Take a toke, then go vote!

The Halloween decorations are up, the furnace is on, and the sample voting ballot is in the mailbox. By statute, New Jersey gubernatorial candidates are allowed to submit a statement (500 words or less) that is printed on the back of the sample ballot. This one is a classic.

Edward Forchion
Legalize Marijuna Party

The reason I'm running for Governor isn't because I think I will win, but for the opportunity it gives me (and anyone who votes for me) to give the "FINGER" state-wide to our Demo-publican party politicians who wage their LIE based "WAR on US." "Us" meaning: "we the people" who freely choose to use substances regardless of what the "do-gooders" think is best. I personally choose to use the "GOD GROWN HERB MARIJUANA" so I fight our government's war on its "POT-FRONT." The fact that I can obtain marijuana any day of the week I choose is testament to the failure of our Government's racist war on drugs. The war on drugs is a $35 billion a year failure that will never be won. For it is "WE THE PEOPLE" that want them! It is for our Freedoms that I run. I'm not rich or seeking power like the other candidates. I'm openly trying to spark a "REEFER REVOLUTION."

There's more, but I think this conveys the herbal essence. I should note that Mr. Forchion also discusses Quakers, Rastafari, the Falun Gong, Iraqi WMDs, and the fact he was legally forbidden to change his name to NJWEEDMAN.COM.

Compare Forchion's stirring prose with these ho-hum statements supplied by the Democrat and Republican candidates.

Jon S. Corzine—Democrat: When you first elected me to the Senate, I promised to fight for New Jersey families against insiders and special interests. Unbought and unbossed—that's how I've served. As your Governor, I will bring these same principles to Trenton….

Douglas R. Forrester—Republican: Dear Residents of New Jersey: It's time to take back New Jersey from the politicians and power brokers who have raised our taxes and turned a blind eye to corruption, and return New Jersey to the people. It's time we brought real change to Trenton….

See, to me, "giving the FINGER" is just so much more to the point.

Always drive on the non–IED side of the street

Talk about fast: William Kristol has already cranked out a triumph-of-will column, "George W. Bush's Not so Terrible Week."

So this was a not-so-terrible week for Bush. I guess a terrible week would be one that saw the 2000th US military death in Iraq. Oh, wait. That did happen, not that Kristol mentions it.

Instead we get: Meanwhile, the political process in Iraq continued in a relatively promising direction and On the military front, the joint U.S.-Iraqi effort to fight an effective counterinsurgency seemed to be making some progress.

Relatively promising? Seemed to be making? Some progress? Whatever happened to the urbane and uber-confident neocon of yester-2003?

The Commerce Department calculated that third-quarter economic growth was 3.8%, and Kristol goes wild: Our economy may remain strong enough to overcome the twin hurdles of high energy prices and rising interest rates.

Well, let the binge spending begin anew!

On Thursday, Harriet Miers withdrew her candidacy for the Supreme Court…. Poor Harriet -- Hallmark just doesn't make a card for what she's been through. Enough said about that.

And then, of course, on Friday, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's two-year investigation came to an underwhelming conclusion with the indictment of Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Scooter Libby--not for any underlying crime but for impeding the investigation through perjury and false statements.

Yes, yes, we all know: In Washington, it's the lying not the underlying that gets you into trouble.

It may sound odd to call this good news for the president. No, not really. The logic here is inescapable.

It's good news for the president because it's not worse news for the president.

Harriet, we hardly knew ye

Snoopy's dancing for joy (really) about the Harriet Miers withdrawal over at Right Wing News.

Oh man, it's just such a win. I mean they say you can't fight City Hall? Well, conservatives just fought the White House and won! Did I say this is such a great moment, such a great day for conservatism already? Good, because it deserves to be said twice!

Snoopy -- a strict constructionist, originalist, Federalist Society member, and scourge of all those who would legislate from the bench. Who knew?

Elsewhere.… Charles Krauthammer played the shrink he used to be, taking on the role of the asylum doctor who offers Harriet Miers/Blanche DuBois his arm and escorts her past the brutish Stanley Kowalski and his buddies at the end of A Streetcar Named Desire.

An enthusiastic Krempasky at RedState.Org cheers, "Ok everyone -- back to the barracks, let's get ready to get behind a nominee we can support." Now there's an image he might want to rethink.

And at The American Spectator, R. Emmett (still no cure yet) Tyrrell, Jr, reveals his pick for the Supreme Court: Ted Olson, a Republican hack so deeply involved in the Scaife-funded Arkansas Project that he still leaves stains wherever he goes.

Finally there is a qualification that only Olson has. In a time of war on terror no one has thought more carefully about the role of law and the condition of the Constitution in time of this sort of insidious war than Ted Olson. As many know, Olson lost his beloved wife, Barbara, in 9/11…. What Democrat on the Judiciary Committee would take cheap shots at a nominee such as this?

Ah, yes, Olson's beloved third wife, Barbara. She also was a partisan hack. The author of Hell to Pay: The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barbara Olson died while on a book promotion tour for her latest piece of political trash, Final Days: A Behind the Scenes Look at the Last, Desperate Abuses of Power by the Clinton White House.

And somewhere, Ann Coulter is cackling and finger-massaging her overactive thyroid gland.

Enumerate and substantiate

David Fiderer does what I like: he enumerates and he substantiates.

In his recent Huffington Post column, "The Nobel Prize and Russert's Lies," Fiderer systematically reviews how the media -- in particular, Tim Russert -- promoted the Bush Administration's line that inspections for WMDs in Iraq would never work.

Two-and-a-half years before Mohamed ElBaradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) won the Nobel Peace Prize, friends of the Administration were trashing them in the media. Pushing for war with Iraq, these hawks insisted that inspections don’t work. In early March 2003, Tim Russert pushed their case further, by repeating lies to “prove” inspections don’t work. Those lies speak volumes about media coverage of the WMD story then and now.

Fiderer identifies five key reasons to believe that Russert lied, not misspoke, about the role of weapons inspections in Iraq -- and why Americans should not accept, as Russert suggests, that "[i]f it was a mistake, it was an honest mistake.”

Here is the critical primary falsehood.

Russert’s lie: (repeated three times) Inspectors never found any nuclear weapons program in Iraq until 1995, when Saddam’s son-in-law defected and revealed secret nuclear program unknown to the inspectors. It was sheer luck, not the inspections, that kept Saddam from building 21 nuclear bombs by 2003.

And here is the documented truth.

The truth: After the Persian Gulf War in 1991, the first intrusive inspections in Iraq led to discovery and destruction Saddam’s remaining nuclear weapons program. In 1995, Saddam’s son-in-law revealed a second crash nuclear program (using a fatally flawed design) that U.S. bombs smashed during the Persian Gulf War, prior to the inspectors’ arrival. Before 1991, Iraq relied on European technicians, equipment and manufacturing expertise for its nuclear weapons program, (which, after seven years, remained unsuccessful.) Lacking foreign assistance thereafter, Iraq remained incapable of building any nuclear device. [emph added]

Go read Fiderer's column for his full analysis of Russert's deception. Here's a skeletal summation.

Five different reasons to believe that Russert lied instead of misspoke

Reason 1: The falsehood was blatantly obvious.

Reason 2: To prove his false assertions, Russert misquoted both himself and his guest on Meet the Press.

Reason 3: The falsehood was repeated on two successive programs.

Reason 4: The primary falsehood is supported by other falsehoods.

Reason 5: To convey the false message, a single question was prefaced with a succession of falsehoods. On live television, this puts the respondent at a disadvantage, reducing the odds that Russert would be corrected with facts.

Reason No. 5 is a gem: Never trust talkingheads who frontload their "questions" with bullshit.

Gone completely mental: The blogger who couldn't wait for Fitzmas

Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas. Gone completely mental waiting for Fitzmas.

The point at which I stopped reading...

Lisa Fabrizio: On the salivation scale, this past week has been a veritable drool-fest for those who inhabit the newsrooms, editorial desks, and websites making up the liberal media world. The Sunday talk shows were awash ….

Cliff Kincaid: The savage left-wing attack on Judith Miller from inside and outside of the New York Times completely misses the point…. She could have done a potential Pulitzer Prize-winning story that could have broken the Joseph Wilson case wide open. It is a story exposing the Wilson mission to Africa as a CIA operation designed to undermine President Bush….

David Gelernter: Casualties concentrate the mind. We refuse to let our soldiers die for too little. America at war has lifted its sights again and again from danger, self-interest and self-defense to a larger, nobler goal. Same story, war after war. Iraq fits perfectly….

Tony Blankley: I truly hope that none of the president's aides have done anything to deserve criminal indictment. Some of them are my friends….

Power Line: Hugh Hewitt has written a lengthy and thoughtful piece….

Michelle Malkin's soul mate

Give credit to David Yeagley of David Horowitz's Moonbat Central. He's owned up to his error, posting a "misconceived defense of the indefensible."

I recently posted a piece on the "Nazi Girls," Lamb and Lynx Gaede of Bakersfield, California, without researching the facts.

So how much research did David Yeagley, PhD, do on the girls, known professionally as Prussian Blue?

I read only one page of the ABC story before firing off my comments.

Oops. And because of that --

I misperceived them as "white nationalists" — rebelling against a multiculturalism that allows every other group to express ethnic pride except whites. [emph added]

By skipping all the pages after the first, Yeagley missed some critical pieces of information.

I had no idea of the extent of their racial and ethnic hatred or their express admiration for Adolf Hitler…. In fact these people — or rather the parents behind the twins — are not misguided protesters of politically incorrect justice, but black-hating racists and Jew-hating Nazis.

Do you think David Horowitz mini-stroked on that?

Ready for the kicker? Yeagley is a direct descendent of Bad Eagle and an enrolled member of the Commanche Tribe.

If Michelle Malkin weren't already married, I'd say these two are made for each other.

Lamenting the lost sunny nobility of a high-maintenance front man

This is Chris Matthews talking to Tony Blankley about the loss of Bush the Golden Boy.

MATTHEWS: You know, Tony, there is in the past, it's not always there, but sometimes it glimmers with this man, our president, that kind of sunny nobility. How does he bring it back, because it hasn't been apparent for a while now?

A sunny nobility? Dubya? I don't think anybody inside or outside the Extended Bush Family Empire would ever use that description.

I wonder how much crap Matthews buys while watching infomercials.

And Blankley's response is instructively economical.

BLANKLEY: Well, he's had a very, very hard last three months, and he's had a pretty difficult administration because of all the -- well, the way it is.

UPDATE Thank you to Rogue Planet's kc, whose link in the Comments section sends us to a horrifying collection of past Bush gushers by Chris Matthews. Does Matthews have a guy crush on Bush?

Hannity: Sometimes things just go poof

Sean Hannity suspects that if those are indeed really bodies of actual dead Taliban, then it might be, you know, a case of spontaneous combustion.

HANNITY: I've looked at the video, at least of what we have, I don't know If there's more of it and it starts in the beginning but what we see is a fire. We don't know who started the fire and don't know if they're actual bodies and don't know any of these questions. But the way it's being reported is designed for people to have a foregone conclusion here. It falls into, you know, the Dick Durbin method of condemning our troops, which is comparing them to Nazis.

Of course. Almost clinched it there, Sean, employing the wait-until-all-the-evidence-is-in argument.

And then you just had to lob that Dick Durbin-Nazi flaming bag of poo.

A clear statement about real dangerous times

Most of the big media have been focusing on the Cheney/Rumsfeld cabal portion of the recent speech by Col Lawrence Wilkerson (Ret), the former State Department Chief of Staff under Colin Powell.

But tell me this paragraph isn't a wake-up call as well.

And I would say that we have courted disaster in Iraq, in North Korea, in Iran. Generally with regard to domestic crises like Katrina, Rita – and I could go on back – we haven’t done very well on anything like that in a long time. And if something comes along that is truly serious, truly serious, something like a nuclear weapon going off in a major American city, or something like a major pandemic, you are going to see the ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the Declaration of Independence.

Read it sometimes again. I just use it for a tutoring class for my students down in the District of Columbia. It forced me to read it really closely…, and read in there what the founders say in a very different language than we use today. Read in there what they say about the necessity of the people to throw off tyranny or to throw off ineptitude or to throw off that which is not doing what the people want it to do. And you’re talking about the potential for, I think, real dangerous times if we don’t get our act together.

Three for three.

A virtual-visual-textual feast

Go savor the virtual-visual-textual feast over at Neil Shakespeare's blog.

To the latter end of a fray and the beginning of a feast. --
King Henry IV, Pt I,IV 2.

Poetic justice versus rat-fucking inevitability

Howard Fineman goes all literary in his web column, talking about gods and the law and -- yes, fluff your puffy shirt, poetic justice.

Poetic Justice
George W. Bush rose to power on the strength of a disciplined, aggressive, leakproof spin machine. Now that machine may have run amok.

That will be the lesson if special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald indicts anyone in the Valerie Plame leak case. Poetic justice is a concept as old as drama, but it applies time and again in the theater of presidential politics. Traits and tactics that lead to power lead to overreach, and ruin. In our day, justice is administered (and balance restored) by law, not by gods. Still, the idea is the same.

Come on. At least Nixon's CREEP facilitators called it for what it was: rat-fucking. And it's not poetic justice when the rat-fuckers get caught and prosecuted -- but it is wonderful. And "the lesson," as always, is not to get caught and prosecuted.

Now here's my idea of poetic justice.

Bush's long-missing Texas Air National Guard records resurface, complete with detailed notations about, shall we say, asking and telling and snorting and drinking.

And Max Cleland, John McCain, and John Kerry get the honors of reading the records aloud to the world. And the international broadcast is paid for by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

See, now that's poetic justice.

Delicate sensibilities

Amazing. The cable news channels show the burning corpses of dead Taliban and yet won't use the word "crapped."

Imagine the editorial agonizing over this.

A FEMA public affairs officer, Marty Bahamonde was sent to New Orleans in advance of the arrival of Hurricane Katrina and wound up being the only FEMA representative in the city when the storm hit. In the SuperDome. Frantically text messaging FEMA officials. From his handheld BlackBerry.

And in one of the messages, Bahamonde used the word "crapped." But sensitive viewers were spared because the news writers replaced the word with the bracketed euphemism "[went to the bathroom]."

This is the original text message, BlackBerry-ed from the dark and stinking SuperDome.

OH MY GOD!!!!!!!! No won't go any furthr, too easy of a target. Just tell her that I just ate an MRE and crapped in the hallway of the Superdome along with 30,000 other close friends so I understand her concern about busy restaurants. Maybe tonight I will have the time to move the pebbles on the parking garage floor so they don't stab me in the back while I try to sleep, but instead I will hope her wait at Ruth Christ is short. But I know she is stressed so I won't make a big deal about it and you shouldn't either.

Why the exasperation? Well, in addition to the fact that the situation was getting desperate in the SuperDome, Bahamonde had received this message about scheduling arrangements for then-FEMA Director Mike Brown's appearance on that evening's "Scarborough Country."

Please schedule Joe Scarborough this evening for 9 pm CST period. Spoke with his producer and told him to call you. Mr. Brown wants to do this one.

Also, it is very important that time is allowed for Mr. Brown to eat dinner. Given that Baton Rouge is back to normal, restaurants are getting busy. He needs much more than 20 or 30 minutes. We now have traffic to encounter to get to and from a location of his choice, followed by wait service from the restaurant staff, eating, etc. Thank you.

Shit.

The Congressional Aristocrats

Here's the set up, make your own joke: guns, fast food, and minimum wage.

The man who holds the patent on the testicle lockbox jacks up his troops

Rush Limbaugh drinking sweet mint tea with Sean Hannity, pinkies up.

HANNITY: You ever envision a day Hillary Rodham Clinton's elected president in this country?
LIMBAUGH: You know, interesting question. People always mention Hillary's name to me, "Rush, Rush, what about Hillary?"

Brace yourself for the trademarked Limbaugh wit.

She puts her pants on one leg at a time like every other guy. She doesn't scare me.

That declaration is significant. Limbaugh is starting to recalibrate his Hillary fear-mongering in anticipation of the 2008 election. But it's a delicate process.

Limbaugh must do some fine-tuning of the nympho-bull-dyke feminazi mythology -- you know, Hillary the castro-convertible who makes guys put their manhood in a testicle lockbox, a phrase he takes great personal pride in. (Creepy, I know.)

Master propagandists understand that in the run up to a war, you must demonize the enemy to get troops psyched and outraged and willing to sacrifice and kill -- but at some point the enemy must be de-demonized to a degree as well, to avoid paralyzing fear.

And getting de-balled must be a huge fear for Limbaugh and his listeners.

I don't think looking at things through the prism of fear is going to accomplish anything…. You know, this woman is one of the most divisive political figures in the country. And I think a thorough examination of her in debates will illustrate she's not the smartest woman in the world and there's no reason to be afraid of her.

And so Limbaugh comforts his fretting dittoheads: Clutch not your balls when you hear the metallic clank of Hillary's testicle lockbox. Hate her, but fear her not.

Duh Roundup: All of life is an ongoing investigation

Things turned Full Monty Pythonesque at today's White House press gaggle:

QUESTION: Scott, is it true that the President --
SCOTT McCLELLAN: Welcome back.
QUESTION: Thanks. Is it true that the President slapped Karl Rove upside the head a couple of years ago over the CIA leak?
SCOTT McCLELLAN: Are you referring to, what, a New York Daily News report? Two things: One, we're not commenting on an ongoing investigation; two, and I would challenge the overall accuracy of that news account.
QUESTION: That's a comment.
QUESTION: Which part of it?
QUESTION: Yes, that is.
QUESTION: Which facts --
SCOTT McCLELLAN: No, I'm just saying -- no, I'm just trying to help you all.
QUESTION: So what facts are you challenging?
SCOTT McCLELLAN: Again, I'm not going to comment on an ongoing investigation.
QUESTION: You can't say you're challenging the facts and then not say which ones you're challenging.
SCOTT McCLELLAN: Yes, I can. I just did.

***

Sec of State Condoleeza Rice responds in her legendary forthright manner to Sen Joe Biden's when-will-the-troops-come-home question:

"I don't want to hazard what I think would be a guess, even if it were an assessment, of when that might be possible."

***

Bruce Bartlett relates what happens when you dance too long with who brung you in shoes that don't fit.

The truth that is now dawning on many movement conservatives is that George W. Bush is not one of them and never has been…. George W. Bush has never demonstrated any interest in shrinking the size of government. And on many occasions, he has increased government significantly…. Conservative intellectuals have known this for a long time, but looked the other way for various reasons…. Of course, this doesn't say much for the conservative movement. At best, conservatives were naive about Bush. At worst, they sold out much of what they claim to believe in.

***

So naïve it makes me cry

From Strategy Page

Al Qaeda Getting Tagged as Losers

October 18, 2005: The referendum on the Iraqi constitution is over, with a turnout of 63 percent, compared with 58 percent in the January elections to select the transitional government. The al Qaeda and Baathist terrorists launched a total of 13 attacks – compared with 347 during the January elections. In essence, for the fourth time in the past twelve months, al Qaeda has failed to halt an election in either Afghanistan or Iraq….

The successful referendum underscores just how impotent al Qaeda has become since the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001.... Al Qaeda has been rejected by the people of Afghanistan and Iraq.

The American strategy of bringing democracy to Iraq is succeeding. So are the tactics that are being used to implement it.... [T]he United States is achieving its objectives, while al Qaeda is not – al Qaeda is even failing to prevent the American objectives from being met.

By any objective standard, al Qaeda is losing the war on terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan. The only places they seem to be winning are in a number of newsrooms in the United States….

I'm willing to bet a few Iraqi dinars that 5 or 10 years from now, the author of this piece, Harold C. Hutchison, will still be wondering what the hell happened -- especially since all the Western-style objective standards he studied clearly showed that Iraq and Afghanistan were "won" on Dubya's watch.

Re-Boot

Re-reading Imperial Hubris, I came across an intriguing reference to an old Max Boot column: "Forget Vietnam -- History Deflates Guerilla Mystique." So I just had to track down the column, which was originally published in the LA Times on April 6, 2003.

Well, it turns out that time makes fools of us all columnists who indulge their arrogance.

Here are the tasty bits (made even tastier if you replace "Baathists" with "insurgents").

The question today is: Does Iraq more closely resemble Vietnam or the numerous places where U.S. counterinsurgency strategies prevailed? The answer is the latter.

In the first place, Vietnam's topography, with jungles, mountains and swamps, is much more favorable to guerrilla operations than the deserts and towns of Iraq. Tarik Aziz, Iraq's deputy prime minister, has suggested that urban warfare was the answer: "Let our cities be our swamps and our buildings be our jungles."

The Viet Cong tried that tactic. They were able to stage periodic terrorist attacks in urban areas, but their attempts to take over Saigon, Hue and other cities were repulsed during the 1968 Tet Offensive.

It is doubtful that, once the initial battles are concluded, the Baathists will have any better luck organizing a large-scale guerrilla campaign in cities held by coalition forces -- especially if they lack outside bases and support.

And, unlike in Vietnam, it is doubtful that any neighboring country will want to give long-term support to a Baathist guerrilla campaign against coalition forces. Although Syria and Iran, which share long borders with Iraq, are not friendly to the U.S., they do not have particularly warm feelings for Hussein either.

In any case, neither state enjoys superpower patronage, so they would be at the mercy of U.S. forces if they fomented a wave of terrorist attacks against the occupation authorities.

Such a campaign has been going strong recently because Hussein's ruthless security apparatus has continued to control most urban areas. But there is little doubt that the Baathist regime will be overthrown in the end. Hussein's appeal in the Arab world, which depends on successfully defying the "crusaders," will be shattered. Already, many Iraqis, in liberated towns like Najaf, are turning against the regime.

Once the war is over, the democratic reforms promised by Washington should win over the bulk of the Iraqi population -- or at least prevent a repeat of Chechnya, where Russia's brutal counterinsurgency tactics created lasting enmity.

If civilians are the sea in which guerrillas must swim, as Mao famously said, then the Baathists are likely to find Iraq an arid place before long.

Do you think columnists like Max Boot ever re-read their columns from years past -- I mean, when they're sober?

You might think you heard answers, but you'd be wrong

Chris Wallace interviews Condoleeza Rice on FoxNews Sunday.

WALLACE: Secretary Rice, a new subject. Were you part of an effort in July of 2003 to discredit Ambassador Joe Wilson, who was a critic of the Bush Iraq policy?

RICE: I am not going to talk about, Chris, as you might imagine, an ongoing investigation. I have, like everybody else, cooperated with Prosecutor Fitzgerald, and I'm quite certain that he will make his report. But I don't think that it's appropriate to comment about those events.

WALLACE: Now, when you say you've cooperated with the prosecutor, does that mean that, in fact, you spoke to investigators or to the grand jury?

RICE: I cooperated in all of the ways that I was asked to cooperate.

So, does Wallace ask for clarification? Does he ask directly: Did you speak with investigators? Did you appear before the Grand Jury? Did you turn over notes, emails, whatever?

Nah. He just moves on to another question.

WALLACE: Secretary Rice, were you involved in any way in the process in which [Harriet Miers] was chosen?

RICE: Chris, I'm not in the habit of recommending Supreme Court justice nominees to the president. But I was delighted that Harriet was chosen.

So, does Wallace ask, Did you break your habit just this once? Did you discuss possible nominees with Bush? Did you recommend Miers for the Supreme Court?

Nah. He just moves on to a videotape commercial promoting "Condi in 2008."

WALLACE: Finally, Secretary Rice, I want to show you a commercial that is running right now in Iowa. Here it is. Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN: She's a woman who isn't afraid to speak her mind. She'll speak on Iraq, America's role in the world, 9/11 and even abortion.

UNKNOWN: Great. I like her, too. You know, she's intelligent, and she's educated presidents for years.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Secretary, what do you think of this group, Americans for Rice, that is trying to launch a "Draft Condoleezza Rice" movement?

What does Dr. Madame Secretary think of all this?

RICE: Well, obviously, I'm flattered that somebody thinks of me in those terms. But, Chris, I haven't ever run for anything. I don't have any desire to run for anything. I didn't even run for high school president.

And so I know my role, and I've got a lot of work to do as secretary of state. We've got a lot of issues, a lot of tough issues, but a lot of opportunities, too. And then I think unless I go to the NFL, I'm headed back to Stanford to teach.

The NFL? Maybe a tryout for the first female punter....

May Richard Cohen eat the DVD version of his words, and then resign.

This is the first paragraph of Let This Leak Go, the incredibly asinine Richard Cohen column that has been rightly micro-fisked to a whispy volatile organic compound.

The best thing Patrick Fitzgerald could do for his country is get out of Washington, return to Chicago and prosecute some real criminals. As it is, all he has done so far is send Judith Miller of the New York Times to jail and repeatedly haul this or that administration high official before a grand jury, investigating a crime that probably wasn't one in the first place but that now, as is often the case, might have metastasized into some sort of coverup -- but, again, of nothing much. Go home, Pat.[emph added]

Think about it: Unless he's exchanging sex for information with a member of the grand jury, Richard Cohen knows no more about the investigation -- and possibly less -- than anybody else on the outside.

Yet he's willing to think, write, and print: Go, home, Pat, and fight the real criminals back in Chicago.

Will he resign in disgrace from the Washington Post if indictments are handed up on serious, serious charges?

F*ck no. That's just not in the pundit's code of ethics.

##

Here are links to some of the micro-fisking:

Zeke L assigns himself the task of dissecting "Cohen's dumbass column" in detail. By the time Zeke's done, the only thing left is the formaldehyde.

Larry Johnson has at it too here. Johnson, a former CIA agent, suggests that someone tell Cohen "he is a nitwit and moron for trying to advance White House supplied talking points that no real crime occurred."

And Roger Ailes offers us "Cohen and diGenova, Solicitors at Prostitution."

Update Here's another: Michael Berube checks out the different ways Cohen has been wrong. "Of the twelve kinds of wrongness Aristotle describes in the Nicodeman Ethics (you remember, predictive, retrospective, substantive, distributive, boneheaded, etc.), Cohen has now employed eleven."

Sluts 'R Us

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We had a deal, damn it. An agreement. An arrangement. A wink. A nod. A nose scratch. An ear tug. A fake cough.

Ann Coulter on The Big Story With John Gibson explains why she's so pissed off over Harriet Miers. You see, the Conservatives do and do and do for Bush, and this is the thanks they get.

It's a disaster. It's a disaster on every possible level. We will lose. The house will lose. We will lose the senate….

A lot of conservatives have stood by Bush when he introduced the prescription drug bill and does nothing about illegal aliens. Let's say the two big issues, the war on terrorism and the courts….

When I sat next to Al Gonzales at a dinner before Bush was elected… I said, speaking on behalf of right-wing crazies, we don't care if Bush gets us in a war or taxes the economy, all we care about is the Supreme Court. This is a long-standing position.

And why the obsession with the Supreme Court? Well, FOXNews viewers long tutored by Mark Levin probably all shouted out in unison:

Griswald, where the Supreme Court decided [that] contraception is protected by the privacy right. Well, there is no privacy right.

And Ann Coulter will not be able to die peacefully until all Americans fully understand and fully appreciate the concept of "no privacy right."

This week's WD-40 Bush-Bot Award goes to… Max Boot

Boot the Bush-bot just keeps on whistling "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."

Commentators are writing George W. Bush's political obituary. And why not? Things do seem pretty grim for the president, with surveys indicating that public disapproval (53% in Realclearpolitics.com's poll of polls) outweighs support (42.2%) by a hefty margin.

The top item on his second-term agenda — Social Security reform — has no chance of passage. His party is mired in scandal, with former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and ex-federal procurement czar David Safavian under indictment. Charges of cronyism and incompetence swirl around the White House. Even conservatives are jumping ship over the president's spending binge and his nomination of a total nonentity — an empty blouse — for the Supreme Court.

And none of it matters.

Well, if you say so, Max.

Why doesn't it matter? Because the great Ronald Reagan endured second-term screw ups (including some un-Constitutional un-tidiness called Iran-Contra) and, as well all know, Reagan went on to become THE MOST POPULAR HUMAN BEING OF ALL TIME.

Likewise, Bush's legacy will not be defined by who he put on the Supreme Court, how he responded to Hurricane Katrina or what he spent. Posterity will look at the bottom line — his record on peace and prosperity. And what will it find?

My guess: IOUs on both accounts.

Pre-impeach Harriet Miers! Now!!

If only Harriet had let Eric Rudolph hide out in her garage.

David Frum got out his yellow legal pad and posted this at National Review.

Petition for the Withdrawal of the Nomination of Harriet Miers to the U.S. Supreme Court

WE ARE REPUBLICANS AND CONSERVATIVES who supported the election of George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004. Today, we respectfully urge that the nomination of Harriet Miers to the United States Supreme Court be withdrawn.

The next justice of the Supreme Court should be a person of clear, consistent, and unashamed conservative judicial philosophy.

The next justice should be a person of unquestioned personal and political independence.

The next justice should be someone who has demonstrated a deep engagement in the constitutional issues that regularly come before the Supreme Court — and an appreciation of the originalist perspective on those issues.

The next justice should be a person of the highest standard of intellectual and legal excellence.

Let's just say that the next justice shouldn't be Harriet Miers because she isn't cool.

For all Harriet Miers. [sic] many fine qualities and genuine achievements, we the undersigned believe that she is not that person. An attempt to push her nomination through the Senate will only split the Republican party, damage the Bush presidency, and cast doubts upon the Court itself.

Too late, too late, too late.

Sometimes Americans elect Republican presidents, sometimes we elect Democratic presidents.

And sometimes Mommies and Daddies can't get along together any more and stop loving each other, and then Daddy goes some place else to live.

Whatever the differences between the parties, surely we can at least agree on this: Each party owes America its best.

But that doesn't mean Mommy and Daddy stopped loving you. They might forget all about you some times, and forget whose turn it is to have you for Thanksgiving, but that doesn't mean they've stopped loving you.

There is a wide range of truly outstanding legal talents who share the president’s judicial philosophy. We believe that on second thought President Bush can do better — for conservatism, for the Supreme Court, for America.

George, listen carefully: we're only going to give you one do-over.

Oh, and just so you know, National Review gives its pinky-swear promise to petition signers:

Our Guarantee: We respect your privacy and dislike spam too. We will not rent, sell, or lease any information submitted herein. You will not receive any spam or solicitations as a result of submitting this form.

Of course not.

Pinch me…

Captain's Quarters takes umbrage in the equating of opposition to "the unremarkable Miers" with sexism:

It's enough to start making me think that we need to send a clearer message to George Bush. The White House needs to rethink its relationship to reality and its so-far loyal supporters.

Ah, this is sweet. Not quite up there with Martin Luther and Pope Leo X calling each other Antichrists, but it'll do for now.

Punk'd underground

So we went from this…>

The 19 operatives were to place improvised explosive devices in the subways using briefcases, according to two sources. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said officers will continue to check bags, briefcases and strollers, and additional uniformed and undercover officers will be riding in individual subway cars.

…to this:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Information that led to heightened security for the New York City transit system was a hoax, government sources said Tuesday.

As someone once observed, if it's a fact then it's not intelligence.

If Woody Hayes were Prime Minister of Iraq

Gotta hand to it to The American Spectator's Jed Babbin: when you start a column off like this, people are going to read on -- if only just to see how much worse it can get.

If Woody Hayes were the prime minister of Iraq, the constitutional referendum scheduled for next Sunday might never be held. The legendarily bad-tempered Ohio State football coach disdained the forward pass because he judged the promise of quick gain to be overshadowed by the risk of failure. He said, concisely, that "When you throw a pass, only three things can happen and two of them are bad."

Because the Iraqi referendum is a long pass into heavy defensive coverage, Coach Hayes's description of the risk is decidedly apt. But the decision to throw it is entirely correct because if it succeeds or better yet fails constructively, Iraq can make substantial progress toward democracy.

Well drop kick me Jesus through the goal posts of life!

Fortunately, that's the end of the Woody Hayes-as-Prime Minister of Iraq nonsense.

Unfortunately, it's not the end of the column.

By column's end, we're getting references to ancient Rome and Carthage, not American football. And that's never a good sign.

The global war against terrorists and the nations that support them will have to go on regardless of what happens in the Iraqi elections. If Iraq can stand as a democracy, the terrorist nations will be weakened, but not decisively. If we stand down as the Iraqis stand up, the terrorist nations will only grow stronger. And the war in Iraq will go down in history as did the first Roman war against Carthage. We will have to go back to the Middle East, again and again, until the enemy and its ideology are truly defeated.

If Babbin's prediction is true, then the legendarily bad-tempered American voters may call a Hail Mary play of their own.

Oh dear -- Miers nomination makes Concerned Women for America feel jittery and a little offended

CWA: What We Need to Know About Harriet Miers 10/10/2005

Washington, DC – Concerned Women for America (CWA) has released a memorandum explaining its evaluation of information about Harriet Miers, President Bush’s nominee to succeed Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. The memo explains why CWA is unable to endorse the nomination at this time based on current information about Miss Miers. It is available on CWA’s Web site, www.cwfa.org.
/SNIP/

“Nothing we have seen or heard establishes Miss Miers' knowledge of and experience in constitutional law. Much is made of her leadership within the American Bar Association, an organization that is hardly known for opposing the ‘living theory’ of constitutional interpretation and judicial activism,” LaRue concluded.

"While we share Miss Miers’ evangelical faith, we find the continual emphasis on it by her supporters to be inappropriate and patronizing,” LaRue said. “It offends the Constitution.”
/SNIP/

Could be.

Patrick Buchanan's conjecture about why, why, why Bush nominated Miers.

[O]n abortion, I am not sure the president the United States wants to see Roe v. Wade overturned. His wife does not, his mother does not. He refuses to say whether he wants to say whether he wants to see Roe v. Wade overturned. There are a number of Republicans, moderate Republicans, who say, "Well this would be a political disaster." I'm not sure the president of the United States wants the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Diplomatically speaking, STFU

From Hardball: A hypercaffeinated and extra-screechy Chris Matthews discusses the NYC subway "terror threats" with a calm and well modulated Richard Holbrooke, former US ambassador to the UN.

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you, Mr. Ambassador, you have got a lot of experience in this field on the international level.
This warning came from Iraq. It did not come from some vague place in the world. I know it may be classified somewhere, but I got it. It‘s coming from Iraq, somebody who was picked up—a couple people. It‘s up to three people arrested now over there, according to the AP. Somebody is squealing, talking about a group of people coming over here, perhaps looking like pharmacists, meeting some people over here when they get over here, just like they did on 9/11, getting together into a cabal and then dropping these satchels of dynamite or whatever, black powder, whatever they‘re using as explosives, plastiques, in the city, in the city‘s subways.

HOLBROOKE: I‘m sorry. Was that a question, Chris?
(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Well, it was a long question.
(CROSSTALK)

HOLBROOKE: You‘re just—that‘s such a nice movie script.
I don‘t see anything we can add to this. We‘re hyping the very story you just said a second ago. We ought to not hype. Mayor Bloomberg has done the right thing. Homeland Security should not have taken the shot at him. And it was a shot. And I think we ought to move on.
(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: But what was the danger in my—what is the danger in my lying out what we know about this threat?

HOLBROOKE: Because we don‘t know anything. We—we don‘t know. We still don‘t even know what happened on 9/11 adequately.
(CROSSTALK)

HOLBROOKE: We certainly don‘t know about this. This is over—this is overkill.

Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.

How to undermine all your preceding arguments in a spectacularly gratuitous closing

Boston attorney Kevin P. Martin, a former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, lays out his case for the appointment of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.

Any suggestion that Miers lacks the basic competency to perform the functions of a Supreme Court justice betrays a lack of understanding of how the Supreme Court operates.

Meaning? Well, the Supremes really don't have to do any intellectual or judicial heavy-lifting. Apparently it's frowned upon if they do.

The qualities needed by a Supreme Court justice are not necessarily those needed by an advocate or scholar. By the time the court agrees to take a case, it has already been the subject of rounds of litigation in the lower courts. Indeed, the court generally will not even take a case unless the issues it raises have already been addressed by several federal courts of appeal and state supreme courts. When the court takes a case, the issues it raises have already been well developed and the arguments on each side honed.

Moreover, cases argued before the court are the subject of extensive briefing by the well-qualified members of the Supreme Court bar and the federal and state solicitors general. Each justice also has a staff of four experienced law clerks, top graduates of the nation's most prestigious law schools, to assist them in synthesizing and analyzing the pertinent lower-court opinions and briefs as well as the court's own precedents.

See, most of the thinking has already been thunked.

So what characteristics should a nominee possess?

What a Supreme Court justice needs most is good judgment and a principled approach to interpreting the Constitution and laws.

A justice needs good judgment. Yes, yes, yes. Hard to argue with tautologies.

And nothing -- nothing -- Miers's critics have pointed to yet suggests that she lacks either judgment or a principled approach to legal interpretation.

Martin should have stopped there. But he didn't.

Conservatives are doing Harriet Miers a grave disservice by their immediate opposition to her. Indeed, the opposition could ultimately prove self-defeating if she is confirmed and begrudges the assaults on her competence and integrity from the right. [emph added]

Piss her off, and Harriet Miers -- she of the good judgment and principled approaches -- just might be tempted to kick you in the judicial nuts if you or your "cause" winds up arguing a case before her.

[Thanks to Busy Busy Busy]

Wizbang!ing the facts

Toss-offs are dangerous.

Jay Tea at Wizbang! gripes about the recent Nobel Prize awards, particularly the awarding of the Peace Prize to Mohamed ElBaradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The failure of a Nobel Experiment

The International Atomic Energy Agency has to be one of the biggest jokes in the world today. Charged with enforcing the Non-Proliferation Treaty and shepherding research and development of nuclear power into peaceful paths, they have a stellar record of accomplishments.

Unfortunately, that stellar record is of failures.

On their watch:

* India announced it officially possessed nuclear weapons.
* Pakistan announced it had nuclear weapons.
* Libya announced that it had a highly-developed nuclear weapons program, and turned it over -- lock, stock, and barrel -- to the United States.
* North Korea has continued violations of the treaty and is unabashedly seeking nuclear weapons.
* Iran has repeatedly violated the treaty and is unabashedly seeking nuclear weapons.
* Pakistan has helped spread what it has learned about nuclear weapons throughout the Muslim world.

There are several technical problems with this list of "failures," but I restrained my inner nit-picker. Until, that is, Jay Tea responded to a comment that he had overlooked Israel's nuclear ambitions.

The IAEA's authority extends from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty -- a treaty Israel has never signed. Hence the IAEA has absolutely no right and no business in Israel, as the agreement that is its empowering authority simply doesn't apply.

Well now. Jay Tea probably thought he was saving Israel, but all he did was put India, Pakistan, and North Korea back into play.

Once he went technical about parties and signatories and jurisdiction and empowering authority, Jay Tea invalidated most of the IAEA "failures" he had listed.

India and Pakistan have never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Thus, the IAEA has no right and no business in India and Pakistan either.

The IAEA also has no right and no business in North Korea, which originally signed the treaty but later revoked its signature.

But Jay Tea didn't stop there. He also tossed off a comment about the Nobel Prize for Literature: [T]he "literature" prize is usually given to some excessively-PC author.

And to see how incredibly wrong that statement is, I refer you to Tbogg.

Cratered expectations

However did Bill Buckley manage to hold his famously sharp tongue?

This is Bush, toasting Buckley at a party celebrating the 50th anniversary of the National Review:

A sign of a good leader is somebody who can lay the foundation so that people are able to carry on. I think that's going to be a legacy of Bill Buckley. He just didn't show up and create something that cratered, he created something that stood the test of time and grew.

Both Bush and Buckley are oil babies, and cratered is oil drilling slang for caved in, failed.

After a violent blowout, the force of the fluids escaping from the wellbore sometimes blows a large hole in the ground. In this case, the well is said to have cratered.

Cratered. Perfect.

Sums up Bush's entire political career: He just shows up and creates situations that crater.

If you ever won an Ig Nobel, what would it be for?

This year's Ig Nobel winners were announced today.

The acknowledged achievements involved penguin poo, artificial dog testicles, locust Star Wars fans, frog smells, and exploding trousers. And the Ig Nobel Prize for Literature was an upset.

Literature - The many Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled".

So, what might you win an Ig Nobel for?

I had to think really hard, but I realized that about 25 years ago, I did do something that might at least get me considered for an Ig Nobel Prize for Literature.

Back then I worked for a major book wholesaler, and they offered a special service to libraries: formatted catalogue cards printed with each book's Dewey Decimal and Library of Congress information plus a brief annotation.

That's what I did: I wrote thousands and thousands of those 30-words-or-less mini-synopses that you find in library card catalogues (now on computers, but originally on those extra-stiff index cards).

These were objective, straightforward annotations of auto-repair manuals, children's pop-up books, physics texts, Pynchon novels, Jackie Collins trash, law books, religious works, dog breed guides…. And the use of words containing more than five syllables was frowned upon, mainly because of the risk of really jagged line breaks.

Understand -- I’m pushing the editorial quantity here, not the editorial quality. Plus the diversity. Plus the artistic suffering -- everything was handwritten in quintuplicate because personal office computers basically didn't exist and coworkers complained that typewriters were too noisy.

So what have you been working on? A caller ID blocker unblocker reblocker? Once-a-month disposable Y-front condoms? A psycho-veterinary investigation into canine Fourth of July aversion?

Doesn't anybody just get knocked up in the backseat of a car anymore?

The state is Indiana. Avoid it if you want to ovulate, inseminate, and gestate without official preclearance.

Before intended parents may enter into a gestational agreement and before conception occurs, the intended parents shall obtain an assessment from a licensed child placing agency in the intended parents' state of residence.

Gestational agreement? Preconception assessment? And by that most despised person in all of America: the licensed and certified expert?

Check out Catch.com for the small print on acquiring small humans and the official photo of the officious woman who wants to make her type of eugenics official.

Deadpan

Dana Bash, CNN's White House Correspondent, deadpans
Bush's speech.

BASH (voice-over): With support for Iraq at an all-time low, the president cast his unmistakably familiar stay the course refrain in new stark terms.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're facing a radical ideology with unalterable objectives, to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world.

BASH: Mr. Bush tried to put near daily terrorism in Iraq in a global context connected to bombings in Bali, London and Egypt.

BUSH: Focused ideology. A set of beliefs and goals that are evil, but not insane.

BASH: And as he urged patience in Iraq, the president compared U.S. fights against communism and fascism to terrorism saying its leaders seek a totalitarian empire.

BUSH: Enabling them to overthrow all moderate governments in the region and establish a radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia.

BASH: He spoke in a strikingly personal way about Osama bin Laden, chiding him as a hypocritical son of privilege.

Bush himself tripped over a piece of humiliating self-parody:

BUSH: He assures them that his -- that this is the road to paradise, though he never offers to go along for the ride.

At this point in the Bush Magical Historical Legacy Tour, no one in the administration can sneeze without ironic overtones being heard.

Bonsai Bush

Why suffer through the agony of a Bush speech and press conference -- syllables spasming off the presidential uvula, all those irritating fricatives and smarmy labials. Read Bonsai Bush instead. Really, why waste any more time than you have to on this prepackaged bullshit?

This is the miniaturization of yesterday's Rose Garden squint-a-thon.

On nominating Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court

Harriet's the bestest. Well, at least after John Roberts. We go way back. No, not that far back. After my drinking days. No litmus test. Never shoot the breeze about abortion. No cronyism, even though she looks like a crone.

On the pending expiration of parts of the Patriot Act

Reauthorize or your dog dies from playing in anthrax-dusted dog runs. Reauthorize or thousands will die, maybe this time in The Mall of America.

On funding the Katrina and Rita reconstruction

Grover Norquist is busy red-lining the "offset" programs. Grandma Millie's gonna have to buy a pill splitter.

On the sudden downgrading of battle-ready Iraqi battalions from three to one

The answer is, there is progress, positive progress.

On explaining to the American people how he's planning to pay for the budget deficit, the cost of the war, and the cost of Katrina

Let me remind people that we are at war.

On what would happen if anybody in the Bush administration is indicted over the Plame outing

I'm not going to talk about it.

On being asked if he'd like to see Roe v. Wade overturned

[Inaudible]

On being asked if he's still a conservative

Am I what?

On being asked how he would bridge the divide of poverty and race in this country beyond economics and home ownership

I don't think you can divorce bridging divides from ownership.

On being asked how much political capital he has left

Plenty.

Supremely inconsequential thoughts

Ah, the unbearable lightness of being a Bush-type Supreme Court nominee. They walk upon the face of the earth for decades and kick up no dust, slake no thirst, utter nothing declarative, serve well but won't name their masters, and do nothing, really, but hang in the background in a seemingly productive yet non-threatening sort of way.

It must take considerable skill.

So, in the absence of anything of substance to consider, here are my judicial thoughts.

__ Amazing but true: Harriet Miers could put both of her feet into one of Karen Hughes' shoes and still have plenty of room to wriggle all of her toes.

__ Katharine Harris and Harriet Miers both prefer to use (generously) Maybelline's Expert Eyes eye pencil and both opt for Blackest Black over just plain Black.

__ Chief Justice Roberts and his wife model their marriage after the ahead-of-its-time 60s sitcom, "Occasional Wife."

__ Judicial romantics hope that the unmarried David Souter and the unmarried Harriet Miers fall in love on the bench, so to speak, thus proving that senatorial "advise and consent" has a higher success rate than eHarmony Dating.

__ Jack Roberts, the 4-year-old son of the Chief Justice, emphatically slammed the front door in the face of his daddy's government driver, punking the burly (think neck muscles hanging over coat collar) man and making him look dorkish in front of dozens of photographers gathered to chronicle daddy's first day at his new job.

Here's to Jack Roberts -- the Ashton Kutcher of 2020.

MISC.

Leo Sternbach, 97, Valium Creator, Dies
"It's a very good drug," [Sternbach] told The New Yorker. "It has pleasant side effects. It's quite a good sleeping drug, too. That's why it's abused. My wife doesn't let me take it." [NYT]


Buying of News by Bush's Aides Is Ruled Illegal
'Covert Propaganda' Seen
Blistering GAO Report Says Administration Analyzed Coverage
Federal auditors said on Friday that the Bush administration violated the law by buying favorable news coverage of President Bush's education policies, by making payments to the conservative commentator Armstrong Williams and by hiring a public relations company to analyze media perceptions of the Republican Party.

[BONUS KICKER]

[Senator] Lautenberg expressed concern about a section of the report in which investigators said they could not find records to confirm that Mr. Williams had performed all the activities for which he billed the government. [NYT]


Generic State University -- Homecoming Reunion Weekend 2005
Baffling small print found on the colorful picture postcard notice of my college's homecoming weekend festivities.

Local, state, and federal laws will be in effect and enforced as necessary during Homecoming Reunion 2005.

Some free psychoanalysis for Bill Bennett

From the British website Black Britain

Black Britain asked London-based psychotherpist Vernon De Maynard what Bennett's comments reveal about his views on black people. De Maynard said:

"Bennett appears to be saying that black babies and therefore black people, are dispensable because they are unproductive and commit crime and that therefore society will be better off without them because there would be less crime. He clearly has a low opinion of black people in general."

De Maynard added that Bennett seems to believe what he said is true and "has no concern for the distress he has caused." [orig emphasis]

Just re-read that last sentence and really let it sink in.

And remember: According to Bill Bennett, not only does he not have a problem with race, he also does not have a problem with gambling.

Good grief -- Republicans go all nuance-y and contextual

William Bennett gets the Dick Durbin treatment, and Republicans cry "victim." Don't you just love this nasty little game that endlessly goes around and comes around?

For comparison, here are the headline and dek for the WorldNetDaily article on Dick Durbin's Senate speech on the conditions under which Americans have been holding detainees in the war on terror.

TROUBLE SPEAK
Democrat senator: U.S. troops 'Nazis'
Dick Durbin sparks national fury after likening treatment of terror detainees to KGB, Pol Pot

Okay. So the WND editors position the word Democrat right up front (have to name the enemy) and state that Durbin called American troops Nazis (he didn't). They also state that he likened American treatment of detainees to the good fellas of the KGB and Pol Pot. Did Durbin do that? Well, normally that's where one might go all nuance-y and contextual. And Republicans and WND readers just hate that kind of crap. So just call Durbin evil and get it over with.

The article features comments from the great Republican sage, Rush Limbaugh, who declared he was "embarrassed Durbin was an American and a senator." And there are comments from blogger Art Green, who thunders, "I think this is one of the grossest and sickest statements to be made yet…. This is beyond hyperbole and rhetoric."

Which of course is itself beyond hyperbole and rhetoric.

There also is a special WND poll so readers can "sound off" -- truly a public service since no one wants WND readers imploding from rage.

Now, here are the headline and dek for the WordNetDaily article on Bill Bennett's no black babies = less crime in America comments.

TROUBLESPEAK
Bill Bennett fires back at 'racist' charge
Won't 'take instruction' from Kennedy,
who 'shouldn't be in the Senate'

What a difference. Bennett is ever the warrior, "firing back." The word racist is enclosed in quotation marks, thus already questioning the legitimacy of its use.* Then there's the mention of Ted Kennedy, an object of Republican loathing in perpetuity, plus the zinger that Kennedy is not worthy of being a senator. And all that is before we even get to the article proper.

And the article incorporates a generous excerpt from Bennett's appearance on the "Hannity & Colmes" program, in which he defends his statement and places it in context. Suddenly, nuance and context are not crap and no one is in a rush to call Bennett evil and get it over with.

For good measure, Bennett also takes an expanded swipe at Kennedy:

"I'll not take instruction from Teddy Kennedy," he said. "A young woman likely drowned because of his negligence. I'll take no moral instruction with him. That's much worse than legal gambling what Teddy Kennedy did. He should make no judgments at all about people. He shouldn't be in the Senate."

My, my, my. WND plugs one of Bennett's books, Bennett gets to explain and defend his racist remarks, plus he works in references to Chappaquiddick. Does it get any better than this -- a Republican trifecta.

Also note: there's no need for a special WND poll so readers can sound off. Very little likelihood of imploding heads among WND readers on a topic like this.
##

*According to the WND article: "Kennedy called Bennett a 'racist.'" However, I cannot verify this via Google. Did anybody see, hear, read this Kennedy statement?

Click "Read More" for the pertinent excerpt of Dick Durbin's statement.

About Dick Durbin's statement, from Bereube Online.

Speaking on the Senate floor last Tuesday, Durbin read from a statement written by an FBI agent, describing the conditions under which Americans have been holding detainees in the war on terror. The statement included graphic accounts of prisoners chained hand and foot on the floor, urinating and defecating on themselves while chained in a fetal position for 18 to 24 hours or more. Durbin then said:

If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime—Pol Pot or others—that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners.