U Make Me Laff
decision not to use him as spokesman for Whitestrips
Sometimes I get past being offended long enough to appreciate our national clowns for their own sweet sake. I mean, sure, there’s always a part of me that gets embarrassed that we have so many crackpots representing us and so many bugfuck-crazy nutjobs soaking up the spotlight, but at the same time… well, that’s entertainment.
But Bush took it a little too far. A brain damaged dry-drunk busy bombing and torturing and hyuk-hyuking his way through the whole process just took the fun out of things for everyone else. I was so busy crying — or more precisely, so busy trying to manage my blood pressure from so much sun-surfacey infernos of anger and disgust erupting in my soul — that I was unable to enjoy the many other abject morons and doddering asshelmets whose antics deserved attention or even appreciation. Distracted by the auto-da-FAIL of the lead, I’d forgotten the zany antics of the bit players.
The political element is so much more important than the human one — by which I mean, the one about character and personality. In a certain way, it was George Bush’s luck that crisis was S.O.P. during his presidency; else he would have ended up as a more pathetic, 12-step version of Gerald Ford, with his Segway follies and mysterious facial carpet-burns getting far more attention than they did. In point of fact, George Bush was possibly the biggest verbal and physical klutz ever unleashed on the Republic (which considering Harding, Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Daddy Bush, is really saying something); sure we noticed the malapropisms, the ‘Bushisms,’ the neologisms, the wtf-eries, the cluelessness, the gracelessness, the clumsy physicality, the fly-open faux pas, but we, distracted by his political antics (also more than a little klutzy), failed to truly appreciate his performance. Tant pis.
Well, no more, I say. Bush is soon to be gone, but some of the bit players remain — and, being Republicans in a minority bloc, they’re soon to have a lot more things to complain (which is to say, be funny) about. We gotta pay attention to them. I for one will keep my eyes on Representative Don Young of Alaska. It’s true he’s just a character actor as it were, but his mastery of comedic timing and his ability to say just the wrong word or phrase illustrates his true talent. Consider:
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when Sen. John McCain proposed that Young redirect his prized pork money to help rebuild New Orleans, Young accused his detractors of “ignorance and stupidity.” The victims of Katrina, he suggested, “can kiss my ear!”
Such coarseness is a Young hallmark. He once called environmentalists a “self-centered bunch of waffle-stomping, Harvard-graduating, intellectual idiots” who “are not Americans, never have been Americans, never will be Americans.”
[…]
As for his pork projects, Young — who tried his hand at gold mining in Alaska before realizing that the real riches lay in Congress — apparently feels no shame. When someone suggested that Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska had outdone him in bringing home federal dollars, Young just laughed. “If he’s the chief porker,” the congressman said, “I’m upset.”
That’s pretty good, but it gets better; like with all great performers, a grander venue inspires Young to a greater show. From Cockburn and Silverstein’s Washington Babylon:
Don Young of Alaska, first elected to the House in 1973, is still its most exuberant practitioner of Dada politics. Head of the House Resources Committee, Rep. Young is best known for his rabid attacks on ecologists. Animal rights advocate Mary Tyler Moore once read a poem about the cruelty of steel-jaw leghold traps before the Merchant Marine subcommittee, where Young previously served. Accompanying Moore was Cleveland Amory, who periodically inserted a pencil in a trap, causing it to snap shut.
The moment was highly charged and Young, as a hunter, trapper, and taxidermist, realized dramatic action was required to turn the tide. His solution was to place his hand into a trap he had brought along to the hearing, and then begin to calmly question a witness as though nothing unusual had happened. “I never told anyone, but it hurt like hell,” Young later confided to a staffer.
Young also made use of a visual aid during a 1994 hearing during which he waved an 18-inch oosik — the penis bone of a walrus – at Mollie Beattie, director of the US Fish and Wildlife Service. Beattie had suggested that Alaskan Natives should be able to sell oosiks only as handicrafts, not uncarved, a posture which Young derided as a frontal assault on the Native economy. Beattie is the first woman to head the Service, and the hearing marked her debut on the Hill.
In early 1995, a group of students in Fairbanks invited the Alaska wild man to speak about the GOP’s Contract With America. Young expounded on a number of favorite topics, including the need to slash federal funding of the arts. The government, Young said, has funded “photographs of people doing offensive things” and “things that are absolutely ridiculous.” One student asked Young what sort of things he had in mind. “Buttfucking”, the congressman succinctly replied, refering to a 1990 exhibit, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, of Robert Mapplethorpe’s photographs in Cincinnati. Young said he was merely “trying to educate” the inquisitive youngsters.
Ok, so he’s not Bob Dornan, a comic genius whose perhaps most hilarious routine was when he’d sincerely flirt with Kathryn Jean Lopez; but then the Bob Dornans of the world are condemned to burn brightly and then burn out, to exit the great stage of Congress and end up at some dump subsidized by the Heritage Foundation, surrounded by even crazier people. So it goes. But if Young is more subtle in his batshit-insanity than was Dornan, it doesn’t mean we should appreciate him any less. I for one am a fan.
Hmmmm… Alaska GOP politician… “mastery of comedic timing”… “ability to say just the wrong word or phrase”… “U make me laff”…
Don Young? What happened to Mrs Palin?
They grow ’em thick up there.
In all the senses of the word.
“…doddering asshelmets…”
beautiful, html! i get the impression that an asshelmet is like an asshat, but way way worse.
We need a better class of asshat.
Wow, just wow. I’m trying to picture this guy surviving in the Canadian senate and I think he’d last five seconds. (And we have our share of crude crazy loons here, too.)
…unable to enjoy the many other abject morons and doddering asshelmets whose antics deserved attention or even appreciation.
Well, that’s why S,N! has many posters, right?
Seriously, the list of criminals, fools, idiot-logs, Young-Earth Creationist Bible-beaters, toadies, cronies, and other undesirables inflicted upon us over the past decade would be enough to sink most other countries. (USA! USA!)
We’ve only a week — and entire, long week — until this freak show ends. Whereas with other (“real”) Administrations, that would mean a compendium of highs and lows over the term(s), here it has only calamities. Let’s start the Mighty Roll Call of Fail. Everyone give your favorite example(s). Here’s mine:
Gov. Bush proposed to return “character and integrity to the Oval Office.” Jack Abramoff made dozens of visits in 2001.
Gov. Bush wanted “to create a culture of life.” Thousands of dead and mained Americans, tens of thousands more humans killed in Iraq, the entire country turned into a recruiting ground/marshalling area for Al-Qaeda — all for a pack of neo-con lies.
President Warren Terra vowed to get Osama bin Laden.
President Warren Terra vowed to get Osama bin Laden.
Only until 2002.
An asshelmet is a protective carapace further thickening the skull against the intrusion of reason.
So what’s an assrocket?
We need a better class of asshat.
That we do. Is it wrong of me to automatically discount any member of the GOP from Alaska? I just don’t feel that it is…..
An assrocket is a device firing fools into places angels fear to tread.
Assrockets, wow! Could those be considered “Weapons of Ass Destruction”?
Good one, Lex!
ASS ASS ASS ASS ASS!!!!
Okay, now that that’s outta the way – Don Young. What a piece of work. Anyone remember you got your martyr syndrome in my global warming denial rant?
Incidentally, that was from 2006, when the comlete list of countries that burned as many barrels of oil as the US was this:
.
.
Were, well “assrockets” gets one thinking I suppose.
It’s comforting to many to think that but for an accident of birth, Bush by any other name would have ended up as a used car salesman in Lubbock. Given, however, the wide variety of crackpots that flourish in Texas politics, and who occasionally make it on to the national scene, I’m convinced he could have made it under most any name. He’s not actually stupid…truly stupid people don’t get to be president no matter what their family connections are. Cunning, wily, and deranged are more like it. And, let’s face it: the guy won two elections in spite of the fact that (thanks for trying, Molly Ivins) Americans were warned, repeatedly, of what would happen if this guy got within two time zones of the presidency. Christ…after they saw the wreckage of the last eight years, over 40 million people lined up at the ballot box and said: “Hell yeah…sign me up for four more years of this!” So, after watching that last, pathetic presser, all anyone can say is, “What did we expect?”
flirt with Kathryn Jean Lopez
My god, I’m glad I still have a half gallon of bleach ready. Time to get the auger and begin the brain bleach.
True enough Dave. Just remember why Tom DeLay got into politics. Pollution is just grand!
Tom Delay is our hero!
I can’t get excited over Don Young. With Joe the Welfare Queen running around Israel looking for early morning McGriddles, all other wingnuts have to step up pretty big. Right now only Palin and W hold my interest. Ok, maybe Malkin.
it’s always a safe rule of thumb—if you’re wondering what happened to your old High School classmates, the biggest asshole is now a diehard Republican…
To be fair, read some notes from the National Diet of Japan. They’ve got us pretty well beat here.
Also, I went searching for this K-Lo/Dornan connection and…well, I’m kinda sorry I did:
Gah!
The occasional fiery congressman with hair the exact colour of ripe orange rind?
The problem with a good weapon is that it becomes exclusive very quickly
The problem with a good mind is that it becomes laughed out of congress very quickly
The problem with a good Don Young has yet to be addressed
Working
I see Bush is planning to address the nation with an emotional farewell.
All I can say is, “Don’t let the door slap your ass on the way out.”
g said, All I can say is, “Don’t let the door slap your ass on the way out.”
It’s nice that you can care so much. I keep thinking, “What? You’re still here?”
If you want to know what America’s political future will be like, imagine a boot stomping a waffle…forever
Speaking of dry drunks, why is it that Young and Ted Stevens both look like ex-accountants who have done some serious time at alcoholic halfway houses? I thought that Alaskan men were supposed to be rugged frontiersmen; these dudes look like they reverse-hibernated, drinking through the winter and sleeping through the summer.
Their Kung Foo requires training of a special sort . The punch that elevates revision into a deadly punch . Three parts bitters , three parts tires , three parts ein ryand , three parts secret dance step with the magic crap flows uphill economic panacea trickle down dosee dohh
Now you must train well little crickets
Ok, so he’s not Bob Dornan, a comic genius whose perhaps most hilarious routine was when he’d sincerely flirt with Kathryn Jean Lopez…
You want classic grade-a B-1 Bob? Oh my friends, you must see The Starfighters!
Wrong bob. Cwap.
Wikipedia claims it is the same fellow
Dornan was also involved in entertainment . He starred in the movie The Starfighters , which was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000 .
I thought “waffle stompers” were hiking boots. What does this wing nut wear when he’s out torturing the arctic wildlife, wing (nut) tips? It’s strange how the art of perjoration starts to fail when the people doing it don’t know how to fucking read. If they can repeat a tv commercial tag line they consider themselves really in the know.
His stunt with the leghold trap reminds me of the jerk we had here in California–and thanks for the nod to B-1 Bob*, because California is still (eat our dust Texas and Alaska) the nation’s most fertile wellspring of ignorant politicians. He was an undersecretary of state, can’t recall his name: to prove the safety of medfly spray, he drank a glass of malathion at a press conference. Died of cancer a few year’s later…I’m not saying it was cause and effect…
*Dornan, after a vote to deny government funds for abortions for military wives:
“I feel it would be a tragic misuse of defense funds to use them to snuff out human life.”
D.N. sez:
To be fair, read some notes from the National Diet of Japan. They’ve got us pretty well beat here.
I’ll say. From t3h BBC:
I’ll have to say this is the first HTML Menken post that I’ve both enjoyed and read to the end.
Motherfucker stuck his hand in a trap in Congress? That shit is real O.G. Why wasn’t the Daily Show in existence yet?!
Dornan was also involved in entertainment.
Some would say that was all he was ever involved in.
Who can forget one of his greatest hits, where in complaining about having drawn criticism on an issue, he declared, “now every lesbian spear-chucker is out to get me,” and then later claimed that “spear-chucker” was not intended as a pejorative.
Dornan was cuckoo for fucking Cocoa Puffs. One of the first times I ever watched CSPAN, I happened to tune in as he was making a floor speech to an empty chamber–something that’s actually not too uncommon in the House, but this one was a real doozy. It was so long ago I can’t remember any specifics, other than my jaw was on the floor at the sheer looniness of it.
I miss Bob. I fondly recall the early days of CSPAN when he would supply hours of entertainment during special orders. It’s been said that Bob Dornan is why god made CSPAN. Ahh, those were the days.
Guys like Bob Dornan and Don Young are basically why the primary viewers of C-SPAN are stoners.
Hee hee hee: Gay Patriot sez the Obama press corps are ALL Jeff Gannons, cuz homina homina EMM ESS EMM homina homina
D. N., it’s like he wrote it for the double entendres.
GPW:
Softballs during the day, hardballs at night.
First commenter, American Elephant:
Yeah, baby, rub my nose in Jeff Ganon! Mercilessly! Give me a puffball award!
California is still (eat our dust Texas and Alaska) the nation’s most fertile wellspring of ignorant politicians
What is it, exactly, about having lots of space within their borders that makes a state go so bugnutty?
“I feel it would be a tragic misuse of defense funds to use them to snuff out human life.
Oh for fuck’s sake.
I feel it would be a tragic misuse of defense funds to use them to snuff out human life.
It’s too bad irony doesn’t turn into an acid that melts the brain of the speaker when triggered by a statement like that.
Motherfucker stuck his hand in a trap in Congress?
I’m surprised Liddy didn’t challenge him to a self-mutilation* duel.
*I first wrote ”self-abuse” but it created a horrible mental picture.
It’s too bad irony doesn’t turn into an acid that melts the brain of the speaker when triggered by a statement like that.
Who says it doesn’t? You may have stumbled onto the proximate reason why so many of these types of statements get made in the first place.
Candy, that’s exactly what happens. The first time – after that it’s only brain drippings in there.
Inhofe is also pretty damn crazy, but Young probably has the edge. Santorum was a wack job, too….
Candy said, *I first wrote ‘’self-abuse” but it created a horrible mental picture.
That starts with Liddy’s calendar. See:
http://www.somethingawful.com/d/fashion-swat/fashion-liddy-babes.php
Poor Don Young. Sticks his hand into a steel-jaw leg hold trap and even in a post dedicated to him, it’s all Boosh, Dornan, Plumber Joe and now Gay Patriot West. But really, I’m just commenting again so I can do this:
ASS ASS ASS ASS ASS!!!!!
That starts with Liddy’s calendar.
Oh that was simply horrible My eyes hurt. Liddy pr0n.
Jennifer and PeeJ, the acid theory would explain a lot.
Is it just me or does Young look a lot like Steve Forbes?
I for one am a fan.
You’re better man than I am. That kind of stuff is poisonous, and I’ve seen it work on people even when they didn’t want it to or knew better. What if you have a minor stroke, or dementia slowly and imperceptibly sets in? What if an emotional or circumstantial crisis increases your susceptibility? Well, you’re a highly trained specialist, and I suppose you account for these things, get regular checkups, but a regular schlamazel like me? I don’t even get near the stuff. Not directly exposed to the primary source.
I am the wingnut … I am the wingnut … I am the oosik, goo goo ga joo!
Waving a walrus schwanz at someone to make your point – now that’s the GOP America knows & loves!
We need to make the “sticking my hand in a trap” routine into a mandatory rite of passage for all wingnuts – & some, like Malkin & Coulter, should use BOTH hands, just to prove that they’re the most 110% hardcorest of all. Boy oh boy, I bet THAT would really piss liberals off like hell, because lefties are too pussy to mutilate themselves with spring-loaded sharp jaws like that.
Or maybe they could put their head in instead of their hands – to avoid harming any vital organs.
*goes looking for waffles to stomp*
“self-centered bunch of waffle-stomping, Harvard-graduating, intellectual idiots”
OH NOEZ!!!!1 Not HARVARD graduates! EWWWWWWW! OBAMA graduated from a Harvard school, EWWWWWW!
What? Bush also graduated from a Harvard school? Well then. Ah, Don Young… Why are Alaskans so stupid as to reelect this idiot?
(In fairness to Harvard, any merit Bush may have derived from going to HBS was more than canceled out by his undergraduate “education” at yale. yale. It rhymes with FAIL for a reason.)
“Auto-da-fail” goes, of course, into my “steal this!” file.