Drunken Max Baucus Slurs Some Drunken Nonsense on Senate Floor ??? (Question Mark Question Mark Question Mark)

Hey, don't knock binge drinking at work until you've tried it. Takes the edge off things.

Whether he's really drunk, I cannot say, because... Uhhh... I guess I'm supposed to pretend I don't think he's drunk to avoid a defamation suit or somethin'. So, like, maybe he's just on some muscle relaxants for an old skiing injury or something.

He's not wildly, fall-down drunk or anything (actually, he's not drunk at all: He just accidentally ingested some freon while disposing of an old air conditioner), but he does seem a little... well, let's say "happy."

No, but seriously, I can't say he's drunk. All I can do -- the most I can do -- is resort to gossip-page non-libelous nonsense-words.

So let me say he's not drunk, he was just spotted canoodling with a bottle of Dewar's.

Thanks to Adam Baldwin's Twitter feed. Adam Baldwin isn't just sort of hinting he might lean a little right anymore. He also talks to his fans (well, mostly his critics, but fans too) so it's a little celebrity-internet-facetime bonus if you follow him.

Thanks to DrewM. I will try to think of some jokes, but I really wanted to get this up.

Oh -- DrewM's twitter feed is great, too. So is Gabe's, and Dave in Texas', and Slublog's. I don't think the others are on Twitter yet, or at least no one has told me they are.

But then -- none of those guys played Jayne Cobb, did they?

Only One Drink Per Hour So Your System Burns Off the Alcohol As It Comes In And You Stay Sober? The system worked.

No but seriously he's not drunk.

Re-Purposed Post: One of the funnier things I remember writing was riffing on the apparent drunkenness of John Kerry at a campaign rally.

I'm going to just adapt that post to the current situation, because as long-time readers know, I'm just not that funny anymore.

Yes, trust me, I know, and I'm far more disappointed by this fact than you could ever be.

A Vile Attack on Max Baucus's Character Which I Cannot Abide

Ace of Spades HQ is far too responsible and classy an outfit to ever engage in this sort of cheap speculation. It fills me with "heart-ache" that I'm required to even link such vile filth.

Whether or not this monstrous calumny is true or not -- and I think there's at least a 10% chance it's not -- I would add three caveats and defenses of the good character of Max "Jegermeister" Baucus:

1. While no one can say with certainty whether Max Baucus was drunk, except, perhaps, for the bartender who got him all loaded up and sloppy, Baucus obviously has some sort of speech impediment going on, whether because he drank too much (low odds of that) or he accidentally licked a rat-trap.

I certainly would not go so far as to speculate about this distinguished gentleman hitting the sauce in anaesthetized desperation, but I would say that I wouldn't blame him if he sought solace in a bottle, which, let's face it, he almost certainly did.

2. Just because the inability to speak coherently without slurring and without giving you that "Angry Drunk Hornyface" is a classic sign of intoxication, there is no reason to draw any conclusions from Max Baucus' apparent high level of inebriation.

We cannot conclude from that slender evidence that Max Baucus may have downed one or a dozen highballs before speaking, although we all damn well know he did.

3. And most importantly: Getting sloppy slosh-drunk for a Senate speech doesn't indicate anything about one's job performance or capacity to represent one's constituents, except to the extent a Senator is called upon to make lucid decisions about life-and-death matters of national security and fiscal policy during an economic crisis, and honestly, how often does that come up? No more than four or five times a week, tops.

What business is that of mine? Who are we to judge chronic drunks, gutter-rummies, and railroad hobos such as Max Baucus?

Completely Unrelated Link Having Nothing At All Whatsoever to Do With Max Baucus's state of Almost Certain Intoxication: If you missed it, here are the Top Ten Signs That a Bear Might Be Drunk.

This has nothing to do with Max Baucus. Read nothing into it, because Max Baucus is quite plainly not a bear.

At least, I assume he's not a bear.

Honestly, who can say at this point. I haven't seen a DNA test proving he's human, and no one else has, either. I suppose it's quite possible that he's some sort of shaved-down mutant "manimal" created in order to infiltrate our society and ultimately destroy all human life, but really, there's little evidence of that at this point.

Let's just call it an open question whether Max Baucus is a kind of ursine Terminator fueled only by a hatred of the human species and copious quantities of peach schnapps.

And on that last point, I see no reason whatsoever to follow Newsbusters and Adam Baldwin down into the gutter of cheap slanders and start calling Max Baucus "Senator Schnapps" or "the Schnappster" or even "Schnappmaster McDrunkerton" or, worst of all, "Schnappy, the Genetic-Monstrosity Bear-Thing Intent on Enslaving the World."

Let's keep this civil. Let's keep this on the issues. And the issues are 1, whether Max Baucus is a falling-down drunk, and 2, can he balance a ball on his nose while riding a tricycle?

Ba-Zing! Cicero--

This is just before he nominated Captain Morgan for the Congressional Medal of Honor.

posted by Ace at 03:47 PM

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