A moment spent basking in the misery of another

Last night Arlen Specter lost the Democratic primary for his own Senate seat to Rep. Joe Sestak. If I may be permitted a moment to chortle, snicker, and guffaw, I would like to take it.

Why do I take such pleasure in the man's defeat? Aside from the fact that he was an awful political hack, he represented one of the things I hate most about our elected betters... especially Senators: namely the notion that once elected to that seat, it becomes their possession, a thing that is owed to them by the voters. The Senator ceases to become an elected representative and ascends to the place of Lord, whose unworthy subjects should avert thine eyes, shut thine mouths, and continually re-elect them... never holding them accountable for anything they do. Joe Lieberman is the living embodiment of this mental disorder, but Specter was a close second.

The basic theme of his 1998 campaign was "I've sat in this seat for so long, you owe it to me to send me to Washington again for one last ride." In 2004 the theme was "Remember when I said that the last time was my last ride? Forget that. Now I have cancer and you owe me this seat as a present for having cancer and serving for so long." This year it was "Yeah, I'm nakedly switching parties with no regard for principle, but this seat is mine. Give it to me."

I guess, finally, the state had enough. The jowls are dead. Long live the jowls. Shame that he at least has the dignity to bow out now. I'd like to see him pull and intensely egotistical "Fuck it, this seat is mine when you pry it from my cold dead hands" Indy run. Cravenly attempt to hold onto this seat through every means necessary: taking hostages, strapping C4 across his chest, weeping "But... it's MY SEAT!" It's a shame, really, that he's choosing dignity now. It's so out of character. But if last night shows anything, it's that maybe Americans are sick of entitled politicians.

Unfortunately, there is no awesomely weepy picture of Specter, so I'll just re-run the photo from one of Sean and mine's favorite electoral blood lettings:


Imagine Arlen as Santorum or the little girl. Either works. Magic bullet my ass, Arlen.

Arlen Specter's raging hard-on for socialism

The health care debate has brought us many grimly hilarious revelations about the specific way with which our legislative branch has caught fire and is burning to the ground, taking all of us down with it. But there is one man out there valiantly fighting for all that is just and right: committed socialist and leftist agitator Arlen Specter, who went after Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins over the public option.

The trio spoke at an event in support of a cost containment amendment to the health care bill that they hope to introduce shortly. About 15 minutes in, though, Specter, who's tacked significantly to the left since he switched into the Democratic party, put his colleagues on the spot about their public option opposition.

"I continue to support a robust public option," Specter said. "There are differences on that, and my two colleagues have expressed their own reservations."
...
Specter went on: "And when Senator Lieberman talks about single payer, I think he's putting his finger on the pulse of it. That's what people have concluded [but] the public option isn't single payer, and it is not going to add to the deficit, it's going to be a level playing field. So I would like everyone to read the fine print and [for my colleagues] to re-read the fine print."

Oooh, collegial Senate burn! "Re-read the fine print" is the Senatorial equivalent of "Get fucked and die, you hatchet faced cretins."

But it's nice to see Senator Specter so committed to the left fringes that he'll publicly call out the actual dishonesty in both Collins and Lieberman's arguments. Funny though, if his re-nomination for the GOP ticket hadn't been such a longshot and he didn't have to switch parties, he'd probably would have taken to the Senate floor to rail about how Obamacare would have ensured his death at the hands of cancer. Odd what the threat of having to get a real job and a Democratic primary challenge does for one's ideological commitments. God bless the integrity and decency of the world's greatest deliberative body. Thanks for being afraid enough to cheaply pander to us, Arlen. We appreciate it.

Science cashes in

I'll be the first to admit that this whole "financial apocalypse" thing hasn't been a big bouquet of roses. Further disappointing matters is the fact that we're stuck in this annoying middle ground where we aren't recovering and we aren't devolving into a hobo ruled, agrarian barter economy. But there are some positives. Just think of all the assholes in finance that were bankrupted and now work at the local Pizza Hut. Plus, the stimulus resulted in billions being invested in science! And not "abstinence education" and "handing out bibles in lieu of science textbooks" science funding. Actual science funding.

More than $20 billion in stimulus money has poured into the nation’s universities, according to a new collection of data gathered by a trio of research consortia.
...
“This is the largest investment in science and research probably since Sputnik,” said Bill Andresen, a vice president at the University of Pennsylvania in charge of Federal affairs and president of The Science Coalition. “We think it’s really important to tell this story in a thoughtful, useful way so that the public and policymakers can understand how it’s being spent.”
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The information is posted to a new website, ScienceWorksforUS.org, which was unveiled today at a press conference in Washington, D.C. Wired Science assembled the state-by-state data into a Google document that includes the total number of grants and money.

And if you visit ScienceWorksforUS you'll find all the various things that money was spent on. Like my home state, Pennsylvania, got 773 grants totaling $390,109,039. The rotten bastards at Carnegie-Mellon who spawned Sean got money to develop tools to monitor the power grid, while the benevolent masters at Pitt that spawned myself were given money to do medical research and buy up the last two remaining building in Oakland that they don't own. Meanwhile Penn got science stimulus money to.....build a website...devoted to tracking....science stimulus money. Well, they can't all be winners. Most importantly the Science Department at WVU received a grant too, so we might finally have a cure for moonshine related blindness in Appalachia within our lifetimes.

Now I know what you're saying, "Isn't all of this money better spent on the desert fortresses and cool looking armoured cars that those of us who survive the next economic Ragnarok will need to wage our post-apocalyptic battles with?" Yes, yes it is. After society finally collapses, fire and gunpowder will be our only science. But this does give people that veneer of hope that everything will be better and that a bright, shiny future of science and knowledge is on the horizon. Why key everyone else in to the fact that the future is just going to be hardship, murdering others for tins of beans, and Garret Dillahunt trying to eat your offspring? No, it's better this way.

Cheap Blogging Crutch 11.02

Pa. high court tosses 'tainted' juvenile cases
Thankfully for the basic tenets of justice, the courts tossed thousands of juvenile cases that were tainted by a kickback scheme that ultimately resulted in a crooked judge sending kids to a for profit detention center in return for bribes. Have to hand it to Judge Ciavarella, throwing people in jail for money is a step up. Usually people just get tossed in on the basis of race, religious, social, or economic status. You free marketed the shit out of legal malfeasance.

Car maker develops its own flower species
Now the Japanese are rubbing our noses in it. Not just content to beat our heads in over the regular car and hybrid markets, now they're making special flowers that absorb nitrogen oxides and take heat out of the atmosphere. When fully grown one of these flowers can actually flip the bird in the correct geographical direction of Detroit while it wipes its own ass with GM stock. Progress, it's a beautiful thing

'Torture flight' plane spotted in Birmingham
The European Parliament is up in arms because of the reemergence of the infamous CIA torture/extraordinary rendition/"frat house hazing" plane that jetted terrorist suspects all over the world to CIA black sites during a refueling in Birmingham and a meeting with British SAS forces. Lest you think that this means Obama is somehow reneging on yet another one of his war on terror campaign promises and that this is not "change we can believe in", know this: that plane used to refuel in Leeds. Now who feels silly? You, that's who.

Ford Posts an Unexpected Profit of $997 Million
Look at that, another quarter, another massive loss by the car indust...wait, what the fuck? Almost a billion in profit? Did Ford find some Nazi gold Harry buried out behind the headquarters? rich uncle die or something? *gasp*...is an American car company being....run intelligently? Sources cite the cash for clunkers program as well as an extensive and intensive 17 hour surgery that removed many of the executives' heads from their collective asses. Ford hopes to make a full year profit by 2011, at which time the sheer unlikelihood of an American car company running itself well will cause the universe to collapse in on itself.

Obama Strategy on Health Legislation Appears to Pay Off
Yup, that's right. According to the NY Times, Obama's strategy is paying off. What strategy is that, you might ask? I have no clue. Because to me it looked like they dicked around for months, fobbed off decision making and power to the legislative bodies, made sure that the "moderates" had the power, needlessly courted Republicans they knew would not support the bill in any shape or form, hamstrung progressive, kneecapped the public option, publicly tried to oppose measures that were not only popular within the caucus and the American public but had been campaigned on by the President himself, then no legislative pressure or arm twisting was applied, Harry Reid was told to basically go it on his own, the White House still fought against even the milquetoast weak public option that remained in the Senate bill, and now Joe Lieberman is threatening to blow up the whole thing unless the weak bill is made even weaker and more ineffective after Obama saved his ass within the caucus and lobbied for him to keep his Senate committee chair. Yeah....looks like that "strategy" really paid off. Note to Rahm or Axelrod or whoever ghostwrote that article: I wouldn't be too eager to claim credit for what just happened and what's about to happen.

Stay classy, PA

The "Alabama in the middle" section of the state reared it's head today during Arlen Specter's nationally televised turn to get hooted at by tinfoil hat wearing birth certificate experts.

Towards the end, a man critical of health care reform asked Specter to “go back to Washington and represent us first as an American and tell Mr. Obama he’s an American and if not, there’s other countries.” When Specter replied by saying that “I think President Obama knows he’s an American,” many in the crowd booed and one person held up a sign saying “liar.”

See I think I know where Arlen's problem was: he tried to answer the question as if the man who asked it was a rational person with a legitimate concern. May I suggest the next time someone asks Specter to remind Obama he's an American or confiscate his license to prove he's an American, he should just take the microphone and attempt to beat the questioner within an inch of his life, then ask the audience if anyone else wants to waste his time.

Quote of the day

Pennsylvania State Sen. John Eichelberger (do I even need to tell you what party) on why gays should just shut up about this whole rights thing and be thankful for the things we haven't taken from them yet.

Leach: Should our only policy towards [same-sex] couples be one of punishment, to somehow prove that they’ve done something wrong?

Eichelberger: They’re not being punished. We’re allowing them to exist, and do what every American can do. We’re just not rewarding them with any special designation.

Ah, the old "we're letting them live" defense after he spends a few minutes vamping on how homosexuality is just like pedophilia & polygamy. Always wins arguments.

Sorry gays, you may not get the same rights as us, but we do let you breath the straight man's air....for now. There are bills working their ways through PA senate committees that require the LGBT community to breathe compressed air through a scuba apparatus when venturing outside. But remember: be thankful that you're allowed to live!

Um... I, ah, I, I, ah... I, uh -- the, uh -- ah

Why is it that every time a Republican is asked this question they turn into some blubbering combination of a nervous Elmer Fudd and Porky Pig? Then they have to pledge their fealty to the scientific method, even though they completely reject most of what it comes up with. Why do they feel the need to take us on a five minute stammering journey of gibberish in order to claim that the science isn't in on evolution or climate change and we sure as fuck shouldn't find out what it says on stem cells? Just say "no".

Why not? The "debate" has been so watered down by attempts to bend over backward to accommodate the opinions of "God did it" that only 40% of the country definitively believes in evolution. The only place on the planet where "I'm not sure about that evolution thing" is even a more popular answer: Turkey. Feel free to definitively state your opposition to science, Mike. You've helped make ignorance a massively popular opinion. You'll gain votes.

Oh, and Tweety? Pat Toomey vs. a Democrat Arlen Specter? I'm sorry about what I said earlier, please run for the Senate in PA.

Stay classy, Arlen.

New Democrat Arlen Specter, freshly buoyed by polls suggesting that soulless, morally empty, completely naked political maneuvering solely in the service of getting re-elected usually works like gangbusters, decided to spend some of the political capital...blaming his former party for the death of Jack Kemp. Did John Boehner poison the former VP candidate? Did Gingrich forget Kemp's safe word during an extra rough BDSM session? Is Sarah Palin concealing a dagger with Kemp's blood on it? No, Republicans are to blame for not curing cancer.

And one of the items that I'm working on, Bob, is funding for medical research. I've been the spear carrier to increase medical research.
...
If we had pursued what President Nixon declared in 1970 as the war on cancer, we would have cured many strains. I think Jack Kemp would be alive today. And that research has saved or prolonged many lives, including mine.

Now, as the New York Times pointed out in a column today, when you talk about life and death and medical research, that's a much more major consideration on what I can do, continuing in the Senate, contrasted with which party I belong to.

Gracelessly executed, Senator. Now I'm not one for absolving Republicans of blame for everything, in fact I blamed all Republicans for an unfortunate toe stubbing this morning, but I would have at least fired off a few tin eared shots about "lazy, goldbricking cancer doctors" before moving on to the entire Republican party. Now Republicans take blame on stem cell related diseases and their opposition to universal health care (whoops, you're against that too Arlen), but I'm not ready to blame them for cancer not being cured unless you have some solid evidence of Eric Cantor smashing up a research lab with a baseball bat.

I'm glad this is what he decided to bring to the Democratic Party. Classless cheap shots, standing for all the same garbage he used to stand for, and an increased chance that Harry Reid will walk in on him and Joe Lieberman wanking it to pictures of themselves. What ever would we do without Arlen? Someone please present a primary challenge to this guy.

Broken News: Specter to electorate: "...from my cold, dead hands”

HARRISBURG—In a stunning announcement today, Pennsylvania’s senior Senator, Arlen Specter, announced that he was switching from the Republican party to the Democratic party in a thinly veiled attempt to hold onto his seat in the 2010 midterms.

“Good people of Pennsylvania, you will knock me out of this seat when I’m dead and fucking buried,” the sweaty and panicked new Democrat announced to the assembled media. “With recent demographic shifts in the state, coupled with your performance in last year's presidential election, I can see the writing on the wall. And that writing says ‘kill, strangle, wound, lie, and cheat anything or anyone who tries to take this seat.' You thought a Republican primary challenge was going to take me down? I just flipped the script, motherfuckers. Specter forever! You can have my seat when you pry it from my cold dead hands!”

The Senator is of course referring to his Republican primary challenge from orthodox right winger Pat Toomey. Early polling has Senator Specter down over 20 points and unlikely to even gain the nomination of his party.

Those close to the Senator note that while he will be nominally a Democrat, he in no way will change his moderate Republican views nor alter the enabling pisspot behavior that had him decrying the same tactics, opinions, and judges he would almost immediately help push through his Judiciary Committee during the Bush years.

“Oh yeah, he’s still the same guy, albeit more desperate and worried” an aide to the Senator said. “This is completely a naked move to hold onto that seat with those wrinkled, bony hands for as long as he can. He didn’t suddenly become enamored with socialism. He’s just hoping that residual disgust over the Republican leadership of the country will let him waltz back to his seat, when the only thing that’s changed about him is the letter next to his name.”

Political analysts see Specter easily able to coast to victory in 2010 based soley on name recognition and party affiliation. While the right wing attitudes of Pat Toomey are perfect for the fever swamps of the Republican primary and surely would have defeated Specter, in a larger general election they taint Toomey with the similar stink of right wing crazy that Pennsylvania, which formerly called Rick Santorum its senator, is still desperately trying to wash off.

“He’s a Democrat now?” asked Billy Wozniak, a confused and disinterested voter from Kittaning, in between naps. “Whatever. I can’t reflexively vote against him based on party affiliation, so I’m not going to bother to learn if he’s made his ideas more like the state he represents. I’ll just assume he does and continue voting for him based on the fact that he’s been senator since this state was founded.” He finished before dozing off again.

“Wait!” Wozniak said, snapping awake with a snort and a cough. “Wasn’t his ’04 re-election entirely based around the fact that it was his last go-round and we all needed to reward him for being elected so many times by electing him one final time… because we owed him or something? Ahh fuck it, whatever. Like I have time to learn about a third party.”

Sources close to Specter say he has been taking judo and a krav maga class, engaged in weapons training, and carries no less than 12 knives on his body at any given time. An increasingly paranoid and tense Specter feels that these challenges may soon move beyond the mere electoral process and may have to move his contesting of the seat into straight physical combat and murder of those he sees as potential rivals.

Those close to the senator say that Mr. Specter has begun the process of mentally preparing himself to devolve into an almost animalistic, feral state should post-party switch polling not show an immediate uptick in his election prospects. Should this occur, Specter plans to paint himself the same color as the actual senate chair in which he sits and proceed to attack anyone who enters his peripheral vision.

Aides hope this contingency will be avoided by the state once again rubber-stamping another six years in office for Mr. Specter.

“Don’t they owe him?” one aide was heard to say. “I mean he really, nakedly wants to hold onto the thing in any unprincipled way possible. Can't they admire his conviction to bend his convictions just so he can stay in office? Isn’t that enough? I mean, this is America!”

This same aide was reluctant to confirm that, mere minutes after his press conference, Specter received a personalized invitation from Senator Joe Lieberman offering him provisional membership in the Senate's Emasculated Irrelevance Club.

Arlen Specter is concerned

After the constant parade of embarrassment that waltzed through the Justice Department over the past few years, with the ignoring of laws, political based prosecutions, acting as a political arm of the White House, enabling law breaking, refusing to serve subpoenas or really do much of anything that Congress wanted, and just in general being in the complete pocket of the White House, Arlen Specter has had enough. It's not because Democrats are in office or there was a cyborg replicant that kidnapped him, replaced him, and shirked his duties over the past eight years, it's because....actually it's probably one of those two reasons.

A leading Republican senator issued a broad attack on Tuesday on President-elect Barack Obama’s pick as attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., questioning his political independence.

The senator, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who is the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said Mr. Holder’s support of the White House’s stance on three contentious issues when he was deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration suggested that he was too willing to do the president’s bidding.

“He’s had an outstanding academic and professional record, and I acknowledge that early on,” Mr. Specter said of Mr. Holder in a 25-minute speech on the Senate floor. “But aside from these qualifications on Mr. Holder’s résumé, there is also the issue of character, and sometimes it is more important for the attorney general to have the stature and the courage to say no instead of to say yes.”

It's funny that none of these concerns were raised when you greased the skids for Ashcroft, Gonzales, or Mukasey, during all the Judicial Committee hearings you presided over either as chairman of ranking minority member, or in general. Of course you're mad about them now, but when you had the chance you were constantly backing down and groveling. That is the Arlen Specter way, complain about something then turtle and vote for it when it's time to do something.

But like many Republicans (and some Democrats) you've found your spine and dusted off your principles just in time. You can move your main focus over the years from Bill Belichik's taping methodologies onto the country and the Rule of Law. Congratulations, I'm sure the timing is coincidental. Just one question: is Chris Matthews sure he doesn't want to run in 2010?

Caroline Kennedy on track to inherit birthright

Good news everyone, Caroline Kennedy is winning people over in her bid to be appointed as New York's Senator. Voters? Democrats? Grassroots supporters? The blogosphere? No, party hacks and Clinton toadies.

When Caroline Kennedy first let it be known that she was interested in being New York's junior Senator, she received a chilly reception from Hillary Clinton backers and some members of the progressive community. Now, it seems, the tide of popular opinion is turning towards the former first daughter and Barack Obama confidante.

Several prominent voices have lent their support to her political aspirations, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Meanwhile, Clinton herself has let it be known that her supporters should do nothing to impede Kennedy. Already, members of the Clinton rank-and-file are sounding that very tune.

Oh good, Harry Reid is for it. Though if Dick Cheney got up in his face about it, he'd probably support appointing Jeb Bush to the seat. But if total hacks like Lanny Davis are for it, it must be a brilliant idea.

I think our elected betters just misheard. We said "new blood" they heard "blue blood". There is something inherent in the Kennedy DNA that makes all of them electorally desirable. All well, I guess Caroline can just hold it down until one of the Cuomo's has to appoint Chelsea to a seat. Do Ed Koch or Chuck Schumer have any kids that are old enough yet? New York needs to take it's cue from PA, here we make our legacy name trust funders run for the seat. We'll probably only elect Chris Matthews by a small margin too.

Oh Christ, Senator Hardball

Perhaps my pleas for a crazy actor senator or governor were too much. I didn't really want Governor Jeff Goldblum, Jesus. I was joking! It seems we Pennsylvanians might get a TV host instead. Chris Matthews, deranged Hardball host and liberal media elite on the teevees, is seriously considering a run for the senate in 2010. As a Democrat. In my state.

Chris Matthews is dead serious about running for the Senate in Pennsylvania - and shopping for a house in the state and privately discussing quitting MSNBC as proof of his intense interest, according to NBC colleagues, political operatives and friends.

Even so, some NBC insiders think it’s all simply a negotiating ploy to jack up his contract.

The garrulous host of the show "Hardball with Chris Matthews" has already picked out a home in Philadelphia to establish residency in the state, according to a Democratic operative in discussions with him about a potential candidacy. Over Thanksgiving weekend, at his vacation house in Nantucket, Matthews’ family gave him their full backing.

Please be a cheap contract ploy, that's all I ask of you Lord. I don't need to see Arlen Specter railing against a liberal media interloper while he runs out of context clips of Matthews yelling at people on Hardball in political ads asking "Is this the kind of man Pennsylvanians need? Re-elect Senator Magic Bullet." Judging from the ads that got run against a comedy writer, I would think that someone with years of constant television coverage would come off slightly better than Stalin. I am already dreading this campaign.

If crazy right winger Pat Toomey challenges Specter in the primaries and the Republicans deem Arlen not right wing enough (which almost happened last time) then Matthews wins in a walk. Hell, he already has a shot against ASpec. People, get ready. Senator Hardball from the great state of Pennsylvania.