Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Fight them, without becoming them!

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

T R E 4 5 O N

Motown is Joe-Town!

It’s a doggy dog world.

Come on, man.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

It’s a new day. Light all those Biden polls of young people on fire and throw away the ashes.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

This fight is for everything.

Let there be snark.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Everybody saw this coming.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / Go for the jugular

Go for the jugular

by | 187 Comments

This post is in: ,

Personally, I don’t have a problem with Sam Alito mouthing “not true” when Obama said the SCOTUS ruling could open the door to an influx of campaign money from foreign donors. If the president bitch-slapped me on national tv, I might mouth something too.

I do have a problem with the disingenuous right-wing push-back on this and with the fact that PolitiFact and Dana Milbank are carrying the right’s water about it. Josh Marshall makes a very good point about:

The president is clearly correct. And it’s only a highly tendentious argument that claims otherwise. But what stands out to me is how sensitive Republicans seem on this point — Alito included. This is an important tell.

(emphasis mine)

I come from a long line of verbal sadists (though I don’t like to think of myself as one) and I know how the game is played — you prick, prick and when someone flinches, you know you’ve hit a nerve and you plunge the needle in as far as it will go.

The Republicans are flinching on the issue of foreign money in elections. Look for Bobo and chunky Bobo to start whining about the xenophobic implications of legislating this issue. That’s how you’ll know it really hurts Republicans.

If Democrats are smart, they’ll hit them so hard they’ll knock their clothes backwards like Kris Kross.

Reader Interactions

187Comments

  3. 3.

    DougJ

    You had me until “If Democrats are smart”.

    Sorry, I just got back from a liquor-tasting event.

  4. 4.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    It was depressing as hell that Ginsburg was the only one that looked ready for Death’s sweet embrace.

  5. 5.

    freelancer

    @DougJ:

    I just got back from a liquor-tasting event.

    Heh, indeed.

    /Reynolds

    You are forgetting that Dems aren’t verbal sadists, they are physical, mental, and emotional masochists.

  6. 6.

    Beauzeaux

    Grayson might be smart enough (and he’s definitely ballsy enough) to hit Republicans hard on this. The rest of ’em? Prolly not.

  7. 7.

    Ana Gama

    @AhabTRuler: Totally agree. Bought and paid for government operatives guarding the public good. Weak tea indeed!

    (PS Thanks for the link on the other thread!)

  9. 9.

    SGEW

    I come from a long line of verbal sadists . . .

    Gosh. I’m actually sorry to hear this; but it’s not very surprising.

  10. 10.

    rikyrah

    he spoke the truth. every Dem should have FOREIGN CORPORATIONS AND GOVERNMENTS come out of their mouths when they talk about this S.C. decision.

    pound pound pound.

  11. 11.

    meh

    Doug – I called you a douchebag for throwing poo at Jon Stewart a few threads back – after watching you work Kris Kros into a front page posting, I withdraw said comment. You, Sir, are full of win.

  17. 17.

    Napoleon

    DougJ you are absolutely right. This decision can be an absolute disaster for the right if the Dems push this.

    But instead look for the Dems to pass a resolution supporting foreign money in US elections and Obama doing nothing to push them otherwise.

  18. 18.

    lamh31

    the GOP knows just like we know the answer tothe question “which group of the electorate is more likely to declare armageddon on their party if non-Amurikans are even suspected of contributing to a campaign?” The usually xenophobic group known as the Repub voter.

    This isnt’ to say that any other member of the electorate would be okay with foreign dollars being used in our elections, we just aren’t the one who go into calling perople non-patriotic cause they hae a Muslim-member of Congress introduce them at a campaign rally or something.

  23. 23.

    danimal

    You know it hurts the GOP when the conservaDems starting talking about the importance of bipartisanship and comity. They never talk about getting along when Limbaugh, Beck and the other loons take their cheap shots.

  25. 25.

    General Winfield Stuck

    As to Obama’s claim of foreign money getting into US elections I am re posting my comment from the previous thread on that question.

    : How odd. I was just watching Cspan 2 with a panel of Attorney’s discussing the SCOTUS decision on now no limit spending outside of by candidates themselves, and the former ABA president said that what the decision did was make it impossible to track where this soft money originated, and therefore impossible to determine if that money violated other statutes, which I presume would mean bans on foreign or domestic sources. Not being a lawyer I didn’t understand his description of why, just that it would make such money difficult if not impossible to regulate.

  26. 26.

    Nellcote

    @lamh31:

    the GOP knows just like we know the answer tothe question “which group of the electorate is more likely to declare armageddon on their party if non-Amurikans are even suspected of contributing to a campaign?” The usually xenophobic group known as the Repub voter.

    They don’t seem too incensed that the Saudis own a nice chunk of Murdoch’s NewsCorpse.

  28. 28.

    Cain

    @General Winfield Stuck:

    bans on foreign or domestic sources. Not being a lawyer I didn’t understand his description of why, just that it would make such money difficult if not impossible to regulate.

    Free speech bitches!

    cain

  30. 30.

    bemused

    Breitbart & Judd Gregg had freakouts earlier on msnbc. Yeah, I think some wingnuts are thrown off their game today. Fun to watch but probably temporary if people don’t keep calling them out on their bullshit.

  31. 31.

    Cassidy

    Go for the jugular

    Or in the case of the average Dem, lick the spot of mustard off of his chin for him.

  32. 32.

    Ana Gama

    @General Winfield Stuck:

    the former ABA president said that what the decision did was make it impossible to track where this soft money originated, and therefore impossible to determine if that money violated other statutes, which I presume would mean bans on foreign or domestic sources.

    I can very easily imagine foreign corps running money through organizations like the Chamber of Commerce and getting away with it….not unlike the insurance companies have done recently with HCR.

  33. 33.

    handy

    @mistermix:

    Or kick dirt in the players’ faces, either. Although I’m not sure if that analogy strengthens the point or not.

    BTW, dropped into Jeralyn’s House of Fun just now. Wow! I’m starting to think that Obama could end both wars, pass universal health care, have 100% employment while raising the minimum wage to $90/hour and these people still would have something to complain about.

  35. 35.

    Chad N Freude

    Sandra Day O’connor is worried (concerned?) about buying elected judgeships.

    Retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor this week told CNN that she hoped the recent decision wouldn’t mean a flood of new money in elections, but feared that it would. She also raised the issue of corporate funding of judicial elections, an issue which contributed to her rulings on the bench, which upheld McCain-Feingold legislation in 2003. She said she feared judges becoming “politically-elected figures in arms races.”

  36. 36.

    demkat620

    There were plenty of populist points in that speech last night that if Dems had even a sliver of spine they would repeat until every american knew them by heart. But this one, used right, could be a killing blow. A lovely little wedge to be used just like abortion. And it plays to a very, very wide swath of americans.

    “Do you really think its okay for Saudi Arabia to have a say in our elections?”

    Oh my they wouldn’t like that at all.

    Oh and props DougJ. The Daddy Mac will make ya…

  38. 38.

    handy

    Is it just me, is DougJ one wounded, violent motherfucker?

    I dunno but he probably could lay off the early 90s kiddie rap references.

  40. 40.

    dricey

    Ayy, there’s the rub: IF the Democrats are smart.

    Has anyone seen any evidence of such smarts?

  41. 41.

    Max

    Obama’s problem is that he’s not attending enough Washington parties. At least according to Sally Quinn.

    Linky.

    The article is crap, but the comments are golden.

    A gem…

    I’d like to applaud the Washington Post for filling a long-standing, heart-felt need in the nation’s political discourse. Could you please follow up with a guest editorial from Marmaduke? Or perhaps ruminations on foreign affairs from Family Circus?

  45. 45.

    AhabTRuler

    I put forth Faust/Charlie Daniels

    Look, we all know that a gold violin would sound terrible and weigh hundreds of pounds, but the point is that you pay the whoresons too much of a complement. Those crappy, flabby villains are worth about a Lucas cross-promotional entertainment experience, no more. They are just that banal.

  46. 46.

    Comrade Luke

    @stevie314159:

    I was going to write “You had me until ‘If Democrats are smart'”, but damned if you didn’t beat me to in IN THE FIRST COMMENT!

    Nice work, sir. Or ma’am.

  47. 47.

    Ana Gama

    @Chad N Freude: The impression I got was that she was mostly issuing a warning to states and localities where judges run for office, unlike federal judges who are merely appointed by politicians…..jeebus!

    She was humorous, though…”“Gosh, I step away for a couple of years and there’s no telling what’s going to happen,” former justice Sandra Day O’Connor exclaimed at a Georgetown symposium on campaign finance and judicial elections on Tuesday.”

  48. 48.

    Napoleon

    Just a point, people up thread and otherwise talk about “foreign corps” putting money into US elections but the problem with the decision is much more elemental. The theory is the corp is just a bunch of American citizens associating and so the corp should be able to speak for them. Of course any American corp of any size has foreign ownership. Even if every foreign shareholder in an American corp is passive, the fact is that whatever the corp spends in an American election is in part foreign money, because there is no way to divide it out (well there was, but that was the system they overturned, where the company could set up a separate PAC that only qualified individuals could contribute).

    So you don’t even need some scenario where some foreign evil doer is trying to undermine the nation for this to be a problem.

  52. 52.

    General Winfield Stuck

    @Max: LOl

    for filling a long-standing, heart-felt need in the nation’s political discourse.

    Personally, round the clock Roadrunner cartoon episodes would fill that void for me.

    Beep! Beep!

  55. 55.

    mr. whipple

    Obama’s problem is that he’s not attending enough Washington parties. At least according to Sally Quinn.

    Jeebus, what a load of vapid crap.

  56. 56.

    kay

    @Chad N Freude:

    I get a little tired of her apology tours.
    I remember when she came out, hair on fire, and started yelling that judges were getting threats.
    Who the hell has run for the last 30 years on “black robed judges” and their “antidemocratic tyranny”? It wasn’t liberals. It was her beloved GOP.
    Who is she talking to, anyway? Why doesn’t she address the more radical elements on her own side?
    90% of the country knew this stuff was dangerous before she raised all these belated alarms. She’s hardly the town crier.

  57. 57.

    demo woman

    @Napoleon: As a stockholder, I should have the right to disagree with the allocation of my funds used for certain political candidates. Yeah right!

  58. 58.

    jenniebee

    @General Winfield Stuck:

    That can backfire though. Is it irresponsible to speculate about whether the money to run those ads came from the Bin Laden family themselves? It would be irresponsible not to speculate!

  59. 59.

    Flappy McScrotum

    @Ana Gama:

    I can very easily imagine foreign corps running money through organizations like the Chamber of Commerce and getting away with it….not unlike the insurance companies have done recently with HCR.

    “In other words, even if Sony Corp. in Japan couldn’t spend money directly for or against a candidate, the electronics company’s American-based subsidiaries could. And that’s got some conservatives upset, fearful of the influence of foreign money on U.S. politics.” Decision may mean more foreign cash[Politico]

  60. 60.

    rufflesinc

    @kay: That’s what I admire about Ginsburg. She has that stoicism and grittiness that O’Connor doesn’t. That and O’Connor has changed her mind about a couple of votes she made in judicial election cases.

  61. 61.

    Violet

    @demkat620:

    There were plenty of populist points in that speech last night that if Dems had even a sliver of spine they would repeat until every american knew them by heart. But this one, used right, could be a killing blow. A lovely little wedge to be used just like abortion. And it plays to a very, very wide swath of americans.

    —

    “Do you really think its okay for Saudi Arabia to have a say in our elections?”

    You speak the truth. Dems should be pounding this stuff home at every available opportunity. And unlike the typical wingnut talking points, this has the added benefit of being true.

  63. 63.

    Comrade Scrutinizer

    @Napoleon:
    __

    The theory is the corp is just a bunch of American citizens associating and so the corp should be able to speak for them.

    Putting aside the question of foreign ownership, even this idea is bullshit. The corporation’s voice is the voice of the guys running the corporation, not the employees as a group. When I go to work for a corporation, I leave free speech rights at the door. The notion that the corporation somehow speaks for me is nonsense, just as is the notion that the corporation should have free speech rights at all.

    Citizens already have free speech rights: giving corporations any rights in terms of political speech is a corruption of the idea, and a particularly repellent one at that.

  64. 64.

    Chad N Freude

    @kay: Don’t think I’m holding up O’Connor as a paragon of judicial judiciousness. Whatever good she did as a SC justice is overshadowed, if not obliterated, by her vote in Bush v Gore (about which she now says she isn’t sure was the right decision). I do think that she is right about this threat, and I hope that she gets a lot louder about it.

  65. 65.

    General Winfield Stuck

    @jenniebee: I have a feeling that a few years down the road this decision will backfire big time. Citizens now can hardly stand the onslaught of ads and other campaign non sense with telephones, mail, etc…/ I see the mother of all backlashes coming from the populace at large, even wingnuts. Hopefully, enough to soften the states up for a Const. Amendment to once and for all decide that dollar bills cannot speak good English, or any other language at all. Wishful thinking maybe, but it will do for now.

  67. 67.

    Cat Lady

    @demkat620:

    No. SATSQ.

    Greg Mitchell and Froomkin were beacons in the dark of the Bush years. He’s been right on everything, which is why you’ll only ever see him on KO or Rachel.

    Sigh.

  71. 71.

    Brachiator

    You had me until “If Democrats are smart”.

    Hah!

    Sad, but true. Smart Democrats in Congress is an oxymoron.

  72. 72.

    kay

    @rufflesinc:

    I try to be generous. She means well. I guess I just bristle a little at her giving me a civics lesson. I am worried about state courts, and I know she seeks to have judges appointed, at the state level, rather than elected-now that may have real urgency, thanks to her buddies, and that’s certainly something we should be talking about.
    Would that she had been more aware of these possible repercussions back when she could actually do something about it, right?
    This “shocked, SHOCKED!” thing she does gets on my nerves.
    She was practically trembling with outrage when she was discussing this HOSTILITY towards judges a couple of years ago, she was personally offended, and all I was thinking was, well, where did that come from? Hmmm…. lunatic right wingers, perhaps?

  73. 73.

    Napoleon

    @demkat620:

    Who is she and what is her background?

    @Comrade Scrutinizer:

    Hey, I am not saying it is not, just that on the foreign ownership issue this is a problem. By the way, the point you make is one the right has made for years against unions.

  75. 75.

    geg6

    demkat620: No way! He’s adorable. And pretty smart. That said, the Dems should hit those GOPers with this and hit them and hit them and keep hitting them. Hugo Chavez! Sheik Omar! Hizbollah! Lil Kim (the Korean one…oe maybe not)! All able to control our elections! And when those pigs come flying over my house, I’ll know they’ve started.

  77. 77.

    Montysano

    @demkat620:

    There were plenty of populist points in that speech last night that if Dems had even a sliver of spine they would repeat until every american knew them by heart.

    The landscape is fucking littered with unused populist talking points. It’s like money laying around, and the Dems are too timid/lazy to bend over and pick it up.

    The average American has taken a savage fucking from the Wall Street/Insurance/Pharma lobbies, but yet 1/2 the country still mindlessly trumpets their love of the Free Market, and their abhorrence of gummint. It’s a marketing triumph of the highest order.

  79. 79.

    Cat Lady

    “Dems should say” – who would that be? Who is an effective spokesperson for the “Dems”, that when that person speaks it gets attention? I vote for Franken, but he’s a “comedian”. Who should speak for “Dems”? It should be Harry Reid, but… no. The fact that no one comes to mind other than Obama is the problem here. There isn’t an effective Dem wurlitzer. The well reasoned arguments don’t work, we need the bumper sticker messages. Simple, effective and true.

  82. 82.

    Midnight Marauder

    @Cat Lady:

    “Dems should say” – who would that be? Who is an effective spokesperson for the “Dems”, that when that person speaks it gets attention? I vote for Franken, but he’s a “comedian”. Who should speak for “Dems”? It should be Harry Reid, but… no. The fact that no one comes to mind other than Obama is the problem here. There isn’t an effective Dem wurlitzer. The well reasoned arguments don’t work, we need the bumper sticker messages. Simple, effective and true.

    I hear Harold Ford is free these days. And apparently, he is PHENOMENAL at message control.

  84. 84.

    dr. bloor

    @Chad N Freude:

    Sandra Day O’connor is worried (concerned?) about buying elected judgeships.

    Sandy Fucking Day can’t DIAF fast enough to suit me. Bush v. Gore, bitch. You don’t like Roberts’s and Alito’s judicial philosophy? Look in the fucking mirror. They’re your legacy.

  85. 85.

    J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford

    @demkat620:

    Btw, why does Melinda Hennenberger have a job? She is idiotic.
    Churlish? That speech was nowhere close to churlish.

    I saw that too. Henneberger sounded like Steven Hayes last night on FOX News.

  86. 86.

    Ana Gama

    @Cat Lady:

    The well reasoned arguments don’t work, we need the bumper sticker messages. Simple, effective and true.

    Al Franken: Pro-Reform Bumper Stickers Have ‘Just Way Too Many Words’

    “The opponents of reform have found their bumper sticker, their slogan, their rallying cry, it’s one word: No. You can read that on a bumper,” said Franken. “Our bumper sticker has — it’s just way too many words. And it says, ‘Continued on next bumper sticker.'”

  91. 91.

    BombIranForChrist

    I’m with you on the Alito thing. His muttering didn’t reflect well on him as a justice, but I don’t think it deserves the attention it’s getting. I guess it fits into the journalism theme of “Republicans can’t keep their willies in their pants during presidential speeches”, but geez. It’s not a big story.

  92. 92.

    Bruce (formerly Steve S.)

    The Republicans are flinching on the issue of foreign money in elections.

    Could be an interesting one. Out here in the Pacific Northwest I’m reminded of the Seattle Mariners, purchased in 1992 by the CEO of Nintendo. Baseball nearly nixed the deal because they collectively freaked out at the thought of a foreigner owning a franchise of the national pastime, but it was eventually approved. Though majority owned by a Japanese investor the team is run by a mostly American front office. Point being, I assume there are an awful lot of situations like this, a corporation whose executives presumably cannot be barred from dumping money into politics on behalf of the company because they are red-blooded ‘Mericans, but which is owned by foreign interests.

  95. 95.

    eemom

    @dr. bloor:
    @geg6:

    yep. A-fucking-men and hallelujah to that.

    Can’t believe she even had the nerve to give that speech. Does she somehow lack awareness of her blood-soaked legacy?

    May she rot in hell next to all the murdering, plundering thugs she unleashed on this country and the world. And her “brethren.”

  97. 97.

    John O

    I come from a long line of verbal sadists (though I don’t like to think of myself as one) and I know how the game is played—you prick, prick and when someone flinches, you know you’ve hit a nerve and you plunge the needle in as far as it will go.

    Creepy. You’re absolutely right about this. And I can relate. Worse, I admit I am one.

  98. 98.

    Bender

    No, the real irony is that the Present who was elected using funds which were shadily hidden from the verification process — Teh Zero’s campaign intentionally disabled basic security measures to prevent illegal or anonymous contributions — is now worried about foreign money in campaigns! Oh, I’m sure all those prepaid, untraced credit card donations were from American citizens!

  101. 101.

    NickM

    Dead on.

    I had to chuckle at “If Democrats are smart” too. Was that a glimpse of naivete or a joke?

  104. 104.

    Anne Laurie

    I come from a long line of verbal sadists…

    Ah. Irish blood, then. On the floor and the furniture, some of it. Ever read Prince of Tides? Pat Conroy, for all his gothic overreach, does the best job I’ve seen of describing the ways verbal and emotional abuse cohabits with physical abuse in dysfunctional family epics.

    P.S. It’s easier for people to recognize Chunky Bobo Brooks as an epithet if you give it proper capitalization.

  106. 106.

    DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)

    Mr. Fix’t to the rescue!

    Obama’s problem is that he’s not attending enough Washington parties. At least according to Sally Quinn.

    Shorter Sally: “Obama’s problem is that he’s not rubbing the elbows, massaging the egos and kissing the asses of those of us who really matter in Washington, thus proving that he isn’t one of us.”

    OT: Thinking about what Erickkk, Son of Erickkk, said about the Obama’s SOTU last night (“cocky”), the first thing that came to mind was Erikkk and other wingnuts drooling and going gaga over Bush and his cocky bullshit like “Mission Accomplished”, the flightsuit/codpiece ensemble and other endless examples of “cocky”. We had eight disastrous years of “cocky” and they loved, cheered and applauded it every bit of the way. The fucking wingnuts love “cocky”, they have embraced “cocky”, they want to be seen as “cocky”.

    But now they want us to believe that “cocky” is bad, that after eight years of “cocky” they finally saw the light. The error of their ways. Bullshit, “cocky” is the new n****r. Same with “arrogant”, “aloof” and other dogwhistles we are hearing when they are describing Obama.

    Dogs across the nation howl in agony when they hear shit like this, we should be too. It’s inhumane.

  107. 107.

    KCinDC

    I don’t have that much problem with the Politifact writeup. It says Obama’s comment was “barely true” and uses various phrases like “a reasonable interpretation”. Milbank is the one who somehow took “barely true” to be a support of Alito’s mouthing “not true”. Someone called him on it later in the chat, but he brushed it off with a joke.

  108. 108.

    SIA

    @bemused: I saw Judd Greg on MSNBC, on the Veronica & Betty Contessa & that Other Girl Show. I have never seen him act like anything other than a total dick. He’s some bitter shit.

  109. 109.

    Ana Gama

    @Cat Lady: Anthony Weiner

    Edit: He make the most lucid arguments I’ve heard on Medicare for All, and he’s a good debater…smart and scrappy.

  110. 110.

    jenniebee

    @General Winfield Stuck: Or Conan O’Brian – I understand he’s available at the moment.

    Seriously, anybody who’s interested in turning the Tea Partiers into a viable third party should be heading to NH next January to work for Stephen Colbert and Frito Lay. Tell me that Stephen Colbert couldn’t draw crowds of a size to make Sarah Palin’s heyday look like a Gainesburg Town Hall meeting that has a scheduling conflict with Bingo Night at the KoC. And this electorate wants to send Washington a message – tell me there isn’t any better way to do that than to give this guy a primary win.

  111. 111.

    Wilson Heath

    Like I said when the stupid, incorrect ruling came out:

    The muppet huggers all exported the tops of their corporate groups about 5-10 years ago. The top-tier corporations are often post office boxes in the Caymans. Tax reasons — the damage was done long before Congress closed the loophole. I don’t care if a Delaware Corporation is operating in the U.S. and has been for a century — if the top of the group is a foreign corporation, so is the “U.S.” one. Take it a step further — if the nominally U.S. corporations can’t demonstrate that their stock is ultimately owned more than 50% by U.S. individuals (i.e. not other corporations or unincorporated entities), presume that they are foreign.

    Why the hell should they be entitled to unlimited spending influencing U.S. political campaigns if they are foreign owned and/or controlled? The rotting excuse for an opinion left this avenue of regulation open, and it jibes with a moronic conservatard Bork frame that the 1st Amendment speech protections protect political speech and little if anything else. Their evil little heads will spin with the dilemma — if they buff the corporate nob, they may strengthen speech rights for the DFHs.

    Also, why not follow the example of California and strip rights from a class? Amend the constitution to be clear that any non-natural “person” is not a 14th Amendment person.

  113. 113.

    Cat Lady

    @Ana Gama:

    He’s smart and wonky, but he’s nobody. We need a Big Media force – Bill Clinton could do it, but I think he’s too busy with his own empire, and I believe he still holds a grudge against O. He’s the only one who could cut through the idiot talking heads like Matthews and the John King/Wolf Blitzer/George Stephanopolous. He’d be great.

  114. 114.

    Anne Laurie

    @dr. bloor:

    Sandy Fucking Day can’t DIAF fast enough to suit me. Bush v. Gore, bitch. You don’t like Roberts’s and Alito’s judicial philosophy? Look in the fucking mirror. They’re your legacy.

    Harsh, and yet accurate. Sandra Day O’Connor is the exact judicial counterpart of George H.W. Bush… a proud patrician who chose to use the screaming undereducated thugs of the paranoid RW fringe as sockpuppets to keep those people (us DFHs) away from “her” nice carefully-zoned gated community of the political sphere. And now the thugs have moved in, complete with junker cars & abandoned political utilities strewn around their weed-strewn lawns, and scarred half-starved fightin’ dawgs skulking around the neighborhood raiding the garbage cans of discarded philosophical tropes… her Beautiful mind recoils! Sucks to be you, lady. P.S. Look out for that Roberts guy, his landscaping may look better than his “friend’s”, but one of these days the cops are going to find all those dead hookers and delivery kids hidden in his crawlspace.

  116. 116.

    Deschanel

    @Max:

    Oh my God. Those comments on Quinn’s Marie Antoinette gimmick are hilarious and richly deserved.

    I love especially someone pointing out that she’s from Georgia, not born into the DC elite. Comments about her “Victorian tea parties” also warmly appreciated. I only wish she read the comments- cruel of me but I’d love to imagine her dabbing tears with a lace kerchief before repairing to the fainting couch. A dreadful woman she is. What a snob, what a bore.

  117. 117.

    Dennis G.

    Nice post.

    PolitiFact is one of those pseudo fact check efforts of various media groups. Their true/false line is subjective and so are their ratings. Missing from their reports is context and the scope of the rating within the context.

    If their work is to be judged by the standards they use, then their work can not be trusted as they have shown errors of bias in the past.

    It is sideshow journalism that scratches the surface of facts and then walks away. It reminds me of the amazing bullshit of CNN’s “Keeping them Honest” segments with their over-hyped promotion of soft-core reporting. I always expect to find that CNN has hired Ron Burgundy or another of the Channel 4 News Team when I see one of these reports.

    But then again, they could all be working at Politfact.

    Who knows.

    As for Dana, what can one add to the words already used to describe the quality of his work.

    Cheers

    dengre

  118. 118.

    Frank

    Supreme Court Ruling Spurs Corporation Run for Congress
    First Test of “Corporate Personhood” In Politics
    Following the recent Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission to allow unlimited corporate funding of federal campaigns, Murray Hill Inc. today announced it was f…iling to run for U.S. Congress and released its first campaign video. And Murray Hill Inc. is running in MD 8th District as a Republican.

  120. 120.

    Cat Lady

    @Frank:

    What’s the progressive equivalent of ratfucking? This is going to get good. They’re “cutting out the middleman”. Win.

  122. 122.

    General Winfield Stuck

    this is like a different blog here at BJ since the SOUS – All smiles and puppy dog tails.

  123. 123.

    Hob

    I thought the Kris Kross outfits were part of Michael Steele’s plan to appeal to the modern new young generation of youth of today.

  124. 124.

    lamh31

    OT, but if in the future some college or university decides to offer a course in Presidential Speech-writing: The Obama years, a) I would take it just to hear and reflect on Obama’s grand writing skills (with or without actual speech-writers,
    and b) James Fallow of the Atlantic should be the professor.

    Fallows academic analysis of the SOTU speech is a very good read.

    Annotated State of the Union text
    by J Fallows

  125. 125.

    Ash Can

    @Chad N Freude:

    Sandra Day O’connor is worried…

    Hey, Sandra Day O’Connor! Come on down! Come join your pal Peggy Noonan here on the stage for an exciting round of THIS! IS! YOUR! LEGACY! ::crowd cheers::

  126. 126.

    KG

    @AhabTRuler: Scalia is only a couple of years younger than Ginsberg (she is 76, he is 73). But Ginsberg has recently battled colon cancer. I use to believe that Stevens (age 89) would step down after a Democrat won the presidency. Now, I think he may serve until he passes away. Scalia, Kennedy (also 73), and Ginsberg are the three I’d keep an eye on as far as potential retirements in the next couple of years. Thomas is surprisingly young at 61 (not much older than Alito or Roberts, but I’d say a much, much better Justice).

    Assuming Ginsberg, Stevens, Kennedy, and Scalia leave the bench in the next 3-5 years, the make up of the Supreme Court may be fairly static for a decade or two.

  128. 128.

    Xenos

    Something is seriously wrong with O’connor. She graduated close to the top of her class at Stanford Law School and then could not get a job at a law firm because she was female. Actually, there was one firm that offered her a job, but that was as a secretary.

    How someone could go through that experience and not become a strident feminist and be able to empathize with the poor and marginalized in society is just bizarre. I guess her class consciousness and solidarity won out in the end.

  129. 129.

    Cat Lady

    @General Winfield Stuck:

    Calling out SCOTUS was full of fucking win….

    Rallying the troops… Eyes on the prize… Hopey changey… Losing battles, winning wars… The arc of justice… Right over might…

    I really really really don’t want to feel hopeless.

  130. 130.

    rob!

    Considering how pathetically out of it Republicans are, the existence of Kris Kross is just getting to them, like the light from a dead star…

  133. 133.

    Nellcote

    @Cat Lady:

    We need a Big Media force – Bill Clinton could do it, but I think he’s too busy with his own empire,

    He’s sort of busy right now trying to get those same global corps to donate to his Haiti recovery project.

  134. 134.

    demo woman

    @KG: Steven’s has given hints that this is his last session. Scalia is too stubborn to leave early plus let’s not forget it’s the Roberts court. I’m not sure about Robert’s health. He has had seizures and I missed explanations on what caused them. Would it be wrong of me to suggest that he resign so he could take care of himself and his family.

  135. 135.

    Cat Lady

    @Nellcote:

    If he really wanted to push healthcare, he could, and he’d be hugely effective. I just don’t think he wants to make it any easier for Obama. He’s not a fan.

  136. 136.

    Nellcote

    @lamh31:

    OT, but if in the future some college or university decides to offer a course in Presidential Speech-writing:

    I love the stories from Japan of students using Prez. Obama’s speeches to learn english.

  137. 137.

    Mark S.

    I’d like to get in on the Sandra Day O’Connor can fuck herself with a rusty chainsaw bandwagon:

    “This is terrible,” she exclaimed. She explained to another partygoer that Gore’s reported victory in Florida meant that the election was “over,” since Gore had already carried two other swing states, Michigan and Illinois. Moments later, with an air of obvious disgust, she rose to get a plate of food, leaving it to her husband to explain her somewhat uncharacteristic outburst. John O’Connor said his wife was upset because they wanted to retire to Arizona, and a Gore win meant they’d have to wait another four years. O’Connor, the former Republican majority leader of the Arizona State Senate and a 1981 Ronald Reagan appointee, did not want a Democrat to name her successor.

    The decision in Citizens United is a billion times more defensible than the decision in Bush v. Gore.

  138. 138.

    Nellcote

    @Cat Lady:

    My mistake, I thought you were talking about the supreme court decision re: global money.

    But given MSM idiotcy, the story would be a rehash of Clinton’s failure last time rather than what’s going on in this century.

  139. 139.

    Chad N Freude

    @Xenos: Republican politics and Bush v Gore aside, I thought she was a feminist. Am I wrong? Well, yes and no. I’m kind of surprised at the intensity of the vituperation directed at her on this thread.

  142. 142.

    WereBear

    @Chad N Freude: There is something wrong with a person who voted that way on Bush v Gore, and yes, the last ten years of my life would have been different.

    And better.

    And I’m not the worst off over the last ten years, not by a hell of a long way. Like the millions of dead, for instance.

    This should be laid at her door.

  143. 143.

    Chad N Freude

    @Mark S.: Thanks for this cite. I had a vague memory of her delaying her retirement for this reason but couldn’t find a reference. Why did she wait until 2005?

  144. 144.

    Tom Hilton

    Late to the thread, but…I loved this comment from a guy on another message board:

    Barack should’ve pointed at him and asked him to repeat himself so the whole class could hear, then pointed to the door and said “My office, now”.

    That would have been a moment to cherish.

  147. 147.

    KCinDC

    Yargh. Made the mistake of following a link to Althouse:

    Isn’t it fascinating that the lengthy, amplified, magnified speech of the most powerful man in the world with his big captive audience — in the magnificent room and in smaller rooms all over the country — are outweighed by one man’s headshake and silent mouthing of 2 or 3 words?

    And it gets worse from there (though fortunately doesn’t go on much longer). Instapundit linked it, of course.

  148. 148.

    Wilson Heath

    @Mark S.:

    The decision in Citizens United is a billion times more defensible than the decision in Bush v. Gore.

    Yeah, but what isn’t? Okay, the Holocaust is at the top of the list of things less defensible, but it isn’t a long list.

  156. 156.

    Ash Can

    @Mark S.: I was thinking of bringing this up myself, but you beat me to it. For want of a vacation/retirement, a superpower/democracy/nation was lost.

    I feel the same way about her as I do about Peggy Noonan. As soon as she utters Word One of complaint, I want to slap her so hard she doesn’t want to speak again for three years.

  158. 158.

    Mark S.

    @Chad N Freude:

    I was saying I didn’t understand it either. Waiting until after the 2004 election was pretty risky, considering Bush wasn’t a shoo-in to win it. Maybe she thought retiring too soon after Bush v. Gore would look bad, but she needn’t have worried. She looked plenty bad after that case anyway.

  162. 162.

    darryl

    Steven’s has given hints that this is his last session.

    Steven’s what has given hints that this is his last session? Steven’s bodyguard? Steven’s poolboy?

  163. 163.

    oclib

    I see a whole new K Street listing in the near future……Carpetbaggers without boarders….and immigration is wonderful when it can assimilate with “dead presidents”….Heck, even C Street will swallow that…..

  165. 165.

    KCinDC

    Wow, the brain damage I suffered from reading Althouse apparently made me continue on to suffer further damage by reading the comments there. I finally tore myself away when I got to the one about how Obama was pissed at Clinton for missing the SOTU, and how she’s been plotting her primary challenge to him since before Massachusetts.

  167. 167.

    darryl

    Huh. I’ve had a goatee for a month now, and it’s a modified one. (The beard was too hot when I move to the Deep South. There’s a small part on the side, where the moustache and chin parts connect, that get extremely itchy, due to how the face folds when talking. So I cut out a small part on each side. Everybody still calls it a goatee. But I just learned there’s a specific name for it, because apparently other people have done the same thing. It’s called a Balbo, after a famous Italian general named Italo Balbo, who used to do it.

    pic here:

    http://kenbaker.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/italo_balbo.jpg

  170. 170.

    Lex

    The thing that struck me in perusing Wingnutistan this morning was the theme that Obama’s call-out was somehow an attempt to “intimidate” the Court’s judicial-activist conservative wing.

    I mean, these are people who have been appointed and confirmed to lifetime jobs. How do you even go about trying to intimidate someone in that position?

  171. 171.

    Chad N Freude

    @Lex:

    I mean, these are people who have been appointed and confirmed to lifetime jobs. How do you even go about trying to intimidate someone in that position?

    By implying that his/her lifetime may be shortened. You don’t see many spy movies, do you?

  172. 172.

    Mattsky

    If Democrats are smart, they’ll hit them so hard they’ll knock their clothes backwards like Kris Kross.

    This is the best you have to hit the Republicans with? You folks are really grasping for straws. While I’m here would one of you please explain to me how an Administration that has as its major legislation agenda making sure all American have health care opposes funding for the 9/11 health bill?

    Which do you think will resonate better with the public?

  173. 173.

    DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)

    @eastriver:

    Cute but not cocky enough for Erickkk!

    If Erickkk doesn’t like cocky then the next obvious question to ask, is ‘is he a cockblocker?’  It would be irresponsible not to speculate.

    Is it just me or does anyone else think Erickkk looks like a chunky Ralph Malph/Donny Most?

  174. 174.

    handy

    Which do you think will resonate better with the public?

    Not necessarily defending Obama on this if true, but seriously…NOW you care about the 9/11 rescuers?! GTFO.

  175. 175.

    Jibeaux

    Linking on my iPhone is beyond my powers right now, but re: golden fiddles, please find John moe’s 39 questions for Charlie daniels from mcsweeneys. Pee your pants funny. Carry on.

  176. 176.

    DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio

    I just got back from a liquor-tasting event.

    In my family, that was called “breakfast.”

  177. 177.

    PAR

    If Democrats are smart, they’ll hit them so hard they’ll knock their clothes backwards like Kris Kross.

    This is why I’m here.

  178. 178.

    Mattsky

    NOW you care about the 9/11 rescuers?! GTFO.

    I care now and I have cared in the past.

    It Looks like Obama is finally fixing this mistake before it turned into a disaster. May be they will smarten up with the 9/11 health bill too.

  179. 179.

    Brian J

    Oh, please. The Republicans would be shitting themselves if some French company tried to buy influence with the Democrats. (And if the we tried to buy influence in French politics, the French would have a right to be outraged.) There’s nothing xenophobic about it. It’s a matter of minding your own business, or in this case, a foreign company minding its business.

    You’re right that the Democrats should nail the Republicans with it, because there’s no easy out. Make them own it or work to change it.

  181. 181.

    bob h

    Remember how Republicans made so much hay over the seeming participation of the Chinese Army in our politics back in the 90’s?

    There is a particular resonance with the Chinese because of a subtle racism that the Republicans were happy to exploit. Now the tables are turned.

  182. 182.

    Mattsky

    Remember how Republicans made so much hay over the seeming participation of the Chinese Army in our politics back in the 90’s?

    Remember how Republicans made so much hay over the seeming participation of the Chinese Army in our politics back in the 90’s? FIXED

    You people are confusing a ruling by the SCOTUS as being that of the GOP. (That is an opening for some snark. Consider it a gift) I don’t think you will find any GOP Senators or Congressmen taking issue with stopping foreign money from entering US elections.

    Go back to work looking for a wedge issue that will have traction in November. This dog won’t hunt.

  183. 183.

    General Winfield Stuck

    @Mattsky:

    You people are confusing a ruling by the SCOTUS as being that of the GOP

    Absolutely goddamn right we are correctly laying the blame for this abomination on the GOP. This “wedge” issue as you call it will likely not provide traction for us this year, but soon after it will. And it doesn’t much matter what GOP CC;res think in the end, because the public will be appalled at the shit they experience slung at them from every angle for future elections and will be out to blame someone.

    They will be gladly pointed in the direction of an out of control wingnut activist court currently cheered on by the likes of you and your fellow wingers. Enjoy the advantage of corporate whore cash that will flow into GOP coffers for now. Because when the public gets sick of it they will rightly blame the right wing, and won’t much care for foreign fascists chipping in with hopes of a permanent right wing junta oligarchy in the US of A.

Comments are closed.

Trackbacks