Fun With Rudy:
For big time high-lariousity, check out ABC's Blotter page about how Rudy Giuliani's then-fuckbag Judith Nathan essentially used the NYPD "as her personal taxi service." In the box that says "The Blotter Recommends," there's a list of the following greatest hits for America's Mayor: "Giuliani's Ties to Qatar Raise Questions for Mr. 9/ll" and "Out of Spotlight, Giuliani Embraces Convicted Moneyman" and "Photos: Giuliani and the Priest," which bears explaining, which we get in the next line: "Giuliani Defends, Employs Priest Accused of Molesting Teens."

Over at the toxic waste dump known as Townhall.com, conservative blogger and obese hate purveyor John Hawkins has done a great deal of the work of destroying Giuliani for the Republican base. In his column (if by "column," you mean, "the howling rage against the world for one's inability to get fucked ever, even at 4 a.m. in a Shanghai whorehouse with a hundred Euro bill wrapped around your dick") titled "Rudy Giuliani Would Be Our Bill Clinton," Hawkins goes through all those things that oughta make Clinton-haters beshit themselves fretting: the marriages, the affair, the Kerik, the pro-life, pro-gay, anti-gun stands, the possible child molester buddy. As one of Hawkins' commenters says, "Further, when Clinton was messing around in the White House with Monica (at the very least) we claimed he was reckless and exhibited bad judgment. The way that Rudy handled his second divorce, adultery and 3rd marriage is way beyond anything that Clinton did in the White House."

Over at the New York Daily News, never a Rudy fan, they got former New York mayor Ed Koch and an official from the administration of David Dinkins to say that they never did anything like Giuliani's clever accounting to cover-up his high-balling in the Hamptons. This forced Giuliani's stooge Joe Lhota, who had told the press that the practice of shifting expenses to lesser departments had "gone on for years" and "predates Giuliani," to crawfish into a corner and say, in a tiny, Kerik-sodomized voice, "I should only talk about what I know about."

Man, no wonder the third wife calls Giuliani all the time. Considering the measures he undertook to hide that he was fucking her when she was the other woman, she has every reason to be worried.

The Rude Pundit doesn't give a happy monkey fuck about who Giuliani fucked and when. But here's the thing: he was a dick about it. He was the mid-life crisis bearing motherfucker who said, "Fuck it" to his family and decided to bust a nut when a new piece of ass came along. Hell, the Rude Pundit, in the scheme of things, doesn't have any moral problem with that. But Rudy thought he could do whatever he wanted as mayor, running City Hall like a petty dictatorship, abusing, at least in an unethical way, his office in order to keep his affair a secret. The public has the right to wonder, "Should I have to pay if a President Giuliani wants to hide from his wife the fact that he's giving the high hard one to some new tail?"

Batshit in St. Pete - The Republican Debate:
Sweet motherfuck, what a collection of pussies, posers, and paranoiacs gathered on that stage in St. Petersburg last night for the CNN/YouTube debate. What the fuck was that? Leaving aside Fred Thompson, who looks and talks like the ghost of Jacob Marley in a community theatre production of A Christmas Carol, Crazy Eyes Huckabee, the worthless Duncan Hunter, the worthlesser Tom Tancredo, and the batshit nutzoid little fuck that is Ron Paul (yeah, yeah, he's against the war - still, fuck him), and leaving aside John McCain for just a moment here, what you had was a throwdown between a pair of pampered bitches each trying to show the other who can tear up a satin pillow the most viciously.

It's hard to figure out what the most embarrassing moment was for Mitt Romney or Rudy Giuliani. Was it the sight of two incredibly wealthy white men trying to out butch each other on illegal immigrants? It's like wandering into a Harvard Club discussion of the relative merits of Jackass versus South Park. You stare for a while in nauseated wonder and then you just wanna smack everyone involved on principle.

For the Rude Pundit, the lowest of the low for Romney came when the former governor of Massachusetts tried to get in John McCain's shit about torture. Perfectly spouting the Bush administration's line about how we don't torture, but we can't tell you what we do, Romney got all manly: "I'm not going to specify the specific means of what is and what is not torture so that the people that we capture will know what things we're able to do and what things we're not able to do. And I get that advice from Cofer Black, who is a person who was responsible for counterterrorism in the CIA for some 35 years."

It was too late, though. McCain had already bent Romney over the bamboo mat and made the Mormon into his bitch when he said, "Then I am astonished that you would think such a -- such a torture would be inflicted on anyone in our -- who we are held captive and anyone could believe that that's not torture. It's in violation of the Geneva Convention. It's in violation of existing law. And, governor, let me tell you, if we're going to get the high ground in this world and we're going to be the America that we have cherished and loved for more than 200 years. We're not going to torture people. We're not going to do what Pol Pot did. We're not going to do what's being done to Burmese monks as we speak. I suggest that you talk to retired military officers and active duty military officers like Colin Powell and others, and how in the world anybody could think that that kind of thing could be inflicted by Americans on people who are held in our custody is absolutely beyond me." It was the best answer to any question the entire evening, one of the only ones that bespoke a grounding in humanity, an oasis of normal among the savagery.

For sheer fucking hilarity, there was Rudy Giuliani's response to the scary guy who wanted to know if the candidates believed every word of the bible. Having already been booed on gun control and immigration, the adulterous, gay-loving Giuliani brought out the weasel stick: "I think there are parts of the Bible that are interpretive. I think there are parts of the Bible that are allegorical.I think there are parts of the Bible that are meant to be interpreted in a modern context. So, yes, I believe it. I think it's the great book ever written. I read it frequently. I read it very frequently when I've gone through the bigger crises in my life, and I find great wisdom in it, and it does define to a very large extent my faith. But I don't believe every single thing in the literal sense of Jonah being in the belly of the whale, or, you know, there are some things in it that I think were put there as allegorical."

You gotta wonder if Rudy was readin' the good book while his limo was taking him to Judith Nathan's place in the Hamptons. Maybe he found in it the wisdom to sustain him while he lied to his wife and family for all those pre-9/11 weekends spent balling Nathan. Perhaps he thought about the allegorical aspects of the crucifixion while he was nailing his mistress. Maybe he thought about Jonah and the whale as Nathan was fellating his tiny cock.

The wheels are coming off Giuliani. Romney's unelectable. Huckabee's spooky. The Rude Pundit's said it before: McCain's the only way to go for Republicans who actually want to win. Sure, the crazy showed every now and then with McCain, when talking about the public losing Vietnam or about Iraq, but among the men on that stage last night, McCain was the only one who sounded like he knew what he was talking about. Other than on torture, McCain's best answer was on another creepy question about what guns the candidates own and can use. While Romney and Thompson went macho, McCain, sounding like the guy who would gut you in your sleep, answered, "For a long time I used a lot of guns, including carrying a .45 as a pilot flying in combat over Vietnam. I know how to use guns. I don't own one now."

Now that's the real badass.

Batshit at Annapolis: A Picture Show and a Pondering:


That's our goddamn President, grinning like he's wondering whether to rape Ronny Cox or Jon Voight next, standing between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (who, in the scheme of things in the Middle East, have pretty easily pronounceable names). Bush is smiling because the two leaders agreed that talking about shit is a good idea. Huzzah. Triumph.


That's Bill Clinton standing between Yithak Rabin and Yasser Arafat back in 1993. Clinton is smiling because the two leaders actually signed a peace deal. It would fall apart soon after, but, still, and all, it was a thing, an accomplishment.


That's Jimmy Carter standing between Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin in 1978. Carter is smiling because the two leaders just signed the Camp David Accords, which led to a peace treaty in 1979.

We might look at this as the photo-ops of diminishing returns. But that would be cruel to Clinton. Instead, let's just ask which of these pictures looks the most dishonest in the context. The Rude Pundit's gonna go with the one where Bush seems like he's physically pushing Olmert and Abbas together by the scruffs of their necks, like trying to get frat pledges to tongue kiss for his amusement back at Yale.

One other note on the Annapolis meeting: Imagine being one of the delegates from Lebanon, which had the fuck bombed out of it by Israel, and having to listen to President Bush say, "[A] battle is underway for the future of the Middle East -- and we must not cede victory to the extremists. With their violent actions and contempt for human life, the extremists are seeking to impose a dark vision on the Palestinian people -- a vision that feeds on hopelessness and despair to sow chaos in the Holy Land. If this vision prevails, the future of the region will be endless terror, endless war, and endless suffering."

Imagine hearing that if you're Palestinian, having heard Bush say, "The Palestinian people are blessed with many gifts and talents." Essentially, the Leader o' the Free World just equated you and your people with an average toddler or a particularly bright spaniel.

Imagine listening to this man who is threatening to attack Iran and plunge your region into conflagration. You know, you see some crazy shit back home, but sitting there and listen to Bush and Rice talk about peace, well, that's like sitting next to a farting camel - you wanna make sure you're not on the downwind side of the stink.

Unspoken Thoughts Floating Around the District of Columbia Yesterday:
In a private Oval Office meeting, on the visitor's side of the desk: "Hey, you wannabe leader, you dickless, coddled, narrow-minded, warped bag of douche, what must it be like to wake up every morning, knowing that your children and grandchildren and generations of your polluted seed will be told that the world was plunged into chaos and destruction because of you? Not only were you the cause of much of it, but of those things you could have solved, you were too much of a fucktwit to do a goddamned thing about it? Yeah, that's gonna be funny when, outside the flooded or burnt out ruins of what were once our great cities, made unlivable by environmental neglect and a wrecked military and the collapse of an economy that finally forced the rich to move to Europe, the shells of schools teach their students to revile you while they ask, like classrooms in Poland ponder, 'What would have happened if Hitler had been assassinated?', what life would have been like if the Florida recount had happened.

"Jesus, George, how Bill and Madeleine and I used to sit around here and fuckin' laugh at the idea that Americans would be so pathetically stupid as to get tricked by you, how it didn't seem possible, how the idiot son of a defeated president couldn't possibly win. Never underestimate the placement of toadies in high positions, though, but I don't have to tell you. And you've made sure that everyone who didn't believe you could do it was punished, which means, you know, most people got to be fucked by you.

"But now, oh, shit, now, it's like what it must have been like to watch child molesters get drawn and quartered in the medieval public squares. It's like blood sport, seeing you fall, seeing your legacy being the nadir of American power and influence. You will be despised by all people in the world except a devoted little suicide cult, but there won't be a restoration for you, like Nixon or Reagan. No. Your name will be spoken in the same breath as Pinochet, Milosevic, and Mussolini, the graceless thugs of recent history. My descendants get the last laugh, motherfucker.

"Now listen up while I try to save your sorry ass only because I'm trying to save us all."

In the Oval Office, on the president's side of the desk: "I hope there's pie at that big dinner tonight. Do Arabs like pie? Sure, they do. Everyone likes pie. How long do I have to listen to this fat fuck to make it look good?"

In a private room at George Washington University Hospital, from the bed: "Suck my dick, Satan. You're not gettin' me yet."

In that hospital room, looking down at the patient, ready to administer electric shock to a skipping heart: "What did my grandma ask me? 'If you had the chance to kill Hitler, would you do it? If you had the chance...' Hmmm. Ah, shit. Just do your job. Fuckin' Hippocrates."

America Hearts Savage Saudi Arabia - Is It the Oil or Their Startling Good Looks?:
A sure sign of corruption at the heart of any ideology is the easy willingness to dive into the slime pool of hypocrisy. For instance, let's say that you're a closeted gay guy who tells himself as long as you get your cock sucked by dudes but do no sucking yourself, you can look yourself in the mirror and tell yourself you're straight. It's a lie, to be sure, but it's a lie you can live with and live by, especially and as long as your wife and children don't find out or call you on it. But one night, after a few drinks and a line or two, you end up in a Bushwick apartment with some bald hipster dude balls deep in your face. As you bob on that boner, the hipster's leather pork pie hat on your head, you may tell yourself that it was just the whiskey and coke that made you do this. But if you like it? And you're good at it, as if it's some preternatural peter piping ability? And, aw, shit, it feels so good to get a hot load blown into the back of your throat? Then, dear friend, 'tis time to throw open the closet door and stop wrecking your life and the lives of those around you. Chances are, though, you'll just go on with your lie, making it expand so that those near you cling to it like a rubber life raft in a cold Antarctic sea.

Apparently, when it comes to Saudi Arabia, the Bush administration's filled with cultural relativists of the most extreme kind. The administration is refusing to condemn Saudi Arabia for the barbaric punishment of 200 lashes and imprisonment for a female gang rape victim because, as the Saudia more or less put it, she was asking for it when she was alone with a man.

Witness the delicious weaselliness of State Department spokestool Sean McCormack, answering a question about the case from a reporter at a daily press briefing: "We think it's essential that every individual enjoy basic universal rights that we believe every person on the planet should enjoy, and those include freedom of expression, freedom to choose freely one's leaders. The Saudi Government has committed itself to a pathway of reform, as have other states in the region. That pathway of reform is going to -- each of those states is going to go down that pathway at its own pace, though...Look, you have a situation that I think most individuals, for example in our country, just don't understand. We don't understand how something like this could happen. That said, these kinds of decisions are going to have to be decisions that the people of that country, in this case Saudi Arabia, are going to have to take for themselves. We can express our views about that, but ultimately it's going to be up to the individual countries to decide whether or not they are going to take into account the views from the outside world."

McCormack said something about how "We have expressed our astonishment at such a sentence." But when he was asked if that astonishment has been expressed directly to the Saudis, well, shit, at least he was honest: " I am not aware of any direct contact with the Saudis on this issue." That's right. No contact with the Saudis. It's just their judicial processes at work and boy, oh, boy, we hope they reform, like we waited for the Taliban to... oh, wait...like we wanted Saddam Hussein to...no, no, that's not right. Man, oil apparently is some kind of drug that eliminates conscience, consistency, and coherence, and forces you to bend over and open your anus to the Arabian pump like so many Hummer fuel tanks.

For extra special fun, here's an editorial from the Arab News this month on the "Dangerous Concept of Spinsterhood," which essentially tells women to get off their high horses and marry whatever dude comes along: "Some women reject the idea of marriage, worried about freedom regardless of her awaited knight. Tension occurs and the woman becomes confused and shattered...When a woman’s only concern is her freedom and not being limited by responsibilities, she will never know what true comfort, ambition, life and family interaction means." Awesome bedfellows.

Add to that the surge in beheadings - 136 this year so far, up from 83 in 2005. By the hair on Muhammed's nutsack, when's the last time the United States condemned anything from these savage fuckers? How many lies about human rights do we have to be told by the President and his lackeys before we realize how anti-human they are?

Maybe Condoleezza Rice can ask the Saudi foreign minister about it all in Annapolis week. But since his hands will be lubricated with high-priced crude, chances are she'll just lift her skirt and let him fist away.

Suck on This, Bill O'Reilly and Michelle Malkin:
O'Reilly and his loyal harpy Malkin love to go all batshit when an illegal immigrant is involved in a crime. Will O'Reilly have the balls to report the story of Jesus Cordova? Will Malkin silence her horrible shrieking and retract her gore-coated claws to praise one man?

The answers, of course, are "no" and "seriously, are you fuckin' kidding?"

Pictures That Make the Rude Pundit Want To Freebase Cranberries:


Camp David must have smelled heavenly yesterday, rich with the succulent scents of simmering gravy and fresh baked breads. The menu for Thanksgiving was fit for a king: all turkey and sweet potato souffle and pumpkin mousse trifle, whatever the hell that is. So American, this meal. Albeit with heavy French influences. And gazpacho. But whatever. It's Thanksgiving, you know? How wonderful it must have been for the President and his family, the fires burning in the hearth, the crunch of leaves during hikes in the warmer-than-normal Maryland woods. So very American. It's what we want from our leader - the comfort, the home, the soul nourished by the simple graces of good food prepared by servants and grounds made immaculate by the gardeners and a security detail that was grateful for the leftovers. Bliss.

And the President took time away from his loved ones to make phone calls to the troops who were having similar meals overseas, stationed in the Green Zone or in the field, many with actual turkeys and pies. How comforting it must have been to those in uniform, hearing the voice of their commander-in-chief, knowing that he cares, sitting at his desk in Camp David in a comfy cardigan, surrounded by a large photo of dog Barney about to get run over by an SUV, a painting of George Washington praying, and a model of a battleship, relaxed in his stuffed leather chair. Yes, such tidings from home.

Later that day, the Green Zone was attacked by mortars or rockets. At night at Camp David, laying in bed next to a Xanaxed-out Laura, Bush could listen to one of his daughters - he can never remember which one - getting roughly fucked by her fiance'. Pulling up his cozy down comforter, his favorite pillow under his head, the President might think for a moment about thanking God for such blessings. But why not give credit where credit is due? He drifts off, feeling like a good and powerful person, with words in his head like a mantra, "I am thankful for me, I am thankful for me."

A Poem Prayer for Thanksgiving:
Eagle Prayer
by Joy Harjo

To pray you open your whole self
To sky, to earth, to sun, to moon
To one whole voice that is you.
And know there is more
That you can't see, can't hear,
Can't know except in moments
Steadily growing, and in languages
That aren't always sound but other
Circles of motion.
Like eagle that Sunday morning
Over Salt River. Circled in blue sky
In wind, swept our hearts clean
With sacred wings.
We see you, see ourselves and know
That we must take the utmost care
And kindness in all things.
Breathe in, knowing we are made of
All this, and breathe, knowing
We are truly blessed because we
Were born, and die soon within a
True circle of motion,
Like eagle rounding out the morning
Inside us.
We pray that it will be done
In beauty.
In beauty.

In Brief: What Did CNN's John Roberts Know About Scott McClellan's Misinformation and When Did He Know It?:
This morning on CNN's American Morning Sans Soledad, host John Roberts was talking to Slate's John Dickerson about Scott "I Just Realized I Have an Immortal Soul" McClellan's revelation that he discovered he was lied to about the involvement of Scooter Libby and Karl Rove in the leaking of Valerie Plame Wilson's identity to the press.

Here's what Roberts, who was a White House correspondent at the time, said: "Boy, I'll tell you though, it's surprising you know. I knew that he was upset because they set to his office and talked to him about it. About told to go out there and do that. I didn't realize he was this upset about it."

Believe what you will about how truthful Scott "You Should Have Paid Me Off Better, George and Dick" McClellan is being about his own innocent involvement. But what exactly is Roberts saying? That he knew McClellan knew he had deliberately been fed misinformation? And why didn't Roberts report on that at the time? Doesn't what Roberts says undermine McClellan's protestations of ignorance in telling the press that Rove and Libby were not involved?

The bigger questions are: How complicit is the media in Rove's exoneration? In stifling investigation?

The Saudi Arabian Justice System Sucks Pig Cock:
Here's the Saudi Justice Ministry's reasoning for a female gang-rape victim being sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison for "illegal mingling": "[A]nyone has a right to appeal verdicts, but [the ministry] also warned of 'stirring up agitation through the media that may not be objective and cannot grant anyone any right as much as it can negatively affect the other parties involved in the case.'" You know, if you can't stir up agitation over a woman and man who were gang raped and then punished by a court because they were unmarried and met with each other before being gang raped, then there's not much to stir up trouble about at all.

You know how the Bush administration occasionally tells us how wonderful they are because they freed the women of Afghanistan from the Taliban (even though that's about as much of a chimera as democracy in Pakistan)? Where's Laura Bush now? Where's the White House at all?

In a proud final moment for America and for women before stepping down as Homeland Security Adviser, stooge Bushette Frances Townshend told CNN, "[T]he case is absolutely reprehensible. I mean and so let's put that aside. What I've praised the Saudis for is their counter-terrorism cooperation, where it is unprecedented, and we share information that's helped us stopped attacks. This case is separate and apart from that. And I just don't think there's any explaining it or justifying it."

Step up to the pig, Fran, and suck away.

Two Brief Observations Regarding the Writers' and Stagehands' Strikes:
On the writers: In this past Sunday's New York Times Magazine, Michael Eisner, former Disney chief and general big muckety-muck, said of the writers' demand for a piece of the Internet use of their labor: "The area where they cannot make a deal is original production for the Internet, which is neither profitable nor is it clear in exactly what direction it’s going to go."

Now, the Rude Pundit's no half-billion dollar or so media mogul, but it does seem that when a large corporation like, say, GE or Disney (and, remember, this is about big ass media multinationals), is investing in developing content, there's expenses that they have to eat. Shouldn't writer residuals be part of that meal?

By the way, this weekend the Rude Pundit's gonna catch up on an episode or two of 30 Rock he forgot to Tivo. Those are available for free over at the NBC website. It's a stream, not a download that you have to buy over at iTunes. There's a couple of commercials during the stream. So someone's paying NBC for time. The writers don't receive a dime for their work being streamed because NBC views it as "promotion." Even though it's the entire episode. With, as mentioned, commercials. Promotion with commercials. So postmodern.

On the stagehands strike that's fucking up Thanksgiving for the tourists in New York City: A dancer friend who works at one of the huge, sparkly musicals told the Rude Pundit, "When there's set pieces weighing a thousand pounds flying onto and off of the stage, I'd rather have too many stagehands there than too few."

Unsolicited Advice to Markos Moulitsas on His Newsweek Column:
My, my, hasn't Newsweek created a crazy little ideological war. Lookie here: it's eeevil Karl Rove on the right vs. nasty blogmaster Markos Moulitsas on the left. Commenting on the presidential election. Ooh, the gloves're gonna come off now. Let's watch the blooding...

Except, of course, in their opening salvos, it's such a punk ass wet noodle slap fight that you just stare and wonder, "Is this all ya got?" Rove jumps into the fray by saying that Hillary Clinton is a cold, brittle woman, so she's beatable by a strong but huggable Republican, before offering a brochure for his services (leaving off his price of two souls and three fat babies). Markos begins his attack by saying that Democrats are gonna win because Bush is such a 'tard and he's fucked it all up and Democrats should just keep sayin' that and it'll all be good. Texas vs. Frisco, baby.

Joan Walsh over at Salon is wrong: Rove didn't win the first engagement. It was a draw in that neither of them said anything surprising, revealing, or important. In fact, both offered a list of shit that added up to "well, that's fuckin' obvious."

Here's the dirty little secret that anyone who has read Daily Kos over the years knows: Moulitsas has never been the strongest writer on the site. On any given day, Hunter (Michael Lazarro), georgia10 (Georgia Logothetis), DavidNYC, McJoan (Joan McCarter) or others are writing more stirring, incisive, and insightful posts. That's not to mention the non-fronted diarists.

This, however, is not to disparage Markos. He is a mad genius in that he created a space where progressives, silenced as public voices by the major media, could express outrage and pain at the strange, violent turn the Bush administration was heading into. Later, it became (and remains) a place for strategy and truth-seeking, along with the anger. This whole grand pseudospace we occupy here in the ethereal realm of the Internet exists in large part due to Markos. Even after purging permanent links to this and other more rambunctious blogs from the front of the Daily Kos, the Rude Pundit can still offer nothing but his admiration and respect to Markos. But just because you're Edmund Woolley, it doesn't mean you're also Benjamin Franklin.

Still, Markos is the face of Left Blogsylvania, and he knows that we're a community. So here's some advice, Markos:

Remember that the Republicans are liars and that Americans have a short-term memory that makes the guy in Memento seem like a talking encyclopedia. And the thing about good liars is that they can say their lies with a straight face, say them so it looks like they believe the lies with all their hearts and who are we to dare question them. You have to treat them like the liars that they are. The way to do this is not to politely tell everyone how incompetent the Bush administration has been. The way to do it is to say they are liars and make their lies plain. You want to revise the story that Americans believe about people like Giuliani and Romney. If you wanna invoke the Bush administration, do it to show how, say, Giuliani is intimately tied to it. Make their failures his failures, not the failures of nebulous Republicanism.

Remember who your opponent is: Karl "We Will Fuck Him...Like No One Has Ever Fucked Him" Rove. Anyone who's paid attention to politics for the last decade knows that this depraved demon always has an ace in his back pocket, that he's never telling you everything, that he's always calculating where to place his camouflaged holes, like a trapdoor spider. What's his game with his Hillary obsession? Is it a masterful triple cross, where he says the truth but he wants everyone to think he's lying but he's really telling the truth? Or is it merely that he wants to destroy a Clinton, as the Rude Pundit has said before?

Finally, c'mon, Markos, stop sounding like a fuckin' Donna Brazile wannabe. You're a goddamn blogger. Remember your roots. Represent a little bit, for chrissake. We actively look for asses to kick because there's so many that deserve the tender pain of a shoe-shaped bruise on their hinds. Put your Doc Martens back on.

Oh, and leave Reagan out of it. Americans are too deluded to believe anything other than that senile bag of fuck was a demigod.

How Democrats Can Explain War Funding Easily:
Let us say, and why not, that your sister with three kids is always asking you for money. You're a generally kind person, willing to give your sister the benefit of the doubt, that times are tough, that decent paying jobs are hard to come by, that we're all doing the best we can, that food stamps and unemployment checks only go so far. Let's say, and, again, why not, that over the course of a few years you've dropped a few thousand because you give a damn about your nieces and nephew. In fact, if you've ever even hinted that you don't have the money, your sister says, "Well, I guess we'll have to skip dinner a couple times this week." What kind of hard-hearted asshole would you have to be to deny her?

The thing is, it's really making you take a hit - there's stuff you need, like car repairs, some dental work, perhaps, that you have to put off because of your sister's constant requests. And the thing is, you don't see how the cash is going to anything that'll actually make your sister get a job or better housing. In fact, when you ask where the money goes, she gets all pissy, saying you don't trust her, saying that you want her kids to be taken from her. Sure, sure, she makes promises, that the money's going to pay for school for her. Or job training. But none of that has happened. Your money could be going for drugs, clothes, or just bullshit expenses that dribble it away. Either way, your sister thinks she's doing the right thing and, hey, the kids are fed, even if they seem a little bedraggled by the whole experience.

One day, you decide enough is enough. Your sister comes to you again, saying once again that she needs money, that she's used up the last check. You tell her, "Okay, I'm gonna give you some money, but only to pay directly for the following." And you lay down a few mild restrictions, like you'll pay school expenses. You'll pay for her to get some clothes to go on job interviews. And, of course, whatever the kids need. You want to be more involved. After all, you're the one providing the money. And she's sure as shit demonstrated that her ability to use your cash is worthless.

Now let's say that she gets really angry at you for daring to question her. She says that you don't care if her kids starve, that you don't support her. You either give her the same cash with no strings attached or you can shove your money up your ass and watch the kids go hungry in rags and it'll be your fault. "What the fuck?" you might think. You've given her every chance in the goddamn world. At some point, haven't you earned the right to say that she's incapable of making reasonable financial decisions or, really, decisions about the welfare of her children. You wanna give her money. She says it's her way or the highway. What are ya gonna do?

As many Congressional Democrats go back to their home districts this week, it's time to explain to their constituents why they are going to take a stand against the Bush administration's war (and they need to take that stand). It's so simple: we'll give the funds, but we demand a say in how the money is spent.

Explain that the President simply wants to be given a credit card with no limit to use as he likes. Sure, yeah, he can bully all he wants, saying nonsense like, "[O]ur troops deserve the full support of Congress -- and that means giving our troops the funding they need to successfully carry out their mission."

It's pathetic that Bush would use the troops as shields for his own incompetence. If your sister was feeding the kids Twinkies and Pepsi while using the TV as a babysitter, would you give her the money to continue?

When the President tries to hide his failure behind the bodies of soldiers, he is merely demonstrating that there's no strategy left, that we are bereft of possibilities as long as he is calling the shots.

Fucked Gulf Coast (A Geographically Larger Edition of the Unending "Fucked New Orleans" Series):
One beautiful thing about having a government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations is that every disaster is measured in terms of economic loss. It's sort of like getting your arm sheared off in a car accident and thinking, "Damn, now it'll take longer to fold the laundry" as blood spurts from your arteries.

So, in the wake of the hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the measurement of the loss of trees was put in terms of timber and cash: $2 billion bucks, 5 and a half billion feet of boards. Goddamn, that sucks. Truly.

But now we have a report about the actual magnitude of the damage to the forests of the Gulf Coast. And it's a wee bit more important than lumber conglomerates sucking up a loss. 320 million trees killed or severely damaged by the storms, "putting as much carbon from dying vegetation into the air as the rest of the nation's forest takes out in a year of photosynthesis," so it will help speed up climate change unless something is done.

Unfortunately, that something being done rests with the Bush administration, whose bumbling makes a young Jerry Lewis in a china shop seem like a graceful ballet dancer. Let's just quote this in full: "Efforts to limit the damage have been handicapped by the ineffectiveness of a $504 million federal program to help Gulf Coast landowners replant and fight the invasive species. Congress appropriated the money in 2005 and added to it in 2007, but officials acknowledge that the program got off to a slow start and that only about $70 million has been promised or dispensed so far. Local advocates said onerous bureaucratic hurdles and low compensation rates are major reasons."

Is there a goddamn way in which the White House did anything right by the people of the Gulf Coast? This is trickle-up shit. It seems like it's just a localized problem, one that can be ignored by those who don't live there. But it's coming to bite us all on the ass and chew that fat off.

Hell, at least the streetcars are going again in New Orleans.

(Tip o' the hat to rude reader Neil for the story link.)

Why Ann Coulter Is a Cunt (Dictator-Humping Edition):
Imagine for a moment what it must be like for Ann Coulter each week as she sits down to write her "column." You sift through the various cocktail napkins, toilet paper squares, and Prada receipts on which you scrawled the different bon mots about those silly Democrats, cutting little lines you conjured during the week and just had to scribble before you lost them. You look at the pile of shredded paper and get depressed, so you burn your left tit with your lit cigarette to inspire you. You take a gander at your recent columns to see just how bugfuck insane you actually got, not really remembering exactly what you wrote since it all gets dumped in a scotch haze, like all those cocks you have to keep on sucking - how can one keep track of which one belongs to which Murdoch or Ailes? Christ, you sigh, seeing how you recently wrote about what a great man Joseph McCarthy was, how you actually rewrote the poignant anti-Holocaust statement to make it refer to the alleged silencing of right-wing voices, saying, "First they came for Rush Limbaugh, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't Rush Limbaugh..."

Truly, and, indeed, it gets wearying, having to think about how to top yourself each and every week. You get frustrated and cut your thighs with a razor, frantically lubricating your twat with the blood so you can attempt a rough fingering of your calloused clit until suddenly inspiration strikes.

If anyone can point out any other way that Ann Coulter writes her columns, the Rude Pundit would be glad to hear it. For, logically, how else could she actually type (or dictate to a cowering assistant who has watched Coulter do all of the above) the following: "If Republicans end up with a divided convention between Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani, I say we pick Gen. Pervez Musharraf." What follows is a series of statements about Musharraf, praising him for imposing emergency rule, for shutting down the Supreme Court of Pakistan, and for ordering the police to beat rioting lawyers. And then, without any sense of irony, she says how great it is that Musharraf wants to make Pakistan a more democratic place. (Along with mocking Pakistani bathing habits.)

The Rude Pundit's not going to argue with Coulter's "points," because it is futile beyond futility to say that Coulter is wrong that the mainstream media hasn't criticized Benazir Bhutto, or that to compare Pervez Musharraf to Turkey's Mustafa Kemal Ataturk ("Pakistan's Ataturk is Gen. Musharraf") is like comparing Ann Coulter to Mark Twain. Coulter doesn't give a fuck about logic, facts, history, or truth. It is agitation for agitation's sake. And for profit's sake. If she doesn't slake her drooling fans' thirst for outrage, then she's just another used-up bimbo with Australian cum in her long blonde hair.

By the way, for a more realistic view of Musharraf, check out Ali Eteraz in The Guardian: "The current tyrant, meanwhile, is not only less popular than Bin Laden, but he is completely inept in counteracting terrorism. He has: failed to reform the madrassas; cultivated a Kangaroo Sharia court in his backyard for six months which he could use for political benefit; killed those that kept the Taliban at bay; considered appeasing the militants by letting them implement Sharia; turned Pakistan into a state sponsor of terrorism; made alliances with pro-Taliban parties; and even engaged in what are being called crimes against humanity. My editor at Jewcy reminded me that Musharraf is so frightening to terrorists that al-Qaida mastermind Khaled Sheikh Mohammad literally lived within 10 miles of him. This is the man that John Negroponte at the State Department considers 'indispensable.'"

The man whose stubby leg Coulter humps like a bitch in heat.

Is a Cup of Coffee Ever Just a Cup of Coffee for Rudy Giuliani?:
The steaming pile of diseased horseshit that is his 2002 book Leadership (or "How I Gleefully Profited Off a Nightmarish Disaster") contains many, many passages of the trademark Rudy Giuliani weirdness, even if "ferrets, psychotic hatred of" doesn't show up in the index. For the Rude Pundit, the page or so Giuliani devotes to the ethics of taking coffee from a restaurant owner while he was mayor is a fascinating microcosm of the ethics of the man. Here's a good chunk, from pages 209-210:

"The importance of setting an example is one of the reasons why I made such a big deal of paying my own way.

"The principle applied when I ate at restaurants. I realized that a free cup of coffee and cheeseburger from a diner owner who voted for me was unlikely to compromise my integrity...The owner would know that he wasn't going to get preferential treatment just because he treated me to a meal, and arguably there's nothing immoral - certainly nothing illegal - about accepting a gift from someone who expects nothing in return. When a proprietor flat-out refused to give me a check, I left enough money to cover the cost - and a nice tip."

Giuliani then tells a story about a time he insisted on getting a check from a diner owner fan in New Jersey, only to realize he didn't have his wallet, thus forcing a friend to pay the bill for him. He concludes that story, which occurred when he was in private law practice in 1990, with this: "Afterward, I realized perhaps I was carrying my objections too far - a cup of coffee from a grateful diner owner wouldn't have compromised my principles and would have given him a lot of pleasure."

The Rude Pundit thought about this passage when he heard FBI agent David Cardona talking about the indictment of Bernard Kerik on multiple corruption charges. Cardona drew a clear line in the sand of right and wrong in regards to the behavior of public servants: "A beat cop accepting a free cup of coffee ... is properly viewed by the public as wrong. ... If a free cup of coffee is wrong, Kerik's long list of alleged crimes is repugnant."

The point here is that the passage from Leadership ain't about a kind of honesty. It'd be one thing if Giuliani said, "I paid the check because a mayor shouldn't take free things from his constituents." Or if he said "It's unethical, even though it shouldn't be." But, no. Giuliani makes it seem like he's doing some great gesture. More importantly, he completely exonerates himself from any possible taint.

Look at that one line: "[A]rguably there's nothing immoral - certainly nothing illegal - about accepting a gift from someone who expects nothing in return." How many elected and appointed officials caught in bribes and graft would re-crucify Jesus to be able to make that statement and get away with it? Duke Cunningham? Bernard Kerik? How big does the "gift" have to be before it implies something is expected in return? What if nothing explicit is ever stated? But here's the bottom line: if Giuliani didn't think it was immoral or illegal to take that cup o' joe, he should have taken it. If he paid, he knew something was skeevy about it, denier though he may be. And, no, this ain't much ado about bullshit.

Of course Giuliani could overlook all of Bernard Kerik's sins. Because he didn't see them as anything other than the price of doing business. Hell, his ability to keep promoting a lummox like Kerik was a crass demonstration of his sheer power. It's a slippery slope, though, when you start to excuse some sins. It's even worse when you surround yourself with sinners. Like it or not, no matter how pure you think you are, at some point, you become the sinner yourself. And for a spiteful, vicious bastard like Giuliani, it compounds his vileness until, when he breathes, he exhales corruption.

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Three Guys on Veterans Day:
This is what the guy who took care of German POWs during World War I and spent three years in a Japanese prison camp in Manila during World War II said yesterday, Veterans Day, when he was asked about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: "I'm no authority, but I'm not in favor of war unless it's an emergency."

And this is what the guy who never even finished his cushy service in the Texas Air National Guard said: "Their service is noble, and it is necessary. The enemies who attacked us six years ago want to strike our country again -- and next time, they hope to kill Americans on a scale that will make 9/11 pale by comparison. By fighting this enemy in foreign lands, the men and women of our Armed Forces are helping to ensure we do not have to face them in our own land. And by spreading the hope of liberty to nations that have not known it, our troops are helping to defeat the ideology of the terrorists." Doesn't exactly seem like an emergency. Our war on an ideology has all the logic and urgency of a Long Island father in 1956 desperately trying to get a good price on a backyard bomb shelter.

Then there's the words of the guy who got five draft deferments. "America may be a country founded in revolution, but we've never been a warrior culture," he spoke, even as he and the administration he "serves" seek hundreds of billions of dollars to wage a war of choice. "[M]ay the rest of us never take them for granted," he said of veterans and soldiers, even as he abides, aids, and abets the Defense Department's stop-loss orders, the lowering of standards for the "volunteer" army, and the sending of troops on fourth and fifth tours of duty with little time at home between deployments.

Here is perhaps definitive proof that there is no God, no being that gives a flying ratfuck about what occurs on Earth: when Vice President Dick Cheney placed a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery, the ground did not open up and vomit forth the zombie corpses of the thousands upon thousands of dead there so they might rip Cheney's remaining functioning organs out and drag his heaving, screaming being into realms of hell where he might be forced to suck mustard gas, be immolated by an atomic explosion, and be burned by napalm, all while having bullets fired through his flesh and grenades with their pins pulled shoved up his ass.

Alas, no, such savage poetry of gore is reserved for the real world, the real soldiers who wreak violence and who die in the real wars for the pusillanimous men whose experience of it is to merely honor the dead while merrily sending more to die.

Quickie Friday: Giulikerik, John Gibson, and Bush's Jacket:

Giulikerik: Are you fuckin' kiddin' here, Rudy? No, seriously, and, c'mon, is that the best defense you can muster about your longtime companion Bernard Kerik? That you "made a mistake" when you recommended that a mob-connected, corrupt, bribe-takin' wad of fuck be the first person to be in charge of the largest government department ever created?

Then, to top it all off, you offered this rejoinder to critics who would point out that your relationship with Kerik makes you a thug-lovin' piece of shit: "But I think they can then look at the results that I had as United States Attorney, the results I had as Associate Attorney General, and most importantly the results that I had as Mayor and say to themselves: if he makes the same balance of right decisions and incorrect decisions as president, the country would be in pretty good shape."

Giuliani was informed that Kerik had lobbied for city contracts to go to a mob-tied company, and he still appointed him police commissioner. Bernard Kerik banged his mistresses in an apartment near Ground Zero that was set aside so the guys who were down in the pit could take a nap. It was after that valiant abuse of public trust that Giuliani recommended Kerik to the Bush administration.

Some mistakes are bigger than others, Rudy. Some mistakes outweigh piles of alleged good. If the hooker you're strangling while you're banging her dies, the fact that a hundred other hookers lived when you choked them doesn't balance the scales. Hell, the fact that you donated thousands of dollars to legless war orphans doesn't balance the scales. If you gobble criminal cock like a Sioux City twink in the bathroom at DC's in Omaha for the first time, don't be surprised if you wake up sticky and stinking of spooge.

John Gibson Looks Like a Homeless Man: The Rude Pundit is haunted by an image he saw at a mall recently. He saw John Gibson, Fox "news" commentator and O'Reilly without the ratings, walking around, doing that Dawn of the Dead stagger, carrying a bag from Kohl's. He was without make-up, with his ample hair grayer and without product wagging around his head like rat tails, wearing clothes that could best be described as "old man chic." Thinking that this wreck of a human could not be the swaggering fucktard who says things like "[A] published report today said that homelessness is virtually over. People may have crushing mortgages, but they have homes," the Rude Pundit surreptitiously passed through the Zane's to take a second look.

On that pass, we made eye contact; he had the sad eyes of a man whose sins have crushed him. And the vaguely panicked look that he had been recognized. You may ask why the Rude Pundit didn't say something, you know, rude to him. Because, seeing Gibson in person, shorter than you'd think, paunchy, bedraggled, pathetic, really, he decided this desiccated shell of a man wasn't worth the effort. You can't hurt a corpse.

Photos That Make the Rude Pundit Want to Smoke Shrooms While Chugging Cheap Mezcal:

Proper caption? "Hey, thanks for the jacket, old man. Now, how about givin' me one of yer fuckin' legs?"

Robertson Hearts Giuliani: A Love That Might Just Destroy Them Both:
Let's say, and why not, that you're a Rudy Giuliani supporter. There are certain delusions you have to subscribe to. You have to behave as if you are a hardcore PCP addict, snortin' and shootin' up that dust like it's camel piss and you're dyin' in the desert. Because you're so constantly fucked up, for you time stopped on September 11, 2001, and all around you are phantoms with beards and guns, evil dictators fellating nuke missiles that are Allah's strap-ons, and voices, oh, those fuckin' voices, in your head, saying, "Wreck shit, wreck it all." So, yeah, sure, you support Giuliani, who shares your hallucinations, who speaks in the same language, the demi-coherent grunts of the bloodthirsty addict, ready to lash out and take out everything to keep the phantoms distant, to keep the voices sated. And Israel, of course, making sure that Israel is safe because...well, you forgot why a long time ago - such is the fate of the heavy user - but you're sure someone you trust told you it was worth starting a regional, if not global, conflagration over.

And because you wanna say you're not a total savage, you especially like Giuliani because he allows you to maintain your liberal leanings on social issues. You don't give a happy monkey fuck about gays getting married, civilly united, whatever, and you damn well wanna be sure abortion is legal, you know, just in case. Yeah, Giuliani soothes that all for you: the "blow shit up" jones and the "leave me the fuck alone" instinct. And he doesn't even talk all that goddamn Jesus bullshit.

For you, when Giuliani courted and received the blessing of Pat Robertson, of The 700 Club, of Regent University, of every prejudiced and anti-libertarian belief you have, you're left with a question: what the fuck are you gonna do? All of a sudden that which distinguished Giuliani is now wiped away when one of the clarion-blowers of intolerance says that Giuliani is his man.

Now let's say you are a Pat Robertson-supporting evangelical. You've lived your life according to what some rich guy on TV and in your local pulpit has told you the Bible means. You've repressed a good four-fifths of your sexual desires because you wanna make sure the correct orifices are in use. You've been told, at various times, that the greatest threats to America and you and your family are homosexuals, abortion providers, divorce, feminists, and more. And, even though it's made you completely nutzoid to agree to hate so much while Robertson smiles and tells you how God loves us all, you nod your head when Robertson says shit like, "Many of those people involved with Adolph Hitler were Satanists, many of them were homosexuals--the two things seem to go together" and "From a biblical standpoint, the rise of homosexuality is a sign that a society is in the last stages of decay." Hell, you've even given Robertson money from one of your two jobs to make sure that gays don't marry because you don't want a pissed-off Jesus asking you what the fuck you did to make sure the homos stayed single and closeted. Nobody wants that.

And, sure, fine, you agree with Robertson that Israel is important because of the rapture. And, sure, Islamofascists or whatever are a threat, but that's new. It's not in your DNA yet. No, all this time, you were a culture warrior, man, and you're all geared up and ready for a battle in '08 against that harridan Hillary.

So when Robertson endorsed Giuliani, the cross-dressing, multiple-divorced, pro-abortion guy who lived with a gay couple, what the fuck are you gonna do?

If the Rude Pundit were advising, say, John McCain right now or, if Giuliani is the nominee, whatever Democrat is nominated, he'd say this moment, right here, is Giuliani's undoing and, possibly, Robertson's. Whatever moderate cred Rudy might have had on social issues is lost. Whatever vestiges of power Robertson clung to in the changing evangelical world are lost as Robertson's nakedly obvious desire to leech prestige off the presumptive leading Republican is revealed.

It's time to precipitate an existential crisis among both groups. For, truly, by letting himself get teabagged by Robertson's saggy sack, Giuliani may secure the nomination, but he's lost the general election. Christ, back on February 28, 2000, on Larry King Live, Giuliani called Robertson one of the "extremists of the right."

And Robertson's support can be pushed away. Make both groups float, lost in the purgatory of political reality, forced to decide what's more important, their souls or the power. Sweet temptations. One might need to, oh, hell, pray to resolve this one.

Why the fuck not. It's the kind of savage self-compromise Democratic supporters have had to make for years.

Bush in Pakistan, March, 2006: Portrait of the President as a Foolish Man:


At the State Dinner: "Americans will support the Pakistani people as they take further steps toward democracy, expand educational opportunities for boys and girls, and create prosperity through innovation and global trade. Pakistan has a bright future because of its proud people, and because of the hard work of a strong leader. President Musharraf, you've proved yourself to be a man of courage and vision."

At the Joint Press Conference: "We support democracy in Pakistan. President Musharraf understands that in the long run, the way to defeat terrorists is to replace an ideology of hatred with an ideology of hope. And I thank you for your extensive briefing today on your plans to spread freedom throughout your country. President Musharraf envisions a modern state that provides an alternative to radicalism."

Standing next to Bush, President Musharraf said, "I will follow constitutional norms. Even now I am following constitutional norms where I have been allowed to wear this uniform until 2007 -- being in uniform as the President of Pakistan. Beyond 2007, yes, indeed, this is an issue which has to be addressed and it has to be addressed according to the constitution of Pakistan. And I will never violate the constitution of Pakistan."

On September 22, 2006, in a joint press conference in D.C., President Bush comments, "We talked about democracy. The last time I was with the President, he assured me, and assured the people that were listening to the news conference, that there would be free and fair elections in Pakistan in 2007. He renewed that commitment, because he understands that the best way to defeat radicalism and extremism is to give people a chance to participate in the political process of a nation."

And, of course, inevitably, President Bush on November 5, 2007: "President Musharraf has been a strong fighter against extremists and radicals, that he understands the dangers posed by radicals and extremists. After all, they tried to kill him three or four times. And our hope is that he will restore democracy as quickly as possible."

There's not a goddamn thing that Bush believes or promises that has or will ever been or be true.

Schumer Makes Sure We Get the Attorney General We Deserve:
The saddest part about the Mukasey cave-in by Democrats was that it was so goddamned predictable. Democrats do their wittle dance o' outwage, stompin' their cute toddler feet on the ground, balling up their fists and declaring, "No way, no how," before finally shitting themselves and crying to be loved. The second some of the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee voiced concern about Michael Mukasey for his inability to say if waterboarding is torture, we knew the way it was gonna go down. It's just fuckin' depressing, innit?

For extra-deep-oh-fuck-pass-the-loaded-Glock despair, read Chuck Schumer's rank justification of why he's giving Mukasey the thumbs-up in the New York Times today. Apparently, without Mukasey, "President Bush has said he would install an acting, caretaker attorney general who could serve for the rest of his term without the advice and consent of the Senate," and, apparently once this apparatchik is in there, the Senate can't do jackshit: "To accept such an unaccountable attorney general, I believe, would be to surrender the department to the extreme ideology of Vice President Dick Cheney and his chief of staff, David Addington."

In other words, once the rapist gets into the Catholic girl's school, he can just lock the doors, and the nuns and priests can do fuck-all while he unzips and wanders from room to room nailing the girls. Well, shit, at least the nuns can say a prayer that the girls aren't too horribly scarred by the ordeal. Schumer has consigned the Senate to bystander status, so he may as well give up now and at least have someone in there he can grab a beer with.

Apparently, Mukasey personally assured Schumer that he'd enforce any laws passed by Congress. And it speaks volumes about our America that Schumer would feel that it's a valid point in Mukasey's favor. One might think that enforcing the law is pretty much the basic function of the job of Attorney General. But as debased as the Justice Department has become, all of a sudden it's a noble quality in someone. These fuckers have lowered the bar so far down that moles tower above it.

So Mukasey's gonna get the go-ahead, and, as with Alberto Gonzales, John Roberts, and others, personal and public assurances made by them will amount to so much bullshit clogging the hearing rooms. Between Harry Reid pulling back his party's senators from filibustering Mukasey to the coming cave on war funding, Democrats are making the big mistake of not taking down the bullies and thugs who are destroying this village. We thought we were electing the Seven Samurai or at least the Three Amigos. Instead, we got a handful of Barney Fifes.

Why Does Conservative Spooge Bucket Kevin McCullough Hate Women? (Part 2):
If you ever want to figure out how deeply in the closet any male friend of yours is, use the following sentences from Kevin McCullough as a baseline: "Some women will be offended by the observation but most will agree, women do not vote according to what they know. They tend instead to vote based on intuition. They get 'a feeling' about a candidate and that's what they trust." If your closeted male friend disagrees with it, he might be ready to come out. If he agrees even a little, that fucker's so far in the back of the closet that he's pushing his spine into the plaster. And if your friend's sucking your dick, then, well, he's come to terms with his sexuality. What's doubly sad about McCullough is that he tries so hard to be such a toughie. What's triply sad is that he tries to be smart. What's quadruply sad is that he fails on every account.

See, McCullough is commenting on Hillary Clinton's campaign and suggesting that conservative nutzoid talk radio hosts back off her because it'll solidify her lead, a lead that's based on how stupid icky women are: "Hillary has understood this better than anyone else. Her consistent campaign 'story' of 90 year old women 'remembering when they didn't have the right to vote' and 'determined to live until they see a woman president' has been thoroughly mocked by talk radio for its lack of believability. Which is true - no one believes Hillary is being swarmed by a bunch silver-haired Susan B. Anthonys." You know what's awesome about that section? How McCullough acts as if he's quoting Clinton, even gussying the whole thing up with quotation marks, but strangely, the only person one can find with that quoted quote that women are staying alive just to elect her is McCullough.

And what woman does McCullough turn to for support on this? A noted sociologist and determined practitioner of self-abasing cuntistry: "Ann Coulter recently confided to me off air - that she would gladly give up her vote because she is tired of using her informed knowledge of candidate selection being overridden by four to five other women who could not even name all of the candidates running for President, much less identify what they stand for." There ya go. Because women might vote for Hillary Clinton, Coulter thinks women should surrender their right to vote.

Let's just get this straight: every presidential election year we have to go through the ridiculous, putrid ritual of which male candidate is most muy macho. Whether it's John Kerry hunting, or George W. Bush clearing brush, or Michael Dukakis in a tank, or other such shit. Right now, the Republicans are engaged in a cock-size exhibition over who is the most bloodthirsty motherfucker of the right. Why? Because they're appealing to fuckin' reason and good judgment in men? Christ, why the fuck are we even discussing this?

Oh, yeah, because of Kevin McCullough and his strange need to lash out at women on a regular basis, as if they get something he's jealous that he can't get, which would be, you know, fucked by men (if, of course, the women are straight). And because there's no fucker like a motherfucker, McCullough's got a kicker in his column: "The only group less rational in its voting patterns than women are African Americans who consistently elect people who keep them poor, keep them uneducated, and keep them killing their own. It should be noted - Hillary does exceptionally well with that demographic as well."

Ah, in McCullough's world, the stupid women are stupid and the stupid darkies are stupider. And he might be right if he wasn't so wrong - utterly, completely, sadly, misogynistically, racistly wrong. As Reuters points out today, not a day after McCullough's column came out: "Many American women are excited about Democrat Hillary Clinton's ground-breaking bid for the White House, but feminists warn she can't count on them just because she's a woman."

And that's probably not counting noted women's rights advocate Ann Coulter.

A Photo Essay on How One Should Behave During War, as Demonstrated by George W. Bush:
"Given the nature of the enemy and the words of its leaders, politicians who deny that we are at war are either being disingenuous or naive. Either way, it is dangerous for our country. We are at war -- and we cannot win this war by wishing it away or pretending it does not exist. Unfortunately, on too many issues, some in Congress are behaving as if America is not at war" -- President George W. Bush to the Heritage Foundation, November 1, 2007.

President Bush on October 20, 2007:

He's bass fishing, to feed the troops, no doubt, with an ESPN host.

President Bush on September 21, 2007:

That's the University of Minnesota Golden Gopher Wrestling Team. They won an NCAA championship. Maybe some of them are going to war.

President Bush on July 15, 2007:

He's watching t-ball and holding up Jackie Robinson's number. Bet the soldiers in Iraq had the day off, too.

Note to Democrats: when some little boy double dog dares you to step across this line, sometimes you gotta just take a giant goddamn leap right into his puny face.

Does Hillary Clinton Really Want People to Think the Other Democrats Are Beating Up a Woman? (Updated):
The Rude Pundit almost got his ass handed to him by a lesbian friend some time ago because he said that, right now, he wasn't supporting Hillary Clinton for President. He tried to explain that he was feeling the love for maybe Edwards, maybe Obama, but at that point, really early in the process, he didn't actually give a fuck. This was not good enough for the aforementioned lesbian, who scoffed at the Rude Pundit, calling over to some friends, "He says he's not gonna support Hillary." The lesbian loves Hillary, has a picture of herself with Hillary at some gathering or other, has convinced all those friends, who now surrounded the Rude Pundit at the dyke bar, that the nation needs Hillary. And why? Swear to the fuckin' god of the obvious, the overwhelming reason is that she's a woman.

Because the Rude Pundit (who by this point had hominah-hominah'd his way into saying that if she's the Democratic nominee, he'll support her all the way) said he didn't think that Hillary's vagina was a compelling enough reason to think she's the best candidate despite her conservative views on foreign policy, her nauseating triangulation gene, and more, the Rude Pundit was labeled sexist. Saying that the lesbian's positions were closer to Kucinich than to Clinton sure didn't help. Even pathetically tossing out that Obama's black didn't help. Of course, being among friends, buying a round of drinks helped blunt the impact of the Rude Pundit's transgression. And it led to much discussion of Hillary's vagina.

Right now, in her post-debate hangover, Clinton's handlers and spinners are out in force, playing the female card. One told the Washington Post, "Ultimately, it was six guys against her, and she came off as one strong woman." Tim Grieve points to the likelihood of this becoming a campaign talking point, asking us what would be the reaction if Barack Obama's campaign said, "ultimately [he had] five whites and a Hispanic against him, and he came off as one strong black man." Or, to take it in another direction, what if John Edwards said he won the debate because he's a strong man?

It's a stupid, bullshit move by the Clinton people, because the strength of Clinton's sex comes from her presence as a woman, her fact of being a woman, not from all the attempts to make her into the image of a woman, as the right demanded when she was First Lady. The Rude Pundit's not saying that Clinton's sex doesn't matter. It sure as shit does. But it's one thing for a woman to be the frontrunner for the presidency (and, no matter how you feel, it's cool to say that, finally, at last, in America) - it's another to make it an issue in the campaign. What happens if Clinton seriously fucks up in the next debate, as opposed to the minor fuck-ups of this past one? Will she have gotten beat up by the men? Does that make her a weak woman? Does the campaign want that image out there?

The act of making sex an issue shuts down dialogue and will sow resentment and backlash among the very voters Clinton guru and corporate lackey Mark Penn thinks will be wooed to Clinton because of her sex: Republican women. Penn may be right that this demographic will shift to Clinton but it ain't just because she pees sitting down; it's because women may take a closer listen to her because she's a woman and vote for her because they agree with her. That's a huge fucking difference from women voting for a woman because she's a woman. One view paints women as sheep without perspective, manipulated by seeing tits like they have. The Rude Pundit's view says that women have agency: the ability to think for themselves and make decisions. And if the Clinton campaign pushes the "strong woman beat the men" meme, however true it might be, it's gonna turn off Penn's microtrending women.

Sure, people will vote against Clinton because of her sex, and that's ignorant, just as it's ignorant for people to vote for her just because of her sex. The Rude Pundit thought (and still does think) that he had a trump card with the lesbian when he asked her if she would have voted for Condoleezza Rice if she was running and Hillary Clinton wasn't. That question was never answered because, well, the god of the obvious was smiling.

One other note on the debate: Bill Richardson was wrong to say everyone should stay positive. If Clinton's the nominee, she will be met with a shitstorm of negative ads and attacks that'll make the Swift Boat-ing of John Kerry seem like a raft trip down a calm stream. And if it's Giuliani for the Republicans, that vile fucker's campaign will be like Karl Rove on speedballs. Let Clinton take her licks now. Let her get her answers straight. The more shit that gets out now in the playoffs, the less impact it'll have in the championship game.

(By the way, did you notice what the Rude Pundit did up there? He kept calling his friend a "lesbian" because, playing on our fucked-up stereotypes, it seems less wimpy to get dressed down by a lesbian than by an undefined "woman." Does it add anything to the narrative? Of course not. It's a punt to make the Rude Pundit seem a little tougher. Get the fuckin' point?)

Update: You mark the Rude Pundit here: Hillary Clinton tying her fortunes to Mark Penn will fuck her over. Big time. Motherfucker is Bob Shrum in slightly better suits.