McCain Tried To Enter His Wife Into A Topless Beauty Contest (I'm Not Kidding)

I swear if I made this up I'd be writing for some sort of All In The Family spin off, but no, its true, McCain offered a crowd of bikers his wife in a topless beauty contest. Forget the implications of women going up on stage to strut their stuff for thousands of drunk men, this place is a festering sewer that regularly results in several 'incidents' per event. It is so bad that there is a crisis center set up across the street. This is the type of crowd McCain feels at ease with, so comfortable in fact, that he joked about his wife entering a topless/bottomless beauty contest.

From DailyKos:

CNN has the details.

If there were any Obama supporters to be found in the vast Buffalo Chip campground, they kept quiet.

Indeed, McCain felt so comfortable at the event that he even volunteered his wife for the rally’s traditional beauty pageant, an infamously debauched event that’s been known to feature topless women.

"I encouraged Cindy to compete," McCain said to cheers. "I told her with a little luck she could be the only woman ever to serve as first lady and Miss Buffalo Chip."

Say whuh?

That's right.

Let's read more about this 'beauty pageant' from ESPN.

Buffalo Chip has a reputation for that sort of thing. It holds a Miss Buffalo Chip contest every night, which is essentially a topless beauty pageant. And occasionally bottomless, too. During a drenching rain Wednesday night, the contest broke up into smaller groups and one woman wound up dancing naked on a bar top. Her boyfriend/husband saw her and angrily dragged her away as she struggled to put her pants back on and muttered something about how, "It's only this one week a year."

I laughed when I heard the guys at Buffalo Chip tell the story, but then I thought about the conversation I had with Pearl Gulbranson, who was working at the Crisis Intervention Center for domestic abuse, which is located in a house across the street from the Broken Spoke. Gather 500,000 people in one spot, feed them a lot of alcohol and there are bound to be some serious problems.

"We average three or four 'contacts' a night," Gulbranson said. "And a lot of women get abandoned here. They get left behind with no way of getting home. So we're here to help."

Rape culture, objectification of women, domestic violence, and raw misogyny. This is what John McCain thinks his own wife is worth.

If that is what you call Presidential material, then our country is seriously f*cked. And if Cindy McCain just stood up there and smiled for that horrendously display of machismo, then shame on her for even thinking about trying to be some sort of role model for 51% of Americans.

'Primary Contests Are Decided In June'

Some of them may be decided in June, but Barack Obama rested the lead from Hillary Clinton in February and he hasn't looked back. Hillary is a strong candidate and frankly that is mostly the reason she's still in this. Tenacious is definitely an adjective for her and her campaign. Today however, is the last day for primary contests in this two thousand aught eight season as Montana and South Dakota put the final 31 of 3,397 pledged delegates on the board. Obama has been leading in that count by over 100 delegates for the last few months.

Tonight when the polls are closed, nearly everyone is expecting Senator Clinton to bow out and endorse Barack Obama, though her staffers say it may come later in the week. Hopefully that statement will come with her speech here in New York. The sooner we all wrap ourselves together for the sake of unity and to fight John McCain and everything he stands for, the better off we are in November. It is time to put down the animosity and stop acting like this.

I know many Clinton supporters are angry about sexism and how it played out in the race. Of course it did and it is sickening to see. I'd love to personally kick Chris Matthews' ass and the rest of the misogynists in the press. They do journalism a disservice like no other. However, do not think that racism has not played a factor here as well.

Racism is an ugly specter in this country and has been for over three hundred years since the first laws were passed codifying chattel slavery in Virginia. I believe that it isn't as visible because for the most part, racism likes to hide itself underneath the facade of our nation. I have heard there could be a possible McCainocrat movement afoot and that Clinton supporters won't vote for Barack Obama because of his skin color. To all those that feel that way, I'd just like to yank your hood off and talk about how you really feel, so that we can begin to tear down that ugliness that is your ignorance.

"Rape And Incest" A Buzzword

The GOP sucker that is going to run against the recovering Tim Johnson (D-S.D.) is making news already in his brand new campaign. Joel Dykstra might have gone too far last year for his pro-life base by saying that terms like rape and incest are buzzwords meant to derail his plans to eliminate all abortions (condoned by the State that is, ya ever see The Cider House Rules Joel?).

From the DSCC:

South Dakota State Representative Joel Dykstra, who last year described rape and incest as a “buzzword” and said that “not everybody who says that really understands what it means,” declared his intention to run for the United States Senate today.

“Once again, the Republican party has turned to the fringes of the far right to find a candidate for Senate,” DSCC spokesman Matthew Miller said. “Joel Dykstra showed how out of the touch with the mainstream he is when he belittled victims of rape and incest last year. With one comment, he showed that while he may be a fitting recruit for the Republican Party, he’s not fit for the United States Senate.”

Joel Dykstra’s Macaca Moment:

"I think 'rape and incest' is a buzzword. It's a bit of a throwaway line and not everybody who says that really understands what that means. How are you going to define that?” --South Dakota state Rep. Joel Dykstra (R-Lincoln County) on why the state legislature didn't include those exceptions in its abortion ban, April 20, 2006.

If this moron thinks he's going to win by being gung-ho about making abortions illegal, he might want to take a look at how the people of his state voted on the issue last year. South Dakota made it clear they do not want to block a woman's right to choose and they certainly won't pick this schmuck to do it.

South Dakota Recognizes First Amendment

I know this will be a shocker to you, but the state will acknowledge the Bill of Rights and specifically the first amendment of the constitution in this case. As you may know Heather Moriah got a brand new beautiful customized license plate for her Prius. Even the license plate was beautiful, it read "MPEACHW."

Then the DMV of South Dakota got a call from an angry Republican and told her she would have to relinquish the plates because they were deemed offensive. Well Heather wasn't taking their threat lightly and the story went out to the press. The state officials were adamant about 'following the letter of the law' or whatever crap it took so that Heather's car couldn't scream "Impeach George W. Bush" in such a creative way.

Well after a little bit of pressure, South Dakota's DMV caved in and let her keep the license plates. The Department's Secretary Paul Kinsman even came out and made a statement:
“After reviewing case law on this issue, we have determined that the plate will not be recalled.” Well good for you Paul, I am glad you checked that other law after trying to follow the letter of the law. And of course cheers to Heather for keeping those great plates being seen around Rapid City!

MPEACHW

Liberals tend to be a creative bunch, whether it is in the arts, science or coming up with interesting license plates. Heather Moriah chose the latter to express herself and add that personal touch to her Prius that she drives around Rapid City, S.D. She wanted to match her partner's IMPCH-W plates. While she generally got good responses, one person got so offended that they contacted the DMV. Now they are taking away her plates for requesting an 'offensive' license plate.

From The Rapid City Journal:

Division of Motor Vehicles director Deb Hillmer said Thursday that the law clearly gives the state authority to recall the plates and have them forcibly removed if necessary. And although only one person complained about Moriah’s political statement, that’s all it takes to recall a set of vanity plates, Hillmer said.

“I’m following the letter of the law,” she said. “It’s offensive to someone and not in good taste and decency. And the plates are the property of the state of South Dakota.”

State law declares motor vehicle licenses plates to be the property of the state as long as the plates are valid. The law also allows personalized plates with as many as seven letters for an extra $25 fee. But it gives DMV officials the right to refuse to issue “any letter combination which carries connotations offensive to good taste and decency.”

Hillmer may be 'following' the law but if there is something on the books that allows one person to complain about a license plate and it is automatically taken away, thats a problem. There should be some sort of review to check if people don't just have an angry neighbor or someone that disagrees with your political views. South Dakota's law is in violation of the First Amendment and should be striken down or revised.