News Roundup for 11/1/11

"Ask me about my sex scandal -- please!"

-Headline of the Day-
"Mark Block Won't Talk About the Other Cain Scandal."

Did you know there were not one, but two scandals following the Herman Cain Train around like a black cloud? It's true! First, there's the sexy boom-chaka-wow-wow sexy sexual harassment sexy scandal broken by Politico and then there's some boring old money-laundering scandal broken by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. One's pretty serious and the other's really serious -- like someone could go to jail serious. So all the news networks are following Cain around with microphones, wondering why he won't shut up about the sexy boom-chaka-wow-wow sexy sexual harassment sexy scandal -- because they're smart like that.

Anyway, it turns out that if -- on the off-chance -- someone accidentally asks the Cain Train about the money-laundering scandal, they run into a brick wall. "We've retained independent counsel to look at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story," campaign manager Mark Block told a reporter when asked about it. What's that mean? You guys hire a lawyer or Sherlock Holmes or what? When asked again, Block gave pretty much the same answer.

When asked a third time, he said, "Why don't we talk about the campaign going forward?"

Or, if you don't want to talk about that, he's probably more than happy to talk about the sexy boom-chaka-wow-wow sexy sexual harassment sexy scandal. "Cain's campaign manager was once suspended from election work in Wisconsin because of election law violations," writes Dave Weigel. "He can't or won't talk now about more possible violations. It might be better for the Cain campaign if we all focus on Politico's story."

That's the sexy boom-chaka-wow-wow sexy sexual harassment sexy scandal, BTW. So if you're a journalist, make sure you ask Team Cain all about that one, OK?

I know they'd sure appreciate it. (Weigel)


-Subtle variations make all the difference-


Click to embiggen

(Truthdig)


-Bonus HotD-
"Ann Coulter On Herman Cain: Our Blacks Are Better Than Their Blacks."

For future reference, it's probably a bad idea for white people to refer to black people as a group in possessive terms -- given US history and all.

Try to keep that in mind, Annie. (Mediaite)

News Roundup for 10/6/11

Sarah Palin

-Headline of the day-
"Palin: Already Almost Forgotten."

When Sarah Palin announced she wouldn't seek the GOP nomination for presidency, she said she wasn't going away, but that she would "continue driving the discussion for freedom and free markets."

To which former Bush speechwriter David Frum answers, "Um, probably not."

"Sarah Palin’s political voice had dwindled well before she announced her decision not to run," he continues. "Now it will sink altogether into inaudibility. She will be no kind of force in future national discussions. She will have no sway over party debates. She will retain some starpower for a little while longer. She may for another cycle or two be able to help certain candidates for certain political offices raise some money. Even that will fade within two more years or four. Her political career was brief, bizarre, and sordid. But now at least it is definitively finished."

Seriously, this whole post is great. It's like an obituary written by someone who didn't like the deceased very much and wanted to get one last good whack in before they started shoveling in the dirt. He says she was a phony who was "never even a very good con artist" and that the people who fell for her bullshit were "people who passionately wished to be fooled."

Sure, she'll pop up occasionally, but for the most part she'll sit in the green room with people like Glenn Beck and Ann Coulter, waiting for the calls for an encore that never come. I like to imagine her as a sort of political Norma Desmond (look it up, kids), rattling around a decaying mansion in the end, waiting for past glories to come again and keeping an eye on the Behring Strait through a big spyglass, in the event that Vladimir Putin pops his head up. There he is! It's Putin! Max! Max! Call Fox News! I'm ready for my live feed, Mr. Hannity!

However it ends up, it's over. Those fifteen minutes are finally up. Everything from here on out is epilogue. (FrumForum)


-Cartoon time with Mark Fiore-
Hey kids, President Obama's here and he's going to tell us all about fighting terr'ism! Yay!


Click for animation

In the words of the great Walt Kelly, "We have met the enemy and he is us." (MarkFiore.com)


-Bonus HotD-
"Sarah Palin's Die Hard Supporters 'Stunned,' 'Disappointed.'"

Wow. You mean both of them? (ABC News)

News Roundup for 4/1/11

Most Americans' view of the federal budget

-Headline of the day-
"Poll: Americans Wrongly Estimate $178 Billion In Fed. Budget Goes To Public Broadcasting."

That's right, yet another poll showing that -- despite holding strong opinions about the federal budget -- most Americans have no idea what's actually in it. When CNN asked how much of the federal budget was spent on the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the "median guess" was 5%. 20% of respondents believed it was 10% of the budget, while 5% thought half of all money spent by the feds goes to NPR and PBS.

"The survey also underscores how clueless Americans are about where the budget goes in general," we're told. "For example, Americans on average thought foreign aid took up 10% of the budget; it really makes up about 1%."

How much does CPB actually get? It's "approximately one one-hundredth of one percent," according to the report. One penny out of every hundred dollars?

Outrageous! (Talking Points Memo)


-The world's gone mad!-
Today, Scientific American announced it would begin to balance their science reporting with creationist and global warming denier viewpoints. Reddit got all moldy. Google announced that you can now use body English in Gmail. Huffington Post announces a pay wall that only applies to people who work at the New York Times. And PBS hires rightwing nutjob Ann Coulter, other rightwing nutjob Mark Levin, and nonpartisan nutjob Lindsey Lohan.

Weird day, huh? (Scientific American, Reddit Blog, Google, Huffington Post, American Spectator)


-Bonus HotD-
"Mike Huckabee Wants Every American To Be 'Forced At Gun Point' To Learn From Radical Historian."

'Cause that there's what you call "liberty!" (ThinkProgress)