Sizemore a loser - again

Dan Petegorsky

Talking Points Memo's Second Annual Golden Duke Awards were announced yesterday, and, sad to say, Bill Sizemore was a loser. He had been nominated in the Best Scandal in a Local Venue category, but lost to former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. So it goes...though I'm sure Bill still has it in him to mount another quest for the 'honor' next time around.

You can see all the nominees here.

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    They sure follow the same script. You could interchange Cindy Sizemore and Kilpatrick's father's ("Killer") statements.

    At a May 2005 campaign rally, Kilpatrick's father, Bernard "Killer" Kilpatrick, made controversial statements equating recent media reports about his son to Nazi propaganda that led to the death of 6 million Jews in Europe. He later apologized.

    Only she won't apologize. They're just greedy. None of the rush of blood to the head that seems to be typical of the Kilpatricks. On the 2008, rich and poor topic I just made a point about character skipping a generation. Here's a good example. His mother is a great member of Congress.

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    It's always nice just to be nominated. Sizemore might have won in a year Kwame Kilpatrick wasn't in contention. Dang it!

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    Sizemore was gypped. He definitely deserved to win.

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    Apparently I used a label whose etymology (unbeknown to me) is a racial slur. So if you were offended--sorry. No malice on my part.

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    On topic, I don't understand why Steven Lipski came so close and got so much more attention than Sizemore. Peeing from a balcony drunk on a bunch of people dancing to a Grateful Dead tribute band could have happened to lots of us last night! Don't see how it could be too much personal embarrassment for him, as the last Jersey City mayor was photographed passed out without any pants on just before he was elected. Sizemore's way better than that.

    Off topic, I got bit by "Snake Oil" the other day, apparently a derivation of "Seneca Oil". I guess the Senecas put the accent on the second syllable.

    If we're going to attribute guilt, apart from awareness, based on the etymology, there's thousands of common words that derive from outdated and offensive ways of thinking. Snake Oil is a good one. Who knew that the patent medicine guys were getting it from the Indians? It's a slur against patent medicine salesmen, no? If someone's offended it starts a conversation and you learn something and don't do it again; what's wrong with that?

    You do have to love a blog that's cool with Saxby Chamblis being a "douchebag", but has issues with "gypped". Personally, I would have called him "scumbag", but that's me. (How did Elizabeth Dole so outdistance him in the Golden Duke over the top political ad. category?!?)

  • mp97303 (unverified)
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    There is such a thing a winning with class.... you beat him, why do you insist on kicking him when he is down. He is irrelevant, let it go. Keep it up and you will become the very people you dislike.

  • DanOregon (unverified)
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    Sex and hypocrisy will trump mere thuggish behavior every time.

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    He is irrelevant

    Is that a promise? You're right. Kicking when he's down is classless a sign of fear. I'll plead guilty. I'm afraid he isn't done. If you stick a fork in him and call dinner, I'll lay off. And his wife isn't going to try to keep the gravy train rolling?

    Maybe it's age. You know after that tremendous victory for the public good that was Nixon's resignation, fighting a war over mineral rights for 5 years, designed by Nixon's staffers, instigated by the son of his favorite strategist, tends to make one very skeptical about when it's safe to stop kicking. Sure it could be seen as classy for Ford to pardon him, so that the nation could begin healing, well, if he had bothered to pull the knife out of our back.

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    You do have to love a blog that's cool with Saxby Chamblis being a "douchebag", but has issues with "gypped".

    I'm cool with "douchebag" because that's an appropriate sum total of the actions of Chambliss, in my opinion. And it was funny. :)

    It's not "the blog" that's cool or not cool with the usage. It's my editorial decision and my apology for the use of a word whose context I didn't understand when I used it.

    Or I suppose I could down a rabbit path of Nixonian proportions in an effort to justify the continual beating on Sizemore.

    Different strokes, eh?

  • Roy McAvoy (unverified)
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    Just for info.. Anglo-Romany Gypsies and Irish Travellers are recognized as ethnic minority groups under the Race Relations Act (1976). "douche-bags" are not a protected group, as far as I know.

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    Posted by: Roy McAvoy | Jan 2, 2009 7:48:08 AM

    Just for info.. Anglo-Romany Gypsies and Irish Travellers are recognized as ethnic minority groups under the Race Relations Act (1976). "douche-bags" are not a protected group, as far as I know.

    Can't say "I don't give a tinker's damn" then, because it's a reference to Irish Travelers. Damn. And that was going to be my comment. Anyway, my metaphor was with the Senecas who are included in the act. "Douchebag" was about editorial policy.

    It's not "the blog" that's cool or not cool with the usage. It's my editorial decision

    Maybe Carla still thinks like a newbie from another blog, but "the blog" definitely comprises her, imo, What else could it refer to, the servers? Yes, I understand that you are factually correct, but I'm referring to what Maurice Merleau-Ponty would call the "lived body" of the blog.

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    Maybe Carla still thinks like a newbie from another blog, but "the blog" definitely comprises her, imo, What else could it refer to, the servers? Yes, I understand that you are factually correct, but I'm referring to what Maurice Merleau-Ponty would call the "lived body" of the blog.

    No. I'm not "the blog". I'm Carla. I am one of a number of voices here. And the choices for what and how I write are mine.

    I suspect my lack of subscription to the tenets of mid-20th French existentialist philosophy may be annoying to some. But its just the price I'm willing to pay for individualism.

    However, it is fascinating to see that this post went from Bill Sizemore all the way to an esoteric reference on an obscure philosopher.

    What I really want to know is if Merleau-Ponty would have given a rat's ass about the usage of "douchebag". That'd be the real news of the day.

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    However, it is fascinating to see that this post went from Bill Sizemore all the way to an esoteric reference on an obscure philosopher.

    Let's look on the bright side, Carla: maybe this is, as someone I don't usually agree with, Peter Beinart, suggests, another sign that the anti-intellectualism of the Bush era is over. According to Beinart, Bush "said he knew he was going to win when he read a New Yorker profile in which Al Gore cited the philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty."

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    Bush "said he knew he was going to win when he read a New Yorker profile in which Al Gore cited the philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty."

    I wish I had seen that; would never have made the comment. That's weird. Can't imagine Gore's motive for reading him... And you're saying W repeated it correctly? So, he was saying, "no one will possibly take seriously the political thoughts of someone that makes references like that"? Hmmm......where have I heard that one before?

  • Zarathustra (unverified)
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    What I really want to know is if Merleau-Ponty would have given a rat's ass about the usage of "douchebag". That'd be the real news of the day.

    OK. one "t". Have to respect Chief Casey Ratt of the Algonquin Nation.

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