarded. And promiscuous. And rich. And retarded. Did I say retarded already?

One wonders why, if a fucking rag like the Daily Mail can write a simple, straightforward piece about McCain's outrageous and tacky affair, one single American newspaper can't do it. Just what do reporters write about these days, anyway? Do people read newspapers for the topic sentences and then just give up, because there is no content thereafter? Is it that goddamn hard to write a coherent narrative, you journalism bozos?

Speaking of coherent narratives (and for better ideas to plagiarize), think about joining GoodReads.

Frank Rich, Hermetically Sealed

Frank Rich has an op-ed in the New York Times that points out what we already know but haven't yet discussed: John McCain is a total unknown to the voting public. Perhaps that is because he speaks in tongues, or at least it sounds like gibberish to me. Or maybe it's the same fucking shitty media coverage we get every election cycle: the Democrat is far more fun to beat up on than the drooler from the GOP. In any case, Rich's call to get to know the real, angry, stupid, venal McCain would be great, except that Rich writes for the most isolated, provincial, easiest-to-dismiss-on-its-face newspaper in the country. Quit your job, Frank, and get a real soapbox. The Times is finished as a fertile ground for virtual democracy and honest discussion.

While we're on the subject of John McCain, I would suggest to the Puckish media, which delights in chaos for its own sake, absent any point or purpose (and certainly without any intention of educating the public or bettering this world), that it dust off that old narrative that certain politicians are prone to exaggeration. You will recall that it was the storyline of the Clinton presidencies, the Gore campaign, and the Kerry debacle.

I submit, however, that this time the media inject new life into that narrative by adding a twist: apply this lens to McCain, the Republican, and mock him for something that actually happened. So, Al Gore (according to our most venerated "reporters," including Maureen Dowd (from inside the bubble), Katie Couric, George Will, et al) invented the internet? Based on John McCain's rapidly evolving, ever-changing website and online campaign, it appears that he really is waging his campaign almost totally on the internet, kind of like...like...oh, yeah: MoveOn.org, that unsuccessful, derided, leftist online amalgam! Great plan! The story there? "John McCain discovered the internet."

Think about it. The man is proud of his inability to master simple button-pushing technology (he may have had his jet converted to a hand-crank starter in Vietnam, we'll have to check). Yet, his is the most massively-online campaign I can remember, in terms of how often his web misadventures become public knowledge. The McCain people, moreover, are stealing, as fast as they can, elements of seemingly every web site they encounter and incorporating all those "new" components into their own web designs. Hence the increasing sophistication of McCain's own website in tandem with the burgeoning clunkiness of it and his media releases. He's like the Simpsons' Mr. X (you know, the dimming pop cultural touchstone TV show, The Simpsons? I don't want to sound like one of those gay liberals who references things to show I'm "hip to the kids."), who, upon "discovering" the internet himself, steals little widgets and add-ons for his own site, never realizing that he has created a risible mish-mash unpalatable to any but the most similarly-ignorant novices. Well, that's John McCain and his campaign. "You say we can get a "hit counter"? Neat-o. Now, what is that, exactly? We can add video to our "yoooo-tooo-ooob" things? Wow! Do people still think Paris Hilton is cool? Do kids still say that, "cool"? Oke. Now we're on easy street!"

There must be some media types out there looking for a new, possibly pointless diversion to carry them through the summer. "McCain discovers the internet" is my suggestion. Or, challenge McCain to go three sentences without saying "my friends," which is apparently the "um, like" of the over-70 crowd.

Oh. Yay.

I'm sorry, but is this supposed to be good news?

Jim Lehrer, the gutless, leans-right wanker, is a doddering old fool whose idea of moderating is to cut people off when they try to respond to lies. You will recall this from 2000. Bob Schieffer is the moron who sat there stupidly while Bush walked around the stage and smirked his abominable smirk while chortling "want some wood?" in response to John Kerry's completely accurate and true statement that Bush got a small business tax break for owning a tree farm. Bob Schieffer, in a word, is a fucking worthless asshole and he cannot die soon enough. Tom Brokaw I have no problem with -- which is to say, I like Harry Shearer's impersonation of Tom Brokaw's speech impediment -- except that, as my friend Dan says, Brokaw will find a way to work in a question about THE GREATEST GENERATION and that can only benefit McCain, who is the only dusty dog turd from THE GREATEST GENERATION in the running. And Gwen Ifill. What can we say about her that I haven't already said? This is the same person who once asked John Edwards what he thought about Dick Cheney's gaybo daughter, and then asked Dick Cheney, later, what he thought about John Edwards' answer to a question about Edwards' personal life. That was the only time I ever laughed at something Dick Cheney said (well, until he shrieks, as he will, "I'm dying of poisonous ant bites from inside my colon!"), "You want me to talk about his experiences?"

These things are already rigged in McCain's favor; three of the four moderators, so-called, are too genteel (read: dumb) to allow Obama to go on the attack against Mothball McCain; the fourth moderator is just a fucking cunt who thinks NPR means "qualified to talk down to the public" and who can't keep her head long enough to remember what the question was.

Express Bus

There is nothing funnier than being on an "express" bus when it stops for the long, drawn-out, very-opposite-nothing-could-be-further-from-the-definition-of-express process of picking up a person in a wheelchair. And the hilarity only increases if you're lucky enough to still be on the bus when that person wants to get off. Life sure is strange.

John McCain sure does look confused a lot. Why has he suddenly become a very stupid man? He used to be Mr. Answers and lately he's Mr. "Hey, my Republican friends, I'm as dumb as you, so let's figure things out together!"

Perhaps this is another way of describing the fundamental difference between the poles of political thought in this country: Democrats like to hear proposals, answers, solutions -- the more, the better (and, to Barack Obama: start with the answers already, shithead!); Republicans want a "dumb buddy" who's just like them.

Incidentally, McCain is running a really bullshit ad nonstop during the Olympics attacking Obama over energy and taxes and what is Obama's response? "I believe in renewable energy." That's his own ad. Good comeback...if you want to lose. You need to start your campaign soon, dude.

Can this really be the Democratic Party's platform for the convention? If so, then it's actually the No Party Affiliation's platform. The best part of Swanson's critique:

"...I mean the glorious new bipartisan consensus, since "There can be no Republican or Democratic ideas, only policies that are smart and right and fair and good for America -- and those that aren't." What sort of Coloradan horseshit did these people step in on the way to the printers? What sort of talk is that for a majority party going up against the would-be successor to the least popular president in the history of the nation, a senile fool bragging constantly about his role in a war opposed by three-quarters of the country? No Democratic ideas? None? And no correspondence between Republican ideas and stupid, wrong, unfair, badness? If you're not going to put an offense on the field, Barack, your defense is going to wear down by November."

Is Obama going to really go this route, the dickless, no consequences, Gerald Ford I-pardon-everyone-without-asking-questions way? Will it make no difference who wins the election, save that one will do his shitty work in the open (McCain) and the other would do it while distracting us with a grin and claiming to be all about change?

They used to say Democrats would hold their noses and pull the lever if Clinton was the candidate. Maybe we should change that to "punch yourself in the nuts and vote Obama."

Me I Like

Last one. Not bad, really.

God Loves Humility

It must be read to be believed.

Web of Horror, Pt. 7?

This is a candidate, based on the strong pretentious undertones, but scroll down and look at what we presume to be models in the blog owner's clothing designs. Why are they so moody? Is it the ugly clothes or are they hungry, or gassy, or what?

Mummy Breasts, Eh Germany?

Is this a good blog or a bad blog? I can't decide. But, the word "Blubsch" keeps me coming back.

Observation

Everyone has, by now, observed that the only thing that can make a fat, stupid man irresistibly attractive to a beautiful woman is a script. Hence, TV sitcoms. Hence, as well, Judd Apatow movies. It won't be seen with these eyes, but the latest abomination to gut-jiggle its way onscreen is this Pineapple Express thing ("Pineapple Express," Judd? Was "Melonball Railroad" taken or something? What about "Tangelo Layover"?), which seems by the ads to be yet another tired, "pot smoking is so...yeeeeeeah" movie.

Let me ask you: does Seth Rogen (the slob who stars and also wrote the film) remind you of that guy at a party who really wants to tell you all the stories he can remember, sorta, about his buddies who smoke pot? And, if you really were at said party, would you stick around to humor him, or would you go find somebody interesting to talk to? And, to take it one step further, if you decided to humor the dumb shit, would you give him $10 to hear his pot stories? Seth Rogen wants you to give him $10 to hear his pot stories. Really.

Pomegranate Go-Kart. Next-day Fruit Salad. Slow Boat to Cantaloupe.

Brett Favre is an Asshole

So Brett's a Jet, eh? Whoop-de-fuckin'-do.

First of all, you cannot retire and then "take it back." Does not happen. Anyone who tries to do that is a fucking fuckface and fuck them anyway. I'm talkin' at YOU, Brett.

Second, to paraphrase Dr. Phil, the fat idiot, It Ain't About You! There's a backup QB in GB named Aaron Rodgers, who probably sucks, but if so, he sucks because the last time he played meaningful football was FOUR YEARS AGO because he's been backing up OLD and DECREPIT and SELFISH YOU since then, and this poor fuck is now shit-eyed for his whole career because you, Brett Favre, left him in the lurch so you could whine and cry about how you wanted to come back but them mean ol' Green Bay Packers were just so meeeny-weeeny iddy wuzzzy booo booo doo poo wuzzzuh. Yes they were! Look, dude: you're white trash from Mississippi. Shut the fuck up. You have at least one million dollars. You're the goddamn Mayor of Mississippi. Drink it off.

THIRD, everyone in the media is somehow on your side on this. You must know voodoo. Good for you. But still, fuck off. After all, this is the same media that decided GW Bush would make a good president because he was "funny."

See ya. And don't forget to go fuck yourself.

Who Will Climb Against Cancer Now?

Surely you have heard by now about the K2 mountain-climbing disaster that killed 11 people and has onlookers' panties all in a wad (well, really it's mostly women who had already wadded-up their own panties to throw them at the climbers upon their rockstar return). Something called an "ice pillar" gave out, causing an avalanche that took out a bunch of multinational climbers. This is very sad. My impression is that the group was scaling the world's 2nd-highest mountain to raise money for the world's 9,342nd-most-pressing disease, juvenile whale cancer. While not my preferred charity, the Global Juvenile Whale Cancer Outreach and Counseling Resource Center and Fair Trade Coffee Outlet was probably in line for a very large donation from those selfless mountain climbers upon their successful ascent of K2. I mean, why else bother doing something so fucking retarded as dedicating yourself to training, consuming resources in massive quantities, wasting money, sucking down pure oxygen, sporting high-tech, one-use gear, polluting the top of one of the globe's majestic natural wonders, and not ever holding a useful place in society, unless it's for juvenile whale cancer or something similarly emotionally affecting?

Of course, the charity angle is just a guess. It's possible these people were just climbing a mountain for no good reason except to do it. In which case, they're God's popsicles and fuck 'em.

Finally

It's been, what? Four years, or so, of this stupid blog, mostly dedicated to trashing things I don't like or don't understand. Many of those things are associated with today's Democratic Party. It's staffed by venal punks who couldn't carry John C. Calhoun's colostomy bag, and most self-identified Democratic voters seem to go in for weak-ass tactics and heavily-hedged arguments. Then, there's the "grassroots" "independent" folks, who don't know what the fuck they're talking about. What a mess that was.

It's all in the past, I think. It seems blasphemous to even hope at this point, but have you seen what the Republicans are trotting out this year? Now that's a fractured, fucked-up party! However, unlike the Democrats, the GOP-ers are only as good as their leadership (hence why the GOP has become a bigger and bigger stain on the American soul for the past two decades).

And the leadership is putting out shit like this.

John McCain? His campaign is all over Obama with hard-hitting shit like this.

Really, now. You're going to compare the Democratic nominee to Jesus and Moses, and that's your plan for making him look bad?! Idiot! This reminds me of, well yesterday, actually, when I saw that Rupert Murdoch's stepson Wally was asking the deep, hard-hitting questions he's known for: will fat people vote for skinny Obama? It's a stupid question by a sub-moron writer, but it sums up the McCain campaign so far perfectly: "John McCain is a dumpy, old, crabby white man, like your grampa who used to fly off the handle and take a swing at you when you were a child and made a little too much racket while the football game was on. Obama is like a hollywood celebrity. Vote McCain!" Look, if there's one thing that fat, stupid, even conservative Americans have proven, time and time again, it's that they will buy/use/keep/treasure/follow/vote for/kill for/strive pathetically for anything associated with Hollywood celebrities!

Vote McCain!

But that's not really the point of this rambling post. No, the point is that the Democratic Party is on the verge of scoring a knockout three months before the vote is even taken. Just for a moment, think back to 2000, when if Bush had run an ad comparing Al Gore to Jesus, Al Gore's campaign would have released a statement saying something like, "We have not heard of this ad, so we cannot comment. Mr. Gore remains committed to running a clean campaign." And then MoveOn.org and the rest of the ADD leftwing online community would have creaked into action with a frenzy of unfocused, random, and smug, self-congratulatory attacks of the Republicans' tactics that were just as off-putting as the original offense. Fast-forward to 2004, and it'd be the same story. The truth seems to be that there is a vast majority of America that doesn't give one or even two shits what MoveOn.org does, or that it can get Will Ferrell to impersonate GW Bush in a 2-minute online ad. The public wants to give Will Ferrell money to watch his really shitty, one-joke movies. The public also wants to give Obama a lot of votes for being a hopeful, helpful, change-istic guy, and he just needs to keep doing that and it's in the bag. The public does not want Will Ferrell to make political commentary, and it doesn't want (apparently, much to my consternation) any concrete policy proposals from Obama.

The public wants nothing at all from John McCain. Which is why he is foundering, trying everything he can think of to get attention, and it isn't working. So he's already at the part where he has to use Jesus (Jesus!) in a campaign ad. An online campaign ad. Which is exactly the kind of ridiculous and WTF?-style antics that the left has been working up as its "big deal" weapon for the past two presidential elections.

If the Republicans want to swap, and base their campaigning on MoveOn.org, which has never gotten even one single issue or candidate approved by the electorate, then I say, "Do it! NOW!!!"

Oh, the Obama response to the assertion that he's like Jesus, in an especially-sacrilegious way:
"Obama campaign spokesman Hari Sevugan dismissed the ad as a juvenile stunt."It's downright sad that on a day when we learned that 51,000 Americans lost their jobs, a candidate for the presidency is spending all of his time and the powerful platform he has on these sorts of juvenile antics," he said in a statement. "Senator McCain can keep telling everyone how 'proud' he is of these political stunts which even his Republican friends and advisors have called'childish'..."

Finally, Democrats have grasped that actual facts carry more weight than abstract principles and outrageous stunts. It's morning in America.

Yeah, I saw Steel Magnolias. And?

Quote from the total horseshit "profile" of the "Curious Mind of John McCain" online at the Washington Post today ("The Feeble Mind of John McCain" would be more apt): "I'm happy with the way our campaign is run. . . . It should be chaotic, I should have Mark [Salter] and Steve and Rick and Charlie and these guys on the line arguing with each other and saying, 'Baloney!' . . ." So, your campaign is being run by some guys, three of whom are named Mark, Rick, and Steve, who are chaotic, dramatic, and who use girly-swears like "baloney!" and, one assumes, "fiddlesticks!" John McCain is the nation's top employer of gay political consultants, apparently. Maybe I'm all wrong on this old queen.

"If I win this campaign," McCain said, "historians will say, 'He was a genius' " who adapted under pressure."

Ha ha. Ha. Hmmm. As an historian, John, you should reconsider what you believe we'll say about you in hindsight. Out of respect, we'll probably wait until you're dead and in the ground before we begin saying those things -- those awful, awful, true things -- but at least you can take comfort in the fact that you won't be around to hear them. Your child bride, Cindy, though, may not be able to concentrate on passing her driver's test, what with all the shit we'll be digging up on your dead ass. Or, maybe she'll have moved on and she'll be getting ready for her prom date with the reanimated corpse of Jesse Helms. You know what they say, "once you go senior, death can't come between 'yer." Or something.

McCain is "proud" of himself because as a committee chairman in the Senate, he likes to get witnesses from opposite sides together and watch them fight. This is how he determined that global warming was "real." The expert on warming made a better case, in his mind, than the expert for the Heritage Foundation/Bush administration. On that day. In McCain's opinion. So now, according to him, "the debate is settled." IT WAS NEVER UP FOR DEBATE, IDIOT!

He also thinks, or is willing to represent, that he lost in South Carolina in 2000 in part because of a flap over the redneck towel, otherwise known as the Confederate battle flag. Or, it was because your bestest friend in the world, George W. Bush, chopped you off at the knees and then pissed on your whole fucking existence and slandered your family. Nice gut-check, old man.

And finally, his aides recently taught him how to "read news and political blogs" online. OK. Let me give this a stab. Hi, John. You look cranky. What's that? Your newspaper didn't arrive yet? Um, we're 30,000 feet up in the air, flying to a campaign event in Des Moines? Do you know what day it is? Sir? Sir? You have a computer, why not just go to Google and type in "news" or "political blogs" and have a field day? Hello -- stay with me, John. Help, I need help over he-- I think he's having an aneurysm! Crash cart!!"