Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 682 Editor's Choice: 9
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The toughest thing about the questions..
[Read the article: Will Obama's debate stumble hurt him?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]..must have been resisting the temptation to just punch those imbecile moderators in the mouth.
If Clinton's tack was to do what her husband Bill did while being interviewed by Chris Wallace not too long ago, I would respect her so, so much more. Likewise, I feel that Obama should have been less restrained and gone for the jugular.
The tactics used last Wednesday are exactly what Glenn Greenwald talks about in his new book, and the counter tactic has to be to publicly and unequivocally call bullshit.
While Obama's "a more perfect union" was undeniably a great speech, he also needs to answer questions like "do you think Rev. Wright loves this country?" with answers like, "He served in the military, he serves his community, and he is frustrated and angry -- exactly /because/ he loves this country. I would go as far as saying that he is bitter, but it is not from a lack of trying."
Likewise, Clinton should respond to questions about Bosnia with a clear cut "asked and answered. I made a mistake. What's next."
I would pay good money to see both of them, lawyers, cross-examine the press.
And that is, in essence, what Greenwald does. Thus far, excuses and turning the other cheek have not worked. Ignoring it doesn't work. Some times you have to punch a bully in the mouth.
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South Park
[Read the article: I Like to Watch]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]South Park skews right, and vaguely libertarian.
Its fine when they lampoon the drug war, or Paris Hilton, but I thought they dove off the deep end with their send-up of Al Gore. Normally, making fun of Gore is something I wouldn't take offense of, if it weren't for the fact that the timing of the episode was very odd: Gore had been out of the mainstream kleig-lights for years. Why send him up for his views on the environment. The answer is that the "left wing" and its "reality agenda" did not consider Gore's just released (to little fanfare) "An Inconvenient Truth" to be newsworthy. So, why spend 1 million dollars animating a half hour animated comedy sending it up? Talk radio.
That's the dirty truth. Parker and Stone derive inspiration from talk radio. Mind you, nothing is funnier that Cartman, whom Parker and Stone claim in interviews to be most like, running around school fomenting race-war after Stan Marsh, Kyle's father, makes a racial gaffe, ala Michael Richardson. But there is a whiff of apologetics for Richardson, who, rightly, apologizes and should be forgiven, and indicting the culpability of mob mentality whipped into a frenzy by Al Sharpton types. While Sharpton is occasionally (if not frequently) deserving of some lampooning, you start to notice a pattern of uneven leveling of criticism: Rush, Bill O'Reilly, Coulter, Imus and the rest of the right wing clown brigade are almost never touched by the poison pen of Parker or Stone. The Bush administration is rarely criticized. Liberal and progressive causes are taken out of context and excoriated (atheism, intelligent design debate, environmentalism, pacifism).
So, regardless of whether they were (originally) conscious of it or not, Parker and Stone had drifted well right by 2003 or so; they have, I'm sure, been called to task on it by now in other forums. The bias exists, in the background. It is no coincidence that a (trumped up, barely there) rivalry exists between Parker and Stone and ideological antithesis (in many ways) Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy and American Dad.
MacFarlane goes to greater lengths to disguise his agenda in Family Guy with a string of non-sequitor cut-aways (Parker and Stone make fun of the show by suggesting that manatees with "plot-balls" randomly select the Family Guy plot sequences), and does not hide his agenda at all in American Dad.
I would guess that MacFarlane is more closely align to the Salon.com/Olbermann set than Parker and Stone, who probably count as their hard core fan base more than a few Ron Paul supporters.
I would not want to suggest that Parker and Stone are neither funny nor have legitimate social and political critiques; they are and they do. However, sometimes they drift too right for my tastes, and sometimes the critiques go as far as acting as a proxy for right-wing talking points ("Man Bear Pig").
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Cherry pick this
[Read the article: I Like to Watch]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I can prove South Park skews right, but I don't want to waste an afternoon of cross-referencing or research, you jerk.
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Snarf..
[Read the article: This Modern World]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"I hope the police start using torture.."
Start? Good lord, what country are you living in and can I move there?
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Yawn
[Read the article: Bill Clinton's Golden Oldies act]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Get over yourselves, Salon.com. Is it because you know your girl is going down in flames the reason you haven't endorsed her yet, or are you still clinging to that tired old lie of "impartiality." I showed some of the Walsh articles to various members of my extended family for comments, and the nicest thing they could come up with was "intellectually confused" as a way of describing Joan's torturous, twisted defense of Senator Clinton. Clearly, Shapiro is in love with the former president. To what address should I send him a blue dress?