Craziest Conservative of the Day: Frank Gaffney

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Gaffney had another mediocre day on Sunday against the Raiders, with just four catches for 39 yards. Given that Orton isn't airing the ball out much, and given that he's fourth on the WR depth chart behind Marshall, Royal, and Stokley, he just isn't a good fantasy option at this point. Besides...

Oh wait. That's Jabar Gaffney. Sorry.

Frank's the crazy one -- not that they're related -- and he proved it again over the weekend at the "How to Take Back America Conference" hosted by the Eagle Forum. Take this, for example:

If Bill Clinton, on the basis of special interest pandering and identity politics, was properly called the first Black American President, on that same basis, Barack Obama should be called the first Muslim American President. […] But there is evidence that a lot of Muslims think he is Muslim. But whether he is or whether he isn't, the key to me is, is he pursuing and agenda that is indistinguishable in important respects from that of the Muslim Brotherhood, whose mission ladies and gentlemen, we know from a trial in Dallas last year, is to quote to destroy Western civilization from within by its own miserable hand? That's what we need to keep our eye on.

Uh-huh. Whatever. This is a regurgitation of an old smear, and it continues to be utterly ridiculous: Obama is a "Muslim," in spirit if not in fact, and wants to destroy America. The claim is wholly without merit, of course, but conservatives like Gaffney continue to beat the drum. And conservatives, especially those in attendance at this far-right lovefest of insanity, continue to applaud enthusiastically. (What exactly is Obama doing to bring down America? Then again, anyone who isn't pursuing a radical right-wing and/or neocon agenda is un-American to these extremists.)

Other speakers at the conference were rather less subtle. Obama was equated with Hitler and those speakers who followed Gaffney stated outright that he is a Muslim. (How he's both Hitler and a Muslim is beyond me. It's also beyond me how he's both a fascist and a socialist/communist, but one thing we can't expect from these hate-filled ideologues, apart from sanity, is consistency. They're just going after Obama with every lie they can dream up.)

But back to fantasy football for a moment. After Jennings and Houshmandzadeh, I'm pretty weak at WR. I was fortunate enough to pick up Manningham from the Giants, and I just picked up Nate Washington to replace the injured Laurent Robinson, a potential breakout star this year. I really need Holt to step up, though. I'm 2-1, but I've won a couple of easy match-ups, and I need significantly more production from my WRs if I'm to have any chance of making the playoffs. I'm so unhappy with my team this year. Orton and Favre as my second and third QBs? Portis as my #2 RB? Ouch. Maybe Forte could actually do something, you know, to justify my taking him fourth overall. That'd be nice.

Frank Gaffney is crazy, though, huh? I much prefer Jabar, mediocrity and all.