Tom DeLay was just on Hardball pushing his book, and received the obligatory fellatio that Chris Matthews seems to reserve for disgraced former pols. The book apparently highlights DeLay’s recovery from alcoholism (he cops to swilling 10-12 martinis and driving home on a regular basis, as well as cheating on his wife), which he attributes to his being saved by Christ.
Which is all well and good, but I am not sure why MSNBC needs to reserve primetime hours for the rehabilition of crooks and thugs- Stanley “Tookie” Williams was also saved by Christ, but apparently did not deserve a primetime slot. Regardless, despite being saved, DeLay managed to devote a portion of his on-air rehab to Clinton bashing, calling him slimy and attacking his character.
I guess DeLay hasn’t worked his way up to the Gospel of St. Matthew.
And yes, there really was no point to this post other than to offer me a platform to once again shit all over Tom DeLay, who I think embodies everything that is wrong with the current GOP.
Judy
When can we expect Britney to appear?
Ted
This post is really going to piss off Darrell.
Pan Pan
haha
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/3/21/195651/118
can’t wait to see this on youtube!
Shabbazz
The fact that anyone would call this guy a Christian, and especially a “Christian Leader”, is the main reason why I have avoided the Christian churches for the last 10 years.
Don’t get me wrong, I dig me some Christ (and Buddha too for that matter), but this guy ain’t even close to embodying the message of the New Testament as I understand it.
He is the text-book example of a wolf in sheep’s clothing; the blind leading the blind; the money-changers running the temple; the inmates running the asylum.
Which is why CNN can’t get enough of him.
Richard 23
So was Tom Delay actually convicted of anything? Has he served time in jail? No?
It’s pretty obvious it doesn’t matter now. The Democrat party only needed to throw enough mud to try and get something to appear to stick so that he would step down as Majority Leader.
John Cole is dishonest as hell and will do anything just to gin up page views and engage his lefty commentariot in yet another session of mutual masturbation.
But he’s the last real principled conservative, or so I am told. What a joke.
Eural
Shabbazz –
Amen, Amen, Amen!
The Other Andrew
I’m curious, Richard–do you think DeLay is the type of Republican the party should model itself after?
Richard 23
Yeah, sure. Tell us another one Shalamar. Screw God. Screw religion, just because of Bush (or Delay by proxy). Can’t you see what a lying scum you are?
The “main reason?” Because Tom Delay was Minority Whip? If that’s enough for you to become an athiest you probably weren’t a Christian to begin with.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
He’s awaiting trial, dummy.
Richard 23
So effective, Andrew, that the DemocRATs would do anything to destroy him. Hell yes. The GOP needs more spine.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
R23 sucks as a troll.
Just my opinion.
DougJ
Did he really say 10-12? That’s a whole bottle of gin or vodka.
AkaDad
That explains this.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=CmaQMOXK2VA
DougJ
And I should say: very good post, John. I agree completely: if you’re gonna have DeLay have Tookie, too.
BARRASSO
All you have to do to remain in republican good graces is say jesus totally forgives me. I should get in on that, I been meaning to steal and rape and kill and get a wife and cheat on her then cash in on it by selling a book or two about my personal relationship with teh jesus.
The Other Andrew
I’m 75% sure you’re a spoof, R23, but nonetheless:
Is “he hasn’t been convicted (yet)” the new threshold of morality in the Republican party?
I hope they keep pumping out more people like DeLay, though. Extremist, hypocritical, corrupt…yes, keep pushing those moderates (hi, John!) on over to our side. Make sure to take a hard line on illegal immegration, too. Between antiquated social “values” and xenophobia, you’ll turn the west and southwest blue by 2020…
Ted
Don’t worry. The gears of justice can grind slowly, but his day in court will come. Money Laundering (and you really should look at the charges; very interesting crimes) is not taken very lightly.
And then the Republic party will have one more criminal under its belt.
By the way, R23, can you tone it down a little? You’re starting to shriek like Darrell.
Ted
You never can tell. He doesn’t seem to like Darrell at all, and at times his arguments seem like parody, but other times they don’t at all.
ThymeZone
It’s a good post and a relevant one. The slimeball turd was on Meet the Press on Sunday, and then the Today Show.
Now, Hardball. Three major NBC hits in four days.
I can only say, WHAT THE FUCK?
What possible rationale can there be for this piece of ethical and intellectual detritus to be paraded in front of the nation’s most-watched cameras? Whose cock at NBC is being sucked by this guy’s agent?
It’s bizarre. It’s beyond bizarre, it’s sickening and disturbing.
What next, Charles Manson on how he regrets the Tate-laBianca things, now that he has been “saved by Christ?”
Here’s what I think: Is Christ really saving these assholes? Then it’s time to fire Christ, whoever the fuck he is.
Alan
What it needs is more brains. I saw a video earlier today of Delay. The guy came across as a complete doofus. He too said the GOP has no spine. He even said Bush caved by ridding his administration of Rumsfeld–as if Rumsfeld had done a bang up job as SoD.
The only religion Delay and the GOP need is a religion of reality. It’s too bad the GOP tied itself to the religious right. The RR has done enough harm to Christianity and the GOP to give the anti-Christ the warm fuzzies.
chopper
that’s some bad spoofing. i mean, come on, the whole “avoiding church==atheism, ‘screw god’ etc” bit is as old as the hills. so is the “hate on delay, you’re a bush hater by proxy” bit.
you need some fresh material.
Oregonian
Amen to that. It really does seem that giving lip service to Jesus is the Republican party’s official “Get Out of Jail Free” card.
It’s such a transparent and cynical manipulation of religion, you’d think that people who really believe in Christianity might eventually get tired of it.
John Cole
Yes. I remember drinking 8 martinis once, and then not much afterwards.
Sirkowski
I’d pay a lot of money to actually see John Cole take a dump on Tom DeLay’s face.
If you’re ever out of a job…
OkieByAccident
I especially liked the way the classy, Christian DeLay called Rep Joe Sestak (a retired Admiral) a traitor last Sunday on Meet the Press.
But hey, what else can a godly, principled, as-yet-unconvicted conservative do when a Commander-in-Chief’s hate filled opposition says stuff like:
“quagmire” “Osama Bin Laden still represents a threat to thousands of American lives” “The White House has bombed its way around the globe. International respect and trust for America has diminished every time we casually let the bombs fly.” “No one wants us to be there” “undeclared war” “de-fund the war” “pull out the forces we now have in the region.” “..meddling in the internal affairs of sovereign nations, where does it stop?” “starting to resemble a power-hungry imperialist army” “occupation by foreigners”
Oh, wait a sec… what’s that? Tom DeLay said all those things about Clinton and Kosovo on the House floor in 1998/99?
I guess he was for hating the CinC before he was against it.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2079324/
John Redworth
I think a better question is, would Tom DeLay pay to have John Cole take a dump on his face? Would we call that a Texas Mudpie instead of the more normal Cleveland Steamer?
Jess
Yeah, I remember that night too–you ended up dancing La Macarena on the bar in your tighty whities. I keep meaning to post the video on YouTube…
salvage
Video clip of Delay here being clueless about his own book.
RSA
Please. I could write an Eliza script that would do a better impression of the canonical wingnut on this blog. Better yet, a Parry script.
VidaLoca
Quote/unquote and verbatim. But now he’s found jeebus. So it’s all good.
I was thinking sort of the same thing. If Delay and his shenanigans are one of the major reasons the GOP is the minority party in both houses of Congress — exactly why is bringing him in now a good idea? Just when you thought the turd had sunk to the bottom of the punch bowl, up it pops — Delay does nothing but remind people what a great thing it is that the Democrats are running the show.
Alan
Many so called conservatives attack those who speak out against the religious right. Like Delay in that Hard Ball video calling Dick Armey “drunk with ambition.”
The RR can be pretty vicious. What’s amazing is they think they’re Christ like.
Dug Jay
Shit-for-Brains ThymeZone questions the fact that DeLay made three appearances on NBC programs. Perchance it was a tiny bit of “offset” for the nearly 70 appearances on NBC programs by the Loathsome and Slimy Mr. and Mrs. Joe Wilson.
RSA
I thought this exchange, via Crooks and Liars, in which Delay explains what a fighter he is, was pretty funny:
Richard 23
Yeah, because if someone disagrees with the leftist lovefest here at BJ, he must be a spoof. You make me sick.
I’d like to see this Eliza script you dreamed up, RSA, along with the voices in your head. I predict crickets.
Pb
I caught a bit of that… comedy gold! Either Tom Delay has balls bigger than that #*&$ golf ball thing at Epcot, or after all those martinis, no one told him that he’s Tom Delay. You know, that Tom Delay. Hilarious.
Yes, it officially replaced “We’re better than Saddam” in 2006. In other news, Tom Delay’s next book will be entitled “If I Did It“…
Richard 23
Try saying that ten times real fast. It’s probably much easier to scream “Bush Lied People Died [tm]” and “No Blood for Oil [tm]” and “Tom Delay’s a crook.” But then it’s been awhile since I’ve paid attention to leftist lovefests.
Richard 23
Apparently Red State is down right now, so feast your eyes on this latest leftist atrocity.
Alan
I don’t think anyone but Delay’s ego is behind his recent appearances. And TBH, I’m sure Chris Matthews et al. are more than happy to remind us who the Democrats replaced.
Slide
I love that Delay is all over the tubes. Let him represent the GOP. Bring it on.. More Coulter. More Limbaugh. More Hannity. More O’Reilly. Love it.. just fucking love it. The GOP is self destructing right before our eyes…
RSA
Heh. I teach this stuff to computer science grad students. If I hadn’t just assigned a homework question on constructing a set of rules for talking with a telemarketer, blog troll wouldn’t have been a bad idea. Next semester, maybe.
Steve
Holy shit, that’s awesome.
Tim F.
True fact: the other day John IMed me, “I want my party back.”
I replied, “so does Tom DeLay.”
Who do you suppose has a better shot at it?
Baby Jane
Dick Cheney.
Har har har
Richard 23
I’ve just proven that RSA is a liar. Apologize? Of course not. The dishonesty of the leftist circle jerk at BJ knows no bounds. I can call anyone on their lies and they crumble away with ers and ahs. So many wackjobs, so little time.
Nice ‘dog ate my homework’ excuse, RSA.
KC
I’m just glad that we’ll have Delay to kick around some more.
Pb
It probably looks something like this:
Randolph Fritz
I think it could use a heart, myself.
o/~ If I only had a brain ~/o
Alan
Tim F,
It’s pretty obvious Delay has the better shot. Until the GOP decides to unhitch itself from the RR, people like Delay will forever steer the party. Just this week I heard Rush Limbaugh say Santorum lost due to his support for Bush and the war–not his social conservatism. You see, Casey was cut from the same social conservative cloth as Santorum.
I’ve lost hope; and I was raised Republican.
RSA
Hey, Pb, you beat me to it! My version:
Close paraphrases in each response. One flaw in the rules is that few of the responses actually refer to words in the questions, but, well, maybe that’s more accurate than not.
Shabbazz
Richard — can I just call you “Dick” for short? Trust me on this point — you do not want to get in a pissing match with me on the topic of religion. Unlike the people who believe Delay is a even remotely Christ-like, I have actually read the book cover to cover several times during my lifetime.
But, please, by all means, continue to defend Delay with a vengeance! Shout it from the hills! He’s the kind of a guy Christians and Republicans can and should be proud of! Hell, see if you can get his name on the ballot for president! Maybe you can get Jack Abramoff on the ballot as vice? Scanlon as Secretary of State? I mean, none of they did anything wrong! It’s all a vast left-wing-conspiracy cooked up by extreme liberal Democrats like John Cole! I’m sure the godless French are to blame somehow as well. And the media. Don’t forget the media.
demimondian
Actually, RSA, perhaps it’s because of my own area of expertise, but Darrell makes me think of a low-order Markovian process more than Eliza or Parry.
I’ve always though that accounted for his memorylessness, too.
Pb
I could do that, given a Darrell corpus… hmm…
Punchy
I just threw up in my mouth. Thanks for the bile salts, Jess.
Mike
Shabbazz, I am pretty sure that Tommy boy has looked at both covers a few times at least. The inside though, not so much….
demimondian
Not snarking for a moment…this isn’t good. (h/t kos)
demimondian
Think of it an an improved pie filter, if you like…
RSA
That’s a nice idea. I see a simple AI system coming into being. . .
Richard 23
Tell me more about your mother.
Face
I suppose we can now call him “Tom De-laid”??
demimondian
Pb has it right: a large enough Darrell corpus…probably any single well-Darrelled thread…random link generator pointing to a small collection of -far-right- patriotic web logs…
I’m thinking AAAI, next year…
demimondian
What is it about computers that bothers you?
Richard 23
Ha ha. But that was supposed to be Jimmy Mack. Not me.
RSA
That would be fun to do (problematic in various ways, but fun). If you’re serious, let me know.
Larry
Wilson was newsworthy, and remains newsworthy.
How would you make out DeLay to be newsworthy right now?
Because he isn’t in jail? Because he’s pimping a gratuitous and useless book about the brain farts of a government embezzler? Why would any person in this country take his tv off Mute to hear what this cocksucker has to say about anything?
He went from speaker to chief asshole to defendant to ex-congressman in linear fashion and never contributed a fucking thing to any family in this country, that I can see.
Why are we listening to him, again?
jake
It cannot be denied that Tom Cat sucks burning gorrilla balls. However, while he is walking around flapping his jowls I can go on looking forward to the day his arse is behind bars.
Call it DeLayed gratification.
[Ducks]
RSA
I take it back; this was an overabundance of snarky enthusiasm.
demimondian
Damn. Now you’ve got me thinking…
How would you solve the language model problem? Could we dodge it entirely, by producing a finite vocabulary of responses, and gating the probability of response on an hidden state, which reflected the “emotional content” of the responses. (E.g. “leftist fucktard” would be rare in the “almost rational” state, common in the “screaming hysteria” state.) The state space would reflect the most recent few posts by a set of victim posters, and would reflect a simple measure of emotional contents of the most recent postings.
I don’t know if it would do Darrell — but R23, now, you could almost model that way: he’s got a small lexicon of basic insults, and is relatively repetitive, and clearly responds to the tone of postings more than he responds to their contents. (After all, you can encourage someone to “keep speaking truth to power” no matter what they’re writing about…)
I’ll be in touch.
demimondian
Ah, well. You’re right — but it’s a fun problem to play with.
Ryan S.
Did anyone catch the bit on the Daily show tonight about yesterday’s interview with John Bolton? Where Bolton was making stuff up just so he could tell Jon he was wrong. Absolutely classic. The sad thing is he wasn’t trying to be funny.
rachel
“Simple?” How apt.
Duane
I guess DeLay hasn’t worked his way up to the Gospel of St. Matthew.
Hell, he hasn’t read his own book yet.
Duane
RE: TROLL Chat (Tired Rightwing On-Line Lexicon)
Let it teach itself. Just set up a small app to use, say, the xmlhttp object to fetch a pre-defined list of website threads along with pre-defined troll names and then parse the list ansd build its own database of keywords and resultant right-wing comebacks. Every site has a few easily defined regular trolls.
My personal preference would be something that isn’t too polished. The charm of Eliza was the ridiculous answers you could generate.
Ryan S.
As is we need anything else to be pissed about. Someone tell me this isn’t true.
Pb
Ryan S.,
Call Rush Limbaugh, he’ll clear it right up–no doubt they were taking a cruise enroute to the day spa, and therefore their orders for the lemon chicken (and two types of fruit, natch) were delayed, and they had to settle for either the oven-fried chicken or the lemon fish.
Of course it’s still happening–did you think that it would suddenly stop when nothing was done about it?
Richard 23
Wow, I’m so hurt. You’ve really wounded me to my soul. I’m gonna need some ice for that spanking you just gave me.
DougJ
More trouble at the DOJ. This may be even worse — probably it’s about the same.
Tough to see Gonzo lasting too much longer.
Pb
DougJ,
Here’s another story about it, from 12/01/05, after/around when she resigned and first went public…
Sounds like a pattern. And, surprise, surprise:
Except that, you know, their expert disagreed, and their lead trial lawyer quit over it, citing their political considerations…
Tulkinghorn
The Tobacco case is worse. First, with three political appointees pressuring the prosecutor on the eve of trial, there is a more straightforward display of interference. Secondly, this is a case joe sixpack can understand the first time he hears it. $100 Billion fix on the eve of trial to benefit major corporate contributo? That fits in a 15 second commercial.
You can’t come up with a BS “no underlying crime” response to this, really. That does not mean they won’t try.
jake
Why do you hate America’s tobacco
tycoonsfarmers? [/snark]Gosh. This doesn’t make the USAs who still have their jobs look like court whores at ALL. While I’m glad Eubanks is saying something now, my first thought upon reading such stories is always: What the fuck were you waiting for, a direct order from the Baby Jesus? (Not the son of TZ’s yard man.)
It has been a very long time since my legal ethics class, but it seems that as an officer of the court she had a duty to scream her head off when it was happening.
Punchy
He aint resigning. And he aint getting fired. Bush couldn’t possibly hire a new, more loyal and c#ck-sucking AG other than AG.
No chance he’s gone.
RSA
Sounds reasonable to me, though after thinking about it, I realized I don’t have the right background to do this well. Here’s my take on the problem, which may be complementary to yours: Some work in natural language generation relies on explicit models of affect, and if we were generating responses from scratch, these models would give us a lot of control over the emotional content of words and phrases. But we don’t want to ignore the corpus of actual responses we have, which suggests that some kind of NLP (or maybe just IR) would be needed to break down and categorize entries in the corpus. (Template-based generation traditionally doesn’t work too well; at least, the NLG people I know don’t use it.) If this problem could be solved, then the trick would be choosing the right answers in context. I’m unsure whether off-the-shelf chatbot techniques are up to this. We have a relatively limited domain of discourse, and the text doesn’t need to be really responsive, both of which help. . . Maybe.
Pug
Maybe Chris Matthews will rename his show “Sleazeball”.
The Truffle
Ya know, I’m having a hard time believing Buggy Boy’s story about swilling 12 martinis at a time. Wouldn’t he be, like, DEAD after drinking that much alcohol? (Of course, I’ve got the alcohol tolerance of a gnat, so what do I know?)
I just think it’s gut-bustingly hilarious that he’s titled his tome “No Retreat, No Surrender.” I mean, isn’t that what he did last year when he chose to bow out of the race for his seat? And he STILL couldn’t get off the ballot, no matter how hard he tried?
Tulkinghorn
The prosecuter can also say:
Some ethics jurisdictions would require a noisy withdrawal if a client insists the attorney commit a criminal act (conspiracy to obstruct justice). Since these political officials were not clients, I don’t know if that applies here. I don’t see why it should. This prosecutor was a witness to a crime, and she may be ethically bound to report it, as well as to pursue the case with all due zeal until she is directly removed by the AG.
Then again, lawyers who think like I do are generally not hired by corporations and government agencies. You can blame the Jesuits who trained me.
The Other Steve
Does anyone else find it ironic that the ship used for detainment and torture was called the Bataan?
chopper
well, he’s a big douchebag, so they were probably small weak-ass titty-baby martinis.
demimondian
Depends how much he weighs. If he’s as fat as he looks, he might actually survive.
neil
They were actually Appletinis.
John Cole
That might explain why, later on in the interview, he stated he was unaware that Foley was gay.
Pb
Assuming that he isn’t dead, I think it’s more likely that he’d pass out; maybe not even that, depending on his tolerance:
rachel
Brain damage is looking likely, too, to judge by his words and behavior during this interview.
Zifnab
Wait, was he having the martinis during the interview?
Tsulagi
That’s the way I see it too. Bush is going into full-on brat mode. “You can’t make me do it!” Only way he’d fire Gonzo is if his ass was on the line. Then he’d drive the bus, run over the body, backup over it, do it again, then give Gonzo a Medal of Freedom.
kchiker
Am I the only one who got the impression that Delay seriously believes that he is a not-guilty verdict away from having a chance at the Presidency? Coming forth with admissions of former adultery NOW? Why on earth?
I think he fathoms himself the Republican party’s Gore who can swoop in at the last moment and make everything better among the sea of not-quites for the Republican nomination. Just a matter of finding the right jury first, eh Tom?
ed
Leave Dick 2.3″ alone. He is a sane conservative voice.
Zombie Santa Claus
That’s almost enough to make me join the GOP and vote in their primaries. Go Tom, go!
Bubblegum Tate
I bet Joe Bataan is fucking pissed.
The Other Steve
What an ignoramous.
http://www.bataan.navy.mil/history.htm
yet another jeff
It’s not like he was likely to have that many martinis in an hour or two…most likely spread out over several hours…say you start drinking after 5 and stay until the bars close at 2…that’s 9 hours. At most considered alcohol metabolism averages, one martini will be metabolized in about 20 minutes. So it seems quite possible to have 10-12 martinis in 9 hours and be sober upon arrival at home.
Depending upon the strength of the martinis and pace of martini drinking.
And I’m sad that nobody in the thread has complained about partisan hack slash attack dog, Ronnie Earle.
DeLay must have a good agent, but the man has to do something since his defense fund donations have slowed so much.
“Please give, it’s the support of citizens like yourself that keep the GOP rolling along. Help the Hammer help you!”
Richard 23
Thanks for the support ed. But I know how much most on the left hates any intrusion into their echo chambers. It’s who they are.
Just reread this thread to see how rude they are to me anytime I dare to comment.
Matt M
As a rare poster but often reader, Richard, before you start writing again, stand up and then sit down, and check to make sure you are not sitting on your “junk”. I think that’s your problem most of the time, you are sitting on your conjones and that is causing you to be angry all the time. Go back and read your first post, you start right off in attack mode.
Pb
yet another jeff,
I don’t think so; cite?
Bubblegum Tate
I know, I know…but me being a record nerd and all, when I see the word “Bataan,” my first thought is of Joe Bataan.
Tulkinghorn
He must be thinking of the English Martini. If you go into a pub and ask for one you get a dram of straight Vermouth.
Fledermaus
That’s just awful. The farther the vermouth stays from the martini glass the better the martini.
Tulkinghorn
Ack! Clipboard malfunction. nevermind
AnonE.Mouse
DeLay’s 12 martini habit is his defense strategy.
Jay
Stanley “Tookie” Williams was also saved by Christ, but apparently did not deserve a primetime slot.
No, he just had a movie made about him.
neil
If you say a modern celebrity is an adulterer, a pervert, and a drug addict, all it means is that you’ve read his autobiography.
–P.J. O’Rourke
yet another jeff
Ah, the link request…I do hope you’re not implying that I’m a DeLay fan and therefore making up stuff regarding booze…generally seems to be what people mean when they say “cite that!”. I’m the guy that gave John the “that budget’s not fat, it’s just big boned” line regarding DeLay…
I’m just saying that it’s possible to have 10-12 martinis in a day and still be concious. So then the average includes non-drinkers and women…ok, that’s fine. Does that mean you don’t believe it’s possible and I have to go look for some source to back up my snark?
From your link…
Healthy people metabolize alcohol at a fairly consistent rate. As a rule of thumb, a person will eliminate one average drink or .5 oz (15 ml) of alcohol per hour. Several factors influence this rate. The rate of elimination tends to be higher when the blood alcohol concentration in the body is very high or very low. Also chronic alcoholics may (depending on liver health) metabolize alcohol at a significantly higher rate than average. Finally, the body’s ability to metabolize alcohol quickly tend to diminish with age.
The average person metabolizes about 1 standard drink (10 grams) per hour.
Heavy drinkers have more active livers and may be able to metabolize up to 3 drinks per hour.
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/alcohol_intoxication/article_em.htm See section on Metabolism at the bottom of page 1.
yet another jeff
The part about heavy drinkers at 3 drinks per hour (20 minutes) is from my link…
Dress Left
He was on CSPAN for 70 minutes flogging his book.
Money quote:
“There’s not enough money in politics.”
He also provides a terrific tip on what to do with his book.