Jeanine Pirro’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Year



You know a campaign is going really badly when freezing up like a deer in the headlights for 32 seconds because you lost a page of your speech is only the second worst thing you’ve done. And yet, that’s where Jeanine Pirro, Republican candidate for New York attorney general, finds herself today. If only she had been rendered as speechless when the government was taping her friend, disgraced ex-New York police commissioner Bernie Kerik. Then she wouldn’t have been accidentally overheard asking Kerik to bug her husband’s boat when she thought he was cheating on her. (Hey, did you and Bernie talk at his secret love pad overlooking Ground Zero? Just wondering). And there would have been no reason to launch a federal investigation into whether she actually did illegally bug her husband. (She and Kerik both say it was just talk).

Fortunately for those of us who enjoy a little politics with our soap operas, she won’t let a federal investigation force her to drop out of the race for the state’s top law enforcement job.

“I’m standing up for myself and I’m standing up for women,” the plucky Ms Pirro declared.

Um, that’s ok, girlfriend, no need to stand up for women. Your marriage, like your candidacy, is not going to be remembered as a feminist cause. A lot of women can empathize with the rage and pain you felt last year when you suspected your husband, Big So-Not-Gay Al of cheating on you (again).

But spare us your righteous indignation, the claims that you’re a victim of a political witch hunt, that the rules are different for women. True, sealed documents shouldn’t be leaked to reporters. But if you’re looking around to see who is victimizing you, perhaps you should look a little closer to home.

Your marriage is your personal business and you don’t have to explain it to anyone. If you want to stay with a guy who a) fathered a child out of wedlock, b) went to prison for tax evasion c) has been suspected of doing business deals with mob figures and d) was twice ticketed for speeding this summer, that’s your call. Still, you have to understand why the public finds it interesting, to say the least.

In fact, a new Marist/WNBC-TV poll finds that most New Yorkers think Pirro is being treated fairly, (66%), and more than half said they have a right to know whether she’s the target of an investigation.

My absolute favorite part of this tawdry tale is the comment an anonymous Republican Party official made to the New York Times Thursday:

“This was one of the reasons we wanted her to run for Senate—all this awful Al Pirro stuff would cloud her credentials to be the top law enforcement officer.”

Right, because you don’t need “unclouded” credentials to be a Republican Senator, is that it? Being ethically challenged is apparently no barrier to entry.

In an interview with WCBS-TV, Ms. Pirro said she doubted law enforcement agents would go after a male candidate because of his wife’s actions. But the investigation was prompted by Jeanine’s actions, not Albert’s. She was the one caught on tape discussing how to bug her husband.

When I wrote Naked Republicans, A Full Frontal Exposure of Right-Wing Hypocrisy and Greed, I thought Katherine Harris was the Republican party’s Worst Candidate Ever. Now, it seems Jeanine Pirro is giving Ms. Harris a real run for her money. They’ll both lose, but here’s hoping we get to watch them campaign again soon.

You can buy the book here

EXPOSE YOURSELF TO:










Ted Stevens Loads Up the Big Internet Truck
For Another Campaign


Good news, everybody—Alaska’s own Senator Ted Stevens is planning to run for re-election in 2008. (Why not? He’ll only be 84).

"I intend to stay as long as God and the people of Alaska allow me to secure these projects for Alaska," he told The Hill newspaper.

While that sounds more like a threat than a promise to wary taxpayers, the antediluvian Senator has many more “projects” to secure for the folks back home before he hangs up his cranky pants and calls it a career. Much has been made of his Bridge to Nowhere (estimated cost: 223 million dollars), but for the true fans of pork, what inspires admiration most is not the showy, spectacular waste; it’s the quiet heroism of the workaday porker. And nobody does it better than Ted.

Citizens Against Government Waste reports that last year Stevens’ “projects” included a million dollars for “alternative salmon products” (a disturbing image), 1.3 million for “berry research,” and 98 thousand dollars for the Alaska Sea Otter Commission. (What do sea otter commissioners do, exactly?)

My own favorite however, is detailed in my book, Naked Republicans, A Full Frontal Exposure of Right-Wing Hypocrisy and Greed. It’s nowhere near the biggest slab of bacon, but it’s arguably the most colorful.

In 2005, Alaska Airlines rolled out what it called a Salmon-Thirty-Salmon, a jet painted to look like a fish. The paint job cost a half million dollars, and the tab was picked up by the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board. That doesn’t sound so bad, does it? Except that the Marketing Board gets its funding from the federal government---thirty million dollars so far. And how does the Chairman of the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board express his gratitude? Probably by saying:

“Thanks, Dad.”

Yep, the Chairman is Ben Stevens, son of Ted. Given the Senator’s understanding of the internet, let’s hope they don’t communicate via email. You know how clogged those tubes can get.

Senator Stevens is too modest to remind us that he is president pro tempore of the Senate, making him third in line for the presidency, in case, you know... And when you consider Mr. Bush’s propensity for pitching off his bike (to say nothing of choking on pretzels), and Dick Cheney’s heart, we’d better all pray that Denny Hastert starts using the House gym real soon.

HEY THERE LONELYGIRL

There are lots of ways to sell your book. Sometimes you have to get a South American dictator to give you a big shout out at the UN. Sometimes you have to make a fool of yourself doing a parody of the whole Lonelygirl phenomenon on Youtube. While I wait for Hugo Chavez to do the right thing, you can watch the video here.

And remember, Naked Republicans: A Full Frontal Exposure of Right-Wing Hypocrisy and Greed is on sale wherever hilarious and snarky books are sold.

Lonelygirl51

Even Lonely Girl is reading Naked Republicans!

MOST CORRUPT MEMBERS OF CONGRESS INCLUDE OH, SO MANY NAKED REPUBLICANS

If you haven't checked out NAKED REPUBLICANS: A FULL FRONTAL EXPOSURE OF RIGHT-WING HYPOCRISY AND GREED yet, what are you waiting for? Join the stampede to buy this book.


Seven Naked Republicans make the top 20 list of most corrupt Congress members (plus Rep Don Sherwood in the Dishonorable Mention category). This is a list compiled by the fine folks at Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington, whose website is beyonddelay.org.

The Seven who made the list include no real surprises: Burns, Frist, Santorum, Blunt, Ken Calvert of California, and John Doolittle, from the Sacramento area. I was glad to see Rep. Don Sherwood of Pennsylvania get a dishonorable mention. He was involved in a domestic violence situation with a young woman who was not his wife, and while he denied choking her and assaulting her, as she alleged in an official complaint, he did settle out of court for an undisclosed sum of money. Just one look at his dancing eyes (right) and you can see why a 29 year old woman would fall for him, can't you? Me, neither.

Sherwood's Republican friends have rallied around him, of course, sending him campaign funds to make sure that a fine, upstanding citizen such as himself manages to hold on to his seat in Congress.

PLEASE, BOYCHIK GEORGE, DENY ANY JEWISH ROOTS



Well, that was a close one. During a debate Monday with Democratic opponent James Webb, Senator George Allen was asked whether he could confirm a report in The Forward that his mother, Etty Lumbroso Allen, came from a prominent Sephardic Jewish family. Outraged by the question, Allen spluttered on about freedom of religion, and then denied the assertion.

Does anybody really care whether Senator George Allen’s mother came from a prominent Jewish family? Well, yeah. I do.

Haven’t we Jews suffered enough this year? Everywhere we turn there’s another shonda (embarrassment), from Jack Abramoff to Joe Lieberman. We learn that Rep. Eric Cantor had a sandwich named after himself at a fundraiser at Abramoff’s deli. We’ve got Kristol, Wolfowitz, Perle. Do we really need a Jewish George Allen?

Fortunately, Allen seemed outraged by the question. As his supporters booed, (suddenly, the very mention of religion is off limits to these guys-- or is it the horrifying possibility that he could be Jewish?) Allen delivered his lecture on religious rights and then characterized the reporter’s question as “casting aspersions.”

Finally, he said “as far as he knew,” his mother was raised as a Christian.

As far as he knows? If you have a Jewish mother, you know it. A Jewish mother doesn’t let you wear a Confederate flag lapel pin in your high school yearbook picture, or pimp your pickup truck with rebel flag bumper stickers. She might mention her religious heritage when you have your picture taken with white supremacist members of the Council of Concerned Citizens. And I don’t think a Jewish mother visiting her son’s law office would remain silent about the noose he kept hanging there, or that she’d fail to ask her daughter in law if hanging a Confederate flag in her son George’s home was really the best interior decorating idea she could come up with. (There’s much more juice on Allen—and not the kind that dribbles from his tobacco chaw--in my book Naked Republicans: A Full Frontal Exposure of Right Wing Hypocrisy and Greed).

I believe you, George. Besides, The Forward’s story says the family was forced to convert to Christianity long ago, so it’s entirely possible that his mother was raised a Christian.

Senator Allen mentioned several times that his grandfather was “incarcerated by the Nazis” but for political reasons, not because he was Jewish. Maybe the Nazis just hated him for his freedom.

Remember when Boychik George was a front-runner for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination?

Now, it looks like he won’t be our first almost-Jewish President.

Such suffering we do.

GEORGE ALLEN, THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN








Dogged by protestors out to make a monkey out of him




KEEPING UP WITH SENATOR MACACA

As seen in NAKED REPUBLICANS: A Full Frontal Exposure of Right Wing Hypocrisy and Greed
ON SALE NOW!

When last we left our old friend George Allen, he was trying to pull his macaca covered cowboy boot out of his mouth. After predicting in Naked Republicans that the best way to stop him would be simply to let him talk, we can’t say we were surprised.

Still, credit where it’s due, we have been entertained beyond our wildest dreams. (It began when he hired Dick Wadham, aka Dick Wad) as his campaign manager. Wad(ham) worked on the Thune campaign against Tom Daschle in South Dakota, enlisting the journalistic skills of one Jeff “Callboy” Gannon to help smear Daschle.

Unfortunately, not even Dick Wadham can protect George Allen from himself.

Favorite move this month has to be stealing a piece of legislation from Senator Dick Durbin and introducing it as his own right before Durbin can do it, (Dad, did you see that? I intercepted that guy’s bill. I did good, right? Dad? Sir? Coach?).

We also enjoyed watching him get outed in The Nation for meeting with the Council of Conservative Citizens, nee the KKK. And that’s after the “Welcome to America, Macaca.”

Now we get to watch a United States Senator hounded by protestors dressed a giant banana and monkey.



Tim Russert asked him on MTP yesterday if he would pledge to serve a full six year term if re-elected to the Senate, and he wouldn’t.

MR. RUSSERT: We are out of time. Before we go, Senator Allen, you have said, “The Senate is too slow for me.” Would you pledge to serve a full six-year term if re-elected to the Senate? SEN. ALLEN: The Senate does move too slowly. Having been governor I like action and I wish the Senate would move faster. But my focus is to keep fighting in the Senate for these ideas. MR. RUSSERT: For six—will you serve a six-year term? SEN. ALLEN: I’m the only candidate running on ideas on education... MR. RUSSERT: OK. SEN. ALLEN: ...and on energy independence. And I am focused... MR. RUSSERT: I, I, I’ve read the—I’ve read the brochure. I’ve read the brochure. SEN. ALLEN: ...and I want—I will... MR. RUSSERT: But will you serve... SEN. ALLEN: Sure, and you can put it in as a...(unintelligible)...of my family. MR. RUSSERT: ...will you pledge to serve a full six-year term? SEN. ALLEN: I pledge that I’m going to fight as hard as I can for our shared values and vision for Virginia for the next six years in Washington. (emphasis added)


But he doesn’t have to take the pledge. Ain’t gonna happen.

FOR MORE ON GEORGE ALLEN AND OH, SO MANY OTHERS, CHECK OUT
NAKED REPUBLICANS: A Full Frontal Exposure of Right-Wing Hypocrisy and Greed

We’ll always have Freedom Fries


Once Bob Ney was the Mayor of Capitol Hill, wielding his influence as chairman of the House Administration committee to assign parking spaces and order French fries to be renamed “freedom fries” in the House cafeteria. Now, he’ll be trading cigarettes for extra cans of Pringles in prison. It’s an American tragedy, don’t you think?

I don’t mean to be melodramatic, it’s just that I’m reeling from the stunning news of Ney’s guilty plea to fraud and conspiracy in the Abramoff scandal. Next thing you know, we’ll find out he wears a toupee. He’s admitting to taking about 170 thousand dollars worth of goodies from Abramoff and his associates. Who could have seen that coming? After all, for more than a year he denied any wrongdoing. “I was duped,” he said, and we believed him, didn’t we? Even when we read emails like this one:

“Just met with Ney! We’re f’ing gold! He’s going to do Tigua…”
---Jack Abramoff, March 2002

Now Ney says he has a drinking problem and has checked himself in for rehab. He didn’t take the Mel Gibson defense until he learned that unlike Mel, they can take away his freedom. And they will. The prosecutors are asking for 27 months.

Actually, my favorite corruption charge doesn’t involve Abramoff at all. It involves Elvis. Well, at least indirectly. In 2003, Ney was flown to London by a guy named Nigel Winfield, who wanted to sell American-made airplane parts to Iran. In exchange for the trip, Ney lobbied the State department to get the sanctions against Iran lifted. Winfield was a convicted felon who had once tried to screw Elvis Presley on an airplane deal. Ney, of course, says he didn’t know Winfield was a criminal.

Which does lead to the question, could anybody call up Bob Ney, invite him on an all expenses paid trip to Europe, and ask him to lobby the Secretary of State…without Ney’s staff doing so much as a five minute background check on Google before handing their boss his passport and airplane tickets?

As Ney was heading for rehab, his House Republican buddies were passing a tiny, toothless “reform” bill that does nothing to clean up the corrupting influence of lobbyists like Jack Abramoff. It requires House members to identify themselves as they stuff earmarks into legislation; they can still rip off taxpayers, as long as they tell us they’re ripping us off.

“We’re blowing away the fog of anonymity,” Rep. David Dreier announced.

Something definitely blows, that’s for sure.

As for good old Bob Ney, We’re going to miss you, Mr. Disgraced ex-Congressman, but we’ll always have freedom fries.


Don't Forget!
Naked Republicans: A Full Frontal Exposure of Right-Wing Hypocrisy and Greed (wherever fine books are sold)
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Tom DeLay Is Dancing As Fast as He Can
It must suck to be Tom DeLay, ex-Hammer. No longer able to threaten to cut off campaign funds from independent-minded fellow Republicans, or the balls of Democrats, he’s reduced to writing emails like this one, which can be found in its entirety at Jake Tapper’s blog at abcnews.com.


"Dear Friend,

"I am writing to you today in an effort to help a good friend of mine, country music singer and GOP supporter Sara Evans. Sara will be competing this year on ABC’s smash hit "Dancing with the Stars" beginning Tuesday, September 12, at 8 pm Eastern/ 7pm Central. Sara has recently launched a new website www.DancingWithSara.com that will connect her fans to exclusive behind the scenes material from the show. Register with this website for free today and then watch Sara compete starting September 12 – and don’t forget that YOUR VOTE HELPS DETERMINE THE WINNER!

"Sara Evans has been a strong supporter of the Republican Party and represents good American values in the media. From singing at the 2004 Republican Convention to appearing with candidates in the last several election cycles, we have always been able to count on Sara for her support of the things we all believe in. Let’s show Sara that same support by watching and voting for her each week to help her win this competition. One of her opponents on the show is ultra liberal talk show host Jerry Springer. We need to send a message to Hollywood and the media that smut has no place on television by supporting good people like Sara Evans.


Do they let you watch “Dancing With the Stars” in jail? Just asking…

And Now They're Going After Poor Christine DeLay
The Houston Chronicle reports today that the FBI is investigating whether Mrs ex Hammer earned thousands of dollars from The Alexander Strategy Group without actually doing any work. The lobbying firm was run by DeLay cronies until they were swamped by the slime of the Abramoff scandal and forced to close, but the FBI apparently isn't finished digging into the Abramoff muck, and the DeLays may have issues.

We're sure there's a logical explanation for everything.

Hey kids, welcome to Naked Republicans, the blog. If you dropped in through website for Nakedrepublicansthebook.com, thanks for visiting. It's not quite completed, but the key part, the one where you get to buy the book, works just fine. I'm sure you bought several copies, right?

What I will do on this blog is pick up where the book left off when I had to send it to be printed. The website currently features a charming little update on Katherine Harris, who is the odds on favorite to win the Russell Crowe phone toss event at the Anger Management Olympics.

Meanwhile, the First Pinhead, with no apparent irony, points out that America is too dependent on foreign oil, from countries where "they simply don't like us." Not sure if that includes Canada.

So does that mean, at long last, his administration will support increasing fuel efficiency standards on cars, or invested in alternative energy sources? What are you, stupid? Two words, my friends: nuclear power. Make that, nucular, as in, "Nucular power is safe, nucular power is clean, nucular power is renewable."

And, not unlike your presidency, it leaves behind a giant waste heap that will last for generations.