I didn't know what I was getting myself into when I decided to chronicle the myriad ways in which Virgil Goode (has there ever been given a more egregiously appropriate misnomer?) fucks up. It's not just a matter of the sheer volume (overwhelming would be the generous - to V.G. - description)... No... It's the emotional toll involved. One can only take so much before beginning to lose faith in the process...
How does this guy get elected? Who votes for him?
It's been about two weeks since my last substantive post on March 3rd...
In that time:
Bad Virgil voted in favor of torture. (I still cannot quite grasp that the United States has fallen so low that we allow our elected representatives to vote in favor of Inquisitorial tactics...)
Scored 1/2 of an "F" in the Drum Major Institute's rating of legislators with regards to how they voted in terms of supporting the middle class. Bad Virgil voted against the middle class 80% of the time. Stunning.
Bad Virgil voted against desperately needed ethics reform in the House. Gee... I wonder why?
to be continued....
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Monday, March 10, 2008
Bad Virgil has an opponent
Monday, March 3, 2008
Not my idea of common sense
It hasn't even been a year yet since a disturbed young Va. Tech. student (sick or not, I'll probably never be able to bring myself to call him a "Hokie") killed 32 students in Blacksburg, VA. Every year brings us a new crop of school shootings and several disrupted plots.
Maybe it's because I'm from a place called Planet Sanity, but I've got to believe that even the most enthusiastic gun-lover would readily concede that schools and guns don't mix.
That's not to say that there aren't plenty of deranged ideologues willing to soak you with spittle while they stand on their 2nd Amendment soapbox decrying the "slippery slope" and their absolute right to arm their second grader.
Of course, anyone that was paying attention knew that Ron Paul was one of these wild-eyed lunatics... By way of confirmation, Representative Paul has introduced H.R. 2424 - a bill that would repeal the Gun Free Schools Act and all of its amendments.
No to be absolutely clear, I'm not exactly sure what the amendments are, but I suspect they were enacted after the Supreme Court surprised everyone by rolling back the Commerce Clause when the decided United States v. Lopez in 1995. They invalidated the law, saying that the federal government could not reach so far into the business of the States without a compelling reason having to do with interstate commerce.
So...
Congress may have gone back to amend the act... or... Paul is blowing a dog whistle for his lunatic base and doing this as a symbolic gesture.
Either way, what does this have to do with Bad Virgil?
Well... there are 434 voting members f the United States House of Representatives. Many of them are far, far, far right-wing nutcases.
But...
Only one of them co-sponsored this fringe legislation. (click on "Show Co-sponsors")
That's right. Blacksburg be damned... Virgil Goode thinks it makes sense for our school children to be strapped in class.
Maybe it's because I'm from a place called Planet Sanity, but I've got to believe that even the most enthusiastic gun-lover would readily concede that schools and guns don't mix.
That's not to say that there aren't plenty of deranged ideologues willing to soak you with spittle while they stand on their 2nd Amendment soapbox decrying the "slippery slope" and their absolute right to arm their second grader.
Of course, anyone that was paying attention knew that Ron Paul was one of these wild-eyed lunatics... By way of confirmation, Representative Paul has introduced H.R. 2424 - a bill that would repeal the Gun Free Schools Act and all of its amendments.
No to be absolutely clear, I'm not exactly sure what the amendments are, but I suspect they were enacted after the Supreme Court surprised everyone by rolling back the Commerce Clause when the decided United States v. Lopez in 1995. They invalidated the law, saying that the federal government could not reach so far into the business of the States without a compelling reason having to do with interstate commerce.
So...
Congress may have gone back to amend the act... or... Paul is blowing a dog whistle for his lunatic base and doing this as a symbolic gesture.
Either way, what does this have to do with Bad Virgil?
Well... there are 434 voting members f the United States House of Representatives. Many of them are far, far, far right-wing nutcases.
But...
Only one of them co-sponsored this fringe legislation. (click on "Show Co-sponsors")
That's right. Blacksburg be damned... Virgil Goode thinks it makes sense for our school children to be strapped in class.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Bad Virgil - in his own words
This is from BadVirgil's "Weekly Report from Washington" dated 1/23/08:
Alright... so it's no secret that BadVirgil hates brown people - especially if they are Muslims... But this is plain ridiculous. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have stood shoulder to shoulder with Americans as policeman, informants, interpreters and in other critical, life-saving jobs. Each one of these heroes has risked not only their own lives, but the well-being and safety of their entire families.
Each of these titantically brave men and women could just as easily have joined Al Qaeda, the Mahdi Army or any number of sectarian militias. If they had done so, life for American troops in Iraq would be doubly perilous because we would have lost their bravery, skills and honor and the insurgency would be that much stronger.
Many thousands of Iraqis that made the right choice reaped a gruesome reward.
These are Rueters reports from one day - yesterday, Valentines Day, 2008:
I can't say for certain why the specific three year old boy was ripped out of his school and hung... I don't know with any kind of specificity why nine people were shot dead in their own home... Hell, I can't even tell you why the soldiers were blown up...
But I can tell you this...
There are 4 MILLION Iraqi refugees... Virtually the entire educated and professional class has left the only home they knew for their entire lives because it has descended into chaos and they wanted to be safe with their families. They've left their homes, their possessions, their friends - everything they cherished - because Iraq has become a ruinous wasteland of broken lives.
I can tell you this...
Before this war, Saddam Hussein suppressed Islamic radicalism. The Ba'ath Party passed a Constitution that granted women equal rights. Women were allowed to go to school... to work as doctors and scientists and in the government... Today?
Work on the Defense Authorization Bill has been brought once again before the House of Representatives. The second vote was similar to the first one, and it passed 369-to-46. As with the first vote, I supported many features of this bill, but I had to vote "No" again. The Defense Authorization Bill still contains a provision to relocate thousands of Iraqi refugees into the United States.
According to the bill, refugees from Iraq would be moved to the second highest priority level for being granted admission to the United States. They would get a higher priority for admission to the U. S. if they are identified as members of a persecuted minority community within Iraq or are children or the spouse of such a person. The Iraqi refugees will be included in a category that falls outside the normal annual quota on refugees to be admitted. 5,000 refugees from Iraqi will be admitted each year for five years, making a total of 25,000 in this category and in addition to those allowed in the normal refugee category, which currently has an annual cap of 70,000. Once they get here, the Iraqis will become eligible for two types of programs: Refugee resettlement assistance, which includes social services; and Supplemental Security Income (SSI), food stamps, Medicaid, and Temporary assistance for Needy Families for upto seven years provided that they meet the income and eligibility requirements for each of those programs. States have discretion to extend eligibility beyond the seven-year period.
Alright... so it's no secret that BadVirgil hates brown people - especially if they are Muslims... But this is plain ridiculous. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have stood shoulder to shoulder with Americans as policeman, informants, interpreters and in other critical, life-saving jobs. Each one of these heroes has risked not only their own lives, but the well-being and safety of their entire families.
Each of these titantically brave men and women could just as easily have joined Al Qaeda, the Mahdi Army or any number of sectarian militias. If they had done so, life for American troops in Iraq would be doubly perilous because we would have lost their bravery, skills and honor and the insurgency would be that much stronger.
Many thousands of Iraqis that made the right choice reaped a gruesome reward.
These are Rueters reports from one day - yesterday, Valentines Day, 2008:
BAGHDAD - Gunmen shot dead nine members of an Iraqi family after storming their house in the village of Awja, north of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Armed men hanged a three year-old boy during an attack on a school in Zaafaraniya district of southern Baghdad on Wednesday, police said.
BASRA - Two Iraqi soldiers were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol in the southern city of Basra, 550 km (340 miles) southeast of Baghdad, police said.
I can't say for certain why the specific three year old boy was ripped out of his school and hung... I don't know with any kind of specificity why nine people were shot dead in their own home... Hell, I can't even tell you why the soldiers were blown up...
But I can tell you this...
There are 4 MILLION Iraqi refugees... Virtually the entire educated and professional class has left the only home they knew for their entire lives because it has descended into chaos and they wanted to be safe with their families. They've left their homes, their possessions, their friends - everything they cherished - because Iraq has become a ruinous wasteland of broken lives.
I can tell you this...
Before this war, Saddam Hussein suppressed Islamic radicalism. The Ba'ath Party passed a Constitution that granted women equal rights. Women were allowed to go to school... to work as doctors and scientists and in the government... Today?
They came for Dr Khaula al-Tallal in a white Opel car after she took a taxi home to the middle class district of Qadissiya in Iraq's holy city of Najaf. She worked for the medical committee that examined patients to assess them for welfare benefit. Crucially, however, she was a woman in a country where being a female professional increasingly invites a death sentence.As al-Tallal, 50, walked towards her house, one of three men in the Opel stepped out and raked her with bullets.
...
While attacks on women have long been the dirty secret of Iraq's war, the sheer levels of the violence is now pushing it into the open. Last week in Samawah, 246 kilometres (153 miles) south of Baghdad, three women and a toddler were killed when gunmen stormed their home in an unexplained mass murder. Like Dr al-Tallal in Najaf, they were Shia Muslims in a Shia city. The three women were shot. The 18-month-old baby had her throat slit.
In the north, too, last week the killing of women became more visible, with the al-Jazeera network reporting that attacks on women in the city of Mosul had led to an unprecedented rise in the number of women's bodies being found. Among them was Zuheira, a young housewife, found shot dead in the suburb of Gogaly. Salim Zaho, a neighbour, quoted by the television station, said: 'They couldn't kill her husband, a police officer, so they came for his wife instead.'
...
And so in Salman Pak, on the Tigris 15 miles south of Baghdad, The Observer is told, the Karaa Brigade of the Ministry of the Interior rounds up some Sunni men. Later some of the police return to the men's houses and promise their worried women to help find the missing men in exchange for sex.
So when Bad Virgil sends out a newsletter bragging about his vote to deny Iraqis - people that never asked for their lives to be upended - a path to opportunity and peace, don't you have to wonder what kind of man this is?
Bad Virgil professes to be of the Christian faith, but this kind of vote kinda makes me wonder if he has even the slightest acquaintance with what it means to love your neighbor...
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Virgil Goode: Bad & Ugly
Listening to Virgil Goode, it's sometimes hard to imagine how such a down-home good-ol' boy can be one of the most despicable characters in Congress. You don't have too look too deeply though - once you start to scratch the surface, it doesn't take long for the troubling truth to set in: Virgil's Southern Gentleman demeanor is a superficial mask that conceals a deeply corrupt and racist person.
Virgil Goode is a very, very bad man.
Bad Virgil is one man's attempt at chronicling Goode's troubled history. From his dealings with Mitchell Wade and MZM, to his abject failure to serve our district, to his unapologetic bigotry and more... I'm going to do my best to tell the world exactly what kind of jack-ass serves Virginia's 5th District.
One last thing: I can use your help. If there's something about Bad Virgil you think needs to be explored or revealed or discussed... If you, like me, are upset that our Representative is his own debased constituency and seeks only to serve himself... well, please send tips to badvirgil@gmail.com.
We get underway this week.
Virgil Goode is a very, very bad man.
Bad Virgil is one man's attempt at chronicling Goode's troubled history. From his dealings with Mitchell Wade and MZM, to his abject failure to serve our district, to his unapologetic bigotry and more... I'm going to do my best to tell the world exactly what kind of jack-ass serves Virginia's 5th District.
One last thing: I can use your help. If there's something about Bad Virgil you think needs to be explored or revealed or discussed... If you, like me, are upset that our Representative is his own debased constituency and seeks only to serve himself... well, please send tips to badvirgil@gmail.com.
We get underway this week.
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