Kevin James gets beaned by a Hardball

This is another piece of footage that slipped through the cracks last week, amidst all of the appeasement coverage, when President Bush disgraced himself, America and the presidency by likening Barack Obama to Neville Chamberlain during a speech in front of the Knesset, the Israeli legislature. Chamberlain is the British prime minister who carved up Czechoslovakia for Adolf Hitler before World War II in the hopes it would satiate Hitler's lust for territory and power. Likening Obama to Chamberlain because Obama believes it's a wise course of action to at least talk to our enemies is laughable enough, but some of the dopes who attempted to join the Bush chorus on television was probably the funniest thing about the whole incident.

Anyway, the video above is probably the best single piece of footage I've seen this year, maybe even since I started this blog over two years ago - it's Chris Matthews absolutely taking apart conservative radio talking head Kevin James, who wouldn't know appeasement if it bit him in the face. By about the mid-way point of Matthews' thundering away at James, I almost started to feel sorry for the guy. Almost.

A partial transcript, courtesy of C&L:

Matthews starts out by saying:

Chris: I want to do a little history check on you—what did Neville Chamberlain do wrong in 1939? What did he do wrong?

Kevin: It all goes back to appeasement. It’s the key term.

Chris: No, what did he do, tell me what he did?

Kevin: It's the key term.

Chris: You have to answer this question. What did he do?

Kevin: It's the same thing, it puts it all…

Chris: Well tell me what he did?

Kevin: It's appeasement.

Chris: What did Chamberlain do wrong...

Kevin: His actions, his actions enabled, energized, legitimized...

Chris: What did Chamberlain do?

Kevin: It's the exact same thing.

Chris: No stop, Kevin. I'm not going to continue with this interview unless you answer what that thing is. What did Chamberlain do in '39, tell me? '38?

Kevin: Chris, it's the exact same thing alright?

Chris: What did he do? [yelling] What did he do![/yelling]

Matthews just took him apart. I loved how Chris ends the interview, too: "Don't use the term appeasement if you don't know what it means."

Ouch!

I also thoroughly enjoyed Matthews' reference to the fact that Dana Perino, President Bush's press secretary, didn't know what the Cuban Missile Crisis was, and admitted as much, during an appearance on NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! program a few months ago. Wow - if I'm the press secretary in the White House (Heaven forbid) and I didn't know what the Cuban Missile Crisis was, I certainly wouldn't admit it.

Chalk up Kevin Jones (and Perino, for that matter) as two more conservatives who don't know what the hell they're talking about. And I have to confess, it's pretty fun pointing it out.

Some on the right accuse "libruls" of being "elitist" and "arrogant" when pointing these things out. Quite the contrary, but when you use these terms or claim to be some sort of expert, you really should know historical references before you start throwing them around to back up a president who doesn't know what the hell he's talking about, either.

For the record, I know who Neville Chamberlain is - he's the NBA player who once scored 100 points in a game, right? Just kidding.

A little more on Bush's "Democrat" slur

As most of you know, I'm a big fan of Podcasts. As long as I've owned an iPod, I was a bit late coming to the Podcasting game, but last year I discovered them in a big way.

One Podcast I never miss is It's All Politics, a Podcast hosted by Ken Rudin and Ron Elving - two political commentators for National Public Radio. Their 10-12 minute take on the big issues in Washington is essential listening.

Last week, the duo spent a few minutes going over the history of Republicans using "Democrat" to describe the Democratic Party.

I have to confess, and I really should just let it die, but I got irked all over again. Of course, Bush has begged off inquiries on multiple occasions since this utterance during his State of the Union Speech three weeks ago: "And I congratulate the Democrat majority."

Elving and Rudin then played a clip of Bush brushing it off, saying it was an "oversight" and that he "didn't even realize he said it," accompanied by his characteristic snide sneer.

President Bush has tried to shovel some pretty nasty fecal matter into the mouths of Americans since he was appointed president in the fall of 2000, but this is one of his biggest. Bush has turned blowing smoke into an art form.

As Rudin and Elving rightfully pointed out, this slur has a long history in the Republican Party, going back to at least to the era of Joe McCarthy, who flat out refused to refer to the Democratic Party as Democratic.

Newt Gingrich, the former Speaker of the House, used to coach Republicans to refer to Democrats this way, to intentionally rile them up. And this slur has Republican pollster Frank Luntz's fingerprints all over it, too.

The bottom line is that the line was intentional, and it underscores the pettiness of our frat boy president. Notice I didn't say fraternity boy president, but really, it wasn't intentional. I didn't even know I wrote it.

iPod turns 5; and a must-hear podcast

Tomorrow, October 23, marks the 5th birthday of one of the most influential gadgets of our time: the iPod. I've owned every generation of iPod since they were first introduced. I bought my first one about a year after they were introduced, and it's been a four-year love affair since. And, like my marriage, I can say with confidence that it's definitely going to last.

Thinking about the iPod's birthday today, I was looking at pictures of my first one (above), and it looks primitive when compared to today's version (below), currently in its fifth generation, and counting.

The iPod has transformed how I listen to my music, how I'm entertained, and how I get my news, too. Lately, with my long commute to Kutztown to work, I've taken up audio books, and they are fantastic. Gone are the days of carrying around thick, heavy books of CDs; it's all in this sleek little box. I take mine with me everywhere - exercising, in the car (I have a docking cradle which transmits what I listen to over the radio - suweet!), to work, everywhere.

Cooler yet is the Podcast - mini audio programs that you can download from iTunes and thousands of other Websites that you can listen to on the go. The latest version of iPod also plays video, so now you can download TV shows and recently Apple announced movies are being rolled out. There's no end in sight to iPod's dominance of the mp3 player medium - here's hoping that the company doesn't get complacent. So far, it hasn't rested on the success of iPods; with the recent announcement that movies will be available for download from its online music store, iPod announced players with bigger hard drives and competitive prices.

Microsoft won the OS war, but Windows was never this cool.

Of course, there are cynics abound who are predicting Apple's iPod will just be a passing fad. Perhaps, but I doubt it. To date, there have been 60 million iPods sold, and 40 million have been bought in the past year. Of course Apple won't keep up that pace of sales growth - eventually, it will probably reach cell phone status, where most people who have one will have one, as an article I read tonight reasons.

But, I doubt there will be a dramatic fall-off. Apple usually finds a way. Here's betting Apple co-founder and CEO Steven Jobs will keep us iPod-ified for years to come. I know I'm a user and fan for the foreseeable future.
Speaking of the iPod, my latest craze associated with it is the podcast. As long as I've owned an iPod, I just never really got into them, until this summer. I'm now addicted. In fact, I have so many podcasts on my player that I'm constantly behind on listening to them all; "podcast guilt," as a former professor of mine labeled it to me a few weeks ago, much to my amusement.

One particular podcast is worth mentioning here - I never miss listening every week. It's one of the most moving series I've heard in a long time. It's called My Cancer, by NPR journalist journalist Leroy Sievers (left).

It's moving, amazing, gut wrenching and heartbreaking. And that was all in the first month I listened to it. It comes out every Thursday or Friday, and every Friday, when I sync my iPod to my computer and update my podcasts, I always wonder, and yes, I'm afraid that Leroy will be gone, and I won't get to hear his podcasts any longer. That's selfish, I know, but the reason I don't want him to die is because he's so inspirational and he sets a good example while facing his own death.

If you are an iPod aficionado, I urge you to listen to Sievers' My Cancer - it will help you appreciate how courageous people who suffer from cancer are, and most of all, it will help you appreciate your own life and how lucky we all are to have our health and to have people who love us.

Thanks for showing us the way, Leroy, and I hope you get well and beat this thing.