Las Vegas Gleaner

Snip

"The Office of Homeland Security. Football. A lieutenant governor."

"Things that the state of Nevada shouldn't pay for!"

Or, put another way, look, it's the Gleaner's latest column in CityLife.

Mixed up messages

Lowly Gleaner is out traipsing area highways and byways before the Islamojihadists conquer the United States and prohibit personal interstate transportion — yet another of our Freedoms which, like the enjoyment of Hostess Ding Dongs and Adam Sandler films, the evildoers are dedicated to destroying. But that doesn't mean a complete abandonment of the website's primary purpose — adding to the inventory of ways that people might harmlessly kill a minute or two at work. How? Reruns!

From "On message," Nov. 19. 2005.

...virtually everyone in the "stay the course" camp, from Bush to Cheney to congressional Republicans to Hannity to Limbaugh, are obsessed with the notion that any deviation from current Iraq policy will "send the wrong message."

Send the wrong message? It's a little late to be worrying about that.

If we "cut and run," cry those who urge "staying the course," we'll be "sending a messsage" to our enemies that that they can strike fear into the hearts of Americans.

Fear? The U.S. has been consumed with fear. Fear is the currency of the Bush administration and its political handlers. Every policy priority, public dialog and political campaign in this country has been subsumed by fear for the last five years. By not only exploiting fear, but heightening it at every opportunity, the Bush administration has unnecessarily and irresponsibly inflated the signficance of a relatively small number of extremists into a terrifying menace of historical scope. Fear prompted the U.S. to launch an optional war against the wrong enemy, a war that the original enemy is now exploiting to drain the U.S. treasury, assure a continued hold on U.S. priorities well into the foreseeable future, and kill Americans. We're afraid, and we sent that message long ago.

We are not afraid, however, to lash out and attack or bomb whoever we want wherever we want, with or without justification and at the risk of killing innocent civilians in the process. So those who are concerned that withdrawal would "send a message" that the U.S. is unwilling to hunt down and kill those who attack us - or even those who displease us - well, they should rest assured. The U.S. has no qualms about blowing up stuff, and people. That message has been delivered time and again.

But if we pull out of Iraq now, we'll be "sending a message" that the U.S. doesn't have any credibility, cry those who cling to the necessity of staying in Iraq.

The people of the world, in a spirit of generosity, might have been willing to overlook the biggest "oops" in history, and accept that the whole weapons of mass destruction thing was just an honest mistake. But if the intelligence was flawed, it also, in retrospect, must not have been particularly compelling. If it was, the Bush administration would not have felt obligated to cherry-pick it so as to support phrases like "mushroom cloud." If the case for WMD was such a "slam dunk," Colin Powell would not have been sent to the UN to sacrifice his reputation forever on an altar of aluminum tubes, even though our own intelligence discounted their signficance. Bush would not have felt it necessary to speak of yellowcake in a State of the Union speech. Dick Cheney would not have felt it necessary to describe an imaginary rendezvous between Iraq and Al-Qaeda operatives in Prague. If our case for war was so good, we wouldn't have had to puff Saddam up into a much bigger threat than he actually was. But that is what we undeniably and incontrovertibly did. So those who are concerned that withdrawal from the Iraq war might compromise U.S. credibility are rather missing the point. U.S. credibility was shot to hell earlier in this administration. The task now, and it's likely to be a long one, is rebuilding it.

Ah, but those who say we should "cut and run," along with those who charge the president lied about pre-war intelligence, are "sending the wrong message" to the troops - and we must support the troops, intone the war's apologists, resorting to their most emotional appeal.

Rep. Jean Schmidt of Ohio explained during the Republicans' political stunt on troop withdrawl Friday that a Marine colonel in Ohio had asked her to "send Congress a message: Stay the course...He also asked me," she said, "to send Congressman Murtha a message: Cowards cut and run. Marines never do."

A lot of messaging there, to be sure.

Even in the highly unlikely event that Republicans are right, and every last troop serving in Iraq is enthusiastic about staying there until Iraq is a stable democracy (or whatever this week's definition of victory is, as provided by the administration), it should be noted that the decision whether to stay in Iraq is not up to the troops. Nor should troop morale be the sole basis of this nation's policy. Having said that, U.S. troops have done everything that's been asked of them and more. If they were yanked out of Iraq tomorrow, it would in no way devalue what they have done - and Republicans should quit suggesting that it would. It sends the wrong message.

Why does Willard hate America so much?

While on a sojourn to assess whether the bumpkin factor in neighboring states can compete with Nevada's, the Gleaner is publishing excerpts from some older posts, in the firm belief that their unbridled brilliance was not fully appreciated the first time.

From Willard declares jihad on secularists, Dec. 6, 2007.

Americans may believe in many different brands of hocus pocus, but they all agree that people who don't believe in any hocus pocus at all aren't really Americans, Mitt the Magic Mormon said Thursday morning in one of the most offensive and intolerant tirades against individual belief ever delivered by a modern mainstream candidate for president from a major political party.

We've highlighted a few excerpts from Willard's remarks (in italics) and taken the "liberty" (if we may use that word) of providing some commentary from the apparently hated, discredited valueless point of view of a hapless non-believer.

"Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom."

Translation: Only people who believe in some complicated web of myths — say, as an example, the myth that a charlatan and plagiarist was visited by an angelic descendant of the planet Kolob bearing golden tablets — are capable of working toward economic and social justice and the defense and promotion of individual rights. Don't believe in god magic? Bad American! No freedom for you!

"Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone."

True, the crusades, the Inquisition and 9-11 remain powerful testaments to religion's historical commitment to protecting freedoms. Willard's got us there.

"Americans do not respect believers of convenience. Americans tire of those who would jettison their beliefs, even to gain the world."

Curious that in a speech on god and stuff, Willard acknowledged that flip-flopping on abortion in a blatant act of brazen and obvious political opportunism has rendered him untrustworthy in the eyes of American voters. Oh well, moving along...

"The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square. We are a nation 'Under God' and in God, we do indeed trust."

What's this "We" shit? You got a mouse in your pocket Willard? Throughout the rest of his talk thingy, the draft-dodging flip-flopping dog-hating Magic Mormon transitioned from offensive to creepy by repeated references to "we" and "us" and "our," hammering home the point again and again that anyone who does not believe in god (or gods, in the case of Willard's faith) isn't really a citizen of the United States....

"We believe that every single human being is a child of God – we are all part of the human family."

OK, we get it — those of us who do not believe that every human being is "a child of god" are not Americans. But are we also denied membership in the human family? Not that it matters, s'pose, because Willard's fellow saints will get around to baptizing each and every person on the planet as Mormons after we're dead, so presumably at the end of the day we'll all get to return to the Kolobian solar system and be gods and have 113 wives (sorry, ladies) no matter what we believe or don't believe now....

"Americans acknowledge that liberty is a gift of God, not an indulgence of government."

Leaving aside the favorite rhetorical retreat of War Party politicians — the false dichotomy — no doubt some Americans do feel that liberty is a divine gift.

No doubt there are other Americans who acknowledge liberty as an underlying, foundational value and concept for which people have fought and died and been persecuted. Many Americans also acknowledge that some of those people who advocated and defended liberty through the ages were religious, some of them weren't, and as often as not, liberty's champions were attacked and killed in the name of the very organized religions and intense god-beliefs that Willard seems to think lie at the heart of every productive activity on the planet earth.

And still other Americans might acknowledge liberty is the right of individuals to think and act for themselves. They might define or interpret liberty in a way that doesn't have jack to do with Goddy McGod. Oh. Wait. According to the Willardian astrological map of the heavens, those people aren't Americans at all. Never mind.   

Extramarital affair that governor definitely isn't having might be ... news!?!

Those in the Nevada news media and others who suffer from profound hypersensitivity probably should not read this..

Still waiting for Porter's reply

Your humble Gleaner is roaming the southwest on a mytho-tour, wherein one explores the culture surrounding popular area fantasies such as crashed alien spacecraft, John McCain's economic policy and the superiority of rural values. In a desperate attempt to make the website seem at least marginally less lame, passages from old posts will be featured and referred to as "Classic Gleaner" because that's seems like the sort of thing the grown-ups would do.

From A personal note to Jon Porter... Aug. 29, 2007:

Jon Porter ... a cad, a liar who would say or do anything to advance his political career, and a sleaze merchant who bargains away votes in Congress in exchange for campaign contributions, no matter what harm or trouble his actions bring on the people who live in his congressional district. He's a cynical opportunist who thinks his own constituents are morons who will believe anything as long as it's packaged properly, hence his well-earned reputation for running the sleaziest attack ads in Nevada politics. His venal behavior would perhaps be mitigated to some degree if he were an idiot. Alas, he isn't; he is just remarkably lazy, which is why, in those rare instances when he overcomes his cowardice and actually speaks with the press directly, he finds himself mindlessly mouthing talking points previously prepared by Washington professionals who, albeit for right-wing causes but in stark contrast to Porter, actually have to work for a living. Subsequently, he is routinely incapable of rendering an intelligent remark or observation about policy, because for him to do so would require taking the time to study issues and know something about them, and that in turn might interrupt band practice. Shiftless, morally vacant, profoundly insincere, demonstrably untrustworthy, hypocritical and apathetic about the well-being of the people he was elected to represent, Porter embodies all the most negative and pernicious qualities often intended — and in his case, deservedly so — by the pejorative phrase "career politician." Oh, and he's a scummy rent lord.

Now, why do we say all that? Because on blogs, authors can defame and lie with impunity because they can be anonymous and don't have to worry about the facts, as Porter reportedly told the Laughlin paper?

No. We say all that because after covering Porter's political career, on the Gleaner and in newspapers before that, over the last ten years, we are convinced that all of it is true. Also, Porter is not just a public figure, but one who presumes to represent the public (he's the Gleaner's congressman, in point of fact), and our being able to say that about him in no way depends on us being anonymous.

As Porter and his handlers know, the Gleaner is not anonymous. If Porter feels we've said something that rises to defamation, he knows where to reach us.

Cheering up the evildoers

The lowly Gleaner is on a reconnaissance mission to take the pulse of voters in some of the other mostly rectangularly shaped states 'round here.

In an admittedly futile push back against the ephemeral nature of the medium, or in an act of unmitigated vanity, or both, some excerpts from a few older, er, previously published Gleaner posts will be resurfacing over the next few days.

From "Yet another ranting churchy guy enchants the viewing public," March 15, 2008.

...War Party Rep. Steve King has summed it up over and over — and over and over and over as he smartly capitalizes on his maiden appearances in non-Iowa media — the terrorists will be "dancing in the streets" if Obama is elected president.

Talk about belaboring the obvious. Any fool can see the terrorists want nothing more than for the United States to be led by a multi-cultural, multi-racial president whose very election in and of itself would not only  signal a dramatic break from American policies of the past and assure nations on every continent and in every corner of the world that the U.S. isn't batshit crazy anymore, but also shatter some of the core assumptions about America that inspire hatred among entire generations of Arabs and Muslims.

If John McCain is elected to continue the Bush administration's policies, by contrast, then the evildoers would most definitely not be dancing in the streets. Well, except for the initial demonstration heralding the continuation of Bush administration policies and hence a perpetuation of the glorious ongoing struggle against the great satan or whatever they're calling us that day. That'll probably involve some dancing. And continued Bush-McCainism will make it easier for evildoer movers and shakers, on a going-forward basis, to attract recruits and rally popular support for killing Americans and attacking people or institutions perceived to be America sympathizers. So that should guarantee the occasional street dance during the course of a McCain administration. And a McCain victory in November will prompt evildoer leaders to dance, cheer and squeal in delight in the certainty that McCain, like Bush, will continue to puff up their image as global historical players to an exalted degree that is far out of proportion to their actual significance. Nothing boosts a fundraising campaign, after all, like press clippings of the president of the United States saying over and over again that your cause is nothing less than "the transcendent challenge of the 21st century."

But yeah, other than that, the evildoers would much rather have Obama as president.

Pete and Repete were brothers...

The unofficial motto of the national Democratic Party is "Bush-McCain." And while the three special elections for U.S. House this year suggest that linking Democrats to Obama or even the word — gasp! — "liberal" isn't working at all, there is every reason to expect that mean-spirited but honest linkages between War Party extremists can be put to marvelously effective use in all sorts of candidate-specific ways.

For instance, voters in Nevada's third congressional district, likely as not, have grown extremely weary of "Bush-Porter." And they're flat-out disgusted by "Bush-Gibbons-Porter."

But why stop there? Associations that are as every bit as politically poisonous as they are well-deserved should work beautifully further down the ticket as well.

In other words, if anyone knows anyone who knows Allison Copening, the Democrat who is challenging Bob Beers in state Senate District 6 in what is the highest-profile down-ballot race in the state this year, could you please tell them to tell her to quit telling the media that she knows jack all about anything but should be elected anyway because she's a self-starter who works well with others? (RJ)

Whether she knows it or not, the point of Copening's candidacy is not to win the seat to give the Democrats a majority in the state Senate. It's even more basic than that: thwarting the state's foolish and harmful march backwards by halting the disastrous Gibbons-Beers agenda.

If and when Copening ever shows some sign of understanding that, somebody send an email or something, because then the race might be worth watching.