Allen is a piece of shit.

"That's Buffoon over there, he's with my opponent . . .

So let's give a welcome to Buffoon; welcome to America and the real world of Virginia."

Still offensive.  Still inappropriate. Still not the type of behavior that you'd want from a Senator.

The only thing that's changed is George Allen's explanation. 

Yet if Allen's sharp questioning gave him such an early margin, it was his sharp tongue also that a few days later cost him much of that very advantage. At a political event in the far southwest part of the state, Allen took note of the presence of a dark-skinned young man (of American Indian descent, it turned out) from his opponent's campaign staff who had for several days been attending all of Allen's gatherings—with video camera in hand to make a record of everything that was being said.

The young guest got more than he bargained for when Allen tauntingly and inexplicably referred to him as a "macaca"—a term some interpreted as a racial slur. Whether the term has any such connotations now is almost beside the point; the issue was immediately so blown out of proportion by the media that Allen felt compelled to apologize. And the fact of the apology then appeared to many to confirm a slipup that within a few days had cost Allen most of his statistical lead in the race.

Allen actually had a pretty credible defense for what he said. No one—including The Washington Post, which featured the story repeatedly for several weeks—ever demonstrated that "macaca" really has such murky racial connotations in any language. But in northern Italy, where Allen's mother had close family connections, "macaca" does seem to mean "clown" or "buffoon." Allen says now that's what he was trying to communicate.

I have no idea what to make of this.

http://www.raisingka...

What gives? I know, I know, here's proof he's lying, but really, what gives?

Wouldn't that have worked better than all this other crap?

http://www.bedfordre...

Republican Headquarters to Host Post Election Party
The Republican Party of Bedford (RPB) will host a post election event at the downtown Republican headquarters at 107 E. Main Street for poll workers, volunteers and party supporters immediately following the closing of the polls on Tuesday November 8, 2005.

They just don't get it!
And they will wonder when nobody shows up:
Was it our candidate Senator Allen?
Or was it our own dumb mistake?
Or was it both?

"U.S. Sen. George Allen, R-Va., who has accused Democratic challenger Jim Webb of anti-Semitism, said yesterday his new-found Jewish roots have emboldened him to become a champion for equality."

http://www.timesdisp...

From a confederate flag loving, noose hanging, racial slur throwing, former college QB, to "champion for equality"--all in the span of 24 hours!  Call me cynical.

Here's a tidbit:

But even as it has enjoyed cozy relations with Washington politicos, from its earliest days the Times has been a hothouse for hard-line racialists and neo-Confederates. Pruden, who started at the paper in 1982, was their wizard. His father, the Rev. Wesley Pruden Sr., was a Baptist minister who served as chaplain to the Capital Citizens Council in Little Rock, Arkansas, the leading segregationist group in town. When President Dwight Eisenhower sent Army troops to protect nine black teenagers integrating Little Rock's Central High School in 1957, Pruden Sr. reportedly told an assembled mob, "That's what we've got to fight! Ni[I've edited the rest of this word out], Communists and cops!" 

In 1993 Pruden gave an interview to the now-defunct neo-Confederate magazine Southern Partisan, which routinely published proslavery apologias and attacks on Abraham Lincoln. Pruden boasted, "Every year I make sure that we have a story in the paper about any observance of Robert E. Lee's birthday.... And the fact that it falls around Martin Luther King's birthday."

"Makes it all the better," interjected a Partisan editor.

"I make sure we have a story. Oh, yes," said Pruden.

He, or one of his editors, screwed up on the Lowell Feld, Lowell Fulk, bit yesterday, but they made an appropriate correction.

Btw,, Schapiro wrote a devastating op-ed a couple weeks ago too about Allen and the insincerity of politicians that's an absolute must read: http://www.timesdisp.... 

I'll have to check out the Washington Times piece.  Historically, their news coverage has been pretty atrocious; however, the news coverage that I've seen of the race by Seth McLaughlin has seemed even-handed.

Btw, I have a friend who worked at the RTD a couple years ago and was curious about the bias issue.  His take was that there wasn't any excessive love for George Allen in the news room--guys like Whitley and Schapiro have been covering politics for years--so they know what George Allen--and most politicians--are like when cameras aren't around. 

The editorial boards of the RTD and Washington Times though are a different story.  As long as the editorial boards let journalists do their job without interference I have no problem. 

If you couldn't tell this media coverage angle is an endlessly fascinating topic for me (I was a journalism student a decade ago as an undergrad).

Each time he finds something that sounds better - something that better rationalizes and justifies previous stupid statements he has made - he embraces that position until an even bigger lie comes along that sounds better than the previous lie.

It's sort of like the fact that he now makes public statements claiming that he has always believed in diversity because he "grew up in a football family."  The irony is, that is a racist statement alleging that only minorities play football. 

And, while he repeats his lie that he has always grown up in a very diverse background, he never reconciles that with his prior actions of hanging a noose in his office, his support for confederacy, and his refusal to support civil rights issues.  Or, more importantly, the fact that he has previously admitted these racist acts to media outlets several times. 

Simply put, Allen's alleged diverse non-racist background cannot co-exist with Allen's blatantly racist actions (and the admissions thereof) for the last three-plus decades. 

The fact that Allen can sit there before a television camera today and deny his racism without being confronted with the overwhelming evidence to refute it, is stunning.

Allen apparently hasn't learned life's lessons yet...  ;-)

On the other hand, every time that he changes the macaca definition, the story gets repeated....

Do I call him "Felix Macaca Allen? Or "Felix Meshuge Allen"?

Yours, still upset at having to have *anything* (maternal lineage) in common with the expletive deleted (and tongue bleeding as the result)

http://www.usnews.co...

Senator Allen's foot-in-mouth disease

That Sen. George Allen–he just can't do enough to alienate various ethnic and religious constituencies, can he? I mean, if you sat there and tried to dream up ways to offend Jews, who prior to this week really didn't pay much attention to Allen or to his religious background, you could not have produced a more complete shellacking.

So, Allen first makes a racial slur, then gets mad during the debate with Webb and accuses his questioner of casting "aspersions." Then he does a 180 and the next day issues a statement saying he takes "great pride" in his Jewish heritage. Later, he states in an interview: "I still had a ham sandwich for lunch. And my mother made great pork chops." Jews who keep kosher don't eat pork.

Shouldn't there be a limit, of say, one per week, for major campaign gaffes? Whatever it is, the junior senator from Virginia has stretched the limit beyond recognition.

"I made up a nickname" [Aug 18]

"I just made it up" [Sep 17]

"I had never heard that word before, from my mother or from anyone else" [Debate]

"In northern Italy, where Allen's mother had close family connections, 'macaca' does seem to mean 'clown' or 'buffoon.' Allen says now that's what he was trying to communicate." [World]

Is the Kowboy's Italian is too refined for him to use those vulgar old Italian words 'buffone" or 'clown' or even 'pagliaccio" [as in the opera]? Or is he channeling telepathic messages from some distant cousin in Livorno?

Just what does 'macaca' mean to a northern Italian? Ask the editors of one of Italy's most respected newspapers, Corriere della Sera: "insulto razzista."

I have not had my coffee yet.  What the heck is he trying to say in this quote?

Reading this entire quote as if it stems from Allen himself seems more likely to be misreading of it than not, and Wonkette and Marshall don't appear to have the kind of support that they need to make the definitive claims that they make.

Oh Boy. Macaca's back with a vengeance. And Wonkette's got the get.

Remember, George Allen said he just made up 'Macaca', right?

Well, that's not what he told Marvin Olasky's World Magazine, a widely read evangelical weekly, a few weeks ago.

Here's what he told them ...

Allen actually had a pretty credible defense for what he said. No one—including The Washington Post, which featured the story repeatedly for several weeks—ever demonstrated that "macaca" really has such murky racial connotations in any language. But in northern Italy, where Allen's mother had close family connections, "macaca" does seem to mean "clown" or "buffoon." Allen says now that's what he was trying to communicate.
So it's a word he picked up from his mom and it means buffoon.

Or he made it up.

Or he didn't make it up and it's a slur for dark-skinned people like Webb's campaign volunteer S.R. Sidarth.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A rising star in the Republican Party and darling of the Christian right was remarkably flummoxed this week as he acknowledged his previously undisclosed Jewish roots.

It's not the first time George Allen - a Virginia senator running for re-election with an eye on the White House - has undergone an identity transplant.

More than 30 years ago his makeover was by design, when the Palos Verdes High School quarterback and son of the Los Angeles Rams coach of the same name methodically shed his California cool to adopt the folkways and mores of the rebel South, grooving on Confederate flags the way his peers did surfboards.

When one sees writer after writer wondering what was going on in Allen's mind when he lost his cool -- for Dick Wadhams to make up false antisemtitism charges is beyond the pale.