Respite? … after the storm? There won’t be any. 6 November 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Culture of Death, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, WAR!.29 comments
A rosy pelican catches a fish in Delhi zoo. The 214-acre National Zoological Park is home to more than 2,000 species of animals and birds from Africa, America, Australia and Asia [Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty Images]
***
I am still advocating for the little Capuchin monkey to take the WH Press Guy Job… with a series of pre-set signs. Add to the pile:
I don’t have the theoretical background to — to answer that… yada – bilge – bile – etc
I think about the scheisse pile in Ft Hood what I think about a lot of erupting violent crime that needed to be assessed early, better managed before it blew, nipped in the famous bud stage, etc. (Garrido/Dugard and Sowell/many – and others)… it is allowed to fester. A stressed and distressed population is a goal. And if the festering, sucking air wounds blow big.. someone somewhere is happy.
A long term side goal, at least by some elements in the country, is and has been race war. Will it ever blow? I have no idea.
Oh, and pretzel? Well, he fails at CinC (I don’t agree with every observation, but with the thrust of the article). Just my opinion. Hell, so did George the Second — where to start! Bill was a mess. IMO the Democrats still pay for Clinton having picked Cohen, a Republican, as SecDef. I think the last credible one was, maybe!, Stansfield Turner.
George the First, practically a drooling lunatic. Sold to us, though, as ”Old Aristocracy” (don’t make me laugh too hard!).. and ”Old China Hand”. He served all of 10 months in China straddling iirc two calendar years – Babs and the kids in Manhattan, it was his life time with the CIA that commended him to the job. It came out in the 1992 election that, from his own mouth, there are three versions of his War Time Heroics. Enuf said.
Reagan, the tag end of decades as a costumed, Max Factor’d propaganda prop, happily drafted to the Hard Right Wars. One more paying gig. Sadly, with better managed Optics. And a chronically vigilant, protective wife (she served him well).
But who’s counting in a losing game.
It – being a credible, walk-on, run-way worthy CinC – is not even a consideration for the job … not anymore, not that I can see. I am not at all surprised that Gates has gotten his H1N1 vaccination (as if I care) but Pretzel and Wife have not — don’t care about that either, it’s the optics and what is revealed. (Or, so the publicly told tale goes…)
The whole of the press briefing today is not up yet at WH.gov, but here is the entry at Political Punch.
TAPPER: Kind of a — a theoretical question, but what — at what point does an attack become considered a terrorist attack, even — even if it’s a domestic terrorist attack?
GIBBS: I don’t know that I would have the theoretical background to — to answer that. I would pose that to somebody at — at the FBI. But, again, I don’t know that we’re at a point yet where we fully understand motive.
TAPPER: OK. In terms of the House health care reform bill, right now one of the big logjams, as you know, has to do with abortion language and also has to do with whether or not illegal immigrants, undocumented workers can have access to the health insurance exchanges. Those are both issues that you have said from this podium, I think, that should have been settled, theoretically, because you said that the bill the president signs will not fund abortions, I believe, and…
GIBBS: The president said that.
TAPPER: The president said that. And you’ve said that the bill the president signs will not — illegal immigrants will not have access to health care…
GIBBS: Well…
TAPPER: … the health insurance exchanges. So why are they still debating this on Capitol Hill if the president has made his position as to what he’s going to sign clear?
GIBBS: Congress, obviously, is working through a process that will ultimately, we believe, before the end of the year get a bill to the president’s desk. I think there are still discussions going on, on both of these two issues up on Capitol Hill. While the president would like it, tomorrow will not be the final vote on a bill coming to his desk, but he sees tomorrow as an important step forward. He’ll go to Capitol Hill tomorrow to advocate for continuing that progress and passing in the House of Representatives a bill.
TAPPER: Well, I guess the question is, the people who are — have the — have the — have the Democrats who are urging a different position from the one that you and the president have stated about what the president will sign, have they not gotten the message? Has the president not conveyed to them what he wants in the bill sufficiently?
GIBBS: Well, as you mentioned, the president’s been clear about what he said, and I think those that — that have a different viewpoint than what the president might have, on either side of the aisle, are best to speak to their motives.
-jpt
November 6, 2009 in Today’s Qs for Obama’s WH | Permalink | Share | User Comments (8)
There is enough word around that Ob/WH just wants ‘’something” by the State of the Union, next year.
This WH seems very interested in big signs, displayed across the frontage. Hang a headline on the Plantation House: Pink ribbons, big ol’ spiders, green water in the fountains.
I suggest a sign that says, ‘Scuse us while we stumble, but we will be mumbling something about it very soon. Check back! Meanwhile: Vote for us!
Leave the sign up for the next occupant. Nobody decent would want the job.
**************
Shoot out 5 November 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Culture of Death, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, WAR!.39 comments
Architectural renderings of recent upgrades to Ft Hood.
So… 11 dead plus the shooter dead, makes 12. More than 30 wounded. Some reports say the main shooter (2 “suspects” in custody) used two handguns.
Major Malik Nadal Hasan. Some reports say he is a recent convert to Islam. Kay Bailey H tells us that he was soon to deploy to Iraq.
Gonna be a long story.
Buckle up.
****
So… Uncle Pookie stayed on the sofa. 3 November 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter.46 comments
Soon we will be treated to a speech. No doubt.
One thing, Ob won’t be running suddenly to the right in a panic, he headed that way from the git go. 
Tuesday 27 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Cuba, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter.38 comments
Cojimar, Havana: A woman sits under the shade of an umbrella
Photograph: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters
Nothing much today… tho I did read yesterday that the UN is ready to condemn our (Bush’s? Obama’s? JFK’s? Too many of “us”?) blockade, sanctions, whatever the word, against Cuba… We stand quite alone in this.
Everything for us, no matter who is elevated to top dog, is Fail Safe, 7 Days in May, Dr Strangelove, Manchurian Candidate…. on and on it goes.
It never ends.
Ooops… 24 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter.67 comments
Schweine flue “emergency”. National no less. So……. what do we do? Shoot them or move them to higher ground? (Just kidding!)
You just know the WH considers this bad (baaad! baaad! bad-bad!) PR as they announced it Friday night.
UPDATE 3-Obama declares swine flu a national emergency
* Disaster proclamation intended as proactive measure
* CDC said swine flu widespread in 46 of 50 states (Adds details on new antiviral drug)
By Patricia Zengerle
WASHINGTON, Oct 24 (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama has declared 2009 H1N1 swine flu a national emergency, the White House said on Saturday.
The declaration will make it easier for U.S. medical facilities to handle a surge in flu patients by allowing the waiver of some requirements of Medicare, Medicaid and other federal health insurance programs as needed, the White House said in a statement.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Friday that swine flu has become widespread in 46 of the 50 U.S. states, a level comparable to the peak of ordinary flu seasons but far earlier and with more waves of infection expected.
Obama signed the statement on Friday night. . . . .
A bit more:
The Health and Human Services Department is trying to deliver vaccines against H1N1 but says production is falling short of projections because companies are having trouble making them.
HHS has also moved to make available stockpiles of antiviral drugs oseltamivir, made by Roche AG (ROG.VX) under the brand name Tamiflu, and zanamivir, an inhaled drug made by GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.L) under the brand name Relenza.
On Friday the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization for an experimental new drug called peramivir, made by Biocryst Pharmaceuticals Inc (BCRX.O) and licensed to Shionogi & Co Ltd (4507.T).
The authorization allows the intravenous drug to be used in hospitalized patients who cannot take pills or inhale Relenza or when Tamiflu or Relenza do not seem to be helping.
Well… more meds can only help…
I am not sure what it is that is out there… if a designation of H1N1 is a diversion, illusion… or what. But something virulent and respiratory is traveling around and effectively killing children and pregnant women… or, at least, that is what is happening in our area.
And, as the head of the CDC snapped in frustration this week… you cannot yell at the cultures and make them grow faster. So, as is often the case, we are stuck in the mud. Or the concrete. Or the verbiage.
Stuck waiting, with no cover…
War mincing – election mincing – abuse mincing … all the same damned thing. 21 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Afghanistan War, Culture of Death, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Pakistan, WAR!.46 comments
A trio of triplet policemen. New Jersey, 1981
Michael S. Yamashita / National Geographic /NG Gallery at UK Telegraph
hmm Jersey cops… I see they are sending Ob into NJ for Corzine. I assume the CW on the street is that Corzine squeaks out a “win”.
Carry on… what else to say. What waits for Corzine? A sex scandal (and they are so dreary, as they keep rolling out)?? … a pay-for-play scandal (more drear)? Union bagmen scandal (dreary!)? Another union babe mini scandal (double drear!)?
I can hardly wait…….. not.
*****
More (late in the day I posted a long comment in the last thread) of the Jane Mayer New Yorker interview which IS online, unlike her big article on the great expansion of drone sorties over Pakistan under The Peace Prize (those poor fucked up Norwegians).
How does the continued collateral damage from Predator drones square with General Stanley McChrystal’s order to the military to lay off the air strikes in Afghanistan and avoid civilian deaths?
Well, you could argue it either way. There is less collateral damage from a drone strike than there is from an F-16. According to intelligence officials, drones are more surgical in the way they kill—they usually use Hellfire missiles and do less damage than a fighter jet might. . . . .
Oh, let’s have some more of that…
If the C.I.A. doesn’t have experience killing people, who is piloting the drones?
It doesn’t take as much talent or experience or training to pilot a drone as it does to pilot a real plane. The skills are much like what you need to do well in a video game. And the C.I.A. has outsourced a lot of the drone piloting, which also raises interesting legal questions, because you not have only civilians running this program, but you may have people who are not even in the U.S. government piloting the drones.
You mention in your piece that drone pilots, who work from an office, suffer from combat stress.
Someone sitting at C.I.A. headquarters in Langley, Virginia, can view and home in on a target on the other side of the world with tremendous precision, even at night, and destroy it. Peter Singer, who wrote a book on robotic warfare, said that cubicle warriors experience the same stress as regular warriors in a real war. Detached killing still takes a tremendous emotional toll inside our borders. . . . .
Weep for them. Copiously.. so it gets noticed.
Meanwhile, keep breathing while waiting for The Big Transparency from The Peace Prize:
What would the outlines of a more transparent drone program look like?
Michael Walzer, the political philosopher, has noted that when the United States goes about killing people, we usually know who they can kill and where the battlefield is. International lawyers are calling for a public revelation of who is on this list, where can we go after them, and how many people can we take out with them. They want to know the legal, ethical, and political boundaries of the program.
****
Update via TimesOnline on the Catholic M&A, LBO, whatever it is, of the Anglican dissidents.
Good comment from the thread…
Ros Roberts wrote:
You’re an Anglican? You want to become a Catholic? Nothing easier: all you have to do is completely change what you believe in: take on board transubstantiation, Papal infallibility, purgatory, things like that.
But if that is so easy for these people, why don’t they simply decide to believe that women are people too and can be bishops too?
October 21, 2009 9:28 PM BST
Farther down (at the bottom, actually) on the FP of the Times is this further story rising from the Irish Revelations… as the chapters and verses continue…
[T]he facts of Kathleen O’Malley’s life would probably not have been believed ten years ago, not before the dam finally burst on the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland.
A long-awaited report into clerical abuse in the Diocese of Dublin is expected to be published this week and bishops are bracing themselves for another round of public anger. It will be a horror story of how known paedophile priests were shunted from parish to parish by their religious seniors. The number of children who suffered as a result of the Church’s cover-up could run into thousands.
It will also be another shattering blow to the moral authority of an institution that once ruled Ireland with an iron rod, following hard on the heels of the Ryan report, an independent tribunal that concluded in May after a decade of evidence-gathering that there had been “endemic and systemic” sexual, physical and emotional abuse of hundreds of thousands of Irish children in residential institutions run by religious orders. Four years ago, when Kathleen first told her story in her memoir, Childhood Interrupted, there were plenty of cynics around who were prepared to cast doubt on the extraordinary tale of suffering inside a system that seemed akin to the worst excesses of a totalitarian regime. . . . . .
What “blow to the moral authority”? Where is that blow?
As a mirror to the concrete entombment of the so-called political class (withhold the vote, FFS!) the ONLY thing the Church responds to is LESS MONEY in the collection plate and, FFS, withhold the children.
People won’t do that… They continue to fork over (really) the children to an abusive system. With or without ritual sexual abuse.
[T]hat is small consolation for Kathleen O’Malley. “I don’t know at what point the religious gained their power, but they had total power and autonomy to do as they wanted. We were brainwashed to say that we were well-looked after.”
…
She is scornful of the progress Ireland is making towards righting these heinous wrongs. “They say they now want to put up a monument to all those who were treated badly. They had a garden party with the President of Ireland, to which around 130 victims were invited, but I wasn’t and neither were thousands of others. And that was like my evidence to the Ryan commission, which was ignored. I was never given the opportunity.” . . . .
What “blow to the moral authority”? Where? From whom?!
Banter 20 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, WAR!.15 comments
Nothing to do with the Tapper v Gibbs below, I just like to pop up these lovely photos of women riding in the far far back of the family automobile, as I land on them….
Gibbs carries on the brilliant weekend had by the WH emissaries… and the righties are loving it. I have lost track of the outlets and voices who see this dumb fake media war as worth anything, much less a pretzel’s precious time. Helen, The Nation, Ruth Marcus, even his old stand-by, NYT.
JAKE TAPPER AT THE WHITE HOUSE:
Tapper: It’s escaped none of our notice that the White House has decided in the last few weeks to declare one of our sister organizations “not a news organization” and to tell the rest of us not to treat them like a news organization. Can you explain why it’s appropriate for the White House to decide that a news organization is not one –
(Crosstalk)
Gibbs: Jake, we render, we render an opinion based on some of their coverage and the fairness that, the fairness of that coverage.
Tapper: But that’s a pretty sweeping declaration that they are “not a news organization.” How are they any different from, say –
Gibbs: ABC -
Tapper: ABC. MSNBC. Univision. I mean how are they any different?
Gibbs: You and I should watch sometime around 9 o’clock tonight. Or 5 o’clock this afternoon.
Tapper: I’m not talking about their opinion programming or issues you have with certain reports. I’m talking about saying thousands of individuals who work for a media organization, do not work for a “news organization” — why is that appropriate for the White House to say?
Gibbs: That’s our opinion.
****
Other than that… have to love the Pope to the Anglicans: come on over, we are ante-deluvian!! No “untidiness” here!! (oh no none at all!)
John Allen at National Catholic:
In a move with potentially sweeping implications for relations between the Catholic church and some 80 million Anglicans worldwide, the Vatican has announced the creation of new ecclesiastical structures to absorb disaffected Anglicans wishing to become Catholics. The structures will allow those Anglicans to hold onto their distinctive spiritual practices, including the ordination of married former Anglican clergy as Catholic priests. . . . the main American branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion. American Episcopalians are said to number some 2.2 million.
…
today’s move creates the possibility that bishops’ conferences around the world can create personal ordinariates, a special structure that’s tantamount to a non-territorial diocese, to accept Anglicans under the leadership of a former Anglican minister who would be designated a bishop.. . .former Anglican clergy who are married may serve as priests in the new ordinariates, but they may not be ordained as bishops. Seminarians for the new ordinariates must be trained alongside other Catholic seminarians, though they may have separate houses of formation.
The details will be presented in a new apostolic constitution from Pope Benedict XVI, expected to be issued shortly. Popes issue apostolic constitutions in order to amend the church’s Code of Canon Law, in this case to create new legal structures.
The Vatican note described the new “personal ordinariates” as similar to the structures created throughout the world to provide pastoral care for members of the military and their families. The structures are in effect separate dioceses, presided over by a bishop and with their own priests, seminarians, and faithful.
Mergers and Acquisitions? Leveraged Buy-Out?
I notice some of the righties think there will be wholesale evacuation to the Holy Roman Empire by African Anglican priests and congregations.
Good luck to all! May they all, evacuees and welcoming arms, trip over the Consecrated Host, the Body and Blood of Jeeesuhs!
What is left to say about much of anything that is going on? It’s all about head counts…
It’s a fish!..? It’s a plane!..? 18 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Culture of Death, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Lie Down Fall Down Dems, WAR!.27 comments
Rahovec, Kosovo: A flock of starlings flies over the town
Photograph: Hazir Reka/Reuters
No… it’s a bird! Starlings over Kosovo, a place that haunts, especially as the wars grind on.
Think it was ABC national news tonight, a segment on Obama, asking dully which is what dullards will be:
“Is he up to the job?”, “Is he tough enough?”
Even as media rhetoric, I mean, jesus! They have to ask?
Just today, the parade of Chicago Mayberry non-Machiavellis was appalling. Rahm, Axelrod, Valerie Jarrett (with special appearance by Robert Gibbs tomorrow).
A snaggle of gaffes, bumbles and stammering pauses.
What is more pointed, ABC news followed the Obama segment with a segment on Benny Hinn. A LONGER segment on Hinn: Is he real? Does he heal?
So appropriate.
‘Fraid of the big. bad. city. 15 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Lie Down Fall Down Dems, San Francisco, WAR!.38 comments
Antonio Partida holds a President Obama bobblehead as he waits behind barricades outside the Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco to see if he can get a look at President Obama on Thursday. [Lacy Atkins / The Chronicle]
Oh what a coward. An open secret he wants to slip in and slip out, barely seen if possible. With DNC bagmen at the ready for the cash.
No official greeting delegation at the air port.. he slipped into the limo, Valerie Jarrett nearly in camouflage slipped into the limo behind him.. and then … they went somewhere. He had two hours, with the roads cleared to make it from the airport to the St Francis (Fright site, it’s where Gerry Ford was shot… cue the masturbation assassination creepiness! Start the prayer circles!)…
Then, leaving where ever, he slipped into the Westin St Francis thru a side door… and on to the event. Then off! To another private hotel event.
Obama is scheduled to parachute into Liberalville on Thursday afternoon and pick up a cool $2 million for the Democratic Party at a fundraiser at the St. Francis Hotel – then spend the night, before checking out early the next morning and heading to Houston for a community service forum hosted by former President George H.W. Bush. [He'll be much happier there, I am sure!]
The St. Francis event is about all the public will see of him here. Concerns about big and loud protests over the war in Afghanistan, the prohibition on open gays and lesbians in the military and other issues have squelched any thought of a trip to a local school or high-tech manufacturing plant that often accompanies such visits, said a source involved in the planning.
“You’re always sensitive about having your San Francisco moment here,” said former White House spinmeister Chris Lehane.
He still recalls a news conference he organized here in 2000 for then-presidential candidate Al Gore. It turned into a near-disaster when a “transvestite kept asking if he would support public funding for sex changes.” snip
He is staying overnight… well guarded I am sure. I suggest starting rumors..
WHY would he want to be in SF overnight? We have such vile cooties. Gay ones, transvestite ones, transgender ones… even buxom red headed Code Pink* cooties, one who made it all the way into the event at the St Francis…. and asked him, at his elbow, about the women having a place at the table for Afghanistan issues. (A backer paid the freight for her to get in, more than 15k a head.)
He defended saying, Hillary is at the table. She countered, “I mean Afghani women.”
“Some of our opponents think they are going to wear us down,” Obama said at a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee last night at the Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco. “I’m not tired, I’m refreshed.”
more by Barack Obama – 1 hour ago – Bloomberg (2 occurrences)
Glad to hear it. I am so relieved for you.
KGO tonight is running interference for the shits in DC… trying to shame people about the 250.00 in lieu of a COLA increase on SS. My god! the money would have to be BORROWED! Should that be done?
Here a war, there a war, everywhere a war.. anyone remember the GOD DAMNED FUCKING WARS?
I’d laugh, but no point.
* And… Yes, thanks, I have heard about Medea and recent machinations.
********
Here is a quite interesting tidbit. No idea if true… tho lots of juicy side stories. The tale, being told these days it seems, about the pilfered Carter binder, in the run up to the ‘80 debate with Reagan. A Dem turn coat with a … very complex history.
[F]ew understood Bobby’s close friendship with Corbin. Old Kennedy hand Joe Dolan called Corbin “the dark side of Bobby Kennedy,” according to Jeff Shesol’s book “Mutual Contempt.” RFK’s daughter Kathleen Kennedy Townsend admitted that her “Uncle Paul” was “a rascal” who “didn’t respect people,” but she told me she understood what her father saw in Corbin: “My father appreciated somebody who would find out what’s going on in the government or in politics and would be forthright about telling him so that he could have eyes and ears in places that he wouldn’t normally have them.” Columnist Drew Pearson characterized Corbin’s role more bluntly: He was “Bobby’s backstage henchman.”
When RFK was assassinated in June 1968, Corbin was shattered. But he got back into politics after moving to Tennessee. Corbin later bragged to some friends that he had the goods on Democrat Al Gore. Joseph Sweat, one of Corbin’s associates in Tennessee, remembered that Corbin accused Gore, then a young congressman, of renting rooms in a motel in Cookeville to watch pornography. “That goddamn Gore, he is up there in a motel … watching those dirty movies!” Corbin exclaimed. Asked how he knew, Corbin replied, “The desk clerk; I paid him a little bit, and he gave me the receipt.”
In the late 1970s, Corbin went back to Washington. Held at arm’s length by the Carterites, he grew to hate Carter. Naturally, he supported Ted Kennedy’s presidential bid in 1980. He couldn’t stand watching Kennedy concede the party’s nomination to Carter at the Democratic National Convention in August. As Kennedy spoke, Corbin stormed off the convention floor. His friend Bill Schulz of Reader’s Digest called after him, asking what his plans were now that Kennedy was out of the race.
Corbin yelled back, “I’m going to go work for Reagan!” snip
Not sure what was involved in going to a motel in ‘68 to watch porno… sounds a tad fishy, that part.
What a saga tho…
I hope they all kick each other to death. Slip and fall, land in the gutter where they ALL belong.
*****
UPDATE, 2:44 am
hmm mmm
..SAN FRANCISCO-President Barack Obama addressed an adoring crowd of supporters at a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee in San Francisco Thursday evening, where he told the assembled that “When I’m busy, and Nancy’s busy, with a mop cleaning up somebody else’s mess, we don’t want somebody sitting back saying, ‘you’re not holding the mop the right way’ : ‘you’re not mopping fast enough’ : ‘that’s a socialist mop.’”
more by Barack Obama – 36 minutes ago – Politico (36 occurrences)
Busy busy bees… 14 October 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, 2010 Mid Terms, 2012 Re Election, Afghanistan War, California / Pacific Coast, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Lie Down Fall Down Dems, San Francisco, The Battle for New Orleans, WAR!.72 comments
From a few days ago in the Situation Room, not that it matters. Could just sprinkle lye over them and leave them in place. I read that the Brits are sending 500 more troops into Afghanistan, heavily weighted with Rules of Engagement. As well, a few days ago, they announced a (small number) return to Iraq… after a showy departure a few months ago.
It will never end.
Helen Thomas graced us yesterday…. and BTW so will Ob, tomorrow he cuts out of depressing, old, black, poor fucked New Orleans.. and comes to the arms of San Francisco progressives or liberals or whatever we are. Who knows by now. ATM of the West…
It’s one thing when the Financial Times says Barack Obama “seems to float like a butterfly — and sting like one…”
Even if the gently biting British criticism does come from one of the few publications that successfully charges for some of its content — journalism is all about commerce platforms these days — we’re still talking the Brits here. Hey! Who won the war? as White House press lioness and legend Helen Thomas once said to then-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl in her bawdy and distinctly American style of directness.
But it’s another thing entirely when Ms. Thomas herself says that Mr. Obama “lacks courage.”
There was a gasp in the crowd when the veteran reporter, who’s covered and stuck her thumb in the eye of 10 presidents from her front row White House briefing room seat, made that comment yesterday at a San Francisco Commonwealth Club Q&A. snip
Gasped! They gasped! The remedy for that is prawns knocked backed by champagne. (It’s a little early for crab season.) Or a very very dry Martini.. with no food – the olive is lunch. Both staples of the city.
*********
UPDATE, 2:56 pm, on the Pacific Ocean
I went over to Talk Left to see if Tentola had picked up on the slithery blither of a “rant” yesterday over at Booman Tribune (catnip linked to it). He linked to this from Greenwald.
Poor Eugene. Honey, they’d pull that Civil Rights rug out from under you so fast. The whole thing is conditional … and Ob is window dressing. (Good luck!). How is Eugene different from Sully who had the fucking temerity to say that those who opposed Iraq War were FIFTH COLUMNISTS?
What sick hacks are seeded in our systems.
(bolding and other emphasis is Greenwald’s)
Yesterday in The Washington Post, Eugene Robinson returned to the DNC’s pernicious theme of last week by arguing that those who were “mocking our nation’s leader . . . as unworthy of” the Nobel Peace Prize have “joined with the Taliban”; are “exhibiting what [conservatives], in a different context, surely would describe as ‘Hanoi Jane’ behavior”; have violated core precepts of “good manners”; and deviated from the “only reasonable response“: to congratulate the President. But also yesterday, Matt Taibbi wrote one of the most scathing (and typically insightful) criticisms yet of Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize, based on the twisted understanding of “peace” which Western Europe and the U.S. uniquely share and the “change” that Obama actually seems to represent.
Has Taibbi really committed a breach against public decency by expressing doubt that Obama’s actions reflect genuine aspirations for peace? That’s not a legitimate view? That can’t reasonably be questioned and debated? How about the numerous liberals (Ezra Klein, Robert Reich, The Nation’s Richard Kim, Naomi Klein) and — according to one poll — a majority of American and British citizens who also believe the Prize was not deserved? Are we actually at the point for some people — as we seem to be — where a person is not only obligated to assume the core goodness of Obama but also agree and affirm that, a mere nine months into his presidency, he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize? That’s now a mandated belief? In order to be a good, patriotic citizen and a decent human being, that’s the requirement one has to fulfill? If that became the prevailing view, wouldn’t the distinction Ambinder highlighted between the Bush and Obama years cease to exist? snip
We are rife with racism in this country, rife with organised diversion and division – going back hundreds of years. But charges of racism at ordinary, if vehement, criticism as well as open dislike of Ob (oh count me in – I have never argued against anyone who dislikes a pretzel, FREE COUNTRY – they say!) is simply thuggishness. As is slandering ordinary people as subversives for disagreeing, however strongly, with acts of the State…
Dipshit lectures.
However… Glenn misses a few oars in the slave ship:
At least as I always perceived it, the “liberal blogosphere” — to the extent that’s a cognizable entity — has devoted itself to criticisms of two failed institutions: (1) the establishment media and (2) the Democratic Party leadership.
Naa-naa. The job of the organised Liberal Blahgosphere has been, over all, to corral the hapless, intimidate open debate and, in timely fashion, reinforce sublimation. To “rebel” just enough to keep the faithful tuned in… and again, at the right time, to change the tone and temper of the argument.
It is an organ of the party it serves.
Last, here is a good laugh also via Glenn, if you needed one:
UPDATE: Arianna Huffington argues today that Joe Biden — who has led the internal administration debate against escalation in Afghanistan — should resign in protest if Obama orders more troops to that war. She makes a good case against escalation and a better case than one might think for why Biden should resign.
What a scream. She misses the entire slave ship. Biden resign. Over principle. Yeah right. The last resignations of any value, post Saturday night massacre (Cox and Richardson) were Cyrus Vance under Jimmy… Edelstein under Clinton over welfare ”reform” and the three diplomats at the opening of Iraq War.
Dipshit lectures… ’til they haul the hapless faithful back in and set in motion the ship. You know, that slow turning ship Ob loves to mention.
