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Were You Aware Of It?

Apparently all Protestants are rich white guys.

Who knew?

Add comment March 11th, 2010 at 09:54pm Posted by Eli

Epic Analogy Fail

So Tucker Carlson’s conservative answer to the Huffington Post kicked off today, because if there’s the net doesn’t have enough of, it’s aggregations of right-wing wankers.  Exhibit A:

Legalized rape. What’s that you say? Rape isn’t sanctioned in this country? Then you must not live in a city with red-light or speed cameras, where it happens every day. Forget for a second that in one-fourth of all automated ticket cases, the ticketed  car owner wasn’t the one actually driving the vehicle at the time of the infraction (what other crime-fighting technology do we consider reliable that nabs the wrong person 25 percent of the time?) Just as heinous is that every year, more and more municipal governments pretend that they plant these all-seeing menaces in the interest of “safety.” Yet every year, their revenues tend to  increase from the very same technology. Meaning that the only deterrent effect the technology has is deterring your government from being honest about raping its own citizenry. If you’re going to slide me a roofie, Government, at least take me to dinner and a movie first.

Of course, this is both ridiculous and offensive.  Automated ticketing is nothing at all like rape – it’s more like the Holocaust.

Also, isn’t the GOP supposed to be the Law And Order “civil rights and due process are for pussies” party, or does that only apply to offenses committed by minorities and poor people?  Maybe these automated ticketing systems simply need to use some kind of cross-reference database so that they don’t send any tickets to rich white people, who were probably in a very legitimate hurry to do important rich white people things.  Or drunk.

Add comment January 11th, 2010 at 06:43pm Posted by Eli

It’s Not Just Hyperbole

Republicans really are woman-hating pro-corporate evil sons of bitches:

Here is freshman Minnesota senator Al Franken’s first-ever legislative action, a relatively simple, almost laughably surefire bill requiring the Pentagon no longer do business with any contractor — hi, Halliburton! — that requires its employees to agree that she cannot sue said contractor if she is, oh let’s just say, gang raped by its employees.

You read that right. It’s a can’t-sue-us-if-you’re-raped clause. In a U.S. government contract. Aimed squarely at Halliburton. Thanks, Dick Cheney!

(…)

The most repellant part is the 30 U.S. senators — Republicans each and every one — who just stepped forth to vote against the Franken amendment, essentially saying no, women should have no right to sue if they are sexually abused or gang raped, Halliburton and its ilk must be protected at all costs, and by the way we hereby welcome Satan into our rancid souls forevermore. God bless America.

Let us repeat, for clarity. Franken’s amendment passed with a vote of 68-30. Meaning 30 U.S. senators voted against the elimination of the rape/sue clause. Meghan McCain, call your dad. He’s one of them.

(…)

[P]erhaps all we can do is ponder how pathetic and sad these various senator’s lives must be, how these bitter old men will now go home at night and announce around the dinner table that, yes, today they worked very hard to help improve the welfare of the nation by essentially enabling rape and sexual abuse, tried their darndest to prevent women who’ve been viciously attacked from having much legal recourse. And lo, Satan will chuckle happily.

Then maybe these senators will try and hug their wives, or their daughters. And maybe, if there’s any justice in the universe, their wives and daughters will slap them as hard as humanly possible, lock them in a shipping container, and never let them touch them again.

P.S.; Would you like a complete list of these 30 senators’ names? Right here.

Why look, there’s grandpa McCain. There’s disgraced man-child John Ensign. Hooker-lovin’ David Vitter. Saxby Chambliss. Inhofe. It’s a veritable welfare-state who’s who of Dick Cheney’s sanctum of oily fluffers, and many more who would love to be. Shall we write a nice letter to them? Or maybe their wives and daughters?

Pure evil, I say.  And the Democrats are idiots if they don’t make an issue of it next fall.

Add comment October 16th, 2009 at 07:22am Posted by Eli

Great Moments In American History

It’s a shame, but these things happen.

(From Married To The Sea)

Add comment October 8th, 2009 at 11:16am Posted by Eli

The Crazy Goes Up To 11!

Wow, this sounds like an awful lot of batshit in one building at the same time:

Conservatives gathered at a Hilton hotel in St. Louis over the weekend for the “How to Take Back America Conference,” a Phyllis Schlafly-hosted gathering where the faithful gathered to discuss issues such as “How To Counter The Homosexual Extremist Movement,” “How To Stop Socialism In Health Care” and “How To Recognize Living Under Nazis & Communists.”

Among the prominent speakers who traveled to St. Louis for the conference were former Arkansas Gov. and GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, Republican Reps. Tom McClintock, Tom Price, Steve King and Michele Bachmann, and “Joe the Plumber,” aka Samuel Wurzelbacher.

(…)

Schlafly went on to suggest that Americans are “waking up” and that they don’t want “our country to be run by czars,” which she called “a Russian idea.” She said of her organization, Eagle Forum, “fighting feminists is still our main object,” arguing that feminism is “the most destructive force in the world.

(I sure hope the agenda features a debate between Schlafly and Jerry Boykin, who said that “there is no greater threat to America than Islam”…)

On the conference’s Web site, there is only one section available under the “listen & take action” tab: “HOMOSEXUAL EXTREMIST MOVEMENT.” There, Liberty University School of Law Associate Dean Matt Barber writes that “the sin of homosexuality is the bunker-buster bomb in this war against morality.”

“The very firm response by defenders of Biblical truth to the homosexual lobby’s relentless assault on our nation’s Judeo-Christian tradition is indeed a defensive reaction, not an act of aggression,” he says. “The sheer mechanics of homosexual conduct very naturally elicits revulsion in most rational folk. Therefore, most of us would prefer not to even imagine it, much less struggle to defend against its wholesale promotion. But regrettably, our hand has been forced.”

Oh, and Mike Huckabee wants to jackhammer away the part of Manhattan with the UN on it and float it out to sea.

It never ceases to amaze and terrify me that there are millions of people who take these backward freaks seriously.  Has America always had this many crazy/stupid people, or did the GOP somehow perfect the science of wacko husbandry?

(h/t WT)

2 comments September 28th, 2009 at 08:56pm Posted by Eli

Wankers Of The Day

ABC News:

Three ABC reporters combined to produce a 188-word post – 63 words per reporter — for Jake Tapper’s blog, speculating that Malia Obama “may have inherited her mother’s taste in sometimes expensive clothes.” No, I won’t provide a link.

Fitting that they would use creepy misogynist asshole Jake Tapper’s blog to pick on an eleven-year-old girl.

(h/t WT)

Add comment July 7th, 2009 at 06:55am Posted by Eli

Sara Robinson Wants The Right-Wing To Declare Themselves

She appears to be a teensy bit irritated with their nudge-nudge-wink-wink game of inciting hatred and then indignantly denying all responsibility when that hatred turns into violence.

Dear Conservatives:

Your fellow Americans demand an answer — and we want it now. Just one simple question:

Are you deliberately trying to start a civil war?

Just answer the question. Yes or no. Don’t insult us with elisions, evasions, dithering, qualifications, or conditional answers. We need to know what your intentions are — and we need to know NOW. People are being shot dead in the streets of America at the rate of several per month now. You may not want responsibility for this — but the whackadoodles pulling the triggers make no bones about who put them up to this.

You did.

(…)

If your answer is yes, then stop this cowardly half-assed screwing around. You speak the language of war and honor; but the honor code of the warriors you pretend to revere demands that you declare your intentions. If you really believe that the only way to get the America you want is to negate a fair election, shred the Constitution, and violently cleanse the country of everyone who doesn’t agree with you, then man up and get on with it. If it’s a shooting war you want, do not doubt that there are plenty of progressives who will oblige you. If this goal is so important that you’re really willing to kill for it, please don’t forget that you will also need to be willing to die for it. Because, like martyrs Greg McKendry and Steven Johns proved, we are willing to do whatever is necessary to stop you.

If your answer is no, then you have just one other choice. Knock off the tantrums, grow up, rebuild your party, come back to the table, and sit down and govern with us. (We know this will be a stretch, but we think some of you are capable of it.) You will need to learn, many of you for the first time, to get your way as adults do — without fear-based politics, polarizing rhetoric, on-air threats against those who disagree with you, and repeating outrageous lies in the face of stone facts and irrefutable evidence.

And most of all: you need to stop feeding the crazies. You need to disavow them in every way possible — sincerely, emphatically, and with full awareness that every time one of these people acts, it destroys the credibility of “conservatives,” “Republicans,” and “the right wing” in the eyes of the country. You cannot assassinate your way back to power. And don’t doubt for a moment that the majority of Americans — even those who agree with your ideas — will abandon your cause forever once it realizes that’s what you’re trying to do.

Since you’re the ones funding the violent radicals on your flank, you need to stop sending them money. Since you know far more about their activities than any one else, you need to be the ones who turn them in. Since you’re the ones who make heroes and martyrs out of them, you need to be the ones who call them out as criminals. Until you do this — consistently, wholeheartedly, and responsibly — we can only conclude that these assassins are operating with your support and approval, and that you are intentionally trying to start an armed revolution in America.

There’s a lot more great stuff in the middle, so read the whole thing.  It’s very hard to believe the right wing’s protestations of innocence when they do so little to dampen or repudiate the crazies.

Add comment June 12th, 2009 at 09:13pm Posted by Eli

Jonah Goldberg’s Perfect Candidate

Must be charismatic and self-loathing.

No freaks.

(h/t BT)

Add comment May 8th, 2009 at 10:11pm Posted by Eli

Wait… What?

Did Pat Buchanan just get on Chris Matthews for bigotry?

PAT BUCHANAN???

Add comment April 30th, 2009 at 06:55am Posted by Eli

Sarah Pallin’ Around With Bigots

If she didn’t before, Sarah Palin now officially scares the bejesus out of me:

In March, Palin nominated Wayne Anthony Ross for attorney general. Ross, a colorful far-right lawyer and longtime Palin ally who sports his initials, W.A.R., on his Hummer’s vanity plates….

Palin’s hopes for a swift confirmation process were dashed April 10 when Leah Burton, a veteran lobbyist on children’s issues and domestic violence, submitted a letter to the Alaska State Judiciary Committee claiming that Ross publicly defended spousal rape. According to Burton, who detailed the allegations for me, Ross allegedly declared during a speech before a 1991 gathering of the “father’s rights” group Dads Against Discrimination, “If a guy can’t rape his wife, who’s he gonna rape?”….

Burton said Ross’s statement was consistent with his overarching attitude toward women’s issues. She claimed that he once said during a debate on the Equal Rights Amendment, “If a woman would keep her mouth shut, there wouldn’t be an issue with domestic violence.”….

Since Burton’s testimony, her father, former Alaska Public Safety Commissioner Richard Burton, wrote a letter of his own demanding to Ross that he withdraw his nomination. “You sir, speak and act like the kind of bully I met many times when responding to domestic-violence calls, some of the most dangerous situations police officers are often in,” Burton wrote. Ross reacted with characteristic fury to the Burtons’ broadsides, barking to reporters that if “anybody said that to me, we’d have a little confrontation because that’s a bunch of crap.”….

(I particularly like how Ross’s response to being called a bully is to threaten to beat the guy up)

But as pro-Palin forces attempted to push back against Ross’s critics, dozens of op-eds Ross authored during the 1980s and 1990s surfaced as key exhibits in the case against his confirmation. Among them is a 1993 piece entitled, “KKK ‘art’ project gets ‘A’ for courage,” in which Ross cheered on a local college student who had offended an African-American classmate by creating a statue of a Klansman with a cross in one hand and a flag in the other. “It might have been fun to see [the African-American student] try to remove the display,” Ross wrote. “Then she could have been arrested and her future as a student of the university could have been resolved through the university disciplinary proceedings.”

(…)

A glance at Ross’s published archive shows he never limited his resentment to minorities. He taunted environmentalists (“It is time we quit crying over the oil spill” was the title of an editorial he wrote in the wake of the Exxon Valdez disaster); he denounced homosexuals as “degenerates” during a 1993 legal fight over a local gay-rights ordinance; and announced that his final wish before dying was to overturn Roe v. Wade. While rising through the ranks of the NRA’s national leadership in the 1980s, Ross published a piece in the mercenary magazine Soldier of Fortune, defending the right to form antigovernment militias.

(…)

….The tribes were especially disturbed by his vow during a 2002 gubernatorial debate to “hire a band of junkyard dog” attorneys to gut federal laws guaranteeing natives subsistence preferences….

I believe the phrase “piece of work” was invented for this guy.  Sexism, racism, homophobia, he hits the whole toxic trifecta.  With a little crazy separatist militia-man thrown in for good measure.  Which makes him Sarah Palin’s kind of people.

If she ever becomes president, she will make Dubya look like FDR.

Add comment April 13th, 2009 at 07:25pm Posted by Eli

Great Moments In Out-Of-Control Prudery

This is completely nuts:

My friends at the ACLU of Pennsylvania have filed a Complaint (PDF):

Plaintiffs in this civil rights action are three teenage girls and their parents. The Defendant, Wyoming County District Attorney George Skumanick, has threatened to prosecute the three girls for child pornography for their roles in the creation of two digital photographs unless the parents agree to place the girls on probation and send them to a five-week, ten-hour re-education program wherein the girls must discuss why their conduct was wrong and what it means to be a girl. One photo shows Marissa and Grace, from the waist up, lying side by side in their bras, with one talking on a telephone and the other making a peace sign. The other photo shows Nancy Doe standing upright, just emerged from the shower, with a white towel wrapped tightly around her body just below the breasts. The two photographs, which depict no sexual activity or display of pubic area, are not illegal under Pennsylvania’s crimes code and, indeed, are images protected by the First Amendment.

Skumanick nevertheless persists in threatening to prosecute the girls because he has deemed the photos “provocative.” Since there is no basis to prosecute the girls for posing in photographs that plainly are not child pornography, in terms of content or production, Skumanick’s threat to prosecute the girls must be considered retaliation against the plaintiffs for asserting their constitutional rights – the parents’ right to direct their children’s upbringing and the girls’ rights both to free expression and against compelled speech – in refusing Skumanick’s demands. Accordingly, plaintiffs seek declaratory and injunctive relief to enjoin Skumanick from bringing the retaliatory criminal charges against plaintiffs based on their refusal to accede to his demand that they submit to probation and participate in the re-education program.

It appears that the only grounds for calling the photos “provocative” is Skumanick’s say-so:

One parent stood up during the meeting and asked how Skumanick could be prosecuting his daughter because, according to him, she was in the photograph wearing a bathing suit. Skumanick told the assembled crowd that she was posed “provocatively,” which made her subject to a child pornography charge.

In response to Skumanick’s comment, Marissa’s father stood up and asked who was deciding what was provocative. Skumanick replied that he was not going to argue and that he could charge all of the minors there that night but was instead offering them a plea deal. Skumanick also told Mr. Miller that, “these are the rules if you don’t like them, too bad.”

Awesome.  If I’m reading the description of the Nancy Doe photo correctly, I can see where that’s a little borderline, but calling a photo with zero nudity or sexual activity “child pornography”?  And using that to threaten 13-year-old girls with prosecution?  That’s insane.

This guy sounds like an unhinged misogynistic crusader who’s about two drinks away from screaming that teenage girls are dirty little whores who tempt the righteous into sin.

Add comment March 26th, 2009 at 09:36pm Posted by Eli

How Bill O’Reilly Stands Up For Rape Victims

…By harassing bloggers who repeat terrible, hurtful things… that Bill O’Reilly said about them:

On March 1, ThinkProgress picked up on a story by News Hounds, which noted that Fox News host Bill O’Reilly — who has made controversial comments about rape victims in the past — was slated to speak at a March 19 fundraiser for the Alexa Foundation. The group is committed to supporting rape survivors.

Our post — which never criticized the Alexa Foundation — highlighted the fact that in the past, O’Reilly has implied that women who dress in a certain way or consume too much alcohol should perhaps expect to be raped. Here is what he said on his radio show on Aug. 2 about Jennifer Moore, an 18-year-old woman who was raped and murdered:

Now Moore, Jennifer Moore, 18, on her way to college. She was 5-foot-2, 105 pounds, wearing a miniskirt and a halter top with a bare midriff. Now, again, there you go. So every predator in the world is gonna pick that up at two in the morning. She’s walking by herself on the West Side Highway, and she gets picked up by a thug. All right. Now she’s out of her mind, drunk.

(…)

This weekend, while on vacation, I was ambushed by O’Reilly’s top hit man, producer Jesse Watters, who accosted me on the street and told me that because I highlighted O’Reilly’s comments, I was causing “pain and suffering” to rape victims and their families. He of course offered no proof to back up this claim, instead choosing to shout questions at me.

All those rape victims were just starting to put their lives back together, mercifully unaware of what BillO said about them, until those horrible woman-hating women at Think Progress blew the whistle.  Such compassion BillO has, that he feels their pain so acutely that he has to send his goons out to attack more women!

That is some seriously ballsy spin, right up there with when the administration claimed it was suppressing the second wave of Abu Ghraib photos to protect the torture victims from embarrassment.

And that’s without even delving into the fact that Watters and his cameraman actually staked out Amanda Terkel’s house and followed her car for two hours before ambushing her and her friend.  No, that’s not creepy or stalkerish at all.  And also not at all in complete violation of O’Reilly’s own policies, which are worth less than the airwaves they’re insincerely bloviated on.

2 comments March 23rd, 2009 at 07:37pm Posted by Eli

Radioenfreude

This is the best news I’ve seen all month. Right-wing hate radio victimized by its own success… at getting incompetent Republican clowns elected.

It would have been even sweeter if Spocko had been the one who took them down, but I’ll take it. These are some seriously vile, horrible people, and the public airwaves are much better off without them.

Add comment March 16th, 2009 at 07:24pm Posted by Eli

Cringemaking Quote Of The Day

From the founder of the perhaps-too-revealingly-named Hooters-like “breastaurant” Bone Daddy:

The girls that work here are drop-dead gorgeous and as friendly as you want them to be.  If I had a 19-year-old daughter … this is the only placed I’d want her to work, because I know how committed we are to creating a great environment to work in.

Sounds like it’s a good thing this guy doesn’t have a 19-year-old daughter.  Eww.

(h/t WT)

Add comment March 5th, 2009 at 07:06pm Posted by Eli

Is America Post-Sexist, Too?

If so, can someone let Jake Tapper know?  Here’s a few eyebrow-raising tidbits from Howie Kurtz’s profile on how awesome he is:

Tapper also became a cartoonist for the student paper, drawing such characters as a woman who rips out a man’s heart while breaking up with him.

(…)

He spent three years as a publicist for the firm Powell Tate, flacking for such clients as Hooters. Tapper also freelanced for The Washington Post, holding forth on such topics as “Stairmaster butt” and how caller ID “has single-handedly changed the rules of romance.”

In 1998, while working for the group Handgun Control, Tapper was pondering an offer from Washington City Paper when the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke. This was of more than passing interest to Tapper, who weeks earlier had gone on a date with the suddenly notorious White House intern. He turned that brief encounter into a cover story — and a job — at City Paper.

(…)

“To be brutally honest, I got with her because I figured that behind her initial aggressiveness lurked an easy, perhaps winning, bit of no-frills hookup,” he wrote….

(…)

Tapper, who festoons his Facebook page with baby pictures, says his network career has had a “horrible” impact on his family life. “I wouldn’t be able to be here,” he says, “if it weren’t for Jen and her complete understanding of this job and my drive.”

It all kind of adds up to a creepy, women-should-be-subservient-to-my-needs vibe (and this is from a profile that’s supposed to be flattering).  Which is a bit of a shock, since Tapper is so totally never a hackish wanker at all, nope.

Add comment March 2nd, 2009 at 11:29am Posted by Eli

Colorado’s Hate Senators

Colorado, Land Of James Dobson, has some truly warped and hateful Republican state senators.  In just two days, we had Scott Renfroe comparing homosexuality to murder:

A prominent national gay rights organization on Tuesday blasted Colorado state Sen. Scott Renfroe for comparing homosexuality to murder when he spoke Monday against a bill that would extend health benefits to same-sex domestic partners of state employees.

After quoting Scripture to call homosexual behavior a “detestable act,” the Greeley Republican said it would be “an abomination according to Scripture” for the Legislature to “(take) sins and (make) them to be legally OK.”

He continued: “I’m not saying (homosexuality) is the only sin that is out there. Obviously we have sin — we have murder, we have, we have all sorts of sin, we have adultery, and we don’t make laws making those legal, and we would never think to make murder legal.”

…And state senator Dave Schultheis opposing HIV testing for pregnant mothers because it “rewards promiscuity”:

Democrats were outraged Wednesday morning when Republican state Sen. Dave Schultheis said he planned to vote against a bill to require HIV tests for pregnant women because the disease “stems from sexual promiscuity” and he didn’t think the Legislature should “remove the negative consequences that take place from poor behavior and unacceptable behavior.” The Colorado Springs lawmaker then proceeded to cast the lone vote against SB 179, which passed 32-1 and moves on to the House.

He then issued a “clarification”:

The Colorado Springs Republican with a penchant for foot-in-mouth moments tells The Rocky Mountain News in a follow-up story to Wednesday’s Senate floor controversy:

“What I’m hoping is that, yes, that person may have AIDS, have it seriously as a baby and when they grow up, but the mother will begin to feel guilt as a result of that,” he said. “The family will see the negative consequences of that promiscuity and it may make a number of people over the coming years begin to realize that there are negative consequences and maybe they should adjust their behavior.”

Yes, Schultheis really said he is “hoping” people “have AIDS, have it seriously as a baby …”

I know Colorado is like Ground Zero for fundies and all, but this really is twisted and over the top.  The religious right is inching closer and closer to Fred Phelps territory.

Add comment February 26th, 2009 at 07:16am Posted by Eli

Wait, Which Country Was He Talking About Again?

Dubya gets right to the heart of the problem in his farewell address:

The battles waged by our troops are part of a broader struggle between two dramatically different systems. Under one, a small band of fanatics demands total obedience to an oppressive ideology, condemns women to subservience, and marks unbelievers for murder. The other system is based on the conviction that freedom is the universal gift of Almighty God, and that liberty and justice light the path to peace.

I think he might be exaggerating a little bit about conservatives marking unbelievers for murder, but otherwise I think he’s spot on.

Add comment January 16th, 2009 at 09:45pm Posted by Eli

McCain Continues To Court The Women’s Vote

McCain sure has a strange way of reaching out to those disaffected Hillary voters…

On October 29, 1991, Senator John McCain went to the floor of the US Senate. The former Navy pilot was angry and disgusted. In recent days, the news had broken that the previous month Navy airmen and others had gone wild—engaging in sexual molestation, out-of-control drinking, and other misconduct—at the Tailhook Association convention in Las Vegas, an annual gathering of retired and active-duty naval aviators. “I cannot tell you,” McCain proclaimed, “the distaste and displeasure that I have as a naval aviator…concerning this incident.” He bemoaned the fact that senior ranking naval officers and civilian leaders had been at the meeting. He called for an investigation and urged the Navy to suspend its traditional participation with the Tailhook reunions. “There is no time in the history of this country that something like this is more inappropriate,” McCain said, “and we cannot allow it. It is unconscionable. And we in the military…should be ashamed and embarrassed…that this kind of activity went on. And there is no excuse for it.”

Now, McCain has placed one of the men responsible for permitting—and encouraging– loutish activity at the Tailhook meetings in a powerful position: heading up his transition team.

McCain recently named John Lehman to oversee his transition effort and figure out how a McCain administration ought to get started—and whom it ought to hire for the most senior jobs—should McCain win the November 4 election. Lehman, now an investment banker, was secretary of the Navy during the 1980s, and he played a R-rated role in the Tailhook scandal.

Lehman was no longer Navy secretary when the Tailhook scandal exploded. But in 1991 and 1992, as military investigators and journalists probed what had happened at the 1991 convention—which included the so-called Gauntlet, a line of rowdy and drunk junior officers who harassed and assaulted women passing by–they learned that the events at the Tailhook convention of 1991 were predated by similar behavior in early years. And they discovered that Lehman, as Navy secretary, had been an enthusiastic participant.

In his 1995 book, Fall from Glory: The Men Who Sank the U.S. Navy, Greg Vistica, the San Diego Union-Tribune reporter who broke the Tailhook scandal, described a scene from the 1986 Tailhook meeting:

When the door to the suite at the Las Vegas Hilton opened, a prominent member of President Ronald Reagan’s administration and a naked woman were clearly visible. He was lying on his back, stretched out in front of a throng of naval officers. There were probably one hundred men watching him, laughing with him….

Several of the Navy and Marine officers now crammed into the room…knew him personally and worshiped him. Many knew he was married and had three children. Almost everyone knew who he was, which made the show that much more fascinating….

Most of the officers in the room, including the man on his back, were hard-drinking renegades. Some had been partying for days, others for hours. The carpet was spongy and damp from alcohol spilled on it by drunken military men. The room itself reeked with the odor of booze and sweat. But nobody seemed to care much. All eyes were on the man and the naked woman standing over him, wagging her bare rump in a teasing motion. The men in the room went into a throaty uproar at the site, and their cheers and laughs grew louder as the show went on.

The man on the floor was Lehman. And this was the example he was setting at this particular Tailhook convention. Another account of the Tailhook scandal–The Mother of All Hooks: The Story of the U.S. Navy’s Tailhook Scandal by William McMichael–noted that Lehman ate whipped cream out of the stripper’s crotch.

Lehman, who had once been a Navy pilot, left his post as Navy secretary the following year—four years before Tailhook would become a controversy. But the 1993 report on Tailhook ‘91 conducted by the Pentagon’s inspector general concluded that the 1991 convention was “the culmination of a long-term failure of leadership” in the Navy. According to the report, “the nature of the misconduct at the annual convention was well-known to senior aviation leaders….We were repeatedly told that such behavior was widely condone by Navy civilian and military leadership.” A footnote in the report stated:

Throughout our investigation, witnesses told us remarkable incidents at past Tailhook conventions. Incidents related by witnesses included a high-ranking Navy civilian official dancing with strippers in hospitality suites.

The IG’s report noted that Tailhook had spun out of control during Lehman’s tenure as Navy secretary: “By many accounts, the increase in rowdy and improper behavior culminated at Tailhook ’85.” After that convention, one Tailhook Association board member privately complained to the group, “Dancing girls performing lurid sexual acts on Naval aviators in public would make prime conversation for the media.” But no steps were taken—by the association or the Navy–to rein in the Top Gun aviators. And Lehman’s antics at the 1986 gathering sent an obvious signal: party on, men.

1n 1996, Lehman, appearing on ABC News’ This Week with David Brinkley, downplayed the Tailhook affair. Asked if he had participated in public lewdness at one of the conventions, he said that was unimportant and railed against “gutter reporting,” insisting that Tailhook ’91 should have been nothing more than a minor story. Speaking more broadly about the military during the Clinton years, Lehman added, “This is not a touchy-feely bureaucracy here. It has to have a macho, tough, warrior culture, and that’s what’s being eroded.”

Dammit, if our aviators can’t harass women and cavort with strippers, they’ll turn into ineffectual pansies!  That is just the kind of bold, outside-the-box thinking that we need in a presidential transition team.  Maybe there will be lots of strippers and prostitutes on hand during the transition, you know, to keep morale up.

And plenty of whipped cream.

(h/t Jenn)

1 comment October 21st, 2008 at 11:38am Posted by Eli

McCain Clings Tenaciously To The Gutter

Wow, he just doesn’t want anything to do with the high road, does he?  From his Fox News Sunday interview with Chris Wallace:

WALLACE: But Senator, back — if I may, back in 2000 when you were the target of robo calls, you called these hate calls and you said…

MCCAIN: They worked.

WALLACE: … and you said the following, “I promise you, I have never and will never have anything to do with that kind of political tactic.”

Now you’ve hired the same guy who did the robo calls against you to — reportedly, to do the robo calls against Obama and the Republican Senator Susan Collins, the co-chair of your campaign in Maine, has asked you to stop the robo calls. Will you do that?

MCCAIN: Of course not. These are legitimate and truthful, and they are far different than the phone calls that were made about my family and about certain aspects that — things that this is — this is dramatically different, and either you haven’t — didn’t see those things in 2000…

To hell with honesty and integrity.  John McCain wants to win, dammit!

MCCAIN: …[Sarah Palin] has excited and energized our base. She is a direct counterpoint to the liberal feminist agenda for America.

“Liberal feminist agenda”?  Is McCain auditioning for a job in talk radio?

And then there’s this breathtaking exchange…

WALLACE: In your radio address yesterday, you raised the “S” word, socialism….  But you did it indirectly, so let me ask you for some straight talk. Do you think that Senator Obama is a socialist? Do you think that his plans are socialism?

MCCAIN: I think his plans are redistribution of the wealth. He said it himself, “We need to spread the wealth around.” Now, that’s one of…

WALLACE: Is that socialism?

MCCAIN: That’s one of the tenets of socialism. But it’s more the liberal left, which he’s always been on. He’s always been in the left lane of American politics.

That’s why he voted 94 times against any tax cuts or for tax increases. That’s why he voted for the Democratic resolution, budget resolution, that would impose taxes on — raise taxes on some individual who makes $42,000 a year.

That’s why he has the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate.

(…)

MCCAIN: So is one of the tenets of socialism redistribution of the wealth? Not just socialism — a lot of other liberal and left wing philosophies — redistribution of the wealth? I don’t believe in it. I believe in wealth creation by Joe the Plumber.

WALLACE: But, Senator, you voted for the $700 billion bailout that’s being used partially to nationalize American banks. Isn’t that socialism?

MCCAIN: That is reacting to a crisis that’s due to greed and excess in Washington.

And what this administration is doing wrong, and what Paulson is doing wrong, is not going out and buying up home loan mortgages, home mortgages, and giving people new mortgages at the new value of their home so they can stay in their home.

They’re bailing out the banks. They’re bailing out these institutions.

WALLACE: But you voted for that.

MCCAIN: Of course. It was a package that had to be enacted because the economy was about to go into the tank.

Wow.  He calls Obama a socialist, repeats the Most Liberal Senator EVAR canard, and then admits to supporting a socialist program that he doesn’t even agree with, because he apparently believes that doing something is more important than doing the right thing.  Truly a virtuoso performance.

Kudos to Chris Wallace for pressing and challenging McCain rather than just tossing him softballs like most of his coworkers would.

1 comment October 19th, 2008 at 04:57pm Posted by Eli

Once Again We Ask…

…Dishonest or incompetent?  Or both?

An internal government document obtained by ABC News appears to contradict Sarah Palin’s most recent explanation for why she fired her public safety chief, the move which prompted the now-contested state probe into “Troopergate.”

Fighting back against allegations she may have fired her then-Public Safety Commissioner, Walt Monegan, for refusing to go along with a personal vendetta, Palin on Monday argued in a legal filing that she fired Monegan because he had a “rogue mentality” and was bucking her administration’s directives.

“The last straw,” her lawyer argued, came when he planned a trip to Washington, D.C., to seek federal funds for an aggressive anti-sexual-violence program. The project, expected to cost from $10 million to $20 million a year for five years, would have been the first of its kind in Alaska, which leads the nation in reported forcible rape.

The McCain-Palin campaign echoed the charge in a press release it distributed Monday, concurrent with Palin’s legal filing. “Mr. Monegan persisted in planning to make the unauthorized lobbying trip to D.C.,” the release stated.

But the governor’s staff authorized the trip, according to an internal travel document from the Department of Public Safety, released Friday in response to an open records request.

The document, a state travel authorization form, shows that Palin’s chief of staff, Mike Nizich, approved Monegan’s trip to Washington D.C. “to attend meeting with Senator Murkowski.” The date next to Nizich’s signature reads June 18.

(…)

In Palin’s court filing Monday to stop an investigation by her state Personnel Board she earlier had requested her lawyer, Thomas V. Van Flein, included numerous emails from her staff expressing confusion and incredulity over Monegan’s planned D.C. trip. None of those emails were sent by or to Nizich, although he was cc’d on several.

Contacted Friday, Monegan confirmed the travel authorization was to pursue funding for the anti-sexual-violence program. He said the travel authorization form was completed in a fashion consistent with practice, even though it showed no expenditures. The signed form approved the travel, he said, and authorized him to use a government credit card or seek reimbursement for expenses he incurred during the trip.

Okay, let me see if I can follow this.  Governor Palin is vehemently denying that she fired Monegan because he wouldn’t fire her allegedly abusive ex-brother-in-law, and claiming that she fired him because he went on an anti-rape lobbying trip… that her office approved? Have I got that about right?

Kinda seems to me that even if her claim that she fired him for being overzealous about preventing rape exposes her to less legal jeopardy, it doesn’t exactly sound like a political winner.

“I didn’t fire Monegan because he wouldn’t fire my abusive ex-brother in law, how dare you suggest such a thing!  No, I fired him because he went on a lobbying trip to DC, which my office approved, to try to prevent rapes!  I mean, some things are just beyond the pale… so to speak.”

Also worth noting, if I’m reading that last paragraph correctly (which I’m probably not), Monegan didn’t try to claim any per diem expenses… unlike, say, his boss, who was claiming them when she was at home.

1 comment September 19th, 2008 at 10:30pm Posted by Eli

Pork Is Once Again Sarah Palin’s Best Friend

Oy.  Apparently because Sarah Palin famously referred to herself as pit bull with lipstick, Obama must have been referring to her when he said this:

Let’s just list this for a second. John McCain says he’s about change, too. Except — and so I guess his whole angle is, “Watch out, George Bush, except for economic policy, health-care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy, and Karl Rove-style politics. We’re really gonna shake things up in Washington.” That’s not change. That’s just calling some — the same thing, something different. But you know, you can — you know, you can put lipstick on a pig; it’s still a pig.

Nope, sorry, not seeing it.  But the McCain campaign and its surrogates are going nuts over Obama’s horrible terrible misogynistic sexism.

And I find myself wondering, was the pit bull with lipstick quote planted in Palin’s speech for exactly this reason – in the hopes that Obama would use the lipstick-on-a-pig expression (an expression that McCain’s candidacy fairly begs for) in some context, any context, so that these proud defenders of feminism could then clutch their fake pearls in fake outrage?

Because let’s face it, John McCain’s Sensitive Feminist credentials are thinner than Sarah Palin’s resume.

Add comment September 9th, 2008 at 11:24pm Posted by Eli

Keep This Quote In Mind…

If Sarah Palin and/or Team McCain start complaining about Obama/Biden’s sexist attacks:

“She does herself a disservice to even mention it, really,” Palin said. “When I hear a statement like that coming from a woman candidate with any kind of perceived whine about that excess criticism, or maybe a sharper microscope put on her, I think, ‘Man, that doesn’t do us any good, women in politics, or women in general, trying to progress this country,’” Palin said. “I don’t think it bodes well for her.”

Wait, did I say “if”?  I meant “when.”

The campaign just blasted out an op-ed by adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer under the heading “Ignore the Chauvinists. Palin Has Real Experience.”

Said McCain adviser Carly Fiorina: “Because of Hillary Clinton’s historic run for the presidency and the treatment she received, American women are more highly tuned than ever to recognize and decry sexism in all its forms. They will not tolerate sexist treatment of Gov. Palin.”

Also, Lindsey Graham:

“Would a man be asked this question? Probably not,” the South Carolina Republican said in an interview with Politico.

This surprises… no-one.

(h/t ArchPundit)

Add comment September 3rd, 2008 at 06:58am Posted by Eli

Presidential Campaign Etiquette

Now, admittedly, I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure that repeatedly checking out your running mate’s ass is bad form.

The nervous swallowing and fidgeting with the wedding ring are also nice touches, as is the way McCain clumsily advances on her at the end while she edges nervously away.

It gives a whole new meaning to his claim that he saw Palin as “a partner and a soulmate” the first time they met, doesn’t it?  I wonder if McCain fidgeted with his wedding ring before he started chasing Cindy around the table those many years ago…

3 comments August 31st, 2008 at 12:52pm Posted by Eli

John McCain Is A Caring Nurturer

Jesus’ General has put all the pieces together, and revealed John McCain for the compassionate, stand-up guy he truly is:

Remember that incident when Sen. McCain called his wife a cunt? I’ve had a very hard time justifying it to people. Indeed, my attempts to do so usually end with me getting kicked in the grenades so hard I vomit.

Well, last week, I heard something on CNN that should help me explain that incident a little better. It was one of those things where the anchor gives one of their star reporters a few minutes to regurgitate a campaign’s latest talking points, raw, unedited, and without the clutter of analysis. In this case the reporter, John King, related a rather heartwarming story about Sen. McCain’s relationship with his old Naval Academy roommate, Frank Gamboa.

Gamboa was one of the first Mexican-Americans allowed to attend the Naval Academy. Being the first isn’t easy and he became the target of some pretty vicious race-inspired hazing. Sen. McCain was one of his most enthusiastic persecutors, calling him “Mex” and giving him a very hard time. But he did so out of love, later explaining that he was simply preparing Gamboa for the racial discrimination he’d face as an officer in the fleet.

I’d like to think that’s the same reasoning he employed when he called his wife a cunt. He was simply toughening her up for the hardship she’d face as a beer heiress and wife of a US Senator.

So you see, calling her a cunt wasn’t the the act of uncontrolled misogynistic rage it appeared to be; it was an expression of the kind of love and respect a man should have for his wife.

The same holds true for all the “Obama is after our white women” ads the McCain campaign has been running. He’s simply helping Barack Obama prepare for all the racial bigotry he’ll face for the rest of his career.

What a relief!  It’s good to know that even if our candidate loses, we’ll still end up with a president who cares deeply about racial and sexual equality and common decency.  He’s like a teacher, really, the way he helps people come to grips with the adversity they’ll face in life.

Add comment August 26th, 2008 at 07:15am Posted by Eli

The False Metric Strikes Again

If your movement’s credibility depended on your ability to come up with a yeah-but that makes you sound somehow morally superior to your opposition despite the dishonesty and near-omnidirectional hate that drips from your every word, what would you choose?

What may be surprising, however, is to what degree profanity seems to be a feature more common to left-leaning blogs than to right-leaning ones.

Which side of the online aisle is more likely to use profanity, though? For answers, I turned to the search engine Google to see how common swearing is in the right and left blog universes by looking up the late stand-up comic George Carlin’s “seven dirty words” in the most popular blog communities.

The results showed that online liberals tend to use profanity a lot more than online conservatives.

(…)

Dividing the number of instances of profanity by the number of pages of the sites on which they appear, then multiplying the result by 100 yields what might be called a “profanity quotient.”

The top 10 liberal sites (Daily Kos, Huffington Post, Democratic Underground, Talking Points Memo, Crooks and Liars, Think Progress, Atrios, Greenwald, MyDD and Firedoglake) have a profanity quotient of 14.6.

The top 10 conservative sites (Free Republic, Hot Air, Little Green Footballs, Townhall, News Busters, Lucianne.com, Wizbang, Ace of Spades, Red State and Volokh Conspiracy) have a quotient of 1.17.

This means that 14.6 percent of all pages on the most popular liberal sites have profanity on them, compared to 1.17 percent of all pages on the conservative sites.

That’s quite a disparity.

(…)

Notable also in these stats are the liberal blogs Eschaton, Crooks and Liars, and Firedoglake, where profanity is so common you basically cannot take part in the discussion without running into it.

On the flip side, the popular conservative community Lucianne.com, run by literary agent Lucianne Goldberg, seems to have no profanity at all.

Why such a disparity between the right and left online?

Some on the right may take this as a sign of their superior intelligence. [HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!] Others may theorize that it’s simply because liberals are angry at President Bush.

More than likely, it is a reflection of how things are offline. Conservatives, especially those who are more religious, are less likely to use profanity in their daily conversation.

All well and good, I suppose.  But tell me: Have you calculated an eliminationism quotient?  Or a racism/sexism/homophobia quotient?  Or a dishonesty quotient?  Or a harassing-12-year-old-kids quotient?

I would much rather read the occasional swear word than wade through a sewer of hate and lies – not to mention personal viciousness (outing liberal bloggers, publishing people’s addresses and phone numbers to encourage harassment and threats).  Oh well, different strokes for different folks, as they say.  But please, do not mistake the right’s lack of profanity for civility or decency.  It’s quite easy to be hateful without swearing, and vice versa.

(h/t Jane)

1 comment August 7th, 2008 at 07:40am Posted by Eli

Bush Administration Objectively Pro-Rape

This is utterly disgusting, yet so true to form for the Bush administration.  Apparently “support our troops” only applies to male ones – or perhaps this is a passive-aggressive Republican strategy to get women out of the military:

There was quite a struggle in Congress this week. The Department of Defense refused to allow the senior civilian in charge of its Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office (SAPRO) to testify in Thursday’s hearing on sexual assault in the military. Rep. John Tierney, chair of the House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, angrily dismissed Principal Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Michael Dominguez from the hearing when Dominguez said that he, the DoD chief of legislative affairs and the chief of public affairs, had ordered Dr. Kaye Whitley, chief of SAPRO, to refuse to honor the subpoena issued by the subcommittee for her appearance.

Full committee Chairman Henry Waxman called the DoD’s decision to prevent Whitley from testifying “ridiculous and indicating DoD is covering something up.” It could also place Whitley in contempt of Congress. Rep. Christopher Shays said the DoD’s decision was “foolish.”

One of the questions that would have been put to Whitley was why DoD had taken three years to name a 15-person civilian task force to look into allegations of sexual assault of military personnel. The panel was finally named early in 2008 but has yet to meet. She would have also been queried on the SAPRO program’s failure to require key information from the military in order to evaluate the effectiveness of sexual assault prevention and response programs.

(…)

Rep. Jane Harman cited Veterans Administration statistics that one in three women in the military has been sexually assaulted. She said the prosecution rate of those accused of raping fellow military service members is abysmally low. Of the 2,212 reported rapes in the military in 2007, only 8 percent of the cases ended in court-martial of the perpetrator, while the rate of prosecution in civilian courts is 40 percent.

(…)

Rep. Shays said he had no confidence in DoD or the military services and their policies of prevention of sexual assault, and asked how recruiting will fare when young women learn that one in three women is sexually assaulted and when young men find out that one in 10 men is raped while in the military.

Recruitment of rapists would certainly improve…

VetVoice wants to know where Bob Gates is:

Now, granted, Gates is a busy man with competing priorities–and two ongoing wars.  So maybe this hasn’t crossed his desk yet.  Maybe this is an issue that hasn’t risen above the Undersecretary level yet.  But if it hasn’t, it needs to.

This type of conduct by the Defense Department is despicable, and it’s indicative of a Presidential administration that has no respect for the American people or their elected Representatives.  Congressmen Tierney and Waxman should not only hold Deputy Undersecretary Dominguez in contempt, but they should subpoena Secretary Gates on this one.  As Congressman Waxman said, this is “ridiculous.”

(…)

With three female troops having been murdered this year stateside, and with the long list of rapes and suspected murders in theater, it’s clear that something needs to be done.  And what the Defense Department is doing now is far worse than simply ignoring the problem: They’re actively attempting to obstruct Congress from investigating it.

Many of us have been pleased with the moderate (non-neo-con) stances Secretary Gates has taken since he assumed the role from Rumsfeld over a year and a half ago.  But now he must step up and show the leadership that the troops and their families expect of him.  He needs to rectify this situation.  And quickly.

If he doesn’t, he will show that the Defense Department has no respect for its female troops, and, more importantly, that he’s going to allow murderers and rapists to sully the name and reputation of America’s Armed Forces. And no one wants to join an organization like that.

Here’s what I said about Gates during his confirmation hearing:

The thing is, while yes, Rummy was incompetent and awful, most of what went wrong with Iraq was dictated from above. If we venture for a moment into Magical Sugarplum Fantasyland and imagine that The Donald was the smartest, most competent SecDef in the history of all the universes, and told Dubya that his plan was Teh Suck, and refused to invade without a better plan, our clueless leader would have immediately shitcanned him and replaced him with Harriet Miers, or Joe Lieberman, or Jeff “Bulldog” Gannon, or Ryan Seacrest DSV.

In other words, the Defense Secretary does not set the Iraq policy; he merely executes it (or tortures it, as the circumstances require). It really doesn’t matter whether Gates has a plan for Iraq or not. Bush will do What Bush Wants To Do, which will inevitably be the most foolhardy and disastrous course possible.

Replacing the SecDef is all well and good, but we won’t have any chance of a least-bad outcome until we replace his boss.

In other words, I’m not convinced that Gates is responsible for this disgraceful rape-and-murder-enabling coverup – I would not be at all surprised if he were just following orders from the most secretive and amoral administration in American history.  Still, Gates isn’t resigning in protest, so his hands are not exactly clean either.

9 comments August 4th, 2008 at 10:19pm Posted by Eli

Subpoena Shrinkage

The BushCo. rationales for defying subpoenas and blocking oversight just keep getting weaker and weaker.  First they used executive privilege to shield conversations with the president (or vice president, as with the secret energy task force), because he needs to be able to receive “unvarnished” advice.

Next they used executive privilege to shield conversations by anyone who worked for the president, even if the president was not involved in said conversations.

Next they breezily claimed “absolute immunity” on the grounds of, well, no-one seems to be sure what, exactly. (And how’s that working out?)

But now, apparently, BushCo. has been so emboldened by their ability to stonewall congressional subpoenas with no consequences that they don’t even feel obligated to give any reason at all:

Subcommittee Chairman Tierney and Full Committee Chairman Waxman threaten Michael Dominguez, Principal Deputy Undersecretary for Defense, with contempt after he reveals that he has ordered Dr. Kaye Whitley of the DOD Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office to defy a subpoena to appear:

Chairman Waxman: “Do we have to subpoena the Secretary to get people in the Department to come before us? We subpoenaed her, you’ve denied her the opportunity to come and testify and put her in a situation where we have to contemplate putting her in contempt. I don’t even know if we can hold you in contempt because you haven’t been issued a subpoena. Mr. Chairman, the Department of Defense has a history of covering up sexual offense problems….. I don’t know if we need to subpoena the Secretary and then hold him in contempt… Those are better options to me than to hold her in contempt when she’s put in this untenable position when her line of command instructs her not to comply with a subpoena of the United States Congress. I don’t know who you think elected you to defy the Congress of the United States, we’re an independent branch of government…”

Wouldn’t Whitley be required to refuse an unlawful order, which this certainly was?  Or does that obligation only apply to uniformed personnel?

In any case, it’s telling that this Dominguez asshat thinks that a subpoena is some kind of optional thing that you can just order someone to ignore.  Monkey see, monkey do, I guess.

1 comment July 31st, 2008 at 08:55pm Posted by Eli

More Of The Comedy Stylings Of Senator John McCain

Think Progress has a golden oldie for those of you who are getting a little tired of jokes about killing Iranians:

The blog Rum, Romanism and Rebellion pulls out a 1986 Tucson Citizen article recounting a joke about rape told by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Speaking to the National League of Cities and Towns in Washington, DC, McCain allegedly said:

Did you hear the one about the woman who is attacked on the street by a gorilla, beaten senseless, raped repeatedly and left to die? When she finally regains consciousness and tries to speak, her doctor leans over to hear her sigh contently and to feebly ask, “Where is that marvelous ape?”

You know, I’m actually not entirely sure whether that even qualifies as a joke.  It’s certainly more clever than “At least I don’t plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you cunt,” but probably not quite as clever as “Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly?  Because her father is Janet Reno.”

So, um, any Hillary supporters who were taken in by McCain’s outreach after Obama clinched the nomination?  You, ah, might want to rethink that.

Add comment July 15th, 2008 at 07:44pm Posted by Eli

Stay Classy, Republicans!

Anti-Obama button being sold at the Republican convention in Texas:

Rush Limbaugh plays compare-and-contrast:

I look at Iowa, I look at Illinois—I want to see the murders. I want to see the looting. I want to see all the stuff that happened in New Orleans. I see devastation in Iowa and Illinois that dwarfs what happened in New Orleans.  I see people working together. I see people trying to save their property…I don’t see a bunch of people running around waving guns at helicopters, I don’t see a bunch of people running shooting cops. I don’t see a bunch of people raping people on the street. I don’t see a bunch of people doing everything they can…whining and moaning—where’s FEMA, where’s BUSH. I see the heartland of America. When I look at Iowa and when I look at Illinois, I see the backbone of America.

And finally, a Republican Congressional candidate shows his appreciation for high school girls’ sports:

The state champion girls volleyball team of Mercy High School in Cincinnati was in the Senate chamber recently to receive a resolution recognizing their accomplishment.

They had gathered around State Sen. Eric Kearney, D-Cincinnati, causing fellow Sen. Steve Stivers, R-Columbus, to comment that Kearney “attracts all the attractive women.”

Reminded that he had just returned from his honeymoon after marrying the former Karen Tabor two weeks earlier, Stivers backpedaled.

“I’m allowed to window shop, just not buy,” he said.

Awesome.  I don’t know we ever win any elections from the Family Values Party.

1 comment June 17th, 2008 at 11:14pm Posted by Eli

Profiles Incompetence: The McCain Campaign Strikes Again

Oh, come on.  You can’t tell me these people aren’t deliberately trying to sabotage him:

ABC’s Rick Klein reports: Sen. John McCain on Friday  abruptly cancelled a Monday fundraiser that had been scheduled at the home of a Texas oilman, after ABC News contacted the campaign inquiring about a verbal blunder the Texan made during an unsuccessful 1990 campaign for governor.

Clayton Williams stirred controversy during his 1990 campaign for governor of Texas with a botched attempt at humor in which he compared rape to weather. Within earshot of a reporter, Williams said: “As long as it’s inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it.”

His Democratic opponent at the time, the late Ann Richards… highlighted the comments in a TV ad during that 1990 campaign. View the ad HERE.

McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers said the Monday event was being cancelled, given the offensive comments. He said he could not yet say what McCain would do with donations brought into the campaign by Williams.

“These were obviously incredibly offensive remarks that the campaign was unaware of at the time this event was scheduled,” Rogers said. He added that Williams apologized for the comments back in 1990, but he said that does not excuse them.

Williams told the Midland Reporter-Telegram recently that he had already raised more than $300,000 for McCain and the fundraiser to be held at his home in Midland. Williams said that he needed to help McCain raise money to stop an Obama campaign that would enact “socialist” policies if elected to office.

Can someone explain to me how absolutely no-one on McCain’s team, or in the Texas GOP, heard Clayton Williams’ name and didn’t immediately think, “Oh yeah, the lie-back-and-enjoy-it guy – maybe we don’t want McCain associated with him, especially when he’s trying to sucker woo disgruntled Hillary supporters”?

I can only hope that the McCain campaign excercises this same kind of diligence and attention to detail when they’re vetting potential running mates.  I think David Duke and Mark Foley are available…

Add comment June 14th, 2008 at 12:39pm Posted by Eli