Real experts are too boring.

Sadly, there’s a lot of truth to it.

Via Alan Boyle]

Questions about John Bolton’s fitness for representing the US at the United Nations were heightened today as more staffers came forward to describe his chronic abuse of his subordinates and volatile, unpredictable temper, as demonstrated in this Senate testimony:

Q: Frank, could we go back? Could you characterize your meeting with Bolton? Was he calm?

MR. FINGAR: No, he was angry. He was standing up.

Q: Did he raise his voice to you? Did he point his finger in your face?

MR. FINGAR: I don’t remember if he pointed. John speaks in such a low voice normally. Was it louder than normal? Probably. I wouldn’t characterize it as screaming at me or anything like that. It was more, hands on hips, the body language as I recall it, I knew he was mad.

Well, you can imagine that when I read this, I was simply shocked at the thought of such a monster representing us at Turtle Bay, reinforcing our international image as an out-of-control cowboy, hands on hips, fingers just centimeters from holsters. I decided to interview some other former staffers to see if this frightening incident was just the tip of an iceberg of hot fury. I got a few leads from the DNC, and came up with some pretty juicy stuff.

First, a “Nita Valium” recounted a fearful encounter with the fiend:

TM: So, what prompted the out-of-control incident that you experienced with Mr. Bolton?

NV: I brought some coffee in to him one morning, and accidentally spilled it on his lap, severely scalding his private parts.

TM: And how did he react?

NV: It was just horrible. He stood up, got a napkin to dry off, wiped off his trousers as best he could, and told me in a tone slightly louder than normal, that I should be more careful. I could tell he was on the very verge of shaking his finger at me. He seems like the quiet type at first, but you can tell that under that mustache, he’s always smoldering, just like Hitler. You never know when he’s going to explode.

TM: Was that the end of it?

NV: Later on, I heard that he had requested that someone else bring him coffee after that. He got his wish–I’ve never been able to do that again. My promising career as a coffee-bringer-to-John-Bolton has been ruined, and I had to settle for a promotion to a different department.

Another former staffer, “A. Peazement,” related the nominee’s response upon being informed that the State Department intended to recommend that North Korea be made permanent head of the UN Committee on Human Rights. He still shuddered in fear at the recollection of the incident, though it was years ago:

TM: So, he didn’t take it well?

AP: No, not at all. He raised his voice almost a half a decibel, and asked me why.

TM: Did your explanation satisfy him?

AP: Well, he said it did, but you could tell he was seething. His voice had the reasonable, calm sound of someone about to explode with fury and fling sharp and heavy items off the top of the desk at you. He was starting to almost frown at me, and I could tell that he was going to put his hands on his hips any minute, but I managed to get out of the room before he could do it.

This correspondent has to ask: How did this brute manage to work in a federal bureaucracy for so many years, with no apparent consequences? How has this kind of behavior gone so unnoticed for so long? How many more sadistic fiends like this are there out there, waiting to be nominated to some sensitive diplomatic post by this bloodthirsty administration? When can we once again be led by people who have the proper temper, and temperament for power?

Heh. Indeed.

Iowahawk has the scoop on the latest judicial implications of the Supreme Court’s new legal theories:

“The decision underscores the principle of Federalism by creating uniformity in our notoriously inconsistent state dowry laws,” noted Harvard Law professor Lawrence Tribe. “For example, Iowa grooms are entitled to $300 and a two-night honeymoon trip to the Wisconsin Dells, while just across the border in Missouri, grooms only get $200 and a set of air shocks for their TransAm. Thankfully, the Court has brought some sanity to the situation.”

January 31, 2005

Baghdad (APUPI) For the second time in less than three months, a popular media campaign designed to influence voting patterns has proven impotent, as millions of Iraqis refused to heed heart-felt calls to avoid exercising their franchise this past weekend.

Roughly modeled after the “Vote Or Die!” campaign of hip-hop empresario P. Diddy last fall, like that effort, Musab al “DeCapitan” Zarqawi’s campaign to suppress the vote in Iraq seems to have had little effect on voter turnout.

With the thrilling and enervating slogan “Vote And Die!,” “DeCapitan” hoped that he could arouse the incipient Iraqi voters, most of whom had never voted before, from their pro-democracy lethargy, and get them out to support his insurgency by continuing to not vote. He was relying on his popularity among former regime supporters and enthusiasts of Al Qaeda, the most recent fad among the young, to keep people of all ages from the polls.

“Our theory was that there was nothing being wrong with P. Diddy’s campaign, except that he didn’t explain the process, and wasn’t graphic enough in the descriptions of exactly how the dying was to be occurring,” explained Qarbom al Qarblewi, an al Zarqawi spokesman. “They weren’t learning until after the election how fatal this non-voting could be, when it was too late.”

He went on to describe the differences between the two campaigns: “In infidel America, you had ‘Rock the Vote.’ In Iraq we had a campaign called ‘Stone the Voter,’ in which we promised every infidel with a blue finger who was supporting an unIslamic democracy that they would be buried up to their necks and have stones hurled at their heads until they were dead.”

Other ads sponsored by the campaign described beheadings, car bombings, and shootings of anyone who attempted to go out to a voting location. There were even warnings about the deadly nature of blue ink.

But it was all for naught, as the voters turned out in droves, in apparent indifference to the imploring from the charismatic murderer.

Perhaps the most puzzling feature of the failure was that it occurred in the face of so much publicity. The campaign was heavily covered not just by the local media, such as Al Jazeera and the Arab press, but also by the mainstream media of the US, including CNN, Fox and the major networks. They broadcast the al Zarqawi threats on an almost nightly basis, with interviews of enthusiastic non-voters, who swore that they would not be going to the polls out of fear for their lives.

“Unlike P. Diddy, we could not get the support of Senator Clinton for our campaign, but we did get much support from other famous and popular American celebrities, like Michael Moore, as well as locals like Osama bin Laden,” explained al Qarblewi. “We’re very disappointed, and just can’t understand why we couldn’t get the message out.”

January 31, 2005

Baghdad (APUPI) For the second time in less than three months, a popular media campaign designed to influence voting patterns has proven impotent, as millions of Iraqis refused to heed heart-felt calls to avoid exercising their franchise this past weekend.

Roughly modeled after the “Vote Or Die!” campaign of hip-hop empresario P. Diddy last fall, like that effort, Musab al “DeCapitan” Zarqawi’s campaign to suppress the vote in Iraq seems to have had little effect on voter turnout.

With the thrilling and enervating slogan “Vote And Die!,” “DeCapitan” hoped that he could arouse the incipient Iraqi voters, most of whom had never voted before, from their pro-democracy lethargy, and get them out to support his insurgency by continuing to not vote. He was relying on his popularity among former regime supporters and enthusiasts of Al Qaeda, the most recent fad among the young, to keep people of all ages from the polls.

“Our theory was that there was nothing being wrong with P. Diddy’s campaign, except that he didn’t explain the process, and wasn’t graphic enough in the descriptions of exactly how the dying was to be occurring,” explained Qarbom al Qarblewi, an al Zarqawi spokesman. “They weren’t learning until after the election how fatal this non-voting could be, when it was too late.”

He went on to describe the differences between the two campaigns: “In infidel America, you had ‘Rock the Vote.’ In Iraq we had a campaign called ‘Stone the Voter,’ in which we promised every infidel with a blue finger who was supporting an unIslamic democracy that they would be buried up to their necks and have stones hurled at their heads until they were dead.”

Other ads sponsored by the campaign described beheadings, car bombings, and shootings of anyone who attempted to go out to a voting location. There were even warnings about the deadly nature of blue ink.

But it was all for naught, as the voters turned out in droves, in apparent indifference to the imploring from the charismatic murderer.

Perhaps the most puzzling feature of the failure was that it occurred in the face of so much publicity. The campaign was heavily covered not just by the local media, such as Al Jazeera and the Arab press, but also by the mainstream media of the US, including CNN, Fox and the major networks. They broadcast the al Zarqawi threats on an almost nightly basis, with interviews of enthusiastic non-voters, who swore that they would not be going to the polls out of fear for their lives.

“Unlike P. Diddy, we could not get the support of Senator Clinton for our campaign, but we did get much support from other famous and popular American celebrities, like Michael Moore, as well as locals like Osama bin Laden,” explained al Qarblewi. “We’re very disappointed, and just can’t understand why we couldn’t get the message out.”

January 31, 2005

Baghdad (APUPI) For the second time in less than three months, a popular media campaign designed to influence voting patterns has proven impotent, as millions of Iraqis refused to heed heart-felt calls to avoid exercising their franchise this past weekend.

Roughly modeled after the “Vote Or Die!” campaign of hip-hop empresario P. Diddy last fall, like that effort, Musab al “DeCapitan” Zarqawi’s campaign to suppress the vote in Iraq seems to have had little effect on voter turnout.

With the thrilling and enervating slogan “Vote And Die!,” “DeCapitan” hoped that he could arouse the incipient Iraqi voters, most of whom had never voted before, from their pro-democracy lethargy, and get them out to support his insurgency by continuing to not vote. He was relying on his popularity among former regime supporters and enthusiasts of Al Qaeda, the most recent fad among the young, to keep people of all ages from the polls.

“Our theory was that there was nothing being wrong with P. Diddy’s campaign, except that he didn’t explain the process, and wasn’t graphic enough in the descriptions of exactly how the dying was to be occurring,” explained Qarbom al Qarblewi, an al Zarqawi spokesman. “They weren’t learning until after the election how fatal this non-voting could be, when it was too late.”

He went on to describe the differences between the two campaigns: “In infidel America, you had ‘Rock the Vote.’ In Iraq we had a campaign called ‘Stone the Voter,’ in which we promised every infidel with a blue finger who was supporting an unIslamic democracy that they would be buried up to their necks and have stones hurled at their heads until they were dead.”

Other ads sponsored by the campaign described beheadings, car bombings, and shootings of anyone who attempted to go out to a voting location. There were even warnings about the deadly nature of blue ink.

But it was all for naught, as the voters turned out in droves, in apparent indifference to the imploring from the charismatic murderer.

Perhaps the most puzzling feature of the failure was that it occurred in the face of so much publicity. The campaign was heavily covered not just by the local media, such as Al Jazeera and the Arab press, but also by the mainstream media of the US, including CNN, Fox and the major networks. They broadcast the al Zarqawi threats on an almost nightly basis, with interviews of enthusiastic non-voters, who swore that they would not be going to the polls out of fear for their lives.

“Unlike P. Diddy, we could not get the support of Senator Clinton for our campaign, but we did get much support from other famous and popular American celebrities, like Michael Moore, as well as locals like Osama bin Laden,” explained al Qarblewi. “We’re very disappointed, and just can’t understand why we couldn’t get the message out.”

Well, at least Iowahawk says that they are still revolting:

We are still revolting because someone needs to be the voice of sanity in AmeriKKKa.

It’s time someone else on this campus besides the faculty learns the ugly truth: with every passing day under BushCo, this country creeps farther and farther beyond the ragged edge of mass political madness, into a sickening extremist mobius strip Texas twilight zone of fat, hydra-headed oilmen electrocuting the innocent while money-green puke gushes from their eye sockets across a basketball court covered in Eggo toaster waffles. Until the rest of you awake from your sheeple dream to the reality of this nightmare, we in the campus reality-based resistance will be like the courageous European boy Hans Brinker — putting our finger in the eroding dyke of Human Rights and shouting out to the world that the Chimperor has no clothes.

Actually, I think that one of his commenters is right. The ‘Hawk is slacking off–he probably just cut’n’pasted this from Democratic Underground. It is a gut buster nonetheless.

Iowahawk has a new, thrilling adventure story about a frightening journey deep into the heart of Jesusland:

After crossing the muddy mud-colored mud of the Missouri river we had finally arrived in Omaha, the last stop before our maps became strictly conjectural. From here on out, until we reached Austin, we would have to rely on our wits and our training in journalism to navigate through hostile red enclaves.

Luckily we stumbled upon a primitive university in Lincoln. We were surprised to encounter a native maiden, Heather, who had taken graduate studies in Lacan and Franz Fanon. She directed us to the cinderblock hut of a kindly Semiotics missionary, Professor Mintz.

“We may be doing the Lord’s work here, gentlemen, but the local tribes do not always look kindly on it,” he warned. “Last month one of our tenured friars merely told his students that Bush was the anti-Christ, and he was viciously attacked by counterarguments. He was so traumatized he had to report the student to the disciplinary committee.”

October 12, 1864

WASHINGTON (Routers) Amidst continuing insurgent action, and fearing disenfranchisement of a large part of the population and the almost certainty of even greater violence in the months ahead, many are now recommending that next month’s Presidential election be delayed until the broken nation can be pacified.

“It’s absurd to hold an election when so much of the country is in rebellion, and won’t accept its results,” said a spokesman for General McClellan’s campaign. “This election will be properly viewed as a farce, and simply provide an excuse for the insurgents in the southern and western regions of the country to continue to fight.”

Many Democrats are frustrated because they fear that with recent Union atrocities resulting from General Sherman’s brutal Atlanta campaign, the voters in the south of the country, which should be largely sympathetic to them and their candidate, will be demoralized and unable to show up at the polls. Moreover, even the “liberated” slaves will continue to support the insurgency in the face of such depravity on the part of the occupiers. To justify their position, they point out that, in fact, the insurgents continue to fight on, making the war seem inevitably unwinnable. Just last week, at Alatoona Pass, they inflicted over 700 Union casualties on General Sherman’s troops.

Even parts of the country that the Unionists claim have been pacified remain under threat. Armed insurgents, often inflamed by the ruthless persecution of southern sympathizers, have taken Union men from their homes, whipped them, and on some occasions, shot them. Thousands have been terrorized even in central and southern Illinois. Gangs of rebel sympathizers from Missouri, opportunistic horse thieves and other criminals, and deserters have joined with the Illinois guerillas to threaten entire towns.

In response, both the War Department and the State Department have released a joint statement, claiming that postponing the fall election would only grant an unearned victory to the rebels, and show them that their terroristic tactics can be successful.

“While we understand General McClellan’s concern that this election is unwinnable for him in light of recent Union victories–victories, we should add, to which he contributed nothing–delaying the election would be a tragic mistake. For three score and fifteen years, this nation has regularly held elections per the Constitution, in war and in peace. We stand unique in the world in our ongoing commitment to free elections, and letting the people speak. It is all the more important to maintain that unsullied record in the face of the greatest crisis to face our young nation. In fact, we quote the president with an excerpt from an upcoming speech: ‘We can not have free government without elections; and if the rebellion could force us to forego, or postpone a national election it might fairly claim to have already conquered and ruined us.'”

This statement has failed to satisfy administration critics. “It’s clear that Secretary Stanton never had a plan for the pacification of this region after Sherman’s brutal invasion,” grumbled an undersecretary at the War Department, who wished to remain nameless.

Others note that it just shows the continuing mistake of going to war on false pretenses. “The president said that this was about keeping the Union together, but with the Emancipation Declaration two years ago, we can now all see that this was a lie, and that it was only an excuse to free slaves, and destroy the southern economy for the benefit of rich northern industrialists,” a Copperhead campaign staffer said. “It’s unreasonable to think that we will ever be able to defeat this enemy, fighting on their home ground against foreign occupation.”

He continued, “…how can we have an election in which large numbers of the electorate are effectively cut off from the political process? All it will do is prolong the day until the nation can coalesce, if that’s even ever possible. It would probably be better to simply admit right now that trying to build a country out of so many fractious viewpoints, cultures and religions was a mistake born of ignorance of history.”