Political Backpedaling (The Weekly Rewind)

Political Backpedaling (The Weekly Rewind…)

New feature being added to the “best political blog on the Internet today”…at least according to my mom…

In trying to keep up with the current administration (in terms of doing things that look good but really serve no purpose in life) Scott and I have decided that we will be adding a new weekly feature that will appear every Friday.

It’s called (as you can see in the title) “Political Backpedaling,” where every week we’ll run across the political landscape and point out things that should be applauded or heckled. Who will decide what should be applauded and what should be heckled? Well, it’s our blog so, we will. If you don’t like it…tough noogies.

APPLAUD: to possible 2008 democratic presidential hopeful john Edwards for starting his Poverty awareness Tour. What is it? We have no idea, but it’s good spin and its for a democrat, so we’re throwing it out there.

HECKLE: to Virginia Republican Gubernatorial candidate Jerry Kilgore for allowing his campaign handlers to create an ad that suggests his democratic opponent is so adamantly against the death penalty, he would have spared Adolf Hitler. Nice…even more examples of compassionate conservatism…an oxymoron if ever there was one.

APPLAUD: to Bryan Lentz, an Iraqi War veteran who is running (as a Democrat) for a seat in the Pennsylvania 7th Congressional District. (A district, by the way, that is very important in the upcoming midterms if the Democrats have ANY hope of gaining control of the House). Lentz joins a handful of other Iraqi War vets who are also running as Democrats for House Seats in the Virginia 2nd (David Ashe) or the Pennsylvania 8th (Patrick Murphy) or running for an Ohio Senate seat (Paul Hackett). Go get ‘em guys.

HECKLE: to Tom Delay…just on general principles alone.

APPLAUD: to Hillary Clinton for stocking her preside— (sorry) her senate campaign warchest with close to $14 million.

HECKLE: to Newt Gingrich and George Pataki for announcing their plans to “maybe” run for president in 2008. (They’re the devil everyone, run fast, run far.)

APPLAUD: to a Texas court that issued a warrant Wednesday for former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay to appear for booking where he was fingerprinted and photographed. And rather than give a stock-mug shot look, the congressman gave a huge smile…which makes him look even more like the jackass that he is (as if that were possible)

HECKLE: to Congress for bowing down to the gun lobby by passing a bill that protects the firearms industry from massive crime-victim lawsuits.

APPLAUD: to Republican (I know, I know) Senator John McCain, who said Tuesday that he would press for the transition to “higher quality digital television signals” by the end 2006 or early 2007 instead of (the proposed) April 2009. I know it’s an unimportant thing in light of other things going on in this country and the world, but let’s remember it’s the small things that allow us to continue on in this life despite everything else.

HECKLE: to the U.S. Supreme Court for handing tobacco companies and cigarette makers a victory in rejecting a Justice Department appeal aimed at allowing a potential $280 billion penalty in the government's landmark racketeering case against the industry. Brilliant…absolutely brilliant.

APPLAUD: to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald for taking aim at (yet) another Bush-cronie. The next target? The usually untouchable Dick Cheney who is considering resignation because of the investigation. Good news indeed, but with some troubling attachments to it that moves us along to…

HECKLE: to President Bush for suggesting he would elevate Condoleezza Rice to be VP in the event that Cheney resigns. (Scary…but still better than Michael Brown. Well, maybe not)

APPLAUD: to Detroit Mayoral candidate Kwame Kilpatrick who stopped wearing his ‘trademark’ diamond earring, saying it “gave off a bad spirit of rebellion.” (Is this even news? Does anyone care? Although Scott said he will not stop wearing his...)

HECKLE: to Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen…just because we can. (what a pretentious, uninformed weasel he is)

APPLAUD: to the epiphanies that some Republican’s have had regarding Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum. Some of the RNC’s biggest moneymen are deserting the one-time re-elected-shoo-in, making his re-election seem less and less likely with each passing day.

HECKLE: to Ms. Rice again. While testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee she stated that the U.S. could use military force against Iran and Syria. I’m sorry; can’t we get out of Iraq first before we start throwing our weight around again? Apparently not, because in that same line of testimony Rice refused to rule out that the U.S. could still have a massive troop presence in Iraq in 10 years. Son of a bit—

APPLAUD: to members of the Senate Judiciary Committee for calling SCOTUS nominee Harriet Miers’ responses to their questionnaire, ‘inadequate’ and ‘insufficient’ and making her do them again…and again…and again…until she gets them right.

HECKLE: to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff for telling lawmakers on Wednesday that he relied on FEMA’s experts to respond properly to Hurricane Katrina. That explains a lot.

HECKLE: to President Bush for calling all the problems in the U.S. (you know – like all the White House leak problems, the Katrina response problems, the disastrous Harriet Miers nomination) as ‘background noise.’ What a tool.

HECKLE: to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for using his nationality and ethnicity as a means to get Hispanics (which I am) to back Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers…what a cabrón.

Noticing more heckles than applauds this week – welcome to George Bush’s America…

That's a wrap