Those Darn Kids!

Burt Prelutsky, humorist, in his latest article, is trying to pin down just when America started to go bad. Was it when Carter failed to take out the Ayotollah? Was it when Bill Clinton got a blowjob? Or was it this?

For all I know, things might have begun sliding the very first time some slack-jawed teenager struck a pose and struck a chord on an imaginary guitar. There was a time, after all, when most American kids were actually given music lessons and learned how to play an actual instrument, and even saved up their allowance to buy sheet music.

Ah the good old days. Actually I saved up money and bought sheet music. But it was to a Sting song if memory serves (Russians I want to say), so I probably don't count.

Of course we did have Reagen and Bush in there, and a Republican controlled congress - so maybe Rock and Roll didn't ruin America.

The rest of the article is lazy and sloppy about what you would expect; Obama is ruining the country and apologizing to other nations (which is just awful).

Oh one other thing, check out the comments on this post from Random Goblin - he wrote a long bit, and it's worth reading.

Back to Palin

Peggy Noonan, speech writer for Ronald Reagan, has written an article about the end of this campaign season, in which she takes particular aim at Sarah Palin.

. . . we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition? She wants to rise, but what for?

. . . No news conferences? Interviews now only with friendly journalists? You can’t be president or vice president and govern in that style, as a sequestered figure. This has been Mr. Bush’s style the past few years, and see where it got us. You must address America in its entirety, not as a sliver or a series of slivers but as a full and whole entity, a great nation trying to hold together. When you don’t, when you play only to your little piece, you contribute to its fracturing.

We talked about this in 2004. The question is how meaningful are the undecided voters? How undecided are they, really? What is more valuable, reaching out to the base and keeping it fired up and energetic or reaching out to the moderates, to the undecided. Because as Random Goblin pointed out, in a response to a post last week, those are two different things. He was speaking about Progressive Bloggers, but I think his comments refer to the politicized base on both sides of the political debate.

This is not to say that "progressive bloggers" should not keep pushing for whatever it is that they want, but that they should not be surprised when, inasmuch as they are not a majority in any sense, they do not actually get what they want.

The problem for McCain is who else does he have? Does he have a real chance of getting the middle at this point? Or is he better off concentrating on the politicized base, getting them worked up, and hoping their enthusiasm is enough to carry him to the end?

It's a political calculation, and he seems to have made his choice. I don't think it is going to work out for him.

Liberals are better than Conservatives

I know you'll all be shocked to find out that I have this opinion, but it's true. I think Liberals are better than Conservatives. It's interesting why that should be shocking; Conservatives have no trouble describing Liberals in the blackest terms possible. But Liberals don't have the same standards; we are expected to see both sides of the issue. Well I do see both sides of the issue, and Liberals are better than Conservatives.

This is triggered by a comment of Random Goblins last week in response to this post.

I question just how tolerant liberals are of different ideas.

The answer, for those playing along at home, is a hell of a lot more tolerant than Conservatives. Want some evidence? We got evidence.

Point number one - there is no Liberal Ann Coulter. There is nobody on the left who has the same combination of malice, hatred AND success. I'm sure there genuinely nasty people on the left side of the fence; hell, I've been described as a liberal Ann Coulter (by a guy who went on to steal $90 of books of mine). But we don't reward them to the same tune that the Conservatives have rewarded Ann Coulter (and many others like her).

Ann Coulter's whole oeuvre is dedicated to tearing down liberals, often in personal terms. Who is there on the left who goes after the right with that kind of vehemence? Nobody of comparative importance.

Point number two - Liberals are generally interested in understanding Conservatives. Conservatives are content to caricature their political opponents. Salon's War Room had this story yesterday.

Liberals, the pollsters found, were "much more likely" than conservatives to tune in to commentary and entertainment with which they disagree politically. The result: The "potential audience" for, say, Rush Limbaugh is "larger than that of liberal competitors because more liberals say they will listen to conservatives than vice versa."

Kind of sad isn't it? Limbaugh has more listeners because of liberals like me who will turn in; Franken is screwed because Conservatives aren't interested in hearing view points other than their own.

Point number three (and I'm about out of points), consider Liberal and Conservative Media Criticism. Conservative Media Criticism is very clearly working the refs; you read or listen to Brent Bozell and he's not interested in a fair and balanced media. He's interested in a media that supports the conservative viewpoint. Consider the long list of liberals he and other conservatives think shouldn't be allowed on TV. Media Matters and FAIR on the other hand are, while critical from a liberal point of view, much more involved in getting better news in general, as opposed to simply making it more liberal.

David Brock (founder of Media Matters) doesn't want to get Ann Coulter off the air; he simply wants someone liberal to challenge her. And too often that's not the case.

Anyway I might come back to this later on today, but that's enough for now; Liberals really are more tolerant than Conservatives.

And a Goblin shall point the way

Random Goblin noted in a comment to my previous post that Patrick Buchannens latest article has the distinctive odor of sanity about it. It's pretty well done too. He starts with a quote from Winston Churchill ("To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war."), a nearly unimpeachable source, given how often President Bush compares himself to him. He then reviews the case for and against invading Iran and comes down squarely against an invasion. Or at least invading before we've hashed out all the details.

Today, Republicans and Democrats are competing in calling Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a Hitler who will complete the Holocaust, a terrorist with whom we cannot deal. But the Iran he leads has not started a war since its revolution, 27 years ago, and knows that if it attacked America, it will invite annihilation as a nation.

Bismarck called pre-emptive war committing suicide out of fear of death -- not a bad description of what we did in invading Iraq.

Today, President Bush does not have the constitutional authority to launch pre-emptive war. Congress should remind him of that, and demand that he come to them to make the case and get a declaration of war, before he undertakes yet another war -- on Iran.

Reader reaction to this declaration seems mixed. Some believe that Bucchanan is right, that we shouldn't invade right off. Others believe Buchannan is a bit off the mark, like Maudrid.

Translation of Pat's Article:

"Let Iran go nuclear, let it go unchecked at its underground enrichment labs, let it stock up and point Shahab 5 missles at Israel, let it develop what it wants because I hate Israel and hate Jews, let Iran develop what it wants while it openly displays its intent to destroy Israel...it's no skin off my teeth."

Pat's soft on Islamofascism. He writes about the Islamocization of Western values in Europe but doesn't care if Iran goes nuclear while wearing its intentions on its sleeve.

Choke on your vomit, Pat.

Nice. At any rate, it's clear that Bush doesn't even have total conservative support for an invasion of Iran; I don't see how he's going to get it either.

Anyway thanks to Random Goblin - and go check out his site - he'a been quite good lately. Well he's usually good - but even better than normal this last bit.

Democrats Vs. Republicans

I realize I have somehow posted the same post twice - I'll fix it in a moment.

This is in response to Random Goblin's comments on a post I made yesterday, about the strains within the Republican party.

Could the Left have a lesson to learn from the foibles of the Right?

I don't know precisely what RG means here, but I will comment that in this particular area I don't think the two parties line up very well.

Since the 1970s and before the Republican Party has grown progressively more conservative so that now Conservativism is the official philosophy of the Republican Party. Conservativism is a relatively compact philosophy - smaller government, lower taxes, traditional values. Now obviously there are fractions who believe that smaller government is the key and others who believe that traditional values are essential, but the similarities are more important than the differences (usually).

On the Democratic side of the fence, on the other hand, we have liberalism as our philosophy. Modern American Liberalism is not a compact philosophy. And Liberalism has balkanized so as to include dozens of submovements. For example, Civil Rights for Blacks, Civil Rights for other Ethnic Minorities, Civil Rights for Homosexuals, Feminism and Woman's Rights, Environmentalism, Small Business, Labor Unions, Farmers, the Inner Cities, Consumer's Right Movements, the Aged, and so on and so forth. All of these different groups have different goals and different plans.

So when the Republican Party is fractured it's a bigger deal. They aren't supposed to fracture, whereas the Democrats are almost always fractured.

Or at least that's my take.

Your Blog-O-Fascist Speaks

I have been inspired by something I read at The Goblin's Lair (Random Goblin's Website). Apparently there is a new version of the Statue of Liberty in which she holds up a Cross (over her head) and the Ten Commandments in her other hand. It got me thinking - this might be a good way to memoralize your beloved blog-o-fascist (by which I mean myself).

Of course in the Make Me a Commentator!!! Statue of Liberty, she will hold over her head one of those cell phones you can surf the web with? It will, naturally, be tuned to this website, and I expect it to be completely functional, so that the statue will update itself as I update this website.

In the other hand, held down on her hips will be either a vinyl copy of Neil Young's On the Beach or the text of the poem "Terrence, this is stupid stuff."

So get to work building that my minions! Remember you basically have to do what I say, or "face the consequences"(TM). And let me know when you get it done.

Let Us Now Praise Famous Goblins

Starting with the most famous Goblin that I know; Random Goblin. Who pointed us to the comments section of the story I posted on yesterday. And rightly so because there are some doozies there.

Excellent the Media needs looking after, Traitors most of them.......

by ken wiley

good, you seditionist creeps deserve what you get. who knows how many serviceman have died because of your "right to know"

by jeff bynum

I am a journalism graduate, UNC-Chapel Hill. I am also a veteran.
I hope they catch every government leaker of classified secret information and put them in prison for life. And any reporter publishing known classified secret information should be shot. It is called treason, not first amendment rights.

by Tom Champ, who apparently likes to stack the deck.

Of course there are those who disagree.

I'm always staggered when people who claim to uphold the "values of America" willingly and joyfully allow their government to violate those values. What's your problem with the Constitution? Take another look: Fourth Amendment. Please.

by RHG

If you don't believe in the US Constitution, get the out of here. If you don't support the Bill of Rights, then YOU are Anti-American. Go move to Russia, Cuba, or China; move anywhere but get the hell out of my country. The only reason our soldiers are dying in this war is because the people that you degenerates voted into office sent them off to fight for someone else. Own up to your mistakes and quit trying to trade my liberty for your false sense of security.

by Leland McGee

The blind hatred for the press conveyed by several who have posted is more frightening than the NSA.

by Mike.

We live in dark days. I walk on guilded splinters (not really, but I'd like to sometime). I'm trying to be vaguely poetic but my head feels like it's not good. Oh well - I'll be back soon to talk about Presiden Bush's plan to militarize the border.

Go Read the Goblin's Lair

Random Goblin's Lair has been on fire lately, so you should go check it out.

Gay Marriage

For those interested, Random Goblin has posted his thoughts on Gay Marriage and they are well worth perusing.

I am of the same faith as Mr. Goblin. I do not have my thoughts completely sorted out on the subject, but I find Mr. Goblin very persuasive.

Just Do It!

Go check out this post by Random Goblin. Do it now! Or the terrorists have already won.

What He Said Redux

Continuing my theme from Friday, I'm also going to link to Random Goblin's Blog on how Democrat can support the President when they are deceived and then stop supporting him when they realize they've been deceived.

And don't even get me started on the "who voted to send them there in the first place." People supported the invasion of Iraq because they were still reeling from 9/11, and because they were systematically lied to.

Go read the rest of it; he makes some key points and has a very good analogy as well.

Torture!

I'm typing that in the same way a characters speaks in the seminal movie "Teen-Agers from Outer Space."

Anyway Random Goblin has a post about the people we pay to torture and their appearance on the Glen Beck show. Go check it out!

Good morning

Hey slow posting today. Cheery is at the dentist and I am being held by work. Grumbly was given a weeks suspension after the incident last week, I'm afraid. The monster phoned in from Zhanjiang, China, and, after listening to Cheery's tearful complaint mandated that Grumbly Muffin be suspended for one week or until she had "got me one hundred squirrels!" Me being the Monster.

I assume Grumbly will wait out the week.

Anyway since I can't post much, here's a few links.

Echidne of the Snake has a nice story that refutes the whole "why don't peaceful Muslims ever protest against the terrorists?" So naturally this will be ignored by conservatoids.

Bark Bark Woof Woof has a story on how Cindy Sheehan Did get to meet with an American President. Kind of nice.

The Goblin's Lair has a selection on why we shouldn't be ashamed to be "liberals." Damned inspiring, if you ask me - go read it and see what you think.

Anyway hopefully we'll have some more later on, if things quiet down.

Recommended

I'd like to recommend this post over at Orcinus. It deals with the recent Rove comments and the mentality of the Right Wing that gave birth to such comments. I would disagree with his conclusion; for one thing I think that American Liberalism has a bit more tools to defend themselves than Japanese Americans had in World War 2. But it's still worth considering.

While I am busy recommending, let me also suggest you continue to give Random Goblin a whirl. Actually one of his recent posts ties right into the above comments by Orcinus.