September 26, 2005 by s.z.

Ultimate Wingnut Challenge: Bye-Bye, Doug

The voters have spoken, and by an overwhelming majority (despite Chris V's ballot stuffing), they said that Doug was the weakest link in this round. 

But before booting him, I wanted to offer every opportunity to the the guy who gave us such gems as "Hacking Away at America’s Heritage" (which contains the line "Judeo-Christian roots support our luscious American tree");  amd "Conservatives with Cojones" ("Our current culture is trying to toss off Judeo-Christian ethics, as Rosie O’Donnell would a tub of low-fat yogurt.  [...] It’s crack night in the ferret hut, baby!"); and, of course, "Dirty Harry Goes To Church" ("My Clash Point is: With the Dirty Harry-like prophet, patriarch, warrior and wild man returning to the house of God, we can expect to see, once again, righteousness exalted in this nation and weirdness effectively mitigated").  

So, I waited for Doug's latest column to see if it showed a return to the wingnuttery of "Conservatives and Liberals: Apples and Orgies" (or, more hopefully, a continuation of the sensible message of last week).  And overall, I have to say that "Riding the Storm Out" is actually pretty Christian (e.g.,. "I’m talking about being rich in good works and standing for truth in a day of lies, hype and spin.  You know what I mean . . . eternal things, like being compassionate and merciful both to those who share our beliefs and to those who don’t.")

So, I'm afraid that by talking about good works and compassion, Doug has shown that he doesn't have the conservative cohones to make it in the cutthroat world of professional wingnuttery, and is outta here, despite this ominous note at the end of his column:

* Logon to www.ClashRadio.com and [...] check out his interview with Annie Jacobsen, author of the book, Terror in the Skies: Why 911 Could Happen Again.

Gah!!! She's everywhere!

Anyway, I listened to the segment with Annie, and here's my summary of it. (Caveat: Although based on a notes I took while listening to the interview, and despite containing some exact quotes, this transcription, like Annie's account of her experience on the plane, is subjective.)

Doug:  Our ClashRadio guest today, Annie Jacobsen, writes about credit cards and terrorism for Women's Wall Street.  She is here to tell us why 9/11 could happen again, and why you should buy her new book, The Scary Skies: Why 9/11 Could Happen Again.  Annie, tell us about your harrowing experience.

Annie: My husband and I were on a flight to L.A. during which 18 (or whatever) Syrian men behaved in such a manner that we were convinced the plane was going to be hijacked.  The men acted in an orchestrated way.  There were bags being passed back and forth.  And, most ominous of all, they insisted on going to the bathroom one after another.  In fact, this was so important to them that they knocked over another passenger who tried to get in the restroom between them.

Doug.  They knocked over another passenger?  How come you never mentioned that detail before, although you've told this same story about 428, 305 times by now?  You're just making up crap now, aren't you?

[Note: Doug didn't say this.  He actually said something like, "Tell us more about those bags they were passing back and forth.}

Annie.  They had a large McDonald's bag, which, about an hour after taking off,  was taken into the rest room, and when it came out, it was smaller. 

Doug: Wow, that IS alarming!

Annie: This detail about the McDonald's sack got a lot of mention after my article gained world-wide attention.  But the reason that it's important is that it was important to the Feds.  They wanted to know all about it.  They made my husband raise his hand and swear an oath about the McDonald's sack.  An OATH!

Doug: Despite the cheap shots that your critics have taken at you, Annie, it's ridiculous to think that this situation wasn't something very serious.  Did any of the male passengers on board ever say, "Let's roll; Let's kick those Syrian bastards to the ground?" {Note. That's exactly what Doug said.]

Annie:  Well, my husband is a big guy.  He is 6 feet, six inches, and he's Scandinavian -- but he was very scared.

Doug: So, you're saying that, when the situation called for Dirty Harry, your husband turned out to be Dirty Cindy Sheehan.  Instead of John Wayne, he was Richard Simmon's eye-shadow.  Face it, Annie, you married a girly-man with a poodle attitude.

[Note: Doug actually made some admiring comment about Mr. Annie's strapping Nordic build.]

Annie: But after we landed, things were even scarier.  I learned that the Federal Government continues to bungle investigations, and then works very hard to cover this up.

Doug: Do you think that political correctness has so inundated our culture that the Feds can't profile passengers, can't discriminate, don't want to mitigate the terrorist's civil rights, and because our borders are more open than Sean P. Diddy Combs' pores before he uses Proactive, they put us in jeopardy of having nuclear blasts set off simultaneously in several cities, as Paul Williams postulates? [Again, pretty much an exact transcription]

Annie:  No, Doug, I don't think that at all.  I'm not crazy, you know. 

[Note. Annie actually said something about how we should do more profiling, adding that "I call it passenger profiling -- I certainly don't call it racial profiling."  She went on to say that Federal Agents did nothing "while these HORRIFYING events were taking place on the plane," and concluded with another pitch for her book, which will tell us why 9/11 could happen again -- mostly, because nobody pays any attention to lone crackpots.

Anyway, while Doug is off Wingnut Island (and deservedly so), I wouldn't be surprised if he and Annie didn't return someday, possibly after being booted out of a plane by the other passengers.

5:48:25 AM