Yes, I'm still following the Mark Foley pedophilia scandal down south and it's starting to seriously gripe my wagger that the Dems and their supporters seem to think they're doing such a stellar job knocking around the Republicans. For example, over here at Americablog, John has a YouTube video that he labels as "good." Um, no, it's not. Frankly, Democrat Rahm Emanuel is, in my opinion, mediocre at best, as he lets countless golden opportunities go by to bitch slap the shit out of his opponent.
Perhaps the most aggravating GOP talking point that is making the rounds is that none of those folks really had any idea how bad things were since they'd only ever heard about, well, "strange" or "overfriendly" messages, but hey, they never actually saw the really bad ones so you can't blame them, right? I mean, who would have guessed?
In the TV ad by Tom Reynolds, Reynolds describes the early warnings as being of only "odd but not explicit" messages, while GOP hack Putnam characterizes those early exchanges as "odd" and overly friendly," as if somehow that wasn't enough to set off all kinds of warning bells. And yet, the Dems seem terminally stuck on dumbass-level stupid as they have no idea how to respond. Well, let me give them some free advice.
If someone said something like the above to me, here's how I'd respond to the hack who made those claims:
"OK, so you're saying that all you'd heard about was "odd" or "overfriendly" messages, but that wasn't enough to inspire you to dig a little deeper, is that what you're saying? All right, let's do a little thought experiment here.
"Let's imagine you have, say, a 16-year-old daughter in high school. She's on the basketball team, and that team has a male coach, a nice guy, say, in his 50s.
"One evening, your daughter comes to you and nervously says, 'Dad, um, you know Mr. Foley, our basketball coach? Well, lately, he's been kind of creeping me out. He's left these weird notes in my locker, and sometimes he instant messages at night, and he's all friendly and everything. And it just feels, I don't know, creepy."
"Now, pause for a second. Your daughter hasn't actually shown you any of these notes. You have no idea what's in them, and all she's said is that they're, well, "weird" and "friendly." As a father, how would you respond?
"If we use your response to Foley as a model, it sounds like what you'd do is just think, well, I haven't heard anything explicit, no actual dirty words or anything. Of course, I haven't even looked at the messages but, if my daughter can't be more precise, I'm not going to worry about it. No big deal.
"Is that what you'd do? Because, if I were that father, here's what I'd do.
"First, I'd be out of my Barcalounger like I had a bottle rocket up my ass. Next, I'd demand, right there, to see these messages. Every single one of them. And any notes if she still had them. Then I'd make backups and copies of everything I could. Multiple copies, just in case. And then I'd ask my daughter if she knew of any other girls on her team who were getting the same messages, and I'd want their names and numbers, and I'd be on the phone to their parents, telling them to right this fucking minute go to their daughter's room and take away her computer to make sure nothing was erased that could be used as evidence.
"That's what I'd do. And that would only be for starters."
I'm sure you can see the point of all this -- to demonstrate the appalling lack of concern on the part of the GOP who, I'm sure, would never in their wildest dreams think of being so dismissive of disturbing rumours if their kids were involved, but when it comes to other GOP congressmen and 16-year-old pages, they just wave it off with, "Well, we never really saw anything explicit, you know, so it's not like it's our fault."
And yet, the talking head Dems seem utterly unprepared to rip someone a new orifice with something like this. And it's just getting more and more aggravating to watch.
Would someone over there finally grow a pair? Please?
4 comments:
I thought the same thing. I can't stand that bullshit excuse of "Foley's out of there so our job is done", kind of attitude. It doesn't matter if Foley was gay/straight/bisexual/asexual, 50 year old men should not be hitting on teenagers, period. The right wing talking heads get away with so much it makes one want to bang one's head into the television/computer screen. Please, someone call these phoney liars out, and plaster their face with their own bullshit. It hasn't really been dug into much yet, but this scandal is not "news". Sure, maybe it's mentioned in passing, but the true newsworthiness of this whole sorry mess is that it is not new! Why is the MSM not all over this glaring fact. It has been going on since at least 2003 and who knows how much longer. There were even pictures posted on blogactive of Foley goggling over his pages, really, really creepy stuff. While the republicans and their pharisses have been getting away with the worst, most despicable gay bashing ever seen in this continent, creeps like Foley, have been hitting on adolescents, kind of reminds me of a certain church/religious institution lead by an equally creepy and santimoneous turd of a pope. Sad part is, stories like this add fuel to the vile religious right and innocent gay people pay for this shit by being excommunicated/disinherited from their families, or beaten to a pulp and left hanging on fences. It's time for the religious right to be hung on a fence. They are the true culprits behind this stuff and the shrapnel that will surely be left when the American fascination with all things penis wares off until the next one. Great way for the government and MSM to avoid the fact that Condi Rice is lying her ass off again, about Iraq and the country is slaughtering it's troops because of some war criminal's pipe dreams. I'm totally outraged.
Its sad when Wolf Blitzer puts in a better performance holding Republicans accountable than people like Charlie Rangel.
Don't believe me?
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/10/08/mchenry-pelosi/#comments
Charlie was better than Rahm (probably because Rahm is just another power hungry corporate Dem and Charlie actually seems to be a half decent rep.), but so many missed opportunities to put the knife in this hach, McHenry.
1. CW in the US is that when your opponent is shooting himself in the foot, you keep out of the way.
2. How, exactly, could the Democrats improve on what the GOPpers are doing to themselves? The more desparate they get, the crazier their alibi's. Though, frankly, who can top Hastert's initial "Who could have foreseen Mark Foley would hit on teenage pages?"
The Seer writes:
"CW in the US is that when your opponent is shooting himself in the foot, you keep out of the way."
In this case, that's more relevant than you might imagine. While the Dems should be keeping the heat on, they should also be doing it at a controlled pace.
Rather than have all the hideous details come out right now, it's in their best interests to drag this out slowly and painfully, so that it peaks right around election day, for maximum possible blowback.
I'd suggest that the Dems want to be careful not to blow their load too soon, but that would be tasteless.
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