Best of the Web Today - August 10, 2005
By JAMES TARANTO
The Great Conservative Crack-Up
"A conservative group in Virginia said Tuesday it was withdrawing its support for Supreme Court nominee John Roberts' confirmation because of his work helping overturn a Colorado referendum on gays," reports the Associated Press:
The group, Public Advocate of the United States, is one of the first conservative organizations to announce anything but support for the judge.
Eugene Delgaudio, the president of the group, said in an interview that he hopes his stance will prod others.
"I know that others feel the same way. I know they believe as I do. They're just not going to act," the 50-year-old Northern Virginia man said. "But once I've done it, then they can't claim that no one's opposing Roberts."
What's hilarious about this is that the AP plays this story (you'll pardon the expression) straight, when it turns out Delgaudio is essentially a clown. Byron York on National Review Online quotes from an article of his own that appeared in The American Spectator in 1996:
Perhaps "activist" is the wrong word to describe Delgaudio. Maybe it's better to call him a clever but small-time practitioner of the art of political guerrilla theater. . . . His primary activity is to stage events--comic protests with a political message. Republicans in Washington might remember one a few years ago, when the "Ted Kennedy Swim Team" marched from La Brasserie, one of the Massachusetts senator's favorite hangouts, to the Capitol. That was Delgaudio. A few months later came the "Barney Frank Housesitting Squad," a crusade to create a "hooker-free zone" around the gay congressman's house in case a male prostitute again tried to do business there without Frank's knowledge. That was Delgaudio, too.
And then there was "Pornographers Against Helms," a group formed during the congressional battle over federal funding for obscene art projects. "Pornographers Against Helms" lent its support to Michigan Democrat Carl Levin when he opposed Jesse Helms's move to ban funding--leading some observers to believe that real-life pornographers really backed Levin. The senator was said to be outraged; "Pornographers Against Helms" turned out to be Delgaudio's handiwork.
A Factiva search turned up an April 4, 1994, article in the Washington Post that recounts a confrontation between Delgaudio and a similar group on the left:
A dozen members of ACT-UP, the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, carried signs referring to "Cardinal Ickey." They were met by more than double that number from Public Advocate of the United States, a nonprofit "family values" group headquartered in Falls Church [Va.].
"Jesus taught love, not mean-spirited bigotry," a member of ACT-UP said.
"We're here; we're not queer; get used to it," responded Eugene Delgaudio, executive director of Public Advocate, bringing chants from the other side of "Dork, Dork, Nerd, Dork."
When a Public Advocate member said AIDS is a lifestyle disease of sexual deviants, his side was accused of being "a pack of bingo freaks," and two men from ACT-UP began kissing just inches from the faces of men from Public Advocate. Police separated the two groups when one of the men kissing was hit with a "Sodomy-free zone" sign.
A man who had been demonstrating with ACT-UP left early in a white car, making an obscene gesture to Public Advocate members as he drove by. He was quickly followed by a family in a van leaving Mass.
The driver and his preteen daughter made obscene gestures before the van jumped the curb. Delgaudio initially said he suspected the two drivers were part of a conspiracy. "The sodomite in front of him was screaming at us, distracting us. As we were looking at the sodomite, the van driver tried to run us down," Delgaudio said.
So we'd have to say Delgaudio's dissent is not worth taking seriously. On the other hand, if the Conservative Bloggers Who Support the Gay Judge Roberts change their minds, then we'll know the nomination is in trouble.
South Park Abortionists
We'd like to offer a halfhearted defense of Planned Parenthood's San Francisco chapter, whose Web site until recently featured a cartoon that has occasioned considerable outrage from conservative bloggers. Blogress Dawn Eden summarizes the video, "A Superhero for Choice," in which the main character, "Dianysis" (based on Dian Harrison, who heads the PP chapter), among other things:
o Drowns a Snidely Whiplash-looking abstinence advocate in a garbage can, then declares, "It looks like it's time to take out the trash."
o Says of a group of pro-life protesters, "I wish they would disappear," then shoots them with giant condoms that envelop their victims before blowing them up.
o Lectures a U.S. senator that "no one is above the law," before plunging him into a pot of soup until he emerges naked and says: "I feel cleansed! I no longer have the stench of misinformed conservatism."
You can download the video here. Frankly, we find it impossible to work up any outrage over it. It reminds us of a movie we enjoyed a great deal: "Team America: World Police," in which the creators of "South Park," using puppets rather than cartoon animation, imagined Michael Moore as a suicide bomber and had various other Hollywood morons die horrible yet hilarious deaths.
Watching this video also reminded us of a very funny "South Park" episode, which "South Park Conservatives" author Brian Anderson described in an April op-ed in the Dallas Morning News (ellipsis in original):
Mr. Garrison, now a "woman," mistakenly thinks he's pregnant--and that makes him very happy because he can rush off to get an abortion, and so prove that he's a real woman. Here's the key exchange, at a Planned Parenthood center:
Garrison: Hello, doctor. Looks like I need an abortion.
Doctor: An abortion?
Garrison: Yeah, I've got one growing inside of me. Now are you gonna scramble its brains or just vacuum it out?
The doctor then tells Mr. Garrison that he can't have an abortion because he can't get pregnant: His sex change is ultimately cosmetic. Mr. Garrison is crestfallen: "You mean I'll never know what it feels like to have a baby growing inside me and then scramble its brains and vacuum it out?" The doctor responds: "Nnn . . . that's right."
[Matt] Stone and his fellow thirtysomething colleague, Trey Parker, portray both abortion and sex-change operations in ways Robert Bork would endorse wholeheartedly--but do so in one of the most offensively vulgar half-hours in television history. Now that's subversive.
To be sure, there are those who object to "South Park" and "Team America" even while sympathizing with their political and social attitudes. But those of us who get a kick out of their exuberantly vulgar sensibility are hardly in a position to begrudge Planned Parenthood for mimicking it. PP has, however, removed the cartoon from its Web site, perhaps embarrassed that it is such a pale imitation.
Kos Tail Wags Dem Dog
On Monday a blogger calling himself Mr. Right (sorry, ladies, apparently there is a Mrs. Right) e-mailed us asking to link to a satirical post he'd written called "Democrats Give Up on Winning, Push for More 'Spectacular' Losses":
"Since we can't ever seem to win anymore, it has taken all the fun out of playing the game," said DNC Chairman Howard Dean in an exclusive interview with the Right Place. "That's why we have embarked upon this new strategy of trying to enjoy each and every humiliating defeat. The more spectacularly we crash and burn, the more fun we're going to have! Why do you think I go around saying all the insane things I have been saying since I got this job anyway? You didn't actually think I was that crazy, mean or stupid, did you? I mean, come on! . . ."
For evidence of this, one need look no further than last Tuesday's special election in Ohio's 2nd Congressional District, where Democrat Paul Hackett lost to Republican Jean Schmidt. After the results came in, showing that another one of their candidates had gone down in flames, many liberals were ready to pop the champagne corks! . . .
To further the stated goal of losing as many elections as possible, Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, publisher of the leading liberal weblog, Daily Kos, is lobbying for a position as a Democrat Party Campaign Manager.
"Kos" cited his "perfect 0-16 record" supporting Democrat candidates for elected office in recent elections as proof of his immeasurable qualification for such a position.
"It only makes sense as the next logical step," Kos said in a recent post, "After all, I couldn't be any worse than Bob Shrum."
We didn't bother linking to it, because it just seemed too absurd and over the top to be effective as satire. But then we read this in today's Los Angeles Times:
An array of liberal Internet activists is urging Democrats to vastly expand the 2006 congressional battlefield by recruiting and funding challengers in dozens of districts that have been virtually conceded to the GOP. . . .
Those calls are drawing new energy from Democrat Paul Hackett's narrow defeat this month in a special election in an Ohio district where Republicans usually romp. Hackett's showing "proved that you could build the party if you pay attention to every race," said Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, founder of the popular liberal website the Daily Kos. . . .
Mark Gersh, a longtime strategist for Democrats, said the liberal websites and blogs were right that the party needed to expand the battlefield for House seats.
"But to expand it into districts where [Democrats] have no chance of winning is absolutely crazy," he said.
Turns out Mr. Right's satire wasn't absurd or over the top enough to be anything more than a description of reality.
Metaphor Alert
From a column by Logan Jenkins in the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Francine Busby is feeling on fire.
Thanks to Duke's hari-kari[*], his effervescent foe has morphed into the It Girl.
"This is going to be the hottest race on the West Coast," the Cardiff candidate pledges with a sunny, know-it-all grin. . . .
Two months ago, you'd have said Busby was blowing smoke with this cocksure prediction. . . .
If legions of Republican candidates eat their enemy's young in a Grand Guignol of a primary, Busby could very well eat the GOP's lunch--and punch her ticket to Washington, D.C.
* The retirement of scandal-plagued Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R., Calif.).
You Mean Like Buckingham Palace?
"The Prince of Wales has resumed his diatribe against postwar architecture by condemning cheap and 'ideological' urban redevelopment and reiterating his desire to see new 'human-scale' homes."--Guardian (London), Aug. 10
This Just In
"Nonsmokers Can Be Cancer Victims, Too"--headline, Associated Press, Aug. 10
He'd Better Hope We Don't Respond in Kind
"Nagasaki Mayor Blasts U.S."--headline, Asahi Shimbun (Japan), Aug. 10
Imagine How She Must Feel!
"Joe Wilson Getting Bored With No-Longer-Covert Wife"--headline, Onion, Aug. 10
Someone Take Kazono to the Movies!
"You get bored just living such a long time. I don't enjoy anything any more."--103-year-old Kazono Gomi of Japan, quoted by Reuters, Aug. 10
"When Bruce Bartlett was the deputy assistant secretary for economic policy at the U.S. Treasury under George H.W. Bush, boredom occasionally drove him from his cushy Washington office to seek relief at the movie theater. One afternoon, he ran into a friend who was a senior official in another department. 'It was kind of awkward,' he said. Bartlett had a secretary, staff, an important-sounding job and the paycheck to go with it. But, like many workers, he found himself underemployed and bored out of his mind."--Washington Post, Aug. 10
Last Night I Shot an Elephant in My Pajamas
"Iran Removes Seals at Nuclear Site"--headline, Associated Press, Aug. 10
'Neigh' Means 'No'
Last month the Seattle Times reported on a bit of horseplay gone terribly awry:
King County sheriff's detectives are investigating the owners of an Enumclaw-area farm after a Seattle man died from injuries sustained while having sex with a horse boarded on the property. . . .
Deputies don't believe a crime occurred because bestiality is not illegal in Washington state and the horse was uninjured, said [sheriff's Sgt. John] Urquhart.
But because investigators found chickens, goats and sheep on the property, they are looking into whether animal cruelty--which is a crime--was committed by having sex with these smaller, weaker animals, he said.
Now an entomonymous state senator, Republican Pam Roach, is proposing a state law against bestiality. You'd think this would be relatively uncontroversial, but it has drawn opposition--from, among others, Robert L. Jamieson Jr., a columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:
The jury is out among experts as to whether sex with animals--clearly repugnant--constitutes cruelty.
But if something truly heinous is being done to animals, there are already animal-cruelty laws on the books.
We don't need a toothless bestiality law spawned by knee-jerk lawmaking and moral hysteria.
Roach is taking animal love to extremes.
Piers Beirne, a professor of criminology at the University of Southern Maine, would beg to differ. "Bestiality is by nature sexual coercion," he wrote in a 1997 article, "because animals are incapable of genuinely saying 'yes' or 'no' to humans in forms we can readily understand."
Unless it's Mr. Ed. |
