Why Las Vegas?
It's not because Vegas is cheap. It's expensive. The "cheap idea" was just a old seduction routine. It isn't used any longer. Now Vegas is selling itself as the exclusive playworld for the rich and famous.
There is nothing political about Las Vegas. It is the heart of American hype. The Strip is an empty place, hollow, lots of sugar and no substance except the kind one puts in one's nose.
The Riviera is a cheap hotel by Las Vegas Standards, at the edge of the strip and placed near the Las Vegas Convention Center. The Director of Entertainment there is "Pussy" who appeared in numerous Soprano episodes before being killed off. Perhaps he and the bloggers are working together. If Mr. Zuniga, (a 30 something allegedly born in Chicago and who was "raised" in El Salvador for 8 years or so) can wing it maybe "Pussy" (Vincent Pastore) can get him a gig as a stand up comedian taking Larry "Uncle Lar" Reebs place. He's from Chicago too. Reeb tells fart jokes for the Riviera.
Las Vegas has and always will be born of corruption, murder and excess. It is the mecca for the old mob and the new legitimate mob. You can go to the Palms to see the new legitimate mob. Those guys own a basketball team. How many Daily Kos will go there and mingle with the young "Chistofahs" in the outfit or catch sight of a mainstream media star or starlet? Or maybe just a fleeting glimpse of the freshly massaged back of Ben Affleck's neck beyond the red velvet ropes that keep the commoners at bay from the high stakes poker table where our hero Ben, on another all-nighter, slumps, sipping a long island ice tea or three.
This is the place that the eager, shiny eyed, perfect toothed, clearasil poster boy Genius fellow from Daily Kos and others have chosen to hold their political convention. Did they go their to discuss their views or to party? Or is it both?
Clever choice for the clean cut, bright eyed, earnest looking authors of a book with a premise based in fantasy called "Crashing the Gate" which pretends to trumpet the liberal blogs and their burgeoning "influence" on the so called Democratic Party and politics in general. Blogsters are fun little toys that members only, clubby congressman in Washington play with for a few seconds by making the Blogsters feel important before sending them on thier way. Cute little things, blogsters. Blogsters are allowed to experience a moment or two of senatorial presence, catch a glimpse of fame and hope that some of the spotlight of fame may have rubbed off on their clothing as they scurry home to tell thier friends of their "experience" and to wonder if they are now somehow changed or different or special now.
Maureen Dowd wrote a column in Saturday's New York Times. She's a mainstream columnist often used by illiberal ...(as in illegal) blogsters to bolster their point of view. It seems the liberal bloggers can't wait to be seen on Mainstream Media TV shows or appear in articles of Mainstream authors. Why is that?
It is because these bloggers are ready to sell out as quickly as you can offer them the opportunity. It seems that Maureen Dowd sensed this quite quickly. And she apparently sensed it from none other that Mr. Kos himself who thought himself quite clever in his sychophantic conversation with her. But it seems he simply revealed himself as a man as deep as Las Vegas.
It seems Jerome Armstrong of Virginia has gone to work for Virginia Governor Mark Warner as a consultant> Larry King loves Warner, the centrist mainstream democrat whose postion on the Iraq War is not based on what is beneficial for the American people, the troops, and oh yes, the Iraqazoids, (whose resemblance to human beings is quite remarkable) it is based on what he mistakenly believes will get him elected. Mark Warner likes having Jerome in his camp. It looks good. That's why he is paying you Jerome. He's not really listening to you. Like Las Vegas, he thinks your cheap. Mark Warner, not Russ Feingold, that's who Jerome Armstrong is a trophy consultant for.
Daily Kos is essientially a forum for the naive Americans still on training wheels who actually believe the world around them is as described by the institutions they have been educated by and exposed to. They believe in a make believe world, not a real one, and that is why they chose Las Vegas.
It's perfect fit. Where Daily Kos meets it's own mirror image. Where fantasy meets fantasy.
