Ace o’ Spades, proudly carrying the banner for today’s conservative movement, carefully explains why his selective prudery isn’t anywhere near as cravenly hackish as it appears:
I know what the liberals are asking: Why is [Spitzer] such a big deal, and Sen. David Vitter’s previous experience with call girls isn’t?
Shut up, that’s why.
Bill Buckley wept.
pharniel
Classic AoS.
And sadly why i stopped reading.
cleek
AceHole smells like playdoh and bacon
mightygodking
I believe that’s excerpted from his upcoming book, Liberal Poopyheads.
horatius
How can I tell you America-hating Liebrul-fascists in a way you can understand.
All conservatives are sticklers for principle, unlike the liebrul moral relativists. This principle is called.
I-O-K-I-Y-A-A-R
Now Repeat after me.
IOKIYAAR
Cyrus
“Now listen, you queer, stop calling me a crypto-Nazi, or I’ll sock you in your god damn face and you’ll stay plastered.”
Why would Ace make Buckley weep?
Zifnab
Well, I’m sold. Re-elect Vitter in 2010!
Callisto
I would like to cite the case of rubber v. glue, 1958.
Cyrus
To be fair, I wouldn’t call Ace’s hackishness particularly craven. He’s being pretty bold about it.
Dennis - SGMM
While Buckley may have brought intellectual rigor to the conservative movement it didn’t stick around. Intellectual rigor ran screaming into the night in early 2000.
Elvis Elvisberg
I’ve got a way better hackish Republican explanation: “Vitter realized his sins, confessed them to Jesus, and ‘asked for and received forgiveness from God.’ Spitzer is far too rootless and cosmopolitan to show such character.”
The Moar You Know
I consider myself schooled. How could I ever hope to overcome such a powerful intellect and brilliant writer?
/snark off
Was this guy dropped on his head a lot as a child, or what?
b. hussein canuckistani
Too subtle. Hardly anyone knows those codewords anymore. Try “New York Liberal”, “swarthy”, “ethnic” or “hook-nosed kike”.
Mike D.
The long answer is complicated and involves the Bushco-era enigma of the Gangbusting Wise-Guy Destroyer who turns into a Girl Guide when the heat is on (“You think you can intimidate me? Screw you. Choose your weapon”; the Take-No-Guff hardass from Nevada who leads the Senate Majority while wearing a gimp suit complete with zippered mouth hole; the Amazing Vanishing Fitzmas… I’m sure I’m missing a few). But long explanations make everyone bored and uncomfortable.
Plus, from his point of view, if you gotta ask, you can eat his shorts. And the people who gotta ask, having been invited to dine on underwear, can get they righteous contemptuousness on and fling in-group monkey doo-doo at Ace and his (derisive snort) fetid ilk. So really, nearly everyone’s happy, and why don’t you shut up if you don’t like it?
Zifnab
You couldn’t just call him gay?
Jake
By wearing diapers, Tender Vitters showed his love of Placenta-Dependent Infants. That’s why.
Paul L.
I am surprised that no one has connected the “swiftboating” of Eliot Spitzer with the Bush/Rove/Gonzales Dismissal of U.S. Attorneys.
This is the result of Bush/Rove/Gonzales handpicked U.S. Attorneys to prosecute prominent Democrats by digging through their private lives.
Loved Eliot Spitzer press conference. He came across as arrogant and self righteous. He seemed upset that anyone would question him about this “private” matter.
Prostitution laws are for little people. It is different with high class hookers when you pay 5 grand a pop.
At least, Vitter showed some remorse.
demimondian
Um, Paul, you *are* having a tough time this morning, aren’t you? Google for “Siegelman Governor Alabama”, and you’ll suddenly understand why this is an issue.
borehole
I thought that bit was kind of cute, actually. But then Ace kept talking.
He always sidles right up to the edge of self-deprecating charm, but veers off at the last second and goes back to acting like a dick.
Davis X. Machina
Remorse is an affirmative defense?
Keith
Maybe not here, but Firedoglake and Harper’s(?) have some posts questioning why the USA office is pouring this many resources into a prostitution (the legality of which is determined state-by-state) sting.
J. Michael Neal
Technically, this is a federal matter. At least, you can put together a plausible case for why it is. Because the transaction involved crossing state lines, it possibly falls under the Mann Act. So, the Feds have jurisdiction.
That’s not to say that this is a smart or honest use of those efforts. On the list of things that the feds could occupy their time with, Spitzer’s Fucking of Mass Destruction doesn’t really rate very highly. It does smell of political prosecution. It’s just a political prosecution where they do have jurisdiction.
John S.
Well it must be extremely difficult to maintain such amazing intellectual incongruity, especially when the issue has nothing to do with the Duke lacrosse case.
Blue Buddha
While Buckley was an asshole to the nth degree, he actually used reasoning and intellect (things the current Cons lack) to back up his arguments. For example, he realized that Bush is one of the worst presidents and charging into Iraq haphazardly would only lead to disaster. Its ironic that his work in bringing the conservative movement to the front brought all the drooling idiots to the table.
4tehlulz
OH YEAH!?! WELL YOUR MOM HAS COOTIES!
Paul L.
Has 60 Minutes been able to prove the allegations or are they still going the TANG route?
’60 Minutes’ at It Again with Rove/Siegelman Story?
I hope this meme spreads to the rest of the netroots.
Jake
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am shocked and saddened by Paulell’s recent neglect of the snowflake babies.
CFisher
Wow. That is the beauty of Republican cheerleaders these days.
I mean, here’s a story about a hypocritical Democratic tool and a chance to score a few points and make folks forget about ‘wide stances’ for a few days, and yet, with just a few lines Ace makes me forget about the hypocritical Democratic tool and reminds me of why I stopped voting for Republicans and why I want them to lose repeatedly until people like him go off and form their own party.
horatius
Suck my dick Paul L.
spencer
At least, Vitter showed some remorse.
Yeah, it was the same kind of remorse I used to show when I was a kid, and my mother caught me with my hand in the cookie jar.
In other words, the only thing I was “remorseful” about was the fact that I got caught. Same with Vitter.
Charity
Oh wait, he wasn’t being sarcastic? What am I saying, the rabid right are all irony-free…
demimondian
I’m wondering if Ace is really a mole planted in the ‘phants by us evil lefties to make the right look foolish.
Now that I think about it…has anybody ever seen him and John Cole in the same room at the same time?
Evinfuilt
Wow, i was slow this morning. I honestly thought that was sarcasm, but now that I’ve looked, he’s serious.
Geez, just when you thought they couldn’t get loony enough.
jcricket
Sometimes I wonder which is worse, though. The transparently stupid + angry (see AoS above), or those that tart up their idiocy with big sounding words (see Buckley, Sullivan).
Believe me, I much prefer the Sullivan and Buckley types. They show the ability to “get it” now and then (e.g. Sullivan and Buckley on Iraq, if belatedly). And they don’t engage in the type of inflammatory rhetoric that the latest crop of Savages, Limbaughs and Malkins use to rile up the base.
That said, I think a large portion of their wonkery is basically 10,000 word essays with Wolcott-esque multi-syllabic turns-of-phrase that basically amount to “conservatism is what I say it is” or “tax cuts raise revenue”.
In other words, if you don’t know better (i.e. AoS) I guess I can’t expect much more. If you do/should, then I have higher expectations for your ability to argue logically.
Martin
He should have used more words. Big words, too.
Sorry, but there were plenty of times that Buckley was just O’Reilly+adverbs.
Paul L.
I guess you are not a arrogant elitist like Spitzer and are capable of felling shame.
Some Questions on Spitzer
Forge ahead you wonderful nutroots, fight the “swiftboating” of Eliot Spitzer.
Of course James Carville tried the same crap on Wolf Blitzer last night.
LITBMueller
Soooo…why isn’t anybody asking who Clients 1-8 are? If a night out costs 5 grand, then at least one of the other unnamed Clients must be an interesting person.
How about Bill O’Reilly paying 7 grand for a loofa session, or Rudy Giuliani paying 8 grand for a threesome with his (current) wife…something like that?
Or, is DoJ only going to leak prominent Dems to the NY Times?
jcricket
Rudy spent quite a bit of taxpayer money paying for security to follow him and/or his mistress around during his affair with her (while he was mayor). Of course it’s OK because he married her later.
Same with McCain (current wife = former mistress). And Gingrich.And Limbaugh (at least a couple of his 3 wives were affairs overlapping with the previous wife).
Family values!!
Ninerdave
Ace is just pissed, because Spitzer wasn’t busted wearing two wetsuits with a dildo up his ass.
Prostitutes are quite tame by the GOP’s current standards.
Paul L.
Rudy Giuliani would be my new hero.
Until it comes out that he busted people for Prostitution.
HyperIon
sorta OT but…
about six months ago i read a post where Buckley was referred to as “William B. Fuckley”. then he died before i got a chance to use it…..but now providence has accommodated me!
daryljhusseinfontaine
There seems to be an extra A in there. Hmmm…
It’s OK If You’re An Asshole Republican.
Oh wait, it works anyhow. Redundant, but still.