The Smarmy Carny

President Bush was literally beside himself during his speech at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner, thanks to presidential impersonator Steve Bridges.

It is traditional that the president shows up and delivers a speech lampooning himself. (You might remember Laura Bush's dirty horse joke from last year's dinner.)

The highlight of the speech is a mental run-through of a phrase followed by the actual words uttered by Bush:

Internal President (Bridges): All right. Maintain. Be cool. Let’s give this a try: "We must enhance non-compliance protocols sanctioned not only at IAEA formal sessions, but through intercessional contact."

External President (Bush): “We must enhance non-compliance protocols sanctioned not only at E-I-E-I-O sessions, but through intersexual conduct.”

Back on April 6, Rush Limbaugh took hold of the immigration issue that has been heating up and helped put everything into perspective.

Rush introduced "The Limbaugh Laws" of immigration. No doubt, liberals (and even moderates) would be upset by these proposed immigration rules:

• You must speak the native language.
• You have to be a professional or an investor. We are not going to take unskilled workers. You will not be allowed.
• There will be no special bilingual programs in the schools, no special ballots for elections, no government business will be conducted in your native language.
• Foreigners will not have the right to vote, I don't care how long they are here, nor will they ever be allowed to hold political office.
• If you're in our country, you cannot be a burden to taxpayers. You are not entitled, ever, to welfare, to food stamps, or other government goodies.
• You can come if you invest here, but it must be an amount equal to 40,000 times the daily minimum wage. If you don't have that amount of money, you can't come and invest. You have to stay home.
• If you do come and you want to buy land, okay, but we're going to restrict your options. You will not be allowed to buy waterfront property in the United States. That will be reserved for citizens naturally born in this country.
• In fact, as a foreigner, you must relinquish individual rights to property.
• You don't have the right to protest when you come here. You're allowed no demonstrations, you cannot wave a foreign flag, no political organizing, no bad-mouthing our president or his policies, or you get sent home. You're a foreigner.
• You shut your mouth or you get out, and if you come here illegally, you go straight to jail and we're going to hunt you down 'til we find you.

Does that sound far too tough? Something so "typical" of Rush's views? Think again, because Rush merely stole them — from Mexican immigration laws.

Head on over to Rush's site to read the full transcript of the Limbaugh Laws.

This story is coming a bit late, but the day after the Academy Awards, Ben Stein wrote a scathing yet well-deserved review of the Oscars this year and Hollywood in general.

The commentary appeared in The American Spectator on March 6, 2006:

. . . there was not one word of tribute, not one breath, to our fighting men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan or to their families or their widows or orphans. There were pitifully dishonest calls for peace — as if the people we are fighting were interested in any peace for us but the peace of the grave. But not one word for the hundreds of thousands who have served and are serving, not one prayer or moment of silence for the dead and maimed.
Basically, the sad truth is that Hollywood does not think of itself as part of America, and so, to Hollywood, the war to save freedom from Islamic terrorists is happening to someone else. It does not concern them except insofar as it offers occasion to mock or criticize George Bush. They live in dreamland and cannot be gracious enough to thank the men and women who pay with their lives for the stars' ability to live in dreamland. This is shameful.
The idea that it is brave to stand up for gays in Hollywood, to stand up against Joe McCarthy in Hollywood (fifty years after his death), to say that rich white people are bad, that oil companies are evil — this is nonsense. All of these are mainstream ideas in Hollywood, always have been, always will be. For the people who made movies denouncing Big Oil, worshiping gays, mocking the rich to think of themselves as brave — this is pathetic, childish narcissism.
. . .
Hollywood is above all about self: self-congratulation, self-promotion, and above all, self-protection. This is human and basic, but let's not kid ourselves. There is no greatness there in the Kodak theater. The greatness is on patrol in Kirkuk. The greatness lies unable to sleep worrying about her man in Mosul. The greatness sleeps at Arlington National Cemetery and lies waiting for death in VA Hospitals. God help us that we have sunk so low as to confuse foolish and petty boasting with the real courage that keeps this nation and the many fools in it alive and flourishing on national TV.

There's plenty more great commentary within, so head over and read the entire article.

For those who are unfamiliar with ::wikipedia("Ben Stein")::, he first achieved popularity for the monotone teacher in ::amazon("B00001MXXH", "Ferris Beuller´s Day Off"):: and a similar character in ::amazon("6305053987", "The Wonder Years")::. He later obtained his own game show, Win Ben Stein's Money. Before all that, however, he was a speechwriter for Nixon and Ford, and he received the 2003 Pro-Life Award.

As expected, Liberals are already moving to attack any of Bush's Supreme Court Nominees.

Before I had even posted about Sandra Day O'Connor's resignation, MoveOn had already sent out an e-mail promising attacks on Bush appointees. This just proves what they've been saying over at UpOrDownVote.com and it really comes as no surprise to me.

Here's the letter put out by MoveOn:

Dear MoveOn member,

Early this morning Sandra Day O'Connor stepped down from the Supreme Court, leaving the first open seat in more than 10 years. As a moderate Justice, she helped protect our rights for decades. With Bush likely to nominate a replacement in a matter of hours or days, our most basic rights and freedoms are suddenly very much up for grabs.

[blah blah blah]

[blah blah blah] In the next few days Bush, the Senate and the media will all be will be listening very carefully–gauging the public reaction to this vacancy and deciding how far they can go.

[blah blah blah]

[blah blah blah] the Republican leadership has exploited every opportunity to attack the basic American right to keep our private choices private, and to make personal decisions without government intrusion.

This vacancy could represent the biggest threat yet.

The only clear indication from Bush about who he might nominate is that he intends to follow the example of his two "model" judges–Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia. These two have weighed in from the far-right fringe for decades, and another judge in their mold could shift the balance on the Court significantly.

[blah blah blah]

On Capitol Hill, today's resignation unleashed a swarm of right-wing fringe groups and corporate lobbyists pushing for a nominee who will favor narrow prejudice and greed over the rights of the American people.

If we can deliver 250,000 signatrures and comments by Tuesday, we can make sure the voice of ordinary Americans can compete with this swarm and tell our senators to stand up for our rights.

Please sign today.

[blah blah blah]

[blah blah blah]

Ben, Joan, Justin, Eli and the MoveOn PAC Team
Friday, July 1st, 2005

P.S. As soon as we heard about the resignation, we put an ad on the air calling for Bush and the Senate to protect our rights and not nominate an extremist. [blah blah blah]

If you like it, help us keep it on the air [blah blah blah]

[blah blah blah]

PAID FOR BY MOVEON PAC
Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

Note that they put an ad on the air "as soon as [they] heard about the resignation."

Of course, MO has no doubt that Bush will pick someone who is too far overboard, but they believe that they and their friends have the ability to influence how far overboard. They also paint the picture of Bush as deciding to listen to public opinion only to figure out how much they can get away with. More nonsensical rhetoric from the leftists.

Don't get me wrong — I'm not worrying about MoveOn. After all, they did everything they could do, and Bush still beat out Kerry 51/48! And as far as Scalia is concerned, Bush could hope to do so well in his nomination!

Spongebob is F. U. N.

The TV Guide folks haven't been paying very close attention. Hopefully they are just lazy at fact-checking. After all, they are just a bunch of couch potatoes.

You may or may not have read some of the articles claiming that Dr. James Dobson (of Focus on the Family) said that SpongeBob SquarePants was a gay character. Dobson never said anything of the sort, of course. As if the usual media slander wasn't enough, even TV Guide jumped in on the game and attacked Dobson. Not only was he jeered in the Cheers & Jeers section, but the listing stands out, thanks to a large picture of SpongeBob punctuating the entry.

Here's an entry in their Cheers & Jeers section:

Jeers to Focus on the Family's founder Dr. James C. Dobson for putting the squeeze on SpongeBob SquarePants. The conservative activist claims the cartoon character promotes a "pro-homosexual" agenda. We always thought sponges were asexual creatures. Maybe Dobson found out about SpongeBob's torrid fling with Tinky Winky.

I frequently feel like writing in and replying to this sort of obfuscation, but I rarely ever do. Generally, others are more than willing to express their opinions and mail them in. This one just pushed the right buttons, though, and I decided that this time I will be one of those "others" willing to express my opinion. Clearly the author and editor(s) of the Cheers & Jeers section wasn't too interested in fact checking this week. I simply had to send in a comment to their Letters department at letters@tvguide.com. I suggest you do the same.

If you're interested in what Dr. Dobson actually said, read his article at family.org about "Setting the Record Straight." Here is an excerpt:

The video, which millions of children will soon see, features nearly 100 favorite cartoon characters that kids will instantly recognize, including not only SpongeBob, but also Barney the Dinosaur, the Muppets, Dora the Explorer, Bob the Builder, Winnie the Pooh, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Jimmy Neutron and Big Bird. The video itself is innocent enough and does not mention anything overtly sexual. Rather, it features the children's cartoon characters singing and dancing along to the popular disco hit "We Are Family."

But while the video is harmless on its own, I believe the agenda behind it is sinister. My brief comments at the FRC gathering were intended to express concern not about SpongeBob or Big Bird or any of their other cartoon friends, but about the way in which those childhood symbols are apparently being hijacked to promote an agenda that involves teaching homosexual propaganda to children. Nevertheless, the media jumped on the story by claiming that I had accused SpongeBob of being "gay." Some suggested that I had confused the organization that had created the video with a similarly named gay-rights group. In both cases, the press was dead wrong, and I welcome this opportunity to help them get their facts straight.

If you're feeling sadistic, you might then want to read how the media interprets his comments about the video. Typical losers CNN and MSNBC had their say, of course. MSNBC refers to him as "A man named Dr. James Dobson," as if he had never been in the news before, or as if he was some unknown making wild comments. What fun.

SpongeBob isn't gay . . . but that Tinky Winky still freaks me out!

Note: My letter will surely not be published, but I can only imagine that someone's letter on this topic will be printed. I will post it here when that happens. As I mentioned, I suggest you write in as well and voice your opinion at letters@tvguide.com