Archive for November, 2007

The Very Best of Pudge

Thursday, November 29th, 2007

– posted by thehim

As a followup to Pudge’s 15 minutes of fame yesterday, I thought I’d give a roundup of some of his greatest hits here at Effu:

- Pudge explains how Iraq isn’t a civil war.

- Pudge goes gaga over the surge.

- Pudge wonders why feminism still exists.

- Pudge defends Karl Rove’s good name.

- Pudge criticizes Glenn Greenwald for being slightly inaccurate in how he pointed out that a high-ranking government official blatantly lied.

- Pudge attacks Michael Moore for saving someone’s life.

- Pudge takes offense to some snark from Barack Obama.

- Pudge takes a wide stance on the Larry Craig scandal.

- Pudge scoffs at the Constitution.

- Pudge dismisses the U.S. Attorney scandal.

And, possibly my favorite one of all:

- Pudge debates with himself about what the UN can and can’t do.

Pudge Goes Big Time!

Wednesday, November 28th, 2007

– posted by thehim

As I mentioned yesterday, one of our favorite local loons, Chris Nandor (AKA Pudge), flew to Florida to be part of the GOP/YouTube debate. And they led off with his song! Congrats! For his sake, let’s hope the rest of the reviews are better than this one:

The first is a guy singing. Chris Nandor, from the same neck of the woods as where Twin Peaks was filmed, and it’s suitably weird.

Okay, this is not a promising start. It’s like a “GET ME AN AGENT” audition tape.

Ouch.

UPDATE: Pudge is just not getting the love from the right-wing pundits. From the Weekly Standard:

When the CNN-You Tube debate among Republican presidential candidates began with a guy named Chris Nandor playing a guitar and singing, my wife Barbara exclaimed, “This is humiliating. This is really bad.” Of course she was right. And then things got worse. This debate not only was mortifying to the candidates. It also should have been embarrassing to the viewers, especially Republican voters who might have been watching.

Just a quick note for Barnes, Kristol, et al — Remember how you thought that all you had to do to stay in power was to start wars and convince young people you were all so awesome and patriotic and then you’d never lose elections again? Well, this is where that strategy ends up, with the few young people deranged enough to buy into your crap humiliating your party on national TV.

Dino’s MySpace Rossi Posse

Wednesday, November 28th, 2007

– posted by thehim

The other day, my friend and colleague Will alerted me to the fact that Dino Rossi has his own MySpace page. As of this moment, the now two-time Republican opponent to Governor Gregoire has 121 MySpace friends (and I guess that includes the doofus Tom, who’s everyone’s friend). Normally, a 48-year-old married man with a MySpace page is a good bet to end up pleading his case to Chris Hanson, but Rossi’s doing the smart thing here and reaching out to the kids. Because if there’s a set of ideas that will resonate with the youth of Washington State, Lou Guzzo and the crew are all over it.

So who are these friends of Dino? Let’s take a look:

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Programming Note

Tuesday, November 27th, 2007

– posted by thehim

I normally have little interest in the GOP debates, but with Pudge being flown to Florida for it and possibly being part of the proceedings, I may have to watch for some good material.

Shorter Wingnuttia

Tuesday, November 27th, 2007

Get thee to Drinking Liberally edition.

* Shorter Radio Equalizer: There’s a war on Thanksgiving in this country.*

* Shorter Lou Guzzo: If only scientists and President Bush would start denying global warming more, then we could make Al Gore look like a fool.

* Shorter Faith and Freedom: I can’t believe that someone would have a greater need for a condom than a Bible in a hotel.**

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How to Tell You Aren’t Funny

Monday, November 26th, 2007

If, like Eric Earling, you have to include this sentence in one of your posts, “And if you’re not catching the sarcasm, you should, because I’m laying it on pretty thick,” I’m guessing you aren’t a funny person.

Now, I’ll admit that sometimes my jokes here fall flat. Or the reference I make is simply too obscure. But I don’t think I’ve ever said in the body of a post, “this is a joke” or “guess what, the thing you just read: I was totally being ironic.”

Anyway, while writing this post, I was breathing oxygen.

Off the Reservation

Sunday, November 25th, 2007

– posted by thehim

The following post from Lou Guzzo is so bizarre, I’m not even sure how to introduce it. Let me just warn you that if you happen to be African-American, your head may explode:

Democrats and Liberals (who are one and the same for all practical purposes) like to point to reports that anywhere from 75 to 95 percent of black voters vote for Democratic candidates and issues when they go to the polls — if they go to the polls, that is.

Like when Republicans successfully keep them from voting.

If those figures are correct or nearly correct, why are so many African-American citizens supporters of Democrats and Liberals?

Why don’t you ask them?

I’ve tackled this thorny issue before on many occasions, but my answer has always been the same — and here it is:

For decades, Democratic politicians in and out of Congress have taken actions which, in effect, keep America’s black population in virtual slavery!

As someone who has often criticized Democrats when it comes to race relations, I’m still pretty sure Lou and I are not on the same page here.

Yes, I said “slavery”!

Yes, you’re nuts.

How so? In many devious, calculated ways.

Putting them all in jail for non-violent drug offenses? Oh, wait. Lou supports that one.

Democrats and Liberals have championed giveaway programs and laws designed to benefit communities that are in almost hopeless poverty, most of whose dwellers are blacks in neighborhoods one could classify as ghettoes.

Just like slavery.

Call these giveaways what you will; in this case, I call them bribes to keep African-Americans from becoming a vital part of mainstream America — something most Republicans want for all blacks.

What kind of head-up-his-ass logic is Lou using to equate programs that provide financial assistance to impoverished Americans with attempts to keep them down? Is there any typical right-wing argument that has gotten more detached from reality than this one?

The refrain to an old song asks “How’re you gonna keep ‘em down on the farm?”

Before my time, I guess.

With a slight alteration, it is substantially what the Democrats are saying to the black community, which it has been hand-feeding to “keep ‘em down in the ghetto.”

The slight alteration is the fact that it’s only happening in Lou’s imagination.

If the Democratic Party truly wanted to bring all blacks into mainstream America, it would long ago have sponsored programs elevating blacks into responsible and well-paying positions in business, industry, and corporate America.

They could call such a program “affirmative action.”

And it would have thrown its support behind a national movement to end segregated neighborhoods everywhere.

Ah, yes, the typical small-government solution from Lou, which involves government telling people where to live.

When are the political voices in Black America going to wake up and realize that they have been kept captive for decades by Democrats and Liberals in high places from the FDR and Lyndon Johnson era through the Clinton years?

When they get out of the jails they were put in by Nixon, Reagan, and the Bushes.*

When are they going to step forward and demand the same status in business, industry, and the professions that whites enjoy?

They have been, Lou. Have you actually met a black person in your life?

Leaders of the black community should recognize that Asian and Hispanic citizens are already enjoying higher positions in the American economy.

And they also vote primarily for Democrats today.

They should be asking why the same advances haven’t been made available to many blacks.

They do.

If they start asking these hard questions, they will discover the fact that the Democrats’ longtime support of giveaway government programs aren’t “giveaway” programs at all.

Actually, if they ask some hard questions, they’ll find out that the drug war is what’s destroying our black communities today.

They are, purely and simply, bribes designed to keep African-Americans from demanding the same status in industry, business, and the professions as whites and many Asians and Hispanics now enjoy.

But Asians and Hispanics get all of the same “giveaways”. It’s not like you have to be black to be on welfare.

The Emancipation Proclamation may have freed the slaves, but the Democrats and their Liberal friends have created a new kind of slavery for blacks — bureaucratically controlled giveaway programs to “keep them down on the farm.”

Lou, can you please start making sense here?

And the sooner thinking Americans realize that, the better the nation will be.

Why don’t you let us “thinking Americans” deal with these problems, while you and the rest of the “non-thinking” ones keep watching The Cartoon Channel in your pajamas all day.

* To be fair, they were also put in jail in record numbers by Clinton as well.

Really Michael?

Friday, November 23rd, 2007

A quickie but a crazy holiday word from Michael Medved:

The Thanksgiving holiday provides an opportunity to refocus on the motivations of early New England settlers, who crossed the ocean not to escape the Old World, but to change it by the force of their example.

In Holland they kind of tried to change it by force. And in England. Oh, and if you were a Native American, you might think that them taking your land was kind of a forceful thing to do.

For Pilgrims in Plymouth, or their Puritan neighbors in Massachusetts Bay, the idea of a “city on a hill” was to create an ideal society that the corrupt world would be forced to admire and, ultimately, emulate it.

Q: Why did the Pilgrims’ pants fall down?

A: Because their belt buckles were around their hats.

This didn’t have anything to do with anything, but they did have funny hats.

In the fine new book “Dangerous Nation,” Robert Kagan makes clear that the drive to bring justice and democracy to the rest of the world didn’t begin with “neo-cons,” or even with Woodrow Wilson. It began with our New England forefathers, and it’s always been a motivating force in America’s international role.

And it’s always worked out that way. Democracy and justice. That’s what I think of when I think of Puritans.

Among many reasons to feel grateful to New England’s founders on this Thanksgiving, we can appreciate them as originators of the idea of our nation’s special, even sacred, mission in the world.

Thanks for the Iraq war, William Bradford!

The UnSounders

Friday, November 23rd, 2007

– posted by thehim

Seattle is starting to look like Even Steven in the world of sports. As the loss of our basketball team becomes a reality, we now find out that we’re getting a soccer team. Knute Berger at Crosscut fires off this dispatch from sometime in the 1970s:

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Shorter Wingnuttia

Tuesday, November 20th, 2007

Happy Thanksgiving, and if you’re Native American, be thankful that our small pox blankets missed your ancestors.

* Shorter Faith and Freedom: Dino Rossi recounts the story of how he’s totally not bitter for something he brought up thanks to Jesus.
* Shorter Eric Earling: The Seattle Times is proposing a bad idea, I think it’s interesting.*

* Shorter Discovery Institute: Michael Medved needed some more wingnut welfare.**

* Shorter My Own Side: I hate hippies.

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