8:13 am Friday January 3, 1997 No backtalk Yikes—Clinton’s Onto Us! by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   The Clinton Administration just blew our cover, my friends, releasing to the media a 331-page report titled “The Communication Stream of Conspiracy Commerce” which details how we, the right-wing would-be masters of an enslaved America, are seeking to destroy Bill Clinton. Our determination to bring this about, of course, stems from our recognition that Clinton is a man of rock-solid moral character and unparallelled brilliance, who alone can deliver the helpless masses of America into a Rennaissance of compassion and getting-along-ness. (Okay, stop snickering!) We here at The Armed Genius are not specifically named in the report (and frankly, I’m insulted), but you can be sure that when they speak of “well-funded right-wing think tanks and individuals”—the originators of the calumnies bedeviling the White House—they had us in mind. So maybe they got the “well-funded” part wrong, but our slim budget is obviously merely a cover for the billions of dollars and the vast power we all stand to gain once that paragon of virtue, William J. Clinton, is out of the way. By the time you read this, there should already be press reports quoting some Clintonista or another talking about Jim McDougal’s “thirty pieces of silver”—meaning, perhaps, a lighter sentence—for his corroboration of David Hale’s allegations against then-Gov. Clinton with respect to illegal loans related to the Whitewater affair.  The sad truth is, there is a massive strain of messianism in the Clintons’ view of themselves. This first emerged long ago, when Clinton spoke of “powerful forces” arrayed to sink his wife’s draconian health-care nationalization scheme. Now, with his day of reckoning fast approaching, the President and his apologists are bringing their psychotic narcissism out of the closet (perhaps the same one where Hillary hid her billing records for two years). Well, far be it from The Armed Genius not to play along with the gag. Therefore, starting with this issue and periodically hereafter, we’ll be “exposing” elements of the right-wing media conspiracy collaborating in the falsification of the truth about the Clinton political machine that has seized the U.S. government. In this issue: NET (formerly National Empowerment Television). The satellite/cable television network ran a report last January called “Quid Pro Coal” on its American Investigator program. Linking the September executive decree establishing the Cascade Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument to a low-sulfur coal venture in (surprise, surprise!) Indonesia, the report means that the Clinton machine has once again taken a hit below the water line. To be fair, the linkage of the monument, which put America’s largest and most promising source of low-sulfur coal off-limits, to massive campaign contributions from the wealthiest man in Indonesia, did not originate with NET. In fact, the White House will surely argue that the progression of this story is following the “media food chain” flow chart contained in their conspiracy report, because one of the first to publicize the link was none other than Dispatches, a biweekly publication of the Western Journalism Center, which was named in the White House report. Clearly, here we have a prime example of the media food chain at work—Sarah Foster, who wrote the Dispatches articles about the Lippo-Escalante connection, broke the story in the October/November 1996 issue of “Land Rights Letter,” which must surely be funded by one or another property rights group that would easily fall into the category of “right-wing” according to the Clintonistas. Both Dispatches and NET, of course, have sites on the World Wide Web, which is sufficient to establish the next step in the progression, which is that such “right-wing” niche media disseminate their claims on the Internet, which somehow brings them to the attention of “right-wing” daily newspapers like the Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the “tabloid” Sunday Telegraph of London (which happens to be second only to the august Times of London as a respected newspaper across the pond). Having thus been made “respectable” by being reported in these unreliable “right-wing” dailies, the allegations—which, you must not forget, originate with “well-funded right-wing think tanks and individuals” with a venomously anti-Clinton agenda—come to the attention of Republicans in Congress, who hold hearings that, naturally, get the attention of “real” media outlets like the Washington Post and CNN. (I said, stop snickering!!) So the next step should be that the Utah coal lockup will be linked to the multibillionaire Riady clan in those media outlets that don’t share the enlightened elite liberalism of the old-line Big Media establishment. If those in the White House who have been watching the right-wing media conspiracy are right, it should happen any day now—if it hasn’t already. From there, it should progress to Al D’Amato and other influential congressional committee chairs, who will abuse their access to the dutiful scribes of the Fourth Estate to further trash the reputation of the Second Coming of Franklin Roosevelt. [Me] [The Armed Genius] [People] [Government] [Politics]

12:24 am Wednesday January 1, 1997 No backtalk Swami Salami Predicts 1997’s Top News Stories by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   It’s over, and good riddance—the most disappointing election year since 1932 (when the Republicans had about as worthy a candidate). With 1997 a-dawning before us, it’s time to take a look into the ol’ crystal ball and see what lies ahead. January The biggest news story of the month now upon us will occur on Monday, the 20th, when Mochtar Riady takes delivery of the United States government with the swearing-at—er, I mean “in”—of William Jefferson Blythe Clinton as general mangler of the newest subsidiary of the Lippo Group (what can you expect of a month in which Friday the 13th comes on a Monday—and a week late?). Nevertheless, Clinton will manage to startle those three or four journalists on hand who are still capable of cognitive processes when, instead of delivering an inaugural address, he enters a plea. Just six days later, the Super Bowl will be held in New Orleans, and in honor of the host city’s most psychotic resident the half-time entertainment will feature James Carville and his newly formed band, the Reign of Error, as they debut their chart-topping smash song-and-dance, “Starr Wars: The Defendant’s Mouthpiece Strikes Back.” Also slated to premiere during the game’s worldwide broadcast will be the kickoff of the AFL-CIO’s 1998 propaganda campaign, with ads blaming Newt Gingrich and the Republicans in Congress for the Big Freeze that recently struck the Pacific Northwest. February After just one month, the 105th Congress will be rocked by a brand-new series of accusations against Speaker Newt Gingrich, all filed by embittered House Minority Wimp David Bonior. Among the charges: that Gingrich habitually fails to consult a dictionary when he is unsure of how to spell a multisyllabic word. Moderate House Republicans will be askance at the seriousness of these charges, and will call for Gingrich to step aside as speaker until they can be fully investigated. But the biggest news story will come from across the pond, as the British government seeks to divorce Queen Elizabeth’s husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, over his remarks against the new law banning all guns from the sceptered isle. The Prince of Wales will be seen looking relieved as Fleet Street’s worst finally catch scent of royal prey other than himself, giving him time for a relaxing game of polo. March Big Media will be shocked—shocked!—when it is revealed that yet another study has found that reporters, editors, and producers in the upper-echelon press are overwhelmingly liberal. The shock will not be over the reports, but over their source: the same outfit that does the exit polling for the networks on Election Day. This organization will reveal that 93 percent of the precincts at which they deployed people to conduct exit polls were populated by Big Media faces, and that all but one of those faces voted for Clinton. The exception, whose name will be withheld out of concern for his safety, will issue an anonymous statement insisting that his ballot was misread. For weeks after, the Sunday morning babble shows will focus on how the exit-polling agency violated the terms of the agreement it had with Big Media. April Halfway through this month of spring’s return, some 49 percent of those voting in the last election will awaken from their stupor as they file their income tax returns. The most effective solution to this problem, which stems from most Americans now having the attention span of a hyperactive hydrangea, would be to move Income Tax Day to the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, and making the act of filing federal tax returns a part of the voting process. No one in a position to bring about this change will propose doing so—which will not qualify as news. May The desecration of Memorial Day will continue as President Bill Clinton lays a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns. June One of the Little Three television networks will incorporate into its nightly news broadcast a feature describing the “Right-Wing Militia Bust of the Week,” and most of the reports will focus on twisting the arrests in question around to argue that the Brady Law’s “mandatory” background checks would have prevented these “extremists” from conspiring to overthrow the government (yes, I know the law is on the books, but in Big Media’s wonderland, facts are irrelevant). The series will continue right up until the Supreme Court issues its ruling on a Tenth Amendment challenge to Brady, which will happen in… July ...and will result in a 5-4 ruling freeing local police chiefs and sheriffs from having to serve as uncompensated federal agents. In reaction to this ruling, the usual suspects will appear on network television, telling sympathetic anchorcritters how many millions of poor, underprivileged children will die tonight because of this unconscionable defense of the U.S. Constitution. August The dog days will be a busy time for Big Media, as a simmering standoff over welfare reform re-reform threatens to erupt into another AFL-CIO-orchestrated passion play pitting the forces of light (defenders of compassionate big government) against the forces of evil (spiteful fiscal conservatives who look at the poor and elderly and see a cheap source of pet food). This epic Ragnarok will fizzle, however, when the hype threatens to overshadow the hype surrounding the pre-announcement of the pre-release of the pre-beta version of Windows 97 (now scheduled for April 1999), causing Microsoft pontiff Bill Gates to order John Sweeney to stand down. Since the labor conglomerate’s money-laundering records are all handled by computers running Windows, Sweeney will have no choice but to obey. What will be overlooked in August will be the formal renaming of Salt Lake City as New Jakarta, as Lippo buys the mineral rights to Utah’s new Mochtar Riady National Monument and commands President Clinton to rescind his executive order closing off the coal reserves therein. September All of the Little Three networks, plus CNN, the Washington Post, New York Times, USA Today, Time and Newsweek will take the month off, running a series of “Best of” compilations, coincidentally happening as Kenneth Starr presents his findings on Whitewater to Congress. As a result, the top news story of September 1997 will be the first moon landing. October When Big Media returns to its regular programming, the first major breaking news event will be President Al Gore’s call for a ban on synthetic carpet fibers after James Carville nearly chokes to death on a deep-pile shag. If anyone thinks to ask why Gore is president, no one in Big Media will bother to answer. November Notorious scandal-sheet Weekly World News will print photos of a mysterious man seen in Rio de Janeiro, and will identify the man as a recently deposed U.S. president. The claim will be ridiculed by the usual suspects. Meanwhile, an IRS audit of Kenneth Starr will culminate in the public announcement, before a grand jury can even be empaneled to consider the evidence, that he will be indicted for unspecified violations that—as a result of a recently-signed compromise budget bill—carry the death penalty. When it is announced the indictment will be sought in Arkansas, Starr drops out of sight. After one too many Justice Department investigations into Microsoft Corporation’s business practices, the company’s Fearless Leader will develop and release a product called “Virtual Attorney General for Windows 95,” featuring a broad-shouldered female multimedia character who will serve as a problem-solver for the operating system, torching misbehaving files and creating “independent counsel” utilities to deal with stubborn hardware conflicts. Microsoft will then sue Janet Reno for copyright infringement. December After a divisive and tumultuous year, the nation will once again come together in good will and friendship as President and Mrs. Gore light the National Winter Solstice Tree and wish all their fellow Americans a happy and environmentally-friendly Kwanzaa. [Me] [Humor?] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics]

1:15 pm Friday October 25, 1996 No backtalk Bill’s Got a Bridge He’d Like to Sell in the South by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   President Clinton’s “bridge to the 21st century” sold pretty well to the uncritical bunch in Big Media, but now he’s touring the South with it, hoping to keep the Republican presidential ticket from turning the region’s traditional conservatism into a threat to his re-election. At the same time he was telling people in Alabama that it looked like they’d like to “cross that bridge” with him, Reuters was reporting that a poll shows Bob Dole and Jack Kemp slightly ahead in Texas (though within the margin of error). I’ve been wondering lately about the other polls, the ones purporting to show Clinton maintaining a steady double-digit lead nationally among “likely” voters—wondering just what Clinton’s actual numbers are in those polls. That part hasn’t been quite as prominently discussed… With Ross Perot running about five percent nationally, and the minor-party tickets threatening to stay in their usual three-points-or-less-combined ghetto, if Clinton is doing no better than—oh, let’s say 43%, just at random—then this race is nowhere near as cut-and-dried as many are making it appear. Bear in mind that in the final results in 1992 Perot had about 18 percent, and the popular-vote difference between Clinton and Bush was only six points. If Perot has slipped as much as the polls now say—thirteen points!—Clinton is toast if he can’t do better than he did back then. So can he? And can he do enough better, in a good enough distribution among high-electoral-vote states, to actually win? These questions don’t seem to be getting much attention right now. But as I read about Slick Willie traveling the South talking about a bridge, I can’t help but think that there are a great many people out there who are in for a real surprise. Especially when you consider that Clinton’s biggest and most persistent scandal involves the sale of swamp land… Can it be that Dick Morris’ departure has left the Clinton/Gore campaign with no more savvy than to go to Dixie to sell a bridge? [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics] [Elections]

6:32 pm Tuesday October 22, 1996 No backtalk The Government We Deserve? by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   PRESS RELEASE In deference to the fact that people get the government they deserve, we are proud to announce the formation of HellPAC—the PAC from Hell—for the purpose of ensuring that people deserve the government they’re getting. Everyone alive today knows what it’s like to live under high taxes and big government, while there are very few people left who remember what it’s like to live under the alternative—and as the saying goes, “Better the Devil you know...” Therefore, HellPAC has been established with a bold, but very simple, mission: to preserve high taxes and big government by any means necessary. With a major national election soon to take place, HellPAC’s directors wish to take this opportunity to inform the electorate of our perspective on certain key races, and our endorsements therein. The presidential race, of course, tops our list. This year’s selection was a tough decision to make. While the incumbent, Bill Clinton, has a record, established during the first half of his first term, of promoting to the best of his ability the expansion of government and the elevation of tax rates beyond the wildest dreams of his most—er—progressive predecessors, in the last two years he has uttered some unfortunate assertions, such as, “The era of big government is over,” and the like. We confess we find such remarks profoundly troubling. He also signed into law a bill that begins the process (a trifling beginning, true, but nevertheless a beginning) of turning back the clock on entrapping the neediest Americans in an endless morass of dependency and self-induced helplessness (one of our favorite programs!). Nor are we thrilled with his recent talk of a middle-class tax cut. However, we have been reminded that Mr. Clinton made this same tax-cut promise four years ago and neglected to do anything to bring it about, which—though not exactly pro-active toward big government—does nevertheless mean profits for another branch of our parent corporation… Mr. Clinton’s Republican challenger, Bob Dole, has done a number of laudable things during his seemingly interminable Senate career, such as defending certain agricultural subsidies. Unfortunately, his record on entitlements, which contribute real substance to federal budget growth, is lukewarm at best. Compared to Mr. Clinton, whose early program included seizing one-seventh of the American economy and turning it into an expensive, unresponsive federal bureaucracy, Mr. Dole is a mere dilettante. And although Mr. Dole’s Senate record on tax increases deserves great credit, there are those on our Board of Directors who do suspect his current talk of a 15% tax cut, if elected, may be reprehensibly sincere. These worries are rooted in our senior directors’ deep understanding of the connection between physical courage, which Mr. Dole shamelessly displayed during the Second World War, and that disgusting character flaw, honesty. In terms of character, in fact, we find Mr. Clinton to be far the more preferable candidate. He lies, philanders, steals, abuses power, sells influence, and is just an all-around better man. For these reasons, we think Mr. Clinton is far more likely than his opponent to act boldly, upon winning re-election, to stab his supporters in the back in a most commendable fashion. Furthermore—and this we find gratifying beyond words—he has shown a unique talent for making his victims grateful for the betrayal. Without doubt, a most satisfying prospect. For this reason, we overlook Mr. Clinton’s conservative pretensions and his carefully cultivated image as a man of deep conviction and compassion, and bestow upon him our most heartfelt endorsement. We do not wish to overlook the less prominent candidates in the race. Mr. Ross Perot, of course, has been one of our most promising associates, but we have a duty to point out that many of his most admirable deeds in the last few years have been committed, not out of a desire to abet our cause in any way, but due to his unfortunate condition. A man of strong will and profound ambition, he was unable to rein in his best qualities (pride, covetousness, etc.). On an individual scale we find this agreeable, but Mr. Perot no longer has any value to us as a public figure. We are given to understand that many of our most dedicated opponents are promoting the candidacy of Mr. Harry Browne, nominee of the Libertarian Party, as the “purest” choice. Some of our greatest advancements have been with the help of those so intent upon purity that they leave the incrementalist road wide open for our use. We see no reason to expect that to change, and wish Mr. Browne well—though if truth be told (and sometimes, unfortunately, it must) we doubt a withdrawal on his part would affect the likely outcome of this year’s race. Anyway, that is our assessment of the 1996 presidential contest. We hope this information will be helpful. To those wishing to contribute to HellPAC: we are grateful that you want to help promote our cause, and appreciate your desire to give us what you can—however, we must remind each of you that, in the end, we’ll get it all from you anyway. [Me] [Humor?] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics] [Elections]

11:28 pm Monday September 9, 1996 No backtalk What Is ‘Negative’ Campaigning, Anyway? by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   There seems to be a desire among many Americans to have our political campaigns conducted like the discussions on PBS’s “Firing Line”—political candidates sitting around pontificating on the issues and politely clearing their throats before looking embarrassed and saying, “I’m so sorry to have to disagree with you, sir, but I’m afraid your reading of the facts in Point #1847A simply doesn’t pass muster...” Here in the Alaskan Interior, the Tanana Valley chapter of the League of Women Voters is emphasizing the League’s drive to end “negative campaigning.” The only really negative campaign that has taken place here in 1996 was the one between Ted Stevens and Dave Cuddy for the GOP nomination for the U.S. Senate—a seat Stevens has held since about the Cretaceous era, giving him the status of a demi-god in the minds of many otherwise independent-thinking Alaskans. By public reckoning, the dirty campaigning started when Cuddy hired an investigator to research Stevens’ ethical conduct during his two or three eons in Congress, but in reality the first dirty trick was Stevens’ public warning that Cuddy’s supporters might try to bypass the legally required primary election with a convention endorsement. While there were those who were seeking to keep the Republican nomination process off the state’s legally required open ballot, Cuddy was not involved in that effort and stated publicly that he didn’t think the open primary would hurt him. On the other hand, this was before the Democratic field shaped up so poorly that Theresa Obermeyer, who has paranoid theories surrounding her husband’s inability to pass the state bar exam (she blames a conspiracy masterminded by Stevens), won the nomination to oppose Stevens in November. Most Democrats probably did cross over to support Stevens, knowing that anyone capable of stringing together two cohrent thoughts could beat Obermeyer, and that, conservative rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding, Stevens is a more dedicated defender of Big Government, at least for Alaska’s benefit, than even the 1996 model of Bill Clinton. Aside from the Stevens/Cuddy fight, though, Alaska’s campaigns have tended to be very positive, though not of the rarefied “Firing Line” caliber. So the emphasis being given to fighting negative campaigning here seems curious. Nationally, it’s a different matter. Just think back to the personal attacks heaped on Pat Buchanan after it began to look as though he would win the New Hampshire primary, and you’ll understand why. But there’s also a great deal of confusion about what really constitutes “negative campaigning.” To some, merely quoting an opponent in context is “going negative;” to some, making any comparisons at all between one candidate and another, regardless of the substance, is “going negative.” Meanwhile, Clinton and the Democrats unleash a barrage of attacks on Republicans, accusing them of wanting to starve children, pollute the air and water, and throw seniors out into the street to subsist on dog food—and that’s okay! Oddly enough, I find even the mindless drumbeat against undefined “negative campaigns” to be a positive sign—it means that there is a desire among the people to hear candidates address substance rather than hear them spread fluff and distortion. People do want, deep down, to see proof that politics is not a war between fanatics on both sides, with the innocent hard-working taxpayer caught defenseless in the middle. For the candidate, this is a tough challenge; the whole point of campaigning is to get more votes than the other guy. That means any serious campaign is going to have a lot of its attention focused on its opposition—where are their strengths that we have to overcome, their weaknesses we can play to, their gaffes we can benefit from? Big Media doesn’t help matters—on the one hand, they thrive on controversy, but their talking heads don’t think you and I are smart enough or interested enough to figure out what the substantive issues are in a real controversy, so they focus instead on “fluff” controversy. On the other hand, Big Media is also largely responsible for the concern that exists out there about “negative” campaigning—and again, because they don’t think Mr. & Mrs. Mainstream America are mentally capable of working out for themselves what “going negative” really means, they never allow themselves to get very deep into the question of definition. As a result, the declining (but still overwhelming) majority of Americans who get their information from Dan, Tom and Peter every evening, only get increasingly confused. Here in Alaska, this has actually led to something of a backlash. Some local leaders have voiced skepticism about the high profile of the campaign to fight negative campaigns. An unsuccessful challenger for a legislative seat in 1994 (a liberal Democrat, no less!) has authored two letters-to-the-editor questioning the League of Women Voters’ efforts. It will be interesting to see where things shake out locally, whether the same community that recently drove an outspoken local conservative off the radio for being so “negative” will turn around and tell an organization touting “going positive” to sit down and shut up. I’ve already described the one truly negative-toned campaign that took place hereabouts. Now I want to describe a campaign that was so positive it made my teeth hurt. A state senate seat in Fairbanks was wide open after its incumbent (a Republican) decided 12 years was long enough. Two Republicans filed for that seat—one, a former Alaska State Trooper, espoused solid libertarian-conservative views and has a charisma that should have made him a shoo-in. His opponent bravely campaigned in favor of “statesmanship” and promised that he would make the Interior’s priorities the state’s priorities (without ever saying what those priorities were). The ex-Trooper could and should have challenged this vacant campaign and made it clear to voters that his opponent is an empty shirt—or at least cajoled the man to start getting specific. Instead he “went positive” and lost. There is certainly plenty of reason to question whether some undefined standard of “positive” campaigning really benefits the process, or helps to ensure that the best candidates get elected. In at least one race in Fairbanks, it actually ensured the opposite. [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Alaska] [Government] [Politics] [Elections]

2:01 pm Sunday August 25, 1996 No backtalk Upstart Group Nominates Dangerous Radical for President by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   “Good evening, I’m Dan Rather. Tonight’s top story: a splinter political party convenes to nominate an Illinois lawyer for President. Does he have ties to an extremist terrorist group? Our Bob Schieffer checks in with the story.” (Long shot of an odd-looking man—very skinny, with a beard, wearing an unusually tall hat that emphasizes his own prodigious height—speaking before an assembled crowd in a convention hall) “Hoping to challenge the established Democratic Party for political supremacy, a new group calling themselves ‘Republicans’ met to choose the man they would offer the nation as an alternative to Democratic nominee Stephen Douglas. Their pick: a virtual unknown from Douglas’ home state of Illinois, a former member of Congress whom Douglas defeated for the Senate and who now hopes to avenge that defeat this November. Abraham Lincoln, a self-described lawyer though he has no formal training, accepted the party’s nomination with a speech in which he vowed to oppose the expansion of slavery into any new territory.” (Long, slow panning shot showing a town in an upland valley, next to a river) “This is Harpers Ferry, Virginia, scene of the most infamous act of slavery opponents, the attack, led by terrorist leader John Brown, on an installation of the United States Army. The attack failed, and Brown was captured. At his trial, he proclaimed opposition to slavery a divine obligation, and asserted his belief that those not willing to risk their lives to end the practice were destined to eternal damnation. Memories of the ordeal during Brown’s siege of the military arsenal remain fresh in this town, and residents are outraged at the Republicans’ choice of an abolitionist to run for the presidency.” (Man-on-the-street interview: an outraged-looking townswoman) “I can’t believe any reasonable person would support such a thing. It’s exactly the same as condoning the killing that horrible John Brown person did here. This Lincoln person won’t get any votes from Harpers Ferry, I can tell you!” (Man-on-the-street interview: an African-American field worker) “I don’t know much about politics. All I know is John Brown didn’t help me, and I don’t think Abraham Lincoln will either.” (File footage of the aftermath of John Brown’s siege, showing soldiers covered by sheets, followed by footage of Brown being led away in chains, defiant and a little wild-eyed) “Although Brown and many of his followers were executed after the Harpers Ferry incident, people here in Harpers Ferry have no illusions that the zealous leader of the abolitionist fringe had many sympathizers, few of whom have ever been brought to justice. As the Republicans take their campaign to the nation, residents of this still-shaken community fear their anti-slavery rhetoric will draw those sympathizers out of hiding, and legitimize their extremist views. For CBS News, I’m Bob Schieffer.” [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics]

7:19 pm Friday August 23, 1996 No backtalk Hey Man, Lemme Have a Hit of That Nestlé Crunch! by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   So, like, I was just getting mellow on some Milk Duds, y’know, and Dude! I saw in the newspaper they think chocolate effects people just like weed! Well, duhhh!! I knew that totally years ago, man! But it’s a bummer, like, ‘cause now the man has got wise, and next thing you know you’ll have to go to the witch doctor for a prescription for your favorite brick of Special Dark. We choco-stoners had it good, man, but now some science geek has found out our dirty little secret and it’s gonna be hard to find a good buzz in a couple of days. It’s gonna take Mr. Bill, like, months to make up his mind to regulate the good brown like he just did the cancer sticks, and maybe he’ll never do it if Bob Dodo doesn’t get into an argument about it on morning TV. Yeah, I know, it means we can still chow down for some great trippin’, but before you can pig, you gotta find the stuff—and until they outlaw it, it’s gonna stay on the rack like it’s always been and the rug rats are gonna be heisting it left and right, know what I’m talkin’ about? Just like we used to do when we were brats, like, and we figured out that high we got from a good mouthful of Milky Way wasn’t from the sugar. Ha ha! So the candy man’s probably gonna jack up the price, and if it’s expensive he’s gonna put it behind the counter with the smokes and the booze, and us indulgers are gonna be hurtin’, y’know? Bummer, huh? Oh, well. Nothing good lasts forever, I guess. Whoa, hey! Look who’s on the tube! It’s Mr. Bill! Dude! Some reporter geek’s asking him about chocolate! Listen, man! “Like everybody else in those days I tried chocolate, but I didn’t like it and I didn’t swallow, and I never did it again.” Aw, man! What a freaking hypocrite! I mean just look at that dude’s butt and you know he ain’t chewin’ Trident when he’s vegging out in the Oval Office! Man, I bet he gets five-pound boxes of Russell Stover delivered every morning with his Washington Post and his Mother Jones. Aw, man, he pisses me off! Oh, and here comes that McCurry puke. Get a load of this! “Hey, I grew up in the Seventies. Did I ever have a handful of M&M’s once in a while? You bet I did!” Now there’s a man who talks straight, y’know? But why ain’t he tellin’ those sanctimonious carob-crunchers that there ain’t nothin’ wrong with gettin’ a little wasted on a good Snickers bar now and then. Life’s hard, man. You gotta unwind sometimes, right? Hey, is that a Charleston Chew peekin’ out of your pocket! C’mon, dude, let’s party! [Me] [Humor?] [My Two Cents]

12:42 pm Monday August 5, 1996 No backtalk Words of Wisdom for Some People Who Need ‘Em by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   To defenders of President and Mrs. Clinton: The surest way to judge someone’s character is to watch how they treat the help. To the Clinton-Gore Information Service (aka “Big Media,” aka “the dogpack"): If you want to know something, there’s nothing like finding out. To the radical Marxist ideologues at “Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting” ("FAIR"): That old line, “Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?” is a joke, not a legitimate debating technique. To Newt Gingrich: Wiser men than you have betrayed their own troops in pursuit of that “strange new respect” offered conservative officeholders who exhibit what the liberal D.C. establishment calls “growth”—and been undone. If you should lose the Speakership next year to a fellow Republican, it will be your own fault. To NBC: Whatever you guys spent to get the right to broadcast the 1996 Olympics would have been better spent on other things (like $700 gold-plated toilet seats). If Bob Dole should win the election in November, you’ll wish you could afford to bring back Dan Aykroyd to impersonate Dole on “Saturday Night Live.” I saw him play Dole in an opening sketch a few years back, and it was dead-on; that geek from “Weekend Update” is about as funny as—well, as Dole himself. (BTW, Aykroyd got the audience cheering wildly when, as Dole, he got into a shoving match with the Hillary character and, in response to the Clinton-impersonator’s effort to break it up, said, “Stay out of this, Bill—this is what you should have done years ago.” Even then, Hillary was being groomed to play scapegoat for coming scandals.) To those who just can’t stomach outright repeal of the capital-gains tax: Try this on for size—limit the tax to assets held for less than three years. That would exempt most middle-class people who get soaked when they sell their family homes to buy a retirement condo, or when they sell that share of AT&T stock, which they’ve had since their grandpa bought it for them for their tenth birthday, to pay their own son’s college tuition. And it would spare us another Clinton-style bureaucracy to administer such functional exemptions. If we absolutely have to tax capital gains, let’s only tax the ones made by speculators who buy something and sell it off in the short term, and let Joe Sixpack and Rick Whitecollar profit from their own, less volatile investments. And if such a change should eliminate “too much” of the tax’s target revenue, then obviously it’s a bad tax and should be repealed outright. To anyone seriously thinking of voting for Bill Clinton: Get therapy. [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics]

7:47 pm Saturday July 13, 1996 No backtalk Big Media’s Foulest Distortion by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   I’ve been losing weight pretty fast lately. It may be in part due to the wise counsel of my doctor (who did, after all, vote for me when I ran for local office last year), but I think it’s also because Big Media is up to its old tricks again. They’re making it hard for me to keep anything down. Remember four years ago when the dogpack journalists covering the presidential campaigns were so casually referring to George Bush as the candidate of the “extreme right”—mainly because he hadn’t barred the doors at the convention to keep Pat Buchanan away from the microphone? Well, now they’re referring to Bob Dole as being a creature of the “far right.” Better duck—here comes lunch! As near as I can tell, Dole’s “far right” credentials—in the eyes of Big Media—stem from the fact that he wants to prevent Bill Clinton from being re-elected. Clearly the sort of attitude one would only expect of a wild-eyed, apocalyptic “militia” type, right? Worse still, Dole’s been a Republican all during his political career, never having jumped ship over, say, Joe McCarthy or Barry Goldwater or Watergate or Ronald Reagan. Big Media loves Republicans who go over the rail at the first mention of steering the nation even a tenth of a degree less to the left, and Dole’s never done it—must be a closet Nazi at heart, right? Next comes the fact that he once earned his keep by prosecuting criminals—trying to punish victims of society for the things every enlightened citizen of the world knows their social environment forces them to do! How heartless! (I have to admit to some surprise at learning of this—how much time could he have had for a career before going into the Senate back around 1583?) Anyone who can not only blame individuals for their misdeeds, but try to persuade poor, ignorant jurors to do the same, must be somewhere away to the right of Heinrich Himmler! So what if Dole’s now leaving everybody with the impression that he would rather veto than sign bills repealing the unconstitutional Brady Law and the downright silly Ugly Guns ban? So what if he took a leading role in getting Reagan and Bush to go along with three consecutive “largest peacetime tax increases in history”? (Didn’t either Reagan or Bush ever hear of the old saying, “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me”? Maybe it should be amended: “...and if you fool me a third time, haul me away in a straitjacket.") So what if Dole seeks to gut the portions of the Republican platform that have made Christian conservatives one of the party’s most valuable assets both on, and before, Election Day? So what if he talks about getting “blame” for tax cuts instead of taking credit for them? These things are all just simple, sensible positions, Big Media tells itself, and Dole may be a jackbooted crypto-fascist at heart, but he’s a reasonable jackbooted crypto-fascist… Lordy, I give up. This “far-right” drumbeat has got Bob Dole so buffaloed that he’s showing a cowardice almost on a par with that of his opponent. Lord, deliver us! Get Bob and Bill both in the same place, and let the ground open and swallow ‘em both up. And let ‘em take the Washington press corps with ‘em. Let the Devil find out what “hell” really feels like. [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Government] [Politics] [Elections] [Media Ochre]

5:49 pm Tuesday July 9, 1996 No backtalk Clean the Air, Pollute the Water by McGehee in North Pole, Alaska   In today’s Fairbanks Daily News-Miner is reprinted a Sacramento Bee article about how the City of Santa Monica now has to import water thanks to the efforts of environmental regulators to “clean the air” by adding MTBE—methyl teriary butyl ether—to California’s gasoline supply. Apparently the additive, a government-classified “possible” carcinogen, survives the combustion of the gasoline, enters the air, is washed from the atmosphere by rain or dew, and percolates into groundwater. Santa Monica’s five city-owned wells are now abandoned as a result. Here in Fairbanks, the federal EPA tried without success to force the use of MTBE in gasoline; resistance—aided by local elected officials—turned the effort back, but the EPA still wants additives put in our automotive fuels to “oxygenate” them and supposedly make them burn more cleanly. The feds have repeatedly threatened to cut off federal monies to the state if the Alaska Depatment of Environmental Conservation (ADEC) does not move to force oxygenation. Frankly, only the friendship of Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Jim Sampson (who was state labor commissioner during the 1986-90 term of Democratic Alaska Gov. Steve Cowper) with current Democratic Gov. “Phony Tony” Knowles (a widely acknowledged “Slick Willie” wannabe) seems to have held ADEC off from making such a move. So far. Where I live, the water table is very shallow, and just about everyone who doesn’t live in city limits has a private well. The MTBE groundwater contamination is just one more example of the failure of government tinkering, due to the Law of Unintended Consequences. Big Gummint liberals—who loudly denounce the idea that the ends justify the means, no matter how beneficial—seem to embrace the idea that the intentions justify the outcome, no matter how detrimental. In environment-obsessed Santa Monica, the city’s chief water chemist, Myriam Cardenas, told the Bee, “I try to keep abreast of ground water issues. I watch the journals. I pay attention. And I was caught unaware.” Does your gas smell funny when you pump it? Does your water come from a well? If so, print out this article and send it to the head of your local water agency, and to your elected representatives, and demand that they stop the feds from forcing local and state governments to expose their citizens to water contaminated with a substance the EPA itself acknowledges may cause cancer. [Me] [My Two Cents] [People] [Beyond the West] [Government] [Politics] [Irony]

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