It's bad enough that Dubya Bush's entire family seems to be composed of
lying, racist, intolerant corporate criminals, but more evidence of the same
just keep on coming.
The latest venture into the underworld of taste and integrity comes via Boy
George's brother, Jeb, who threw the 2000 election in his brother's favor by
having his shock troops keep blacks from exercising their right to cast a vote
for president. Shades of Georgie sucking up to Bob Jones III, the South
Carolina man whose father had called Dubya's dad "The Antichrist." That a way
to defend your father's honor, Dubya. This was at the same time that Dubya was
accusing rival John McCain's wife of being a junkie and essentially calling his
daughter a wog. What a class act.
Jeb stepped on his teeny white dick at the beginning of October when he told a
delegation of Florida panhandle legislators that he had "juicy details"
concerning the sexual proclivities of caregivers of a missing Florida child.
Needless to say, it was that said caregivers are lesbians. "Bet you don't get
that in Pensacola," the moron Jeb quipped. Unfortunately he failed to realize
one of the people in the room at the time was a reporter for Gannet Regional
Newspapers, who wrote up the story for the Pensacola News Journal the
next day.
Bet you do get flagrant racism and intolerance, however, quite happily
supported by all of the Bushies -- from Daddy George H.W., his mother, the
menacing matriarch of her mentally challenged brood, to corporate-scamming
brother Neil, Jeb, the vote-fixer with the druggie daughter, and Dubya the
Dumb, who never met a right-wing conservative Christian he didn't like. And as
put by the spokesperson for one of the women charged not with the disappearance
of the child, but stealing public assistance funds, "[Jeb's] making jokes when
they're still a missing baby here, or doesn't he care?" The attorney also
pointed out that the two women are sisters, not a lesbian couple.
Meanwhile, Jeb continues to ask the news media to respect the family's privacy
while his daughter undergoes drug abuse treatment in Orlando. Guess the Bush
family ethical knife doesn't cut both ways. Do you know where your daughters
are drinking tonight, Dubya?
Peace be with you
Last week, a brief article in the Washington Post gave a lot more
details than we were able to glean from the local media about the recent
removal of Vo Dilun-based Brigadier General Rick Baccus as a National Guard
commander. Baccus was the head of the military police in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,
where suspected Al Qaeda members and other alleged terrorists have been held
for months. The Post article indicated that Baccus "has been removed
from his job amid allegations that he was uncommunicative with superiors and
that he improperly tried to interfere in the interrogation of suspected
Taliban and Al Qaeda prisoners jailed there."
He was also said to have "clashed repeatedly with a number of senior officers,
including the head of the camp's interrogation unit, Army Reserve Major General
Michael Dunlavey. Some sources said Baccus complained that at times
interrogators were rude or too intrusive with the detainees, an assertion
Baccus denied in interviews with Rhode Island news organizations."
Now, imagine this incredible outrage: "A number of military officers also have
complained that Baccus coddled detainees by beginning his addresses to them
over loudspeakers with the phrase, `peace be with you.' Others said Baccus
raised questions about some tactics of psychological pressure that
interrogators sometimes used on prisoners, even though the interrogators were
within the bounds of proper tactics, sources said. Baccus has denied those
accusations."
Well, there you go. According to the report, Baccus appears to be a stickler
for following Geneva Conventions for detaining prisoners of war. We'll wait
until the whole story becomes clearer, but based on this, it sounds as if Rick
Baccus is one of the good guys.
Tissue ads
Local Republicans are all in a tizzy because the so-called "issue ad" paid for
by Republican National Committee "soft money" has been found in violation of Vo
Dilun campaign finance laws. Both parties do it, but in this case, it's the
Republicans who've been called out for putting out a thinly veiled Carcieri
spot. We don't doubt that the ruling by the state Election Board (chaired by
Democratic Party boy Roger Begin) has a partisan odor about it, but these
tissue ads are insulting to anyone's intelligence and a classic example of the
giant Mack Truck-sized holes built into election finance law.
The ad is stupid to begin with, trying to tie Myrth to Speaker Hardwood, which
is sort of like trying to claim that drinking milk leads to heroin use because
the vast majority of mainliners started by sipping moo juice. So, good riddance
to the ad and let's see if the GOP can come up with something a bit more
substantial.
Meanwhile, Myrth has gone after Enron Don by running an ad about "pursuing
profits over people" and pointing out that when he was CEO of Cookson America,
the company was involved in destroying a Brazilian rain forest and ran a plant
that spewed lead into a Philadelphia neighborhood. Needless to say, Enron Don
took umbrage, replying that the company didn't run the Brazilian tin mining
operation in question, just bought product from it, and regarding the
Philadelphia plant, he said, "Every once in a while when you're running a
plant, the plants have accidents."
The honest answer to the questions about a corporation's involvement in
environmental calamities would have been, "That's what corporations do. We mess
up the environment." Also: "That's what being a corporation is all about,
putting profits over people." But we're not likely to hear that.
The Healey factor
Jorge was a recent guest on Phoenix contributor and man-about-town Joe
Vileno's cable television program Viewpoint, along with the Cool Moose
himself, Bob Healey, a candidate for lieutenant governor. As you all know, Bob
has run for governor three times, and from our perspective, he is the best sort
of political gadfly, i.e., someone who has a sure grasp of issues and functions
as a repository for political theorizing. Your superior correspondents have
never been able to fully embrace Bob because of his decidedly
libertarian bent, but we have always admired his honesty and
intelligence.
One of the raps against Bob has been that he doesn't do the necessary things
to actually win an election. From Bob's perspective (and on this we agree),
much of this amounts to pandering. Bob's not cutting his hair or beard, and
he's always going to run witty, edgy campaigns. He never built up the Cool
Moose political party as a legitimate, libertarian alternative because . . .
well, because we don't believe his heart was ever in creating an institution.
Healey is truly the outsider's outsider. (And nothing's cooler than his black
and white lawn signs featuring a slowly fading Healey head with the legend
"There he was . . . gone.")
Despite the belief that Bob is not entirely serious with this campaign, he
does have a scenario in which he could actually win. This consists of the
belief that the GOP candidate, John Pagliarini Jr., is especially weak (he's
relatively unknown and, based on Channel 10 Newsmakers forum with the
other candidates two weeks ago, appears none too swift), and that there are
certain fissures in the Democratic Party, To wit, the current lieutenant
governor, Charlie Fogarty, supported Sheldon Whitebread in the primary.
This indicates to Healey that Myrth's base is not necessarily throwing much
support Fogarty's way. Add to this the fact that the strong Democratic vote
for David Cicilline in the primary is likely to slacken off a bit because of
the assumption that he will triumph anyway (and David's voters are Myrth
supporters), and Healey thinks he could chip away enough for a victory. He is
certainly better known than the Republican and Green Party candidates.
But of course, Bob's entire campaign is based on one issue - entirely
dispensing with the lieutenant governor's office. He promises that he will have
no staff and refuse compensation. On the other hand, Healey is on record as
stating, if you do believe that the lieutenant governor's office is worth
keeping, you could hardly do better than with its current occupant, Charlie
Fogarty, who has been energetic in pursuing a positive agenda. Our take is that
the notion of obliterating the office of LG has not reached critical mass.
People will stick with the popular Fogarty. But we also believe Healey will
come in second and pull some impressive numbers.
Years from now, because of the way he has conducted himself and his campaigns
over the years, Bob Healey will be perceived as a visionary, and his popularity
and support will only grow. But this is probably a moot point because, if Bob
proves true to form, he'll be relaxing on some beach in Uruguay in 2006, rather
than campaigning in the Biggest Little.
Send election insights and Pulitzer-grade tips to p&j[a]phx.com.
Issue Date: October 25 - 31, 2002
