Ignore him my ass. The damage is done in that he has provided propaganda for the assholes in the mideast. Ignoring him will only allow him to get away with this shit at home. There needs to be severe repercussions. Ignoring him is not one of them.

Then again there was the Trib's puff piece from Jill Zuckman, who did such a good job she's SURE to be invited to Dick's next pool party...

"On a range of matters, the 60-year-old from Springfield is key in helping devise his party's strategy to protect the filibuster, oppose certain judicial nominees, halt President Bush's plan to partially privatize Social Security and try to project a positive Democratic agenda. A possible Supreme Court nomination this summer will place him squarely in the fray.

Though he lacks the celebrity status of his junior counterpart, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), Durbin is far more potent in the Senate as the person Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) turns to first for advice.

Durbin, said Reid, "has all the talents I don't have."

Indeed, having Durbin by his side has been something of a relief to the press-shy Nevadan. "Dick Durbin is the best debater in the Senate," Reid said in an interview. "He's unquestionably the best. On the most difficult issues, you send Durbin to the floor."

In the face of an organized Republican brouhaha over his remarks, Durbin refused to back down. He maintained that the Bush administration bears responsibility for creating the conditions that led to the mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo by saying they were not subject to the Geneva Conventions."

--------------

Nice work Jill.

Jill's schoolgirl crush disguised as a news story continues...

---------------
"Although Durbin has held his new leadership post for only six months, he is drawing rave reviews from within his party.

"For me to have him as my partner is a dream come true," Reid said. "If I have a problem, he's the first person I call."

Rank-and-file senators similarly gush over his ability to explain things in easy-to-understand, persuasive terms.

"He puts issues we're dealing with in real American language," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.). "I think he's really a good face for our party."

Part of his strength is derived from his always-ready-for-sound-bite rhetorical skills."
-------

Yes folks THIS is supposed to be a NEWS story. Jill, why don't you suck his cock while you're down there?

But this "news" story needs something to put it OVER THE TOP. The Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman doesn't disappoint...

-------
"Such a move would force Republicans to object and to quash Democratic initiatives such as improving education, lowering gasoline prices and raising the minimum wage"
-------

Seriously. You've got to read this. 4 pages of fawning, about two inches of the controversy, which is dismissed by the author as a "brouhaha."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0506170083jun17,1,2637500.story?page=1&coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed&ctrack=2&cset=true

Hey anon, you ever heard of "giving them enough rope?"
We can and should give sharp, surgically accurate rebukes to Durbin (I think Repubs are playing this just right), but don't overdo it. Allow him and other libs to say even more outrageous, indefensible things, and liberals will get burned where it really matters... the polls.

See Dick. See Dick dance.

The description of prisoner treatment sounded awfully familiar to me: Widely disparate temperatures, comatose-like states, casual experimentation with bondage and days of non-stop music. That isn't a gulag, that's a rave.

No thanks.

Durbin is hot, I'll grant you, but he doesn't have the sheer animal magnetism of Howie Dean.
That's the kind of stuff you need to really animate the true believers.
I have a proposition, and I wonder if it will fly or fail, but here goes anyway-

Ridicule is the best defense

It is amazing to me that the left seems to be falling over itself defending the indefensible.

Don't be amazed, RWS, it's what they're best at.

Brewfan

Look to the Shiavo Blog man!! Tell me what you think.

Let's see - when Trent Lott called Strom Thurmond's Dixiecrat vision of America a great thing in a thoughtless moment - Durbin, the Grey Kleagle of VW, and the fat-guy-who-would-have-been-President-if-he-had-only-driven-a-VW all called for Lotts head. They got it.

Even Republicans joined in ousting Lott from leadership because his remarks were hurtful to so many Americans and he clearly crossed a line.....and they agreed that he shouldn't stay in Senate leadership because of "damaging remarks" that impugned the Senate Body if he remained a Leader.

Now we have another Senate Leader that calls our soldiers Gulag-keepers, Nazis, akin to Pol Pot and soldiers of other mad regimes.

If Bush wasn't doing such an incompetent job of communicating on issues of the most importantance to Americans - Iraq, gas prices, loss of jobs overseas, out of control borders, and nothing about the war with radical Islam - the Democrats might be worried about Durbin.

But not with Bush stubbornly locked into Social Security and threatening his 1st veto in 5 years - not on another reckless spending bill - but in his imagined role as Theocrat in Chief, vetoing stem cell research funding..

For now, the Democrats can breath easy about Durbin's fate. The bulk of the country is more pissed at Bush than pissed at Durbin's borderline treasonous, aid & comfort to the enemy remarks.

"Brewfan
Look to the Shiavo Blog man!! Tell me what you think."

I think you've made your bed. Now lie in it.

P.S. Google 'cedarford' and enjoy!

So, I'm curious: Does their GITMO TORTURE DICK OF TREASON beat our GAY PORN COCK OF LIES?

Brewfan,

What bed? Just asking for your thoughts. Don't want to google cedarford. What is that?

Are you crazy, TallDave? Nothing--and I mean NOTHING--beats the 8 INCHES CUT GAY PORN COCK OF LIES!

NEVAAR!!!

Except perhaps the LEBANESE CLEAVAGE OF FREEDOM.

Durbin nosing out Dean for dirtbag of the decade.

Decade ain't nearly over, Bob. They'll come up with something worse. Just wait for it.

Brewfan,

Come on now. I agree with this guy on one thing and I've "made my bed". Does that mean you won't write nice to me? This guy is not a jew hater. He just doesn't think like we do on the Israeli-Arab state. What do you suggest we do with our liberal left wing buddy Cedarford?

I say go with our constitution and let him say what he wants. Because that is what our country is about. Freedom. Even if you or I disagree with it. Dude, when you said to google his name I thought Cedarford was gonna be a Stalin henchan or something. Brewfan, you sound like a dope. Even though I am a conservative, I would probably rather hang with our commie jew hatin' buddy, cause he has guts. Look at the Schiavo site you Yank!!

How many liberal sites have you posted on?

"Oh wish i was in the land of cotton!"

Johnny Reb, he shares far too many obsessions with the enemy.

I'll stop flaming now. But the guy is slime. Slime on our side, maybe, but still slime. I just like typing the word slime, actually.

Johnny Reb: If you want to go hang with your, not our, your, commie jewhatin' buddy, no one can stop you. But don't lecture us about the creep. And don't lecture us about how being pals with jew haters is what makes this country great. Jeesh.

Knemon -

Please! The slimeness is yours and your anonymous friend!

I have grave reservations about America going it alone in a series of ME wars that intend to preserve Israel's - a non-signatory to any proliferation treaty, regional WMD monopoly. And it's land grabs.

On top of radical Islam which is really about a war of ideas within Islam - not "a few evildoers hijacking Islam, the US faces the rise of China, the N Korea threat, and is 1 trillion in hock to Asian bankers.

But there are still people in America and only America that hold Israel alone of all nations sacrosanct from criticism, and not so coincidentally, it's ardent Zionist supporters. As opposed to the freedom Americans have for criticizing Saudi Arabia and Wahabbism as bad and working against American interests, folks like Knemon, Jack M, and Spewfan attempt to enforce stifling Americans from making any criticism of Israel's policies and the quasi-religion of intolerant, expansionist Zionism. Worse, holding Israel's interests above America's.

The war we are in with radical Islam cannot be won with just the military, and just America's military at that. The military is just a component of a strategic reponse that requires allies. There is no magic high tech weapon that will win the struggle of ideas. To win this war means not doing whatever Israel wants, but America being a fair broker and a force for positive change, loaded with allies believing the same thing and pressuring Muslim nations to change and reform and rewarding change . Part of that means final borders agreed to by Israel and its neighbors. America should launch war only when America's vital interests demand we do so, because we have been reminded by 15,000 casualties and 200 billion dollars blown so far in Iraq that there is no fast, easy, cheap "high-tech" war and occupation these days.

You know what scares the shit out of me? The left is CONSTANTLY saying stuff like this. In fact, it's turned into a "Top This!" contest. Ward Churchill, Michael Moore, Harry Reid, Durban, Pelosi, Dean, Kennedy, Boxer... The list just keeps growing. None of these people ever pay any type of penalty, politically, financially, publicly, etc. in any way, shape or form.

And Bush only gets 51% of the vote, when he should be getting about 60%.

The future is very bleak, indeed. The number of voters in America who CANNOT be shocked by anything said by moonbats is obviously way too high, and not dropping, no matter what the outrage is.

This can mean only one thing- the critical tipping point that has to be reached in order to finally discredit the left is at such a high threshold that it will take nothing less than a catastrophe of immense proportions to make them finally become irrelevent.

A dirty bomb? Fifty thousand American civilian casualties? Who knows what kind of clusterfuck it will require?

America is still too wrapped up in its little cocoon of SUVs, 150 channel TV, broadband, air-conditioned malls, etc. to understand just how blessed we really are, and how bad things really are outside our borders.

I'm suddenly a lot less confident than I used to be.

Dogstar -

It will take more American blood before we get serious, but blame falls on both parties. The Dems want nothing more than to return to a 9/11 world and the natural anti-American, "blame America first" tendencies of the Democratic Left come out as expected from the mouths of Dean, Pelosi, Teddy, and shits like Durbin. But the message from Bush was initially that it was all about getting a few "evildoers" who hijacked the "Religion of Peace". His solution was for most Americans to focus on shopping, travel, enjoying their tax cuts, and doing something nice for a neighbor ----while the "sacrifice" part would be by the "heroes" - the 1st responders, law enforcement, and the troops which constitute a small part of the American population.

Then the quest against a "few evildoers" hiding in their caves broadened to include a guy who was not a radical Islamist but a "bad kinda guy" supposedly sitting on a mountain of WMD that we couldn't "let the evildoers get". But turned out not to exist.

Going on almost 4 years, we have yet to seriously contront the war of ideas within Islam or involve the non-Muslim world in common cause in a strategic fashion - just in some halfway productive "evildoer chasing". Outside that, the world is not with us and is telling us to get serious about getting Israel under control so that we can get the ME reasonably stable and only then can we confront radical Islam strategically - the rest of the world says we can't when all the Muslims see is an Israeli boot on a Palestinian throat and the US asking if the Israelis need more boots....

Democrats, Euros, and Muslim countries fail to take radical Islam's threat seriously and hold enemy civil liberties too dear. They will only wake up with further bloodshed.

Bush and some conservatives err in thinking America can do it alone, that only military solutions are to be used, Israel's happiness with our military adventures is a major consideration, and that all the war-fighting must be done on the cheap lest mostAmericans are asked to sacrifice. Bush further errs in ignoring urgent domestic matters that do not affect his wealthy cronies.

The only fun in the Bush mess is the thought that Democrats are tearing hunks of their own skin off in anguish that they ran a total boob like Kerry against him instead of a competent, centrist Democrat.

Drop fuckface a line and let him know what you think about his sorry ass:

http://durbin.senate.gov/contact.cfm

erratum - that should be "a pre-9/11 world".

Adding, while I agree with Dogstar that liberal or Left Dems are FUBAR, no way Bush deserves 60% approval numbers on his own merits.

This is a guy who has borrowed 1 trillion from Asian bankers to help fuel his tax cuts for the weathy while going on the biggest spending spree since ,,,no, he actually exceeds what LBJ did with federal spending! Since his reelection his message has been "America's economy is doing great", "Save Terri Schiavo!", "Iraq is going great, the noble Iraqi people are happy as clams, stay the course", and a plan to cut Social Security benefits while setting up private accounts tailored for high end earners.

Ignoring real problems that people actually care about - the looming energy crisis, healthcare crisis, globalization crisis, volunteer military crisis. The dead stock market, job growth and wages as business owners make money hand over fist since 2004. The out of control US Borders. America's loss of goodwill in the world. The incoherence of the war on radical Islam..

No way does that guy deserve 60% approval. I predict that unless he wakes up, and wakes up hard and fast, and starts doing things the public expects him to do - his approval numbers will be in the 30-40% range in a month..

Hint to Bush - And, Dubya, the way back to getting public confidence regained is not to pose again as Theocrat in Chief and blow the 1st Veto of your Presidency - not on the latest reckless spending bill relying on Chinese willingness to take our IOUs - but on Stem Cells. Lets hope, stubborn as you are, you learned from your stupidity on the Terri Schiavo cluster fuck.. And please, don't take another month-long vacation at Crawford..

1. I'm amazed at how little communication is possible by some here without the use of profanity. Oh, well, such is the state of education, I guess.

2. If it looks like a moonbat, quacks like a moonbat and argues like a moonbat, it must be a moonbat. Cedarford sure looks, quacks and argues like a moonbat.

3. I wonder if Senator Durbin has seen pics of the Sadham torture chamber just uncovered? I am really surprised all of the Gitmo prisoners aren't demanding (with the help of the All Crooks and Liars Union) that they be held in those rosy confines. It would be so much more humane.

I've read The Protocols of the Elders of Zion ABOUT A HUNDRED AND SIXTY-SEVEN TIMES, AND IT KEEPS GETTING FUNNIER EVERY SINGLE TIME I READ IT !!!

(Bush sold our children into slavery to China)

Cedarford, you are definitely the oddest of the odd ducks that hang out here. You actually cite the U.N. voting record and you think that supports your argument around here? Yeah, OK - whatever.

Frankly dude, why don't you just get your own blog? If you really believe this stuff, then get your own space to make the case and stop hijackin’ Ace. If you really want to show us simpletons the light of the truth that you've embraced, then lay out your arguments in a logical order and post the direct evidence you have to back them up. Hell, if you asked politely, I wouldn’t be surprised if Ace gave you a send off statement and a prominent link to get you started. Of course he dislikes you intensely (like most of us) and I also wouldn’t be surprised if he just gave you the finger. In any case, this option is available to you - why not take it?

Well, it's fun pissing off Zionists here for starters, Enas. The knowledge that the truth about Zionism is getting out in the last country still under manipulation - that in some ways it is as malignant a movement as radical Islam - makes Zionists hysterical. Hard to have as much fun with my own blog in that aspect, though I do have a blog under a different Internet identity.

As for your conclusion that the opinions of all the countries America has been on long-term friendly terms with doesn't matter....because ITS JUST A UN VOTE..on our dear, special friends the Israelis --well, that's silly.

Israel is now in the same boat as S Africa was. A pariah nation.

Gee Cedaford, where are these damn evil Zionists you write of? What because as an ethnic and religious group Jews try to run their country according to their religion? What fiends! They're so evil they even let people who don't share their beliefs vote, hold office and practice their own religion! DIABOLICAL! We HAVE to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. THANK YOU CEDAFORD! for exposing this evil evil regime!
Israel is obviously Iran, and North Korea's moral equivalent!

And as for embryonic stem cells, why do they need federal funding, for as you know Bush did not ban embryonic stem cell research, he just restricted its funding to existing lines? Because no venture capitalist will fund it. Why? Because no viable therapy has been developed with embryonic stem cells to say nothing of the ethical issues involved. What has been developed with embryonic cells are some very nasty cancers. However, adult stem cell research has led to some dramatic successes and practical therapy, which has drawn venture capitalists, and no nasty ethical issues either.

In the ramp-up to the 2028 Presidential Elections the 2005 Democratic Party Strategy Papers were leaked by an anonymous source at Comedy Central known as ViennaBoys.

ViennaBoys admitted having alot of anger about the DNC but refused to describe why as if it were obvious.

ViennaBoys said the DNC wanted to singularly focus all of it's attention. They want to specifically focus on The War, Terrorism, Chinese Productivity, India's Economic Future, Whether Elections in Theocratic Nations Are Legitimate, Historical Revisionism, MiddleEast Agit-Prop, Nuclear Proliferation, Post Soviet ReAlignment, Low Cost Labor, International Business Competition, Petroleum Refineries, The Internet Blogoshpere and a host of Domestic Issues such as Stem Cell Research, Retirement Security and Healthcare.

But their main goal, according to ViennaBoys, was boost the morale of Americans at every turn in order to break through and snatch the 2028 White House.

I think the US economy is in great shape, and any American who believes otherwise is simply not looking at reality.

The budget deficit, which is supposedly an out-of-control fiasco, is shrinking at a pretty significant rate. It will probably end up at around $300 billion this year, a reduction of about $150 billion from last year, and less than 3% of GDP- something most of Europe cannot achieve. The budget deficit is also about the same or even lower when compared to deficits of the late 80s and early 90s.

Income tax receipts are up, big time. Unemployment is around 5%- half of Europe's. GDP growth is over 3% and has been for going on three straight years, which is a pretty impressive stat compared to historical patterns. Europe's GDP growth is about half that.

Ditto with productivity growth. It continues to rise, while Europe's stagnates at about half the rate.

The stock market is breaking out to new highs not seen since August, 2001 (I'm using the S&P 500 as my yardstick). S&P 500 earnings (which are about 80% of our economy) are at all-time highs, at roughly $60/share.

Home ownership as a percentage of the population is at an all-time high. The biggest improvements have come in minority households, who evidently haven't figured out yet that Bush might have something to do with it.

Long term interest rates remain at multi-decade lows. The 20 year US Treasury bond is around 4%. The rate keeps dropping, because the demand for US government debt is higher than the supply. So much for that evil deficit, eh?

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about when I say I'm worried about the future- if over half of Americans think Bush is doing a bad job on the economy (which was the conclusion of a couple of recent polls), what the fuck does it take to make people happy? An unemployment rate of 0%? Issuing every household their own personal assistant? Even more $40,000 SUVs sitting in people's driveways? Even higher housing prices?

People don't have a clue as to how good our collective national standard of living is. This is precisely why Muslims attacked us- they targeted our TRADE CENTER, because it is the most obvious symbol of our country's immense wealth and success. Muslims and Europeans don't hate us because we are in the Middle East- they hate us because our economic model is steamrolling them into the dirt.

And most of our cocooned, spoiled rotten idiotic fellow citizens can't stop floating around in their brand new, in-ground, heated swimming pools long enough to figure it out.

It seems like we are in a place very similar to the final days of Rome.

Knemon and "june",

I'll lecture all I want about that Jew hating liberal. Because I can. Ya see I believe in individual liberties. If you don't want me on this blog, then Ace can kick me off. Like I said in the first thing I wrote, TELL ME HOW TO THINK!!! I don't think exactly like you do and you resort to calling me slime or whatever. The fact that I don't think he is a piece of shit makes me your enemy. Whatever. Like I give a shit.

BTW - Knemon, what "obsessions" do I have with cedarford? Or should I say the ENEMY?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Yeah, ya'll, Cedarford isn't a Jew-hater just because he spouts off gold-standard time-honored Jew-hatin' rhetoric! I mean, did yer know that the Jews are manipulating us? And that even though Jews are only 3% of the population, they don't count for 3% of our war casualties? But what do I know? I can't even be bothered to read the stuff I'm defending. I'm just an unfrozen caveman lawyer southerner, from the south, where we are southern. Ya'll.

"Ole Suzanna, now don't yer cry for me. . ."

Johnny Reb, I didn't say, and I don't think, you were slime. I meant that Cedarford, while sort-of kind-of on side, shares the mindlook of the jihad (viz., Israel is an evil entity controlling the world, or at least the U.S.) to a degree that used to make me uncomfortable, and now nauseates me.

Yes, I sound like Andrew Sullivan. I'm aware of that. I retract all my calls for Ace to ban him. You're right, free spech should be valued above all.

(I should add that some of this hysterical reaction of mine comes from guilt. I was a full-on moonbat not too many years ago, and I said and thought things about Israel then that make me cringe when I see others writing them now.

See, Cedarford, that's why you piss me off so much - we're not so different, you and I.)

All this Dick from Ace and no dinner .... what gives?

Knemon,

free spech should be valued above all.
Amen and hats off. Thanks For clarfying what you said, and sticking to your principles. Cedarford kinda pisses me off with his view, but I don't hate him.

Sortelli,

Not a lawyer, but thanks for the insults. I know Cedarfords blogs are out there, but they are to damn long and I just don't feel like reading them. That's why I was asking you. I don't really feel like studying and putting to much effort into a blog. If that is what you do, then all I have to say is that you really need to get laid or at least talk to a girl.

Johnny Reb, thanks.

I went over the top on a few threads, but I don't "hate" Cedarford - you can't really hate someone you don't know, who for all you know is actually a St. Bernard typing with its nose or something. I should say I hate the way Cedarford acts on this board and leave it at that.

Can't we all get along?

Good post Dogstar. If only the general pop was more educated about econmics, they might see through the same old DNC "improving education, lowering gasoline prices and raising the minimum wage" for the tripe that it is.

And yes, the Trib would love for everyone to ignore this. Because although it is embarrasing, it is the same kinds of things they say at their parties amongst their like-minded friends.

First, as always it's impressive to see the high quality of idea exchange here at Ace's place.

Second: *Usually* there's at least a grain of truth in the complaints of the Left/libs. Cedar makes one good point about Israel: that the U.S. govt is strongly pro-Israel. That much is hard to plausibly deny.

But it's also hard to seriously claim there's a behavioral equivalence between Israel and the radical Palestinians and the gov'ts that support them: e.g. total freedom of all religions in Israel, vs. "no Bibles allowed" in the Islamic world; suicide bombers in pizza parlors, etc.

But Cedar's bigger oversight is believing that defeating radical Islam requires allies--make that *much bigger allies* than Britain, Aussies, NZ, Poland and 30-odd other countries. Here's why:

Most European nations know that if they *openly* ally with the U.S. they risk a Madrid-style bombing. Why should they risk that? So most of 'em will keep quiet and let the existing U.S.-led alliance do the heavy lifting. Not only that, while doing this they'll bitch and moan about how *awful* the nasty Americans are for doing...whatever will buy a headline, because they believe this will cement their bonafides with the Islamofacists.

Europe (for the most part--Poland a *shining* exception!) will keep up this behavior as long as the Islamofreaks don't attack *them*. So for the entire duration of the WOT we can expect this behavior to continue.

Much as we may wish to have more allies, ain't gonna happen. And for Cedar (and the rest of the Dem/Left) to assert that the WOT "can ONLY be won if we have allies" is to set up an obvious condition for a return to the good ol' days of Clintonesque willful blindness--i.e. to unilaterally surrender.

In any case: keep up the good work, all--including Cedar.

I agree that the worst thing we can do to this blowhard is to ignore him.

at

Ignore him my ass. The damage is done in that he has provided propaganda for the assholes in the mideast. Ignoring him will only allow him to get away with this shit at home. There needs to be severe repercussions. Ignoring him is not one of them.

In the past this could be done. But Liberals and the MSM have shown their appetite for making the US look bad to the world is insatiable and want nothing more than to be given a forum to engage in their evil tit-for-tat bullshit charges for the cameras. And they will not stop this shit until we stop them through boycott.

But until then, the more we ignore this stuff and say that these charges don't deserve to be dignified with an answer, the more likely it'll die down. Which, I am afraid, is the best we can hope for until the right begins to boycott.

THE RIGHT MUST BOYCOTT!!!