by Smitty (h/t BlogProf)
Griggs graciously takes the Michael Moore comparison:
Will it throw more gasoline on the Democrat political pyre in, as someone reminded me Thursday night, less than 1,000 hours?
It may. It may very well.
‘Same Old Place, Sweet Home Chicago’
Remember the bikini bombshell? Lots of laughs. Good times. But is it possible that a Democrat like Jesse Jackson Jr. could actually lose in Chicago? Never say never, as I point out in my latest American Spectator column:
Isaac Hayes wasn’t always happy to share the same name as a singer famed for “Shaft” and other 1970s soul classics.
“All of my life, I’ve had to deal with that,” say Hayes. “I didn’t appreciate it as a kid, but now, I think my Mom and Dad were geniuses.… It helps break the ice.”
Breaking the ice is important for Hayes in his campaign in the 2nd District of Illinois, where he is perhaps the GOP’s longest of long-shot candidates for Congress this year. Encompassing the southside suburbs of Chicago near the border with Indiana, the district’s electorate is so heavily Democratic that two years ago, 90 percent voted for President Obama. The 2nd District hasn’t elected a Republican to Congress in 60 years.
Why, then, did the Republican challenger find himself with a crowded schedule of media interviews this week? The explanation involves the incumbent Democrat, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. . . .
Please read the whole thing. The famously crooked governor of Louisiana, Edwin Edwards, once boasted he was such a shoo-in for re-election, the only way he could lose was if he got caught with “a live boy or a dead girl.” In Jackson’s case, you might make that a blonde girl.
UPDATE: Wow, Isaac Hayes just got endorsed by National Right to Life PAC.
Florida 20: Send Debbie Wasserman-Shultz To The Beach
by Smitty (via The Corner)
The sanest wonk in Congress, Paul Ryan, attempts to speak sense. DWS replies with “fear Wall Street”.
If anything, Ryan’s plan is too centrist, in my opinion. My opinion is probably not too politically tenable, either.
This blog would like to commend Paul Ryan for extraordinary tact when faced with an utter knob.
Karen Harrington for Congress
Under-the-Bleachers Blogger Externalizes Rage, Demands to See Speedo Picture
Susie Madrak’s conference-call complaint that the Obama White House treats liberal bloggers like “the girl you’ll take under the bleachers but you won’t be seen with in the light of day,” has become the hottest topic on the ‘sphere. The premise of the conflict is itself a conundrum, as Allahpundit says:
Mind you, the purpose of the call was for Axelrod to beg the nutroots to help get rank-and-file Democrats excited to vote in November. . . . Aren’t lefty bloggers already doing everything they can to scare the hell out of their readers about the coming GOP wave? Didn’t Kos, whose site is big enough to have generated an annual conference attended by top Democrats, just publish a book comparing conservatives to the Taliban? What more do you want them to do, Ax, immolate themselves in grief?
Aleister of American Glob compares Madrak’s situation to Flounder in Animal House, and Left Coast Rebel says:
The story here is not that the ‘professional left’ is pissed with Obama. The real story here is that far-left, pseudo Bolshevik smear merchants like those at Crooks and Liars are given access to the White House in any shape, matter or form in the first place.
And the fact that a blogger at Crooks and Liars has her you-know-whats in a bunch? Give me a break, she’s a fringe-kook, that would probably make Ward Churchill look moderate.
She’s obviously got anger issues of the sort that raise the question, “If a tree falls in the forest, and there are no Republicans around to blame, who does Susie Madrak cuss at?” Continue reading Under-the-Bleachers Blogger Externalizes Rage, Demands to See Speedo Picture →
‘Prove Them Wrong’: Not Too Shabby, NRSC
by Smitty (via No Sheeples)
What’s interesting is all of the Tea Party candidates appear briefly. So maybe the blowback is reaching some of those floppy senior elephant ears.
VA-8 Gets More Interesting This Friday
by Smitty
From a 16Sep AP story, emphasis mine:
Paul Magliocchetti pleaded not guilty to an 11-count indictment felony indictment on Aug. 20. He is charged with paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal donations to scores of campaigns dating back to 2003 to enrich himself and increase his firm’s influence with public officials.
The former lobbyist was to have gone on trial Oct. 5.
A person outside the government who is familiar with the criminal investigation said that the once-prominent lobbyist will enter a plea on Sept. 24 in federal court in Alexandria, Va., where a new electronic entry on the courthouse docket specifies that Magliocchetti will have a “change of plea hearing” in his case on that date.
Later on, emphasis still mine:
Magliocchetti was a major player in Washington lobbying for nearly two decades.
Democrats on the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, where Magliocchetti once worked as a staffer, became favored recipients of donations by lobbyists in Magliocchetti’s firm, PMA Group Inc.
One of his early successes was lobbying on behalf of New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, who received a $58 million bailout from Congress for his shipbuilding business
From 1989 to late 2008, Magliocchetti and his employees gave members of Congress $3.4 million in campaign donations, more than most of the larger lobbying firms in town.
If the allegations in the indictment are true, a sizable chunk of that money actually came from Magliocchetti personally or from the firm’s coffers
In 2007 and 2008 alone, three top Democrats on the House defense subcommittee directed $137 million to defense contractors who were paying Magliocchetti’s PMA Group to get them government business.
The three were subcommittee chairman John Murtha of Pennnsylvania, James Moran of Virginia and Visclosky.
Murtha, who died in Feburary, collected $2.37 million in campaign contributions from PMA’s lobbyists and the companies it has represented since 1989, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks political money. Visclosky has collected $1.36 million; Moran, $997,348.
“Gentleman” Jim Moran made the 2009 most corrupt politicians list, courtesy of Judicial watch.
This blog thinks that Jim should just go hang out with his buddy Matthews on Hardball more or less indefinitely.
Let’s hope that the prosecutor does an effective job. Moran may be innocent. Also, Charlie Rangle has merely been a trifle careless with some paperwork.
Patrick Murray for Congress
Take Order Issued On 20 House Seats
by Smitty
The FaceBook Page That Rocked America just celebrated 6 months of the ObamaCare sucking wallet wound with a post: “Lies, Damned Lies – Obamacare 6 Months Later; It’s Time to Take Back the 20!”
No need to quote the litany of government prevarication outlined. This blog, ever concerned with safety, would like to caution everyone to stay well clear of the Executive Spin Machine, as they’re likely to engage battle-override to deal with this, and the machine could fly apart. You are warned.
From TBT20:
Join me in standing against those who stood with Obama and Pelosi in voting for this disastrous bill. The Democrats from 20 districts we carried in 2008 voted for Obamacare. Now we can vote against them.
Not to bag on the Gov. for thinking small, but there are far more than 20 Democrat louts lacking loafer love. Thus, I’m off to phonebank for Col. Patrick Murray, and see if I can get a live post out from the HQ.
Update: Ace of Spades quotes Michael Barone:
I asked Michael Barone about the Democrats’ full year of denial, about when they finally started to grasp that this was genuine outrage, a citizenry aroused.
He didn’t answer that, but he did offer this explanation: The Democrats assumed all the Tea Party rallies and Town Hall confrontations were astroturfed and filled with Republican operatives, because that’s precisely how they gin up their public displays of support.
They almost couldn’t grasp the possibility that our rallies, unlike theirs, might be real.
Instead of Waterloo, I’ll link the even-more-appropriate S.O.S.
ABBA? Let’s move a bit East of Sweden. I think Finland’s Apocalyptica working out on “Enter Sandman” by Metallica far more fitting the Democrat situation
Oh, My: Liberal Bloggers Getting Tired of Putting Out (Propaganda) for Obama?
“We’re the girl you’ll take under the bleachers but you won’t be seen with in the light of day.”
— Susan Madrak, Crooks and Liars
Never mind exactly why Madrak went off on David Axelrod during a conference call today. The point is that she’s right.
In order to win elections, Democrats have to pretend to share the values of the American middle class. They can’t afford to associate themselves too publicly with the grungy leftoids who are, in fact, the driving force behind the Democratic policy agenda.
I have no idea what inspired Ms. Madrak’s evocative metaphor.
UPDATE: You know, the difference with conservative bloggers — beyond the demonstrably greater pulchritude of our lady-bloggers — is that we’re not so willing to shovel shit for politicians.
The whole point of calling this blog “The Other McCain,” after all, was to distinguish myself from that two-faced backstabbing weasel who got the 2008 GOP presidential nomination. (David Nolan for U.S. Senate!) And just today, Erick Erickson, Philip Klein and others panned the Republicans’ “Pledge to America.”
The conservative blogosphere staged an uprising when the GOP establishment tried to shove Charlie Crist down our throats, fought tooth and nail to defeat a sitting Republican senator in Alaska, and recently dumped the “safe” Mike Castle in favor of Christine the Teenage Witch. We’re rather lose an election than to get screwed over by people who don’t respect us.
Our liberal moonbat counterparts dismiss us as dangerous extremist wingnuts, but we actually expect the politicians we support to pursue our wingnut extremist agenda — whatever that agenda may actually be, because at this point, all we care about is electing people who will vote “no” to Obama’s agenda.
Frankly, I liked the moonbats better when they were completely out of power, foaming at the mouth, camping out in ditches with Cindy Sheehan, and trying to elect that hopeless loser Ned Lamont.
Don’t worry, Susie Madrak, you’ll get back there yet!
UPDATE II: Susie “Suburban Guerrilla” Madrak tells her version of her exchange with Axelrod:
[H]ow am I supposed to motivate my readers when you treat them like the town ho?
Or words to that effect. I do it all for you, my beloved readers.
And what readers they must be! She gets 14 comments on a post, but averages barely 1,000 visits a day. In recent months, we’re averaging about six times that traffic, and seldom get more than 10 comments on a post.
UPDATE III: Welcome, Instapundit readers! And thank you, Professor. The ‘Lanche arrived while I was toiling away on an answer to that burning question: “What’s wrong with people like Susie Madrak?”