Politics As Usual

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
Why?

re·gime also ré·gime ( P ) Pronunciation Key (r-zhm, r-)
n.

(1) A form of government
(2) A government in power; administration: A prevailing social system or pattern.
(3) The period during which a particular administration or system prevails.
(4) A regulated system, as of diet and exercise; a regimen.

All "regime change" means is a change in the government in power. Every non-incumbent wants regime change.

So really, Hitler just increased train traffic to certain Eastern European destinations?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
the weekly local newspaper that arrives whether we ask for it or not,

Proudest moment for me recently re. daughter. She delivers this paper. The paper asks for a voluntary 1.75/month. Cute kid- no one say no. Except recent Russian immigrant across the street. when she tries to collect, instead of just saying no, he shows her a stakc of the papers and tells her its not a very good paper. (in fact it is the local paper where your kids get in sometimes- but he's working to dodge the 1.75$.

Hankettia says "I'm not responsible for content." Sigh...

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Drop it, Chinaski. You're in danger of this becoming a new topic with a high probability of you going to 41-8.

SS is a Thurgreed sock?

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
And the fellow has some strong views -- you should hear him talk about the increased funding for the local mosquito abatement district!

I've often thought that if I were to want to break into elected office, the smart thing would be to move to Marin and run for the Mosquito Abatement District board on a pro-mosquito platform. Upside: environmentalist credibility; potential national "nutty California" feature story media coverage. Downside: West Nile virus; malaria; Dengue fever; yellow fever; and California serogroup, Japanese and Western Equine encephalitides outbreaks.

I still think the upside is stronger than the downside. The only thing stopping me is my Jack Ryan problem, IYKWIM.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Proudest moment for me recently re. daughter. She delivers this paper. The paper asks for a voluntary 1.75/month. Cute kid- no one say no. Except recent Russian immigrant across the street. when she tries to collect, instead of just saying no, he shows her a stakc of the papers and tells her its not a very good paper. (in fact it is the local paper where your kids get in sometimes- but he's working to dodge the 1.75$.

Hankettia says "I'm not responsible for content." Sigh...

You're going to have to teach her to take ownership of the problem for the client, or she's going to be bitching to her co-workers in a few short years about how someone moved her cheese.

Dad has a Labrador Retriever, and after years of failing to take advantage in any meaningful way of the animal's genetic predispositions, he decides to teach the dog to retrieve the free morning newspaper. This going swimmingly, in light of said DNA, until the afternoon when the free weekly newspaper manifested itselves in everyone's driveways. The dog gets out and spends the afternoon retrieving newspapers from driveways hither and yon and depositing them on our porch. How do you deter such behavior once it's in the genes? Oh the humanity!

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
my Jack Ryan problem, IYKWIM.

Since the "one you urged to go to sex clubs" is just your feminine side, I'm pretty sure a little pre-primary visit to a trusted shrink can keep this under wraps as it were.

[Hank Chinaski]

:violin:

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Kevin Drum on Fahrenheit 9/11:

Originally posted at Political Animal
FAHRENHEIT 9/11....I caught Fahrenheit 9/11 yesterday. No long lines at a Monday matinee!

What to say? The argument over the film mostly seems to revolve around whether it's factually accurate and presents a logical case, a conversation so pointless as to be laughable. I mean, it's a polemical film from Michael Moore, not a Brookings Institution white paper. It's like complaining that editorial cartoons are unfair because they don't portray the nuance of serious policy discussions.

Now, as it happens, I thought Fahrenheit 9/11 was a bit mediocre even as polemic, but the thing that really struck me about the film was the almost poetic parallellism between its own slanders and cheap shots and the slanders and cheap shots of pro-war supporters themselves over the past couple of years. If Moore had done this deliberately, it would have been worthy of Henry James.

Take the first half hour of the film, in which Moore exposes the close relationship between the Bush family and the House of Saud. Sure, it relies mostly on innuendo and imagery, but then again, he never really makes the case anyway. He never flat out says that the Bush family is on the Saudi payroll. Rather, he simply includes "9/11," "Bush," and "Saudi Arabia" in as many sentences as possible, thus leaving the distinct impression that George Bush is a bought and paid for subsidiary of the Saudi royal family.

Which is all remarkably similar to the tactic Bush himself used to link Saddam Hussein to 9/11. He never flat out blamed Saddam, but rather made sure to include the words "9/11," "Saddam Hussein," and "al-Qaeda" in as many sentences as possible, thus leaving the distinct impression that Saddam had something to do with it.

Or take Afghanistan. In a lengthy and nearly unreadable screed in Slate, Christopher Hitchens takes Moore to task for arguing in 2002 that the war in Afghanistan was unjust but then arguing in the film that Iraq was a distraction from the real war against al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

But surely I'm not the only one who's reminded by this of the ever shifting rationales for war from the Bush administration itself? In 2002 it was mostly about WMD. But there was no WMD. So then it became al-Qaeda. But there were no serious al-Qaeda ties. How about liberation? Maybe, except the Iraqis don't seem especially happy with their liberators. Democracy? Stay tuned.

Finally, the last half hour of the film includes a piece of street theater in which Moore accosts congressmen on Capitol Hill and asks if they'll try to get their sons and daughters to enlist in the military. It's a brutally unfair question, but one that echoes a standard debating point of Hitchens and others: "Would you prefer that Saddam Hussein was still in power?" It's a question that's unanswerable in 10 words or less, and about as meaningful as Moore's ambush interviews with congressmen.

So is Fahrenheit 9/11 unfair, full of innuendo and cheap shots, and guilty of specious arguments? Sure. But that just makes it the perfect complement to the arguments of many in the pro-war crowd itself. Perhaps the reason they're so mad is that they see more than a little of themselves in it.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
So I always thought the sign meant that while we're changing regimes in Iraq, we might as well change ours here, too. You know -- a way of saying, dump Bush, in what passes for clever on political signage.

"Dump Bush"? That's outrageous. The man is President of the United States. I generally dislike his policies, but how dare you compare him to excrement?

Next you'll be making fun of his children, and we alllll know how the Wahhabi Republicans object to that sort of behavior.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
I've often thought that if I were to want to break into elected office, the smart thing would be to move to Marin and run for the Mosquito Abatement District board on a pro-mosquito platform. Upside: environmentalist credibility; potential national "nutty California" feature story media coverage. Downside: West Nile virus; malaria; Dengue fever; yellow fever; and California serogroup, Japanese and Western Equine encephalitides outbreaks.

I still think the upside is stronger than the downside. The only thing stopping me is my Jack Ryan problem, IYKWIM.

Taking the blue pills instead of the red ones today, are we?

[sgtclub]

"Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you," Sen. Clinton said. "We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."

Maybe I'm overreacting (I am currently rereading some Ayn Rand, so I may be particularly sensitive) but does this kind of language scare you?

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
Kevin Drum on Fahrenheit 9/11:

From today's OpinionJournal:

"It's been widely reported that the first-weekend box-office receipts of "Fahrenheit 9/11" set a new record for documentaries. Blogger Frank J. notes that this isn't true. "Jackass: The Movie," released in 2002, grossed $22.8 in its first weekend, a million dollars more than Michael Moore's gross-out flick."

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Maybe I'm overreacting (I am currently rereading some Ayn Rand, so I may be particularly sensitive) but does this kind of language scare you?

It's weird, that is for sure.

It's sort of Politics 101 that you never characterize taxes as "taking money away from you." At least not if you are advocating increased taxes.

OTOH, if you are buying Ayn Rand books then maybe you do have too much disposable income.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
From today's OpinionJournal:

"It's been widely reported that the first-weekend box-office receipts of "Fahrenheit 9/11" set a new record for documentaries. Blogger Frank J. notes that this isn't true. "Jackass: The Movie," released in 2002, grossed $22.8 in its first weekend, a million dollars more than Michael Moore's gross-out flick."

My god, that's utterly hilarious, not to mention spectacularly insightful.


Run out of anti-Kerry t-shirt pics?

[cue the t-shirt pics]

[SlaveNoMore]

sgtclub
Robin Hood quote

Stop cribbing my sig lines.