Letters to the Editor
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@ mico220
My Man Godfrey is making funny.
(Love the family names, MMG!)
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Take it down a notch!
"Loser"
"Fucking troll?"
Let's all settle down, everyone. Engage in a heated (or not) exchange of ideas, but let's set this type of invenctive aside.
Unless it's really, really witty. And even then, maybe you should leave it out.
Seriously, though: why is it that no one's opinion is ever mistaken, misguided, misinformed, etc., but rather, the screed of a fucking loser troll? Isn't this what Fox News is for?
Jeez...
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Acting Out
Last week the local news got to lead with Maximum Hysteria Team Coverage when a 14 year old kid was discovered planning a "Columbine-style assault" on a local high school. One of the more sensational aspects of the reports was video of the suspect's bedroom, which appeared to contain an arsenal of automatic weapons.
Further reports described the would-be perp as a classic isolated, bullied, socially rejected adolescent driven back into his head.
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/137-10142007-1423366.html
His parents indulged the kid's propensity for collecting weapons to boost his morale-- from the outside, that seems so obviously heinously wrong, but I've known parents truly agonizingly trapped into similar warped enabling.
BTW, on closer inspection all but one of the weapons turned out to be air guns; one gun was real, and that's one too many. Still, there were tons of knives and evidence of homemade bomb-making with black powder and BB shot.
I see a parallel between this wretched teenager and the subjects of Glenn's post. The latter were born into circumstances that allowed them to sublimate their addiction to violence and Manichean righteousness into pseudo-intellectual forms. They didn't need to adopt the Working-Class Goth Megadeath ("Columbine-style") approach; unlike this lonely teen, they were fortunate enough to be born into families with great sociopathic traditions, including access to appropriate sociopathic institutions of higher learning. And sociopathic connections sufficient to guarantee a lucrative career cheerleading warmongers.
The difference between the shooter wannabe and these dynasties of mountebanks is one of degree, not kind. Instead of an insidious attraction to a dream of (briefly) becoming an all-powerful executioner and laying waste with a vengeance, the chickenhawks project their neurotic violent fantasies into a socially acceptable career, and espouse principles and plans that bring death in abundance to everyone but their own privileged class.
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So that pretty much sums up the GOP:
kids of parents with ideologies drilled into kids heads as opposed to free-thought or individual choice.
It's a tribal mentality/ideolgy passed down from generation to generation. (or brainwashing)
This explains why they (the GOP) is so far removed from accepting reality.
These people have probably been living the fear-based propaganda for generations(at their parents hands)-
No wonder they always play the victim card.
They don't know how to think any other way.
Mommy & Daddy have always done the thinking for them-so actually making decisions in life is next to impossible.
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@ My Man Godfrey
You forgot Glenn's islamocommunist-documentary-filming brother Robert Greenwald.
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re: Take it down a notch!
"Seriously, though: why is it that no one's opinion is ever mistaken, misguided, misinformed, etc., but rather, the screed of a fucking loser troll?"
Because My Man Godfrey wasnt stating a "mistaken, misguided, misinformed, etc." opinion, nor was he engaging in the free exchange of ideas. He was attempting to undermine the credibility of this article, and GG in general, by fabricating a lie.
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Bethincary
Hold the phone. Many democrats/progressives/liberals also inherited their politics from their parents, just as so many people inherit their relgious beliefs. I'm sure each of us knows a number of exceptions, but still, your reasoning doesn't strike me as fair.
Are conservatives inheriting their political beliefs at a significantly greater rate than their counterparts on the left? Perhaps in some places, but I doubt in the more left-leaning areas of the country.
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Dalefi & My Man Godfrey
He was attempting to undermine the credibility of this article, and GG in general, by fabricating a lie.
-- dalefi
Guys, guys, guys. Man Man was making a humorous joke. Little satire. Ha ha. Cool thy jets.
Yes, he did forget brother Robert Greenwald.
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Fabricating a lie: see Satire, or Sarcasm, use of
Wow, you are seriously humor-impaired if you took Godfrey's post literally. Go back and read it again. Are you telling me you seriously thought he was saying Glenn was setting himself up for a post in the GRAVEL ADMINISTRATION?
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@ Dalefi
No, he wasn't.
My Man Godfrey was trying to be funny. We can debate whether or not the attempt was successful, but surely it wasn't an attempt to spread lies. Don't you think his post was a little too... exaggerated to be a genuine smear campaign?
But the bigger point is a bigger point. I wasn't reacting only to the responses to Godfrey (I thought I had made that clear, but it's possible I hadn't.) People who post comments to Mr. Greenwald's articles often sling that kind of hostility around and it's just plain ugly.
Heaven forbid you generally agree with Mr. Greenwald, but take exception to this detail or that detail, this idea or that idea. It's astonishing the wrath that gets visited upon you.
Perhaps it's the anonymity of the internet that allows us to be much meaner than we ever would face to face. Or maybe we're taking our cues from what's going on out there. Regardless, when it happens, it reveals that some liberals aren't quite as tolerant as liberalism would have us be.
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No Need To Look Abroad
parryisle says:
"If you seek a monument for the Kagan's just look around Iraq - one of mankind's oldest civilizations now reduced to a scrap heap of destruction."
I'd say the destruction, or rather, the intent of the destruction, is much closer to home. If you want to see what these rascillions* are up to, open up your curtains and take a peek outside. If you're a couch potato, turn on your TV. Sheesh, they don't hate us because of our freedoms. They hate us because of what we've become. An observer from any outside culture only has to watch American Idol or Fox's Friends for 5 minutes, and they realize, Woah, dude. This country needs a severe make-over.
*To paraphrase an interesting quote I read a day or so ago: "I can understand why these people act like assholes -- it's because they are. But you lose me when they take such pride intheir 'assholedness'."