Kerfuffles

Who’s Dumber than Dirt? John Edwards or His Supporters?

The Edwards Endless Audacity Timeline:

July 6, 2004: Senator John F. Kerry, the Democratic nominee, selects Senator John Edwards as his running mate.

Nov. 3, 2004: John Kerry concedes defeat to President Bush. Edwards’ wife, Elizabeth, is diagnosed with breast cancer.

February - March 2006: John Edwards meets Rielle Hunter in a bar at the Regency Hotel in New York City. “She enjoyed sex, drugs and had fun, but that doesn’t mean she robbed banks,” says Rielle’s best friend, the aptly named Pidgeon O’Brien.

July 2006: The contributions of Edwards’ supporters enable the John Edwards’ One America Committee to pay Rielle Hunter more than $100,000 to produce four videos about Edwards.

Dec. 28, 2006: Edwards announces his candidacy for the 2008 Presidential nomination.

Dec. 31, 2006: The Edwardses celebrate New Years Eve with John confessing his affair with Rielle Hunter to Elizabeth.

March 2007: Elizabeth Edwards announces that her cancer, formerly in remission, has returned and there is apparently no cure.

May 2007: Two months after the sad announcement by John Edwards’ wife, his mistress, Rielle Hunter, miraculously conceives a “fatherless” child.

June 27, 2007: John Edwards is honored by the Father’s Day/Mother’s Day Council as “Father of the Year,” which is great timing for the “Two Americas - Two Families Candidate!”

The John Edwards campaign website proudly tauts his Father of the Year Award among the “family values” senator’s many accomplishments.

August 9, 2007: ABC News gushes over John and Elizabeth Edwards’ Renewal of their Wedding Vows. The countdown begins for the birth of Rielle’s “fatherless” child in seven months.

Oct. 10, 2007: The National Enquirer reports that Edwards had an affair with Hunter. Edwards dismisses the story as trash talk telling reporters: “The story is false. It’s completely untrue, ridiculous.” Rielle Hunter also denies the allegations. Knowing that her husband is lying to the American electorate, Elizabeth says nothing.

Dec. 19, 2007: The National Enquirer reports that Rielle Hunter is more than six months pregnant and has revealed to a close confidante that Edwards is the father of her baby. The scandal is squashed as ex-Edwards aide and family man, Andrew Young, 41, claims paternity.

Jan. 30, 2008: Edwards ends his campaign for the Democratic nomination, throwing his support to Obama. Hillary Clinton’s supporters feel slighted.

Feb. 27, 2008: Rielle Hunter gives birth to her daughter, Frances Quinn Hunter. Although Andrew Young claimed to be the sire, Ms. Hunter does not record a father on her daughter’s birth certificate.

July 22, 2008: The National Enquirer, acting upon an inside tip, confronts John Edwards, in the wee hours of the morning, secretly leaving the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles. John Edwards runs and hides in the men’s restroom. The Enquirer claims he was visiting Ms. Hunter and “their” baby daughter.

July 23, 2008: At a news conference in Houston, Edwards says “the tabloid trash is full of lies.”

Aug. 6, 2008: National Enquirer publishes photos that it says are of Edwards with Rielle Hunter and of him with her baby.

Aug. 8, 2008: Edwards finally comes clean, sort of, and admits to having had an affair with Ms. Hunter while stating that the possiblity of him being the father of his mistress’s baby is quite impossible.

Aug. 8, 2008: Elizabeth Edwards in a blog posting writes that her husband made a “terrible mistake” but that the healing process was “oddly made somewhat easier” after her diagnosis of breast cancer in March 2007. She blames the media for the harm done to her family.

Aug. 8, 2008: Speaking to Bob Woodruff of ABC, John Edwards, 2007 Father of the Year, denies Rielle Hunter’s baby. “I don’t know who that baby is, I have no idea what that picture is.” Woodruff asks “… are you saying you don’t remember holding that child of Miss Hunter?” Edward answers “I don’t know who that baby is.” The reporter continues: “… you don’t remember a baby being there? ” For the third time John Edwards, Father of the Year, denies the baby: “No.”

Aug. 9, 2008: Big time John Edwards supporter, Dallas lawyer Fred Baron, reveals that he paid for Rielle Hunter and Andrew Young to move to California because they were being hounded by tabloids in North Carolina. The trial lawyer added that he paid all expenses directly, using his own money and not campaign funds, and that John Edwards knew nothing of it. He thereby saves John Edwards’ sorry hide from doing prison time. News outlets report that Rielle Hunter and Andrew Young are living in multimillion-dollar-homes and that each is receiving towering financial payments; Ms. Hunter’s amounting to $15,000 a month.

September 2008: Continuing with the audacity that never ends, religious politician John Edwards appears on the cover of the magazine of faith, culture and politics, “Sojourners” with his preaching inside. In a piece titled “The Right Thing to Do,” John Edwards explains how we can do something about poverty.

The Cast of Characters of “The Timeline”

John and Elizabeth Edwards Lied to America

We must forgive John Edwards as he is a narcissist. However, should Elizabeth Edwards be forgiven for her lies to America?

Who are you going to believe - former Senator and Presidential candidate John Edwards, or the “National Enquirer?” That was my dilemma a few weeks ago, when I read conflicting news reports on the very same day that the Obama Campaign was considering John Edwards as its choice for Vice Presidential candidate. Because John Edwards condemned the National Enquirer revelation of his mistress, Rielle Hunter, as trash talk, I did not accept the story as true. Like many other Americans, once again I was taken in by a political liar. Because the mainstream media will no longer reveal to us the known moral failings of Democrats, we the American public must now learn to trust the “National Enquirer.” The Enquirer is correct now, and it has been correct in the past, a la Jesse Jackson.

The mainstream media is finally following the National Enquirer’s lead. See ABC News: Edwards Lied as Presidential Candidate.

Now to get to the “Rich Wretches” part of this story. It is agreed by all, including John Edwards himself, that he is a “Rich Wretch.” But what about Elizabeth Edwards? Is the picture painted of her by the mainstream media as the sainted, heroic, long-suffering wife, an accurate one? Incredibly, Mrs. Edwards has just published her diary at “Daily KOS” wherein she places most of the blame for the current Edwards scandal and its harm to her family on … you guessed it … the media! She even refers to America’s interest in the character of a Presidential candidate as “voyeurism.” At the very same instant she writes of her husband: “I am proud of the courage John showed by his honesty.” Mrs. Edwards even validates her husband’s claim that because he betrayed his marriage vows whilst she was in remission from cancer, not in the throes of the terminal illness, that it was somehow okay. No, I do not understand the meaning of that pronouncement. Perhaps America’s strong, liberated feminists, such as Elizabeth Edwards and Hillary Clinton can explain that one to the rest of us.

Elizabeth Edwards has every right as a private wife and mother to forgive or not forgive her jerk of a husband for cheating on her. However … her decision to publicly broadcast her support for John Edwards as a staunch family values candidate, when she knew he was nothing of the sort, shows her to be as much of a narcissistic deceiver as her husband. Her media-tauted courage in dealing with the loss of a child and her own cancer should not be a subterfuge for her deliberate attempts to mislead the American public into electing such a lying wretch as President.

Narcissist John Edwards felt he was entitled to cheat on his wife and family, and keep it secret from the American voters, because he was a Golden Boy who could do no wrong. Besides, he had incredible monetary resources from campaign donors and his own family’s wealth to pay any hush money needed. Elizabeth Edwards agreed that they and their accomplices in the media could keep his mistress and her baby hidden while he was running for President of the United States. Surely the mainstream media would not stoop so low as to tell its readers the real sordid truth, they believed. Because Elizabeth Edwards has known of her husband’s betrayal at least since last fall when the National Enquirer first broke the story, it shows that she was an accomplice to the Edwards Campaign sham. Elizabeth Edwards knowingly encouraged her husband to enter the Presidential campaign and enthusiastically propagated the false image of John Edwards as a devoted husband and family man.

Elizabeth Edwards was so ambitious of her husband gaining the United State presidency, not even her own metastasized cancer stood in the way. Facing a terminal illness, she was still willing to lie to all America about the character of her husband.

SATIRE: Help from the Cheat Team for John Edwards

The Media: John Edwards Scandal in Three Minutes

She Can Dish It Out, But She Can’t Take It!

Senator Barack Obama called Republican tactics of criticising his wife’s political comments as “low class” and “detestable.” On “Good Morning America” the senator and his wife Michelle were discussing his (their) race for the White House, when the Illinois senator told the television audience that the hardball political tactics that are acceptable when aimed for the gander, are unacceptable when targeted at the goose. “… I also think these folks should lay off my wife,” he told “Good Morning America,” as his wife Michelle chuckled.

“The GOP, should I be the nominee, I think can say whatever they want to say about me, my track record,” Obama said. “I’ve been in public life for 20 years. I expect them to pore through everything that I’ve said, every utterance, every statement. And to paint it in the most undesirable light possible. That’s what they do. But I do want to say this to the GOP. If they think that they’re going to try to make Michelle an issue in this campaign, they should be careful. Because that I find unacceptable,” he said.”

While the GOP is forbidden by the Obamas from attacking Michelle Obama’s political statments, the Obama campaign is well within the bounds of “decency and class” to attack the spouse of Hillary Clinton for statements that he has made while campaigning for his wife. Obama’s campaign roundly condemned spouse Bill Clinton for calling Obama’s lack of experience “a roll of the dice“, for describing Obama’s opposition to the war as a “fairy tale“, and for his comparison of Obama to Jesse Jackson after South Carolina primary. General McPeak, of the Obama campaign, proclaimed that Bill Clinton was just another Joe McCarthy. At the same time that the GOP must “lay off” the wife of Obama, the DNC has promised that the tax returns of the wife of Senator John McCain will be an issue during the general election. (”DNC Targets Cindy McCain“)

When Michelle Obama makes campaign speeches about being proud of her country for the first time in her adult life, no one on the other side of the political spectrum may criticise those remarks lest the Obamas label them as “low class” and “detestable.” No one may point out that while Obama was NOT listening to Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s preachings from the pulpit, his wife Michelle was. How else to explain that her attitude is so similar to that of their Pastor and spiritual mentor? Obviously Michelle WAS listening when the Reverend Wright was preaching racism and hatred against White America.

However, to make that point is not acceptable to the elitist Obamas, for to their minds, when spouse Michelle injects her words into national politics, the Hoi Polloi is expected to listen, not criticise, lest they pierce the delicate thin skin of Mrs. Obama. Or as the Illinois Senator himself says: “Because that I find unacceptable.”

Or … How to Increase Business at Your Bar with the DAR Daughters and a Six Shooter.

The pop photographer Richard Avedon created a black and white portrait, “The Generals of the Daughters of the American Revolution,” which captured officials of the DAR formally outfitted in their full regalia. He exhibited it at an art show in 1970, and then gifted the colossal portrait to his favorite watering hole in South Minneapolis, the Black Forest Inn. There it grandly hung covering the entire wall of the back bar until one wild day when a bar regular, Ellis Nelson, sauntered into the place, pulled his six shooter and took aim. Ellis did not shoot a lady in the back, however sorely tempted, as Minnesota cowboys do have their principles. No, he aimed straight for the eyeball of one demurely standing woman and the chest of another and he didn’t miss. Notching the barrel of his pistol, he explained: “That photo always bugged the hell out of me.”

The moral of this story is that DAR ladies should not permit their portraits to be displayed in places of ill repute, such as the back bar of the Black Forest Inn, where they risk the unfortunate fate of this innocent DAR lady immortalized in Richard Avedon’s photographic creation. THE BAR PORTRAIT now serves to attract bar hoppers and other curiosity seekers to the Black Forest Inn where they ask to finger the bullet hole in the head of the DAR lady.

Avedon’s black and white photograph was taken at the 1963 NSDAR Convention, at the Mayflower Hotel, in Washington D.C. The original “without gunshots” portrait may be seen HERE and there is more information about the shooting at The Rake, November 2004.

The image, Detail of Avedon’s "Daughters of American Revolution" with bullet hole, is subject to copyright by TedSher. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by Kerfuffles.

It was the “Fear of Freedom” which begot the murder yesterday of a woman freedom fighter, Benazir Bhutto. She was a Muslim woman, a Muslim mother who, because she believed in freedom, was martyred in her own native Muslim land of Pakistan by her fellow Muslim brothers.

Where religions, creeds, nations and lands espouse “Fear of Freedom”, truth becomes an unknown commodity. All truth is from God; freedom is God’s gift to all of mankind. Those who teach “Fear of Freedom” to their people are enemies of the true God. Yesterday’s tragic murder of a woman for her belief in freedom is one more example of the “Fear of Freedom’s” tyranny of the human mind, its debasement of the human soul and its degradation of human life on earth.

Thank God for the man named Jesus who preached freedom. Jesus taught HIS followers to seek freedom, not to fear it, and hence influenced HIS civilized world to carry freedom’s torch: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John Chapter 8).

“I’m standing up for the principle of democracy. I’m standing up for moderation. And I’m standing up for hope for all the people in Pakistan who today are poor and miserable and really quite desperate..” ~~ Benazir Bhutto, CNN Interview of 28 September 2007.

In 1775, Patrick Henry declared “Give me Liberty or Give me Death,” at Saint John’s Church in Richmond, Virginia. That declaration set the course for revolution and independence for Americans. It was the cry that has reverberated in the hearts of mankind ever since. Many freedom lovers around the world have met death in their quest for liberty for themselves and others.

Today it was the American educated, woman freedom fighter, Benazir Bhutto, who was martyred in the name of freedom in her own native land of Pakistan. Today, it was a Muslim woman, murdered in a Muslim land, by her fellow male Muslims.

The news story is at BBC News; Christopher Hitchens names her “A Daughter of Destiny

The image, Benazir Bhutto last moments-5, is subject to copyright by PAKlSTAN. It is posted here with permission via the Flickr API by Kerfuffles.

In the category of “Who Knew?”, I have recently become aware that young American women are in need of a reintroduction of the patented Langtry Bustle. In the 19th century, long before the miracle of silicone implants, young “fashionable” women who were deficient in their posterior endowments area made up for it by wearing bustles. These bustles made sitting a challenge, therefore inventors’ ingenuity came to the rescue with the spring-loaded Lillie Langtry bustle. It collapsed fan-like when a bustle-endowed lady sat down. When said bustle-endowed lady arose from her seat, her faux posterior automatically sprang back into place, maintaining her grandiose rear profile. This was considered so inspired an invention that someone named James Laver declared it to be “one of the most extraordinary inventions in the whole history of fashion.”

Young “fashionable” women of today have a similar problem, although much more hazardous to their health. As any big-bottomed lady with silicone buttock implants will secretly admit, sitting down, or anywhere else, when one has silicone appendages on one’s backside IS a problem. The everyday act of sitting must be done very carefully, apparently. The days of plopping in one’s chair are over for them. One blogger recently blogging of this type of plastic surgery cautioned “the prudent implantee should be cautious around cacti.”

For those young women cursed by nature with normal rear ends, and who for lack of money, bravery or whatever, cannot opt for the corrective surgery, the old time 19th century bustle for buttocks enhancement would be just the thing, except that they would then need to wear clothing to cover it. Wearing clothing is so “out-of-fashion” for today’s young women who prefer the 7/8s nude look, that there is absolutely no incentive at all for an entrepreneur to bring the bustle back into production. Hence, for young women of the twenty-oughts, it’s “go under the knife, or go out-of-fashion with the au-naturel physique that God gave you.”

Rape in war a growing problem
UN to World: Stop us before we rape again!

Indeed! It must be true, as the United Nations has just discovered there is “Rape in War”.

Rape and sexual violence in conflict appear to be worsening and very little is being done to tackle the problem, a major UN conference has heard.

A UN report prepared for the meeting found that systematic rape was a prominent feature of the conflicts in Bosnia-Hergovina, DR Congo, East Timor and Haiti, and is ongoing in the Darfur region of Sudan.

What does the United Nations Secretery General Kofi Annan have to say about that?

Sexual violence is a human rights violation, a global public health problem, and an impediment to recovery, development and peace.

Good on ya Kofi. The General continued in a written statement, proclaiming that the United Nations “took the issue with ‘utmost seriousness’ and urged donors to ‘provide the backing required’ to deal with the problem.” In other words, known as Kerfuffles’ words, “Send money fast to stop us, before we rape again.“

Radical conservative Ann Coulter and the ultra liberal Hillary Clinton are screeching and batting their heads together. How much fun is that? Seems Ann Coulter is publicizing another of her screeds and in this latest book authoress Coulter refers to the widows of the September 11th terrorist attacks as “harpies”. Hillary is taking Ann to task for her disrespect, describing Coulter’s actions as “a vicious, mean-spirited attack”, and the good Senatoress speaks from experience. It is just too much fun to watch two real harpies fighting to defend or slander other women as harpies.

The dictionary definition of “harpy”, singular of “harpies”, is a predatory person; a shrewish woman, a malicious fierce-tempered woman, a hellcat, a vixen, a disagreeable woman, an unpleasant woman, a woman who is an unpleasant person.

This clinches it. Greek mythology defines a harpy as a vicious and voracious, loathsome monster with the head and trunk of a woman and the tail, wings, and talons of a bird of prey. Who wins the Battle of the Harpies, Hillary or Ann? Watch the Harpie Championship Fight.

It’s Spring Break - Do You Know Where Your Kids Are?
Throughout the Natalee Holloway tragedy I have been contemplating the wisdom of youngsters going off to foreign lands, seemingly for the sun and beaches, but in fact for the opportunities to partake of activities that are illegal or morally unacceptable in their home communities. “The St. Petersburg Times” documented a typical holiday in a story about two young women entitled “Too Much Fun”.

Spring Break - Is It Merely Innocent Mating Rituals?
Do you know what your college kids are doing on Spring Break? If they are in Cancun with one of the travel agencies such as Wicked Fish Tours, the details and photographs at its web site will give you a good idea. Last month I wrote about “Spring Break Broken”. Call me a prude, and I am, but I am also pro-woman, and it is not good for women to behave in this manner. It is not good for young men either, but neither is it good for women to want to behave as men, as, believe it or not, men and women are different. Such mating rituals are an uncivilized regression to animality.

All Spring Break vacations with Wicked Fish Tours include:

• Round Trip Airfare or Party Bus to Cancun
• 7 nights hotel/condo accommodations
• 14 meals included in Cancun Mexico.
• 7-50 Included Hours of Cocktail Parties
• Free Spring Break T-Shirt
• 0% Trip Financing with low deposit
• Cancun, Mexico VIP party entrances
• Welcome Orientation in Cancun Mexico.
• Free Welcome Party in Cancun Mexico.

Why Cancun, Mexico asks the Wicked Fish, and then answers the question:

Cancun is responsible for some of the best vacations most Spring Breakers can’t or don’t want to remember. … But, do your fellow partygoers a favor and leave the speedo stateside. Join over 100,000 college spring breakers gettin’ smashed and trashed at Mexico’s top vacation spot. Cancun is the most popular Spring Break destination and consistently delivers the most awesome spring break experience. A few marriages and a helluva lot more breakups can be attributed to Spring Break in Cancun. The party beverages flow and egos grow as guys and gals alike partake in the mating ritual that is Spring Break. (we don’t condone sex or drinking btw) Remind me of that if you see me doing either.

I wrote an essay entitled “Too Much Fun” in July of 2005, shortly after the disappearance of Miss Holloway that is still worth reading.