Category: Schadenfreude

GOP Retirements Crippling Fund Raising

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With changes to lobbying rules at the beginning of this yearmaking revolving door payoffs more difficult, the unpleasantness of being the minority party, and the prospect of losing a seat in what was once a safe election, Republican incumbents are retiring in droves, and now it’s reported that this is crippling their fund raising apparatus:

Of the 32 Republicans who have resigned or announced plans to retire, 26 have political action committees known as leadership PACs — which members of Congress typically use to make donations to colleagues facing tough campaigns. Those 26 PACs raised $17 million in the last campaign cycle, but only $5.3 million for this election, a USA TODAY analysis of the latest campaign reports filed in March and April shows.

The bigger picture is that when your fund raising is based on bribery and extortion, which is what Tom Delay’s “K Street Project” was, you can no longer raise money if you lack the power to deliver.

Fee for service also means no fee for no service.

My Apologies, There is a Schadenfreude Shortage, and I Haven’t Mentioned This

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I really should be writing about the travails of New York Republican congressman Vito Fossella, following his arrest for drunk driving while on the way to his mistress, with whom he had fathered a child.

The sane* Republicans in New York, are calling for his resignation, but congressman Peter King, showing that he’s firmly in the nutzo category, is blasting them for, “Putting a knife in the back of a good guy who’s made a mistake.”

Actually, it’s at least two mistakes…heh.

It gets better, because it appears that not only is Vito not resigning, it looks like he has decided to stay in the race for reelection.

*Well, relatively sane…they are Republithugs.

Schadenfreude, National Association of Home Builders Edition

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About 3 months ago, I noted that the NAHB was putting a moratorium on political donations to punish Congress for inaction.

Well, it looks like they are back in the bribe campaign donation business again.

They are claiming that it is because they have a tax credit to lobby on, but in reality I think that it’s because no one in Congress really cared that much.

The lesson to be learned is that members of Congress are less concerned about your donations to them than they about the potential of you donating to their opponent.

Bank of England Governor Blasts Pay and Benefits in Financial Industry

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We’ve been hearing more and more about how the bonuses for short term profits encouraged leverage and risky investments, and now BOE governor Mervyn King has joined the fray:

Mervyn King yesterday laid the blame for the credit crunch squarely at the door of commercial banks, criticising their excessive pay packages and risky lending.

The Bank of England governor also told the Treasury select committee he was unhappy that excessive pay in the City attracted too many young people away from careers elsewhere.

Speaking as data emerged showing that the credit crunch had hit retail sales, consumer confidence and mortgage lending hard, King said he hoped the banks would learn the lessons from the crisis and rein in their pay structures and be more responsible in their lending.

“Banks have come to realise in the recent crisis that they are paying the price for having designed compensation packages which provide incentives that are not, in the long run, in the interests of the banks themselves, and I would like to think that would change,” King said.

Of course, Alan “Bubbles” Greenspan would argue that the pay schemes were innovation, and a good thing.

I am so glad to see him alive to see his reputation melt away like that of the wicked witch of the west in the Wizard of Oz.

Too Batsh&# Insane for the Constitution Party

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Yes, even that merry band of Christofascists have that Alan Keyes just isn’t their type, so instead, they nominated wingnut talk show host Chuck Baldwin for president.

When the Talibaptists eschew the most priminent right wing nut-job in the United States, he disowned his daughter for being gay, you it means that you are either too crazy, or too black for them.

For Mr. Keyes, it’s probably both.

Stupidest F&%$ing Guy on the Planet is Fired

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Yes, Georgetown has decided not to renew Douglas Feith’s contract

Speaking of Iraq, the Georgetown Hoya newspaper last week quoted a student saying she was ‘displeased that university officials have not asked’ former Pentagon undersecretary Douglas Feith’to return to teach next year.’

Asked about Feith’s status, Robert Gallucci, dean of Georgetown’s foreign service school, told us that when Feith was hired — something that caused an uproar among the faculty — it was understood he ‘was on a two-year appointment.’ Any decision not to renew should not be seen as ‘a judgment on his performance,’ Gallucci said, noting that Feith’s students’ ‘course evaluations were really good.’

Good move.

A better one would have been never to hire the son of a bitch.

OK, I’m Beginning to Like This Guy

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About three weeks ago, I expressed admiration for Pope Benedict XVI for bitch slapping Condi Rice by refusing an audience, and now he’s bitch slapping George W. Bush and ODL by refusing to attend a dinner in his honor at the White House.

I think that there are a number of things involved here:

  • He is justifiably upset about the gross disrespect shown John Paul II on his statements on the Iraq war.
  • He feels that Bush and His Evil Minions™ consistently ignored his concerns regarding the violence directed towards Christians in Iraq.
  • He is far savvier on American politics than was JP II, and realizes that Bush is completely toxic, and that any action that might be considered an endorsement of Bush or his Republican party is simply not in the best interest of the church.
  • He realizes that the Republican party is driven largely by right wing Evangelical Christians who at best consider Catholics only marginally Christians.
  • He also realizes that the future of the Catholic Church in the US is Hispanics, and that Bush and/or his allies are implacably hostile towards Hispanic immigration.

I think that he’s much savvier in the ways of the world than his predecessor.

Schadenfreude

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It looks like Senator David Vitter will be called to testify at the DC Madame trial by the defense.

Apparently, Vitter did not do “sex”, just the fantasy service….if reports are true, something involving his wearing a diaper.

BTW, his lawyer is suggesting that he will take the 5th.

For what’s worth, in addition to Vitter, “Randall Tobias, a former senior State Department official, and military strategist Harlan Ullman, the father of the ‘shock and awe’ tactics are also on the list.

Heh.

Mark Penn is a Complete Asshole

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It appears that while Hillary Clinton was condemning the Columbia free trade pact, mark pen, in his capacity as CEO of Burson-Marsteller Worldwide, was having meetings with representatives of the Columbian government in order to lobby for the agreement.

Penn subsequently apologized for this, but the Change to Win union alliance is now demanding that Penn be fired by the Clinton campaign:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, April 4, 2008

CONTACT: Greg Denier
Noreen Nielsen
(202) 721-0660

WASHINGTON, DC – The following is a statement from Change to Win executive director Greg Tarpinian concerning the latest revelation that Hillary Clinton’s chief campaign strategist Mark Penn met Monday with Colombia’s ambassador regarding the Colombia Free Trade Agreement.

“It’s time for Senator Hillary Clinton to send her vaunted ‘chief strategist’ Mark Penn packing — back to his job consulting for union busting corporations and anti-labor governments for good.

“We have questioned Penn’s role in the Clinton campaign in the past for his representation of union busting employers like Cintas. At that time, Penn said there was a wall between him and his firm’s representation of union busters. The latest revelation that Penn — whose firm represents the Colombian government in its effort to secure passage of a so-called free trade agreement — is actively involved in securing its passage in the middle of Senator Clinton’s presidential campaign is outrageous. It also suggests that he has been playing a double role – advising the Senator on what to say to curry Democratic voters and advising the Colombian government on what to say to curry a majority of votes in Congress.

“The vast majority of Americans do not believe that we should be granting preferential trade status to a government that coddles death squads that target union organizers. Colombia remains the most dangerous country in the world for union members, where more than 2,200 workers have been murdered since the 1980s by Colombian death squads for trying to form unions while the government has done nothing to effectively stop the murders. It is time for Penn to go.”

A postscript to all this is that Columbia has now fired Burson-Marsteller Worldwide, saying that, “The Colombian government considers this a lack of respect to Colombians, and finds this response unacceptable.”

Bummer of a birth mark, Hal.

Schadenfreude, the Fredddie Thompson Clown Show Edition

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It appears that Sean Hackbarth, “Co-eCampaign Director, Friends of Fred Thompson, Inc.” is begging for work.

He has a resume up, and his day jobs appear to have been pretty meager, and he did not graduate college (it just says “education”, not degree).

I will say that given that he is around 33, perhaps the infantry would be a good idea.

Not sure if I’m just posting because I didn’t want another chance to write, “Fredddie Thompson Clown Show”.