Sandra Bernhard--Stop a clock ugly on every level

Just when you think things couldn't get any uglier, along comes Sandra Bernhard, who's ugly in her sleep.

Following the lead of Chevy Chase, Lindsey Lohan, and something called Margaret Cho, Sandra has attacked Sarah Palin - warning that if the governor were to come to New York, she'd be raped by "big black brothers."

Yep, that's not racist...at all (Paging Al Sharpton).

But what you're really seeing, once again, is the amazing effect Palin has on the fragile minds of the C-list celebrity. It's as though Palin's success is a dog whistle that only unhappy has-beens like Sandra can hear. And it unhinges them completely. It would be funny if the responses were funny. But they're not. They're just vicious.

So where, again, does this hatred come from? A lot of it, simply, is envy. Perhaps Sandra realizes, sadly, that if we were to poll a group of rapists, they'd prefer Palin over her. But then again, they'd probably prefer a donkey, a blowfish, or maybe even a small discarded sponge dipped in lye. It's why she only does one-woman shows. No one else can stand to be near her.

Of course, Sandra's words are just another example of the rich intolerance only the tolerant left can muster. For more of it, check out how reporters are handling Palin's hacked emails. The media thinks the real story is about her use of a private email account - as opposed to her actual privacy being invaded. This cowardly garbage, mind you, comes from the same folks who decry Bush's imaginary infringements on our own personal liberties.

But here's the real hypocrisy: all of these media whores have private email accounts separate from work - which helps them jump from job to job. I mean, do you actually think the wussy bloggers who exposed Palin's emails don't have a private account that they use to apply for entry level jobs at Vanity Fair? Private email is as common at work as stealing Post-it notes.

Finally, if Obama's email had been hacked instead, and something embarrassing had been found, imagine the media hellfire that would have been unleashed. Heads would roll and Republicans would be gang-raped.

I don't know... maybe all this hate is what Obama needs to get elected. And if it works, Sandra... then Palin won't be vice-president.

But you'll still be ugly.

And if you disagree with me, then you sir are worse than Hitler.

Lipstick, Pigs, Paint and Turds

So to quote Reverend Wright, it looks like the chickens have come home to roost. Commenting on his Republican adversaries, Barack Obama used the phrase "lipstick on a pig," which has now created what he calls a "made-up controversy." He claims the McCain campaign seized "an innocent remark," taking it out of context "because they knew it's catnip for the news media."

Okay so we've got chickens, pigs and catnip. What is it about Obama and his lurid obsession with animals? More important, no unicorns. I simply hate the politics of exclusion.

Anyhoo, Can I be the first to say, "I adore his manufactured outrage."

"I adore his manufactured outrage."

So, let me get this straight: Barack is bent out of shape because his own words have been twisted to make him look like a mean-spirited sexist. But isn't this what his supporters have been doing to anyone who dare question Barack's own sainthood?

They tried to railroad Hillary as a bigot, they've seized every phrase uttered on Fox News as proof of racism, and the crap they've spewed about Sarah Palin defies any level of explanation. Obama-mites have spent the last two years making it clear that any criticism of their savior comes not from common sense, but from a darker place – that subconscious level where every single one of us is an undocumented member of the Aryan Book Club.

But here's the thing: I don't think Obama meant to call Sarah a pig. He was applying an old slang phrase meant to describe someone trying to gussy something up that's inherently bad. So Obama is innocent of the charge, I think. But I wonder if the leftwing media would be as fair to the right, if they had made the same mistake. I mean, in my opinion, when Obama's tries to camouflage his own foibles by shifting blame to others, he's simply "painting a turd" - to use an old phrase that's identical to "lipstick on a pig."

I wonder what Media Matters, the Huffington Post and Keith Olbermann thinks of that.

And if you disagree with me, then you sir are worse than Hitler.

Satire Alert--Just for you Loretta

Poor Repuglikkkans think they have a dream ticket on their hands, but startling revelations are now coming to light that will put the final nail in the coffin of John McSame's illegal and immoral candidacy: Sarah Palin has cooties.

Apparently, McSame didn't thoroughly vett his darling little bimbot before choosing her for his running mate. Then again, the senile old man doesn't know how many houses he owns...how can he be expected to know whether or not his own Veep has cooties? He'll probably deny she even has cooties or try to bury the truth. But the folks over at Daily Kos and the Democratic Underground have it on good authority that Sarah Palin does indeed have Cooties, and that her daughter is a slut (and not even the good kind of slut - she's keeping her baby). But more importantly, Sarah Palin has Cooties.

Can working families who are facing mortgage foreclosures, unemployment, and skyrocketing gas prices thanks to Bush's failed economic policies really afford putting someone with Cooties a mere heartbeat away from the presidency? And how exactly can a Cootie-sufferer find the time to perform her duties as Vice President while raising five kids, one of whom is a slut? Perhaps Palin should just go back to Alaska and concentrate on being a Mom and finding a cure for those Cooties of hers.

No one is really sure how Cooties are transmitted, but the general consensus is that you get them by being a pro-life, pro-drilling, Christian Conservative member of the NRA...and by kissing *YUCK!* boys. Any Hillary supporters or Evangelical Christians who do not want Cooties would be advised to refrain from voting for McSame/Palin this November.

No empty rethoric from a man of substance

Substance topped eloquence last night in St. Paul. It's what you actually say, not how you say it ... and John McCain got quite a lot said last night. Watch it yourself here, or read it here.

Here are just some of the excerpts from his speech that I particularly liked:

• I understand who I work for. I don't work for a party.
• We were elected to change Washington, and we let Washington change us.
• We believe in low taxes; spending discipline, and open markets. We believe in rewarding hard work and risk takers and letting people keep the fruits of their labor.
• I will keep taxes low and cut them where I can. My opponent will raise them. I will open new markets to our goods and services. My opponent will close them. I will cut government spending. He will increase it.
• His plan will force small businesses to cut jobs, reduce wages, and force families into a government run health care system where a bureaucrat stands between you and your doctor.
• We will drill new wells offshore, and we'll drill them now
• My grandfather came home from that same war exhausted from the burdens he had borne, and died the next day. In Vietnam, where I formed the closest friendships of my life, some of those friends never came home with me. I hate war. It is terrible beyond imagination.
• The constant partisan rancor that stops us from solving these problems isn't a cause, it's a symptom. It's what happens when people go to Washington to work for themselves and not you.
• Russia's leaders, rich with oil wealth and corrupt with power, have rejected democratic ideals and the obligations of a responsible power. They invaded a small, democratic neighbor to gain more control over the world's oil supply, intimidate other neighbors, and further their ambitions of reassembling the Russian empire.
• I'm not running for president because I think I'm blessed with such personal greatness that history has anointed me to save our country in its hour of need. My country saved me. My country saved me, and I cannot forget it. And I will fight for her for as long as I draw breath, so help me God.

I particularly liked it when McCain addressed government schools. The teacher's unions must have been throwing things at the TV.

Education is the civil rights issue of this century. Equal access to public education has been gained. But what is the value of access to a failing school? We need to shake up failed school bureaucracies with competition, empower parents with choice, remove barriers to qualified instructors, attract and reward good teachers, and help bad teachers find another line of work.

When a public school fails to meet its obligations to students, parents deserve a choice in the education of their children. And I intend to give it to them. Some may choose a better public school. Some may choose a private one. Many will choose a charter school. But they will have that choice and their children will have that opportunity.

Senator Obama wants our schools to answer to unions and entrenched bureaucracies. I want schools to answer to parents and students. And when I'm President, they will.

And then there was McCain's story of Vietnam. Compare this narrative to John Kerry's endless repetitions of his Swift Boat escapades .. and his band air purple hearts and hasty run back home:

On an October morning, in the Gulf of Tonkin, I prepared for my 23rd mission over North Vietnam. I hadn't any worry I wouldn't come back safe and sound. I thought I was tougher than anyone. I was pretty independent then, too. I liked to bend a few rules, and pick a few fights for the fun of it. But I did it for my own pleasure; my own pride. I didn't think there was a cause more important than me.

Then I found myself falling toward the middle of a small lake in the city of Hanoi, with two broken arms, a broken leg, and an angry crowd waiting to greet me. I was dumped in a dark cell, and left to die. I didn't feel so tough anymore. When they discovered my father was an admiral, they took me to a hospital. They couldn't set my bones properly, so they just slapped a cast on me. When I didn't get better, and was down to about a hundred pounds, they put me in a cell with two other Americans. I couldn't do anything. I couldn't even feed myself. They did it for me. I was beginning to learn the limits of my selfish independence. Those men saved my life.

I was in solitary confinement when my captors offered to release me. I knew why. If I went home, they would use it as propaganda to demoralize my fellow prisoners. Our Code said we could only go home in the order of our capture, and there were men who had been shot down before me. I thought about it, though. I wasn't in great shape, and I missed everything about America. But I turned it down.

A lot of prisoners had it worse than I did. I'd been mistreated before, but not as badly as others. I always liked to strut a little after I'd been roughed up to show the other guys I was tough enough to take it. But after I turned down their offer, they worked me over harder than they ever had before. For a long time. And they broke me.

When they brought me back to my cell, I was hurt and ashamed, and I didn't know how I could face my fellow prisoners. The good man in the cell next door, my friend, Bob Craner, saved me. Through taps on a wall he told me I had fought as hard as I could. No man can always stand alone. And then he told me to get back up and fight again for our country and for the men I had the honor to serve with. Because every day they fought for me.

I fell in love with my country when I was a prisoner in someone else's. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for. I was never the same again. I wasn't my own man anymore. I was my country's.

Here is what the "New York Times" said about the Surge

Surge of Ignorance

The only real question about the planned "surge" in Iraq — which is better described as a Vietnam-style escalation — is whether its proponents are cynical or delusional. -- Paul Krugman, NYT, 1/8/07

There is nothing ahead but even greater disaster in Iraq. -- NYT Editorial, 1/11/07

What anyone in Congress with half a brain knows is that the surge was sabotaged before it began. -- Frank Rich, NYT, 2/11/07

Keeping troops in Iraq has steadily increased the risk of a bloodbath. The best way to reduce that risk is, I think, to announce a timetable for withdrawal and to begin a different kind of surge: of diplomacy. -- Nicholas Kristof, NYT, 2/13/07

W. could have applied that to Iraq, where he has always done only enough to fail, including with the Surge -- Maureen Dowd, NYT, 2/17/07

The senator supported a war that didn't need to be fought and is a cheerleader for a surge that won't work. -- Maureen Dowd, NYT, 2/24/07

Now the ''surge'' that was supposed to show results by summer is creeping inexorably into an open-ended escalation, even as Moktada al-Sadr's militia ominously melts away, just as Iraq's army did after the invasion in 2003, lying in wait to spring a Tet-like surprise. -- Frank Rich, NYT, 3/11/07

Victory is no longer an option in Iraq, if it ever was. The only rational objective left is to responsibly organize America’s inevitable exit. That is exactly what Mr. Bush is not doing and what the House and Senate bills try to do. -- NYT Editorial, 3/29/07

There is no possible triumph in Iraq and very little hope left. -- NYT Editorial, 4/12/07

... the empty hope of the "surge" ... -- Frank Rich, NYT, 4/22/07

Three months into Mr. Bush’s troop escalation, there is no real security in Baghdad and no measurable progress toward reconciliation, while American public support for this folly has all but run out. -- NYT Editorial, 5/11/07

Now the Bush administration finds itself at that same hour of shame. It knows the surge is not working. -- Maureen Down, NYT, 5/27/07

Mr. Bush does have a choice and a clear obligation to re-evaluate strategy when everything, but his own illusions, tells him that it is failing. -- NYT Editorial, 7/25/07

The smart money, then, knows that the surge has failed, that the war is lost, and that Iraq is going the way of Yugoslavia. -- Paul Krugman, NYT, 9/14/07

U.S. Hands Off Pacified Anbar, Once Heart of Iraq Insurgency. -- NYT, 9/1/08