TOBY PETZOLD

I am very sorry to hear of Heath Ledger’s death this afternoon. I thought he was a very good —and becoming a great— actor. Bless his and his loved ones’ hearts.

The only two movies I saw him in were The Patriot and Brokeback Mountain. In the former, I knew I was watching a star in the making; by the latter, he’d become one.

I don’t know enough about Ledger’s opinion of that performance to say whether he’d choose to be remembered by it, but I think it will be so. And it is an important performance because I think it helped to open a lot of minds.

Goodbye, young man. Something good of you will remain.

Does anyone know why Mike Huckabee is constantly shadowed by Chuck Norris? I’m sure it’s been explained, but I’m afraid to look. Not only is it bizarre; it’s stupid. Because when Huckabee is giving a speech, I’m not paying any attention to him; I’m watching Chuck Norris and going, ”WTF?!” Ha, ha!

Dragging along this B-movie eunuch to Huckabee’s campaign appearances is either a deliberate perversion of Hollywood’s alleged star-power allure (in which case it’s time for Huckabee to let Chuck in on the joke) or it is a revealingly clumsy attempt to reach for the Walker, Texas Ranger demo of white Southern women over 65.

Huckabee’s silly. I wouldn’t vote for him if he were to get the nomination.

Mayor Bloomberg is going to fund an Obama-Bloomberg third-party ticket after Clinton takes the Democratic nomination.

The next President, in the manner of Bill Clinton, will only receive a plurality of the popular vote.

On FOX, they’re interviewing some girl who fainted at a Clinton rally.

Huh?! That’s what gets you on the news?

Nonsense.

Great exchange this morning between John Kerry and George Stephanopoulos.

Kerry thinks the value of his endorsement of Barack Hussein Obama is of greater moment than whatever loyalty it is that he owes to John Edwards —and to his own judgement from 2004. Has he not rather given the final proof of the worthlessness of his own judgement? You are accused of yourself, John Kerry. What offense could more be made of? Your choice of Edwards for veep was enormously stupid and it cost you the election. And only now do you understand and confess it. Ridiculous.

Interestingly, this snub suggests a pattern among the Democratic Presidential nominees of maltreatment of their running mates. Gore screwed Lieberman in the lead-up to 2004 by withholding his own plans until it was too late for Lieberman to act on his own —and now this thing with Kerry not even giving Edwards a reach around. 

What do you suppose accounts for this? Besides the viciousness of your average Democrat.

I want to know how Sidney Blumenthal —one of the biggest assholes since Larry O’Donnell or Terry McAuliffe or Sandy Bergler or any number of other Clintonistas— could have gotten arrested for aggravated DWI before last Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary and we’re only now hearing about it late Friday night.

This needs to be examined and exploited in full.

The very idea that Bill Clinton should go on the radio with the disgusting Al Sharpton to explain to Black America his recent slam at the Obama candidacy as a “fairy tale” is itself a demonstration of racism. Is he serious? Who set him up to do that? Only a straight-up Saltine-American would turn to Tawana’s Pimp for a chance to revise and extend.

Worse, Clinton is trying to recast his fairy tale characterization as specifically touching on Obama’s anti-war position. That’s a total lie: it’s obvious from how Clinton starts off on his rant that he’s referring to Obama the Candidate as perhaps too audaciously hopeful. Speaking as Obama, Clinton said:

‘It doesn’t matter that I started running for president less than a year after I got to the Senate from the Illinois State Senate. I am a great speaker and a charismatic figure and I’m the only one who had the judgment to oppose this war from the beginning. Always, always, always.’

Think about it. That’s just the First Black President being resentful that he’s not the most exciting Democrat anymore; he’s slippin. So, when the wife says:

“I see what’s happening and we have to reverse it.”

You’d better believe he’s going to do whatever it takes to get that third term.

That’s a rare ego, folks. One of a few of its kind you’ll see in a lifetime.

I just heard Barrack Hussein Obama say that it’s the drug companies that are keeping “change” from happening. Hmmm.

Do you know how many millions of Americans owe their mental and physical health and, indeed, their very lives to the use of pharmaceuticals? That’s a big “change” from a century ago when people routinely died from diabetes, infections, cancer, etc. that can be easily treated and controlled today through drugs. There’s not a person reading these words who doesn’t know a friend or loved one whose life hasn’t been lengthened and improved by the research and development dollars spent by “Big Pharma.”

Let’s keep our demagoguery informed, shall we?

I can’t shake the feeling that Big Media has gone to a lot of trouble to give HRC the rope-a-dope comeback concoction to beat all just now. After kicking her in the nuts every day since Iowa, New Hampshire has been made into some sort of transcendent turn in the narrative that everybody can marvel at. You have people like Brokaw and Russert declaring her victory tonight one of the biggest upsets —if not the biggest upset— in American electoral history. Well, that’s fucking absurd. But it’s no surprise: they recognize that fluffing Obama may make for great political theater, but that he can’t get elected right now. Better to go with the Clinton Machine — which knows how to play at the liberals’ heartstrings, but without committing this country to the unvetted Leftism of the “Yes We Can” crowd.

The Republicans may have a problem with McCain locking horns with the Christian Right, but there are a lot of Obamists out there tonight who really hate the Clintons. I don’t know which split will be uglier in the end, but it should make for some entertaining days to come.

Guess what, dumbass. You forgot to stop using the War for Iraq as a partisan tool long past the time you should have layed it down. You made opposing the war the end-all and be-all of your political interests —even though you never fully understood what its purpose was or what good things it would and will achieve.

Instead, you insisted that opposition to the War for Iraq be the great shibboleth of the day —and stood by like demented hobgoblins awaiting some sign of ideological consistency on an issue that serves you nothing. Nothing.

And, for this, what is your reward? The prospect, at least, of nominating someone who cannot win in November —while finally destroying the only machine in the past 40 years (with the exception of the miserable aberration from Plains) that has given you any benefit of a Democratic White House.

I think what you’re doing is dangerous to the party. Maybe that’s a good thing to some, but as an American whose politics are often very liberal, I think it’s a disservice to the stability of the Republic.