Bill about Monica, Duhbya about cocaine

On day 1216, an incredibly smarmy, lying asshole...

Note which two of these liars committed a crime - and which party they belonged to.

(h/t Jed Lewison on DailyKos)

Look no further for fascism

It's pretty clear that the local authorities in Louisiana are in bed with BP. The federal government should be there enforcing the U.S. Constitution. At gun point, if it's necessary to arrest some of the LEOs for civil rights violations.

Major Malcolm Wolfe of the sheriff's office [of Terrebonne Parish] says the deputy's pulling someone over in his official vehicle while working for a private company is standard and acceptable practice, because Wheelan was acting suspicious and could have been a terrorist.

Update (7/5): I can understand why the local authorities could be bought and paid for many times over by BP, but I don't understand how the Obama administration can find any reason whatsoever to be seen working fist in glove with BP.

Copping a drill

Click image for full Pat Bagley/Salt Lake Tribune cartoon.

Sucking up to wingnuts

Why would a Louisiana magistrate go out of his way to compliment the alleged talents of the Fake Pimp of Wingnuttia?

Magistrate Daniel Knowles III, who cited the defendants’ potential as investigative journalists though he was critical of this incident, sentenced Mr. [James] O’Keefe, 25, to three years of probation, 100 hours of community service and a $1,500 fine.

...

Mr. O’Keefe, whom the judge described as “extremely talented,”...

Louisiana elects its judges. Knowles was just playing to the crowd.

That's what you want in a judge, right? No reason to question the justice of a wrist-slap sentence - it's what the people wanted!

Why liberals think Republicans harbor racists

Again, because they do.

[Keith] Bardwell, a Republican, has served as justice of peace for 34 years.

At least, this time, Bobby Jindal is calling for Bardwell to resign.

Meanwhile, CNN won't mention Bardwell's party. Since this is about his official duties, there should be no excuse that this is a merely personal failing. Heck, he probably once was a Dixiecrat, but we pushed him out and he took refuge in the remaining national party that does harbor racists.

Flip the bird at your radio

That's what I do when Cokie Roberts comes out with her well-compensated pabulum on NPR or one of the TV talk shows. I'm glad other people notice, too:

If Roberts' vacuous segments seem phoned-in, it's probably because they are.

...

Roberts doesn't just voice the conventional wisdom; she is the conventional wisdom.

Roberts grew up in a powerful, famous political household. I even met her mother Lindy Boggs long ago after Lindy succeeded her lost husband Hale in the House of Representatives. There's a certain class of politicians who cultivate the ability to talk and talk and talk without ever saying anything. The Boggses were that sort of politician, and it served them well as conservative pseudo-populist Democrats from Louisiana, where you needed (and often still need) both racist votes and black votes to win.

But it doesn't serve well for a news analyst, quite the contrary in fact.

Joined at the ...

Eliot Spitzer was caught in a prostitution scandal a year ago. He has this to say about it:

It was an egregious violation of behavior that I fell into for many reasons, but none of them an excuse or justifiable.

I'm sure that David Vitter has said similar mea culpas over his past two years. It's hard to judge any public figure's sincerity base solely on words.

However, there is one difference that's pretty striking: David Vitter remains a member of the U.S. Senate after 634 days as a known consorter with whores - and I'm not even counting the first time he is alleged to have paid to play.

Lava bombs

Bobby Jindal opened his mouth and inserted a tasty treat of lava on a stick. The governor of Louisiana - a state that everyone knows has received billions for its category 3 levees, dams, and pumps even if it needed category 5 and mucky piles of wetlands conservation - tries to stoke a little resentment over $140 million for monitoring active volcanoes that unambiguously threaten human lives in other states.

This is part and parcel of the Republican way: Pick out some small piece of a Democratic appropriation that they can gin up into something that looks bad - and never mind whether it's really a good thing. What's important is the craven political use of the bullshit image.

Congressional Republicans tried this last week when they decried marsh mouse conservation funding in the stimulus bill - when it in fact was not in the bill at all!

Now, rather than admit error, Jindal is doubling down. His chief of staff stands firm on his pedestal of bullshit:

"That was just one example of wasteful spending in the largest government spending bill in history," Teepell said. "The governor made it clear that we need to grow jobs, not government."

These people are morons. No, that's not it. These people think we're morons.

Rare day

It's not often that it's good news for a Democrat to lose to Republican, but this is one of those rare days. William Jefferson has lost to newcomer Anh Cao, ridding the Congress of one of its members who most smells of corruption.

Meanwhile, since we're in Louisiana, it's David Vitter watch, day 514. Ya think if he keeps his, ah, nose clean that Louisiana voters will re-elect him in 2010?

Favorite white T-shirt

Even if they had figured out how to get the blood out, those stupid stains are impossible to treat. Cripes, they didn't even have the wit to hide the bloodstains and to tell the clerk that one's wife needed to get stains out, much less to burn the stained clothing. These losers are a lot more than a few bricks shy of a load.

Just you wait, there's going to be a sexual abuse aspect of this case or at least involuntary imprisonment. That should get the charge upgraded to murder one.

Face of white supremacy

Of course I shouldn't judge people based on their appearance, at least not those aspects out of their control, but I can still see why this guy needs a racist ideology to tell him how great he is.

Mark Potok, though, gets the KKK right:

"Really, it's a pathetic collection of losers and thugs," Potok said. "Even across the radical right most people look down their nose at the Klan these days."

Frozen assets

Will someone, preferably a Democrat, please freeze this man's assets! He's an embarrassment to everyone who believes in good government.

Photo op straight talk

So.

John McCain takes a stroll in New Orleans, no flak jacket or military escort required. Or so you'd think, though there are four soldiers in camo in this AP photo:
Now, years after it could have mattered, he blames government for its response. Years after it did matter, he defends his votes against the victims as pork prevention. On the campaign trail, he makes promises that next time will be different.

There's no reason to believe him.

Live boy or dead girl?

No branch of government is clean in Louisiana. But don't sneer at the Cajuns for Edwin Edwards and Huey Long and now John Weimer - the federal gummint is corrupt, too, by money and by power.

Judge Robert Nader, dissenting, could barely contain his disbelief, saying the initial decision was infected by “approximately $1 million in contributions from a very financially interested individual” to Judge Batchelder, a Republican, and to the local Republican Party.

Make no mistake about this, though, both parties are to blame.

But any state where judges raise campaign cash to run for office is more subject to this obvious conflict of interest.

02138 again

02138 even favors its Maybach-demographic readers with a blurb on David Vitter. It doesn't say yea or nay whether he got his start as a john in the infamous Radcliffe call girl scandal of the late 1970s. Or maybe he didn't get to Cambridge in time, and he's been expressing his regret for that ever since.

Here's an interesting nugget: Not only did Vitter succeed Bob Livingston in Congress, he also had held David Duke's seat in the Louisiana legislature. That sort of puts his yen for sloppy seconds into perspective.

(Oh, if you have to ask, you can't afford a Maybach.)

Pay attention

John Gibson, one of Fox's ugliest bloviators, demands to know where racial incidents occur. Of course, he demands this rhetorically, using "unguested confrontation", a wingnut propaganda technique pioneered by Rush Limbaugh. He sure as hell doesn't notice anyone discriminating against all those nappy-headed hos and gangstas.

So, Gibson you moron, here's another.

The world would be better off if jerks like Gibson had to earn an honest living.