slapdown

Well, looks like there's another party out there Ralph Nader is too good for.

Ralph Nader, whose 2000 campaign many Democrats believe cost former vice president Al Gore the presidency, has decided not to run for president next year as the candidate of the Green Party but is still contemplating a presidential race as an independent, a Nader associate said yesterday.

Ross Mirkarimi, who ran Nader's presidential campaign in California, said Nader recently called him to announce his intentions and is in the process of informing national Green Party officials that he will not be their standard-bearer in 2004.

"My understanding is that, if Nader runs, he does not want to run a mediocre campaign, and he is trying to assess the political and resource variables on how he would run the most serious campaign possible to unseat George Bush," Mirkarimi said...

Because, of course, the Green Party would not be the most serious group trying to defeat George Bush. That would be Ralph, who believes that Bush will best be defeated by cannibalizing the Green Party to run his own third party campaign for president.

Of course, he has a head start in name recognition because of all those Greens who went way, way out on a limb and supported his last race. Been defending him ever since, they have, and he hasn't made it easy for them.

They're not, I guess, serious enough people.

Kind of dazzling, isn't it?

shorter David Brooks

If the Democrats were serious about winning next year's election, they'd be push polling about Howard Dean's illegitimate mixed-race children and his wife's drug problems. Go Lieberman.

you can tell when it hits because you start to see shit emanating from the penumbra

Rush Limbaugh has made a major advance in his understanding of constitutional law.

Rush then:

So many people think the Constitution has in it a specific right to privacy and it doesn't...There have to be limits and the right to privacy, simply does not say or does not guarantee that there are no limits on what you can do.

The so-called "right to privacy" wasn't established until the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut birth control case. A ruling on this law under the privacy statute could push us down one of those "slippery slopes" liberals always talk about for behavior that people of all races, sexes and creeds agree is damaging to society.

Rush now:

The headline of our statement - it's not really a press release; we just issued a statement in response - "My Lawyers to File for Stay, Appeal Judge's Ruling Denying Motion to Quash Search Warrant on Seizure of Medical Records." Here's the statement. Now, this is odd for me because it's got my name in it and I don't like reading about myself, but there's some quotes in here. So even though I never talk in this third-person business, please permit me in this case because it's a written statement that I'm going to read.

"Judge Jeffrey Winikoff today denied a request by Rush Limbaugh's attorneys (my attorneys) to quash the search warrants issued for the seizure of my confidential medical records. Roy Black, my attorney, said, quote, "We respectfully disagree with the court's decision and will be filing an appeal today. These records will show that there was no doctor shopping. But the larger issue is that the seizure of Mr. Limbaugh's private medical records without going through the process outlined by the state legislature is clearly an invasion of Mr. Limbaugh's constitutional right to privacy. Mr. Limbaugh was not Dr. Shopping.

"He should not have to sacrifice his privacy to prove his innocence. The burden is on the prosecutor's office, not only to prove otherwise, but also to go through the appropriate legal process that protects an individual's right to privacy. We are confident we will prevail on appeal," said Roy Black.

Justices Scalia, Thomas and Bork could not be reached for comment.

briefly noted

more Katie Roiphe - and don't even _talk_ to me about that bitch Zelda...

( &c. )