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With the following post, I'm initiating a new category here at F/A: Worst President Ever?
I figure it's something both liberals and conservatives can contribute to.
I left it as a question because I don't really know enough about the Van Buren Administration to make it a statement.
George W. Bush, who has never suffered the consequences of his own actions, wants the federal government to use the tax money of people who are financially responsible to bail out homeowners who bought houses they couldn't afford.
Bush will direct Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Housing Secretary Alphonso Jackson to work on an initiative to help troubled mortgage holders get services and products they need to keep them from defaulting on their loans. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details of the initiatives ahead of the presidential event.
Oh, wait: He's just asking his administration to work on an initiative. He never follows through on stuff like that, so no problem.
I don't know who it is who's subbing for Rush Limbaugh right now, but whoever it is is pretty close to bone-stupid. He started off today's show quoting an article about the Republicans' recent run of scandals: Duke Cunningham, Jack Abramoff, Mark Foley, Larry Craig and so on. The premise of the article was that the Republican Party is wearing down as a result of all the scandals.
The guest host, who sounded like someone who'd won a "be a radio host for a day" contest, objected to the idea that the Republican Party might be suffering as a result of this remarkable string of scandals. He asked: How come the media don't wonder how the Democratic Party is weathering all of it's scandals?
"I can make a list just like that of Democrats," the host said, and he did: William Jefferson, Bill Clinton and Barney Frank.
Certainly, William Jefferson is a disgrace, and the Congressional Leadership's tolerance of him is unforgivable. But as for the others on the list: Bill Clinton, whose scandalous behavior was certainly not overlooked by the media, left office more than six years ago. And Barney Frank, who got caught cavorting with a prostitute, was reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee in 1990. 1990!
Now I understand the right's need to protect itself by blaming everything on the media. But this surely has to be one of the lamest arguments ever made. At one point, to bolster his case, the host asked if anyone could name a single Democrat "who's done something similar to Craig" who had been treated the way Craig has in the media. The answer to which, of course, is that gay Democrats don't generally take time-out from their anti-gay rants to engage in furtive, anonymous gay sex in public bathrooms. So no, I can't refute the host's case by holding up similar Democratic behavior. Still, I'm not sure that proves the point the host was trying to prove.
(Somehow, the more fevered media bashers on the right assume that there is a reporter somewhere who would bury the story of a United States Senator accused of soliciting gay sex in an airport bathroom, so long as that Senator was a Democrat.)
The show's callers, by the way, uniformly agreed that the media were piling-on Republicans while ignoring horrible behavior by Democrats. Calling in from an apparent ideological fever swamp, they fixated on Barney Frank, no matter how much the host tried to lead them toward John Ford, a Democratic state legislator in Tennessee just convicted of taking bribes. The host, like most of the right-wing intelligentsia, maintains message discipline by making clear that the problem is not that Craig is gay, but the infidelity and public nature of Craig's act. The callers were having none of that, and took the opportunity to condemn Frank's "immorality," as if being gay and conducting one's sex life in public bathrooms were the same thing.
Rush better come home quick and get things back under control. A couple of more days and he's going to come down off the mountain and find everyone dancing around a golden calf.
Talking Points wants to know what Senator Larry Craig did that should be considered a crime, and I'm not entirely certain why headline writers are labeling this a "sex scandal" since 1) no sex seems to have taken place and 2) being gay isn't exactly scandalous.
Granted, Craig is a lying hypocrite. And, like a lot of social conservatives, he's showing signs of being sexually stunted to the point of deep weirdness. But, seriously, does that mean he's either unfit for service or worthy of being charged as a criminal?
Apparently, Madonna's father has a winery, and is going to start churning out wine festooned with daughter's famous image.
Tony Ciccone hopes to secure US nationwide distribution for his limited edition Madonna Wine, which comes all the way from Ciccone Vineyard in Michigan, said contactmusic.com.
The hand-numbered bottles are signed by the singer, her dad, and feature images from her recent 'Confessions' tour - and will cost $39.99 a bottle.
I'm sure it will be worth every penny.
Medal of Honor recipient and MSNBC Military Analyst Jack Jacobs makes a familiar argument in favor of the President:
The other principle focus of the president was that precipitous withdrawal from Iraq would be a disaster for both the United States and Iraq. He’s right about that too...Bush is correct to castigate those who argue for bringing everyone home immediately, because it would be bad for Iraq and dangerous for our troops.
It's worth mentioning that exactly none of the leading Democratic Presidential candidates advocate immediate withdrawal, and that the legislation proposed in Congress to end the war doesn't either.
Barack Obama calls for "(1) a reduction in the number of U.S. troops; (2) a time frame for a phased withdrawal; (3) the Iraqi government to make progress on forming a political solution; (4) improved reconstruction efforts to restore basic services in Iraq; and (5) engaging the international community, particularly key neighboring states and Arab nations, to become more involved in Iraq." That may not be good policy, but it's certainly not precipitous or immediate withdrawal.
Hillary Clinton proposes "legislation to end authority for the war in Iraq. The legislation will propose October 11, 2007 -- the five year anniversary of the original resolution authorizing the use of force in Iraq -- as the expiration date for that resolution. The President would be required to come to Congress to seek new authority. Following deauthorization, Senator Clinton would not support any new legislation that did not start to remove our troops from the middle of this sectarian civil war." Again, maybe not great policy, but not the imaginary bogeyman of immediate withdrawal, either.
Even proud liberal John Edwards advocates only "complete withdrawal of all combat troops in 12 to 18 months." That is, for the record, three times as long as some of the War's advocates said it would take to prosecute the whole war.
As admirable as it may be that the President stands steadfast, wouldn't it be more admirable if he were standing steadfast against an argument that someone was actually making?
It's been long enough since I declared the Fidel Castro Death Pool that we've gone past all the predicted death dates, so the winner is by default the person who guessed the latest date. After a couple of days of rumors about Castro's death, I don't want some web surfer to swoop in and take the prize from my loyal readers, so I'm closing the contest and starting a new one.
So here I announce a winner: Melonhead, who posts comments under a variety of names and who sometimes makes me so mad I want to spit. Melonhead guessed July 1, 2007, and his choice of locations on the ready-to-drink rack yields an interesting, if flawed, bottle: Mas des Bressades 2005 Syrah-Grenache, a Vin de Pays du Gard from what winegod Robert Parker calls "one of my favorite value-priced producers."
If you don't know -- and I'm absolutely certain the Bourbon-drinking Melonhead doesn't -- Vin de Pays is a historically low-class designation, a step down from the government enforced Appellation Controlee (AC) standards that dictate just about everything about how French wines are grown and made. In the last couple of decades, ambitious producers have opted out of the AC standards, accepting the lesser Vin de Pays designation in exchange for the freedom to produce wine however they damned well please. In this case, that means the adoption of techniques pioneered in places like California and -- gasp! -- Australia. The result, again going back to Parker, is a "medium-bodied red (that) possesses a lovely texture, admirable purity, and a lush, heady finish."
Vin de Pays du Gard is an area in southern France that overlaps the Costieres de Nimes AC, which has the kind of stuffy AC rules that have made France the world leader in unsellable, surplus wine. By ignoring the government regulations, Mas de Brassades retains the character of its terroir while producing wine that Oz Clarke describes in his New Encyclopedia of Wine thus:
These are big, juicy modern reds, often perfumed, always ripe, that would be very much at home in the Southern Rhone.
Or, I'd say, the central coast of California.
I, personally, think Mas de Bressades tastes a lot like some of the lower priced Chateauneufs, which is why I bought it in the first place. It's about $13 a bottle, so I can drink three for the same price as one bottle of Grand Veneur, and the taste is largely the same -- especially once I'm deep into the second bottle.
So Mas des Bressades is an excellent and fitting bottle with which to toast a dead Communist, a bottle whose very existence in powerful testimony to the power of free markets over government-regulated economies, and whose enjoyment is an act of pure Capitalist decadence.
Anyway, I'll set up another Castro Death Pool in the next couple of days. Same rules, same prize and -- unfortunately -- same old dictator.
Idaho Senator Larry Craig -- cultural conservative, supporter of the Federal Marriage Amendment and member of a barbershop quartet -- arrested in an airport bathroom for solicitation of sex from another man.
What is it about public restrooms that makes Republican politicians so horny?
Apparently, Homeland Security attracts a lot of self-dramatizing, self-important people. Reason magazine has an excellent round-up of anti-terrorist overreach in airports. Here's my favorite:
Travelers who assert their legal rights can find themselves bounced. Della Maricich was banned from a Portland-to-Seattle flight on May 1, 2002, after she asked an airport screener to keep her purse where she could see it while he searched it. (Many airport screeners have been accused of theft since the new search procedures were introduced.) The screener refused, and Maricich demanded to speak to his supervisor. A National Guardsman arrived on the scene a few minutes later and, Maricich later told The Wall Street Journal, "He told me that because I had disrupted the line by calling for a supervisor, I would not be allowed to fly out of PDX that day. He told me that I was a troublemaker and I was the only one who had ever complained."
Because that's what are security people are there for: to teach us lessons about respecting authority.
