I know you are tired of hearing it, but the McCain campaign really was run by wingnut bloggers:
In an appearance with Rick Sanchez on CNN in the final days of the campaign, Goldfarb had accused Obama of hanging out with anti-American and anti-Semitic figures and cited PLO sympathizer Rashid Khalidi as an example. Sanchez wanted more.
Goldfarb had done the interview from a studio at the campaign headquarters in Crystal City, in suburban Virginia outside Washington, D.C. His exchange rocketed around the Internet and quickly became a favorite of left-wing bloggers–who alternately accused him of playing dirty by making charges he couldn’t back up and wimping out by refusing to name a second anti-Semite. Others wondered whom Goldfarb was talking about.
If it wasn’t obvious to them, the identity of “number two” was clear to those inside McCain headquarters: Reverend Jeremiah Wright. McCain had pledged last spring that he wouldn’t use Wright’s hate-filled sermons against Obama, who had listened to them for 20 years in the pews of Wright’s church. But virtually no one on McCain’s staff agreed with the candidate’s restraint. Goldfarb had joked before the appearance that he was going to “go rogue” and bring up Wright’s name in the interview. He didn’t–barely–thereby preserving his job at the cost of looking a bit ridiculous. But when he walked into the campaign’s common area after his exchange with Sanchez, his colleagues gave him a standing ovation.
A standing ovation for making yourself look like a total jackass on national television, and attempting to engage in a little recreational Jew-baiting. Notice how they continue to smear Khalidi. For a reminder, here is what earned a standing ovation:
Being made to look the fool by Rick Sanchez is teh win for wingnuts. Can you imagine what the government would have been like the next four years staffed by these morons and governed by an increasingly out of it John McCain and the Wasilla Wannabe? We dodged a serious bullet as a nation. Not only do they not realize to this day that Goldfarb looked like a total idiot on CNN that day, they are now writing celebratory pieces about the encounter in the Weekly Standard. They are incapable of learning, and completely clueless.
BTW- Obama is so anti-semitic that he appointed Rahm Emmanuel as his chief of staff and won 78% of the Jewish vote, two points higher than Kerry. All that Jew-baiting really worked out well for the GOP, didn’t it? Oh, and Obama’s campaign manager, David Axelrod, who is described in Newsweek as so close to Obama that they do not even need to speak to communicate- also Jewish. And, if you google Rabbi Capers Funnye, prepare to have your world blown away, Weekly Standard.
In case this is not clear enough for the folks at the Weekly Standard and the RNC- You lost ground with Jews, despite running against a guy named Hussein who has stated he will sit down and talk with Iran. It might be time to sit down and re-assess, rather than writing paeans to c-list wingnut bloggers for speaking truth to power to CNN.
Comrade Stuck
Au Contraire, Wingnut Wizard Riehl disagrees, and puts forth the winning ticket for a GOP comeback.
though ego might get in the way in either case
Ya Think Dan, You bet’cha
Michael P
I can’t remember where I saw it, but some blog had a picture of Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder together and the headline above the picture said, "Black, Jew to Lead Country". Someone should send that over to Goldfarb.
What a no-talent assclown.
Hass
Don’t forget the appointment of David Axelrod to Assistant to the President…he’s also Jewish.
tomjones
I hate to rehash all the Rev. Wright brouhaha, but why do the Righties take as an article of faith that the good reverend’s sermons were hate-filled screeds lo all those 20 years?
I will grant for the sake of argument that the 3 or 4 taped sermons played ad nauseam back in April were hate-filled screeds.
But Obama claims he wasn’t in church those days, and no one has been able to prove otherwise. But how does the existence of four sermons prove that he preached hate for 20 years? There is .25 percent as much evidence that his sermons were positive, hopeful affairs: at least one, the audacity of hope sermon on which Obama took his book title, seemed inspirational and inclusive.
Wouldn’t it be just as objectionable for liberals to take the occasional sermon in churches against gay marriage and extrapolate that as proof a parishioner has been listening to anti-gay screeds over their entire history at the church?
tomjones
@Comrade Stuck: Does that mean we got bonus points for watching wingnut head explodes when Sen. Barry HUSSEIN Obama, the secret Manchurian Islamoscialist, won the election?
kommrade jakevich
I hope someone is working on a functional party (or two, or three…) that is ideologically different than the Democratic party. The GOP has now reached the point where rebuilding the party would require torching the entire thing, ploughing the ashes into the ground, waiting a hundred years and then soliciting for blue prints.
There’s no way the people who remain in the big tent will admit anyone who isn’t as stupid, vicious and vain as they are. They’ve become the party of anti-talent where even a guy who was a good enough actor to come off as appealing to moderates would be regarded with suspicion. They’ve managed to beat themselves to a pulp and fuck up the brand so badly that no one sane will go near them.
And they still don’t have clue one.
Via the comments at Sadly, No! Patlas Shrugs has stopped shrieking about John Galt long enough to call Emmanuel Obama’s "House Jew."
Explode with laughter.
But how the hell do you get bonus points for watching shit?
Oh, wait. Sorry, I forgot we’re talking about the same asswipes who think sitting over their keyboards in their mom’s basement is just as vital to the war against terror as the N.G. member shivering his ass off in Afghanistan.
Danko Ramone
Heh, I loved seeing that. Goldfarb is such a waste of flesh. I had that one posted on my website a few days ago myself.
http://www.bustergetmypills.com
Comrade Stuck
@tomjones:
They are clearly doing their deep thinking from slim droppings of Wingnut Gray Matter currently stuck on the wall.
Comrade Jake
If laughing one’s head off qualifies as exploding, then, yes, there will be lots of heads on the left exploding over Gingrich/Palin.
These folks would appear to be stunningly clueless, or completely fucking lost in crazy base land.
tomjones
@kommrade jakevich: In the spirit of unity, might I suggest that instead of holding a secret, conservative-elite concave to fix their fucked-up party, they invite David Cameron and some of the other new faces of the Tory party to craft Republicans a new platform/ideology/constituency (cut the tether to the fundies, my friends).
Comrade Jake
Pretty decent read/takedown of the current state of the GOP, over at the WSJ.
Money quote:
I’m probably in the minority here, but I really would prefer that the adults return to control in the GOP. It really is surprising to me that most of them seem to be working hard to move in the other direction.
kth
Remember, Goldfarb specifically accused the unnamed other of anti-Semitism. It’s a total stretch, with the only basis being Wright’s connection to Farrakhan. But it’s more likely that Goldfarb simply assumes that fiery black preachers are all anti-Semites than that he was placing that much weight on Wright’s acquaintance with Farrakhan.
Dennis - SGMM
Palin/Stevens 2012, bitches! He should be out of prison by then.
kid bitzer
i knew this. i predicted this.
while we on the left thought the guy looked like a total loser, i was certain that he would be viewed entirely differently by the guys in the next universe over.
yeah—here it is from edge of the west–i wrote this on 10/31:
"i don’t know: i worry that our unanimous loathing of goldfarb is one of those perspectival/tribal things, and that there were millions of other viewers watching him and saying, “oh yeah! he so told off sanchez! man, he just showed obama for the muslim he is! and furthermore, his silence just shows how it’s not safe to speak the truth on the msm, because the media is constantly taking away our first amendment rights!”"
depressing.
jcricket
I said this in the other thread, but righties have lost their ever-loving minds, and I don’t care anymore. There’s nothing to talk about with the moon-is-made-of-green-cheese folks. They aren’t honest opposition, they aren’t even honest with themselves (see Palin lying about the whole clothing thing). They are done as long as these people are major, coveted, promoted, fund-raising, excitable, required parts of the party structure.
Toast. Dead. Ex-Political-Party. Ceased to breathe. Without life. (insert rest of Monty Python sketch here).
But seriously, the Republican party will never (in any form I can imagine) with the black vote. They will never win the jews. The list of minority groups they cannot win with is so long that it’s easier to basically say the only groups they can count on are right-wing white Christians (mostly pentacostals, evangelicals, mormons); racists, xenophobes, homophobes, anti-government types and the few remaining old people that vote Republican out of habit.
Oh, and a couple of self-hating deluded minority types, like the log cabin Republicans.
kth
hate to consecutive-post, but I just noticed that the article was penned by one Stephen Hayes. I’m guessing that would be the author of "The Connection" (about the non-existent connection between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 perpetrators) as well as a puff biography of Dick Cheney.
give the imbecile fabulist his props for the Vegas anecdote that opens the piece. It’s priceless, though not for the reasons wingnuts like Hayes and Goldfarb think:
Dennis - SGMM
@jcricket:
Seems like declaring the end of three card monte or email scams. There is an almost unlimited supply of teh stupid out there. The Repubs will continue to harvest it.
Ash Can
If that’s what passes for intellect among "influential conservatives," then we’re not talking years in the wilderness, we’re talking extinction, from causes such as tying shoelaces together and falling down stairs and inability to chew gum and cross streets at the same time.
kommrade jakevich
The adults won’t be allowed back in. It’s like the Star Trek episode where only kids are running around on the planet because puberty = death. Any adult who tries to help gets the shit knocked out him.
Hmm. Yep. I think that was geeky enough. Ta, I’m off to claim my place in the Obama cabinet.
Anon
"House Jew"? That sounds pretty damn offensive. And of course Summers is a "House Economist". And the people on his economic advisory team were "House CEOs".
Of course, we all know that Obama will be just a puppet POTUS. We will really be ruled by a secret cabal of Fascists, Socialists, Redistributionists, Jihadists, Muslims, Progressive-taxationists, Surrender-Monkeys, Communists, and Black Panthers, led by Ayers of course.
jcricket
I’m not arguing they won’t continue to find suckers. It’s just that suckers aren’t enough to win elections. When you have 0 chance of winning a major city, and you lose the suburbs and split the ex-urbs, you’re not left enough people to win anything important going forward.
Oh sure, there are states like Idaho, Alaska, Kentucky where the crazies are almost a 3/5ths majority. But elsewhere, the three-card-monte scams are finding slim pickins these days.
I fully expect Republicans to be around for a long time, and to be forceful – even if they don’t grab the center. There’s a lot of damage well-funded nutjobs can do (see Mormons and Prop 8). And Scaife, Moon and others (maybe not Adelson anymore, tee hee) are gonna be shoveling money at the Republicans as fast as they can in their hope to keep the no-taxes-on-rich-folks legislation alive.
Conservatively Liberal
I have listened to wingnut callers to C-SPAN’s Washington Journal repeatedly state that ‘blacks are playing the race card’ because 95% of them voted for Obama. Lessee, Kerry got 88% of the AA vote in 2004 and Obama got 7% more?
Yup, obviously racist AA voters. NOT.
I hope the wingnutz keep it up because at the rate they are going I would guess that 99% of the AA vote in 2012 will go for the Democrat just because the AA voters will be sick and tired of being called racists by wingnut racists.
Face it wingers, the AA voters will not support a Repug because they know the Republic party is full of people who hate them.
Gingrich/Palin in 2012? Please let it happen! Hell, I would even donate a few dollars to help make it happen. There is no f’ing way that ticket would win, not even a chance. But it sure would be entertaining to watch them try!
Comrade Stuck
No, I agree. A Constitutional Republic needs two viable parties to work properly. The trouble is, that the devils bargain with the Southern Strategy has come full circle. What we call Wingnuttery is actually not the Republican Party nor loyal conservatism. What we now have in charge of the GOP, are the remnants of the conquered secessionist ideology of the Old South. Their beef is with the Constitution itself, or those parts that are either explicit or have evolved liberally into things like progressive taxation, separation of church and state, total equality under the law and a whole host of public laws that insure fairness and accountability, such as privacy, and laws of God versus those of Men.
The conflict is currently intractable IMO, and who knows what will emerge out of the ashes of the also conquered Conservative Movement.
jrg
Boy, those McCain staffers sure were geniuses, weren’t they? I’m glad no one was there to let the cat out of the bag and tell them that in order to form "guilt by association", mentioning some sort of "association" is required.
nabalzbbfr
Obama doesn’t have U.S. interests at heart.
For the first time in my life, I am ashamed to be an American. We as a nation have proved Osama bin Laden correct: We no longer have the stomach for any kind of fight.
The American people have elected a man who hates America and all it stands for. In our epic war on terrorism, he is a man who sides with our enemies. Although I have disagreed with the policies of many politicians, I never questioned their desire for a better America. I disagreed with almost every policy of former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and former Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill, yet they all had America’s best interests at heart. Obama has fooled the American people into thinking he is a middle-of-the-road Democrat, relying on the laziness of the people to avoid checking his voting record. He is the most hard-core leftist radical in the U.S. Senate, who has condemned America at every chance.
We have elected a socialist with strong anti-American beliefs, a man with a United Nations view of the world.
May God bless America; we certainly need it.
demkat620
Yes, because all that is wrong with the GOP is that they were never able to come up with the right bumpersticker slogan. Also.
The next four years are going to be hilarious.
p.a.
Marx said, about the French aristocracy or the Bourbons in particular, "They forget nothing, and yet they learn nothing."
Who’d a thunk the modern American GOP would model themselves after the French!!! (anyone know the accuracy of this quote? sounds apocryphal).
kid bitzer
jrg–
but part of the echo-chamber effect is that you can *read each others’ minds*!
so they knew exactly what goldfarb had said–even though he hadn’t said it!
and they thought it sounded awesome!
this was part of mccain’s problem in the debates; he kept talking in code to a smaller and smaller group of people who could read his mind. he forgot how to talk to people who aren’t wing-nuts.
b-psycho
@jcricket:
…now why would true anti-government types vote Republican?
There’s a difference between "I think the State is an inherently corrupt and violent institution" and "I think pointy-headed libruls control everything despite all evidence to the contrary". The latter are Republicans, the former are anarchists.
r€nato
Geez, I’ve been saying that…. IN JEST.
Please please please let them run those two in four years!!!
Oh and next time, guys… more Joe the Plumber! More Bill Ayers! Because the reason you lost was that you didn’t push those hard enough!
Rommie
The problem with Gingrich/Palin in 2012 is that there’s no chance that Palin will be the VP choice again – it’s the top of the ticket or nothing. At any cost.
mr. whipple
granted, i only listened to several hours of wright’s sermons on youtube, etc when the whole thing broke during the PA primary, but i’d be lost to remember them as ‘hate filled’.
whatever.
are there any sane goopers left?
Comrade Darkness
Actually, I thought he had rather a hard time with that style of rhetoric (unlike Bush, who is a master of it). He really is rather straightforward. Simple sentences, etc. Ergo, the reason that the wingers only really came on board with his ticket post-Palin.
Ed Marshall
For the first time in my life, I am ashamed to be an American.
Traitor.
Country first.
Will Hunting
Shorter nabalzbbfr:
My arm is really getting tired.
ksmiami
Just for catharsis, I re-read the Taibbi article, "Mad Palin" today and I was so relieved that there are still more decent people than assholes in this country. I think I am in love with Taibbi.
LiberalTarian
The problem for the GOP is that they forgot the very real value of credibility. They acted as though words don’t have real meanings, that lies are truth if you tell them often and loud enough, and that the average US citizen really does have an attention span of 15 seconds.
It just isn’t so.
We remember that they lied, and lied, and lied; now when they speak, we assume they are always lying.
When the GOP grown-ups run the liars out of power, well, maybe we can have a conversation again. In the meantime, Goldfarb and Co will be taking their lumps from pretty dealers in Vegas.
tripletee
nozzleboffer, you need to take some lessons from attanutjar. The competition to be our House Troll is fierce, and you’re just not measuring up.
Left Coast Tom
That "devils bargain" is the Republican Party because the Republican Party willingly sold itself. The intellectuals described in the Wall Street Journal column linked by Comrade Jake @11 were more than happy to take Wingnut Votes and accept Wingnut Help. They didn’t want the Wingnuts in charge, but really…what else could they have expected?
I agree it’s not "loyal conservatism".
kommrade jakevich
Longer if the TalEvan succeeds in taking over. I mean, Obama isn’t even office yet. Imagine what’s going to happen when he nominates a judge for the S.C. who has never injected glue into the locks of an abortion clinic. Wheee!
Watching those idiots stamp on their own dicks for a few decades will just about make up for all the Bushit we’ve had to endure.
Comrade Stuck
@Left Coast Tom:
Yep
Delia
My favorite site for keeping track of how the religious wingnuts took over the Republican Party and turned it into gooperville is TheocracyWatch. They’re always updating it, and even have links to post-election news. but the most interesting part to me is the history of their stealth campaign to take over the party in the 80s and 90s.
They also have detailed explanations of just who these people are and what they believe, which is quite different from what people believe at your average Presbyterian church down the street.
The wingers have suffered a setback, for which they don’t seem to have been prepared. But they’ll be back, to coin a phrase.
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
Why beat around the bush?
Comrade Jake
I bet noballz loved this article:
Giddyup!
Comrade grumpy realist
Don’t think it was Marx who said that about the Bourbons–maybe Tocqueville?
"Ils n’oublient pas, et n’apprendent rien."
(Dommage, le Google ne marchait pas. Merde alors!)
r€nato
the first 100 days of Obama’s term is gonna RAWK!
r€nato
Thank goodness President Bush didn’t do Osama’s bidding by starting a war of aggression in the Middle East against a country that had nothing to do with 9/11, thereby providing OBL with all the recruits he would ever need and a country-sized training camp for future terrorists.
Thank goodness Bush didn’t do Osama’s bidding by withdrawing US troops from Saudi soil.
Thank goodness Bush didn’t do Osama’s bidding by drastically curtailing our freedoms and spending this country nearly bankrupt on useless wars and security measures.
Dennis - SGMM
@Comrade Jake:
While Obama was running a world-class campaign his advisers took time and devoted resources to discern what Bush administration actions could be undone. If America becomes accustomed to a president whose administration can do more than one thing at a time then the Republicans are doomed for longer than they think.
demimondian
@b-psycho: The anti-government types in the current Republican Party are opposed to the current government. Consider that Constitution in Exile proponents, for instance: they’ve got nothing against the United States government, provided that the 15th Amendment is gutted, and provided that the republic-wide commercial effects of local legislation are completely ignored. They’re anti-government, unless it’s government of the blacks, by the whites, and for the whites, domination of the poor. by the rich, for the rich, and oppression of the weak, by the strong, for the rest of time.
Delia
Which reminds me. As I was driving home on Election Night from watching Obama’s speech at the County Fairgrounds Events Center, I was listening to NPR. The reporter was talking about an impromptu block party that had started in front of the White House. Just bunches of people who had showed up, turned their radios up loud and started to dance. The reporter was talking to one of the people and said to him, "But it’s raining."
The guy replied, "It’s been raining for eight years."
Glory be. It looks like the rain might stop.
Chris Johnson
Can I just contemplate the awesome of this for a minute? :)
jcricket
By anti-government I didn’t mean the anarchists, but the "government can never help people and all taxes should be abolished" types. The Ron Paul + Waco folks, basically.
But otherwise, what demi said.
Seriously, I welcome the lunatics taking over the asylum, at least in the near term. If Republicans keep pushing wingnut crap, they’ll get NY, WA and OR (where Dems are solidifying their majorities at a record pace because the wingnuts are in charge). Look at what happened in OR because of Sizemore.
Lie down with dogs, wake up with fleas.
Dance with the devil, the devil don’t change, the devil changes you.
And so on.
eyeball
Do these people actually get paid for what they do? I mean, can i just start a blog and get a six-figure job wrecking a political party and up-fucking a campaign? Is this really that easy? There are lemon laws in most states — you don’t have to keep a car that doesn’t run. How does this sort of thing happen? Is it that I’m too stupid to get on the gravy train? Or too naive to realize it exists? Can someone tell me how much actual money these people got for this?
And this Weekly Standard guy … what crappy, cliche-ridden bit of hooey. "taking a long sip of his Johnny Walker Black Label"? This is farcical. I feel like Mork from Ork when I read this stuff. Somebody please help me.
Blue Raven
@nabalzbbfr:
What? We have the independent senator from Vermont as President-elect? Wow. What a country!
tripletee
I’ve been loving all of the stories about impromptu celebrations that broke out on election night, with hordes of DFHs marching on their state capitols and . . . peacefully waving flags and singing the national anthem. That had to really annoy the wingers.
Notorious P.A.T.
Please don’t.
TenguPhule
nabalzbbfr’s bitter tears taste so sweet.
Cry nabalzbbfr.
So Delicious.
Zuzu's Petals
@LiberalTarian:
They will have four years to watch the re-runs of themselves saying "Her state is right next to Russia!" with straight faces.
There is justice in the world.
Nancy Irving
O come, O come, Emmanuel,
and ransom captive Israel…
LOL.
Matt
@ 26, (can’t pronounce it, so I’ll just call him Snuggles)
This may come as a surprise to you, Snuggles, but the rest of us are also ashamed that you are an American.