Things I Learned This Week

1. If you’re a Bush Administration appointee charged with promoting abstinence and suppressing Third World prostitution, you can spend $300 an hour to have “university professors, legal secretaries, scientists, military officers” to come to your condo and massage you, although it may later turn out, to your horror, that they were whores.  The solution?  Switch to “Central American gals.”  That way you can still get your rubdown, without the danger that you’ll be accused of unsavory congress wih the slutty John Phillips Newman Chair in Psychoneuroimmunology.
   
2. W. Mitt Romney’s favorite novel is “Battlefield Earth,” while his favorite book is the Bible.  He doesn’t seem that crazy about the Book of Mormon, although it did barely crack his personal Top Ten, coming in just behind The NRA Guide to Varmint Management.

Posted by scott on Wednesday, May 2nd, 2007 at 1:01 pm.

6 Responses to “Things I Learned This Week”

This week I learned that Our Forces killed the one hundred thousandth Main Al Qaida Guy in Iraq but then it turned out they didn’t. Never mind.

Left by BeginningToWonder on May 2nd, 2007

Hey now! I’ve charged many a “business conference” in Guatemala to the….um, nevermind…

Left by actor212 on May 2nd, 2007

So, you’re telling me that Mitt Romney can READ?!??!?!?
(BTW, you & Jesus’ General need to start cross-referencing one another — he did your point 1 a couple days ago, and now he’s doing your role-playing gubmint-bimbo suxxxors {thought without your brilliant illustrations, obviously} bit today.)

Left by Anntichrist S. Coulter on May 2nd, 2007

Hey love the site! Congrats on your own domain! You are well on your way to world domination!

Left by Stacy on May 2nd, 2007

Cripes, scott–postarrhea! Not that I’m complaining, mind you. It’s just… startling after that long quiettime.

Left by Marq on May 3rd, 2007

The sooner their sepulchres are whitened, the better.

Left by Herr Doktor Bimler on May 3rd, 2007

Hopefully, At Least One of Them Tells About Being Seduced by Bill Buckley

We want to thank Powerline’s Paul (the one without a snappy nickname) for alerting to the book “Why I Turned Right: Leading Baby Boom Conservatives Chronicle Their Political Journeys,” because is sounds, um, fascinating.  Here’s part of his review:

The essays essentially narrate the intellectual voyages of twelve leading thinkers under a certain age (I’m guessing around 60, with the average age under 50) who can be considered conservative. They are: Peter Berkowitz, Joseph Bottum, David Brooks, Danielle Crittenden, Dinesh D’Souza, Stanley Kurtz, Tod Lindberg, Rich Lowry, Heather Mac Donald, P.J. O’Rourke, Sally Satel, and Richard Starr.
Not all of them actually turned right. Lowry was never other than a conservative — his tale is about how he became an armed and dangerous one.

I was wondering how Rich, who (like fellow contributor Dinesh D’Souza) was the editor of a right wing college paper funded by the right wing Collegiate Network, and then went from one conservative sinecure to the next, ever was ever on the left.  Now I know that he just became a gun nut (and therefore is NOT just another baby-faced conservative wuss, despite what you might think) somewhere along the line.  Yes, this does sound like a real page-turner.

Crittenden was always conservative — her tale is about how she shed the feminism of the 1970s.

Yes, Danielle, who “began her career in journalism as a teenager, with a column in the Toronto Sun” — which her stepfather just happened to have co-founded, is hardly an example of a lefty who eventually came to her senses.

O’Rourke came from good Republican stock and returned to something like his roots after getting (in his telling) as much sex as he could from the “fetching” girls of the left who wore “peasant blouses, denim skirts, and sandals” and “strummed guitars, smoked unfiltered cigarettes, and drank beer straight from the bottle.”

So, basically this book is about people who were always conservatives, but did sleep around in college, so they can now see how much much better they are than all those deluded liberals who they used to exploit.

Well, Paul does indicate that some of the contributors actually did have a change of heart — presumably either after 9/11, when everything changed, or at a dinner party where their lefty friends ate all the pie, thus revealing the weaknesses of liberalism.

Anyway, now that I know that there is a market for this kind of thing (well, as least a publisher for it), I’d like to edit a similar volume. So, if you would, please share YOUR story of how you saw the light and became a conservative. (If you want to see the template for such conversion stories, TBogg provides a good one).

And if your story is included in my volume (which I am tentatively titling ”‘Why I Sold Out: Leading Baby Boom Conservatives Chronicle Their Journeys from Closet Jerks to Out-and-Out Bastards”), you won’t get any money (I, as the editor, will keep it all as a tribute to capitalism), but you will get your name on the cover, probably. So, start writing!

Posted by s.z. on Wednesday, February 7th, 2007 at 4:06 am.

COMMENTS:

Hopefully, At Least One of Them Tells About Being Seduced by Bill Buckley
Eeew. Sudden vision of the three-way with Dinesh and P.J. O’Rourke. I’m off men forever.
S.Z., I trust you’re getting John Stossel to headline and do the introduction? A little advice, if you go on a signing tour with those guys, go with the straight per diem, because O’Reilly will spend all his time whining about the absence of chickpeas at the buffet.

Left by D. Sidhe on February 7th, 2007

David Horowitz wasn’t invited to contribute? That’s gotta sting. He was having Second Thoughts when Lowry was still in diapers.

Left by Mark S. on February 7th, 2007

How about the other way, such as Charles Barkley’s quote: “I used to be a Republican until they lost their minds.” This could be a future growth industry.

Left by ciocia on February 7th, 2007

I, too, was wondering why David Horowitz was left out. Maybe the title he submitted – Why I Turned Fascist: Leading Baby Boom Paranoid chronicles his hop, skip and jump from Stalin to Mussolini – wasn’t quite what they wanted.
Still, I sort of like this quote from The NY Times about Sally Satels politics:
“although she reached voting age in the early 70′s, she did not cast a ballot until 1992, when she voted for Bill Clinton. (She liked the idea of ”ending welfare as we know it.”) Before then, she said, ”I never read the paper. I didn’t have a political thought in my head.”
Well, I guess from empty-headed to block-heacded is sort of a conversion.

Left by tomg on February 7th, 2007

I’m gonna have to finagle a promotional copy of this thing. It’s just about my favorite topic in American political life–not “how” these people “became” “conservative”, but how the old 60s and 70s itinerant church-basement speaker (“I used to be a hippie/drug dealer/Satanist”) routine morphed directly into this idiocy and remained saleable.
I’m 53, older than most of those people. I still had a learner’s permit when the 60s ended. For a lot of them the era of “Boomer” political and social upheaval (mostly led and achieved by non-Boomers) is merely the era of Freely Pooping in your Drawers, and they’ve displayed precious little interest in getting the history right since then. Their exposure to The Left amounts to watching Charlie’s Angels first-run and having long-haired dope smokers steal their lunch money.
Brooks (born 1961) touts his Road to Damascus moment at regular intervals, but is there really any doubt he was Alex Keaton, not Alex Chilton?

Left by Doghouse Riley on February 7th, 2007

It was the pie at a dinner party scenario, and a liberal bastard at all of it, analogous to those illegal aliens eating the whole “pie” of emergency health care. So, I saw the light, became a conservative.

Left by terry on February 7th, 2007

I became a conservative because a period of unemployment taught me the evils of relying on a social safety net. The unemployment checks that enabled me to keep my home and medical insurance sucked my soul out of my bosom and made me weak. If only I had been left to fend for myself! I would have found the strength to become an entrepreneur, and today I would be as rich as Donald Trump, but with better hair.

Left by Rugosa on February 7th, 2007

September 2001. It was my week, at my anarchosyndicalist commune in the hills of Oregon, to bicycle down to the town. There I would trade our home-baked bread, henna and seedlings for items we weren’t yet able to produce for ourselves, such as toilet paper and news about Ralph Nader’s upcoming visit.
The townspeople seemed very alarmed and too distracted to barter with me. There were mutterings about how America had come under attack and New York City had been destroyed by the forces of evil.
Although I was in a bit of a rush (the camp was VERY low on t.p.) I stayed to watch the terrible drama unfold. The Pentagon was smoldering; New York was in flames; the President was rushing back to Washington via Nebraska, Denmark, Winnipeg and the Ice Planet of Hoth. I didn’t know what to think.
Then like a beacon on the TV screen came the glowing visage of Bill O’Reilly. His sure demeanor and no-nonsense truthtelling made me immediately see the error of my hippie liberal ways.
I traded in my bike for an AK-47. I traded all the bread for a copy of “Atlas Shrugged”. I traded the henna for a U.S. flag lapel pin. The seedlings I flushed down a toilet to avoid them falling into the wrong hands.
I never went back to the commune; I wonder if any of them ever heard the news, or found any toilet paper.

Left by michael on February 7th, 2007

Can I fake being a conservative like D’Nesh D’John D’Phillips D’Souza fakes being liberal to be in your book? I could use the exposure…

Left by actor212 on February 7th, 2007

Early July, 1970. Dawn. I was standing on the chest of a dead man, in a muddy hole in the red dirt east of An Loc. Scattered around the hole were the remnants of battle dressings, piles of spent brass and three dead NVA soldiers. I was covered in blood and bits of entrails, and the NVA bodies were badly dismembered, spilling their gory secrets onto the red dirt.
People were beginning to stir, to climb out of their holes and look around. I was sitting on the edge of my hole, trying to work up the energy to check the dead for souvenirs. Sergeant McGinnis came by and handed me a cup of coffee and a darvocet. I rubbed at my reddened eyes and looked out once again over the horrors that lay scattered around this nowhere place like forgotton toys in a vacant lot.
That’s when I decided “Hey, this is a whole lot of fun! I want to support more wars and more mindless, meaningless, futile bloodshed and horror” And I’ve been a conservative ever since…
mikey

Left by mikey on February 7th, 2007

Mikey,
I think you should add “And I wanted to make sure my son grew up to have all the opportunies to kill foreigners that I had”
or something like that.

Left by Dorothy on February 7th, 2007

I became a conservative because there’s no money in being a liberal.

Left by Realist on February 7th, 2007

Is Mary Eberstadt’s book intended as a companion volume to Hunter Thompson’s “Generation of Swine”? Seems to fit, except for the apparent lack of irony and black humor. God, I miss him….

Left by trashfire on February 7th, 2007

Intellectual voyages, huh? Yeah, right up there with Copernicus and Newton.

Left by edward on February 7th, 2007

It wasn’t about the pie. I was just fed up with the guilt. Liberals always try to make you feel like you should do something about the poor and stuff like that. What’s up with that? Conservatives are lucky. When we’re doing okay, it’s proof of our superior characters and also that God loves us. When we’re screwed, it’s all the fault of wimmin and fairies and mine-ORR-it-tees and the UN and such, stealin’ our white male birthright.
You know, I’m really going to have to limit my exposure to the wingnuts. It kind of amuses me when I can accurately parrot the Moon Landing Hoax mindset, but this is just creepy and wrong.

Left by D. Sidhe on February 7th, 2007

“Creepy and wrong,” you said it, girl.
David Brooks was once a witty and able journalist in his WSJ days–he called his stint in Brussels the “‘Whither NATO?’ beat.” But once he got into the Washington groove–the kids, the private schools, the big house, the depressed-looking wife–he had to talk the right-leaning talk in order to support all that.
Brace yourself for two years of college-angst essays: one of his kids goes to school with one of my kids. The hysteria among parents and kids during the college search period is not to be believed.
I was absolutely gobsmacked to read Brooks’ description of the dear, late Molly Ivins as a “victim of Bush Derangement Syndrom.” BDS, as y’all know, is a right-wing meme that hardly could be applied to someone who 1) wrote two well-researched, depressing, substantive, and funny books about W., and also 2) had known him personally since adolescence.
Molly was too polite to say that herself, or that while she got into the “best” school in Houston, St. John’s, W. did a year at Kinkead (Kinkeade?) before being sent to Andover. That is where, in his disastrous fling with a thesaurus while looking for a synonym for “tears,” he wrote, “Lacerates ran down my cheeks” in an essay that his appalled English master marked with a zero.
And Danielle Crittenden… don’t let me get started. One can skip university when one’s stepfather slides one into a journalism job, and when one marries an immensely wealthy man in one’s twenties. If you don’t do THAT, well, my dear, it’s your own f**king fault what happens to you…
I’m not looking forward to THAT family’s college-angst or smug-legacy essays, either.

Left by Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel on February 7th, 2007

Oh! I have an unanswered question about Bill Buckley! If he’s such a strict Catholic, how come he only had one kid?
And question 1a, why does Pat Buckley look like a drag queen? Do we know she’s female?

Left by Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel on February 7th, 2007

and drank beer straight from the bottle.”
Wow, those leftist chicks are crazy!

Left by Gus on February 7th, 2007

Hey can I tell the opposite story? Lets organize a meeting for former reupblicans. I can say how I was a republican until I realized that they did not conserve money and seemd more interested in sex between two male consenting adults than they did about anything else?

Left by richard on February 7th, 2007

I was a liberal until I became a small business owner, at which point I became a communist, because the ‘free market’ consisted of a game between Barnes and Noble and Random House and where they were going to put the Oprah books and I figured that communism would at least smash the state first, then go after the multimedia multinationals next. But when I found I didn’t like the fashion of being a Red (burlap), I went libertarian. But that phase lasted for as long as it took me to realize that “libertarian” wasn’t the same as “libertine” (I was drinking a lot at the time), so I became an independent for awhile, and was SO FUCKING INDEPENDENT that Joe Liberman himself promised me piece of a small dutchy in the “non-chafing dry air” of someplace that he said would soon be called the “Anbar-Lieberman” Estates. But being SO FUCKING INDEPENDENT, I guessed that he was trying to sell me something, so I dabbled in anarcho-syndicalism while writing a thesis on the threat of an activist judiciary and their effect on nanotechnology. Suddenly, I found myself running in the same mock-cyborg technophile circles as Glenn (the second ‘N’ stands for Nano) Reynolds and he said I might like this club he and some hillbilly lawyer buddies formed — “a gun club”, he said with a sweet robotic lilt — so I became a Republican. But when I checked it out, I found that it was just a department at some State School and not a place where anyone actually shot guns. Reynolds called it a “utopia factory” where people theorized about what would happen if other people shot guns. That’s when I tried Jainism…

Left by Jay B. on February 7th, 2007

P.J. was an underground newspaper editor in my town when he was a 20-something and I was a teen. He was quite the hippie wit in those days. I saved those papers. Heh.

Left by sj on February 7th, 2007

i thought bush derangement syndrome was where a woman suffered trauma to her midsection resulting in a visible dislocation of the skin around her uh … oh wait, is this a political blog? Never mind.

Left by trashfire on February 7th, 2007

That’s “Bush Disarrangement Syndrome”, trashfire. Close, but remember, close only counts if you’re a republican husband. The rest of our wives expect us to actually cause an orgasm occasionally.

Left by D. Sidhe on February 7th, 2007

Also available: the twenty-one volume compendium “How George W. Bush Made Me Reconsider ‘Conservatism’: Stories From The Reality-Based Community”
For me personally, it was the treatment of his coke habit by the right-wing during the 2000 elections compared to how the same people treated Clinton’s botched bong hit.

Left by James M. Cape on February 7th, 2007

I just can’t imagine being the sort of person who claims to be conservative these days. I tried- my brothers & Dad are, but they are filled with hate and rage. They gobble up and regurgitate the neocon lies like addictive junk food. Why, I don’t know.

Left by Kathy on February 7th, 2007

…or at a dinner party where their lefty friends ate all the pie, thus revealing the weaknesses of liberalism.

Umm, that wasn’t me. That was Fafnir!

Left by John Owens on February 8th, 2007

And question 1a, why does Pat Buckley look like a drag queen? Do we know she’s female?

Only her hairdresser knows for sure.

Left by Marq on February 8th, 2007

Kathy, I’m curious: Do you see your brothers and dad often, or at all? If so, how do you cope when they say something with which you vehemently disagree?
The junk-food analogy, by the by, is quite apt. One of my sisters, a junk-food shoveler (even AFTER stomach-stapling surgery) told me in ’84 that she’d voted for Reagan. “He’d do more for my pocketbook,” she insisted.
I was stunned, cited a few of Reagan’s middle-class-screwing outrages, and tossed in ignoring AIDS as well. To shut me up, she waved her hands and said, “Okay, okay, I won’t do it again.”
“Honey, you CAN’T do it again.”
“I can’t? Why not?” So I had to explain the two-term limit, which came as an utter surprise to her. Oi veh.

Left by Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel on February 8th, 2007

I became a conservative when the rape charges were dropped by the DA.

Left by actor212 on February 8th, 2007

I couldn’t get laid in a prison shower with a dozen pardons jammed up my ass. I became a conservative so it’d look like I was single by choice, for ideological reasons (no sex til marriage!)and hence look like less of a loser. When I kept repeating the explantion to people until I believed it, I even felt like less of a loser.

Left by Bill S on February 8th, 2007

Once I realized how much money I could get for being religious and right, I went for Jesus like a crack-whore for the pipe. My baby-face and aura of availability worked like a charm. These fundies are so easily fooled by my innocent looks and fake piety, even after Abramoff they keep giving me their dough.

Left by Ralph Reed on February 8th, 2007

“I became a conservative because there’s no money in being a liberal.” — Realist
Man, you ain’t never lied.
“When we’re screwed, it’s all the fault of wimmin and fairies and mine-ORR-it-tees and the UN and such, stealin’ our white male birthright.” — D.Sidhe
How come that never works on my job applications?
“Oh! I have an unanswered question about Bill Buckley! If he’s such a strict Catholic, how come he only had one kid?” — Mrs. TQBB
Mrs. Biscuitbarrel, darling, I would think that THAT would be self-evident, honey. Kinda the same reason that Laura only conceived (well, to full-term, anyway) once.
I personally gave up completely on capitalism when I saw that the Violent Femmes had sold out for a fucking WENDY’S COMMERCIAL.
*sob*
*sob*
*sigh*
“I couldn’t get laid in a prison shower with a dozen pardons jammed up my ass. I became a conservative so it’d look like I was single by choice, for ideological reasons (no sex til marriage!)and hence look like less of a loser. When I kept repeating the explantion to people until I believed it, I even felt like less of a loser.” — Bill S
Bill, will you marry me?
That’s the most perfect answer to the question that I’ve seen thus far. The “Ralph Reed” quip is cute, but yours resonates so much more truly.
Besides, it’s not like I couldn’t find you some cute guys, as long as you did the dishes…

Left by Anntichrist S. Coulter on February 9th, 2007

[...] http://world-o-crap.com/blog/?p=374 gives us a lovely summary on a new book about Baby Boomers who became conservative, and puts out a call for submissions. So, basically this book is about people who were always conservatives, but did sleep around in college, so they can now see how much much better they are than all those deluded liberals who they used to exploit. [...]

Left by Suburban Guerrilla » Good Kids Gone Bad on February 9th, 2007

Does it count if I’m not nearly as lefty as I used to be (I think I was a Maoist for a while) but would still be considered an enemy of the state by the right wingers who consider themselves centrists in America?

Left by yank in london on February 9th, 2007

David “I used to be a left wing asshole, now I’m a right wing asshole” Horowitz has already written extensively (to say the least) on this subject.

Left by Davis on February 9th, 2007

Oh! I have an unanswered question about Bill Buckley! If he’s such a strict Catholic, how come he only had one kid?
And question 1a, why does Pat Buckley look like a drag queen? Do we know she’s female?
Ms Bicuitbarrel? Don’t you answer your first question with your second?

Left by actor212 on February 10th, 2007

I had always been a card-carrying liberal. I marched with King in Selma. I joined the Peace Corps after college. I voted for Bill Clinton – twice. But one day I was reading the comments at Eschaton, and I noticed the word “fuck” being used…

Left by The Kenosha Kid on February 11th, 2007

Oh. Guess I did, actor 212…

Left by Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel on February 12th, 2007

Annti, you flatter me.

Left by Bill S on February 22nd, 2007

[...] Richard Lowry is a wingnut pundit originally from Virginia and now based in New York. He has always been of the wingnut hivemind, though never quite so impressive a reactionary, contrary to what he’d like to think, as an “armed and dangerous one” (except, perhaps, when he’s frying turkey). If the Lowry egg was conceived and nurtured by his vaguely conservative parents, then his pupae stage must have occurred at the University of Virginia, where he wrote for the Virginia Advocate, a college “news”paper along the lines of the infamous Dartmouth Review, and like the Review funded by the same sources: primarily, the Collegiate Network. Not yet ready to fly, his next stage of development was as go-fer of and apprentice to the insane psychiatrist-cum-columnist Charles Krauthammer, from whom he presumably learned the fine wingnut art of Strangelovian foreign policy advocacy. And from thence into ugly: after leaving Krauthammer’s service, Lowry went on to contribute to wingnut fink tanks and to write for rightwing propaganda mills like The Wall Street Journal as well as the National Review, where is currently editor. Lowry has also come to pollute the airwaves, predictably at Fox News (where he is often a substitute for the reprehensible Sean Hannity) but also, disturbingly, at PBS and NPR. [...]

Left by Sadly, No! » Super Wingnut: Rich Lowry on August 16th, 2007

The Presidential Book Club

Human Events Online in featuring a great little piece entitled “Top 10 Books President Bush Should Read on His Next Vacation.”  Let’s take a minute to go through their list, won’t we?

10. How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

So, even the HEO editors believe that Mr. Bush is losing friends, both internationally and domestically, and alienating people right and left (and Right and Left).  I guess they’re not as stupid as I thought.

9. Reagan in His Own Hand edited by Kiron Skinner, Annelise Anderson and Martin Anderson
President Reagan was known not just for his remarkable speeches, but also for his ability to write well. He was able to clearly communicate his conservative beliefs because he truly believed them—they were a part of him.

I think that what HEO is trying to say is that George Bush can’t communicate well because he doesn’t truly believe in the principles and policies that Dick Cheney is trying to get him to sell us.  This is fairly astute analysis from the wingnut set.

8. Men in Black by Mark R. Levin

The President probably would enjoy the story of Johnny Cash, Zorro, and Jean-Paul Sartre, and how they saved Christmas.

7. Godless: The Church of Liberalism by Ann Coulter
The greatest danger America faces is not the external Muslim threat but the internal moral terrorists destroying our culture and teaching people to blame the West for everything. 

When the President begins the War Against Moral Terror and Liberals, I bet Ann Coulter will be our new Secretary of Inquisition.

6.  The Heritage Guide to the Constitutio edited by Edwin Meese, Matthew Spalding and David Forte
In order to better protect and defend the Constitution during the last two years of his presidency, Bush needs to fully understand what our Founding Fathers put in there.

Um, okay, but wouldn’t it have been a good idea for the President to read the Constitution during his first six years in office?

5. The Big Ripoff by Timothy P. Carney

I hear it’s not as gripping as Clifford the Big, Red Dog or The Pet Goat.

4. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) by Robert Spencer
The President has learned a lot since his statements immediately after the 9-11 attacks that “Islam is peace.” Spencer’s book could teach him a few more things.

You know, any of the books from the “Politically Incorrect” series make great companion volumes to Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People.

3.  The Quotable Calvin Coolidge by Calvin Coolidge and Peter Hannaford

I’m guessing this is a really short book.

Everyone would profit from reading the words of this conservative President who opposed big government and signed the 1924 Immigration Act, limiting the number of immigrants per nation of origin.

Like Silent Cal said (or mimed, or something), “America must be kept American.”  Racism: It’s what’s for dinner.

2. On Classical Economics by Thomas Sowell

This is probably the best book on the market about the economics of human organ sales, and the benefits they offer to both the desperate poor and the worthy rich. 

1. State of Emergency by Patrick Buchanan
If the U.S. does not enforce its borders and immigration law, we will not be able to withstand the onslaught of multiculturalism combined with mass immigration that is sure to come.

Unless the President heeds Pat’s advice, our country is doomed to extinction via multiculturalism onslaughts, which pose our most pressing national problem, next to moral terrorism.

Anyway, that was the HEO list. But we think it omits the book that would be most valuable to President Bush: Better Living Through Bad Movies. This handy, timesaving book details the life-lessons contained in literally dozens of bad movies, making it perfect for an on-the-go, bike-riding, prezel-swallowing-and-then-choking kind of guy like the President. And in light of current events, we think that at least he should read the chapter on “Surviving the Apocalypse.”

The chapter on Weird Sex might also be of interest to him.

So, that was our idea of how the President could begin to recover from funtional illiteracy. Now, we want to know what books YOU think Mr. Bush should read during his next vacation. (For the duration of this exercise you must accept the premise that he actually reads actual books when not busy presidentin’.) Remember, reading is fundamental — and we all know how popular fundamentalism is with the Bush administration these days.

 Posted by s.z. on Tuesday, September 5th, 2006 at 3:36 am.

I don’t know what I’d recommend, but I can tell you that he should probably not try to finish “My Pet Goat.”

Left by BillyTheSquid on September 5th, 2006

So, even the HEO editors believe that Mr. Bush is losing friends, both internationally and domestically, and alienating people right and left (and Right and Left). I guess they’re not as stupid as I thought.
No, but they are all a bunch of assholes. Where the hell do they get off making fun of the man they voted for twice and would vote for again? We’re stuck with him. It’s HEO’s fault as much as anyone else’s. The least they can fucking do is take some responsibility for it before leaping straight into criticizing him. And don’t give me this “We were fooled” crap. You weren’t. You voted for him ’cause he wasn’t a scary liberal. And you’d fucking do it again. And based on your little reading list, you’re *still* hoping he’ll kill a bunch more people you don’t like, and you’re still on his side as long as he’s foursquare against the liberals. So fuck off.
As far as books go, let’s send him the entire Serendipity series. Maybe he can learn something. And let’s send it to HEO, too.
Damn. When’d I get so angry? Oh, yeah, when people started dying in massive numbers and the people responsible decided that not enough people were. Billy, I think he should finish “My Pet Goat”. Fewer people die when he’s not doing his job, on the whole.
Incidentally, it’s my birthday, and I see a new neurologist today, and the vet and I will be discussing the kitty again, so wish us all luck.

Left by D. Sidhe on September 5th, 2006

[...] World o’Crap [...]

Left by sonitus.org » Blog Archive » The Presidential Book Club on September 5th, 2006

Now, we want to know what books YOU think Mr. Bush should read during his next vacation.
Any of the early Hardy Boys books. One can learn a lot from Frank and Joe.
Oh look, Iron Eagle is on! gotta go.

Left by tune on September 5th, 2006

Wow, what a colossally mediocre list. I had to check back to see if it was the result of a reader poll, though I should have known that would have resulted in ten Coulter screeds.

Which, I suppose, is as good a place to start as any. What do these bozos imagine Bush is going to get from reading Coulter that he doesn’t already know? That he hasn’t heard for 60 years from that mother of his? Is there some blinding insight in Men in Black that can’t be fitted on a bumper sticker? And hasn’t already?

How is it that this is always the sort of thing you get from modern-day “conservatives”–long shopping lists of books designed specifically to regurgitate that zeitgeist? Think Bushie needs to bone up on the Constitution? Why not Jack N. Rakove’s Original Meanings? That won a Pulitzer, as opposed to that Ed Meese/Heritage Foundation doorstop, which was named “Best Compost Starter of 2005″. I’m sure Hating Muslims: Your Key to Improved Self-Esteem did wonders for HEO’s editors, but something like David Fromkin’s A Peace To End All Peace offers actual sanity along with its historical insight, just as a refreshing change. And Coolidge? Funny guy–really–the book might be an excellent sourcebook for budding standup comedians, but I do believe Bush has already absorbed what political value it might offer. How about Garry Wills’ book about the Gettysburg Address? Would it kill those people to get anywhere near a book that might contain a thought they hadn’t pre-agreed with?

(And I’m not proposing to snatch away the one-hand-typing tribute to St. Ronnie–abrupt withdrawal of a totemic item can cause permanent psychic damage, and they don’t need any more of that.

As to my recommendations: none. I don’t mean I don’t have any, I mean Bush shouldn’t read books on the same grounds that you do not suddenly add a fuel additive or knock the rust of the radiator of a neglected sixty-year-old engine. And Happy Birthday, D. Hang in.
Left by Doghouse Riley on September 5th, 2006

Better Living Through Lousy Movies
is that the forthcoming smash sequel to “Better Living Through Bad Movies?”
I can hardly wait

Left by preznit giv me turkee on September 5th, 2006

I’d like Bush to read.

Left by Hysterical Woman on September 5th, 2006

Happy birthday D. Sidhe, and best of luck to you & your wee fuzzy ones. Your comments here and on other blogs give me hope for the future.
If there’s any book out there written to help children deal with the death of a parent or loved one in Iraq, I suggest Bush reads it. A lot.

Left by Charlotte Smith on September 5th, 2006

I would say that Dubya should probably raid the Beverly Clearly archives…if he’s feeling adventurous. Sure, they’re light on the fart jokes, but they’ll provide a nice challenge for him. When he’s done, he’ll get a gold star and maybe a personal pan pizza.
Of course, he could move up to The Babysitters’ Club if he wants a true challenge to his reading ability.

Left by Johnny M on September 5th, 2006

Happy birthday, D., and stay angry. It works.
As for books, I’m immediately inclined toward anything with laminated pages, just so Georgie is less tempted to eat them or wipe his ass with them.
Overcoming that hurdle, I’d suggest Canticle for Leibowitz on the odd chance that a fervent expectation for the End Times (and war) is shown as just another big fucking bump in nature’s inevitable evolution.

Left by Heydave on September 5th, 2006

Happy B’Day, D. Sidhe. Hope all goes well.
I can’t think of any suitable reading suggestions, but I do find it scary that anyone would put Pat Buchanan at the top of anybody’s reading list, except as some kind of sick practical joke.

Left by Bill S on September 5th, 2006

Here’s another birthday greeting going out to D. Sidhe, best wishes, you are one of my e-heroes. The book I’d most like Bush to read right now is Mad In America by Robert Whitaker, just cause that’s what I wish all Americans would read, but he is the one who gave us the constitution-shredding New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. That is all.

Left by flawedplan on September 5th, 2006

#7 I’d like Bush to be able to read AND think. However, I believe that would be akin to patting his head and rubbing his tummy simultaneously….I doubt he’s mastered that either.

Left by Gappy on September 5th, 2006

Happy Birthday, D. Sidhe! We might be cosmic sisters – my birthday was Sunday. And your anger seems quite normal to me. Love to you and the kitty, may you both be well.
I think Bush should read “Conservatives Without Conscience” by John Dean. Maybe his head would explode.

Left by BeginningToWonder on September 5th, 2006

i suggest he read ‘bin Laden determined to strike w/i the US.’
oh wait. like 5 years too late. never mind.
fucker.
ps, happy b-day D Sidhe and good luck w/your kitty and everything else.

Left by rimone on September 5th, 2006

Now that George has absorbed The Stranger, he’s probably ready for something a bit deeper and more complex by Camus, perhaps The Plague, The Rebel, or The Myth of Sysyphus.
To feed his inner nature he should read Junkie by William Burroughs (perhaps Queer would be a good one as well) and I Claudius by Robert Graves. He’s really going to love that “Little Boots” character, but should probably remain alert to the inevitable and know when to abandon the book.
Then to feed his medieval mind, he could take a look at A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, by Barbara Tuchman,just to clue him in to where his bosses are steering the country.
Finally to teach him life lessons not previously learned he should read his metaphorical biography, People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil by M.Scott Peck and The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster.

Left by bidziliba on September 5th, 2006

On the offchance that he might actually learn something, I’d suggest Cosmopolitanism by Kwame Anthony Appiah.

Left by ralph_nadir on September 5th, 2006

Meese wrote a book about the constitution? Maybe Michael Jackson’s writing a book about child care. Or Brownie, about emergency manangement.
Oh yeah, books for W to read… Any compilation of Flannery O’Connor’s short stories, all of which feature protagonists doomed by their blind adherence to various ideologies. All are pretty short (the stories, not the protagonists), are set in the South, and feature occasional racial epithets, so the Prez will probably like them. The fact that many of the protagonists end up dead, upsetting to most readers, probably wouldn’t bother him a bit. It’d be like Sesame Street, so much fun he wouldn’t even realize he was learning.

Left by trashfire on September 5th, 2006

What an absolutely intellectually bankrupt reading list from Inhuman Intents Online. Actually, I thought it was a goof at first. Dale Carnegie and Calvin Coolidge, jeeezus.
As to George’s reading list, I have to agree with trashfire that Flannery O’Connor’s work would be great. In particular, the last line of “A Good Man is Hard to Find” spoken about the grandmother might be appropriate to George. Or Maybe not. At the very least, though, it would be fun watching him trying to make some sort of sense of it all.

Left by tomg on September 5th, 2006

Ha HA! READ!
*whew*
They kill me. No, really.

Left by Res Publica on September 5th, 2006

s.z. writes: The President probably would enjoy the story of Johnny Cash, Zorro, and Jean-Paul Sartre, and how they saved Christmas.
Nobly aided by Adam Cartwright…

Left by Chris Vosburg on September 5th, 2006

Tom Swift And His Diving Seacopter. The first book I ever read in one day. I think he’s ready for the challenge!

Left by teroodle on September 6th, 2006

bidziliba: ‘Now that George has absorbed The Stranger, he’s probably ready for something a bit deeper and more complex by Camus, perhaps The Plague, The Rebel, or The Myth of Sysyphus.
‘To feed his inner nature he should read Junkie by William Burroughs (perhaps Queer would be a good one as well) and I Claudius by Robert Graves…’
LOL, puh-leeeze! coffee just spurted out my noise. don’t stop.

Left by rimone on September 6th, 2006

People, people, very few of you are taking Shrub’s actual reading proficiency into account as opposed to his purported skillz. Thus, I would suggest “The Lorax,” by Dr. Seuss, ‘cos if he can absorb the message in that one (and I am not confident he can), we win!

Left by Marq on September 6th, 2006

The Bible
And not just skimming, either; he has to read every single page, including the ones about how big the tabernacle should be and what it should be made out of and where you can and can’t take a shit.
I’ve always been particularly affected by Abraham asking god, “Would you sweep away the just with the wicked?”, and call me crazy, I think that that passage might have some relevence to modern American policy.
The American Constitution. Not some fucking commentary that tells him what he wants to hear. He should read the primary source, and then meditate on it for a while before he starts getting into commentary.
Mister Terrific Comics Mister Terrific was a Superhero who loved fair play so much, he had the words stitched on his costume. You figure out why I think he’d be a good influence for the president.

Left by Christopher on September 6th, 2006