Letters to the Editor
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correction
Left out the ellipses between the two Freidman grafs. Sorry.
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-- quickstrategy
At the risk of being branded as an O/T Loon, may I please take advantage of this lull in posting to publicly declare my desire that you stick around here for a while.
My whipper still snaps.
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@ L.W.M.
In 1995, McArthur Wheeler walked into two Pittsburgh banks and robbed them in broad daylight, with no visible attempt at disguise. He was arrested later that night, less than an hour after videotapes of him taken .from surveillance cameras were broadcast on the 11 o'clock news. When police later showed him the surveillance tapes, Mr. Wheeler stared in incredulity. "But I wore the juice," he mumbled. Apparently, Mr. Wheeler was under the impression that rubbing one's face with lemon juice rendered it invisible to videotape cameras (Fuocco, 1996).
I think that's what they want us to think. If we all went around being invisible, they could control us!
I think it's more like the game you play with three-year-olds, putting your hands over your eyes, and saying, "I don't see Arne. Where's Arne? I can't see Arne...", resulting in loud giggles from the three-year-old as to how silly you are....
This is a game played to perfection by "Bart" over at Balkinization (and his former side-kick Sh**ter here). But adults seem to have lost their whimsical sense of humour, so the giggling is more restrained.
Cheers,
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piling on
I don't know from snapping whippers, but I second the request that quickstrategy take up residence here. At least build a second home ... mountain retreat ... weekend getaway ... or, even just pitch a tent.
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Support
By God I never ever never supported this dumb son-of-a-bitch and his stupid war. Things have turned out just as bad as I suspected from the start.
It is my constant prayer that they will all burn in Hell.
I think it was the Guilt of Kings that caused the protestants to come up with an easy and painless absolution for even the worst of the worst Sins: The Salvation of Jesus.
It's when these poor assholes realize the weight of their transgressions that they'll start looking for SOMETHING to hold on to. Cell bars sounds like a plan to me.
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Sinjan/Pedinska
I think we all have it in us to express RWA traits. Certainly at the population level, it has been shown that circumstance can shift how groups of people think so that they become more authoritarian.
I agree with you. Certainly we have seen how the Bush administration has used this tactic. It is equally interesting to me how those of us who are resistant to this kind of manipulation came to be so.
Thanks for the link.
-- Pedinska
The traits you are both talking about are left-wing as well as right-wing. We all have it inside us to lord it over others to get things we want, to make ourselves feel superior, to punish, or a host of other reasons that makes power corrupting. Power has been a corrupting evil since men have banded together into armed gangs. Power is discussed negatively in texts that date back to the beginning of writing.
What to do? Restrict power as much as you can. The founders of this country claimed they were trying to do this. (I sometimes wonder if they were completely honest men)
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Desiderata
I'm already on record in favor, but please record a yes vote for quickstrategy from me also. I picture him just up the road from GC!, and when he raises the flag in the morning, even us leftist one-worlders will be happy to stand at attention. If America were more like qs and GC!, it'd be a green and pleasant land indeed.
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Blind
Willingness to support war once that inspection record was revealed to be imperfect: incorrect, given how poor the Bush administration's preparation for the post-Saddam period turned out to be. It was very hard to realize how shoddy this preparation was, looking from the outside, but I wish I had dug deeper and pressed harder.
Two obvious things(besides being a war/occupation) told me that any Iraq (mis)adventure was screwed , before it was even started . As of September 11, 2002 , we had spent ~ 12 billon on the war in Afghanistan , and ~ 5 Million(!) on reconstruction. About 6 weeks before the Iraq war started, there was a one-day conference to discuss the future of post-Saddam Iraq. Seems as though that should have been the the first thing discussed .
How does a supposedly professional scholar/pundit/thinktanker, whose full-time job is to study such matters miss that? Or see it, and ignore/dismiss it?
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Re: "I say take him to the wall"
Please peeps, be careful with this sort of thing, especially when Che has tied it into a coming "revolution." This is just the sort of commentary Glenn's enemies -- and ours all -- could use to try to get the blog and some commenters in trouble for issuing "threats" of assassination, violence & etc., even if some or all mean it rhetorically.
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Fact of the Day: victimless crime
A victimless crime is one in which the accused has not acted in a manner harmful to another. In other words, nothing was stolen; no property damaged; no other party was hurt, no other real person that is. What has occurred is this: The accused has broken some "shall" or "shall not" statute of law. In all such cases the state assumes the role of victim, no matter that in most cases the accused is the real victim and the state the assailant.
http://www.reference.com/thisday/
Where is arch anyway?
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What a low rent, mean, pat yourself on the back, attack.
If one wonders why some commenters here are self-indulgent, quarrelsome, and petty, one need only cite "birds of a feather". Gee Glenn, why not just write a post entitled, "Why I'm The Greatest Anti-War Hero Of All Time" (except that I was in favor of invading Afghanistan).
Here's a guy that gives you credit for setting a high standard, and then attempts to measure himself against that standard, but all you have is scorn for his efforts. Jeebus, has no one ever counseled you that kicking someone when they're down is an act of gratuitous savagery?
The worst part of all this is the monumental hubris of accusing someone of negligent homicide, while advocating exactly the same thing in a different country that didn't attack us either. And with blithe disregard you ignore the fact that without invading Iraq you would never be in the position you are today of prancing and giggling "I told you so, I told you so" like a three year old. Alternating that childish glee with impersonations of Torquemada presiding over potential heresies, is just whack.
I understand that being a one trick pony is tiring, but you should really consider the mature tack of acknowledging an opponents congratulations, rather than slap them away as if they are nothing. Right now, O'Hanlon is the better man.