Monday, September 10, 2007

Personal Asides: Giuliani-Touting Big Jim Does it For Me…Sneed Describes Judith Miller as a “Disgraced” Reporter…”The Beachwood Reporter” on “Our Foot-Tapping Governor.”

Rudy_Giuliani

Giuliani & Big Jim.

I have always entertained the notion that since Rudy Giuliani leads other Republicans in significant polls, there may come a day when…no matter his baggage (his three marriages, his wife’s three marriages plus one-shack-up job with a lover from whom she broke up to go for Rudy)…his wrong stance on social issues…a prudent voter could decide to back him from the standpoint that he may in fact embrace strict construction in judicial appointments, that he is undeniably good on anti-terrorism and that he may turn out to be a far better president than heretofore expected.

He was never my first, nor even my second, third or fourth choice but in an imperfect world (and God knows this one is) I might have the prudence to be able to accept him. That was before the elephantine Combine Republic-crat-Demo-publican announced his support for him, saying that Giuliani is Jim Thompson’s kind of Republican. That’s what I feared all along. This is where I get off the train before I hop aboard. Giuliani isn’t going to get the nomination with Jim Thompson as exemplar. At least not if I can help it.

As Jim Thompson’s guy, Rudy is the favorite of one who—

o never met a major state issue he didn’t resolve for a malleable liberal ideology—from repeatedly running on assurances there would be no tax increases, then, after election twice saying oops there will be tax increases and supporting liberal social issues…

o espoused state-paid-for bread and circuses to keep the White Sox here by using state funds blatantly with no earlier recourse to private funding…

o built a temple for bloated state government, later named in his honor by sycophants, a psychedelic nightmare with a white mushroom doughboy statue out front to embody his extra-terrestrial avant-garde elitist concepts in art at taxpayer expense—a building hard to heat in the winter, hard to cool in the summer, all designed as a self-monument in the style of Suleiman the Magnificent…

o spent $20 million of his law firm’s money pro-bono defending the bulbous-nosed, snout-in-the-trough snuffling George Ryan from ostensible fear of what Ryan might disclose…

o co-chaired Blagojevich’s transition team from which he derived huge legal sinecures for his law firm, so compromising himself that he had to avoid even the semblance of criticism of Blagojevich…

o represents Blagojevich even today and—get this—his law firm advises him on ethics issues…

o skimmed reports of misspending by the two thieves who ran the “Sun-Times” in order to sit well with his elitist board buddies Henry Kissinger and Richard Perle, narrowly missing getting cited for misfeasance as chairman of the corporation’s audit committee.



All of which means that--

o he ties Rudy to special interest snout-in-the-trough repudiated “Combine” through Thompson’s “anything goes” lobbying which he pursues with the sensitivity of the hard-shelled Armadillo.




Sneed: Judith Miller a “Disgrace”—Huh?

We should forgive Michael Sneed who probably doesn’t have time to do research on public policy, so busy is she reporting stuff like actor Tim Gamble “spotted at Suzuki’s Sho Studio hair salon on Chicago avenue”—but she displayed a knee-jerk lefty approach yesterday when she described the “New York Times” former correspondent Judith Miller as “disgraced.” The item: “The press beat: Disgraced former New York Times reporter Judith `Weapons of Mass Destruction ‘ Miller has landed a new job”—“an adjunct fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute, a New York-based think tank. The organization was cited by Miller critics as evidence of partisanship in her coverage of the Bush administration in the run-up to the Iraq war.”

“Disgraced?”

Miller believed the weapons of mass destruction gambit. How was she different from liberals including Sneed’s friends who joined with heads of foreign governments who believed the same thing?

“Disgraced?”

She had been “The Times’” Cairo bureau chief, the first woman in that post (1983) ranging from Tripoli to Damascus; the Washington bureau’s news editor and deputy bureau chief (1987-88); the Times’ deputy media editor (mid-1990s); shared in a Pulitzer for explanatory writing (2002) for profiling “the global terrorism network and the threats it posed”; broke the story that U. S. germ warfare research pushes treaty limits; broke the story that listed the “Holy Land Foundation” to a list of organizations with suspected links to terrorism ahead of Patrick Fitzgerald who brought a lawsuit against the paper (2001); steadfastly reported Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (which she maintains will be proven as accurate one day—but where’s the disgrace?); upheld her view of journalistic responsibility by refusing to appear before a grand jury on the so-called Valerie Plame leak when Fitzgerald knew all the time the source of the leak was the deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage (and who told Armitage to keep it quiet).

The list goes on and on; Miller has been controversial but only “disgraced” in the view of the left; she doesn’t deserve that kind of snotty gossip-columning label. In Sneed’s and increasingly the “Sun-Times” vocabulary, reporters are either called “journalists” or “conservative”—not liberal. For Sneed’s education, the “conservative” Manhattan Institute is an urban think tank—called “conservative” by lefties since it challenges everyday assumptions made by generalizing label-mongers like Sneed.

Miller is “disgraced” because she supported the pretext of the Iraq War and Bush on anti-terrorism issues. Sneed’s labeling is the latest lowest blow for Cruickshank’s paper which has already descended to its nadir in sensationalism. The working-class paper. Yeah, right.

The Beachwood Reporter.

Excerpts, slightly edited here, from “The Beachwood Reporter”…a hilarious blog that comments on Illinois doings which can be found at www.beachoodreporter.com .

Our Foot-Tapping Governor.

If Rod Blagojevich had been the one caught tapping his foot in a men’s room…

1. “You’ve got this all wrong. I just reached down to grab my approval ratings which had actually fallen through the floor…”
2. “I guess I was being too literal in my efforts to low-ball the state legislature.”
3. “What bathroom? I wasn’t in a bathroom. I’m not even in this room talking to you right now.”
4. “I was trolling for campaign contributions, you idiot! Ever think about serving on a state board?”
5. “I only reached my hand around to see if you were wearing a wire.”
6. “I was hoping you could spare a square because I accidentally cut toilet paper out of the budget.”
7. “I was just tapping our Morse Code for `Do you know a good accountant?’”

5 comments:

  1. Maybe we should start an office pool to pick the date when Tom flip-flops and adopts the "nuanced" view that Big Jim is his friend. Or in other words, how many free lunches does it take for Tom to go from person obsessed with trying to harpoon the big whale that is Big Jim, to blind defender and spreader of disinformation on Big Jim's behalf.

    I'll take 3 weeks. 1 if the lunch location and menu are really top notch.

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  2. Endorsement by Big Jim is akin to endorsement by David Duke.

    Given that, we must LEARN to unite around the best alternative to Rudy based as much on electability and least likely to self-destruct as on perfection of the issues.

    We must first learn how to do it in my 14th Congressional Dist before we can do it in the presidential race. Lauzen did an excellent job Sunday night.

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  3. Shoot, Tom, don't blame Rudy for Big Jim supporting him. A poor fella can't help who endorses him. Besides, you Big Jim's support doesn't mean anything...he just tries to see looks like he may be a winner and latches on, hoping to land a big contract later. Now you could have done a real service by warning Rudy that Big Jim NEVER endorses anyone for principled reasons - and that when the big fella comes around asking innocently for Rudy's autograph, the Mayor better look carefully before signing to make sure he is not, unbeknonst to him, signing a sweetheart contract with our Big Jim.

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  4. I take offense at your gratuitous slap at the hard-shelled armadillo via comparison with Big Jim. Armadillos serve some useful purposes--inexpensive highway speedbumps (albeit temporary), and they play a major role in keeping many roadside entrepreneurs in the barbeque business.

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  5. Rudy and the other cuties like Thompson the actor are just more of the same Neo-Con Todies that the neo-cons would like to foist on the ma's and pa's and ga ga pundits like you Tom..... Rudy belongs in NYC.... there he can live the life that he wants FAR FAR away from any social conservatives!

    You look at Big JIM and frown..... maybe someday you will look that same way at the neo-cons that are RUINING the Republican party! Like good old Scooter they neo-con sweetie that you stood up for...... Good ole Scooter's big claim to fame was being the counsel for Marc Rich..... another sweetie whom Clinton pardoned. I know Tom, I know that the President can pardon whom he pleases.... but such rats?

    Some how I would think that Big Jim and Scooter have a lot more in common than you think!

    You will wake up some day see the light!

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