“The so-called ‘blogs,’ with their trumped-up speculation and wishful thinking, are treating the Libby case as if it were…um, say, if Mr. Russert is out there, I’m free most Sundays…”
(See Mirengoff’s movin’-on-up manifesto here.)
[Vid clip at Crooks & Liars]
…then you should probably buy me a copy of NewsMax’s Ronald Reagan comedy CD:
If you love Ronald Reagan – or just enjoy laughing – you need to get NewsMax.com’s special audio program “Ronald Reagan’s Greatest Laughs.”
And if you hate life – or are just looking for reasons to off yourself – then you should probably buy the CD, too.
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[Updated with more straw]
Bush Using Straw-Man Arguments in Speeches
By JENNIFER LOVEN,
Associated Press Writer
Sat Mar 18, 12:52 PM ETWASHINGTON -“Some look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that the war is lost and not worth another dime or another day,” President Bush said recently.
Another time he said, “Some say that if you’re Muslim you can’t be free.”
“There are some really decent people,” the president said earlier this year, “who believe that the federal government ought to be the decider of health care … for all people.”
Of course, hardly anyone in mainstream political debate has made such assertions.
When the president starts a sentence with “some say” or offers up what “some in Washington” believe, as he is doing more often these days, a rhetorical retort almost assuredly follows.
The device usually is code for Democrats or other White House opponents. In describing what they advocate, Bush often omits an important nuance or substitutes an extreme stance that bears little resemblance to their actual position.
“The girl from I-pa-nema goes walk-ing… Ack! It’s wingnuts!”
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Now that the Iraqi documents have proven the existence of WMD and established Saddam’s links to Al Qaeda, the WingNet has resumed its clever plan to starve us of material by obsessing obsessively on jots, tittles, and dandruff flakes (i.e. things they can occasionally be right about), with a special concentration on close, intertextual engagement with sites of non-dominant knowing as discursively (re)engendered through the meta-semiotics of photos in newspapers.
Michelle Malkin blows the roof off the Times Hooded-Guy Photo Scandal, while Powerline blows the extra-super-roof off the Times Magenta Blazer Photo Scandal.
Malkin is of course confused again. Or, rather, not confused again, because that implies transit between lucidity and bonkiness — but a difficulty in referring to Malkin’s persistent cognitive state is that “Ho ho, Malkin’s acting crazy” eventually takes on the informative value of “There is air.”
PHOTOSHOPPING THE NYTIMES
By Michelle Malkin · March 19, 2006 12:09 AMThe phony who posed for the NYTimes:
[…]
While we’re on the subject of the Times and photo alterations, beware of posing for Times photographers. It seems even Dems aren’t immune to the paper’s distorted lens.
That’s a lot of air!
Dear Ombudsman, MichelleMalkin.com:
In your item of March 19th., etc., the writer seems unaware of the difference between the following two propositions:
1) The NY Times faked a photograph to make it look like there was an Iraqi in a hood being tortured, when there really wasn’t an Iraqi in a hood at all, but only some guy dishonestly posing as one to fool people.
2) According to the NY Times, an Iraqi guy said that he was the one in the hood being tortured, in the photo, but he was actually a different guy than the one being tortured, wearing a hood, in the photo.
The right answer is Number Two. Please print a correction.
Thank you,
Godyer Sodum
Vastly Shorter Powerline: By evidently changing the color of Governor Mark Warner’s blazer and tie to magenta, the cover story of the liberal NY Times Magazine destabilizes the counter-hegemonic narratives at stake in the positive coverage of Governor Mark Warner in the cover story of the liberal NY Times Magazine.
Back when Gavin M. proved once and for all that Dean Esmay is a humor-impaired asshat, we thought he (Dean) should win some kind of prize for his ability to overreact and start issuing empty threats. Turns out we hadn’t seen nothin’ yet:
If you e-mail me again I will get a restraining order from the police that will go on your record.
We have a couple things cowards like you third world pussy country don’t have called freedom of speech and protection from harassment as a result.
The entire story is at SuperFrenchie. Vas-y SuperFrenchie!
We’ve posted quite a few times about the supply (or lack) of electricity in Iraq in the last 3 years. Whether we were prompted by blatant lies or misrepresentations by the likes of Caspar Weinberger or David Frum, there always seemed to be a reason to do so. On the third WMDiversary, where do we stand?
Electricity hits three-year low in Iraq
Awesome!
Electricity output has dipped to its lowest point in three years in Iraq, where the desert sun is rising toward another broiling summer and U.S. engineers are winding down their rebuilding of the crippled power grid.
Will the last U.S. engineer to leave Iraq remember to turn the lights off?
All religious doctrines, from Christianity to Hinduism to Judaism to Islam, have a lot of stupid bullshit in them. Let’s face the facts: the world wasn’t created 6,000 years ago, you won’t be reincarnated as a slime mold if you’re a bad person, and God won’t give you 70-something virgins if you blow up a bus full of school children. And yet, for all the silliness of religious dogma, most religions have some redeeming qualities that give billions of people hope and faith in their darkest moments.
Notice how I said “most.” I think it’s safe to say that Scientology is the exception to the rule, and is the first-ever religion to be comprised of 100% stupid bullshit. Witness the “church’s” successful attempt to strong-arm Comedy Central into not re-airing “Trapped in the Closet,” the brilliant South Park episode that lampooned scientology and its most famous advocate, Tom Cruise:
Tom Cruise reportedly forced U.S. network Comedy Central to cancel the repeat of a “South Park” episode about Scientology by threatening to boycott publicity events for “Mission: Impossible III,” according to media reports.
The star is alleged to have pressured Hollywood executives at Paramount Pictures which are owned by Viacom — as is Comedy Central.
South Park episode “Trapped in the Closet” thrilled fans when it aired in November, by poking fun at both Cruise and his controversial beliefs system.
How I wish reporters would stop referring to Scientology as a “belief system,” when they should really be calling it what it is: the Fucking Stupidest Religion on the Face of the Earth. Or, if you you prefer the shorter version, “The Doug Feith of World Religions.”
Pete Shelley – ‘Homosapien’ (3:19)
“Hey, that’s an okay song. He’s saying like everyone’s a person and we’re all people, and that’s cool.”
“I’m a ho-mo-sexual too…”
“Ha-ha, it means ‘human,’ dumbass.”
Joan Jett – ‘Bad Reputation’ (2:41)
“Joan Jett is pretty tough for a girl.”
“Yeah, I’d definitely hang in the smoking area with her during lunch.”
Freddie Mercury – ‘The Great Pretender (Extended Version)’ (5:51)
[radio playing]
“No wait, this is the song where he says ‘gay.’ No really, listen. See?”
“Dude, the record company must have totally missed that.”
Frankie Goes to Hollywood – ‘Relax (Banned Version)’ (4:15)
“‘Hit me with your laser beam?'”
“Yeah, this song is, like, written in code or something.”
(Bonus Antipodean after the jump)
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It’s late and I’m a sack full of sleepy, so let’s zip through this with some fancy word that means ‘fast’ which I can’t think of at the moment.
Our Pal Michelle’s ‘Army of Translators‘ assembles at Pajamas Media, and actually it’s only two people so far. Ding-dong. Who’s there? Yay! It’s Laura Mansfield, the fabled Cousin-It-person of the WingNet. Picture of her — let’s see…
Official photo of Laura Mansfield
And if she keeps using that photo, someday someone is definitely going to Photoshop… Oh, what the hell.
Laura Mansfield is a Mad Arabist, meaning she speaks and reads Arabic and seems bonkier than a very bonky sort of thing, of which I can’t think of any at the present time — although ‘croquet mallet’ would have done the trick if the word ‘mallet’ wasn’t used up on John Spencer just before. Where were…? Oh yeah — document and translation.
SECRET AND PERSONAL
Number: 1/22/11836
Date: 12/1/2001
To: Iraqi Intelligence Service
Re: RumorGreetings.
1. In the report on the status of rumors for November of 2001 regarding Fedayeen Saddam in al-Anbar, there is an entry that indicates that there is a group of Iraqi and Saudi Arabians numbering around 3,000 who have gone in an unofficial capacity to Afghanistan and have joined the mujahidin to fight with and aid them in defeating the American Zionist Imperialist attack.
2. After presenting the matter to the Supervisor of Fedayeen Saddam, he ordered that the matter should be looked into for verification of the truth of the rumor.
Please review and inform us.
So there are these rumors floating around that a bunch of people have gone on their own to fight in Afghanistan. …Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of a hat.
[…]The newly declassified documents shed more and more light on the evolution of the violent insurgency in Iraq, and show that Saddam Hussein’s government was aware not just of the presence of Al Qaeda terrorist Abu Mus’ab Al Zarqawi, but also was aware that the Anbar province in Iraq was being used as a launch point for organized groups of jihadis headed to fight the United States in Afghanistan.
[…]
The sheer volume of “mujahideen� that reportedly departed from the Anbar province, combined with the presence of Zarqawi in Iraq, indicates the presence of an organized Al Qaeda infrastructure within Iraq just a few months after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
Now how do they do that?
If only our man Spencer had kept running around waving his arms in the air and gibbering about liberals destroying America, this could’ve been the most riveting primary race of the season. What a waste of talent! It’s like that time after the Smiths broke up when Johnny Marr switched to harmonica.
The theory has been that Spencer, who’s backed by Karl Rove, was only in the race to spread dirt and make crackpot accusations against Hillary Clinton and Democrats in general — and that as soon as the primary came near and the Clinton killdozer began to rev its diesels, he’d be quickly hustled off to a place with no sharp objects or temptation from volatile inhalants and ye olde Cracke Rocke.
But here it is not even April, and he’s being croquet-malleted by the moderate-Republicanoid KT McFarland campaign. Argh! Comedy weeps, Mr. Spencer.
McFarland strategist trashes opponent in GOP Senate race
NEW YORK — The top adviser to Kathleen Troia “KT” McFarland said Friday that her rival for the Republican Senate nomination, former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer, lacked the credentials, knowledge and financial backing to mount a credible challenge to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.
“It would be a very big mistake to think John Spencer — no offense to John, who I guess was a decent enough mayor — to move him to a level of where anyone is going to take him seriously as a U.S. Senate candidate,” McFarland adviser Ed Rollins told The Associated Press. “Unfortunately, John Spencer wouldn’t know which side of the Capitol the U.S. Senate meets.”