Political Irony

Tortured Blind Date

Saturday, April 25, 2009

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“Texas Governor Rick Perry said the state of Texas could secede from the Union if it wanted to. Is that what we need, another foreign country on our southern border speaking a language we don’t understand? Come on!” – Jay Leno

“Former President Bush wasted no time responding to this. He said, ‘Wow, does that mean I get to be president again?'” – Jay Leno

“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the United States is now ready to talk to Cuba. You know what that means? Apparently, we are already interviewing replacements for Texas.” – Jay Leno

There are more and more states now where you can get married if you are a gay couple. For example, Vermont, gay couples can get married in Vermont. So that’s good news for Ben and Jerry.” – David Letterman

“President Obama is visiting Mexico this week, where he’s talking to President Calderon about poverty, drugs and violence. When he’s done with that, he plans on talking about the problems in Mexico, too.” – Jay Leno

“The Obama family finally got their dog, a Portuguese water dog. And they have named the dog Bo. And so far, the training of the house-breaking has gone pretty well. The dog has not made any messes, not chewed any furniture. So already he’s ahead of Dick Cheney.” – David Letterman

“Here’s a story that writes itself. People who contribute money to help Hillary Clinton pay off her presidential campaign are being offered the chance to spend a day with Bill Clinton. Yeah. … No, that’s real. All you have to be willing to do is write down everything Bill does and then report back to Hillary.” – Jay Leno

“Climate experts say we should tell villagers in developing countries to reduce the amount of cooking smoke they generate to help fix global warming. You know, it’s as if these people don’t hate us enough already. I mean, they live in mud huts, they have thatch roofs, their clothes are made of straw. We pull up in a bunch of Humvees and SUVs going, ‘Hey, you want to cut the smoke out of here?'” – Jay Leno

“A 13-year-old boy in Peoria, Illinois, has been arrested and accused of robbing a bank. Well, the kid is obviously young and naive. He still thinks banks have money. You know how he got caught? … He was Twittering ‘I’m currently robbing a bank.'” – Jay Leno

“Nieman Marcus announced they’re selling a diamond-studded dog collar for $3.2 million. Well, finally, it’s nice to see one big company that’s not out of touch with mainstream America.” – Jay Leno

“More bad economic news. Southwest Airlines announced they lost $91 million in the first quarter. Now they say they’re going to have to start cutting back. Cutting back? Have you ever flown Southwest, huh? What, are they taking the glass out of the windows?” – Jay Leno

“Earlier this week, there was a reunion of the Bush administration officials in Dallas, Texas. … Reunion of Bush administration officials in Dallas, because there is one team you want to put back together, am I right? You bet, buddy. George W. Bush is now in his ninth year of not being president.” – David Letterman

“Bobby Jindal, the Republican governor of Louisiana, criticized Dick Cheney today, saying that he shouldn’t question Obama’s patriotism. In response, Cheney said, ‘I respect your opinion. That’s cool. Hey, would you like to go on a hunting trip this week?'” – Jimmy Fallon

“It’s being reported a congressional aide caught a staph infection at the Congressional gym. Hey, let me tell you something. If that’s all you catch from a congressman, consider yourself lucky.” – Jay Leno

“Let me ask you something. Did you even know there was a Congressional gym? Have you seen your average congressman? Does Barney Frank look like he’s been to the gym to you? No. I don’t know who’s using it.” – Jay Leno

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Noonan talks out of both sides of her mouth

Friday, April 24, 2009

Peggy Noonan on Clinton committing perjury in a civil suit (December 21, 1998):

The Democrats had long labeled the impeachment debate a distraction from the urgent business of a great nation. But the Republicans argued that the pursuit of justice is the business of a great nation. In winning this point, they caught the falling flag, producing a triumph for the rule of law, a reassertion of the belief that no man is above it, and a rebuke for an arrogance that had grown imperial.

Peggy Noonan on the Bush administration torturing and lying about it (April 19, 2009):

It’s hard for me to look at a great nation issuing these documents and sending them out to the world and thinking, ‘Oh, much good will come of that.’ Sometimes in life you want to keep walking… Some of life has to be mysterious.

I keep thinking about a satirical post I did a few weeks ago about how conservatives reject moral equivalency, therefore it is perfectly alright for them to do things for which they would condemn liberals. This seems to be another glaring example.

Or as Andrew Sullivan puts it “Faster, Peggy, faster“.

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For Bush & Co. Torture DID work

Friday, April 24, 2009

I keep seeing people debating whether or not torture works, and in particular whether it produces “actionable intelligence”. An example of this is liberal pundits trying to respond to Cheney’s recent assertion that torture produced intelligence that prevented a terrorist attack.

You’d think by now we would have seen the Bush administration framing the debate so many times (and so often succeeding) that we would not let them get away with it again (especially now that they are not in power). It doesn’t actually matter if torture “worked”. To Bush and Cheney, it absolutely did work. Their goal was not to find out the truth, their goal was get evidence that would allow them to invade Iraq.

Torture is notorious for getting the person being tortured to say anything you want them to say. Waterboarding was used extensively during the Korean war to get American prisoners to confess to war crimes. The Chinese did not care whether these confessions were true; they only wanted the confessions for use in propaganda.

So in order to get their propaganda, Bush and Cheney authorized the only technique that was guaranteed to get them what they sorely needed. The use of torture provided “intelligence” that allowed them to invade Iraq, which they desperately wanted to do from day one of their administration. Beyond that, any arguments about the effectiveness of torture are simply rationalization.

Unfortunately, once they started using torture, they couldn’t just stop using it once they got what they wanted. That would be tantamount to admitting that it doesn’t actually work. So they had to keep using it — even though it was clearly giving them information that was no good.

What is truly evil about all this is that they weren’t using torture to save us from any terrorist attacks. If they had, then it would be important to know whether it works or not. They were using torture for political reasons. And, for them, it worked like a charm.

UPDATE: Good rant over at Prose Before Hos. Here’s just a sample:

What kind of f**king country do you live in where you have to debate whether torturing someone is a crime? What kind of country do you live in when you can spend 3 years prosecuting the President for a consensual sexual act but won’t prosecute a President for authorizing illegal wiretaps and torturing people? What kind of country do you live in where the supposed ’spiritual’ and ‘religious’ leaders think it’s OK to torture non-Christians?

UPDATE 2: BLOWBACK! You just knew this was going to happen. How can anyone doubt the damage done to the US (both past and future) by our use of torture? How can we repair this damage?

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Meet the Tax Revolters

Friday, April 24, 2009

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Late Night Political Humor

Friday, April 24, 2009

“We have a new ‘border czar.’ His job is to make sure nobody sneaks into the United States from Texas.” – Jay Leno

“Do you know about this? Texas Gov. Rick Perry fired up an anti-tax tea party this week by saying that Texas has the right to secede from the Union if it wants to. And former President Bush, who now lives in Texas, is of course against the idea. Bush said if Texas leaves the Union, they’ll be a foreign country, ‘like Alaska and Hawaii.'” – Jay Leno

“Yesterday, the governor of Texas, Rick Perry, said Texans are fed up with Washington. He said they might secede from the rest of America. If Texas forms their own country, they could be invaded by Mexico. They’ll have to change their name to Texico.” – Craig Ferguson

“But on the plus side, if Texas did secede from the Union, we could then invade them for the oil.” – Jay Leno

“A lot of folks from out of town visiting New York City. Be careful, word of caution, word of caution. Never hail a cab, now I’m serious about this, never hail a cab that is flying a Somalian skull and bones.” – David Letterman

“Have you had a cab driver using a cell phone? I’m in the cab this morning coming to work and I said, ‘Look, look, look. Look, do me a favor, stop talking on your cell phone.’ And the driver said, ‘I’m not talking on my cell phone, I’m on Google Earth trying to track down an oil tanker off the Horn of Africa.'” – David Letterman

“President Obama’s now in Mexico. He has already met with the FWEA, the Future Wal-Mart Employees of America.” – Jay Leno

“President Obama is in Mexico right now. So if you want to break any laws or anything, this is the time to do it.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“The President arrived in Mexico City this morning to discuss border security, drug-related violence, and to officiate at a wet t-shirt contest. It’s spring break for him too, you know.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“Part of the reason the President is there is to help stop the massive flow of drugs into America. Obama’s basic message is, ‘Stop selling us the stuff, no matter how much we pay you.’ And I don’t know if it’s going to work.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“In Philadelphia, a government program offering a $10,000 tax credit to any business hiring an ex-con had no takers. In fact, you know the way most ex-cons actually get jobs? They get re-elected.” – Jay Leno

“Oh, well, here is something that makes me proud to be a member of the NBC family. NBC has signed disgraced former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich to star in a reality series. It’s called, ‘I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!’ This is different from the show he did in Illinois. That was, ‘He’s an Idiot, Get Him Out of There.'” – Jay Leno

“The state of California says that singer Dionne Warwick owes $2.2 million in back taxes. I feel kind of sorry for her. I mean, if there had only been some sort of group or network of psychics she could have consulted with.” – Jay Leno

“New York Governor David Paterson announced that he will support legalizing gay marriage in New York. Well, you can understand why New York politicians are for this. Let’s look at the problems. I mean, David Paterson and his affair, Eliot Spitzer with the hookers, Hillary and Bill. Straight marriages obviously don’t work in New York. Let’s try the gay thing.” – Jay Leno

“George W. Bush has reportedly landed a $7 million book deal. The book will be about his years as president and is tentatively called ‘Decision Point,’ because every time Bush had to make a decision, he would point to Cheney.” – Jay Leno

“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is still paying off her $6 million debt for her unsuccessful presidential campaign. And they’re doing it by auctioning off a number of things, including a chance to spend a day with former President Bill Clinton in New York City, which I think technically makes Hillary a pimp, doesn’t it?” – Jimmy Kimmel

“To pay off her campaign debt, Hillary Clinton is auctioning off a day with Bill Clinton. She is. Bill says he’s thrilled to do it, as long as Hillary isn’t allowed to enter the auction.” – Jimmy Fallon

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Panel of Experts

Thursday, April 23, 2009

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Quote of the Year

Thursday, April 23, 2009

I call on all governments to join with the United States and the community of law-abiding nations in prohibiting, investigating, and prosecuting all acts of torture and in undertaking to prevent other cruel and unusual punishment.

– Official Proclamation by President Bush, June 26 2003

And as an added bonus, Cheney’s claim that the torture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed — the guy who was waterboarded 183 times in one month — gave them information that prevented a major terrorist attack on Los Angeles is (in the words of a senior FBI official) “ludicrous“. In fact, the LA plot had been cancelled by February 2002, and Mohammed was not captured until March 2003.

Does Cheney actually believe the lies that he keeps spewing out? As Hillary Clinton put it bluntly on Tuesday when asked about Cheney, “I don’t consider him a particularly reliable source of information.”

UPDATE: The agent who interrogated Abu Zubaydah also says that claims that torture was necessary to prevent future terrorist attacks is absolutely false. Interestingly, he also believes that use of torture was requested by contractors, not CIA officers. This puts a new spin on torture — it wasn’t the CIA, the FBI, or even the military who wanted to use torture, it was the Bush corporate cronies who were making tons of money off the war on terrorism.

UPDATE 2: Another mind-numbing quote from Bush: “War crimes will be prosecuted, war criminals will be punished and it will be no defense to say, ‘I was just following orders.'” I guess that doesn’t apply to himself (he was saying it to the Iraqis just before the invasion).

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Tortured Explanations

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Jon Stewart nails it on the head again. Best quote is: “Apparently everyone’s not upset about the fact that we torture. They’re upset about the fact that we know about it.”

I do want to point out one little thing. When joking about how one prisoner was waterboarded 183 times in one month, Stewart thinks maybe it would lose its effectiveness — like the prisoner might get used to it and not be afraid of drowning. Waterboarding triggers a primal panic response. Here’s a video of a journalist who bet he could endure 15 seconds of waterboarding. Of course, he knew he would not actually be drowned, and he had a signal so he could stop it at any time. But it still totally freaked him out (and no, he did not last anywhere near 15 seconds).

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Late Night Political Humor

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

“The mayor of New York City, Mayor Bloomberg, is going to outlaw cab drivers talking on cell phones. And are you like me? Do you hate it when you are in a taxicab and the driver is twittering the Taliban? Awful.” – David Letterman

“Here’s something that caught my attention as I was leafing through the paper this morning. NBC is making a reality show starring former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. This is the same network that didn’t want me.” – David Letterman

Tea Parties

“A lot of protests today. Thousands of people had these tea parties, during which they protested higher taxes. But here in LA, it was called the Green Herbal Double Decaf Tea Party.” – Jay Leno

“Some Americans did a very dumb thing today. They had tea party protests. They’ve been mailing tea bags to Congress to I guess express their dissatisfaction with taxes and government spending because nothing shakes a politician up like a complimentary bag of tea. ‘Hey if you don’t straighten up next year, crumpets, buddy.'” – Jimmy Kimmel

“This is like the Boston tea party for people that decided, let’s say, I don’t know, two and a half months ago, that they didn’t want to pay taxes anymore. The tea part is just a metaphor [on screen: a Fox News reporter pointing to boxes at one of the tea parties containing a million tea bags]. Let me get this straight. To protest wasteful spending, you bought a million tea bags. Are you protesting taxes or irony?” – Jon Stewart

Taxes

“According to MSNBC, there’s a big problem with identity theft affecting electronic tax filing. People are stealing other people’s identities, filing taxes in their name, and then getting their refund check. Today, half the Obama administration said, ‘That’s what happened to us!'” – Jay Leno

“Well, hey, it’s tax day today. It’s tax day. It’s Wednesday, April 15th. But if you don’t get yours down in time, don’t worry about it. The good news is, you may be on your way to an Obama cabinet position. So that’s good. Congratulations. Good luck.” – Jimmy Fallon

“President Obama should get a big refund this year because he has a lot of dependents. AIG, Citibank, Morgan Stanley — all dependents.” – Jay Leno

Obama

“I heard this coming out here a few minutes ago. Apparently, Rush Limbaugh’s dog said it hopes that Obama’s dog fails.” – David Letterman

“But the good news is we have a new White House dog, a Portuguese water dog named Bo. So welcome to the White House, Bo. Actually, Bo has only been there a couple of days, but he is already very busy. Earlier today, Bo hosted a luncheon for former White House dogs.” – David Letterman

“And you know they have Bo wearing one of those electronic collars. If he strays beyond the perimeter of the White House grounds he gets a little buzz. That’s to make sure he doesn’t — no, wait a minute, that’s Joe Biden.” – David Letterman

“President Obama has lifted the travel ban to Cuba. If you do travel to Cuba, don’t forget to set your watch back 50 years. Yeah, if you go back. If you’re looking for a ’58 Buick, that’s the place to get it.” – Jay Leno

“President Obama is going to Mexico tomorrow. He visited Canada a couple weeks ago, then he went throughout Europe, then he went to Iraq, and tomorrow he’s going to Mexico. See, this is what happens when your mother-in-law moves in with you. ‘Honey, I’m going to be out on the road a couple weeks.'” – Jay Leno

The Economy

“And, according to the U.S. Labor Department, because of the recession, the number of unemployed lawyers in this country has hit a ten-year high. So, see, there is a silver lining in all of this.” – Jay Leno

“You know what you call a bunch of lawyers sitting around out of work doing nothing? Congress!” – Jay Leno

“In Arlington, Virginia, the Environmental Protection Agency is holding something called the National Bed Bug Summit. Health officials are going to offer advice on how to combat the growing problem of bed bugs. And it’s being held in Arlington’s Crystal City Sheraton Hotel. See, that’s when you know the economy is bad, okay? When a Sheraton hotel is thrilled to be hosting the bed bug summit. ‘Hey, be sure to come back in June for the big head lice symposium.'” – Jay Leno

“Newsweek magazine reports that the reason there are so many of these pirate hijackings is that the shipping companies have decided it’s cheaper just to pay a ransom than to change the shipping route to sail out of the pirates’ way. So even though these are evil crooks, we give them the money anyway. It’s the same way the bank bailout works.” – Jay Leno

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Republican Moral Relativism

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

UPDATE: What’s even more bizarre about the right-wingnuts freaking out about Obama shaking hands with Hugo Chavez, is that they keep referring to Chavez as a dictator, even though he is a three-time democratically elected president. As for shaking hands with dictators, watch this video:

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Nothing is ever Sarah Palin’s Fault

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Last week, Sarah Palin’s nominee to be the Alaska Attorney General, Wayne Ross, was denied by the Legislature. It was the first time in Alaska’s (short) history that a nominee was not confirmed for any state agency. A new Attorney General was needed because her last one resigned because of the Troopergate scandal.

But in an interview yesterday, Palin blamed bloggers and the public for the defeat, claiming “A great problem was public lies were told about Mr. Ross.” But when asked for an example, the only one she could come up with was “he being engaged in a machine gun shoot on somebody’s property down in Seward, and there were witnesses to such a thing, and he’d never been there.”

Fortunately, the newspaper doing the interview did a Google search, and couldn’t find any mention of that story in any blog or other website. They even asked the main legislator who led the fight against the appointment, and he hadn’t even heard that story.

What did sink Ross’ nomination? Could it have been his statement “If you can’t rape your wife, who are you gonna rape?” Or his previous bigoted statements against Native americans and gays? Or the fact that during the nomination fight, Palin herself was off in Indiana, at an anti-choice fundraiser.

The real problem here is that once again, Palin is claiming that this isn’t her fault. As one Alaska blogger puts it “Sarah Palin is George W. Bush with lipstick; nothing is ever her fault.”

Troopergate was her brother-in-law’s fault. Her terrible interviews were the fault of Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson. Her expensive wardrobe was the RNC’s fault. Her problems during the presidential campaign were John McCain’s fault. Her daughter’s problems are all Levi Johnson’s fault. Can you think of any problem for which she has taken responsibility?

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The Mainstream Media is Worthless

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

A year ago, David Barstow reported in the NY Times reported on how the Pentagon was manipulating the news by planting retired generals into major networks as independent analysts, and that in many cases the networks themselves were complicit. What made this even worse was that this story was completely suppressed by the networks in question, including ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, and Fox.

What makes this news again is that Barstow just won a Pulitzer prize for investigative journalism for this story, and yet, when these same networks reported on the Pulitzer prizes, every single one of them failed to mention this particular one, even when they gave details about other prize winners. Could it be because many of them continue to employ these fake “independent analysts”?

So the bottom line is that the TV networks feed you propaganda direct from the Pentagon, without telling you that their “independent analysts” aren’t really independent (not only do most of them work for the Pentagon, many also have ties to military contractors so they stand to benefit financially from the lies they are spreading). Then, when this scandal is exposed, they completely suppress it (to this day, the story was only mentioned by bloggers on the Internet). Then, when the story wins a Pulitzer prize, the networks pretend like this particular winner didn’t exist.

The mainstream media must believe that if they don’t report on a story, then it doesn’t exist. My question is, how far can they stick their heads into the ground.

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The Revenge of Darth Cheney

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

“It’s important not to personally attack the new president. I’ve never done that.” -Dick Cheney on Fox News

Meanwhile, in a galaxy far, far away, but in the very same interview, Cheney criticized Obama for shaking hands with Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez:

I think you have to be very careful. The world outside there — both our friends and our foes –will be quick to take advantage of a situation if they think they’re dealing with a weak president or one who’s not going to stand up and aggressively defend America’s interests.

MSNBC responds “Did Cheney just call Obama weak?”

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The RightWingOVerse

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

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Tortured Blind Date

Late Night Political Humor

Noonan talks out of both sides of her mouth

For Bush & Co. Torture DID work

Meet the Tax Revolters

Late Night Political Humor

Panel of Experts

Quote of the Year

Tortured Explanations