Assclowns of the Week #78: Nattering Nabobs of Negativism edition

Rarely even in East Wingnuttia does one see such a pure distillation of assclownery within the space of a single week. Such a stratospheric level of compliance is tailor-made for a guy like me, someone who thrives on assembling a list that skewers the organ donors of America. Presented for your amusement:

We saw John Derbyshire (2), who wants to set women’s suffrage back to the 19th century because they vote liberal; We were treated to a Rush Limbaugh Million Cock Puppet (3) march and we had to suffer through another screed from “leftist” John L. Perry (5) who thinks a military dictatorship is better than the one we have now.

So clambor aboard the Assclown Express as we review this week’s negative nattering and much, much more!

10) The FRC’s Prayer Warriors

From the Rude Pundit comes this all too typical tale of religious intolerance that was really the mission of the Founding Fathers, don’cha know? On September 25th, a crowd of 1000-8000 Muslims held a rally in Washington, DC calling for national unity (termed a “massive Muslim prayer rally” by the Family Research Council).

Counterterrorist “expert” John Cosgrove had this to say at the rally:

(Jefferson had the Koran) so that he could know his enemy, so he could confront them, know them, kill them, and vanquish the Islamic pirates, the scourge of the seas and spreading tyranny abroad. After reading the Koran, founding the Marines and expanding the Navy to go kill them, I think he laid the Koran down thinking perhaps he was done. Sadly, it was not the case.

In other words, Jefferson failed because he didn’t kill every last Muslim. Of course, Jefferson’s actions against the Barbary pirate states had nothing to do with genocide or Christian supremacy. As Commander in Chief, Jefferson sent ships to the Mediterranean simply to protect American maritime trade routes and so the pirates’ constant demands for ransom and tributes wouldn’t bleed the treasury dry. His ultimate goal was peace with the Barbary states, not their complete elimination.

But try telling that to the bigots and Bible-humpers of the FRC, who can’t stand the idea of Muslims gathering in groups of more than two or three and confounding their own stereotypes by calling for peace, unity and religious tolerance. And, like the Rude One said,

Of course, there were conservative Christian protesters, some handing out pamphlets that yelled, “Abortion is Murder!! Homosexuality is Sin! Islam is a Lie!” If the pamphlet shovers took a second to ask anyone there, they'd discover that many of the praying, scary brown people agreed with them on two out of three of the expressed sentiments.

Like the Rude One, your porcine powerhouse has discovered Jebus and covertly joined Tony “So What if I Collect Wigs and Knives?” Perkins’ Super Duper Prayer Team of Holy Ninja-Christian Warriors. Dispatches from the front lines will be frequent, I’m sure.

9) Sen. John Ensign

Ensign Pulver-ized.

Apparently, someone on C Street didn’t tell John Ensign that being a Promise Keeper involves things other than promising to steer a lobbying job to the husband whose wife he was secretly fucking despite there being a federal law prohibiting staffers from lobbying on Capitol Hill less than one year after resigning.

Meanwhile, not a single Republican in the Senate has come to Ensign’s aid (unless Tom Coburn’s “clarification” of his involvement can be construed as a defense).

And, really, how stupid was this middle-aged Lothario to cheat on one of the hottest wives on the Beltway after calling for Clinton’s impeachment for doing the same thing?

8) Rep. Louie Gohmert

Louie You Lie.

Last Tuesday night, Louie Gohmert (R-Gomer) channeled Rick Santorum and claimed that passing the Matthew Shepard hate crime bill would lead to things like Nazis, necrophilia, bestiality and pedophilia. In a way this is a microcosm of the ongoing Republican jihad against Kevin Jennings, President Obama’s Safe Schools Czar who’s nationally renowned for GLSEN, which successfully seeks to protect schoolchildren of all sexual orientations from bullying. If it protects teh gays in either the classroom or the military, it’s eeeeviiiiil! Better to let defenseless gay boys to get beaten to death and hung on barbed wire fences and kicking valuable soldiers out of war zones. Not allowing such will open the floodgates of Hell.

Gomer, you may remember, is the smirking idiot who also disrespected Obama during his joint session speech last month. Btw, his inspiration is Watergate jailbird and professional Christian prison proselytizer Chuck Colson.

Republicans. They sure know how to pick ‘em, don’t they?

7) American Private Police Force

How ironic would it be if “Captain” Michael Hilton got thrown in the very same jail he tried to buy? Of course, Hilton is no more a Captain than Harland Sanders was a real Colonel and even admitted as much.

Yet, the $27 million Two Rivers correctional facility that was bought by Hilton’s American Private Police Force wasn’t actually bought since the bank appointed to be the trustee for the sale never finalized it. And Hilton’s bogus military title is the least of the revelations that have led to the transaction being put on skids. Let’s look at the facts:

Hilton comes parading into town with three Mercedes SUV’s (the payment on one was late) with fictional City of Hardin Police Department decals slapped against them; The town, seeing $27 million dangled in front of their noses, gives them the keys to the jail before they’ve even officially passed papers; Becky Shay, a local reporter quit her job for a $60,000 salary, a signing bonus, a company car and help with a down payment on a new home; Former Two Rivers Authority director Greg Smith, after “vetting” Hilton’s background, was put on paid administrative leave 72 hours after announcing the deal, right around the same time his wife was offered a lucrative job with APPF.

Here’s how well Smith vetted Hilton: Hilton has a history of alcoholism, was ordered by a California judge to appear in court on Oct. 27th to answer fraud charges involving taking money from investors for a senior assisted living home that was never built. Hilton is also a jailbird who’s been tried and convicted for petty crimes like passing bad checks to flim flam operations involving over a million dollars.

Add to the mix the fact that APPF’s new director of operations is currently working in Afghanistan and doesn’t know anything about his contract being finalized, no one knows who the mysterious parent organization behind APPF is or even if one exists and Hardin’s contract with APPF would’ve given not just the jail and the 40 acres to them but also permission to continue posing as the city’s police force and to set up a training camp to train other rent-a-cops. Plus, the Montana Attorney General is investigating APPF and demanding all documents concerning the sale of the jail.

Come to think of it, maybe the Two Rivers Authority should be occupying this spot instead of APPF considering how corrupt and stubbornly gullible they’ve been through this whole thing. But take heart, fans of capitalism: If they can’t find a home in Hardin, Montana, there’s always Macon, Georgia and…

6) Erick Erickson

Erick Erickson, Red State.com managing editor and right wing councilor for the city of Macon, Georgia, has a nice compromise for Macon police officers who want to unionize for better pay and benefits: dissolve the 130 member police department and hire mercenaries. Last September 29, Erickson wrote on his blog,

I’m thinking I’ll have the City Attorney draft me legislation to dissolve the police department and contract with the Sheriff to provide public safety services.

[UPDATED:] Looks like I won’t have to draft the legislation. The City Attorney tells me that unionized police officers cannot strike, cannot use a union to collectively bargain, and pretty much cannot do anything other than pay union dues and hold picket signs off duty. I would still rather us contract out to the sheriff’s office than see a union come in. They breed inefficiency, corruption, and taint.

So, even though a city statute would render any police union completely and utterly worthless, Erickson would still rather contract law enforcement out to whomever. Hm. I wonder if “Captain” Mike’s contacted him or vice versa with any tantalizing bids?

5) Newsmax’s John L. Perry

Last week, John L. Perry, “unpaid blogger” of Newsmax, offered an ingenious solution to our president problem in this now deathless, Beckian screed. Quoth Perry:

There is a remote, although gaining, possibility America's military will intervene as a last resort to resolve the “Obama problem.” Don't dismiss it as unrealistic.

America isn't the Third World. If a military coup does occur here it will be civilized. That it has never happened doesn't mean it wont. Describing what may be afoot is not to advocate it. So, view the following through military eyes…

In other words, let’s finish what Prescott Bush only started. Damn the ballot boxes and full speed ahead. Not that I’m advocating insurrection against a president whose name happens to find its way in the title of my every column.

In keeping with Republican and Libertarian cowardice, Newsmax, while pointedly not apologizing, immediately pulled the article then tried to crawl away from Perry, demoting him to “an unpaid blogger” and a former Carter administration alumnus when in fact he’s been writing for Newsmax for over a decade (but this Newsmax fluffer of a bio says otherwise). And certain libertarians are already trying to Velcro Perry to our side because he used to work for the Johnson and Carter administrations (both administrations used Republicans). This about a guy with a byline called “Right Angles”? Uh huh. Well, let’s check that out:

In 2004, Perry once wrote of Obama right after his Senate victory,

Amid the mumbo-jumbo at the Bean Town Demo blah-blah was the ga-ga promo of Chicago politico Barack Obama as the party’s newest Great Pinko Hope. Leftist media are even now busily endeavoring to orchestrate Obama’s elevation – leapfrogging him out of national obscurity – to the United States Senate. Can 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue be far behind? Pseudo-journalists are huffing and harrumphing over the audacity of Alan Keyes to oppose Obama by moving his residence from Maryland to Illinois – one of the five “home” jurisdictions of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., if you count the District of Columbia and her Global Village.

And two years ago, he opined that what’s ailing Fred Thompson is not his platform or somnambulist-style of campaigning but the liberal media. And, more recently, just last June Perry delivered this whopper on the pages of Newsmuck starting with the words,

If President George W. Bush hadn’t acted courageously to defend the free world after 9/11, Iranians wouldn’t be protesting today for freedom from tyrannical Islam. His successor, President Barack Obama, and the worldwide leftist coterie of catcallers have falsely blamed Bush for just about everything from the sinking of the Titanic to the rising of the national debt. Here’s one thing Bush undeniably accomplished about which there should be no distortion or disagreement: He lit the spark of passionate and insatiable hunger for human freedom throughout the world of Islam, from the Mediterranean basin to the farthest reach of the Indonesian archipelago. It is no exaggeration to suggest Bush may go down in history as the Abraham Lincoln of the Middle East – and Obama as an asterisk of irrelevancy.

Oh yeah, he’s one of us, alright. Every bit as much as Joe Lieberman and Zell Miller were.

4) Orly Taitz

From the start, Orly Taitz has struck me as a slightly less sane version of Jay Porter, the whacked-out, plate-flinging law partner of Al Pacino in …And Justice For All. Last month, Judge Clay Land gave Taitz two weeks to prove why he shouldn’t slap her with a $10,000 fine for bringing frivolous lawsuits into his courtroom. Well, obviously that was time well-spent because this was the result:

Taitz basically told the judge to take a hike. Why? She’s basing a rambling, 19 page motion for recusal on two rock-solid principles: 1) That Judge Land owns stock in Microsoft and Comcast, which is tied in some undisclosed way to Barack Obama. And 2) Attorney General Eric Holder was allegedly seen at a coffee shop across the street from Judge Land’s courthouse. (Here’s a copy of Robert Douglas’s affidavit attesting to his Eric Holder sighting.)

Here’s the good part: Not only is Judge Land under Obama’s Svengali-like spell (Judge Land, it ought to be noted, was appointed by George W. Bush), he ought to recuse himself because the judge’s attempt to restore order in his court and respect for the federal judiciary makes him “a complaining witness”, thereby rendering him ineligible for imposing a sanction of any kind as a judge.

Yes, she actually wrote that. And why hasn’t this screaming harpy birther been disbarred, yet? Well, the Magna Carta presumes innocence until guilt is proven and apparently in the legal world, people like Taitz are presumed sane until proven insane. Still, you would think the preponderance of evidence she’s offered up to this point would’ve been sufficient.

3) Wingnuts

On second thought, blame it on Obama for losing the Olympics.

President Obama’s critics, whether they be birthers, deathers, tenthers, 9/12ers or astroturfers, generally conduct themselves like wouldbe blacktop bullies who always take their cues from the head bully. They cannot and will not be made happy and have the mental and emotional maturity of elementary school-aged toadies. Barack Obama going to Copenhagen, Denmark this past week to make a pitch for Chicago hosting the 2016 games brought out the best in them.

When it was announced that the IOC had chosen Rio de Janiero to be the first Latin American country to host the games, these wingnuts were actually glad that America failed. Not because Latin America would get to host its first Games but because that’s what Obama wanted.

Yet it’s obviously been lost on these gold medal-winning wingnuts that Rio has a murder rate 3 times that of Chicago or that Bush’s own Department of Homeland security may have queered us getting another Olympics for a long time. Fox’s Kimberly Guilfoyle said that Chicago was plagued with “lawlessness, violence on the street, innocent bystanders being killed, children beaten and unable to go to schools.” In fact, just last month alone, this was a typical week in Rio:

A police shootout with criminals stopped a commuter train and sent passengers fleeing for cover. Officers conducted a drug raid on a slum, keeping 2,000 children out of school. Police got into gun battles that killed more than a dozen suspected traffickers.

And we all know that murder and crime wasn’t an issue at all in Beijing last year.













Of course, these sneering pricks would’ve applauded the Great Chicago Fire, roasted marshmallows and weenies with it and made a mascot of Mrs. O’Leary’s cow if it happened right after Obama called for a more efficient city fire department. Why we continue to subsidize and tolerate these seditious, subversive sociopaths is anyone’s guess. But we ought to recycle their own meme to immigrants and liberals and hand it right back to them: If you don’t like our country, get the fuck out.

2) John Derbyshire

Wanted for Crimes Against Humanity’s Intelligence.

“Where will a more intelligent, hence pessimistic, yet sprightly conservatism come from? You are holding in your hands part of the answer.” - George F. Will, Pulitzer Prize winner

“John Derbyshire contends that a comprehensive pessimism is the natural home for realistic conservatives, a breed that understands human nature better than utopian liberals and 'happy talk conservatives.' His argument is wide-ranging, erudite, and invigorating, but, paradoxically, delivered with cheerful panache.” - Judge Robert H. Bork, still-embittered Supreme Court reject

These are just some of the plaudits given to John Derbyshire’s new optimistic opus, We Are Doomed (you’ll note that they’re almost exclusively from white Republican males who still wistfully and nostalgically long for the days of brandy, cigars and overstuffed leather chairs). Well, Derbyshire has ideas in his new book that come screaming right out of the 11th century: Namely, that women should be stripped of their right to vote.

For good measure, he also told Alan Colmes that he’d also love to see the Civil Rights Act repealed because “you can’t force people to be good.” I guess that would also apply to the Emancipation Proclamation that legally forced people to abolish the slavery that he claims he doesn’t want to see come back.

1) Dan Riehl

When blogger Dan Riehl goes on TV, the network has to use closed-captioning for the thinking-impaired.

It takes a Riehl asshole to write something like this about the dead.

Last September 12th, census worker Bill Sparkman’s body was found in southern Kentucky hanging with the word “Fed” scrawled across his chest. Rather than embracing the far likelier scenario that he could’ve been killed by some antebellum, gubmint-hatin’ redneck, Riehl offered a more compelling theory into the federal employee’s murder:

Sparkman's bio and work history suggests at the least he was not just your average guy. No teaching degree, no full-time means of employment and no wife or kids so far as I am aware. But he certainly did gravitate towards children. I can't help but wonder if this wasn't a revenge killing disguised to look like something else. If he did have issues in this regard and messed with the wrong kid, it isn't as if something like that can be ruled out until we know more.

Point in fact, Sparkman adopted one boy and attended college and there are no indications that he was some loner who hung around school yards wearing nothing but a raincoat. But try telling that to a right wing stooge like Riehl who makes Debbie Schlussel look like Murphy Brown by comparison.

(Image courtesy of Sadly No!.)