Jezebel
Welcome back kids! How was el fin de semana? Because it sure sucked for a lot of our overseas amigos! A devastating earthquake on the scale of an earthquake that killed a quarter million people in 1976 just rocked China's Sichuan province; Burma's totalitarian military junta decided to grant itself unlimited totalitarian power and all the donated rice; no one can really protest the junta since they are mostly all dead and/or starving to death anyway; hopefully Jenna Bush did the sensitive thing and refrained from throwing rice at her wedding; two John McCain advisers did the sensitive thing and stepped down when it turned out they'd actually taken three hundred grand from the junta for PR services. Bob Barr and Ron Paul both launched separate attempts to do what voters are already doing anyway and sink McCain's campaign; Michelle Obama is nixin Hillary as a running mate (according to Bob Novak?!) and speaking of Nixon, there's a new book on him and the white voters who elected him and we read all about it sorta. All that and a Vito Fossella primer ATJ.
MOE: Okay I cannot tell you how much I read and forgot last night while trying to get to sleep. And then a fucking earthquake came and toppled a thousand cell phone towers and trapped 900 high school students in school and if it's anything like the 1976 earthquake of a slightly lower Richter 240,000 people stand to die.
MOE: Did you also read how in Burma they are counting the survivors because it's easier than counting the dead? I guess the death toll there is supposed to reach 100,000...
MOE: But the Most Emailed story is this thought provoking Tom Friedman column.
MEGAN: That was last week, before the military decided that all the food was for them. So, I think we can safely assume that the total survival rate will be about equal to the members of the junta, the military and their families, since apparently everyone else is just supposed to die quietly and let the soldiers dump their bloated bodies in waterways so no one knows.
MEGAN: Fucking Tom Friedman.
8:55 AM
MOE:
That restriction has angered local government officials like Tin Win who are trying to help rebuild the lives of villagers. He twitched with rage as he described the rice the military gave him."They gave us four bags," he said. "The rice is rotten — even the pigs and dogs wouldn't eat it."
He said the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees had delivered good rice to the local military leaders last week but they kept it for themselves and distributed the waterlogged, musty rice. "I'm very angry," he said, adding an expletive to describe the military.
MEGAN: Can we just assume that he called them "fuckers"? Because I would.
MOE: Remember how that guy you interviewed called it an "Orwellian nightmare that makes China look like Scarsdale by comparison" or whatever?
MEGAN: Yup. That guy totally knew what he was talking about...
MOE:
"The government told us that school must reopen June 1, if you have a schoolhouse or not," Myint Oo told his visitor. "'Teach under a tree if you have to,' they said."So...safe to say the referendum was good for the junta?When he began describing the devastation to the school and village, a portly man in a white T-shirt who also seemed to hold a position of power interrupted.
"Don't tell these foreigners anything," the man said.
Myint Oo replied that he wanted to talk to the visitors in the hope that they could help rebuild the village.
"They will send the facts to the world and show the weakness of the Myanmar government," said the man in the white shirt.
MEGAN: Yes, I believe the junta won, the people of Burma totally love them. Obviously.
9:00 AM
MOE: They're very patriotic.
MEGAN: And, as we've learned here in America, being patriotic means never questioning you government leaders.
MOE: Well, since the Nixon era made politics about Stuff That Isn't Actually Politics anyway right?
MOE: Here's Rick Perlstein's brief blog answer to George Will's (actually somewhat positive) review of his book.
MEGAN: Spencer keeps harping about that book on his blog.
MOE: ANYWAY, so yeah, I read that whole review about how Richard Nixon's resentment of the popular kids at college moved him to split the nation into two factions, "values voters and other conservatives who are infuriated by the disdain of amoral elites conservatives consider a 'Toryhood of change'" and "Hofstadterian liberals who feel threatened by these nincompoops who have been made paranoid by their status anxieties." Good work eh?
MOE: Yeah the topic seems seems up his line of attackerman.
MEGAN: Yay Nixon! Also, he went to China. And hippies were probably really annoying by the time he took office.
MOE: Oh my god he wrote a punk-rock love note to his wife at the end?
MEGAN: In the comments, Rick says it was jazz, not punk rock.
MOE: My favorite part was from a TIME magazine story on the boomers:
"This is not just a new generation, but a new kind of generation...In the omphalocentric process of self-construction and discovery," today's youth "stalks love like a wary hunter, but has no time or target — not even the mellowing Communists — for hate."
MEGAN: Either way, I will admit, it's just another long nonfiction book I will never read because I have 1,000 great works of literature to get to first, including the end of Crime and Punishment and Lady Chatterly's Lover and Tropic of Cancer.
MEGAN: Yes, I'm a little ADD about literature.
MOE: Well then there's something George Will and Rick Perlstein can agree on; jazz over hippie music; boomers are annoying. Oh, and I bet also: that Hillary should drop out now that everyone agrees she's showed more putrid cynicism than Nixon and we haven't even seen the convention much less the nomination? BC Peggy Noonan and Bob Herbert think so and they're both boomers.
MOE: And yeah re literature I'm too ADD to really read anything, but we already knew that. Although I totally read an excerpt of Lady Chatterly's Lover on Nerve one time I think.
MOE: And everyone is sick of living in Nixonland.
MEGAN: Peggy was on Morning Joe last week and I liked her. Granted, at the time, my uterus was trying to forcibly escape my body and apparently nothing but hormones raging against the dying of the light could stop it, so I might've been emotional, but she sounded really smart and thoughtful and part of me went, oh, gosh, if only Maureen Dowd could sound like that.
MEGAN: And then I warmed up my hotpack and forgot to read the column, so thanks for the link.
MEGAN: But there is good news here, too! Bob Barr is going to play Nader to McCain's Al Gore! He doesn't care who wins because McCain isn't a real conservative!
MEGAN: Run, Bob, run! I'll give him money! Maybe he can talk about how his conservative ideals led him on a crusade during his tenure in Congress to spend extra tax dollars to name something in every state after Ronald Reagan!
MEGAN: Maybe he can talk about how he held the Metro system's budget hostage until they agreed to spend more than a million dollars to change all the signage in the system to reflect the full name of National Airport.
MEGAN: But to guarantee his ability to fuck over the Republican Party and my ability to have something interesting to write about, I would totally make my first political donation to him.
MOE: No Peggy is totes the weird answer to Maureen Dowd. Her prose is kind of hilarious, like the way she seems to go inside a dark room and close her eyes and meditate and return with a Very. Melodramatic. Assessment. Of the feelings and attitudes governing the political awareness of the American populace. I should have Maria do a Best Of Peggy I think. And does McCain really need Bob Barr undermining his campaign when he's got RON PAUL undermining it already?
MEGAN: Scroll down, by the way, for the picture of them standing in front of the Eiffel Tower with a Ron Paul sign. Crazy ass motherfuckers.
MOE: Also: didn't two McCain advisers just step down after admitting to representing the Burmese junta? (That might lose Laura Bush's vote.) McCain is kind of a lousy subject right now.
MOE: Here we go.
Doug Davenport, the regional campaign manager for the mid-Atlantic states, founded the DCI Group's lobbying practice and oversaw the contract with Myanmar in 2002.
"Doug has tendered his resignation and we have accepted it," Jill Hazelbaker, McCain's communications director, wrote in a e-mail.
He joins former DCI Group CEO Doug Goodyear, who resigned yesterday from the post of convention CEO after Newsweek reported that DCI was paid more than $300,000 to represent Myanmar's ruling junta.
MOE: Classy.
MEGAN: Yeah, the did. It's interesting because I went to search FARA for their names on Saturday (me=nerd) and Burma/Myanmar isn't actually an option in the pull-down list of countries for which people are registered to represent.
MOE: Was Davenport the one who wanted to leave anyway if Obama got the nom?
MOE: Hahaha weird!? Is North Korea on there? What about Syria and Sudan?
9:30 AM
MEGAN: Every time I hear the name Davenport, I think of my grandma's couch.
MOE: So did you and Spencer discuss "whitegate" last week? I didn't read the site because I was kind of...sick.
MEGAN: North Korea (ROK), Sudan and Syria are all options.
MOE: North Korea is the DPRK
MOE: The ROK is South Korea
MOE: What the fuck did those guys even do for the junta?
MOE: Oh no Mark McKinnon is the one who's quitting if — and only if! — Obama is the nominee.
MEGAN: Fuck, I always mix that up. DPRK is there, too.
9:35 AM
MEGAN: DCI was leading their charm campaign trying to get us to open a dialogue with them without them having to, you know, change anything about their regime or the way they abuse their own people. Kind of like Nixon did with China.
MOE: Dude, I can't believe it took me till now to make the link between Nixonland and big Obama supporter Julie Nixon Eisenhower. Who was a big supporter of talking to China, as was I, incidentally, because at the end of the day people are better off in China today than they were during the cultural revolution. But can we discuss for a moment Bob Novak's bunch of "close-in" Obama supporters — whatever that means — telling him Michelle has vetoed Hillary as a running mate?
MEGAN: Never mind, apparently even though our government doesn't officially recognize the name Myanmar, you can register to represent it, so here's DCI's registration
MOE:
The Democratic front-runner's wife did not comment on other rival candidates for the party's nomination, but she has been sniping at Clinton since last summer. According to Obama sources, those public utterances do not reveal the extent of her hostility.Jesus Christ, her fury towards the white Americans knows no bounds does it.
MEGAN: Only in Washington would there be someone to whom Michelle would confide and who would know Bob Novak well enough to break that confidence.
MOE: I bet it's the same gentle soul who told Chris Hitchens she was the radical separatist who told Jeremiah Wright about that AIDS conspiracy!
MOE: So you know what we haven't discussed?!
MOE: TEH WEDDING
MEGAN: I'm gonna guess that Michelle is a fiercely loyal person and she's taking Hillary's negative campaigning harder than her husband because that's what fiercely loyal people do. They get madder for you than you get for yourself. I should know, I threatened to beat a girl up this year who was being cruel to my ex.
MEGAN: Because we hate weddings? Or is that just me?
MOE: Yeah I have entirely outsourced my "getting mad" duties to my more rage-filled loyal friends. I'm lucky that way I guess. And oh fuck you know what else?
MOE: I totally read ALL ABOUT MOKTADA AL-SADR
MOE: over the weekend.
MOE: It confused me though.
9:45 AM
MEGAN: What part of it confused you?
MOE: Or Vito Fossella? Who is supposedly planning his reelection campaign already! My these stories are starting to all run together!
MEGAN: Why did he not use a condom? How did he support the love child?
MOE: Here's the thing too. I haven't been paying close enough attention:
A procedural hearing on Fossella's drunken-driving arrest - which ultimately exposed his double life - is slated for a Virginia courtroom Monday.How did the DUI "ultimately expose his double life"? Especially if it happened in Virginia where he doesn't even have an address?
MEGAN: Ah, that's the brilliant thing! When he got pulled over for running a red light drunk, his excuse was that he was on his way to a friend's house, after which he admitted he was going to see his sick kid.
MEGAN: Only his official kids were in NY with his wife. And, OMG, they've been having an affair since at least 2003? Five years? Dude, what the fuck. Even Kennedy got a divorce.
MOE: Even Prince Charles got a divorce! Dude did we learn anything over the weekend about this minister who officiated the Jenna wedding?
MEGAN: He's an Obama supporter who also does weddings?
Comments
take that burma death toll and multiply by 15. that's what happens if aid doesn't get there.
i teared up when i heard about the aid ship sinking.
am i the only one who is completely underwhelmed and kind of over the whole bush nuptuals as news?
... And now Rick and Kathy owe me forever. You guys fucking rule.
@lermanzo: All fucking day Saturday CNN was running this shit. "Oh, uh, some stuff went down in Burma. But back to Crawford! They are selling mugs with Jenna's face on them. MUGS!!!"
I heard Daniel Schorr on NPR over the weekend, and even thought the UN should pass a resolution saying the people of Burma need to be helped, even without the cooperation of the Burmese government. That tells me that the world in general is just a little fed up with this farce. One US cargo plane in 8 days? One? Taking supplies, stamping their faces and names on them and handing them out? Holding a vote while most of your people are dying? What does it take before these sycophants are removed from office at the end of the barrel of a gun, because it doesn't seem they are going anywhere voluntarily, except to their mountain retreats where they can dine on good rice and the finest foods while their populace die a slow, undeserved death!
@hortense: To which I say (politely): F*CK JENNA BUSH!
I think that tells all you need to know when a 'government' would rather let its people die than allow the world to know it needs aid. WTF are they going to rule then, when everyone's dead from their fucking musty rice. *arrrrgh*
@hortense: OMG the Bush wedding gift shop! Key chains and mugs! So chintzy, in a "down the shore" kind of way
@RyanB: And they were selling out of that shit! Apparently the mouse pads were a big seller.
Who the fuck buys this shit?
@hortense: i am beginning to resent the fact that i care about things other than the completely vapid. because maybe then mugs would make me feel a teeny bit better about the 15 million people who stand to die in burma.
I saw a video of the Burmese military handing out DVD players as "aid." And aid crates with different Generals' names stamped on them, either they were personally going to pocket the goods, or at least take credit for distributing it in their districts. Let's at least hope for #2.
Jenna looks nice. Henry already looks like an old, gross 'Publican that he's soon to be. They'll get to making little 'Publican babies in no time. Blech. But let's focus on it, because its sort of celeb, and this celeb-focused news crap sells better than real news.
@battleaxonista: yeah... and apparently people are rebuilding around the bloated dead bodies. so effed up.
@NefariousNewt: but of course if we were to go in and "forcibly remove them from office" we'd be considered policing the world again.. damned if we do, damned if we dont!
re: the wedding.. stupid media needs to learn what real news is and that we're not actually interested in the bush wedding. but obviously its not the Bush family's fault the media's all over them. they tried to keep them away.
Goddamnit. I wanted to hear about Moktada al-Sadr.
@hortense: Perhaps people are buying the mugs and snow globes to forever keep in their memory the legacy of our worst President ever
@jenalicious: but the bush wedding might help THE ECONOMY! because it gives people HOPE when preppy white young republicans get together for a party!
The minister at the Bush wedding is cute! What's a nice looking coloured boy like him doing in a place like that?
@NefariousNewt: What, should she have rescheduled the wedding? I mean, it's not her fault the media acted like ninnies over the whole thing, as if it was the Di and Charles wedding. At least the whole thing wasn't televised!
And I really really liked Jenna's bridal look. I give her props for looking pretty without poofy.
@braak: Me too, because I am confused as well.
Re: Michelle/Hillary VP possibility. I don't think this is new at all - didn't the New Yorker mention this in their profile of Michelle this past summer? I would love to see Bill's head taken off the first time he tried to mack on Michelle.
@NefariousNewt: I heard that this weekend while washing dishes & I broke a glass in the sink. I am horrified. What in hell is going on down there? These people need help, why are they being denied that? Are those dirtbags actually nervous the Burmese will be kidnapped/unbrainwashed by UN food delivery people? Jeez.
Second, who gives a FUCK about Jenna Bush getting married. Yuck city.
@jenalicious: There are more than 2 choices, other options include: stop selling arms; preferential trading; debt relief; supporting local movements; labour mobility, etc
Where the hell is that Asteroid of Justice?
I know we've beaten this whole Jenna wedding to death, but I have to ask this ONE THING. Did anybody else see this bit the White House Press flogged about Jenna having a "Traditional Texas House Party" instead of bridesmaids? I am Texan, I got married in Texas, and neither myself nor my mother nor my other Texan relatives have a clue what the hell they're talking about.
Any other Texas Jezzies ever heard of this? I am befuddled.
so, why not just start bombing burma with food? they did it to save the starving dutch during WW2-- [en.wikipedia.org] sovereign airspace? fuck you, SLORC cunts.
@BlowJoy:
Neither. Probably in the tradition of juntas everywhere, sell the goods for a tidy profit.
@hortense: People who don't know or care what's happening in Myanmar, I would assume.
@Charlotte Corday: cunt is too good a word for those post-terrence howard baby wipes.
i agree, though. but i think the concern is that they wouldn't be able to tell people on the ground to clear the way. you know, so they wouldn't be crushed by tons of food and other aid items.
@funnyface: I don't mean she shouldn't have had the wedding -- I mean on the earthly scale of things, it was one of the least important things happening right now. Burma is going to hell in a handcart and we need updates on a wedding no one was even allowed to see or cover at short range?
The wedding was symbolism for the whole Bush Administration -- a lot of things that look good, are cheery, and fundamentally bankrupt because they don't matter. And as a side rant, piss on CNN for covering it so intently.
If anyone can't tell, I'm mad.
@rosasparks: It's not about brainwashing; it's about control. If the thugs in Myanmar have all the food, they have control. That's all they want.
besides not letting in enough aid, the junta is also preventing local donors from distributing directly. some famous burmese guy was personally handing out rice he'd purchased and was stopped by the military. messed up.
And now the earthquake in China, thousands predicted dead... let's see how this affects aid to Burma. In an "Well eff you Burma, if you don't want our aid, we'll give it to China." And agree with Jenalicious... what can we do? Invaid?
Let's see what sorts of medical epidemic comes out of Burma from all the rotting corpses in standing water in the coming weeks, and if it will seep into neighboring countries. Then it will no longer be "just Burma's problem."
HOW do you do PR for these fuckers? Seriously. Spin it into "Junta officials are initiating a unique war against obesity in Myanmar"?
@battleaxonista: musty rice and cholera-- the SLORC think they would finally have the perfect country of hungry, obedient slaves.
i say drop tonnes of food, etc. at least some would get thru. and if the SLORC junta fire on US planes, just bomb the fuck out of napyidaw, the fake capital.
@lermanzo: i was in aceh after the tsunami, and the US deployed helicopters to drop food, etc. some of it landed on the houses, but honestly, so many were destroyed that people were more concerned with food, iodine pills for clean water, and the tarps that could provide shelter, than their houses.
@katastic: that's all i need to know about mccain and co.
@BlowJoy: Its all about the news cycle - how about the twisters in Oklahoma in the US last week? Classic though is NOLA/Katrina. Sometimes I think the US admin is HAPPY when disaster strikes other parts of the world so the spotlight is off their own ineptness.
@katastic: AHHHHHH! I hadn't even thought of that. Jesus, this stuff makes me shake with anger.
I like the earlier suggestion of food bombs.
@Charlotte Corday: i think if i was homeless and stranded in burma among bloated and rotting corpses that i'd risk having some rice land on my head in order to get some food and first aid supplies.
@Charlotte Corday: Exactly - and if they do enough drops, the bloody SLORC can't be in all places at the same time, so the people will get SOME aid, whereas now they are getting worse than none.
@MadameOvary: Apparently, while al-Sadr was in Islam seminary (or its equivalent) he was called "Mullah Atari," because he played videogames instead of studying.
@katastic: Seriously, I linked to that shit, they lay out their plan (and the money they made) in the FARA registration. Also, don't we have, like, sanctions against them? Oh, right, yes, we do. I wonder how it is exactly that the junta was allowed to transfer money to them?