WHAT NEXT?!

GEORGE FELIX ALLEN JR.


Let's see, he called his opponent's campaign aid "macaca" then give six different explanations and non-apologies over the incident. Then we find out that he's been awful cozy in the past with a certain affiliate of the Ku Klux Klan. He is later asked if he knew that his maternal grandfather is Jewish and he flips out about it. Just recently he has declared in no uncertain terms that he has never used the "n-word" though more and more people are coming forward to dispute that claim. To me, that's about enough scandal for three election cycles, but Felix apparently likes the challenge of fending off controversy after controversy. But I guess he was getting tired of the garden variety racist/antisemitic stuff because he has really upped the ante over the last day or so. Ready for this one? He spits (or expectorates - gotta work on my GRE vocabulary) at people. Female people, in fact.
There are currently four different stories currently floating around that chronicle Felix's disgusting habit of indulging in chewing tobacco and then expelling the brown spittle with excellent accuracy at the feet of women. Swing State Project has the whole story, including the four instances. Some quick excerpts:

Then, the Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia gathered up a glob of tobacco-laced saliva. He used his lips to squirt it out, as if he had practiced. The spit landed just at the tip of my shoe. He grinned, but didn't say a word.

...

While they were talking, [Felix] was chewing tobacco. He spit on the
ground and a fleck of brown spittle landed on my sister-in-law’s shoe.

...

... Allen turns away and spits a long brown streak of saliva into the dirt, just missing one of his constituents, a carefully put-together, blonde, ponytailed woman approaching the senator for an autograph. She stops in her tracks and stares with disgust at the bubbly tobacco juice that almost landed on her feet.

...

[Felix] made a few remarks to the crowd and then stood with his back to us, turning once to aim a jet of tobacco spit directly at our feet.

I urge you to go read the whole thing over at Swing State. It's great, if somewhat stomach-turning, stuff. It's just amazing the amount of controversy that surrounds this guy. And this is a guy who, until a few months ago, was an early front-runner for the GOP nod for prez in '08. God help us.

I can only imagine what he might do for an encore. I'm thinking that perhaps in his spare time he like to run over children with cerebral palsy or maybe he enjoys killing bunnies and kittens with various garden implements. I welcome any suggestions from my loyal readers over what will be the next "...-gate" to strike Felix's campaign.

KNEEL BEFORE JOEMENTUM

MARSHALL BULLMOOSE WHITMAN


The Bullshit Moose is at it again. And this time, it's pretty sickening. Based on a recent poll that shows Joe Lieberman up by 10 on Ned Lamont, the Moose has decided that it's time to genuflect before the beauty that is Joementum and kiss his ring. He had this to say:

Some Democrats who have shunned Joe or endorsed his opponent should have some second thoughts. Joe will return to the Senate next year as likely the most powerful Senator. Those donkeys who desire to be President of the United States should consider this - Joe better represents the electorate than over-hyped McGovernites with modems.

Can someone please go knock on this assclown's door and ask him why Joementum won't even mention Iraq anymore? Why it's next to impossible to actually have a position on the issue? Why he is against releasing the full NIE? Why Joe claimed to be for working towards ending the war before being against working to end the war? Why Joe claims that it doesn't matter what the National Intelligence Estimate says since will not change his wrongheaded position on Iraq?
And why is the moose harping on one poll. The one he refers to is from Quinnipiac and it does in fact show Lieberman leading 49-39. I wanted to check back and see if Quinnipiac might have been an outlier in the past and sure enough, there's have some of the largest margins seen in any recent polls. Going back to August 18, Quinnipiac had Lieberman up 53-41; go back to before the primary on July 18th (three weeks before the primary) and the lead was 51-27. Three weeks before a primary that Lamont won and Quinnipiac had Joe up by 24%?! And we're supposed to take this seriously.
Besides, how come the Moose isn't crowing about Joe's enormous leads in some other recent polls, like a Zogby Interactive that has Joe leading 46-44, or an ARG poll showing Joe with a 47-45 lead, or a Rasmussen poll that has Joe leading 45-43? All three of these polls were taken within the last few weeks and all show Joe with a statistically insignificant "lead" yet Moosey uses the outlier as proof that Joementum is back and it's better than ever!
You know, I just don't get the Moose. I used to dig reading him sometimes. His was a witty and fun little read each day. But now he's just so far gone with his support of Lieberman that it's a shame where he's at now. Maybe he should pull his moose head out of his moose ass and realize that Joementum shouldn't be the guy to blow all your credibility on.

I GOT YOUR "N-WORD" RIGHT HERE!

GEORGE FELIX "NINCOMPOOP" ALLEN JR.


Continuing to inspire some enterprising writer to pen the tale of "How I Went from '08 Presidential Contender to Losing my Senate Seat All in the Span of Two Months", George Felix Allen Jr. now has a new kick. I guess he thought that the "macaca" controversy had run its course, so he decided to rustle up a new one. Recently, a Salon article revealed that Felix has used the "N-word" in his past. Now before I'm drowned out with hundreds of "So?" in the comments section, Felix decided to do the extra dumb thing and claim that he has never ever never ever never used that word in the entire history of his world.
Two huge problems for Felix here; first, he's dealing in an absolute. Never? Never ever? C'mon, we all know his history, his fascination with the Confederacy and nooses, his relationship with the KKK or the CCC or whatever it's called. Given this, does he actually expect anyone to buy that he never used the "n-word"? Seriously?
Second problem I see is that he immediately painted himself into a corner. More and more people are coming out daily claiming that he has used the word, but since he already issued his "never ever" denial, there's no way for him to back out of it without looking like a big stupid racist liar. One would think that he had learned from the whole "macaca" thing that when you say something stupid, you quickly apologize for it and move on. It negates the point of attack and allows you to move on. Try this out, Felix: "Yes, I have used that word in the past. I'm ashamed that I have used it and I can assure you that I no longer use it. It's a dispicable word and it has no place in civilized society. Now, what I want to talk about is x and y...". Subject closed, move on. Instead, Felix issued his unrealistic denial and will now spend the next two-plus weeks denying it while more former associates come out of the woodwork to undermine his denial. Now this is a no-win for him. There is no one that is going to come out in support of Felix and with any kind of authority say that he or she is 100% certain that Felix has never said the "n-word". If he had issued a quick apology like the one above, then any further revelations would pretty much be moot. I'm no political consultant, but this campaign is operating like a middle school class treasurer campaign. Mistake after mistake has been made, and every indication is that it will cost Felix his current job, and further down the road, a chance at the presidency.

POINT/COUNTERPOINT

BILL FRIST


Since I rarely borrow so judiciously from other's writings for a single post, please allow me this. Via Bob Geiger's blog:

How did Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) commemorate Constitution and Citizenship Day, when he returned to the Senate floor on Monday? In an odd twist of logic, he blamed the minority party for how little work has been done in the 109th Congress.
September 17, which fell on Sunday, celebrated the ratification of the United States Constitution and Frist used that occasion to announce that Senate Democrats are actually the reason that the last 20 legislative months have been proclaimed the "Do-Nothing Congress."
"Too often my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have inhibited the fulfillment of our duty," said Frist, after a stirring reading of the preamble of the Constitution. "They have relied on obstruction and thrown up roadblocks at every opportunity. They have let politics get in the way of sound policy and purpose. That is unacceptable."

Poor Fristy. I mean, he's only got 55 senators who just happen to be long to the same party as him. How can he be expected to get anything done with that darn minority party getting in the way. Instead of pointing this sort of obvious fact out, Minority Leader Harry Reid had this to say instead:

"This Republican Congress has wasted 20 months on horse slaughtering; the Schiavo case, dealing with someone's personal relationship, which should not even have been before this body; gay marriage; the nuclear option; flag burning; repealing the estate tax," said Reid. "But they could not find a day for some time to look at the President's mistakes, missteps, and misconduct, which have hurt American security and plunged Iraq into a civil war -- not a day."

Reid expounded on the lack of Congressional oversight over the last few years:

"During the Civil War, President Lincoln was faced continually with oversight hearings by his Congress. Of course, we know during World War II, there were a number of commissions. The most famous was that conducted by Senator Harry Truman of Missouri, which led to his becoming Vice President. Some say, but for that he would not have been chosen as Vice President."

What was the Truman Commission? It was to determine what was going on with World War II. Was money being wasted? Were troop levels right? Korean war hearings were also held, and the same for the Vietnam war. But for this war, none--even though this war has taken longer than it took to settle the differences in the European theater in World War II. Soon it will be the same amount of time that we were able to beat Japan."

Reid absolutely excoriated Majority Leader's bullshit. To come with such weak game like this just illustrates more and more how absolutely hilarious it is that Fristy still believes he is a viable candidate for president in '08. The guy is a clownshoe; a sockpuppet for the Bush regime. Giving him four years in the White House after eight years of the Bush nightmare/debacle/horror show would be the equivalent of putting a loaded gun in Uncle Sam's mouth and pulling the trigger. Let's not let that happen.

LUUUUCY, I'M LOSING!

RICKY SANTORUM


Dollars to donuts, Ricky is the guy who invariably makes me laugh. More so than even Lieberman and Felix. I don't know, they guy is just a big goofball who has to know by now that he has no chance at holding onto his seat in the Senate. Over the last few weeks, the GOP has done everything in their power to shift the narrative and puts Dems on the defensive, mostly through Bush's "Fears and Lies U.S. Tour" that just recently wrapped up in front of a sellout crowd at the UN. Add to this media blitz the fact that Santorum has been running negative ads against his opponent Bob Casey and one would assume Ricky would receive some sort of boost in the race. And if you're one of those that would assume such a thing, then you would be wrong. Shorter me: Ricky, meet the tank. This is where you be living. After all the Bush blitz and all the ads, Ricky still cannot get closer than nine percent to Casey, and most polls do not even have him cracking 40% support. Far be it from me to frolic in the misery that is the Santorum campaign but it couldn't happen to a bigger ass.
Want one more laugh? This one's a doozy - you'll love it! The big ad that Ricky threw out there featured actors supposedly portraying four big donors to Casey's campaign meeting in a shadowy smoke-filled room. Oooh, spooky stuff, right? Well, Santorum's campaign later conceded that the four donors that the actors were portraying had never actually given money to Casey and two of them had in fact contributed to Ricky's campaign! Dude, that's freaking awesome!!! What can Ricky do next, show pictures of cute little bunnies and then have in a big bold font how a vote for Casey will result in these bunnies' deaths?! Ah, it is to laugh. Thank you, Ricky. When you go down, you go down hard, buddie.

MAVERICK MY ASS

JOHN MCCAIN


John McCain once again donned his Maverick star this week as he stood up to Bush on the matter of not violating the Geneva Conventions to allow torture. He was doing his thing, talking all tough about how the Conventions had quite possibly saved his life. McCain was tortured for a time as a prisoner of war during Vietnam, but it was the United States' position of moral authority that convinced the North Vietnamese not to torture POWs. Given this circumstance, McCain seemed to really be standing his ground. Until today.
Here was yet again another example of the bullshit facade that is the McCain Maverick. He'll look strong in facing Bush before it actually matters, but when the chips are down, he folds. Plain and simple. Thursday night was just another example of it. After spending the week as one of three Republicans who steadfastly refused to acquiese to Bush's insane desire to torture, they closed up shop and walked away. Of course, the narrative of the legislation is that it was a compromise with Bush giving a little and McCain getting a little, but upon closer examination, nothing of the sort ever really happened.
From Marty Lederman at Balkinization:

[I]t only takes 30 seconds or so to see that the Senators [McCain, et al] have capitulated entirely, that the U.S. will hereafter violate the Geneva Conventions by engaging in Cold Cell, Long Time Standing, etc., and that there will be very little pretense about it. In addition to the elimination of habeas rights in section 6, the bill would delegate to the President the authority to interpret "the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions" "for the United States," except that the bill itself would define certain "grave breaches" of Common Article 3 to be war crimes.

Follow the link and read the whole piece. Fun stuff. And by "fun" I mean heart-wrenching and upsetting.
I've been sniping at McCain's Maverick bullshit since I started this blog, mostly concerned with the fact that the media has been sucking at the teet of the Maverick since at least 2000 and the manlove has only grown stronger over the years. They use words like "independent" and "principled" to describe a man that time after time has proven to be anything but. Time and again he's mounted his trusty steed and looked like a shining white knight against Bush only to dismount into a pile of horseshit when the camera lights are shut off. Is the media ever going to notice that the Maverick is a sham? Though I have my doubts that he truly is the presumptive front runner going into the '08 GOP primaries, the media has latched onto that narrative. My question is, will they also continue to be married to his Maverick persona this time next year when we're in full primary campaign mode? Or will they begin to open their eyes and realize he's just as devoid of actual principles as the man he pretends to stand up to on occasion?

WHERE'S MY CHECK?

GEORGE FELIX ALLEN JR.


The Allen Senate campaign continues its slow burn to November defeat with this little tidbit from campaign manager Dick Wadhams (if ever there was a radio disc jockey name, that would be it) - he's whining about how "paid bloggers" (financed by his opponent, Jim Webb) won't let go of the fact that Felix's reaction when asked about his family's Jewish heritage was so out of left field. The short version: during a debate, a moderator asked his mother's father was Jewish. Felix flew off the handle and complained that the moderator was "making aspersions about people because of their religious beliefs."
Of course, the modus operandi of this campaign is that whenever there's a misstep, there will be a denial, a strong denial, a qualified apology, a rant about how the media is attacking them for no reason and finally another strong denial. I think that's basically how it went for the infamous Macaca controversy.
Well, it seems for this controversy they're right on schedule. In a way, I agree with Wadhams - it is sort of a nonissue. In the grand scheme of things, it matters little that Felix's grandfather was Jewish (except maybe to his KKK friends, but that's another story). It's just that their successive rants and denials make it impossible not for us bloggers to keep bringing it up, if for no other reason than their screeching over whatever controversy they're embroiled in during a given week just gets more and more preposterous.
Basically, this campaign may actually have the worst damage control operation this side of Joe Lieberman keystone campaigners. And that's really saying something. Bloggers live for this kind of stuff. The fact that this campaign has a proven track record of failing to effectively deal with even the simplest dustups is like catnip to us. So much so that many of us do it for free (though if someone with the Webb camp wants to cut me a check, just let me know).

SECRET WEAPON

BILL FRIST


I was originally going to title this missive "Lapdog" but it just seemed to obvious. I went with "Secret Weapon" because I believe that Bill Frist is an often overlooked component when it comes to the national dominance of the GOP over the last four years. Installed in 2003 as the Senate Majority Leader, Frist has perhaps had closer ties with the White House than any majority leader in recent history. And it is through these ties that Bush/Cheney/Rove have effectively controlled almost every piece of legislation to come out of the Senate, and to a larger extend, out of the entire Congress itself.
I made a comment over at one of the big blogs, and I opined that there is a big difference between Bush crony and a run-of-the-mill Republican. Former Senate leader Trent Lott is what I would call a Republican while Frist is a Bush crony through and through. I did a little Wikipedia search on Lott in order to refresh my memory of on the whole Lott/fall from grace thing. For those not aware, Lott was slated to become majority leader in 2003 after the Republicans gained seats in the '02 midterms. A month after the election, Lott was in attendance at Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday party and he had some complementary things to say about Thurmond and his run for president as a Dixiecrat in '48. Here's what he said, courtesy of Wikipedia:

"I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either."

Though the remarks can be read a number of ways - a tacit approval of Thurmond's racial segregation platform all the way to a meaningless compliment to an very old man on his birthday - they caused quite an uproar. A number of Republicans brushed it off as more of the latter than the former and I tend to wonder if the thing wouldn't have died down over time if not for Bush expressing his moral outrage a few days later. It was Bush's remarks that effectively ended any hope of Lott gaining the majority leader position, allowing Frist to assume the position with Bush's full support. Lott has maintained on a number of occasions that it was the Bush/Rove machine that drove him out of the leadership position, and it is a position he still holds. To me, it makes an awful lot of sense. Granted, Rove didn't stick his hand of Lott's ass and play "ventriloquist" with him, making him say what he said, but Bushco certainly didn't miss this opportunity to remove a senator who was not as controllable as they might like and replace him with someone who apparently doesn't mind having Rove's hand you-know-where.

All of this brings me to today's announcement that Fristy is once again being the good little White House stooge as he actually threatens to filibuster (and here I thought only obstructionist Democrats did that sort of thing) a national security bill because it does not allow Bush to torture people. The current bill have strong bipartisan support in the Senate and it would appear that the Republicans that crossed the aisle on this subject are firm in their commitment to not allow the United States to further lose its moral authority in the world by allowing torture. He has made his intentions clear that the bill as written and supported by a majority of the Senate is dead and will not be allowed to pass. He has effectively drawn a line in the sand and he will not waver from standing from standing with Bush on this.
Frist has been a key contributor to the notion that there really isn't any sort of checks and balances among the three branches of government. His actions on this bill are another clear indication of this concept. In Bushworld, the president is king and Frist apparently sees himself as a faithful servant, always ready to do the king's bidding. I find it mindnumbingly hilarious that Frist envisions himself a viable candidate for president in two years. He'll be retiring from the senate next January, no doubt to clear up his schedule to campaign. It's just amazing that a guy who has acted as Bush's inside man in the Senate can somehow expect voters to not to notice that for the past four years he's been nothing but a stooge for the White House.
It'll be interesting the watch if nothing else.

IT'S THE ADVERTISING, STUPID!

JOE LIEBERMAN


I know, I know, it's bad form to beat up on Lieberman two posts in a row. I just wanted to make a quick note on something - campaign ads.
I've enjoyed the hell out of Ned Lamont's two recent ads, Yanks/Sox and Turncoat. I think that they're both fresh, smart, cool, non-wonky (no citing obscure legislation in tiny print) and just plain fun. If you haven't seen them, I highly recommend doing so. Both the links above go to YouTube, so go check them out.
Then, we come to Joe Lieberman's latest ad, Blackboard. Shorter me: LAME! Wow, just so lame. It basically had the same tired feel that I get from most campaign ads. This thing was the exact opposite of Lamont's. I guess that you should go and see just to see what I'm talking about but it's just a dumb premise. Voiceover starts with just a chalkboard with "Democrats" written on one side and "Republicans" on the other and then there's a line in between them. Then Joe enters the scene and proceeds to erase the line and blather on about what a great guy he is because he's always reaches across party lines. The tag at the end is "... I approve this message because it's about people, not politics." How he actually said that with a staight face is beyond me. And if Joe was being completely honest in the commercial, he probably should have also erased the word "Democrat" as well and put a big circle and a smiley face and hearts and flowers around "Republican". But then, that would probably not fit into the 30-second spot.

One other note - won't be much blogging today from me as my agenda is packed. Aside from regular work stuff and an inordinate amount of driving, I'm also meeting with an official at a local university about enrolling in graduate school. I've been out of school for almost ten years so it's all quite daunting at this point, but hopefully by the end of the day I'll have a better idea of where I stand. I'll blog all about it later. Thanks for coming by.