Kathy Griffin wins an Emmy, gets attacked by hateful William Donohue and censored by E!

I already love Kathy Griffin. Glad to hear she won the Emmy. Now that homophobic, racist William Donohue is attacking her, I love her even more. Leave it to Donohue to get riled up by a comedian. Also, very, very weak of E! to censor Kathy Griffin. Yes, the channel that brings us "The Girls Next Door" (where we can "Join Hugh Hefner and his three lovely ladies—Holly, Bridget and Kendra—as they expose the secrets of the Playboy Mansion") is going to censor Kathy Griffin for making Jesus jokes. Pathetically weak:

"Kathy Griffin's offensive remarks will not be part of the E! telecast on Saturday night," the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences said in a statement Monday.

In her speech, Griffin said that "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus."

She went on to hold up her Emmy, make an off-color remark about Christ and proclaim, "This award is my god now!"

The comedian's remarks were condemned Monday by Catholic League President Bill Donohue, who called them a "vulgar, in-your-face brand of hate speech."

According to the TV academy and E!, when the four hour-plus ceremony is edited into a two-hour program, Griffin's remarks will be shown in "an abbreviated version" in which some language may be bleeped.

Congrats on the Emmy, Kathy. (By the way, I'll be at your show here in DC next Wednesday.)

And as for that buffoon, Donohue, let's all remember South Park's "Fantastic Easter Special" when "Ninja Jesus" took out William Donohue, who had made himself Pope and proclaimed he was the voice of God. Kinda what Donohue thinks in real life, too: Read the rest of this post...

Toe-tapping Larry files to withdraw guilty plea

And I thought I was done with this guy for a while...

The Idaho senator's case won't be heard until September 26, which is four days before he said he would step down. The Senator and his lawyer just don't know when to stop the insanity.

Sen. Larry Craig sought to undo his guilty plea in an airport sex sting on Monday, claiming that he admitted to the charge in a panic to avoid triggering a story about his sexuality in his hometown newspaper.

Craig had denied to editors at the Idaho Statesman that he was gay just weeks before his June 11 arrest in the bathroom of the Minneapolis airport. The paper didn't run a story, but Craig thought his arrest would change that.

That is such a doofus excuse that I laugh every time I read it. Really, he and his lawyer should just stop giving quotes like this to the media.

Craig's actions, his attorneys argued, were influenced in part by police Sgt. Dave Karsnia, who arrested and interrogated the senator. Karsnia told the senator he could resolve the case by paying a fine, and added: "I don't call media."

"In his mind, the terms of the plea included the promise made by Officer Karsnia that the alleged incident would not be released to the media," Craig's attorneys wrote.

"While in his state of intense anxiety, Senator Craig felt compelled to grasp the lifeline offered to him by the police officer," they wrote.

Read the rest of this post...

Vitter was meeting one prostitute "two or three times" a week

Seems the Senator from Louisiana had quite the active libido according to a former prostitute. Vitter apparently had to end the "relationship" with the prostitute when she told him her real name was "Wendy." That would also be the name of Mrs. Senator David Vitter. You can't make this stuff up -- and the former prostitute passed a lie detector test yesterday.

Also, to clarify, as today's update points out, this "relationship" lasted from July to November of 1999. So, this is not the same prostitute who worked for the so-called DC Madam. In July of 2007, Nola.Com reported, "The records show that Vitter number was called by Palfrey's service beginning Oct. 12, 1999 and ending Feb. 27, 2001, which was Mardi Gras."

Here's the report from the press conference today:

A woman who once worked as a prostitute in New Orleans said Tuesday that Senator David Vitter had sex with her several times a week from July to November 1999, when he had just resigned his seat as a state representative to make his first run for Congress.

Wendy Yow Ellis said she met Vitter through an escort service and saw him two to three times a week in an apartment at Dauphine and Dumaine streets in the French Quarter. At first, he knew her only by her stage name: Leah.

Ellis said the affair ended "abruptly" when she gave him her real name. She shares a first name with his wife, Wendy Baldwin Vitter.

"When I asked him if he would like to carry this beyond the business, I gave him my name and phone number. I said, 'My real name is Wendy,' and he said, 'Oh my God,'" Ellis recalled. "I did see him a few times at the club I danced at after that. He just kind of gave me a look of disbelief."

Two or three times a week? No wonder all those old guys in the GOP Senate Caucus were applauding for Vitter after this scandal broke.

Gotta love this classic quote from Larry Flynt:

"It is not a question of muckraking and exposing the perverts," Flynt said. "It's more than that. It is trying to maintain some honesty in the government."

Mr. Flynt will be publishing the details of Vitter's visits to Ms. Ellis.

Over to you, Mitch McConnell. Read the rest of this post...

West Virginia: Black woman held against her will and raped, beaten, tortured by six

"Here's the unmentionable secret: Racism isn't that big a deal any more. No sensible person supports it. Nobody of importance preaches it. It's rapidly becoming an ugly memory."
-- departing White House press shill Tony Snow, on an October 2003 edition of Fox News Sunday

Guess we'll have to retire that hoary one, huh? This comes from The Smoking Gun, which has the full arrest report up. It's hard to read the sickening charges.

A black West Virginia woman was sexually assaulted, stabbed, and tortured while being held captive by her white abductors, one of whom told her, "That's what we do to niggers around here." The 23-year-old victim was freed Saturday after cops responded to the home of Frankie Brewster for a "welfare check on a female that was reportedly being held against her will." When cops arrived, Brewster claimed she was the only one home, but then the victim limped to the door and said, "Help me." According to six harrowing criminal complaints, the woman, who apparently had been held for more than a week, had four stab wounds in her left leg, bruised eyes, and had been repeatedly sexually assaulted and humiliated. The woman told police that she was forced to lick Brewster's "toes, vagina, and anal cavity." Brewster's son Bobby forced the woman to eat dog and rat feces, according to one complaint filed in Logan County Magistrate Court. The victim, who is now hospitalized, was raped at knifepoint, choked with a cable cord, and had her hair pulled and cut during the ordeal.

Read the rest of this post...

Soltz: Petraeus not knowing if Iraq strategy is making us safer shows Bush "is hiding behind General Petraeus"

Jon Soltz from VoteVets weighs in on the "stunning admission" from General Petraeus that he doesn't know if Bush's Iraq strategy is making us safer. The transcript and video of that testimony from Petraeus are in a post below:

This exchange verifies the argument VoteVets.org has been making, that General Petraeus' job is not to take those things into account, and therefore the President is hiding behind General Petraeus.

Let me explain.

General Petraeus was given an order -- find a military solution for Iraq where there is none, and without concern for troop overextension or the larger war on terror. General Petraeus followed his orders, giving the president what he wanted to hear, and now the president will hide behind that to justify his failure as a commander in chief.

General Petraeus has a very limited area of concern -- the US military in Iraq -- and his testimony today reflected that.

When one looks at the grander scale, past just the military in Iraq, the picture is dismal, and becoming a critical danger. From the Government Accountability Office report to Congressional Research Service report to the report by General Jones, it is clear that there has been no political reconciliation overall in Iraq or increased security, despite our military's strongest efforts.

From Admiral Fallon to Admiral Mullen, those above General Petraeus in the chain of command are telling the president that this war is hurting our military and our global security. The president has chosen to ignore all of this, in favor of a report based on a false premise with faulty findings, signed by a General with a very limited scope of concern. Call it denial, or call it stubbornness, or whatever you want; it all boils down to the same thing -- this president still refuses to listen to those he needs to listen to, in favor of those who tell him what he wants to hear.

Unwittingly, General Petraeus just confirmed all of that in the exchange above, today.

Read the rest of this post...

Untangling the latest GOP gay scandal

I was on the Michelangelo Signorile Show (Sirius Satellite Radio's channel 109 OutQ) this afternoon to wade through the latest convoluted, woefully under-reported GOP scandal -- the bizarre murder-suicide in Florida of a Republican consultant and two of his "friends". Some of the facts we discussed:

* the bodies of Republican political consultant Ralph Gonzalez, 39, president of The Strategum Group, his roommate David Abrami and "a friend," Jason Robert Drake, were found in the house of Ralph Gonzalez.

* Gonzalez served with the Republican Party of Florida's House Campaign Division and executive director of the Georgia Republican Party and counted the Alabama Republican Legislative Committee as a client, producing an anti-gay flier accusing a Dem candidate of supporting marriage equality.

* A newspaper, Florida Today, initially reported that there were signs of a struggle, printing "Lovers' fight may have sparked three deaths" as its headline. The paper later scrubbed any references to a love triangle.

*  BradBlog has shown the ties  between Gonzalez and Florida's vote-tampering congressman, Tom Feeney. From Pat Go Bye Bye:

Gonzalez, who was out to his friends, had ties to Ralph Reed when he took over the Georgia Republican Party and used unethical tactics to beat Senator Max Cleland. He was also the campaign chair for the ethically-challenged Tom Feeney's  congressional campaign as well as his state rep campaign after which Feeney became house speaker and got involved in a  software-buying scandal involving Yang Enterprise.   Feeney is best known for his vote-rigging scheme (which has ties to an unexplained death of a Florida state investigator in Valdosta GA), Jack Abramoff, and a variety of unethical smear tactics against Democratic candidates.

* Republican Congressman Patrick McHenry has ties to Gonzalez and Drake, the latter was determined to be the shooter in the murder-suicide.

* McHenry's office initially denied knowing Drake but  confirmed later that McHenry did know him, but didn't specify the nature of the relationship.

* Drake was also allegedly tied to a gay escort service in Virginia; the prostitution angle -- and who it extends to -- is very murky at this point, with few sources on the record.

The people and relationships involved are almost too convoluted to follow; here's more:

* Patrick McHenry is also affiliated with outed former National Field Director of the RNC Dan Gurley. According to NC Conservative, McHenry "owes his seat to Dan Gurley" --  with Gurley working with Robert Drake on McHenry's behalf.

* McHenry's apparently a good friend of the former National Young Republican Chairman, Glenn Murphy. Yes, that Glenn Murphy -- the one arrested for sexually assaulting a sleeping man, performing oral sex on him (image of police report here). McHenry supported him for the National Young Republican Chairmanship.

* Pat's deputy field director Brett Keeter blew a 0.13 on a DWI, recently and received a two-week suspension and alcohol education classes. Keeter, as a Region IV director of North Carolina Federation of Young Republicans allegedly also pressured the College Republicans National Committee to endorse Glenn Murphy for the chairmanship.

* Another big problem for McHenry recently was the saga of Michael Aaron Lay, field coordinator for McHenry's 2004 campaign. He was indicted for voter fraud in North Carolina.

At the time Lay was listed as a resident in a home owned by 32-year-old McHenry but campaign records indicate Lay's paychecks were sent to an address in Tennessee. McHenry won the primary by only 86 votes. According to Gaston County, North Carolina District Attorney Locke Bell, Lay was indicted on Monday, May 7 by a local grand jury.

Lay accepted deferred prosecution on Aug. 8 and with unsupervised probation for six months. More than one man was listed as living at McHenry's address, btw (he has scans of the documentation on the site). No less than three other men listed their residence as McHenry's pad in Cherryville, NC. I have no idea what that's about, but it surely is worthy of investigation.

And if you thought that was all that was dogging Patrick McHenry, take a look at the latest bit of business passed on today -- at least $182,000 of McHenry's 2004 campaign funds ($923,975) came from an organization donating under fraudulent circumstances. That's almost 20% of McHenry's campaign war chest. Who is behind that? It just keeps on coming, folks.

Via Pat Go Bye-Bye and BlueNC:

Last week the Citizens Club for Growth PAC paid $350,000 to settle an FEC lawsuit which

arose after the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee filed a complaint with the FEC in 2003 alleging that the group was violating federal election laws. After an investigation, the FEC concluded that the 527 was required to register as a political action committee because it was accepting contributions and engaging in activities intended to influence the outcome of federal elections.

According to FEC Schedule E report the Citizens Club for Growth had funneled the McHenry donations through an organization called Red Sea LLC:

Red Sea LLC
1111 19th Street NW
Suite 211
Washington, DC 20036

Purpose of Expenditure: tv air buy

This Committee SUPPORTS The Following Candidate: PATRICK TIMOTHY MCHENRY
Candidate ID: H4NC10047
Office Sought: House of Representatives
State is North Carolina in District 10
Date Expended = 08/12/2004
Amount Expended = $49790.00
Calendar YTD Per Election for Office Sought = $182440.7

Red Sea is an invention of a former communications director for the disgraced Tom DeLay, Jonathan M. Baron.

That said, McHenry isn't the only pol who benefited from Citizen's Club for Growth -- but the Congressman from NC only won his primary by an 84-vote margin, so it's clearly relevant to look into, as well as any other irregularities in McHenry's financial documentation.

The mainstream media is negligent if it doesn't get off its duff and investigate all of this. What does it all add up to? Who knows.

Anyway, that's just another look at the outer edges of the sordid tales. You can read more at Pat Go Bye-Bye, Scrutiny Hooligans, BlueNC, Howie Klein at Down With Tyranny, Judson Cox at NC Conservative, and InterstateQ (and here).

***

For a gut-busting take on some of this fracas, read The General's "Can Rep. McHenry's Hostel for Strapping Young Republican Lads survive this?"  -- a letter sent to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. A snippet:

I'm especially worried about Rep. Patrick McHenry. His name seems to be coming up a lot in connection with that GOP heterosexual naked wrestling triangle's murder-suicide investigation. One of the dead men, anti-homosexual political strategist and former executive director of the Georgia Republican Committee Ralph Gonzalez, was connected with a service that would send men to hotel rooms to help husbands get what they wanted. He is also said to have been Rep. McHenry's close personal friend, perhaps even a former guest of Rep. McHenry's Hostel for Strapping Young Republican Lads.

How do you expect him to explain himself if it comes out that he too loves to occasionally suck a little soldier in a completely heterosexual manner? You've pretty much sealed his fate, haven't you? Perhaps you've sealed your fate as well, and Grahams and Dryers too for that matter.

Read the rest of this post...

Petraeus doesn't know if his strategy is making America safer

This is HUGE. HUGE. Petraeus just completely undermined Bush's rationale for the escalation of the Iraq war. Senator John Warner asked a simple question --- and got a very telling and disturbing answer:

Senator Warner: Are you able to say at this time if we continue what you have laid before the congress here,this strategy. do you feel that that is making America safer?

General Petraeus: Sir, I believe this is indeed the best course of action to achieve our objectives in Iraq.

Warner: Does that make America safer?

General Petraeus: Sir I don't know actually. I have not sat down and sorted in my own mind what i have focued on and what I have been riveted on is how to accomplish the mission of the multinational force Iraq.

Hoping to have the video soon. But this is undoubtedly the news of the day.

If the Bush/Petraeus "course of action" is not ultimately making us safer, what the hell are we doing in over there? And, why are Republicans sticking with Bush's plan that doesn't make us safer?

Here's the video. Big hat tip to Nico at Huffington Post:
Read the rest of this post...

Petraeus gets "bipartisan grilling" in the Senate

Some Republicans in the Senate were actually challenging Petraeus today, according to Reuters:

The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, faced a tough challenge on Tuesday from both Republicans skeptical about war strategy and Democrats who want a swifter withdrawal of American troops

The bipartisan grilling of Petraeus and U.S. ambassador to Baghdad Ryan Crocker in Congress raised questions about whether President George W. Bush could count on enough of his Republican colleagues for help in staving off Democratic demands for a faster pullout.

Bush is expected to give a speech later this week on Iraq but has shown no signs of ordering drastic troop withdrawals.

Petraeus insisted progress was being made under Bush strategy of temporarily building up troops this year to allow time for political reconciliation, an approach which is being strongly challenged in Washington.

Now, as we've seen with these Republicans many times, they talk tough for awhile, then fall right into line with George Bush. But, clearly, they are worried. Read the rest of this post...

Hey Pundits, This Is The Forest - Please Ignore The Trees

After spending yesterday trying to avoid the Gen. Petraeus' Half-hour comedy hour, I spent a good portion of this morning reading the analysis of his testimony. I was struck, repeatedly, about the horse-race, partisan coverage of the event.

Most of the newspaper coverage viewed Petraeus' speech in terms of a partisan lens. The typical column spewed something like "Petraeus didn't convince any Democrats and war supporters enjoyed his speech." Even intelligent columnists (outside of George Will, as John points out), spent time writing on the horse-race aspect of the report. Here's something from the usually insightful E. J. Dionne.

Oddly, Bush's intransigence has caused more problems for Democrats than Republicans. The inability of the new Democratic majority to muster the votes to cut off funds for the war has left the party's large antiwar constituency furious - even as moderate Democrats push for compromise measures that could get Republicans on record as opposing the president.

But E. J. and the other writers really are all being suckered once again by Bush. The fact is, the "surge" (and the subsequent Petraeus report) is like putting 24 inch rims on a Yugo - they may be nice and shiny, but after the momentary distraction, you eventually realize that the car is still a piece of shit.

Petraeus has reporters buzzing and bussling, essentially hijacking the political debate for the past few months. We've seen this before - capturing Saddam, the Baker-Hamilton report, etc. etc. Washington gets all whipped up about the event and analysis flows on how this new development effects the political scene.

But it all continues to be window dressing, as Bush dazzles the crowd while he runs out the clock. The basic facts never change - Iraq is still broken. Iraq is a huge problem for the next President. And, politically, Iraq is a millstone around the neck of Republicans. Someday, even reporters might even catch on to those basic facts. Read the rest of this post...

Newsweek: Internal Pentagon report contradicts Petraeus' testimony to Congress

That's called perjury, in some parts. It's also called, someone in the Pentagon has Petraeus' number and is leaking information. Not so well respected after all, is he?

NEWSWEEK has learned that a separate internal report being prepared by a Pentagon working group will “differ substantially” from Petraeus’s recommendations, according to an official who is privy to the ongoing discussions but would speak about them only on condition of anonymity. An early version of the report, which is currently being drafted and is expected to be completed by the beginning of next year, will “recommend a very rapid reduction in American forces: as much as two-thirds of the existing force very quickly, while keeping the remainder there.” The strategy will involve unwinding the still large U.S. presence in big forward operation bases and putting smaller teams in outposts. “There is interest at senior levels [of the Pentagon] in getting alternative views” to Petraeus, the official said. Among others, Centcom commander Admiral William Fallon is known to want to draw down faster than Petraeus....

Even some supporters of the surge effort wonder whether Petraeus isn’t thinking as much about selling the war as winning it....

John Arquilla, an intelligence and counterinsurgency expert at the Naval Postgraduate School, is even harsher in his assessment of Petraeus. “I think Colin Powell used dodgy information to get us into the war, and Petraeus is using dodgy information to keep us there,” he said. “His political talking points are all very clear: the continued references he made to the danger of Al Qaeda in Iraq, for example, even though it represents only somewhere between 2 and 5 percent of the total insurgency. The continued references to Iran, when in fact the Iranians have had a lot to do with stability in the Shiite portion of the country. And it's not at all clear why things are a little better now. Is it because there are more troops, or is it because we're negotiating with the insurgents and have moved to small operating outposts? On any given day we don't have more than 20,000 troops operating. The glacial pace of reductions beggars the imagination.”....

Petraeus called in a large press gaggle to observe training exercises at his local Iraqi military training academy. Later, back in Baghdad, Bremer shook his head and laughed indulgently. “He loves headlines,” Bremer said.

Yeah, not well liked at all, this guy. Read the rest of this post...

A day robbed of its rightful meaning

It's impossible to appropriately comment on a day like today.

One wants to think about this day differently, somehow, despite the fact that its impact and effects confront us endlessly. One wants to be able to think about this date, this anniversary, without partisan overtones and instead with recognition of the shared experience. The collective response to an appalling attack had such potential, such meaning for who we are as individuals and as a nation.

Today it's an arrow in political quivers.

Pain and suffering can beget pain and suffering, even when so many of us work to make it otherwise.

So we work harder, and do more, and maintain the notion that this is a day for all Americans. One to be remembered simply for loss, even in the midst of all other factors. Just loss. Read the rest of this post...

George Will: "The surge has failed"

George Will's commentary in today's Washington Post:

Before Gen. David Petraeus's report, and to give it a context of optimism, the president visited Iraq's Anbar province to underscore the success of the surge in making some hitherto anarchic areas less so. More significant, however, was that the president did not visit Baghdad. This underscored the fact that the surge has failed, as measured by the president's and Petraeus's standards of success.

Those who today stridently insist that the surge has succeeded also say they are especially supportive of the president, Petraeus and the military generally. But at the beginning of the surge, both Petraeus and the president defined success in a way that took the achievement of success out of America's hands.

The purpose of the surge, they said, is to buy time -- "breathing space," the president says -- for Iraqi political reconciliation. Because progress toward that has been negligible, there is no satisfactory answer to this question: What is the U.S. military mission in Iraq?....

After more than four years of war, two questions persist: Is there an Iraq? Are there Iraqis?

Read the rest of this post...

September 11, 2001

Are we really any safer today, after all the "hard work" of the Bush Admin? Is the world a better place after invading Iraq, where there were no WMD or terrorists before 9/11?

Take a look these pro-surge propaganda ads by former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer's pro-Iraq war outfit Freedom's Watch (complete with an eagle on its front web page), they conflate Iraq with terrorism and 9/11 with a "They attacked us before -- and they will attack us again if we leave Iraq" message. Ads like this are running here in NC.

 

***

I took these grainy pictures of the WTC with my low-tech Palmpix camera on July 11, 2001, while on a business trip. They weren't the best quality and I almost deleted them at the time. I actually retrieved them from the very full trash folder on my hard drive that morning on 9/11 after hearing what happened.

NOTE FROM JOHN: To me, September 11 will always be the day that I sat in Washington, DC, watching the smoke from the Pentagon float across the horizon outside my living room window, wondering if the entire world was at war, while George Bush ran away and hid for the entire day. It will be the day that ABC's Peter Jenning, rightfully, three hours after the attacks, had to ask the White House, on the air, to consider letting us know that Bush was still alive and in control of the country:

"I don’t mean to say this in melodramatic terms, but where is the President of the United States?" Jennings wondered aloud when he realized that Air Force One should have already landed outside Washington, DC. "Pretty soon the country needs to know where he is."

Read the rest of this post...

If the Surge were a product, this would be its TV ad

From our buddy Andy Cobb.

Read the rest of this post...

Sanofi proves exactly why the US government should negotiate prices

"Letting the market decide" means that when you are a power-buyer (such as the US government) you use that power to negotiate quantity pricing and receive advantageous terms. Bush has a spotty track record with every business he has ever touched so he has no idea what "the market" even means, but in the real world you use volume to dictate pricing and to lower it as much as possible. It's taxpayer money, so the GOP political leaders ought to be taking that into consideration once in a while. Taxpayer money isn't supposed to be a slush fund where you help friends in industry. Setting prices - as is normal when doing business - and then managing the process is common sense business but for some reason it seems to be considered unnecessary with the GOP.

French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi-Aventis has agreed to pay 190 million dollars to settle a probe into whether it overcharged US government health care programs, the government and company said Monday.

Read the rest of this post...

59% of Americans see Iraq as a failure

History will not be kind on Bush and the GOP for this failed venture. Just think how historians will judge the administration in total when they include Katrina and the economic disasters that they brewed up.

The pessimism expressed by most people — including significant minorities of Republicans — contrasted with the brighter picture offered by Gen. David Petraeus. The chief U.S. commander in Iraq told Congress on Monday that the added 30,000 troops have largely achieved their military goals and could probably leave by next summer, though he conceded there has been scant political progress.

I suppose since the the media has fallen for the false outrage against Petraeus we can just call him General Sunshine or General Honesty and Beyond Reproach. Strangely enough, I just scratch my head and wonder where these people were back when similar attacks were made against anyone who dared question the intelligence of invading Iraq. Somehow those who criticized were anti-American and it was fair game to label war doubters like myself as America-haters and that was all OK. If the media was fine with those attacks a few years ago, they ought to be fine with the criticisms of Petraeus today. He's a big boy and can handle it and I don't see him as being any more or less of an American than anyone who spoke out against the invasion and who was smeared. If the GOP and their friends want to play like this - as they did back when the war was so popular - they should expect to receive as much as they dished out. If Petraeus is going to serve as the yes-man mouthpiece for the administration, he too should expect to take a bit of heat. Read the rest of this post...