Speaker Of The House

There was a time when I would have said there was no way the governor of New York was paying money to have sex with a prostitute. I would have said there was no way John Edwards had a girlfriend and an illegitimate daughter. I would have said there was no way the junior senator from Nevada was having an affair with the wife of one of his closest friends and I would have said there way no way the governor of South Carolina had a girlfriend in Argentina.

Way. I would have been wrong in all four cases. That's a long way of saying that at this point I was pretty sure that nothing a politician does could surprise me. Even so, I probably would have said that there was no way former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, of Illinois, of course, was not only hiding a deep, dark sex secret but had agreed to pay $3.5 million to keep it secret. Yikes.

We're now in the middle of the media feeding frenzy I call Sex Scandal 101 and the Hastert thing will play out over the coming days and weeks, with all the tawdry details trickling out as they always do. I'll be keeping an eye on, and possibly blogging about, the scandal but for right now, I find that I'm most intrigued by thinking about the position of Speaker of the House. It's the top leadership role in the House of Representatives, but as most of the media stories about Hastert have pointed out, the Speaker is also second in the line of succession to the presidency, right behind the Vice President.

(Brief rant about details: I've seen a couple of articles saying that the Speaker is third in line. No. Just no. The President isn't in line. He's the President. The VP is first in line and the Speaker is second. Who's third? The Senate President pro tempore. Current titleholder: Senator Orrin Hatch.)

Anyway, no big deal, right? Second in line, how important can that be? We've always got a Vice President, right? Actually no. On three occasions in the last 50 years or so the country has been without a VP, twice for a few weeks and once for over a year, putting the Speaker of the House one heartbeat away from becoming President.



In the 1970s it happened twice, both times connected to Richard Nixon. On October 10, 1973, VP Spiro Agnew resigned after being charged with accepting bribes. From that day until December 6, 1973, when Representative Gerald Ford was confirmed and sworn in as Vice President, there was no VP.

Eight months later President Nixon resigned as a result of the Watergate scandal and on August 9, 1974, Vice President Ford succeeded to the presidency. Nelson Rockefeller was selected to be the VP and was sworn in on December 19; until then the country was once again without a VP. Who would have become president if anything had happened to Nixon in 1973 or to Ford in 1974? Speaker of the House Carl Albert, a Democrat from Oklahoma.



The country was also without a VP for over a year from November 22, 1963, when Lyndon Johnson succeeded President Kennedy, until January 20, 1965, when Hubert Humphrey was inaugurated as VP after having been elected along with Johnson in November 1964. According to William Manchester in The Death of a President, there was some drama surrounding Speaker of the House John McCormack, who refused Secret Service protection, saying it was an intrusion:

When Johnson reached Washington [flying home from Dallas after the assassination] McCormack insisted that the Secret Service must discontinue all interest in him at once. Because of the Speaker's political power his extraordinary demand was honored that Friday. Thus the man next in line was without security protection for fourteen months. It was one of the best-kept secrets in the government. Those who knew of it did not even mention it to one another until Hubert Humphrey had been sworn in.  

I know. I'm a geek and it'll probably never happen, at least in real life. It did happen in the alternate universe of The West Wing, thanks to the imagination of Aaron Sorkin. At the end of season four, Vice President Hoynes is found to be having an affair and resigns; shortly thereafter President Bartlet's daughter is kidnapped. Feeling that he is too distraught to lead the country, the president temporarily steps aside and with no VP, Speaker of the House Glen Allen Walken, played by John Goodman, takes the oath as president. Watch it here:



Sunday morning update: I've written about presidential succession, and posted this video, before. (Here and here, for example.) I want to again point out that the typo in the title isn't from me. That's how it's labeled on YouTube.)

Peak Kardashian?

At The Daily Beast, Amy Zimmerman has a fun article pondering the activities of the Kardashians over the last few days and it's a doozy. Sample paragraph:

On Monday Kylie Jenner launched a chemtrail conspiracy theory from her personal Twitter. The 17-year-old accused some unknown enemy (Aviation officials? Blac Chyna?) of poisoning the world and killing the honeybees with airplane emissions in an energetic meme that can only be described as syntactically “on one”. With her modern ideas on grammar and prose form, her anti-government paranoia, and her 25-year-old boyfriend, Kylie is the closest thing the Jenner family will ever have to a college graduate. 

You can read the entire story here. As I said a few posts ago, I usually don't praise the Ks but I will point out that unlike that other reality TV family where no one goes to college, no one in the Kardashian-Jenner clan has been accused of molesting children. (And please, God, let that continue to be true.) They're monumentally annoying but they aren't telling people how to live, and that's something. At least as far as I know, (and, please, God, let this also continue to be true) they don't endorse politicians or make hateful robocalls encouraging voters to support discriminatory laws. 

Duggars Again, Double Ick

Issue dated June 8, 2015


I've gotten a little behind on posting People covers, so let's catch up. This week it's the Duggars, no surprise, but in spite of the dramatic headline ("THE DUGGARS' DARK SECRETS") there's probably not much original or new information. The article accompanying this picture at people.com refers to the "exclusive" statement from the Duggars that was published on May 21 when the scandal first broke, then quotes a "source close to the family." As far as I can tell, other than the family's original official statements and a blog post from the father-in-law of one of the married daughters, everyone in Duggarland has gone completely silent. They'll probably surface eventually to tell their side of the story, and right now I can only imagine the hysteria of bookers from Good Morning, America, Today, Dr. Phil, maybe even Oprah, trying to get the get and serve up the first interview.

No sign of Bristol Palin. There's been some chatter online that if the wedding had gone off as planned we may have seen a big cover story but sorry, Bristol (and Sarah,) without an actual wedding, you're old news.

This is last week's issue, dated June 1, 2015,


The Bachelorette story was just a short interview with Kaitlyn; the most interesting part for me was when she was asked if she's "happy." She replied that she's always happy but things didn't turn out exactly as she expected. I'm paraphrasing, and I admit I'm surprised. Is this some kind of foreshadowing that she's not engaged to one of the fine gentlemen we see courting her every Monday night? In seasons past I would have gone straight to Reality Steve for the scoop but so far I've restrained and stuck to my "no spoilers" strategy, so at this point I truly have no idea how the show ends. I'm watching the old-fashioned way!

Brokeback Bachelor?

JJ and Clint. Are they really a couple? Almost certainly not, notwithstanding the Brokeback Bachelor promo ABC's currently running in a hot rotation. I think it's safe to say it's a just a tease, designed to gin up interest in Monday night's episode. You may have heard that ABC occasionally runs promos that don't reflect exactly what really happened on the show and I think this is one of those times.

The other big news in Bachelor Nation is that the most recent Bachelor, Chris Soules, and his fiancée Whitney Bischof have broken up, just two months after their season finale aired. (The proposal was actually filmed last November.) It's not that big of a surprise, of course; at this point out of 19 Bachelor seasons, only one, Sean Lowe, actually married the woman he selected at the end of the show. Maybe when it really got to be time to start packing, Whitney just couldn't face life on the farm.

Finally, Amy Schumer. She was a big hit on the show Monday night and it didn't take long for an "Amy for Bachelorette" campaign to spring to life on Twitter, complete with the hashtag #DraftAmy. It probably won't happen but producer Robert Mills entered into the spirit of things:

OK here is the official offer to @amyschumer to become #TheBachelorette. Just say yes and we start tomorrow. #DraftAmy

— Robert Mills (@Millsy11374) May 26, 2015

And Then There Were Eight

Declared GOP candidates, that is, with Santorum and Pataki making it official; two more, Perry and Graham join the crowd next week. There are also signals that Ohio governor John Kasich is serious about running, as outlined in the Washington Post:

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who has been actively gauging reactions to a possible campaign for president in 2016, is now moving rapidly to assemble the staff and financial resources for such a bid and is looking to declare his candidacy sometime after June 30, according to knowledgeable Republicans.

The two-term governor and former House member is running through a checklist before formally entering the race, but strategists close to Kasich and other longtime friends say there is no doubt that he will soon join the crowded field of those vying for the GOP nomination.

If everyone on my Declared, Possible and Late Add lists does in fact run there will be 15 candidates. If former governors Ehrlich and Gilmore, and wink, wink, The Donald jump in too, we'd be at 18. Why so many? First Read at NBC explains it like this:

Turning to the 2016 race, former New York Gov. George Pataki today becomes the latest GOP candidate to enter the presidential race. And it now looks like Ohio Gov. John Kasich is a sure bet to get in, too. So why are there so many Republicans -- as many as 18 (!!!) -- running in the 2016 race? Here are two obvious answers: 1) It's an open seat with history on the GOP's side (only once since Truman has a party held on to the White House for more than two terms), and 2) Jeb Bush isn't intimidating anyone. 

But it's more than that. Another answer is the Santorum Effect -- as 2012 proved, anyone has the ability to be the last man standing against the eventual nominee. There's also the Huckabee Effect -- a strong presidential performance can win you a TV contract. Then there is this fact: There are so many political reporters that almost ANY candidate can get some kind of coverage and find oxygen to justify an existence. And finally, in the Super PAC Era, all it takes is for one political sugar daddy/momma to keep you in the game.

I've updated my list and, just to keep track, I've added numbers to the Declared Candidate category. 

Declared GOP Candidates

1. Ted Cruz (March 23) 
2. Rand Paul (April 7)
3. Marco Rubio (April 14)
4. Dr. Ben Carson (May 3) 
5. Carly Fiorina (May 4) 
6. Mike Huckabee (May 5) 
7. Rick Santorum (May 27)
8. George Pataki (May 28) 

Possible Republican Candidates
Jeb Bush
Chris Christie
Bobby Jindall
John Kasich
Rick Perry (announcement June 4)
Scott Walker

Late Adds on December 22
Lindsey Graham (announcement June 1) 

Officially Not Running
Rob Portman (Dec 2)
Paul Ryan (Jan 12)
Mitt Romney (Jan 30)
Rick Snyder (May 7)
John Bolton (May 14) 

Mike Pence (May 20) 

Days until Election Day: 529

This Woman Is 89 Years Old

Most of the time I think it would be pretty cool to be the Queen. When I see a picture like this, however, taken today, not so much. It looks like Her Madge would be happier staying home with the corgis, with her feet up and a nice cup of tea. Not gonna happen, because as Tina Brown once said, this Queen believes in Royalty 101: you get out there and wield your handbag [and your crown] until the day you die.

Note that in September, Queen Elizabeth II will surpass Queen Victoria as the longest-reigning Monarch in British history. As of now, nothing special is planned to mark the occasion.

Is The Barbecue Still On?

Are Sarah Palin and Dakota Meyer taking shots at each other via Facebook? Maybe. Sarah posted this on her page this morning:



And here's what her daughter's ex-fiancé posted on his Facebook page this morning:

#Morning Motivation I am thankful for all of those who said NO to me. It's because of them I'm doing it myself. - Albert Einstein

Yeah, I'd say the party's off.

Not So Pure After All

Friday afternoon update: TLC has pulled the show from its schedule for "the foreseeable future." Realistically, it's gone for good.

More: Will TLC cancel the Duggars' show? In the end I think they will, as I tweeted last night, but if they don't they might find themselves in court. "Mama June" Shannon, the Mom from the Honey Boo Boo show, reminds everyone that TLC cancelled her show last fall after reports surfaced that she was dating a convicted child molester. That was an expensive loss for Shannon, apparently costing her hundreds of thousands of dollars and she wants to see the Duggars take the same hit. From the Detroit Free Press:

On Friday, she was fuming to TMZ that she wants to sue TLC about unfair treatment, since — so far — the Duggars still have a show, even though, she believes, the parents covered up Josh Duggar's confession to groping five girls 12 years ago in Springdale, Ark.

"I read that the Duggar family said this happening with their son brought them closer to God and each other,' Shannon complained to TMZ. "So they're saying it's OK to have family touch time? Hell no." Read the story here. 

Late Friday afternoon before a long week-end would be the perfect time for TLC to make their announcement. Stay tuned.

Original Post:

My guess? TLC cancels Duggar show before the week-end is over.

— Kimberly Hanes (@WritingTheWorld) May 22, 2015

Believe me when I say that I never thought I'd take to my blog to say nice things about the Kardashians. Around here snarkiness is the usual tone when I talk about Kim and the gang. This morning, however, I'm struck by the contrast between the loving acceptance they've expressed concerning Bruce Jenner's transition, and the hateful intolerance shown by the Duggars for anyone who doesn't live according to their rigid and restrictive morality. And note that the Duggars aren't just a family with a reality show. They use their fame to tell others how to live, supporting conservative politicians and in the case of first-born son Josh, working for the Family Research Council, which has been decribed by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an anti-gay hate group. As the Executive Director of the FRC's political operation (up until yesterday, when he resigned,) Josh Duggar toured the country expounding "traditional family values" and yes, telling people how to live:

"Evil done to children is one of its worst forms."
"We have to stand up to defend the American family"
"Children are a gift from the Lord and and when you look at them that way and you look at them really as more of an investment and really, you know, looking beyond yourself, I think that's what's so important."
"... I think it's just such a blessing when you see family and you see that you can honor each other"

It sounds a little different when you know that young Mr. Duggar was sneaking into his sisters' rooms to sexually assault them, doesn't it? (Quotes are from an article at Think Progress, read it here.)

This is an ugly story all around and the gleeful schadenfreude, even gloating, from observers who don't admire the Duggars, isn't contributing anything positive to the situation. Given the hypocrisy at the heart of the Duggars' purity empire, however, I'd say it's understandable.

Mike Pence Won't Run

Wednesday afternoon update:  Jonathan Bernstein says there are now nine viable candidates, in three tiers:

Tier 1: Bush, Rubio and Walker
Tier 2: Huckabee and Kasich
Tier 3: Jindall, Perry, Santorum and Christie.

He discounts all the rest:

My list of viables doesn’t include Senators Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Lindsey Graham. Nor am I counting Ben Carson or Carly Fiorina, who haven’t held elective office, or the three Bateson class candidates, (very) former Governors George Pataki, Bob Ehrlich and Jim Gilmore. 

Wait, what? Bob Ehrlich? Jim Gilmore? Who are they and where did they come from? Ehrlich is a former governor of Maryland and Gilmore is a former governor of Virginia. They are both the longest of long shots and I've never seen them on any list of "potentials" before. (Read Bernstein's full post here.)

Original Post:
A spokeswoman for Indiana Governor Mike Pence has confirmed that he will run for reelection next year, which effectively takes him off the list of possible presidential candidates. Among the "viable" candidates that leaves Bush, Christie, Jindall, Kasich and Walker who have yet to "announce to announce." I've updated my list.

Declared GOP Candidates
Ted Cruz (March 23) 
Rand Paul (April 7)
Marco Rubio (April 14)
Dr. Ben Carson (May 3) 
Carly Fiorina (May 4) 
Mike Huckabee (May 5) 

Possible Republican Candidates
Jeb Bush
Chris Christie
Bobby Jindall
John Kasich
Rick Perry (announcement June 4)
Rick Santorum (announcement May 27) 
Scott Walker

Late Adds on December 22
Lindsey Graham (announcement June 1) 
George Pataki (announcement May 28)

Officially Not Running
Rob Portman (Dec 2)
Paul Ryan (Jan 12)
Mitt Romney (Jan 30)
Rick Snyder (May 7)
John Bolton (May 14) 

Mike Pence (May 20) 

Days until Election Day: 537

Christie For President? Part 3

In February, 2014, New Jersey's largest newspaper, The Star-Ledger, "broke up" with Chris Christie, saying their endorsement of him for reelection had been a mistake and that he was the "most overrated governor in the country." (Read it here.)

Now, in an editorial titled "Gov. Christie loses his marbles on national TV," the paper throws more shade on the guv. I was going to link to it, but it's not that long, so here's the text in its entirety:

For months, we have wondered how Gov. Chris Christie thinks he can win the presidency when New Jersey is in such rotten shape after his six years in office.

Now we may have our answer: The man has lost touch with reality.

In a national TV interview Monday, Christie was asked to explain why 65 percent of New Jersey voters think he'd make a bad president.

His answer: We love him so much that we want him to remain our governor." They want me to stay," he told Megyn Kelly of Fox News. "A lot of those people in that 65 percent want me to stay. And I've heard that from lots of people at town hall meetings."

Maybe he doesn't believe that himself. That might step on his core pitch about telling the truth, but it would at least tether him to the planet earth.

The worry is that he really believes it. Politicians like him live in a bubble, surrounded by sycophants. Hard truths have a tough time penetrating.

We are here to help. First, the governor needs to hold more town hall meetings in Democratic districts, and at night when working people can attend. He preaches to elderly and overwhelmingly white audiences, over and over.

Second, he needs to look beyond this one poll and spot the pattern. Only 1 in 3 approve of his performance. And even fewer believe he's coming clean about Bridgegate.

Last, he needs to pour himself a drink and ask himself the tough question: Why don't people love me?

It could be the rotten job market. Or the high property taxes. Or the crumbling transit system. Or the broken promise on pensions. Or the private jets. Or the Bridgegate indictments. And so on.

It's no wonder that New Jersey is screaming a warning to the rest of the country. God forbid he gets a chance to make an even bigger mess on a larger stage.

Christie hasn't officially declared yet, or even "announced to announce" a date when he will make his candidacy official. My guess at this point is that in the end he will decline to run, saying that he needs to focus on his current job of running New Jersey and/or spend more time with his family. Stay tuned. 

Days until Election Day: 537

Is Bristol Palin Getting Married?

Tuesday afternoon update: Some random thoughts.

Cancelled? Or just postponed? Sarah's statement, posted on Facebook yesterday, simply says that the planned celebration will not be held this week-end. Is it cancelled forever or just postponed? The fact that Bristol is no longer wearing her engagement ring would appear to indicate that she and Meyer are no longer engaged but that hasn't been definitively stated.

They're still having the party/reception/barbecue? When I read this my first thought was "non-refundable airline tickets." Anchorage to Kentucky and back is a very, very long way to fly just to eat barbecue with a family that the Palins don't appear to know very well. If they really are gathering in Kentucky to "celebrate life," I hope everyone's on their best behavior. Drunken Brawl, The Sequel would not be a good thing.

Why is this happening, anyway? A superficial reading of the news coverage suggests that the cancellation was because of information about Meyer's first (and so-called "secret") marriage and divorce, which surfaced last week, but in her statement Bristol indicates that she knew all about it and that Meyer was legally divorced years ago. She further asks everyone to disregard "false stories and dramatically written headlines begging controversy." So why, exactly, is the wedding not being held?

Finally, what does all this have to do with me? Absolutely nothing. As I've stated before, sometimes I just have to blog about the weirdness of Sarah and her dysfunctional extended tribe of kinfolk.

Monday afternoon update: the wedding is off, at least for this week-end. Click here to read people.com's coverage.

Original Post:
Blog readers know that I'm frequently entertained by the trainwreck known as the Palin family, and their antics have been the basis for some of my snarkiest blogging (#drunkenbrawl! The Iowa Freedom Summit Speech! No, she's really not running for president...) Now there's some intrigue surrounding Bristol's impending marriage to Medal of Honor winner Dakota Meyer, which I believe is scheduled for this Saturday. (That's Sarah with Meyer in the picture below, which some people thought was less than completely gracious.)



Bristol's engagement to Meyer was announced in mid-March, with some reports noting that although Bristol had been engaged (twice!) to baby daddy Levi Johnston, this would be the first marriage for both Palin and Meyer. Now it turns out that's not true. Radar Online dug up the marriage license for an early (apparently secret) first marriage by Dakota, in May, 2008 when he was 19 years old. His lawyer subsequently confirmed that Meyer is indeed single now, with a divorce having been finalized in March, 2010. Read the Daily Mail story here.

Did Bristol know that Meyer had been married before? Did Sarah? With a divorce in 2010 he's now been single for five years, so why the secrecy? Is there trouble in romantic paradise? Is there any significance to a picture posted by Bristol, dated yesterday and featuring a ringless left hand?



Fascinating questions all. I'll update this post if answers to any of them bubble up between now and the wedding day.

Because I've Missed The Duck

Blogging The Bach'ette (With Spoilers)

Note: this post contains a couple of early spoilers.


Ben Zorn


Chris Strandburg


Clint Arlis


Ian Thomson


Joe Bailey

Who are these guys? They're Chris Harrison's "5 Men To Watch," which means that one of them is probably now engaged to the Bachelorette.

And who is the Bachelorette? Warning: spoiler coming. ABC is still pretending that the identify of the Bachelorette is secret but anyone who's been on social media has probably sussed out the fact that Kaitlyn got the job. This is a slight disappointment to me because I was Team Britt, but you know, whatever. Kaitlyn it is and let the fun begin.

Speaking of spoilers, unlike past seasons I'm going to try to get through this season without reading any, which may not be that easy to do. I'll stay away from realitysteve.com, of course, but unless I go completely dark on all of social media, I may at some point come across some info about who's getting roses and who isn't. Still, I'm going to give it my best shot. I admit that Steve Carbone, a.k.a. Reality Steve, has changed the way I watched the show in the last few years. I'd gotten in the habit of visiting his site and reading his posts, with the result that I was watching the show already knowing who wins, who comes in second, who gets sent home rose-less after a date, etc. (Yes, most of the time he's got the goods, not just who the star is engaged to but how everything plays out across every episode.)

For this season, mostly just for a change, I've decided to go cold turkey on spoilers. I'm going to watch the old-fashioned way, not knowing the outcome until it plays out onscreen. That's the plan, anyway, except for one juicy tweet RS sent out yesterday:

Monday's episode of the "Bachelorette" can be described in two words: Ryan McDill. There's drunk, and then there's McDill drunk. Holy crap

— RealitySteve (@RealitySteve) May 14, 2015

This is Ryan M:


So gather ye rosebuds, Bach'ette fans, the mayhem is only three days away!

Not Exactly Mayweather v. Pacquaio

Yes, Mitt Romney really is going to fight Evander Holyfield, but not to worry, Mitt isn't going to get his face bashed in or his ear bitten off. It's all for charity.

John Bolton Won't Run

Friday afternoon update: I hadn't been keeping track but apparently several Republicans and one Democrat have "announced to announce" about their plans to run for president. (Thanks to Ana Navarro for summarizing this stuff in a tweet. I'm trying to embed it.) Rick Perry, Lindsey Graham, Rick Santorum and George Pataki are all planning to make big announcements within the next three weeks. (Announcement dates shown below.) Democrat Martin O'Malley is also announcing something on May 30.

And here's the tweet:

It's the era of pre-announcements of political announcements: Santorum 5/27; Pataki 5/28; O'Malley 5/30; Graham 6/1; Perry 6/4...

— Ana Navarro (@ananavarro) May 15, 2015

Original Post
Who? John Bolton is a Republican former United Nations Ambassador who had been flirting with running for President. I'd seen his name mentioned a couple of times, always as a very, very long shot, and he never appeared on any "Top 10" lists, so I never put him on my "possible" list. Yesterday he announced definitively that he's not running, and I have added him to my "officially not running" list, just because I can.

Any guesses for who will be the next candidate to officially declare that he is running?

Declared GOP Candidates
Ted Cruz (March 23) 
Rand Paul (April 7)
Marco Rubio (April 14)
Dr. Ben Carson (May 3) 
Carly Fiorina (May 4) 
Mike Huckabee (May 5) 

Possible Republican Candidates
Jeb Bush
Chris Christie
Bobby Jindall
John Kasich
Mike Pence
Rick Perry (announcement June 4)
Rick Santorum (announcement May 27) 
Scott Walker

Late Adds on December 22
Lindsey Graham (announcement June 1) 
George Pataki (announcement May 28)

Officially Not Running
Rob Portman (Dec 2)
Paul Ryan (Jan 12)
Mitt Romney (Jan 30)
Rick Snyder (May 7)
John Bolton (May 14) 

Days Until Election Day: 542

Royal Baby, Part 2

Issue dated May 25, 2015


Totally predictable. I thought Sandra Lee, and her boyfriend (the Governor of New York,) might be the main cover story, but apparently editors couldn't resist the cute new picture of George.

Update: I didn't notice it when I first posted this cover, but the tiny little headline just to the right of George's mouth says "Plus! The history of royal kneesocks" Why kneesocks? Remember: