Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

John Fetterman: Too Manly for Pennsylvania.  Paid for by the Oz for Senator campaign.

The GOP couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Eh, that’s media spin. biden’s health is fine and he’s doing a good job.

We still have time to mess this up!

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

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

In my day, never was longer.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

You cannot shame the shameless.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

You are here: Home / Just a Shadow of a Man I Once Knew

Reader Interactions

51Comments

  4. 4.

    Brandon

    I don’t really care what the cause is and I am sure that young woman and her family don’t either. Kudos to Pelosi for aggressively weeding out the bad apples in the caucus.

  5. 5.

    PIGL

    I’m unhappy about the teen-aged girl, assuming the pseudo-allegations turn out to be true. In that case, it would be better for the rapist to disembowel himself with a runcible spoon on the steps of The Capital, pour encourager les autres.

  7. 7.

    Brian R.

    For some reason, I can’t get Deadwood dialogue out of my head on this.

    “Wu! Cocksucka!”

  8. 8.

    j low

    @Punchy #6- Does the gold rush, farm labor, WWII internment, or gateway to the Pacific mean anything to you?

  9. 9.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    It sounds like Wu is crazy, not high.

    I believe the term you’re looking for is “mentally ill,” or “suffering from mental illness.” I’m sorry to see his personal medical/mental health information splashed all over the media in a way that will not help him, and will only increase the stigma of mental illness. It’s a damned shame that he couldn’t get help before that unfortunate young woman was traumatized.

    Yeah, I have no sense of humor about this. So what?

  10. 10.

    gwangung

    I’m unhappy about the teen-aged girl, assuming the pseudo-allegations turn out to be true. In that case, it would be better for the rapist to disembowel himself with a runcible spoon on the steps of The Capital, pour encourager les autres. But instead, like all other office-holding criminals, he will more likely appear with his priest and wife to return publicly and in tears to the waiting arms of Jeebus.

    How many Dem dirtbags go back into public life (i.e., not be paid shills)?

  12. 12.

    kay

    What happened to Kay’s thread that you stomped on?

    It’s my fault. I hit publish too soon, didn’t realize it, then took a phone call.

  13. 13.

    LittlePig

    How many Dem dirtbags go back into public life (i.e., not be paid shills)?

    ’bout as many as Republicans, I’d guess.

  14. 14.

    Brachiator

    It sounds like Wu is crazy, not high.

    In addition to the allegations of inappropriate behavior, Wu should never have run for re-election.

    The alleged incident raises new questions about Wu’s behavior during the 1st District congressman’s re-election campaign last year. According to staff at the time and emails from the period, he behaved so erratically that staff avoided scheduling him for public appearances and ran a campaign that relied heavily on advertising. Shortly before the Nov. 2 election, senior staff quietly shut down the campaign office and sent other campaign workers home.
    __
    In February, following unexpectedly large staff turnover, Wu acknowledged extreme stress last year, which he attributed to the campaign and problems in his marriage. He and his wife are in the process of getting a divorce. He said he sought counseling and has taken medication for an unspecified mental condition.

    I hope he gets whatever help he needs.

  15. 15.

    Ahasuerus

    It sounds like Wu is crazy, not high.

    Nah, he’s just an ordinary guy. But it finally got to him.

  16. 16.

    Dexter

    O/T..but Jim Jordan of Republican Study Committee confirms that Boehner doesn’t have the votes in the house to pass his plan.

  18. 18.

    LittlePig

    What happened to Kay’s thread that you stomped on?

    It’s up above. I made a comment on that one before wandering down here.

  19. 19.

    Lol

    There’s an entire generation of popular Seattle liberal politicos that have been waiting for McDermott to retire. Did anyone seriously think there was ever room for Kucinich?

  20. 20.

    Amanda in the South Bay

    I’m not that unhappy; I grew up in Wu’s district, and its pretty reliably Dem, though unfortunately the bulk of the population in it is reliably suburban and sorta whole foods shopping/upper middle class-ish (Beaverton, Hillsboro, etc). The last GOP challenger that I remember was…an Iranian American woman back in the Bush years, she got trounced for some reason or another.

  24. 24.

    Punchy

    Does the gold rush, farm labor, WWII internment, or gateway to the Pacific mean anything to you?

    I expressed my surprise at Asians in Oregon, not California.

  25. 25.

    The Moar You Know

    Does the gold rush, farm labor, WWII internment, or gateway to the Pacific mean anything to you?

    Punchy: All of these issues were at play in both Oregon and Washington as well, especially the land grab perpetrated on the Asians of the region. Not just Cali.

  26. 26.

    Amanda in the South Bay

    I expressed my surprise at Asians in Oregon, not California.

    I only lived the first 25 years of my life in Oregon, so take it with a grain of salt, but Oregon isn’t some monolithic white state. Geez, the way some people talk, Oregon is Utah on the Pacific. Portland, Eugene and Salem are reasonably diverse, the smaller towns not so much (but what small towns are) and Wu is an adult transplant to Oregon, IIRC.

  27. 27.

    MikeJ

    @artem1s:

    so I guess Dennis will have some where to run once he’s redistricted out of OH.

    Good, Orygun can have him. He’d been making noises about coming to WA and running for the brand new district here.

  28. 28.

    wrb

    I expressed my surprise at Asians in Oregon, not California

    Gold Rush: Rogue & Applegate Valleys (Resulting in towns named Gold Beach and Gold Hill

    Farm labor… everywhere

    Internment: Tule Lake, on the border.

    Gateway to the Pacific: PORTland.

    Oregon has lots of Asians

    Wu seemed like a good guy a few years back but seemed to loose his grip lately. Drugs or brain problems, by appearances. Sad

  31. 31.

    quaker in a basement

    @comrade, eemom

    It’s a song lyric. Steely Dan, Are You With Me Dr. Wu.

  32. 32.

    Cain

    Yeah, Wu was a pretty good guy. He would have these random “phone forums” where, you’d get a call and be connected to a open forum to talk about the district. It was really empowering.

    The governor did something similar too.. it was great to talk about shit like the kicker law which I fucking hate. I don’t want the goddam money back.. keep it and put it in a rainy day fund.. then spend it when things are bad. Luckily both, Repubulicans and Democrats are working on getting that out of the constitution.. (the fact that republicans are participating shows that we have SOME sanity in the state political circles)

  34. 34.

    j low

    @wrb #28- Don’t forget the gold rush in my home town Canyon City. There was once a large Chinese population in Grant County. The Kam Wa Chung museum is one of the most awesome little secrets in all of Oregon.

  35. 35.

    nancydarling

    Punchy, there are Japanese wheat farmers in western Kansas whose families have had the farms since the 1800’s. I have a Japanese American friend whose great-grandfather homesteaded in Colorado in the 1800’s.

    There was a Civilian Assembly Center in Portland,Oregon and a relocation camp in Tule Lake, CA which is very close to Oregon.

    You need to get out more.

  37. 37.

    Mattminus

    Can we stop referring to adult women as “teenagers”? I’ve got no brief for Wu, but the language creates the impression he was going after 13 year olds.

  38. 38.

    wrb

    Comrade:

    Are you with me doctor wu
    Are you really just a shadow
    Of the man that I once knew
    Are you crazy are you high
    Or just an ordinary guy
    Have you done all you can do
    Are you with me doctor

    Me, I find “mentally ill” and “suffering from mental illness” oppressively clinical

    Dude is twisted, crazy, moogie-shoogie, flip city
    No more ifs or ands or buts

  39. 39.

    albatrossity

    I actually knew David when he was a premed at Stanford back in the mid-70’s. I thought he was a bit tightly wound, but that was pretty normal for Stanford premeds then, and it probably hasn’t gotten any better since. I do hope that he gets the help he obviously needs.

  40. 40.

    PIGL

    gwangung@10: I just naturally assumed he was an R, without having read carefully. I cravenly edited my comment to remove the public rehabilitation part (see upthread). But now I am not sure. A person with a real mental illness could conceivably initiate something interpretable as unwanted sexual contact without being a rapist or ordinary sleazebag thereby. In that case, I would be sorry for both of them.

    In contrast, the only excuse the Republican sinners seem to have is that they are Republicans.

  41. 41.

    Draylon Hogg

    Generation sex, elects
    The type of guys
    You wouldn’t leave your kids with
    And shouts off with their heads if
    They get laid

    The Divine Comedy 1998

  43. 43.

    trollhattan

    FWIW the PNW (well, maybe not Idaho but do include B.C.) has a robust Asian population. For example: our current ambassador to China, Gary Locke, was Commerce sscretary, Washington governor and a high school classmate of my sister (in Seattle).

    While Wu orchestrates his retreat, let’s keep our eyes on the other corner of the nation. (Yup, I keep thinking of “Deadwood” and his conversations with Al at The Gem.)

    http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/07/21/2324906/feds-investigate-rep-rivera-on.html

  44. 44.

    Tony J

    sixers @ 30,

    Breitbart is behind this!

    Really? I hadn’t heard that.

    Maybe you should send a memo up the troll-chain and let the right people know that Andy isn’t pulling his weight vis-a-vis promoting the source of this sting. After all, how are Real Americans supposed to know they should feel good about this when they don’t even get told that it’s not what it seems, i.e. another example of the DemoRats cleaning house better and faster than the GOP ever does, and is instead another hard-won victory for the Citizen Journalists of the Right?

    Get on it, sunbeam, there might be a job in it for you when the dust clears.

  45. 45.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    Given the Steely Dan reference, which I got, I didn’t take offense at the crazy, not high. Though while we’re objecting to things, how about instead of hoping he gets the “help” he needs, why don’t we hope he gets successful medical treatment? When’s the last time you hoped someone with heart disease or emphysema or cancer got “help” for that? I thought so.

  46. 46.

    gwangung

    PIGL S’okay….we do know that Rs have been clinging to office and most Dems have been forced out.

    I have no problem with the Democratic response. Sleeping with teenagers…eewwww.

  47. 47.

    Older

    Punchy: I live in Oregon, and have most of my life. My current job takes me to a lot of the smallest towns in the mid-valley area. I go to Philomath, Alsea, Aumsville, Gates, Sodaville, and every one of them has both black people and asian people. In addition to white and native people, who also live all over the state. Even the small towns are “diverse”, racially.

  49. 49.

    shortstop

    hip hop:

    When’s the last time you hoped someone with heart disease or emphysema or cancer got “help” for that? I thought so.

    Friend of mine who occasionally posts here says that in his parents’ northern Michigan town (Bart Stupak’s old district), when someone gets cancer, everyone holds bake sales to show their community spirit and the power of private-sector solutions. The results cover the patient’s care for about 13 seconds after the insurance company arbitrarily drops him or her. The premature death that ensues is quite agonizing, but is extended enough to give everyone plenty of time to continue bitching about what a fucking commie Obama is, ruining our healthcare system.

    I totally agree with your point, BTW. :) Just wanted to tell that story.

  50. 50.

    Bmaccnm

    To Punchy{: The owners of the fruit orchards in the Hood River Valley were predominately Japanese before WWII. All of those people were relocated and their land was taken. Very few owners got their land back.

    To Mattminus: 18 is a tricky age. Yes, you’re legally an adult, but many 18 year olds have no real experience at being an adult. They don’t always make the best choices, especially if those choices involve much older, much more influential friends of the family.

    To HHAFI (FBQ): It may be harder to cure mental illness than heart disease,emphysema, or cancer, as it is much harder to remove the damaged parts. A person with mental illness has to actively participate in a cure, not simply and passively place trust in a healer.

    I am always pleasantly surprised at the Orygun representation here. I live in the People’s republic of Southeast PDX, myself.

  51. 51.

    stinkdaddy

    @33 Oh good, I was going nuts thinking I was the only one noticing that. “Unwanted sexual contact?” Oh, you mean “Sexual assault,” lame-ass power-worshipping media? Not exactly a novel concept I’m expressing here, but when the media can’t bring themselves to say ‘sexual assault’ or even ‘groping’ it’s no wonder these fuckers figure they can get away with anything.

Comments are closed.