The GOP's front-runner, 2012.

If I were Obama I'd be scared.

Not.

Heh.

[via]

Like Erick Erickson, only dumber and fatter.

Warner Todd Huston, RedState assclown.

Also, FOX News is Fair and Balanced.

Times Online:

Two of the world’s leading thinkers are in the middle of a spat.

That would be a compelling lede if the "thinkers" in question weren't Chris Anderson and Malcolm Gladwell.

Jesus.

Charming. (update)

Rod Dreher:

Big kerfuffle in Fort Worth as gay protesters complain that cops who turned up at a gay bar to arrest patrons were brutal. I find this hilarious:

Protesters said they want to know why Fort Worth police officers and Texas Alcohol Beverage Commission agents used what the protesters described as excessive force when arresting seven patrons at the Rainbow Lounge early Sunday. ...

In a statement, the Fort Worth Police Department said agents inspected three bars early Sunday and police arrested patrons at the Rainbow Lounge because they were drunk and tried to grope officers.

How drunk and horny do you have to be to be a male who gropes a male cop -- especially in Texas!?

Please note the "...".

Here's what Dreher left out:

Todd Camp of Fort Worth, who was at the bar, said one person was hospitalized after hitting his head during the incident. Police could not confirm that Sunday night.

"It was incredibly excessive and brutal," Camp said.

No word yet on whether Dreher also finds this beating "hilarious."

...More:

Senior Editor Tammye Nash is just now leaving the hospital in Fort Worth where she spoke with Chad Gibson’s family. Gibson is in intensive care after reportedly suffering head trauma when he was thrown to the ground by police early Sunday during a raid of the Rainbow Lounge. Nash said she visited with Gibson’s mother and his sister this morning, and they told her that his condition has worsened. Gibson reportedly has a brain bleed — also known as intracerebral hemorraghing — and the clot inside his skull has gotten larger and shifted, which is a bad sign. Gibson is scheduled for another CT scan at 10 a.m. today. After that, doctors will decide whether the clot can be shrunk with medication or whether they need to perform surgery.

Hahahahahaha!

Hehindeedy!

Putz, yesterday:

“TRAITORS:” I remember when calling people treasonous was wrong.

March 2008:

They’re not antiwar. They’re just on the other side.

September 2007:

NOT ANTIWAR, just on the other side: “Disturbed anti-war protester can’t find soldier, kills civilian with axe instead.”

March 2007:

“Anti-war?” Or just on the other side? Your call.

March 2006:

ANOTHER UPDATE: More photos here. They’re not so much “antiwar” as just on the other side.

May 2005:

I WARNED EARLIER that if Americans concluded that the press was on the other side, the consequences would be dire.

May 2005:

As I've warned before, if Americans conclude that the press is, basically, on the side of the enemy, the consequences are likely to be dire.

September 2004:

THE NEW CLIMATE OF FEAR IN AMERICA seems to have claimed another victim:

A local soldier back from the war in Iraq said he was beaten at an area concert because of what was printed on his T-shirt, NBC 4’s Nancy Burton reported. . . .

According to a Columbus police report, six witnesses who didn’t know Barton said the person who beat him up was screaming profanities and making crude remarks about U.S. soldiers, Burton reported.

Not anti-war. Just on the other side.

UPDATE: In response to a later link back to this post on August 8, 2006, Reader Ted Gideon emails that this report turned out to be false.

May 2004:

THEY’RE NOT ANTIWAR: They’re just on the other side.

April 2004:

Note to Kristof: They’re not “well-meaning,” and it’s odd that you’d think so in light of these sentiments. And they’re not anti-war. They’re on the other side, and they’re admitting it.

March 2004:

And, once again, it looks as if another “peace” group isn’t really for peace, but simply on the other side. And, apparently, on Kerry’s side as well.

January 2004:

This, of course, is why the Bush Administration’s efforts to keep the UN relevant were a bad idea. The Security Council was — and is — packed with people who were on the other side.

How are these for some charts, Glenn Reynolds?

Putz has been pimping this graphic, from the Heritage Foundation, forever and a day.

Here are a few he'll never post.

Hehindeedy!

The demise of Pajamas Media is awesome on its own merits, but the fact that John Cole can write this without fear of losing a paycheck is awesomer.

Really? Really?

What city do I live in?

Also, welfare mothers.

Who is at fault in the Mark Sanford to-do? Why, "liberalism", of course! It make perfect sense. To Mark Steyn.

I have to agree with Mark on this one, though, given that Big Government and Rachel Maddow were the ones who yanked Sanford's wang out of his Dockers and stuck it in an Argentine woman.

Pack Your Bags, Goldberg.

Yes, Jonah, should Hell exist, it is surely the final destination of a man who pimps out his 5-year old kid. But he'll have company. Remember this?


When you've been bad, God don't even hear you.

Deep Thought.

If he hadn't been a plagiarizing asshole, Ben Domenech would still be blogging for the Washington Post.

Ow.

"That part I liked."

Click through, kiddies. I wish I'd written it...

Joe the Plumber is my muse.

The voice of the Republican Party and the Teabaggers strikes again.

And The Horse You Rode In On.

A week after he got axed from The Washington Post, Dan Froomkin uses his last column to thank some of his Post colleagues who, he says, "did exceptional investigative reporting during [the Bush] era really deserve our gratitude."

Froomkin singles out Barton Gellman and Jo Becker, Dana Priest, and Walter Pincus [his hyperlinks].

There's a name missing and I can't quite put my finger on it...

Notably not on this list: The likes of Bob Woodward and Tim Russert. Hopefully, the next time the nation faces a grave national security crisis, we will listen to the people who were right, not the people who were wrong, and heed those who reported the truth, not those who served as stenographers to liars.

Ouch. Froomkin: calling it as he sees it, to the bitter end.

I'm afraid Krugman is right.

Yep.

At the beginning of this year, you may remember, Mr. Obama made an eloquent case for a strong economic stimulus — then delivered a proposal falling well short of what independent analysts (and, I suspect, his own economists) considered necessary. The goal, presumably, was to attract bipartisan support. But in the event, Mr. Obama was able to pick up only three Senate Republicans by making a plan that was already too weak even weaker.

At the time, some of us warned about what might happen: if unemployment surpassed the administration’s optimistic projections, Republicans wouldn’t accept the need for more stimulus. Instead, they’d declare the whole economic policy a failure. And that’s exactly how it’s playing out. With the unemployment rate now almost certain to pass 10 percent, there’s an overwhelming economic case for more stimulus. But as a political matter it’s going to be harder, not easier, to get that extra stimulus now than it would have been to get the plan right in the first place.

I'm not an economist, but $787B, 40% of which was tax cuts, seemed small to supposedly rescue an economy that's $13-14T.

Hmmmmm.

Is PJs dead or what?


...No, thankfully they're okay. Whew!

News Is a Dish Best Served Stale.

Remember that one time in band camp when wingnuts called Sonia Sotomayor a racist? And for, like, two weeks that's all they would talk about? And remember that other time, like, four months ago when Eric Holder made a speech that made whitey uncomfortable?

Yes, well, apparently Ren and Stimpy have been off the grid...


Advantage, blogosphere!

Side-splitting

Jonah Goldberg trying to be funny, or more accurately to pass along something he thinks is funny: why not make the tax code progressive based on height? That wouldn't be any crazier (or less UNFAIR!) than the way we do it now!!!!!!!!!!!!1111!!!!!one!!!!

Oh, Jonah. You whip.

You Can't Make This Shit Up.

K-Lo on Mark Stanford:

'He Has to Go' [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
Bill Bennett on Sanford, just now.

He quoted Chuck Colson on integrity[...]

For real.

Teabagger in action.

Ouch.

Michael Ledeen, last seen here badmouthing your beloved editor, has been pwned by Paul Saunders... in The Corner! How embarrassing!

Bizarrely, Ledeen also tries to make a distinction between offering “political and moral support” and offering “encouragement” to the Iranians backing Mousavi in the street protests. This makes little sense. The dictionary provides several definitions of “support,” most of which I assume Ledeen is not proposing (though I suppose he may want America to pay the protesters’ bills, presumably secretly and perhaps through his good offices, as he once established key connections in Iran which facilitated the Iran-Contra disaster).

Oh. Dear.

Total third rail.

This will not end well hilariously.

Stay tuned, dear readers.

Why I'll Miss K-Lo.

Is it just me, or is Erick Erickson getting dumber?

I swear he is.

Seriously, though, I'm bummed Sanford's going down. He had no chance in 2012.

Hehindeedy!

I realize that what with his second job as Dana Milbank's assignment editor, Drudge might not have time to read over his work, but still -- this shit is embarrassing.



The Berkshire Hathaway honcho is many things -- rich, philanthropic, driven -- but he is not, as far as I know, edible.

Aw, So Cute.

Dr. Mrs. Putz denies being the recipient of wingnut welfare $$$:

Anyway, the [Mother Jones] article begins by talking about me and states that I am a blogger for the “conservative Pajamas Media network” --newsflash to the author Amy Benfer: I am a blogger on blogspot, not at Pajamas Media-- but why get bogged down with too many facts?

BECAUSE OF THE CIVILITY!!!!! /goldstein

K. is rightly amused.

Conservatism in a nutshell

Texas profoundly retarded fetal alcohol syndrome baby Governor Rick Perry is a big fan of toll roads, believing like a good conservative that people should pay for services used and that goods should not be subsidized by those who do not use them. And what better way to spread the idea than with a massive taxpayer-funded advertising and marketing campaign by the Texas Department of Transportation in favor of new toll roads?

Perry vetoed HR 2142, which prohibited the use of state funds for this purpose and which passed both houses with a grand total of one vote against. Note that Perry trails KB Hutchinson in polling for the Republican primary, meaning that Rick Perry is too much of a fucking idiot for Texas Republicans.

Pajama Putziness.

Putz is funny:

When I first started back in 2001, the blogosphere was a relatively small place: I actually had a pretty good handle on what was going on in general. Now it's gigantic, and I often run across highly trafficked blogs I've never heard of before. It was also a place where people made a big effort to be civil; that seemed to fade after the 2002 elections and has mostly gotten worse ever since. I'm tempted to blame the influence of anonymous comment-trolls, but it's also the case that other media have grown much less civil in recent years, so there's probably a larger societal influence there, too.

He's right! I'm sure the loss of civility was not at all an outgrowth of continued warmongering in the face of defeat, potshots at anti-war protesters, a willingness to play Hurricane Katrina for laughs, passive-aggressive homophobia and the canonization of Joe the Plumber...

Nope. The loss of civility, which, much like conservative citizen journalism, never really existed, was totally the fault of some commenters.

Hehindeedy!

Oh for fuck's sake.

This is lazy, even for Putz and Kudlow. Sample:

He doesn’t link to the survey he mentions, probably because he doesn’t want you to realize that it’s two years old. Took me about 45 seconds to find it, and it would have taken less if I weren’t simultaneously downloading so much Ann Althouse/Jonah Goldberg slash porn. Here. Survey date: September 12, 2006. Before the financial crisis, before the recession, before millions of layoffs, before the last midterm election. On Monday, June 22, 2009 Larry Kudlow is making a point about a contemporaneous health care debate using a survey from two thousand and fucking six. But I’m sure his omission was accidental.

They're not even trying to be not dickheads anymore

"Walter Duranty meets the Holocaust."

I'd have gone with "Like the Holocaust."

Iraq'd

Like an Indiana market in the summertime. Thankfully I escaped from the Bloomington Farmer's Market on Saturday before the explosions started.

Good to see the violence is a thing of the past.

Laziness incarnate

Glenn Reynolds, 10:03 AM

CHRISTINA HOFF SOMMERS: No Country for Burly Men: How feminist groups skewed the Obama stimulus plan towards women’s jobs. "A “man-cession.” That’s what some economists are starting to call it. Of the 5.7 million jobs Americans lost between December 2007 and May 2009, nearly 80 percent had been held by men. Mark Perry, an economist at the University of Michigan, characterizes the recession as a “downturn” for women but a “catastrophe” for men.
(snip for length - Ed) Our incoming president did what many sensible men do when confronted by a chorus of female complaint: He changed his plan." Sensible? Read the whole thing.


Glenn Reynolds, 10:38 AM

MICHAEL BARONE: Obama’s governance style. “First, Obama likes to execute long-range strategies but suffers from cognitive dissonance when new facts render them inappropriate. His 2008 campaign was a largely flawless execution of a smart strategy, but he was flummoxed momentarily when the Russians invaded Georgia and when John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate. On domestic policy, he has been executing his long-range strategy of vastly expanding government, but may be encountering problems as voters show unease at huge increases on spending. His long-range strategy of propitiating America’s enemies has been undercut by North Korea’s missile launches and demonstrations in Iran against the mullah regime’s apparent election fraud.” Read the whole thing.


Glenn Reynolds, tempus immemoria

AUTHOR'S NAME IN CAPS, COLON: Linky go here. "This is where the lengthy quote goes. Most bloggers attempt to limit the use of long quotes because they betray a thundering lack of effort and originality, but Glenn realizes how much easier it is to click ctrl-c/ctrl-v than to come up with original content and besides, why let the fact that you have absolutely nothing interesting to say stop you from becoming a Famous Blogger?" Read the whole thing.

Nice People.

As you're no doubt aware, Times reporter David Rohde escaped his Taliban captors. Powerline appears, um, less than happy. BECAUSE OF THE WIRETAPPING111!!111 /jeff goldstein

Gawker observes that, while The Times successfully shut down reports of the kidnapping in major media, there were a few outlets that disregarded the blackout: "Conservative forum/quasi-hate mongers Free Republic did a little dance on it."

Yes, they did. For posterity:



Etc.

Change of heart.

Allow me to quote myself:

Two months ago, and for the past five, ten, twenty years for that matter, the right have demanded that we bomb the sovereign nation of Iran into the Stone Age. It was a nation led by lunatic Islamic fundamentalists and composed almost entirely of bloodthirsty terrorists desperate to wipe Israel off the map and rain death upon the Great Satan. The urgency with which we needed to start killing Iranians was difficult to put into words. Now - almost literally overnight - Iran is America circa 1775, a noble people yearning desperately for sweet, sweet democracy while being oppressed by the Commies or Terrorists or Whigs or whoever the boogeyman of the moment happens to be.

Full take here.

Yeah, This is Totally the Guy You Want Criticizing Letterman.

Putz 'n' Pejman, a Retrospective.

Putz, today:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH OFFERS a quick path to “Jeffersonian democracy” in Iran.

June '02:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH says forget this wobbly stuff: we’re getting ready for war with Iraq.

August '02:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH responds to a growing trend among antiwar folks of impugning the masculinity of prowar folks while engaging in chest-pounding displays on their own.

March '03:

IRANIAN-AMERICANS hope that Iran will be next...

UPDATE: Pejman Yousefzadeh has some thoughts.

June '03:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH WONDERS why Western media are paying so little attention to the demonstrations in Iran, when those demonstrations might topple the mullahs and demonstrate the effectiveness of the Bush Administration’s strategy in . . . Oh, hell, never mind. Some questions answer themselves.

August '03:

UPDATE: Pejman Yousefzadeh notes that this is more evidence that Iraq didn’t distract us from the pursuit of Al Qaeda.

September '03:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH thinks that the air is going out of the Plame/Wilson affair as Robert Novak says it wasn’t leaked by the Administration.

November '05:

PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH: “You would think the myth that General Shinseki was fired because of his comments on troop deployment in Iraq wouldn’t get any traction anymore.”

I guess what I'm trying to say is...Pejman Yousefzadeh is an idiot. Anyone who gives any credence to his thoughts on Jeffersonian democracy -- or, for that matter, the temperature at which water boils -- is also an idiot.

OMG.

Things are about to get a whole lot wingnuttier:

If a number of other conservative publishers have their way, the Examiner will get more competition. PajamasMedia, the blog conglomerate that grew out of the “Rathergate” story, is talking to potential reporters for an investigative journalism site. Jennifer Rubin, the site’s Washington editor, declined to discuss the plans but pointed to the site’s coverage of anti-tax “Tea Parties” as proof that “the old model of elite journalists peddling liberal opinion as ‘objective reporting’ is dying.”

Hahahahahaha! I was wondering when PJs would finally get around doing what they said they would do -- four years ago!

Powerline Raises The Bar...

Big time:

RealClearPolitics flags Charlles [sic] Krauthammer's column today with the heading "Obama clueless on Iran." It's enough to make one wonder whether Obama supports the Iranian regime. Whose side is he on?

Is this peak wingnut? I mean, I've heard criticisms that Obama is, oh, ineffectual on Iran, but this is the first I've heard of him being a crypto-Muslim double agent for the Supreme Leader...

George Will thought balloon

"If I use a word like "crystalline" in the first three sentences no one will notice how retarded my arguments are! Yes, yes. That's the ticket. Just create a veneer of intelligence with diction, posture, vocabulary, and tie selection."

FYI.

Stossel <3 Beck

Watch John Stossel unhinge his jaw like a snake to swallow more of Glenn Beck's hot Mormon manhood.

Remember where you were on this day...

For Putz has written a classic.

The little green anti-Letterman protest, says Putz, shows that Dave is "feeling the heat," even though, notes Putz, it was attended by "more media than activists." Protest FAIL? Not if you're Glenn Reynolds!

I dunno, this sounds like a PR triumph to me.

It would. And, suddenly, Pajamas Media, Sarah Palin, and the bargain-basement reputation of the UT law school starts to make a lot of sense.

[via]

"I wish Sarah Palin would just go away."

But she won't, because she's a bit of a media whore who has no desire to return to Alaska.

...I just want her to stop milking her role as GOP martyr. Palin should stick to her day job - by which I mean, governing Alaska, not being fodder for talk-show humor.

Palin's become late-period Elvis -- playing the old hits, but the once-formidable spark is gone.

No matter; she's given Treacher a reason to live.

"All she did was take her kid to a ballgame," he says, adjusting his crown of thorns as he props himself up on the cross.

Sure, Jim, and all she did was take her kid to a Flyers game, all she did was have Bristol publicly humiliated on the tarmac...

Yes, Sarah Palin is mother of the year.

Frankly, JT's attachment to Our Lady of the Caribou is far creepier than anything David Letterman has ever said or done.

I think he should be fired.

I'll miss you most of all, Scarecrow.

When K-Lo is gone I will miss smooth, flowing English prose like this most of all:

I tend to think men should be able to have clubs and women etc. But if we're
going to have a standard for one sex as pertains to the judiciary, it should be
applied equally.

K-Lo: applying the standard of awesomeness. Equally.

Pallin' around with terrorists.

Did Tom Tancredo share the stage at a 2007 event with Shawna Forde?

Tapper Makes a Funny.

Deep Thought.

Does InstaWintergreen still advocate assassinating Iran scientists and clerics?

Glenn Beck, comedian

I almost did another undercover gig for the Glenn Beck comedy show thingy on June 4 (encore June 11) but I couldn't talk myself or any of my friends into spending $20 to see that fluffer cry on a stage. But here's a nice review. Apparently for one's $20 bill Glenn provides a 15 minute intermission, a 10-minute spiel pimping his new book, and no actual jokes in a 2-hour show.

This Week in Racism

The GOP Minority Outreach Program continues unabated.

Hehindeedy!

Putz '05:

I didn’t write about immigration, which I agree is a core question of sovereignty and one that doesn’t lend itself readily to self-help, though the Minutemen are an early sign of what we might see if the federal government remains ineffectual on the subject.

Uh huh.

According to local law enforcement, three people posing as police officers forced their way into the home of Raul Flores in Arivaca, Arizona, about 10 miles from the Mexican border, on May 30. They shot and killed Flores and his nine-year-old daughter, and wounded Flores' wife. The three, Shawna Forde, Jason Bush, and Albert Gaxiola, were arrested and charged last Thursday and Friday.

But here's where it gets interesting: Forde's brother, Merrill Metzger, has told the Arizona Daily Star that Forde had been talking recently about "starting a revolution against the United States government," and had said she planned to recruit members of the Aryan Nations as part of a plan to rob drug cartels.

It sounds like Forde had started putting that plan into action. Bush, accused of being the triggerman in the killing, was also charged Friday in the 1997 murder of a sleeping Hispanic homeless man in Washington, reports the paper. According to law enforcement authorities in the state, Bush "has had long-standing ties to the Aryan Nations." In 2003, they say, Bush moved to the Sandpoint area of northern Idaho, a historic center of white supremacist activity.

Both Forde and Bush also have ties to the fringe of the anti-immigration movement. As Josh noted last week over at TPM, Forde leads Minutemen American Defense (MAD), a vigilante group that conducts patrols of the US-Mexico border.

Frank Gaffney, pathetic little weasel.

What an ass.

He does, however, make an excellent case study for Franken's "taking a dump in the middle of the room" theory.

I Never Got To Say Goodbye.

As noted here and elsewhere, our beloved Kathryn Jean Lopez

has been shitcanned
is leaving to spend more time with her cats

is moving to DC.

A look back at the crazy:

-- K-Lo boycotts verbs

-- K-Lo fantasizes about a Bork/Bennett sandwich

-- K-Lo quarantined

-- K-Lo hatin' on gays

-- K-Lo reconsiders the Third Law of Thermodynamics

-- K-Lo makes BT angry

-- K-Lo wants to give her flower to Rush

-- K-Lo wrote something not-stupid

Oh, for the love of God.

This is getting out of hand.

Glenn Reynolds' Republican Party: still racist.

Stay classy! And this isn't a one-off. These are the same people who did this.

And this is the party the totally non-partisan libertarian "kooky leftist" pulls the lever for -- election after election after election.

His pose would be so much more effective if he lived in say, Vermont.

UPDATE

And now this racist Tweet, from a South Carolina Republican.

JUST HEARD OBAMA IS GOING TO IMPOSE A 40% TAX ON ASPIRIN BECAUSE IT'S WHITE AND IT WORKS.

HAHAHAHAHA. And there's cotton in the bottle and everything.

Obama is really the GOP's worst nightmare, from a PR standpoint. This is what happens when your party is primarily a product of the Old Confederacy. They just can't help themselves.

Wishful thinking watch.

Little early for this, isn't it?

"Well, the greatest thing to ever happen to the Republican Party is Barack Obama," GOP consultant David All told Mark Preston and Lisa Desjardins Monday in an interview for CNN Radio.

Obama's latest approval numbers: 62/31. Excellent news for Republicans.

Always is.

"I don't think any animal lover would be walking around trying to staple tails back on monkeys as they became humans."

That's Glenn Beck, ladies and gentlemen, on the TARP funds.

Oh no! K-Lo!

K-Lo go bye-bye, but not really:

I will soon be stepping aside as editor of National Review Online. I’m not going too far. I’ll still be contributing to NRO with ideas and content, and if you are an author or reader you might not notice much of a change.

Phew!

(And yes, Canadian Instaputz readers, the title is a NoMeansNo reference)

My soul hurts.

Breaking News

Transcripts of an e-mail exchange between Carrie Prejean and California pageant officials reveals that - please make sure you are seated - she is a semiliterate child.

Take my Nixon/von Brunn quiz at FDL.

Betcha don't get all 10 correct.

How stupid are Ann Althouse's readers?

Obviously, very. Very touching that Ann jumped to Putz's defense, though.

In case you didn't know, this is all about this post. Does Althouse go to the bathroom for him, too?

Faster Less Stoopid Plz!

It's testament to how deeply Obama has neutralized conservatives that they are reduced to stuff like this:

Surprise in the Iranian Elections [Michael Ledeen]
Everyone thinks he is winning! Mousavi says he's won. Ahmadinejad says he's won. Karrubi says he's a solid second, and will contest the runoff (with Mousavi) next Friday. Rezai says he's won a moral victory.

And the ballot counting has only just begun . . . so here's another way in which Obama has influenced Iran: It's the Chicago school of ballot counting.

Interesting! Is Dr. Contra suggesting Obama didn't really win the election? He's a terrible writer, so it's hard to say for sure.

Let's go to the source!

I do not speak wingnut. HALP?

...Charles translates.

QOTD.

The Slog:

Sometimes I almost feel sorry for poor Carrie Prejean, a pretty young woman shoved into the front lines of the culture war simply by answering a question at the Miss USA Pageant. But then I remember what an emphatically idiotic trash heap she's repeatedly revealed herself to be, and I get over it.

Your Friday Nooners.

Appeasing your base is terrible for the country, unless you're running it.

Instant Karma's Gonna Get You.

Sez Jonah Goldberg:

If Napolitano was prophetic about all those returning vets becomes crazed terrorists, we're going to have real trouble for a long time now. After all, von Brunn was a WWII vet, which means we still have all those vets from Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Gulf I, and Gulf II to worry about. Given the 60-year lag time, the returning-vet terrorist threat is going to continue well through the end of the century.

Oh, ha ha ha! PSTD is teh funny!

Army Sgt. John M. Russell and Pfc. Jaynie May Askew were desperate soldiers far from home, one accused of killing five GIs in Baghdad and the other is thought to have committed suicide in San Antonio.

They snapped, beyond the reach of a military that tried hard to save them.

“I wish there were easy answers,” the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, said Saturday. “There are not.”

The Army says Russell, a three-tour veteran from Sherman, shot five soldiers and that Askew, of Scotsdale, Ariz., probably killed herself.

The Army thinks there are fixes — one slowing down a high “operational tempo” that has forced troops to pull two, three and even four war-zone tours. It's trying to expand the time between tours to 18 months by 2010 and 24 months in 2011.

“There's no end to the cycle,” said Raul Villaronga, a retired Army colonel and Vietnam veteran who works with groups that support military families.

My Christmas wish is that Goldberg's shitty little magazine goes belly up, and Mr. Legacy Pledge lives the rest of his worthless life on a diet of dog food (dry) and Tang.

Misc.

1. Putz hasn't mentioned the Iranian election. I wonder why.

2. Apparently, the prescient Homeland Security report is now, according to Putz, the equivalent of "blood libel." This is not the first time that Putz has casually evoked tales of Jews using Christian blood to make Passover matzoh. He did it earlier this year, in response to the outlandish suggestion that Richard Poplawski, who "feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns," was a right-wing gun nut.

Hard to believe, I know.

Exactly.

Chait:

First, the "conventional political classification" is a rubric that accounts for extremists on the far right or left who abhor Democrats or Republicans. Ralph Nader has a lot of bad things to say about the Democratic Party, but that doesn't make him hard to classify on the left-right spectrum.

Second, a certain strand of conservative thought is comfortable with most of the tenets of Republican doctrine with the exception of free trade and, especially, Jews, Israel, and neoconservative influence. Pat Buchanan is the emblem of this brand of conservatism. Buchanan is generally a Republican partisan except for Jewish/Israeli/Middle Eastern issues where he takes strong exception. Von Brunn is pretty clearly a violent and more extreme adherent of Buchanan's basic worldview. That he would detest a neoconservative institution like the Standard isn't "complicating" or surprising at all.

The fact that wingnuts don't even know the subsets of their own movement is a testament to their ignorance.

I wonder why we're fucked up as a country.

CNN headline story, with big picture: Chastity Bono is becoming a dude.

CNN not-headline story, buried in "U.S." section: Military suicide rate is breaking records.

Keep up the good work, assmasters.

Kathleen Parker states the obvious.

Hehindeedy!

Post o' the day...

Word Choice.

I wasn't even gonna mention the whole Playboy wingnut hatefuck thing, but this wangdoodle from Dr. Mrs. Putz caught my eye:

Honestly, do you really think a pansy guy like this Guy Cimbalo would have the courage to get in a room with, much less actually rape any of these conservative women?

I'm not sure why the Dr. Mrs. wants to equate courage, which last time I checked is a virtue, with rape, but... that's just me!

Pandemics Are Cute.

Von Brunn: still not "right-wing."

They've dropped the whole "don't politicize shootings" crap and just moved on to totally denying the basic facts of said shootings.

The Self-Correcting Internet.

Putz, yesterday:

MIRANDA WARNINGS FOR TERRORISTS: Thank Sen. McCain.

Accuracy FAIL.

A DOJ spokesman says there’s been no new policy directive.

“There has been no policy change and no blanket instruction issued for FBI agents to Mirandize detainees overseas,” spokesman Matt Miller said.

Putz will have to update his post! This is so exciting!

EXCLUSIVE!!! MUST CREDIT WONKETTE INSTAPUTZ!!!!!!!

We have just learned that Alex Rodriguez dropped his testicles in Jim Treacher's mouth and shook them vigorously.

The Anchor Baby's spin: neo-Nazis aren't far-right.

Really, Michelle? That's the best you can do?

Try again.

James von Brunn served six years in prison for trying to make what he called a "legal, non-violent citizens arrest" of Federal Reserve board members in 1981 -- a sentence he blamed on "a Negro jury, Jew/Negro attorneys" and "a Jew judge," he said on his Web site, "Holy Western Empire."

"He is in our files going back way into the 1980s," said Heidi Beirich, a researcher for the Montgomery, Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center. "He has an extremely long history with neo-Nazis and white supremacists. He's written extremely incendiary publications raging about Jews, blacks and the like."

Von Brunn is a native of St. Louis, Missouri, and a 1943 graduate of Washington University there. According to his online biography, he served as a Navy officer in World War II and became an advertising artist and executive after the war.

But by the late 1970s, Beirich told CNN, he had become a "hardcore neo-Nazi" and an associate of William Pierce -- the white supremacist leader whose 1978 book, "The Turner Diaries," is blamed for inspiring Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

Next we'll hear that Tim McVeigh and William Pierece were left-wing, too.

"Bit by bit Liberalism ascended. Bit by bit the Constitution was re-interpreted. Bit by bit government institutions and Congressmen fell into JEW hands --then U.S. diplomacy, businesses, resources and manpower came under JEW control," one such message reads. "Whitemen sat on their collective asses and did NOTHING -- NOTHING BUT TALK."

Yep, sounds totally left-wing.

"Half the American People."

Heh.



Indeed?

CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: How Fox News Opened America. “I said some years ago that the genius of Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes was to have discovered a niche market in American broadcasting — half the American people.”

Deep Thought.

If only that security guard had been armed, no one would have shot up the Holocaust Museum.

Less popular than Russia.

Brutal.

Remember this the next time you see Putz or some other wingnut fear-mongering about Putin or Chavez.

Self-awareness watch.

Malkin's boy:

People who commit crimes bear the entire responsibility for those crimes. Assigning guilt, real or imagined, to groups rather than individuals for their own actions is one of the reasons we have to have a Holocaust Memorial at all. It’s the kind of thinking that leads to genocide when allowed to run to run to its extreme.

Is this guy serious? Does he really expect us to believe that if the shooter were a Muslim, wingnut blogs wouldn't be screaming RELIGION OF PEACE!!!11!1! right now?

Please.

The recipe for success

A Gallup poll asked American adults to name the GOP's leader or "main person who speaks for the party." The responses, in descending order of popularity, are:

52% Don't Know
13% Rush Limbaugh
10% Dick Cheney
6% Newt Gingrich
6% John McCain

Two things. First of all, wither the great Savior from Alaska? Second, HOLY FUCK. That list is the saddest thing I've ever seen, and I've watched an orphanage burn down. I wonder which is more depressing for the GOP: that half of America can't name anyone or the batch of fossils, lunatics, and fossilized lunatics who were named.

Another right-wing terrorist.

Should we send him to Gitmo and waterboard him?

According to NBC, the man who shot a security guard and potentially one to two other people at the Holocaust Museum today is 89-year-old James W. Von Brunn. Von Brunn maintains a white-supremacist Web site, HolyWesternEmpire.org. The biography of Von Brunn on the site states that he spent over six years in federal prison for attempting to "place the treasonous Federal Reserve Board of Governors under legal, non-violent, citizens arrest." A World War II veteran and resident of Maryland, Von Brunn is the author of a pamphlet entitled "Kill the Best Gentiles: A new, hard-hitting exposé of the JEW CONSPIRACY to destroy the White gene-pool."

Malkin's crowd was trying to guess the profile of the shooter before it was released, and this comment is ironically amusing.

OOOHHHH, ME, PICK ME!

The shooter is a White, Republican, Right-Wing Christian Extremist who served in the Military, listens to Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck who is mad because his Orthodox Jewish Girlfriend aborted his baby at Tiller’s Kansas clinic last month IN the last month before the expected due date.

How’d I do? Do I get a hand grenade or a shoulder-propelled rocket launcher?

Give that man a hand grenade.

UPDATE

Looks like the shooter wrote an "article" that was posted on Free Republic. Awesome.

UPDATE 2

Dumbass comment of the day so far goes to Jawa:

I'll just go ahead and lay the odds at 2:1 that the suspect's name will be something like Joe Smith, but then in 48 hours we'll learn that he recently changed his name to Ahmed al-Jihad. Yet we'll also be told that that authorities are perplexed at what possibly could have motivated him.

Oops.

The Only Thing These Two Have In Common is their First Names Begin With Ro.

Roger L. Simon thinks terribly highly of himself. He has for some years now sustained the delusion that, were it not for his youstabee status, he would still be a player, a sought-after screenwriter. His latest scribble is of a piece:

Now screenwriters have their prejudices against actors - and I’ve certainly been guilty of them on occasion. Truth to tell, we’re jealous. In the Hollywood pecking order they have all the power. Hardly anyone goes to see a Roger Simon movie and not that many even go to see a Robert Towne movie. So among ourselves we writers like to disparage actors as pretty boys who mouth our words, etc., etc.

Oh. My.

The first part of that sentence is indisputably true, mainly because Simon hasn't gotten a movie made in more than a decade, and hasn't written one that anyone actually saw since the first Bush Administration. (A movie which, btw, nobody liked.) As for the latter, well, that must be why Mr. Towne keeps getting work.

Whatever happened to...

...not caving in to the demands of deranged loners or terrorists?

Powerline Fissure?

One can hope!

Scott Johnson (Not-Assrocket) hehindeeds Frank Gaffney's loony "Obama is a Muslim" column, a work against which all others must be measured.

The third Powerliner, Not-Not-Assrocket, rather than praise his colleague's extraordinarily powerful corndog intellect, reports that he, in fact, would like to get off the crazy train:

Gaffney's claim that Obama is our first Muslim president is quite far-fetched (as was Morrison's statement that Clinton was our first black president, but Morrison is not a serious analyst) and his suggestion that Obama may be a Muslim seems baseless.

Obama was engaged in Muslim "outreach." In my opinion, that's a fool's errand and probably dangerous too -- as it was when President Bush tried it. But if you're going to make the attempt in a serious way, then it makes sense to throw around the various catch-phrases that Gaffney cites and, more generally, to speak to Muslims from "inside their perspective ".

I also disagree with Krauthammer's claim that Obama made statements that delegitimize the state of Israel.

Not-Assrocket, dude -- your fugly friend just called you out.

DEVELOPING....

Get Me The Rewrite Desk!

This is depressingly out of date...

Movie references.

Krugman has just raised the bar. Seriously, I'd give him a second Nobel for this.

Uh, Allahpundit? When does Olbermann claim to be objective?

Wuh?

FYI, here’s the extended web clip of her interview with Hannity. The most eventful bit is the one Drudge quoted, but the last two minutes are worth watching just to see how chummy Hannity is with her. Say this for him: Unlike the modern-day Murrow at MSNBC, at least he makes no pretense whatsoever of objectivity.

I'll say this for Hannity: he's an asshole and a liar.

But the idea that KO claims to be "objective" i.e., nonpartisan, is silly as anyone who has seen one of his sometimes tedious "Special Comment" segments. "Commentary" would seem to be the opposite of "objectivity," yes?

If you're going to kiss Hannity's ass, please do so without the lame, "Well, he's more principled than Olbermann" BS.

Do Me a Solid.

Go to this.

It will be massive amounts of fun and Al tells great stories.

That is all.

Jake Tapper Slaps Former Bush Spokesbot.

Poor Tony Fratto has been bitching that no media outlet has questioned the White House job creation numbers.

A certain Drudge whore will have none of it.



Clap clap.

Frank Gaffney: Obama's a Hitlermuslim.

You wonder how bad the crazies are going to get before 2012.

Chrysler'd

TARP is a giant sinkhole into which money disappears and will never reappear, leaving taxpayers with a trillion-dollar bill to pay.

Yep.

Glenn Reynolds, always rushing to defend wingnuts.

Putz:

...if you appoint yourself someone’s anonymous blogging nemesis, you can probably expect to be outed.

Whelan:

I have been uncharitable in my conduct towards the blogger who has used the pseudonym Publius. Earlier this evening, I sent him an e-mail setting forth my apology for my uncharitable conduct.

UPDATE

Sully:

Poor Jonah covered himself in goo when he could have waited a day and avoided any comment.

So did Putz. Same motivation.

Wingnut welfare beg.

K-Lo:

I am here to ask you to open your wallet for National Review Online.

I know. This is the worst time to ask for money. Money is tight all around, and most of us have strict priorities for the little that we have. There are mortgages and rent payments. Groceries. Tuitions. Vacations. And thanks to the president, date night now costs ten times what it used to.

Like she would know.

Pajama Putziness.

Roger L. Simon, today:

This week’s Poliwood is about “Who Killed Hollywood?” - assuming somebody did. Or perhaps, as I state, cribbing the great words of Preston Sturges referring to chivalry: “It’s not only dead, it’s decomposed.”

August 29, 2008:

The media, of course, swallowed like eager, brainless adherents - another indication that liberalism is not only dead, it’s decomposed.

August 13, 2008:

Or, to once again paraphrase the great Preston Sturges: “Lberalism is not only dead, it’s decomposed.”

April 15, 2008:

The word liberal no longer exists. It has been hijacked and placed in the deep freeze… or … to paraphrase Preston Sturges (who was talking of chivalry at the time)… “Liberalism is not only dead. It’s decomposed.”

January 15, 2008:

David Brooks has a smart column in the NYT today - The Identity Trap - that almost doesn’t go far enough. Identity politics isn’t just “dead,” in the immortal words of Preston Sturges, “it’s decomposed.”

November 8, 2005:

Back on 6/13/2003 I put up a post based on that great Claudette Colbert (okay, Preston Sturges) line from Palm Beach Story: “Chivalry is not only dead, it’s decomposed!” The same, I wrote then and continue to feel [You haven't matured, I see.-ed.], can be said of party politics in our country today...

May 22, 2005:

The ideologies of liberalism and progressivism, as they were known to us for decades, are not only dead, as the lady said… they’re decomposed.

July 24, 2004:

The UN Oil-for-Food Scandal - undoubtedly the greatest boodoggle in the entire history of international organizations — continues to be virtually unreported by our sclerotic Mainstream Media like the NYT and the LAT. They seem desperate to preserve the impression that all is well at the United Nations — proof by itself that our contemporary hidebound “liberalism” is not only dead, it’s decomposed.

42% of the world's defense spending.

U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

Can't have "small government and low taxes" when you spend more than the next 14 countries combined on armed forces.

Learn from the (ass)master.

Michael Barone, v.2009: "Obama Needs to Brush up on Middle East History."

Michael Barone, v. 2002: "Off the Side Track," featuring Middle East History Lessons such as:

It is often said that we cannot prosecute a war against Iraq until there is a solution to the Palestinian problem. But actually it is the other way around. We cannot get a solution to the Palestinian problem until we have successfully prosecuted the war against Iraq. That is because the problem that needs to be solved is the state of mind of the Arabs. As long as Arabs, and Palestinians particularly, believe that they can extirpate the state of Israel, there will be no solution they and Israel can agree on.

Bitchin'.

Fumigate The Place, Ann. (update)

Putz points us to a caption contest at Althouse's place. Here's the photo:




Here are some representative suggestions from the commenters:

Treacle said...

I could eat you like last night's barbeque.

John said...

I hate skinny white girls.

Fen said... Deanna: I'm always taken aback at how angry or disapproving Michelle Obama looks.

Darcy: I just think her sour, negative nature shows in photos.

I know that look. See it every day. Its the consequence of carrying a racial chip on your shoulder all of your life. Everything is whitey's fault.

Fen said...

"Die white bitch"

/fixed

AllenS said...

Sometimes, I get the feeling that Michelle is not comfortable around white people. I'll bet she felt more at home in Rev. Wright's church.

wvhillbilly said...

“White bitch better step the fuck off.”

Lem said...

This ho told me to wear white.

veni vidi vici said...

Michelle: "You're *Italian*, bitch; stop frontin' like y'all French 'n shit."

PierreLegrand said...

Waaaaaaa! I HATE THIS WHITE BITCH! BARACK PLEASE MAKE FRANCE GO AWAY!

Sun Tzu said...

What 'chu talkin 'bout, ho?

Anonymous Blogger said...

"I so love to ignore black women!"

Now, I don't think that Ann's commenters are anti-Semitic. I'm damn sure, however, that the above selection is racist.

It's bothersome that a) this a significant percentage of the comments and b) none of the other regulars seem to have a problem with this stuff.

Look, it's admirable that Ann doesn't moderate her comments. (Most conservative blogs don't even have them.) But perhaps she should. This is ugly.

...Oh, she does moderate comments: "I moderate and delete really insulting comments on my blog."

Just not these comments.

Ouch.

And she's the future of the GOP:

But many in the party establishment, mindful of her polarizing persona and the devastating caricatures that emerged last fall, would prefer [Palin] remain in Alaska and leave the party rebuilding to others who may appeal to the broad middle of the country.

The subtext of the article is that, while Palin's colleagues concede that she's stupid, they don't mind if she makes appearances -- so long as she doesn't open her mouth.

Naturally, I find this deeply amusing.

Oh what have we here? Our almost-veep on Hannity, proving that malaprops are an art form:

Palin continues:

"America is digging a deeper hole and how are we paying for this government large-esque. We're borrowing. We're borrowing from China and we consider that now we own sixty percent of general motors -- or the U.S. government does. But who is the U.S. government becoming more indebted to? It's China. So that leads you to have to ask who is really going to own our car industry than in America."

omfg. Oh. Dear.

Can't anyone play this game?

Sadly, the Democrats still can't.

Newt goes full Christianist.

Heretics everywhere.

GINGRICH: I am not a citizen of the world. I am a citizen of the United States because only in the United States does citizenship start with our creator. [...] I think this is one of the most critical moments in American history. We are living in a period where we are surrounded by paganism.

Let's change this statement around, and pretend Gingrich is an Islamic right-wing conservative in, say, Pakistan.

AL NYUT: I am not a citizen of the world. I am a citizen of the Pakistan because only in Pakistan does citizenship start with Allah. [...] I think this is one of the most critical moments in our history. We are living in a period where we are surrounded by infidels.

Do Republicans realize how much they sound like the people they keep insisting are the problem?

Regarding Ed Whelan's Douchebaggery.

First of all, what Tbogg said.

Second, what's the National Review's thinking here? "Well, it's been three years since we outed a liberal blogger...Let's do it again!"

One day, National Review, I will confirm my suspicions that Kathryn Jean Lopez is not the virginal New Yorker she claims to be, but is in fact the remnants of a decades-old Phyllis Schlafly late-term abortion.

And you will rue the day you outed publius.

Hehindeedy!

Assrocket, 2009:

I personally have never seen a teen-age girl make a fool of herself over a boy the way many--most--mainstream reporters have over Barack Obama.

Assrocket, 2005:

It must be very strange to be President Bush. A man of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, he can't get anyone to notice. He is like a great painter or musician who is ahead of his time, and who unveils one masterpiece after another to a reception that, when not bored, is hostile.

The ultimate sacred cow in American politics.

Defense spending.

It's not just Republicans that are the problem.

Eat Balls, Jared Kushner.

Kushner, you fired Peter Stevenson? The guy basically wrote Sex and the City and was, outside of Kaplan, the best editor on staff.

Are you out of your fucking mind?

You've killed a once great paper, you entitled piece of shit, and don't expect whatever talent remains to do so for long.

Christ, I need a drink.

This Explains Everything.

At last! The unified theory for why conservatives are such bigoted assholes think gay marriage is a "state's rights" issue: they're wimps. According to some new studies out of Cornell...

People who squirm at the sight of bugs or are grossed out by blood and guts are more likely to be politically conservative, new studies find.

In particular, the squeamish are more apt to have conservative attitudes about gays and lesbians.

[snip]

In one of the new studies, Cornell University psychology professor David Pizarro and colleagues surveyed 181 U.S. adults from politically mixed swing states.

They used a Disgust Sensitivity Scale (DSS), which offers various scenarios to assess disgust sensitivity, as well as a political ideology scale.

They found a correlation between being more easily disgusted and political conservatism.

Then they surveyed 91 Cornell undergraduates with the DSS, as well as with questions about their positions on issues including gay marriage, abortion, gun control, labor unions, tax cuts and affirmative action.

Participants who rated higher in disgust sensitivity were more likely to oppose gay marriage and abortion, issues that are related to notions of morality or purity.

This bit goes a long way towards explains the existence of Rod Dreher:

Some conservatives think there is inherent wisdom in repugnance, that feeling disgusted about something — gay sex between consenting adults, for example — is cause enough to judge it wrong or immoral, even lacking a concrete reason, Pizarro explains.

This is fucking revelatory. It all makes sense! [more here]

Take that, Albania!

60% of bankruptcies are linked to medical expenses. As a former employee of the medical collections industry, I should add: yep.

Good thing we don't suffer the horrors of socialized medicine.

Karl Rove: we bitchslapped those Muslims!

Turd Blossom:

O’REILLY: Well, all the polls showed in every Muslim country that President Bush’s approval rating was 20 percent. So I mean how can you disagree?

ROVE: You know what? Who cares about whether or not they approve or like the president of the United States? The question is do they respect the policies of the United States government? And you bet they did. Because we showed strength and power and influence.

Let's see. Still taking KIAs in both wars nearly 8 years after 9/11. Taliban running all over Afghanistan and Pakistan. Bin Laden still at large. All at a cost of a few trillion dollars and 4,000+ dead, what -- 40,000 wounded?

Yes, we really showed them, Karl.

Oh. Snap.

This is a beautiful thing. In a just world, Ackerman would have a Times op-ed gig; Ross Douthat would be handing out fliers for Operation Rescue.

Alas.

Wingnuts + Humor = TS Wants to Sylvia Plath Himself.

QED.
Having a guy play Rachel Maddow (ha ha she's a lesbian!) must've seemed hilarious on paper. [via Putz, naturally]

See! He's just like Bush! OMG WERE ALL DEAD.

I have to give credit to Joe Klein for spotting this meme some weeks ago (with extra kudos for using the word 'wingnuts'):

As for Krauthammer, and the assorted wingnuts he is parroting, there's a weird disconnect going on: one paragraph, Obama is simply adopting Bush's policies...the next paragraph, he's running the country off a cliff.

Sure enough, it's all over the place today.

It's Always 9/11 With These Douchebags.

I don't give Bob Owens enough credit. In an impressive feat of wingnuttery, the white-sheeter has managed to tie Obama's speech in Cairo to September 11, 2001.

9/11 was clearly the highlight of Bob's life.

This is Dirty, I Think...

Big Hollywood bit player Andy Klavan asks:

Would I do anything Ann Coulter told me to do? Let me put it this way: if she ever offered me a piece of candy and told me to get into her car, my picture would soon turn up on the side of a milk carton.

Ew?

Tomorrow's Wingnut Freakout, Today!

Madam Secretary, appeaser.

..."Apparently Hillary Clinton is also a secret Muslim. Who knew?"

BIG NEWS!

Conservatives are angry about something! Maybe because it's already June and Obama hasn't started a war.

My New Favorite Wanker.

Meet Erin Manning, or as I like to think of her, "Rod Dreher With a Uterus".

Ms. Manning is filling in for Rod, who is on sabbatical or something -- and so is tragically unable to share in our latest national nightmare called New Hampshire.

If the available evidence is any indication, Rod is only using Ms. Manning to burnish his reputation. Ms. Manning is dumber than a bag of rocks and, comparatively speaking, Rod is Richard Fucking Feynman.

Weak.

I like Ben Smith and am willing to believe his article's central contention, that Richard Wolffe's Obama book is pure puffery and one-sided, but Smith does himself no favors with this as his lead quote:

"Richard Wolffe was doing PR for Barack Obama throughout the campaign,” said Michael Goldfarb, a former aide to John McCain and a writer for the conservative Weekly Standard. “At least now, with the new book and the new job, he's dropped even the pretense of being a journalist."

As someone who is actually in the business, I can honestly say that Michael Goldfarb wouldn't recognize public relations if it fucked him in the ear.

Peak Althouse.

Different venue, but the crazy persists:

I assume the Democratic Party would do very well if the Supreme Court happened to overrule Roe v. Wade.

For some reason, that doesn't surprise me.

Pantload: fuel efficent cars = fascism.

Not much to add.

Kathleen Parker makes a funny.

Heh:

Some Internet commentary even refers to [Scott] Roeder as a "Christian terrorist." Let's see: Christian, pro-gun, anti-government, pro-life. Sounds like a Republican, right? Oh, and he's suspected of being an assassin. Connect them dots.

Ouch.

To Be Read Aloud While Ululating.

Suck it, wingnuts...

Obama spoke Arabic in his first public exchange with King Abdullah, getting in the last word after in a joint appearance each leader briefly spoke to reporters.

"Shukran," Obama said, using the Arabic word for "thank you."

Putz on vacation

As she subs for a vacationing Putz (in the demanding role of posting inane one-liners) I am horrified at the extent to which Megan McArdle's rhetorical skills are indistinguishable from those of one of my undergraduates who slump in the back of the classroom in Ron Paul t-shirts. It does not go too far to conclude that she would be, at best, a fifth-string blogger at RedState (and more likely not a well-read blogger at all) if not for the fact that in the parade of the lame, halt, and ugly that is the right-wing media, the intended audience of doughy, balding white guys considers her fuckable.

It's really quite embarrassing how eager the right-o-sphere is to find shills who serve the dual purpose of telling the mouthbreathers what to think while serving as a cure for what I can only assume is an epidemic of erectile dysfunction among their sweaty ranks.

Fire Tom Friedman.

800 words of real estate, and this is how he starts his column:

During a telephone interview Tuesday with President Obama about his speech to Arabs and Muslims in Cairo on Thursday, I got to tell the president my favorite Middle East joke. It gave him a good laugh. It goes like this:

There is this very pious Jew named Goldberg who always dreamed of winning the lottery. Every Sabbath, he’d go to synagogue and pray: “God, I have been such a pious Jew all my life. What would be so bad if I won the lottery?” But the lottery would come and Goldberg wouldn’t win. Week after week, Goldberg would pray to win the lottery, but the lottery would come and Goldberg wouldn’t win. Finally, one Sabbath, Goldberg wails to the heavens and says: “God, I have been so pious for so long, what do I have to do to win the lottery?”

And the heavens parted and the voice of God came down: “Goldberg, give me a chance! Buy a ticket!”

I told the president that joke because in reading the Arab and Israeli press this week, everyone seemed to be telling him what he needed to do and say in Cairo, but nobody was indicating how they were going to step up and do something different. Everyone wants peace, but nobody wants to buy a ticket.

I think Matt Taibbi's brain just died.