The Globe rehashes old news today, reminding it's readers that Governor Patrick makes a point to attend the funerals of servicemen killed in Iraq/Afghanistan.
This has been reported before both by the Globe and by local TV news so the story hardly seems new in any way. Nevertheless it does make an odd book-end to yesterday's bizarre front page assertion that the Governor was not spending enough time on the job, except when he is attending soldier's funerals, hosting policy forums or checking up on conditions in Peru, Florida, Mendon or Sunderland.
Dukakis, even when he was riding high, came in for this kind of schizophrenic treatment all the time...one day they love him the next they loath him. The Globe has always been ambivalent about it's weighty liberal bona fides...never more so than when a democrat is governor for some odd reason.
Well...I say the Globe forget all this useless palaver about where the Governor spends his long weekends and concentrate on the pension issue. If Morrissey Boulevard wants to go down fighting AND hold the executive and legislature's fee to the fire...I say the foot-toasting begins with pensions.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
The Death-Scream for Purity....
Jeff Jacoby, the Boston Globe's laughing young senescence, soon to be back selling used cars in Norwood...takes time out of his busy schedule to slag Colin Powell.
Whenever conservatives run out of ideas they start insisting that they have plenty of ideas they just need to be imposed on the GOP more firmly and with the zeal of an amok puritan.
Hence Jeff's attempt to read Powell out of the ranks of conservatism...an army the former Secretary of State was never a member of to begin with. Just because he served under conservatives doesn't make Powell a conservative, certainly not the sort of book-worshipping, witchburning, selfish, intellectually bankrupt, hypocritical, political autistic that constitutes movement conservatism today.
Ah but Jeff doesn't get that...purity and zeal is the name of the game over on the other side that is when they are not whining like whipped curs of course.
This line in particular is especially hilarious:
Though he owes every lofty position he has held - national security adviser, four-star general, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, secretary of state - to GOP presidents, Republicans perpetually appear to rub him the wrong way: especially the conservatives who constitute the party's base.
There are never any moderates in the GOP's base ever notice that? Of course not they have all defected to the democrats after being nigh deafened by Jeff and his ilk's screams for loyalty and purity.
One of the lasting legacies of the Bush-Rove years is the GOP's war on party moderates, the constant need to attack and destroy unbelievers to fall upon the nearest at hand usually their own mushy middle of the roaders.
Which is why the GOP is at a 21% identification level nationally, numbers that are only slightly better than Henry Wallace's Progressive Party or that of the Spanish Falange.
Whenever conservatives run out of ideas they start insisting that they have plenty of ideas they just need to be imposed on the GOP more firmly and with the zeal of an amok puritan.
Hence Jeff's attempt to read Powell out of the ranks of conservatism...an army the former Secretary of State was never a member of to begin with. Just because he served under conservatives doesn't make Powell a conservative, certainly not the sort of book-worshipping, witchburning, selfish, intellectually bankrupt, hypocritical, political autistic that constitutes movement conservatism today.
Ah but Jeff doesn't get that...purity and zeal is the name of the game over on the other side that is when they are not whining like whipped curs of course.
This line in particular is especially hilarious:
Though he owes every lofty position he has held - national security adviser, four-star general, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, secretary of state - to GOP presidents, Republicans perpetually appear to rub him the wrong way: especially the conservatives who constitute the party's base.
There are never any moderates in the GOP's base ever notice that? Of course not they have all defected to the democrats after being nigh deafened by Jeff and his ilk's screams for loyalty and purity.
One of the lasting legacies of the Bush-Rove years is the GOP's war on party moderates, the constant need to attack and destroy unbelievers to fall upon the nearest at hand usually their own mushy middle of the roaders.
Which is why the GOP is at a 21% identification level nationally, numbers that are only slightly better than Henry Wallace's Progressive Party or that of the Spanish Falange.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
More and more I've come to the conclusion that
Former Vice President Dick "The Faceblaster" Cheney's closest literary antecedent is none other that Comrade Napoleon, Orwell's power hungry pig from that deathless modern fable, "Animal Farm".
Whenever Dick speaks these days it is in a charming neanderthal grunt that asserts "We iz strong, da strong should rule...we must become more strong...bullies are brave cuz they are strong..." yaddah yaddah yaddah.
Hence his recent tie-up with Rush Limbaugh,I mean he'd never chose a beaten man like Colin Powell would he? Doesn't make sense from the neolithic bone-cave perspective of the Former VP.
Rush at least is the sort of fat sickly leviathan that pre-hominids like Dick Cheney regard as a Titan made flesh.
James Carville speaks of forty years of democratic dominance in Washington DC, this strikes me as a fantasy...but it could happen all we'd need is for Cheney to remain healthy and talkative and for Michael Steele to recruit the candidates...the rest of it will be akin to watching Bonnie Prince Charlie's Highlanders gettung cut down by the Redcoats at Culloden.
Whenever Dick speaks these days it is in a charming neanderthal grunt that asserts "We iz strong, da strong should rule...we must become more strong...bullies are brave cuz they are strong..." yaddah yaddah yaddah.
Hence his recent tie-up with Rush Limbaugh,I mean he'd never chose a beaten man like Colin Powell would he? Doesn't make sense from the neolithic bone-cave perspective of the Former VP.
Rush at least is the sort of fat sickly leviathan that pre-hominids like Dick Cheney regard as a Titan made flesh.
James Carville speaks of forty years of democratic dominance in Washington DC, this strikes me as a fantasy...but it could happen all we'd need is for Cheney to remain healthy and talkative and for Michael Steele to recruit the candidates...the rest of it will be akin to watching Bonnie Prince Charlie's Highlanders gettung cut down by the Redcoats at Culloden.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Politics in Massachusetts is funny
It is arguable that Boston Mayor Tom Menino hasn't had a new idea in over a decade, city services lumber along and the crime rate spikes and drops and spikes and drops...and yet for all that he has a twenty five point lead over his nearest rival in this year's mayoral election.
Meanwhile Governor Deval Patrick who bristles with good ideas from pension reform to consolidation of transportation bureaus is at best a fifty fifty shot for re-election next year.
Of course I've long maintained being Mayor of Boston even a would-be five term wonder like Tom just doesn't engender the scrutiny a that gets applied to a sitting Governor. Some of this is tribalism, some it is is just a bad local custom in action....the rest of it is plain inexplicable.
The contrast though couldn't be starker, Menino has risen from unintelligible to simply boring, Patrick is a master rhetorician, crisp and precise in all his public pronouncements.
Yet Tom is coasting to victory while Deval must look over his shoulder and apply the whip.
The crowning irony is that Menino's current rivals Sam Yoon and Michael Flaherty do seem to have some interesting ideas or at least contrasting notions as to how Boston functions as a community...whereas Governor Patrick's potential opponents (Harvard Pilgrim CEO Charlie Baker and State Treasurer Tim Cahill) will be hard pressed when the time comes to explain to the public just what the hell they can do differently.
Meanwhile Governor Deval Patrick who bristles with good ideas from pension reform to consolidation of transportation bureaus is at best a fifty fifty shot for re-election next year.
Of course I've long maintained being Mayor of Boston even a would-be five term wonder like Tom just doesn't engender the scrutiny a that gets applied to a sitting Governor. Some of this is tribalism, some it is is just a bad local custom in action....the rest of it is plain inexplicable.
The contrast though couldn't be starker, Menino has risen from unintelligible to simply boring, Patrick is a master rhetorician, crisp and precise in all his public pronouncements.
Yet Tom is coasting to victory while Deval must look over his shoulder and apply the whip.
The crowning irony is that Menino's current rivals Sam Yoon and Michael Flaherty do seem to have some interesting ideas or at least contrasting notions as to how Boston functions as a community...whereas Governor Patrick's potential opponents (Harvard Pilgrim CEO Charlie Baker and State Treasurer Tim Cahill) will be hard pressed when the time comes to explain to the public just what the hell they can do differently.
Sunday, May 03, 2009
on Hiatus next week
Going to NYC for some R &R...might update if i see something worthwhile. However if it all goes to smash and i don't come back, try to remember I was an Eagle.
Checked the mail yesterday and
still no Pulitzer.
Ah but Monday is another day and I am still young by the standards of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Now...if the only way I could collect on that award was still on a podium quietly and suffer thru a speech by Former President Bush or worse...Mitt Romney hell I'd do it.
I'd even make polite noises afterwards.
Why?
In my time I've had to works productively next to outright falangists, people weirder than Mitt Romney in every way, one learns to cope.
Jeff Jacoby though, the Globe's Laughing Young Senescence, holds a different view.
He applauds Harvard Professor Mary Glendon's decision to decline an award from Notre Dame as it would entail listening politely to President Obama's commencement address.
Churlish and stupid sez I, it isn't about Obama's views on abortion (which Professor Glendon abhors) it all about making a big self indulgent scene on behalf of one's ideology.
This sort of crude narcissism, Jacoby calls "courage".
Frankly all I can say to Professor Glendon is, wayward sister go in peace.
Movement conservatism abounds with theatrical rubbish like this, GOP stalwarts are never more unconvincing when they start swanning about in this fashion. It is idiot dram queen antics like this that got them smacked down hard last fall, anyone else recall Senator McCain's silly melodramatic campaign suspension when the bailout bill came to a vote?
This whole sad situation only rebounds to President Obama's credit...as always he is sane cool and unfazed while every one of his opponents goes cavorting in the limelight like druken Nibelungs.
As for Jeff Jacoby, he is never more laughable than when he pimps out for the Vatican's Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, you'd think he was a 20 year usher at Saint Muldoons or something.
Ah but Monday is another day and I am still young by the standards of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Now...if the only way I could collect on that award was still on a podium quietly and suffer thru a speech by Former President Bush or worse...Mitt Romney hell I'd do it.
I'd even make polite noises afterwards.
Why?
In my time I've had to works productively next to outright falangists, people weirder than Mitt Romney in every way, one learns to cope.
Jeff Jacoby though, the Globe's Laughing Young Senescence, holds a different view.
He applauds Harvard Professor Mary Glendon's decision to decline an award from Notre Dame as it would entail listening politely to President Obama's commencement address.
Churlish and stupid sez I, it isn't about Obama's views on abortion (which Professor Glendon abhors) it all about making a big self indulgent scene on behalf of one's ideology.
This sort of crude narcissism, Jacoby calls "courage".
Frankly all I can say to Professor Glendon is, wayward sister go in peace.
Movement conservatism abounds with theatrical rubbish like this, GOP stalwarts are never more unconvincing when they start swanning about in this fashion. It is idiot dram queen antics like this that got them smacked down hard last fall, anyone else recall Senator McCain's silly melodramatic campaign suspension when the bailout bill came to a vote?
This whole sad situation only rebounds to President Obama's credit...as always he is sane cool and unfazed while every one of his opponents goes cavorting in the limelight like druken Nibelungs.
As for Jeff Jacoby, he is never more laughable than when he pimps out for the Vatican's Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, you'd think he was a 20 year usher at Saint Muldoons or something.
Friday, May 01, 2009
I love it when big blustery wingnuts turn
chickensh*t....nothing more amusing, it even beats the Kentucky Derby for sheer entertainment value.
Case in point, WTKK-FM has "suspended" chat show tyrant Jay Severin for making inflammatory remarks about Mexicans in the wake of the current swine flu crisis.
You could just see the suits at WTKK diving under their desks in terror, you see they want their audiences (who are bombarded with wingnut bombast 24-7) agitated but still willing to buy Fritos Corn Chips at Christy's...not stoked to mob violence...bad for the sponsor's bottom line doncha know?
Frankly the whole ghasty comedy is entirely situational, Jay has in fact been talking like this for years and no one gave a hoot in hell til the swine flu came along and suddenly everyone has nightmares straight out of Steven King's "The Stand".
Let Humble Elias be simple and blunt, it isn't about the damn flu, we will survive that. No it is about WTKK's willingness to profit by Jay Severin's continual need to verbally persecute out-groups that cannot fight back given the nature of his show. So until the debate is at least about having a debate then...there is no debate.
Case in point, WTKK-FM has "suspended" chat show tyrant Jay Severin for making inflammatory remarks about Mexicans in the wake of the current swine flu crisis.
You could just see the suits at WTKK diving under their desks in terror, you see they want their audiences (who are bombarded with wingnut bombast 24-7) agitated but still willing to buy Fritos Corn Chips at Christy's...not stoked to mob violence...bad for the sponsor's bottom line doncha know?
Frankly the whole ghasty comedy is entirely situational, Jay has in fact been talking like this for years and no one gave a hoot in hell til the swine flu came along and suddenly everyone has nightmares straight out of Steven King's "The Stand".
Let Humble Elias be simple and blunt, it isn't about the damn flu, we will survive that. No it is about WTKK's willingness to profit by Jay Severin's continual need to verbally persecute out-groups that cannot fight back given the nature of his show. So until the debate is at least about having a debate then...there is no debate.
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)