SOME QUESTIONS ON BASES, HOWEVER BASE, WHEN IT COMES TO RACE

Barack Obama has been a man often deserving of praise for phrase, but, in one of his radio follow-ups to his speech last week on race, he used a phrase better left in the future, well unused. It (the phrase he used) was in describing his grandmother as “a typical white person”. He’s getting some flack for it and that’s understandable, but there’s something we at the Faux find challenging and just . . . a little creepy and that is that on the subject of blacks, and Jews, people in the political center, and left of center, are held to a much, much higher standard, and are politically on a much shorter leash and we all know the examples. When, for instance, Hillary Clinton hugged Sulha Arafat or Jeremiah Wright had some do-wacky-do moments, it’s major spin (and grin) by the right wing columnists, especially the Jewish ones, but yet again, somewhat creepily, when a sitting president (Richard Nixon) is known for anti-Semitic tirades, it doesn’t seem among those columnists anyway, to affect his historical standing. When an aspiring president (Ronald Reagan) opens his campaign at a rally where the KKK murdered civil rights’ workers, and its an historical fact that many of the Klan were in the audience that day and that this same president while in office honored a cemetery noted as a burial place for many SS in Germany, the right to this very day can’t honor and emulate him enough. Again, what these men did was when they were in the Oval Office, not after they left, as opposed to Jimmy Carter, where ever mentally he’s wandered to. There are many other examples, onto the present when Mitt Romney opened his Republican campaign at the museum honoring Henry Ford, and the fact that Ford is one of the more notorious anti-Semites in our country’s history did not seem to matter. Aside, if Mr. Romney wanted to honor a Ford in Michigan, he had Gerald’s Library. No, honoring Henry Ford for this conservative republican was not an issue, what was an issue, with the right anyway, was that Romney was a Mormon, how fascinating.
There are too many more examples to give a complete accounting here including actions and statements by both Presidents’ Bush, but this fact is inescapable; anti-Semitism or anti-black words, bias or statements, actual or symbolic, never but never, seem to harm a candidate of the right with their own base. I know this politically, and regretfully personally. That said it can be a pretty base base, but I so wish they’d at least tell us why and even more, I wish they’d ask themselves this: has any American candidate on the political right ever suffered at the polls for anti Black or Anti-Semitic remarks, ever, ever? And then, please ask yourselves why.

THE D.C. DECIMAL SYSTEM

We’re told President GW Bush, a man who proudly allows that he doesn’t read much, will have a library at Southern Methodist University. We at the Faux find the choice a bit interesting since SMU as far as we know was neither a place Mr. Bush matriculated as even or even aspired to , but we digress. We do have same advance information as to the structural and literary logistics planned for Mr. Bush’s collection: there will be two wings , one for housing Marvel products and the other for D.C.

MR. HAGEL: JUST CHUCK FULL OF TRUTH

Good news, Mr. President, the glass is 19% full. According to the Gallup Poll in the last week, 81% of Americans believe our country is going in the wrong direction, and no memory, recent or otherwise, shows pessimism of our people on any similar scale. As Senator Chuck Nagel (R) Nebraska noted this past week, the Democrats in this climate of change will have a groundbreaking choice for president; either an African-American man or a woman, whereas the Republicans (in an out with the new, in with the old moment) will have potentially the most senior American president in our history. This man, Mr. Nagel, is an American hero, from service in Vietnam to standing up to George Bush on his Iraqian missteps, and . . . he has not endorsed John McCain. He’s said from the beginning “the whole concept of judging our success in Iraq, is not a win or lose aspect, the future of Iraq will be judged and decided be the Iraqi people.” How novel an idea by a novel interesting man. And he believes we need “a clear plan” on withdrawal from Iraq noting, “we’re in a deep hole”. So how come Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney keep on shoveling it?

FRIDAY FAUXLOSOPHY

There is no lie more unfortunate than the one that didn't have to be told.

A DATE THAT WILL LIVE IN …FAMY

Today is a great day for those on a mission to enhance for romance and that’s because March 27, 2008 is the 10th anniversary of the FDA’s approval of Viagra for its current and extended use. How do we know such stuff, well one of the ways is we consult the Faux Nation Calendar which we hope to have published for the public by 2009. In any event Viagra was intended originally to help with angina and hypertension, but it failed to produce any solid results, in that respect, but….knock on wood (sorry); there was a scientific advancement of sorts. Consider its color, blue and the timing of its approval, the first week of spring, and that the name Viagra rhymes with shag-ya – it was obviously then an idea for the ages, so to speak.

DON’T JUST DO SOMETHING, STAND THERE

The economy on many levels is in crisis – even George Bush is beginning to hear about it. Just the other week, he was told oil was over $100.00 a barrel and that gas would soon be at about $4.00 a gallon. His answer, “really, I’ll have to look into that”. Doesn’t he get better as his presidency goes along?
Next, members of the Senate are breaking the news to the “happy fellow” president (that’s how he described himself in a talk last week about the economy) that there are a bit more than a few Americans facing some sort of mortgage crisis. Hope this also, at least, is a look into it moment, as opposed to a looking glass moment. In his eighth year at least, could George begin to get curiouser and curiouser?

ON BROADCASTING QUESTIONS OF RACE: NOT JUST AN OBAMA TRAUMA

Candidate Barack Obama gave the speech that had to be given, confronting racists and intolerance from a number of sides and eras. What brought things to a head, of course, was the showing of a number of incendiary speeches by Mr. Obama’s former pastor, the Reverend Jeremia Wright, who for this worthy candidate (Obama) may be Reverend Guaranteeya Wrong. After the speech (I was not able to hear it all) I was dial surfing for commentary in the AM (Abundantly Malicious) radio regions. One announcer who caught my ear was playing the speech while voicing over his obviously agended commentary, rich with sarcasm, line for line. I was trying to figure, in the brief time I had available, who he (the talk show host) was, to literally dissect the dissector, and what, if anything, he represented in honest racial dialogue, here’s what I heard; Mr. Obama “ he (Reverend Wright) has done some worthy things as well”, talk show guy (again to the audience), “name one”, Obama “he’s set up Aids clinics”, talk show guy which he accuses the white man of spreading”, Obama, “and he’s served his country as a United States Marine” – talk show guy – suddenly not a word, there was silence. After that respite, there was more of the speech and more of the host right winging it and I had to go but still couldn’t figure out his identity, so…. maybe one of you kind folks can help. What I did know for sure was that the “patriotic” commentator serving himself on his talk show had quite clearly never served his country, and thus did not want to talk about Reverend Wright being a marine, that he spoke with sarcasm and a bit of racist code, but what I didn’t know was his identity. Again on a reasoned discussion of race in America he didn’t and doesn’t have a clue, but is that a clue as to his name? Not enough, we guess because given the tenor of right wing talk show hosts on race and anything not Republican, who couldn’t he be.

THE NEWS FROM IRAQ IS GOOD, WELL KINDA SORTA

President Bush is, as he said on his press conference this week on our economy, a “happy fellow”, so on the progress in Iraq, he must be an ecstatic guy. Consider first these stat lines: There is power for 8 hours a day, there are 2,000,000 displaced Iraqi’s in Iraq, and 2,000,000 refugees in Jordan and Syria. To continue, civilian casualties range from 85,000 to 600,000 (depending on who’s talking) while Saddam is said to have killed about 50,000 while he was in charge. There are “only” 65 attacks a day, and 30% of the workforce is unemployed, and this is the good news – plus people are out in cafes well past 10:00 p.m., whereas a year ago if they violated the 9:00 p.m. curfew, they were arrested or shot or we guess both.
We’re told the troops have to stay after 5 years because the Iraqi government still can’t provide security or basic services. A few thoughts on this, they had 24 hour power under Saddam and 29,000,000 people instead of 27,000,000 people. The percentage of fleeing Iraqis is the equivalent of 20,000,000 people having been forced from the United States. At the rate of the improvements, Mr. McCain’s 100 year war (do the 5 already spent count?) may be enough time to get back to the 2003 levels and without Saddam. Although . . . in 100 years, he’d have been gone already, right?

MCCAIN’S MESOPOTAMIAN MIXUP, THREE TIMES (OR MORE), NOT A CHARM

Three times this week, John McCain misspoke on Iraq, claiming they’re training Al Quaeda. After the third such gaffe, not a charm, the younger more sprightly member of that traveling duo, the 63 plus year old Joe Lieberman, whispered it’s “extremists, not Al Quaeda.” Al Quaeda, you see, is made up of Sunni’s (funded by Bush buddies Saudi Arabia) while Iran is a Shiite nation, and believe it or not, we at the Faux already knew that. He (Mr. McCain) noted he corrected his mistake(s) immediately. Well after three times, but considered it absurd he wouldn’t know the difference (between Sunni’s and Shiites) and then he asked what was the question again.

FRIDAY FAUXLOSOPHY

One good deed to help a fellow human being is better than a thousand sighs decrying the state of world affairs.

WE PLAGIARIZE IN ADVANCE AND ALSO AFTER

On a recent Colbert Report, Steve Colbert spoofed (and echoed) our previous sentiments that John McCain gets credit for having previously condemned Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, while the Straight Talk Express has taken a self serving route as the Senator embraced them in this election cycle. Mr. Colbert also pointed out that Obama should be “blamed” for not having commented on Jeremiah Wright years ago, even though he’s condemning his excesses now. That’s what we said.
We will return the favor by quoting a statement shown on that same program, of March 19th by our warrior President. It went as follows as President Bush on March 13, 2008 sent a message of “support” to our troops in Afghanistan, “I must say I’m a little envious. If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines (he really said this) of helping this young democracy succeed. It must be exciting for you…. in some ways romantic, in some ways you know, confronting danger.” Mr. Colbert went on to “warn” the troops not to so “excite” our President, recalling how he reacted to last time he was “excited” by a war (Vietnam) when “he ran off to join the Alabama National Guard and nobody could find him”. Don’t worry he wouldn’t join now, they actually call up most National Guard units, but were giving Mr. Bush our first “Faux Fortitude Award” and we’ll also give him this, he’s still just as brave.

IS BARACK A BETTER SECOND?

Should Barack Obama, as the Democratic leader in delegates and every bit as important, the leader in the popular vote, even consider a spot as Hillary’s Vice President? That depends on a number of things (states); four to be exact as we at the Faux see it and remember we may not always be right but we’re always sure. The four then are Pennsylvania (primary in late April), Florida and Michigan, where do overs could provide a make over for the popular vote tally. Oh, we did say four and the fourth is Ohio; we know the primaries done there but if Senator Clinton, in the general election, can take Ohio (many feel she can and Senator Obama can’t) that single state in a blue-red world could be the difference maker.
Mr. Obama’s many victories in traditional red states have to be considered and respected but does anyone think the Democrats can win in the general election in Idaho or Mississippi or South Carolina. Would Mr. Obama run a close second, yes, but that is not how the Electoral College works. So we call again for an electoral polling by the super duper delegates, responsibility they can’t delegate, to find out not so much who’s winning the Democratic nomination, but who would be the big winner in November.
As Harry Truman said, (and either Mr. Obama or Mrs. Clinton should say to America) “If I lose, you lose”. That’s because, being more that a bit Bearly Stern, we have to tell you folks as to the economy, our health care, and Iraq, you should heed things.

WHO SPEAKS FOR YOU, OR THEM?

Geraldine Ferraro may not be an idiot, but she certainly acted like one with her comments that Barack Obama is “lucky” to be Black in America. Ms. Ferraro, we at the Faux have a number of lifelong friends who have dissenting life experiences. But hey, he could have hit the lottery and been Jewish in Saudi Arabia. In any event, Ms. Ferraro’s remarks were condemned by Senator Clinton and she has resigned from the Clinton campaign, but did not personally apologize.
The Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama’s pastor does not, however, appear to have acted like an idiot because it seems to be not an act. Witness his latest imbecillian statements about America this past week, and his murkiness is pretty clear. Apparently his rantings have gone on for years and while, perhaps Senator Obama should have condemned such words earlier, he has certainly done so now and Mr. Wright has become Mr. Wrong for Obama’s campaign. And the Reverend Wright too, will not apologize; there’s a pattern here.
The Reverend (yet more Reverends) Jerry Falwell, was not an idiot either, he was a bigot and so went to his grave. His remarks about Jews and others who were not in lock step with his approach to the Lord are too numerous to list. We find John McCain’s embrace of Mr. Falwell during his current presidential run all the more fascinating since during the 2000 campaign, he had mentioned by name Jerry Falwell (along with Louis Farrakhan) as “agents of intolerance”. However, the condemnation from Jews who remember are defective and not “worthy of Heaven” and others seemed so, so brief when Mr. McCain honored Falwell by speaking at the commencement exercises at his Liberty University. And the chronology is fascinating too: Mr. Obama after being unresponsive in the past to Reverend Wright’s rantings, certainly stood up in the present where as Mr. McCain has done just the opposite – he, to reiterate, condemned Mr. Falwell’s bigotry in the past while tolerating it in the present.
Obviously, Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama, or Mr. McCain cannot control the idiots (or their idiocies who may speak on their "behalf"), other than by condemnation and dismissal. What we can’t figure is how Democrats seem so much more vulnerable to criticism when “bigotry, real or codified” is bantered in their name, than are Republicans, it certainly hurts Democratic candidates more with their base then it does Republicans with theirs. Specifically, read the letters of right wing Jews and watch their voting patterns; some, and we are serious, are still obsessing about FDR. It’s almost like when it comes to gaining at the ballot box from prejudice and all that goes with it, there seems to be an affirmative . . . inaction in judging Republicans by people who should know far better.

WHO SPEAKS FOR YOU, OR THEM?

Geraldine Ferraro may not be an idiot, but she certainly acted like one with her comments that Barack Obama is “lucky” to be Black in America. Ms. Ferraro, we at the Faux have a number of lifelong friends who have dissenting life experiences. But hey, he could have hit the lottery and been Jewish in Saudi Arabia. In any event, Ms. Ferraro’s remarks were condemned by Senator Clinton and she has resigned from the Clinton campaign, but did not personally apologize.
The Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama’s pastor does not, however, appear to have acted like an idiot because it seems to be not an act. Witness his latest imbecillian statements about America this past week, and his murkiness is pretty clear. Apparently his rantings have gone on for years and while, perhaps Senator Obama should have condemned such words earlier, he has certainly done so now and Mr. Wright has become Mr. Wrong for Obama’s campaign. And the Reverend Wright too, will not apologize; there’s a pattern here.
The Reverend (yet more Reverends) Jerry Falwell, was not an idiot either, he was a bigot and so went to his grave. His remarks about Jews and others who were not in lock step with his approach to the Lord are too numerous to list. We find John McCain’s embrace of Mr. Falwell during his current presidential run all the more fascinating since during the 2000 campaign, he had mentioned by name Jerry Falwell (along with Louis Farrakhan) as “agents of intolerance”. However, the condemnation from Jews who remember are defective and not “worthy of Heaven” and others seemed so, so brief when Mr. McCain honored Falwell by speaking at the commencement exercises at his Liberty University. And the chronology is fascinating too: Mr. Obama after being unresponsive in the past to Reverend Wright’s rantings, certainly took up in the present where as Mr. McCain has done just the opposite – he, to reiterate, condemned Mr. Falwell’s bigotry in the past while tolerating it in the present.
Obviously, Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama, or Mr. McCain cannot control the idiocies or idiots who may speak on their behalf, other than by condemnation and dismissal. What we can’t figure is how Democrats seem so much more vulnerable to criticism when “bigotry, real or codified” is bantered in their name, than are Republicans, it certainly hurts Democratic candidates more with their base then it does Republicans with theirs. Specifically, read the letters of right wing Jews and watch their voting patterns; some, and we are serious, are still obsessing about FDR. It’s almost like when it comes to gaining at the ballot box from prejudice and all that goes with it, there seems to be an affirmative . . . inaction in judging Republicans by people who should know far better.

ADMIRAL FALLON HAS FALLEN

The Commander of the U.S. Central Command, Admiral Fox Fallon, resigned Tuesday, March 11. The reason was he spoke his mind and challenged presidential judgment once too often although, for the Bush people, once is always too often when it comes to questioning this administration’s judgment. The White House pressured and Defense Secretary Gates wouldn’t take his calls and the Admiral had to go. Among his wild and crazy ideas included the thought that a pre-emptive war against Iran would be “ill advised” and . . . that we had taken our eye off the ball in Afghanistan, becoming obsessed with war with Iraq instead. Where have we heard that before? His cardinal sin then obviously was taking on the President in public, and that is the only way you’re not ever allowed to criticize this President, ever, other than in private.