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“An Extravagant and Wheeling Stranger” [Dan Collins]

So far from having no understanding of my analogues am I that I will use them even when I understand that I am supplying ammunition for those who would deliberately misread me, and so it is when I reference Iago’s Rodrigo’s speech from Othello I.i. It is in fact more intriguing to me because it implicates me, because it makes me consider myself in that character, in that light. And undoubtedly those pristine persons who will choose to regard me in that light are correct so to do.

Because to read other than by the light of their verisimilitude . . . that would be foolish, you cuckolds. Besides, I am racist even to make the comparison.

Oh, and David Brooks actually has interesting things to say about Obama’s pattern of being in and out at the same time, a liminal figure who seems to have issues with committing to institutions, whilst using them for his own benefit: A calculated ambiguity, one might call it. Fascinating how someone so averse to committee work would want to preside.

27 Replies to ““An Extravagant and Wheeling Stranger” [Dan Collins]”

  1. Ouroboros says:

    The word is ‘Tupping’.. not ‘topping’.. Tupping.. As in “The old black ram is tupping the young, white, hillbillie Britney Spears ewe as the urban slut ewe Paris Hilton waits her turn..”

    Tupping.

  2. Sdferr says:

    “…Who is Barack Obama? His campaign, as it reupholsters him before our eyes, says we can never know — perhaps because Barack Obama does not know himself. …”

    Alex Castellanos at HuffPo, “The Molten Core of Barack: Why Obama can’t Win”

  3. 11B40 says:

    Greetings:

    In spite of all the punditry about Senator Obama, there seems to be no effort to address the psychological impact of his having been, first, abandoned by his Kenyan father and then, later on, being sent away by his American mother.

    When I was studying psychology back in the ’70s, there was a popular concept called to as “basic trust vs. mistrust.” This referred to the subject’s belief in the willingness or ability of others to meet the subject’s needs.

  4. Jeff Y. says:

    ‘Liminal.’ You’re saying Obama is liminal? Ambiguous probably, equivocal even, polysemantic perhaps.

    Liminal? No.

  5. Ric Locke says:

    This part, Dan?

    Others there are
    Who, trimm’d in forms and visages of duty,
    Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves,
    And, throwing but shows of service on their lords,
    Do well thrive by them and when they have lined their coats
    Do themselves homage: these fellows have some soul;
    And such a one do I profess myself.

    Regards,
    Ric

  6. Dan Collins says:

    In the technical sense, Jeff. Half in, half out the door.

  7. Pablo says:

    The word is ‘Tupping’.. not ‘topping’.. Tupping.

    Schtupping works too.

  8. Dan Collins says:

    And this, Ric, from III.iii.

    Ay, there’s the point: as–to be bold with you–
    Not to affect many proposed matches
    Of her own clime, complexion, and degree,
    Whereto we see in all things nature tends–
    Foh! one may smell in such a will most rank,
    Foul disproportion thoughts unnatural.
    But pardon me; I do not in position
    Distinctly speak of her; though I may fear
    Her will, recoiling to her better judgment,
    May fall to match you with her country forms
    And happily repent.

    The issue then is what is liable to be so, what is considered likely, what is plausible, what is verisimilar. And Iago is one of those critics who insists on his own idea of what is verisimilar, whereas what strains credulity is the wonderful. In other words, in Iago, Shakespeare critiques a kind of critical scold who would be unkindly disposed to Shakespeare’s heterogenous creations.

    How that might apply to lefties, I will leave up to you.

  9. TheGeezer says:

    Schtupping works too.

    Schvantzschtupping.

  10. Dan Collins says:

    Schwartzschvantzschtupping.

  11. Sdferr says:

    Weissschwartzschvantzschtupping.

  12. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Weissschwartzschvantzschtupping through the glen.

    – No specific, definable Obama yet exists. He was picked to young, and foisted onto the stage by a group of people who’s agenda accepted an accidental talent for audiobooks in place of any real experience simply because hes not-white.

    – He will change in all things before their very eyes, since he is not habitual in any reasoned way for now. No seasoned opinions. No principled positions. He will read whatever is put before him, and a day later rebuke his very words, and a day after that rebuke his rebuke, but always surrounded by a flood of rhetoric to make the shift as un-noticeable as possible.

    – I have not a doubt if he wanted to he could take on the coloration of whatever curtain he was standing in front of at that moment.

    – We just didn’t understand what he meant by change.

  13. Ouroboros says:

    Uberweissschwartzschvantzschtupping through the glen.

  14. Ouroboros says:

    “- He will change in all things before their very eyes, since he is not habitual in any reasoned way for now. No seasoned opinions. No principled positions. He will read whatever is put before him, and a day later rebuke his very words, and a day after that rebuke his rebuke, but always surrounded by a flood of rhetoric to make the shift as un-noticeable as possible.”

    Indeed.. The perfect Manchurian Candidate.

  15. dicentra says:

    Dan:

    The “wheeling stranger” passage was spoken by Rodrigo, to Brabantio, in Iago’s presence.

    to make the shift as un-noticeable as possible

    Um, epic fail, dewd. The shift is blindingly obvious to those not of the sycophant persuasion.

  16. Sdferr says:

    Unteruberweissschwartzschvantzschtupping durch den wald.

  17. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    Unteruberweissschwartzschvantzschtupping durch den wald, glücklich legte zu erhalten.

  18. Ric Locke says:

    Unteruberweissschwartzschvantzschtuppinghinweis für den hinterwalderen.

  19. Mikey NTH says:

    If you commit to something, Dan, you cannot be a blank canvas upon which others can paint their desires.

  20. Mikey NTH says:

    Ric:

    IF you can keep your head when all about you
    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
    If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
    But make allowance for their doubting too;
    If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
    Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
    If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
    If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
    If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
    And treat those two impostors just the same;
    If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
    Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

    If you can make one heap of all your winnings
    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
    And lose, and start again at your beginnings
    And never breathe a word about your loss;
    If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
    To serve your turn long after they are gone,
    And so hold on when there is nothing in you
    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

    If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
    ‘ Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch,
    if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
    If all men count with you, but none too much;
    If you can fill the unforgiving minute
    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
    Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
    And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

    That is not the song of a blank slate.
    Me? I’m still trying to live up to it.

  21. Rob Crawford says:

    Uberweissschwartzschvantzschtupping through the glen.

    What’s the “Little Bunny Foo Foo” in German?!

  22. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    Posted on the chowhall bulletin board aboard the USS Nimitz:

    “IF you can keep your head when all about you
    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
    You obviously have no frigging idea whats going on.”

  23. Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) says:

    – Oh, and Rob: “Wenig Häschen foo foo”

  24. Mikey NTH says:

    BBH: Ha!

    From the (ill-remembered) sign over the door of the teachers’ lounge at Dearborn High:

    Illegitimi Non Carborundum.

  25. Dan Collins says:

    Thanks, dicentra.

Comments are closed.