Tony Snow has cancer, again

Snow, who hoped he had overcome colon cancer after surgery and chemotherapy two years ago, learned after surgery this week that a new growth in his abdomen was cancerous and the disease had spread to his liver. The 51-year-old press secretary, a former television news commentator and father of three, is facing a new round of chemotherapy and vowed to beat his cancer again.

There was a time in my life when this news would have made me hysterical with joy. I was an asshole, then. And anyone who thinks this is cause for celebration is also an asshole.

We have to remember that no matter how horrible or terrible someone is, that someone is still a human being. Maybe when its revealed that Mr. Snow is a mass-murderer, a pedophile or a deliberately engineering a nuclear holocaust we can revel in his pain, but until then he's small potatoes, evil-wise.

Cancer is a terrible disease. He's fought it off once already. I hope he can do it again. And if that isn't possible, I wish him peace.

O'Reilly Outs Self for Kool-Aid Man*

O'Reilly:... and with us tonight to answer his critics is the Kool-Aid man, himself. Kool-Aid, thanks for being on our show.

Kool-Aid Man: Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

O'Reilly: Now... what about this assertion. This assertion, given by the liberal New York Times, that you've been giving profits to organizations that sponsor terrorists?

Kool-Aid Man: Man, I don't know nothing about that.

O'Reilly: You don't?

Kool-Aid Man: Not a thing.

O'Reilly: Well, how is it this is being said, then? I mean, why are you being named if it isn't true?

Kool-Aid Man: I dunno, man. I think it's the Hawaiian Punch guy. He's always trying to start stuff with me.

O'Reilly: Oh, so this is professional jealousy by a colleague. Come on! You've got to give a better answer than that.

Kool-Aid Man: That's all I know. I swear, man.

O'Reilly: I'm really disappointed, here, Kool-Aid. I mean, when I was a kid... when I was a kid I guzzled Kool-Aid like you wouldn't believe. I drank every flavor you ever made. And when I was asleep in bed... I... I mean, I feel funny saying this, but I dreamed about you. I really did. I laid in my bed dreaming about you and me.

Kool-Aid. Uh, okay...

O'Reilly: *sigh* Okay, no spin. No spin. No BS. I was gay for you when I was five years old. I still am.

Kool-Aid Man: You are?

O'Reilly: I'm gay for you, Kool-Aid man.

Kool-Aid Man: Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy-

(Broadcast interrupted)










* Okay, no, this is not real. It's a parody. It never happened. No Kool-Aid men were harmed in the making of this post. HT to C&L for the graphic)

Columbus Day - 13 at a time

I can't stand Ward Churchill, no, but I think people need to be aware of this.

What ARE we celebrating on Columbus Day?

Did Delay write his own book?

Too fucking priceless. (hat tip - C&L)

Followup: Disingenuous Dinesh

Mr. D'Souza would do well to stop feigning shock at the Left's reaction, and provide some kind of well-spoken answer to his conservative critics. Otherwise, he may be risking the same kind of ostracism from their ranks that he used to treasure receiving from the Left.

So I said here. Now it seems he's picked up the gauntlet in a four-part series on National Review - entitled, amusingly enough, "The Closing of the American Mind."

So far the response seems... unimpressed.

But on an interesting note: there's some amazing similarities between my column and the start of D'Souza's first essay. I doubt he even read my column, but if he did, and he really liked how it went... it wouldn't be the first time he plagiarized something, would it?

Young Americans for a Little More Freedom for People Who Think As We Do

As promised, the Southern Poverty Law Center has placed MSU's chapter of Young Americans for Freedom on its list of hate groups.

But this makes two YAF chapters I've been in close proximity to whose actions have been questionable at best. And the last time, at OU, the chapter won an award for being the best chapter of the year (or some such...) at their big conference.

(I've had one go-around with them thus far. they wanted to shut down the vagina monologues, so I told them to stick it. As you can guess, the show went on.)

I do think that YAF is a hate group, but not for the reasons the SPLC would tag them. YAF exists to get people to hate leftward, progressive politics, and to despise people whose opinions run counter to theirs. They don't do a very good job of encouraging debate or providing a contrary opinion to the "wisdom" of the Left. But they do an excellent job of smearing and sneering, not to mention creating silly and demeaning political stunts to draw attention to themselves (and often shoot themselves in the foot).

Of course, the University seems more upset that their YAF chapter was tagged with this label than they are at having such a group on campus. It goes without saying that they have a right to be there, speak their minds and so on, but just once I would love to see MSU's president go on record as saying that in any marketplace of ideas, some ideas are much less constructive than others.

For Others To Conclude

"what have you done for me lately...?"

WASHINGTON, March 14 — Asked if she believed homosexuality was immoral, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Democrat of New York, initially said Wednesday that it was for “others to conclude,” but later issued a statement saying she did not think being gay was immoral.

Well gee... good to know triangulation is alive and well in the Clinton camp.

Why anyone salivates after Hillary I will never know.

As-salaam alaykum, Haliburton!

Haliburton to move headquarters and CEO to Dubai

MANAMA/HOUSTON - U.S. oil services firm Halliburton Co. is moving its headquarters and chief executive to Dubai in a move that immediately sparked criticism from some U.S. politicians.

Texas-based Halliburton, which was led by Vice President Dick Cheney from 1995-2000, did not specify what, if any, tax implications the move might entail. It plans to list on a stock exchange in the Middle East once it moves to Dubai — a booming commercial center in the Gulf. The company said it was making the moves to position itself better to gain contracts in the oil-rich Middle East.

Oh yeah... I got out at the right time. Yes indeed.

I guess this means we're in for another round of how icky and bad Dubai is, huh? : P

Newt It To Me One More Time

The true story of this last week was not that Mr. Gingrich admitted to having an affair with his current wife while he was still married to his second – it’s old, old news, much like hishaving affairs while married to his first wife.

The true story is his having copped to the offense in an interview with James Dobson of Focus on the Family. It’s just like him to go to one of the largest arbiters of conservative moral power in America to confess his sins, knowing that the moral lapses that caused his departure from electoral power would come back to haunt him if he ran in 2008.

In other words, it’s a pre-emptive strike.

The normally astute Wall Street Journal says “He’s Back,” but they miss the underlying truth is that he’s never been gone – just absent from immediate political view.

Like any good supervillain, Gingrich knows the value of a subtle exit and a period of seeming inactivity, followed by a slow, steady climb back up to the light – speech by speech, book by book, thinktank by thinktank. He’s political pneumonia: you might shake off a bout with it and think yourself cured, only to have it flare up again a few years later when your guard’s back down, again.

I'll have more to say soon.

Oh, so now he's surprised

As a follow-up to Disingenuous Dinesh, it seems reality has finally set in... to an extent. Here we see him cop to being surprised by the conservative reaction to his book, The Enemy At Home

Q: Are you still alive? You've been beat up pretty good by the left and the right for this book.

A: No, no. I'm very much alive. In a way this sort of reaction is not totally a surprise to me. It's true this is the first book in which I have had conservative criticism. Normally I just drive the left insane. Sure, any book that is going to point a finger at the left and say, “Look, you’ve got a role. You’re responsible for 9/11” is going to cause a furor on the left. I expected that.

The conservative criticism is little more of a surprise. Not because of its existence -- my first chapter in the book is called "What do conservatives 'know' about 9/11 and why it's wrong." And the book is a critique of the conservative and liberal assumptions about 9/11. But what I've been struck by is how vehement some of the conservative critics have been -- not all or even most, but some.

The interview is a real soft-touch job, and his answers seem a little contradictory in places, based on my reading of the book. But then, so's his book.

I'm still wondering if he engineered that POS to be inflammatory to both sides. If so, he really should start fanning the flame - the moment is passing.

Coulter: Nice to see she's keeping count...

COULTER: And -- I mean, this is the same thing we go through every six months. I say something, the same people become hysterical, and that's the end of it.

I mean, I think the lesson young right-wingers ought to draw from this is it's really not that scary to attack liberals. This is about my 17th allegedly career-ending moment.

COLMES: But Ann -- well --

COULTER: And by the way, also, again, the left has precisely proved the point of the joke, which was to make fun of that actor going into rehab for using a word. This is like the Soviet Union where if you disagree --

COLMES: It would be better if it were a funnier joke, but --

COULTER: -- with the government, you go into -- you go into --

COLMES: But Ann, you're ignoring my question --

COULTER: -- you know, a mental institution.

I sort of agree. I think the actor in question should have just been fired from the show. Being strong-armed into 'rehab' to allay suspicions of homophobia is no more effective than being sent to 'rehab' to allay suspicions of being homosexual. Be who and what you are and let the chips fall where they may, IMHO.

That said, she's equivocating very, very badly, here. Fact is she called John Edwards a faggot, and a good number of 7000 people(?) at CPAC thought it was funny enough that the laughs and applause outweighed whatever boos and coughs you hear on the tape.

I think this lady hit the nail on the head (H/T to C&L)

And then it all changed... (Duncan Hunter)

Well, teach me to turn my eyes away from a developing story and then go on a road trip.

Did you read my article on Duncan Hunter's Muslim-Hating advisor, Henry Jordan?

It seems that Rep. Hunter did the right thing and let Henry Jordan go on the 26th. The story got picked up on the 1st. My article posted on the 2nd and I've been gone since. Whoops!

(Another whoops has to be pointed out - turns out that Henry Jordan was not a national adviser - just one in S.C. The article is rather oblique about this: "Hunter also named former state Rep. Tom Marchant and Dr. Henry Jordan campaign co-chairmen." Why couldn't they have put 'state' in there? !$#@^@%!!!!

Anyway, This article concerning the fallout is priceless.

Eargle, the Horry County auditor, knows she’ll be taking the lashes for a long time just by looking at the fate of the other person dropped by the Duncan Hunter campaign — Henry Jordan, whose words have stuck with him for a decade.

“I guess, darling, just to put it in a nutshell, that’s politics,” she said.

...

Eargle went on to rip Hunter, a California Republican, dismissing him as a viable candidate.

“He’s not even going to win South Carolina,” the former supporter said. “He lied to me. ... A politician is fake. There’s a difference between a politician and a statesman. He is no statesman — he’s a politician.”

Jordan blamed his woes on the media, which he said paid more attention to things conservatives said than liberals.

“Let me tell you how I feel,” he said. “The daggum news media’s got nothing to write about. I made a joke about Muslims and the daggum news media won’t forget it. They keep bringing it up and bringing it up.”

Jordan said Hunter had told him some bloggers in California had already begun bringing up his infamous remarks. “He said he thought it might be an issue,” Jordan said. “The last thing we want to do is hurt his campaign.”

How interesting, then, that a Duncan Hunter supporter showed up to my humble article... : D

Anyway, that's showbiz.

Oh Boston, Boston, Boston...

Duncan Hunter: Questionable Candidate, Worse Advisors

Rep Duncan Hunter (R-CA) seems a long shot for the President. But he's hurting his already-slim chances by having a poisonous campaign adviser on board. Does he stand behind Dr. Henry Jordan's big, Muslim-hating mouth?

From the article, here

The Duh-Word

In the department of "right heart, wrong head," The city council of New York has voted to ban the use of the word "nigger".

The New York City resolution was sponsored by Councilman Leroy Comrie, who says the "N-word" was derived solely out of hate and anger and that its meaning cannot be changed.

But for America's so-called hip-hop generation using the word among themselves is about self-empowerment.

Its usage is habitual and seems culturally fixed and to stop it is likely to take a change in their attitudes rather than an edict from elected officials.

The fine print is in the 2nd paragraph: "The resolution to ban the so-called "N-word" is largely symbolic as it carries no weight in law and those who use the word would face no punishment." I'd be highly amused to see the n-word patrol, out on the streets with duct tape to muzzle offenders, most of whom would probably be black, themselves.

Sorry, folks - that's not how you combat racial prejudice and hatred. I'm not 100% sure how you do it, given that we've tried and failed for most of our species' time here on Earth, but this ain't it, either.