Martin Eisenstadt’s Blog

I warned you in my last post that Denny joining that tranny friendly lobbying firm would remind people of his past involvement with Mark Foley. And lo and behold I was right. Let Dennis deny that we grappled on his office floor after a late night appropriations vote, that he routinely gave me pointers when we passed in the halls and restrooms. So one more thing Denny. Not only is Dickstein & Shapiro tranny friendly, it counts General Electric subsidiaries as clients. Which brings me to the subject of this post, the warning my prophetic and good friend Bill O’Reilly is trying to get across to the sometimes gullible American people. Boycott NBC!

Bill O’Reilly is right, 100% right. NBC is the most insidious, self-serving American corporation there is. The mouthpiece of the government behind the government. Between David Gregory dancing the jig with Karl Rove and Tim Russert offering up Meet the Press as a White House briefing room, NBC, in the run-up to the wars, was just as pro-Bush, pro-invasion as was FOX (not that I was complaining). But now that the tides seem to be turning, with possible criminal investigations down the road, NBC has coincidentally found again its liberal soul, its outrage, dare I say shock at the last 8 years of “excess”.

You liberals are such fools. Fox News is not the propaganda channel. It’s owned by an Australian for God’s sake. NBC, owned by GE, who makes more money off one bomb dropped in Iraq than it earns off the entire franchise of “Friends”, is the channel you got to watch out for. And who are all their gas bag blowhards, like Olbermann and Matthews, screaming for this year? Barack Obama.

So I guess what I’m saying Denny is: Think twice before you join a tranny friendly, GE subsidiary-representing lobbying firm. You always struck me as having ideals and principles that you believed in and stuck to. But in this fight, you’re either with us or against us. And remember just because GE thinks Obama is going to win doesn’t mean they’re right. Because now that Obama has become the choice of the real establishment, NBC and its parent company GE, John McCain is once again finding his voice as the true outsider, the maverick he’s always been. And in this election environment, the smart money is on who can better paint himself as the “outsider”. So dear Dennis choose your sides wisely.

ps. And for all you liberal haters who have defended Dickstein & Shapiro as some sort of utopia for liberal diversity hiring policy, you might want to get a load of their clients: Indian gaming, online gaming, the smoking lobby, mercenaries in Iraq, nuclear power, etc. Come to think of it, maybe they’re not so bad!

I was one of Dennis’ first friends here in Washington. One of the few who could talk in detail with him about high school wrestling over the occasional mid-morning drink (I grappled JV back in high school). From what I hear, he was one of the most hands-on and effective wrestling coaches of his day. And I recognize that retirement can be expensive and a man needs to make a buck.

But going to work for transgender-friendly Dickstein and Shapiro? Well, I know I said I’d let bygones be bygones and focus on the present but my friend Stanley Rubin has told me stories about that operation that would make your blood curdle. And even though I fully endorse John McCain, I remember (like I remember Amalek) the dirty tricks campaign waged against my candidate at the time, Rudy.

Dennis, come on, buddy. I know you can do better. I defended you in the Mark Foley scandal, and now you’re just perpetuating stereotypes of the GOP.  We’re going to have enough trouble this fall defeating Obama and heading off another Democrat landslide.

Kudos to our good friend Debbie Schlussel for keeping the pressure on Dunkin’ Donuts over that tasteless Rachael Ray ad. Granted, Rachael is notoriously insecure about her lack of neck (so wear a mock turtle).

The keffiyeh has blood on its hands and should be as offensive to the West as the Windsor knot is undoubtedly to the East.

I must, however, take issue with Debbie on her criticism of Cindy and Meghan McCain. As a McCain campaign surrogate I know that Meghan’s wearing of the keffiyeh was personally disturbing to John, but as any father of daughters will tell you, girls at that age can’t be entirely controlled. I imagine even Debbie of Detroit made some poor fashion choices in her younger years.

At least when Pam Geller and Michelle Malkin rightly went after Rachael Ray, they didn’t drag Meghan McCain into the mud.

I am proud to announce that I recently accepted an offer from the McCain campaign to serve as “a Liaison with the Jewish community” and “foreign policy advisor”. Although I have in the past blamed the McCain campaign staff for dirty tricks against my candidate at the time, Rudolph Giuliani, I have come to recognize the importance of supporting John McCain at this crucial juncture in our country’s history. Israel is at risk. The dollar is at risk. The most cherished American symbol, the automobile, is at risk. So today more than ever before, let us unite for the common causes of liberty, of freedom, of family, of God. John McCain for President!

Okay. I’ve had a couple of drinks and I just saw something on TV that irked my goat. To those alter cocker Florida Jews who think “Barry” is a Jewish name while “Barak” is some scary boogie man name: “Barak” is the Hebrew word for thunder, you fools of life. I don’t know what you are. But you sure as hell ain’t Jews. I just returned from a trip to Israel where Jews wear on their skin the color of the desert, the sun. So, to Barry from Florida, stop being such a wuss.

If there’s one thing I learned growing up in Washington is never look a tulip in the eye and call it cross.   I met Senator Kennedy for the first time when I was a boy.   Always the mentsch unless he was drunk and that was only for a period of years, his angry drunk years.  But for most of his life, he  showed class and caring.  So even though he sits on the opposite side of the aisle, I extend my respect to a friend, to a mentor. Speedy recovery, Mister Senator.

My old pal and Harding Institute cohort Stanley Rubin just bent my ear over a midday Dewars at McCormick & Schmick’s about how we should really be reconsidering our relationship with so-called rogue states like Sudan and Myanmar. In what is fast becoming a return to the polarized Cold War-like era of satellite states and surrogate wars, America needs to compete against China (and yes, Russia) not for resources per se, but for INFLUENCE.

Stanley just got back from a well-heeled fact finding mission as a guest of the Sudanese goverment, and he says that there’s a real willingness for the Sudanese to open avenues to the White House. Frankly, they’re not so crazy about their new found benefactors, the Chinese. Whether it’s a racial thing, or they just can’t figure out how to use chopsticks, they’d rather be bought off by the West than the East. If it weren’t for that pesky Darfur thing and the UN’s mishandling of it all, Stanley assures, we’d have Sudan in our pocket in a heartbeat.

As many of you know, I’ve long put my trust into my associate fellow at the Institute, Eli Perle. He takes care of the web, books my interviews, and has truly been my aid-de-camp. So it was with great sorrow that when I returned from my last Mid-East trip, Eli greeted me with the sad news that he’s decided to seek greener pastures. He feels - and I think correctly - that he’s gotten all he can get out of his tenure at the Institute. I’m sure there was more we could have gotten out of him, but I don’t want to be accused of holding back a promising young politico. Eli’s still deciding where he’ll end up, but we’re sure he’ll be fine.

In the meantime, the Institute is happy to bring aboard two new staffers: Jimmy Havermayer and also recently, Poppy Cartwright. (see, it takes two to fill Eli’s well-trod shoes) Jimmy drove me around the Florida panhandle as a volunteer for the Giuliani campaign, and I sensed in him then that he had a keen grip on life but knew when to ask for directions. It’s Jimmy’s first time in the District, and I’m sure he’ll do fine. Poppy, some of you may remember, first interned at the Institute last summer, and now has joined us on a fulltime basis.