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Citizen_X

Published Letters: 330
Editor's Choice: 15

Sunday, February 22, 2009 10:09 AM

Also: doesn't Beck owe Colbert royalties by this point?

Apparently, Beck keeps watching Colbert and saying, "Hey, that's a good idea."

His "WAR ROOM" graphic looks an awful lot like the one for Colbert's "THREATDOWN." (Without the screaming siren that raised my blood pressure considerably the first, oh, twenty times or so that I heard it.) And this is after Beck went on a rant about "trusting your gut" that was taken practically verbatim from Colbert. Thus Colbert had to one-up him by actually showing his gut, via proctoscope (!).

Once again, the 21st-century American right makes it difficult for satire to keep the lead in the Crazy Race.

Sunday, February 22, 2009 09:55 AM

So let's coopt (the few sane parts of) their rhetoric

One of the things that's not like the '90s is the fact that there's a been a genuine collapse in basic civil liberties and constitutional checks in the intervening years. Who here--well, besides shooter and the other trolls--is not concerned about Obama continuing some of the Bush policies re: habeus corpus, the imperial presidency, etc?

My point is there are a very few principled conservatives and libertarians who would support pro-constitution movements. This would have the benefits of strengthening and broadening the movement and undercutting the Obama-is-coming-for-you nutjobs.

Friday, February 20, 2009 09:11 AM

From Limbaugh, the point emerges: moving the goalposts

"You've said you're against reinstating the Fairness Doctrine, but you've not made it clear where you stand on possible regulatory efforts to impose so-called local content, diversity-of-ownership, and public-interest rules that your FCC could issue."

You can practically hear the sneering: so-called local content. Public-interest rules. None of these points have anything to do with the specific Fairness Doctrine, but Limbaugh is merrily conflating them. They could stand, however, in the way of eternal monopoly control of media outlets and content.

I am completely in favor of any effort to break up the media monopolies. That is the more important game, and perhaps Limbaugh dimly realizes that. I don't really care so much for the Fairness Doctrine; I think it operated within a post-WWII/Cold-War-era political consensus that no longer exists. However, if the saying, "Fairness Doctrine!" lights up the wingnuts, I'm all in favor, just for distraction's sake.

Thursday, February 19, 2009 10:03 AM
Original article: Eggs are people, too

Yes, we should compel some people to carry them to term...

What do we do with all those fertilized eggs sitting around IVF clinics? "Is it morally acceptable to leave those egg-people in a freezer for their whole lives, or should we compel some people to carry them to term?"

To the last question, absolutely! And it's easy to pick the candidates for this honor. They must fulfill two conditions. They must:

1) be a member of the North Dakota legislature, and

2) have voted for this bill.

Yes, I know, many of them are male, and have not been blessed by God with a proper vessel for easily carrying these precious little snowflakes to term. But science can find a way, just as surely as it'll prove evolution wrong any day now. I have faith!

Wednesday, February 18, 2009 07:59 PM
Original article: Judging autism

@Ambassadoodle

Absence of evidence does not equal evidence of absence

Ah, yes, nearly the exact words Rumsfeld used to defend his scaremongering Iraqi WMD BS. And how many died behind that lie?

No, I'm not equating you to Rumsfeld. But that sentence is too long: it can simply stop at, "Absence of evidence is not evidence." Which is, of course, a tautology. Absence of evidence means you got nothing. Nothing that'll save any kids, or solve any problems.

When you or anyone else come up with something, let us know.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009 07:37 PM

All right! Fox News is taking on the military-industrial complex!

Oh, they're not? Never mind, then.

And that's a challenge for all the wingnuts that are going to show up here: please explain to us how the ~$800 billion we're going to spend on the stimulus is vast government interference in our hitherto virginal market, and the $600 billion we spend on "defense," every year, is not.

It is a mixed economy...just like all industrial economies, even the so-called Communist ones. Your Capitalists' Paradise has never existed, and never will, except as propaganda to cover massive corruption.

Now: how, then, do we properly mix this economy? You may favor market solutions, I may favor government intervention, and that's fine. But let's not pretend the economy is something it's not.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009 11:45 AM
Original article: Don't cry for me, Wasilla

One more vote against "snow machine" pedantry

Why, O pedants, are we required to call it a "snow machine?" Aren't snow blowers and snow-making machines also "snow machines?" Why not more descriptive--and already commonly-used--names? Thus, a snow blower blows snow. A snowmobile moves over snow. Duh.

Governors of petrostates who deny AGW, even as it melts permafrost, destroying their own infrastructure, who imagine that the ANWR, with 7 billion barrels, max, will reverse our decline in oil production after North Slope oil, at 13 bbls, didn't, and who reportedly think our ancestors were walking around with dinosaurs, don't exactly get to lecture me on pointless changes in terminology.

Monday, February 16, 2009 09:52 AM
Original article: Watching Republicans grieve

@steviekm3

Let us remember Nazi was "National Socialist German Workers" Party which believed in the failure of laissez-faire capitalism. The most racist, totalitarian, evil party was born out of the left. Time and time again throughout history.

Keerist onna cracker, read a fucking book or something! The Nazis came out of the German Right; they got their support from the Right, they entered a coalition with a Right-wing government, and they made war on the Left. If you were a German Socialist or Communist, you got sent to a concentration camp.

When lefties go nuts with state power--at least at any time after the French Revolution--that's called Communism. I may not like it, but Communists are our ugly relatives.

The Fascists, in all their forms--German, Italian, Spanish, or any others--are yours. It's time you owned up. If nothing else, because you're looking awfully similar these days.

PS: Laissez-faire capitalism? Never existed, never will. What you get is rank corruption, perfumed with "free-market" bullshit. Or maybe you've never heard of Halliburton.

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