The Stuff I Didn't Get To -- 5/18/09

Sorry buddy, maybe next week...

-Headline of the day-
"Perry: That whole secession thing? Nevermind."

Texas Gov. Rick Perry raised eyebrows earlier by saying that his state might just have to secede from the United States. He lowered them again by saying he didn't really mean they'd actually ever secede. Then the eyebrows went up again when he said the Lone Star state might secede. Now he's lowering them again in an op-ed for a Texican paper. Not only won't Texas secede, says Perry, but they've never even considered it. See, those two times Perry said they might secede... well, they never happened. Rick doesn't even know what this "secession" thing means.

"I have never advocated for secession and never will," he writes. "Like the president, members of Congress and every other state governor, I have sworn oaths to our nation and Constitution. My sincere pledge to uphold and defend the Constitution has fueled my concern and my statements about the recent unprecedented expansion of our federal government."

Of course, that's this week -- next week could be an entirely different story. No one will ever accuse Governor Goodhair of being decisive. I wouldn't rule out that wave of illegal Texican immigration yet. (Salon)


-Cartoon time with Mark Fiore-
Hey kids, it's "Old vs. New" -- as in media...


Click for animation

Don't worry, we don't need reporters to find stuff out. That's what press releases and ad campaigns are for!

Don't forget to check your Tweetles and Facetubes! (MarkFiore.com)


-Assholery, stupidity, and hypocrisy-
That's the trifecta conservative blogger and Drudge Report co-founder Andrew Breitbart hit recently. He and his wife were having a quiet seaside lunch, when antiwar protesters marched by his table on the beach. Being a Republican tool, Breitbart's automatic reaction to peace protesters was "Yay for war!" and he flipped off the protestors as they went by. In fact, he made a big deal out of doing it. By his own account, when one protester raised his fist, "I jumped from my seat and bolted to the center of the balcony, where the American flag waved furiously in a now-harsh wind. Positioned next to Old Glory, I countered the young punk and reached out my right arm directing my middle finger in his direction."

His knee-jerk pro-war position turned out to be a bad one. He didn't really know what he was defending in the name of good old-fashioned war. Turns out the marchers were protesting against child soldiers, slavery, and genocide in Northern Uganda and the Congo. This is like giving someone the bird because they said that Adolph Hitler wasn't a very nice man. Someone in the march recognized him, wondered "WTF?" and wrote him an email about it. Andy calls his public apology published in the Washington Times, "I, Jerk." So at least he's not digging himself in deeper -- a common conservative trait.

OK, you're asking, you've got the assholery and stupidity covered -- where's the hypocrisy?

Way back in the mists of nearly forgotten history -- March of this year, to be exact -- Breitbart wrote another op-ed for the WT where he complained about what total pricks liberals are and how we're not willing to have a rational discussion. Righties were much nicer, the delusional Breitbart wrote, because they embrace "basic Judeo-Christian ideals and would not promote nor defend the propaganda techniques that were perfected in godless communist and socialist regimes."

Coming from a professional propagandist, that criticism was pretty easy to take -- not just because it was complete bullshit. And now Andrew Breitbart proved the superiority of those "basic Judeo-Christian ideals" by giving the finger to people who think genocide and child kidnapping aren't good ways to do things. Not because he's for all that genocide and child kidnapping, mind you, but because the conservative default on war is to support it. I guess because they're pricks.

So, the next time you see Andrew Breitbart anywhere -- he looks like this -- give him the finger.

It's the Judeo-Christian thing to do. (Michael Roston)