Perfunction

BREAKING Kennedy News

Still deceased. Repeat. The Lion of Chappaquiddick is still deceased. Be sure to stay tuned as this rapidly changing story evolves.

RIP: Ted Kennedy

Dead at 77.

Aside from my oblique blue dot reference to the strong strain of misogyny (including Ted's chivalrous, knightly heroics at Chappaquiddick) that coursed through the Kennedy bloodline, I won't speak ill of the dead. Indeed, here is Ted Kennedy's finest moment:

BREAKING IMPORTANT UPDATE: yep, still dead.

MUST READ UPDATE, BREAKING FAST: No longer alive. Repeat: No. Longer. Alive. Check back for further shocking updates as the MSM keeps us abreast of this rapidly developing story over the next week.

Flag@whitehouse.gov Snitch Line Quietly Shut Down

With no explanation nor post at the White House blog where it was launched with great fanfare, the flag@whitehouse.gov snitch line has been quietly terminated. Here's the bounce I received:

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification

Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently:

    flag@whitehouse.gov

Technical details of permanent failure:
Google tried to deliver your message, but it was rejected by the recipient domain. We recommend contacting the other email provider for further information about the cause of this error. The error that the other server returned was: 550 550 5.2.1 <flag@whitehouse.gov>... The email address you just sent a message to is no longer in service.We are now accepting your feedback about health insurance reform via: http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck (state 14).

So while the opportunity to rat your neighbors out to the White House via email has disappeared, you can still snitch via a web form.

Also in symetrically ironic news, after being accused of THE worst trangression against internet users, the White House also has adjusted its outbound email policies --- we're not spammers!!1!one! --- after a 100% pure non-astroturf, unsolicited email from David Axelrod got spammed far and wide by eager supporters of the President:

1. Does the WH spam any communication for any purpose. If not, does it follow a specific policy - either internal or external (meaning statute) - that guides adherence to the no spam policy?

Answered in the quote: We only email addresses received through whitehouse.gov. Our operating guidance is the privacy policy published on the website.

2. How does the WH enforce or monitor adherence to its no spam policy?

As the quote said, We are implementing measures to make subscribing to emails clearer, including preventing advocacy organizations from signing people up to our lists without their permission when they deliver petition signatures and other messages on individual’s behalf. 

After being hailed as the most Internet savvy White House since Al Gore created the damned thing, the Obama White House sure is flubbing the most basic Internet conventions --- respecting privacy and not spamming. Way to go, Macon Phillips!

(h/t: Drudge and memeorandum)

UPDATE: Welcome, Forgotten Man and doubleplusundead. Ace thinks these two email snafus are directly related.

UPDATE (8-18-09): Macon Phillips responds on the White House blog --- yeah, we're amateur spammers (sorry-move-along-nothing-to-see-here):

It has come to our attention that some people may have been subscribed to our email lists without their knowledge –- likely as a result of efforts by outside groups of all political stripes -– and we regret any inconvenience caused by receiving an unexpected message.

and you guys are still a bunch of evil-mongerers:

An ironic development is that the launch of an online program meant to provide facts about health insurance reform has itself become the target of fear-mongering and online rumors that are the tactics of choice for the defenders of the status quo.

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Video: "Hello, Barry..." --- Obama, Healthcare & the Post Office

Picking up where my photoshop left off:

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Obama: Govt-Run Post Office "Has Problems"; Govt-Run Healthcare? "Stop Talking"

"Hello, Barry."

Wow. At his town hall in New Hampshire today, Obama deployed conservatives' all-time favorite example of government ineptitude --- the United State Postal Service --- as an example of how public and private enterprises can peacefully co-exist:

He also disputed the notion that adding a government-run insurance plan into a menu of options from which people could pick would drive private insurers out of business, in effect making the system single-payer by default.

As long as they have a good product and the government plan has to sustain itself through premiums and other non-tax revenue, private insurers should be able to compete with the government plan, Obama said.

"They do it all the time," he said. "UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. ... It's the Post Office that's always having problems."

(h/t/: Ace)

UPDATE: Video of this wonderful, Biden-esque gaffe here.

SEIU Sends Orders To "Drown Out Their Voices" ... Down The Memory Hole. UPDATE: SEIU Still "Un-American"

Organizing For America, Five Dollar Footlongs

Soon after Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer took things to DEFCON 1 this morning...:

Drowning out opposing views is simply un-American.

... Mary Katharine Ham scooped hard with this quote from the SEIU's website:

Action: Opponents of reform are organizing counter-demonstrators to speak at this and several congressional town halls on the issue to defend the status quo. It is critical that our members with real, personal stories about the need for access to quality, affordable care come out in strong numbers to drown out their voices.

Its patriotism questioned and its organization viciously slurred as un-American by Pelosi & Hoyer, SEIU issued a full-throated demand for an immediate, public apology meekly deleted the verboten phrase:

Action: Opponents of reform are organizing counter-demonstrators to speak at this and several congressional town halls on the issue to defend the status quo. It is critical that our members with real, personal stories about the need for access to quality, affordable care come out in strong numbers to counter their voices.

Predicting this cowardly about face, MKH made sure to get a screen grab of the original SEIU call to action.

Courage.

UPDATE (8-11-09): While the above example occurred on an SEIU local chapter website, Jon Henke helpfully pointed me to two more unscrubbed instances of SEIU calling for "drowning" out the town hall protesters, this time on SEIU's main official blog. Oops.

First, an SEIU blogger implores:

Come to his townhall; show up early. Wave signs, wear t-shirts & buttons. Most of all, tell your stories. Standing together, we will drown out the enemies of reform. We will send a message that, for the general welfare of America, health care reform must happen this year. (screen shot)

In an ironically titled --- and looong --- blog post (Your Guide to Corporate Astroturfing: Lobbyist-Run Groups Orchestrating...), SEIU's Kate Thomas says in the last paragraph:

Playing politics with health reform is simply unacceptable. We must fight back against lies and fear-mongering to drown out the opposition--and send the message that health care reform must happen this year. (screen shot)

So you SEIU guys are still "un-American" by Pelosi/Hoyer's lights. Perhaps you should clobber them or something. SEIU SMASH!

Or just airbrush it away.

UPDATE: Welcome Ace & HotAir headlines, Driscoll and Moe Lane.

Dissent Is The Highest Form Of Patriotism ... Sometimes

With Pelosi & Hoyer's recent launching of the nuclear "Un-American" slur, Jonah Goldberg gives us a reminder of "patriotic protests" from the recent past with a link to zombie. While Jonah's examples are repugnant in their own special way, this one captures the trifecta of recent Democrat caterwauling in one handy composition:

Hitler --- check:

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs responded to the emotionally charged rhetoric on Friday, saying that “any time anyone ventures to compare anything to [the Holocaust], they’re on thin ice and it’s best not deployed.”

Effigy --- check:

[Peolsi & Hoyer] singled out the hanging in effigy of Rep. Frank Kratovil (D-Md.)

Noose --- check:

Obama is in white face, his mouth (like Ledger's Joker's) has been grotesquely slit wide open and the word "Socialism" appears below his face. The only thing missing is a noose.

(h/t: recent fellow Wolcott target, Cold Fury)

Democrat Leaders Pelosi & Hoyer Pacify Town Hall Protestors, Seek Calm & Understanding

Hugs.

Realizing that inflamed passions on both sides of the health care issue could erupt in violence at any minute, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer urge everyone to take a deep breath, step away, and calm down:

The dialogue between elected representatives and constituents is at the heart of our democracy and plays an integral role in assuring that the legislation we write reflects the genuine needs and concerns of the people we represent. In the spirit of democratic debate, we urge everyone to respect the views of their opponents and refrain from unnecessary escalation with charges of "Nazism" and the ugly questioning of your neighbor's patriotism.

I keed; that last sentence is mine. No, Pelosi and Hoyer know how to really calm protestors down --- by calling them Un-American in USA Today:

These disruptions are occurring because opponents are afraid not just of differing views — but of the facts themselves. Drowning out opposing views is simply un-American. Drowning out the facts is how we failed at this task for decades.

Health care is complex. It touches every American life. It drives our economy. People must be allowed to learn the facts. Which is why we attempted to railroad it through Congress.

There I go again.

But really, after a relatively calm weekend, they pull this crap on a Monday? In USA Today? Hello, news cycle domination. Good work.

UPDATE: Welcome, National Review and HotAir. Here's President Obama keeping the rhetoric calm and soothing (video).

UPDATE: Even Democrats are disgusted by Pelosi and Hoyer's over-the-line invective:

But throwing around the term "un-American" in the pages of a major paper? Do we really need to use the kind of language that Bush's supporters hurled at Iraq war protesters?

Of course we don't. It's wrong.

And

Steny, Nancy…do know this…if health care passes it’s in spite of you, not because of you. At nearly every turn you’ve chosen to take a hacky, partisan road and it’s simply maddening to watch. You could have been the better people in this debate, but you apparently either don’t know how or don’t care.

I am officially embarrassed by and for my party today.

Sensing blood in the water, Media Matters is scrambling to protect Pelosi & Hoyer. Of course in their desperation, Media Matters conveniently fails to state the title of the radioactive USA Today op-ed:

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Video: Obama: What If?

My latest creation:

Feel free to embed & spread.

UPDATE: Welcome, Don Surber readers.

Meanwhile, Back To The Thing That Started All This

Geoff's Famous Chart (July 2009)

August's town hall fury grew directly from the Tea Parties of April, which in turn were prompted by the pork-filled $787 billion stimulus that was first and foremost sold as an emergency job creation bill by Obama.

Casting the stimulus as an, er, employment stimulator was so important to Obama's team, they did what smarter economists hardly ever do: Christina Romer and friends put it all down on a handy chart, right there in blue and white. Here's what you get with the stimulus, and here's what happens if you reject our awesomeness --- choose wisely, peasants. The stimulus passed with zero Republican votes.

And now geoff has a monthly project plotting unemployment Reality against Hopenchange that will keep him employed the next 3 years.

In a move that a more experienced chief executive could plainly see was fraught with the tragicomedy of giving legislators a blank check backed by Treasury's printing press, President Awesome-O outsourced the stimulus bill writing to the Democrat Congress. Lesson not learned, he's doing it again with health care reform.

Unfortunately, Obama burned up all of his honeymoon goodwill and attendant political capital on the stimulus turd:

Honeymoons always end. But it is fair to ask: What did Obama use this initial period of unique standing and influence to achieve? It will seem strange to history, and probably, eventually, to Obama himself, that the president's main expenditure of political capital and largest legislative achievement was a $787 billion stimulus package he did not design and that ended up complicating the rest of his policy agenda. Such a pleasant honeymoon -- yet all we got was this lousy stimulus bill.

Hello, Tea Parties.

But hey, we were repeatedly told the Tea Parties were no biggie and would soon peter out once the trogloditic Right got their spleens thoroughly vented. Here's the attractive James Wolcott --- reader of 4, count 'em, 4 daily newspapers, he squeakily trumpets --- completely discounting the Tea Parties even as frontpage after frontpage after frontpage are held in front of his fat face:

At the time, bloggers ridiculed Wolcott not just for his fastidious aura, but for his Bush-like intransigence on giving the Tea Parties any recognition even after the C-SPAN anchor's montage of frontpages. "Does that change your view at all," she asked. "No, no," Wolcott sputtered.

But watching it again today, I especially like Wolcott's analysis on how woefully unorganized the Tea Parties were:

Frankly, it looked like a kind of ad hoc photo-op. You had a lot of people holding up signs for the cameras. There didn't seem to be any real organization. You know, the conservatives like to mock MoveOn.org and, you know, other organizations. But, yeah, there's a reason organizational efforts work. Because for one thing they provide follow through and continuity. And what I saw yesterday [Tax Day], I thought, this is not going to strike fear into anybody.

Wolcott doubled-down on his own blog:

The Tea Parties play to a very restricted, undynamic constituency, one that I can't see evolving beyond a loose confederacy of the disgruntled.

Amazingly, a few months later the Tea Parties cum townhall protests are now just too darned organized (or as Nancy Pelosi would prefer, Über-organized) what with their planning memos and puppetmasters. How'd that happen, James?

All because of the stimulus --- and the Democrats are now scared shitless.

Video: Obama To Opponents: "Get Out Of The Way ... Don't Do A Lot Of Talking"

Full gallery here. If you're late to the game, here's the background on Obama's flag@whitehouse.gov snitch line.

Our President responds to his opponents: "get out of the way ... don't do a lot of talking"

Digging deeper and deeper... He just cannot pry himself out of campaign mode. It'll be his undoing.

UPDATE: Welcome, doubleplusundead and Innocent Bystanders.

UPDATE: Ed Driscoll's quote of the day:

“I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration somehow you’re not patriotic. We should stand up and say we are Americans and we have a right to debate and disagree with any administration.”

– Then senator (D-NY), nee-First Lady, now Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in 2003

UPDATE: My own video addition to this unraveling of Hopenchange.

Pelosi, The Rent-A-Nazi Strategy & The Stench Of Fear

Jonah Goldberg on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's awesomely consistent logic:

Nancy Pelosi, who will get her own bound volume in the annals of asininity, has outdone herself. When asked by a reporter whether the protests at various town-hall meetings represented legitimate grassroots opposition or were manufactured “AstroTurf” stunts, she replied, “I think they’re AstroTurf. You be the judge. They’re carrying swastikas and symbols like that to a town meeting on health care.”

Now this is a pas de trois of dishonesty, slander, and idiocy. Not only is Pelosi lying when she says protesters are bringing swastikas to these town halls, not only is she suggesting that American citizens are Nazis for having the effrontery to get in the way of Obamacare, but she’s also saying that the alleged swastikas are obvious proof that these protests are manufactured by slick P.R. gurus.

How does that work? What public-relations genius says: “Okay, we need these protests to seem like an authentic backlash of real Americans. Make sure everyone has enough Nazi paraphernalia!”

When their own talking points start contradicting each other --- in the same breath, no less --- you know they're severely rattled.

Peggy Noonan, forever floating along on whatever is the strongest current at the moment (she was among the nominally conservative doe-eyed Obama acolytes during the magical First 100 Days), gets her groove back. Echoing Goldberg, Noonan smells the stench of fear on the Democrats:

The leftosphere and the liberal commentariat charged that the town hall meetings weren’t authentic, the crowds were ginned up by insurance companies, lobbyists and the Republican National Committee. But you can’t get people to leave their homes and go to a meeting with a congressman (of all people) unless they are engaged to the point of passion. And what tends to agitate people most is the idea of loss—loss of money hard earned, loss of autonomy, loss of the few things that work in a great sweeping away of those that don’t.

People are not automatons. They show up only if they care.

She also touches on Obama's snitch line, flag@whitehouse.gov:

But most damagingly to political civility, and even our political tradition, was the new White House email address to which citizens are asked to report instances of “disinformation” in the health-care debate: If you receive an email or see something on the Web about health-care reform that seems “fishy,” you can send it to flag@whitehouse.gov. The White House said it was merely trying to fight “intentionally misleading” information.

...

All of this is unnecessarily and unhelpfully divisive and provocative. They are mocking and menacing concerned citizens. This only makes a hot situation hotter. Is this what the president wants? It couldn’t be. But then in an odd way he sometimes seems not to have fully absorbed the awesome stature of his office. You really, if you’re president, can’t call an individual American stupid, if for no other reason than that you’re too big. You cannot allow your allies to call people protesting a health-care plan “extremists” and “right wing,” or bought, or Nazi-like, either. They’re citizens. They’re concerned. They deserve respect.

"Unnecessarily and unhelpfully divisive and provocative." Exactly. Allahpundit gives Democrats a helpful reminder:

Let me remind you again: They can pass any bill they want any time they want. Conservatives can scream their heads off at these things and there’s not an ounce of good it’ll do if Democrats are united.

...

The cowardice they’re showing in not wanting to face their constituents is actually obscuring the deeper cowardice of the the party stalling on a landmark bill they finally have the numbers to pass for no better reason than that doing so will jeopardize their hold on power next year. They want ObamaCare and they want their permanent majority, and if the only way they can get both is by calling conservatives Nazis then that’s what they’re a-gonna do.

Get out of your reflexive thrust-and-parry campaign mode, Mr. Obama. Persuade. I'll stop calling you a Nazi if you stop calling me one. Oh, and maybe shut down the Anne Frank snitch line. Discarding an actual Gestapo tactic might very well keep people from going all Godwin on you like I did. Crazy, I know.

You Just Made The List, Buddy

Lighten Up, Francis Barack

Wonderful. Because of a jokey protest email sent to flag@whitehouse.gov, I am now in a permanent dissident database, according to the lawyers on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Byron York reports:

Senate Judiciary Committee lawyers studying the proposal say that although there is no absolutely settled law on the matter, the White House plan is likely not covered by the Privacy Act, which prohibits government agencies from keeping any records "describing how any individual exercises rights guaranteed by the First Amendment unless expressly authorized by statue or by the individual about whom the record is maintained."  Therefore, it appears the White House can legally keep records of the emails and other communications it receives in response to Phillips' request.

...

"So the White House, whether by design or accident, has requested information from the public that will become 'records' under the Presidential Records Act, yet would be impermissible for any government to otherwise collect under the Privacy Act," writes one Judiciary Committee source.  "Where were the lawyers in all of this?  What is their legal basis for authorizing the collection of these records?"

No wonder Cornyn blasted out his letter to Obama.

UPDATE: Welcome, National Review and AOSHQ.

For the record, I'm not completely freaked out by the White House having my IP address permanently in a database. Because I know the more I post flag@whitehouse.gov here and around the web, the more robo site-crawling spambots will join me on the enemies list. The White House hates re-financed boner pills from Nigerian governments-in-exile. That address again: flag@whitehouse.gov

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Must Read: MKH Uncovers The Town Hall Puppetmaster!

Smoking Jacket by Brooks Brothers

The ultimate ringleader of the "manufactured" Brooks Brothers-clad mobs that the Left and MSNBC (but I repeat myself) are using to somehow discredit the tsunami of popular opposition to ObamaCare has finally been unmasked by Mary Katharine Ham --- tremble before his raw power!:

Right Principles PAC was formed by Bob MacGuffie and four friends in 2008, and has taken in a whopping $5,017 and disbursed $1,777, according to its FEC filing.

"We're just trying to shake this state up and make a difference up here," MacGuffie told me during a telephone interview. He's surprised at his elevation to national rabble-rouser by the Left.

Right Principles has a Facebook group with 23 members and a Twitter account with five followers. MacGuffie describes himself as an "opponent of leftist thinking in America," and told me he's "never pulled a lever" for a Republican or Democrat on a federal level. Yet this Connecticut libertarian's influence over a national, orchestrated Republican health-care push-back is strong, indeed, if you listen to liberal pundits and the Democratic National Committee, who have crafted a nefarious web out of refutable evidence.

Hell, I'm not even on Twitter and I probably have five followers. In spirit. But one day soon, I hope to learn the secret handshake to gain admittance to his awesome treehouse club and/or couch pillow fort. Then --- and only then --- will I be ready to attend my first town hall. That and some sweet, sweet K Street cash.

Read the whole thing to learn how Think Progress itself "manufactured" this budding leader, propelling his nefarious memo into a starring role in DNC commercials and a special segment on Rachel Maddow's show (crap, there I go again with the repetition).

Sounds like someone is disseminating disinformation about healthcare reform --- brb!

(h/t: memeorandum)

UPDATE: Right Wing Nuthouse unloads on the other manufacturer of manufactured news about manufactured mobs, Joshua Ezekiel Micah Isaiah Marshall:

There is no “memo” that tells protestors what to do. If anyone else besides this guys mother, grandmother, and maiden aunt saw this “blueprint” I would be enormously surprised. It was a wholly manufactured piece of “evidence” - along with the ridiculously tenuous connections - by TPM.

Josh Marshall bragged to high heaven about the George Polk Award for journalism he received. I am going to write the award committee and ask them to rescind it. This isn’t even yellow journalism. It is propaganda, as Marshall and the rest of the left (who are, in fact, the ones who receive instructions on a daily basis about how to frame issues through their exclusive email list) can’t be bothered with the facts, can’t be bothered with the truth, and are only concerned about demonstrating their rank partisanship and shocking demagoguery.

UPDATE (8-6-08): Related, Philip Klein writes about the lefty bloggers pushing the "it's all astroturf!" ... who recently enjoyed a freaking health care strategy teleconference with the President.

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Subject: Fishy Neighbors (possibly insurance execs)

Achtung! Do you know this girl? Report her to the White House.

ABOVE THE FOLD UPDATE (8-7-09): Don't even bother reading this post. "Shut up," he explained.

(original post starts here)

The creepiness of the Obama Administration reaches a new low, with its official White House blog recruiting snitches:

Opponents of health insurance reform may find the truth a little inconvenient, but as our second president famously said, "facts are stubborn things."

Scary chain emails and videos are starting to percolate on the internet, breathlessly claiming, for example, to "uncover" the truth about the President’s health insurance reform positions.

...Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

Of course, I fire off an email for inclusion in the White House's new micro-blogging app, Snitcher:

Subject: Fishy neighbors (possibly insurance execs)

Hello White House bloggers,
 
I recently overheard several neighbors talking about how much they opposed President Obama's historic health insurance reform initiative. I think one of them works for Blue Cross. Is this where I report them?
 
Keep up the great work,
Cuffy Meigs

(h/t to Ace commenter Rob Crawford for the "is this where I report them?" part. Original post at whitehouse.gov here --- don't worry, it's been screen-grabbed for posterity)

UPDATE: Welcome, Jawas, STACLU, Ace of Spades HQ and Nice Deb. I know, I know ... you really got here via some K Street health insurance lobbyist payola, not by links from those so-called "blogs". You filthy automaton whores.

UPDATE (8-5-09): Sen. John Cornyn fires off his own letter to President Obama:

"I am not aware of any precedent for a president asking American citizens to report their fellow citizens to the White House for pure political speech that is deemed 'fishy' or otherwise inimical to the White House's political interests," John Cornyn of Texas wrote US President Barack Obama.

"As Congress debates health care reform and other critical policy matters, citizen engagement must not be chilled by fear of government monitoring the exercise of free speech rights," he wrote.

"I can only imagine the level of justifiable outrage had your predecessor asked Americans to forward emails critical of his policies to the White House," Cornyn wrote, referring to former president George W. Bush.

"I suspect that you would have been leading the charge in condemning such a program -- and I would have been at your side denouncing such heavy-handed government action," he wrote.

View Cornyn's full letter here (PDF). He's calling for Obama to terminate the flag@whitehouse.gov snitch program:

So I urge you to cease this program immediately. At the very least, I request that you detail to Congress and the public the protocols that your White House is following to purge the names, email addresses, IP addresses, and identities of citizens who are reported to have engaged in "fishy" speech. And I respectfully request an answer to the following:

• How do you intend to use the names, email addresses, IP addresses, and identities of citizens who are reported to have engaged in "fishy" speech?
• How do you intend to notify citizens who have been reported for "fishy" speech?
• What action do you intend to take against citizens who have been reported for "fishy" speech?

Way to go, Macon Phillips!

UPDATE: James Wolcott at Vanity Fair links --- JABBA-LANCHE!

Frankly Appalling

That some of the more rageaholic in the right blogosphere would revel in racist demonology comes as no surprise.

But I would have thought that even in those fevered precincts, no one would be so ghoulishly avid to score a polemical point as to exploit the image of Holocaust martyr Anne Frank. Obviously, I was wrong.

Oh, please. Save it, Jabba.

Of course, Wolcott wishes he could ascribe the racist rageaholic label to yours truly as well. But because I had the temerity to put the klieg lights on the Gestapo tactics of the Obama Administration ---- hello, snitching on your neighbor --- he simply cannot.

Instead, Wolcott feigns indignation at my use of the MOST FAMOUS VICTIM OF SNITCHING IN WORLD HISTORY to make my point.

Vanderleun, also targeted by the readers of this bloated tic of faux outrage, points out in the comments below the ironies of ironies for Wolcott and his gang of cat fanciers:

August 4th was the 65th anniversary of the betrayal of Anne Frank

On the morning of 4 August 1944, the Achterhuis was stormed by the German Security Police (Grüne Polizei) following a tip-off from an informer who was never identified.

As fate would have it (and it must only be Fate since the WH folks are not that dumb. Are they?), the flag@whitehouse.gov rat line was announced on

TUESDAY, AUGUST 4TH, 2009 AT 6:55 AM The White House - Blog Post - Facts Are Stubborn Things There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can't keep track of all of them here at the White House, we're asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

All of which is only to note, once again, that history, like nature, bats last.

In the end, Wolcott is simply upset because he so spectacularly blew it when it came to his commentary on the Tea Parties last April --- and these town hall protests are their direct progeny. Blew. It.

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Ex-Prez Clinton In North Korea: What Could Go Wrong?

Big Kim, Lil Kim & Prez Malaise (1994)

The last time a Democrat ex-President visited the Hermit Kingdom, he royally screwed up the sitting President's foreign policy --- essentially giving the Norks the Bomb. Who knows what will happen this time:

North Korean officials told relatives that the government would release the women to Clinton, a Washington source told POLITICO.

The Politico editor is either asleep at the switch ... or a frickin' comedic genius.