Day: September 20, 2007

Umbrage, Hand-Wringing, Britney, Hillary, and MoveOn

Trish

The whole country is beginning to sound like that guy (who knew?) who sobbed over the justified criticism of Britney Spears’ lackluster MTV Video Music Awards performance.

More than anyone else, Hillary Clinton is taking a pounding over allegedly egregious transgressions. An incredibly slanted story on ABC takes the Democratic front-runner to task over supposedly beyond-the-pale references to Rudy Guiliani by Clinton supporter former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack. ABC claims Vilsack made a personal attack on Guiliani by merely acknowledging the former mayor has some “issues.”

The attack came in an interview on NY1, when former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, a top Clinton presidential campaign adviser, laughed when an interviewer discussed the prospect of Giuliani as the GOP presidential nominee…

Whatever your interpretation of the ad, all the gasping for air and waving of scented handkerchiefs among the war’s most enthusiastic supporters is pretty comical

“I can’t even get into the number of marriages, and the fact his children — the relationship that he has with his children, and what the kind of circumstance New York was in before September the 11th, and whether or not he could have even been re-elected as mayor prior to September the 11th,” Vilsack said. “There are lots of issues involving Mayor Giuliani and I’m sure if he becomes the nominee we’ll be able to see those.”

Kaaay. I agree — if Rudy gets the Republican seal of approval, we’ll all be knowing way more about the thrice-married-once-to-his- cousin-absentee-dad-extraordinaire-9/11-best-thing-to- ever-happen-to-him-and-fellow-lame-o-George-Bush than we want.

But the veracity of Vilsack’s comments matter not. The important thing is this is a chance to skewer Hillary. Kind of.

On Radio Iowa today, Clinton was asked about an interview Thursday when she said she was focusing on a positive agenda.

“Have you told Gov. Vilsack privately that you don’t appreciate his negative comments that were made in New York on that television station yesterday in regards to Mr. Giuliani?” the station’s news director asked.

But instead of distancing herself from the remarks, Clinton replied that Vilsack “is more than capable of speaking for himself.”

Good damn answer.

All this false outrage at Hillary is best explained by a Time essay from Michael Kinsley, analyzing the “How dare you” stance Republicans are taking, particularly in regard to the MoveOn.org ad about Gen. Petraeus’ testimony before Congress.

Goodness gracious. Oh, my paws and whiskers. Some of the meanest, most ornery hombres around are suddenly feeling faint. Notorious tough guys are swooning with the vapors. The biggest beasts in the barnyard are all aflutter over something they read in the New York Times…

Welcome to the wonderful world of umbrage, the new language of American politics. You would not have thought that the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly would be so sensitive. Sticks and stones and so on. Yet they all seem to have taken one look at that ad and fainted dead away.

[…]

Media Ignores Story of Federal Prosecutor Nabbed Soliciting Sex from Five-Year-Old Girl

Jon Ponder

Despite the high profile of the alleged perp, the national media is ignoring the arrest of a longtime assistant U.S. attorney in Detroit on Sunday in a child-sex sting:

In his online profile, Atchison appears to be into infantilism, a fetish where adults wear diapers and act child-like for sexual gratification.

John D.R. Atchison, 53, of Gulf Breeze, Fla., an assistant U.S. attorney based in Pensacola, Fla., was arrested Sunday at Detroit Metropolitan Airport when he arrived for a meeting with a woman he thought was going to let him have sex with her young daughter, authorities said. The woman actually was a Macomb County sheriff’s detective and part of an Internet sex sting operation….

When he arrived Sunday, he was carrying presents for the girl, including a doll and earrings, and also had sexual materials, Sheriff Mark Hackel said.

While the story has gotten little play nationally, it has shocked Atchison’s hometown:

“He’s squeaky clean,” said one local official, on condition of anonymity. Another says there was no indication of any untoward behavior on his part as a coach and president of the Gulf Breeze Sports Association (GBSA).

However, the mug shot confirms Roy Atchison is the same local resident who serves as GBSA president and assistant U.S. attorney…

And:

“I can’t believe it. It’s something that’s just totally out of the blue,” [Gulf Breeze City Manager Buz Eddy ] said. “I never would have even thought ‘That guy’s a little strange’ or anything like that. I’m still hoping to hear some type of explanation.”

And yes, he’s a family man:

Atchison’s wife, Barbara, is a science teacher at Gulf Breeze High School and the two have three children.

The particulars of the case are really heinous:

[…]

Poll: Normal Americans Not Swayed By Petraeus’ Poodle and Pony Show

Jon Ponder

The results of the congressional testimony last week by Gen. David Petraeus — George Bush’s new (hired) poodle now that Tony Blair is off the stage — are in, and, not surprisingly, he failed to change hearts and minds of regular Americans:

After the “surge” ends next spring and U.S. security forces are no longer present in sufficient numbers to flood the zone of unrest, the violence will resume to pre-surge levels or worse — just as the 2008 election season is ramping up

A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday found essentially no shift in views on whether U.S. forces are likely to win the war — two-thirds predict they won’t –and if the United States should set a firm timetable to remove troops.

In the days before Petraeus’ appearances and President Bush’s speech to the nation last week, 60 percent supported setting a timetable for withdrawal and sticking to it “regardless of what is going on in Iraq at the time.” Now 59 percent do.

(A CBS News poll taken after the testimony and after Bush’s “stay the course” address to the nation last week produced similar results.)

Of course, changing the minds of normal Americans was never the goal. Bush’s prime objective was, and is, to avoid having the ghastly ending to his war occur on his watch. He sent Gen. Petraeus to Capitol Hill to keep the GOP base in line, thereby ensuring the loyalty of Republicans in Congress. On that level, the Petraeus hearings were a smashing success.

And yet, as the Republicans line up to follow Bush once more into the breach, it is beginning to look like their loyalty to Dear Leader has become a death wish. What else could explain such selfless obedience to a president whose only noteworthy accomplishment has been the efficiency with which he has emptied the treasury, and whose pathological lying and ineptitude have left his party at least as politically damaged as it was when it was forced to cede power to the Democrats after Sen. Joe McCarthy’s reign of terror in the 1950s and after Watergate 20 years later?

Republicans in Congress must know that after the “surge” ends next spring and the number of U.S. security forces is no longer sufficient to flood the zone, the violence will resume to pre-surge levels or worse. If this happens, the violence will be ramping up in Iraq just as the 2008 election season enters its final heat.

This is particularly dangerous for Republicans in the Senate, where almost half the GOP seats (with Warner and Hagel dropping out, I think it’s up to 24) are up for grabs next year, compared with 12 seats for the Democrats. By following George Bush off a cliff one last time, Republicans in Congrewss could find themselves in January 2008 handing a veto-proof majority to the Democrats — one more time.

Poll: Bush, Congress Set New Lows in Approval Ratings

Buck Banks

In a new Zogby/Reuters survey, both George W. Bush and the Democratic-led Congress have hit new low approval ratings. Just 29 percent of respondents approved Bush’s performance, down from his former low of 30 percent set in March. Congress is considered even more ineffective, with 11 percent of respondents approving of the legislative body’s performance, down from a previous record low approval rating of 14 percent.

‘The mood is getting ugly.’
— pollster John Zogby

Pollster John Zogby said events over the past months have affected the nation’s overall mood and outlook:

“Since the last time we polled we have had the mortgage crisis, and we are hearing the recession word a whole lot more than we’ve heard it in the past,” Zogby said. “There are things that happened in the September polling that drove the number down a bit, and they are mostly economic worries,” he added.

Nearly 62 percent of those polled think the country is on the wrong track. About two-thirds of Americans think the value of their homes will stay the same or decrease in the next year, and about one-third expect the housing slump and credit crunch to lead to a recession in the next year.

The poll also found that 68 percent of Americans rate U.S. economic policy as fair or poor, and 73 percent calling U.S. foreign policy either fair or poor.

“The public mood is not just dark. What’s darker than dark?” Zogby said. “The mood is getting ugly.”