Inside the beltway and in his native Georgia, that crusty old fucker, Zell Miller, is known as "Zig Zag" Zell, master of the flip flop, because he has been known to switch his entire political repertoire on a cat's fart. And, apropos of nothing, why is it that Southerners have those strange, alien-sounding names. I mean, they're always complaining about the "Lashawnda's," and the "Fallopia's" of the African-American community (okay, I have to agree, Fallopia is not entirely an appropriate baby name), but who in their right minds sees a cherubic lump of little baby and says to himself/herself -- "this sour milk scented bundle of sweetness and joy needs to be named Zell," or, for that matter, "Lauch". And what not.
Anyhoo: imagine my surprise when, last night, stumbling and drunken from my evening making Cutty Sark's disappear at Dave's Tavern in Hells Kitchen, after being diverted from my usual path home by burly cops and their hugely inconvenient "metal barricades," I found myself, mirabile dictu, surrounded by jovial protesters, in Herald Square at, like, 1AM in the morning, looking on at MSNBC's Hardball roundup summing the nights RNC speeches. Like a moth drawn to media. I felt like Giton, lost, at the beginning of Petronius' Satyricon.
CoomandPost.org has the transcript of said interesting and heated exchange between Hardball's pseudoblonde tough guy, Chris Matthews, and The Man Known as The Zell:
"Zell MILLER: ... Well, I didn?t make speeches about them and I didn?t put them in my platform.
Right here is what John Kerry put out as far as his U.S. Senate platform, was, he was talking about he wanted to cancel the M.X. missile, the B-1 bomber, the anti-satellite system. This is not voting for something that was in a big bill.
(CROSSTALK)
"MATTHEWS: Which of those systems was effective in either Afghanistan or Iraq? The M.X. certainly wasn?t, thank God, nor was the other
(CROSSTALK)
"MILLER: Look, this is front and?wait, this is front and back, and it?s two pages. I have got more documentation here than they have got in the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress."
(Ed Note: This is typical "tough guy" posturing. Note how he throws in a little New York cultural relic, perhaps to get the hometown crowd on his side.)
"MATTHEWS: OK.
("Ed Note: OK is about the only way to respond with "the quickness" to this type of blather)
"MILLER: I knew you was going to be coming with all of that stuff.
"And I knew that these people from the Kerry campaign would be coming with all this kind of stuff.
"That?s just baloney. Look at the record. A man?s record is what he is."
"MATTHEWS: I agree."
(Ed Note: You can tell Matthews is trying to soothe the savage beast with baby talk)
(CROSSTALK)
"MILLER: A man?s campaign rhetoric?what?
"MATTHEWS: I?m just asking you, Senator, do you mean to say?I know there?s rhetoric in campaigns. I just want to know, do you mean to say that you really believe that John Kerry and Ted Kennedy do not believe in defending the country?
"MILLER: Well, look at their votes."
(Ed Note: Ah, yes, the Ted Kennedy Defend America With Spitballs Omnibus Bill)
"MATTHEWS: I?m just asking you to bottom-line it for me.
"MILLER: Wait a minute. I said I didn?t question their patriotism.
"MATTHEWS: No. Do you believe that they don?t believe in defending the country?
"MILLER: I question their judgment.
"What?"
(Ed Note: Is it just me or does Zell Miller remind you of Lil Jon)
"MATTHEWS: Do you believe they want to defend the country?
"MILLER: Look, I applaud what John Kerry did as far as volunteering to go to Vietnam. I applaud what he did when he volunteered for combat. I admire that, and I respect that. And I acknowledge that. I have said that many, many times.
"MATTHEWS: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
"MILLER: But I think his record is atrocious.
"MATTHEWS: Well, let me ask you, when Democrats come out, as they often do, liberal Democrats, and attack conservatives, and say they want to starve little kids, they want to get rid of education, they want to kill the old people?
"MILLER: I am not saying that. Wait a minute.
"MATTHEWS: That kind of rhetoric is not educational, is it?
"MILLER: Wait a minute.
"Now, this is your program. And I am a guest on your program.
"MATTHEWS: Yes, sir.
"MILLER: And so I want to try to be as nice as I possibly can to you. I wish I was over there, where I could get a little closer up into your face.
(LAUGHTER) "
What the fuck?!
1 comment:
I was in the crowd when Zell said that. People were going crazy. It was a wild scene at the Hardball taping. Chris Matthews looked like he was a kid that got locked in the ice cream parlor.
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