Category ►►► Drama Kings and Queens

July 5, 2012

Weiner Roast

Drama Kings and Queens
Hatched by Korso

It's probably too good to be true. Comes now the Don Himself, opining on the recent spate of interviews given by one Anthony Weiner, the first man to be driven out of Congress for hyperextending himself:

Degenerate former Congressman Anthony Weiner is trying to make a comeback. He is a sick and perverted man that New York does not want or need.

Apprently Trump isn't too hapy with Weiner making the rounds, as it were, praising the Supreme Court's decision to keep ObamaCare around for a little bit longer. I guess Weiner didn't get the note from F. Scott Fitzgerald about there being no second acts in American life.

So far, though, the man who gave a whole new meaning to the term "Twitter Handle" is denying he's trying to make a comeback. Still, you gotta figure that Big Tony took one look at how Eliot Spitzer landed that sweet (albeit brief) CNN gig and thought to himself, Hey, I can do that!

Me, I'd be pleased as punch. Politics can be so stuffy, and let's face it -- Weiner livens things up, perhaps more than even he realizes. Besides, with defenders like that, bringing ObamaCare down will be that much easier.

So whatdya say we all chip in and get him a new Blackberry? The kind with the 4x zoom. I'm sure it'll come in handy.

UPDATE: Uh-oh. Be careful what you wish for!

Hatched by Korso on this day, July 5, 2012, at the time of 4:47 PM | Comments (0)

September 24, 2007

Cindy Sheehan's Day of Out-of-Tunement Manifesto

Afghan Astonishments , Asquirmative Action , Dhimmi of the Month , Domestic Terrorism , Drama Kings and Queens , Econ. 101 , Enviro-Mental Cases , Hippy Dippy Peacenik Groove , History of Moral Philosophy , Illiberal Liberalism , Impeachment Imbecilities , Iraq Matters , Kriminal Konspiracies , Liberal Lunacy , Logical Lacunae , News of the Weird , Palestinian Perils and Pratfalls , Politics 101 , Scurrilous Scribblings , Terrorism Intelligence , Unnatural Disasters , Unuseful Idiots
Hatched by Dafydd

I rarely do this, as you know: I rarely link to some piece and say simply "read this." (I'm too in love with the sound of my own fingers typing on a keyboard.)

But here's an exception. Read Cindy Sheehan's Yom Kippur "sermon," delivered at Michael Lerner's Beyt Tikkun "synogogue;" you will be -- if not exactly glad, then at least agape. (Rabbi Lerner is Hillary Clinton's mentor, author of the Politics of Meaning and other works of Socialist agit-prop masquerading as theology.)

My response (I love this) is entirely contained in the list of categories I had to attach to this post.

(Well, one more thing. It has always been my understanding that Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, is a day for each person to atone for what he, personally, has done wrong -- not "atone" for his enemies failing to live up to his own lofty standards, apologize for all the times America hasn't followed his lead, or wallow in self-righteous indignation that nobody listens to him. 'Nuff said; read the list of categories above.)

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, September 24, 2007, at the time of 2:36 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

August 4, 2007

A Lame Duck Beats a Full House (and Senate)

Drama Kings and Queens , Hillary Hilarity , Hippy Dippy Peacenik Groove , Terrorism Intelligence
Hatched by Dafydd

And in the fullness of time, both the Democrat-controlled House and the Democrat-controlled Senate broke with longstanding Democratic tradition and decided to support the United States of America.

Silly bit of business, really; foreigners calling foreigners whose calls happen to be routed through nodes in Los Angeles or New York, and the National Security Agency was listening in when it appeared that one or the other foreign party was a terrorist, a terrorist supporter, or a terrorist harborer. But the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court opened the Devil's gate by deciding that this violated some obscure clause of the Constitution of which we were all previously unaware: the constitutional right of privacy for all foreigners living abroad. A judge -- they won't say who -- struck down the program.

Gleeful Democrats charged into the breach and demanded that President Bush submit all proposed "wiretaps" to a judge, present their "probable cause," and sit back and wait two or three weeks until he makes his decision. And if the four hundred year old judge doesn't understand why it's important to "wiretap" some radical cleric in Waziristan talking to young Moslems in Westminister, then it's back to the drawing board for the NSA.

But the Old Texan called their bluff. He argued that protecting Americans from terrorism required gathering intelligence. He pronounced that foreigners living outside the United States have no rights whatsoever under the American Constitution. And he insisted that the people's business was more important than Congress' vacation plans.

Bush proposed that the decision to surveil be made by (here was the compromise) both the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence... thus keeping it within the Executive branch, which has sufficient energy to make a decision and act upon it, rather than endlessly debating the question (as the Legislative branch does) or consulting accumulated decades of hoary "wisdom" (à la the Judicial branch); but also not leaving the decision solely to the discretion of Alberto Gonzales, the Democrats' current Great Satan.

And Bush insisted that Congress enact the reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA, which predates both commercial cell phones and the modern version of Islamist terrorism) before adjourning for Congress' traditional August recess. This trapped the Democrats between Scylla and Charybdis:

  • They're driven by the nutroots to dismantle any and every program to collect intelligence about pending terrorist attacks (while simultaneously demanding to know why we haven't gone right in and gotten bin Laden yet)...
  • Yet they daren't be seen putting off American national security so they can go home and scarf up more campaign contributions and distribute more pork-laden earmarks.

At last, Democrats in both chambers of Congress arrived at the same conclusion, which they enacted and sent on to the president for signature: They caved to the Bush plan to reform the nearly three decade old FISA, thus betraying the MoveOn, George Soros, Daily Kos wing of the Democratic Party (they've been flying on one wing for seven years now).

But then, in an agony of cleverness, they set things up so their surrender to the Bush plan will only last six months... at which point they'll have to go through the entire nightmare all over again, navigating the narrow passage between the six-headed snake and the greedy whirlpool, to finally arrive right back to the same bill they just approved six months down the road (with or without yet another sunset clause).

That means that the next time Congress faces either infuriating "the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party," or else alienating those Americans who care anything about national security, it will be at the end of January and beginning of February 2008: Exactly when more than 50% of American voters go to the polls to decide the presidential nominees -- in the states of Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, Florida, Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Utah.

Brilliant planning, Democrats; somebody didn't have his PDA turned on when the donkey party agreed to that calendar!

I'm sure a massive debate about whether or not the Democrats care a fig about national security won't affect people's primary voting; just as I'm equally certain that the looming primaries won't in any way affect how Sens. Hillary Clinton (D-Carpetbag, 95%) and Barack Obama (D-IL, 95%) will vote on the terrorism-intelligence bill.

How do the Democrats always manage to get themselves into a pickle like this? Oh, wait -- maybe their complete lack of "the vision thing" or any set of moral principles has something to do with it.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, August 4, 2007, at the time of 11:01 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 28, 2007

Narcissa of Nova Yorc

Drama Kings and Queens , Media Madness , Presidential Pomp and Circumcision
Hatched by Dafydd

This hagiographic Hillary-ous AP piece is remarkable for the casual arrogance she displays... the contempt not only for us peons but also for her rivals for the Democratic nomination. For example, how's this?

"I am going to level with you, the president has said this is going to be left to his successor," Clinton said. "I think it is the height of irresponsibility and I really resent it."

Buried within this "how dare you!" is the offhand assumption that HRH HRC is just naturally going to be the next president of the United States. Yeesh.

She also slips into the "royal we" when not consciously fighting against it:

Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday that President Bush should withdraw all U.S. troops from Iraq before he leaves office, asserting it would be "the height of irresponsibility" to pass the war along to the next commander in chief.

"This was his decision to go to war with an ill-conceived plan and an incompetently executed strategy," the Democratic senator from New York said her in initial presidential campaign swing through Iowa.

"We expect him to extricate our country from this before he leaves office" in January 2009, the former first lady said.

Harumph. We are not amused.

We are, however, amused by the cockamamie idea that the Iraq war is Bush's mess, and as such, he should clean it up (withdraw all the troops) by the arbitrary date of January 20th, 2009... no matter what is happening on the ground. That would be like President-presumptive Dwight D. Eisenhower demanding in 1950 that Truman withdraw every last soldier and Marine from South Korea before January 20th, 1953 -- or they (Eisenhower) would stamp their feet like Rumplestiltskin (or Rumplestiltskins).

Here's more of Hillary Rodham Clinton Rodham, patronization on parade:

One questioner asked Clinton if her track record showed she could stand up to "evil men" around the world.

"The question is, we face a lot of dangers in the world and, in the gentleman's words, we face a lot of evil men and what in my background equips me to deal with evil and bad men," Clinton said. She paused to gaze while the audience interrupted with about 30 seconds of laughter and applause.

Oh, yes, the perennial Democratic fantasy: that George W. Bush is the most evil man who ever lived, next to whom the jihadists (if they even exist) pale into insignificance.

She never did actually answer the question. Here is a near-miss:

During the town hall meeting, she tried to make clear that she thinks she would be a chief executive with enough fortitude to confront any danger facing the country.

"I believe that a lot in my background and a lot in my public life shows the character and toughness that is required to be president," Clinton said [Caesara of Chappaqua elected not to elaborate]. "It also shows that I want to get back to bringing the world around to support us again."

This is condescending in the worst way, just as she practiced during her entire first senatorial campaign: questions are effrontery; interrogators are traitors -- off with their heads!

Finally, here is a tyop that, I think, shows the true feelings of the Associated Press and many other establishment liberals -- why they're so anxious for Madame to be elected:

Clinton said he will run hard in Iowa's leadoff caucuses, an early contest her husband skipped when he sought the nomination in 1992 [He, not she; the Big He]. That year, Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin was in the race and Democratic rivals opted not to challenge him in his home state.

"My participation in the Iowa caucuses is the only thing in politics that I will do that Bill has not done," she said.

I have long suspected that AP, et al, imagine that a Hillary presidency would really mean two more terms for Bill Clinton. This is a not so very secret desire to return to those days of peace and tranquility (assuming one didn't live in Bosnia, Kosovo, or Haiti), back to the womb, when nobody had ever heard of Osama bin Laden or seen any need for a United States military. As all wise men know, the quickest and easiest way to make evil go away is to pretend it's not there. That always works.

Oh well, I'm sure I'm reading too much into this piece. It's just a bit of fluff, and you shouldn't even have wasted your time reading it. Too bad I didn't tell you that before you started, eh?

For God's sake, next time, before you commence reading -- have the common sense to skip to the end and see whether it's going to be on the test, even!

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, January 28, 2007, at the time of 8:58 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack

September 19, 2006

The Chicks Lay Another Egg

Drama Kings and Queens , Make Mine Music
Hatched by Sachi

As an obsessed anti-fan of Dixie Chicks, I was planning on talking about their hate-mongering movie premier in Toronto anyway, even if it hadn't been so fatuous and whiny. Of course, I haven't seen it, and I have no plans to go see it; but there's plenty of buzz from people who have:

In one memorable scene, Maines watches news footage of the president being interviewed about the furor that followed the singer's on-stage comment that she was ''ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas,'' which resulted in the group being dropped from most radio stations, as well as protests and plummeting sales. ''The Dixie Chicks are free to speak their mind,'' Bush told Tom Brokaw at the time, adding, ''They shouldn't have their feelings hurt just because some people don't want to buy their records when they speak out. You know, freedom is a two-way street.''

After watching this footage, Maines repeats the president's comment about how the group shouldn't have their ''feelings hurt,'' incredulous, and then says, ''What a dumb f---.'' She then looks into the camera, as if addressing Bush, and reiterates, ''You're a dumb f---.'' [Thereby completely refuting the point about freedom being a two-way street, running rings around the president with her Vulcan-like logic. -- Dafydd]

Methinks their feelings are hurt by former fans (such as me) choosing not to buy their CDs or go to their concerts. I weep great crocodile tears. And today, I read an article about their press conference in Toronto; from the section subtitled -- I'm not kidding -- "the rough road to free speech":

Directed by two-time Academy Award winner Barbara Kopple (“Harlan County, U.S.A.”, “American Dream”) and Cecilia Peck, the documentary chronicles Maguire, her sister Emily Robison and Maines’ transition from country darlings to bold symbols for freedom of expression....

“They’re from Texas. They’re supposed to be these women that people have put a box around, and here are these incredible all-American girls coming out and making a statement and not backing down from it,” Kopple told The Associated Press in an interview.

They may not be "backing down," but they're sure whining an awful lot. What they call "freedom of speech" is what the rest of us call "freedom from the perfectly reasonable reaction to their offensive words." (I mean, it's not as though we called them "crusaders" then ran out and burned down that church up in Nova Scotia that worships a giant graven image of Natalie Maines.) The Chicks can criticize the rest of us all the live-long day, using every four-letter word they can call to mind (which appears to be only one, endlessly repeated); but boy, if we criticized them, we're suppressing their freedom of speech!

If you want to know what real suppression of freedom of speech looks like, you should ponder that letter sent by powerful Democratic senators to ABC, threatening the network's broadcast license if it didn't cancel the miniseries "the Path to 9/11." That is true censorship -- fortunately unsuccessful.

And for an example of media hypocrisy, read Syrus Nowrasteh, who wrote the screenplay, discussing how he was treated by the antique media for speaking the unspeakable: that Bill Clinton was at least as responsible for 9/11 as George W. Bush (reparagraphed for easier reading):

In July a reporter asked if I had ever been ethnically profiled. I happily replied, "No." I can no longer say that. The L.A. Times, for one, characterized me by race, religion, ethnicity, country-of-origin and political leanings -- wrongly on four of five counts. [All emphasis added.]

To them I was an Iranian-American politically conservative Muslim. It is perhaps irrelevant in our brave new world of journalism that I was born in Boulder, Colo. I am not a Muslim or practitioner of any religion, nor am I a political conservative. What am I? I am, most devoutly, an American. I asked the reporter if this kind of labeling was a new policy for the paper. He had no response.

The hysteria engendered by the series found more than one target. In addition to the death threats and hate mail directed at me, and my grotesque portrayal as a maddened right-winger, there developed an impassioned search for incriminating evidence on everyone else connected to the film. And in director David Cunningham, the searchers found paydirt! His father had founded a Christian youth outreach mission.

The whiff of the younger Mr. Cunningham's possible connection to this enterprise was enough to set the hounds of suspicion baying. A religious mission!

A New York Times reporter wrote, without irony or explanation, that an issue that raised questions about the director was his involvement in his father's outreach work. In the era of McCarthyism, the merest hint of a connection to communism sufficed to inspire dark accusations, the certainty that the accused was part of a malign conspiracy. Today, apparently, you can get something of that effect by charging a connection with a Christian mission.

The Ditzy Chicks' belief in "free speech for me but not for thee" sounds strikingly similar to what too many Moslem extremists believe. In the last few days, we've been treated to their hysterical overreaction, all over the world, to the pope's innocuous statement. Was what Pope Benedict said so bad that it justifies calling for his assassination, burning down churches in Gaza, and shooting a nun in the back, for the crime of dedicating her life to saving Somali children... as part of a religious mission?

If I tried to count all the times that I've been called a "Zionist pig," just because I dare to support Israel's fight against terrorism, I would still be counting 100 years from now.

And all this time, Moslem extremists have not only verbally attacked those of other faiths as "infidels," they have killed Jews and Christians by the bushel. For that matter, they kill each other for not being the right kind of Moslem (their violent attacks against each other peak during the holy month of Ramadan.) And we have yet to see a single Jewish rabbi or Catholic nun blow up a Hummus stand in Jerusalem, except maybe to protest the Arabic rap music they play incessantly.

So the Moslems' feelings are hurt! Big deal. They're killing Americans nearly every day in the name of Allah; pardon me for thinking that's a little more aggressive than quoting some emperor from six hundred years ago who thought conversion by the sword was "evil and inhuman."

Unlike the "death threats" the Ditzy Chicks claim to have received (and let's see some of them!), the threat against modern civilization from the Moslem extremists is deadly real. We must take this threat seriously, but not by backing down. We must speak up aginst this bloodthirsty assault on freedom of speech. Threatening murder, mayhem, and assassination in response to words is completely different from simply refusing to buy a CD by some annoying chit with the brains of a Pekingese.

As for our suppression of the Chicks, we're just exercising our "freedom of wallet." Although their album hit the number 1 on Billboard (for a few weeks before dropping like an egg), ticket sales for the tour are less than half of the Chicks' last tour. Maines' decision to stick to arenas, instead of shifting to smaller venues (garages, bathrooms), cost them millions... but don't shed any tears: they're much happier with their new listeners, they say:

“We’ve basically been playing to about half the audience as on the last tour, but it’s a different audience. They just look good,” band member Martie Maguire told reporters at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the documentary “Dixie Chicks: Shut Up & Sing” premiered.

In the grand scheme of things, the problems of the Dixie Chicks rate somewhere between warm beer and a cold sore, and I don't even know why I wrote this. Never mind; don't read it!

Hatched by Sachi on this day, September 19, 2006, at the time of 6:27 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack

April 13, 2006

Grumbles, the Coincidental Coda

Drama Kings and Queens , Future of Warfare
Hatched by Dafydd

If you read the previous post to this, Grumbles From the Griped, you shall understand how amused I was this evening.

After racing to finish that post -- and making the utterly witless mistake of ascribing Gulliver's Travels to Daniel Dafoe instead of Jonathan Swift (duh), may UC Santa Cruz (my alma mater) and Trinity College, Dublin (his) forgive me -- Sachi and I went to the theater to see Shaw's Arms and the Man, which neither of us had seen staged before.

In the second act occurs the following bit of byplay between the Lady Catherine (Bulgarian gentry) and her daughter's fiance, Major Sergius:

CATHERINE
You look superb--splendid. The campaign has improved you. Everybody here is mad about you. We were all wild with enthusiasm about that magnificent cavalry charge.
SERGIUS
(with grave irony)
Madam: it was the cradle and the grave of my military reputation.
CATHERINE
How so?
SERGIUS
I won the battle the wrong way when our worthy Russian generals were losing it the right way. That upset their plans, and wounded their self-esteem.

I jumped, of course. I felt almost like Wilson, in the play Harvey, when he looks up Pooka in the encyclopaedia -- and the entry reads:

P-O-O-K-A --- Pooka -- from old Celtic mythology -- a fairy spirit in animal form -- always very large. The pooka appears here and there -- to this one -- and to that one -- a benign but mischievous creature -- very fond of rumpots, crackpots, and how are you, Mr. Wilson?

I feel very dramatic today.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, April 13, 2006, at the time of 11:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

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