My views on politics, life, death, the army, and other things too miscellaneous to mention here. This is a personal blog. This blog is 100% factual.
Bill Duckwing
Poet, Author, Journalist
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Your Super-Cute Daily Terror Alert Update Will Be Forevermore:
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"There are some myths and untruths surrounding the role God plays in our daily lives. To say that religion and politics do not mix, is certainly a myth, unless you ask a liberal. Anything that affects a Christian (and voting is one of them) — enters into the religious realm. Trying to separate the two is like trying to separate oil from a glass of water, it's impossible to do. "
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Tuesday, July 19, 2005
What the Hell, Let's Speculate
Given all of the rampant speculation of Bush's choice to take Justice O'Connor's seat on the Supreme Court, I thought I'd do a little bit of last minute speculation of my own. Sure, you'll probably already know and chide me for being wrong by the time you read this, but what the hell.
Right now the money is or isn't on supreme contender Edith Brown Clement. But most are now thinking that she's a big red herring, and that her name's being flown around right now like a Boeing 767 to stall and deflect attention away from the real nominee. Yeah, that whole day's work researching the herring is sure going to put a lot of liberals off when the nominee is disclosed in about 2 and a half hours!
But I'll take a bite. Clement is not 100% certain, I'll wager that. True, she might be a "stealth" conservative judicial activist, but given she's gone on record saying she believes in a constitutional right to privacy, and also mentioned the unhappy fact that she respects the legality of Roe, the fact that the right wingers haven't pounced all over her possible nomination like rabid wolves makes me a bit uneasy. Yeah, maybe she is a herring.
We also got moderate Edward Prado, another one of Bush's appointee's to the wonderful and fabulous Fifth Circut Court of Appeals. I'll allow this if Bush is feeling frisky in a "don't mess with Texas, you Jesus Freaks!" kinda way. Do you see this happening? Well, do you, punk? No, you don't.
So let's take a look at the Hellqueen of Evil from the Deep Fifth Circut, Edith Jones. I'm not kidding. What a super fun fucking war that would be. I'm really not sure what her judicial philosophy is, but her very outspoken politics take a page from the very well known treatise on political theory, "I Hate Humanity." This is the option Bush should choose if he wants to do away with the filibuster on judicial nominees forever. Dems filibuster, then kablooie! Nukes ahoy.
I'll also mention Alberto Gonzales, I guess, and he has a chance, just because he's such a flunky. I'll also mention Michael Luttig, who got an endorsement and more betting money placed on Fox News, and John Roberts, who seems like another good conservative "stealth" candidate due to some amount of bipartisan support.
But if I were a betting man, which I am, I'd pick Edith Jones. She would be a perfect candidate to placate Dobson and the religious elite, since there's no doubt where she'll fall on gay rights and abortion, which should encourage a huge turnout for the religious right for the 2006 elections. It also allows him to engineer a big showdown in the Senate. Once the nuclear option is unleashed, Democrats are done for. Bush won't ever have to listen to their whining and carping again.
Any takers?
Edit (7:45PM): I guess I lose. AP says it's John Roberts. But one question -why the fucking leak? Given the amount of confirmations today, I reserve my right to speculate.
-duckwing, at 6:08 PM
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Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Draft Ed Prado
Since O'Connor resigned, the Supreme Court vacancy has been pretty heavy on my mind. But I think if Bush nominated this guy, some of my worries would go away.
Bush nominated Ed Prado for the Fifth Circut a couple of years ago, where we won 97 votes in the Senate, and is generally a moderate and an all around intelligent guy. Seeing him take O'Connors place on the Supreme Court would make me far more confortable if Bush decided to put in a shitheel like Gonzales or Prissy Owen once Rehnquist finally bites the dust.
Can this possibly happen? Will Bush finally reach for bipartisanship in the Senate and save it from another year of arm twisting and gnashing of teeth? Well, no. Not in a million light years. I imagine Bush would nominate Dobson is he had the votes, and probably has Dobson's identical twin hidden somewhere dark and secret to cue up for the bullpen for when Rehnquist retires.
-duckwing, at 11:02 AM
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Tuesday, July 05, 2005
Happy Fourth of July Everybody!
Hey, I just want to take the time out of my busy schedule and remind everyone to have a really happy and super Fourth of July. Happy Fourth of July, Everybody!
I spent most of the day a couple of airports. Eight hours, actually, for a 1 and a half hour flight. So I was reading this little thing from an old issue of Granta, maybe from 2002 or so I'm not sure, and the theme for the issue was "What We Think of America."
That was kinda stumpy for me. I mean, what does the rest of the World think about America? Actually, maybe the really interesting question would be, what did the World think about America in 2002?
Overall, what the World thought about America in 2002 was a pretty mixed bag o' nuts. I guess you could say that, if you were an American picking through them, there would be some nuts you'd like and some nuts you wouldn't. Now I like most nuts, I think. Actually, I think I like most nuts. But you might be a little more selective, so I urge you to be open-minded when I summarize the thoughts of a few of the nuts to give you a better idea of what the World thought about America in 2002.
Amit Chaduhri (India): When we were young, we used to like to be the cowboys when playing cowboys and indians. Heh, teh irony. Isn't that a cute little anecdote?
Harold Pinter (Britain): The only people in America nowadays that care about my work are elite liberal snobs serching for relevence in this horrible fucking world. Fuck America.
Everyone else (the World): McDonalds. Oh, and Wal-mart. Hershey's chocolate. Hollywood. And the Gap.
Honestly, I really do like Granta, especially for the way they incorporate pictures with their stories and articles. It was interesting to see how much of other people's experience of American culture revolved around exposure to our corporate products and our movies, though. Not surprising, to say the least, but still interesting.
-duckwing, at 9:47 PM
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