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October 24, 2008

The Tattlesnake – The Worms Turn On the Wormy Edition

Plus: Palin Prop Blames the Hired Help, the Rove-Rezko Connection, and the GOP Fear of Michael Moore

Well, you know it’s really hit the fan when all McCain can do is babble on vacuously about Joe the Plumber while Sarah the Terror veers off the reservation with an eye to her own future political career and the Backstage Crew, Steve Schmidt and Rick Davis’ crack squad of Rove-inspired GOP intelligentsia who have managed to mount one of the worst and most negative political campaigns in modern history, are eviscerating each other anonymously in the pages of The New York Times magazine. The End is Near, but not in Palin’s ecumenical concept of that notion, as the Solons of Scat have realized they simply can’t chisel and cheat enough and in a sufficient number of states to overwhelm the Obama juggernaut. With a dozen days to go and the Dem ahead by as much as 10 points in rock-ribbed Republican Indiana, the game is up. Expect resumes to be sailing out of McCain’s HQ any day now, if they haven’t been already. Meantime, The Tattler will stick to his earlier prediction: If Indiana goes to Obama, the rest of the Rust Belt Midwest, from Iowa to PA, will follow and it will be an early night and a landslide of over 300 electoral votes for BHO.

The barely mentioned saving grace this time around is that Rove’s nasty tactics aren’t working for McPalin, just as they didn’t work in 2006, nor in the subsequent special Congressional elections in GOP districts in Illinois, Louisiana and Mississippi, all won by Dems.

Thankfully, we are seeing the final death of this horrific negative-campaign monster — created by Nixon’s dirty tricksters, perfected by Lee Atwater, and adopted with a few new kinks by Rove — played out in the Palin-McCain fiasco, a proof of that Euripides quote: “Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.” Is there any doubt that what is destroying McPalin at this point is their own insanity?

When asked by David Shuster on MSNBC, Oct. 23, 2008, to explain ‘non-elitist’ regular-gal Sarah Palin’s expensive taste in clothes and accessories, ‘Republican Strategist’ Jennifer Millerwise-Dyck fell back on the time-tested and threadbare GOP excuse – blame the underlings. She basically said that Caribou-Slayer Mom was too busy herding her kids and mucking-up campaign appearances to do her own shopping, so it was all the fault of her clueless staff forcing her to wear those pricey duds from Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman-Marcus. Yes, Sarah really wanted to go to ‘Tar-Zhey’ but her damn staff fouled up! Do you laugh at the ludicrous flop-sweat desperation or moan at the pathetic lack of imagination? The Palin-McCain crack-up is like watching a limbo contest – how low will they go?

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October 22, 2008

The Tattlesnake – Lipstick on a Pygmalion Edition

Plus a Ray of Light on McCain’s Silly Phillie Charge and Other Diversions

“If your actions speak louder than words, you’re not yelling loud enough.”
– Stephen Colbert, October 20, 2008.

What’s up with God’s Own Hockey Mom, that plain small-town Wasilla girl we’ve all grown to know and love, dropping $150,000 bucks of RNC cash on clothes and jewelry from such snooty elitist shops as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman-Marcus? Say it ain’t so, Joe – has Alaska’s neo-secessionist pitbull become a pampered poodle, corrupted by her trip to the lower 48? (Perhaps it was associating with all those liberal socialists on Saturday Night Live is what did it, the same way as Obama meeting Bill Ayers turned him into a 1960s domestic terrorist by osmosis.) Jeepers, next we’ll find out she doesn’t know what the Vice President’s job is, according to the Constitution.

Speaking of Mrs. Bent Mooseburger, why isn’t the following a bigger story among the Big Media bobbleheadery? McCain’s Bullwinkle-Killer spent Alaska taxpayer money to drag the whole fam damily along with her to various events, paying out $21,000 for daughters Piper, Willow and Bristol to travel and hotel in luxury at the public’s expense. Worse, she lied when she claimed that the kid’s were invited to these events and, worst of all, altered the expense accounts after the fact. Alaska law is clear: Gov. Palin’s expense account is to be used only for official state business, period. This used to be the kind of Enormous No-No that got state executives and those playing executives on TV fired, yet the BM has hardly peeped about it. C’mon, Beemers, step up to the plate here.

Speaking of stepping up to the plate (in the head), Cap’n McCrash is indulging in yet another head-scratcher by using Obama’s innocuous political hat-tip to both World Series contenders, The Philadelphia Phillies and the Tampa Bay Rays, as some kind of example of BHO’s horrible hypocrisy. This is interesting since the Ol’ Straight-Talker himself, appearing on Pittsburgh TV station KDKA last July, recited his usual anecdote about telling his North Vietnamese captors way-back-when that some of the officers in his squadron were the starting offensive line of the Green Bay Packers, but for purposes of political pandering, changed the Packers to the defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers, even though the story was in his friggin’ book!

“When I was first interrogated and really had to give some information because of the pressures, physical pressures on me, I named the starting lineup, defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers as my squadron mates.”
– John McCain on KDKA-TV, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, July 2008.

“Pressed for more useful information, I gave the names of the Green Bay Packers offensive line, and said they were members of my squadron.”
– John McCain, from his book, “Faith of My Fathers” (1999).

“Imagine if Al Gore or John Kerry had changed the facts of a story they told forever in order to appeal to whatever swing state they were speaking in? … Also, the famous Steelers defensive line that McCain was trying to refer to (Mean Joe, L.C. etc.) didn’t become famous until after McCain was out of Vietnam.”
– Chuck Todd and Domenico Montanaro, MSNBC First Read, July 11, 2008.

Keep digging, Johnny!

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October 21, 2008

The Tattlesnake – The True Meaning of Powell’s Obama Endorsement Edition

On Meet the Press October 19th, Colin Powell took out a very thin, very sharp stiletto and carved up John McCain without ever raising his voice or uttering an angry or blatantly demeaning word, culminating with his endorsement of Barack Obama for president.

Powell has been on a crusade to resurrect his lost integrity and honor since he submitted a noxious pack of lies to the United Nations Security Council in support of Bush’s invasion of Iraq. He knows his performance was the clincher that ended the debate for many Americans – if the reasonable and straightforward Powell was behind it, it must be true.

This is the final stage of Powell’s reclamation of his character and veracity – rejecting the aggression and insanity of McCain’s more-war stance in favor of the kind of diplomacy he advocated before he served the interests of BushCo at the UN in 2003.

While his endorsement is unlikely to move many civilian voters, former Joint Chiefs of Staff head Powell is still respected in the military and his nod to Obama will signal to many in the armed forces, including the top brass, that it’s safe to support the Democrat this election.

Beyond that, it’s also a sign of the deep fissure in the Republican Party between the Old Guard secular conservatives, such as Powell’s former boss George H.W. Bush, James Baker and Brent Scowcroft, and the emergent power of the Christopublicans, embodied by the elevation of the inexperienced but devout Sarah Palin to vice presidential nominee.

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October 14, 2008

The Tattlesnake – The Old Man and the She Edition

Sarah the Terror is a Sideshow Attraction Pushing the Wretched McCain to the Background of His Own Campaign

“You’re starting to feel real frustration because we are running out of time. Our message, the campaign’s message, isn’t connecting.”
– Saul Anuzis, Michigan Republican Party Chairman, as quoted by the NY Times, Oct. 11, 2008.

Who is McPalin appealing to these days? Not Joe Sixpack, nor Hockey Moms and Dads – they roundly booed the Alaska Governor at the Philadelphia Flyers opener last Saturday; not ‘Lunch Bucket’ Workers; not ‘Reagan Democrats’ (the last two categories joining the liberal Rockefeller Republican in extinction long ago). Nope, all of the voters who fit those media-hyped pigeon holes have been suffering the pain and remorse of living in King Junior’s Politics for Profit United States of Katrina for the last couple of years.

These days, aside from the Party Hacks – that random collection of reliable bobbleheads: GOP office-seekers, low-level local staff, other small fry and their kin — it seems the only faction of American humanity — and I use that term advisedly — showing up in large numbers to see Gov. Snow Job and her doddering Grandpa running mate are a type not much discussed but well-known by the Punditrocracy and the Big Media — let’s call them Mr. and Mrs. Screwloose. These are not just Low Information Voters — they are that, to be sure — but the Lowest Common Denominator loonies and Hate-for-Jesus Christians who spend their lives forwarding brainless emails assuring the reader that prayer is what the troops in Iraq really desire more than anything else; who want the Ten Commandments hanging off every government building; who believe we were founded as a Christian theocracy regardless of the evidence to the contrary; who violently oppose the idea of someone they don’t know marrying someone else they don’t know of the same sex because it’s written in the Bible, yet still chow down on pork and shellfish; who equate ‘liberal’ with ‘traitor’ because comic geniuses like Ann Coulter told them so; who perpetually mistake actors who play cowboys for real cowboys; who go to check when someone calls asking if their refrigerator is running; who want more war with those they perceive as terrorists, even after being told to turn the other cheek by the founder of their faith; who know nothing about Islam, yet believe it is an ‘evil’ religion; who resist scientific proof of anything unless it comports with their bizarre, pre-fabulated religious beliefs; who focus on abortion as state-sanctioned murder while they applaud the death penalty and celebrate the carnage of war; who wallow with Rebel Yell pride in their ignorance and let themselves be suckered by slick Republican hucksters to vote against their own interests; who viscerally believe in an End Times scenario and subsequent Rapture that never appeared in the Bible; who think Serial Liar Sarah Palin is ready to be president since she’s just like them: a card-carrying member of the rusty-truck-up-on-blocks, fuckin’ redneck, hootin’-and-hollerin’ Kallikaks ‘ignorati’; a goofball fundamentalist Christian yahoo who shares their demented white-trash-wet-dream ‘values’ which include a spiteful racism that would make Joseph Goebbels grin and a preposterous gullibility that has made a creepy Messiah pimp like Pat Robertson rich.

Palin’s singular talent is that she can deliver her pre-scripted message competently: It’s acceptable for you to vent your hateful bigotry on McCain’s black opponent since he’s conveniently a friend of terrorists.

That said, it appears the McCainiacs running the Palin traveling carnival have misunderstood why so many people turn up at her events — she’s now a cultural phenomenon, a Britney Spears freak of nature slathered over by the supermarket tabloids, as well their big brothers in the MSM. Many Gawkers of the American Idiocracy show up not because they endorse her message, but just to get a look at the Two-Headed Geek in person. She’s a sideshow attraction now more than a serious candidate for political office. In a campaign rally last week, a good portion of the crowd started leaving after Palin was done speaking, giving the hapless McCain a view of their departing backs. It’s Palin and McCain these days, from the same lineage as Barnum and Bailey.

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October 2, 2008

The Tattlesnake – I Knew Sarah Palin Edition

…Or, At Least, Someone Like Her

Centuries ago, before personal computers, Blackberries, cell phones and The Google, Your Decrepit Tattler worked for a company that published a glossy magazine in a mid-sized, Midwestern US city. The glossy was eponymously named after the city, and the company also owned the local civic-booster travel guide and an FM radio station.

One day the word went out – the company had hired that year’s winner of the state beauty pageant to flack for the magazine, and proudly announced that the owner/publisher was confident she would go on to become Miss America, thereby enhancing the magazine’s ‘national prestige and image.’ All of us Worker Bees were ordered to come up with ways to promote the wonderfulness of Wendy Jo Stepford – her real name has been lost in the mists of age, but that’s a serviceable substitute – making sure we ‘excited’ local and state media coverage of her and, of course, the magazine for which she stood.

Our Advertising Director Ron, the dog, eagerly took it upon himself to be her personal escort and tutor, and arranged photo-ops around town to display her at various events – inaugurating the Oktoberfest celebration, cutting the ribbon at a car dealership opening, saluting the interstate trucking industry, dining at a new trendy restaurant – where she could smile with incredibly large teeth, open her eyes unnaturally wide, and proclaim forgettable hooey with the breathy guileless sincerity of a pretty 20-year-old in a miniskirt.

At first, the plans of the owner/publisher went smoothly – wherever she went, Wendy Jo attracted crowds of young women asking her about her choice in cosmetics and wardrobe, and leering old lechers who lusted to be her Sugar Daddy, and the media couldn’t get enough of her blandly sweet persona and trite, platitude-laden lexicon. Plus, she looked good in a two-piece bathing suit – somewhat incongruous for a German beer festival where she was posed with ruddy men in lederhosen, but it put her picture on the front page of the city’s highest-circulation newspaper.

The first crack in Wendy Jo’s edifice occurred during that suds-soaked Teutonic rave-up when she was asked about the history of Oktoberfest – they might as well have asked her to define Quantum Mechanics. She paused for a long uneasy moment, eyes practically bugging out of her head in naive intensity while her mouth froze in a large-mouthed professional beauty contestant grin; then came the groaner, delivered brightly: “Uh, those Nazis in Germany had a lot of bad stuff about them, but I think we can all agree that Oktoberfest was a pretty darn good idea!” Oh, you betcha! Gemütlichkeit!

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