September 04, 2003
PHIL'S FUN "FACTS"
A nice line from John Anderson in Mountain Creek, Queensland:
With reference to Phillip Adams liberally sprinkling his column with quotes from Macbeth. May I add one more: "It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
Phil’s prior column contained some typical Adams idiocies as well, including this:
Bush was, of course, aided and abetted by the judicial activism of Supreme Court judges appointed by Dad – and the candidate who’d lost the popular vote got the glittering prize.
As reader Zsa Zsa points out, Bush Sr. appointed two Supreme Court judges: Souter and Thomas. And how did they vote?
In the majority were Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Those dissenting were Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer.
Bush Sr.’s appointees cancelled each other out.
Posted by Tim Blair at September 4, 2003 01:06 AMTim, my good man...
When, oh when, will you clue in that facts DO NOT MATTER to such people as Mr. Adams? They "feel" that Bush 43 "ought" to have been placed in power by "daddy's judges". "Ought" not as in, "what's right", but rather, "what is necessary to make our little fantasy paradigm of evil corporate Christian oppressors vs. The People" correct. Stick a pin in that ballon, and find out it's really a watermelon. Fill it full of holes, and it will still maintain it's shape, by sheer will alone. "Truth is, after all, only our construct".
Those WERE daddy's judges. They always were daddy's judges. They always will be. Europa has always been at war with Oceania.
Forgive my hyperbole. ;-)
God bless you for fighting the good, and necessary, fight. It damn sure must feel like the ocean with a broom sometimes though.
Posted by: Andrew X at September 4, 2003 at 01:19 AMInteresting that President Clinton's two appointees - Justices Ginsburg and Breyer - both ruled in favor of Mr. Gore. Are they guilty of politics and favoritism?
And the totally Democrat Florida Supreme Court ruled in favor of Mr. Gore, as well. Favoritism on their part?
He who says A, must say B.
SMG
Posted by: SteveMG at September 4, 2003 at 01:29 AMPost note:
And, of course, Mr. Clinton never got a majority of the vote in either of his presidential bids. On both occasions, it was under 50%.
But as anyone who has actually read the U.S. Constitution realizes, the popular vote is meaningless in presidential elections. It's the electoral vote. Electors can be chosen by individual states in ANY manner they wish. Constitutionally, electors are NOT required to vote for a president based on the popular vote of their state. Many states require that they do so; but most do not.
But to the left, the U.S. Constitution is unconstitutional. Just a blank page upon which they can promote their political agenda. Some on the right do the same thing, admittedly.
SMG
Posted by: SteveMG at September 4, 2003 at 01:34 AM
Of course, we Republicans wish Bush Sr had appointed someone else, who might have then voted with the majority (and the correct result) in Bush v Gore.
This Phil Adams dude seems to always be writing about stuff he knows nothing about.
Posted by: Tongue Boy at September 4, 2003 at 02:48 AMInteresting, is it not, that we never hear references to the big media consortium recount of Florida that was done after the election?
Liberals for weeks after the decision was handed down were saying, "Just wait until the press examines those ballots. We'll find out that Gore really won. Just wait . . . "
Well, the press went down and in nearly every - not all - method of counting the ballots, Bush still would have won. There were a couple of scenarios where Gore may have won; but the margin of error in the press recount (missed ballots, misread ballots, lost ballots, et cetera) exceeded the margin of victory for either Bush or Gore in EVERY scenario imagined.
A real mess. What we had, remarkably, was essentially a tie. The Court was forced - this was thrown at them by a series of terrible decisions by the Florida S.C. - to settle the issue. And it's always a poor option to have the courts settle political disputes (e.g., abortion, affirmative action, et cetera).
The case is moot. Had the Court ruled in Gore's favor, we would had have the Florida legislature step in and settle things.
SMG
Posted by: SteveMG at September 4, 2003 at 02:48 AMYou know one of the things that always gets conveniently ignored by these people is the fact that none of the recounts ever showed Gore in the lead - and that includes one that journalists did after the election was decided. There's no evidence whatsoever that if the Supreme Court had allowed the recount to continue that Gore would have won anyway.
If Bush wins a decisive victory in 2004 will that put an end to this nonsense or we still have to listen to another four years of it? And I say that as someone who voted for Gore.
Posted by: Randal Robinson at September 4, 2003 at 02:49 AMOh for fuck's sake. This whole Clinton/Gore vs Bush debate is pointless. They're all account executives for various feuding branches of the overall oligarchy.
It's like choosing between the corrupt and incompetent, and the incompetent and corrupt.
I mean who the hell places their trust in pollies anymore?
Posted by: Elitism For The People at September 4, 2003 at 03:11 AMYet again, gotta love it when the left-wing moral superiority crowd in Europe or Canada or Oz pontificates about American political processes they clearly do not understand. Do they even know that Americans are laughing at their ignorance?
Posted by: Irene A. at September 4, 2003 at 04:09 AMThere were 3 Supreme Court decisions pertinent to the Florida vote. The first was 9-0 to send the case back to the FL Supreme Court to reconsider their judicial repeal of FL election law. When they refused to reconsider, the case went back to the US Supreme Court who ruled 7-2 that Florida's method of recounting was unconstitutional; the 5-4 vote was only as to whether further counting should stop.
Posted by: Latino at September 4, 2003 at 04:43 AMFYI:TONGUE BOY.
Phillip Adams is the local pin-up boy of the Aussie hard left whose sole purpose is to prop up their jaded Marxist fantasies.
He is currently presenting an old favourite, AMERICA IS EVIL. Of course, no one takes him seriously.
Down here we affectionally think of him as Gods little clown, sent here to amuse us. As such we pay him out of the public purse to do so. Don't worry about Adams - he's an idiot.
Irene A. says: Yet again, gotta love it when the left-wing moral superiority crowd in Europe or Canada or Oz pontificates about American political processes they clearly do not understand. Do they even know that Americans are laughing at their ignorance?
I wasn't laughing during the 2000 election, which I spent in Australia. I was too busy grinding my teeth. The SMH waxed Indignant! at the old-fashioned punchcard ballots. So inefficient! Oh, but they were used in the poorest neighborhoods, you know, to disenfranchise the poor Little Brown People.
This was news to me, since I used those very same type of ballots in every election back to my first one, in 1980. And that would include those elections in poverty-stricken Silicon Valley.
it's always so funny to see Mr Blair - the king of cut and paste slap around his fellow peers in the media. Like most dumb arse bloggers, he hasn't had an original thought since.....
never.....
Posted by: White Bread at September 4, 2003 at 08:43 AMWHite bread,
Isn't "fellow peers" a tautology? Go to the bottom of the class.
Posted by: Toryhere at September 4, 2003 at 09:07 AMWhat, then , does Adams make of Democrats rigging of judiciary selection processes. Or, the Dems. venal quashing of the nomination of Judge Bork to the Supreme Court, because Bork has no truck with judiical activism ( to further Dem. aims).Adams is rather blind to the inconvenient fact, corruption of courts is long standing Democrat Party practice.Oh, heck,Adams is a commie and pines for good ol soviet style justice. Well, Adams, the Dems can't effect that just yet, so somebody supply him with a box of tissues.
Posted by: d at September 4, 2003 at 10:52 AMI vote you cut out the middle-man and give Zsa Zsa access so he/she can blog directly.
Posted by: Alex Hidell at September 4, 2003 at 11:03 AMDamn It Tim!!!
Bush Sr.’s appointees cancelled each other out.
You don't seem to understand that mathmatics, which you are apparently employing here, is merely a white/male/rascist/sexist/oppressor construct that is used to keep lesser-priveleged groups down and subordinate. 1 minus 1 does NOT necesarilly have to equal to zero when the result would be to perpetuate chronic patterns of oppression on the down trodden of the world. In such cases it simply CAN'T equal zero. It's definitional. Until you learn this very basic Truth I have very little hope of you ever seeing the Light.
Bower to da Beeple.
--Cheers :-)
Posted by: Gremlin at September 4, 2003 at 01:29 PMIsn't "fellow peers" seriously sexist? Can't peers be female?
Posted by: JorgXMcKie at September 4, 2003 at 01:46 PMGremlin: ‘One minus one does not necessarily have to equal zero......’ reminds me of the old Jewish joke - little Ari goes to school on his first day and the teacher asks him,
‘OK Ari, what’s one minus one ?’
Quick as a flash Ari shrugs his shoulders and with open palms responds, ‘What - are we buying or selling ?’