PREHISTORIC CHELSEA

A land that time and proper lighting forgot.

WHAT RELIGION CAME IN THIS BOX?

Whatever it was, someone used it all up!

ROMNEY AND LIBYA: DOES THE LEAKED TAPE EXPLAIN IT?

The Mother Jones transcripts look like they explain just what the hell Mitt Romney was thinking when he made those very ugly comments after the Libya embassy massacre:

Audience member: If you get the call as president, and you had hostages…Ronald Reagan was able to make a statement, even before he became, was actually sworn in—

Romney: Yeah—
Audience member: the hostages were released—
Romney: on the day of his inauguration, yeah.
Audience member: So my question is, really, how can you sort of duplicate that scenario?
Romney: Ohhhh. [A few chuckles in audience.] I'm gonna ask you, how do I duplicate that scenario.
Audience member: I think that had to do with the fact that the Iranians perceived Reagan would do something to really get them out. In other words [unintelligible]…and that's why I'm suggesting that something that you say over the next few months gets the Iranians to understand that their pursuit of the bomb is something that you would predict and I think that's something that could possibly resonate very well with American Republican voters.
Romney: I appreciate the idea. I can't—one of the other things that's frustrating to me is that at a typical day like this, when I do three or four events like this, the number of foreign policy questions that I get are between zero and one. And the American people are not concentrated at all on China, on Russia, Iran, Iraq. This president's failure to put in place a status forces agreement allowing 10-20,000 troops to stay in Iraq? Unthinkable! And yet, in that election, in the Jimmy Carter election, the fact that we have hostages in Iran, I mean, that was all we talked about. And we had the two helicopters crash in the desert, I mean that's—that was—that was the focus, and so him solving that made all the difference in the world. I'm afraid today if you said, "We got Iran to agree to stand down a nuclear weapon," they'd go hold on. It's really a, but…by the way, if something of that nature presents itself, I will work to find a way to take advantage of the opportunity.

So, he DID have a situation like that happen and he jumped on it with both feet. He didn't use his supposedly large brain to filter out the idea, because he already had that idea in mind! The handlers only crafted the message, at best. This was no misstep or misstatement. It was on him.

See Also: ROMNEY AND CAIRO UPDATE
ROMNEY LEAK TAPES: DEEP INTERPRETATION

ROMNEY CAUGHT ON TAPE: DEEP INTERPRETATION

The reality show that is the Romney campaign hit the rocks this week.

What no one has mentioned about the video is that none of the audience even coughed. No one stirred, fidgeted, or looked around. Does that mean they agreed with him? Not necessarily, but neither did they find his remarks outlandish.

And so, in private, these thoughts can be voiced. Hell, Paul Ryan says about the same things into any public microphone he finds live.

This is the ideology, often cloaked, rarely stated, tied with a bow. I admire Romney's boldness in stating it directly. How is he not a conservative now? Those calling on him to double down are the voices he should listen to. Why not have this argument out in the open, finally? Without the code words, without the dressing and drapery.

When the many conservatives pile on Romney now, it's a damn good spectacle. But what else have they been saying all along? About the same.

I'll take that debate. Then let the vote happen. Romney did not back off. Good first step.

ROMNEY and CAIRO, UPDATE

How did I predict it? Romney backed off and basically said the same thing that the Cairo U.S. embassy said, and that Secretary Clinton said. And he basically issued a no comment on the whole story.

Of course, certain of his advisers and point people are still flapping their gums, but it's a 180, and it's obvious.

At least he did the right thing after all! Not huge praise. I still have no idea what he was thinking when he followed this dreadful advice! He should have used his brain to filter out this concept.

He's just looking way too weak, following whatever some far right person tells him to say to keep that part of the party in the bag. He's been so desperate to court and hold them, that he's backed himself to the edge of a cliff. I think he fell off this time, but that may not be true.

We'll see soon enough. Hell, I could have told him not to do it.

BOY SCOUTS COVERED UP FOR CHILD RAPISTS

Don't believe it? Read the LA Times article about the Boy Scouts's dirty doings.

In 1976, five Boy Scouts wrote detailed complaints accusing a Pennsylvania scoutmaster of two rapes and other sex crimes, according to his file. He abruptly resigned in writing, saying he had to travel more for work.

"Good luck to you in your new position," a top troop representative wrote back. He said he was accepting the resignation "with extreme regret."

Of course the lawyers fought tooth and nail to cover up the cover-up. These files apparently only cover the '70s to the early '90s.

A few months after Humphries' arrest in 1984, local Scouting official Jack Terwilliger told the Virginian-Pilot newspaper that no one at the local Scout council had had suspicions about Humphries.

But that was not true. Records in Humphries' file show that six years earlier, Terwilliger had ordered officials to interview a Scout who gave a detailed account of Humphries' repeated acts of oral sex on him.

"He then told me to do the same and I did," the 12-year-old boy said in a sworn statement in 1978.
...

Humphries continued to work with Scouts and molested at least five more boys before police, acting on a tip, stopped him in 1984. He was convicted of abusing 20 Boy Scouts, some as young as 8, and was sentenced to 151 years in prison.

Another sanctimonious "religious" organization aiding and abetting horrific crimes. Lovely. Disband the thing by court order.

ROMNEY AND CAIRO, WHAT IS HE TALKING ABOUT?

Romney's people need to exert message control. I know he's getting slammed for what he said, but it could derive from a combination of bad information and bad advice. Let's look at what happened, even though details are, ahem, sketchy.

UPDATED HERE

Okay, here's the Cairo Embassy statement:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others

This is about the notably bad video, Innocence of Muslims. It may or not be made by its poster, Sam Bacile.

The press release above is dated Tues., Sept. 11, 2012. I see no time stamp on it, so I have no idea when it was written. This becomes crucial, and I'll update when I find out, if I can, because now the Republicans are lining up behind Romney's attack on this statement. Sarah Palin, first to flap gums as always, claims it was sent while the Egyptian embassy was being stormed.

They obviously should be doing damage control, because they're all but saying this statement caused the attacks. That's a real stretch.

Here they might be seen as aligning with Koran-burning nut job Terry Jones. He seems to have been pumping this video. No one seems to know a damn thing about this video's true origins, but it got mentioned on Egyptian television after an Arab-language dubbing happened. Somehow Pastor Jones's promotion gets on government radar, as the linked article here reads:

On Wednesday, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called Mr. Jones and asked him to consider withdrawing his support for the video, a senior administration official told reporters in a conference call. Mr. Jones’ response was “non-committal,” the administration official said.

Perhaps the statement came out before the rest of it all. I don't know. If so, that's a problem for a blame-the-statement messaging, and backtracking may ensue. Whether chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff should be calling up private citizens and telling them to put a lid on it, that I have the answer to. Er, no. Love him or hate him, this nut job has every right to pull his nuttery. He can light Goodnight Moon, holy books, or a set of encyclopedias on fire in the public square, for all I care.

In Libya, while there was a protest happening in front of the embassy, rumors fly that there may have been a planned attack that used an ordinary protest as cover for the operation. I don't know. If that turns out to be true, then Romney's shot off his mouth too soon.

The White House is saying they did not clear the statement. Fine, if true, and Secretary of State Clinton has basically restated the premise: not a great idea to deliberately insult a people's religion, because we've been supposedly a tolerant nation for oh so long. Unless you happened to be a Native American, or, well, let's not bring all that up now.

So, the timing is crucial. When did the statement go out? Whether the Libyan attack was planned is also crucial, because no cause and effect can be found.

See Also: ROMNEY AND CAIRO UPDATE
ROMNEY LEAK TAPES: DEEP INTERPRETATION

A Moment of Reflection

BURGER KING DEAD!

Burger King at his coronation as the Messiah.

And I didn't even know he was married.

No more paper crowns for you plebs!