Open thread *UPDATED*
Bookworm on Feb 04 2009 at 8:06 am | Filed under: Uncategorized
Full plate of work that will keep me busy through 3:00 (my time). This is therefore an open thread — which I consider a brilliant idea, since I’m bereft of ideas and I bet you’re not.
UPDATE: Just had to comment on the fact that our speaker is an incredible idiot. If it was a conservative, given her age, they’d be making nasty cracks about Alzheimers. I say skip the disease and just go for stupid.
UPDATE II: All of us predicted it. We all said that electing a leftist neophyte with delusions of grandeur wasn’t just stupid, it was dangerous. Victor Davis Hanson spells out just how dangerous it’s proving itself to be — and that after only two weeks of a new administration. Pride goeth before a fall. Bite off more than you can chew and you will choke. Hubris. It was all written there in advance in myth and popular saying. Obama deserves a great deal of the blame, of course, but so do 54% of the American people and 90% of the American press corp.
UPDATE III: Jonah Goldberg exposes the hypocrisy behind the liberals breaching the religion of tax to the poor slobs who work hard (when they’re not clinging to guns and God), while freely excluding themselves from the same obligations.
UPDATE IV: Thomas Sowell is optimistic about Michael Steele’s ability to communicate clearly, frequently and without apology core conservative principles. I am too. I try not to make the too common mistake (as we’ve seen in this past election) of confusing quality of words with quality of ideas. Nevertheless, if you do indeed have quality ideas, you better have a medium by which to communicate them.
UPDATE V: We’ve wondered at this blog whether liberal columnists will be able to attack Obama, or if they’ll continue to cringe worshipfully at their feet. Charles Martel floated the concept, with which I agreed, that a least some of the media is like the scorpion, whose nature is to sting no matter what. Maureen Dowd is demonstrating that fact. She’s written an amusing, critical and right-on-the-money column about the myriad failures of the newbie Obama administration. True to the confluence of her scorpion nature and BDS, Dowd couldn’t resist a residual attack on the old administration, but it’s clear that she’s got her stinger aimed at a new target. Remember too, that to the extent Obama wooed the media, there is no hate stronger than that of a lover scorned or disappointed. In other words, if the media turns on him, it will be ugly.
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No time till later either… This was linked at MMalkin. Y…are you familiar with this site? Looks interesting.
http://formerspook.blogspot.com/2009/02/collision-course.html
The Iranian regime just gave an AWARD</a? to Samir Kantar, best known for smashing in the head of a little Israeli girl with a rifle butt.
In other news, Iran has apparently launched a satellite…technology used for satellite launch is, of course, essentially the same technoogy used for ballistic missiles.
The Marxist phrase “correlation of forces” comes to mind when I think of the storm now gathering about Obama.
Perhaps he can handle a crisis with Iran if that’s all he has to face. But what happens if that crisis coincides with a Russian aggression against Ukraine, Chinese saber rattling against Taiwan, Venezulean incursions against Colombia, a meltdown in Pakistan, and coordinated terror attacks and Muslim rioting in Europe?
I do not think he has the calmness that comes from courage and experience, and will choose one of two disastrous extremes: cringe in a corner for days on end like Stalin did when the Germans invaded the USSR in 1941; or lash out blindly in a show of pseudo-manhood, pushing our overextended military around on paper like Hitler did at the end, not understanding that there were no reserves, no lost legions that would come to the rescue.
But worse than waiting for Obama to consume himself like that vacuum creature in “Yellow Submarine” is the knowledge that we are stuck with this guy for four years, and that the emergency fire extinguisher is a dolt named Joe.
It is unbelievable that a nation that 230 years ago produced such magnificent political thinkers as Washington, Adams, Paine, Jefferson, Franklin and Madison from a population of 4 million today can only summon Bidens, Reids, Reichs, Krugmans, Obamas and Pelosis from a population of 300 million.
For those who claim that Speaker Pelosi is not stupid, I ask them: Please come up with a statement of hers that is NOT stupid. She is serial stupid.
I heard that some mall owner in suburban Baltimore has been able to make loitering teens scatter by reading excerpts from Ms. Pelosi’s autobiography over the PA system.
Also, Oregon is thinking of using the same tactic with euthanasia patients. The controversy is over whether the Speaker’s prose will do the trick by itself, stopping all vital processes as it deadens the brain.
Or will it force euthanizees to beg out loud for relief, thus offering provable and recordable demands for termination (that the Oregon Supreme Court can later cite as it defends its decision to extend state-sanctioned murder to cover such groups as the handicapped and retarded)?
What Pelosi and Obama shows is that the least qualified amongst us can in fact become successful and powerful in this country. I’m not sure that is such a great thing to be proud of though. But I guess that is one of the short falls of the democratic process.
I still cant fathom how a guy like Obama got elected over a man who served his country and has a proven resume of leadership like McCain. Very concerning for me. I sometimes wonder where the other 54% of the electorates heads are at.
Spiff
Y…are you familiar with this site? Looks interesting.
I think I remember the blog name “In From the Cold” from a few years back via a link from instapundit or somewhere.
or lash out blindly in a show of pseudo-manhood, pushing our overextended military around on paper like Hitler did at the end,
Like I said in 2008, Charles, Obama will be the second Democrat to use a nuke on a city.
I still cant fathom how a guy like Obama got elected over a man who served his country and has a proven resume of leadership like McCain. Very concerning for me. I sometimes wonder where the other 54% of the electorates heads are at.
The Democrat party is in the business of ensuring that the bottom 25% percentile of the human species in terms of competence, compassion, wisdom, and tolerance are put into positions of power and authority in this nation.
while freely excluding themselves from the same obligations.
of course, Book, we knew this all along. It was only the useful idiots that needed enlightening on this precept.
I believe the country made a great stride forward electing an African American President. Now that that’s done however, we should elect next time around a President actually capable of governing.
Oh, and seeing Drudge this morning, with Speaker Nancy’s picture and statement about 500 million unemployed, moved me to LOL. She’s like a stock character out of old comedy: the well-coiffed, shrewish she-bourgeoisie, hell on heels, who spouts nonsense every time she opens her mouth and opens her mouth incessantly. This would be great comedy except for the fact her performances cost billions to the taxpayers.
Charles – “It is unbelievable that a nation that 230 years ago produced such magnificent political thinkers as Washington, Adams, Paine, Jefferson, Franklin and Madison from a population of 4 million today can only summon Bidens, Reids, Reichs, Krugmans, Obamas and Pelosis from a population of 300 million.”
Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s classic essay “Defining Deviancy Down” comes to mind.
http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/formans/DefiningDeviancy.htm
‘It is unbelievable that a nation that 230 years ago produced such magnificent political thinkers as Washington, Adams, Paine, Jefferson, Franklin and Madison from a population of 4 million today can only summon Bidens, Reids, Reichs, Krugmans, Obamas and Pelosis from a population of 300 million.’
Sic transit gloria mundae. The mystery is that they existed at all, and all at the same time in the same place, and bonded to a common cause. Human beings when not atavistic tend to complacency, and when fortunate rarely appreciate how fortunate they are.
A)>> It is unbelievable that a nation that 230 years ago produced such magnificent political thinkers as Washington, Adams, Paine, Jefferson, Franklin and Madison from a population of 4 million today can only summon Bidens, Reids, Reichs, Krugmans, Obamas and Pelosis from a population of 300 million.>>
That’s a keeper, Charles.
B) Re: Maureen Dowd et al: I wonder if their scorpion like tendencies will be sufficient to cause Libs like Helen to look at them with new eyes – or at least, eyes from which the scales have fallen.
It’s not the Helens we need. Neither are the secular Jews, the Stephens.
Stephen said…
Rose, this is utterly sick. “It’s too dang bad that our CIA can’t assassinate those two.”
The CIA did assassinate Allende and now you want them to assassinate Chavez and Iran’s leader, two men who have done exactly what to deserve your incredibly myopic and down-right insane jingoistic advice in this day and age? What have they done, Rose, that you think they should die? Oppose your Neo-Cons, your oil men, your corporations exploiting their countries, your Israeli war-criminals?
Rose, you keep this up and you really are testing our friendship because I cannot be friends with people who want to kill others for no other reason than their political beliefs are socialist or anti-Zionist. You would have me killed by that philosophy.
2/04/2009 2:37 PM
Anonymous said…
It is easier to compare the Bush and Hitler regimes. Both were strongly influenced by corporate and banking interests and both invaded other countries in order to expand those interests and take over the assets of those countries. Chavez, on the other hand, has been a consistent advocate for his people by rewriting the contractual terms that his predecessors had negotiated with the multinational oil companies that were ruinous to his countries well being. Just what you would expect from the leader of a country that puts his peoples’ interests ahead of his own.
2/04/2009 3:05 PM
Rose said…
We have not invaded other countries and taken over their assets. Quite the contrary. Our people fight for the rights and freedoms of others, and when we are done, we walk away.
No nation on earth has been as giving, nor sacrificed as much for so many, nor stood up for the rights of other people.
That is why we are so often asked for help.
I see that you prefer the socialist system of Chavez, and seek to turn our country into that model.
I would rather you moved there. That way, if you find out it is a mistake, you will still have somewhere to go.
2/04/2009 4:03 PM
Link
You need Dems that are 1. true believers and 2. can’t stand the fact that they were duped and made into useful idiots.
Stephen believes and has no problem with his status as a tool. You’ll notice he’ll never engage me with the rhetoric he uses with Rose. Why? For the same reason that he won’t use that rhetoric with the Palestinians, the Russians, the Iranians, or the leader of Venezuela. Because he knows they won’t tolerate it, that they aren’t vulnerable to it.
You need True Rage, as was present in the Al Anbar Awakening, before real changes can develop. Before alliances can shift and cultural beliefs bent.
Nancy Pelosi is indeed, as I’ve said before, the real deal: a halfwit. It’s always tempting to degrade those with whom we disagree, but this woman – like Harry Reid in the senate – is a genuinely stupid human being.
However, I think Geithner, Daschle, and what’s-her-face (not to mention Rangel) do present us with a genuine opportunity here. We can use these people as poster children, to make the case that it’s past time for the absurd, nonsensically complicated, 6,000 page US Tax Code to be thrown into an incinerator somewhere, and replaced with a simple flat tax that anyone with a third grade education can figure out.
If even these geniuses can’t figure it out enough to stay on top of it, how can Joe the Plumber be expected to? Or – more reasonably – why should he be expected to?
Or – more reasonably – why should he be expected to?
Cause the Dems like putting people who don’t toe the line into jail. Nationalization of private industries and all that. Taxes are patriotic and all that.
When the aristocrats tell you to do something, you just bend knee and do it, peasant.
Of course, there’s something called the Second Amendment standing in the way of that little Leftist fantasy.
And if they can’t get you physically, they’ll just assassinate your character. It is all the same to the mighty lords of the Left.
Tiresias:
It will be crucial to the effort you suggest to get the mainstream press to begin repeating our meme regarding the stupidity that reigns atop the Democratic Party.
That’s why we should create a “gotterdammerung virus” that infects news reporters with an urge to take the whole damned Demo thing down with them since the media are going down anyway.
The virus will create voices in their minds that counsel, “Last chance to take down a sitting president before your newspaper tanks!” Or, “Be a man [or ballsy feminista] for once and go for the jugular! Show people that you can interrogate!”
Eventually this will create a competition among “journalists” as to who can diss Hopeychangey the most. Look for it to take on the MSM’s patented racism as “journalists” scramble to create a division between long-suffering African Americans who have slave ancestors and the dark-skinned Bobo metrosexual messiah who looks down on them.
Ymarsakar:
I love the look on my leftists friends’ faces whenever I gaze soulfully into their eyes and say, “Well, God forbid it come to a civil war because if it does our side has almost all of the guns and most of the bloodthirst.”
Then, “Just joking! Unless, of course, you guys push it that far.”
Their chuckles are very half-hearted.
VDH has up another elaboration of the link you posted, Book, here.
Highly recommended
Being serious here – I think this might perhaps give us an opportunity or an opening to begin the discussion:
“Look, the goddam tax code is beyond nonsensical. Even these geniuses you want to put in the government apparently can’t understand it, or figure it out. (Or else they’re just crooks, which is it?)”
Now you can say: “the guy running the Treasury and the guy who was for years the democrat leader in the senate can’t even understand this nonsense – FIX IT!”
I think we ought to make an automatic audit part of the requirement for serving in government – and right now, in the light of what’s been going on, the IRS damn well ought to be auditing every single jerk in the congress and the senate.
This article by Ann Coulter was in my inbox this am. I usually skip all the Human Events emails – they send a ton of them – but I like Ann’s writing, and the title intrigued me. It’s a good article. Not as hard hitting as some, but it raises one of those little questions of logic that we all love…
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=30570
>>the IRS damn well ought to be auditing every single jerk in the congress and the senate.>>
Hey…why stop there? Include the President and the cabinet!
Use Alinsky principles….make them follow their own rules – _all_ of them…to the letter!
The thing is, Dems don’t have any ethical rules. They just have identity group politics and the Will to Power going on.
In the example of AQ, you can’t make them follow the rules concerning war, cause they don’t recognize them. You can make them follow the rules of jihad and blow themselves up so they can go to heaven, however. You can make them follow those rules. But since we’re not at war with the Dems, whatever we do to them, we also do to ourselves. That is the fundament of law. What goes around comes around. We cannot, thus, blow them up without inviting return action. But we can blow up AQ, just because.