Bill Moyers: 'Greed and God won four elections in a row' for Rove
What struck me about my fellow Texan, Karl Rove, is that he knew how to win elections as if they were divine interventions. You may think God summoned Billy Graham to Florida on the eve of the 2000 election to endorse George W. Bush just in the nick of time, but if it did happen that way, the good lord was speaking in a Texas accent.
Karl Rove figured out a long time ago that the way to take an intellectually incurious draft-averse naughty playboy in a flight jacket with chewing tobacco in his back pocket and make him governor of Texas, was to sell him as God’s anointed in a state where preachers and televangelists outnumber even oil derricks and jack rabbits. Using church pews as precincts Rove turned religion into a weapon of political combat -- a battering ram, aimed at the devil’s minions, especially at gay people.
It’s so easy, as Karl knew, to scapegoat people you outnumber, and if God is love, as rumor has it, Rove knew that, in politics, you better bet on fear and loathing. Never mind that in stroking the basest bigotry of true believers you coarsen both politics and religion.
Short of Purple Hearts, Navy tells vet to buy own:
"PEARLAND — Korean War veteran Nyles Reed, 75, opened an envelope last week to learn a Purple Heart had been approved for injuries he sustained as a Marine on June 22, 1952. But there was no medal. Just a certificate and a form stating that the medal was 'out of stock.' 'I can imagine, of course, with what's going on in Iraq and Afghanistan, there's a big shortage,' Reed said. 'At least, I would imagine so.' The form letter from the Navy Personnel Command told Reed he could wait 90 days and resubmit an application, or buy his own medal. After waiting 55 years, however, Reed decided to pay $42 for his own Purple Heart and accompanying ribbon — plus state sales taxes — at a military surplus store."
Homeland Security Enlists Clergy to Quell Public Unrest if Martial Law Ever Declared:
"Could martial law ever become a reality in America? Some fear any nuclear, biological or chemical attack on U.S. soil might trigger just that. KSLA News 12 has discovered that the clergy would help the government with potentially their biggest problem: Us. Charleton Heston's now-famous speech before the National Rifle Association at a convention back in 2000 will forever be remembered as a stirring moment for all 2nd Amendment advocates. At the end of his remarks, Heston held up his antique rifle and told the crowd in his Moses-like voice, 'over my cold, dead hands.'"
Woman has rare identical quadruplets:
"HELENA, Mont. - A 35-year-old Canadian woman has given birth to rare identical quadruplets, officials at a Great Falls hospital said Thursday.
Karen Jepp of Calgary, Alberta, delivered Autumn, Brooke, Calissa and Dahlia by Caesarian section Sunday afternoon at Benefis Healthcare, said Amy Astin, the hospital's director of community and government relations. The four girls were breathing without ventilators and listed in good condition Thursday, she said. 'These babies are doing grand,' said Dr. Tom Key of Great Falls, the perinatologist who delivered the girls."
People of the Web - Hooter Heaven:
"Jason Grunstra's 'eureka' moment did not occur while sitting under an apple tree like Newton — nor while flying a kite in the rain, like Franklin. Then again, Grunstra wasn't busy discovering the law of gravity or the conductivity of electricity.
Grunstra's 'discovery' was this: Americans are obsessed with breasts. Ashley, a.k.a. Minxie, trades photos for donations to her next implant procedure. Appropriately enough, his eureka moment came in Las Vegas, at a bachelor party, in the company of strippers. One of the strippers had recently gotten breast implants. Another was sad because she could not afford them. So Grunstra did what any gentlemen would do — he started raising cash for the flat-chested one. 'I said, 'I've got five on it!'' he recalls. 'And everybody else said, 'I've got five on it, too.' By the end of the night we had $70 bucks.' That's a long way from the cost of a breast implant operation, which can run $4,000 and up. But for Grunstra, this was more than just crumpled dollar bills stuffed in a thong. This was a big idea."
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