Scott Swett and Roger Canfield, writing in the American Thinker:
The lack of media interest in the role of former domestic terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn in Democratic nominee Barack Obama’s political ascent in Chicago is one of the most remarkable aspects of the 2008 presidential campaign. When the question is raised at all, reporters are quick to repeat Sen. Obama’s claim that his relationship with the two former bomb-makers was fleeting and casual. Some cite Chicago mayor Richard Daley’s defense of Ayers as a “distinguished professor of education” and “a valued member of the Chicago community.” Why then should there be cause for concern?
[…]
Weatherman was a revolutionary communist sect that split from Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) in 1969. Weatherman’s founding document called for a “white fighting force” that would be “akin to the Red Guard in China” to work with the Black Liberation Movement and other “anti-colonial” movements to bring about a communist revolution and destroy “US imperialism.” Weatherman committed at least 40 bombings between 1969 and 1975. Targets included the Pentagon, the State Department and the US Capitol, other government buildings, military bases, police offices and corporations. Two of the group’s primary leaders were Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn.
Defenders argue that Weatherman was not a terrorist group, since it frequently tipped off police about the devices. Bill Ayers recently called the bombings “a dramatic form of armed propaganda” and claimed “no one was ever hurt.” In reality, the relatively low death toll from the bombing campaign was mostly due to technical incompetence.
On March 6, 1970, three members of Weatherman were killed when a powerful bomb they were constructing exploded prematurely. The device had been made from dynamite, wrapped with roofing nails to maximize casualties. Its intended target was a dance for noncommissioned officers and their dates scheduled for that evening at Fort Dix.
[…]
Larry Grathwohl, an undercover FBI agent who infiltrated Weatherman, later testified that Ayers had identified Bernadine Dohrn as the person who bombed a San Francisco police station in February 1970, killing one officer and injuring two others. The agent also said that Ayers had constructed a bomb made from 13 sticks of dynamite that the group placed in a Detroit police officers’ association building. The agent contacted the police, who cleared the area, but the bomb failed to explode. Ayers’ murderous intent was clear enough, however. According to the FBI agent, “Bill said that we should plan our bombing to coincide with the time when there would be the most people in those buildings.”
Ayers and Dohrn were never prosecuted for the bombings because of government misconduct in collecting evidence. In 2001, Ayers told the New York Times, “I don’t regret setting bombs. I feel we didn’t do enough.”
[…]
Ayers now uses his academic position and political connections to promote his theories of “progressive” education, a topic on which he has authored several books. In 1995, Ayers co-founded the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a radical education reform project created to award grants to Chicago schools and “education networks.” The grant-making non-profit handed out well over $100 million between 1995 and 2001, but failed to measurably improve the Chicago school system. Where all the money went may never be determined, but some of it was used to fund projects run by Ayers’ radical friends.
For example, $175,000 went to former SDSer Mike Klonsky, who until recently was also a blogger at Obama’s official campaign website. Before reinventing himself as an educator, Klonsky founded an American Maoist communist sect that worked with the Chinese communists. Among the organizations receiving funding from CAC were the community action group ACORN, the Arab American Action Network, Bernadine Dohrn’s Children and Family Justice Center, and Trinity United Church, home base of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
The man Ayers and his friends chose as CAC’s first board chairman was a little-known 33-year old associate at a small Chicago law firm, Barack Obama. Ayers himself co-chaired CAC’s other operational arm, the “Collaborative.” Ayers and Obama held their respective positions for more than four years, working closely together during that time. They also served together on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago for three years.
Their association extended beyond working hours. In 1995, Obama launched his first political campaign, for the Illinois State Senate, at Ayers and Dohrn’s home in Hyde Park. In 1997, Obama endorsed Ayers’ book on juvenile justice, and Michelle Obama hosted a panel discussion of the book in which Ayers and Barack Obama participated.
However, when asked to describe their relationship during the Philadelphia primary debate last April, Barack Obama recalled Ayers merely as “a guy who lives in my neighborhood.”
[…]
When Klonsky was identified online earlier this year, all his posts at Obama’s website were instantly deleted. Documentation concerning many aspects of Obama’s life remains unavailable, including papers from his time in college and law school, medical records, law firm clients, and files as an Illinois State Senator.
Obama’s campaign attorney has tried to suppress a TV ad that calls attention to his connection with Ayers, threatening the broadcast licenses of TV station managers and calling for the Justice Department to prosecute those who produced and financed the ad.
Throughout his life, Barack Obama has selected his mentors from the ranks of those who despise the United States. This common thread connects Hawaiian Communist Party organizer Frank Marshall Davis, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright (“God bless America? No, no… God DAMN America!”) and the former Weatherman leaders, Ayers and Dohrn.
Did Ayers, Dohrn and their fellow domestic terrorists ever give up their revolutionary goal of destroying the “imperialist” America they hate? Or have they simply substituted new tools for the bombs and violence that were once the measure of their commitment?
Question: why is it improper to note the longstanding ties — and ideological affinity — between a man running for the Presidency of the US and those with whom he has long associated, and with whom he has only begun “distancing” himself from as the spotlight on those associations has grown more intense?
Whether or not Obama is an Alinskyite, one thing is, to me at least, certainly clear: he has, along with Dohrn, Ayers, Klonsky and others, attempted to repackage political radicalism in ways that appeal to the middle class.
And this has been, since the failures of the New Left in the late sixties and early seventies, something of a sustained plan of action — first, with the coopting of the “liberal” designation, then with steady marches through a number of institutions by way of appeals to political correctness, a steady reworking of what “diversity” truly means, a revision of the ground for “tolerance” (which has led to the slow public re-imagining of the First Amendment), and a “distrust of America” cloaked in the garb of carefully-manipulated “introspection.”
Obama’s connections with socialists, communists, and those of one anti-American bent or another, is undeniable. And while that doesn’t prove Senator Obama hasn’t completely rejected their influences, his failure to own up to those connections, and to explain just how he has rejected those teachings (including the teachings of long-time mentor and spiritual adviser, Rev Jeremiah Wright, whose BLT teachings were well promulgated from the pulpit), leave open a lot of room for speculation — speculation that he has chosen to squelch by force, when he can, rather than by any honest accounting.
Notes a commenter at American Thinker:
The most important things here aren’t the details of the aging hipster terrorists Ayers and Dohrn, it is the curious incuriousness of the media about any details of the same. Obama was also a “community organizer” for the Communist organization ACORN for years, but so far I have not heard ACORN referred to a single time in the MSM as Communist. Has there been even ONE article or report in the MSM that examines ACORN or it’s history or the history of so many of it’s Communist members?
The MSM is the fifth element vanguard of the self-appointed Leftist saviours and as such is ground zero for the war that is occuring in America. This is the real war. Both the supposedly “real” news — filtered and manicured to shape public opinion — from the MSM along with the cultural filth dispensed by Hollywood are facets of the same war. This election is prehaps our last chance to overturn [and] eviscerate the Leftists or lose this country to the “enlightened” who will drag us into a new dark ages.
What advantage is there to pretending that the MSM is anything but what they are, Leftists in pursuit of power and the “perfect” Leftist world? That world, should it ever be brought about, would in reality would be an age of Leftist Inquisitions and unmitigated misery, all in the name of perfect “fairness” of course.
While I think this commenter overstates things a bit — there may be “cultural filth” issuing from Hollywood, but not everyone sees it that way, and no one is forcing you to watch it — the points about the press are well taken.
Discuss.
It is beyond frustrating that the media continues to stick its fingers in its collective ears and do the LALALACAN’THEARYOUCAN’THEARYOUCAN’THEARYOU thing when it comes to the Obama-Ayers connection. Keep banging the drum!
Lets get it out of the way early: RACIIIISSSSSSSSSSSSSSTT!
Continue with the scheduled evisceration of the Obama campaign.
Joe Biden: “John McCain spent several years surrounded by violent Communists too”
…..
Oh wait, what? Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
Roofing nails?
Why wouldn’t he wrap his dynamite in one of Barrett Brown’s especially long comments? Talk about sharp objects flying around. That would sting.
Because of the smokiness, al.
Regarding the MSM, why ask why? There are two basic options: either just whine about it on sites like this, or do something about it. The latter involves keeping track of which reporters spread BHO’s lies and holding them accountable in letters to the editor, emails to ombuds, blog posts, or comment threads at the reporters’ sites. For instance, every time I see Anne Kornblut post at the WaPo’s The Trail, I’m going to try to work this post into the conversation.
Unfortunately, I don’t see too many others doing anything similar; some even fail to note the reporter’s name when discussing bias.
See, folks, these are just distractions from the real issues. Like whether Palin owns a tanning bed, and how McCain doesn’t use email.
Hadn’t thought of that.
BTW, Letterman got his start as a weatherman.
either just whine about it on sites like this, or do something about it.
Easy there 24. You don’t want to get too popular here all at once. And your glasses are about to slip off the tip of your nose.
Well when Tom Brokaw parrots the idiotic line “Jesus was a community organizer”, the press has pretty much crossed the line from bias to advocacy. While this article eludes to the causes of this, I do not see any solution to it. I doubt one lost election will change the behavior as the writer on AmericanThinker suggests.
Still can’t understand all the defense of “community organizing.” People who help other people with altruistic intent are sometimes called social workers, volunteers, outreach coordinators, etc. When you put in the “organizing” bit, it implies a political motivation right? So Obama was a leftist, doing “good” in the community with an eye on building a political bloc, as all “organizers” do.
“Some cite Chicago mayor Richard Daley’s defense of Ayers as a ‘distinguished professor of education’ and ‘a valued member of the Chicago community.'”
Apparently, there’s where Timothy McVeigh went wrong – he never got a Ph.D. and tenure.
Isn’t comparing Obama’s affiliation to Ayers like comparing Eric Rudolph to Busch. I don’t see much solid evidence of anything other than a remote connection. Aren’t we better served by going to the jugular and say that Obama is a left wing elitist?
-jw
Isn’t comparing Obama’s affiliation to Ayers like comparing Eric Rudolph to Busch
Well, he did head for the mountains.
That had a McGehee feel to it.
BUUUUUUUUUSCH!!!
If your point is to say that this will never gain traction in the MSM, I agree. If your point was to say that there is no solid evidence, then I say you need to brush up on your reading comprehension skills.
I wonder if anyone — even such as Stanly Kurtz — recognized the insidious role of these “community organizations” before Obama came along?
He and Fannie Mae used the same model: direct money — as much as you can — from public and private sources to these groups in strategic constituencies, and in return receive an army of activists, ready and willing to be your “grassroots” support, whether it be silencing critics or gettting out the vote drives, in Obama’s case, or flooding congressional switchboards and email in support of Fannie Mae.
After all, what congress critter or mediameister would dare question the moral authority of groups with lofty mission statements that include key phrases such as “awareness,” “diversity,” “disadvantaged,” and “education,” etc.? Americans helping Americans! For a price, and with a political purpose.
What was Eric Rudolph doing in Tampa?
Good for Barack Obama, I say. He won’t likely be sending out letters asking librarians it they’ll remove certain titles when asked. He’s read books. He’s read controversial men of letters. He’s not a closed-minded wingered text-bigot.
Freedom of the word! Freedom of association! Freedom!
Free Italo!!1!!seventy!11! from the impulsive Jesus-croakers! Allow Celine to roam the halls! Henceforth, for freedom!!!
jw, if it were just Ayers, you’d probably be right. But it’s not. It’s Ayers, and Frank Marshall Davis, and Jeremiah Wright, and Michael Pfleger, and his own wife who have either condemned America as a horrible place or promoted a social, political, and cultural overhaul of this country. Or both. And his mother was no flag-waving patriot either.
So how about this: Obama is a left-wing elitist who has, throughout his life, voluntarily surrounded himself with people who despise America. Now, we’ve never caught him openly agreeing with them, but the fact that he’s been married to, and raised, mentored, counseled, and shepherded by such folk, demonstrates that he’s more at home with these kinds of people than, say, the Sarah Palins of this world.
Because everyone throws political fundraisers at their own house for politicians they have never met, never speak to at the event, and then never talk to again. That is so totally like plausible. Really it happens all the time. Hell I threw a fundraiser at my house the other day.
Not quite. Not “building,” really. The adjective matters. Everyone knows who that “community” is, who’s on the puppet end of this “organizing.”
“Communitty organizers” are sent. And, like Planned Parenthood clinics, they — nefarious “they,” here — don’t put ’em up in Malibu. So let’s just call a shovel a spade: The phrase exists because no one wants “nigger wrangler” on his resume.
Not the words.
I’m still disappointed with Jesse for not really sharing with us about this. His shakedown is different, morally, to him; he’s not really okay with the one Obama came up through. I know you guys can’t be disappointed by Jesse, but I can, still, a little. Precisely as much as I am.
He knows.
Like Brett Favre, I’m comfortable with wrangler
Yes, Psycho, he knows. But he doesn’t have the guts to act against his own interest.
The ACORN-ites are at it again. How can this be happening even after Barry’s stellar “organizational” skills?
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008809140383
Niall–Basically, Obama was a paid Communist.
thor–How many Aggies does it take to screw in a light bulb?
One, but he gets 3 hours credit.
23 psycho = moby
Tony
Who in-the-fuck are you quoting? Are you too pussy to own up to your own words?
FUCK YOU. ASSHOLE.
Guess again, Tony LaVanway and read for comprehension this time.
Yer doin it wrong:
Fock You Ahsshole
Hey, loosen those neck bolts a little there thor.
Wow suddenly you are outraged thor? After spending the last week or two insulting people with Down syndrome, women, and Palin’s family. Hey thor take your fake outrage and shove it up your ass. That comment was probably written by you anyway.
Didn’t you get banned from here for saying shit about 100 times worse than what that guy just typed?
Anyone who doesn’t reject that verbiage is a also a fuckin’ asshole.
Thus Spaketh Zarathorstra.
This election is prehaps our last chance to overturn [and] eviscerate the Leftists or lose this country to the “enlightened†who will drag us into a new dark ages.
I’m not big on predictions of imminent American apocalypse. “We” will not only win this election, but it will be counted as the year a seismic shift occurred in the MSM’s credibility, abetted by McCain Inauguration Day footage wherein Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann’s coverage is confused with two masturbating baboons jacked up on speed.
And if by some chance we don’t win this election, go read a little about some guys named Francis Marion, Thomas Sumpter, George Washington, and Nathanael Greene.
Wow,
Now tHOR is the verbiage police.
What about the nouniage?
Just saying … I’m offline (hughsnet dish is broken) and I’m getting dumber by the day.
How do people get by trying to get their news with the MSM?
I never reject verbs. Nouns, sometimes yes. But verbs? NEVER.
Ha, Al. I’m too slow. I said I was getting dumber.
Raisin Wrangler eats Sunmaid raisins
For the fastest energy in the West
Even if “frequently” meant “always” this little pile of obtuse justification makes me shiver.
Denounce is stronger, btw.
Bj doesn’t Al Quada “warn” us they are going to attack as well?
#23, psycho
Did you really write that?
Actually, Percy, I think you’re correct: that is precisely where McVeigh went wrong.
There is an enormous double standard in modern society regarding politically-motivated violence. Tim McVeigh was a right-wing nut. He believed in Irregular Militia/Sovereign Citizen survivalist libertarian stuff. He was too creepy for the actual groups’ tastes, but their shared belief in the insidious evil of the FedGov led him to think himself a True Patriot for bombing an office building. He is reviled an all sides of the political spectrum (excepting I suppose the few dozen Aryan Nation loons in the hills of Idaho & Montana). He has no following. He sparked no revolution. Indeed, he killed the Militia movement more thoroughly than the FBI ever could. Bill Ayers, on the other hand, is a left-wing nut. He believes in “small-c communism” & radical activism. The radical Marxist student organizations of the 1960’s not only didn’t find him creepy, they made him a leader & spokesman. Their shared belief in the insidious evil of the FedGov led them to think themselves True World Citizens for bombing a statue. And NYPD headquarters. And the Pentagon. And the Capitol. And occasionally themselves. While they failed to spark a revolution, they do still have a following. Ayers repents of nothing. He freely admits that his tactics have changed through necessity, but his end goals are the same.
One was condemned to death. The other hosted the launching of Barack Obama’s first political campaign. One was, for a time, the most hated man in America. The other has tenure & a doctorate in education.
The Money Quote:
O! can’t address any, let alone all, of these people from his mis-spent youth. So, instead of refuting the ideology of those who made him-and could now just as easily break him by coming out of the woodwork-he simply evolves his positions to sound more mainstream; and all the while the sycophantic MSM cover for him, dismissing the phenomena by noting how “politicians traditionally run to the center during the general”…
As I’ve said before, O! is the left’s dream candidate. He’s demonstrated his loyalty to the faith throughout his life and is devoid of any centrist inclinations or feels any need to compromise-despite his post-partisan palaver; and owing to his membership in the chief victim-hood group of identity politics is virtually unassailable. Since this was supposed to be their year, they figured they could go for the whole enchilada instead of possibly having to get behind that closet centrist Hillary…
Anyone who doesn’t gushingly embrace O!s candidacy is….A RAAAAAAAACISTS; the most despicable, and toxic label that can be applied in multi-cultural America…
And the media facilitates this BOZO in the name of the faith…Never realizing that after the revolution the intelligensia are the first to go; lest they foment a counter revolution-even by accident…
#23, psycho
Did you really write that?
Pretty sure psycho was bringing Jesse Jackson’s caught on mike words back to life.
agree with… thor, of all people.
Srsly, stop with the n-word shit, K? Community organisers suck, but they work with all races not just one race.
Also, dividing people up into groups to despise each other is the Libs job. Don’t add to it, is all I ask.
I hope not, Cowboy.
The thing is, Ayers hasn’t stopped being a revolutionary — he’s morphed, just like Acorn. He’s bringing the revolution to the classroom — legally, and with Obama at the helm — nirvana!
ACORN in the blue state cities will not make a difference — after all IL, NY, CA, NJ, PA have been going Dem.
The ACORN problem occurs in purple states — WI, OH, MI, MO, FL . . . and southern blue states with large cities — GA, NC, SC, AL, LA.
Defenders argue that Weatherman was not a terrorist group, since it frequently tipped off police about the devices.
I would be curious to know what these defenders think the actual intent was if not to scare and intimidate?
FYI, thor
Psycho is quoting Jesse Jackson, from a moment of candor caught on tape, I do believe.
Tanning-Gate = OUTRAGE !!!1!!
Palin’s faith = TEH COMING THEOCRACY !!!1!!
Mav = BOOOOOOOOOOSH !!!1!!
O!s nefaraious associates = …
CAC = …
O!s lack of experience = CODE WORDS !!!1!!
O!s ever-evolving positions = TEH JUDGEMENT
Skepticism of O!s narrative or qualifications = RAAAAAAAACISM !!!1!!
Of course, I’ve been wrong before, being as it was confidently washed down the memory hole by most outlets.
Srsly, stop with the n-word shit
and the c-word, b-word, r-word, m-word, ds-word, etc. etc.
Look, none of us know whether or not Obama would like to see the “soft revolution” flower into a full blown crypto-marxist socialist state. However, I would like him to spend at least as much time as Palin has on “troopergate” explaining exactly what he took away from his Alinsky inspired community organizing and his connections with ACORN and Ayres, especially his time distributing the CAS money.
In fact this information is significantly more important than his 20 year association with Trinity and by acres more important than Palin asking a librarian in a small town whether or not she was willing to censor certain books … which were never censored or banned.
Nobody from the Obama campaign is willing to talk about CAS or community organizing other than to to dummy up cute rejoinders like “Jesus was one! !O!” or not even that much for CAS. Why won’t he or anybody else talk about it? Isn’t he proud of the work? Why doesn’t it have a profoundly important place in either of his books?
That’s all, no commie/marxist name calling. Just answer a few questions, Barack, rather than send the E-Mail minions out to shout down critics. That one is getting old and very concerning.
I’d start posting hip-hop lyrics, but I wouldn’t want to upset any delicate racial sensitivities.
I denounce all white people who read #23 and do not denounce it.
Embrace the One, whitey! Ask His forgiveness on November 4th, and ye shall be healed of your racial sins! Please turn now in your hymnal to #44.
“Waaaaashed in the Blood of Baaaar-aaaaaaaaaack”…
Actually, what Jesse said was “nigger anglers.“
Google disagrees with you, Techie.
And no, I don’t always exercise good taste. But I understand context, stylized word play and humor.
You’ll note I don’t mock or ham-it-up at the expense of holocaust and slavery. It just doesn’t taste right to me.
E’nuff said. I’ll not harp on it.
…I have not heard ACORN referred to a single time in the MSM as Communist. Has there been even ONE article or report in the MSM that examines ACORN or it’s history or the history of so many of it’s Communist members?
I haven’t read a single article in my local LAT about any aspect of the ACORN story. Actually, there are a virtual cornucopia of stories that could be written about ACORN which would be significant and relevant to the current election, but this is another subject that the MSM has chosen to scrub from their coverage.
Remember the avalanche of media coverage that the Enron collapse received? The Fannie and Freddie debacle is very similar, except, you know, bigger, yet the MSM has been strangely silent about it.
A Google search does not bring back that phrase but references Jackson’s off camera remark about Obama “talking down to n—s.”
Perhaps psycho could explain his sourcing and “intention.”
All I know is, if I don’t get 30 minutes of whiting in my new whiting bed, people are going to start crossing the street when they see me coming. Right Grandma?
Actually, you do. You just don’t realize you’re doing it. You’ve used the history of slavery as a shield against Certain People being criticized.
Ah, such quasi-magical powers in a word, even when placed in the mouths of fictitious characters unmet and unseen. Otherwise (semi) rational human beings immediately fly off in all directions flinging imprecations and hasty judgments with a ferocity so rarely seen in grocery store lines nationwide.
Grenade, he shouted, and lo, they fled!
Imagination, beloved by thor in ordinary circumstances, is abandoned with instant alacrity for a stance of high dudgeon and disgust. It’s too precious to be soon forgotten.
And scene.
The American Revolution required a little community organizing, so call out George Washington for what he was – a crypto-Marxist tool of revolution.
In my book persons so very concerned at the hijacking of certain words shouldn’t be condoning and doing the same.
Intentionalism, it’s what’s stabbed with toothpicks and served at the happy hour buffet table.
You’ll note I don’t mock or ham-it-up at the expense of holocaust and slavery.
https://proteinwisdom.com/?p=13265#comment-539148
Has any one pointed out what a fool you are lately?
So if Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn don’t like being ignored by Baracky, what could they POSSIBLY threaten to let out?
Under an equality-based Baracky administration, his old pals would be “more equal” than anyone under the sun. Bet on it.
I would have thought you all knew psycho’s style by now. Nothing in that comment is upsetting in the least.
BJTexas @ 59:
Look, none of us know whether or not Obama would like to see the “soft revolution†flower into a full blown crypto-marxist socialist state.
Oh, I think we can make an educated guess, based on the Democratic Party Platform:
Hey, it worked in Chicago — why not nationwide?
BJT
CAC accomplished getting a “Black Liberation Day” being recognozed as part of Black History Month..?
Doesn’t Trinity United adhere to Black Liberation Theology??? Didn’t O! attend that church for 20 years???
Then following the Left’s Christianists baiting logic….
Black Liberation Day = TEH COMING THEOCRACY !!!1!!eleventy!!11!!
thor, your non-response response in # 68 is the reason why I struggle to take you the least bit seriously. The cute and clever doesn’t amount to a thimbleful of exchanged ideas or reasoned debate. No amount of dropping Calvino’s name will change that.
The American Revolution required a little community organizing, so call out George Washington for what he was – a crypto-Marxist tool of revolution.
“Fight with me gentleman, and with victory will come higher taxes.”
–not George Washington
yes/no, Jeff.
Guess I’m just seeing an uptick in what I’m perceiving to be language that betrays a ….lack of grace in winning is the only way I can put it as of yet. Pre-victory jitters, maybe.
Shoot, I’m no virgin to it. Just don’t think its called for.
Why can’t it be called for when it calls out for calling, urthshu? Word.
The American Revolution required a little community organizing, so call out George Washington for what he was – a crypto-Marxist tool of revolution.
Washington formed and trained a militia, it that what you think Obama was doing in Chicago?
JBean@73
What in the world is a Social Entrepreneurs I wonder???
From Merriam-Webster: Entrepreneur-one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise
Oh I get it…A Social Entrepreneur is the local political commissar !
Bob Reed: I just wanted to say that you are teh suxor with the bolds.
html luvs u
Bob Reed @80:
Social Entrepreneur = Community organizer. (With lipstick, shade PC).
Sdferr –
Already explained my reasoning. If you don’t accept it, then you don’t. I’ve never asked for censorship of any kind, not for thor or nishi or anyone, nor am I asking for it here.
What I am trying to get across is that this partakes of the same divisive insanity the Left engages in. The Narrative of Election 08 is becoming, apparently, The Blacks Did It. Whatever happens.
Community organizers, they do not go out into the community to target the best and the brightest. When they’re doing what they do they actually approach it that way, and the most organizable ones are the ones they have the least respect for. So jeez leave psycho alone he’s not racist and you know it and if you don’t know it then you should still give him the benefit of the doubt cause he’s smarter than you are, even thor I think. Ok then I am going to finish my salad now.
oh. What Jeff said. Tasty vegetable damn I would kill for a taco.
*vegetables* I mean … broccoli is involved
Hf … can’t breathe … please stop … ACK!…*plop*
BJT
Is that good or bad?
I’m new at all this stuff…
“…this partakes of the same divisive insanity…”
I just disagree as to your conclusion here, is all.
Or, to put it another way, separate the separable and place ’em separately in nice, neat, piles, separated like. Calculi, you know, little stones.
So jeez leave psycho alone he’s not racist and you know it and if you don’t know it then you should still give him the benefit of the doubt cause he’s smarter than you are…
Yes. Much. Context.
Nah, the Approved VRWC Narrative for an Obama victory is “The MSM did it”.
Nobody’s calling psycho racist, least of all me.
A broccoli taco?
That’s so wrong.
[…] from Scott Swett and Roger Canfield, writing in the American Thinker in a post titled "Obam’s Foul Weather Friends […]
Racist.
No worries, Bob. I went through a period here where I fell in love with CAPS LOCK to make various points and the commentariat chided me for excess. All in good fun.
HTML is so alluring…
It isn’t like I don’t see what psycho’s saying, after all: Obama and Jesse represent different power bases, one centered in Chicago with the Daley machine and the Maoist-affiliated terror kids, the other regional from the South to NYC. There’s a struggle between the two, and Jesse is seeing his influence wane because of it.
OK. So say that. Not enough incendiary, I guess.
psycho is calling on his authenticity. Like a rapper. Or a VIKING!
As for the MSM, part of the problem is that many of them don’t really accept that there even is such a thing as “the Left” in this country. They see the political spectrum as Republicans, Nazis, Klansmen and other conservatives on the Right, no one but McCarthyism-spawned strawmen on the Left, and all of them normal Democrat-type folks in the center.
Hm, I google “acorn communism” and the results I got included some poet named Milton Acorn, how to make acorn mush, and a some breathless screeds by righty and PUMA blogs.
The Weathermen were reformers, people who believed the Establishment was corrupt and had to be taken down by force for the sake of the common people. Supporters of the populist, back to basics McCain/Palin ticket should have more sympathy with their program.
Read David Brooks today, please:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/opinion/16brooks.html?_r=2&ref=opinion&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
Really, read David Brooks. He’s a conservative, you can trust him.
And read Daniel Drezner too:
http://danieldrezner.com/blog/?p=3934#comments
Being conservative doesn’t have to make you stupid.
Mr. Bennet, please die in a fire. And I mean that, most sincerely.
To try to link Obama to Ayres is like trying to link Bush with the Bin Laden family.
I think if Obama is guilty for Ayres faults 20 years before Obama was born, then Bush is guilty or Bin Laden faults against America.
I find strange that no one is commenting on the fact that there are even pictures of the Bin Laden and the Bush family in their home in Texas.
Why do not we find more about this?
Sure, particularly if we didn’t mind breaking a few eggs. You know, like Tim McVeigh did.
You’re a piece of work, Bennett. You really need to see a mental health professional.
He’s just raising a welt on the fleshy n*gger lips of Obama’s reputation with his metaphorical horse whip.
Who am I to call psycho a pussy for using quotation marks when doing so? I think I’ll answer that in the odd yet oft used question-answer self-narration style. I’m a Man! That’s who I am! Employed by the Academy of the Hopeful!
O! is also the Man! He’s the One soon to be elected King.
ENOUGH OF REPUBLICAN CORRUPTION AND LIES!
The Independent Thinker has published some lies thought by Rove and friends.
Republican lies are not intependent thoughts!
Sanity, I don’t know about that. An ex-journo friend of mine (who now does PR for the local Congressional Democrat Rep)once described a former prof as being “way left of me, I’m left, and he’s way farther than I am.”
I don’t think they don’t know it exists, they just see it as being the True way to live. You might say “left” as a pejorative, they see it as a mantle of enlightment, quite unironically.
Astroturf much Bennett?
Translation to English, please?
#103 Andy:
It may be that after declaring war on the USA and bombing its people and buildings Mr. bin Laden became persona non grata. Mr. Ayers, not so much.
Neither has regrets for what they did; only one is considered a respectable member of the community in a large American city.
Really, read David Brooks. He’s a conservative, you can trust him. And read Daniel Drezner too
Really, because, you know, we don’t know how to think — so we need pundits — moral authority pundits!
The American Revolution required a little community organizing, so call out George Washington for what he was – a crypto-Marxist tool of revolution.
Tats pretty stupid, even for you thor.
Good point. McCain and Palin are hopey-changers from inside the corruption nebula. Their Republican-corruption rolodexs are golden.
The Weathermen certainly saw themselves as reformers. I see them as thugs. Their Maoist rhetoric does not impress me.
I agree with you about utopian fantasy. I am extremely impressed with Sarah Palin, but she & Uncle Cranky will not make a dent in how things get done in DC. Neither will Obama. The System, i.e. the entrenched civil service, run the FedGov. They outlast any administration, and guard their prerogatives zealously.
Uncle Cranky has experience. Scads of it. Prudence as Brooks appears to define it means knowing not to tilt at populist windmills. It’s a realistic outlook, though not especially ennobling. I don’t personally think McCain nor Obama will accomplish any lasting reform, but it can’t hurt to let them try. If they don’t even try, we’ll cope. The Republic is stronger than any of these preening peacocks.
“Comment by Matt on 9/16 @ 3:49 pm #
ENOUGH OF REPUBLICAN CORRUPTION AND LIES!”
Rangle, Pelosi, Reid, Obama, Biden, Dodd are Democrats sir.
I find strange that no one is commenting on the fact that there are even pictures of the Bin Laden and the Bush family in their home in Texas.
Oh, there has been lots of coverage of the links between the Bush and bin Laden families. Just look websites specializing in Area 51 and faked-moon-landing conpiracies. Osama bin Laden had something like 51 siblings, who operate a far-reaching global business empire. Not surprisingly, various members of the bin Laden family have rubbed shoulders with many American politicians from both parties. Actually, their closest political connection was to Jimmy Carter.
Down the path of stupidity lies more stupidity. Onward Christian soldiers!
First, I saw #23, and thought it was OK, so now I feel obligated to denounce myself.
Second, there IS a theocracy comin’ but the leftards are determined not to see it. It is, of course, an Islamofascist theocracy, and left-wing political correctness statutes forbid anyone to mention it. But they aren’t shy about telling anyone who’ll listen that they DO intend to establish (expand?) a theocracy, where women are property, and gays non-existent. But these blind fools slavishly attack Sarah. I realize it is much less dangerous, as Sarah and the Republican Party aren’t likely to hunt you down for a little knife-play, but the situation is getting ridiculous.
Bomb-planting commies are now “reformers?” Yowza.
The SDS and Weathermen were Revolutionary Communists, dedicated to the overthrow of the US Constitution. David Brooks is an idiot. That is all.
And, the WU were terrorists. Typical American incompetent leftwing terrorists, but there it is. The Red Army Faction and Bader-Meinhoff gang at least managed to not look like buffoons.
Memries,
Like the corners of my mind
Misty water-colored memories
Of the way we were
Scattered pictures,
Of the smiles we left behind
Smiles we gave to one another
For the way we were
Can it be that it was all so simple then?
Or has time re-written every line?
If we had the chance to do it all again
Tell me, would we? could we?
Memries, may be beautiful and yet
Whats too painful to remember
We simply choose to forget
So its the laughter
We will remember
Whenever we remember…
The way we were…
The way we were…
CONTROLLED DEMOLITION! PULL IT! NEVER BEFORE IN THE HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE HAS FIRE MELTED STEEL!
Sorry. It was that History Channel special on 9-11 conspiracy theories that set me off.
The American Thinkers seem to have confused the Weathermen with Burning Man or something. Not sure who this Weatherman they speak of refers to. Al Roker?
David Brooks says, via Richard Bennett:
“She has not been engaged in national issues, does not have a repertoire of historic patterns and, like President Bush, she seems to compensate for her lack of experience with brashness and excessive decisiveness.
The idea that “the people†will take on and destroy “the establishment†is a utopian fantasy that corrupted the left before it corrupted the right. Surely the response to the current crisis of authority is not to throw away standards of experience and prudence, but to select leaders who have those qualities but not the smug condescension that has so marked the reaction to the Palin nomination in the first place.”
Actually, Palin has been very engaged on three national issues of particular salience to the public currently and on which McCain’s opponent has demonstrated weakness:
Energy policy
Party loyalty over state/national interest and the corruption it engenders
The excessive power of the unelected over the elected
Perhaps Palin’s focus on these crucial issues precluded her mastery of the niceties of the Bush Doctrine, but this is hardly evidence for her lack of a repertoire of historic patterns, whatever that is supposed to mean. Judging by the overreaching of the second Inaugural, it could be argued that Bush paid too much attention to the historic patterns, and not enough staying connected with those he was elected to serve.
See: http://www.the-american-interest.com/ai2/article.cfm?Id=459&MId=21
This ain’t Plato. I say elect the executives and let them hire the philosophers. As for experienced, prudent elites: check your birthdate on Alexander Hamilton. McCain and Palin are in the Churchill mold – prudence is not on offer. These times require more than mere prudence, even if Brook’s Times do not.
The Weathermen were reformers, people who believed the Establishment was corrupt and had to be taken down by force for the sake of the common people. Supporters of the populist, back to basics McCain/Palin ticket should have more sympathy with their program.
That
Is
Fucking
Hilarious
Fuck that bomb-tossin’ Dietrich Bonhoeffer too!
Deiter, Deiter, Deiter! Kind’a silly ass name is that!
Down theComment by thor on 9/16 @ 3:59 pm #
“Down path of stupidity lies more stupidity.”
And you, son, are leading the parade.i wasn’t going to say anything, but you seemed so proud.
The founding fathers took down the establishment for the people. The Weathermen didn’t like that idea and wanted to replace the establishment with themselves. Their descendants still do.
Lemme guess, Dick, Pol Pot was just an agrarian reformer, right?
The most wonderful (in the sense of “inducing wonder in an observer”) aspect of Bush Derangement Syndrome is watching the Left and their pseudolibertarian stooges abandon every pretense of (what they claim to be) their principles the instant his name comes up.
The gravamen of the charges against Bush for Iraq is that it wasn’t necessary and was likely to cause bad byproducts. The right way to do it is diplomacy, persuasion, and leading by example — go along to get along; yes, there are vile people in the world, and one of them was Saddam Hussein, but use of force against them is Right Out. What you have to do is treat with them gently and lead them down the Paths of Righteousness. Realistic foreign policy ::spit::
And yet… Rumsfeld shook hands with Saddam! This is supposed to prove — what? I’ve never been really clear. In fact, Rumsfeld’s mission to Iraq in those days was precisely in pursuit of a “realistic” foreign policy. He was there. Nothing we could (rightfully) do would change that. The right thing to do was entangle him in trade agreements and treaties, and show him that he was better off going along with the rest of the world, and that’s what the mission Rumsfeld was part of was trying to do.
Same here. The bin Ladin family is richrichrichrich, and unlike 90% or better of Saudis it isn’t just from divvying up the oil profits among the Princes — they build things, demolish things where needed to provide construction sites, and plan construction; they sell cement, and import and export building materials; among other things. In fact, that’s part of Osama’s plan. He has about as much contempt for the Sons of Ibn Saud as most of us do, and feels like people like his family, who actually build things and accomplish things instead of running around the world to parties in jets with gold-plated taps on the hot tub, ought to be running the country. If you accept the “realistic” ::spit:: ideal of international politics, the bin Laden family are people you really ought to be cultivating. If there’s a way out of the Mexican standoff between the Sons of Ibn Saud and the followers of Qut’b, it would pretty much have to at least start with people who aren’t firmly embedded in either group, now wouldn’t it?
Regards,
Ric
For what Ayers has been up to lately, see this:
“Ayers’s influence on what is taught in the nation’s public schools is likely to grow in the future. Last month, he was elected vice president for curriculum of the 25,000-member American Educational Research Association (AERA), the nation’s largest organization of education-school professors and researchers. Ayers won the election handily, and there is no doubt that his fellow education professors knew whom they were voting for. In the short biographical statement distributed to prospective voters beforehand, Ayers listed among his scholarly books Fugitive Days, an unapologetic memoir about his ten years in the Weather Underground. The book includes dramatic accounts of how he bombed the Pentagon and other public buildings.
AERA already does a great deal to advance the social-justice teaching agenda in the nation’s schools and has established a Social Justice Division with its own executive director. With Bill Ayers now part of the organization’s national leadership, you can be sure that it will encourage even more funding and support for research on how teachers can promote left-wing ideology in the nation’s classroomsâ€â€and correspondingly less support for research on such mundane subjects as the best methods for teaching underprivileged children to read.”
I don’t worry about Obama letting Ayers anywhere near the White House. I worry about the influence Ayers already wields entirely outside Obama.
You know who else has close ties to the bin Ladens?
http://tinyurl.com/6hueht
The economy tanking:
O! is partying in Malibu with Barbra.
Yeah, Lutherans are just like commies. Oh, and Godwin called looking for you. He sounded disappointed.
Today’s Aggie joke:
Where was O.J. hiding right before the famous white Bronco Chase?
On the A&M campus, because that’s the last place you’ll find a football player.
B Moe — And more ties here — because “No matter how distasteful we may find Mr. bin Laden’s views and alleged actions, it is important that heâ€â€and the worldâ€â€understand that on a university campus in the United States, all views are worthy of an audience.â€Â
And David Brooks would agree, I’m sure, since bad things don’t happen to tolerant, urbane sophisticates — it’s just those other human life forms which are too embararassing, really, to acknowledge as one of us, and who getting in the way and making things messy by jumping out of bombed buildings and stuff.
That Brooks column has to be one of the stupidest things I’ve ever read. Ever.
That so many conservative “thinkers” will say and do just about anything to tar Palin is almost as frightening as how far the left elite has been willing to go with similar smears.
It’s like the battle is not really between conservative and liberal, but rather between who gets to speak for each — whose credentials allow them the right to pontificate. I imagine they hate Palin for the same reason they’ve long hated blogs.
Real people are interrupting their staged game of “debate.” And that’s unseemly.
I’m on record with my concern over some of McCain’s “reforms”; and I will criticize any of his new reform ideas that smack of overreach. But alternative energy strategies — to include drilling and nuclear power — along with opening up schools to competition, are worthwhile pursuits.
As is a commitment to conservative justices.
Richard can scoff at Palin — and find allies in thor and a handful of others here; but if his disgust at Palin’s snowbilly stylings so influence his thinking that it leads him to vote for, or even tacitly support, a politician like Obama, than he is cut from the same cloth as Brookhiser and Frum and Brooks, snobs merely playing at talking politics, a game they find enjoyable only when the field is cleared of all these peasants who should just stand back and let them do the heavy lifting.
thor, elsewhere:
Like I said, thor — you use the history of slavery as a shield.
And just how the hell old do you think I am? Hell, my great-grandparents were born after the Civil War, and their parents were dirt-farmers in the hollows of Kentucky.
So you can take your crap, fold it until it’s all corners, and shove it up the ass you use for your mouth.
“Some cite Chicago mayor Richard Daley’s defense of Ayers as a ‘distinguished professor of education’ and ‘a valued member of the Chicago community.’â€Â
So was Al Capone.
Not so much an educator, but valued nonetheless.
Insufferably unfunny pretentious asshole thor never alters his pedantic idiocy in the desperate hope of impressing someone with his undergraduate knowledge. Name dropping left and right (Celine, Bonhoeffer) as if anyone is the least bit awed, crafting lame humorless bon mots. It never changes. thor you remain a painfully unfunny douchebag deluxe possessing a mere fraction of intellect that you jerk off over yourself thinking that you contain. Lame as always. Pathetic sniveling cretin in love with himself. Colossal prick and loser. Object of derision as usual. Please continue, you amuse in ways you don’t intend and you’re too blinded by your own pseudo-intellectual bullshit demeanor to realize.
Except for the whole killing people thing. It’s so easy for lefties to forget that part, isn’t it? What’s the term? Radical chic?
#136 JeffG.:
It isn’t the left elite, it is just the elite (so they think). Gov. Palin has not yet earned a place in the Beltway Club. The Congress dances, and these rude people, like Gov. Palin, insist on breaking in.
Saruman speaking to Theoden in the wreckage of Isengard. “Won’t you come up?”
Theoden refuses, and Saruman reacts with all of the contempt he has. “What is the House of Eorl but a thatched barn where the brigands drink in the reek and their brats roll on the floor with the dogs?”
Tommy ain’t blind, Tommy sees.
…opening up schools to competition, are worthwhile pursuits.
I don’t have kids and have been fairly unaware of what has been going on in the public education arena, but between reading about Ayers influence, and discovering things like this:
http://tinyurl.com/5gubyz
I think what may need to happen is a parent and students strike. Pull enough kids out of these schools that lay-offs are unavoidable and you will start seeing some changes quick.
“#
Comment by SGT Ted on 9/16 @ 3:56 pm #
The American Revolution required a little community organizing, so call out George Washington for what he was – a crypto-Marxist tool of revolution.
Tats pretty stupid, even for you thor.”
Please ignore the talking pile of shit.
Thank you.
Well, Rusty, I think you’re a proud, steamin’ pile of retardation. Sorry to be so blunt, but if you’ll fuck off for a moment I’d like to address Ric, thanks.
Hey Ric, how about the fair market price of $147 per barrel oil. Lookey at it today. I think I need another one of your lectures in how “free markets” work. I could swear there’s been some unusual price movement. To have your expertise in commodity futures market pricing and would be invaluable to me. I’d willy, willy, willy, like to know what role you think Prime broker lending played in funding the highly leveraged positions in oil and derivative trading. As you know, you being a big-time economic loving Republican and all, Lehman was a very aggressive player in prime and hedge lending.
This precipitous price decline in oil trading in the wake of shuttered refining capacity has me whiffing the stench of some hell’a leverage-to-asset ratio trading positions in oil might be getting unwound. That goes against the perfect pricing model, I know, but you’re the hype-master of Adam Smith Econ 101 so give it a shot, if you would, fine sir.
I’ll sit here with my head full of silly economic Leftist/Anarchist thoughts and allow you the floor.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 9/16 @ 5:19 pm #
Please ignore the talking pile of shit.
Thank you.
Comment by Jack Klompus on 9/16 @ 5:20 pm #
Please ignore the talking pile of shit.
Thank you.
Actually, Bonhoeffer knew a guy who knew a guy who tried to bomb Hitler. Bonhoeffer is dry reading, but one of the deeper thinkers in Western Religion.
Oh. Just for the record: In the Western Religious community, I’m something of a heretic. I know that Anu is the Lord Above All Lords upon which western religious thought is based and that Enki and Enlil are still runnin’ things and fightin’ over who’s on first here on this third rock from the sun. Oh…and Marduk’s still mad ’cause he got screwed by the refs.
Eat it, you short story butchering context muncher. You were giving it to Lisa in the face and I popped you with some humor to your wet nose. If you don’t like, bugger’a bender.
I think I need another one of your lectures in how “free markets†work.
You should probably bone up first on how quotation marks work. Therein lies the answers you seek, grasshopper.
Please release your bladders onto this illiterate man’s head.
I thought that’s what I said.
Jeff says:
That’s good company.
The peasants – common people – are free to regard their superiors as snobs, but they actually prefer to leave the heavy thinking to those with the requisite skills when it’s all said and done.
Comment by B Moe on 9/16 @ 5:33 pm #
Please ignore the talking pile of shit.
Thank you.
Ah, there’s BMoe! A man with a decent caliber of intellectual curiosity! Now, I’ll admit that I know more about exotic securities than most, since I used to be a Wall Streeter. A man of many security licenses! And I might know how a free and fair market works well beyond what your average message board clown does, but what does it say to you, BMoe, that the price of oil is in a free fall during an exemplary time where we’d been pre-disposed to believe there was such increasing demand and decreasing supply, so much so in fact, that the mere news of a hurricane entering the Gulf’o Beans was, just yesterday, good for a $10-to-15 price jump in oil trading? (question marked)
I loaded the question nicely, eh.
“The peasants – common people – are free to regard their superiors as snobs, but they actually prefer to leave the heavy thinking to those with the requisite skills when it’s all said and done.”
Dick proves, yet again, that he is really, not just a prick, but a smarmy prick.
Please remind this receiving vessel for so many greased dongs past that he’s a…
Thanks in advance.
I hate it when I get busy and then I walk in on greased dongs and I don’t have the backstory or any template of understanding really and I just have to wonder til I can get home and invest the time.
Happy, is it vassal or vessel? Oy.
#151 JeffG.:
It bears repeating.
Yr.frnd., etc.
Vassals I think are above peasants if I remember right. If you’re a vassal you’re ahead of the game really. I mean it’s not like yay! I’m a vassal but you can work with it. I think.
It would suggest to me that first of all it is not really a free market, hence your use of quotation marks, and second of all that markets fluctuate. I will freely admit being ignorant of many of the intricacies of the global market, and as I have stated before, you would be the object of a little less scorn here if you would actually discuss these things instead of prissing about like a little girl with a new tiara.
Comment by happyfeet on 9/16 @ 5:53 pm #
Don’t worry, hf, it’s just the talking pile of shit practicing it’s freelance socialism by stealing Jeff’s bandwidth, and polluting the blogoshere with it’s lamebrained inanity.
Just ignore it.
It can safely be ignored.
#152 Richard:
It is good company if you consider the bulk of Americans mere peasants who need to be guided by their betters. And look! You place yourself amongst the betters!
Fancy that.
Have you ever considered following your own advice, O’Brain?
“Have you ever considered following your own advice, O’Brain?”
Yes, actually, but making fun of fucktards like thor is soooo much fun, and maybe he’ll pop an anurism.
ok, I denounce myself for that last comment.
It’s the (self-declared) elite vs. the rest of us. Compare the life histories of Jamie Gorelick and Sarah Palin — which one has avoided any scrutiny while pocketing tens of millions of dollars? Which one has been involved in some of the most destructive government failures in the last decade?
One of the two is going to be subjected to more press scrutiny. The press is digging into the life of one of them, looking for dirt — any dirt, no matter how trivial. Fer crissake, the supposedly respectable press was demanding DNA tests to prove one of them was the mother of her own child!
Yeah, one of them’s running for office. But she’s not the one who enriched herself after being appointed to offices she was not qualified to hold. She’s not the one who was appointed to review the results of her own failed policies.
But she’s the outsider — no Harvard degree, the wrong relatives, the wrong accent, the wrong thoughts — so she’ll be subjected to as close to an inquisition as the press can manage. People who hadn’t heard of Palin a month ago have decided — and publicly declared — they hate her to the point of wishing her ill.
Because, frankly, she doesn’t know her place. She’s getting above her proper station. The right people are going to do their damnedest to put her back where she belongs.
Wow.
Just ‘Wow’.
Is it just me or is the troll ratio expanding like my ass after a week of red-velvet cupcakes?
Back when I’ve got a more settled stomach.
Hi,
I wanted to draw your attention to this important petition that I recently signed:
“Impeach Senator Barack Obama”
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I like this:
http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/6222.html
Quoting Spider Robinson’s article “Rah, Rah, R. A. H.!”
“I think one could perhaps make an excellent case for Heinlein as a female chauvinist. He has repeatedly insisted that women average smarter, more practical and more courageous than men. He consistently underscores their biological and emotional superiority. He married a woman he proudly described to me as “smarter, better educated and more sensible than I am.†In his latest book, Expanded Universeâ€â€the immediate occasion for this articleâ€â€he suggests without the slightest visible trace of irony that the franchise be taken away from men and given exclusively to women. He consistently created strong, intelligent, capable, independent, sexually aggressive women characters for a quarter of a century before it was made a requirement, right down to his supporting casts.
Oddly, this complaint [“Heinlein can’t create believable women charactersâ€Â] comes most often from radical feminists. Examination shows that Heinlein’s female characters are almost invariably highly intelligent, educated, competent, practical, resourceful, courageous, independent, sexually aggressive and sufficiently personally secure to be able to stroke their men’s egos as often as their own get stroked. I willâ€â€reluctantlyâ€â€concede that this does not sound like the average woman as I have known her, but I am bemused to find myself in the position of trying to convince feminists that such women can in fact exist.”
Yeah, I thought that Sarah Palin reminded me of someone….
N.O’Brain — that parallel has been pointed out before. Expect Barrette to show up and denounce the very idea because PALIN THINKS JESUS RODE A DINOSAUR!!!!
In a lifeboat, it’s a good bet that Richard Bennett, as a flabby, pseudo-intellectual elitist, would be the first one eaten. Odds are also good that he would say something like, “Hey! Save me a drumstick!”
It is good company if you consider the bulk of Americans mere peasants who need to be guided by their betters. And look! You place yourself amongst the betters!
It’s exactly analogous to the way that dull-witted New Agers were always “Egyptian princesses” in their previous incarnations.
Guys like Dick just assume that they’ll wind up on top, come the revolution.
They never seem to understand that once the revolution is over the State has no further use for revolutionaries.
You mean to say it’s too free a market, meaning it’s too open for manipulation by leveraged players acting in concert, which is but just one form of manipulation, actually.
As I read the blowhards bellow their political-season-inspired B-school cliche belches, don’t think I don’t realize that that is the disease. Too many with no knowledge laying claim to it, moreover they’re willing to insult those who do know something, at least something, about what caused this wasteland of speculation.
I used to be much more of a conservative than I am today, sure, but my knowledge of the cap markets has no bearing on how I vote. If I vote for Obama it certainly doesn’t mean I don’t know 10X what you r-wing bitches know about capital markets and mortgage-backed securities. Do I have all the answers? No. Do I have time to lecture on securities? No. But that’s the rub, all the false assumptions of the “they” versus “us” two-party politics.
Alan Greenspan’s lowering of interest rates after the market collapse and then after 9/11 were not the correct response from the Fed, in retrospect, that’s what’s been eating my craw for a long time. The ramifications of that have come home to roost! We weren’t geared to regulate the activity that followed immense amounts of cheap borrowing costs entering the markets.
We need regulation. I don’t have much confidence that the backgrounds of Messrs. McCain nor Obama are well-suited for thoughtful regulation of the cap and commodity markets, but I do know the Darleens, et. al, out there don’t know two-shits about how the credit markets collapsed and what the ramifications of the could/will be. Yes, Bush and his economic advisers are too blame, many at the Fed, many Dem.s too, but mostly the laize faire non-regulatory climate brought to us by the those who benefited financially from such activity, and their harp choir conservative economic orchestra, which is nothing but pure economic theory bullshit, frankly. Those in the White House underestimated the extent of the crisis caused by the laize faire in-actions. And they’re still in denial about it.
shorter Crawford: Let’s stroke the head of our ignorant hick bitch while comparing her to that conniving bitch on the other side.
Thanks Rob for sharing your the-less-you-know-the-better theory with us, again.
You’re such a pussy, thor — you can’t address the argument. Largely because you’re an example of the argument, of course.
Your own rhetoric towards Palin is precisely what I was talking about: “ignorant hick”. Palin’s neither, yet your own self-image of being one of the “elite” and your investment in backing the “elite” class requires you say so.
Palin’s deeds trump those of Obama — by a mile. Her political career has shown more bravery and integrity than Obama’s entire life. Yet Obama has taken all the required steps to be one of the “elite” — the right schools, the right connections, the right stands. Obama’s supporters marvel over the “brilliance” of his speeches and his writings, yet are barely able to cite an example of something he’s actually accomplished. But being part of the elite isn’t about accomplishment; if anything, it counts against you, much as involvement in trade or industry was considered “beneath” the landed gentry.
I didn’t know we were talking about moose hunting and snowmachining. My bad.
That’s no way to talk about the runner-up to Miss Alaska 1980, thor. But it does make you wonder what the winner is doing now.
Walk a mile in my ears.
George Bush likes to chop wood. He has a Tolstoyan inclination that manual labor helps clarify one’s inner thoughts, I think.
Maybe you should fell a tree and seek out your inner-Obama. This Palin hag has you all knotted.
Marketing bikinis to Alaskan midwives? Don’t know.
Thank you Richard for stirring the viper nest. There are only so many of us centrists out there willing to stick it to ’em snake-mean Redumblicans for any length of time.
Please ignore the talking pile of shit.
Thank you.
Pass the syrup, please.
Do I have all the answers? No. Do I have time to lecture on securities? No.
So what do you have, besides a ridiculous ego and porta john graffiti masquerading as prose?
Me as his Messiah.
uh-O!
@Comment by Richard Bennett on 9/16 @ 5:42 pm
The peasants – common people – are free to regard their superiors as snobs, but they actually prefer to leave the heavy thinking to those with the requisite skills when it’s all said and done.
That’s certainly not in the spirit of all men are created equal…
You may be better educated, sir, but whether your judgment, character, or integrity is better than ordinary folk requires documentation. So, you are not necessarily anyone’s superior. Better to be content with equality of opportunity as a starting point, and let your accomplishments speak for themselves.
I don’t know you sir, or know of your accomplishments or endeavors. And, after that smirking, disdainful statement, I don’t wish to waste my time googling your name to check it out. Your attitude demeans everyday Americans, in a vile, nasty, elitist fashion. Many may not be able to keep up with current events and politics like some here are blessed to be able. But, that doesn’t mean that if given the opportunity to do so that their opinions wouldn’t be equally as valid as yours…
From Jeff’s reference, I get the feeling that you are a man of letters or academia. Let me ask you a few questions…
When your car is broken, who does the heavy thinking involved in diagnosing the problem? And when the problem is determined, do you fix it yourself?
When there is a problem with the electric, plumbing, or structure of your home, who does the heavy thinking involved in diagnosing those problems? And when the problem is determined, do you fix it yourself?
When you are ill and need a doctor or a dentist, who does the heavy thinking involved in diagnosing those symptoms? And when the problem is determined, do you treat yourself?
Sir, the beauty of the human intellect is that, given the time, we can all teach ourselves just about anything when motivated. And while the average mechanic, carpenter, electrician; et al may never know the things you do-so too will you never be an expert in their milieu either. We all need each other to do the heavy thinking for one-another at some point in time. And that’s exactly why your air of superiority is so narcissistic, egotistical, and antithetical to what America is really all about.
I’ll thank you to leave me to do my own heavy thinking for myself…
Interesting question: “When your car is broken, who does the heavy thinking involved in diagnosing the problem? And when the problem is determined, do you fix it yourself?”
Not the kind of thing you want to ask a dude who worked his way through college rebuilding Volkswagen engines, but it raises an interesting point. As you say, given time and opportunity, lots of folk can do lots of things. That’s certainly true. But we don’t have time and opportunity to do stuff we’re not good at, so it’s more efficient to pay people to do what they’re good at while we focus on what we’re good at, right? This is human society’s natural division of labor.
A long time ago this Grecian fellow named Plato figured out that running things is a skilled occupation, and he theorized that societies would work best if the people with the most skill at running things ran things most of the time. Some of them Grecians in Plato’s day were smart, and this may be one of their smarter ideas.
All men aren’t *really* created equal, they’re to be considered that way by the law for various practical reasons. The truth is that the Holy Baby Jesus, in the wisdom of his plan for this world, has endowed us with diverse skills and interests.
It’s not our place to question his judgment.
I pointed this out on another web site: Obama is claiming that he is going to save the economy, yet his campaign is burning through cash almost as fast as it is bringing it in. The one time he was put in charge of handling other people’s money, he spent over NINE figures with no tangible results. Michelle Obama has admitted that until his book advances came in, they were barely making ends meet, and even after that were essentially living paycheck to paycheck.
You could leave aside EVERYTHING else–the ties to the professional voter-fraud organization ACORN, leftist radicals, the messiah complex, the loony-tunes followers, the racist spiritual mentor, his complete lack of spine in the Senate–and his economic record alone would be enough to make even Simple Jack realize that voting for him is stupid. The man cannot control his own finances, both professionally and personally, and the left wants to put this man in office.
Fuck that shit.
@ thor
Alan Greenspan’s lowering of interest rates after the market collapse and then after 9/11 were not the correct response from the Fed, in retrospect, that’s what’s been eating my craw for a long time. The ramifications of that have come home to roost! We weren’t geared to regulate the activity that followed immense amounts of cheap borrowing costs entering the markets.
thor, I give you credit for recognizing what really has driven the current financial sector meltdown…
I believe that I would also add that the whole sub-prime bug was put in the high-financeers brains by the mandate of the community re-investment act, both in 1990’s as well as under Bush. It’s fascinating how some big money guys could fall victim to their own greed. Instead of simply carrying the required number of these loans, as a percentage of their overall portfolios, on their books-they behaved like crackheads. After they’d bundled and sold the first batch of these securities, for a tidy profit, they were hook and began to peddle them as creative finance tools and viable alternatives instead of the de-facto low-income ownership vehicle they were intended to be. So, instead of Lehman’s exposure being limited to 10 or 20 percent of these bundled securities, they repeated the lie to themselves until they were convinced of it-that these were mortgages after all and were backed by fannie, freddie, and HUD; these were secure instruments, and paying a nice rate too. And the bond rating houses went along with them, just like the corrupt appraisers in bed with the banks…
This doesn’t relieve anyone who signed on for these crummy high-interest loans from the personal responsibility of being able to honor the contract they signed. I know a lot of folks, non-minority, who fell for these deals and are crying the blues now; but non would say it was predatory. They have a hundred excuses, but oppression is not one of them…
And, by the way, Booooooooosh did have concerns about this a few years ago, Check out this NY Times story , but the Democrats on the hill wanted to play obstructionist and wouldn’t let him have it…
Regards…
post 30 Sdferr
I think i may have misunderstood psycho’s post. I did not mean to offend.i was’nt trying to start a fight.
If i was wrong,i apologize to you psycho.
Im a dumbass.
I think i’ll go sit in the corner, and be quiet.
or maybe go and play Silent Storm
Tony
South Haven,MI
Thanks for your comment. It’s fairly common knowledge that GNMA pass-thru certificates and FNMA CMOs may both pay interest and principle monthly, but they are of two very different credit classes.
Underwriting fees became teen porn to some investment banking houses over the years. The only problem now is our tax-payer money is backing single A and lower paper versus GNMA pools and, today, we are on the hook for numbers with zeros that’d stagger a TI-84.
It would be helpful if Europe also cracked. We might get more sympathy from the vultures that way.
A cynic’s eye and a respect for what goes into sausage.
A long time ago this Grecian fellow named Plato figured out that running things is a skilled occupation, and he theorized that societies would work best if the people with the most skill at running things ran things most of the time. Some of them Grecians in Plato’s day were smart, and this may be one of their smarter ideas.
But unfortunately, we select our leaders with a popularity contest that has jack shit to do with leadership. But I would like you to take a serious stab at answering this, where in their resumes have Obama, Biden, Barr, or any of the other candidates you care to mention, shown leadership skills or abilities that impress you more than McCain or Palin?
Not vague bullshit and snark, but real instances and examples.
A cynic’s eye and a respect for what goes into sausage.
Sorry O’Brain, but a part of me can’t help but like this fucker.
Suddenly I’ve a longing to break out my Yeats.
@ Comment by Richard Bennett on 9/16 @ 8:07 pm
Touche…You have a point about the division of labor. And also about some of those folks in Plato’s day being pretty smart. I’ll argue that they might have not been so easily overcome had they been as practical and productive as they were smart, but that’s beside the point.
I still disagree with you that all men are not equals. I don’t know if you mentioned Jesus to chide me because of my use of the “blessed” term, or because you really believe. I get the feeling that it was a rhetorical thrust though since in the eyes of God all men are brothers and therefore equal. While that doesn’t preclude us having different skill sets and abilities, it does put on a existentially equal set within the constructs of Christianity. Also, that same belief stresses humility, service, and the notion that our individual skills are given to us to serve others, as needed, just as we are served.
Humility is an important element of a person’s makeup, along with ability, elan, intelligence and integrity they are the pillars of one’s character. A crucial element in leadership is one’s character; it can be masqueraded and dramatized.
So, I maintain that while intelligence is a sought after attribute, it is but an element of leadership, and by itself does not make one existentially superior.
Forgive me my earlier rant; I am one to correct bully’s in real and ideological. And these days especially, I am sensitive to what I percieve to be elitist slights…
I blame poetry for my transformation into brooding contemporary apologist.
Comment by Bob Reed on 9/16 @ 8:53 pm
Sorry for al the typos on this post, but it’s late back east (in elitist NYC)and I’ve been drinking a bit…
Comment by thor on 9/16 @ 8:27 pm
It would be helpful if Europe also cracked. We might get more sympathy from the vultures that way.
As much as I hate to see others suffering, perhaps unnecessarily, I must admit that I secretly wish that would happen every day…
The Feds are going to loan AIG $85-billion.
Fuckin’ A, is there no limit on our credit card?
“Suddenly I’ve a longing to break out my Yeats.”
Is that what the kids call it nowadays?
thor, there have always been bubbles and panics and runs. There always will be. Once upon a time it was tulips. This time it was securitized derivative bundles of derivative securities, or whatever the Hell the jargon is. Next time it’s liable to be Martian mining futures. Tell you what: figure out how to keep preteens from wheedling a day’s wages out of Poppa to squeeze themselves into units of ten thousand all screaming at the latest “hottie”, and I’ll let you design the regulations, hey? It’s exactly the same thing. If you can’t prevent Hula Hoops, Pet Rocks, and/or J-Lo you haven’t got a hope in Hell of curbing the next business fad.
Richard: Nothing I have seen in my lifetime suggests to me that desire for power and ability to manage are positively correlated. I would suggest to you that the coefficient is small, and negative. We need the brightest and most able people available in managerial positions, but if you want a useful eugenics program, I would suggest that anybody who volunteers to be Philosopher-King (let alone anyone who demands the position) be shot out of hand, along with all their progeny.
Regards,
Ric
Horseshit. The natural state of affairs is a kind of healthy, monotonic (but not excessive, mind you) growth in which inflation is zero, yet everyone’s pay rises equally. Not in equal proportion: equally.
We’re just not doing it right. If only we had smarter people in charge, we’d do better. What we need is another Jimmy Carter. Or…I hear that Dick Nixon guy was pretty sharp.
First, I’ll apologize for commenting without reading the previous comments — it’s late and I’m beat from hiking in Yellowstone [grin] — I’m probably just repeating what’s been discussed. But..
Here’s what really chaps the MSM: Search Google News for ‘Obama ACORN’ (with no quotes) and you get 198 results. This is very apparently news not fit to print. But google the entire intertubes and you get 720,000 results. Try as they might, the MSM can’t stop the signal. They can’t shape the narrative as they’d like. Is it any wonder they hate the blogosphere?
Or, you know, Brezhnev.
Europe worse shape than we are. I expect whining, not sympathy. With the exception of 9/11 type tragedy, never expect sympathy from Europe. And in those cases, never expect it to last.
I hope Bennett don’t go crazy trying to find an answer to 194. It was a bit like telling him to go shit in the corner of a round room, I fear.
B Moe, I’m still wondering how he reconciles being a father’s rights guy with his utter obliviousness to the idea that Todd Palin can be an effective primary caregiver to Trig.
A long time ago this Grecian fellow named Plato figured out that running things is a skilled occupation, and he theorized that societies would work best if the people with the most skill at running things ran things most of the time. Some of them Grecians in Plato’s day were smart, and this may be one of their smarter ideas.
Then, why are you supporting a person who has no real experience running things at all, who’s ideas have empirically been shown to fail over and over. It’s like saying we need to trust the car mechanic who thinks pouring sugar in the gastank is a solution, merely because he’s a mechanic and knows better than the rest of us, when anyone with sense woulds say, “no thanks, that mechanic has his head up his ass.”
The “best and brightest” aren’t that at all. Talent is everywhere and it doesn’t necessarily attend University. There is no one document that points to *who* are the “leaders”, other than the self-appointed/anointed folks whe confuse their pedigree and/or diploma with a licence to run others lives. This flies in the face of individual liberty and freedom in general. That is the problem of trying to practicably apply Plato’s general statement into a Governing system. It is inherently un-American in thinking that one must attend the “right” schools in order to “lead”. Bullshit, because no one asked you to run their lives, which is the main point entirely. Talk of societies “natural leaders” like that makes me want to bring a little revolution on their presumptuous ass.
Bill Gates is a prime example, a college dropout who became one of the richest, most powerful men in the world because of his leadership ability.
Had to be leadership, he obviously don’t know shit about software.
I’m not really skeptical of the leaders-should-be-smart suggestion, but more is required than smarts. Just ask Dick Nixon. Hopefully I don’t have to do a complete review of all of the smart people who sucked as leaders, to make this point.
Or we could run Richard Bennett for president, and see how that works out. Getting people to vote for him might be Herculean, though.
Talent is everywhere and it doesn’t necessarily attend University.
And of course there’s more than one kind of “talent”. Proponents of the ‘philosopher king’ model of fascism (and no mistake, that’s what it is) typically assume that the talents required to succeed in academia are the same talents required to succeed in government.
Let’s look at things empirically, shall we?
Hoover: engineer
Carter: engineer
Wilson: college professor
Taft: college professor
These administrations are not widely considered to among the most successful.
Of the “famous-enough-to-appear-on-money” Presidents, we have:
Washington (no degree, had what amounted to a trade school certificate in surveying)
Jefferson: undergraduate degree – William and Mary
Jackson: no degree
Lincoln: no degree — became a lawyer through self-study
Grant: US Military academy (poor academic record)
FDR: Columbia Law (perhaps the one exception here)
Truman: dropped out of law school
Franklin (not a President, of course): self-educated
You know, when Barrack touted running his campaign as major executive experience, nobody questioned if it was his decision to forego federal funding, and how that seems in hindsight to be a rather regrettable strategy. It is almost as if no one is holding him responsible.
Barrack Obama-
The buck never stops.
Denounced again.
Okay, denounced a couple more times.
As someone who has to actually lead people – life and death and combat and all that, I find Mr. Bennett’s assertion of:
“The peasants – common people – are free to regard their superiors as snobs, but they actually prefer to leave the heavy thinking to those with the requisite skills when it’s all said and done.”
laughable when taken in regards to leadership. I have seen “common people” inspire, I have seen those with all the right “credentials” not be worthy of following into an Irish tavern with free beer on St. Patricks Day. It all comes down to how the psuedo-elite like Mr. Bennett think they can identify the “betters”. I have seen it in the crucible fire of combat – and because of it I do not presume to pre-judge the leadership abilities of those I have not seen in leadership positions. But I don’t have to ignore the evidence of character, behavior and such. I really don’t like what I have seen from Senator Obama. And should being a member of the legislature be considered “leadership”, then I am even mre dismayed.
Soon-to-be Lt. Colonel John !!!!!
JD – the countdown will start soon for LTC.
I am always happy to see your name show up on here. Keep you head down and congrats on trading in those oak leaf clusters for the bird.
THe bird comes with COL, I just get to trade gold leaf for Silver/black leaf.
I am dummerer than a box of rox, butt smarter than timmah and caric.
[…] questions that are mounting about the past associations of the saviour of the planet; and “The lack of media interest in the role of former domestic terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn in Democratic nominee Barack Obama’s political ascent in Chicago is one of the most remarkable […]
I still disagree with you that all men are not equals.
Thay’re not ,Dick. They’re just created that way. Choices, Dick. it’s how we exploit our choices that makes the difference between a methhead and a surgeon.Charachter then.
“Things fade. Alternatives exclude.”