Zell Fell

I watched a fair bit of PBS's coverage of the Hate-Fest on Broadway, aka the Republican National Convention last night. I managed to catch Karl Rove's appearance in the booth, where he showed a Denny Hastert-like ability to pull things right out of his ass, too. In Rove's case, it was a ridiculous statistic--something like "for every one second of positive, there were two seconds of negative at the Democratic Convention," or words to that effect.

Hmmm. I wonder if he had his stopwatch running last night...

My own take on the Zell and Dick hour has, alas, been fortified with a heavy dose of blog reading--this was because I really can't afford to destroy my television. It seems as if the immediate reactions, based on random internet surfing and David Brooks on PBS, who was wearing a shit-eating (in French, mangeant merde) grin, were not good for the Gross Old Party. I DID consider the now-famous Molly Ivins take on Patrick Buchanan's 1992 address--"it sounded better in the original German"--but with the media doing their best interpretation of a puppy dog doing tricks for a Beggin' Strip, I found it comforting that the left bloggers were doing the written equivalent of a high-five, while wingnuts like Tim Graham are reduced to a stance of "it wasn't really THAT bad--was it?"

It was. While I managed to somehow miss Zell's 'spitball' line, I noticed how both he and Cheney quite simply lied--out and out lied--as to several positions of Senator Kerry. In particular, the old John Bircher paranoia about the UN made for a central focus of each wingnut address. The best lines, though, are once again courtesy of Michael Berube, who gave us "Highway to Zell," "Zell-raising," and even "Dick-hardening."

That's about right, no pun intended.

The New York Times managed to deliver it's usual milquetoast, fence-straddling coverage, but I wouldn't be surprised if, in the next few days, something a little harsher comes down the pipe. They'll have a moistened finger in the air, checking the direction of the political wind, while each side offers their spin.

My own take is that if Dubya doesn't really put some cold water on the Zell-fire, there could be a good sized backlash. Already we're beginning to see some rumblings regarding what George was doing at a time when Kerry was demonstrating leadership qualities (answer: not much), while Mr. Bush's war story--the one where he ran like a chicken from possible combat--will air on 60 Minutes this weekend.

I'll grant the Rethuglicans one thing: last night might well have sewed up the genuine yahoo vote. These are the people whose initial reactions to anything involve heavy doses of beer and violence (Girlfriend problems? Get drunk and beat the shit out of her. Money problems? Get drunk and beat the shit out of someone--anyone. Don't like terrorists? Get drunk and talk about how you're going to beat the shit out of someone. Car problems? Get drunk and run the goddamned car into a tree). But, then again, I think the yahoo vote was inclined to go GOP anyway.

Somehow, I don't think most folks would feel their family would be safer with Zell Miller's choices.