If You Can't Count On Dave Weigel...

Normally I can count on Dave Weigel (formally of Journolist, now at Slate) to provide an utterly banal bashing of Sarah Palin or some other - OK, any other - Republican.

Today he crosses me up with a very funny media-basher.

Comments

[Thomas Collins]

Happy Birthday, TM. See LUN for my present to you.

[anduril]

I'll laugh with Weigel later. First I'll shake my head in dismay with another Slate regular (and noted anti-Semite), Christopher Hitchens. It seems I wasn't the only one to take note of Netanyahu's brazen shakedown of the US and public humiliation of its hapless president--the first fruits of Eric Cantor's foreign policy:

Israel's Shabbos Goy

Why America will come to regret the craven deal Obama is offering Netanyahu.

Those of us who keep an eye on the parties of God are avid students of the weekly Sabbath sermons of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef. In these and other venues, usually broadcast, this elderly Sephardic ayatollah provides an action-packed diet that seldom disappoints. A few months ago, he favored his devout audience with a classic rant in which he called down curses on the Palestinian Arabs and their leaders, wishing that a plague would come and sweep them all away. Last month, he announced that the sole reason for the existence of gentiles was to perform menial services for Jews: After that, he opined, their usefulness was at an end. A huge hubbub led to his withdrawal of the first of these diatribes. (I would be interested to know if this was on partly theological grounds. After all, the local Palestinians may still have some labor to perform before the divine plan is through with them.) The second sermon, so far as I know, still stands without apology. Why on earth should anybody care about the ravings of this scrofulous medieval figure, who peppers his talk of non-Jews in Palestine with comparisons to snakes, monkeys, and other lesser creations, rather as Hamas and Hezbollah refer to the Jews? Well, one reason is that he is the spiritual leader of the Shas Party, an important member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition. Indeed, two key portfolios, of the Interior and of Construction and Housing, are held by Shas members named Eli Yishai and Ariel Atias.

Yishai recently delighted the Diaspora by saying that only those Jews who converted via the Orthodox route could carry "the Jewish gene." Atias has expressed alarm about the tendency of Israeli Arab citizens to try to live where they please—or "spread," as he phrases it—and has advocated a policy of segregation in housing within Israel proper. He also advocates the segregation by neighborhood of secular from Orthodox Jews, adding that he does not wish his own children to mix with their nonreligious peers. It is Yishai's ministry that is famous for making announcements about new "housing" developments outside Israel itself and in legally disputed territory. Very often, Netanyahu himself has claimed to be taken by surprise at these announcements, which usually involve tense areas of Jerusalem.

...

Now we read that, in return for just 90 days of Israeli lenience on new settlement-building (this brief pause or "freeze" not to include the crucial precincts of East Jerusalem), Netanyahu is being enticed with "a package of security incentives and fighter jets worth $3 billion" and a promise that the United States government would veto any Palestinian counterproposal at the United Nations.
Netanyahu, while graciously considering this offer, was initially reported as being unsure whether he "could win approval for the United States deal from his Cabinet." In other words, we must wait on the pleasure of Rabbi Yosef and Ministers Atias, Yishai, and Lieberman, who have the unusual ability to threaten Netanyahu from his right wing.

This is a national humiliation. Regardless of whether that bunch of clowns and thugs and racists "approve" of the Obama/Clinton grovel offer, there should be a unanimous demand that it be withdrawn.

...

The only mystery is this: Why does the United States acquiesce so wretchedly in its own disgrace at the hands of a virtual client state? A soft version of Rabbi Yosef's contemptuous view of the gentiles is the old concept of the shabbos goy: the non-Jew who is paid a trifling fee to turn out the lights or turn on the stove, or whatever else is needful to get around the more annoying regulations of the Sabbath. How the old buzzard must cackle when he sees the gentiles actually volunteering a bribe to do the lowly work! And lowly it is, involving the tearing-up of international law and U.N. resolutions and election promises, and the further dispossession and eviction of a people to whom we gave our word. This craven impotence will be noticed elsewhere, and by some very undesirable persons, and we will most certainly be made to regret it. For now, though, the shame.

[anduril]

Obama Gives a Pass: TSA Won’t Touch Muslims’ Junk

Thirty-one-year-old John Tyner, a 31-year-old recently unleashed the “Don’t tase me, Bro” moment of airport security. While about to receive a genital check from TSA security, Tyner agreed to a search of non-intimate areas but said, “If you touch my junk, I’ll have you arrested.” However, Muslim women will not have to face such worries. CNSNews.com has reported that Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) — which is frequently tied to domestic terror plots — has been guaranteed that TSA officials will only pat down Muslim women in the head and neck area.

[narciso]

With Weigel, one has to think what's his angle; for writing this .As one of the kids invited to be the Hournolist, he attacks an all too earnest 'modest proposal' by Schoen and Caddell. He leaves out the largest counterintuitive proposal, let's elect a one term Senator with a nihilistic contempt of American institutions, with little accomplishments to his name, but rewarding his allies through abuse of an educational charity; now that's such a crazy notion, no one would take it seriously (sarc)

[sbw]

You mean TM isn't fictitious? Like Charlie on Charlie's Angels? Well then, I suppose he does have birthdays.

Happy Birthday, TM!

[Captain Hate]

I'm not sure about this but I think I'm pleased with the mainstreaming of calling male genitalia "junk".

[Thomas Collins]

I always thought he was the real TM deal, sbw. He posted a nice XMas photo last December of his family and himself. I suppose this whole blog could be a big Karl Rove ruse to discredit Plame and Wilson. :-))

[anduril]

The news has been full of analyses of Obama's failure's in Asia, but the estimable M K Bhadrakumar is full of praise of overall US strategy--with good reason. JOMers would be well advised to attempt to wrap their pea brains around this, rather than further shrinking their mental capacity by watching Sarah Palin on TV:

Obama cleaves Asian rift

United States President Barack Obama's 10-day Asia trip exposed the limits of America's influence, though a short-term setback doesn't add up to the entire story.

"Sometimes because we've [US] gone through a tough couple of years, there's a tendency for us to think that somehow Asia is moving and we're forgotten,'' Obama told the media. "And in fact, I think everywhere in Asia, what I heard from leaders and people is that we are still central, and they want us there."

A meeting of foreign ministers from Russia, India and China on Monday confirms Obama's tidings that the US foothold in Asia is planted on firm ground. With the strengthening of US ties to Russia and India, and the aggravation of tensions in US-China relationship the backdrop in Wuhan, the ancient city on the banks of the Yangtze River, it was the Russia-India-China (RIC) triangle on which fissures were opening up.

Having got into bed over the Russian thought that the three Asian powers have a shared destiny which they should probably mould together, the ministers' 9th meeting was in a fix - like in the love-shack lyric by Noah and the Whale: "I'm a fox trapped in the headlights/And I'm waiting for the tires to spin over me ..."

...

The wheel has come full circle today.

And as they opened their morning newspapers, the lead story was the meeting between Obama and the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at Yokohama on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Obama spoke optimistically about getting US Senate ratification for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.

Thanks to the "reset" with the US, Russia hopes to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2011; the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has invited Russia to join its missile defense project for Europe; and Russia is about to partner NATO in Afghanistan.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said over the weekend that Moscow and NATO may "put an end to the post-Cold War period" at the upcoming summit in Lisbon on Friday. (Obama and Medvedev are scheduled to meet again in Lisbon). Lavrov revealed that the agenda was agreed during NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen's visit to Moscow in the previous week.

The odd man out is China. Again, the Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe is holding a historic summit in December in Kazakhstan, where Beijing is kept out. The Russian involvement with NATO in Afghanistan deprives the Shanghai Cooperation Organization of its gravitas.

What may hurt China most is that the US is rolling back the Caspian energy rivalries. The prospects for the South Stream and Nord Stream gas pipelines have brightened. Russia is assuming long-term obligations as energy supplier to the European market. Conversely, Moscow will be in no tearing hurry to find alternate Chinese markets for energy exports. The Russian-Bulgarian agreement on Friday on South Stream enables the project to take off ahead of schedule - Washington is applying brakes on Sofia no more.

The reset caught China by surprise. Chinese commentators were sanguine until recently that it was unworkable. But the reset vindicates Obama's belief that the preservation of American power is best achieved by jettisoning his predecessor's "unilateralism".

...

[Sue]

Ah, but no editor wants columns that make obvious points!

He should know.

[Abadman]

I don't know this seems as banal as most of his stuff. He could have substituted some of his own greatest hits as examples. That might have been funny. As it is he displays a distinct lack of self awareness

[MayBee]

At least Weigel is still defending Obama!

[Clarice]

Abadman has a point.

At the SF Examiner Mark Hemingway notes that in his review of Fair Game, Roger Ebert makes a fantastic claim of the damage caused by Plame's "outing". I sent in a blog offering him a $100 bet if he could substantiate it. my winnings to go to the Libby defense fund.

http://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/retired-cia-officer-quit-saying-the-valarie-plame-leak-was-a-big-deal-already-108219474.html#ixzz15SqXYJmq>Details on Ebert's flopperoo

[Captain Hate]

Fat Egbert will never take that bet, Clarice; although I salute you for calling him out on his witless howlers. When Gene Siskel died, so did the IQ of Siskel & Ebert.

[narciso]

Considering that Mr. Pound took charge of the program, he's in a better perspective than some VIPer, what a actually occurred. THen again they didn't go after Vest, for burning
Rodriguez and Foggo, I know rhetorical question

[lyle]

"Gene Siskel died"

Gene Siskel died?!? And here I thought Ebert ingested him whole.

[Jack is Back!]

If that is the best Weigel can do then bgates has a terrific career ahead of him just here at JOM comments section.

And Clarice, if he won't accept the bet then introduce him to Rachel Maddow, they are made for each other.

[The Junk Yard Dog.]

You don't mess around with Slim.
========

[Danube of Thought]

A world indoor record: scrolled past three asshole posts out of the first seven on the thread.

[Dave (in MA)]

Cigar Shover Update

http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/1530/billclintonm.jpg>

http://www.bostonherald.com/entertainment/lifestyle/view/20101116bill_clintons_hangover_pains_all_of_us/>"The jokes just write themselves."

[Clarice]

Blog's still not up. If/when it is I'll email it to Ebert to make sure he doesn't miss out on this great opportunity to put his money where his big mouth is.

[Frau Reisetante]

Q, not all pea brains are equal!

BTW I read Hitchens yesterday. A link is truly the best gift to fellow citizens.

[Frau Reisetante]

"Stumping for the Democrats."
The first sentence had to be read several times to make sure, MarkO.

[Captain Hate]

Cigar Shover Update

Clinton is complete trash; once you realize that everything he does makes sense.

[daddy]

Well at least Weigel is still getting twitters from his girlfriend transplanted to the Aleutians, so when all else fails he can still fall back on his love life:
alexgutierrez">http://twitter.com/alexgutierrez">alexgutierrez

[jorgxmckie]

Mildly funny, at best.

[Mitch H.]

Weigel thinks that Bloomberg has the slightest chance in hell of being any sort of spoiler in the 2012 primaries? I've never paid much attention to him in the past, but good lord, that's the mindset of someone who never sets foot outside of the Beltway or the New York City limits without putting on a pith helmet & a thick coat of mosquito repellent.

[Dave (in MA)]

I think it's much more likely he gets primaried like Carter and LBJ were, by someone from a Democrat political dynasty, which in this case would be Hillary.

[David Weigel]

Thanks!