Promoted by Steven D
From my pal Tim:
I don’t know if you knew or remember this guy, but Jay M., Mark M’s little brother (both of whom worked at Christie’s for a while with Joe Kelly, Bobby Cocktails, etc.), is dead.
He was a smart, loveable fuck-up a couple of years younger than us who lived for years in Newport (they grew up in Fall River) who had some issues with drugs (who fucking didn’t?) and got into some trouble, but later woke up, grew up, and as part of his efforts to turn his life around and get on the straight-and-narrow, joined the US Marines. He ended up being shipped off to Iraq. He was living somewhere down south and had been back from a recent tour of duty (probably more than one, given the way the regime ruining/running the country has been abusing its American service people) and apparently had been suffering severe PTSD. A few weeks ago, he took his own life by throwing himself in front of an eighteen-wheeler on a highway. It had to be PTSD, because that guy, even in the depths of his drug problems, loved life and was too fucking cerebral to remotely fit any profile of a suicide case. Pauly told me a couple of weeks ago that he’d heard a rumor about it, but at the Fu Manchu show, Joe Kelly confirmed it. Joe, his wife, and Mike Livingston were up in Cambridge for the show, and he filled me in at the merch table. Joe still hangs out with Mark (“I’ve been making a point of spending as much time as I can these days,” he said), so he had, sadly, the best access to the truth.
It’s fucking awful, and as I said to Joe, it’s not Jay’s fault and it’s just the tip of the fucking iceberg. I am not religious but at times like this I really hope there is a just god and a place more horrible than any existing human conception of eternal hell for the criminal warlords like Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, etc. to burn and suffer for the countless worthwhile lives like Jay’s that they have and will continue to ruin. What a sad, sickening mess. Words fail to capture it.
I called up Clinton’s campaign in Pennsylvania and read them this email. They told me they were sorry for my loss, urged me to have a wonderful day, and hung up the phone quickly. Arlen Specter’s office put me on hold, and never returned to the phone.
Why should they care? It’s not their kid. It’s not their friends…
..and it’s not their major campaign contributors…
Those that ‘will do anything to win’ will never understand that war is always about those that we love, not geography.
I agree with every word of this.
BUT. If November rolls around and God forbid Clinton is our nominee, we will have a choice. And, as bad as her foreign policy is… as compromised as she is by the Mark Penns of the world… there will be more Jay M.s if John McCain becomes President than if Hillary Clinton does.
I might not say that if the Republican candidate were different. Clinton will be far too ready to use force, and far too unready to leave Iraq. But McCain will be far worse: he is the most militaristic candidate in our lifetimes. God help us when that damned phone rings at 3 p.m. and he is the one answering it.
In the meantime, rereading this post, I think it’s time for me to send some money Obama’s way.
You may be right about McCain’s militarism, but at least he knows what war really means, and to my eyes has conducted his life with a fraction of the political calculation of the Clintons.
He might not be shy about a military solution, but he’s more likely to do it right and less likely to do it based on what the poll numbers are telling him (as Hillary’s war vote was).
Remember, while McCain supported the war he also called from the beginning for a much larger force to “secure the peace”
And also remember it was Bill Clinton who was getting blown while deliberating on the phone about deploying troops to Bosnia.
Who do you really fear?
My greater worry with McCain is he will forget who we are supposed to be fighting.
Check this out, on McCain, from the Financial Times…
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1a47e1ac-f9b0-11dc-9b7c-000077b07658.html?nclick_check=1
Thank you for taking the time to call them in your friend’s behalf, although it’s too late for him. But not for others.
I just can’t stand these “kill the kittens” post. Basically this says if my candidate doesn’t win, I will kill the kittens. I don’t think I can add anything to Wolcott.
Except this, these kinds of posts will make it very difficult to reunite the party in the event that Obama is nominated.
The Pond too casually disregards the real possibility that women will walk, but it could very well happen, especially if Obama wins and picks a radioactive VP nominee. If you want Obama to win keep going after Clinton on why she is wrong and not the best candidate and why Obama is better. But announcing you won’t vote for Clinton only gives her supporters permission to walk in November. This is a very bad game to play.
This election is not about you, it is about whether we go to war with Iran and whether things get much worse. There are worse things than a Clinton presidency.
A very wise reminder.
“The pond too casually disregards the real possibility that women will walk …”
What? You mean you might “kill the kittens” too?
If you “kill the kittens”” because somebody else wanted to “kill the kittens”, then you are no better than they are & you have no right to condemn.
While there may be worse things than a Clinton presidency there are better things too. That is what we are all looking for.
I, for one, am not looking to defeat “really good”, & to settle for “bad”, in order to avoid “worse”.
Hillary started her political career as a Republican in college & she remains one under the skin. The hate, revenge & essential misanthropy that taints Hillary & her camp can’t help but leak thru & that is why I don’t support her.
Hi all. While I haven’t talked to Brendan directly since he wrote this, I suspect he’s refering to his vote in the PA primary. (he’d been undecided and considering not voting in the primary)
I doubt Brendan would opt to vote for McCain or any alternate candidate rather than the democratic nominee…
You may not vote for Clinton, but if she doesn’t get the nomination, a whole lot of her backers, myself included, will throw a monkey wrench into Obama, and will under NO circumstances vote for him.
… Uh… So let me get this straight.
You’re saying that, if Obama wins, you’ll do your best to sabotage him, because… He’s run an unrelentingly and unceasingly positive campaign, talking about hope and change and fixing this country’s massive problems. And this is completely reasonable.
But the people who don’t want to vote for the woman who’s still in favour of the war in Iraq, who’s descended to GOP-like lows of slime and dishonesty, who supports “a law guaranteeing “religious freedom” in the workplace, such as for pharmacists who refuse to fill birth control prescriptions and police officers who refuse to guard abortion clinics” are just screaming at each other and completely uninterested in solving this country’s problems?
Riiiiiiight. Pull the other one, it has got bells on. The two candidates are not equal, are not interchangeable, and are not in the same situation. It’s not a horse race. Obama’s won. All Clinton’s trying to do is destroy his chances in the general election so she can run against McCain in 2012.
Obama is as phony as a 4 dollar bill. He speaks in platitudes, and has no real plan for anything. He says he will get us out of Iraq, but according to him, the earliest he will do this is the year 2012. A LOT of Hillary supporters will not support Obama simply because they do not think he is presidential material.
And before you, or anyone else tell me I’m full of sour grapes, just remember, a lot of Obama supporters will not vote for Hillary if she should somehow get the nomination. So what ever happens, there are going to be a lot of upset Democrats that will not be so easily swayed to get behind the eventual nominee. I am one pissed off Hillary supporter, who will be even more pissed off if Obama is the nominee. Either we will vote Mc.Cain, Nader, or we will stay home. Can Obama win if a full 20% of Democrats, according to a pew poll, vote against him?? Nope!!!! Call it sabotage if you want, but that’s the way it is.
A lot of Obama supporters are independents or first-time voters. My guess is that most Dems who support him will vote party line if Clinton were to somehow get the nomination – but to expect the same of independents or first-time voters is just illogical. Other than Limbaugh fans, isn’t Clinton’s base all solid Dems?
Shut up and go away. I remember your blind support for Joe Lieberman after he left the Democratic Party a couple years back.
Your opinion is as worthless now as it was back then.
You mean Sen. Joe Lieberman, the INDEPENDENT who now supports Mc.Cain. That Joe Lieberman!!!!
By the way, where’s Neddie these days???
Ned’s supporting Obama. He co-chaired his campaign in CT, which, if you didn’t pay attention, was won virtually the same way that Lamont beat Lieberman in the primary.
Also, your fuckwitted idol from the Nutmeg State is going to be utterly useless once the Democrats pick up one more seat in the fall – which, if Obama is the nominee, is a sure thing to happen.
It’s funny because the Republicans in the senate could be so decimated that they will have trouble staffing the committees. Lieberman will probably caucus with them just to have an iota of relevancy, but they won’t be making him the ranking member of anything except inconsequential subcommittees.
His only hope is that McCain wins the presidency and gives him a job.
Who are referring to? I was never keen on Sen. Liberman.
eastcoastmoderate, I believe – not you.
Just remember – according to Dick Cheney, these people VOLUNTEERED!
They volunteered to die, they volunteered to lose a limb or two or three, they volunteered to have their faces burned off & to enter into a spiral of horror that culminates in their own suicide.
If they volunteered, they must be responsible for whatever they suffered & it’s nobody’s damn fault but their own.
Certainly not Dick Cheney’s.
Certainly not George Bush’s.
And even Hillary Clinton seems to think it’s not HER fault.
“Time to kill our children, … and sing about it.” – Michael Timmins
Hey Brendan,
Long time no see, but fuck man…
Just to play a little Devil’s Advocate, did you call up Obama’s offices in Center City or Chinatown and read them the story? Let’s thrown in that fuck up Casey too.
Yo Arthur!
I havne’t called Obama’s campaign but will do so. As for casey, he didn’t have anything to do with voting for the war and has been good on FISA, so I’m reluctant to give him hell he doesn’t deserve.
Still, perhaps I’ll call up and give him a reading too. keep him honest and all that.