October 30, 2010
PUMPED UP
I barely follow politics lately and try not to let it work me up anymore because I can't waste energy right now being depressed about the direction of our country, but this
open letter to Rush at Hillbuzz (via Amritas) got me all pumped up on dorkosterone.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:57 AM
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Thanks for posting the link. I got it from
James Hudnall.
Having done a 180 myself, I know where Kevin DuJan is coming from, though my party didn't betray me. (I used to think the Democratic Party was too conservative!)
I'll admit it: I wanted Hillary Clinton to win the Democratic nomination. A third Clinton term would be preferable to one term of the One.
I've known a number of converts - libertarians, centrists, and conservatives who voted for Obama - but I've never read an article explaining the PUMA perspective. DuJan's allegations are shocking. I would like to see a response from the other side.
Exit polls showed 8 million PUMA voted Republican for the first time in our lives in the fall of 2008How many PUMA will vote Republican for the first time in their lives on Teasday?
Record numbers or not, the battle will be long:
Just like with the Leftists Carter infected the Democrat Party with, Obama legacy hires will be in the DNC for a generation to come…and it might not be until the 2030s before the Democrats can remove the taint Obama and his Leftist agenda have put on the party.
Posted by: Amritas at November 01, 2010 12:21 PM (5a7nS)
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October 22, 2010
WHAT'S GOOD FOR THE GOOSE
I heard about this secondhand so perhaps I'm missing some nuance, but did Juan Williams just get fired for expressing basically the same thoughts that Barack Obama attributed to his typical white granny during the greatest speech on race relations since Martin Luther King?
Posted by: Sarah at
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The difference is that Juan Williams admitted to having crimethoughts ... or should we say crime
feelings ("I get worried. I get nervous"), whereas The One was describing the crimefeelings of his grandmother. The One has never had a crimefeeling in his life. He is correctness personified. It is the mission of NPR to make the masses as correct as He is, to take their money and use it to indoctrinate them with correct thoughts for their own good. The sick should keep their crimethoughts to their
psychiatrists.
Posted by: kevin at October 22, 2010 12:56 PM (5a7nS)
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Yes, he got fired for thinking what probably 95% of us think ... I think maybe the P in NPR should stand for something other than "Public"...
Posted by: Toni at October 23, 2010 07:07 AM (OoGre)
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Ah, but Juan Williams was also working part-time at Fox. And is therefore evil. *shaking head*
Posted by: Lissa at October 25, 2010 08:40 AM (geun6)
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October 08, 2010
THE REASON FOR THE PRIZE
How utterly pathetic is it that
this man has to share the Nobel Peace price honor with the likes of Al Gore and Barack Obama...
Imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace
Prize on Friday for "his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental
human rights" — a decision which produced a bitter reaction from the
Chinese government.
[...]
Unlike some in China's highly fractured and persecuted dissident
community, the 54-year-old Liu has been an ardent advocate for peaceful,
gradual political change, rather than a violent confrontation with the
government.
[...]
Liu Xia said she hoped the international community would now press
China to free her husband, adding that the country itself should "have
pride in his selection, and release him from prison." He is serving an
11-year sentence for subversion, which was imposed last year.
She said she had not expected her husband to win. "I can hardly
believe it because my life has been filled with too many bad things,"
she said in an emotional telephone interview with Hong Kong's Cable
television.
I could almost cry reading this. This man is the reason the prize was created, not do-nothing douchebags like Gore and Obama.
Posted by: Sarah at
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As of this writing, the title of the MSNBC article is "Obama to China: Free Nobel-winning dissident". For once I agree with Obama.
How ironic. As one commenter wrote,
"Unfortunately the Nobel Peace prize has lost all credibilty after giving it to Barack Hussein Obama!!!"What does Liu's imprisonment tell us about the weakness of his government? The truly strong do not need to suppress their critics. Only the fragile resort to fatwas. Can cartoons really threaten an entire ideology?
Yes, they can.
Posted by: Amritas at October 08, 2010 11:58 AM (5a7nS)
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Your URL somehow got embedded into the link. Here it is again:
http://www.faithfreedom.org/comics/introduction.htm
If only Obama and Gore were do-nothings like the celebrities that get more media attention than Liu ever will. The problem with those two men is that they do too much. Leftists are compelled to change the world. Why can't they just leave us alone? Because that's not as exciting as playing patriarch. We are wayward children who must be shown the error of our ways ... at our own expense.
Posted by: Amritas at October 08, 2010 12:14 PM (RI6GR)
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Interesting, Amritas. The title was different when I first saw the article, was something like "Imprisoned Chinese dissident wins Nobel Peace prize."
Posted by: Sarah at October 08, 2010 06:05 PM (7mj5Z)
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Sarah, I could be wrong, but when I first clicked on the link to the article, I don't remember seeing Obama's name. Then when I clicked on the link again, I noticed Obama in the title and in the beginning. Perhaps I missed the Obama references the first time. Google has the article on other sites with the title "Chinese dissident wins Nobel Peace Prize". I suspect the article was copied to other sites with that title before the article was updated to include the Obama references. I don't meant to imply anything sinister, though I do wish there were a way to track changes in news stories, just as one can track changes in Wikipedia.
Posted by: Amritas at October 08, 2010 09:20 PM (ke9P1)
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Yes, when he won the Peace Prize, I kept saying "this is wrong. This is totally wrong. I hope he doesn't accept it". I don't know if that was reasonable. Heck, it would probably be tough to face the world and turn down, arguably, the most important honor a human being can aspire to earn. But what did he do? In his acceptance speech he even seemed like he was at a loss. Did our wars with muslim countries end? Did other violent countries, such as Iran, stop threatening war and instead shake our American hand in an offer of peace? No. Nothing life changing has happened in his short time in office.
And despite voting for him, it teed me off.
Posted by: Sara at October 09, 2010 03:22 PM (hcSFs)
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October 03, 2010
IF THIS WERE FACEBOOK
If this were Facebook, my status would read:
Sarah Grok wants to keep blogging, but when she realizes she spent the baby's entire morning nap and part of the afternoon one writing the previous post, she kinda wants to throw up.
Posted by: Sarah at
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Why? I don't think you did anything wrong.
Posted by: Amritas at October 04, 2010 01:33 PM (5a7nS)
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DUSTY BOOKSHELVES, MY FOOT
Via
The Corner, I had to laugh at
this NYT article about the Tea Party Movement. I think the author is pretty ignorant of her subject matter. It would be as if I tried to write a professional article on the environmental movement; I am not a part of it, I am fairly contemptuous of it, and I really haven't done the grokking necessary to understand why its followers behave the way they do. (But I'd like to think I could do it better than she does because
I've done it before.)
Her thesis is that "long-dormant ideas" and "once-obscure texts by dead writers" have shaped the movement. (I find it amusing that she considers Hayek to be obscure, but I digress.) She says of authors like Hayek and Skousen, author of
The 5000 Year Leap, that:
They have convinced their readers that economists, the Founding Fathers, and indeed, God, are on their side when they accuse President Obama
and the Democrats of being “socialists.†And they have established a
counternarrative to what Tea Party supporters denounce as the
“progressive†interpretation of economics and history in mainstream
texts.
All told, the canon argues for a vision of the country where
government’s role is to protect private property — against taxes as much
as against thieves. Where religion plays a bigger role in public life.
Where any public safety net is unconstitutional. And where the way back
to prosperity is for markets to be left free from regulation.
Heh.
I think she's attributing parts of the movement to these books when really she wants to attribute them to Glenn Beck, but that dead horse has already been beaten, so she focuses on the books he promotes on his show. I admit that I am out of the loop these days, but I have watched some Glenn Beck lately and I must say that I am impressed with his new approach to bettering America. My summary of it is that he is moving away from pointing out how much Washington stinks these days and is instead truly trying to encourage Americans to "be the change you want to see in the world." His plan calls for self-reflection and self-improvement, with a focus on "faith, hope, and charity." He wants everyone to commit to becoming a better person, and once we're all better people, we will have better people running for office as virtuous candidates for whom we can vote. We are a nation of individuals, and we will be a better country once we are better individuals. It's a long-term strategy, something quite interesting to promote nightly on a news show.
Glenn Beck does encourage people to strengthen their religious devotion on the way to becoming a better person. If the NYT wants to characterize that as "where religion plays a bigger role in public life," um, OK. I think that's a negative oversimplification of what he's proposing from a journalist who wants to scare readers into thinking he is advocating the blurring of church and state, but maybe I'm nitpicking. I think the scare tactic of saying that "any public safety net is unconstitutional" is more egregious though. It's funny because it's technically a true statement, but by not explaining it, the article leads readers to conclude that Tea Party folks are Scrooges who are out to screw the poor. I have never heard anyone say anything of the sort: they resent the safety hammock, not the net. And Glenn Beck regularly encourages his following to tithe, either to a church or a charity of their choice. He wants people to be more charitable, not less.
I just thought the article was an interesting example of someone who is obviously writing outside her level of understanding. It's a window into the mind of someone who's trying to be objective while writing about something she clearly thinks is simultaneously hokey and dangerous.
It wasn't as bad as it could've been, but the undertone of contempt was clear. And I bet she thought she was being fair and balanced.
The most interesting part of the article was this, in my opinion:
Doug Bramley, a postal worker and Tea Party activist in Maine, picked
up “The Road to Serfdom†after Mr. Beck mentioned it on air in June.
(Next up for Mr. Bramley, another classic of libertarian thought: “I’ve
got to read ‘Atlas Shrugged,’ †he said.) He found Hayek “dense
reading,†but he loved “The 5000 Year Leap.â€
“You don’t read it,†Mr. Bramley said, “you study it."
Across the country, many Tea Party groups are doing just that, often taking a chapter to discuss at each meeting.
I think this would've made a much better thesis. Glenn Beck is prompting postal workers and regular folks to read substantive books. I read Hayek last year and found it dense as well; the fact that Glenn Beck's viewers are devouring these intellectual tomes and creating book clubs to discuss them is phenomenal. People are setting aside their Harry Potter and Twilight for Frederich Hayek!
But one would have to be less contemptuous of Tea Party people to write that story.
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I think that this is the problem that occurs when you start a story choosing facts (or "facts") to fit your foregone conclusion without the willingness to use your research for your own better understanding.
I've changed my mind many times after researching something. It wasn't always the case, but I got my ass handed to me often enough during arguments because I used selective facts that eventually I got sick of looking stupid and changed my approach.
I also found myself irritated at her accusations of "abolishing the safety net". One reason is that as a volunteer for Sew Much Comfort, as well as someone who has worked for government agencies (aside from the whole military wife thing), I have seen the tremendous difference between volunteers taking care of people and the government doing so. It's profound. Although money is always nice, throwing money at a problem and having the government own it doesn't help everything. Or most things. And some would argue it doesn't help anything. There are things only the government can do - national defense definitely, and much infrastructure (a lack of standardization in roads and substandard building leads to more problems than the current system by far). But we take care of each other better than Uncle Sam can take care of us.
Posted by: airforcewife at October 04, 2010 10:57 AM (uE3SA)
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Although this article is not too bad, its opening is a Modist attack. The reader is supposed to dislike the Tea Party because it's not with the times, maaaan. But the reader might not realize that the Tea Party isn't the only movement that "has reached back to dusty bookshelves":
"These [Leftist]
ideas are beyond old. They’re dead. Yet they’re still walking around."-
Bruce ThorntonThe age of an idea does not matter. The truth of an idea does.
The ideas of Bastiat and Hayek are only "obscure" because they are not Leftist and therefore not mainstream. I don't remember either man being mentioned in my economics class. I may have first learned of both when I entered the blogosphere.
I have not read Skousen's book on Communism in over twenty years and have not read
The 5000 Year Leap. Does the article distort his ideas or the ideas of other authors in the canon? If Skousen believed that "public schools should be used for religious study, and should encourage Bible reading," then I can understand how the author might feel justified to write, "The canon argues for a vision of the country [...] Where religion plays a bigger role in public life." Yet this is potentially misleading since Bastiat and Hayek weren't religious advocates. The canon does not speak with a single voice. If I wrote the article, I would point out that the canon includes both libertarian and conservative books.
The author does not lie, but she does omit. Is omission always deliberate deception? Is it even her fault? Could an editor have removed clarifications to make the article fit the print edition? (Space considerations matter far less in the blogosphere.)
The author could have stooped to depicting Tea Party members as illiterates touting books they can't even read, but she didn't. I've seen far worse depictions of the Tea Party.
"someone who is obviously writing outside her level of understanding"Couldn't this describe almost all journalists, who are rarely specialists in the field they're covering?
What is acceptable journalism as opposed to simply rehashing press releases from some political organization or corporation?
Was Rightist coverage of the One Nation Working Together event any better than this? Can any of us really get into Al Sharpton's head? (As an ex-Leftist, I can try.)
Posted by: Amritas at October 04, 2010 01:32 PM (5a7nS)
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The contempt felt by many "progressives" for the vast majority of Americans has become more and more obvious. What drives these feelings?...in some cases, like a John Kerry or a Teddy Kennedy, it is an aristocratic sense of entitlement. With others, it is a fear of loss of status...for example, the individual who drank the academic kool-aid and got a degree in some squishy subject and is now working at Borders...all he has to hold on to, psychologically speaking, is the sense of superiority that his credential gives him.
I expect that the attitude of typical NYT writers, once you get below the top tier, is more driven by the second factor than by the first. After all, they are working for an institution that may not even be around in 10 years, and if it is, it will need a lot fewer employees.
Posted by: david foster at October 04, 2010 02:34 PM (Gis4X)
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David, good points. I can only add that the insecure vastly outnumber the aristocrats. The latter appear in the NYT but don't deign to work for it. Both share an entitlement mentality - a need for recognition by others for their alleged 'superiority'. The Tea Party scares them because its members - mere 'little people' - aren't 'looking up' to them anymore. They're suffering from acknowledgment withdrawal.
No wonder they side with Mohammed, who had a similar problem. The Meccans wouldn't accept his pretensions to authority. So he and his followers resorted to force, and
a hundred converts became a hundred thousand.
Posted by: Amritas at October 06, 2010 02:35 PM (5a7nS)
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