the last word (tm)

Vol. 16/No. 4 - 437th issue - May 20, 2007
bandit@iglou.com - http://members.iglou.com/bandit - Bellevue, Kentucky
Blog blogga blogs at http://bandit73.pitas.com and http://www.myspace.com/bandit41073

AH! ANOTHER ELECTION! EW!

May 20 - Actually no "ew!" this time. "Ew!" usually describes the choices in every election, but this time Kentuckians have a candidate they can trust.

A lot of you probably think of The Last Word as a Democratic publication. But ever since the party's Dick Morris-induced sellout of '96, nothing has been further from the truth (except maybe thinking it's a Republican publication). That The Last Word isn't a softball partisan organ rankles the milquetoast hacks of the party to no end. Tough.

We have no problem backing Democrats who are more conservative than us if no better option exists and if they aren't too conservative, but the center of debate has moved so far to the right that what the media calls moderate (even liberal) isn't just conservative but downright reactionary. It wasn't a Republican who sent fan mail to a foreign dictator praising him for permanently disfiguring teenagers accused of vandalism, so you can see why we can't always trust party labels anymore.

This whole crazy world is just too frustratin'.

Issuing endorsements has also become harder because elections receive less coverage than they used to, so it's hard to see where candidates stand, especially for downballot offices. This is unfortunate, because our endorsements carry some weight in these parts.

But there's one candidate for governor of Kentucky in the upcoming Democratic primary on May 22 who's long been a refreshing voice of populism: GATEWOOD GALBRAITH.

Galbraith is an advocate of civil liberties and economic fairness. His longtime support of legalizing cannabis encouraged similar movements in other states, and he's long been a critic of government abuse. Galbraith released a report that estimates that $720,000,000 has been wasted on corruption in personal service contracts in Kentucky since 1998 - corruption that he wants to end.

Gatewood Galbraith is a strong ally of labor and of Kentucky's working people. He plans to stop the state from frittering away our tax dollars on handouts to greedy out-of-state corporations. Galbraith also proposes reining in the pharmaceutical racket by asking drug companies (whose wares are causing addictions all over the state) to pay for drug treatment programs. In addition, Galbraith wants a referendum that would let Kentuckians vote on whether or not they want more legalized gambling.

That's what a real Democrat ought to sound like! People like Gatewood Galbraith who run on populist ideas are what America needs.

Vote. It's what cool people do.

RIGHT-WING SPAMMER RUNS FOR ATTORNEY GENERAL

May 20 - Meet Kentucky State Rep. Stan Lee. Asshat extraordinaire.

This is not the same Stan Lee who created Spiderman. This is a different Stan Lee.

The powerful Lexington-based lawmaker is a candidate in the looming Republican primary for Kentucky Attorney General. (Smell it? It really does loom.) Lee is such a favorite of the discredited Bush cult that a Lexington Herald-Leader editorial said he is "fundamentally an ideologue committed to pushing a social agenda."

Well, that he is. Lee (who looks like he's stuck in 1982 in all his photos on his campaign website) is a dominionist who wants creationism taught in public schools. He also wanted the public schools to teach that Christianity is the only true religion, which would clearly be an unconstitutional affront to separation of church and state. When a federal judge ruled that public buildings can't use the taxpayers' money to sponsor a Ten Commandments display (a ruling later backed up by the Supreme Court), Lee said, "Just because a federal judge rules something is unconstitutional doesn't make that the law."

Oh yeah, Stan? If it's based on the Constitution, it does. What'd be the purpose of having judges hear constitutional cases if they can't even rule on them? It's different when judges just pull nonsense out of thin air like the "role model effect", but please don't complain when they actually base their decisions on the Constitution. As a lawyer, Stan, you should know that.

According to the book Politics, Religion And Death: Memoir Of A Lobbyist by Carl Wedekind, Stan Lee's behavior was outright bizarre when Wedekind and an associate talked to him about the death penalty. Lee interrupted the two and launched a frightening sermon. Lee declared, "With the coming of Christ, there will be a circle of judges who will decide ... who is good, who is evil ... and there will be no appeal! Then there will be a thousand years of goodness - of bliss!" Lee's thundering forecast seemed way out of place in a discussion with lobbyists about a major public policy issue.

To give you an idea of who backs Stan Lee, he's received the endorsements of extremists like State Sen. Dan Kelly, who supports school bullying, and State Rep. Jon Draud, known for his loopy editorial blaming the First Amendment for school shootings.

Because Stan Lee hates gays, he teamed up with State Rep. Joe Fischer to introduce a bill designed to prohibit cities from passing laws that would protect residents from discrimination based on sexual orientation - or on any other basis, as it turns out.

That's not just conservative. That's Bushist.

You know what else is Bushist? E-mail spam! And that's what Stan Lee's been filling our e-mail box with. Not just once, but over and over.

We have no idea how we would have ended up on a mailing list for a right-wing Republican, so it's obvious Lee is just e-mailing people indiscriminately. Lee actually sent us multiple copies of an e-mail in which he complains that "the liberals will fight me tooth and nail every step of the way" and tries to solicit a donation for his campaign.

So that got forwarded to the Federal Trade Commission. Not like we expect the government to do anything about it, because it's been obvious since its phony anti-spam push of the late '90s that it's more worried about The Last Word getting posted on more than minus one newsgroups (where it's actually on-topic) than in people getting bombarded with unsolicited e-mail. Especially when the sender of said e-mail is a Republican politician. We know the government doesn't give a shit about e-mail spam, because if it did, we wouldn't still be getting some of the same spam we got 10 years ago. But oh well. We're reporting it anyway.

And he's a wasteful guy! Oh, he's a very wasteful guy!

Lee played a role in the legislature's failure to adopt a spending plan like it was supposed to. He preferred instead to squander lawmakers' time on stupid feely-bad social engineering crap that nobody else gives a damn about.

This type of arrogance is dangerous. From our experiences with whack-a-doos like Stan Lee, we can tell he's the type who's brainwashed himself into thinking he's some sort of divine messenger. We'd wager that, if Lee becomes attorney general, and a Democrat becomes governor, Lee is going to launch all sorts of bogus investigations against the new chief executive. He's exactly the type of politician who'd do such a thing.

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(Copywrong 2007)
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