Right Wing Radio's Waterloo: "ABSOLUTELY TORTURE"

This is the Chicago shock jock, Mancow Muller, who once called President Obama a Muslim, and who has incessantly shouted the right wing (radio) mantra that waterboarding is not torture. Well, the tables were turned on the shock jock when he was subjected to an all too brief shock of his own: TORTURE.




At least Mancow was honest enough (I was going to say man enough, but he's not so big or manly, hell he's a winger) to admit the truth, having experienced it. He lasted less than SIX seconds; I counted FOUR. Too bad. In the back of my mind I wanted the winger's torture to last longer than their average premature ejaculations. Oh well.

Mancow Waterboarded, Admits It's Torture

"It is way worse than I thought it would be"

By RYAN POLLYEA


And so it went Friday morning when WLS radio host Erich "Mancow" Muller decided to subject himself to the controversial practice of waterboarding live on his show.

Mancow decided to tackle the divisive issue head on -- actually it was head down, while restrained and reclining.

"I want to find out if it's torture," Mancow told his listeners Friday morning, adding that he hoped his on-air test would help prove that waterboarding did not, in fact, constitute torture.

"The average person can take this for 14 seconds," Marine Sergeant Clay South answered, adding, "He's going to wiggle, he's going to scream, he's going to wish he never did this."

With a Chicago Fire Department paramedic on hand, Mancow was placed on a 7-foot long table, his legs were elevated, and his feet were tied up.

Turns out the stunt wasn't so funny. Witnesses said Muller thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop. He only lasted 6 or 7 seconds.

"It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that's no joke,"Mancow said, likening it to a time when he nearly drowned as a child. "It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back...It was instantaneous...and I don't want to say this: absolutely torture."

"I wanted to prove it wasn't torture," Mancow said. "They cut off our heads, we put water on their face...I got voted to do this but I really thought 'I'm going to laugh this off.' "

Last year, Vanity Fair writer Christopher Hitchens endured the same experiment -- and came to a similar conclusion. The conservative writer said he found the treatment terrifying, and was haunted by it for months afterward.

"Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture," Hitchens concluded in the article.

POSTCRIPT: Keith Olbermann who had offered to donate $1,000 for every second Sean Hannity endured waterboarding withdrew his offer after Mancow had the "guts" to go through with it. Mancow's program contacted KO as to whether the offer was still on the table, and the answer was YES. Olbermann has donated $10,000 to a charity for military families in the radio shock jock's name (the winger with a smidgeon of guts). GOOD MAN, Keith.

Is Dick Cheney the Most Hideously Traitorous VEEP since Aaron Burr?

Worse, I'd say. At least Burr was a better shot.

Dick Cheney’s speech yesterday was filled with so many lies that it would be impossible to name them all in context in this limited space. But here’s a start.

My favorite reaction to Cheney's speech came from former CIA analyst, Jack White:

"He beat the CIA for year after year like a Piñata, and then all of a sudden he's going to become their champion?!?"

No we can't! No we can't!

Beer tax on tap for health care?

WASHINGTON (AP) — Consumers in the United States may have to hand over nearly $2 more for a case of beer to help provide health insurance for all.

Details of the proposed beer tax are described in a Senate Finance Committee document that will be used to brief lawmakers Wednesday at a closed-door meeting.

Taxes on wine and hard liquor would also go up. And there might be a new tax on soda and other sugary drinks blamed for contributing to obesity. No taxes on diet drinks, however.

Beer taxes would go up by 48 cents a six-pack, wine taxes would rise by 49 cents per bottle, and the tax on hard liquor would increase by 40 cents per fifth. Proceeds from the new taxes would help cover an estimated 50 million uninsured Americans.

Science and Bad Movies

Tom Hanks was on The Daily Show last night to talk about Angels and Demons, and the discussion into the science of antimatter was, not to put too fine a point on it, excruciating. I now know not to ask Tom Hanks or Jon Stewart any physics questions.

I must correct the scientific record - I think it's in my contract or something.

What actually happens is that the amount of antimatter that is created is very small (it's a bunch of antiprotons, and they're smaller than 10^-15 meters across), and it needs to be held in a magnetic field to remain stable - it actually moves around a storage ring at very high speeds. The explosions that the antiprotons make when they collide with protons wouldn't really be visible at all, since none of the particles they create are large enough to see and they don't emit light in the visible range. The detectors that we use to see the products of the collision are huge, expensive, and very complicated. You couldn't walk around with a vial of antimatter, because you need something to generate the magnetic field to hold the antiprotons away from so-called normal matter.

A delightful Sean Hannity Ass-Kicking

Kudos Jesse Ventura!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeMuDN9Ewyc

And in this corner...

We have Randy Rossi of Grayslake, Illinois. This constitutional scholar demonstrated his brilliance to the world this morning in the local paper, lamenting how, with regard to poor little Miss California, that "[w]e didn't hear from the ACLU defending her rights to her personal opinion."

Randy, here's a tip for you. Don't wast any time waiting for the phone to ring with news of one of those "genius grants."

THE ACLU??? Why would they get involved? Where have her civil rights been violated? Was she arrested? No. Was her speech suppressed in any way by state action? Of course not. She has a right to be heard without government interference and we have the right to say that there is little difference between her bust size and her IQ. And Randy, before embarrassing yourself in public, turn off Fox News, brush up on some basic civics and

Nancy Pelosi the Target of Right Wing Sexism

It comes as no surprise that sexism is alive and well in the male-dominated worlds of Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes, right wing radio, and Fox-Lite wannabes like CNN. (Shame on MSNBC for joining this lineup.) What's really disgusting is the ferocity of the attacks. At least, President Obama's election has had the salutary effect of unmasking the true nature of the right wing mullahs. Sunlight, as they say, is the best disinfectant.



One wonders what those hard-edged, coiffed women working at Fox think about this, above and beyond the daily indignities they suffer, along with all working women. They're either sublimely hypocritical opportunists like Greta Van Susteren, who prefers the legal beat but toes the party line on politics, or the vacuous, vaguely ideological 'Stepford' blonde anchors favored by Murdoch and Ailes.

Beauty pageants are fertile launching pads for women seeking a right wing career path: Sarah Palin was a Miss Alaska runner-up, and just recently Miss California got her big shot on Fox and Friends, standing in for a former Miss America.

By the way, Carrie Prejean was not criticized for her views against gay marriage -- she has the right to free speech -- but rather for breaking pageant rules, lying about past indiscretions, and lending her name to a political activist group engaged in defeating gay marriage. So her Profile in Hypocrisy is a perfect match for Faux News, isn't it?

Whether or not Nancy Pelosi has had Botox injections or a facelift (hell, Joe Biden has very bad hair plugs) is irrelevant to her position. Nancy Pelosi is not a participant in a beauty contest seeking a political or media position; she earned her place as the first female Speaker of the House of Representatives in our nation's history.

One gets the distinct impression that these wingers were just chomping at the bit for the first opportunity to launch sexist attacks on Pelosi. It's so hard for conservative white males to go against their nature. They're an endangered species (thanks be to the Goddess!), but they have served notice they will not go quietly into the night.

Time to change our SOX?

No, not the White or Red Sox, but what we in my line of work refer to as "SOX"--the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

This was a huge and somewhat hastily-passed piece of legislation to deal with the Enron, WorldCom, etc. scandals (ah, it was such a simpler time when companies merely engaged in "creative accounting" rather than turning Wall Street into a giant financial casino.) Well, today, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear (in legalese, granted a petition for certiorari) a challenge to a key part of that act, the establishment and empowering of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board.

The legal points are somewhat obtuse, dealing with the constitutional "appointments clause." But let's be serious for a moment. The groups funding this (headed by our old pal Ken Starr) don't give a damn about accounting regulation and oversight. They want to overturn the entire Sarbanes-Oxley Act, with its corporate accountability provisions.

Granting cert means that 4 justices wanted to hear it (hmmm, Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Scalia?). SO the fate of financial regulation in America rests on--Mr. Swing Vote, Justice Kennedy.

Your Armchair Movie Critic

If you liked the book, you'll hate the movie. If you didn't read the book, you will be underwhelmed by the movie.

Repugnant in the News: Karl Rove Interrogated by Feds

Karl Rove reportedly squealed: "DON'T WATERBOARD ME!!! PLEASE ... PLEEEAAASE." (Copious SOBS)
Fed interrogator: "Sir, CALM DOWN. We don't do this any longer. Would you like a Valium?"
KR: "Yes, please ..." (Whimper)

KARL ROVE TO BE QUESTIONED BY PROSECUTOR

The aim: to determine if officials obstructed justice in the dismissals of U.S. attorneys.
Washington Post
May 15, 2009

Washington -- Karl Rove will be interviewed today as part of a criminal investigation into the firing of U.S. attorneys under President George W. Bush, two sources say.

Rove, a former senior aide to Bush, will be questioned by Connecticut prosecutor Nora Dannehy, who in September was named to examine whether former Justice Department and White House officials lied or obstructed justice in connection with the dismissal of federal prosecutors in 2006.

Re: You Read it Here First (Peter's Prophecy)

Note: Peter once hit a $20 straight exacta at the Kentucky Derby for $1,000 and change, so his gift for prophecy in the Sport of Kings is established. The rest, by comparison, is gravy.

Let it be written--let it be done

And the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls--and sometimes in blogs:

Miss California on Cable News: Fox & Friends Gives Carrie Prejean Her Chance
May 14, 2009 03:24 PM ET Paul Bedard Permanent Link Print
by Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

Miss California and Miss USA runner-up, Carrie Prejean, tossed around in the battle over gay marriage, will be a one-day guest host for Fox News Channel's popular morning show Fox & Friends, Whispers learns. She will host the 6 a.m.-to-7 a.m. slot on May 27, filling in for Gretchen Carlson—the 1989 Miss America—who will be off that day.

The party of Lincoln

Is now a petulant 3rd-grader (from Politico, courtesy of my pal Ms. Em):

A member of the Republican National Committee told me Tuesday that when the RNC meets in an extraordinary special session next week, it will approve a resolution rebranding Democrats as the “Democrat Socialist Party.” When I asked if such a resolution would force RNC Chairman Michael Steele to use that label when talking about Democrats in all his speeches and press releases, the RNC member replied: “Who cares?”

I understand that "Democrat Socialist Party" narrowly edged out "Stinky Poo Poo Heads," and that the RNC further stated "na na na na na you can't get me" and emphasized that girls have "cooties."

A concise statement of the obvious

From former law prof, current federal appeals judge and interesting crank Richard Posner:

By the end of the Clinton administration, I was content to celebrate the triumph of conservatism as I understood it, and had no desire for other than incremental changes in the economic and social structure of the United States. I saw no need for the estate tax to be abolished, marginal personal-income tax rates further reduced, the government shrunk, pragmatism in constitutional law jettisoned in favor of "originalism," the rights of gun owners enlarged, our military posture strengthened, the rise of homosexual rights resisted, or the role of religion in the public sphere expanded. All these became causes embraced by the new conservatism that crested with the reelection of Bush in 2004.

My theme is the intellectual decline of conservatism, and it is notable that the policies of the new conservatism are powered largely by emotion and religion and have for the most part weak intellectual groundings. That the policies are weak in conception, have largely failed in execution, and are political flops is therefore unsurprising. The major blows to conservatism, culminating in the election and programs of Obama, have been fourfold: the failure of military force to achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives; the inanity of trying to substitute will for intellect, as in the denial of global warming, the use of religious criteria in the selection of public officials, the neglect of management and expertise in government; a continued preoccupation with abortion; and fiscal incontinence in the form of massive budget deficits, the Medicare drug plan, excessive foreign borrowing, and asset-price inflation.

By the fall of 2008, the face of the Republican Party had become Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber. Conservative intellectuals had no party.

I would argue that the judge might be overstating the intellectual power of conservatism even BEFORE its Limbaugh-ization, but that is another story for another time. His analysis of the party and what passes for "conservatism" hits fairly close to the mark.

Hurray for Miss California!

Now go away. Now. Away. Go.

I think I know where she's headed though. She's blond, dumb as multiple bags of hammers, with a fake tan, fake boobs, hell, everything about her is fake. You know what that means?

FUTURE FOX NEWS ANCHOR!!!!!!!!

The Right Just Keeps Lying and Lying and Lying

The chattering right wing chihuahuas LIE with almost complete impunity. It’s nearly impossible to catch these bloviators in real time because they keep throwing out the lies quicker than anyone can correct them. Sure, there’s YouTube, KO, Rachel Maddow, Huff Post, and the blogs. The problem is the lag time and a captive audience that has already drunk the Kool Aid.

On the bright side, the right is losing audience as fast as the left is gaining it, so the country is becoming less stupid as a result. Those of us who tuned in to Keith Olbermann last night were treated to a fist-pumping point-by-point destruction of Bill-Oh Really’s historical revisionism that President Obama was wrong when he said Winston Churchill never tortured.

Yes, Bill-Oh, you are WRONG, you fool; ignorant lying sophist.


Sunday, on This Week with Georgie Boy, the unctuous George F. Swill declared imperiously that “more than 80% of Americans are more than satisfied with their health care plans.”

WRONG again, Swill, and YOU KNOW IT. The FCC ought to have a voluntary truth-in-commentary rule that would place the political chattering class on time delay so that every time they utter an untruth the viewer would see a freeze frame with a rolling text box at the bottom displaying the factual information. I propose that it be called WINGERFAX.



As soon as Swill makes the statement, “more than 80% of Americans are more than satisfied with their health care plans,” the screen would be frozen and the following rolling text displayed at the bottom:

According to the respected Gallup Poll (12/4/08) on Americans’ attitudes toward U.S. healthcare:

“The net result of these observations about the way U.S. healthcare works is that Americans generally believe the system is highly troubled: 14% say it is "in a state of crisis" and 59% think it has "major problems." Only 26% believe it has minor problems and a slight 1% say it does not have any problems.”

What’s most galling about this smug little jerk with a bow tie is that as the father of a special needs child who was never denied the best healthcare available, one would expect him to have some empathy for the uninsured, or at least, to accurately and honestly discuss the state of healthcare. 

But this is by no means the one and only time Swill has lied: as with all right wingers it's a consistent pattern with him.

- In 1980, Swill helped Ronald Reagan prepare for his presidential debate while posing as a neutral or objective journalist. There were similar conflicts of interest involving his associations with Conrad Black and Bob Dole.

- More recently, in a 2008 column Swill claimed China and Cuba had partnered to drill for oil off the Florida coast. That statement was false, and Swill published a retraction, but not before Dick Cheney and John Boehner repeated it.

- In 2009 Swill disseminated false information about the effects of global warming by claiming that, "[a]ccording to the University of Illinois' Arctic Climate Research Center, global sea levels now equal those of 1979." The Arctic Climate Research website of U of I fired back: "We do not know where George Will is getting his information, but our data shows that on February 15, 1979, global sea ice area was 16.79 million sq. km and on February 15, 2009, global sea ice area was 15.45 million sq. km. Therefore, global sea ice levels are 1.34 million sq. km less in February 2009 than in February 1979."

And so, Swill's off-the-cuff "80%" remark is simply the first salvo as he (and I'm sure, Bill-Oh) aim to destroy President Obama's efforts to provide healthcare for all Americans. Their campaign will be one of lies, misinformation, and slander to swiftboat healthcare. (Yes, it's true; the swiftboaters are baaack and they're the anti-healthcare storm troopers.) Anything for a buck. It's in their DNA.

Senator Edward Kennedy, who is battling brain cancer and whose son lost a leg to cancer, dedicated his entire career to giving Americans universal healthcare, precisely because of these experiences. He said he and his son are alive today because they were privileged to get the very best healthcare available. But millions of our citizens are not so fortunate, and that’s wrong.

For Senator Kennedy, healthcare is a right, NOT a privilege.

Therein lies the difference between liberals and conservatives. Let's roll.

We live in the world's dumbest country

You probably heard this one:

Teen Suspended for Going to Prom--Baptist School Forbids Dancing, Rock Music and Hand-Holding

FINDLAY, Ohio - An Ohio teenager has been suspended by his Christian school that bans dancing because he attended another high school's prom.

Officials at Heritage Christian School in Findlay had warned 17-year-old Tyler Frost that he would be suspended and prohibited from attending graduation if he went to the public school dance over the weekend with his girlfriend, according to The Courier.

Frost danced and held hands [Editor's Note: OMIGOD!! WE'RE DOOMED!!!] with his girlfriend, Rebecca Smooty, at the Findlay High School prom, attended by about 800 students, officials told the newspaper.

OK, boys and girls, this raises SOOOO many issues.

First of all, what sort of mutant parent sends their child to such a school?

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, given that 44% of Americans believe in this:



Well, if the school won't allow hand-holding, we know who can't enroll:


People far wiser than me have called faith the belief in things not seen. I don't think faith requires the rejection of those things that are patently obvious.

CHENEY'S CHILLING MOTHER'S DAY MESSAGE

With apologies to all the wonderful moms for this slightly twisted post:

To the relief of all those present, Darth Cheney did not attend the WH Correspondents Dinner. President Obama joked the Dark Lord was busy working on his memoir "tentatively titled, How to Shoot Friends and Interrogate People.” Then, he reportedly added: “The FORCE is with us.”

But Darth Cheney wasn’t too busy to make it onto one of the Sunday talk shows:

A Tale of Two Joes: Baseball Musings

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

One of the most famous opening lines in literary history could well describe Joe Torre’s passage through the Bronx as manager of the storied New York Yankees. From 1996 to 2007, Torre managed the Yankees to consecutive postseason play, winning ten American League East Division titles, six American League pennants, and four World Series titles, while earning a .605 winning percentage.

All of this got tossed overboard after Torre published his kiss-and-tell book, mildly titled “The Yankee Years,” ripping into his former employer and certain players, whom he called “prima donnas.” But Torre reserved some of his most acid remarks for A-Rod, according to the NY Post:

Alex Rodriguez, was called "A-Fraud" by his teammates after he developed a "Single White Female"-like obsession with team captain Derek Jeter and asked for a personal clubhouse assistant to run errands for him.

Weird.

And that’s not all. Torre headed for the sunny climes of California to manage that other team that had fled NY for LA, the Dodgers. In doing so, he made sure to torch any and all bridges to the Yankees. As Yogi Berra said, “when you get to a fork in the road, take it.”

Today, another Joe is managing the Yankees: Joe Girardi. He’s well known to Cubs fans as a capable defensive catcher and game caller. When he was a Cubs player, I met his parents once in a bar on Milwaukee Ave. Or so they said (I had no reason to disbelieve them.) They were nice folks, proud of their son.

Joe Girardi is a nice guy, some would say a player’s manager. But managing the Yankees and all those prima donnas Torre blasted may be too much for Girardi. I get the impression that Girardi is as tightly wound as Willie Randolph was when managing that other NY team, the Mets, in a slow, painful, downward spiral, till he was abruptly and summarily fired.

By the numbers, the two Joes are a study in contrasts:














Which of these Joes would Yankees fans want to see managing the team?

- Joe Torre
- Joe Girardi
- Neither Joe

Question for Cubs fans: Is Lou Piniella overrated as a manager? I’ve never understood his penchant for yanking starters after six innings, no matter how well they’re doing on the mound. I saw two blown Cubs games in which the starters were stellar and the floodgates opened up once Lou decided to yank them after six.

PS - The Dodgers' red-hot record is imperiled now that Manny Ramirez is out for 50 games after testing positive for steroids.

Feliz Cinco de Mayo, Hermanos y Hermanas!

On May 5, 1862 an outnumbered and ill-equipped Mexican army defeated the occupying French Army in the Battle of Puebla. This event was the cornerstone of Mexican resistance to foreign occupation. Today, the date is observed voluntarily in the U.S. to commemorate the cultural experiences and great contributions of Americans of Mexican ancestry to our society. The Battle of Puebla, pictured below:



Viva Mexico y Estados Unidos!