June 14, 2010
May 10, 2010
April 22, 2010
March 2, 2010
February 16, 2010
February 5, 2010
Telling the Truth About the Blue Dog Democrats
Think President Obama had a 60-vote majority in the Senate that was spoiled by the election of Republican Scott Brown in Massachusetts? Think again. Aside from ‘Independent’ (McCain Republican) Joe Lieberman, There are ten die-hard ‘ConservaDem’ Blue Dog Democrats, as well as another five senators who tend toward Blue Doggerel. That means progressives would have had trouble getting even fifty votes on any important reform legislation. Read on, especially below the fold:
January 21, 2010
December 17, 2009
December 4, 2008
The Tattlesnake – Was Wrong Edition
“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”
– Mark Twain
In previous editions of The Tattler, some drunken idiot wrote piffle such as:
“Well, it’s three days after Thanksgiving and Hillary Clinton has still not been named as Obama’s Secretary of State. I just don’t think it’s going to happen.”
Well, it did happen, last Monday, and, I confess, the drunken idiot was staring back at me from the mirror this morning. (I am now hunched into a Basil Fawlty ball, hopping around with my head between my hands in disgust with myself.)
In another edition of The Tattler posted here November 18, 2008, “The Tattlesnake – Big Media Hillary Silly Season in Full Swing Edition,” I hilariously typed:
“Lost in most of their [the Big Media] circuitous gossip is any sort of common-sense analysis: Why would Hillary give up her powerful senate seat, and an excellent chance to be Senate Majority Leader, to serve as a peripatetic foreign service factotum in Obama’s government? The appointment would also proscribe her from criticizing him should things go sour, thereby tainting her bid for the 2012 nomination. Quick, name the last five Secretaries of State before Condi and look at what has happened to them. I think it’s fair to say the energetic Sen. Clinton doesn’t desire to live out her days lounging in academia, playing golf, or filling space on the board of some think tank or corporation, publishing occasional knotted-brow op-ed pieces in The New York Times.”
Those were, I felt, valid questions IF Sen. Clinton wanted to be president some day but, since then, I’ve checked with an Anonymous Source Close to the Obama Camp (just like the Mighty NYT!) and gathered some exclusive background that changes the picture considerably.
First off, my A.S.C.O.C. says Hillary doesn’t desire the presidency any longer. She allegedly feels that 2008 was her best shot and she hates ‘mass-market’ retail campaigning. (Hubby Bill is the political animal who loves that glad-handing stuff.) Although she likes talking to people in small groups, the speaking to large gatherings, the endless traveling, the repeated stump speeches, and the sheer exhaustion of running for president turned the fire in her belly into a bad case of dyspepsia that she never wants to experience again.
Secondly, while she liked the Senate, her ability to work on the issues that most animated her — health care, economic justice and children’s rights — was limited, and she supposedly got The Word: even with her national celebrity, there would be no jumping ahead in line – the junior senator from New York would have to wait her turn to become Majority Leader and that could take decades. (Even NY colleague Chuck Schumer is ahead of her in seniority.) Aside from that, the appointment as SoS relieved her of having to campaign for office again, and she and Obama have actually become friends since the summer and work well together. She’s willing to respect his office and policies, so there should be no conflict there, and she’s a popular figure overseas. Her keen intelligence and ability to quickly process new information are a relief to foreign leaders accustomed to dealing with the Bush-bedazzled Condi Rice.
November 23, 2008
The Tattlesnake – The Senate’s Teddy Bear Picnic and Other Maddening Madness Edition
“I don’t have a rearview mirror. I look only forward. And I still see the day when I can remove the cloud that currently surrounds me.”
– Disgraced and defeated Sen. Ted Stevens (R-VECO), on the Senate floor, Nov. 20, 2008. (Perhaps he can bribe it to go away.)
Even in politics, a business known for honking weirdoes and depraved lowlifes, outgoing Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens is Weird with a strut and horns and as crooked as a pig’s tail. Yet there were his Senate colleagues standing and applauding the convicted-on-seven-counts-of-corruption felon last Thursday, proving, I guess, that there is some honor among thieves — or, at least, praise. No wonder the Senate Ethics Office is a toothless farce – what do you have to do to engender the disrespect of these ‘public servants’? (Oh, right, tell the truth.) Utah’s ‘Mr. Republican’ Orrin Hatch, another blazing nutball with a hard nougat center of Petrified Kook, publicly ejaculated without shame that Ted was “one of the greatest men I ever met,” while his colleague from the Planet Strange, Sen. Jim Bunning, GOP marital aid of the KY-Jelly state, spread it on less grammatically: “If only you knew the Ted Stevens like I knew.” Democrat-turned-Wolfman Norm Coleman, verging on a well-deserved term limitation up in Minnesota, bayed to Ted’s moon-that-don’t-shine, “Those of us who know him also see the love that’s in his heart, reflected in love of country, love of family…” unnatural love of sheep. Even I-da-ho Spud Stud Larry Craig felt moved to knock three times on Stevens’ pipe with his own spit polish, so to speak.
Jebas, what if Uncle Ted had shot a man in Memphis just to watch him die? Would the Senate just rise as one to elect him King – or maybe Pope?
It’s too bad that AG Michael Mukasey collapsed suddenly during a speech Thursday night, but what the Big Media didn’t remark on was who Mukasey was speechifying to – the frickin’ Federalist Society, home base for the Unitary Executive malarkey that the departing Little King has used to justify dodging the Constitution. Sure, BushCo is on its way out the door, but you might think that the BM would be a little discomfited at the idea that the Attorney General, dressed up in a tux, was addressing a meeting of a group that basically believes in an American monarchy, much like democracy-distrusting icon Alexander Hamilton, who once encouraged George Washington to declare himself King of the United States. [Take a gander at FedSoc’s founders and current members: Ed ‘The Grand Inquisitor’ Meese, Robert ‘Nixonite’ Bork, Ted ‘Florida Recount’ Olson, John ‘Bob’s Dad’ Roberts, Tony ‘Bush v. Gore’ Scalia and Sam ‘The Sham’ Alito.) For a rough political equivalent, imagine the hew and cry if Obama’s new AG Eric Holder passed out while speaking to the Socialist Worker’s Party — think the venue would go unnoticed by the still-unjailed Press Gang at Newsweek and Time?
She Stoops to (be) Flounder: Remember those stories about a young Danny Quayle seeing the Robert Redford film, “The Candidate” and thinking it was a primer for a career in politics? Now it seems the Alaska Hockey Momster has aimed even lower; she’s apparently using Tim Robbins’ satirical flick, “Bob Roberts” as a roadmap for political success. For more cinematic inspiration to further Sarah’s future in government service, may ‘oui’ suggest “Amazon Women on the Moon,” “Idiocracy,” “The Aristocrats,” “Weird Science,” “Ernest Goes to Jail,” and “Linda Lovelace for President”?
And finally, the Vatican has forgiven John Lennon – imagine that? (Hint: it has to do with something he said in 1966.) I wonder if they’ve caught up with the news that he was murdered in 1980? (Lennon’s lucky; it took the Pope about 400 years to forgive Galileo for finding out the earth is round and circles the sun.)
(Quotes re Stevens from “We Salute You, Ted Stevens!” by Benjamin Sarlin, The Daily Beast, Nov. 20, 2008.)
The Tattlesnake — The Alvin Greene Fraud (and More) Edition
Just How Stupid Are South Carolina Republicans?
“I’m the Democratic Party nominee. I mean, I mean, the people have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina.”
– Alvin Greene, apparently accepting the Dem nomination for US Senate from South Carolina, as quoted by CommonDreams.org.
Did the South Carolina GOP really think they could sneak this poor hapless vet through without anyone noticing? Regardless of what the Bias-Belted Insider Punditocracy says, I think the SC GOP, including cynical rump-pimple Sen. Jim DeMint, are a lot more vulnerable than the Big Media Babblelonians realize. It’s the only reason the GOP dirty tricksters would try a lame stunt like this – what with the aftermath of the Mark Sanford scandal and the Republican-run state cratering economically mired in record unemployment, they’re getting desperate.
Sadly, 13-year military veteran Greene resembles an advanced PTSD case in the way he speaks and acts. He may also have a drinking or drug problem that needs servicing. Such people are easy to hornswoggle for money into buffoonish charades such as this. If the SC Republicans abused a brain-damaged vet this way, they should be boiled in BP’s Gulf oil. (They should anyway, but that’s another story.)
It shouldn’t be too hard to find out how an unemployed man who had declared himself indigent a couple of months ago came up with $10,400 to put his name on the ballot, didn’t spend a dime for anything else in his ‘campaign’ (even his t-shirt reads ‘Greene Family Reunion,’ although he wears it as if it had something to do with his senate run), and somehow won against an experienced former judge and state legislator, Vic Rawls, who actually went out and campaigned across the state. (Maybe it has to do with the fact that in SC Republicans can vote for Dem primary candidates, or the state’s easily-hacked, no-paper-trail touch screen voting equipment manufactured and installed by GOP-friendly companies.) This stinks of blatant election fraud and it would seem easy to prosecute the seamy GOP lowlife that is surely behind it.
Not only that, but SC Rep. Jim Clyburn’s Democratic primary opponent, a shit-grinning ‘bidnessman’ named Gregory Brown, supposedly spent $70K to challenge incumbent Clyburn. Curiously, more than a third of that money was paid for ‘marketing strategies’ to a firm owned by Preston Grisham, who worked as a special assistant and campaign manager for Republican Rep. Joe “You Lie!” Wilson up until November of 2009, and was flacking for two SC Republican candidates at the same time he was being paid by Brown. Move along, nothing to see here, stop connecting those dots.
Perhaps this is to be expected in a state that spawned the late Lee Atwater and his nasty and devious approach to political campaigning, but certainly Eric Holder’s DOJ can take action to charge those responsible for such obvious, and stupid, attempts at defrauding South Carolina voters – these were elections for federal office, after all.
Read more:
“Clyburn’s Dem Challenger Denies He’s A ‘Plant’ — But Hired GOP Rep.’s Aide”
– Christina Bellatoni and Justin Elliot, TPMMuckraker, June 11, 2010.
“Clyburn Alleges Conspiracy To Plant Candidates In Three Dem Primaries In S.C.”
– Christina Bellatoni, TPMMuckraker, June 10, 2010.
“The Alvin Greene Interviews; a TPMtv Original Video”
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.