Rebecca Dittman – Staff Writer, HI-RISER

June 23, 2008

Rebecca Dittman – Staff Writer
HI-RISER
P.O. Box 1189
Deerfield Beach, Florida 33441

RE: Speaking of censorship…

Ms. Dittman,

Speaking of censorship…Can you tell me where I can get some of those cartoons about the Prophet Mohammed, blessed be his name?

Speaking of censorship…I can find no one to publish my theory of evolution. It is obvious to me that man has descended, not from the apes, but from the bears. Do you remember when the big threat to the world was Global Cooling? Did Global Warming save the world from Global Cooling? Are the bears, the warm and fuzzy ones who eat baby seals, now paying the price for our profligacy?

Speaking of censorship…I am looking for media sponsorship of my upcoming Free Speech Festival. It will be held at noon, July 4, 2008 on the steps of the Federal Court House on Broward Boulevard. I will burn a copy of the King James Bible. Then, to show that I am note playing favorites, I will burn a copy of the Koran. I will have a full bladder handy should the need for extinguishing the small conflagration arise. Will you and your paper join my crusade to see how free we really are?

Congressman Barney FranK

June 26, 2008

Congressman Barney Frank
29 Crafts Street
Newtown, MA 02458

RE: Emmis, one Bayonne guy to another, OK?

Congressman Frank,

In the Logic most familiar to modern American Liberals, and I consider you to be the paradigmatic template for that endangering species, you say that Countrywide Mortgage is “unusually sleazy”.

Would it not therefore follow that people who profit from this cistern of sleaziness are themselves “unusually sleazy”?

I don’t mean Senator Conrad. All he needs are bib overalls, a hatchet faced wife and he’s “American Gothic” redux. Besides, he’s from Middle Lakota or Bug Fug or a place that Starbucks hasn’t yet found. He is dull and the source of dullness in others. Not him.

I mean Dirt Bag Dodd. He is the only politician who has ever lied to me face to face.

I can say that he gives Irish-Catholics a bad name. I can say that because I am Irish-Catholic, He wouldn’t last 5 minutes in either of Bayonne’s better saloons, Pop’s Corner or the Speedway. By the by, neither of them was particularly Irish.

Do you suppose a “Friend of Angelo” would have been a friend of “Bayonne Joe”?

Can I infer that you will serve on the “Committee to Horse Whip Senator Dodd” for being “sleazy”? If you want to get rid of “sleazy” Countrywide wouldn’t that broom of Augean proportions extend to Dodd the Stealer of Hot Stoves? If not, why not?

Commissioner Addie Greene, Palm Beach County Commission

June 22, 2008

Commissioner Addie Greene
Palm Beach County Commission
301 North Olive Avenue
West Palm Beach, Florida 33401

Palm Beach, Florida

RE: What were you thinking? That’s a big assumption on my part, thinking that you can think

Commissioner Greene,

I just know, with absolute 100% metaphysical certitude, that the phrase “Free men speak with free tongues” is alien, even extra terrestrial, to you.

“It never bothered me until Obama beat Hillary, and
I got the one [anonymous letter] saying that we had a
baboon in White House, – and that ticked me off,”
Green said…”When you start attacking me and Obama,
I have a problem with that. Leave Obama alone.”
The Miami Herald
Today
Page 5B
You

And if I don’t leave Obama “alone” what will you do? Since I don’t do anonymous letters you know my name. My address is right below my signature. If you decide that I am a White red necked hurler of billingsgate at Senator Bambi will you come to my house and beat me senseless? Be advised that my love for the First Amendment does not diminish my love for the Second.

“Baboon” is one of my favorite words in the illustrious History of political speech in America.

It goes without saying that, of course, you knew that the Democratic Party and the New York Times called Abraham Lincoln a “baboon”. You knew that, didn’t you?


Being an elected official comes with some perks and some drawbacks.

You can be a nit-wit in public, you can say biblically dumb things, you can walk around with a neon sign that flashes “I am a boob”, and no one will really mind. The obverse of that coin is the First Amendment is always on patrol. Free speech is bit like pregnancy. Either you are or you aren’t. Either speech, particularly political speech, is free or it isn’t. 25 centuries ago “Free men speak with free tongues” was good advice. It still is.

My advice to you is that you shut your mouth. It is advice I hope you don’t take. While it would be of great value to the diminishing ozone layer and would drastically reduce the dreaded greenhouse gases that dumb assed pols, poltroons, and mountebanks such as you give off in copious amounts it would deprive the citizens of Florida the sheer joy of hearing someone like you ramble on.

You suffer from an ailment common to all modern American Liberal politicians. It is “non-malodorous fecal matter syndrome”. If you don’t know what that means send a SASE. If you don’t know what SASE means dial 911.

As long as you keep your mouth shut people will only suspect you to be a world class fool.

Keep talking. Addie, your name, is short for addlebrained, right?

You go, girl!

Congressman Robert Wexler

June 21, 2008

Congressman Robert Wexler
5790 Margate Boulevard
Margate, Florida 33063

RE: At last! A gilded lily.

Congressman Booby Wexler,

I watched you performance yesterday at the hearings featuring Scot McCllelan.

You give new meaning to the word putz.

G-d’s Holy Trousers! You are a moron.

Censorship & Rebecca Dittman

June 20, 2008

Rebecca Dittman – Staff Writer
HI-RISER
P.O. Box 1189
Deerfield Beach, Florida 33441

RE: “Banned Books” – Why “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing…”

Ms. Dittman,

Is the Kennedy family “conservative”? Are they “usually religious”? These seem to be the traits that you find most common in those who would ban books. Whatever adjectives you can attach to this family “conservative” and “religious” would not come first to mind. Yet this didn’t stop them from threatening William Manchester with a law suit set to rival Jarndyce v Jarndyce unless he made substantial changes in the book he was writing on President Kennedy.

He did.

Short of stopping the publication isn’t making the author dance to your tune just as good? Perhaps better?

You mention that “Animal Farm” was “confiscated in Germany by Allied troops”. If this is so I learned something new today. Turnabout is fair play.

The three books for which Orwell is most famous for were all subject to being blackballed or subjectively reviewed [if at all]

“Homage to Catalonia” was deemed to be slightly Fascist because it wasn’t anti-Franco enough. Also, since he was an eye witness participant, when he wrote that anti-Franco forces, AKA “The Good Guys”, were just as brutal as “The Bad Guys”, he was condemned by the London literary Left as a traitor. When he reported that the Communists looted all the gold in the Spanish Treasury and shipped it to Moscow their rage knew no limits.

The “non-conservative, non-religious” Left has a long memory.

The publication of “Animal Farm” was much delayed because loon laden London literary Left thought it to be an attack on Stalin.

The publication of “1984”, a book whose working title was “The Last Free Man in Europe”, was delayed because Orwell made no distinction between bad totalitarianism [German] and good totalitarianism [Russian]

Around the time of its publication the United States was prosecuting Alger Hiss for perjury. Around the same time Kremlin surrogates were defenestrating Jan Masaryk and jailing Cardinal Mindszenty. Meanwhile, and you may want to become more familiar with Solzhenitsyn, Stalin was busy filling up his gulags. I search in vain for the moral equivalency.

Congressional Republicans sent some Hollywood types to jail for contempt because they refused to testify before Congress.

Funny how some things repeat themselves.

Congressional Democrats want to do the same thing to Karl Rove.

One last example of “book banning” backfiring.

A 1944 book, “The Road to Serfdom”, could not get any of the regular publishing houses to touch it. You’ll be surprised to know that nobody wanted to offend Stalin, by then a war time ally. The great Lord Keynes was an enthusiastic supporter

The book was published by the University of Chicago. Its author, Friedrich Hayek, won a Nobel Prize in 1973.

As to Dr,Seuss/Theodore Gesiel, I mean he has a stamp so what could he have done? From August 22, 1939 to June 21, 1941 his considerable talents were used to defend the German-Russian Non-Aggression Treaty. That meant that all his characters were used to tell what a nice guy Hitler was. Look it up.

“Quaff deeply or taste not of the Pierian spring

Senator B. Hussein Obama

June 20, 2008

Senator B. Hussein Obama
@Democratic HQ
430 Capitol Street, SE
Washington, DC 20003

RE: What’s that smell?

Senator B.O.

It doesn’t pass the “bag test”.

I was introduced to the “bag test” by a dear friend whose modern American Liberal credentials were quite in order.

He voted for Henry Wallace.

The “bag test” is simple.

If there is a doubt or you just want to confirm something that is empirically self evident you put it in a bag. You close the bag and put it in a closet. Wait one day. Open the bag. Your nose knows. PHEW! Dispose of the bag in an environmentally sensitive manner.

While bellyaching about how “mean” this country is, while fretting over the unfairness of having to pay back student loans, your wife used her Ivy League education to do something warm and fuzzy for a hospital in Chicago. Her choice so a good choice.

You’re from, Cook County, Illinois. I’m from Hudson County, New Jersey. We have many things in common, particularly when it comes to politics. Let’s follow the bouncing balls and see where they lead us. If you forget to bring your bag don’t worry. I have mine.

1 – You are elected to the United States Senate.
2 – Your wife gets a $4,000 a week raise.
3 – Repeat 2. That’s $4,000 a week.
4 – You slip an “earmark” worth $1,000,000 into a bill.
5 – A Chicago hospital, your wife’s employer, gets the loot.
6 – What with the price of arugala and private dance lessons for your daughters thank God you were able to bring “the failed policies of the past” into the 21st century.
7 – “Bag? I don’t need no stinking bag.”

The kerfluffle about Muslim chicks wearing scarves getting the heave-ho from the photo session…brilliant. Your minions make the point that bearded women wearing shrouds would distort your message. The message, simply put, is that you ain’t one of “them”. It was a subtle first step. By next week you’ll be tossing back the Buds while devouring a ton of pork rinds while singing “If I were a Rich Man”. Meanwhile, you get to be a gallant gentleman. You telephone Fatima and her sisters and say that you are “shocked, shocked” to learn that such behavior is going on. You toss a few unknowns under the bus. Incidentally, it may be time for a bigger bus. It’s getting very crowded under the old one.

Like I said. Brilliant.

The rejection of public financing…brilliant. George Soros will give you rolled quarters if he has to. Like the legendary British labor leader, Jake Kite, said, “I’m on the bus. Ring the bell.”

Like I said. Brilliant.

I have to call the Guinness Book of Records.

I am going to need the world’s biggest bag for you. I may as well get my picture in the next edition.

Senator B. O.

You got your name the old fashioned way.

You earned it.

FL State Senator Steve Geller

June 19, 2008

Senator Steve Geller
400 South Federal Highway #204
Hallandale Beach, Florida 333009

RE: Congratulations!

Senator Geller,

As the only certified life coach and hackle raiser in Broward County I travel in search of the perfect specimen. I was in Texas for almost 3 weeks trying to bag the last of the Jim Hightower species. No luck.

I just got back when a friend called from Stonington, Connecticut. “Who is this horse’s ass?” he wanted to know. I cannot tell a lie. It was you. Dorothy was right. There is no place like home.

Your comments on off shore drilling have earned you the title

HORSE’S ASS OF THE WEEK.

You said that any oil spill would despoil Florida’s beaches, wreck our economy, hurt all the creepy crawly creatures that bite and sting us, and would make les merdes du Quebec even worse. One of the hallmarks of modern American Liberals is that facts are never allowed to interfere with an argument. In 60 years of drilling in the Gulf of Mexico not one drop of oil has ever been spilled from an American drilling or production platform. Hurricane Katrina, the one that was started by Global Warming and President Bush because he “doesn’t like Black folks”, huffed and puffed but did no harm.

You are correct to worry about a possible oil spill. If banning all drilling in the Eastern Gulf makes you feel better then you must accept the Logical consequences of such a ban.

#1 – Turn off all air conditioners in your home and office.
#2 – As an elected official you must give up use of a private automobile. Public transportation must be your only means of travel. No exceptions. A look at your official bio picture suggests that you too are calorically challenged. A few hours a day on a bike or a skate board would do you a world of good. Plus, it would decrease your carbon footprint.
#3 – You must be an ardent supporter of the expansion of nuclear energy.

Would you know if there is a legislative remedy should Cuba and China begin to drill in the Florida straits? Would either country be subject to a legislative subpoena? Would the drilling entities be subject to American laws? How about Mexico?

Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama encourage drilling off their shores. Although there has never been drop of oil spilled in 60 years can the Florida legislature enact a law – Let’s call it Canute’s Law – that prohibits any oil from these states from entering Florida waters?

Perhaps you could get Congresspersons Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Ron Klein, and Alcee Hastings to introduce legislation banning ALL drilling in the Gulf. Perhaps you would introduce legislation in the Florida legislature banning the use of any petroleum products in Florida that came from the Gulf of Mexico

There is an argument to be made that if we are at risk anyway we should share in the bounty. We allowed Florida’s indigenous population – not from the Bronx – to establish not quite sovereign nation status so we could share in the swag generated by gambling. What’s the difference with drilling in the Eastern Gulf?

Am I writing too quickly for you?

Cars are fueled by gasoline that is distilled from petroleum. Domestic petroleum production is declining. We like the benefits of an advanced industrial society. There are Homeric amounts of oil and gas waiting to be tapped in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico. Drawing a line on a map does not stop a geological formation. If you think it can then you believe in the tooth fairy also. If you think it is good public policy to send money to a thug like Chavez or to robed people who stone women and think that living in the 13th century is kosher then continue your opposition to drilling in the Gulf. Speaking of kosher, oil is fungible. Once it is in a refinery no one knows where it comes from. That we buy and use oil from Iran is a given. Ergo, America is financing a country that wants not only to defeat Israel but to wipe it out. And you’re still in favor of banning drilling in the Eastern Gulf? Oy!

After a few months doing a Lance Armstrong-like back and forth to work you can change your bio picture, the one of you with more chins than a Chinese phone book, to one of you in Spandex. Next stop, Tour de France.

KS

P.S. – Did you know that France gets 75% of its electricity form nuclear power?

Judge Janet Sanders

June 15, 2008

Judge Janet Sanders
Superior Court Administration Office
Three Pemberton Square
Boston, MA 02108

Judge Sanders,

A twice convicted toper appears before you on a third charge of DWI. This time he has struck a pedestrian breaking both his legs and smashing him into a month long coma. You treat him as if he had run a yellow light for the first time. You gave him what amounted to a walk.

I hereby name you

HORSE’S ASS OF THE WEEK
MARE DIVISION
JUDGE SECTION


Case closed.

Fran Wood, The Star Ledger

June 15, 2009

Fran Woods
The Star Ledger
1 Star Ledger Plaza
Newark, New Jersey 07102

RE: If she talks, walks, and throws like a girl do you think maybe she might be a…a…girl. A somewhat different take on your column of June 11, 2008 about Hillary as, quelle surprise, a victim of uterine circumstances.

Ms. Wood,

I was inadvertently trapped in the Pioneer Space Probe in 1977. It was the express route. It didn’t stop until Uranus and you know how difficult it is to make connections form there. But even then and there I knew about Hillary Clinton.

I knew that in her first high profile law job – Special Counsel to the House of Representatives – she recommended that the accused be denied the right to counsel.

I knew that she was hired by the largest law firm in the state of Arkansas when her husband became Attorney General. I knew that she became a partner in the largest law firm in the state when her husband was elected Governor. I knew that she most zealously defended a pedophile rapist by attacking the victim, the 12 year old victim. The perp went inside for only a year when she had the top count dismissed and he pled guilty
to one count of stinky finger with a non-family member.

I knew that she had a broker named “Red Bone”. I knew that a lot of people involved in Whitewater went to prison. I knew that the sales contract she drew up for Whitewater was the worst, most God awful anti-consumer contract ever done. In it she got the red necked rubes who were the typical purchasers to give up the right to a hearing before a Judge, that’s usually referred to as “due process”, in favor of the Rule of 78. If you are not familiar with that go to Route 22 and ask one of the charmers who wears suede shoes and sells used cars on a lot with a sign that says “Buy Here – Pay Here”. I knew that she gave Ricky Ray Rector a lap dance to keep him from fidgeting in the electric chair. Ricky Ray, you may recall was a feral Black man who after killing several people, tried to kill himself. All the bullet did to his brain did was turn him into a lump with an IQ of 60. Being able to neither understand the charges against him nor being able to assist in his own defense did not prevent Arkansas from convicting him of capital murder. He went to the chair to show that Bill was tough on crime. She did her part.

When she got to the White House her 3rd choice for Attorney General began her illustrious Federal care by charbroiling some 7 dozen of her fellow citizens. There were two qualifications for the job: #1 – A valid law license and #2 – most important, no prostate gland. I know that her firing the White House travel staff wasn’t enough; she had them indicted. The one job her husband gave her, a job in violation of Federal law, she first SNAFUed. Then she FUBARed it.

I know that she didn’t send her daughter to any of the really fine public high schools in the District of Columbia. I know that while she was doing the Serpentine Shuffle and Two Step on the tarmac at Tuzla she Damn near gave Milosovic a third eye. I know that she garnered some credit for not hitting her layabout husband, Handsome Billy, The King of the One-Eyed Trouser Snakes, with a bat. Perhaps a Lorena Bobbit origami would have been in order. I know that she put her family abandoning, child support dodging brother in the way of some easy Benjamins by acting as the bag lady for the sale of Presidential pardons. [When the question of pardons comes up I have the picture of Denise Rich blowing Big Bill’s flute most skillfully. Don’t you just know that wasn’t the only instrument she tuned for him?] I know that she would have taken the Rose Garden and the West Wing of the White House out the door with her save for the fact that Mayflower didn’t bring a big enough truck.

As to your criticism of the First Amendment, such criticism being expressed by you taking genteel umbrage of someone calling her a “presumptuous woman”, may I suggest that should any women as presumptuous as Golda Meir or Margaret Thatcher were to present themselves for public office; I would keep alive the tradition of Hudson County – I am from Bayonne – and vote for them twice.

Your knickers, and I just know that they are really cute, are in a knot because Don Imus referred to her as “Satan”. If he had called her “macaca” he would have been sent into pursuit, perpetual pursuit, of the Pioneer Space capsule. May I ask what your reaction was when President Bush was referred to as Hitler? What would have been your reaction if you knew that the New York Times acquiesced in calling President Lincoln a “baboon”?

You end by saying that Hillary – I hope you won’t think ill of me if I tell you I still haven’t made up my mind if it’s Hillary the Harridan or Hillary the Hecate – was like Ginger Rogers. She did everything that Fred Astaire did only she did it in high heels and backwards.

Not so. Not so.

Ginger Rogers rose to the top of her profession not because of what Fred Astaire did. She earned an Academy Award not because of what her husband did. She got it the old fashioned was; she earned it.

Would that Mrs. Clinton could say the same.

Senator B. Hussein Obama

June 15, 2008

Senator B. Hussein Obama
@Democratic Party HQ
430 South Capitol Street, SE
Washington, DC 20003

RE: Another helpful hint

Senator Obama,

Many people feel that you are an elitist. Allah be praised but thank Sweet Baby Jesus the bowling ball was – Surprise! – round. That, plus inertia, enabled you to score as high as you did. You looked like you would rather being having your ears cropped than be doing that.

“I mean have you been to Whole Foods lately and seen the price of arrugala?”

Barry, Barry or May I call you Hussein? That is not the way to get the people in the VFW hall to vote for you. Thank God there is no picture of you doing a shot – a la Hillary – of Crown Royal. The picture was so condescending. People don’t do shots of Crown Royal. They do shots of Four Roses or Wild Turkey. Besides, Crown Royal is a Canadian whiskey. She missed a chance to bash NAFTA.

A door closes but a window opens.

Notwithstanding the fact that Budweiser is a terrible beer it is a uniquely American institution. It has been around forever as America’s own terrible beer.

It is under siege by, and let us thank God for such blessings, a Belgian beer conglomerate. [On the merits, an outfit that is responsible for both Bass and Beck’s couldn’t help but make Bud better. That’s not the point. The point is to win an election.]

Here’s a chance for you to strike a blow for America.

Do you remember the Ports Dubai deal? The deal to take over management of several of America’s port facilities fell apart not because they were incompetent – they manifestly were/are not so – or because they were politically inept – the simpler days of White Envelopes stuffed with cash lining the pockets of politicians have been replaced by consulting fees for lobbyists – but rather because people here did not want to see such a visible part of the country being run by WOGs.

Foreign invaders, led by a horde of sly Walloons, supported by Flemish jackals, want to ravish an American icon. Belgians are known for their lace, their chocolate, and some of their dogs The French lost a big fight there. Also, the Germans like to trample them.

You must go to St. Louis, grab a six pack of Bud, thumb you nose at History, and say “This will not stand”.

Governor Dukakis, AKA “Wee Mikey”, the man who gave us Willie Horton, told Iowa farmers to raise endives. Better he should have told them to plant tofu trees and pasta bushes or succotash vines. Then you stand up and kvetch about the price of arrugala. [If you plan on spending time in Broward County kvetch is a word with which you may wish to become more familiar.] A lot of people think arrugala is part of the Soprano family. A lot of those people vote.

Everybody, including those of us who hate Anheuser-Busch on its merits, knows that Bud is a beer made by Americans. It’s time to secure our borders.

The Chrysler Building will be sold to foreigners. The buyers? People from the Gulf People who wear robes and stone women. They don’t like Jews much, either. Remember that the next time you’re at a B’nai B’rith breakfast in Broward. Tell them that as the ultimate goy you will block the sale, disassembling, and shipping of the landmark building to the Gulf to be used as a tourist attraction. I mean what do they think it is? London Bridge?


SAVE BUDWEISER
American beer brewed for Americans by Americans

Who says politics, even the politics of change, can’t be put on a bumper sticker? The “embittered” guys you pissed off by telling your truth are beer drinkers. They will love it.

Senator B. Hussein Obama

June 13, 2008

Senator B. Hussein Obama
@Democratic Party HQ
430 South Capitol Street S.E.
Washington, DC 20003

RE: Smears and such

Senator Obama,

Despite beautiful web site pages importuning me to buy a hat and believe in change I could not find a mailing address for you. I prefer a letter in an envelope with a stamp on it when I want to share my thoughts with someone. Besides, should you be elected and you are able to get universal, interplanetary, and, ultimately, intergalactic health care what better source of diligent and sensitive Federal workers other than the United States Post Office would you turn to for the implementation of what will surely be a labyrinthine scheme?

Here’s hoping this letter gets to you before the election.

I was very upset during the Presidential campaign of 1960.

If you ask anyone who was there the Democratic Party said that there was a “missile gap”. Further, they said such “gap” was caused by the negligence of the Republican administration.

It is well to note that 11 months and 2 days after the Allies invaded Europe Nazi Germany surrendered.

I don’t know how familiar you are with History but the man who led that invasion force was General Eisenhower. 8 years after WW2 ended he became President Eisenhower. That a man such as he would let his country slip into mortal peril is an example of a campaign smear that cannot be allowed to stand.

Let the record further show that it was he who sent the United States Army to Little Rock, Arkansas to see that nine Negroes [as they were known then] could attend high school. He did this despite the 100% opposition of every Democratic Senator from the South.

Talk about profiles in courage!

Senator Kennedy also said that “anyplace is defensible if free men wish to do so”. You may wish to Google Quemoy and Matsu to familiarize your self with the above. You may also wish to familiarize yourself with “we will pay any price and bear any burden in defense of liberty”. On second thought that may a bit too much for your plate.
Sometimes free speech is a burden.

I am a concerned citizen, a bit curmudgeonly perhaps, who knows that “politics ain’t beanbag”. There are some things, however, that are beyond the pale. When I hear them I’ll pass them on so that you may dispose of them in a timely and environmentally sensitive manner.

Here are a few of the whoppers gaining traction.

#1 – “I see dead people” – You look to be about as familiar with Memorial Day celebrations as you were with bowling. There is supposed to be a YOU-Tube clip of you at a Memorial Day service in which you praise those who fell in combat. Supposedly you say ”I see some of them walking here today”. It will take 50 years to overcome the damage that Senator Jay Forbes Kerry did to Henry the Fifth’s Agincourt speech so I rule out any connection there. Aristotle said that “something cannot be that which it is not”. You could not have seen dead men walking, could you? Perhaps Reverend Wright gave you a head’s up on the Second Coming. If so, you would be well advised to let those “embittered, gun toting, bible thumping” White people know. Do the math. You need their votes to win. Don’t worry about those San Francisco swells. They’d vote for you even if you were to become Blackula and shagged both Hillary and Bill. In fact, they’d probably continue a Cook County tradition and vote for you twice.

It’s something you have to get in front of.

#2 – “Michelle’s $4,000 a week raise” - There is a base canard circulating that upon your election to the United States Senate your wife, the lovely and charming Michelle my Belle, got a $4,000 a week raise from the hospital that employed her. Some people say there might be a connection. Some people say that, should you win in November, it was money well spent. However it plays out she was catapulted through that glass ceiling, wasn’t she? Since you filed a joint tax return for that year some might say that you benefited from it also. I say “Horsefeathers”! You remember what Bertie said to Jeeves, don’t you? “All evidence is circumstantial. Like when you find the trout in the milk.”

It I something you should address lest it get out of hand like the “missile gap”.

As soon as I hear more of the above I’ll share them with you.

Senator Chris Dodd (D-Ct)

,June 13, 2008

Senator Christopher Dodd
30 Lewis Street #101
Hartford, CT. 06103

RE: A long time coming

Senator Dodd,

It’s been a long time but maybe things do come right in the end.

A bit of background is in order.

“Character is destiny”, or so said Heraclitus,

“Character”, said James Madison when asked what was the most important thing to look for in a candidate for any public office. “Character is all.”

“We cannot be too curious when inquiring about the character of men seeking public office.” Credit that to a member of the Adams family. It was either Samuel, John, or Edie.

Hark back to the end of the glorious Carter era.

We met at a fundraiser for you in a spectacular Park Avenue apartment. It was a very hot summer evening. I was with Norman Kelly. He had done a favor for your mother in honoring your father’s memory. She was pleased and you were most warm and gracious in your greeting of him. Whatever it was he had done you were most thankful...

As we chatted our similar backgrounds became apparent.

We both were Irish Catholic. We both were sons of attorneys. We both went to Catholic schools. We both were History majors. We both were in the Peace Corps.

Here the road splits.

I asked you about Central America in general and the Sandinistas in particular. You gave me very specific answers.

Your subsequent public statements and votes in the Senate indicate one thing.

You looked me in the face and lied.

That’s why the straight line from that lie to being a “Friend of Angelo” is so obvious.
That you have ca. $1,000,000 in mortgages held by a company that looks like it shares quarters with poltroons, grifters, boosters, and con men is a matter of public record. The 800 pound gorilla sitting in the corner is how you qualified for that much debt on a salary of $165,000. It would appear that 80% of your net income goes to debt service. That doesn’t leave much for cocktails, does it? I hope you have your daughters on the inside track for “Friends of Angelo” scholarship fund.

Maybe you are a “Special Friend of Angelo”. Maybe Tony Soprano sent you. Maybe you do some collection work for him. Maybe you do some “facilitating” for him.

Private men of wealth, men such as Angelo, like to have public men running interference for them. Since we met at the end of the Carter administration it is well to note that Archer-Daniels-Midland purchased an insolvent peanut farm in the early ‘80s. They assumed some past due obligations and tossed the seller a few bucks. They are a world wide food company. They were into globalization before anyone had even heard of the term. ADM got a marker on a former President for about $4. Carter, the worst President of the 20th century, sold his birthright for considerably less than a bowl of porridge. When he parlayed his treacly nostrums, his dry wall hanging ability, and his penchant for publicly pissing in his country’s soup into a Nobel Prize the value of the trade was confirmed.

Maybe you work the phones for Angelo getting the deadbeats to pay up. Maybe you greased the skids for him with regulators.

Either way neither a hot stove nor the pennies on a dead man’s eyes are safe when you are around.

Either way “the sins you did two by two you pay for one by one”.

Either way you are still a liar.

Rep. Ron Klein

June 11, 2008

Congressman Ron Klein
800 East Broward Boulevard
Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33301

RE: Off shore drilling

Congressman Klein,

I just called your office in Fort Lauderdale. I asked if yesterday’s vote on drilling off-shore was in committee or in the full House. The man responding wasn’t sure, an admission for which he gets high marks, but he said “the Congressman was opposed to any off-shore drilling”.

The Logical conclusion of such a vote would be to introduce legislation mandating the removal of drilling and production rigs off the coasts of Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas. Logic is not the strong suit of modern American Liberalism so I doubt if we will see that. Further, it is good that Congressman Wexler, a man about whom enough bad things cannot be said, is so near to you. Every time he does or says something egregious, things which happen only when he is awake, he makes you seem like Solon.

I don’t know, what with your busy schedule, if you are aware of the fact that Cuba has granted China a drilling permit, an off-shore drilling permit, within their territorial waters. Since both are sovereign nations there is no chance of them responding to any Congressional resolutions.

Cuba has had 3 problems since Castro took over. The lack of breakfast, lunch, and dinner fleshes out the timeless observation of the legendary restaurateur and sportsman, Big Mike from Bayonne, when he said “that’s why you never see anybody swimming to Cuba”. China is a different proposition. 70,000 Chinamen were killed in an earthquake last month and they have a state funeral for a friggin’ panda. Perhaps I should end that last sentence with a question mark except it isn’t a question. It is a fact.

Do we want these people drilling 60 miles from Key West?

If you don’t want any American oil companies drilling in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico why should Chinese companies get a pass?

There has never been one drop of oil spilled into the Gulf from any of the 5,000 drilling rigs there. American oil companies are subject to American law. Do you imagine that the Hop Sing Oil Company will respond to a Congressional subpoena? Do you imagine that they will respond to a Federal Court order?

Far be it for me to pose a problem without offering a potential solution.
The Monroe Doctrine.

Just tell the Cubans and the Chinese that should they prepare to spud one well in proximity to the shores of Florida the United States Navy will guarantee a dry hole. In fact, because it’s so close to where we live, we can make it an all service show. The Air Force and the Army can get their licks in too.

Since we are protecting ptarmigan and wandering caribou in Alaska can we do less for Florida’s native symbol of victimhood, the manatee?

Of course, if you choose not to sponsor such legislation, would you not be duty, honor, and Logic bound to turn off the air conditioners in your offices?

A swift reply, be it bellicose or hot and sweaty, would be appreciated.

Dave Michaels, The Dallas Morning News

June 1, 2008

Dave Michaels
The Dallas Morning News
508 Young Street
Dallas, Texas 75202

RE: If it’s gone too far is there room on your ark? Mine’s filled. Besides, I have a pen with two captive adults manatees Molly is just coming into estrus and Marko, the Alpha male, is a perpetual paragon of priaprism. I feed him oysters laden with Vigara. Barry White is crooning in the basckgound. White wine, cigarettes, whatever. A premise denying take on your story on Congressman Joe Barton [R-Texas] in today’s Dallas Morning News that I read this morning on a visit to my Texas ladies.

Mr. Michaels,

Every morning, before I go to the other side of my docks, lest I disturb some manatee foreplay – the sound of a whirling propeller seems to get his attention while 8 day old lettuce hitting her in her ample ass seems to get hers – I read a few lines of “The Population Bomb” by Paul Ehrlich, Ph.D. You may remember him as a one time stand up comic wannabee on the Johnny Carson Show around 1970 The guy was no Don Rickles but he stood in there and gave it his best shot. He’d come out in front of a national TV audience and say, “Did you hear the one about we’re all going to starve to death in 2000? Of course, we may freeze to death first. Either way, don’t buy any green bananas and max out those credit cards.. Who’s going to sue you? The joint will look like Neptune or Saturn in a few years times.”
He didn’t make it as a stand up comic but, Thank God, he had his Ph.D. to fall back on. If he didn’t he be in “Dirty Jobs” as a Dirty Job or he’d be bait in one of those Alaska crab pots. He’d last for years as a crab siren because there is no end to educated dopey bastards who couldn’t find their ass using both hands in a phone booth filled with mirrors. His big shtick was “Global Cooling” causing “Global Starving”.
Would it be within the bounds of what passes for the Scientific Method today for me to say that Global Warming saved the world from the peril of Global Cooling? Perhaps it was the decline of the Leisure Suit and the return of Billy Carter to his studies on Red Man tobacco, Mozart, and the kid on the porch of Deliverance; perhaps not. Either way I have a closet filed with down jackets that are yours for the asking,
In the mid ‘70s, “while in disfavor with fortune and men’s eyes”, I amused my children by letting them squirt Right Guard out the bathroom window. The object of the game was to deplete the ozone layer. I told them there was a monster called “stupidity” that lived there. He was clever though. He got everybody to say he was smart. He then got other people to say that if you said he wasn’t smart you were stupid. Later on the champion of this, the poster boy for the frisson moment of discovering every day that his thumbs are apposable, became the Vice President of the United States. The name on his license says Alfred Arnold Gore, Jr. We know and love the old galloot and mountebank extraordinaire as Alpha Gump. The Secret Service called him “Cementhead”.
I read a lot.
I read a lot because supposedly smart people write a lot. They do that because most people can’t think. They feel. Confusing thoughts with feelings is a sure way to lose your birthright.
I try to say in a gentle and convincing manner, “Hey Dummy! What you are saying is so dumb it makes my hair hurt. You’re making my finger nails curl backwards. What you are saying is so dumb that you should be tied to the flag pole by city hall so tha told men with no teeth can come and piss on you. Old ladies whose pants don’t fit would come and beat you with sticks. I am working on a new methodology consistent with the lessons learned at Camp Gitmo and Abu Ghraib.
Maybe we could have copies of “Silent Spring” set ablaze and the first WOG who pees on it to put it out gets to sniff at an infidel virgin while he is alive.
Worse than the out and out lie is the quarter truth.
It begins by saying that on Monday morning all limes are green, round, and bitter. It ends by saying that if we haven’t banned hydrocarbons, switched to tofu, and raised taxes by Thursday noon we will all perish.
It is quite true that on Monday morning all limes were bitter. The rest is constructed by people who wait impatiently out where there is no regular bus service. Alas, these people, these ohmadahns, these “Trousered Apes”, now own all the ink.
Thankfully, in a language that gave us Shakespeare, Keats, Lincoln, Eliot, MacArthur, and Wolfe there is a word in that language, a word that is unique in that it cannot be qualified.
That word is bullshit.
You slip a toxic nugget into your news story on Congressman Barton on Page D4 of the Dallas Morning News.. You say
“1997 – The U.S signs the Kyoto Protocol, a climate control treaty
that restricts greenhouse gases for some continents.”

[Here’s a layman’s thought. I’ll write slowly, #1 Greenhouse gases are bad. #2 –CO2 is a greenhouse gas. #3 –Every time we exhale we expel CO2, a dangerous greenhouse gas. #4 – Why don’t we all hold our breaths for an hour each day? #5 - That’s a plan we can get all behind, don’t you think?]
For a treaty to have the force of law it must be submitted to the Senate for its “advice and consent”. Should 2/3rds of the members present, presuming there is a quorum, vote in the Affirmative it becomes the law of the land.
Forgive me if I thought you had working knowledge of the Constitution. Silly me.
There are two things worthy of note with regards to the Kyoto Accords.
#1 -When the Treaty was being negotiated the United States Senate voted 95 to 0, that is to say that in a Democratic majority Senate not one member of either Party voted for any Provision of the Treaty.
#2 – Whatever History’s final verdict on the life and times of President Clinton [W, not H] repeated inclusion in later additions of “Profiles in Courage” will not be high on the list of pluses. He did not submit the Treaty for the Senate’s Advice and consent.
If Global Warming is now a moral issue the President was obligated to submit it.
T.E. Lawrence said, “Not much can be gained form a sure win. There is much to be gained form a sure defeat.” For a man so concerned with his legacy that perjury was a trifle it could have been a bully pulpit moment.
The above, failure to submit the treaty, is a material fact that you chose to omit. Should you have been writing a prospectus you would be liable for charges of fraud.
Alas, the rules that apply to the real world, the world where gravity still has a say, don’t apply in the world of pseudo science.
In a world governed by shoulda, coulda, woulda, in a world where “it’s a great idea so it must be true”, in a world where correlation is causation, in a world where Lysenko was never given a fair shot, in a world where the Luddites weren’t all wrong, it is a given that those who do not bend their knew to the Gods of Delusion are evil.
I can tell you from 5 years of empirical observation and recordings that the water in the Intracoastal in Fort Lauderdale, Florida is not rising. Maybe the icebergs are melting. Maybe the polar bears are drowning. Maybe it’s going to be tough sailing for those poor baby seals for a while - the fewer the polar bears to eat them the more Canadians with poleaxes to…to… poleax them Maybe the water going to the Seychelles. Maybe it’s going to Tonga. Maybe the “surge” is subverting it. Maybe it went to Myanamar. Maybe the Falklands will become the Atlantis of the South.
Wherever it’s going it’s not going up my dock. Molly and Marko are free to cavort. Manatee suffrage is on the horizon. Who knows what they’ll do?
Quarter truths will become the coin of the realm.
Molly and Marko will contact their cousins the armadillos to turn Congressman Barton out of office.
Should that happen will the voice of the turtle will be heard once again in the land?
“Modest proposals” will become the law of the land.
Meanwhile, sitting quietly on the hill, notebooks in hand, pens fully inked, “The Gods of the Copybook Ledgers”, will be ready to take notes.