Tom DeLay & Britney Spears
"Bork" became a verb after the Senate rejected President Reagan's nomination of Circuit Judge (and former Solicitor General) Robert Bork as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. In the course of the nomination hearings, opponents mounted an unprecedented assault on every aspect of his life, public and private. Every day there was a new charge, until it was impossible to keep up.
For what now seems like years, but is really only months, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has been under political attack from the usual Democratic suspects. In large part their assault is a response to his effectiveness as Leader. But they are truly enraged by his refusal to be intimidated by the New York Times and the other organs charged with enforcement of orthodox political thought.
But DeLay isn't being "Borked" in the usual sense of the term, because his opponents have not, as they did with the judge, dishonestly multiplied their charges -- the true, the false, and those more or less impossible to understand -- but have instead hit upon another tactic. Instead of coming up with a new charge every day, they simply repeat the same charges day after day. And, of course, the MSM go along with this nonsense, despite the fact that each day's story has to twist and reach further and further for "news" to justify yet another repetition of already old complaints.
The most frequently mentioned charges are simple, and haven't changed in quite some time: Trips were made by the Majority Leader (some several years ago, all disclosed in DeLay's House filings) and are alleged to have been paid for by lobbyists, which would be a violation of House rules. DeLay says the trips were paid for by nonprofit organizations, which would not be a violation.
Now I have no clue as to who actually paid for the trips, or what DeLay did or didn't know. But I'm getting tired of hearing the same things being repeated over and over again. Sunday's WaPo story is particularly bizarre, breathlessly revealing that one trip (taken five years ago) was charged to a lobbyist's credit card. Apparently it had previously been speculated that payment had been made in gold bullion.
But it finally occurred to me that we've seen this phenomenon before.
Britney Spears! Those interested learned that she was pregnant on April 12. And the WaPo dutifully reported on April 13. She was still pregnant on April 14. And as recently as yesterday, WaPo was advising us that the ex girlfriend of Ms. Spears current husband was unsurprised, and assured readers that Britney was STILL pregnant!
Going out on a limb here, I predict that Ms. Spears will CONTINUE pregnant for, oh, let's say, many months. And I predict with great confidence that this unchanging fact will be reported many times, in the guise of updates, comments by the great and near great, reflection by pundits on the comments of the great and near great, comparisons to the pregnancies of others, reviews of media coverage of this pregnancy, reviews of media coverage of other pregnancies, and the like.
All indistinguishable from the campaign against Tom DeLay. Simply brilliant.
So I suggest addition of the verb "Spearsing" to the vocabulary, with the Majority Leader as its first object.
"The Majority Leader was Spearsed again today . . ."
And one more suggestion:
Barney Frank needs to get a web site like this one.
But that's a whole 'nother story.
For what now seems like years, but is really only months, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has been under political attack from the usual Democratic suspects. In large part their assault is a response to his effectiveness as Leader. But they are truly enraged by his refusal to be intimidated by the New York Times and the other organs charged with enforcement of orthodox political thought.
But DeLay isn't being "Borked" in the usual sense of the term, because his opponents have not, as they did with the judge, dishonestly multiplied their charges -- the true, the false, and those more or less impossible to understand -- but have instead hit upon another tactic. Instead of coming up with a new charge every day, they simply repeat the same charges day after day. And, of course, the MSM go along with this nonsense, despite the fact that each day's story has to twist and reach further and further for "news" to justify yet another repetition of already old complaints.
The most frequently mentioned charges are simple, and haven't changed in quite some time: Trips were made by the Majority Leader (some several years ago, all disclosed in DeLay's House filings) and are alleged to have been paid for by lobbyists, which would be a violation of House rules. DeLay says the trips were paid for by nonprofit organizations, which would not be a violation.
Now I have no clue as to who actually paid for the trips, or what DeLay did or didn't know. But I'm getting tired of hearing the same things being repeated over and over again. Sunday's WaPo story is particularly bizarre, breathlessly revealing that one trip (taken five years ago) was charged to a lobbyist's credit card. Apparently it had previously been speculated that payment had been made in gold bullion.
But it finally occurred to me that we've seen this phenomenon before.
Britney Spears! Those interested learned that she was pregnant on April 12. And the WaPo dutifully reported on April 13. She was still pregnant on April 14. And as recently as yesterday, WaPo was advising us that the ex girlfriend of Ms. Spears current husband was unsurprised, and assured readers that Britney was STILL pregnant!
Going out on a limb here, I predict that Ms. Spears will CONTINUE pregnant for, oh, let's say, many months. And I predict with great confidence that this unchanging fact will be reported many times, in the guise of updates, comments by the great and near great, reflection by pundits on the comments of the great and near great, comparisons to the pregnancies of others, reviews of media coverage of this pregnancy, reviews of media coverage of other pregnancies, and the like.
All indistinguishable from the campaign against Tom DeLay. Simply brilliant.
So I suggest addition of the verb "Spearsing" to the vocabulary, with the Majority Leader as its first object.
"The Majority Leader was Spearsed again today . . ."
And one more suggestion:
Barney Frank needs to get a web site like this one.
But that's a whole 'nother story.
Presented for your delectation by the Gentleman Farmer at 9:59 PM
Comments on "Tom DeLay & Britney Spears"
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Hired Hand said ... (1:40 AM) :
post a commentInterestingly enough, both DeLay and Spears have been known to make bizarre pronunciations seemingly out of nowhere. Britney, as you may know, has an extensive collection of letters online at www.britneyspears.com/letters (an outstanding bookmark), wherein she howled a few weeks ago, "Dear False Tabloids, As you read this letter, I bet you are asking yourself: Who? Who, me? Am I a false tabloid?"
DeLay, who of course came of age in a simpler time, relies on traditional media for his outbursts. For example: calling the EPA "the Gestapo of government" (AP, 7/29/95) and later noting that "it's never been proven that air toxics [sic] are hazardous to people" (Houston Chronicle, 10/27/90).
Incidentally, Britney scored a #1 hit with "Toxic" 14 years later.