Our Ignorant Dolt of the Week ... RNC Hack Chip Saltsman!

Jesus, you really had to be, overtly, strenuously, going-out-of-your-way, knocking people over, to garner the IDOTW title - during Christmas Week!

I fully expected to come up with a goose egg for our "Ignorant Dolt of the Week" honoree this past week.

I mean, everyone is on the down low, chilling out for the holiday.

Even MSNBC had given most of their Big Dogs time off, and running their venerable Doc Block pap.

It was time to kick back, chow down on the leftovers, and wait to zombie-out in front of TNT's marathon showing of 'The Christmas Story'.

So, if you thought you could sneak a big Christmas-wrapped dollop of racism under the ol' tree, you screwed the pooch.

And that is exactly what RNC Hack Chip Saltsman did.

Who is Chip Saltsman, other than a full-grown adult that continues to call himself "Chip"?

Chip Saltsman, via Wikipedia, "has served as chairman of the Tennessee Republican Party, senior political advisor to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and manager of Mike Huckabee's presidential campaign".

You remember the former Majority Leader, don't you?

Frist, also being a doctor, had the uncanny ability to make medical diagnosis via videotape, and was a deft player in the stock market, miraculously, selling his stock in a company, coincidentally, just before the stock crashed.

Mike Huckabee campaign?

Please ...

No, our IDOTW Chip, is one of those Republican hacks, and he's mounting a campaign to become Chairman of the Sarah Palin Party, err, we mean the other dying one, the Republican's.

He even has a cheesy website up, touting himself as the next hero, the guy with the juice to pull the party out of the ashes.

Leadership has impacted every milestone in American history. Looking forward at the opportunities ahead and examining the lessons learned from the past, it is apparent to all that now is the time for new leadership within the Republican National Committee.

Now there's someone with some serious vision, such prescience.

You just got your asses kicked in the Presidential Election, and your party is hemorrhaging seats in Congress, but you cut through all that and make the call for "new leadership".

Duh!

So, as a warming gift, a little trinket to get his name in front of the potential other hacks who would want this particular hack to be running the show, "Chip" handed out a little gift bag.

From 'The Hill';

RNC candidate Chip Saltsman’s Christmas greeting to committee members includes a music CD with lyrics from a song called “Barack the Magic Negro,” first played on Rush Limbaugh’s popular radio show. Saltsman, a personal friend of conservative satirist Paul Shanklin, sent a 41-track CD along with a note to national committee members.

“I look forward to working together in the New Year,” Saltsman wrote. “Please enjoy the enclosed CD by my friend Paul Shanklin of the Rush Limbaugh Show.”

A closet Dittohead?

Maybe a Gold Level Dittohead, the friend-of-a-friend, who has actually worked with ...

Or is Chip just one of the Flying Monkeys that lives in that alternate universe and believes, as Barry Crimmins used to call him, "the cheeseburger that sweats", actually is a great mind, and spews out pearls of wisdom?

You know, because the former drug addict Limbaugh passes it off as harmless parody, than that is what it must be, not that a majority of the rest of the country would think it to be vile racist slander.

Because that's what Chip is claiming, as he actual defends the "gift".

Please, RNC members, elect this guy to lead your party!

Having Chip with a direct hand in the national campaign of Sarah Palin in 2012.... Priceless!

And, look, he already has another endorsement.

He can proudly post to his website - during Christmas Week, mind you - Chip Saltsman, The Garlic's Ignorant Dolt of the Week!

Go get'em Chip!


Bonus "Chip-in-Mouth" Riffs

Michael Shear: RNC Rivals Discuss Racial Song; Would-Be Chairman Who Sent CD With Parody Blames Media

Steve Benen: RNC CHAIRMAN 'APPALLED' BY 'MAGIC NEGRO' CD...

Robert Stein: GOP Goes South But Obama Doesn't

Bob Cesca: Rush the Magic A-hole

Leave Freddie Alone, He Knows His Symbolism - As Good As The Red Paint On An Old Pick-Up Truck

Well, he is an actor, and he does know how, and when, to hit his marks.

The Aqua Velva Man, in all of one day of being - finally - an official candidate for the Republican nomination for President, poked a stick into The Commander Guys', as well as the entire right-wing freak show, beehive, on the latest videotape from the still-hanging-on-the-wall Wanted Poster, Osama bin Laden, by characterizing it as;

"Bin Laden is more symbolism than anything else," Thompson said while campaign in Iowa Friday. "I think it demonstrates to people once again that we're in a global war."

WOW!

That's enough to get kicked out of the RNC, and have your bathroom stall privileges revoked.

But they need to lay off Freddie.

He's a pro at symbolism ... Just ask'em about his red pick-up truck...

Bonus Big Guy Links

Media Matters: Wash. Post, CNN reported on Thompson's pickup truck without noting it was a leased campaign prop

Glenn Greenwald: Chris Matthews on Fred Thompson's sexiness and smells

Boston Globe: Not all would put a heroic sheen on Thompson's Watergate role

Breaking News! Thompson Responds To FEC Charge, Claiming He's Now Moving Into "Testing Executive Privilege" Phase; Also Invokes "The Cheney Principle", Saying "He's Not Part of The Campaign"

Juan Cole: Bush's incompetence gives al-Qaida new life

Newsweek: The Ongoing Hunt for Osama bin Laden; Into Thin Air

The Aqua Velva Man

Karl Rove ... How Do I Push Thee? ... Let Me Count The Ways

Rumors, theories, speculation and just plain, juicy dirt abound across the regions of the World Wide Web ...

Of the many, many heads popping up to weigh in on Rove, one of them that stuck out above others was Joe Wilson, checking in to remind the MSM on Rove's involvement in the outing of a covert CIA agent ...

Rove resigns ... Explosion of news coverage, from cable-to-print-to-the-blogs ...

Hmmm ... What is that the Bush Grindhouse wants to get off the front pages?

• The motives of bamboozling the Democrats in passing the Bush Grindhouse's "No Oversight" FISA Law?
• The continued snow job on "the encouraging news from both Afghanistan and Iraq"?
• That the surge is working?
• That the other Vacation Man, Nuri al-Maliki, has called for an "crisis summit"?
• A video of Darth Vader, from about 10-years, or so, ago, extolling on how bad an idea it would be to invade and occupy Iraq?
• The unfolding U.S. Credit Market scandal, that may play out making Ponzi looking like a Quick-Change Artist?
• And what's just around the corner? ... The 3rd Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and the Bush Grindhouse's abandonment of an American City

Now, haven't we seen this movie before?

Doesn't this Bush Grindhouse have an unyielding tenacity to cover bad news attached to the Grindhouse with a "new" and "urgent" terror threat?

We can argue the terror value of Karl Rove, but it hasn't been that often that they've thrown a real human being, a staffer, under the al Qaeda-filled-Dirty Bomb-laden bus ... Former Secretary of War Donald Rumsfeld got the boot a few days after the 2006 Mid-Term elections, to change the conversation away from the miserable thumping the GOP received - courtesy of the new, Rovian 'The Math".

And what followed Rumsfeld's melted snowflakes, just a handful of weeks after his carcass was left on the doorstep?

The Surge!

Rove walks away the second week of August, and what's coming down the pipeline in September?

The Golden Boy, the man with the plan - General David Petraeus and his tablets from the mountain, the much-heralded status report on ...

The Surge!

How Do I Push Thee ... Let Me Count The Ways

Now, in the parlance of the Grindhouse, these "dead enders" who just want to throw mud on Rove, and build up the stature of the White House Chief of Staff ... Give him a big (and in Rove's case, that's literal, not figurative) scalp to hang on his wall.

After all, it was widely reported how Bo Boy bellowed out his Labor Day edict of you're either with us or against us, and Rove cowered, choosing to slink out the door.

Can't really buy into that one ... For however proficient Bo Boy is, he definitely doesn't have the balls, let alone the power, to push Rove out the door.

If there was a hint out there today, it may have come from The New York Times, ever so the cheerleader of the Bush Grindhouse and its' Rovian spin, whether it was Judy Miller in the past, or Michael Gordon in the present, today, blaming the Turd Blossom for the weak display in the Iowa Straw Poll, and spelling out doom for the GOP ...

Now where would that line of thought come from?

Perhaps from a former RNC Chairman ... Someone who was very much at the crime scene during the theft of the 2000 election ... Someone who just came aboard, to replace another person who was leaving to spend more time with his family ...

Ed Gillespie.

"As structured under Bush and Bartlett, the position of White House counselor has been a free-ranging adviser with broad authority over communications, as well as a hand in policy and almost everything else that comes across the president's desk. Both Bolten and Gillespie suggested that model will continue, though officials said it is unlikely that Gillespie will be able to fully replace Bartlett, who worked with Bush for almost 14 years and enjoyed an unusual rapport with him."

The GOP has to know the retaining the Oval Office is a pipe dream.

Thanks to the dead weight of Bush, and his insistence on staying in Iraq, the Dems could trot out the cadaver from "Weekend at Bernie's" and walk away with the 2008 election.

It's downstream that they have there eyes on ... Go for retaking the Congress, or, at minimum, cut the majority down to tie-up efforts of the incoming Dem Pres.

And after the drubbing they took in November 2006, me thinks the RNC had to be squawking - loudly - that they were going back to their old multiplication tables, having no stomach for more of that Rovian 'The Math".

In sum, the base, the rank-and-file, don't think of endearing images when they hear the words "Turd Blossom".

"Always the dollars. Always the fucking dollars."

With the Bush Brain Boy staring at multiple investigations, and his lantern empty of any new Genies, there's going to be a run on Geiger Counters in those flaming Red States.

It will come in whispers, blind items, "a former staffer on the Hill" ... Rove did this ... Rove did that ... That was Rove's fault ... Nothing will come out of the Grindhouse, at least not attributable, but it will come ...

Rove blew the 2006 election ... The Bush Policy Legacy?... And that big, dominating, GOP dynasty? ... Karl Rove failed and the crowd he runs with can, and will be, very unforgiving.

It's like in Casino, with Joe Pesci lamenting about the bosses, that it's "Always the dollars. Always the fucking dollars."

Karl Rove has been cashed out.

He's not an earner any longer.

Bonus RovePalooza Links

The Mahablog: Filed under: Bush Administration

Martin Lewis: Give Karl Rove The Ultimate Gift!

Arianna Huffington: Rove Exits with his Usual M.O.: Delusional, Fanatical, and Deceptive

Think Progress: Karl Rove’s Record Of Failed Predictions

Jane Hamsher: Why Don’t Journalists Just Tell Us What They Know?

R.J. Eskow: Finding True Rove -- And That 'Book-Reading' Contest With the President




















I Sing the Body Electric

Minced Garlic - New Keith Olbermann Special Comment Slams Giuliani: "Republicans equal life; Democrats equal death?"

Maybe it was the couple of days off ... Or that baseball season is back ... Or, that he had to endure "America's Mayor" Rudy Giuliani for eight-years.

MSNBC Countdown host Keith Olbermann came out with a full head of steam with a new Special Comment this evening, "Republicans equal life; Democrats equal death? Rudy Giuliani exploiting fear for power and personal gain. A special comment about Rudolph Giuliani’s remarks at a Lincoln Day dinner in New Hampshire."

And it didn't take long for him to get the heat turned up - like, about 10-seconds into it;

"Only in this America of the early 21st century could it be true that the man who was president during the worst attack on our nation and the man who was the mayor of the city in which that attack principally unfolded would not only be absolved of any and all blame for the unreadiness of their own governments, but, moreover, would thereafter be branded heroes of those attacks ..."





Then, about a another 10-seconds later;









"And if you somehow missed what he was really saying, somehow didn’t hear the none-too-subtle subtext of “vote Democratic and die,” Mr. Giuliani then stripped away any barrier of courtesy, telling Roger Simon of politico.com:

“America will be safer with a Republican president.”

How ... dare ... you, sir?

“How many casualties will we have?” — this is the language of Osama bin Laden."

Now, something else is going on here, beyond Giuliani's pandering to the lowest common denominator (and do the heralded base Republicans really eat this up like happy soup? What fucking sheep they must really be if they do).

Bush and Cheney have been doing it the past week, or so. Now Giuliani.

Is Rove, and the RNC, spooked by the "lost emails" and the thought of getting their sorry asses hauled into a Senate hearing? Is the Lincoln Group and WHIG on Spring Break? Or are they just trying to save a few bucks by recycling old smears and spin?

"This is not the mere politicizing of Iraq, nor the vague mumbled epithets about Democratic “softness” from a delusional vice president.

This is casualties on a partisan basis — of the naked assertion that Mr. Giuliani’s party knows all and will save those who have voted for it — and to hell with everybody else.

And that he, with no foreign policy experience whatsoever, is somehow the messiah-of-the-moment."

Olbermann then skewers Giuliani, and the Republicans, with a gattling-gun list of "Which Party ... ", which I will let you read or watch (links below) to get the full effect.

"Call attention to the casualties on your watch, and your long, waking slumber in the years between the two attacks on the World Trade Center.

Become the candidate who runs on the Vote-For-Me-Or-Die platform.

Do a Joe McCarthy, a Lyndon Johnson, a Robespierre.

Only, if you choose so to do, do not come back surprised nor remorseful if the voters remind you that “terror” is not just a matter of “casualties.” It is, just as surely, a matter of the promulgation of fear.

Claim a difference between the parties on the voters’ chances of survival — and you do bin Laden’s work for him."

Links

MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann

Olbermann Special Comment: Rudy Giuliani exploiting fear for power and personal gain

Watch The Video of Olbermann Special Comment: Rudy Giuliani exploiting fear for power and gain

Chopped Garlic: "Emails? We ain't got no emails! We don't need no emails! We don't have to show you any stinking emails!"...

I think we've used the Alfonso Bedoya line before, but it comes to mind listening to White House Assistant Press Secretary Dana Perino the past few days duck, dodge and stammer the absolute unbelievable drivel about the lost emails of the White House.

It seems the Bushies are more intent in giving their all for an audition on their, excuse me, the Fox News Network's "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?", when it, just on face value, appears to be a lot closer to, Judiciary Committee Chairman, Senator Pat Leahy (D-VT) assessment that "This sounds like the Administration’s version of the dog ate my homework."

Bush is going to get his surge all right, unknowingly challenging every high school hacker and 40-year-old burnt-out computer programmer, living in their parent's basement or garage, who, undoubtedly, have already begun their treasure hunt through the White House either nets, searching for the most embarrassing email they can find.

Some chat room or YouTube will likely see a Rove-penned smoking gun before Leahy does. Or maybe former Senator Rick Santorum, who, after all, did such a fantastic jog unearthing those much-heralded WMD's.

If all their crimes, lies, spins, smears and trampling of the Constitution, ignorance and arrogance against the democracy and the rule of law hasn't motivated the Congress to serve up some Articles of Impeachment, than this latest dust-up should.

They are taunting and laughing at the Congress, and the American people, on just how stupid they believe all of us to be.

They wrapping themselves, most absurdly, in the flag, citing only trying to comply to the Hatch Act, the preservation of presidential records, with tongue firmly implanted in cheek. It's Eddie Haskell, in a suit with a flag lapel pin, and an RNC email account in his back pocket.

And, if it works, if the Congress and people buy into this lame explanation, then it will be in short order they'll start the spin on their Iraq Disaster as having "lost the strategy and plans" for that. Their gall knows no bounds, in case you haven't noticed, they have been advertising for a Fall Guy for the Iraq Fiasco, via their search for a War Czar (and surprise, no takers).

We will likely soon be reliving the Nixon Administration, with the inevitable court battle over Executive Privilege regarding the Lost Emails (and boy, to be a fly on the wall for the oral argument over, not just Rove's string-pulling, but some WH Intern's Horoscope files being tied to National Security).

In fact, it shouldn't be a surprise if Bush revives his WMD comedy routine, and applies it to the Lost Emails.

Forget about the final days of his administration and Bush being a lame duck. We can drop the bird and just go with lame.


"Nope ... No emails here ...."

Retro Garlic ... Must Be His Friends and Family Circle ...

Maybe they need his money-raising prowess to bail them out of ... Well, pick a scandal - Crony General Alberto Gonzalez and the "Just Us" Department fiasco? ... The super secret tree house email system that Rove & Co. used in the White House? ... Walter Reed Hospital and the troops that Bush is accusing the Democrats of abandoning? ...

It seems that the King of K Street may be footloose and fancy free in the not-so-distance future.

NBC News reported today that - and at the request of the government - a federal judge may grant a new hearing, to reduce the sentence of Jack Abramoff, as a reward for his cooperation.

NBC News Story

NBC: Abramoff could get reduced sentence; Judge grants request for new hearing, rewarding lobbyist for cooperating

And, back in November 06, on The Garlic ...

Top Ten Cloves: Ways Jack Abramoff Will Gain Favors While In Prison

Or maybe, they're just trying to distract us again.


Link

Retro Garlic - The Iraq Jar

Top Ten Cloves: Reasons Rick Santorum Is Joining Fox News

News Item: Rick Santorum To Join Fox News

10. Someone had to fill, so to speak, Rita Cosby's place at Fox

9. Needs the power of Fox to finish of his hunt for gay priests

8. Suddenly realized, now that he's out-of-office, he doesn't have any restrictions on meeting with lobbyists and can really cash in

7. He's really turned on by Ann Coulter, especially when she's wearing that eye patch

6. Part of the deal for Fox to get the exclusive video on the WMD's Santorum found

5. Santorum doesn't know it yet, but he's being placed in new show "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?", but as the kid who always answers wrong

4. Sean Hannity personally recommended Santorum, for his Iranian Bus Strike plan

3. With the 2008 Presidential race heating up early, Fox needs someone who can really piss off gay people

2. The Ethics and Public Policy Center is quietly paying Roger Ailes to take Santorum off their hands

1. Win-Win Situation ... Fox wanted someone on their roster in the event a "Man-On-Dog" story broke

Which one would you bet on in a test against a 5th Grader?