MaxSpeak, You Listen!
You should call instapundit the "wingnutty professor"! Just hammer the guy relentlessy the the vrwc does to evrybody else. see what happens
Pffffpt sputter sputter mother %#@%@^& sonofa phfssssss.
good idea.
Speaking of Saddam; I wonder when his show trial will be queued up. Think they can delay it until the congressional midterm elections?
Nice flame, Max. That punkass needed to be smacked down.
I should read this blog more often.
I agree, if I had my way Saddam would still be in power in a toothless state
like Iraq, we would still have all of the money we've spent,
and 10,000 military families wouldn't be mourning the loss of thier
family members.
Shouldn't that be, "Few on the Internet can claim more credit...?"
But, bravissimo.
Serious question: Reynolds didn't used to be nearly this bad, did he? Because I remember his site as having sometimes been interesting a couple-three years ago. Now, it's unreadable. Did he get worse or did I get better?
I'd rather have Osama in custody and Saddam free than what we have now. Yes.
The key is outright mockery. During the Carson retrospective this week I saw a bit of Floyd Turbo, his right-wing gun nut character. More Stewart, less earnest wonkery.
Perle on Nightline Thu night said Iraq would be in better shape if we'd turned over the country to Chalabi immediately after Baghdad fell. That's a reputed crook pimping for a convicted crook.
Reynolds didn't used to be nearly this bad, did he? Because I remember his site as having sometimes been interesting a couple-three years ago.
Glen used to run a blog with relatively interesting legal commentary. Even post-September 11th, it was worth reading. The Iraq war, however, turned Glen, along with several right-wing bloggers, into total lunatics. Their actions were really a microcosm for how the US political world really went collectively insane because of the Iraq war. It was the first time they had to confront mainstream opposition to the president for making transparently false and immoral claims since September 11th. It drove them off the deep end, since their own sense of honesty (if any) was unable to overcome their knee-jerk loyalty to Bush. At that point, Glen became an unreadable hack (or at least more of one than he already was).
Good for you, Max. (Although I can think of a better argument for our staying out of Iraq than the fact that "10,000 American families would not be suffering" -- namely, that in that case we might still have a military with some chance of preventing Iran from acquiring the Bomb, or stopping Kim Jong Il from invading South Korea without turning the war into a nuclear exchange.)
The Wingnutty Professor he shall be deemed.
God, what a dishonest, sleazy wanker.
I think someone should put together a list of the rightwing's greatest hits, and circulate it. Make sure that the Wingnutty Professor gets up close and personal with his bedmates on the proto-fascist right.
AND about 100,000 more Iraqis would still be alive!
That statistic may be a footnote over here, but in their country it's around .4 percent of the total population. In the U.S. that same percentage of the total population would be about 1.2 million people.
And those dead people had nothing to do with 9/11, so don't imagine those are dead terrorists. Rather, there are now many many new terrorists among the dead people's family and friends.
ozoid: At the risk of spinning this thread, as it were, off-topic, I thought the Hitch's defense of Chalabi in Slate a couple days ago seemed pretty convincing. I daypopped it in search of a refutation, but got nothing.
The Wingnutty Professor appears to have made a borderline-libellous post. I hope he gets a writ, since he'd probably soil himself. Oh, and if Michael Moore's presence in Jimmy Carter's skybox at the DNC is symbolic of anything, can he account for the presence of Dan 'Tom Tomorrow' Perkins, who was with Moore at the time, and has mentioned more than once that it was a spontaneous invitation to allow both of them to escape the press pack pursuing Moore around the Fleet Center.
On the other hand, mendacious, disingenuous, stab-in-the-back-accusing Reynolds is the true face of the right. And to think that he gets paid out of Tennessee tax revenue.
reynolds gets paid from tenn tax revenues because ut is a state-supported school.
i bet he has tenure, too.
now if he was a true conservative, he's teach at a private college and negotiate a contract every year.
tenured redneck.
I'm a country boy whose neck has been burned red by the sun, and no doubt will get burned again. Most city people are welcome to visit. We don't hate them, much, and even the Daisy Buchanan sophisticates manage to move on out of here just fine. You could send us the wingnutty professor for a work cure. I hear it's the best remedy for soft hands and softer minds.
Completely aside from our interests, it's been clear since at least last April, for anyone with ears to hear and eyes to see, that Iraq was better off under Saddam. No question, Saddam & Sons were vicious bastards, but under Saddam's rule, Iraq was a functioning country. People worked, shopped, went to school, and did all the usual stuff of everyday life, in safety. Criticizing Saddam's rule would of course get you in deep shit - jail, torture, death - but if an Iraqi could resist that temptation, he could live some semblance of a normal life.
And now, what do we have? Iraq is not a functioning country. People are aren't safe in very many places, very much of the time. Electricity is less available than it was before we invaded. Riverbend's part of Baghdad recently went for ten days without running water, and it couldn't have been a very local outage, because the price of bottled drinking water went through the roof.
And it's not any safer to speak one's mind politically nowadays; rather than getting killed by Saddam, you can get blown up by a Ba'athist insurgency. If that's progress, you can have it.
And of course, tomorrow's election is merely the prelude to a civil war. The Shi'ites will win the election, the Sunnis won't recognize the results, and while they're a minority, they're better armed, better organized, and know how to fight. So the post-election Shi'ite government will be stuck between the rock of the internal Sunni enemy and the hard place of being regarded as 'collaborators' if they keep us around to protect them from the Sunnis.
Even if this war had not cost the USA one life or one penny, it would still have been far better if we had never gone to war in Iraq.
Dear Iraq: we're from the US government and we're here to help you.
Max,
I don’t know who the hell you are, but I’m definitely coming back to see what you got to say. The Instapundit is one of the reasons I got into blogs. After reading about the take down of Trent Lott and the articles that appeared in the MSM, I came to blogs and the much mentioned Instapundit was one I bookmarked early.
However, I became disillusioned by his constant harping on the liberal bias of the MSM. While I’m no PhD, I do have some education and I just couldn’t see all the liberal bias he was ranting about. I believe there is biasness in the MSM but nothing so noble as partisan politics. It’s greed measured in readership or viewers and personal ambition. But we’re not here to talk about that.
If I thought what Glenn says about MSM was true, then I would also believe what they say about lawyers is true: They are leeches on society, providing no value and enriching themselves off the misfortunes of others. If a journalist can not do a story objectively, then a lawyer can not adequately represent a person whom he thinks is guilty and doctors can not treat enemy soldiers. Of course, the Instapundit may have credential bias.
Also, his claim that MSM reports are not reporting the good stories because they will not leave the green zone for fear of being killed or kidnapped. If it’s so great, why doesn’t Fox News, which is supposed to be showing Bush bias, go out and show MSM just how good it is. There are some ambitions journalists over there, and if they are too scared to go out, it must be bad – real bad.
Anyway, glad to stumble over someone who see the Instapundit's insta-shortcomings.
“I’ll be back” – the Govenator.
What kos said was out of line. Why not say "he messed up, royally in that case" and move on?
Max: Thanks for that update. I don't go to IP. My problem with Reynolds is that he rarely lays out a clear argument. It's all atmospherics. Sort of like what the Cool Kids do in high school. Snide remarks about others that "logically" lead to some damning conclusion. Except there's no logic involved at all.
Thanks for reading Insta, so we don't have to.
You're right about being able to put together a comparable screed from the other side. But there is an important difference. Guys like the Prof keep saying we need to take our party back from guys like Michael Moore. Well, Michael Moore doesn't hold office, nor do any of the other people they love to hate. It's the Republicans who have their nuts in power.
Attaturk, over at Rising Hegemon, has the best take on Glenn Reynolds: alternately, Professor Jethro or Ernest T. Bass, Esq. The biggest problem with Prof. Jethro is that he has a lot of people who actually listen to what he has to say and they then make it gospel shouting to the rooftops how he is a professor and, therefore, must know what he is saying. As both Seymour Hersh and Paul Craig Roberts, these people are definitely cult-minded and whatever is spouted out by their charlatans becomes gospel.
What kos said was out of line. Why not say "he messed up, royally in that case" and move on?
For anyone willing to face the reality of what happened, the reason Kos made the comment he did was because on the same day as the three "contractors" were killed multiple American soldiers were also killed, but subsequently ignored in the press while the mercenaries deaths gained all the media oxygen. This set him off for two reasons. One, Kos is a veteran and was pissed that mercs would be getting all the headlines while regular Army personnel dying were being ignored and two, Kos grew up in a Central American war zone and has more first hand experiences with mercs than anyone should be cursed with.
He also made an extensive post about his reasoning so it's not that hard to know the truth behind the "screw them" incident . . . for those that cared about the truth anyway.
Under those circumstances I think many would agree, screw the for-profit cowboys for garnering the headlines while REAL soldiers, American soldiers, die anonymously and screw those twisting this to smear a veteran for petty partisan points.
On a related note, is the "MSM" showing "too much" carnage in iraq to treasonously demoralize our troops or "not enough" carnage treasonously not informing people just how bad the bad guys are... I can't keep track.
Awesome post. Thanks for getting my Saturday off on the right foot!
Glenn Reynolds merely confirms what I always suspected in law school. Namely, that law professors are just really lazy lawyers who happened to luck into cushy billets. Why else would this self-righteous jerk have so much time to compose his dopy jeremiads?
I was going to clarify Kos' "screw them" remark, but I see that Thumb has done so, and more eloquently than I likely would have.
As for the Wingnutty Professor, I quite reading him ages ago. It's been crystal clear for a long time that he's downright eager to abandon whatever shred of intellectual integrity he might have in the defense of Dear Leader. Screw him, sez I.
The funniest part is at the end, where Insty attempts to defuse the obvious counterattack (the very same one that Max makes)-
"Heh. And for those who email saying "what about Falwell on the right," well, it's worth remembering that the term "idiotarian" was coined with Falwell in mind. It's just that the right has done a better job of muzzling and marginalizing its idiots, while the Left has embraced them."
Yeah, religious leaders like Falwell and Robertson and James Dobson and Ralph Reed- they are completely muzzled(!) and marginalized. Or was that "praised and pandered to?" Heh.
The problem with the media is simple. They're f'n lazy.
They just regugitate talking points back to the public without even thinking about hte validity of them. It's easy, and it's safe. But it doesn't do anybody a real lick of good.
IP, the reason I use a psudonym around these parts (we share the same first name 
), has never been "that good". I read him for about two weeks when his blog first started to get some steam. It was always bad and vapid. It's worthless.
Thumb got that part mostly right, but it's a bit of a step further, Merc bad actors as well basically really hurt any chances of stability in Iraq, making more soldiers suffer. It's really quite bad.
For the record, Markos slammed those Mercs because he knows first-hand how they operate from when he was growing up in El Salvador. Clearly, what he said was hot-headed and in reaction to a powerful and painful experience. I think it was an error on his part, but at the same time, I understand the emotion.
If Markos was so proud of his comments about the "mercs", why did his comments go down the memory hole?
What Carleton Wu said -- everytime someone calls the Right on their extremists, we get the pious, "Well, Rush is just an entertainer," or "Ann Coulter isn't an actual journalist," or "No one takes Dobson seriously."
As if.
Suggestion:
Everyone who read this post and agrees with it, click on the UT law school's webpage.
If their faculty members have e-mail addresses, we should all e-mail them the link to this post.
This way, they can see what kind of shit their distinguishted colleague is up to.
I've got to say that dedicating the first part of his article to making fun of what Ward Churchill looks like is completely appropriate and mature. But, considering the photo of himself that Glen's posted under the "About Me" link (clearly trying to imagine what cool people look like: "Cool guys wear jeans, right? and polo shirts? oh, hey, what about this blazer--instant credibility! and it covers up my big gut. I'm the hip law professor that all the chicks totally want to bang. Who cares that I cut my own hair and have a chin that melts directly into my neck?), this willingness to mock Churchill's appearance shows some enormous balls.
I also can't think of a more appropriate writing tic for Glen's brand of idiocy than his "Heh": in every post, always lurking just off-stage, waiting for its cue to spring forth with that perfect mix of snide arrogance and laziness. Indeed.
yup, I'm an idiot.
Glennocide Reynolds really is a dishonest asswipe, and anyone who can claim that the views of Kennedy, Boxer, Moore, and Kos are the same as those held by Ward Churchill has his own problems with "moral and intellectual decay."
The Tennessee law Prof. is one of the first flaming wingnuts I came across when I started reading political blogs about a year ago. The curious point about him is his wide exposure and celebrity or notoriety, depending on your take. He is inane and never adds anything substantial to issues or discussions, as far as I can see. There's a lot of insinuation, but maybe that is his idea of legal argumentation. What about the old adage: ignore it and it will go away.
I've mulled this over a bit, and I'm impressed by the, well, groupthink, that Glenn represents. That Hussein and the Ba'athist government of Iraq no longer seek a nuclear weapon is good, but if one had given me $200 billion and authorization to get up to 1400 Americans killed and ten thousand wounded to insure that Saddam doesn't get a nuclear weapon for the foreseeable future, with the agreement that I get to keep the change and revel in the transcendant joy of sending each of the surviving, able-bodied Americans home to his grateful family, I suspect I could have done an awful lot better than George W. Bush has. And that's not mentioning the number of Iraqi dead and hurt from military or [Iraqi] criminal activity, malnutrition, and the like. And that's what we're talking about: efficiency in a world of relative value and limited resources. Not absolutes. Having been beguiled by absolutes and been made servant to our fears, we've bogged down half of America's ground forces in a vast undermanned nation-building mission, a task far more daunting than merely keeping Saddam and The Bomb in separate rooms. Why not admit that critics of the Bush Administration might find its [stated] aims--a safe, free world--admirable, but believe that Bush deliberately avoids counting the costs to us and to the world? And that a real, transparent discussion and popular acceptance of the costs is essential to the success of the enterprise? Indeed, acknowledgement of costs are missing from critiques like Reynolds', and absent from policy statements from the White House in all but the vaguest terms. We are effectively assured, then, that a total committment to world freedom doesn't really mean a total dedication of this nation's future, its economy, its youth, to reaching it.
[Max: How about a preview button, speaking of faith?]
I realize, now, that considering costs was never part of this "Bush Doctrine", because costs are, intrinsically, questions, and questions are obviously, doubts, which faith, true belief, can't admit. To mention costs is to imply choice, to impugn destiny, to face the possibility of failure. And, well, to do that is treasonable, even if history's dustbin is full of leaders and ruling elites who launched grand schemes on misplaced faith.
>that it was a spontaneous invitation to allow both of them to escape the press pack
That is a calm, factual rebuttal. And I hate it - this very response says "I agree with you that something's wrong with Michael Moore", doesn't it? We are goddam zebras, as soon as the lions grab a hold of one the rest move off. If the entire zebra herd turned and said "fuck that", well, lions would quickly become extinct.
The correct answer to "MM was with (some thrice-removed connection to the current Democratic Party)" is "Yes, he was. You got a problem with that?" Do not back off - make them explain precisely what their problem is, and attack, attack, attack. Tear them an new one if they try a "weakens" or "hates" America canard, there are plenty of universally respected Americans that have criticized our country when it didn't want to hear it ("I tremble for our country when I realize God is just"). If they claim to be libertarians like most netzians, the moment they try that argument they are exposed as frauds. If they are American Greatness conservatives ask them how the hell such a "great" country could be threatened by one voice. If they are "patriotic" Americans push the conversation to "Roger and Me".
Everything MM says has some grounding in reality, make them bring it up and examine it. They will pretty much immediately drop the conversation, I've discovered.
But whatever you do, STOP HELPING THEM SPLIT US. We've dropped so many goddam bloc-leaders (Michael Moore, Jesse Jackson, the contraceptives-woman-whose-name-escapes-me, did you see any NOW leaders on stage during the Democratic convention?, and so on make your own list its pathetically easy) for stuff that's trivial compared to the Rethugs and yet we expect the people they speak for to stay in our "big tent" just because we have policies for them.
Crap, our wacko left defends Mumia and yet our center-left runs from Michael Moore. Does that make any sense at all? What does that say about us? That our wackos have more heart than our centrists? What does it mean to be on the left if it isn't about standing up for the good in somebody when - and MM has certainly - they stumble? I'm sure baffled.
No wonder nobody trusts us to "defend America". We don't defend our own. It's way past time to start.
If I thought what Glenn says about MSM was true, then I would also believe what they say about lawyers is true: They are leeches on society, providing no value and enriching themselves off the misfortunes of others.
Does he actually practice law? Or just teach at a state-funded institution (in addition to producing content for the "MSM" and making his lazy-ass blog posts)
Watchful B -- right. "more credit," not "less credit." I've fired my editor.
Very nicely put, as usual.
Wow. The complete left-of-center echo chamber.
This is probably a coincidence, but the ad on the blog post says:
The UN Oil-for-Food Program cut Iraqi children's malnutrition rates in half.
I feel like I have entered a parallel universe.
Brilliant rebuttal, Kevin P. You do Professor Instastupid proud.
Golly, if we wanted to locate and identify all the completely insane, lying, thieving, sleazy, dangerous, and downright frightening wackos on Glenn's side of the political aisle, I am afraid we'd never get anything else done.
If Ted Kennedy, KOS, and Michael Moore represent the worst of the Left, then, bygawd, we're in pretty good fucking shape. Thanks, Glenn, for helping me to sleep a little easier.
I am one who has sneered at the "Warbloggers" since the inception of the word, and it is good for me to see that the king Warblogger dipshit, Glenn Reynolds, still sits on the throne spewing out the same specious filth.
Max, you are the best.
Say what you want about Glenn's politics, I don't think anyone could match his sustained output and maintain a job in the real world besides. The guy is amazing in that regard if nothing else. One point I'd like you guys to address; Mikey Moore made a film where he explains our reason for attacking poor widdie Afganistan was because we wanted to put our Unocal guy Karzai in power. The left's reaction to this slander? He gets to sit next to Saint Jiminy Carter (the guy who encouraged Saddam to attack Iran) at the Dem confab in Boston. Where is the right wing's equivalent of this?
Where is the right wing's equivalent of this?
Senators Chambliss, Coburn, Coleman (and others) say "hello!"
Say what you want about Glenn's politics, I don't think anyone could match his sustained output and maintain a job in the real world besides.
Being a tenured university professor is not most people's idea of "the real world," but whatever. Anyway, I doubt posting a bunch of links and appending "heh" and "indeed" takes too much of his time.
Instahack wrote:
Isn't he exactly what you imagined? Shoulder-length hair, grimly self-righteous expression, black turtleneck, Abbie Hoffman sunglasses. A man whose look, like his rhetoric, is frozen in the amber of 1969.
WTF???? Ward Churchill is a fucking Indian! (Keetoowah Band Cherokee) What, Reynolds thinks all us Injuns should just give up and assimilate? What, should Churchill bleach his skin as well? Dye his hair blonde? How about some blue contacts?
People should call Reynolds on the racist piece of crap he is. Attacking Churchill for his ideas is one thing; but making fun of his appearance, due to culture and ethnicity, is way out of line.
This is the worst-looking font madness I've ever seen in a Comment box. Damn!
"Mikey Moore made a film where he explains our reason for attacking poor widdie Afganistan was because we wanted to put our Unocal guy Karzai in power."
No he doesn't, stupid. That's a distortion of what is in the movie.
The left's reaction to this slander? He gets to sit next to Saint Jiminy Carter (the guy who encouraged Saddam to attack Iran) at the Dem confab in Boston. Where is the right wing's equivalent of this?
Ever hear of Michelle "Internment iz Dope" Malkin? Ann "Everyone Who Votes for Kerry is a Traitor" Coulter? Sean "Everything I Say is Not Only BS, but Really Really Stupid BS" Hannity?
Or, for that matter, Rick Santorum, who is the #3 man in the Senate?
Where is the right wing's equivalent of this?
Senator Coburn, call your office.
"Where is the right wing's equivalent of this?"
George W. Bush made a speech saying that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. The right's reaction to these lies? He gets to run for president again instead of being asked to quit by for deceiving the American people, killing possibly 100,000 Iraqi civilians, and wiping his ass with international law and Article VI clause II of the US Constitution.
If your opinion to me mattered more to me than gooey egg farts I'd ask you who was worse.
Wow. The complete left-of-center echo chamber.
We don't see things as they are; we see things as we are. - Anais Nin
"If you had your way, Saddam would still be in power." Yes, if I had my way, Saddam would probably still be in power. And ten thousand American families would not be suffering. That's an easy call.
If my father, my uncles and the rest of their generation thought in this manner, Hitler's government most likely would still be in power. Oh I forgot, you guys think that Hitler IS in power.
Don't forget to tune into "Air America", they need the ratings!
Leave my buddy Glenn alone. He is a freedom fighter.
Like me.
And that ain't no lie.
-
If my father, my uncles and the rest of their generation thought in this manner, Hitler's government most likely would still be in power.
HA! You're just jealous that they had a REAL threat to react to (and speaking of threats, I might add that while your father, your uncles and the “rest of their generation” were fighting to stop Hitler Bush's grandfather Prescott Bush was FINANCING Hitler's war machine -- an act he was later tried and convicted for). So, much like your revered St. Georgie Porgie, you need to create a scaaawy boogieman out of a paper tiger so that you can slay it with your mighty wooden sword, stand above it and pound your chest while crying out, "Hey look at me, I'm a man TOO," fruitlessly hoping this time someone will notice.
Saddam was Hitler!! Hah or is it HEH
Godwin's Law. dead thread... time to move along. ...Indeed!
If my father, my uncles and the rest of their generation thought in this manner, Hitler's government most likely would still be in power.
Ummmm...Hitler declared war on the US.
If my father, my uncles and the rest of their generation thought in this manner, Hitler's government most likely would still be in power.
Your father and your uncles I know nothing about, but "the rest of their generation" (well, except for the leftists among them) of Americans were perfectly fine with Hitler's government right up until the very day, December 9, 1941, when Nazi Germany declared war on the United States of America. So, unless your relatives are Canadian, or British, or French, or were citzens of another nation that launched an attack on the Nazis in response to the Nazi attack on Poland, then you'll forgive us if your moral outrage seems a little transparent.
Of course, unlike Iraq, which had a Third World economy and armed force, Nazi Germany was a genuine threat to the security of Americans, given that it was the world's third largest industrial power at the time, possessed a well-equipped, well-drilled army of millions, and had a population nearly 2/3 of that of the United States. Thankfully, Roosevelt and others were laying up the materiel and plans to fight it, so that when the fight did come to the United States, we were ready. God, you'd think that with the current wingnut fetish for Churchill, they'd bother to read more about the Second World War. But, of course, they might realize how pale their "War of Civilizations", or "World War Four" or whatever, is in comparison. Except in regard to rhetoric. They've pumped that right up to 1940s grandeur.
MBW -- his opinions aside, the Churchill picture reminded me of Roy Orbison.
Somehow, you dumb fucks on the left seem to get the "big" picture. The rightwingers don't seem to understand Arab politics. Who cares about those fucking Shia's anyway? Fuck them and their mothers. And the Kurds? They smelled like chicken when they got their asses gassed.
Thanks to you "bois" on the left, and God willing, I'll be allowed to do it all over again some day.
PS : Ramsey Clark's dick tastes like chicken.
Hugs and Kisses,
Saddam
Oh, and before I forget, I want to thank George Bush Sr. for helping me get into and retain power (the poison gas and helicopters came in handy). So what's with the stick up drunken junior's ass? Did I miss a payment?
My only regret is that I never got to invade Oklahoma so my boys Uday and Qusay could fuck some OkieGirls and start the Master Race .
I don't know why people think Max's ditty is an especially hard hitting swing at Reynolds. And I'm not clear what Max means when he writes, "The question is, who has a mind that could content itself with pursuing such an exercise? Nobody I know."
I think liberal bloggers are doing this all the time. It's what MMFA lives for! So why take Reynolds to task for this?
I think Churchill makes valid points and, all things considered, his anger understandable. But knew he was going to create a shit storm for his comments.
Just need a bigger roll of toilet paper.
And between 8,000 and 194,000 Iraqis, half of them women and children, would still be alive.
Hi Saddam,
Good to hear from you again. Yeah, sorry about that mess with the Kurds. I guess we really screwed them something fierce, huh, trying to get them to rebel against you and then dropping them like hotcakes! Ahhh, good times, good times.
BTW, we sent you a bill for the gas you used. You never paid. Should we just add it to your tab?
Sincerely,
America
Okiedokieboy, your father and uncles and the rest of your pathetic inbred family didn't go fight Hiter on their own accord. The US stayed well clear of World War II for over two years, while the British and French were fighting and dying, until Hitler declared war on the US two days after Pearl Harbor. We didn't go to war against Germany -- Germany went to war against us. If we hadn't gotten attacked first, we would have been content to sit back and let Hitler take over the world.
Oh, and Okiedokie, don't forget to enlist -- Bush needs the soldiers!
We didn't go to war against Germany -- Germany went to war against us. If we hadn't gotten attacked first, we would have been content to sit back and let Hitler take over the world.
Fucking a right. Industrial America was making a fortune arming Germany before the war, too.
Allen Dulles:
worked with brother John Foster Dulles, as lawyer and international finance specialist for Sullivan & Cromwell, a Wall Street law firm in New York (1927-1941). While there, he worked with top Nazi industrialists and played a pivotal role in promoting U.S.-Nazi corporate relations. Allen worked with Prescott Bush (grandfather of President George Walker Bush) and George Herbert Walker (Prescott's father-in-law) who ran Union Banking Corporation for the Nazis. Allen was legal counsel for Standard Oil and the Nazi's I. G. Farben, co-owned by the Rockefellers. (Other U.S. millionaires allied to the Nazis were: William Randolph Hearst Sr., Andrew Mellon, Irenee du Pont, Henry Ford and J.P. Morgan. Morgan, du Pont and others were even involved in a Fascist plot to overthrow the U.S. government in 1934.)
But the Right doesn't know this shit, nor do they care.
BRILLIANT!
It's about goddamn time someone finally spitted the evil little moron.
well, except for the leftists among them
it's important to note that the true socialists were opposed to intervention in WW2 until we were attacked, and the communists among them opposed to intervention until 6/22/1941.
Remember when Ahmed Chalabi was a guest of honor at the State of the Union address in January 2004?
Remember how he sat right behind the First Lady during the speech?
Isn't he the guy that lied us into a war in Iraq for his own reasons, possibly while working as an Iranian spy?
I'll start feeling bad about Moore at the Convention, when the White House shows a little regret about that other bastard.
Prescott financed Adolph, Rummy and Cheney financed Saddam.
Exactly how many brave missions to end evile did AWOL Bush EVER perform personally? Zay-ro
Cheney had better things to do than serve 'nam, like get into the door of Nixon's lawbreaking thugs who used Cubans as a front(aka Osawld). Cheney's buddy in the Nixon-Ford White House?
None other than Donald "Body Counts" Rumsfailed.
Was Ford EVER elected to POTUS?
Was Bush 43?
It seems these guys continue the mark of hubris.
Not to be confused with the make of the beast that St. ROnnie identified on Groby's head and delayed the y fall of the Iron curtain until election cycles resumed to enable further Defense buildups and to capitalize on occurrences for partisan gain.
It's okay, a stupid example punditry harps on like the recent slew of paid journalists...
The Confederacy will not be brought down under Glen's watch.
GH Venture Partners, an outsourcing named after the one and GH Walker Bush, features a lot of outsourcing ties and bid assessments to outsourcing in China and India. They also did some market access for oil well and gas pipelines.
They pulled their links after I posted it on John Kerry forums. His corporate helpers didn't really wish to harp on it either. Still a good portion of it was posted on my dKos diary...
Names abound in it. Many Boosh pioneers , rangers, supporters of the Military Industrial Complex.
It's a matter of public record.
>No he doesn't, stupid.
There you go!!! (wild applause)
>I'll start feeling bad about Moore at the Convention, when the White House shows a little regret about that other bastard.
I won't. I plan to be pissed about Chalabi until the day Bush & Cheney die.
Okiedokie, enlisted yet?
*sound of crickets chirping*
Thought not, you cowardly little scumbag.
Jebus, OkieBoy got shredded like incriminating evidence in Ollie North's office. Or like Steve Buscemi's character in 'Fargo'. Or...
Spoken like a bunch of losers......tired pathetic losers.
Glenn puts the ass in bombastic.
I'm amazed that laughingboy has time to post on this board, what with his being in combat in Iraq and all, tirelessly working to secure that country's freed...sorry, what's that you say? He's here at home? He's not in Iraq? Why, I'm shocked I tell you, just shocked.....
Yeah - right on, Max!
So Saddam isn't in power, and Islam Karimov (who is something of a cult figure in certain neocon circles) is. Saddam isn't in power because he became a liability to his American patrons; the point at which that happened coincides, perhaps coincidentally, with the point at which the American government suddenly "discovered" his atrocities. People like Marcos, Noriega, Suharto, and Mobutu, likewise, were overthrown by assorted forms of "people power" (TM) when their cost to the U.S. outweighted their usefulness in keeping labor and the domestic Left under control.
Any time U.S. foreign policy serves "humanitarian concerns," it's purely coincidental.
You wrote; "Speaking of American casualties in Iraq, unlike Markos and other critics of the war, Reynolds has hyped every piece of duplicitous, discredited bullshit floating from the Pentagon down the Potomac."
Can you give some examples?
" Nobody I know. Maybe that's why we're losing. We dislike being assholes."
So Americans vote for "assholes". Can you explain that?
Thanks
You know, this kind of stuff is why I stopped reading Glenn a long time ago. I used to know him a little, and I liked him -- I think I first encountered him giving a seminar to teachers on resisting the incursion of creationism in classrooms, and he was sharp and funny. But however good this whole blogging thing has been for him in some ways, it's done very weird things to his head. I honest to God don't even recognize the guy he was 5-6 years ago. As I told him (not like it made any difference) I couldn't read him anymore because of exactly this kind of vicious cartoon straw-manning of "the left" -- he attributes attitudes, ideas and beliefs to "the left" that aren't even vaguely related to the actual attitudes, ideas or beliefs of any of the "leftists" I know. Which makes him no different than Savage or Hannity or Coulter or any of the rest of them. Talk about echo chambers. If Glenn had any real interest in confronting the actual ideas and beliefs of "the left," then he would actually engage them. But at this point I think he's been breathing his own oxygen so long it might kill him to leave his bubble. Sad.
(And he oughta be just ashamed of himself for throwing around phrases like "near traitorous.")
>So Americans vote for "assholes". Can you explain that?
This is easy. Nice guys finish last.
I think at some unconscious level people understand how crooked the world, the French, the British, the UN, OPEC, Russia, ...everything... it's one big crock of shit.
Americans have profited IMMENSELY in the 20th century by capitalizing on other's fuckups and suffering. Eg. the big 5 US oil companies collectively owned a quarter of Iraq's oil from 1920-1958 (when it the Iraq oil concessions were nationalized by the Iraqi nationalists).
That's what Cheney represents... Senator Palpatine or whatever, one nasty piece of work you'd want on your side and not your enemy's.
Indeed, Max.
Troy that is real deep, real insightful. So if Dick Cheney weren't Vice President he would be working for the British or the French or the UN?
I guess your for America to withdraw from the UN, right?
Are you a teacher?
a different chris wrote, No wonder nobody trusts us to "defend America". We don't defend our own. It's way past time to start.
Right on!
I've mulled this over a bit, and I'm impressed by the, well, groupthink, that Glenn represents. That Hussein and the Ba'athist government of Iraq no longer seek a nuclear weapon is good, but if one had given me $200 billion and authorization to get up to 1400 Americans killed and ten thousand wounded to insure that Saddam doesn't get a nuclear weapon for the foreseeable future, with the agreement that I get to keep the change and revel in the transcendant joy of sending each of the surviving, able-bodied Americans home to his grateful family, I suspect I could have done an awful lot better than George W. Bush has.
However, the objective is not to stop Iraq from getting nukes. It is to stop any state with terrorist ties from getting nukes. These states include Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya and Pakistan.
Bush has failed in this miserably. Iraq is no longer a threat and due to European diplomacy, Libya has given up. Pakistan, however, has nukes and is growing more and more anti-American, Iran is on the cusp and the US doesn't have the capability to stop them due to being tied up in Iraq, and who the hell knows what's happening in Syria?
Iraq was, despite Saddam's brutality, one of the lesser threats to the US. And Bush squandered all of the US's energy occupying a resentful nation of 25 million people.
Stefan,
If you're going to have the elementary standard that one must physically participate in the actions that they support then I'll kindly request that you post your W-2 that shows that you pay the same percentage of federal income taxes that you propose Bill Gates pay (and that goes for everyone else, as well).
Otherwise, what say ye debate in an advanced manner?
That's some logic Ricky. Because Stefan points out that you don't have the courage of your convictions, endemic among wingnuts, that means he should have the courage of your convictions? I don't know Stefan, but I doubt he supports the flat tax.
I don't know Stefan, but I doubt he supports the flat tax.
So, sitting back and demanding that others physically be forced to do what one proposes is OKAY when it comes to money.
Noted.
Good to see that "logic" extends to the point that it's convenient.
As a recent student of Ward Churchill's, I can say that he was one of the best professors I ever encountered at the University of Colorado. He was intelligent, humorous, humanitarian, and had actual passion for the subject he taught. His characterization of those in the WTC and the Pentagon are open to debate, but thus far I haven't seen or heard any, you know, facts offered up to dispute his assertions. Glenn Reynolds hasn't the brains or the courage to engage Ward in debate, and so he has to harp on Ward's appearance; real impressive for a man who claims to be a jurist. Reynolds is heir to the legacy of another man from the nazi era: Julius Streicher. If there were any justice in the world, Reynolds would face the same charges Streicher did at Nuremberg and would also be convicted of advocating genocide; in these more enlightened times, the mand from Tennesee would escape the noose and instead live out his miserable life in prison.
Troy that is real deep, real insightful. So if Dick Cheney weren't Vice President he would be working for the British or the French or the UN?
that is an unintended misreading of what I said. My point is that out in the real world nice guys finish last, so at some level and to some large degree americans /want/ assholes in charge of the country, out-bastarding the French, Russians, Chinese, etc. This is a dog-eat-dog worldview.
I guess your for America to withdraw from the UN, right?
I don't have an informed opinion on this one way or the other.
My point is that out in the real world nice guys finish last,
No, in the real world nice guys are assassinated, either literally or figuratively. It doesn't mean the ends justify the means, not that having a traditional “strong man” for a ruler hasn’t been ruinous for the majority of the cases it’s employed.
And for the record, history is littered with the evil guys only briefly finishing first before a spectacular crash and burn.
If you're going to have the elementary standard that one must physically participate in the actions that they support then I'll kindly request that you post your W-2 that shows that you pay the same percentage of federal income taxes that you propose Bill Gates pay
Poor ricky. How long has it been? A couple years now? Couldn't you have grown up just a little? I guess that was too much to hope for. Anyway, to answer your challenge, I don't need to post my W-2 to tell you that 1) I wish Bill Gates paid the same percentage payroll withholding tax (FICA) that I do [as self employed it's over 15%] and two, I can promise you that I'm striving to make a seven figure income and no, I won't cry if my income tax increases progressively. Given the option of paying 20+% on a hundred grand or 40% of a million . . . or 50% of ten million . . . or 60% of $100 million, which would you want?
And that doesn't even begin to address how you compare wanting to be rich and taxes with being a flaming proponent of this war but too much of a chickenshit do actually do more than type away from the safety of your parent's basement.
Glenn Reynolds hasn't the brains or the courage to engage Ward in debate.
Well, sure. This guy could, though.
There’s two people you ought to know: Greg O’Neill and Clinton Davis. They are exceptionally important because, according to Rana Kabbani, writing in my British sister paper The Guardian, they are "two symbols of American hegemony."…Churchill vs Palast would be a worthwhile debate, primarily because neither is an empty-headed right-wing dick-wad.
Davis worked in the basement of the Trade Center. O’Neill on Floor 52 of the South Tower…
Here’s what O’Neill did in Suite 5200. When the Exxon Valdez grounded, he fought British Petroleum and Exxon to get compensation for the natives of Alaska. When he learned a power company had faked safety reports on a nuclear plant, O’Neill, a lawyer, hit them with a civil racketeering suit and ultimately helped put these creeps out of the nuclear business.
Davis worked in the cops’ division of the state’s Port Authority. Neither Davis nor O’Neill would be my first choice for a symbol of US imperial might, to target for retaliation for "terror by Jewish groups," to use Kabbani’s bone-head words…
That terrible Tuesday evening, I had to call O’Neill’s home. He answered the phone. "My god, you’re safe!"
O’Neill replied, "Not really." I hope that doesn’t disappoint Ms Kabbani.
Davis was safe too, in the towers’ basement. But he chose to go up into the building to rescue others. Today, this symbol of American capitalist hegemony is listed as missing.
Notice ricky employs the usual wingnut position when losing an argument: change the terms of the debate as quickly as possible. We were talking about whether why, since he and his ilk felt so strongly about the importance of the war in Iraq, they didn't enlist and help out, and he counters that with some non-responsive blather about Bill Gates and the flat earth, er, flat tax. This is called thread hijacking, and it's a rather transparent tactic.
My point was not, obviously, that you can only support policies you partake of. You don't have to collect Social Security, for example, to support it. But when it comes to a matter of life and death, then yes, different standards apply. If you want others to fight and die, you should be willing to do so yourself. However, when it comes to Iraq ricky, okiedokie and the rest of the chickenhawk brigade seem awfully eager to have other young men fight and die when they aren't willing to do so themselves. This shouldn't be suprising, I suppose, as they are only following the example of their Dear Leaders George W. "I do not volunteer for overseas duty" Bush and Dick "Five Deferments" Cheney.
I said it before and I'll say it again: cowardly little scumbags.
The level of personal attack reflected in Stefan's last line is not welcome here, especially because it was unprovoked by any similar remarks from Ricky. Believe it or not, I'd like the threads to be an opportunity for dialog among strongly those with strong disagreements. Thanks.
"If you had your way, Saddam would still be in power." Yes, if I had my way, Saddam would probably still be in power. And ten thousand American families would not be suffering. That's an easy call.
And Saddam wouldn't be in power forever. Not like, say, that Communist, Fidel Castro.
If Bush hadn't been so hot-headed and invaded, an insurrection from within could eventually been far more successful than an attack from without. The problem with the invasion is that it created the very power vacuum that Max and many others predicted, with no one to fill it. Had we waited until there was a genuine opposition within the country (no, Chalabi does not count) that could promptly have taken over, an invasion might never have been necessary, and better results could have been obtained.
Typical of nut cases that seem to be the self-appointed mouth pieces of the leftie/losers in this country...
Long on whine, short on facts (seeing as how facts undercut the position of leftie/losers) and pathetic in their interpretation of the real world...
I'm guess since to be a real leftie/loser one has to have at best, a very tenuous grip on reality...
The leftwing nutcases railed on by Reynolds don't represent the left, but you all seem to agree with them. I fail to see how anyone can read this post and the comments and not conclude that people like Chomsky and Moore really do represent the left. Come people really? Saddam's show trial? Yeah, Saddam was just this innocent guy who ran a great country in Iraq and now is being railroaded by the vast neocon conspiracy. Perhaps we should add Ramsey Clark to the list of leftwing icons. This guy gets so upset over Reynolds, but I have never seen in four years of reading Instapundit, one word of vulgarity or invective in it. You make not like what he has to say, but he doesn't say it in a vulgar or insulting way. Contrast that with " duplicitous, discredited bullshit ", "We dilike being assholes." That is really a high level of discourse. I am sure the parents of one of the kids who attend whatever you university hired this guy feel great to know that they are spending 1000s of dollars to send their kids to be taught such erudite and thoughtful guy such as this.
Keep talking folks. You are on the wrong side of history. It must be a very tramatic experience to see your entire world view proven wrong over the last sixteen years and to go from a majority party to an increasingly reactionary, isolationist, and incoherent minority party. In that sense I guess people like Reynolds should cut the left some slack. Not everyone dies with dignity.
"If Bush hadn't been so hot-headed and invaded, an insurrection from within could eventually been far more successful than an attack from without."
That did happen. In 1992 there WAS an insurrection from within and we all now what happened then... or do at least, those of us who care about Iraqis do.
I think we all need to come to grips with the simple fact that Saddam, Castro and Kim Jong Il and their band of merry men are not cast from the same mold as the liberal British imperialists who meekly fled the coop in India against Gandhi's resistance. The rights we have to protest our own government: they do not have. Police may come and restrict our movement, slightly. The army will come and massacre them, entirely. This is the essential difference between a slightly compromised free society and completely tyrannical one.
To Max [who claims that Kos's April 2004 remarks were about contractors]: screw you! Kos specifically was talking about United States Marine Corps casualities in the battle of Fallujah, not contractors, not mercenaries, but United States soldiers.... the ones he (and you) claims to be speaking on behalf of.
"Maybe that's why we're losing. We dislike being assholes."
No it's because you don't realize that you ARE.
Dylan, you're a liar.
As John Stuart Mill pointed out in On Liberty, when one's ideas are not challenged, one's ability to defend them weakens. Not being pressed to come up with arguments or evidence to support them, one forgets the arguments and fails to obtain the evidence. One's position becomes increasingly flaccid, producing the paradox of thought that is at once rigid and flabby. And thus the academic left today.
Richard Posner on his blog today. That pretty much goes for the entire left. They have lived in an echo chamber for so long and leaned so heavily on attacking the motives of their political opponents, they have forgotten how to have a rational argument about anything. Most of the leftist posts on the stream illustrate this completely.
"Maybe that's why we're losing. We dislike being assholes."
I keep seeing the left making comments like these. They look at themselves through rose colored glasses. The left needs to realize they are losing elections, not because they aren't nasty enough (they are), but because it is the left who is out of touch with America, not the right. They see the religious right as the boogyman and try to wave it at the voters to scare them. What they need to realize is that the religious right is much closer to the middle than is the radical left.
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