Hopalong Hillary: Packin' the Heat

The revelation that Hillary Rodham Clinton learned to hunt at the knee of her Granddaddy is not only one of her many warm and treasured memories of deadly weaponry, but overly modest by half. As many know, Senator Clinton reluctantly admitted to her early firearms training after her Democratic opponent, Barack Obama’s snarky comments about guns and the fine people who own and shoot them.

While Ms. Clinton recounted how much she delighted in turning bunnies and ducks and all God’s creatures great and small into pulverized blobs of blood, fur, and feathers, the Presidential nominee humbly neglected to acknowledge her many other contributions to the art and science of gunplay.

For instance, as a child of three, young Hillary drew up plans for what would later become the modern day Gattling gun, the machine gun used in most current US attack aircraft.

“Make the spinning barrels go round n’ round” she told then Air Force Chief of Staff Curtis LeMay, inspiring the general to adapt the weapon, first used in the Civil War, to modern day aviation. Today the seven barrel 30mm GAU-8/A Gatling gun can fire 3,900 rounds a minute and is effectively used in A-10 Warthog tank killers.

There are more NRA Hall of Fame achievements Ms. Clinton has modestly advoided admitting to until recently. For instance, Clinton still holds the Pennsylvania state record for largest bear ever bagged, a 7 foot 3 inch, 1162-pound Grizzly she brought down at age six with a single shot from her Lady Derringer. And while the animal was not shot during hunting season, the record is still considered official as Ms. Clinton plinked the varmit as it menaced a schoolyard filled with tasty third graders.

At age 20, between semesters at Wellesley College, Ms. Clinton appeared on Broadway in the title role in “Annie Get Your Gun,” winning a Tony for her performance.

At age 23, while on tour with the late singer Johnny Cash, she shot a man in Reno just to watch him die. Charges were later dropped.

When her husband, Bill, failed to join the military during the Vietnam era, Ms. Clinton helped him compensate by teaching him the military ditty, “This is my rifle, this is my gun, this is for shooting, this is for fun.” (A decision she admits regretting with all her heart and soul.)

Few of these accomplishments were known publicly until Senator Obama--who has repeatedly stated that cancelling the Second Amendment is his first priority upon assuming office--made his recent gun gaffe.

In one instance, National Security prevented Ms. Clinton from not lying. She said she “had to bite my lip” during the recent confusion over her “arrival under fire” in Bosnia. Both her and former President Clinton’s “explanations” were created from whole cloth because the truth was "highly classified" until now.

The night before her “official” arrival, Ms. Clinton infiltrated the area with an Army Sniper team, and spent the ensuing 24 hours clearing the area of enemy sharpshooters. Ms. Clinton single-handedly bagged 37 enemy gunmen and gunwomen, using only 36 rounds. Highlight of the operation, Miss Clinton stated in the afteraction report, was nailing a husband and wife sniper team with a single bullet. This was the very team tasked with killing the adorable child scheduled to give Hillary the flowers.

Also, Hillary invented dum-dum bullets.

Hussein Name Game

I got a call from my Uncle Morty yesterday. (Morty wants you to know that's NOT his real name, and that he's imaginary.)

“Have any of you Media geniuses realized the real reason why his opening act shouldn't have played the Hussein Name Game at the McCain rally?”

“You talking about Mr. Red Meat, the radio assclown who kept trying to associate Barrack Obama with a certain deceased dictator?” I asked.

“Yeah. Why should McCain have stopped the guy before he did that to an honorable opponent?”

“Because it was a dirty, underhanded, sleazy political trick,” I said.

“No, I'm serious,” Morty said.

“I give up, why?”

“Because of the radio guy's name,” Morty said.

“I don't get it.”

“See, McCain is a Capitol Hill politician and a war-hero former Navy pilot with a whiff of political scandal in his past. He's famous for spending time in involuntary confinement. And the guy who introduced him is named Cunningham,” Morty said.

“So what?”

“So, connect the dots. 'Capitol Hill. War-hero. Former Navy pilot. Political corruption. Incarceration. Cunningham.' Name associate and you get another war-hero former Navy pilot, known for political corruption and he's famous for spending time in involuntary confinement. HIS name is Cunningham, too. Duke Cunningham.”

“But Duke Cunningham's sins have nothing to do with John McCain.”

“And Saddam Hussein's sins have nothing to do with Barrack Obama.”

“Good point. Anything else?”

“Yeah. Why does Hillary think the Media wants Obama to defeat her?” Morty continued. “Doesn't she know they know she's a package deal with Bill? And doesn't she know they remember her husband and how covering him put a lot of Media kids through college?

"And what about the funny guys? Why on God's Earth would Dave, Jon, Keith, Conan, or Jay want a President Obama? A smart, scandal-free, anti-war President who speaks English is the last thing they need. Bill Clinton's chilliwacker and George Bush's tongue have been comedy gold for years. Obama would be comedy dross.”

Uncle Morty was dropped on his head once as a child, and several times again as an adult.

“A final question,” Morty continued. “Twenty debates and the last one got the highest rating ever. So will they renew the series?”

They'd love to. Morty makes a good point. If the all-news networks could, they'd want them to run indefinitely. Tim Russert and Wolf Blitzer have become the political Simon Cowell and Paula Abdul and “American Idol” has become the template for the candidate's debates. Seriously, laugh about it, shout about it--when you've got to choose, every way you look at this you lose.

“You're darn tootin', Mrs. Robinson,” Morty said and hung up.

I gotta put him on my Do Not Call list.

Have Another Boozeberger, Ralph

Let's say for a moment Ralph Nader is a lush. I mean that metaphorically. As far as I can tell Nader has never tasted liquor, and as far as I can tell there are few people in public life who could use a drink more. But if Nader is a Metaphorical lush (Booze for Fame, get it?), then “Meet the Press” host Tim Russert was his enabler, Sunday. The Metaphorical case of scotch was the national platform Russert turned over to Ralph.

Russert helped resurrect the political career of a man who is at least peripherally responsible for the last seven years of National Misery. Lest we forget, had Nader not siphoned off the naiveté vote in Florida, the pivotal state in the 2000 election wouldn't have been close enough to steal-hanging chads be damned. Al Gore would never have done his Slide Show, the publisher of the “Bushisms” would be out some serious cash, and -who knows-perhaps half the country wouldn't hate the other half so much.

Nader made news Sunday, of course. Ralph announced he was running for President. Three thoughts. (1) Shocker. (2) Nader has as good a chance of getting elected as Harold Stassen does-and Stassen is dead. (2) You KNOW Russert knew in advance Ralph was there to announce. Otherwise, my sources say, Russert would have booked Brittney to announce she was going back into rehab.

Nader's combination of Ego and pragmatism is understandable. He runs for President again to reestablish his faded presence on the national stage. Fortunately for Megalomaniac enablers, this need plays right into their wheelhouse. Russert gets the pub for his Sweeps guest; Ralph gets a boost with voters anxious to waste their ballots. Win-win and sexier than-I dunno-booking guests who might discuss the real issues facing the country.

The (redundancy alert) Paranoid Far Left might also see a deeper conspiracy--the move as part of the McCain-loving MSM's desire to elect as president one of the few politicians who pretends he likes them, really likes them, just for themselves. Why, if John McCain becomes President, I'm sure he'll have us all over for a beer.

Never has the need for self-aggrandizement by the Ego needy been better positioned than in this day and age. Jokemeister turned Kingmaker Jay Leno launched Arnold Schwarzenegger's political campaign, and even Jon Stewart, Steven Colbert and Conan O'Brien “fought” over who helped bring Mike Huckabee out of obscurity.

Bored over the early Presidential campaign, some Media luminaries promoted Fred Dalton Thompson from the workaday TV character actor he was (and may again be) to “movie star Fred Thompson,” some even comparing his career with Ronald Reagan. Critics know Fred Thompson is a better political campaigner than an actor.

Last week we saw other examples how Splashmakers and their enablers operate. When Bill O'Reilly cranks up his (obviousness alert) Outrageous Stupidity Factor to Eleven, his Sworn Enemy, Keith Olbermann, tweaks O'Reilly by naming him the Worst Person in the World.

Last week O'Reilly suggested the possibility of lynching the African-American potential future First lady of the United States, and Olbermann righteously pointed out that--at the very least--O'Reilly should be suspended by Fox. True, but Keith is too smart to think that would ever happen.

So the Media Mandela goes on. O'Reilly rages, Keith rails-and both look good to their base.

But worse yet? When “The New York Times” ran its innuendo fest about John McCain, the biggest question on the Media's mind wasn't merely “What the Hell Were They Thinking?" or "What else have they got?" No, Media just had to know how the most Bloviated Bag of Wind in the land would react--in other words, what would (Oxymoron alert) Limbaugh Think?

So America's news junkies were treated to undercover quality video snippets of Rush doing his radio thing, telling the Dittoheads around the country how they should behave.

I could go on with other examples, but my goal here was to write about Media Megalomania without mentioning Chris Mathews.