February 20, 2004 by s.z.

"Everyone's having a lovely time, biffing about" Meanwhile, at the home of America's Worst Mother (a trademark of TBOGG Screeds Inc.): [There is another pause. In the background, children can be heard shrieking in a rhythmic fashion reminiscent of the fatal scenes in Lord of the Flies.] "Uh-oh, I think they've got my husband! Yes, there's his face — hello darling — oops, now it's gone. He's — he's submerged under a seething wave of nursery-school children, like Gulliver — " Actually, that's just Meghan screwing around with one of the voices in her head (probably the "Invisible Wife," whom we heard about last week in connection with Meghan's plans to wreak vengeance on the liberal neighbors).  In truth, she hasn't seen her husband in weeks.  Meghan hastens to assure us (and her hallucination) that 4-year-old Snapdragon's birthday party is perfectly lovely, what with the refreshments consisting of heart-shaped ham-and-cheese sandwiches, strawberries and bowtie pasta, a cake made by daughter Vashti (said cake being "nothing like those horrible sugary supermarket jobs," since Vashti uses real "refined sugar and bleached flour" in hers), and homemade madelines (in honor of the incident a couple of weeks ago when  Snapdragon used A la Recherche du Temps Perdu as a potty).  And the house is decorated with teapot centerpieces, and "sweet little thrift-store teacups filled with candy hearts as party favors," and "candy-floss tulle and bubble-gum-colored tissue paper."   Doesn't it all sound so precious and adorable and charming that you could just die?  And now don't you wish you had been nicer to Meghan, so she would have invited YOUR kid to the party? The Invisible Wife insists that Meghan is a hypocrite, since back in October she wrote about the tyranny of other people's lavish birthday parties.  But Meghan claims that she's only having the shindig because her friend Shelly (probably Michelle Malkin) wants to start a catering business, and daughter Vashti  (who is 9, or 11, or some age where child labor laws apply) wants to make her living selling cakes, since being a little match girl didn't work out. And what is the point of this week's "Fever Swamp"?  That while Meghan still disapproves of YOUR birthday parties (and child rearing methods), her birthday parties are scrumptious, and she is MUCH more admirable than that bitch, the Capable Mother. At least, that's what I thought it meant.  Tune to TBOGG for the King James translation of the column. 7:48:27 AM

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Sean Hannity Tells Conference to Practice Christianity at Work, Like He Does From the Charlotte Observer: More than 2,000 people are expected to gather today in Charlotte for a Southern Baptist-sponsored conference aimed at helping them spread their Christian faith at work.  But the concept of Elevate 2004, with its lineup of conservative celebrity speakers that includes Fox News commentator Sean Hannity, doesn't sit well with everyone. [snip] Randall Balmer, who teaches American religion at Columbia University in New York, said Wednesday that a conference to help people share their faith outside church is part of the long Southern Baptist tradition of witnessing to the world.  It's the combination of religion, politics and celebrity that Balmer said he finds "deeply troubling" -- particularly Hannity, whose archconservative politics dominate the Fox News airwaves nightly. "I do question the appropriateness of someone like Sean Hannity to talk about evangelism," Balmer said. "That doesn't quite click with me. ... There's a real danger in associating the faith with celebrity.  Jesus didn't do that. Jesus called on ordinary people to propagate the faith."  Other speakers include "former TV sitcom hearttrob Kirk Cameron (whom, if you're part of the target audience, would know best as Buck "Naked" Williams, who, along with Rayford "Porn Name" Steele, fights the antiChrist in the Left Behind movies).  I don't believe Jesus would have a problem with Kirk as a person, but if he saw "Growing Pains" or the Left Behind movies, he might object to Kirk presuming to tell anyone else how to act at work (or anywhere else). And I think that Jesus might object to one of the other Christian celebrity speakers, "conservative political strategist Ralph Reed," who, as you will recall, was one of the masterminds behind that "Max Cleland Supports Osama and Saddam" commercials.  Yes, with both Hannity and Reed in town, Charlotte was lucky that God didn't send one of those Pat Robertson-style tornedos to wipe out the town for hosting such wickedness. Here's more about the conference: Gregory Webb of Tulsa, Okla., who is helping organize the event, said its goal is to "encourage, embolden and train" Christians from college age into their 40s to evangelize in the workplace. The Web site --www.elevate2004.com -- focuses on the "next generation of business leaders and influencers." Webb defended the right of Christians to witness in offices, farms and factories. "If we surrender the rights of freedom of expression," he said, "we lose something in terms of our rights of citizenship. You can't let territory be taken from you." He defended Hannity's coming. "Sean Hannity is very open about his faith influencing his values and his positions on the major issues of the day," Webb said in an e-mail. "We as Christians need to learn how to handle controversy and conflict because it will come up if we are faithful to witness where we live and work." Webb also defended the entire lineup of Charlotte speakers. "I would like to see a liberal espouse basic biblical values, the core values ..." he said. "It only seems to be conservatives who are doing that."   I, a liberal, will now advocate the basic biblical values of "Love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again,"  "Judge not and ye shall not be judged, condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned," and "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth."  I am available to speak at the next Elevate confererance.  However, if called to speak, I would advise participants not to spread their Christian faith at work, because not only might that annoy their coworkers, but if might cause their employer to fire them, since said employer might rightfully expect people to, you know, spend their time working during work hours.  But if I see Sean Hannity advising his TV audience, "But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation," I might change my mind. P.S. Speaking of bad employees, Fried Green al-Qaedas has a great story of a guy who did sorta share his faith at work, in that he mailed letters in which he threatened to "kill and injure" President Bush in the name of "my God Saddam Hussien" -- and used the return address of a former boss on the envelopes.  6:46:48 AM

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Crushing Those Who Would Deny that Conservatives Are Being Crushed On Campus Shorter Edward Feser: When Professor Michael "Shecky" Bérubé jokes that he spends six classroom hours a week, "denouncing Bush as a drunken, lying fratboy," he unwittingly reveals a great truth.  For, while preachers don't spend much time "in their sermons arguing for the existence of God," everything they say is predicated upon the belief that God does exist.  And so, while professors don't actually spend much time denouncing Bush as a drunken, lying fratboy, that is actually the basis of the entire campus curriculum. Want proof?  Feser offer six tests, to include: 6. Are [students], on balance and in general, more likely after having attended university to believe that traditional moral scruples, especially concerning sex, lack any rational justification and ought to be abandoned as mere expressions of superstition and bigotry?" So, if students have fewer moral scruples about sex after attending college, then that proves that the Left dominates the modern univerity.   Oh, and  "[G]iven the actual content and historical development of Fascist and National Socialist doctrine, there are far more connections between it and the modern Left than there are between it and the modern Right."  So stop calling Feser a Philosofascist! 6:02:49 AM

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It Appears That Lileks Read TBOGG's Post About the 666 on Gnat's Scalp . . .   Just put Gnat down, and no, not in the animal sense.  That’s the difference between kids and horses; your child breaks a leg, and your first thought isn’t where you keep the shotgun.    And the fact that Lileks can joke about it means that he's not subconsciously considering it; no, not at all. He later informs us that Gnat, much like the Gurdon tribe (Heresy, Sugar Magnolia, Nyquil, and Lima) is now making conservative political points: Earlier today I was playing with Gnat, and she took two rag dolls and pressed them together. “They’re married now,” she said. Then she took another girl doll and said “she doesn’t have anyone to marry. No – she can marry a My Lil Pony.”  “No, hon. Girls can’t marry horses.” “Why not?” “Because they’re different species.” “My Little Pony is made out of glass metal.” “Uh – yeah.” “She can just ride her around then.” “Okay.” And I thought: if I write this up tonight, some people will think I’m trying to make an analogy to current events. No, we would never think that, since you tell us everything that Gnat says, not just her opinion on the San Francisco weddings ("Gays can't get married, but they can just ride each other").  So, you're covered -- but be very careful about sharing Gnat's lisping utterances about how she hadda go bafoom during roll call, but wasn't AWOL from preschool.  5:42:04 AM

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Ann Coulter Hits Bottom and Then Digs Down Another 10 More Feet As Sadly, No! memorably puts it, "Being Ann Means Never Having To Say You're Sorry."  Yes, Ann devotes this week's column to defending herself from the complaints from decent people everywhere about her smear of Max Cleland -- and somehow, per Ann, it turns out that they're the ones who are lying. As you will recall, last week Ann wrote that "Cleland dropped a grenade on his foot" in a "routine noncombat mission where he was about to drink beer with friends;" and "Indeed, if Cleland had dropped a grenade on himself at Fort Dix rather than in Vietnam, he would never have been a U.S. senator in the first place."  And "There was no bravery involved in dropping a grenade on himself with no enemy troops in sight."  Oh, and "no one ever challenged Cleland's 'patriotism'," the Republicans just "challenged his performance in the Senate." Like Dr. No! said, Ann doesn't apologize for any of that.  Instead, she claims that she was right about everything except about the part where she said that Cleland would now be a pharmacist if he hadn't "dropped a grenade" on himself (he'd actually be a "history teacher.")   She says that the hysterical liberals have insinuated that Ann lied, but "With their Clintonesque formulations, my detractors make it a little difficult to know what 'lie' I'm supposed to be contesting."  So, let's help out Ann (and Andrew Sullivan, who says, "I'm no fan of hers, but this column is relentless. I'm glad it's not me she's after."), by pointing out her lies: 1. "Cleland dropped a grenade on his foot."  To prove her case about Cleland not being injured in battle (which no one is claiming), Ann provides a newspaper account which says that Cleland jumped out of a helicopter, saw a grenade, and reached down to pick up, when it exploded.  It blew off both of his legs and one arm.  It wasn't his grenade.  So, Cleland did not "drop a grenade on himself." 2.  About that "routine noncombat mission":  BuzzFlash provides a first-hand account from the Battalion Executive Officer during the assault on Khe Shan, who says it was a combat mission. Cleland says it was a combat mission.  Jim Boyd says: Here's what really happened: In March 1968, the Tet offensive staged by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong was winding down -- except at Khe Sanh, a Marine outpost famous for the siege it endured.  An Army-Marine team was put together to relieve the Khe Sanh garrison and Cleland, an Army captain, volunteered. The combat his unit saw was heavy. At one point Cleland, the battalion signals officer, was told to set up a radio site on a hill near Khe Sanh. As he was helicoptered in with a couple of young soldiers (presumably because it was too dangerous to walk or drive), he told the pilot he was going to stay awhile because he knew some of the guys on the hill.  Maybe have a beer with them, he said.  As the soldiers left the helicopter, Cleland noticed a grenade on the ground.  He thought he'd dropped it and leaned down to pick it up.  It exploded, shredding one arm and both legs.  It took a heroic effort by medics and doctors to keep him alive. It is sick that Coulter can take that story and make it sound as if Cleland was safely ensconced at some rear area, ambling toward the officer's club for a few brews. She also fails to mention that Cleland won a Silver Star a week before he lost his limbs -- he was honored for braving enemy fire to tend wounded troops. While no one is claiming that Cleland was wounded by enemy fire, people have pointed out the truth: that Cleland WAS wounded on a combat mission in Vietnam.  Like Jim Boyd said, implying that Cleland was injured because he stupidly dropped a grenade on his foot while partying with his friends in the safety of, oh, Texas, is "sick." 3.  "Needless to say, no one ever challenged Cleland's patriotism." Let's hear from Jim Boyd again: In a hard-fought campaign for re-election, Cleland got everything the Republicans could throw at him, including the kitchen sink. His challenger was Saxby Chambliss, picked and managed by the White House's Karl Rove and Georgia GOP Chairman Ralph Reed. The absolute low point was a television ad which showed Cleland's photo together with those of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, equating the three. Cleland, the ad said, had shown his true colors by voting against homeland security. He was, the ad implied, unpatriotic. To be fair and balanded, let's now hear from Rich Lowry, who is jealous of all the attention Ann is getting, and wants to attract some detractors of his own by ordering Cleland to stop whining about being maligned: The case for foul play rests on a tough anti-Cleland ad that Chambliss broadcast featuring Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. The ad didn't morph Cleland into either of these figures or say that he supported them. It noted at its beginning that the United States faced threats to its security as the screen was briefly divided into four squares, with bin Laden and Saddam in two of them and the other two filled with images of the American military.  It went on to explain that Cleland had voted 11 times against a homeland-security bill that would have given President Bush the freedom from union strictures that he wanted in order to set up the new department. Okay, if I read Rich's account correctly, the commerical was "clearly implying -- without stating" (to use an Ann phrase) that Cleland was voting against the military, and was thus helping our enemies Osama and Saddam.  I (and all reasonable people) would say that this challenged Cleland's patriotism. 4.  "Liberals simply can't grasp the problem Lexis-Nexis poses to their incessant lying. They ought to stick to their specialty -- hysterical overreaction. The truth is not their forte."  At the beginning of her column,  Ann said that her "detractors" were "clearly implying -- without stating -- that Cleland lost his limbs in combat."  And then she refutes what nobody claimed, using evidence which shows that she lied about point #1.  And then she denounces liberals for their "incesssant lying."  If I didn't have doubts about her hold on reality, I'd have to admire her adament adherence to old dictum on how to handle accusations: Admit nothing; deny everything; make counter accusations. And I give her extra points for bringing up Lexis-Nexis, since, as you no doubt know, Ann claimed in Treason that a Lexis-Nexis search revealed that The New York Times didn't report on a Christmas 1994 Jesse Jackson speech which criticized the U.S. for being racist.  In Lying Liars, Al Franken points out that if you do a competent search, you do indeed find that the Times covered the speech.  ("A more reasonable search [Jesse Jackson and Christmas and Britain] shows that yes, of course, the Times did run an article about the controversy using excerpts of Jackson's speech, which was prerecorded.")  When asked about this last year by Publisher's Weekly, does Ann admit that she made a mistake?  No, she instead asserts that if Publisher's Weekly would believe Franken over her, that's clear evidence of liberal media bias, and then says: The New York Times did not, in fact, report the speech. Franken does not say otherwise. My guess is -- and this is just a stab in the dark -- Franken doesn't say otherwise because he can't say otherwise, inasmuch as . . . THE NEW YORK TIMES DID NOT REPORT THE SPEECH. What Franken says is that my search method was faulty -- though, somehow, it still managed to produce the truth! (To wit: The New York Times did not report the speech.) Like I said, if I didn't have doubts about her hold on reality, I'd have to admire her ability to stick to lies and errors in the face of incontrovertible proof that she was in the wrong   If we admired people for things like that, of course. So, in conclusion, I offer you this tribute to Ann from yesterday's ChronWatch: A lawyer, a syndicated columnist, an empowered career woman, a media star, a coveted political pundit, and best selling author of not one --or even two-- but three books.  Her plethora of accomplishments speak for themselves.  Ann Coulter is the epitome of true feminism--and I applaud her.   While I wonder who covets her, I agree that her "accomplishments" speak for themselves.  Yes, Ann Coulter is the epitome of true sleaziness -- and I deplore her. 5:11:50 AM

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Merchandise! And I guess that this is as good a time as any to update you on the National Review Online's fine line of Corner products (all guaranteed not to expose your breast during a halftime show).  Here's one of the Jonah designs: You can get the design on t-shirts, sweat shirts, caps, tote bags, mouse pads, jock straps, and on those conservative wetnaps that Jesse of Pandagon told you about.  And if you don't like that design, there are three more Jonah ones, three Cosmos (including Cosmo: The "It" Dog of the American Right), several Derbs (none of them using Derb's best known quote, the one about buggery), and two Krugman Stalkers Anonymous designs (wear them and announce to the world that you ARE in fact a friendless, obsessive nut!).  Anyway, order now, and you'll have the perfect gag gift for your next office Christmas party.  [Note: due to popular demand, there is no World O'Crap merchandise, but if there was, who would you like to be on it: Jonah Goldberg, Ben Shapiro, Ann Coulter, The Gurdon Bunch, The Young Conservatives, The TownHall Gang, Bill O'Reilly, or other?  Vote now: operators are standing by.] 2:31:44 AM

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The Salon Cruise Vs the National Review Bermuda Triangle Cruise Jonah Goldberg, in a neighborly gesture, advertises for the competition: SO, SO, SO, SO, SO..... [Jonah Goldberg ] SOOOOOOOOO different than a National Review cruise. Here's an email sent out from Salon: [snip email, which is about the Salon cruise to the Carribean in September, with speakers to include Ann Richards, Joe Conason, Joe Wilson, Sidney Blumenthal, and some Salon staffers.] Posted at 04:42 PM So, yes, it is soooooooooo different than a National Review cruise, in that I would actually pay money to hear these speakers, whereas they'd have to pay me a fairly large sum to be in an enclosed space with William F. Buckley, Jr., Bill Bennett, Rich Lowry, James Woolsey, Jay Nordlinger, and John O'Sullivan (the only speakers lined up so far for the cruise in May -- they still haven't found a replacement for the cannibalized Ed Koch.)  While I wish the Salon well with their cruise, I doubt it will be as successful as the NR ones, since Salon readers just don't seem like cruise people to me (cruise people being faded second-rate TV stars and/or aging humorless Republicans).  But hey, I could be wrong about that, since all my cruise knowledge comes from "The Love Boat" and the photos from last fall's NR Murder Cruise.  Here's one now: Jonah Goldberg, demonstrating that gay marriage will inevitably lead to polygamy But, as I mentioned previously,  I would like to hear the Salon speakers; maybe someday they'll do something within my price range, like a Salon Bus Tour, and I'll participate and tell you all about it. 2:25:46 AM