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Sunday, August 10, 2008

John Edwards: 'I am a straight American'

Over the years, along with the rest of the country, I've marveled over the tendency of celebrities to fuck around. When their miserable attempts at having a secret sex life were revealed, I wrote about Bill Clinton, Ted Haggard, and others. Now John Edwards joins them.

This Marueen Dowd column, though rather drawn out, pretty much sums it up:

For some reason, super-strivers have a need to sell what is secretly weakest about themselves, as if they yearn for unmasking. Edwards's decency and concern for the weak in society -- except for his own wife. Bill Clinton's intellect and love of community -- except for his stupidity and destructiveness about Monica. Bush the Younger's jocular, I'm-in-charge self-confidence -- except for turning over his presidency, as no president ever has, to his Veep. Eliot Spitzer's crusade for truth, justice and the American way -- except at home.

This urge, as DowD identifies it, has long been satisfied by famous, powerful men by seeing prostitutes, especially dominatrices. But as Spitzer and the FBI demonstrated, you can't even fuck a prostitute in private these days without getting accidentally caught up in some racketeering investigation.

Clearly the only solution is that pursued by Rudolph Giuliani: Fuck someone else and act like you don't care who knows it.

technorati: John Edwards, adultery

Labels: adultery, Clinton, closet cases, dominatrix, heterosexuality, JohnEdwards, Lonnie Latham, Ted Haggard

Friday, August 08, 2008

It's Bad Behavior Friday™! -- Gold medal edition

I know who's not going to be Obama's choice for VP. By lying about having an affair, John Edwards proved his presidential stature. Only bad thing about this? He fucked around while his wife was battling cancer, and that means we can no longer fault Newt Gingrich for doing the same thing.

Megachurch pastor Joel Osteen's wife -- a classic big-haired Southern blonde -- is being sued for an alleged air rage incident that started over a wet spot on the armrest of her first-class seat. They were kicked off a Continental Airlines flight in December, 2005 when Mrs. Osteen berated a flight attendant, who is now suing her. Victoria Osteen, who is the author of a new book, Love Your Life, was fined $3000 by the FAA in the incident.

The Osteens' congregation -- she is also listed as a pastor of the organization -- is called the nation's largest church, so huge it meets in a former basketball arena, capacity 16,000. Turning the arena into a space suitable for a televangelist cost $75 million. And the Osteens -- neither of whom seem to have had any training to be ministers -- weren't traveling on a mission to the poor on that fateful day in 2005. They were on their way to Vail, Colorado "for a family ski vacation."

The trial is being covered by The Houston Press's Hairball blog, which earlier this week alerted me to the difficulty Stephen Elliott's Progressive Reading Series is having getting getting Houston to accept a donation to buy more recycling bins.

Not content with playing second fiddle to China as the Olympics open, Russia started a war with neighboring Georgia yesterday. So much for the peacemaking effect of nations meeting on the sports field and all the other b.s. that's singing over the airwaves today.

technorati: John Edwards, Joel Osteen

Labels: evangelicals, JohnEdwards

Friday, August 03, 2007

Publishing and politics

Nothing's simple in the modern world of overlapping media ownership, politics, personae and publicity. From a Washington Post article:

Former senator John Edwards, who has been throwing punches at Rupert Murdoch and his Fox News Channel, demanded yesterday that the other Democratic presidential candidates return contributions from Murdoch's media conglomerate. "John Edwards will never ask Rupert Murdoch for money -- he won't accept his money," said a statement e-mailed to supporters.

Not so fast, Murdoch's people say. His publishing unit, HarperCollins, paid Edwards a $500,000 advance -- and $300,000 in expenses -- for his 2006 book Home: The Blueprints of Our Lives. "We assume the senator is going to give back the money from his advance," News Corp. spokesman Brian Lewis said.

Edwards spokesman Eric Schultz said his boss donated the book payments to charity and that the expense money went to staffers and vendors.

Courtesy MediaBistro. What appeals to me about this little rock fight is how Edwards, as the underdog in the Presidential race, has once again put himself in a no-lose situation. The more he slams Fox News and its owner, megalo-titan Rupert Murdoch, the more Fox News attacks him, resulting in free publicity. Edwards can then send out more mail to his supporters depicting himself as a victim of right-wing attacks, resulting in more donations.

I was thinking yesterday of that old ploy by abortion clinic defenders of organizing pro-choice people to pledge donations to Planned Parenthood for each anti-abortion protester who showed up at a clinic, thereby de-motivating the protesters. It would be nice if there were some kind of similar process for, say, Ann Coulter: Every time she opens her mouth, more money is donated to the Democratic National Committee or, even more fitting, Code Pink, whose Medea Benjamin is simply the far-left photographic negative of Coulter.

technorati: John Edwards, Rupert Murdoch, Fox News, Ann Coulter, Medea Benjamin

Labels: 2008 president race, Fox News, free speech, JohnEdwards, politics

Monday, March 05, 2007

Focus on the Fundies: Haggard's church in 12% staff layoff

New Life Church, the former fiefdom of Ted Haggard, has suffered such a drop in attendance and donations that it has been forced to lay off 44 staffers, about 12% of its 350-strong workforce.

Of course it's not just the drop in attendance and dough. They also paid at least $130,000 as go-away money to the formerly influental Republican fund-raiser and secret cock-sucking meth snorter. That could have paid for more than a few staffers, because I'll bet most of the minions at a place like that get paid pretty bad -- and are expected to tithe ten percent of it back to their employer, to boot.

In other news, a blogger asks, "Why is Ann Coulter the darling of the religious right?" That's a good question, as she ought to scare them nearly as much as she does blue-staters. But by calling John Edwards a faggot, she showed how much she has in common with foamers like Rod Parsley and Ken Blackwell.

In other news, there's a new book out called The Jesus Machine, about James Dobson and his ilk; its author was interviewed on Terry Gross today. Contrary to the book's subtitle ("How James Dobson, Focus on the Family, and Evangelical America Are Winning the Culture War"), the interview was mainly about how the generation of Dobson and Jerry Falwell is about to pass from the scene and the Christianists have no one obvious to replace him with, especially now that Haggard is out.

technorati: Ted Haggard, James Dobson, Jesus Machine, New Life Church, John Edwards, Ann Coulter

Labels: Ann Coulter, Focus on the Fundies, James Dobson, JohnEdwards, New Life Church, Rod Parsley, Ted Haggard

Friday, February 09, 2007

It's Bad Behavior Friday™! -- It Depends edition

It's going to be hard -- very hard -- to top the whole psycho astronaut love triangle story. That has got to be in the finals for Bad Behavior story of the year. But we'll try.

A Colorado Springs TV station has revealed that Ted Haggard's former church is paying him to shut up about his indiscretions with a male prostitute and everything else (courtesy Street Prophets). The "agreement" also calls for Haggard to leave town. This explains his announcement earlier in the week that he would be relocating to Iowa or Missouri.

Take my advice, Ted. Pick Missouri. The people there are stupider, and they'll definitely buy your online "psychology" degree.

A teacher in Brooklyn pocketed $6000 for home-schooling a student who was dead.

High schoolers in California are fighting short-tempered teachers by posting videos of their blow-ups on YouTube.

Finally, conservatives attacked presidential candidate John Edwards for hiring irreverent, scatalogical blogger Amanda Marcotte. Edwards said he disagreed with some of Marcotte's more hard-edged posts of the past, but wasn't firing her. An example quoted by the conservatives:

On the crucifixion, Miss Marcotte says this:"The paradox was this.How can anybody look at the figure of Christ on the cross and think that's anything but a condemnation of torture? For the thinking person, it clearly is. But for the fundamentalist, that image creates anxiety about death and makes them cling to their hierarchical values even more."

Hmm, provocative but hardly off the wall. What about this:

Some of her ramblings on Pandagon, like this example on Catholics and the Plan B pill, "Q: What if Mary had taken Plan B after the Lord filled her with his hot, white, sticky Holy Spirit? A: You'd have to justify your misogyny with another ancient mythology." are truly disgusting. In another instance, she glibly remarks that religious conservatives should "keep your nose of out of our britches, our beds and our families."

Okay, the bit about God's come is pretty much over the top. But is the quote that immediately follows it equal in some way? Seems like the conservatives don't really have their shit together on this one. Stay tuned.

And finally, guess who's sponsoring the premiere of the musical "Urinetown" in Omaha, Neb.? The Urogology Center of Omaha, which will serve "dessert -- something yellow -- in specimen cups."

technorati: amandamarcotte, JohnEdwards, tedhaggard

Labels: amandamarcotte, Bad Behavior, JohnEdwards, tedhaggard