Over the weekend

A round-up of things that happened over the weekend while we were all eating nurgers to the sound of the sky exploding.

Robert McNamara, Architect of Vietnam War, Dies at 93
God, during his all-time record run of celebrity killing, has taken Robert McNamara. *Sniff* and he still had so many ill-conceived wars left to give us. His last words were reportedly either "Yeah, the blood still won't come off my hands" or "I can't believe the fiasco in Iraq didn't help rehabilitate my image by proxy. Fuck it, I'm out!" In his post-government career he took to helping the poor with financial aid and showing remorse, regret, and self-reflection for that whole Vietnam thing. Remember kids, if you want to start a war try to think about and experience those thoughts and emotions before you do it.

Afghan Presidential Candidate Takes a Page From Obama's Playbook
James Carville has decided to go to Afghanistan to help advise the campaign of the man running against Karzai. Carville ought to be able to give great insights on all the strategies that don't work against Obama's, seeing as he helped mastermind some of them for Hillary. They hope to turn the candidate Ghani into the Muslim Obama, which is coincidentally what John McCain wanted to do to the actual Obama. They hope to recreate the whole Obama phenomenon and campaign strategy....except without the whole internet & TV thing. The initial slogan is rumored to be "Severely Tempered Hope".

Ethnic Clashes in Western China Are Said to Kill Scores
You think news out of Iran is hard to come by? Try China. They announced that for some reason there were ethnic clashes in the city of Urumqui, that you shouldn't really worry your pretty little head why or even where that city is, and that as a result 140 people are dead and the number of injured is creeping up into the low thousands. The clash was reportedly between Uighurs and Han over...something....which will never be heard about again. Right now Khamenei is shaking his head and saying to himself "That's how you do it."

The punditocracy prognosticate

On the Huffington Post, their net apes collected a relatively impressive banana pile of political insiders, conventional wisdom molesters, and election guesstimators who have divined the results of tomorrow's National Day of McCain Shaming. Mark Halperin, Matthew Dowd, Donna Brazile, George Will, George Stephanopoulos, Chris Matthews, Nate Silver, Chris Cilizza, Ariana Huffington, Elanor Clift, Markos Moulitas, Ed Rollins, Paul Begala, my mortal enemy James Carville, Charles Mahtesian, Morton Kondracke, David Plotz, Alex Castellanos, Dan Gerstein, Tom Doherty, Robert Y. Shapiro, Robert Erickson, and Alan Abramowitz all picking McCain to win. Just shitting you, they all picked Obama by a measure of around 318-378 electoral votes, with democrats picking up around 8 Senate seats and 25 House seats. Way to go out on a limb my dear gentlefops and courtesans.

One man was so drugged out of his mind he decided to weave his own narrative and poll numbers out of his hallucinations, freebasing pure freedom to show him the route for a McCain victory. Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard rejects your reality and substitutes his own, foreseeing a McCain 286-252 victory and lesser gains for Democrats in Congress. Is he just an insane old man with an inability to deal with the impending Obama States of America, or is the rest of the conventional, boot licking media, the same ones who couldn't see 10 minutes ahead, get it wrong again?

538 votes insane old man. Essentially for McCain to win every poll from multiple and varied polling organizations in multiple states would have to be drastically wrong on an unprecedented scale never before seen in mathematics or humankind. To think McCain has got it in the bag right now is to imagine hordes of cartoons, dwarves, Jedi, and winged unicorns tipping the tide for him tomorrow, negating the elf, Muppet, and sentient sandwich vote. ACORN didn't register enough of them. There's always good old fashioned election theft via electronic voting machines. There is that. So take some measure of relief, it should be a waltz. You haven't calmed down have you? Still breathing into a paper bag over the Pennsylvania I? Fine, IT'S ALL GOING TITS UP! MCCAIN WILL WIN! FOREVER DARKNESS! GOBLIN HORDES! FOUR MORE YEARS!

That One vs. the Ancient Mariner 2

With Sean off representing Brooklyn in the all-NY Powerpoint/Dry Erase Board Olympics, it was my solemn duty to watch last nights farcical town hall. He gets to huff dry erase markers in hotel conference rooms and I have to freebase 21st century American political theater. My brain can't take it. Was it an eventful night? No. It was pretty much the same as the other debate, with Obama modifying his answers somewhat and McCain not modifying his answers at all. Though he did add a dash of bizarre bad humor, strange asides, and referenced 'the tiller' too many times for a man running for office anywhere other than the rural 1940's.

As for the only important political debate measuring standard, gaffes, McCain clearly made the biggest of the night. It wasn't important by any real standard, but in our stupid media culture it was enough to dominate the post-debate coverage. Sweet Johnny Mac went and referred to Obama as "that one" with a dismissive wave of his hand. Quelle horreur! It was a tad indelicate and showed the general level of disdain McCain holds for Obama, but it wasn't half as scary as some of his policy goals or foreign policy aims. Oh, Mac also wandered around the stage like a doddering old man and generally looked like a 72 year old geezer. I know this because I have eyes and it was pointed out by all the commentators afterward. Look media, it's my job to mock him for his age, stay the fuck off my turf! I'm looking at you Chris Matthews and Anderson Cooper! Don't make me send James Carville to your set in one inch by one inch chunks.

As for how the great unwashed masses saw things, it was again a clear win for Obama. With snap polls from CNN, CBS, and the like showing people with a clear preference for the guy who doesn't hold Republican ideas. It seems fairly certain at this point that unless Obama starts shitting on stage, has a complete mental breakdown, or has a secret radical racist preacher who is also a terrorist, he's going to be the next President by a large margin. McCain will be buried alive for his conduct this year and Sarah Palin will be banished back to Alaska to stand guard against any incursion by Putin. There is, for fucks sake, one more debate. In it you will either see McCain break down in tears as the realization dawns on him that he sold his soul for second place, or he'll just go mental and try to tear into Obama in the craziest way possible. It will not be important for any reason relating to learning about policy, just as a freakshow. Bring it on.

More please

Anyone notice a change in the Obama campaign the last few days? They're throwing some inside heat as the media wises to the fact that just about everything McCain says has turned out to be a lie. Though one must give John credit for properly identifying both his opponent and his own name. McCain hasn't lied about those....yet. See if you can pick up the theme in these statements, released over the past four days.

"The McCain campaign said Governor Palin opposed the Bridge to Nowhere, but now we know she supported it. They said she didn't seek earmarks, but now we know she hired a lobbyist to get millions in pork for her town and her state. They said she visited Iraq, but today we learned that she only stopped at the border. Americans are starting to wonder, is there anything the McCain campaign isn't lying about?"

“We will take no lectures from John McCain who is cynically running the sleaziest and least honorable campaign in modern Presidential campaign history. His discredited ads with disgusting lies are running all over the country today. He runs a campaign not worthy of the office he is seeking,”

"Today on "The View," John McCain defended his campaign's latest ad campaign, which has been debunked repeatedly as both false and sleazy. In running the sleaziest campaign since South Carolina in 2000 and standing by completely debunked lies on national television, it's clear that John McCain would rather lose his integrity than lose an election."

"John McCain is rotten old bastard trying to ratfuck his way to 1600. If he had any balls he'd drag his ancient ass down to the alley behind the Get-Go in Georgetown, where Obama would beat the everliving fuck out of him on general principle. Just wait till the debates, we're gonna cut off your sack and use it as a herb sachet for the rat stew we're making. You're fucking dead!"

OK, the last one wasn't said by the Obama campaign. James Carville yelled it at me after I set his lawn on fire. It was supposed to say "Cajun Style" in big fire letters, but I spread the gasoline improperly and it just kept spreading to other houses. Obama should use it. But it looks like the Obama campaign found it's message: "John McCain lies about everything, he is unfit for office." I like it, more please.