Parrot Cage

Enron Republicans Behind Bars

Our little joke is starting to wear thin, having been repeated more often than we thought likely in this era of Republican dominion; but, as we consider Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling's potentially lengthy jail sentences, for fraud and conspiracy in driving Enron into the ground, forgive our indulgence:

There is pleasure to be taken from Republicans behind bars, and that should commence sometime after lockdown.

Get out the honey butter Kenny-boy, you're gonna make some friends.  Kenny's dreamy eyes and virile pate could make his lips the most coveted executive position in the entire cell block.  But don't count out the allure of Jeffrey "mad booty" Skilling.  When those expensive hair plugs take more tugging than they were designed for, he's got those executive ears which could get utilized more in jail than they ever were in the boardroom.

Will repeated impolite sodomy reverse the California energy crisis?  Will the two biggest Republican donors having their teeth kicked in to make a more inviting orifice for the Aryan Brotherhood restore Enron's pension funds?  Sadly, no.  But it almost makes it worthwhile.

Lest anyone confuse our unsympathetic speculation on Enron management's new love life with a sadistic streak, keep in mind we merely ruminate on such terrors because there is almost no chance they will ever materialize.  Being a Republican donor has its privileges; we predict that a Presidential pardon will almost certainly interrupt the union of the smartest guys in the room with the collective lust of the united Crypts and Bloods.

Let's hope that somewhere before that Presidential pardon the Justice Department has at least made a dent in retrieving the massive fortunes these crooks amassed in their wake.

When Economists Go Bad

For those who don't know the likes of John Lott, he's a gun fetishist researcher who has published some books suggesting, well, the title of his most popular book says it all: More Guns, Less Crime.
Lott recently filed a lawsuit against highly respected economist and co-author of Freakonomics, Steven Levitt.

If you've read Freakonomics (and if you haven't, we strongly recommend it), you know that Levitt isn't exactly "rabidly anti-gun", nor is he a fan of John Lott.  The lawsuit targets a particular statement in Freakonomics:

According to Levitt's book: "When other scholars have tried to replicate [Lott's] results, they found that right-to-carry laws simply don't bring down crime."

But according to Lott's lawsuit: "In fact, every time that an economist or other researcher has replicated Lott's research, he or she has confirmed Lott's conclusion."

By suggesting that Lott's results could not be replicated, Levitt is "alleging that Lott falsified his results," the lawsuit says.

Factually, the dispute is a matter of semantics.  Lott claims that the studies which debunk his pro-gun findings did not "replicate" his methodology, but used different approaches to the same data.  Given Lott's specious methodologies, meticulously "replicating" their flaws is something few credible researchers would have any interest in.

Tim Lambert at Deltoid is our primary source for many of Lott's scandals, unscrupulous behavior and dubious research.  We're not sure which is the more fun fact about Lott: that he created a pseudonym (Mary Rosh) to pay himself some gushing compliments on internet bulletin boards, or that he cited as evidence in his pro-gun book a survey which he supposedly financed by himself, involved unknown persons, has no documentation of any sort, and produced strange, almost impossible results.

This guy is gonna get creamed in court.  With Lott's feeble credibility, why would he want a libel suit that accuses Levitt of ruining his reputation when he's done all the heavy lifting himself?  Quite simply, Lott probably has nothing left to lose.  He lost his cushy job at the American Enterprise Institute last year, and when conservative think tank scams have no use for you, that leaves precious few job opportunities as a "researcher".

Oddly enough, AEI fellow Ted Franks notes the lawsuit on his overlawyered.com blog with a nearly audible tsk-tsk.  Fun fact: Ted Franks wrote the glowing review of More Guns, Less Crime as featured on Amazon.  An Amazon update may be forthcoming.

Leahy grows a pair

Congratulations to Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy for openly opposing the Supreme Court nomination of Republican flunky Judge Samuel Alito.  For whatever reason, Leahy actually voted for John Roberts to become Chief Justice, and guess what, the guy's a tool: witness the recent Supreme Court decision to not let the Bush Justice Department punish Oregon doctors in assisting patients in state-sanctioned suicide.  Is anyone surprised that Roberts cast his first vote in lockstep with Scalia and Thomas.  Expect a lifelong pattern.

Samuel Alito will be no different; however nice and smart the guy is, he's still a threat to our basic liberties.  As we've said before:

His stellar character and brilliance will be of little comfort when he assists in completely dismantling whatever semblance of progressive accomplishment we have in this country.  Justice Alito's kindness and jocularity with other judges will not devastate the American way of life, his right-wing reflexes will.

Senator Leahy deserves kudos for openly stating the most reasonable case for voting against Alito:

"At a time when the president is seizing unprecedented power, the Supreme Court needs to act as a check and to provide balance," Leahy, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a speech at Georgetown University's law school. "Based on the hearing and his record, I have no confidence that Judge Alito would provide that check and balance."

 

Bush's people know that if they don't start packing the courts with dyed-in-the-wool robotic Republicans, they're in for serious trouble.  We think the unwarranted wire-tapping is just the tip of the iceberg.  In a world of accountable government, the Bush Administration would have been impeached, tarred, feathered, drawn and quartered by now.  If they can stack the courts, they just might be able to get away with all the evil they've bred.

We don't expect many Democratic Senators to bravely follow Leahy's actions; not because he hasn't given them a brilliant reason, but because they're Democrats, given to cowardice at the drop of a pejorative label.  And the chances of any Republican Senator rejecting Alito is nil.  There really is no such thing as a "principled Republican" however moderate they paint themselves.

The Democrats would be wise to unite against Alito under the banner of Checks and Balances.  If Alito goes Supreme with only Republican votes, then only Republicans have to answer for the avalanche of repression which Alito will surely unleash.  With upcoming elections, the Democrats could use any leverage they have in America's growing discomfort with Bush's overreaching executive powers.

But the threat of a smart Democratic Party is not something the Republicans have had to fear for quite some time.

Another Vegetative State

...and that state is Massachusetts.  Mooniebots are gearing up to make an 11 year old girl in Massachusetts their redemption for the Terri Schiavo fiasco.  As reported by the Boston Globe, the state of Massachusetts ruled that Haleigh Poutre was beyond recovery and that feeding tubes could be removed.  However, as it turns out, she is starting to look recoverable.

Haleigh's stepfather has been the one trying to keep her plugged in, but his motives aren't exactly pure.  Jason Strickland, whose brutality put Haleigh into her vegetative state in the first place, risks murder charges should her feeding tubes be removed.  Haleigh's aunt, who adopted her at 7 and married this shit, was also charged with abuse, but turned up dead alongside Haleigh's grandmother in an apparent suicide pact.

While the white-ringers are licking their chops over this story, looking at every angle to exploit to its fullest, lefties have largely ignored the story and its implications.  We do not.  This is a very valuable lesson: don't trust the government to make correct decisions, especially when there are no real advocates for the individual and a huge governmental conflict of interest.

Take the inconsistency of medical science, with the flaws of medical professionals, and mix in a little government bureaucracy and you have a formula for disaster.  Haleigh lacks any real advocates, since her medical care is paid for by the same state which determines her fate.

Of course, our take on the horrific Terri Schiavo parade was that if her parents wanted to keep her as a potted plant, why wouldn't you turn her over to them?  Whatever the motives of Michael Schiavo, we are not pleased that the courts would turn a life or death decision over to a husband in spite of the people who raised her.  Yes, she was already dead, there was no brain there, nothing to redeem.  That said, why shouldn't parents be allowed a share of the empty shell that was once their beloved daughter?  The lunatic right turned the whole affair into a statement of life v. death, and the autopsy showed that they were idiots.

How recoverable is Haleigh?  We don't know.  It's likely that she's already gone, or slowly getting there.  That does not change the fact that she needs a real advocate, outside of that stepfather who so abused her.  She needs a proper diagnosis from professionals with her best interest at heart.  Unfortunately, this leaves an opening for the wingnuts to make her a poster child for their anti-right-to-die crusade and general religious lunacy.  So be it.  There's a broken little girl who needs someone, anyone, to start thinking about her.

Sammy, the bull---

The Alito Supreme Court hearings are gearing up to be the most hostile event that nobody saw.  Not that there aren't many viewers, and not that the MSM hasn't tried to wring as much drama out of this event as possible.  However, we've been watching this endless parade of self-important Senators making self-important speeches rather than seriously grill this judicial candidate, and very little coming of it.

But the real drama is apparently the invisible drama:  All those nasty Democrats nastily attacking poor Sammy.  Oh wait, did that happen?  It must have, Sam Alito's wife went running out of the hearings in tears.  WTF?

If we had taped this whole mess, we would have been skimming tapes for the smackdown that we never saw.  But it never happened.  Nary a cross word has been exchanged between the nominee and his would-be inquisitors, and yet the irksome mooniebots are crying foul.

This must be the new strategy of the white-ringer bug brain: Portray your nominee as a hapless victim to mean--and did we say nasty?--Democrats who will stop at nothing to cripple a good man's reputation.  The two Senators most responsible for this angle are ancillary Dukes of Hazzard villain Lindsey Graham and Orrin Hatch, the Most Sanctimonious Mormon in all of Mormondom--a fiercely competitive title, by the way.  Graham bemoaned the fact that Alito's family had to be witness to his humiliation and even reassured the nominee that "No, sir, you're not (a bigot)."  And Orrin Hatch reprimanded Senate Democrats with a 'how could you do this to a woman?' indignation.

If questions about one's involvement in an overtly racist and sexist organization are too hard to handle, is this guy really suited for the job?  The opportunity to demonize Democrats apparently trumps the risk of making Justice Alito look like a puss, hiding in his mother's apron strings.

Nevermind, that's not the point.  It's all theater and these crocodile tears are meant to intimidate the Democrats.  However, if Alito does believe what the Republicans are telling him, he could do a Clarence Thomas.  Old Clarence, in all his basic on the job incompetence, has never forgotten how he was treated in his confirmation hearings.  It's safe to say that his record reflects that--since it defies any logic other than a slash and burn vengeance upon all that would disapprove of him.  Perhaps there is that risk.  Beating up a guy will not exactly send him off with warm feelings for your cause.  But, thus far, not only has there not been a beating, these Democratic kid-gloves seem hardly necessary for their awkward nancy-slaps.

Senator Joe Biden has publicly suggested that the hearings should be abandoned altogether.  Given this level of hysterics, he may be right.  Or maybe he's just remembering how badly he fucked up the Thomas hearings and how he permanently assured a vote on the Supreme Court to strike back at Democrats.

Hara-Kiri Harriet

Harriet Miers leans into the pitch and takes one for the team.  The eminently unqualified Bush nominee finally ends her painful confirmation process, which never really got off the ground.

As it turns out, the conservative faithful don't really want an up or down vote on all of the President's wishes.  We tremble at the thought of who Bush could replace her with.  Given the choice between unqualified without malice and qualified bomb-thrower, we'd obviously prefer the one in over her head.

Harriet the Spy

Contrary to the fears of the moonie-bots, Bush's Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers is very much in the mold of Clarence Thomas: She has precious few qualifications other than as a symbolic tool.  And what a tool she is.

After some fifteen years, Clarence Thomas continues to sit on the Supreme Court with nary a word to say.  Literally.  His supreme disinterest in any clarifying matter before the court, his manifest lack of even a whisper during cross examination apparently never interferes with his dogged habit of offering an amen to most anything Scalia rules on.  Justice Thomas' greatest displays of independence smack of immaturity: when he breaks from the pack, it's usually notable in its lunacy.  It must be only coincidence that the quietest member of the judicial branch happens to be an originalist: the laziest judicial philosophy one can hold without getting disbarred.  And certainly he is not influenced by the sweet lecture fees he receives from hardcore white-ringers and their institutions.

Clarence, meet Harriet.  She too has never shown much sign of independent thinking.  In fact, her closest male companion affirms that Harriet isn't exactly rigorous in her decision-making on life and death and freedom matters.  If David Frum is correct (and when has he ever been so?), then Harriet's crush on the President doesn't speak well for her judgment at all.  No David, the choice isn't between her being a sycophant or a robot, she could be stupid: you know, flat-out bag of hammers Bush dumb.  How dumb can someone with a law degree be?  More imbecilic than you can imagine.

Either way, she presents another empty vessel which Antonin Scalia can mold and shape at will.  Harriet will be the next Clarence Thomas, in the worst possible way.

No Judge is Good Judge

Bush nominates a White House staff member with no judicial experience to the Supreme Court.

White House counsel Harriet Miers is apparently not the dream choice of the white-ringer chorus, which could make her confirmation hearings quite interesting.  Well, not that interesting.  As we have been told, Senate Republicans overwhelmingly confirmed Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose philosophy wasn't exactly a mystery.  At best, Lindsay Graham will attempt to folksy up his Jesus rating with bland pieties while Jeff Sessions, the Senate's most insipid marionette, might stammer his way through a recitation of the 10 commandments, or at least the three he can remember.

We thought we had some raw meat when the President announced that she served on the board of Exodus Ministries.  Now, anyone who has heard of an "Exodus" related ministry should think of those butch camps whose primary mission it is to spin homo-straw into hetero-gold. Notwithstanding the dubious success or ethics of reparative therapy, we were hoping that the real story was that Ms. Miers might have a proverbial horse in the gay race, so to speak, as do all involved in ex-gay ministries or anti-gay politics.  As it turns out, it's not that kind of Exodus Ministries.

Alas, that will leave John Roberts as the only closeted justice.

Rosy Democratic Knees

Prominent Democrats are showing off what their party does best and will continue to do: give concession speeches.

Despite openly acknowledging that Bush's Chief Justice nominee John Roberts was agressively evasive in Senate hearings, and that his confirmation would be rolling the dice on the viability of progressive legislation for generations to come, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont knuckled under and endorsed Bush's candidate.  Many more will follow.

The impotent Democrats are now suggesting that this approval of Bush's candidate was some kind of deal so that Bush's next Supreme Court nominee won't be any more conservative than Roberts.  WTF?

In George Bush's prayers every night, he must thank his god for creating Democrats; without them he'd never be able to get away with anything he wants.

Democrats have devolved into the lubrication by which Republicans rape the country.

With each concession the Democrats send a clear message to every potential voter:  This is not a party to be trusted with power.  If they will not defend their own values they will defend nothing.