Month: May 2011

An intriguing but as-yet unconfirmed story. But this makes it plausible:

Mrs Gaddafi, who is the dictator’s second wife, was with her husband in a house attacked by Allied warplanes on April 30, killing Col Gaddafi’s youngest son, Saif al-Arab.

A map of demographic change:

The latest nugget:

Marty Steelman, a woman who lives next door, said the real estate agent who sold the house to Ms. Baena in June told Ms. Steelman that it had been purchased by Mr. Schwarzenegger for an employee who was retiring. Property records show Ms. Baena as the property’s owner.

This is a classic from a Tea Party blog:

"Let me tell you what I think about moderates. Even Jesus had a problem with moderates. He said, “You are lukewarm–neither hot nor cold, I will spew you out of my mouth”. In other words, for crying out loud, have the backbone, character and conviction to take a stand for something. The liberal media wants to set us up with another moderate linguine to lose AGAIN!

The 2012 presidential election is going to be all about Obama, mmm, mmm, mmm! Thus, we need a candidate who understands this reality and will boldly go after Obama politically; someone with all American John Wayne true grit committed to tea party principles. So far, our John Wayne is a Momma Grizzly."

Via McGinniss.

Pretty badass for people in white coats:

Now stripped of his law license by Alaska's Supreme Court:

An Alaska bar committee last year found Shea had a conflict of interest in representing the sister of a former client, David Kyzer, in a family dispute. The panel also found that Shea had made "false statements of fact" against Kyzer or his attorneys in court filings. And it said he acted unprofessionally in court pleadings by using language or displaying conduct the committee described as demeaning, intemperate, frivolous and outrageous.

No wonder Esther picked him. Her kinda guy.

Does Jim Fallows think we can really resist this gem?

“The literati sent out their minions to do their bidding. Washington cannot tolerate threats from outsiders who might disrupt their comfortable world. The firefight started when the cowardly sensed weakness. They fired timidly at first, then the sheep not wanting to be dropped from the establishment’s cocktail party invite list unloaded their entire clip, firing without taking aim their distortions and falsehoods. Now they are left exposed by their bylines and handles. But surely they had killed him off. This is the way it always worked. A lesser person could not have survived the first few minutes of the onslaught. But out of the billowing smoke and dust of tweets and trivia emerged Gingrich, once again ready to lead those who won’t be intimated by the political elite and are ready to take on the challenges America faces.”

No can do. At some point we can and should debate the differences between Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty’s views of the individual mandate. And yes, Jim is right that froth can Trump substance. But until then … Tiffanys!

An Oscar category in the making:

A pretty definitive takedown by Melissa Harris-Perry.

He made a deal with the tabloids?

For many years, Schwarzenegger employed pit bull attorney Marty Singer—whose legal threats to journalists are the stuff of legend—to stamp out negative stories and discredit women who claimed he'd misbehaved in front of them. … But perhaps the greatest coup came in 2002, shortly before Schwarzenegger announced his candidacy for Governor. That year, David Pecker's American Media, which publishes supermarket tabloids like The National Enquirer and Star, purchased a slew of fitness magazines from Schwarzenegger's mentor Joe Weider in a transaction valued at around $350 million. Soon after, AMI signed up the Terminator himself in a multi-year contract that made him the executive editor of a number of its publications.

AMI got a PR boost from the publicity, and Schwarzenegger got a certain amount of immunity from the company’s tireless attack dogs. As one longtime AMI staffer put it to Los Angeles Magazine in a 2004 article by Ann Louise Bardach, “When Weider was being bought, the edict came down: No more Arnold stories.”

But tabloids are not the MSM, are they? Here's a fascinating first-hand account of reluctant MSM reporting on Arnold's history of sexual abuse in 2003. The reporter uncovered another love-child rumor in her inquiries. My only inference: when people tell you something is so irrational no-one in public life would ever do it, inquire further.