July 06, 2004
BUSH CAN'T WIN
Phillip Adams -- who is, as usual, completely in tune with American voters -- notes a crucial election omen:
Posted by Tim Blair at July 6, 2004 03:01 PMWhen William F. Buckley Jr, who is to American conservatism what the Pope is to Rome, joins in the growing unease about the war in Iraq, you know that Bush is whacked.
What the Pope is to Rome?
Uh.... wouldn't that be... uh... what the Pope is to CATHOLICISM?
Posted by: Sortelli at July 6, 2004 at 03:08 PMTut tut, Sortelli, let's not let logic or reason get in the way of this high fine rhetoric!
Phatty wouldn't know if you were up him with a tram 'til you rang the bell. I'm sure the (few) Americans he talks to would be akin to the Australians he interacts with; sad Naderite losers with a mindset forty years past its use by date.
Posted by: Habib at July 6, 2004 at 03:17 PMCatholicism, yeah, that's what I meant to say...
/old crank
Perhaps Mr. "they were only a couple of buildings" Adams may be unaware that the esteemed Mr. Buckley represents the old line Country Club Republicans who no longer hold sway in the GOP.
Hmm, would that make the "Reagan Revolution" akin to the Prostestant Reformation?
Posted by: Spiny Norman at July 6, 2004 at 03:20 PM
Buckley isn't the Pope of American conservatism. He's the monk who protected and illuminated the manuscripts (National Review and Firing Line) during the Dark Ages from Nixon's pronouncement that "we're all Keynesians now" to Ronald Reagan's election.
I have boundless respect for the man, but his influence in American politics waned twenty years ago.
If liberals like Phil are so "progressive", why are they so stuck in the past?
Posted by: Dave S. at July 6, 2004 at 03:32 PMMelbourne readers will remember Lou Richards' footy tips in the Sun were called "The Kiss of Death." The idea was that if Lou tipped you, you were a goner.
Like Michael Moore and "Payback Tuesday" (remember that?), I have a feeling that being counted out by Dunny Lane Phil is like being given the kiss of death.
Posted by: The Mongrel at July 6, 2004 at 03:35 PMHow the crap written by Phil can be worthy of a paycheck is beyond me. His column is the 'seinfeld' of the Australian in that it is a column about 'nothing'.
First, a salvo at Howard, devoid of logic, just to loosen the bowels, followed by yet another diatribe at the evil Bush.
What a wank.
Posted by: nic at July 6, 2004 at 03:44 PMAdams and Margo Kingston in the SMH (and whoever the tosser is who does Media Watch on the ABC) are living proof that the Australian media is (with the honourable exception of Andrew Bolt, and of course Mr. T. Blair) largely staffed by left-wingers who have never held a real job since leaving uni, and makes us poor Aussies wish for something like the UK's Daily Telegraph or Spectator.
Posted by: Andrew at July 6, 2004 at 04:07 PMScrew Buckley, Buchannan and the whole lot of 'em. Sorry Willy if Bush doesn't meet your criteria. Look, Buckley ain't God. If he wants to join hands with the left at the meeting point in the political circle (Not spectrum, a circle. All of the extremists usually meet at one point.) more power to him. I still predict Bush in a landslide. Mark my words...
Posted by: Patrick at July 6, 2004 at 04:56 PMReading Adams' drivel inspires me to borrow and revise a famous comment by Robin Williams about cocaine:
"Hiring Phillip Adams as a columnist for one's publication is God's way of letting a publisher know he has too much money."
Of course, the names of numerous lefty idiots could be substituted for Adams, and the comment would be just as accurate.
Posted by: M. Scott Eiland at July 6, 2004 at 05:50 PMJohn Pilger is my favorite revolutionary. If I understand him correctly the Alliance in Iraq is an Imperialist force, that needs to be defeated by loyal Saddamists. Following his logic, all European settlers in Australia are invaders that need a good defeating. Viva the revolution! I am going up to the attic now to dust off the Kalashnakov .Pilger can pick me up in his Toyota Land cruiser, I'll be waiting on the corner. Hopefully Phillip Adams will be riding shotgun, wearing his green Mao cap with the big red star. Then the revolution can begin. I have only one simple request. That we start with all those pesky Socialist Chardonnay sippers of the Eastern suburbs. Hey Phillip, check the rear vision mirror.
Steve Atkins
Darlington
If I remember right, at the last election Kim Beazley was given the kiss of death by Phatboy...and a week later Phatso retrospectively decided he'd been against Beazley all along....can't wait to see how he talks down Bush's reelection in November...which he'd known would happen all along, of course...
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 6, 2004 at 06:27 PMLeave Phillip Adams alone. I used to sodomise him and he loved it the jolly bitch.
Posted by: Andrew Bolt at July 6, 2004 at 06:33 PMHow did you get anything through the two flabby buttocks??
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 6, 2004 at 06:36 PM20 inch dildo, my friend. Adams used to squeal like the little pig he is.
Posted by: Andrew Bolt at July 6, 2004 at 06:39 PMSo how cum you've given up?? Does Margo K fistfcuk him now??
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 6, 2004 at 06:41 PMMargo Kingston fistfucking? Agghhh, Thats an ugly thought. She is the ugly thing I have ever seen, no wonder she has her personality.
Posted by: Andrew Bolt at July 6, 2004 at 06:45 PMWhy are lefties all either incredibly ugly, or incredibly fat, or both ??? Is leftism a condition afflicting only the very bottom of the gene pool or soemething?
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 6, 2004 at 06:48 PMPhillip Adams is a stupid lefty wanker who writes badly, so how come he isn't with the Newcastle Herald.
Posted by: John P. at July 6, 2004 at 06:53 PMTrue, I think it stems from feeling inadequate about yourself, so rather feel bad about the way you look, you try and embrace and fix society. Like Mark Latham, you don't often see foreheads that big, combined with eyes that small. Ugly motherfucker.
Posted by: Andrew Bolt at July 6, 2004 at 06:55 PMAnd not surprising that Latham is obsessed with such important issues as fast food advertising on TV...for a lefty, being fat is an "epidemic", a "social disease" that needs to be fixed by throwing millions of taxpayer dollars at it...somthing as simplistic and old-fashioned as dieting/exercising couldn't possibly be the solution....
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 6, 2004 at 06:58 PMLike the great Tony Abbott once said " He's a walking advertisement for junk food, Mr Speaker ".
Posted by: Andrew Bolt at July 6, 2004 at 07:03 PMBuckley, 3 days after 9/11, published the Bush doctrine in its most eloquent form
The approach now should be very different. The word to
Saddam Hussein should be: We are coming into Baghdad.
We will arrive in force, together with Pakistani and Egyptian
and Russian military units. Your aggressive war of l990 and
your shelter of terrorist units ever since make you an enemy.
From now on, enemies who are associated with terrorist
activity will not cohabit the globe with the United States of
America.
http://www.nationalreview.com/buckley/buckley091401.shtml
so it would be interesting to see what Buckley says now; or it may be that the neurons are flaking out and it isn't interesting. His nut-finding percentage has been dropping recently.
Posted by: Ron Hardin at July 6, 2004 at 09:09 PMDon't diss Bill Buckley just because some idiot slow Australian who happens to have been given a column to 'write' in a national daily mentions him (and doesn't even quote him yet several posters have already excoriated Buckley on the strength of that - WHAT IS THAT? - is there some national disease?).
Buckley remains a good commentator:
'The American people can't be counted on for unerring political judgments, but they are ever so much more reliable than Michael Moore, and they can weather, in the longer seasons, even the charm storms of William Jefferson Clinton.'
Posted by: ilibcc at July 7, 2004 at 12:00 AMWhat did Buckley ever say to indicate that his support for the President was waning? I haven't seen it and I read the National Review religiously.
By the way, Bill Buckley does NOT represent "country-club Republicans," regardless of his purple background. He's an (the?) absolute movement conservative and his attatchment to his ideals clearly transcend those he has to the Republican party.
Posted by: DrZin at July 7, 2004 at 01:37 AMWhat Buckley said is:
With the benefit of minute hindsight, Saddam Hussein wasn’t the kind of extra-territorial menace that was assumed by the administration one year ago. If I knew then what I know now about what kind of situation we would be in, I would have opposed the war.Buckley didn't say the Administration was wrong given the information that it had, or that he doesn't support it now. Nor is his position unreasonable.
The problem is that the war was sold on the basis that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, and from there it is a cynical but easy leap to assert that Bush lied. Of course Bush didn't lie, and everyone, including the French and possibly Saddam himself, thought that Iraq did have WMD. But this is the Big Lie that the Soros-funded groups have been pounding home.
Moreover, whether Saddam actually had WMD before the war is largely irrelevant now because it remains vital to our security and the war against terrorism that we are successful in transforming Iraq into a pro-Western Democracy, or at least not a terrorist-friendly Middle Eastern Thugocracy.
A retreat now would be a disaster.
Posted by: Bruce Rheinstein at July 7, 2004 at 03:20 AMWhat's wrong with the Buckley quote is that it's unexplained, a single line in a NYT article in response to who knows what. It's as if the Pope came out for abortion but didn't elaborate. You have to know the reasoning.
In short, something's fishy.
Buckley was for the war irrespective of exterritorial menace, for the support of terrorists, which is in fact the reasoning today. What happened to that idea? That's what's left out.
No enemy harboring terrorists, was the doctrine.
Posted by: Ron Hardin at July 7, 2004 at 07:27 AMI notice they've shunted old Phil to the back of the Australian Weekend magazine. I this in anticipation of shunting him out all together ?
Posted by: sam at July 7, 2004 at 11:56 AMWe can only hope that The Australian has seen the error in its ways and gives him the flick. Surely there is a wordsmith available that has a more impartial view of things or is at least more believable to read than the "Phat One."
Posted by: Lofty at July 7, 2004 at 03:26 PMI think The Australian has put him in the magazine simply as recognition of what he is and where he belongs - alongside horoscopes, yoga and other fee-good waffle. Most of the other commentators at the Aus seem pretty rational and level-headed - I think Phat Phil is their token lefty to keep the arts grads, teachers etc in the audience happy.
Posted by: HippyKiller at July 7, 2004 at 05:18 PM