The famous fight between Arlen Specter and Russ Feingold of the Senate Judicial Committee discussing a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, which went along these lines:

“I don’t need to be lectured by you. You are no more a protector of the Constitution than am I,” Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., shouted after Sen. Russ Feingold declared his opposition to the amendment , his affinity for the Constitution and his intention to leave the meeting.

“I’ve enjoyed your lecture, too, Mr. Chairman,” replied Feingold, D-Wis., who is considering a run for president in 2008. “See ya.”

… was all held in secret.

And yet we know all about what happened.

I suppose when such high drama conflict occurs, the news is just going to have to be leaked out. Probably by the staff of Russ Feingold, who makes the point about the Republicans Congress’s warped priorities. Arlen Specter’s point is simply how tedious he (and seemingly the 99 other Senators, give or take a Senator Byrd) of Russ Feingold’s branding himself as “Mr. Constitution” — in his case to put a finer point on it “Mr. Civil Liberties”.

What Arlen Specter is branding himself as these days I do not know.

The “next black GOP Congressman” ends his television assault ad, an assault against the attack by illegal immigrants and homosexuals and the foreign Jihadists and Jesse Jackson against bedrock Conservative American values, with a shot of the lily-white (and white bread) Beaver Cleaver in the back seat of the station wagon.

Because we want to return ourselves to those great 1950s. When illegal immigrants weren’t flooding the borders, homosexuals were safely tucked away in the closet, Islamic extremists were nowhere to be seen, and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton were not getting all uppity. And life was just swell. Especially for people of Vernon Robinson’s skin color in the South.

Because his opponent, Brad Miller of North Carolina, is all for illegal immigrants’ homosexuals’, Islamic Extremists’ and Jesse Jackson’s coordinated attack on bedrock Conservative American values.

“The aliens are here but they didn’t come in a spaceship, they came across our unguarded Mexican border by the millions. They’ve filled our criminal courtrooms and invaded our schools. They sponge off the American taxpayer by clogging our welfare lines and our hospital emergency rooms; they’ve even taken over the DMV. These aliens commit heinous crimes against us, like Maximiliano Esparza who raped a nun and strangled her with her own rosary.”

Maximiliano Esparaza. Raped a nun. Strangled her with her own rosary. These are the type of things that the Illegal immigrants are doing, don’t you see? From their battle-line bases, the DMV. They took over the DMV!! Their secret line of attack is to have us waiting in long lines, and while we’re occupied stuck in these long DMV lines, then they will take over because nobody’s there holding down the fort because we’re all waiting in line at the DMV!

Press 1 for English? NO! Vote Vernon Robinson for English.” Cue Spanish-speaker giving the “Hey Gringo! Vote for Vernon Robinson for Congress” in Spanish.

Maximiliano Esparaza. I remember him. But when I remember him as Willie Horton. The first story you see on his news page (a creature of candidates’ web sites mostly devoted to upbeat news items on the candidate) is Suspected Alien Shoots an American Citizen at a North Carolina Waffle House. The politics of Fear is in full effect.

Three ads.

Peter Beinart has been running around hawking his new book The Good Fight : Why Liberals—and Only Liberals—Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again.

It’s a call for a “muscular foreign policy” in the Truman and “Americans for Democratic Action” tradition, the “Cold War liberalism” that dared to attack the foreign threat of Communism and cut ties with the Communists in the US en route to their model of Liberalism.

All of which is sort of good, as far as it goes. Maybe. You will remember, or you will learn here, that the ADA was constitently attacked as being proto-Communists by the Right and Joe McCarthy types. The lesson being that even if you decide to take a “hawkier than hawk” stand against foreign menaces, you will not be innoculated by the charges of weakness.

Next I invite you to consider the problem with Peter Beinart by way of Iraq. He advocated the war in Iraq. He suggested that the opponents were weak-kneed surrender monkeys. He was unable to see the perils of attacking Iraq. Today, he’s sort of come around on Iraq, believing it was a mistake, while at the same time continuting to suggest that the opponents of the War in Iraq are… weak-kneed surrender monkeys.

The problem here is that his “Liberal Hawk” “hark back to the Cold War Liberalism” positioning more or less predisposed him to reflexively stand for a War in Iraq. A similar case may go for, say, Hubert Humphrey — the type of Cold War liberal Beinart is suggesting we emulate, on Vietnam.

Actually the Truman case is pretty interesting as well. After a number of years in Korea where the Cold War Liberalism and the reflexive desire to … keep… going… we turned to Eisenhower to do a “Nixon goes to China” and just call the whole thing off, saving us from one morass before we embarked as a nation on a completely different morass.

What I’m suggesting here, if Peter Beinart is aware of such problems, is that the idea that you can have two competing thoughts in your mind, and shift a bit from time to time, in your assessment of “knowing what you believe”. The Cold War offers many lessons, and one of them is that sometimes it’s better not to reflexively fight and it’s not a good idea to venomously attack the peaceniks.

Hm. This is funny. Google up the images for “Gordon Allen Pross”, and you will find an animatronic Sean Hannity, Jimmy Carter, Ken Jennings, Keith Olbermann, Clyde Lewis, Elmo makes two appearances, Strom Thurmond, assorted paraphenilia…

… somewhere around there you’ll see Gordon Pross.

I’m wondering about Gordon Allen Pross. What’s he running for this time around? Surely he’s running for something. He was the 1998 Democratic candidate for Doc Hastings’s seat, a textbook lesson in what candidate a party will end up with if they choose to totally abstain from a district. He ran in the Republican primary in 2000 and 2002 for the seat. And in 2004 he moved on to the Senate.

His platforms, ladies and gentlemen.

The second question I’m wondering is… how many Gordon Allen Prosses have pulled through victories to the US House and various high office general election races for the 2006 cycle? Actually I want to see if I can find them. Consider it the “Gordon Allen Pross Project”. These candidates are the gluons in the American political scene.

Dennis Hastert swaggers, or staggers, into the Capital Building. He casts a long shadow, in the same way Ariel Sharon casts a shadow over Israel, in the same way William Howard Taft does over American history, in the same way…

Okay. None of that is fair. I could care less about Dennis Hastert’s girth.

Maybe there is something a bit off about an agency tucked into the Executive Branch peeling its way into the Legislative Branch. See, there’s this sham in our political system. Close your eyes and I can almost make the case that the very act of Representation in Government is a Corrupt enterprise, which means that there are 435 Corrupt House members. It’s easy enough to pry one loose if an executive branch so desires, and open up a bit of light to the Legislative Sausage Creature.

None of them, save one, are William Jefferson of Louisiana, who is a product of Louisiana politics which goes like this:

I am not going into any kind of tirade on this but from my youth [in the south] to my middle years [sometimes in the south] to my old age [in the south], this subject has always been one of those constants of Nature; Louisana + politicians = corruption. Never any middle ground, always the same, day in and day out, year in and year out; they are bought and sold like a not-so-cheap Commodity such as corn, sugar, soybeans, bananas, etc, and it is always only too easy to find one waiting somewhere with his hand out. Speaking of their ethics and honesty is about on the same level as speaking of a woman who is a little bit pregnant; somehow you know the very statement itself is rediculous as a use of words. In no way does this speak to the honesty and ethical conduct of any other politician, it is just that in Louisana it is so open and notorious that one wonders how it even made the front pages in Washington DC.

I imagine if you want to make sure to ensnare and entrap a Democratic politician, you go to two places: Chicago and New Orleans. But I suppose there are always short interims where a short-lived backlash temporarily breaks the Machine, and at this precise moment I’d hope someone else can slide into place: the ravaged city of New Orleans does not William Jefferson representing them at this time. The Congressional Black Caucus’s defense of him notwithstanding.

As per Dennis Hastert’s cries of foul, he douth protesteth too much. All of a sudden this weirdly cohesive Republican tightly wound Federal government cracks a bit. And to what? Dennis Hastert chooses this moment to make a stand against Executive Power? THIS? William Jefferson’s corruption? There was a commentator on CNN the other day who mused abot this: they’re keeping the phone records without a warrant ordinary citizens and you defend that — but with a warrant they go after a Congressman and then — then you cry foul?

Sure. ABC News says he’s implicated and under investigation. Hastert wants a retraction. We go from there.

Did you know that Pat Robertson, through rigorous training, leg-pressed 2,000 pounds! How did he do it?

Watch a video of Pat leg-pressing 1,000 pounds.

So Pat Robertson has a protein shake for sale. Put yourself on the Pat Robertson Protein Shake diet, and you too will be able to leg-press 2,000 pounds. Perhaps even more, seeing as how Pat Robertson is 76 years of age… perhaps even more, that is, if you can find as much God as Pat Robertson has.

Pat Robertson worked out at the gym on an incline leg press machine with weights up to 570 pounds. Working with his physician, who was an amazing strength trainer, he worked up to 800 pounds, then 1,000 pounds. Then one day he was able to leg press 1,500 pounds one time. Then over the succeeding months, he trained with multiple reps of 1,200 pounds, 1,300 pounds, and 1,400 pounds.

Mr. Robertson warms up now at 500 pounds, and was shown on television with Kristi Watts doing 1000 pounds.
His doctor, by the way, has leg pressed 2,700 pounds. It is not nearly as hard as the authors of these reports make it out to be. We have multiple witnesses to the 2,000 pound leg press, plus video of the 10 reps of 1,000 pounds.

Pat Robertson’s doctors can leg press 2,700 pounds? I’m entering this worm-hole here. It’s a little like hearing the scientific explanations for the 6,000 year old Earth, replete with the Canopy Theory. Maybe the measuring machines are just adjusted somehow, with the effect that if a bunch of empty air-filled stylofoam are marked “500 lbs”?

There is no way on earth Robertson leg presses 2,000 pounds. That would mean a 76-year-old man broke the all-time Florida State University leg press record by 665 pounds over Dan Kendra. 665 pounds. Further, when he set the record, they had to modify the leg press machine to fit 1,335 pounds of weight. Plus, Kendra’s capillaries in his eyes burst. Burst. Where in the world did Robertson even find a machine that could hold 2,000 pounds at one time? And how does he still have vision?

In the first Superman issues, Superman was able to “leap tall buildings in a single bound” — he did not fly properly. The scientific explanation for Superman’s abilities was to compare the difference of Earth’s and Superman’s home planet’s gravitational pulls with the super-abilities of ants to the small scale that they inhabit in bulk strength, and the jumping ability of grass-hoppers. Where the flight and the heat vision came into the picture, I do not know. I guess God tossed Superman those abilities later on.

Pat Robertson has a number of abilities. He can leg-press beyond any previous human ability, while keeping his body (a bit flabby, mind you) straightened and unstrained. He can predict world events — there’s a tsunami that is going to hit this here Cascadia any day now, apparently. And he has the King-making ability to elect Presidents, to the point where John McCain and even goddamned Howard freaking Dean* must bow down before him.

Now we just need to find out what his Kryptonite is, so that we can decrease these super-human abilities to the point where he will no longer ramble on and annoy us like this, and the human race will be done with him.
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* No, seriously. There is no reason that any member of the Democratic Party should go on before Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell. Maybe you can make some allowances for Ben Nelson of reddest Nebraska, but beyond that this is just absurd. Even if you decide that the lesson of 2004 had something to do with the “Values Voter”, which follows through with the Virginia Governorship election of Kaine, the version of “values”, Christian or otherwise, that you’re promulgating is never ever going to mesh with Pat Robertson’s or Jerry Falwell’s.

One of the odd things I’m considering with John Gibson’s “We need more babies” take on the immigration issue, which correlates to “We need more white babies”, which connects to “Start breeding, White People”, (found here) is where Gibson’s head was at when he said all of this.

I believe John Gibson set out to be politically incorrect. He had a “I’m going to say something outrageous and radical” mindset, and when he was wracking his head for some opinions to offer to the American public, this is what he came up with.

The give-away here is the tone of giddiness and giddy-up in his voice when he says “To put it bluntly — we need more babies!” This is a sort of “A novel concept, ain’t it? Think about it for a second but don’t be too pointy-headed intellectual about it” thought-process.

The one thing worse than the stifling restraints of Political Correctness is a sort of slap-knee political incorrectness created for the sake of — not so much contrarianism, but a supposed cleverness of a forceful thrust forward of the primitive part of the brain.

From the stats page:

bush cia fbi nsa kennedy lennon hoover lbj nixon

Hm. Yes. All of them. They all killed each other after greasing one another’s rise. They worked together on the project, before splitting apart over petty differences and reacting in violent furies.

conspiracy theory – maron

Either you mean “mason”, or you actually do mean Maron.

legislation was actually proposed to provide every newborn infant in the states of georgia and tennessee with a classical music cd

‘Twas Zell Miller’s project, actually.

fuck the horse that glen beck rode into town on

I’m pretty sure that’s illegal. Except, it would seem, in Washington State. (Famous Enumclaw case.) Maybe it is legal where you are, I don’t know. The one warning I have for you, though, is that it is Glen Beck’s property.

no evidence whatsoever that jack kennedy ever knew lloyd bentsen

If you say so.

joe scarborough slams prussian blue

Not a difficult thing to do, seeing as how Prussian Blue are a White Supremicist blond-teenybopper duo.

doc hastings skull and bones

Don’t make me laugh.

abercombie and fitch models

I note that the downtown store has set up some weird box with their models, who here are at least wearing jeans that one may presumably be able to buy and wear there.

ray nagin skull and bones

I don’t know. Seems like a WASPy organization to me.

From the laws of the Fanatic:

`Your worst enemy is not he who differs the most (for that one is merely ignorant of the truth and may be enlightened); but rather he who differs the least (for that one knows the truth and actively perverts it)’

Sound about right?
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Sounds about right to me. But— According to his expressed view, on the first day of Creation, when the very first breath of life entered the very first creature God created, in that very instant all the events in all the days of his life and unto the instant of his death were foretold and entered into the Great Book of Life along with all commentary and activity pertaining to his life; whether for good or ill, if it had anything to do with his life, it was all there; fixed, immutable, and unchangable by any but God. In other words, this event in life that we call death was meant to be; the events ordained for him by God to occur in exactly this manner, with no deviation whatsoever.

Of course, I could have got it wrong. I will admit I do have a logic problem when it comes to anyone’s definition of pre-destination.

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I followed the supposed “Nuremberg Files” court case in the late 1990s, which has — I believe — petered out to its conclusion. deParrie was party to the case, loosely affiliated with “Army of God” as it may be. There was this list of Abortion Providers. If they die, their name was crossed out. Someone was wounded, their name was marked somehow or other — italicized? Red font?

I put something up on my website, which I took down within an hour upon consideration. It went like this:

Abraham Lincoln
James Garfield
William McKinney
Theodore Roosevelt
John Kennedy
Ronald Reagan
William Clinton

Was it possible that the Secret Service could end up with a not-seen geocities site? I don’t know.

At any rate, deParrie once posted something to the effect of “I like Howie. He has a quirky sense of humor.” Well, fine then:

Paul deParrie

Leave it at that.

What’s interesting is that the photo he’s used, and which appeared in yesterday’s Oregonian, looks as though he is either conciously or subconciously harking to Che Guevara.
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Yeah, I remember that list now and his defense of it, and denials that it would “stimulate” any violent types, that it was just expressing opinions, etc.

The sad thing is when good people can’t seem to expand their personal convictions to global positions which take into account all the nuances of the human condition.

The worst thing I think porq ever did on this board was read a heart-rending story from a first-person source about having a serious pregnancy issue (foetus about to die inside her as I recall) and following the doctor’s advice to abort it to save her own health….and porq (who thought “there are never any problems with pregnancies” to keep his issue oversimplified and just because his own wife never had any) actually wished her not to get pregnant again unless she “repented.” All that to a girl who desperately wanted a baby, and could have been given courage to try again vs. any more heaping on injury. Of course she stood up to him because he knew nothing of the experience or its details, but a fragile person could have taken that as a kind of curse.

You know that fat guy, dressed in black, who goes to Pioneer Square, wears this beret, has a sandwich board on him telling you that everyone in a wide variety of categories is going to go Hell, waves a poster of a giant bloodied fetus? Or maybe you saw him marching at the front of a Gay Pride Parade, or — probably his main location for such things, as per numerous law suits — in front of an Abortion Clinic, where he has been known to take photographs of women exiting or entering for the purpose of posting on the Internet.

Paul deParrie has passed away.

I flick around the Internet, and go his message board, and see that someone has already written this:

Paul’s dead and Jesus spits upon his grave. Good riddance to another foul stench terrorist.

I do not know if he is, um, technically a terrorist or not. He is, as I’ve noted before, a source that the news media will go to if they need a quote condoing violence against Abortion providers, after a quip fromthe mainline anti-abortion (pro-life if you must) organizations who will as quickly as possible condemn it all.

But others, like Paul deParrie editor in chief of Life Advocate Magazine in Portland, Oregon, said: “I think it is wonderful any time an aboriton clinic is closed for whatever reason. If the toilet backs up and closes the place, that is great. I think it is great when babies’ lives are saved through whatever means. I am not going to try to condemn somebody that God won’t condemn.” The bombing was perhaps the most violent act — at least in its potential for destruction since four killings at abortion clinics in 1994.

That’s the New York Times, circa January 1997, and is par for the course for deParrie’s contribution to the national dialouge.

I have gotten to know the man a bit, and have some sort of bizarre relationship with him. deParrie once posted, quite correctly, that I was avoiding him… something I’ve done regularly and did just a couple weeks ago, actually. He called me a snob. This was from a protest he and his friends held on September 11, 2002, across from Pioneer Square with a year-old memorial to 9/11. For that, I shrugged, allowed myself to have a couple conversations with him, and generally avoided him nonetheless. There was this time where they shouted out toward me, with a large group heckling them. I was obliged to yell something back at them, and thus went “Just remember — THERE IS NO GOD!!”, which for whatever reason the crowd found “ballsy”.

Or I could go with, “Obey the Buddha!”, which I did once when his son-in-law, a less frightening sort who seems to share a similar sense of humour as I, pulled the same stunt with me. But he I once had regular weekly conversations with.

Never mind. Paul deParrie is dead. His niece, who has for the past decade vowed to counter-act her uncle’s work by working with Planned Parenthood and assorted pro-choice work, can either keep going by way of eulogizing what he stood for, or do whatever.