Dipsticks

Happy Canada Day.

Had so much fun at WGAF that I stuck around for awhile. 

So much to process.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, reeking 0f DNA: "But, officeur, ah wahs merely trah-ing to give ze maid, 'ow you say, ze tip." 

Osama, we now know, had bin Wankin all this time to some primo porn. He just wanted to blow us all up with his torpedo of love, like Domi-nookie. Or Charlie Sheen. Or Newt Gingrich. Or Ah-nuld, the Sperminator. Or Mel Gibson. Or John Edwards or John Ensign or David "Depends" Vitter, he of the diaper fetish. Or Mark Sanford, who rode his bone down the Appalachian Trail and out of office. Or the king of them, the Most Aptly Named Person in History, Anthony Weiner, who never put his wiener to actual use, preferring to use it as a prop.

Penises sure are funny, blowing up in people's faces and all.

Sarah Palin, continuing her political cock-tease with the media who follow her around as if she was a Serious Person Who Will Run for President, says, à propos of doing just that, that she has "the fire in my belly." I have just sent her a note to reassure her that she won't burn in hell if she decides not to bring this one to term. Maybe hubby Todd can quench that fire with his own torpedo, maybe grow themselves another Palin. Baby name? Schmuck. 

Palin is headed to Britain soon, according to reports, and she made all kinds of noise about wanting to have a get-together and a cuppa with Maggie Thatcher, the Iron Maiden herself, or, as I like to think of her, Mrs. "Very-very-adjective-indeed". To her everlasting credit, The Thatchrix sent word through her fart-catchers that Palin "is nuts" and should sod off. This will knock a few years off Mrs T's sentence in Purgatory, when the time comes. 

The recent election was a bit of a shocker, revealing the sea change beginning to take place in Quebec around the "national question." The nuking of the Bloc and the  rending of the PQ in its wake throw Quebec back into play for federal parties. Layton was the main beneficiary this time, but the NDP is not institutionally grounded in Quebec the way the Liberals are. Some sort of understanding between these two parties would deliver the lion's share of the seats to a progressive party. Don't hold your breath.

However, even when everything seems dull and grey, there is always Conrad, Lord Black of Crossdresser, who thought he could get up in front of judge Amy St. Eve and impress her by reciting Kipling's "If" in its entirety: ("If You Can Keep Your John Thomas in Your Trousers While All About You Are Using Theirs, My Son"…). Apparently, the rumour that Her Honor scrunched her nose, sniffed, and complained "it smells of Biggles in here!" cannot be confirmed. Bottom line: another year in the slammer for Canada's own Churchill.

The least we can do in this time of travail is lower the poor man's taxes.

Royal Animal Husbandry

That theme park known as England-land is having a big do tomorrow, when poor SOD (son of Diana) William Saxe-Coburg-Gotha marries poor little rich girl Kate Middleton. They will then go on to squib out two suitable human offspring, so that England-land may endure. Diabetics are encouraged to crank a double dose for the big day.

Everyone is going to be there, including assorted dictators, torturers and other seldom-do-wells. Unless, of course, they're two former Labour Prime Ministers, Blair and Brown, who are not considered worthy to rub shoulders with this august assemblage. 

Join Dick tomorrow, starting at 3 a.m., as he streams his pithy insights into this historical event. Look for him on cable station WGAF. 

Stockaholics everywhere in panic after supply cut off

Japan reels in the face of a near-apocalyptic earthquake and tsunami, followed quickly upon by nuclear meltdown and mass evacuation.

And Stockwell Day decides to shuffle off the political stage. (No word on whether noted self-proclaimed Stockaholic Ezra Levant has been put on suicide watch.)

What does Day know that we don’t? 

The conventional wisdom is that this “clears the decks for the Tories” as they prepare for the election that is surely coming this way soon, as predicted in these pages last year.

It has been a while since his clownish and gaffe-ridden performance in the 2000 election and afterward as leader of the Canadian Alliance (basically the Reform Party in lipstick), which saw his own party splinter in Parliament, followed by his subsequent turfing in favour of Stephen “L’état, c’est moi” Harper. Since losing reins, he has pursued a much more low key profile, eventually earning a reputation in the Harper cabinet for being not a total disaster. In fact, he is considered a senior statesman. Draw from the latter statement what conclusion you will.

Day’s lowered profile was, to a considerable degree, a function of the short leash Harper put on all his ministers, who are drawn from a less than overflowing talent pool. Whatever he felt about this Day kept to himself, and so can be credited in the end with being a good Tory soldier.

The stars all argue for the wisdom of the move. Day has been in government railing about government for 25 years. He has seen what life in Harperland is like. The horizon offers only more of the same, more Stockboy than Stockwell; it certainly doesn’t offer another shot at being PM. Elections are coming every 30 months now. It’s as good a time as any. Time to kick back and start collecting that sweet government pension.

National Headshot League

cartoon: Aislin, Montreal Gazette, March 9, 2011


Seven years ago this month, then-Vancouver Canuck Todd Bertuzzi mugged Colorado Avalanche forward Steve Moore from behind, broke his neck and ended his career. Another day at the office. Moore had delivered a head shot to Bertuzzi's teammate Markus Naslund several games before, giving Naslund a nasty concussion. For this, Moore was assessed a grand total of zero minutes in the penalty box, and was suspended a grand total of zero games. 

From that day forward, the Canucks, from coach Marc Crawford to team enforcer Brad May, issued dire warnings about what might have to be done about Moore. Hockey, you see, is this sport that preaches that referees ruin the game by calling penalties, and that players should be left to settle their differences among themselves. This pattern played itself out all too predictably in the case of Moore and the Canucks. In the moments after the Bertuzzi mugging, Canuck coach Marc Crawford was seen (on this video still) registering this greasy shit-eating grin of approval.

Mission accomplished, Marc.

Bertuzzi, sued by Moore for well over $30 million, has since gone on to spread the love, claiming that Crawford had been calling for Moore’s head in the dressing room. That night, it seemed like the only thing the Canucks could do right. Colorado was drubbing them, and so the Canucks, with no prospect of winning the game, went to the next order of business on the hockey agenda: settling scores. Bertuzzi would not have attempted his cowardly attack if there were a chance he might cost his team a win, but with the game out of reach, hey, why not break the guy’s neck?

It is a measure of the NHL’s debased culture that most of what issued forth from the mouths of hockey wise people was concern about how poor Todd Bertuzzi was taking it all. Todd dutifully wandered up to a microphone with a prepared statement, and bit his quivering lower lip while blubbing how sorry he was.

In this 2004 file photo, Vancouver Canucks hockey player Todd Bertuzzi cries as he apologizes for sucker-punching Steve Moore of the Colorado Avalance during an NHL game.

CHUCK STOODY/CANADIAN PRESSIt was a most unconvincing performance, but Bertuzzi needn’t have worried. For going to work one day and breaking the neck and ending the career of another person in the workplace, poor widdle Todd was suspended for fewer than 30 games. (The NHL and its apologists will try to convince you that he sat out for well over a year, while omitting to mention that everyone in hockey sat out for the entire subsequent year because of the owners’ lockout. Bertuzzi’s suspension—if by that we mean not being allowed to play hockey while everyone else plays—amounted to the rest of that season and the playoffs.)

Not bad for nearly killing someone, eh?

As for Steve Moore, he immediately became persona non grata in hockey. While the troglodytes pulled out their hankies and dabbed their eyes thinking about how all of this was affecting poor snivelling Todd, Steve Moore quickly found himself flushed down the memory hole, shunned even by his own teammates. That’s hockey for you, instilling those good values, as Sarah Palin might be tempted to say.

Since then, the Bertuzzi-Moore saga has been winding its way through the courts, and even though Bertuzzi might be retired by the time the issue comes to trial, his day of reckoning (and that of Marc Crawford) will come. In the meantime, the league seems to be in a rush to make sure someone dies on the ice.

Last night they nearly got lucky. Boston Bruin Zdeno Chara ran Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty’s head into the stanchion for the rinkside glass near the Canadiens bench. As he rode him along the boards at the bench where there is no glass, Chara, who had no business even touching Pacioretty since the latter did not have the puck, pushed Pacioretty at the last second, ensuring that Pacioretty’s head would hit the stanchion even harder. Pacioretty ended up, like Moore, with a broken neck. He is surely finished for this season, and possibly for the rest of his career. He is 22 years old.

Just as the hockey trogs circled the wagons after Bertuzzi’s cowardly assault, much of the noise emanating from the usual places today are clucks about how Chara didn’t mean to do what he did, Chara’s not a dirty player, Chara’s a good guy. In typical hockey cult rationalization, they say, as Damien Cox alluded to today in the Toronto Star, that had the play taken place along the boards where there is glass, nothing would have happened. True. And if the play had taken place in the parking lot, obviously there would be no evil stanchion for Pacioretty to break his neck on. Stupid stanchion.

So now seven years later, we have another player mugged by an opponent, and left with a broken neck, and possibly a finished career. It has been reported that Pacioretty came within a millimetre of having his spinal cord severed by the hit. Sidney Crosby, the best player on the planet, is not playing because the league doesn’t give a shit if someone wants to use his head as a piñata. Marc Savard, a teammate of Chara’s, is finished playing for this season after yet another concussion, and likely for good. Brett Lindros, Eric Lindros, Pat Lafontaine, Paul Kariya, Adam Deadmarsh, Matthew Barnaby, Keith Primeau, Jason Botterill, Jesse Wallin, Steve Dubinsky, Mark Moore (brother of Steve Moore), Stu Grimson, Cam Stewart, Brian Bradley, Marc Savard, Nick Kypreos, Chris Therien (for a fuller list, see http://www.thestar.com/Sports/article/287833): the roster of players whose careers were ended or shortened by headhunting grows longer every day, and it is likely also to include Sidney Crosby, who until he was blindsided in January (and criminally allowed to play again, only to sustain a second concussion within days), was on his way to a record season in scoring. Don't expect him back this season.


The NHL is committing suicide.
   

Evidence mounts every day about what blows to the head are doing to athletes, and the NHL, for its part, responds by quivering in fear that if it did anything about this epidemic of deliberate infliction of traumatic brain injury, it would turn its players into pansies and then Mike Milbury would hurt their feelings on TV. Do we not appreciate what the trauma of being called a pansy does to players, people? Will no one think of those poor thugs?

Don’t believe me? Today the league announced that Chara will not have to serve one nanosecond of suspension. Exactly zero games. Something about Chara not meaning to, it was a clean play, a hockey play, and so what about Pacioretty's neck? It's not as if he was killed or anything. Move along now, nothing to see here.

A proud day for the Boston Guins. A proud day for the NHL, its thug culture and its gecko commissioner Gary Bettman (whose response to criticism from Air Canada was a surly invitation to auto-copulate). A good reason for Sidney Crosby to think twice before returning to offer his head up to yet another goon the NHL is scared of alienating.

The league and all its fartcatchers, enablers and exculpators don’t have to worry about chronic traumatic brain injury. They exhibit all the signs already.

"C'mon, get up, you pussy. It was a good, heads-up hockey play."
Aislin, Montreal Gazette, January 26, 2011

…But I Tumesce

What does the Pope do when gripped by tumescence, even if it is only of the matutinal, bladder-assisted variety? It is, of course, inconceivable that, being an adult male of the species homo sapiens, he has not experienced it.

In any event, ha! Made you think of the Pope with a boner.

I had never even once been tempted to conjure such an image, but it came to me after hearing of yet another pearl of wisdom from Herr Ratzinger on the subject of marriage and family life. From the Associated Press on January 22:

Pope Benedict XVI told priests Saturday to do a better job counseling would-be spouses to ensure their marriages last and said no one has an absolute right to a wedding….

He said the right to a church wedding requires that the bride and groom intend to celebrate and live the marriage truthfully and authentically.

“No one can make a claim to the right to a nuptial ceremony,” he said….

Benedict said priests had an important pastoral job to discern whether would-be spouses are prepared and able to enter into a valid marriage.

A laudable goal, getting young couples to think seriously about the seven and a half years they will spend together. But is there any less qualified a group of would-be counselors than a contingent of celibate males in robes, barred by vow (not that that seems to have mattered to many of them) from any knowledge of physical intimacy and its place in family life?

There are many Serious Catholic Apologists who would have you believe that the Church’s pedophilia crisis has no relationship at all to the celibacy of its clergy. Noted vein-popper William Donahue, head of the so-called Catholic League, as well as at least one senior Vatican official, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, answer with the vile smear that the problem is that these offending priests are gay. Yet this crisis can easily be seen, if we are to give a moment’s sympathy to the perpetrators, as a product of the general ham-handedness of the clergy when it comes to responding to the appearance under their robes of a stiffened pee shooter, something that, as was pointed out, befalls all male great apes. Confronted by an onset of penile ossification, all too many priests, many of whom were marked for the priesthood before they were old enough to know how to responsibly handle this thorny challenge, have sought out convenient targets to discharge their urges. This usually means children, who are easier to gull and scare into silence.

From such as these—celibates with no knowledge of sexuality and its place in a committed relationship, or alternatively, those who have quenched their tumescence in the orifices of the vulnerable and innocent—the Church would require young couples to receive counseling.

Sounds like a formula for success.

No Child’s Behind Left

Those familiar with the ongoing revelations of widespread sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy will recognize, in the title to this post, Christopher Hitchens’ grim humour (somehow I cannot imagine Hitchens having any other kind). The spectacle provided by the leadership of what increasingly resembles (in addition to whatever else it is) a pedophile cult, as it frantically trims, slices and parses its way through the thicket of accusations of abuse from all corners of the world, might inspire a cringeworthy pity for its fecklessness if it weren’t for all the lives it ruined and destroyed.

It should be clear by now that the leadership of the Catholic Church, expert as they are in casuistry, have been engaged in a vast exercise of jesuitical turd-polishing in the face of its worldwide child sex scandal.

Now from Ireland comes the latest coprolite, another instance of Church lying and evasion.

As reported by the Associated Press on January 18, 2011:

A 1997 letter from the Vatican warned Ireland’s Catholic bishops not to report all suspected child-abuse cases to police – a disclosure that victims’ groups described as “the smoking gun” needed to show that the church enforced a worldwide culture of covering up crimes by pedophile priests.

The newly revealed letter... documents the Vatican’s rejection of a 1996 Irish church initiative to begin helping police identify pedophile priests following Ireland’s first wave of publicly disclosed lawsuits.

The letter undermines persistent Vatican claims, particularly when seeking to defend itself in U.S. lawsuits, that Rome never instructed local bishops to withhold evidence or suspicion of crimes from police. It instead emphasizes the church’s right to handle all child-abuse allegations and determine punishments in house rather than give that power to civil authorities.

When challenged in lawsuits that name the Pope as a defendant, the Vatican insists he cannot be sued because it is a nation state, that thereby the Pope, as head of state, is immune from prosecution, that priests and others who commit these crimes do not “work for” the Vatican, and that the Vatican cannot be held responsible for what is done by these miscreants. Yet this so-called nation state also claims jurisdiction over sex crimes committed on the soil of other sovereign nation states by those it claims to have no power over. The polite term for this is sucking and blowing at the same time, something that, sadly, the Church and the pederasts among its clergy are all too good at.

It is clear that the clerical side of the Catholic Church has never listened to radio station WWJS. If they had, they might have heard these golden oldies, straight from the lips of a certain Jesus of Nazareth, yo: “whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me…. [I]f you cause one of these little ones who trusts in me to fall into sin, it would be better for you to have a large millstone tied around your neck and be drowned in the depths of the sea.”

You get the picture: Jesus clearly wanted pederasts to get the cement shoes treatment. This, I submit, gives you an indication of how seriously He would have dealt with this latter-day corruption of the innocents, and of the enormity of the Church’s (including this unworthy Pope’s) response to it, which has been to coddle the criminal and punish the victim, further compounding their sin. Der Kurrent Pope himself has voiced the typical self-pitying response of the Church: “I am personally convinced that the constant presence in the press of the sins of Catholic priests, especially in the United States, is a planned campaign ... to discredit the church.”

Hitchens responds to the response:

On April 10, the New York Times—the apparent center of this “planned campaign”—reprinted a copy of a letter personally signed by Ratzinger [now Pope Benedict XVI]  in 1985. The letter urged lenience in the case of the Rev. Stephen Kiesle, who had tied up and sexually tormented two small boys on church property in California. Kiesle’s superiors had written to Ratzinger’s office in Rome, beseeching him to remove the criminal from the priesthood. The man who is now his holiness the pope was full of urgent moral advice in response. “The good of the Universal Church,” he wrote, should be uppermost in the mind. It should be understood that “particularly regarding the young age” of Father Kiesle, there might be great “detriment” caused “within the community of Christ’s faithful” if he were to be removed. The good father was then aged 38. His victims—not that their tender ages of 11 and 13 seem to have mattered—were children. In the ensuing decades, Kiesle went on to ruin the lives of several more children and was finally jailed by the secular authorities on a felony molestation charge in 2004. All this might have been avoided if he had been handed over to justice right away and if the Oakland diocese had called the police rather than written to the office in Rome where it was Ratzinger’s job to muffle and suppress such distressing questions.

Until now, this Pope has said nothing directly about the role he played in protecting child rapists from justice. Instead, he whines that the shame brought upon the Church is a result of a concerted campaign by those who expose crimes by its clergy, crimes that Jesus himself stated should be punished by throwing the perpetrators into the sea with millstones tied around their necks. Only when the light of day was shone on the Church’s ugly secret did Herr Ratzinger respond, with words of regret crafted to deflect moral and legal accountability, all the while defiantly insisting that the Church continue to call its own balls and strikes.

Until he confesses his own sins, as the Church requires every Catholic to do, until he releases all internal Church documents that would in any way shed light on all cases of child rape by clergy and the actions undertaken to protect these monsters from answering to the law, until he resigns and accepts whatever punishment is meted out by due process of the law, Ratzinger cannot expect anyone to accord him the least deference or respect. Until that time, the institutional Church will continue to be seen as morally rotted out.

Tomorrow's Yesteryear

Where was I?

It’s been a mere 499 days since last I visited this space. Jesus and Mohammed clocked in at a mere 40 days away from the world before emerging refreshed and raring to take it on (actually, in their case, take it over). Pikers.

Just so there’s an entry for 2010:

When last I wrote, I was bemoaning the unraveling of the Obama project south of the border. It would take another half-year before health care reform was passed, and the result was, unfortunately but perhaps inevitably, a Rube Goldberg device. (I earlier predicted it would be an abortion, but since it mostly doesn’t kick in for a couple of years, the judgment will have to wait.) There was some financial reform, but given the propensity of this president to cater to Wall Street (his closest economic advisers coming from the ranks of those whose criminally irresponsible speculation with others’ money led to the crash in 08, including Robert Rubin), it is difficult to feel hopeful that the same thing that brought on the current Great Recession will not blow up in our face again. Obama has done bugger all to address the pit in this pustule: those who destroyed the livelihoods and retirements of millions around the world have not only been restored to their pre-Crash selves with money from the very people they had just finished ruining, they have gone on since then to award themselves record bonuses in the thousands of millions.

As if this weren’t enough, after spending the mid-term campaign season drawing a line in the sand on the Bush tax cuts, Obama folded, handing those who could not possibly need it a several-hundred-billion dollar windfall that only pours vinegar onto fresh wounds. Incredibly, he joins Bush in the pantheon of those deserving to be honoured for their work with the overprivileged.

Having said that, Obama remains by far preferable to anybody from the Grotesque Old Plutocrats, with their collection of cranks and wankers. He has to be given credit for finally getting “don’t ask, don’t tell” repealed. And when you look upon the last days of this officially sanctioned anti-gay bigotry, and think of John McCain’s performance, you can not but be thankful that at the moment, it is Obama and not McCain who is entrusted with running the country.

McCain has shown himself unable, or rather, unwilling, to climb out of the vat of bile he has been swimming in since Obama whipped his ass by 10 million votes. Like that other GOP whore, Mitt Romney, who now pretends to rail against basically the same health care plan he himself implemented in Massa2shits, McCain has shown no hesitation in, as Sarah Palin would put it, refudiating everything he has pretended to stand for. Nothing so defines this shriveled erstwhile “maverick” in his political and personal decline than his tortured and petulant rearguard action to demonize gays in the military, this while his own wife campaigned to eliminate the bigotry fueling an epidemic of gay suicides. Following in the steps of that other one-time war hero Randy “Duke” Cunningham, McCain is further proof of the sad truth that military exploits do not automatically confer personal integrity. Public discourse can only get better once this cynical old poop, the man who brought you Sarah Palin, shuffles off the stage.

Would that it were otherwise, but here in the Great White North the political landscape is particularly barren at this juncture. Despite a succession of big events designed to boost his profile—the Olympics, the various summits—Harper has not been able to move the needle into majority territory, after 5 full years at the tiller. There will no doubt be an election this year, probably in the spring, and it will spell the end of either Harper or Ignatieff. If Harper were to win but still be unable to secure a majority, look for enough grumbling to surface that he will decide it’s not worth it for him to carry on, and will head for some soft corporate sinecure.

After all of 5 years, Harper finds himself with a gauzy legislative record. Unable to do anything of substance with his minority government, Harper and his Great Big Cabinet of Unsurpassed Tory Talent have been reduced to feeding bite-sized cubes of red meat to their hard core hyenas. On more than one occasion, it was reported that a Russian aircraft flew really close to Canadian airspace in the Arctic, but actually did not enter it. Gasps were audible all across the droolosphere as Tories took to their fainting couches. In the end, a little froth was stirred up, and all the little Vic Toews in Reformworld could go home and snort about how they gave it good to the Russkies. It also justifies spending up to $24 billion on new planes to counter this dread threat.

Lacking a majority, Harper has not been able to pursue a more vigorous, Repugnican agenda. As John Ibbitson recently noted in the Globe, the Tories are seen as adrift.

All of this should give some comfort to Michael Ignatieff and his Liberals, but they too seem to have hit a ceiling of 30% in support, which simply will not deliver them power unless in some kind of coalition with the NDP and the Bloc.

For whatever reason, the Liberals under Ignatieff have failed to light a fire, forced by circumstance not to force an election and thus effectively neutered in the House. This makes it difficult for the leader to affect a macho posture—remember “if you mess with me, I’ll mess with you til I’m done”? The spectacle last year of Iggy and Steve waving their dicks, each daring the other to trigger an election—en garde, varlet, sample my flesh blade!—was low-grade reality TV.

Anyway, it is a sad comment on the state of political leadership when the Liberal party can’t muster the mojo needed to take on a Tory leader who wears his tie to bed each night.

Ignatieff’s ascension to leadership was sold to many as the second coming of Trudeau: a heavyweight intellectual come to do his duty and give his country the gift of his leadership. Unfortunately, he has had all the impact of a 3 nanoton bomb.

Recent history provides a simple test of leadership and judgment, and that is the Iraq War. When Frat Boy Smirk embarked on his project to reshape the Middle East, it is helpful to remember that both Harper and Ignatieff supported this lunatic adventure, none more so than Harper, who was positively viagrified over the prospect of playing army in the sandbox with W. When Chretien nixed Canada’s participation in this right-wing circle jerk, Harperbot, with the laughable Stockwell “Wet Suit” Day in tow, waxed apoplectic about letting down a friend in need. They were joined by other solons who rushed in to bray about this historic mistake, in particular noted intellectuals Ralph Klein and chief Mike Harris fartcatcher Ernie Eves, reassuring Oedipus Tex that Canadians supported him even if their leaders didn’t, despite polls putting support for Chretien’s decision at 75%. A proud moment, to be sure.

As for Ignatieff, he signed on to Iraqapalooza at first, (the spectre of renovations to vast areas of the geopolitical map no doubt appealing to his intellect), even permitting himself to muse about circumstances where it would be okay to use torture, but had the menschitude to apologize for it later in the New York Times.

In any event, Harper can’t continue his smoke-and-mirrors government for much longer without finding a fight to pick, and Ignatieff can’t afford to be seen caving to Harper one more time, so expect to see Election Night in Canada sometime during the Cup playoffs.

Break out your vuvuzelas.

Lance the Republican Boil

Dick apologizes to his reader for yet another absence. It has been a very discouraging summer for all kinds of reasons, not the least of which is the unravelling of the Obama project south of the border. Anyone not infected with the Repugnican swine virus can only look upon the spectacle being played out in so-called town halls across the States, and despair. Is there no more feckless a thing than the Democratic party, which postures about bringing change, but which, stinking of insurance money, melts like ice in August in the face of hate-spewing thugs and racists?

One must question how a nation like the United States, where most polls routinely put support for a "public option" (which would provide health insurance for those unable to obtain it in the private market) at 70%, has managed to cower before the stupidest and loudest of its people, people who in almost any other nation would be objects of eye-rolling and derision, people who clearly seem to be off their meds. Charles Blow had the right diagnosis for them in the New York Times: "Hateful people are loud — to disguise their cowardice and shame."

If Obama jettisons the public option, his health bill will end up being an abortion, and he will risk falling into what characterized Clinton after he got mired in the health care bog—a period without much focus (albeit one in which the economy largely boomed), characterized by little initiatives and PR-schtick (a bridge to the 21st century, anyone?)—in short, boutique progressivism. Obama needs to stop Kumbaya-ing the right wing crazies and move ahead. After all the spectacle of the last six months, does he honestly think he can achieve the Holy Grail of bipartisanship with a Republican party whose leadership speaks of death panels and churns out lie after lie, such as Stephen Hawking being euthanized by the National Health Service in Britain?

The Repugnicans, since losing last November, do not deserve any longer to be treated as serious players in the health care debate, or any other issue for that matter. The party has degenerated to little more than a festering cyst, like the one on Rush Limbaugh's ass—you know, the one that prevented him from becoming a Vietnam war hero. It's time for Obama to move on, and leave these spittle-flecked mouth breathers at the side of the road, where they belong.

They weren't so Grrrr-eat!

The end of the 30-year Sri Lankan kill-a-thon, howsoever brutally it might have been at the end, is a blessing, if an ugly one.

It is possible to have a just cause and still in the end not deserve to prevail in struggle, and the case of the LTTE (Tamil Tigers) illustrates this, as does the experience in Ireland, which has more or less successfully emerged from decades of murderous civil conflict. Taking up arms against oppression carries extreme moral risk. As happened with the IRA, the longer one is forced to continue to conduct armed conflict, the more likely one is to attract, in addition to those committed to the cause, those merely committed to the criminal and homicidal. The Tigers earned a reputation for a particularly sick version of ruthlessness, visited upon vast numbers of even their own community, drafting the entire population at gunpoint into their war, kidnapping children to turn them into soldiers, itself a crime against humanity, and training cadres of suicide bombers (something for which you never saw the leadership volunteering). They crossed irretrievably into the irredeemable when one of their suiciders assassinated then-Indian PM Rajiv Gandhi in the early 90s, because he had the gall to send peacekeepers to Sri Lanka.

This is not to diminish the culpability of the Sinhalese, who have their own atrocities to account for, going back decades. In a perfect world, there will be a war crimes trial for all those who participated in massacres of Tamils in the early 80s, which lit the fuse on this conflict, as well as for those Tigers responsible for forcing children to fight, and for waging suicide terror, to list only two. The Sri Lankan government are victorious, but victorious like the Russians, who "won" their war in Chechnya by utterly destroying it, thus ensuring that down the road we will be treated to a comeback performance.

In the end, history will look upon the Tigers not so much as freedom fighters, but as the Sri Lankan version of the Khmer Rouge.

Lyin' Brian

Dick is back from his spring tour of the Tropic of Torpor.

What is there left to say about Myron Bullroney? Anyone harbouring a shred of sympathy for this pompous, venal gladhander should take the time to read Andrew Coyne's take-down of him in Maclean's magazine, (normally not a publication I'm drawn to, since one would have to come across the sneering "what the fuck are you looking at, asshole?" gaze of the loathsome Mark Steyn). Coyne has been on the Mulroney-Schreiber case like a bloodhound, and his eviscerations of the greasy former PM should finally put to rest any questions as to whether he has, as he would have it, been unfairly pilloried in the court of public reckoning. Mulroney's performance at the Oliphant inquiry, the one he demanded from Stephen Harper so he could rescue his "good name" from the blizzard of allegations that he basically took kickback money from the Airbus affair, was a case study in maudlin self-pity. What is amazing is that he could have believed he would emerge from an examination of his relationship with such a low-life as Schreiber with an intact reputation.

As Coyne devastatingly shows, at the end of this sordid affair, Mulroney has still never answered head on the question of why he took this cash.

There may have been a time when having a whiskey tenor could open doors for the congenital bullshitter, but the Oliphant performance showed clearly that this time is past. In the end "I, Martin Brian Mulroney," who pledged to show up at the inquiry "with bells on," emerged looking like a clown.

This is a pity in some sense. Canadians who saw him every day and tired of his schtick might be inclined not to recall that Mulroney did Canada proud on a number of international files, most especially his leadership in helping rally the world community to the unfolding catastrophe in Ethiopia in 1984, and in his steadfast refusal to join with Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan in blocking action against the apartheid regime in South Africa. That he would sully this record with the spectacle of taking cash in envelopes from a shady professional palm greaser will continue to puzzle, since he never gave a coherent account of it when he had the stage to himself.

Church of the Unclad Schlong

So Papa Ratzo, otherwise known as Pope Benedict 16, has concluded that the Bishop Williamson affair was not handled all that well. By him, that is. After it was pointed out that a simple Google search would have sufficed to tip off the Vatican about Williamson's Holocaust denial, it was revealed that no one in Ratzo's inner circle had any clue about this newfangled intertube thingy. Which gives you a pretty good idea of just how sclerotic and clueless are the people the Pope has surrounded himself with.

Let's charitably assume that these worthies are not counted among those Catholic clergy who have put their penises ahead of their faith, and that none of them has parked his pecker where it is not allowed, in particular, in the orifices of the most vulnerable of the faithful. As I've had occasion to note, that such a collection of robed virgins, not a female among them, is uniquely placed to lecture the rest of the world on issues of sex and family life is one of the more hilarious conceits of Catholic thinking. In comedic terms, it has shown itself to be the gift that keeps on giving, as evidenced by Ratzo's recent swing through Africa. In this case, the only orifice being filled was his mouth, and by his foot.

The Church's record, when it comes to the issue of AIDS and how best to keep it from ravaging Africa, is one of shame. It has lobbied long and hard against the use of condoms, because, as we know from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, it is more important for the Church to ensure that every sperm remains sacred than to save actual lives. This was true with J2P2, and if we had any doubt that it is also true of Ratzo, he put it to rest with his contention that condoms, which have been known to help cut the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases, actually make the AIDS situation in Africa worse: "you can't resolve it with the distribution of condoms.... On the contrary, it increases the problem."

One can see the intellectual laziness in this position. Rather than be honest and say, "we know that condoms can help protect against AIDS (although not perfectly), but we have a moral principle that keeps us from accepting the use of condoms among our believers, and therefore we do not support their use for Catholics," Ratzo instead doubled down, disputing what virtually every other person not addled by dogma could see, and claimed that somehow condoms increased the suffering caused by AIDS. Of course, not one single piece of evidence was offered to support this transparently ridiculous claim. Perhaps Ratzo and his perfumed coterie feel that his status as Virgin-in-Chief is sufficient to create this new upside-down reality.

What next from this Pope? Given that he's already used both his feet to fill his cakehole, can we now expect to see him walking on his hands? Given his predilection for pompous inanity, we won't have to wait long to find out.

Making Catholicism safe for Mel Gibson

I would like to preface the following by noting that I was born into the bosom of the Catholic Church, raised by devout Catholics, taught by Christian Brothers. I served Masses, sang in the choir, and was altar boy of the year in my parish. I have experienced firsthand all the good that can flow from people whose faith has informed their lives. I also witnessed, however, the physical and sexual abuse that was often meted out by those who wear the "uniform" of the Church—particularly the brothers and priests—as well as the arrogance that animates the pronouncements coming out of Rome, and out of bishops and other officials who have done so much to advance causes that, despite being given cover by their collar, promote hatred and sow division among people. Although brewed a Catholic and imbued with many of its teachings, I have found it impossible to stay in the Church, since some of what look to be its core values are ones I absolutely reject, in particular its rejection of full membership for women, its homophobia, its misogyny, and its twisted and backward views on sexuality (not surprising, given the ludicrousness of celibate misogynists setting themselves up as experts on family life). Add to that list now its racist bigotry, thanks to Joseph Ratzinger, aka Benedict 16.

Ever since his predecessor J2P2 told Catholics that anti-Semitism was in fact a sin, Der Kurrent Pope has kept a special place in his heart for Jew haters and other ding-dongs who long to return to the bosom of Mother Church, and has now welcomed some of them back with open arms. Last year, when Ben16 relaxed rules to allow the return of the Latin Mass, one of the effects of this was to reinstate the Good Friday prayer that seeks the conversion of the Jews (who we all know "murdered" our Lord and Saviour on the Cross). This reinstatement is odd, given that the Church has, since Vatican II, rejected the notion of collective guilt for Jews for the crucifixion, but Ratzinger seems unbothered by this. Four bishops of a schismatic sect who rejected the Church in the wake of Vatican II reforms and who have referred to both Popes J2P2 (who excommunicated them) and Benedict16 as "heretical"—among them Richard Williamson, a very vocal Holocaust denier who also claims that the US staged the 9/11 attacks so they could go to war in Afghanistan—have been welcomed back into the Church, apparently without having so much as to recant any of their repulsive bigotry. Days after this, B16 promoted ultra-conservative Father Gerhard Maria Wagner to assistant bishop of Linz, in Austria. Father Wagner believes, among other things, that Harry Potter spreads Satanism, and that hurricane Katrina and the flood of New Orleans were divine retribution for the city's tolerance toward sex and gays. He was particularly pleased that in addition to brothels and clubs, the Katrina disaster hit five of the city's abortion clinics.

One can just imagine a boy's night out with the likes of "Bishop" Williamson, Father Wagner, and Hutton and Mel Gibson. Not to mention that Neo-Nazi waste of skin, Ernst Zundel, who found himself enthusiastically defended by Williamson years ago when the latter was in Canada.

Frances Kissling put it best in the New Republic, "It is not merely discouraging or problematic that Pope Benedict XVI is making nice with a Holocaust denier, or mending fences with a splinter group of ultraconservative anti-Semites, it is sick and evil."

What kind of church is it that (or equally, what kind of a spiritual leader is it who) will welcome back into their midst someone who bears false witness about one of the most horrific episodes in human history, who in so doing continues to perpetrate a hate crime? Those who might be tempted to find the answer to this in Joseph Ratzinger's being German should note that German Chancellor Angela Merkel tore a strip off him over this, and that many prominent German Catholics have raised a holy ruckus, so much so that only today the Vatican declared that Williamson would have to recant his Holocaust denial as a condition of his being brought back into the Church. The Vatican also stated that Ratzinger didn't know about Williamson's views before asking him back in. This latter shit-eating statement cannot but be a lie, yet another sin to be added to this catalogue of shame for the Church.

It will take a long time, and a new Pope at a minimum, before the stain of this will wash off the leadership of the Church. In the meantime, those clerics who preach hatred, and all those who enable them in the Church need to be told to go to hell.

Free at Last

This is almost as deep into winter as you can get, and it feels like it. It was brass-monkey cold all last week, and the air has been thick with Bush's pathetic attempts to spin his place in history, a stupid man frantically trying to polish a turd. Many fatuous words were spoken about a library and a book from the Bushes—apparently Laura believes there's a lot we would pay $40 to find out from her. Frat Boy Smirk himself is said to be keen to sharpen his favourite crayon and give it a go. That would give him a two-book head start on filling up his new lie-berry. Presumably the new facility will feature stations where weary readers can go to have their reading calluses treated. Signs will hang from the ceiling reminding the various visiting Bush scholars: "REMEMBER: Lips together when reading."

One hopes for the day when Bush and Cheney will have their Pincohet moment, charged with war crimes and unable to travel for fear of being taken off the plane and sent to The Hague. The world showed it was serious when it hauled Milosevic and Karadzic (and soon, one hopes, Mladic) before the International Criminal Court. It should show no less zeal in seeking to add Bush and Cheney to this butchers' gallery. It would be worth paying to see W try to smirk and chuckle his way through a war crimes trial. He'd look good in orange.

Here in the Great White North, Prime Minister Doughboy gets a second chance to get it right with a budget next week. OpLeader Ignatieff makes noises that if it contains broad tax cuts, the Libs won't vote for it, and we're back to coalition time. However, Ignatieff never liked the coalition idea and will try to steer around it if he can. Harper may accommodate him, since he may realize that playing chicken this time around will see him in Stornaway post-haste. However, since he likes to campaign far more than govern, Harper may just decide to pull another adolescent stunt and force a crisis—election or coalition?—which would provide plenty of drama and keep everyone distracted from the world of hurt coming our way in the next several years. Harper may decide that now is not the time to be running things, since as the recession deepens, people will find out that at the end of the day, Sweater Boy, like his hero W, is really interested in rewarding his friends, and has no particular interest in, or talent for, running an economy for the benefit of everyone. Let's hope he takes financial wizard Patricia Croft's advice on how to weather the coming storm, delivered on TV on January 9: "batten down the hatchets."

Harper has decided his quest for a reformed Senate is doomed, as any first year poli sci student could have told him and Preston Manning back in the 90s, when this idea was trotted out as part of the sacred Reform canon. A quick look at the formula for amending the constitution (it basically requires unanimity from the provinces and federal government), not to mention memories of the great fun we all had the last time we tried doing it, could have saved the Reformistas a lot of grief. Then again, Reformers were never more happy than when angry and venting their own special brand of sour gas. In any event, Harper appointed 18 new warm bodies to the upper chamber, including media stars Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin, skier Nancy Green Raine and 15 other hacks, this while the House was prorogued. It might be argued that this is nothing more than facing political reality, and it is something he would rather not do if he had his druthers, but this can't be said of his decision to appoint a new Supreme Court justice without running it by a parliamentary committee, something he crowed about doing in 06. Apparently, Stevie doesn't think getting MPs' input on such appointments is worth it this time. Easy come, easy go. Back to Square One.

Still no word from the secret committee of anti-abortion MPs on how they intend to outlaw abortion without anyone finding out. Stay tuned. Or not.

Prince Harry, who distinguished himself a couple of years ago for showing up at a costume party dressed as a Nazi (perhaps in affectionate remembrance of his great-grand-uncle Edward VIII/Duke of Windsor, legendary bon vivant, Nazi sympathizer and likely traitor), has called a Pakistani member of his regiment "our little Paki friend," but we are told it is meant as a term of affection, as is, apparently, "raghead," another nickname he is fond of using. Harry comes by his racism honestly: daddy Charles affectionately refers to polo-playing friend Kuldip Dhillon as "Sooty", and Charles' daddy, notorious horse's ass Prince Philip, famously told British students in China they would end up "slitty-eyed" if they stayed there much longer. As for Harry, he continues in the tradition of other "spares" to the heirs, like Princess Anne, who must be kept occupied lest they open their mouths and Philip's genes kick in. If one prefers to treat things royal as a matter of animal husbandry, as is often done, Harry can soon be expected to get to work fashioning a suitable breeding arrangement, by way of marriage. His role as spare is not done, of course, until William suitably discharges himself of his responsibilities in this matter, with his own pair of spawn. And who knows? One need only look to the aforementioned Eddy8 to see the wisdom of having someone in the wings who can step in, someone who must share your blood, according to the rules, and, oh, by the way, definitely cannot be a Catholic.

Meanwhile, in the Unholy Land, Israel, having pulverized Gaza over the holidays, is getting out just in time before President Obama is inaugurated and has something to say about this latest murderous incursion. Sadly, it is hard not to see this as being as much about the upcoming Israeli election as anything else, as everyone trips all over themselves trying to out-Likud each other. Israel would like us all to see this as a one-off aimed at silencing Hamas rockets, with no reckoning being made of the effect of decades of Israeli occupation and colonization of Palestinian land, leaving the Palestinians something very much like the detestable Bantustans of apartheid-era South Africa. Media in this country and in the US have drunk the Israeli Kool-Aid; Israel is a fragile vulnerable country surrounded by fanatical mortal enemies, who need periodic doses of Israeli medicine to keep them in line. It is perfectly reasonable to kill 1000 or so Arabs every once in a while, just to show them.

I have come to the depressing belief that Israel and the Palestinians are doomed to a perpetual death-dance. Both are permanently traumatized populations who believe they can will their favoured reality into being. Do Tzipi, or the Ehuds, or Bibi really believe the claptrap they spout about how they will "topple" Hamas and replace it with a government more to their liking? What arrogance is it that looks upon the Palestinians as people allowed to elect only those who meet Israeli approval? As long as Israelis look upon their neighbours this way, there is no way forward.

The Gaza adventure exposes Israel as a country that wants not peace but only quiet. The biggest favour a President Obama could do for Israel is to tell them that they will not receive another red cent from the US until they immediately stop all settlements on Palestinian land, and submit a plan to dismantle the ones already there. If Israel is serious about long-term peace, they cannot pursue it while taking the land from under the Palestinians' feet.

Support for Israel on this side of the pond has sadly come down to support for the Likud view of never-ending violence and war, something dear to Netanyahu's heart. If, God forbid, he wins in February, Israel can look forward to more of the same, a debilitating prospect for anyone interested in her long-term security, but even more maddeningly, understandable in the short term, given Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran have made it a stated aim to see Israel wiped from the map. Welcome to Square One again. The future belongs to those with the rockets, guns and bombs.

I have been to The Beast, Tina Brown's answer to the HuffPost, and sampled some of Conrad Black's ageless prose. Actually, a while back, Black wrote a column in the Globe and Mail defending FDR from the revisionist claptrap of the right wing in the States to the effect that the New Deal actually made the Great Depression worse than it was. Black is always fun to read, and when he practises scholarship, he is at his best. It doesn't hurt that he writes coherently and in complete sentences, either. He seems to be unaware, though, of the ludicrous spectacle of him casting himself in the role of stalwart defender of the wrongfully convicted, something he has announced to the world from his cell through The Beast. Further outpourings from him on this subject are sure to be entertaining. We can look forward to five more years of his tireless work on behalf of those who have been shafted by the system, man.

HNY

Pulled a Harper and prorogued the blog for December. After the coalition drama was put on hiatus, December offered little except the departure of Stephane Dion. I couldn't bring myself to watch his address to the nation, apparently with a hand-held camera in some basement, explaining the coalition. At least his departure speeds up the succession process in the Liberal party, and someone who projects a little more gravitas is in place to act as a check on Harper, who can't be trusted not to pull a stunt at the first opportunity. Look for another election in 09. Little Stevie can't help himself.

A Conservative MP announces he leads a secret caucus of anti-abortion MPs, whose identities he declines to reveal.  Apparently this secret group plans to pass a law outlawing abortion without anybody knowing. Good luck with that.

Look for Conrad Black to remain in prison, and raise a glass to Patrick Fitzgerald.

Bristol Palin had a kid, named Tripp. I had no idea it was tripping season, but there you go. Supposedly she will  score somewhere in the neighbourhood of 300 Gs for the baby pix.

Obama thought it would be a good idea to have homophobe bible thumper Rick Warren read the invocation to his inauguration. Swing and a miss. Like all episodes involving gas, this too shall pass, but it shows Obama continuing to have a tin ear on sexual orientation, around which I sense a profound discomfort on his part. 

Buh-bye 08. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

A Consummation Devoutly to be Wish'd

So Stephen Harper, only 6 weeks after being denied his majority, finds himself on the cusp of being thrown out of a job by a feckless and fractured opposition. Quite a demonstration of leadership, wouldn't you say? He joins that other Tory with a minority who, to prove his manliness, decided that the people were wrong to deny him a majority and would proceed as if he had one: Joe Clark. To share this distinction with Clark must turn Harper's spit to vinegar. And all because he couldn't resist the temptation to try to destroy his political opponents, something that looks like he is more interested in than in doing anything about the economy, which the last three years have shown he had sadly mismanaged, burning through more than $60 billion in tax cuts for his well-heeled friends.

Thomas Walkom of the Star called it right. While the world is plunging ahead with massive stimulus initiatives, Harper chooses to do essentially nothing. That is actually a defensible enough strategy, given that much of what needs to be done must wait til after Obama takes over. So what do Harper and his Harrisite Flaherty do? Give in to the yahoo howlings of their base and go for predictable red-meat targets. Target public service pay and their right to strike (the public service in Ottawa has been running at a record profit clip over the last 10 years, delivering gigantic surpluses), pay equity, and while they're at it, destroy their political opponents.

Having got used to daring the opposition to kiss his posterior and seeing them dutifully pucker up, Harperbot figured he could cow them into going out of business, daring them to plunge the country into another unnecessary election. Having already run one unnecessary election himself, forcing another one was something Harper figured the opposition parties could not afford to be seen doing, let alone afford, period. The opposition, dispirited as they settled into their seats for a long winter in the political wilderness, were instantly galvanized by this gratuitous bit of pissery and in the blink of an eye, a unite-the-left movement had formed, lured by the heady prospect of instant governing. They may just find they like it. Welcome to a new era of coalition governments, brought to you by your unfriendly Conservative party.

This is another classic example of the Reform-party nastiness that curdles in the Tory soul. Like the neo-cons he idolizes, Harper and his hyenas prefer to campaign rather than govern and simply cannot keep themselves from waving their dicks in front of people when they think they can get away with it. In the current crisis, the proposal to essentially kneecap the other parties bespeaks an adolescent, video-gamer opportunism.  

Today, Little Stevie has gone into his sweater drawer with a vengeance and said he won't try to eliminate the funding for the other parties under the current arrangement after all. Old Milky Eyes, however, may find that everyone has moved on and decided that he cannot be trusted to be a leader, and that he will be asked to spend Christmas in Stornaway. Given his predilection to sulkiness, though, he may just decide to take his ball and go home. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wish'd. 

So here we are at the end of 08, Harper has failed to get his majority against a fractured and poorly led opposition, and is looking at being tossed out on his ample keister by them. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy. Now Jim Flaherty will be free to pursue his dream of becoming Premier of Ontario and doing what really wanks his crank—jailing the homeless.

Shocked Disbelief

Still awash in the sea of endorphins unleashed by the accession of Obama, and waiting for the Big Shoe to drop on the economy. Part of the giddy hope that grips us is no doubt a reflection of the passing of Oedipus Tex from the scene. George Wanker Bush grows paler and more insignificant every day, filling his days issuing regulations and orders to ruin as many things as he can in his final 60 days, jetting around warning all those A students that regulating the markets is bad, this while we were treated to the  spectacle of Alan Greedspan admitting to Congress and the world that one of the linchpins of his economic philosophy was, how to put this? W-R-O-N-G.

“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Greenspan has been a life-long disciple of nutjob pseudo-philosopher Ayn Rand, a favourite of adolescents desperate to show their worldliness and to find deep meaning in an all-encompassing philosophy. That he would continue to cleave to Rand's undercooked gumbo of ersatz libertarianism in his later life does not recommend him.

We have, with the great help of Randers like Greenspan, been told that of all the fields of human endeavour—making cars, building houses, tending to the sick, representing parties in court, farming—tending to others' money should, alone among them all, be unencumbered by rules and regulations meant to curb abuses by mere mortals. Working in finance bestows infallibility, it seems. Markets are self-regulating, they take care of themselves, their self-interest (paging Ayn Rand) provides the necessary corrective.

Except, of course, when it doesn't. And then there is a state of shocked disbelief.

Although Daniel Gross in Slate tells us that analogies to the Great Depression are over the top, Nobel winner Paul Krugman on Friday wrote: "nothing is happening on the policy front that is remotely commensurate with the scale of the economic crisis. And it’s scary to think how much more can go wrong before Inauguration Day."

Turn Out the Lights

Time for the Repugnicans to break out the fine beach-size 400-thread-per-inch Egyptian cotton crying towels, because it's over, baby. Reports have the McCain team jockeying for a post-blowout take-down of Sarah Palin, who they claim has gone rogue on them. When Peggy and Cotton Hill finally sat down for their interview with Brian Williams of NBC, their body language spoke volumes. McCain suppressed the twitches, sighs, snorts and harrumphs that he featured to such edifying effect in his last debate appearance, but clearly these running mates were not feeling the love. Palin, for her part, has reportedly become fed up with her McCain handlers and, with 2012 in mind, gone off-message, publicly questioning the decision to abandon campaigning in Michigan and to not talk about Jeremiah Wright. 

And then there is Ashley Todd, 20-year-old Texan college student and McCain volunteer who previously worked with that model of rectitude, the College Republicans (of Jack Abramoff infamy). On Wednesday she called police in Pittsburgh to report that she had been attacked by what she described as a tall black man who, realizing she was a McCain supporter, carved a B (for Barack, you see) into her cheek with a blunt knife, but such was the assailant's finely modulated rage, he didn't manage to break her skin. She showed up with a black eye and sure enough, the red welty B was there, only it was backwards, exactly the way it would be if someone had carved it into her cheek while looking in the mirror. Oops. It didn't take the cops long to get Ashley to fess up that she made the whole thing up. A more pathetic end note for the McCain campaign can hardly be imagined: raving about what awful things that black man has done to  them, clutching their little Obama monkey dolls. We can finally retire all the old myths about McCain the reforming maverick, the man of honour, of sound judgment. He'll go down as running the dirtiest campaign in recent memory, and that's saying something. As for the Grotesque Old Party, it threatens to turn into a lunatic rump, powered only by paranoia and bigotry. Even Colin Powell—having permanently sullied his reputation by his disgraceful performance at the UN when he knew the evidence was, as he was reported to have said at the time, "bullshit"—couldn't take any more.

Palin of the Day: Zamboni