whether a Republican congressman one year ago jumped in Lake Kinneret, also known as the Sea of Galilee, without his swim trunks on.
A year ago.
An f-in year ago. Skinny dipping. One person. And some others who — wait for it — got drunk.
Actually the subject of an FBI investigation. As Jonah Goldberg points out, it’s a big freakin’ lake, which is why they call it a Sea:
If anything, the news should have been “FBI wastes tax dollars to investigate non-event.”
And what might the crime have been? Or does Obama’s FBI not need a potential crime when Republicans are involved.
Is this like the Gibson Guitar case where we’re going to prosecute someone for violating some other country’s laws — assuming it’s even a violation, which it probably isn’t.
And how convenient that it’s just leaked to Politico just before the Republican National Convention.
So Politico can run a breathless three-screen EXCLUSIVE about it and everyone on the internets from bloggers to ABC News and WaPo will write about it.
Your government and mainstream media at work. One distraction after another.
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You could a daily “The country is falling apart, so let’s focus on …” post. Maybe even a FB page devoted to just that.
I’m thinkin’ the Democrat team has these attacks already scheduled for every few days from now till the election.
RULE 8: “Keep the pressure on. Never let up.” Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. (Attack, attack, attack from all sides, never giving the reeling organization a chance to rest, regroup, recover and re-strategize.)
http://politicalarena.org/saul-alinsky%E2%80%99s-rules-for-radicals/
I would say yea, I agree… but at this point some of these stories are stretching the point of relevancy for even liberal columnists.
let’s hope the progressive/communists aka Democrat Party keep it up
Hey Prof, I used to skinny dip at the res off Giles St when I was a student at Cornell. What’s the big deal?
I want to know why the FBI is not addressing the forged birth certificate issue raised by Sheriff Joe and Mike Zullo. This is a topic most worthy of an FBI inquiry.
The real “crime” is that they were enjoying time while visiting the left’s enemy – Israel.
Meanwhile the new “freely” elected Egyptian ruling party members may be involved in crucifying people – but hey, that isn’t news – drinking in a foreign country is now an FBI offence (unless you are Hillary Clinton buying rounds and dancing around wildly) and that is the most important news possible.
I guess we are left to assume that the Republicans “manhood” was so large that this act was a possible violation of the Logan Act.
The Black Panthers are saying they are building an army, and are going to break into white people houses, skin them alive and kill them. They want to kill all “cracker” babies, so they want to bomb hospital nurseries. The muslim extremists are killing any American they can, yet we can’t call them terrorist. (Yet the tea party patriots are terrorists)
All of this, and more is happening in America, and yet the FBI is investigating this??
What about investigating John Corzine???
What the heck is happening in this country?? Who are we anymore????
You need a new tag for posts like this one: “Desperation”.
How is this even an FBI matter?
From my understanding the FBI investigated it and to their credit decided it was a non issue. Politico is just feeding their masses the B.S. they savor. They keep poking them with their stick to keep them stirred up.
Holder’s lap dogs should be investigating the Fast and Furious crime wave and the tsunami of illegal immigrants – not the ripple a moment of skinny dipping creates in someones’ bucket (list).
Examples like this, of our government at work, almost make a person yearn for sheer anarchy! Almost! 🙂
Life imitates The Onion.
Again. This is getting monotonous.
IF there is ANY scandal here, it is that the FBI reportedly spent ANY time on this.
Ummm….John Corzine…billions of dollars “lost”…
“Priorities, guys…”
Will our Twitter/Facebook/TMZ driven celebrity culture win out or will we ever return to the days where policy and beliefs were mostly all that mattered for the elected class and elections? Abs, tailoring, botox, ‘hotness’, skinny dipping, etc., all seem to have taken on equal importance for some strange reason.
Exposing divorce records or creating scandals (say, in military service, for example) is age-old dirty politicking. But, this?
They told me that if I voted for John McCain, skinny dipping would become a federal offense and nude Marco Polo would be denigrated as a legitimate form of health care.
LukeHandCool (who admits to occasionally not yelling “Polo” when he’s in danger of being tagged … only because he’s so ticklish).
What about Article one section 6 of the Constitution:
Under the expansive interpretations of this immunity clause that the courts have developed the search that uncovered “Cold Cash” Jefferson’s refrigerated bribe money was ruled unconstitutional, but they can investigate Congressmen for swimming and drinking in a foreign country where they have no jurisdiction in any case?
If the FBI under a Republican administration were to investigate Congressional Democrats in what would seem to be an obvious attempt to trump-up a scandal the cries of unconstitutional thug-tactics would quite correctly be the top headline for a week, with endless calls for investigation into how this happened. Unlike the Jefferson case, where the courts stretched the speech and debate clause beyond its original intent, this investigation falls directly under the intended prohibition: it is an attempt to interfere with the opposition party for political gain, or it certainly looks like it.
This is potentially as big an unconstitutional abuse of power as siccing IRS audits on political enemies and opposition funders. The scandal is the FBI investigation itself and Politico pretends that it is the drinking and swimming. Unmitigated hackery. They are worse than TASS.
No mention in anything I have seen about how this FBI probe got initiated. Anybody else seen this mentioned? Surely it is not routine, in the face of Article I section 6, for the FBI to investigate Congressional trips.
Afaic it is not the FBI’s business whether any American goes skinny-dipping in a foreign country.
Too many conservatives are reluctant to acknowledge abuse of the State’s law enforcement powers. IMO they misinterpret the need for law and order. Maybe they will start to wake up when they see those powers being turned against them.
NB: I don’t object to giving the State extraordinary powers to deal with extraordinary national-security threats like terrorism. I object that those extraordinary powers tend not to remain extraordinary.
(ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
WTF.
Team You-Didn’t-Build-That just now became Team Distract-Everyone-From-My-Ineptitude.
And yes my age is showing, but the table flip meme is priceless.
And this worksafe gif is…how I feel still.
Said Gif: http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/5117/eae.gif
“Is this like the Gibson Guitar case where we’re going to prosecute someone for violating some other country’s laws — assuming it’s even a violation, which it probably isn’t.”
The pertinent Indian government agency has denied that Gibson violated any of their regulations. Gibson has settled with the feds, paid a penalty, and signed an agreement that they won’t discuss the case further.
How this differs from a mob shakedown, I don’t know.
The Statist objective is to establish a set of laws and regulations so massive and complex that any American, at one time or another, will act illegally. This enables selective prosecution, when timely and necessary, of political enemies. This is pretty much true today — the effort to observe even interpret all laws is beyond the scope of even corporations with whole departments of lawyers. So a Van der Sloop or a Sheldon Adelson or the CEO of Gbson can fall under boot of the State when it suits the Statist.
I agree, but am adding this (off-topic) remark:
This is how government, left to its own devices, naturally evolves unless it is explicitly and constantly checked. No Statist objective, in the sense of a master plan, is necessary (though it is possible, especially in the later stages of the process).
Point well taken.
Forgot to mention, and this is O/T except that it involves alefty media outlet, but Politico has posted a story outlining deep problems within the Obama campaign team and White House staff:
Politico e-Book: Obama Campaign Roiled By Conflict
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0812/79867.html?hp=t1
If the left’s attacks on the GOP are presented – most recent first – we should be looking at Republican war crimes from WW2 by November.
The media is the enemy. Not simply of conservatives, but of America. Maybe in our lifetimes the Republicans will figure it out and substitute a strategy of war — to be enacted in every single encounter with them — for the same old abashed and exasperated flailings of futile protest until it was the media that flinched and fell into a defensive crouch every time they saw one of US come along.
It’s a dream anyway.
I’m glad I wasn’t the only one searching desperately to find out why the heck this was a major story, only to come up empty handed.
It is a major story because every day of distraction from the economy and the debt is a good day for the Democrats.
It’s funny, I posted the article from NBC News on my facebook asking why that was front page news. My normally quite active liberal friends all seem to be busy and unable to answer…
Curious.
Forget “major story”. Why is it a story at all? Seriously, can someone explain why this is more than a gossip column piece? Why is anyone interested in it at all, other than in the same way people are interested in what some celebrity was seen wearing, or driving? It’s good that the FBI decided it was a non-issue, but why did it occur to anyone to ask them to look into it in the first place? Since when is skinny dipping in the sea even mildly scandalous?
Also, I’m puzzled by Politico’s note that they’d corrected the sea’s description; what exactly did they call it originally?
I was under the impression that the Democratic party was the party of drunken parties, sexual liberation and tweeting pictures of your penis to your constituents? Ohh right, whenever the Dems ew in power they shame everyone to cover up their failings.
I focus on skinny dipping with my Speedo goggles … whether the country is falling apart or not.
LukeHandCool (who can do more than two things at once … especially if one of those things involves nudity).
You are absolutely right. The Republicans had better get into this fight. This situation reminds me of conditions in the late thirties and early moments of WW II. Britain, in the face of Nazi Germany’s conduct in the war, refused to permit itself to be dragged down to their level. It wasn’t until they got over it and fought on the same terms that any progress was made. It’s not necessary to descend to the level of MSNBC and their Toure’ dirt bag, but Republicans shouldn’t hesitate to send people to MSNBC to see the creep every time there’s an opportunity. They will make no real progress until they get down in the muck and fight this thing on the Democrat’s terms: it is that simple.
I suffered through two or three excruciating minutes of the opening on each of the Sunday morning talking heads on ABC, NBC, and Fox and saw no mention of Joe Biden’s conduct on any of them. None. I couldn’t stand much more but returned occasionally to each to see what was being discussed and never heard a word about it anywhere. (I admit to tolerating only a couple minutes of each, so someone, please correct me if I missed it.) Nevertheless, Biden’s conduct or something similar, and there’s lots to choose from, should be called out by every Republican spokesman every time some newsie brings up some two year old nothing event by a nobody. Every time. No exceptions. The cost to newsies of opening up this kind of discussion is that they’ll get the discussion. It’s time the Republican establishment did its own fighting in stead of leaving it up to you, Dana Loesch, and a few others to do it for them. (You listening, Scott Brown?)
Romney and his minions had no trouble stooping to some pretty low levels in the primaries, why not now against the Democrats? It’s what people don’t like about him.
Superbly put. But it’s not going to happen. It was up to Republican bastard stepchild Rudy to take on Biden. The effete GOP elite won’t touch it. In keeping with your plan, as a start, we need to challenge the media’s premises, professionalism and ethics (one of these at least) in EVERY encounter with them. For example, what if Romney had not lightheartedly quipped over Brian Williams’ question about picking a “boring white guy” but instead held it up to the light for a moment. “Brian, I’m puzzled. Would this be a question you would ever ask a democrat, or did you ask this of Barack Obama? Why not, I wonder. Why ask me? In the last election cycle the Republicans chose a woman. So what is the basis of your vaguely denigrating preumption? Isn’t this something of a double standard?”
The point is, to force them into reckoning with their own abuses and laziness and biases. We can’t keep doing this in impotent, after-the-fact commentary among ourselves. This fight has to be taken to their faces.
Does this mean Yoder has a legitimate shot at “The Lion of the House” title?
Mitchell & Todd were all atwinkle reporting it on Today this morning.
The FBI looked into the matter and said there was nothing to see.
That FBI finding absolutely crushed Congressman Yoeder.
Well, I’m officially registered as Unaffiliated, but I almost always find the Republican candidate to be the better (or lesser evil). However, this revelation that a GOP congressman went swimming naked changes everything. First thing tomorrow morning I will go to our local voter registration office and immediately change mine to Democrat. I strongly urge any LI reader who values integrity to do the same.
Bwaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahaha….
You mean he swam (swum, swimmed) naked in the Sea of Galilee?
How cool is that!!
FBI investigation-bad
Apologizing for it-worse
…talk about shrinkage
Swim, swam, swum.
The verb is irregular.
The agency is dysfunctional.
[…] Thing Instead of Swimming In It…. Posted on August 20, 2012 3:30 pm by Bill Quick » The country is falling apart, so let’s focus on … – Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion whether a Republican congressman one year ago jumped in Lake Kinneret, also known as the Sea of […]
By the way, was there ever an FBI investigation, even an abortive one, into the Kennedy-Dodd waitress sandwich? Did it merit more than a footnote on page 26 of any publication anywhere?