[2003.10.10 - 07:00 P.M.] No Mercy for Rush
And so Rush Limbaugh has decided he needs to take some time off to
clean himself up:
"I am not making any excuses. You know, over the years athletes and celebrities have emerged from treatment centers
to great fanfare and praise for conquering great demons. They are said to be great role models and examples for others. Well, I am no role
model. I refuse to let anyone think I am doing something great here, when there are people you never hear about, who face long odds and
never resort to such escapes. They are the role models. I am no victim and do not portray myself as such. I take full responsibility for my
problem."
That's reassuring. I'm surprised he's not blaming Clinton.
I thought about taking the high road here. But fuck that. Here's some vintage Limbaugh for you:
"There's nothing good about drug use. We know it. It destroys individuals. It destroys families.
Drug use destroys societies. Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country.... And so if people are violating
the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up."
That's kinda funny, huh? Because, um, it appears that Rush is a drug addict. And it appears that he was
obtaining and using prescription drugs illegally.
Rush, Rush, Rush.
For all the lies you've told, for all the good people you've smeared, for all the insane, destructive policies you've
advocated in favor of, and most of all for all your simplistic, insensitive moralizing, this one's from me to you: I hope
you suffer horribly as you kick your addiction. And then I hope they lock you up and throw away the key. Asshole.
[2003.10.09 - 10:00 P.M.] Josh Goes Through The Looking Glass with Condi
Josh Marshall has a great post
today on the Administration's continuing, mind-boggling attempts to paint the Kay report as an
affirmation of the decision to go to war in Iraq. Oh hell, I don't even know why I'm linking to it.
I'm just going to post the whole thing:
They truly know no limits.
Condi Rice says that if the facts revealed in the Kay Report had been known
last winter, the UN Security Council would have backed President Bush in going to war."
The comments are noted in Bill Sammon’s
article today in the Washington Times and the transcript is
here at the White House website.
The full quotation is:
"Had any one of these examples been discovered last winter, the Security
Council would have had no choice but to take exactly the same course that President Bush followed:
to declare Saddam Hussein in defiance of Resolution 1441, and enforce its serious consequences.
Really? Is that how it is?
Every administration fudges, conceals, or deceives in this way or that.
But, at least in my memory, I cannot remember any administration or even any administration
official that so routinely says things that are the polar opposite of reality --- when the
facts to the contrary are sitting right out there in the open.
Set aside all the ridiculous efforts to spin the details of the Kay Report
into some sort of vindication for the White House. The one thing the Report clearly shows is
that Saddam was doing far less on the WMD front than even our staunchest international critics
suggested. Given that they were unwilling to go to war when they thought he had some stocks of
WMD, it’s awfully hard to figure why they would go to war once it confirmed that he had none.
It’s just more up-is-downism. The same ridiculous spin as a year ago.
Note the tone. "Really? Is that how it is?"
Do I sense disbelief? Disappointment? Depression? Maybe I'm projecting here, I don't know.
Even three years into this freakshow, I know I still keep expecting someone in this group to
crack, to break from the message, to tell the truth about something. About
anything. But they just plug along, robotically repeating the same spin points. In a sick
sort of way, it's actually a bit awe-inspiring.
[2003.10.07 - 11:00 P.M.] There Were No WMD's, 'Kay?
My favorite author, Robert Anton Wilson, says
in his book Prometheus Rising that the human mind can be modeled as having two
parts: The Thinker and The Prover. The idea is that The Thinker can think any damn thing it wants, no
matter how absurd, and The Prover will do whatever is necessary to tailor any available evidence so that
it "proves" that thought correct.
I can think of no more striking example of this phenomenon in action than the Bush administration's reaction
to the Kay report.
Much anticipated over the Summer as the report that would shut up all the whining war critics by
demonstrating that Saddam really was a one-man Legion of Doom, the Kay report is out. And guess
what? Turns out Saddam wasn't a threat at all. Nope. No giant stockpiles of WMD's. Not even any
respectable excuse for the WMD "programs" that the Bushies have tried to bait and switch us with.
Do you know what those evil bastards had, though? They had intent, dammit.
Here's David Kay
himself talking with Jim Lehrer:
JIM LEHRER: "At this point, where does the preponderance of the evidence lean?
Does it lean toward the fact there are still some -- there are some weapons out there and you haven't
found them yet, or that they don't exist?"
DAVID KAY: "What we have found is a substantial body of evidence that reports
that the Iraqis had an intention to continue weapons production at some point in the future. We've also
found undeclared activities in the chemical and biological and missile area that were never declared to
the U.N. and not discovered during inspections."
So there it is. The Smoking Gun. The Iraqis had the intention to continue weapons production.
That must have been what Bush meant when he said:
"Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime
continues to intend to eventually perhaps build some of the most lethal weapons ever devised."
Dick Cheney clearly pointed out this imminent danger when he said:
"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has a fervent desire to
possess weapons of mass destruction.
And surely that's what Rumsfeld was referring to when he said:
"We know where the Iraqis intend to have these weapons. They intend to build them
in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat. That's where they intend
to start the programs to develop WMD's someday."
Anyhow, I digress. For a devastating look at the Kay report, I recommend Fred Kaplan's
article on Slate.
The bottom line is this: Iraq had jack shit. And, in fact, the reason they had this jack shit
(which was rumored to be in the area around Tikrit) was because the policy of containment implemented after Gulf War
I worked. As Kaplan states:
"Saddam wanted and, in some cases, tried to resurrect the weapons
programs that he had built in the 1980s, but .. the United Nations sanctions and inspections prevented
him from doing so."
So the evidence is in. Saddam had nothing. Containment worked. Surely the Bushies must
now admit that they were wrong to go to war, right?
Colin Powell doesn't think so:
"Powell said the administration was 'even more convinced with the Kay report that we
did the right thing.'"
Neither does Bush:
"[Bush] said that the preliminary findings of active research projects in Iraq and efforts to
obtain missiles proved that 'Saddam Hussein was a danger to the world.'"
Whatever the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves.
Indeed.
[2003.10.07 - 09:50 P.M.] Estate Taxes. Concentration Camps. Same Thing, Really...
Grover Norquist is insane. And I don't mean that in the over-the-top rhetorical sense. I mean it in
the clinical sense. No, I'm not a practicing psychiatrist, but I know that "insanity" has a lot to do with
the convergence - or divergence - of an individual's perceptions of reality with reality itself (insofar
as it is accessible to us).
The other night I'm driving to the bank to get money to do laundry, and I flip on NPR. The local
affiliate is running Fresh Air with Terry Gross. That night's guest was none other than
Norquist, and,
as usual, he was pontificating in his hushed, can't-you-hear-how-sincere-and-reasonable-I-am voice
about the injustice of our tax system. At the particular moment I tuned in, he was riffing on the
Estate Tax. Here's what he said:
“The argument that some who play to the politics of hate and envy and class division will say is
‘well, that’s only 2% or 5% in the near future of Americans likely to have to pay that tax.’ That’s the
morality of the Holocaust.”
As Norquist's brain/mouth complex began to regurgitate its next blob of anti-tax spewl, Terry
broke in:
"Wait a minute - wait a minute.. Did you just compare the Estate Tax to the Holocaust?"
It's no wonder she was confused. I mean, I'm no history buff, but I thought the Holocaust was about
millions of people being rounded up on the basis of their religious and ethnic affiliation and systematically
massacred whereas the Estate Tax was about a small percentage of extremely successful Americans
- each worth at least a few mil - having to pay a tax on the transfer of their wealth to their heirs after they
die. Silly me! Thank goodness Grover Norquist came along to draw the obvious moral equivalence between
the two that my addled liberal brain completely missed.
Seriously, I don't get it. Never have. I don't understand how someone can be so wrapped up in the
accumulation of property and wealth that -- even though they might have 100 times what they need to live
a normal, happy, healthy, life -- they can be driven past the edge of reason by the notion that someone,
somewhere, might wish to take some of it away. I guess that's why I'm not a Republican. (Well, one reason
among many.)
I know the Estate Tax debate is more complex than this, folks. Personally, I think it's a good brake on the
natural tendency of economic family dynasties to build over time. It's a tax that's founded in the best of our
democratic ideals. But that argument isn't the point. The point is that you could substitute just about any
tax for this one and Norquist and his ilk would get just as lathered up about it. It's all about someone else taking
their gold coins. If that's what they live for, I pity them.
[2003.10.06 - 09:40 P.M.] GOP Backs Sensible Medicare Reform. What Are They Up To?
The New York Times this morning
reports that Republicans are close to passing a Medicare reform initiative that actually makes
a great deal of sense:
"With unexpected support from some Democrats, Republican negotiators from the
House and the Senate say they are seriously considering a change in Medicare that would require
elderly people with high incomes to pay higher premiums than other beneficiaries."
"Republicans like Senator Don Nickles of Oklahoma say such a requirement is a
sensible, progressive way to slow the growth of federal Medicare spending. The Senate majority
leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee, said the Medicare negotiators had "a mandate" to charge affluent
people somewhat more."
"In the past, Democrats have vehemently opposed the idea. But some of the
social policy experts most respected by liberal Democrats now say they are receptive to it, as
a way to avert cuts in Medicare and other domestic programs. Pressure for such cuts will increase,
they say, as budget deficits grow and baby boomers cash in their claims to Medicare and Social
Security."
Far be it from me to be skeptical of the Greedy Old Party, but what gives? Are we to believe
that the Republicans have seen the light? That they suddenly understand the inherent fairness
of having the wealthy pay a higher premium for certain government services? And if so, when can
we expect Frist and company to begin the drive to repeal the Bush tax cuts?
No, I don't think so. I smell something nasty in the works here, and I think Teddy
smells it too:
"..Some liberal Democrats, including Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts,
say levying an extra charge on affluent beneficiaries would undermine the universal nature of
Medicare. Such a change, they say, would be a dangerous first step in turning Medicare from a
universal social insurance program into a welfare program."
See what they're up to? Make the rich pay more in the short term, and then, a few years down
the road, the next crop of angry, anti-govmint GOP crusaders can target the entire program as an
unnecessary sop to the poor. Think I'm paranoid? Wait and see. You can't be paranoid enough
with these bastards.
[2003.10.03 - 06:00 P.M.] Don't Let The Door Hit Your Ass On The Way Out, Rush
And so, just like that, he walked out of our lives forever.... Yeah, right. We should be so lucky.
The Rush-Limbaugh-as-Football-Analyst experiment is over in Bristol, Connecticut. Gotta say, I'm surprised. If the bookies
had given an over/under on how many weeks Rush would last, I would've probably bet the over. Hell, I figured he'd at least last
one season and then, if things hadn't gone so well, he and ESPN would come up with some more graceful way to part.
But Rush, who claims doing football commentary was a lifelong dream, couldn't help but take a shit all over his newfound
gig. Like the scorpion in the parable, it was just his nature.
Let's deal with Rush's quote from a football perspective first:
"I think what we've had here is a little social concern in the NFL. The media has been very desirous
that a black quarterback do well. There is a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance
of this team that he didn't deserve. The defense carried this team."
As an accomplished fantasy football coach, I can tell you that's bullshit. First off, defense, contrary to popular myth,
does not win football games. Defense puts teams in position to win football games, but last time I checked, you
need to put points on the board to actually win the game. McNabb, a three-time Pro-Bowler, has been a one-man offense
for at least two seasons now. With a terrible running game -- Duce Staley has been a pale shell of his former self for years -- and
a cadre of starting receivers who would be on the practice squad on most teams, McNabb has managed to put way more points
on the board than the Eagles had any business scoring. He didn't do it as a classic drop-back QB. He did it by scrambling, rushing,
and improvising, because he had to. It wasn't always a pretty game to watch, sure, but he took that team to two consecutive
AFC Championships. Unfortunately for the purposes of this debate, his success doesn't show up in his QB rating or completion stats.
Nonetheless, saying he got credit he didn't deserve is a ridiculous slap in the face. Considering the supporting cast, you can't give
this guy enough credit for doing what he did.
OK, now that that's out of the way, we can get to the core of all this: Was Rush's comment racist?
No, it wasn't.
Rush's comment was racially biased. Rush is a racist.
Allow me to explain. To me, "racial bias" is when a person makes a broad judgement based on race. This does not have to
be a negative judgement. If you think most Asian-Americans are smart, that's racial-bias. If you think most Hispanics have terrible
taste in music, that's racial bias. In both cases, you are substituting your judgement about a racial group as a whole for actual
empirical data about the members of that race.
Racism is the employment of racial bias with malevolent intent. Again, I realize these are my definitions, but hang
with me here. If I'm the chief of police, and I think Hispanics have horrid taste in music, and I therefore instruct my officers to crack
down on noise violations in Hispanic neighborhoods, that is an example of turning racial bias into racism.
You see, if Steve Young had said the exact same thing Rush did, I would just think he was making an unfortunate racially-biased judgement
about the media's treatment of black quarterbacks. I would think "Hey, Steve Young thinks that a.) Black QB's haven't historically
been very good, and b.) Maybe that's some sort of social failing on our part and so, c.) Perhaps the media really does overstate
a guy like Donovan's skills because they want him to do well." Now, I don't agree with (a) or (c), and (b) is a big can of worms to
open, but I'd give Steve the benefit of the doubt if he raised the issue.
Not Rush.
Not Rush "Take that bone out of your nose" Limbaugh.
Not Rush "The NAACP should buy a liquor store and practice robberies" Limbaugh.
Rush Limbaugh is a racist. And there is no doubt in my mind that what Limbaugh was trying to communicate in that
quote was "See, my ditto-head friends? Even in sports those blacks are the unfair beneficiaries of affirmative action, bestowed
upon them by the librul media." Limbaugh had malicious intent when he made that comment, and he deserved to lose his job
for it.
That brings me to my current dilemma. Personally, I never watched the show. I vowed not to, and I stuck by my guns.
When I first heard Rush was gone I thought "Great! I can start watching pre-game at 11:00 A.M. again instead of having to wait
until noon!"
Well, upon further review...
ESPN hired this goon knowing full well who he was. They had access to every
word he had ever said on the radio, in print, or on T.V. They knew what a vile piece of human filth he was, but they
hired him anyhow just to boost their ratings.
This is a network I'm going to go out of my way to patronize? I think not.
It's a damned shame too. ESPN was a great network. Innovative, original producers of cutting-edge programming. They
filled a void. Kind of like CNN did when they first came out. But, just like CNN, they had to reach out for that right-wing dollar.
As BartCop has said so many times over the years, the Dittohead dollar is the
easiest money to earn in show business. I don't blame ESPN for wanting to boost their ratings and make a buck. But there
have to be limits, and hiring a slimeball like Limbaugh -- for a sports show of all things -- was over the line.
At some point, I'll probably drift back into watching Countdown. Hell, I'm a junkie, it's almost inevitable. But I'm not
going to go easily. I'd like an apology. I'd like it if someone at ESPN would admit that, even putting Rush's controversial
quote aside, hiring him was a bad idea. It polluted the sports discourse, and it told ESPN's liberal and moderate viewers that
their place at the table wasn't all that important.
That's an apology I won't hold my breath waiting for.
[2003.10.01 - 07:58 P.M.] Joe C. Administers Severe Beating to David Brooks
Both the press and the blogosphere have been absolutely abuzz with reaction to David Brooks' stupidly indefensible and
disingenuous op-ed in the Times yesterday. (Here's my take.)
For sheer brutality, however -- for clear use of overwhelming force -- in short for a shocking and aweing beat-down, you
need to check out Conason's response:
Now that liberals are finally pushing back on the playground, the Bush bullies are running to tell the teacher.
(nice sub-head, don't you think?)
"Brooks is concerned that several left-leaning books, none of which he seems to have read, are appearing on bestseller lists.
To him, a single confessional article in the New Republic suggests that everyone on the left simply despises the president for
reasons that have nothing to do with dishonesty, incompetence and horrific policy. He frets that 'the hatreds have left the
animating ideas far behind and now romp about on their own.' He detects in the haters a 'threat to democracy.'"
"His handwringing is hokum. After a decade of continuous Clinton-bashing, much of which appeared
in a magazine he edited, has Brooks just now noticed the substitution of vitriol for debate? Has he just awakened, like
some right-wing Rip van Winkle? Has he failed to notice the tactics used by the Bush administration, that repository of
honor and integrity, against critics like Joe Wilson?"
"No. More likely, what troubles Brooks is that liberals are finally answering his movement's attacks
on their patriotism, character, morality and honor. It doesn't seem to have occurred to him that sooner or later, unrelenting
viciousness would provoke an angry response."
You tell 'em, Joe!
"Brooks realizes that his moaning about the quality of American politics may strike the rest of us as
rather belated: 'I did say some of these things during the Clinton years, when it was conservatives bashing a Democrat,
but not loudly enough, which I regret because the weeds that were once on the edge of public life now threaten to choke
off the whole thing.'"
"That melodramatic warning is a happy omen. If conservatives are suddenly worried about civility,
perhaps they will begin to act civilly. A truer threat to democracy was the lopsided national discourse that conservatives
have so loudly and rudely dominated in recent years. That's over, and good riddance."
[2003.10.01 - 07:03 P.M.] Wesley Clark Is A Liar!
I was reading through Josh Marshall's raw and engrossing
interview with Wesley Clark when, suddenly, I was stopped dead in my tracks by this exchange:
TPM: "As we mentioned before, in different capacities you worked for a number of different administrations...
You've seen these different presidents conduct foreign policy. What are your opinions of the different ones?"
CLARK: "Well, you know, nobody gets to be president of the United States without conspicuous strengths."
LIAR! I cannot believe he went on the record with that statement. Surely Clark knows that the current resident
of the Oval Office was a 'C' student at Andover and then again at Yale, that he is a thrice-failed businessman, and that he
has the intellectual curiosity of a turnip. Conspicuous strengths? Hell, Bush isn't even a good liar, though it certainly
isn't for lack of practice.
OK, I am, of course, kidding.
About Clark being a liar. Not the other part.
As I said in my previous post on Clark, I'm extremely
impressed with his skills as a communicator. To my ear, he has a way of addressing issues that is inclusive rather than
adversarial, and yet - unlike Clinton, for instance - this doesn't blunt the critical impact of what he's saying. Here's a
representative exchange:
TPM: "There are all sorts of critiques about the present administration's domestic policies. What's the
central one? What's the central problem, the central flaw in this administration's domestic policy?"
CLARK: "There's an underlying ideological drive that overrides pragmatism. The American people want
government to fix the things they can't fix themselves. The American people are basically individualists. They like each
other; they're very charitable and generous; they're bound together in a hundred different ways -- they're not a big-government
country. They're not socialists. But they recognize there are things they can't fix, like healthcare, or education--public education."
"And this administration comes in with an ideology that blocks its ability to see, articulate, and resolve
those problems. It's an ideology that's a sharpened sort of right-wing Republican party ideology. It has no real intellectual
base to it. It's just the ideology of a party. By intellectual base, I'm talking first, trickle-down economics. No reputable economist
stands up and says, "Trickle down economics really works." Because we know the marginal propensity to consume of people
who are making $100,000 a year and less is much higher than the marginal propensity to consume of people who are making
$350,000 a year and more."
"So therefore when you say you're going to give money to the rich so they'll make jobs for the poor -- that's
not a very efficient way of producing jobs in the American economy. We know that, all things being equal, that the lower the tax
rate at the margin, the greater the incentive to earn the extra dollar. But we also know -- it's just human nature to figure that out --
that in a society where you've got a lot of people that are struggling to pay the electricity bill and the telephone bill and you've got
a few people who don't care what the electricity and telephone bill is, that the few people who don't care about these things
ought to pay a higher proportion of their income to help the rest of the country than the people who are struggling with the
necessities in life."
Clearly, Clark gets kitchen-table economic issues. Read that last paragraph again. That's a cogent defense of the
progressive taxation system, but it's phrased in a way that makes it sound like the pure common sense that it is instead of the
dirty communist scheme the Right wants us to think it is.
Marshall takes Clark through foreign policy, Iraq, taxes, school privatization, even WilsonGate. If you have the time,
definitely read this interview front to back. (And speaking of WilsonGate, while you're there be sure to check out
this transcript of today's press meeting
with WH spokesman Scott McClellan. I bet he's thinking 'career change' right about now...)
