Why don’t we just put a template for this story on a macro on standard newsroom computer systems? You could plug in the details, and it would really save a lot of time.
UPDATE: This blog will be respecting Owen Wilson’s request for privacy at this difficult time. Please, do not discuss Mr. Wilson’s personal problems in the comments. General comments about Wilson’s career choices, performances and other public statements, as well as statements of support, are just fine, however. Let the healing begin.
MarkH said on August 28, 2007 at 12:50 am
HA! And I actually wondered earlier this evening, as I perused this story online, not whether, but how long it would take Nancy to post about Larry Craig. Let’s log on…Could it be…? YES!
Up late, exceeding my expectations…
This is not a dig, Nance, just an observation. Not that I have any sympathy for the, um, esteemed senator (his family, maybe). Yes, some of these guys really know how to step into it, don’t they?
Ooh; bad pun.
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alex said on August 28, 2007 at 6:25 am
Disorderly conduct? Never heard it called that before. I’d say the Senator got off easy.
Ooh, another bad pun.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 7:23 am
It still always surprises me that folks try to go for the gusto in such romantic hot-spots as public bathrooms…if it was customary for men and women to use the same public facilities, and if I went into one in which Elle McPherson (or her look-alike) was in a stall – would I try and hit on her THEN and THERE?
What if she really was ‘doing her business’? Or – is there some subtle set of signals that practitioners exchange, and that others do not?
I recall visiting the restroom at the airport in Orlando, and a fellow in a nice suit had Mr Happy out and somewhat plainly visible, two stations over. So, with my (mental) caution flags out, I completed my stop-and-go, and washed my hands, and exited, and that guy seemingly never did his business. Pam laughed at me when I told her, saying that I’m a nut…and indeed, I could be all wet (so to speak), but that guy came to mind when I read about the hapless senator
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Kirk said on August 28, 2007 at 8:16 am
A haiku I found:
One more bathroom sting
Nabs one more G.O.P. queen.
Black man not present.
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 8:23 am
I’m indebted to Roy for parsing the wingnut reaction to the Craig story, but this one may be the best:
Are we actually paying undercover police officers to stake out airport bathrooms on the off-chance they might be solicited by someone looking for sex? Maybe I’m just a naive rube from fly-over country, but since when has that been a priority?
Yes, a naive rube from flyover country.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 8:26 am
Well, if you read this morning’s WSJ and saw the article about a very modest address in San Francisco, from whence hundreds of thousands of dollars have flowed into HRC’s campaign coffers, then this haiku will make sense
Problem with Chinese
is that just eight years later
Clinton still wants more
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 8:28 am
You need another syllable in the second line, Brian. Try again.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 8:29 am
I was fixing that just as you pointed it out!
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 8:35 am
How can you expect
to say something profound in
seventeen sylla
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Kim said on August 28, 2007 at 8:42 am
Great idea to put the Craig story on a newsroom macro. I’ve known reporters who write in what I call the “madlibs” style of journalism, using their little templates for every sort of story and inserting new names, car makes/models/colors and the like.
Another idea is to do a macro for the folo that apparently never occurred outside blogs, despite MEs’ statements that their papers were gonna get right on it. They were probably too busy.
Love the haiku, Nance. Did John from Cincy speak in haiku?
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MichaelG said on August 28, 2007 at 9:00 am
There have been stories about Craig floating around for some time. Including supposed events in a DC train station washroom. That’s the part I cannot understand. What’s with restrooms? I’m sure that disgust at these kinds of encounters is a component of anti gay sentiment. There are gay guys all around. If you want to get together with someone it’s easy to do so. I repeat: What’s with restrooms?
And by the way, part of Roy’s appeal is his great commenters. They never fail to make me laugh.
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 9:19 am
The haiku’s not mine, but I’ll happily accept credit for it.
If you want to read a great post/comment thread, this is the one, although you also have to watch the clip first. I was snickering all morning yesterday.
As for the restroom thing, I should probably leave that one for the experts. But I will say this: If women and men were wired the same, sexually, restrooms would have beds in every stall.
And finally, I’m glad to see so many of you are respecting Owen Wilson’s privacy. Let’s keep up the good work.
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ashley said on August 28, 2007 at 9:24 am
Somewhere, I have a pic of me shaking Craig’s hand, back when I was a prof at the U of Idaho. I need to dig that out.
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garmoore said on August 28, 2007 at 9:45 am
There’s a fairly comprehensive article on Craig in this morning’s Idaho Statesman. Apparently the rumors about his sexual orientation go back to his college days. This latest incident won’t make the rumors go away.
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Dorothy said on August 28, 2007 at 9:46 am
Poor, poor Owen. I read somewhere that he was distraught over breaking up with Kate Hudson recently, and then she was seen kissing some other guy in a coffee shop. The pressure these stars are under, I’m telling you!!! How do they cope?!?
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 10:10 am
There’s the Kate Hudson thing (I broke up her marriage for her and nows she’s boffing someone named Dax) but I think it’s more the realization that he is 38 and he keeps playing the same cute doofus. He even writes cute doofus parts for himself. You, Me and Dupree? Crap.
Speaking of crappy movies, I saw one that is right up there with Last Kiss. I only lasted 35 minutes into it, though. Just Like Heaven. So bad. There is actually a scene where Reese Witherspoon’s acting sounded like something from the senior class play. It made us crave the brilliance of Enough.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 10:13 am
Ashley, you need to wash your hands too.
Hey, for the wingnut who was wondering why the cop was there, maybe it was the cop from the Village People.
Dorothy, I see that you are NOT respecting the Butterscotch Stallion’s privacy. I sense the healing is beginning.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 10:19 am
Well, Mary – we just watched Perfect Stranger, which is a silly sort of remix of Sandra Bullock’s old “Scarey internet” movie (whatever it was called), with pretensions of being more sophisticated.
But it DOES have Hallie Barry (spelling?) – so we stuck with it. One sure sign that a movie is not well crafted is when you get to the last 10 minutes and one character is tasked with talking to another, and verbally explaining very twist in the plot. In this one, that patch-patch-patch scene went on for a good 5 minutes.
Feh
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 10:26 am
Some friends brought over Perfect Stranger this weekend. We dodged that bullet because I had already rented something else.
The Net. I think that is the Sandra Bullock movie.
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Peter said on August 28, 2007 at 10:33 am
What really ticks me off about the whole Craig issue is the hypocrisy that to me at least seems to be off the charts these days.
If I liked men, or little boys, I wouldn’t keep talking about protecting marriage and family values.
Slightly off subject – I read where Ted Nugent recently ripped into Barack Obama and Hillary regarding their anti-Iraq stands, but Mr. Nugent is widely known for crapping in his pants at the Induction Center to get out of going to Vietnam. It just gets me so angry that people who ran away when it was their turn at the plate become so strident when it’s not their problem anymore. What the hell ever happened to discretion? Did it ever occur to anyone of these clowns to think “you know, I’m not one to talk…”
And speaking of not being one to talk, I’ll go public – I just missed getting the draft notice, and I’m sure I would have done a student deferral. I was going to type more, but I think you can guess where this conversation is going…
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 10:40 am
The Nuge has to say something to get people to pay attention to him, as his faithful audience is now 90 percent deaf, thanks to his shitty music.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 10:50 am
The Nuge was my first concert. I was 14 or 15. For about 4 months I had a huge poster of him in my room and thought he was the greatest guitarist ever. Then I heard Steve Howe of Yes and down came the Nuge’s poster, into the trash can.
I now own a 1953 Martin 00-18 that is 14 serial numbers away from Steve’s own 00-18 of the same vintage. There is a good chance that it was made by the same luthier.
Peter, though I have held him in low esteem for a long time, the revelation about the draft dodging, if true, is a new low.
Nancy, what did you think of Ted’s timeless romantic classic, “Wang Dang, Sweet Poontang?” I’m sure it is a great prom or wedding song by now.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 10:53 am
Actually, There are only two songs I like of his these days that occassionally find place in my biking mp3’s: Stranglehold and Storm Troopin’. The Double Live Gonzo versions.
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 10:54 am
The most Republican member of my family, the one who gives a lot of money and time to the party and is the most in line with W’s vision thing, is believed to be gay by the rest of the family. We’ve all thought that for as long as I can remember. I have no idea why he puts so much effort into looking not gay. It seems like really hard work. I worry that someday he’ll get busted in some public toilet.
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 10:57 am
If you can bring yourself to buy one of those Starbucks complilation CDs, the current one with James Brown and George Clinton on it is pretty good. It’s got a non-Archie Bell and the Drells version of Tighten Up.
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 10:59 am
One of the spinning teachers at my gym uses “Stranglehold” for an 8-minute climbing set. Odd coincidence.
The pants-wetting (and -pooping) story has been told many times by ol’ whack’em and stack’em. Recounted here by Richard Roeper. I’ll add to the pile-on by noting that when the Nuge set up his private-hunting operation up north, he fenced it in. What a sportsman.
The hardest-rockin’ couple I know in Michigan, people who fearlessly attend every ear-popping concert they can, walked out of a Ted Nugent show a couple summers back, and swear they’ll never go to another. The volume was cranked so high the “music” was indistinguishable from industrial noise, quite literally painful to be in the presence of.
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harry near indy said on August 28, 2007 at 11:17 am
And by the way, part of Roy’s appeal is his great commenters. They never fail to make me laugh.
MichaelG, on behalf of the commentators at alicublog — and i’m a regular there — thank you.
other various comments:
writing haiku in english is like writing iambic pentameter in japanese — a waste of time and effort.
from what i read, owen wilson doesn’t seem to be an asshole, so i’m sorry to read the bad news about him. but i just don’t understand his appeal, and wonder why he got cast in several somewhat successful movies. please explain, someone.
larry craig probably went to a men’s room for assignation because he doesn’t know of any gay bathhouses in the area. he wasn’t in d.c. or idaho.
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Can’t resist sharing the link to the Nugent video in which he insults Obama, H. Clinton, D. Feinstein, B. Boxer, and maybe some other people too.
You probably won’t be surprised to hear that, if you search on “Nugent”, you’ll find a clip in which Sean Hannity defends him. The clip is 6.5 minutes long. I could only bear 30 seconds, I missed whatever the punchline might have been.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 12:13 pm
I don’t think it’s funny when Whoopi or Rosie or Natalie Maine shoot their mouths off. And I don’t think it’s funny when it comes from my side of the aisle either.
Can you all say the same?
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 12:21 pm
I don’t think what Natalie Maine said was in the same class as calling someone a worthless whore, or a piece of shit. She said she was embarassed that Bush was a Texan.
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MichaelG said on August 28, 2007 at 12:44 pm
Took the words right out of my mouth, Mary.
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Kirk said on August 28, 2007 at 12:46 pm
Rosie sort of reminds me of Nugent: Both do a lot of yapping, desperately hoping that someone’s still listening.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Well, let me put some words back in sweet little Natalie’s mouth that you may not have been aware of.
Speaking of President Bush at the Toronto Film Festival: “What a dumb f—.”
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 12:57 pm
Was she holding an automatic weapon when she said it?
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Anybody seen “Shut Up and Sing”, the documentary about what happened w/ the Dixie Chicks after Maines’s remarks in London? Good review by Stephen Hunter here.
Hunter calls Maines a blowhard who has more talent than sense, which I think is on target. Her comments do seem to be in a different class than Nugent’s though; they are disrespectful, but not hateful.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 1:07 pm
Was she holding an automatic weapon when she said it?
Yeah, her mouth without her brain.
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 1:15 pm
Probably something less dangerous to suck than a machine gun, as per Ted’s directions to Obama.
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Jim said on August 28, 2007 at 1:25 pm
On a completely different note … I thought the journalists (or reporters …) would enjoy this article. The first sentence itself made me wistful.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/in-depth/black-and-white-and-all-over/2007/08/24/1187462515667.html
A classic quote: “Only snobs or big heads called themselves journalists. The rest of us were reporters.”
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 1:53 pm
Well, one comment from the cheap seats: right or wrong – it is very very hard to campaign against a woman, and in some ways HRC benefits from that.
AND – I find it extremely extremely extremely uncomfortable when a lowest-common-denominator type (like Nugent) tosses around phallic/violent metaphors regarding political figures, and particularly against a woman, or a black American.
To be honest, The Dixie Chick’s remark struck me as somewhat silly, and a little annoying (like a fly at the picnic); but Nugent strikes me as much worse – if only because pundits like Hannity, who presumeably have a white-bread following in fly-over country, seem to be trying to laugh off his remarks.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 1:59 pm
Agreed, Brian. About Hannity.
Mary, I think you are (once again) defending the indefensible.
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Joe Kobiela said on August 28, 2007 at 1:59 pm
I do remember a interview with Ted, and when the dirty pants thing was brought up, he said it was made up by some magazine, tried to find out about it on snopes but could not find anything on it so who knows. I like Ted, like the song Great White Buffalo, he also played on the song Journey to the center of the mind, Does not use drugs or drink, and thinks kid should stay in school, and thinks we are all responible for are own actions. I think he likes the attention. You Dem’s are so funny, I agree with Danny, I don’t like when Some one from my party say’s something dumb or outrages,but you Dems will fight to the death when someone like Rosie or Natalie or some other Hollywood has been say’s something dumb, yet you all get your undies in a knot if someone on the other side of the fence say’s something. I figured out a long time ago that those people out on the left and right coast’s don’t really give a shit what we here in the Midwest think, we are nothing but a 2-hour detour they have to fly over, and really I don’t care what they think, I can think on my own. ( end rant).
Nancy,
I’ll wave when I fly over tonight.
I like you,even when our politics are different
Cheers to all, your all like family
Joe
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Wow, Danny, just whom did I defend? I said what Natalie said was not as crude and nasty, or as someone said above, not as hateful. You say I defend the indefensible, which I would strongly contest. You assume I support the other extreme of any issue, which I don’t. I can find what Ted Nugent said obnoxious and rude without loving Whoopi Goldberg. Your world seems awfully black and white, Danny. I’m not outraged by Ted Nugent. I think he’s a another person who didn’t fight in the war who talks macho and criticizes people who oppose war. The Bush administration and its supporters seem to have a lot of these folks. I’m going on 55, and I knew a lot of boys who got drafted. I think one person I knew really wanted to go. The rest would rather have not, but they did anyway. Some of them didn’t come back. They didn’t crap their pants at the draft board. They didn’t have dad pull strings so they could fly obsolete jets over Texas before going AWOL. They didn’t have “other priorities” like Dick Cheney. I resent these people defining patriotism or courage and dismissing those who don’t support the war as cowards. It’s as hypocritical as closeted gay senators running on anti-gay issues.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 2:28 pm
Mary, would you agree that President Bush-43 at least did more than President Clinton-42?
W at least risked plunging into (as opposed to over) Texas, like a fiery lawn dart – and very well could have been grabbed by the collar and sent off to war. He came a whole lot closer than WJC
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deb said on August 28, 2007 at 2:31 pm
mary. GIRL. you are awesome.
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nancy said on August 28, 2007 at 2:32 pm
I stepped out for a couple hours to do some actual work and sort of lost the plot of what we’re fighting about here. I’m pleased to see you’re all still respecting Owen Wilson’s privacy at this difficult time.
However, to steer the conversation in a new direction, how about some fresh meat?
Geoffrey Feiger, local lawyer and well-known publicity hound, was just indicted on campaign-finance charges, not too far removed from the ones that tripped up Matt Kelty last month. However, his reaction is ever so much more amusing:
“We are now living in a McCarthy era,” Fieger said. “I have always been the target.”
At that (press) conference, Fieger appeared surrounded by 10 lawyers, including famed defense lawyer Gerry Spence, who read a statement from Alan Dershowitz, another famous lawyer who is working on the Fieger defense. Spence wouldn’t say directly if Fieger broke the law but said he didn’t believe that reimbursing employees for political contributions was illegal under current law.
Lawyers at the news conference, held in a sunlit mock courtroom in Fieger’s office complex, portrayed the U.S. Justice Department as the defendant, accusing it of rewarding officials for prosecuting Democrats and punishing and firing those who prosecuted Republicans.
Gerry Spence! Alan Dershowitz! A sunlit mock courtroom! I expect Chris Matthews any minute now.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 2:44 pm
Mary, I am not disagreeing with you on the people you point out as being hypocrits. Or even with Natalie Maines’ comments not quite reaching the level of The Nuge’s.
Which by the way, speaks to my ability to see things a whole lot less “black and white,” than you say.
What I am trying to point out is that, on this forum, you repeatedly take the side of liberals without nary a criticism. They are your team. You are the one seeing “black in white.” Near as I can tell.
And it’s no big. I don’t think anyone here is the least bit upset about it (I’m definitely not). It would just look better if you would ‘fess up.
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 2:45 pm
He did, Brian, and Clinton’s thing about worrying it would hurt his future political career if he dodged the draft is pretty disgusting. If he thought the war was wrong, good on him, but worrying about his resume? Not good.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Deb, I’m trying to conduct an intervention here. Can you please stop enabling?
And fix your shift-key.
{snort}
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 2:52 pm
Geoffrey Feiger, local lawyer and well-known publicity hound, was just indicted…
I read about that. If Feiger’s actions didn’t violate campaign finance laws, then nothing possibly can (imagine if 5,000 Haliburton employees each contributed $2,200, on the same day to a GOP presidential candidate, and we learned that they all had gotten a $2,200 ‘bonus’ the day before)
And of course, this WILL draw the bright lights and Chris Matthews (et al).
I have a question, though – does (or should) the candidate/campaign get in trouble for the violations of a donor? Certainly, it is at least an unwelcome pie-in-the-face for the candidate – who may not have any way of steering around such potholes, short of spending all their own money (and thereby limiting the field to millionaires)
The WSJ article on HRC’s wealthy Chinese backer made the interesting point that the campaign may well have had no idea what sort of financial conga-line preceded the contributions they were getting from the Haws.
Kelty, on the other hand, had his hand directly on the cash (Kathy Hawks came out for Tom Henry!! The GOP sky is falling!!)
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Jim in Fla said on August 28, 2007 at 2:59 pm
WJC took steps to avoid Vietnam, as did GWB, as did RBC, as did a lot of us in the late ’60s/early ’70s. That was not a good time to be an 18 – 26 year old male.
I wish we could get beyond defining one’s patriotism by what someone did or didn’t do 40 years ago.
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MichaelG said on August 28, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Danny, think it’s possible for people to disagree without snide innuendo and the nasty personal attacks?
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 3:19 pm
Yeppers. Which is why I have not done either of those things.
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ashley said on August 28, 2007 at 3:47 pm
So, moving to the present, when’s Jenna gonna enlist? Or Mitt Romney’s sons, once they’re done drivin’ the Winnebagos?
Or is war only good enough for the Ty Ziegels of the world?
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4dbirds said on August 28, 2007 at 3:52 pm
Dear LA Mary,
I think I have a girl crush on you.
4d
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alex said on August 28, 2007 at 3:53 pm
It seems this theme has run its course here before. I quit taking Danny’s bait. Y’all should too.
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4dbirds said on August 28, 2007 at 3:56 pm
In addition to two of my sons who wore/wear the uniform, the war is also good enough for my two nephews, my brother’s sons, who are both shipping out to Iraq in September. I hope they have all the courage of Ty without his tragic results.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 4:08 pm
Cripes, Alex. I guess I never thought “I would get so old” that reasoned discussion would be wrongly identified as “baiting”. Wonders never cease. And I say this especially since you were in agreement with my call a few weeks back when Mary was defending some Democrat or another.
Anyway, on to new things. Looks like Fidel Castro is endorsing a Clinton-Obama ticket.
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 4:13 pm
Hey, that reminds me. Is anyone here in support of n Obama candidacy? Or even sending money to the campaign?
It seems a bit far-fetched that anyone named Barack Hussein Obama will be elected as president, but I guess he did make it to the Senate. Of course, in light of today’s revelations, that ain’t sayin’ much.
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 4:16 pm
And, for a little threadweaving, Mitt’s sons (or, at least, two out of the five) are probably on their way to the recruiting office now, having already completed the work of removing a video of Larry Craig endorsing their dad from their collection of clips on YouTube.
And, too funny. When I looked for a link about removing this video, which I’d read about in a couple of places, one of the first hits contained this comment:
No one has noted this yet, but I think it is a sign of a well-oiled and responsive campaign machine that the Mitt Romney campaign was able to remove Craig’s video from YouTube so quickly.
And I don’t think the guy was kidding.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 4:20 pm
Is anyone here in support of n Obama candidacy?
Honestly, I am quite taken by Obama. I’m a sucker for tall legislators from Illinois – and his announcement speech in Springfield was wonderful. Before that, I listened to a speech of his on people of faith, and how the Democrats should forthrightly court those people, with appeals based on shared values. Very, very refreshing to hear a leading Democrat NOT write-off a few 10s of millions of work-a-day Americans as simple-minded lunatics!
In the debates, he has done quite well – and even the supposed “gaffes” regarding going after Sammy bin Laden wherever he is, and his willingness to sit down with any number of unsavory world leaders, struck me as merely re-restatments of current US policy….albeit in a refreshingly blunt style.
Honestly, I cannot see any of the GOP crop winning in ’08, other than maybe Rudy….and you just KNOW that some tawdry skeleton will tumble out his closet in the fall of 2008
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Owen’s people have fessed up to it being a suicide attempt. Defamer is a good source of non-privacy respecting news (and comments)
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LA mary said on August 28, 2007 at 4:28 pm
Rudy’s skeletons are banging on the door to get out.
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Laura said on August 28, 2007 at 4:30 pm
A little change of subject.
Have any of you been following the anti-semitic rants of the Columbus cop and her sister on YouTube? Their tirades are the sort I thought you only saw in bad Lifetime movies about really bad people.
I’d link you, but I don’t have the skills to do it on nnc.
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 4:34 pm
I’m supporting Obama, at least until HRC is declared the Dem nominee, which seems more likely.
Here’s my rationale: After this administration, we need an inspirational leader, and I think he fits that bill. I also think it’s important to have someone who welcomes interaction w/ the rest of the world.
Numerous people, including Anne Applebaum, a right-centrist WaPo columnist, have written that our reputation in the world would be greatly enhanced by enhance by an Obama presidency.
Her comment: Obama, with his African relatives and Indonesian childhood, would start his presidency riding an enormous wave of international goodwill. His differences from our current president — he’s young, black, with a more complicated background — would win him a lot of points in a lot of places, whether or not he knows the name of the Pakistani president (and whether or not he would bomb that country, as he recently seemed to imply he would).
Her column is about the importance of foreign policy experience, in which she points out the obvious, i.e., that nobody who isn’t president really has experience in making foreign policy decisions.
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alex said on August 28, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Rudy isn’t too worried about tawdry skeletons falling out of his closet. He drags one around on his arm.
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Kirk said on August 28, 2007 at 4:46 pm
Laura, that cop will soon be reassigned and probably will be investigated by internal affairs for conduct unbecoming an officer. She’s a real winner.
It took New York City eight years, but it finally was vindicated in its firing of some firefighters and cops who put on a racist display in a Labor Day parade some years back.
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 4:50 pm
And two more comments re Obama: He says things that are quite reasonable if only people would stop and think. When asked what he would do first if there were another big terrorist attack in the U.S., he said that he’d first make sure that there was an effective emergency response so that survivors and local leaders were getting the help they needed. He then said:
“The second thing is to make sure that we’ve got good intelligence, A) to find out that we don’t have other threats and attacks potentially out there, and, B) to find out, do we have any intelligence on who might have carried it out so that we can take potentially some action to dismantle that network.”
Sounds kinda reasonable, huh? But, speaking after him, both Edwards and HRC emphasized retaliation, and Obama was widely criticized for his “gaffe”, which supposedly indicated that he wasn’t tough enough.
In addition to being reasonable, Obama is right, I think, re needing to turn the page. Our arguments here re forty-year-old events support that idea. I’ve thought, particularly, that he could deal more effectively than could any white person w/ the racial issues that confront us now. The issues of basic rights–voting, accommodations in public places, laws prohibiting discrimination in housing–have been addressed, however imperfectly. Given changes in laws and public perceptions, they can be treated as problems of enforcement and decency.
But there are still serious problems that, in one way or another, come to affect us all–most of them stemming from poverty, poor parenting, and poor education. There is, in dealing w/ these problems, a role for government to play, but they are largely local and familial issues. Obama could, I think, take them on and make a difference.
And,by the way, I’m in the demographic that seems common on NN.com, i.e., about 10 years older than Obama.
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Dorothy said on August 28, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Nance what’s the record for “most comments” to one of your entries? Can’t believe this is at 68 so far today!!
Another redirect of the conversation: Today was my last day at my job – Ohio and Kenyon College here I come!! I’m over-the-moon happy to be starting the next chapter of my life. Corny as that sounds, it feels monumental to me anyway.
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Jolene said on August 28, 2007 at 5:09 pm
Hope your new situation at Kenyon is as great as you expect it to be, Dorothy. What will you be doing there?
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Danny said on August 28, 2007 at 5:50 pm
Dorothy, as I read you comment, I heard the theme to Laverne & Shirley in my head.
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MarkH said on August 28, 2007 at 6:19 pm
Or, the Mary Tyler Moore theme.
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brian stouder said on August 28, 2007 at 7:17 pm
Jolene, I could not possibly agree with you more strongly! Great post!!
And Dorothy – I envy your courage. The proprietress of this place and you…and come to think of it, LA Mary and several of the other people around here, positively embrace change; take charge of it, and turn it to your own purposes.
This is not something that I’m good at!
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joodyb said on August 28, 2007 at 9:44 pm
thanks a lot, alex. stuff just came out my nose!! i’m supposed to be working!
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John said on August 29, 2007 at 6:55 am
Alex, still the champion NN.com commenter!
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Dale Price said on August 29, 2007 at 7:38 am
I hope there’s a sequel to Zoolander.
There–I said it. I’m not remotely ashamed, either.
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MichaelG said on August 29, 2007 at 7:46 am
Josh Marshall has a terrific post from a reader on TPM this AM about gay restroom sex. Educational.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/
scroll down to “Context and History”.
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MarkH said on August 29, 2007 at 12:54 pm
Dale, you oughta be.
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Danny said on August 29, 2007 at 2:27 pm
Dale, until the sequel comes out, you may enjoy this.
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Dale Price said on August 30, 2007 at 4:51 pm
MarkH: That’s just the way I roll.
Danny: It just entered the email queue–thanks!
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