The Vampire Coulter, the Lava Lamp Effect, and Newt Explains It All

Our old friend Ann Coulter was censored on the MSNBC show, "Morning Joe" the other day. She called John McCain a d****bag, proving once again that hell hath no fury like a conservative turning on one of their own. It is an ugly sight when this sort of thing happens, rather like watching a tiger eating one of its own cubs.

Coulter has never been shy when it comes to outlandish statements, or self promotion, both of which seem to morph into the same thing when they let her on TV. Her books and speeches make clear that she is the ultimate authority on all things patriotic and conservative. Anyone out of touch with Ann Coulter is subject to her undying wrath.

To see her is to understand that the reason she would never be offered a part in the popular "Twilight" series is because she looks too much like a vampire. There is no subtlety about her pale, anorexic appearance and her wanton and relentless need for human blood. One can only imagine her private thoughts on Mitt Romney's run for the nomination. If they were to be made public secret service inquiries would surely follow.

The hard right of the republican party is in complete disarray. They just can't seem to get rid of this Romney fellow and sell the GOP faithful on voting for one of their own. The polls have shown different conservative purists rising to challenge the Mitt, then dropping back to the pack as their fifteen minutes fade. It is rather like watching a lava lamp. Those red globs heat up, rise, then cool and sink back into the depths of the viscous liquid.

On the rise right now is Newt Gingrich. He lags in New Hampshire, Romney's backyard, but leads in South Carolina, basically his own backyard. How long he can mount a meaningful challenge is a matter of much speculation. Mr. Gingrich can push the right buttons much of the time, but on others, he inserts his foot neatly into his mouth.

Newt Gingrich makes much of the conservative leadership tremble. He talks the talk, but rarely walks the walk. When you lecture Americans on fiscal responsibility and the evils of deficit spending it isn't good form to run up a huge bill at Tiffany's because of your THIRD wife's taste for fine jewelry. He takes $1.8 million from Freddie Mac and then blithely says he never lobbied for them. In a speech in South Carolina he explained to the voters he didn't have to lobby because his income from his speaking appearances was so great. In other words he was so fabulously well to do, he didn't need to dirty his hands by shilling for his pay master. This is hardly the populist message or image the leadership of the right wants to send to lower income, socially conservative, evangelical, voters. Only Ronald Reagan could get away with such nonsense.

The fact of the matter is, Newt Gingrich is such a loose cannon when it comes to personal behavior and ethics that to this day he remains the only Speaker of the United States House of Representatives to be removed by his own party. If Dick Armey, Tom DeLay, and John Boehner can't put up with you, who can?

I don't know, but, despite his own devastatingly low poll numbers,or, perhaps because of them, if I'm Barak Obama I might want Newt to head the ticket on the other side. And if the president is really lucky, Gingrich will pick Ann Coulter as his running mate. Now there is a duo that will appeal to the middle of American politics. Especially everyone who would actually have to work for a $1.8 million pay check, or be genteel enough to not call one of their own a d****bag on cable TV.

11-30-11

The NBA Returns, The Owners Win the Big One, and Self Loathing is All the Rage

The NBA has returned, well is going to return sometime, hopefully by Christmas Day. David Stern and the owners have wrung the players out to dry. It is has been an ugly affair, like all labor disputes are, but this one has been particularly odorous.

According to The Oklahoman, OKC's daily paper, an unscientific and random poll shows locals side with management. These published results are hardly a surprise given the daily paper's long and dreadful history of anti-labor propaganda. Management of the Oklahoman has considered organized labor a communist endeavor for over one hundred years. Under the previous ownership it was routine for them to send their own employees, for a fee of course, to other publishers who were battling unions in order to keep their presses working. Oklahoma Publishing's scabs for hire policy has justifiably made them an anathema with organized workers all across the land.

OPUBCO's treatment of its own employees is one of abject exploitation, arrogance and intimidation. In three separate talks with three different OPUBCO shop employees the uncoached conclusion reached by all of them was that if someone was stupid enough to try to organize a union there, that person would end up face down in ditch somewhere southwest of Hollis. No, the OPUBCO Sultans don't take kindly to workers trying to better themselves or their work conditions through legal means.

Which of course brings us back to the NBA. Apparently, at least some of the conservative fan base of the OKC Thunder, blame the players for the work stoppage. Terms like greedy millionaires and spoiled babies are being bandied about.

As always, conservatives never let a few facts get in the way of their hysterics.

This labor dispute was NOT a strike. It was a lockout. The players were not asking for more. They were just fighting to keep what the owners had given to them years ago. The entire tiresome negotiating process wasn't about Kevin Durant getting more money and benefits, it was about him keeping the money and benefits found within the contract signed by Clay Bennett and his top flight advisers.

You have to really be incompetent to lose money with a NBA franchise. Your product has to be abysmal and your management team has to have the collective sports IQ of the people in the office fantasy league. It isn't the players fault that some of owners can't run a taco stand, much less a pro sports franchise.

If we're going to point fingers here it should be at the owners who several years ago made promises they couldn't, or wouldn't keep and now want to re neg on the whole collective bargaining agreement.

Of course that argument won't phase the lower income conservatives. Long ago they bought into the argument that they are only worth what their bosses say they are worth and they should be damn glad they get that. Self loathing is part of that psyche and there is no changing it. The old, "What makes you so special?" mentality is insurmountable.

OPUBCO's ceaseless barrage of right wing fol de rol has worked wonders convincing anyone who makes an hourly wage that they have no value. And, more importantly, that anyone else who thinks they do, is part of some sort of fearsome, traitorous cabal.

It is reminiscent of the callous line used in the movie, "Gangs of New York." A well to do satrap looks over the rim of his brandy glass and says, "All we need to do is pay half the poor to kill the other half."

People like the ones running the NBA and OPUBCO love to depict those who criticise them as waging class warfare. In reality the critics are just pointing out that they are.

Next time you spend the weekend at home, take a vacation, work an eight hour day, or go on medical leave think about who got you these things. It certainly wasn't management. And don't think for a minute management wouldn't take all those things away from you if they could.

Kevin Durant isn't the team in OKC. Clay Bennett and his partners are the team. To them, Kevin Durant is nothing more than a jock strap and a jersey. He is, in the scheme of things, simply part of the cost of doing business. If he can be had for less, all the better.

11-28-11

Egyptians in the Streets, Americans in the Mix and Freedom Can Make Some Queasy

Kamal el-Ganzouri, the new Egyptian Prime Minister, appeared on TV the other day and had that deer in the head lights look to him. Indeed, he seemed infected by that nervous tic that infests all last ditch leaders of doomed regimes. It is the look of a man who seems sure there is a gallows somewhere in his near future.

He has reason to think that. Tens of thousands have taken to the streets in Egypt once more, despite promises of an election process beginning in a couple of days. The masses are on edge and the career track, not to mention life expectancy, of anyone put into power by the military seems limited at best.

el-Ganzouri's job history has not helped his cause. He was a member of the deposed regime for eighteen years. In fact he was its prime minister from 1996-1999. It makes you wonder what that shadowy military junta was thinking. The despised Hosni Mubarak is on trial for his life and they appoint one of his boys to run the country. While no one has ever accused professional military men, anywhere, of being astute political strategists, this move seemed a literal invitation to stir up more unrest and violence.

Well if that is what the military wanted that is what they got. Tens of thousands have flooded into Tahrir Square chanting things like "Illegitimate, Illegitimate!" Nearly forty have been killed and pungent clouds of tear gas have once again drifted through the streets of Cairo.

As always a few Americans have felt the need to watch or record the proceedings from a little too close up. Derek Sweeney, Luke Gates, and Gregory Porter, students at American University in Cairo were busted on top of a university building near the Square. The police charged them with joining in with protesters as they tossed fire bombs at the authorities. The trio denied all charges and appear to have been released from custody.

Several things happen to Americans when they go overseas. Number one, they often seem to think that since they are beyond the boarders of the United States all rules of civilization and normalcy no longer apply. They can behave as beastly and depraved as is humanly possible with no consequences whatsoever. Number two, since they are Americans they can be anywhere they want, whenever they want and nothing will happen to them. They are shocked, shocked when they realize police in other countries will arrest anyone and everyone. That the authorities don't have to read them constitutional rights, provide them with a lawyer, and if they are a mind to, will give them a few shots to the testicles just for fun. No, getting popped in places like Cairo isn't like being questioned by the Nichols Hills, Oklahoma police department.

Lastly American liberal idealism doesn't apply in certain parts of the world. Especially those parts where the military run things. Soldiers generally have no tolerance for people who believe in things like freedom of the press. Mona Eltahawy, a columnist and activist with dual American-Egyptian citizenship, learned that the hard way. She was filming the protests with her camera phone when she was surrounded by police and taken away. She has accused Egyptian police of sexually assaulting her, beating her, breaking one hand and the other arm. She says they groped her all over and called her, among other things, "a whore."

Well, Mona, you aren't in Kansas any more. It isn't an Arkansas-Louisiana St. football game. It is a revolution. When dealing with a military that has no legal restraints and hasn't had, ever; one that is hanging on for dear life, barbarity is going to be the norm.

The Egyptian revolution poses a problem for both the U.S. and Israel. Both nations can talk about supporting the march toward open and free elections and the will of the people. However, in their heart of hearts, they both know the results of those free elections could mean that Islamic fundamentalists could become a real power in the new government. It is not a prospect either wants to deal with.

The Egyptians are going to have a new government, or a military dictatorship that makes Mr. Mubarak look like a screeching liberal. One is an anathema to liberty the other is a step into the unknown.

Either way the middle east is not going to stabilize. Dangers there will persist for generations, if not for all eternity.

It almost makes you wish for the good old days of the cold war doesn't it?

Actually, Buddy Can You Spare $1.2 Billion, Sinking Boats, and the Enron Plea

To break things down into terms even I can understand, here are the rules:
A:The company can buy a boat with a client's excess cash, sell it and keep some of the profit.
B:The company can buy a boat with its own cash, sell it and keep the profit.
C:What the company can't do is use a customer's money to make payments on the boat while the brokerage is sailing around on it. If the boat sinks you've not only broken the law, you have a hard time explaining to the client why his or her money is somewhere deep in the Mariana's Trench.

Violation of rule C is apparently what happened at MF Global. The boat was European debt, which as anyone who has picked up a newspaper knows, has become an economic black hole.

On November 1 of this year MF Global attorney, Kenneth Ziman told a US Bankruptcy Judge that, "to the best knowledge of management there is no shortfall."

There you have it, "The Enron Defense" last used unsuccessfully by Kenny Lay and Jeff Skilling. "I don't know what happened. I just run the place."

Things began to crumble quickly. Soon a figure of $600 million was bandied about. Now as the investigation deepens the auditors are saying it is more like $1.2 billion. Who knows what the final figure will be? This pyramid scheme appears to have few limits and more felons than Watergate.

The FBI is now involved and we can assume indictments will follow at some point. There is no telling who will be in the dock, although former New Jersey governor and MF Global CEO, Jon Corzine seems a sure bet.

Yes, Bernie Madoff is soon to have some fellow movers and shakers roaming the cell block with him. One can only imagine the tales of high finance that will be spun in the yard. There will be fond, misty eyed, memories of high times, fast jets, and champagne on ice. And then there will be navy beans, boiled spinach and soggy toast for dinner.

The hammer always falls because once you're in on a deal like this you're in all the way. There is no jumping off the speeding gravy train. At least not until it runs full bore off the washed out bridge. Of course by then it is too late.

You can dress them up in Armani suits, but they still carry around the cards for the Monte game in their hip pockets. There is no curing them.

11-22-11

Flashbacks, Howling Joe Walsh, and the Unwashed in the Streets

Joe Walsh, a representative from Illinois, has the Occupy Wall Street people pegged. According to him, "I think these are generally, pampered, unfocused, clueless, young people and a smattering of other people who don't understand this country and are advocating anti American solutions. They don't at all represent America."

In his defense he did pause a couple of times during that first sentence to catch his breath. I know this because I saw the video. He also likes to yell a lot when people ask him a question he deems antagonistic. He raises his voice, he begins to cut off responses. He tells people to be quiet and to listen to him in some sort of bug eyed frenzy. He is a bully and if you wish to challenge him he will begin to get red in the face and he will yell and call you uninformed. He will attack like a cornered beast. He is the poor man's Newt Gingich.

The real Newtonian comments about the Occupy people are this. "They should take a bath and get a job." Well that may not be exact, but it is close.

I've heard this sort of superficial dismissal horse shit before. I was on the south and north ovals of the University of Oklahoma. I was protesting the war in Vietnam. The cat calls from the sidelines were usually, "Get a job," "Why don't you take a bath?" and the most common, "You communist son of a bitch."

A, I was in school and some of the time I had a job, some of the time I didn't. B, I assure everyone I showered every day. C, I am not now, nor have I ever been a communist.

Those denials don't matter though when dealing with the faithful. Everyone to the left of Ann Coulter, Newt Gingrich and all the other cheap jack bullies like Joe Walsh consider democrats and liberals un American. The purity of their belief relegates all opposition to the oily world of treason. Herr Hitler would be proud A couple of old phrases come to mind, "You are either part of the solution, or part of the problem" and "America, Love it or Leave it.

When the tea party rubes ran around Washington a while back as the complete closure of government was a real possibility they held up signs that said, "Shut it all down". That means they advocated that US troops in harms way should not be paid, or re-armed. That means they wanted the entire inter state highway system to crumble into shambles. That means they wanted every lake in the great state of Oklahoma to dry up. It also means old people should starve if their pensions aren't enough to sustain them. Yes, if the company they worked for all their lives squandered their pension, well the ice floe is over there, pray for the quick swipe from the polar bear's claws.


It is an ugly flashback. These yokels, who were educated in segregated public schools, are an awful lot. They have no argument, so they have to yell at the top of their lungs. They have to shout people down because reason is not on their side.

Every now and then I think evolution is a myth. The howling and brutality and faux martyrdom that spews from them cannot come from anything but apes trapped in trees who have been speared by poisonous darts. Back in the day, I parked my VW in an OKC grocery store parking lot. When I came out my driver's side wing window had been broken into, my car seat and steering wheel had been spit on profusely and my McGovern for President bumper sticker had been torn off.

I know these brutal thugs and I loathe them.


Here is to the people who have the guts to sit passively and get pepper sprayed by some out of control cop. Here is to those who say no to the greed and the incompetent speculation by the goofs who run Wall Street. Here is to those who say enough of this right wing crap that infests us like a cancer.

America is better than the tea party and the hard right of the republican party

We always have been. We always will be.

That is why I still believe in this nation.

11-21-11

Newt Redux and the Desperate Right

Hunter S. Thompson once wrote of Richard Nixon a few years after his fall, "He's tanned, he's rested, he's ready."

The same sort of thing could be said for Newt Gingrich as the sunny skies of Indian Summer give way to the battle ship gray clouds of early winter.

Newt is resurgent. After an amateurish and disastrous campaign kickoff that had him written off as some sort of latter day Harold Stassen he is back with a vengeance. The latest Rueters/Ipsos poll gives him twenty four percent support from the republican faithful. Mitt Romney in the same poll has slipped to twenty-two percent.

No one has ever accused Mr. Gingrich of not knowing which buttons to push when it comes to playing to the masses. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Attack, attack, attack. Confront the press in debates, rather than the issues. Declare them evilly stupid and biased. Slash into what has become Obamacare, despite past public statements that seem to endorse vast portions of it. Take Freddie Mac's money, and after the checks have cleared condemn the management and then the president for accepting contributions that are paltry compared to the consulting fees personally raked in.

It seems like madness and perhaps it is. The hard right of the party is desperately searching for someone, anyone, who can wrest the nomination from the suspected liberal and cult member, Mitt Romney. The true believers have watched Perry make George W. Bush seem an orator the likes of William Jennings Bryan. Cain has been reduced to the Sandusky defense on public TV. "All of my accusers are lying." Yes, and please ignore the court sealed payouts.

All the others in this race are babbling buffoons and hopeless libertarians. They are so far out of touch with the vast majority of America that one wonders how many windmills they see each dawn on the plain before them.

The hidden figures in this poll don't bode well for the Newt. Thirty-seven percent of all Americans believe he lobbied for Freddy Mac. And, the most damning, of the republicans polled forty-two percent believe Mitt Romney will win the nomination. Only nineteen percent think Gingrich will. Banzai charges are impressive, but almost always fail. Mr. Gingrich has personal and political baggage that will doom his campaign

The right edge of the republican party is going to lose this nomination process because they just don't understand that huge numbers of people, not on the street, think they are as crazy and dangerous as a pack of rabid pit bulls.

If I was to wager I would put my money on Romney. Barring some unforeseen disaster, he is too slick and, to the chagrin of the baying right, too far to the center. It may drive them into conniption fits, but he is the exact sort of candidate who can really challenge Barak Obama.

They are the only ones who don't seem to recognize that.

11-20-11

And Another One is Gone; The Autumn of the Lost Girls Continues

The details were predictably sketchy. A body found last week in rural far eastern OKC was identified as that of Alina Fitzpatrick. She was seventeen years old. Police have yet to determine if it was a homicide. One thing is certain, the cause of death wasn't old age.

She is the third teen aged girl to be found dead within a month in the metro area. Carina Saunders was the first. Her dismembered body was found in a duffel bag in a wooded area behind a suburban supermarket. The second was Kelsey Bransby. She was discovered shot in the face in a southwest side apartment.

There are similarities and there are differences. Saunders had graduated from high school, but was living on the dark fringe. Bethany police who are in charge of that investigation have said publicly she had a taste for a variety of drugs and no fixed address, or job that they could tell.

The information released about Bransby by Oklahoma City Police through the daily paper is minimum at best. She was in the same high school class as Saunders, but had dropped out a few months before graduating. She apparently lived in the apartment where she was found dying. There is no published account of how she was supporting herself.

Fitzpatrick had attended Putnam City North High School until last spring. She began to take classes over the school system's internet, Putnam City Virtual, this fall. Her parents say she left North because of bullying. School officials say they have no reports of bullying that involve her. A district spokesperson, always the careful bureaucrat, was sure to mention all the anti-bullying procedures in place there.

Saunders was last seen getting into a SUV with an older, gray haired man. Fitzpatrick was last seen when she was dropped off at an apartment complex near NW 23rd St. and Western Ave, across town from the PC North district. There is no word about what she was doing there, or who she was going to see. That was on November 4th.

If there is any evidence that all three deaths are related, the police in two different departments and the OSBI are keeping it to themselves. Credulity, however, is beginning to be stretched. Oklahoma City isn't Mayberry, but three dead teenage girls in a month, two confirmed murders and one fairly reeking of homicide, would seem to take us beyond the realm of coincidence.

Alina Fitzpatrick's parents had established a facebook page after she went missing, looking for help in trying to find their daughter. Ms. Saunders' parents had done the same thing. Kelsey Bransby's parents didn't have time to.

As the leaves dry up and fall, then scuttle away in the wind, a chill is settling in. It has nothing to do with the season. This is the chill that is never chased away by a fireplace in a warm den or living room. This is the chill that comes from within.

Children are being killed. It doesn't get any colder than that.

The police have no suspects.

11-17-11