BobHarris.com - Unelectable, and rightly so

Not Quite So New!

But still a great gift! Get some holiday shopping done early!
Order yours now!

"A rollicking ride of intellectual discovery and emotional growth... unlike his buzzer skills, his comic timing never fails"

-- The Wall Street Journal

"Pulls you in like a good sports story"

-- The New York Times Book Review

"Endearingly frank... jubilant... lighthearted and fast-paced"

-- New York Newsday

"A surprisingly touching memoir"

-- Entertainment Weekly

"Hugely funny"

-- Mental Floss

"Like Jeopardy! itself, it covers a lot of ground and in snappy and informative fashion"

-- Associated Press

"Down to earth and entertaining, even for non-Jeopardy! fans"

-- The New York Daily News

"A very funny writer... the book works like gangbusters."

-- Ken Jennings, 74-time Jeopardy! winner, holder of numerous other Jeopardy! records

"Effortlessly funny and informative... tender, human, and very wise... A must for anyone who loves Jeopardy!, or has ever seen it, or is breathing."

-- Joss Whedon, creator, Buffy the Vampire Slayer

"I haven't seen Jeopardy! since I was a kid, and yet I was charmed and amused by Bob Harris's fascinating and surprisingly suspenseful book. Through sheer force of personality, he takes this brainy TV show and makes it funny and easy to relate to."

-- Ira Glass, creator and host, This American Life

"Eccentric, energetic, and engaging"

-- Publishers Weekly

"The perfect gift for any Jeopardy! fan... I was thoroughly entertained"

-- USA Today, "Pop Candy"

"Surprisingly compelling... a funny and in-depth look at what it takes to win"

-- Long Island Press

"Wise, honest, and very funny... I wish I'd written it. Then again, I wish I'd won $127,000 and his-and-hers Camaros on Jeopardy!, too."

-- Jeff Greenstein, writer/producer, Desperate Housewives, Will & Grace, Friends

"Cleverly executed... solid entertainment"

-- Kirkus Reviews

"Answer: A hilarious, engaging and highly entertaining book. Question: What is Prisoner of Trebekistan? (All right... that was sort of a lame Jeopardy! joke. But what can I say? It's a great book.)"

-- Paul Feig, creator of Freaks and Geeks, author of Superstud and Kick Me

"A surprisingly intimate, entertaining book."

-- Orson Scott Card, author of Ender's Game

"Prisoner of Trebekistan is funny, enlightening -- and just might help you win a million bucks on Jeopardy!"

-- A. J. Jacobs, author of The Know-It-All

"If you don't buy this book -- this funny, learned, charming, and surprisingly moving book -- I will make it burst into flames in your hands."

-- Arthur Phillips, author of Prague and The Egyptologist

"A keeper for anyone who's even remotely a fan of Jeopardy!"

-- TVSquad.com

"If you enjoy... self-aware, geeky good humor, this could actually be your favorite book of the year."

-- The Stranger

"Highly entertaining... laugh-out-loud, absurdist funny... hilarious"

-- Akron Beacon-Journal

"Hilarious... a true treat for all Jeopardy! fans."

-- Strand Bookstore

"Everything you'd hope for... surprisingly compelling... deftly woven together... this sweet, fascinating book is a great read."

-- Book-blog.com

"If super-intelligent space aliens invaded our planet and demanded to interview one member of our species to ascertain whether or not we human beings were logical, bright, kind, and entertaining enough to be allowed to continue, I would nominate, with all my powers of persuasion, Bob Harris."

-- Emo Philips, comedian

"A masterful job of describing the feel of Jeopardy! in the heat of battle... I knew that Bob was a great guy and a fantastic Jeopardy! player. Now I've found that he's also a wonderful writer. I think I'm starting to hate him."

-- Brad Rutter, top money-winner in Jeopardy! history

Books I'm Getting

Now available from the Crown Publishing Group, the kind folks who gave you Prisoner of Trebekistan!

Who Hates Whom:

Well-Armed Fanatics, Intractable Conflicts,
and Various Things Blowing Up
A Woefully Incomplete Guide™

“Revelatory... wryly funny about some very serious subjects... Harris's sly wit and infectious curiosity make understanding world chaos fascinating... witty, horrific, and necessary.”

— Boston Globe

“Only Bob could make a user’s guide to our increasingly hostile world this absorbing, this breezy, and—ultimately—this hopeful.”

— Ken Jennings, author of Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs

"Brave... irreverent... charges into the thick of the globe's myriad simmering wars... hilariously relaxed."

— New York Observer

“Fascinating, enlightening, and surprisingly: NOT TOTALLY DEPRESSING. A gimlet-eyed look at the world we endure that’s also suitable for enjoying with a gimlet.”

— John Hodgman, author of The Areas of My Expertise
and correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Order now from Amazon—and pick up Prisoner of Trebekistan at the same time and save a few nickels.

.

Main

Unelectable, and rightly so

Tag it:

Saturday, 20 January 2007

Hillary's in. Well, whoopty-doo.

No, she's not evil; she just votes along with evil when it seems politically expedient

Forgive me, but aside from huge money and name recognition, which is all usually swell, and as much as I'd like to see the Democrats take the White House, and as badly as the US could use more women holding important public offices, and while I'd enjoy being proven wrong... let's look at the basic math.

Everybody must surely realize that 30 to 40 percent of this country -- the same hard-skulled core of lunatics who still support our Criminal-in-Chief -- will simply never, ever vote for Hillary Clinton.

Of the remainder who might vote for Hillary, at least half were opposed to the war from the outset. Remember, the Iraq War was never particularly popular; Zogby figured 42% of the US was opposed before the first bomb ever fell; most of these, obviously, were Democrats. And Hillary, these early war opponents will remember, was an active, enthusiastic accomplice to the crime. (See below.)

If these numbers are even close, then Hillary has a maximum of roughly 35% of the electorate who could conceivably support her with gusto.

In short: if Hillary wins the nomination, the Democrats just ain't likely to win the White House in 2008.

I mean, come on -- the GOP death machine could prop up the corpse of Augusto flicking Pinochet and get 35 percent. About that many people still support George W. Bush, for gods' sake, despite Iraq, New Orleans, warrantless spying, and a dazzling array of further crimes and incompetence that could fill this page.

Now, I'm not saying Hillary has been treated fairly, or that she's one tenth the hellion she's made out to be. I'm not siding with the contemptible nutjobs who long ago convinced themselves that she's a Chinese communist agent who had a tawdry affair with Vince Foster and then killed him using the lead pipe on the grassy knoll. These same bastards happily call anti-war veterans "cowardly" for merely having a lick of goddam experience and sense, not to mention the occasional three limbs blown off, and they now try to imply Obama might have been on the wrong side of 9-11. They'd frame Bill Clinton for the Fatty Arbuckle case if they could. In their minds, Hillary is part Black Panther, part castrating mama figure, Tanya from the SLA in a Brooks Brothers catsuit, an evil so frightening that no lie can be greater.

It must suck to be Hillary sometimes. I get that.

But here's what sucks worse: the Iraq war is one of the deadliest, stupidest, and most criminal foreign policy mistakes of our lifetimes. (Just making that list is a major accomplishment, btw, considering Guatemala, East Timor, Cambodia, etc.) And Hillary, despite her recent weaseling -- sorry, triangulation is the term of art -- vigorously supported Bush's Iraq adventure from the start.

In the wake of 9-11, it wasn't just George W. Bush telling the world "every nation has to be either with us or against us." It was Hillary, as you can hear for yourself.

In October 2002, during the debate about giving Bush authorization to invade Iraq, it wasn't just Dick Cheney telling the world in that Saddam Hussein had links to Al-Qaeda. It was Hillary, from the floor of Congress.

And in February 2005, it wasn't just John McCain claiming that democracy was taking root in Iraq, and that the insurgency was in its last throes. It was Hillary, standing right at John McCain's side.

Yeah. So President Hillary would be soooooo much better about Iraq. Clap louder, everybody. Make it come true.

If this were a just world, not one person who authorized Bush to invade Iraq would ever be re-elected to anything, and the prime engineers of this mess would be going to jail instead of Fox News desks. And if this were a just world, Hillary would be held in almost as much contempt by people opposed to this war as Bush, Cheney, and the rest of Team Chimpy.

Maybe a lot of people who supported the war early and then turned against it will identify with her more strongly than with people who were right in the first place. So I dunno. Maybe I'm wrong.

I can certainly imagine Hillary changing the subject away from Iraq, which she'll have to as much as possible. I can picture many Democrats supporting Hillary eventually in the hold-your-nose, best-we've-got, wish-it-wasn't-her sort of way. And with our inherently corrupt campaign finance system in which a big war chest often buys power, yeah, she might have a shot. And maybe I'm a big enough jerk that a year from now you'll see me holding my nose, too.

But it seems to me, anyway, that when you're starting as an active accessory to the bloodsoaked mess that your core constituency now deeply opposes, and when you're starting with less than half of the electorate not already actively hostile to you in some way...

It's no wonder that Hillary's announcement gives Iraq exactly one sentence, implying opposition but without taking any position whatsoever. If you read closely, you'll notice she instantly changes the subject to liberal-sounding blah about health care, conservation, and Social Security (while falsely adopting the right-wing talking point that Social Security is in financial trouble, incidentally) -- but all cleverly framed as open questions, so she doesn't have to take any position right now.

I don't really blame her for that.

I mean, we can all see just how wise Hillary Clinton is when she decides to take a clear stand.