It had been about a month since I'd checked out Free Republic, and was pleased to see that the unity and morale of the freepus Erectus continues its death spiral unabated.

Today's gnashing of teeth was in response to the latest brass-balls, Bizarro-Bush statement on the economy:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush reiterated on Wednesday that his administration believed in a strong dollar, and said the currency would reflect the relative strength of the economy.

"We're strong dollar people in this administration, and have always been for a strong dollar, and believe that the relative strengths of our economy will reflect that," Bush told reporters at a news conference ahead of his trip to Japan for a meeting of the Group of Eight rich nations.

Inflation is expected to be high on the G8 agenda next week. Some countries have blamed the weak dollar in part for pushing up prices for oil and other commodities.

Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson have repeatedly expressed their belief in a strong dollar, only to see the currency fade. The euro hit a two-month high against the dollar on Wednesday.

Join me below the fold for teh comedy.

I come not to bury John McCain, but to encourage him to stay his course.

In the last 72 hours, McCain and his strategists have yet again demonstrated that they are strategically adrift, resorting to both outright lies and crypto-racist framing -- all on the single and seemingly benign topic of energy.

Associated Press - On the heels of proposing a $300 million reward to anyone who could invent a more efficient car battery for hybrid cars, John McCain has offered Democratic opponent Barack Obama a $300 million reward to endorse McCain's candidacy for president.

Excerpts from McCain's speech follow:

Prices at the pump biting you square in your rump?

Well, turn that frown upside down.  Our presnidette has a plan.

In 2000, it was prophesied:

Gov. George W. Bush of Texas said today that if he was president, he would bring down gasoline prices through sheer force of personality, by creating enough political good will with oil-producing nations that they would increase their supply of crude.

"I would work with our friends in OPEC to convince them to open up the spigot, to increase the supply," Mr. Bush, the presumptive Republican candidate for president, told reporters here today. "Use the capital that my administration will earn, with the Kuwaitis or the Saudis, and convince them to open up the spigot."

So we've got that going for us.  Which is nice.

Conservative NRO blogger Jim Geraghty asks why the apocryphal Whitey Tape bears such an astonishing resemblance to a plot point in the 2006 political thriller novel The Power Broker, by Stephen Frey:

A major plot line of the novel is the presidential campaign of Democrat Jesse Wood, aiming to be the country’s first African American president — "Wood was handsome, smart, charismatic, and being mentioned increasingly often in the press as someone who could unite a twenty-first century America growing more, not less, racially and economically divided." (p.35)

He’s a U.S. Senator from New York and former senior partner at a prestigious law firm. His backers include "some of the old Black Panthers." He wants to make Puerto Rico a state, and a recurring figure in his campaign is a controversial minister from Philadelphia called "Jefferson Roundtree."

Holy.  Shit.

Okay, pile in.

Obama supporters and Hillary supporters welcome.  What is NOT welcome is vitriol or acrimony or recrimination or bitterness of any flavor.  If you deal dirty you will be asked to leave, so the rest of us can get our love on.

I'll start, below the fold.

I see that my deceptive title has drawn you into my web.

So I must confess that Larry Johnson is, in fact, not Deep Throat.  I mean, at least as far as I know.

Actually, I take that back.  How do I know he's not Deep Throat?

Come to think of it, I don't.  Whoa.

Obama is getting hit, and hit hard, by McCain and the RNC, who have now launched an online clock counting the days since Obama has visited Iraq.

According to AP, Obama is considering a trip to Iraq in response:

Barack Obama -- increasingly under fire from John McCain as he appears poised to win the Democratic nomination -- said he is considering a trip to Iraq but dismissed as a political stunt an invitation by the Republican candidate to make the visit together.

No shit.  Just now.  On Fox News.  Hannity, Rove (& Colmes).

Hannity asked Rove why McClellan said in his book that he'd so rarely seen Rove and Scooter Libby together that the meeting was notable in itself.

Said Rove: "That just goes to show you how out of the loop he was."

From Christopher Beam over at Slate.com:

Lanny Davis, former special counsel to the Clinton White House and a high-profile fundraiser/surrogate for Hillary's campaign, circulated an e-mail a few days ago from Rear Admiral David Stone (Ret.), a Clinton supporter who has visited other veterans across the country. Stone's message includes this passage:

Of note, Senator Obama has zero—repeat zero—traction in the VFW and American Legion Halls. Veterans cite his refusal (until recently) to wear the American Flag pin, the photo where he is shown not saluting the Flag with his hand over his heart, ... his alleged MoveOn.Org relationship and that organization's innuendo (in an ad) of General Petraeus as a traitor, his relationship with Rev. Wright (who once said "God Damn America" in a sermon), Mrs. Obama's comment about only recently being proud to be an American, and Senator Obama's recent comment that some people were "bitter" about their economic situation and thus "cling" to guns and religion as a result...

John McCain, douchebag:

"Obviously, I find these remarks and others deeply offensive and indefensible, and I repudiate them. I did not know of them before Reverend Hagee's endorsement, and I feel I must reject his endorsement as well," McCain said in a statement to CNN Thursday.

He added that his relationship with Hagee did not compare with Obama's lengthy association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright. "I have said I do not believe Senator Obama shares Reverend Wright's extreme views. But let me also be clear, Reverend Hagee was not and is not my pastor or spiritual advisor, and I did not attend his church for twenty years. I have denounced statements he made immediately upon learning of them, as I do again today," said McCain.

The NYT reports today that John McCain has set up meetings with possible VP choices, and that first-term Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is among them.

This would be a smart choice for McCain.  A very smart choice.

Salon has a terrific piece today on the unholy and sub rosa alliance between John McCain and Beelzebubba Karl Rove.

It has now been more than three months since Karl Rove first appeared on television as a Fox News political analyst on Feb 5. In no fewer than 57 appearances, he has increasingly been welcomed into the Fox News fraternity, even joking that the "Hannity & Colmes" show should be renamed the "Colmes & Rove" show. After departing from a Bush administration in political tatters last August, he has reemerged to hold forth at length on the 2008 presidential race. And he may have plenty of seasoned political wisdom to offer Fox's audience. Rove, however, is playing a strategic role that he and the network refuse to reveal to viewers.

Fox News hosts routinely introduce Rove as a "former senior advisor to President Bush," "the architect," a "political wizard" and a "famed political consultant." But never has he been introduced as he should be -- as an informal advisor and maxed-out donor to John McCain's presidential campaign.

John Bolton, everybody's favorite stapler-chucking supercop, weighs in on the appeasement flap in this morning's WSJ:

On one side are those who believe that negotiations should be used to resolve international disputes 99% of the time. That is where I am, and where I think Mr. McCain is. On the other side are those like Mr. Obama, who apparently want to use negotiations 100% of the time. It is the 100%-ers who suffer from an obsession that is naïve and dangerous.

Dear jacknapes at NBC: Would it kill you to have some real live actual Democrats on Meet The Press every blue moon or so?  You know, Democrats who aren't either serial, weenified failures as "centrist" strategists (Shrum) or DINOs who regurgitate Republican talking points every time they're given an opportunity to articulate progressive ones (Ford)?

This is not the first diary about today's Post story chronicling the abject racism and hatred encountered by Obama staffers and volunteers, and I hope to God it will not be the last.

Victoria Switzer, a retired social studies teacher, was on phone-bank duty one night during the Pennsylvania primary campaign. One night was all she could take: "It wasn't pretty." She made 60 calls to prospective voters in Susquehanna County, her home county, which is 98 percent white. The responses were dispiriting. One caller, Switzer remembers, said he couldn't possibly vote for Obama and concluded: "Hang that darky from a tree!"

Nobody has ever accused me of being politically correct.

If there's a raw nerve in the room, I'm guaranteed to rub it.

Right or wrong, I can be relied upon to take the piss out of just about everything and everyone, including myself, given the opportunity.

But I want to dialogue sincerely, and perhaps even a bit seriously, about a dimension of this presidential race that I believe will require some sensitivity if we are to prevail: age.

Dear Hillary,

First of all, just let me say this has been an amazing year.  I've really enjoyed getting to know you better.  I'm sure that years from now I will look back fondly on all the good times we shared together.  The town halls, the pressers, the photo ops.  My gosh, who knew the human jaw was capable of such feats of endurance!  You're truly one of a kind, Hillary.  I mean that.  I really do.

But Hillary, that's not why I'm writing today.  I'm writing because, despite all those memories, and despite how much I sort of respect you, the truth is that...well...I'm just not that into you.