Following Democratic Indiana Senator Evan Bayh’s Monday announcement that he would not be running for re-election this fall, colleagues from both parties came together to issue the kind of consensus statement the two-term Hoosier pined for in his retirement speech.
Senators, Democrat and Republican alike, agreed: the 54-year conservative political scion was a total douche bag.
Having lamented that, “There’s just too much brain-dead partisanship,” in Washington, Bayh’s complaints inspired the brief interparty comity, perhaps embodied best by a quick hug stolen between socialist Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and right conservative James Inhofe (R-OK) in the Senate Cloak Room after word of the retirement began to spread.
“Total dick, and a real hypocrite, to boot,” said Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), citing Bayh’s curious complaints in his retirement speech.
In the speech, Bayh lamented that, “For some time, I have had a growing conviction that Congress is not operating as it should. There is too much partisanship and not enough progress — too much narrow ideology and not enough practical problem-solving. Even at a time of enormous challenge, the people’s business is not being done.”
“I have two words for that: health care,” Schumer said, “I mean, this guy is complaining about obstruction? Really? He was one of the schmucks holding the whole thing up, that disingenuous little schmutz-face.”
Indeed, frustration with Bayh on the issue of health care cut across party lines, with Republicans also complaining of his conduct during the contentious Senate debate.
“He was a constant flirt,” GOP leader Mitch McConnell said. “He’d always say he was going to filibuster, we’d get some lobbyist cash for him, and then after a few backroom meetings he’d go back to their side, richer and fulfilled. Asshole, that guy. So smug, too.”
McConnell’s frustrations touched on the final dick move Bayh pulled: having acquired the signatures needed to get on the Indiana Senate ballot; watered down legislation enough to raise over $13 million for his re-election campaign; and already hired and given commitments to a number of campaign workers, it was a total shock to everyone that he was leaving the race.
Those surprised included Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid and the leaders of the Indiana Democratic Party, who will almost certainly not have enough time to recruit another candidate and acquire the signatures required to put him or her on the ballot. That’s sure to bring about legal wrangling, reducing even further the Democrats’ shot at retaining his seat in the politically conservative state.
“Had he done this a few weeks ago, we’d be properly prepared to at least put up a fight,” said Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Robert Menendez (D-NJ). “Now, we’re probably screwed, which is a total Bayh thing to do.”
“Yeah, we were totally looking forward to beating him in November, too,” added a nodding South Dakota Republican John Thune. “What a jerk.”
Inspired by the back to back nights of national exposure for the participants in a famed 2005 sex tape, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele announced early Tuesday his own proposal for economic recovery: universal sex tapes.
Steele, animated as he handed out a series of graphs collectively labeled “Sexynomics” to gathered media, the former Lt. Governor of Maryland cited the success of both Kim Kardashian and Ray-J, in the wake of the release of a sex film he called “buck nasty.”
“Democrats come up with the same solution, time and time again: tax and spend, tax and spend,” Steele said. “It sure seems like the old, frumpled Washington decision makers just can’t figure how to make this economy grow. Well, if they can’t get average American folks aroused, let the OG of the GOP step in.”
Turning to a short video presentation that featured selected clips from the Kardashian-Ray-J romp, Steele promised to “grab America by its plump, juicy behind and get it working.” The GOP chair pledged successes akin to the sex tape’s stars, which include reality TV shows, Super Bowl-winning boyfriends, rap albums and, most importantly, heavy internet exposure.
“I was on Twitter last night, seeing what people thought about ‘Celebrity Fit Club’ and then I see both Kim and Ray-J in the worldwide trending topics,” Steele recalled to gathered reporters before the event. “And I’m like, what? How can we get America in on this action?”
The crux of Steele’s plan called for tax credits, $500 for couples and $350 for individuals, to purchase camcorders and “maybe a classy little nighty, or something sexy like that.” Citizens that exercise the credit and purchase the video cameras would then be required to film and upload to the internet at least two sex tapes within a three month period.
“Soon, we’ll have stars poppin’ off left and right,” Steele said, listing Paris Hilton and Dustin Diamond as two other celebrity beneficiaries of sex tapes. “All that money Kim and Ray-J got? All started with a sex tape. Why not take take a proven success model and apply it to the government? Soon we’ll have ‘Keeping Up With The Smiths’ or ‘For The Love of Joe Sixpack’ and reality shows and celebrity blogs and expensive tweets for everyone.”
“That’s what I call the American dream.”
Fending off potential conservative critics that could label the policy heavy-handed government intrusion, Steele offered, “Listen, we’re just creating opportunity — I ain’t tellin you which position to do it in. But, FYI, if you do it from behind, you can see both your faces. And if you can, mix it up a little bit, people don’t wanna see the same old thing over and over, they like a little spice. Just sayin’.”
The party’s leaders, reached for reaction, seemed enthusiastic about the proposal, saying that it struck to the very core of the Republican party’s message: telling the American people to go fuck themselves.
Scanning through early Saturday morning television and eating his customary breakfast of organic brie, thirty seven grain toast and arugula, classical singer Josh Groban grew instantly panicked as he flipped to FOX News Network’s coverage of the Tea Party Nation convention.
Within moments, Oprah’s favorite singer was on the phone with the airport, chartering a plane to Nashville. All those white people in one place, he figured, must be a pre-show gathering for a Josh Groban concert — a concert that he had nearly forgotten about.
“My heart nearly stopped,” Groban said. “The idea of denying people the gift I have been so graciously given — how could they forgive me? How could I forgive myself?”
A three hour plane ride and a taxi fare later, Groban arrived at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel & Convention Center, hurrying through a throng of his fans that seemed angrier than his usual concert goers. Perhaps word of his late arrival had already spread through the crowd, he thought.
It wasn’t until right before he thought he was scheduled to go on stage, though, that Groban began to truly grow suspicious that something about the scene was fundamentally awry.
Unaccustomed to opening acts, the classically trained Grammy-winner was confused as to why there was a senior citizen-led ragtime band warming up the crowd; what all the white bed sheet head dresses in the audience were about; and, most perplexing, why former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin seemed more interested in writing on her hand than showing the usual enthusiasm that dignitaries displayed when granted audiences with the singer backstage.
“She asked me if I was that, ‘nice Jonas Brothers kid’ and when I said no, she kind of lost interest,” Groban recalled.
But, in a rush for time, he pushed the strange signs to the back of his mind, concentrating only on the beautiful concerto he was about to perform for what would be a captivated audience. Show time had arrived, and Groban took the stage.
Inexplicably without his customary backing orchestra, Groban quickly improvised, instructing the ragtime band’s 67-year old fiddler, Wallace Duncan, to provide the rising number that customarily introduces his opener. Appearing from behind the curtains, Groban breathed in deep, summoned the audience to its feet, and began a rousing Italian vocal that, for years, has given listeners worldwide the faintest hint of what the booming voice of God may sound like, if the monotheistic deity indeed embodies all the pure goodness that centuries of prayer have promised.
This time, though, instead of the gasps of glee puncturing the rapturous silence of the crowd, Groban heard jeers.
“Sing in English!” one man yelled out, while another taunted, “Go home, faggot!”
Trying to ignore the jeers, Groban pushed on through the end of the song, when he made an abrupt change in strategy: remembering a song a middle school bully used to sing, Groban broke out into a verse of “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” by Poison, moving the audience to tears — even Sarah Palin, who later raved about the performance on Facebook.
Reacting swiftly and with the compassion it is so often accused of lacking, Wall Street’s top CEO’s and bankers rallied to the aid Goldman Sachs’ CEO Lloyd Blankfein, announcing a weekend fundraising telethon for the industry trailblazer in the aftermath of his devastating 2009 bonus.
Just hours after his firm announced that Blankfein would be receiving just a $9 million bonus, housed in 58,000 shares of the banks’ ever-climbing stock, other top bankers on Wall Street released a statement urging every American to “give what they can” to help Blankfein “weather this recession.”
“It’s almost as if he’s taking a bullet for everyone else,” said Mark Borges, a principal with Compensia Inc., a Northern California compensation consulting firm.***
Organizers for the telethon, which will be aired live from Goldman’s Financial District headquarters and aired live on CNBC and FOX Business Channel, announced the event will be hosted by comedian turned talk radio host Dennis Miller, and feature guest appearances from conservative superstars such as John Larroquette, Ben Stein and Craig T. Nelson.
A later press release also announced that organizers had received commitments from a number of prominent orchestras to play live and via satellite.
Wearing long, serious faces and black velveteen armbands with Blankfein’s initials, L.B., scrawled across, bank CEO’s stood in solidarity as they announced the “urgent” fundraising event. Particularly disturbed was JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon, who earned a $17 million bonus this year and is a close friend of Blankfein.
“The devastation this has wrought on Lloyd is incredible,” said Dimon, who was in perhaps the best position to understand. Dimon received only stock as a bonus in 2008 and had to suffer the embarrassment of living an entire two years on his 2007 bonus of $27.8 million.
“I don’t think the American public can quite understand what it is to have to budget for two long years, both fiscally and mentally,” Dimon said. “He’s having his take home bonus slashed nearly in five, and that takes just a barbaric toll on a man,” Dimon said, now near tears, no doubt remembering his own suffering.
Indeed, the event was planned quickly to help spare Blankfein from much of that embarrassment, as a number of bankers recalled the social awkwardness in boardrooms Dimon suffered when he declined to join in eating gold plated mahi mahi at company retreats to Tahiti.
“It was really uncomfortable,” said one JP executive on condition of anonymity. “At one point Jamie was declining caviar at least once a week, and one time we saw his wife picking him up in their Bentley, instead of his usual driver. He put on a brave face, but you could tell that he was hurting. We don’t want to see that happen to Lloyd. It was pathetic.”
***This quote was actually uttered by a real “human”
Politically stung and legislatively out maneuvered much of the last year, Senate Democratic leaders yesterday issued a “sternly worded” letter to both their Republican counterparts and Wall Street executives in attempt to wrest back policy-making power and public approval.
Unveiling the missive in a Capitol Hill press conference, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid read out some of the most aggressive excerpts from the two page letter.
In frank, unapologetic terms, the letter called out Republicans’ “partisan obstruction” and Wall Street’s “blatant arrogance and ignorance of” the financial situations faced by middle class Americans, asking both sides to change their ways “or else.”
“As Democrats, we stand for something,” it said, “and will no longer tolerate that something to be obstructed and blocked at every single turn by you guys.”
“To our Republican colleagues,” the letter continued, “we simply cannot abide by your political gamesmanship, and demand that you help us deliver real change for the people that sent us here. The American people demand as much, so seriously, stop it.”
Growing more animated as he read, Reid later hinted that his caucus could perhaps threaten to take the filibuster away if the obstruction continued for another year or so.
The really seriously angry letter then set its sights on Wall Street, specifically CEO’s that seemed to “disregard” their customers and were enriching themselves on taxpayer bailout money.
“While millions of Americans are out of jobs, out of homes and seemingly out of hope, you continue to enrich yourselves on their tax dollars, which were dedicated to cleaning up the mess you caused for them,” the Democrats wrote. “It’s looking really bad, and you’re already rich, so seriously, cut it out.”
Taking his turn at the lectern, Tom Harkin of Iowa unveiled a serious of punitive measures the caucus was considering to rein in big banks and their CEO’s, including a non-binding resolution declaring their opposition to banker bonuses that were “too big,” and a blue ribbon panel that would report to Congress in six months on other ways it could keep pay packages “to a reasonable size.”
“Honestly guys, this has got to stop,” Reid said as he waved his finger at the camera, “you can’t trick the American people into thinking you have their best interests at heart when it’s this blatant.”
It started with a whisper, a faint “there he is,” traveling like a hormonal game of telephone through a crowd still half asleep in the pink sleeping bags that lined the lawn.
As the truck came into focus, the murmur grew into a hum, a buzz, and then, when the Massachusetts license plates came into full focus and the lead girl, ignoring frost bite from six days of waiting, called out, a high pitched sonic boom that rocked the Capitol Hill lawn.
Scott Brown was taking office.
In what onlookers called the biggest Congressional hysteria scene since Dennis Hastert first took office, Capitol Police could do little to stem the wave after wave of screaming girls that rushed the truck that Brown rode to electoral victory and teen idol fame.
“It was a mob scene,” said one GOP aide, clutching the autographed head shot of the new Senator that he had procured for his daughter.
Brown, dashing in a blue suit and wearing his signature purity ring that signifies his independence from partisan politics and party agenda, came out of the truck to deafening roars that reportedly awoke West Virginia senator Robert Byrd from the first of his two daily naps. With an effortless charm and grace that recalled a young Adlai Stevenson, Brown handled the throng with smiles and aplomb.
“Oh my God, you’re so hot!” called out one frantic girl beside another holding a sign that read, “SiT iN My PeoPLe’S SeaT!” Just beyond, there stood a life size cutout of the Senator’s 1980’s Cosmopolitan Magazine nude centerfold, with a number of teens taking turns kissing and photographing themselves with it.
After posing for nearly 1300 photos and signing double that amount in head shots, the ruggedly good looking Republican newcomer was goaded into reciting an excerpt from his special election victory speech. The performance was quickly halted, though, with the deafening roar of the elated crowd drowning out the sound of the newly elected Senator’s pledge to deny them health care.
Move over Scott Brown; John McCain is the new “it” boy of the Senate Republican Caucus.
In a packed Senate hearing room yesterday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, the nation’s top two military officials, called for the repeal of the 16-year old “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy banning openly gay men and women from serving in the military. And senior citizen chic Senator McCain (R-AZ) gave the entire room, and the entire television audience, a full on chubby with his impassioned defense of discrimination.
The A-mazing Arizona Senator sent onlookers into states of quiet panic, so taken with both his sartorial grace and effortless charm.
“I saw him in a whole new light today,” said Gay rights activist Joseph George. “And that light was refracted back into my desirous eyes by his to-die-for pure as the white driven snow complexion. He certainly raised my Arizona.”
The Senator, who in the past had said both that he preferred the uneasy compromise to be repealed, and that he would defer to top military brass on the matter, stalked the room and questioned witnesses with a fire in his belly that instantly aroused any and all onlookers with even half a hint of yearning in their loins.
Knowingly employing the slight hunch that years of fabulous hath wrought, McCain was emphatic in his speech, catching the wandering eye of both sides of the issue. In a sharp blue suit that blanketed his 72-year old figure like a sex poncho teasing the shapely rock of desire within, the failed 2008 Presidential candidate’s lips emitted pure steam as he described the military’s “forced intimacy with little or no privacy,” a condition every onlooker instantly fantasized about sharing with McCain.
His customary red tie resting titillatingly along the soft creases of his love-worn bosom, the Arizona Senator turned the heat on Secretary Gates’ advocacy for the repeal, bringing a bit of glam to his furious reaction to his fellow Republican’s assertion that it was in the military’s best interest to end its policy of shaming and discriminating against those who wish to bravely serve their country.
“Again you are embarking on saying it’s not whether the military prepares to make the change but how we best prepare for it, without ever hearing from members of Congress,” McCain told the Secretary through pursed, kissable lips. He then indicated his gratefulness that, “we still have a Congress of the United States that would have to pass a law to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, despite your efforts to repeal it, in many respects, by fiat,” a flip flop matched in size only by the level of pure desire it created in the hysterical masses.
Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, a noted fiscal conservative and sometimes budget hawk, announced on Tuesday that he was placing a hold on his son Ronald’s lunch money until the fifth grader addressed what his father termed “an egregious child rearing deficit.”
“We have spent and spent on this child, wildly and irresponsibly, and can afford to do so no longer,” Coburn said. The Oklahoma Republican went on to cite numerous child rearing expenses that he deemed, “superfluous and out of line with our priorities.”
“From diapers to baby food, to pre-school registration to science fair materials, this out of whack spending needs to stop,” Coburn said in a speech on his Georgetown lawn. “Comb through the budget, you’ll be outraged by this use of dollars. Did you know we buy this boy a new pair of underwear every year — every year?!”
To stem the “profligate” spending, Coburn placed the hold on lunch money, its removal conditioned on the 9-year old’s proposal to balance his budget. And the Senator offered a number of suggestions for doing so.
“I found out that we bought him a box of crayons for Christmas three years ago, and now he puts in a request for new pencils. And I say to myself, what can’t he do with crayons that he needs some pencils so much?”
In a response statement, filed from his broom closet bedroom, Ronald answered: “math,” he said, “and social studies.”
Coburn’s proposed axe didn’t end there, as he suggested that if his son was truly serious about wanting to eat lunch, he could perhaps put for sale on craigslist his soccer ball, or his other pair of sneakers.
“During these times, we all have to tighten our belt,” Coburn said. “Only Ronald may have to do so literally, although I’m not sure how much slack that hemp waist rope I gave him when he was six years old has left.”
In the face of difficult cuts, Ronald does have a fallback plan.
“They have this great program that helps kids pay for lunch at school when they can’t afford to do so on their own,” the besieged 9-year old told reporters. “So I’ll probably just do that.”
Survey USA reports that That Prick From College holds a narrow advantage over That Jerkoff You Hated In High School in the organization’s last poll before today’s Congressional primary election.
In the poll, That Prick From College earned 34 percent of likely voters, while That Jerkoff You Hated In High School made up ground recently, taking in 32 percent of respondents. The results revealed a high level of undecideds, who felt that neither candidate espoused their views, though none of were quite aware that other voters felt that way, too.
In a hard fought campaign, tracking poll data indicated a number of lead shifts as voters were barraged with a hail of attack ads and endless billboards, with accusations of foul play and questions of personal integrity overshadowing what many political experts believe are small, imperceptible differences between the candidates.
A decided lack of personal outreach by both That Prick From College and That Jerkoff You Hated In High School also made it difficult for voters to decide just who deserved their vote.
State officials expect a record turnout in today’s vote.
In a shock, impromptu press conference outside her home in Wasilla, former Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Chair, former Vice Presidential nominee and former Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin announced her resignation from being Sarah Palin.
“It has been my great honor to serve as Sarah Palin,” Palin said in prepared remarks, “but I believe that I can serve Sarah Palin better in another, less restrictive capacity.”
Citing the pressures of not writing a book; not running a state; not giving paid speeches and not serving as an active grandmother for a teenage mother; the Alaska Republican reasoned her ambitions for Sarah Palin would be less inhibited by the responsibilities she accrued and ignored as Sarah Palin.
“In this economy, with so many people struggling, I had to make a decision as to how best I can help, and it is with great difficulty that I reached this conclusion, but I know that this allows me to best make a difference in the life of Sarah Palin,” Palin told a raucous crowd of supporters that had paid the $500 donation fee to watch Palin quit.
