Mucking Around With Chicago Young Republicans: Hillbuzz's Prophet-Making Enterprise

Identities shielded out of sheer embarrassment for the subjects

The absurd little man who once selected Snarkopolitan for random target practice, Kevin Dujan, aka Harvey Bilk, Lord Of The Flies at $hillbuzz (on right, sporting air of mystery and overactive antennae), collected his first real scalp this summer. Based largely on the paranoid Palinophile's not very reliable say-so, his erstwhile buddy, the president of Chicago Young Republicans (above, in pink turban) (and a purported member of the Mittens Mafia of Romney thuggery!!!) was forced out, and now Harvey's clamoring for more scalps. And more.

Harvey's confabulatory antics are well known to Snarkopolitan's, and other, rightier blogs', regular readers, and I really wasn't going to revive this post, but since Harvey's wading back into the icky goo of Chicago politics, a little perspective might be a good thing.

Time was when Harvey and the turbaned fellow above were, as a Chicago magazine put it, "Unlikely Friends." Heck, as the tagline says, "They’d probably be enemies if they weren’t best buds!" Oh true, oh inarguable! The friendship, in fact, must have gone awfully sour.

First, let's consider this quote:

"Unbalanced, vainglorious, and vindictive, yet exceedingly charming and bisexually attractive, “The Prophet” was fired by the Murphy campaign"

"The Prophet?" What is this, an airport paperback? It is fiction, isn't it? Triply adjectival horrible fiction?

It isn't fiction? Well, in a way. It is another Dujanian brew of Gothic poli-romance junk fiction, with more unsubstantiated accusations by mysterious anonymous shadow figures than populate the crumpled contents of Danielle Steele's wastebasket. "The Prophet," Dujan insists, is in fact the very same young man with whom he is posed up there as the Beast With Two Fronts!

And, even better, the unnamed group that emails Hillbuzz (and a few other Chicago RW polibloggers, not all of whom are persuaded) calls itself, ludicrously, "Roxy Vanilla."

This blog's interest in the particulars of Chicago Republican politics is miniscule, but if political organizations are going to start tricking themselves out like drag queens and posting rabid, foam-flecked perorations that are to oratory what armpit-solos are to violin concertos, we're going to have a look. And looky here at this spectacular piece of wroth-waxing:

"Resign PROPHET, just resign. Resign before you are thrown out. Or

do you want to go out in some blaze of glory and burn the whole
house down with you? That is more your style isn’t it. Guess
what? There are more surprises coming. Do not even think you are
smart or you can maneuver your way out. You lost. Go. Quit.
Resign. Leave town. Get out. Put Chicago in your rear view
mirror. Or risk suffering the consequences.

Roxy Vanilla"

There was more. There was so much, much, more. But when you read that frothing, fantastic coup-de-grace, you know that Dujan must have fantasized about using it ever since he was a sprout bouncing on his parents' sofa, using a bathmat for a cape. Charming picture, until you realize it's a power-drunk thirtyish blogger aiming it at a 23-year-old former friend.

Hillbuzz's "Roxy Vanilla" stirs up an accusation against the head of the Chicago Young Republicans that had been handled internally, to the evident satisfaction of the original complainant, a year before. What Kevin Dujan does not mention in reheating this leftover is that he has a conflict of interest. In an October 5 post examining the whole mess, one Michael Volpe charges:

While Hillbuzz has been the driving force in raising the profile of this story, its proprietor, Kevin Dujan, failed to disclose a conflict of his own. He was a Hillary Clinton supporter who joined the CYR to help John McCain get elected. He stayed on after the election, but in June of 2009 he was considered for the position of fundraising director. ([!]--ed.)When that position went to another member, Dujan had a very public blow-up and wasn't seen by the group again.

Michael Volpe is a blogger for Andrew Breitbart's Big Government, which would not ordinarily recommend him, to put it delicately, to this scandalously lefty blog. But it's interesting to see a Breitbart writer take on another blogger who has been doing his best to flirt with Breitbart. Given the pounds-per-square-inch of hissy fits, melodramatic outbursts, and passive-aggressiveness in any Hillbuzz post, it's not hard to imagine the reality of the "very public blow-up."

Volpe's article also details the divisions in the CYR that found Dujan parted from his "best bud," which tidbit of course Dujan omits in his breathless pulp-thriller plot.

Just as Snarkopolitan doesn't want to become embroiled in Chicago Republican (or any Republican!) politics, this blog isn't going to pass judgement one way or another on the young man Dujan was so eager to accuse, except to remind all parties to consider this particular source.

But this is not the end of the story. It actually gets crazier.

The crux of the accusation against "the Prophet" is that he either tried to put some cheesy moves on, or attempted to restrain by sitting on the lap of, a young woman who didn't find him compelling, and wanted to leave, which she subsequently did with another woman who'd been there the entire time. But Dujan doesn't give his audience details; he simply calls the encounter, "attempted date rape:"

"Murphy was provided with a copy of the attempted date rape complaint filed against “The Prophet” by a young Chicago woman back in July 2009; Murphy received that complaint while he was still attempting a gubernatorial bid of his own, running with a staff comprised squarely of “The Prophet” and other young, relatively inexperienced 'Romney Guys'”

Date rape? That's horrible. There are obviously ugly political currents underlying this post, but that's a serious charge the writer's passing along there. So the segue seems a little abrupt when in the comments of the same post, the readers are treated to this:

Hillbuzz Says:

July 16, 2010 at 10:40 am
"We will give him this: he is cute. especially when he first wakes up in the morning and is all mussed hair mr. blondy sleepy needs his coffee bear."

WAIT....What?

Oh, jeez. Of course.

After all, this is Hillbuzz! So Harvey Bilk has just published allegations that "the Prophet" may be a rapist, and now, in the comments of that same post, he's calling him "mussed hair mr. blondy sleepy needs his coff---"
blechh blechh blechhh!

Excuse me.

But what is the proper response when somebody tells you:

a. So-and-so should be investigated for committing rape.
b. And I've slept with him! And he is like, so cute!

Harvey's loyal readers have had a little trouble digesting this one, and some couldn't quite fight either the nausea or the cognitive dissonance:

B***** Says:

July 16, 2010 at 10:51 am
"Oh, ICK! What a geek!! Ip, I agree.
If this is the best Old Moneybags can DO, that’s just sad!

The Boyz said he was cute so I was expecting somebody MUCH more studly.
Not in a million years!"

Now fights there within the bosom of Harvey Bilk a battle royal between his Sammy Glickitudinous desire to advance himself, and his preening vanity, which begs that his readers recognize that he does NOT sleep with sad icky "if this is the best old Moneybags can do" unstudliness. No! He sleeps with positively adorable date-raping man-candy, prompting this exchange:

Hillbuzz Says:

July 16, 2010 at 11:01 am
"He is nerdy cute. And a surprisingly good snuggler."

Reply
B***** Says:

July 16, 2010 at 11:13 am
"TMI…TMI…TMI…TMI!!!!!

Boyz, have mercy!
Must…find…brain…bleach"


B***** and other of Harvey's followers are conflicted any old which way; is B***** repelled by the idea that Harvey's called a rapist "cute?" Or is she unable to handle the fairly tame mental image of two men snuggling? Or is it those two men? As Hillbuzz's audience gradually turned from Hillarophiles to Palinophiles, the number of people comfortable with even mild homoerotica undoubtedly dropped. Where she fit in the continuum is hard to say.

In any case, BRAIN BLEACH, STAT!

Boasted friend to women, and boastful lover of their (and some men's, too!) sexual predator, Harvey Bilk is quite a piece of work.

It's not funny that either this man has done what he is accused of, or else he is the innocent target of a Hillbuzz smear campaign. Or that there's a greyish, boozy, furry reality not easily discernible to anyone, even the participants.

As always, Harvey buries his hapless readers in yards and yards of unrelieved block text, in post after post about Chicago Republican politics that this blog is not going to try to dissect. Frankly, except for hoping that there was in fact no date-raping going on, this blog's official position is not to care.

Except to note that the all the raping, closeted, covering-up miscreants seem to be part of that damnable gang of smiley-faced Utah-based mafia, the Mormons, whose bland menace is represented in the Buzz-reviled person of Mitt Romney. Mittens is running, putatively, against the Kwittin' Image herself, former half-Governor Sarah Palin. And that might have everything to do with why Harvey Bilk has pulled the plug on a beautiful, unlikely friendship, one that got the retiring Mr. Bilk a write-up, by name, with picture, half a year before he went thermonuclear at the idea that he had been "outed."

The retiring and anonymous Mr. Bilk might also have forgotten an interview he gave to a magnificently credulous CBS reporter. Bilk happily gave his real name, the name of his virulently nutty online screedatorium, Hillbuzz, and FAN-ta-sized designing a green wardrobe for his inamorata, Sarah Palin.

And by green, he doesn't mean organic bamboo rayon, he really means GREEN. Because dressing like a Lucky Charms logo is sure to quieten the voices of Enviro-fascists who are not in love with the Alaskan Frozen Cheezkake. Excellent job of branding, Harvey.

How could the Palin campaign ever get by without you.

**BONUS!!**

Harvey's "All the Kids Love It When I Read My Hatemail Post turned into a Wordle! (Click through for full-size) "I" "Me" "My!"

Brought to you as always by Mrs. Polly of Snarkopolitan, the undead blog, who says, "Ask me about Tattoine Sarlacs! Go ahead, ask me!"

Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, Thank Heaven The New Agenda Will Speak For You!

A kiss on the hand may be quite continental, but hardhats are a noblewoman-by-marriage's best friend
** *** ** *** ** ***
Oh hell's bells, just consider this a visual supplement to Betty Cracker's wonderful post.

Just like poor old neglected Snarkopolitan, Betty Cracker's blog looked like Coney Island in January, before it was also jolted into life by a dimwitted neoMcCarthyite schlub who thought she'd be a convenient target, and easily intimidated. And once again, he was predictably wrong.

Now, the dimwitted neoMcCarthyite's chum, Elizabeth Cady Siskind, Voice of All Women Mostly,
is holding a "tribute" to noted Fox populist Lady Lynn Deforester, who deplores elitism unless it's a decrepit acquired-by-marriage title accompanied by an ancient pile in the very best part of London. This would be only half as laughable as it is if it weren't that Lady Lynne holds onto her tatty honorific even as Charlton Heston held onto his last gun, all the while condemning the President, who grew up fatherless and only recently finished paying off his college loans, as an elitist.

But as Betty points out, the New Agenda's pose as "Voice For All Women," is certainly belied by the behavior of its one-and-only visible representative, a woman who is not averse to a few dirty tricks,

Here's a Siskind quote Betty pulled out, which I have decorated to lighten the burden of realizing that women as puerile, snide, and just plain childish as Amy Siskind could have a rolodex full of lazy producers who accept them on short notice as viable mouthpieces for women's rights, and living rooms large enough to hold a half-dozen "prominent" dilettentes whose pretentions are enough to impress fools into parting with their money.

Behold Amy at work, answering an unfortunate who made the mistake of asking an honest question:




brought to you by Snarkopolitan, the undead blog, cataloging just some of the dishonesty and dirt, because we are only one person, and we work, but not on Wall Street!

Driving the GOP

What better image for the GOP than that of a bloated, loud-mouthed, drug-addicted, Viagra hound multi-millionaire sitting in his ormolu encrusted Palm Beach mansion hoping the president's programs for rescuing the economy fail? And the proud parade of Republicans prostrating themselves before his Steele-reinforced throne?

Mrs. Polly On the Air: KPFT's the Inner Side

Scooter, Host of the Innerside on KPFT, the Houston Pacifica station, said, "I've been thinking of having a Ladies' Night for the women of Rumproast. What do y'all think?" The women of Rumproast (America's Meatiest Blog) looked at each other, gulped, and said, "Yer on, Scooter!"

"This ain't no BS Blogtalk radio either, this is a 100,000 watt antenna, we go out all over Texas and the Gulf Coast," Scooter reminded us. "It'll be fun, we'll crunch some bones."

Rumproast first met Scooter through the mewls and hisses of diehard Hillary Clintoniacs known as PUMAs. One of them had bid on an hour of airtime at KPFT. The PUMAs used their hour to alternately scream at and dump startled KPFT callers who disagreed with them. Since they had "proudly voted a straight Republican ticket", and KPFT is a Pacifica station, that meant everybody.

To Scooter, host of his own weekly satirical program scheduled immediately after, this was a gorgeous, gift-wrapped box of crazy, delivered right to his doorstep.

He immediately put together a montage of PUMA screeches which he called "Five Minutes of Hate from the Daughters of the Democratic Confederacy." That, plus a surreal pitched battle between forces of PUMA and Rumproast on the KPFT program director's blog, led to Scooter's and the Meaty Blog's alliance.

Scooter invited two Rumproast personages to guest on his show: proprietor Kevin K, and RR's foremost practitioner of both gravity and waggery, billed intriguingly as "in the dark robes, the mysterious Dr. Strange." The show went well, and no KPFT callers were harmed during the broadcast.


Rumproast has, besides Kevin, three active posters, all women, including me, Mrs. Polly. It has an audience of mixed genders and sexual orientations. The PUMAs, incredulous that anyone with female body parts would not follow in their wandering pawprints, tastefully branded the women of Rumproast as "little female house slaves."

So I found it immensely satisfying to be invited on the radio instead of, as Scooter called her," Icepick Voice," PUMA's "Five Minutes of Hate" headliner (who artlessly expected to be asked back for more of her squeaky wisdom).

What was not so satisfying was the powerful case of nerves I developed. "It's a conversation, not an interview," Scooter said, but I worked myself up to a fever pitch nevertheless. It was the sort of neurotic mania that I could cure when I was ten by lying on the cool patch of rug under the piano. Now lying under the piano wouldn't have the same effect unless I added a bottle of Scotch. So I scoured the papers, made notes, and ate chocolate instead.

I also studied Kevin's and Strange's program. Jesus. They talked knowledeably about cabinet nominations. They had a world-view. They quipped. (Strange, on Obama's speechwriter, who had been photographed groping a cut-out of Hillary: "Kevin, you shouldn't publicize that--there are people who have cardboard family members.")

The show was how long? I listened again, and was slightly cheered on the second hearing. That was a bunch of time spent on Jennifer Aniston posing in nothing but a necktie! And Tina Fey. Yes, yes, brains, beauty, total package, what man wouldn't admire her, yes. I smiled, reserved to myself the right to think of George Clooney, and felt like a much calmer little female house slave. I stopped cramming for the test, and relaxed a bit. Aren't men wonderful, though.

On Thursday, 11:30 P.M. East coast time, our phone rang, I picked it up, and said, "Hello Scooter!" Instantly, my thoughts flipped over like beetles on their backs, their little legs wiggling helplessly. Scooter tried leading the witness, asking me about subjects I'd said I could discourse on. I shamelessly let my fellow guest, Denise Williams, take the first few questions.

About ten minutes into the show, my brain stopped flat-lining and began to function in a halting kind of way. I'm not entirely sure what I said, but I seem to remember "Arabic naughty lingerie parties." And telling a story about snarfing communion wafers as if they were potato chips.


If KPFT thought it had gotten angry calls from the PUMA invasion, I'm pretty sure they paled in comparison to the inadvertant combo crusade and fatwa that have probably been declared on that station. A crufatwasade.

Always happy to bring people together.

Here it is, the half-hour Innerside production of what we're calling Prime Rib Radio.

Next Thursday will be the second half of the Prime Rib Radio series, 10:30 PM Houston Time, 11:30 PM Eastern Time, with Scooter, marindenver and Betty Cracker, the other little female house slaves of Rumproast.

Scooter's Website is AcksisofEvil.org, where he has all his shows archived, and pictures of his family, his atheist friends, and his ferrets.

After the show was over, I hung up, and entered a state of absolute liquifaction. I sank into bed like syrup into a waffle, and allowed Mr. Polly to overindulge me terribly. In other words, life returned to normal.Mrs. Polly recuperates

On The Heels of Greatness

Since Barack Obama failed to save the country, let's go back to a sunnier time, when Bill and Hillary rang in their new administration with a word their followers don't usually associate with them: Hope. Yes, the Bells of Hope.The Clintons' TV producer pals came up with the idea of ringing in, ahem, Change, with every bell, gong and gamelan they could assemble, from the Liberty Bell to bells in space (the astronauts of the Endeavor, who would be asleep during the inaugural festivities, had to prerecord their bell solos) and the People would ring all their bells too. It would be magnificent, overblown, and deeply hopey, except that Clinton did not win with a majority. So that put something of a damper on the chimes.

Another damper was the trouble Clinton had run into even before the inaugural: his own campaign promises. The most immediately serious was his promise not to repatriate Haitian boat people without a hearing; while Cubans who set foot on U.S. soil could stay, Haitians were forcibly repatriated to the brutal regime that had ousted Jean-Bertrande Aristide.Desperate Haitians put together improbable collections of tires, boards, netting, piled onto them and pushed off into the open sea, only to drown or be picked up by the Coast Guard, who brought them to detention in, among other places, Guantanamo. They were not, however, put in stress positions, besides the basic one of being held while waiting to be forcibly repatriated.

After he was told that over 150,000 Haitians were ripping down every tree in sight to make rafts for their 600 mile journey, Clinton went back on his campaign promise, saying that forced repatriation would continue. The following paragraph from the NY Times is so upsetting I will let it pass without comment:

Indeed, in the last two weeks, members of Mr. Clinton's foreign-policy team have expressed concern that celebrations surrounding Mr. Clinton's inauguration, which will be widely televised, will be marred by news footage of Haitian boat people drowning in stormy waters while trying to make the 600-mile journey to the Florida coast. Mr. Clinton cited a report in recent days, still unconfirmed by the Coast Guard, that nearly 400 Haitian boat people drowned when their boat sank in the Bahamas.

The fledgling presidency was darkened by plenty of ironic foreshadowing: Bush I left a deficit that scuttled Clinton's middle-class tax cut. On the very day that Bush sent missiles into Iraq, Clinton remarked that as he was a Baptist, he believed in death-bed conversions, and so he was open to restablishing normal relations with Iraq. On the very day that Bush sent missiles into Iraq, Clinton remarked that as he was a Baptist, he believed in death-bed conversions, and so he was open to restablishing normal relations with Iraq, causing. He then snappishly denied being asked about normalization of relations, a question that appeared twice on the transcript. He also tried to finesse the Haitian problem:

He tried the same on Haiti. There was no joy in reversing a policy that was proving untenable, nor was there dishonor in a forthright acknowledgment of change. Yet Clinton insisted that he was not reversing anything. His earlier statements offering asylum, he maintained, had hinged on a distinction between political refugees, who were entitled to stay in the United States, and economic refugees, who were not. "Sometimes people hear only half the message," he complained. (from "the Survivor", by John F. Harris)

The hedging and nice sidestepping aggrieved reporters, and gave them warning to examine every Clintonian statement with a jeweler's loupe.

Meanwhile, Bill had named Hillary head of the President's Task Force on Health Care Reform, and she embarked on a series of secret meetings, much to the dismay of friends and enemies alike. The Clintons' sunnily optimistic plan called for both a budget bill and a health care bill to be pushed through the Senate, but Senatorial etiquettician Robert Byrd blocked it:

(he was)convinced the strategy amounts to a "prostitution of the process" by
pushing through "a very complex, very expensive, very little understood piece of
legislation."

The process retained its virtue, and the very expensive, little understood piece of legislation died, only to be mocked in memorium.

President Clinton's other travails included his nominees being torpedoed by nannies and tax troubles, and his ultimate AG selection, Janet Reno, running afoul of the Branch Davidians at Waco. Each of these created a furor. But Clinton's compromise over his promise to lift the ban on gays in the military, the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, has resulted in well over 11,000 service members being expelled from the Armed Forces.

The Clinton Administration's first hundred days are a hard act to follow.

Cross-posted at Rumproast.com, Brooklyn's Meatiest Blog.

***************

~~~Thank you, Blossom Dearie~~~

A crisp little sugar cookie voice with a bite:

Will Somebody Please Snake My TV?

There are moments of stupidity so great, so enormous, that people circle them, trying to comprehend them, yet can't get a purchase on them. That's how I feel about Joe the War Correspondent. In trying to describe him, I feel like an ant trying to carry home a grape.
That's right, back in the good old WW II days, there were neat movies where people could cheer on the troops. They were called NEWSreels, but no matter. When the Germans marched across Europe, do you suppose they let the media come along and down the troops? Of course not!

Joe's performance as a self-hating war correspondent would be funnier if it weren't that President Bush held his last press conference today and did not do much better. And if Joe made me feel like an ant trying to carry a grape, the President makes me feel like an ant trying to carry a medicine ball.

One pundit/apologist described the President's defiant, arrogant, addled performance as "West Texas". The President may think of himself as the hero of his own Western, but he's really the weak-chinned bullying jealous son of the cattle-baron, the one who drives onto the poor widda's property in his Daddy's convertible and threatens to take Maw's farm.

There was a voice he used today, a voice we have been told of, but that I didn't want to believe. Today, talking of the burdens of the office, which unsurprisingly he maintained rested lightly on him, he mocked the idea: "You know, it's kind of like, `Why me? Oh, the burdens, you know. Why did the financial collapse have to happen on my watch?' It's just pathetic, isn't it, self-pity?"

Leaving aside the obliviousness of not knowing, or admitting, how much his policies had to do with the financial collapse, and the self-centeredness of considering, even to reject, pitying himself in any respect regarding what is to millions of vulnerable Americans a catastrophe, the feigned whine Bush used is no doubt the same whine he used to mock Karla Faye Tucker's plea to him to spare her life. Asked what he thought the born-again condemned killer might be thinking as her execution approached, he said, "Oh, I don't know--(whining, high-pitched tone)please don't kill me!"

This bumbling, unthinking scion of robber barons was the perfect president for the bumbling unthinking sheltered son of the Midwest. The President who didn't believe in government and the war correspondant who doesn't believe in reporting deserve each other. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is suffering the burdens of Bush's office.

And now, an amateurishly literal scrawl, from Snarkopolitan's great store of amateurish scrawls:

now that's a plumber's helper I can believe in.

An Overflowing Cup of Joe

Unlicensed plumbing contractor and McCain Foreign Policy Advisor Joe the Plumber was opining again on the danger of Obama: would an Obama presidency be the death of Israel? "I'll have to go along with that," said Joe, who did, to be fair, caution people to make up their own minds and not just base their decisions on his seconds and seconds of intensive reflection.
He was okay with himself even after Shepherd Smith of Fox (!) gave him every chance to back away from his cheerful, unmalicious, unthinking, devastating slander of a major public figure.

He has happily embraced the same media that McCain and Palin have been demonizing, finding the "media filter" suits him fine. He always has a word or two for whatever microphone sticks its tempting self under his nose. He was a familiar caller to right-wing talk shows in the area.

Joe used Barack Obama for his chance at the Big Time, and it worked. He saw Obama in his neighborhood, made his way through the crowd and asked a set-up question, since the answer was supposed to make Obama look bad and didn't actually apply to Joe. Now, McCain is using Joe and Joe is using McCain. Joe's PUBLICIST is angling for a book deal and a RECORD CONTRACT.

Everybody was using everybody except Obama, who simply tried to answer the guy's question seriously, and ironically will end up cutting Joe's taxes. Obama was nice to Joe, who is too full of himself and his own opinions to absorb any outside information.The glory of this incredible year: just when you think they've hit a new low, they dig down and come up with a lower low. From Sarah the winking Serial Liar to Joe the Singing Unlicensed Plumber.

ALERT! JUST IN-A FEW FUN FICTS FROM THE MAVERICK

Fun, because they are fictional facts, so lets jump in on the neologism-coining craze and call them FICTS. These are courtesy of intrepid newshound Larry King at CNN, the Network that Said NO to Obama's paid infomercial, and replaced it with a free infomercial for McCain: John Sidney McCain III is from humble beginnings. Although he is the son and grandson of admirals, flew and crashed one airplane after another, fortunately not onto the airfield that bears his own name, and was admitted to elite schools and programs on the strength of his last name, intrepid newshound Larry King managed to worm out of him that he came from humble beginnings. There's a scoop for you.

Another scoop is his plan for the economy: he's going to grow it. And there you have it, my friends, the detail you 've been craving that Obama's afraid to give: John McCain will GROW the economy right out of this mess.

Thank You, and Good Night.

Oh, you want more? Okay.

He will give tax cuts just like Reagan did, and that will grow the economy. Intrepid newshound Larry King did not point out that Reagan left the economy wobbling around carrying the biggest honking deficit it ever had to heft, or that Reagan didn't come in looking at a deficit there aren't enough zeroes in cyberspace to express.

The third and final scoop of the evening: he's delighted with Sarah Palin's maverickiness, and whenever she's around, he finds her presence uplifting. Oh, there are a lot of comedians who are grateful to him just for that last sentence. She's going to drag him up to ANWAR and show him how she dresses those meese.

That's more than enough scoops from McCain for one night. Apologies to Stephen Colbert, whose concept "truthiness" has had every damn body on the Internet trying to come up with a better neologism. There is no better neologism, but "Ficts" fills a needed gap, I think; while truthy things seem like they ought to be true, Ficts are obviously truth-challenged, if not truth-deprived, and depend on the kindness of strangers (like intrepid newshound Larry King) not to challenge their existence.

PLUMBING THE SHALLOWS

McCain was as pleasant as usual, which is to say he acted as if Obama was something that needed to be scraped off the bottom of the national shoe. And if ever there was a time to advocate for retiring the use of finger quotes, it is now. Using finger quotes around "health of the mother" is the worst McCain faux pas, maybe ever! Well, in the last twenty-four hours.

The worst faux-pas since "We Have Got Them Right Where We Want Them!" :

Yes, having our opponents 10 points ahead of us allows us to keep an eye on them, the sneaky Arab bast**ds!

Mr. Polly thought McCain had won, just, with the fabulous "I'm not George Bush" line. If this was the best line of the night, it was a pathetic night, say I, Mrs. Polly. Remember the old apocryphal story about LBJ calling his opponent a child molester, and after an aide points out the opponent isn't a child molester, LBJ says, "I know, but I just want to hear him deny it."? Well how is it a zinger for McCain to have to deny he's George Bush?

Of course, I couldn't bear to look directly at the event; as usual, I read about it as others live-blogged, while Mr. Polly gave me updates. I'm easily nauseated, and tonight I'm still a delicate, Dresden China-frail blossom, having had oral surgery. So add the debate to the presoftened, lukewarm swill I require. Like much of the rest of America. But I had my gums sliced to ribbons, what's their excuse?

It's fun to see the pundits check each other in their peripheral vision, trying to get a read on what they ought to conclude about what just went on right in front of them, and adjust accordingly. Tonight, as for the first debate, several went out on a limb and called it for McCain only to have the focus groups and snap polls reprove them. And this after everyone, even Public Radio people, got totally obsessed with the CNN Wiggly Line of Damnation! The CNN Wiggles plainly favored Obama, particularly the female wiggles. How could anybody sit through 90 minutes of line watching and call the debate for McCain?

Well, time to take a Vicodin and go on the Oral Surgery Opiate Nod. Kids, remember to floss after every meal, snack, or accidental inhalation of particulate matter. It's important.

YOU BETCHA!!

Only in this teledadaist, reality-unencumbered, common senseless, cowardly, faux-objective goofball pomo world could any pundit look into the camera and say with a straight face that Sarah Palin even participated in a debate, much less ponder on whether she or Biden won it.

I have a procedure for handling these debates. In order to not fall on the floor and foam at the mouth, or spend ninety minutes projectile vomiting, I avoid looking directly at the wreckage; Mr. Polly does instead, while I block out sound with a Walkman tuned to a hip-hop station. I sit at the computer and read live-blogs, and drink. I have to circle around an event, and have it fed to me pureed.

No amount of pureeing, or other distancing divice is enough to make Sarah Palin digestible for me. The day-after montages of winks and mavericky high-kicking homespinning cowpatty-shoveling charm mongering made me want to push an ice-pick into my own brain, just to finish what Sarah'd started.

Once you have a new low in American culture, it doesn't take long to breach it. George Bush was a ridiculous figure, pathetic, gross, choking on his pretzels, massaging Angela Merkel, invading Iraq because why? According to Bob Woodward, only tonight, Bush said, "Because they're assholes." How can you bottom that?

With the relentlessly adorable runner-up, Miss Wasilla "I may not answer these questions the way you want" Governor of Alaska. And her stack of answers, written on index cards, from which she read her answers to Gwen Ifill's gentle puffball questions, those she didn't directly ignore.

Snarkopolitan has exclusively obtained a couple of Sarah Palin's answer cards :

I especially liked the Wh. Fl. of Srdr.

NO CLOTHES! NO CLOTHES!

The empress has been buck-naked from the get-go, pardon the folksiness. Her same canned speech, broken up and written on notecards, dispensed in small chunks after she declared her intention to ignore the moderator, made the fear that she would be wired under that beehive completely superfluous. Why bother simulating being knowledgeable? She's, like, only been at this for what, five weeks! She can bring her notecards to her next sit-down with the G-8. Angela Merkel will melt once she's been winked at. But will she wink at Sarah Palin?

Goddam Weasel

So now he's doing schtick?

He does have a degree in sacred music, but does that qualify him to do stand-up? Bits of Chris Rock, Richard Pryor and Bill Cosby all mashed up with liberation theology and some really bad impersonation (that British accent, yeesh).

I only caught one act of the Reverend's traveling Bitter Medicine Show. It isn't a crime to defend oneself, especially against the bland repetitive stupidity of the 24 hour looping cable heads, but the Reverend certainly seemed to be enjoying himself overmuch.

And then he plugged his book.

And then he plugged Farrakhan.

And then ----

There is a famous Goya painting of Chronos eating his children that I could have parodied, but three and a half people would have been amused, and the other half person (comprising in total 95% of my devoted readers) would have been befuddled.

Chronos was one of the Titans, the precursors to the Greek Gods. He thought he'd be cute and ingest the competition---his children---because of a prophesy that the Titans would be slain by them. But Zeuss lived to do just that. I'll have to go back to my Edith Hamilton and firm up the story.

Also, in the Goya painting, Chronos was about to snack on a little naked figure, and I wasn't about to do Obama nude.

So here is Obama as Saint Sebastian instead. Enjoy, three and a half readers.

Political Discourse in Twenty-First Century America

They tell you in Blogging school, first thing: unless you're aiming for a real niche market, don't nauseate your readers. So I hate to mention last night's Democratic debate. It stunk up the joint.

ABC thoroughly scraped its barrel bottom, where dwell Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopolous. The Costello and Costello of ABC did their best to put the moron in the oxymoron of TV journalism.
The first policy question, noted Andrew Sullivan, didn't occur till 53 minutes into the debate.
No, "debate" isn't the word for it. Show. The ABC Dumb Show.
Until minute 53, it was flag pins, Bosnia and bitterness. Mostly bitterness. On the part of the viewers.
ABC switchboard: 212-456-7777. Direct comment line: 818-460-7477.

Mr. Polly's position is that Reverend Wright, the flag pin question and the bitterness question are simply good excuses for whites looking for an excuse to not vote for a black. He thinks the country is too racist. I disagreed with him. I thought young people really don't have latent racism, really are beyond it, even if older voters still harbor prejudices they may not even recognize.

Perhaps Bill Clinton's rant against younger voters is because he feels this too. It's not that he's racist; he wants to blow Obama out of the----oops, unfortunate choice of words, he wants to torpedo Obama and regain the White House. For Hillary. Really.

Of course, Obama did remark that working-class Pennsylvania had problems that preceded Bush's presidency.

Bill took that as a slam against his spectacular legacy, and let the worser angels of his nature dictate what happened next: a full-out paranoid explosion. How dare Obama say that Bill never did anything for the working people of Pennsylvania! Well, Obama didn't say that. But let truthiness guide your spleen, and the rest is easy.

By now, you might suspect I'm not a fan of either Clinton. Not hardly.That being said, if by some exceptionally Byzantine politicking, Hillary gets the nomination, ugly as that thought is, I'll vote for her. Simply because she is likely to support policies I support. Policies. Policies. POLICIES!

Policy: "1. A plan or course of action, as of a government, political party, or business, intended to influence and determine decisions, actions, and other matters. 2.a. A course of action, guiding principle, or procedure considered expedient, prudent, or advantageous. b. Prudence, shrewdness, or sagacity in practical matters."---American Heritage College dictionary, 3rd edition.

We are not a reasoning culture. We are a reactive culture. After eight surreal, disastrous years of the guy we wanted to have a beer with, we don't know better. Are we voting for plans of action? No. We're voting for mascots of what we've determined is our team. Which is the warm and fuzziest? The other mascot's fans are so mean! (note: any resemblance to the Joker is unintentionally intentional)

I visited the Hilary Clinton website, to look at the blog. Like the comments sections of all the big blogs, it's full of cheerleading and teenage angst-filled grousing---from forty-year-olds. " Did you read what those others said on their blog? They're such snobs. I'm never voting for their team. Well they started it." And on the other blog: " No you did." "No you did." "No, you did."
Hillary and Obama's policies are virtually identical. McCain's policies and Bush's policies are virtually identical. Which is it you want now, health care or no health care? Fewer wars, or more wars? Decide.

If you want warm and fuzzy, buy a Beanie Baby. Of course, they're all made in China....

Dishing Cindy McCain

So a lowly intern lifted Food Network recipes for the McCain campaign! So they tell us. Another gift-wrapped three minute filler for cable news's Chattering Classes. Stretched to ten minutes.


Actually, this non-story says much about the quality of Lowly Interns these days:

1. Ethics: Even lowly unpaid interns should know enough not to plagiarize in anyone's name, much less that of a candidate for First Lady. After all, when they buy their term papers online, they pay for them fair and square.



2. Stupidity: Nothing says tradition like exotic fruit desserts! Obviously, Lowly Intern is too young to remember a time when every family didn't have the resources to whip up a batch of Passionfruit Mousse. I love going through my Gramma's recipe box and taking out that dog-eared card, written in her elegant copperplate, for oil-poached Meyer Lemons with Yuzu gastrique.



3. Tastelessness: Rachel Ray, for God's sake. They plagiarized Rachel Ray. Inventor of the Cheeseburger Salad.

And in particular, the passionfruit mousse recipe also calls for baby bananas and a blowtorch. How's that for elitist?

16 years ago,Elite Big Lawyer Hillary outraged the citizenry by announcing that she wasn't staying home baking cookies. Then in expiation she had to produce a chocolate chip cookie recipe for the nation's consumption. And she did, differing only slightly from the recipe on the chocolate chip bag. Although it really ought to be Bill's turn to show off his kitchen chops, at least with a barbecued something, it's still Hillary's cookie recipe in the paper (Hillary's F.U. Cookies) along with Lawyer Michelle Obama's Apple Cobbler and Beer Heiress Cindy's purloined passionfruit.

To be sure, the Obama Cobbler sounds good, fattening, and easy to make: toss a bag of frozen apples with sugar and spices, stash them in the fridge overnight, "so the spice goes all through the apples"--an evocative, compelling phrase---and sling them into a pan with sticks of butter and ready-made piecrust dough. Bake until "it's all crusty on top like Obama likes it." Obama? Hell, everybody! Nothing elitist about all crusty on top cobbler.

The news is that the President of the United States said in an ABC interview that he knew his top advisors specifically discussed what tortures our country should apply: which, how often, when, including waterboarding and sleep deprivation:
http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/LawPolitics/Story?id=4635175&page=1

This is one day after Associated Press reported that administration officials "took care to insulate Bush." Naturally, Bush didn't get that memo.

That's real news. We aren't hearing it, though. Instead, networks prefer the easy, research and reporting-free option of sitting in TV studios, replaying the soundbite of the day to rent-a-pundits.

While the chattering classes--CNN, MSNBC, et al. enjoy the no-thinking-necessary bitter primary horserace, bloggers sit at home, calling our outrage each to each.

Lord knows calling Bush a pimply-bottomed frog detonator on a blog is temporarily satisfying, but let's not mistake it for action. Sending money to anti-torture candidates is better but sometimes it's not enough either.

The phone number for the ABC switchboard is 212-456-7777. I called it. Essie the operator asked if I wanted the comment line. I told her I preferred a human, so she put me through to the newsroom. I told the young woman who answered that ABC had run an interview with the President and Martha Raddatz (on the phone, nobody cares how you spell) about his awareness that his top advisors had discussed torture, and that I wanted the story to get more play.

"Okay! I'll pass that along! Thank you!" said the sprightly newsroom minion.

This meagre act of non-heroism took one minute, without requiring me to disconnect from these my homely comforts even a little bit. But it may have had some slight effect. So instead of hammering away in the comments sections of digby and crooksandliars exclusively, complain to the offenders themselves:

viewerservices@msnbc.com
nightly@NBC.com

cnn.com/feedback/cnntv/

And for blasting off actual letters on your most impressive letterhead:

NBC News

30 Rockefeller Plaza

New York, N.Y. 10011

Anybody who wants to provide other actual addresses and phone numbers, go right ahead.

Just be nice to Essie. She only works there.