.
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By MARC McDONALD
Michigan State University professor William Penn has been getting a lot of flack over recent comments he made about Republicans (as seen in the above video).
In the video, Penn describes the GOP as full of "dead white people, or dying white people."
"They are cheap. They don't want to pay taxes because they have already raped this country and gotten everything out of it they possibly could," Penn says. "They don't want to pay for your tuition, because who are you? Well to me, you are somebody."
Predictably, the right-wing media has been throwing a hissy fit over Penn's comments. And, predictably, Penn lost his teaching duties after making these comments.
I've got to laugh about the right-wing media's response. "That mean Lib! He hurt our feelings! Call the WAAAAAmbulance!"
Of course, right-wing media in this country never uses derogatory language. They never insult anybody. They never hurl vicious insults at their foes.
Nope, they're the pinnacle of courtesy and they always use logic, reason, and truth in their statements.
Yeah, right.
There's one big thing that bothers me about episodes like this. Yes, both Liberals and right-wingers have their occasional outbursts. But there's one big difference. Usually, in their outbursts, progressives tell the truth.
By contrast, the right-wing crazies just make sh*t up.
"Obama is a Muslim who was born in Kenya!"
"Obama is coming to take away your guns!"
"Obama murdered four people in Benghazi!"
"John Kerry faked his wounds to get the Silver Star and the Bronze Star in Vietnam!"
"Bill Clinton murdered Vince Foster!"
By contrast, I think anyone who is not a card-carrying member of the Fox News/Drudge/Rush Limbaugh cult would agree that, while Penn's remarks could be more tactful, basically the guy is telling the truth.
I mean, I myself personally know many Republicans who think and act EXACTLY like what Penn describes.
Their worldview can basically be summed up thusly: "I've got mine, screw everyone else."
We see Republicans who act exactly like what Penn describes in the U.S. Congress. There, you'll find dozens of "Conservatives" who enjoy lavish, taxpayer-funded salaries and very generous socialized health care benefits. And then, these same hypocrites fight tirelessly, day after day, to prevent our government from doing ANYTHING to help ordinary working people gain access to health care.
To these Republicans, "socialized, taxpayer-funded" health care is BAD. But oddly enough, they have no problem with enjoying lavish, socialized, taxpayer-funded health care themselves.
(Of course, no sane person would ever confuse Obamacare with "socialized" health care). But even this modest attempt at reform faces ferocious GOP opposition.
One reason I no longer consider myself a Democrat is that I long ago got sick and tired of Democrats who always wimp out and refuse to stand up for the truth.
After listening to people like Penn, it's clear that there are still a few fighters out there. And they don't give a damn about whose feelings they hurt. Good for them.
Showing posts with label progressives. Show all posts
Showing posts with label progressives. Show all posts
Monday, September 23, 2013
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Today's Bible Verse: "Listen, You Rich People, Weep And Wail Because Of The Misery That Is Coming On You"
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"Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty."
---James 5:1-4, The Bible, New International Version.
By MARC McDONALD
One of the great political mysteries to me has always been how on earth the money-worshipping, screw-the-poor Right Wing in today's America have somehow managed to convince many people that the Bible supports their twisted beliefs.
In reality, the Bible is full of hard-core socialist messages as radical as anything I've ever written on this blog. To be sure, I've blasted America's greedy rich on a number of occasions on this site. But I've never said that, simply because one is rich, one will almost certainly burn in hell (like Jesus did).
After all, the rich who I target are those who (like the Koch brothers) who seek to destroy organized labor and America's already skimpy social safety net, simply so they can pad their already fat pockets. But I don't condemn all rich people. For a start, I admire George Soros.
Anyway, back to the Bible. It's one thing for deluded Right-Wingers to wrap themselves in the Scripture and to claim that the Bible somehow supports their beliefs. But what disappoints me far more is that the Progressives allow them to get away with this.
The fact is, the vast majority of the Bible is full of archaic, obscure verses that only a fool would claim to understand. However, the Bible does contain a number of verses that are quite clear and unambiguous.
James 5:1-4 is a good example of the latter. This passage doesn't beat around the bush: it very clearly issues a warning to rich oppressors. It condemns the greedy, exploitative rich ever bit as much as anything Marx ever wrote.
The problem is that Bible verses like this languish in obscurity. Right-Wingers carefully tip-toe away from such explosive verses that they no doubt find deeply disturbing. Instead, they dig through the Old Testament, looking for passages that seem to validate their homophobic, bigoted views. And Progressives, as always, sit around passively and allow the Right-Wing to get away with it.
We Progressives need to reclaim the Bible from the bigots, the hate-mongers, the money-grubbers and the supporters of brutal dog-eat-dog "capitalism."
Every time one of these bigoted money-grubbers claims that the Bible supports their views, we need to take crystal-clear Progressive Bible verses like James 5:1-4 and throw it into their faces.
"Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty."
---James 5:1-4, The Bible, New International Version.
By MARC McDONALD
One of the great political mysteries to me has always been how on earth the money-worshipping, screw-the-poor Right Wing in today's America have somehow managed to convince many people that the Bible supports their twisted beliefs.
In reality, the Bible is full of hard-core socialist messages as radical as anything I've ever written on this blog. To be sure, I've blasted America's greedy rich on a number of occasions on this site. But I've never said that, simply because one is rich, one will almost certainly burn in hell (like Jesus did).
After all, the rich who I target are those who (like the Koch brothers) who seek to destroy organized labor and America's already skimpy social safety net, simply so they can pad their already fat pockets. But I don't condemn all rich people. For a start, I admire George Soros.
Anyway, back to the Bible. It's one thing for deluded Right-Wingers to wrap themselves in the Scripture and to claim that the Bible somehow supports their beliefs. But what disappoints me far more is that the Progressives allow them to get away with this.
The fact is, the vast majority of the Bible is full of archaic, obscure verses that only a fool would claim to understand. However, the Bible does contain a number of verses that are quite clear and unambiguous.
James 5:1-4 is a good example of the latter. This passage doesn't beat around the bush: it very clearly issues a warning to rich oppressors. It condemns the greedy, exploitative rich ever bit as much as anything Marx ever wrote.
The problem is that Bible verses like this languish in obscurity. Right-Wingers carefully tip-toe away from such explosive verses that they no doubt find deeply disturbing. Instead, they dig through the Old Testament, looking for passages that seem to validate their homophobic, bigoted views. And Progressives, as always, sit around passively and allow the Right-Wing to get away with it.
We Progressives need to reclaim the Bible from the bigots, the hate-mongers, the money-grubbers and the supporters of brutal dog-eat-dog "capitalism."
Every time one of these bigoted money-grubbers claims that the Bible supports their views, we need to take crystal-clear Progressive Bible verses like James 5:1-4 and throw it into their faces.
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
The Day the American Left Died
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"This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper."
---The Hollow Men, T. S. Eliot
By MARC McDONALD
Many progressives are outraged over President Obama's caving on tax cuts for the rich. But I think this latest episode could signal something far more significant and disturbing in our society: no less than the death of the American Left.
Over the decades, the U.S. Left has suffered many thrashings, from the government's repression of the Wobblies nearly a century ago to Ronald Reagan's firing of 11,000 air traffic controllers in the 1981 PATCO strike.
But in the past, after each bruising setback, the Left always managed to pick itself up, dust itself off, and rally to fight another day.
Frankly, that's no longer the case in 2010. And Obama's habitual tendency to always yield to GOP demands shows that there really is no Left in America any more. Yes, there are individual progressives out there. But there is no real "Left" in the form of a significant national force that can counter the rabid Right.
Obama has stumbled on virtually all the important progressive issues during his presidency, from climate change, to the Employee Free Choice Act, to closing Gitmo, to ending George W. Bush's disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Indeed, he has even escalated the Afghanistan disaster.
Indeed, the only "progressive" victory Obama has to show for his time in office is his ridiculously wimpy health care bill---a convoluted mess that is so watered down, compromised and corporate-friendly that it's exactly the sort of thing that a Republican politician might have passed. (In fact, one did---and it's important to note that Obamacare is actually to the right of Mitt Romney's plan in Massachusetts).
Obama has had many chances to reverse the outrages of the Bush years---and time after time, he has failed, as he continues to cave in to GOP demands.
Reversing Bush's reckless and fiscally insane tax cuts for the rich was a golden opportunity for Obama to finally draw a line in the sand and stand up for what his supporters wanted him to do when they voted him into office.
The fact that Obama caved without even putting up a fight shows that there is no real Left in America any more. Even the corporate-friendly moderate Bill Clinton put up a fight to push through his modest tax hikes in 1993. And Clinton was no Liberal.
The worst part about all of this is that Obama's constant concessions to the GOP will, in the end, wind up pleasing no one. It certainly won't win him any allies in the upcoming new Congress, which is about to be stocked with a new crop of rabid, right-wing Tea Bagger fanatics who'll do everything in their power to undercut Obama.
And Obama's constant appeasement will only serve to further disillusion his shrinking base who invested such high hopes in him only two short years ago. Exactly, who does Obama think is going to be inspired to vote for him in 2012? Who among the progressives really wants another four years of his wishy-washy, bland, constant appeasement of the hard-care Right?
Yes, there are still fragments of a "Left" in America. There are a relatively small number of idealistic progressive politicians, like Bernie Sanders. But none of them has any real chance of ever wielding any significant levers of power in American society.
Make no mistake: the American Left is, for all practical purposes, dead. It has taken many beatings and brutal setbacks over the decades: from the slayings of JFK, MLK and RFK in the 1960s to the crushing of the unions in the 1980s to Reagan's ending of the Fairness Doctrine, to the Supreme Court's Democracy-demolishing "Citizens United" travesty.
It should be clear to everyone now that the Left is dead. After eight horrific years of Bush, the Democrats were handed the reigns of power with a simple mandate: to end the GOP's ongoing rape and pillaging of U.S. society.
Instead of responding, the Dems and Obama proceeded to give the GOP virtually everything it wanted on a silver platter. And instead of taking a principled stand on Bush's tax cuts for the rich, Obama merely caved yet again with a whimper---and showed just how impotent and irrelevant the Democrats are in 21st century U.S. politics.
One final note: to those who think I'm being too alarmist or pessimistic, I'd like to say that no one on earth will be happier than me if I'm proved to be wrong. In fact, I'll be happy to eat a very large serving of crow (literally)---and I'll Webcam it and put it on YouTube for all to see.
But frankly, I'm hardly alone in my pessimism for American society. In April, 2010, Noam Chomsky compared today's U.S. to Weimar Germany. He said that the "mood of the country is frightening" and that he'd "never seen anything like this" in his lifetime.
As Chomsky noted, in Nazi Germany: "...it was the Jews. Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. We will be told that white males are a persecuted minority. We will be told we have to defend ourselves and the honor of the nation. Military force will be exalted. People will be beaten up. This could become an overwhelming force. And if it happens it will be more dangerous than Germany. The United States is the world power. Germany was powerful but had more powerful antagonists. I don't think all this is very far away. If the polls are accurate it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election."
Chomsky was right about the "crazed Republicans" sweeping the next election. Time will tell if the rest of his gloomy prognosis turns out to be true.
In the meantime, it's clear that the Left is dead in America. Granted, we never really had much of a "Left" in this country anyway, compared to the likes of Europe. But what we did have is pretty much dead now. And Obama's impotence demonstrates the Left's extinction as a force in American society.
"This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper."
---The Hollow Men, T. S. Eliot
By MARC McDONALD
Many progressives are outraged over President Obama's caving on tax cuts for the rich. But I think this latest episode could signal something far more significant and disturbing in our society: no less than the death of the American Left.
Over the decades, the U.S. Left has suffered many thrashings, from the government's repression of the Wobblies nearly a century ago to Ronald Reagan's firing of 11,000 air traffic controllers in the 1981 PATCO strike.
But in the past, after each bruising setback, the Left always managed to pick itself up, dust itself off, and rally to fight another day.
Frankly, that's no longer the case in 2010. And Obama's habitual tendency to always yield to GOP demands shows that there really is no Left in America any more. Yes, there are individual progressives out there. But there is no real "Left" in the form of a significant national force that can counter the rabid Right.
Obama has stumbled on virtually all the important progressive issues during his presidency, from climate change, to the Employee Free Choice Act, to closing Gitmo, to ending George W. Bush's disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Indeed, he has even escalated the Afghanistan disaster.
Indeed, the only "progressive" victory Obama has to show for his time in office is his ridiculously wimpy health care bill---a convoluted mess that is so watered down, compromised and corporate-friendly that it's exactly the sort of thing that a Republican politician might have passed. (In fact, one did---and it's important to note that Obamacare is actually to the right of Mitt Romney's plan in Massachusetts).
Obama has had many chances to reverse the outrages of the Bush years---and time after time, he has failed, as he continues to cave in to GOP demands.
Reversing Bush's reckless and fiscally insane tax cuts for the rich was a golden opportunity for Obama to finally draw a line in the sand and stand up for what his supporters wanted him to do when they voted him into office.
The fact that Obama caved without even putting up a fight shows that there is no real Left in America any more. Even the corporate-friendly moderate Bill Clinton put up a fight to push through his modest tax hikes in 1993. And Clinton was no Liberal.
The worst part about all of this is that Obama's constant concessions to the GOP will, in the end, wind up pleasing no one. It certainly won't win him any allies in the upcoming new Congress, which is about to be stocked with a new crop of rabid, right-wing Tea Bagger fanatics who'll do everything in their power to undercut Obama.
And Obama's constant appeasement will only serve to further disillusion his shrinking base who invested such high hopes in him only two short years ago. Exactly, who does Obama think is going to be inspired to vote for him in 2012? Who among the progressives really wants another four years of his wishy-washy, bland, constant appeasement of the hard-care Right?
Yes, there are still fragments of a "Left" in America. There are a relatively small number of idealistic progressive politicians, like Bernie Sanders. But none of them has any real chance of ever wielding any significant levers of power in American society.
Make no mistake: the American Left is, for all practical purposes, dead. It has taken many beatings and brutal setbacks over the decades: from the slayings of JFK, MLK and RFK in the 1960s to the crushing of the unions in the 1980s to Reagan's ending of the Fairness Doctrine, to the Supreme Court's Democracy-demolishing "Citizens United" travesty.
It should be clear to everyone now that the Left is dead. After eight horrific years of Bush, the Democrats were handed the reigns of power with a simple mandate: to end the GOP's ongoing rape and pillaging of U.S. society.
Instead of responding, the Dems and Obama proceeded to give the GOP virtually everything it wanted on a silver platter. And instead of taking a principled stand on Bush's tax cuts for the rich, Obama merely caved yet again with a whimper---and showed just how impotent and irrelevant the Democrats are in 21st century U.S. politics.
One final note: to those who think I'm being too alarmist or pessimistic, I'd like to say that no one on earth will be happier than me if I'm proved to be wrong. In fact, I'll be happy to eat a very large serving of crow (literally)---and I'll Webcam it and put it on YouTube for all to see.
But frankly, I'm hardly alone in my pessimism for American society. In April, 2010, Noam Chomsky compared today's U.S. to Weimar Germany. He said that the "mood of the country is frightening" and that he'd "never seen anything like this" in his lifetime.
As Chomsky noted, in Nazi Germany: "...it was the Jews. Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. We will be told that white males are a persecuted minority. We will be told we have to defend ourselves and the honor of the nation. Military force will be exalted. People will be beaten up. This could become an overwhelming force. And if it happens it will be more dangerous than Germany. The United States is the world power. Germany was powerful but had more powerful antagonists. I don't think all this is very far away. If the polls are accurate it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election."
Chomsky was right about the "crazed Republicans" sweeping the next election. Time will tell if the rest of his gloomy prognosis turns out to be true.
In the meantime, it's clear that the Left is dead in America. Granted, we never really had much of a "Left" in this country anyway, compared to the likes of Europe. But what we did have is pretty much dead now. And Obama's impotence demonstrates the Left's extinction as a force in American society.
Monday, August 06, 2007
The Real Reason The Wingnuts Hate YearlyKos
By MARC McDONALD
Once upon a time, it was easy to be a GOP propagandist.
Up until the mid-1990s, Republicans could spew out lies all day long and rarely had to worry about any watchdogs holding them accountable. Oh sure, there were a few obscure leftist print publications here and there, but they had tiny circulations and were often difficult to come by.
Back then, the GOP propagandists certainly didn't have to worry about the corporate mainstream media keeping them honest. Indeed, the likes of CNN, The Wall Street Journal, and even The New York Times were quite happy to carry the GOP's water.
With the dawn of the Web, it began to dawn on the GOP propagandists that they were no longer able to spew out lies without being challenged.
Suddenly, anyone could set up a Web site for relatively little cost and effort and instantly have a potential worldwide audience.
GOP propagandists like Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly soon discovered, to their horror, that they could no longer peddle their daily lies and bullshit and have no one to challenge them.
This, I believe, is the real reason that the likes of O'Reilly and Limbaugh have been attacking sites like Daily Kos and events like the latter's YearlyKos convention. And despite O'Reilly's boasts of success in countering Daily Kos, it's obvious that he is scared shitless these days (as evidenced by his hysterical, over-the-top denunciations of the site).
O'Reilly and Limbaugh and their ilk have found that everything they say these days is going to be picked apart, analyzed and fact-checked by the progressive Web. As a result, the GOP serial liars have been exposed for the frauds that they really are.
Watchdog sites like Media Matters terrify the GOP propagandists. The latter have discovered that once they tell a lie, it is promptly dissected and debunked and then lives forever on the Web---only a mouse click away for any truth seeker.
The old GOP propagandists' old tricks no longer work in cyberspace. No longer can GOP liars like Dick Cheney fall back on their usual tactics (like claiming they were misquoted). On today's Web, your words live forever in easy-to-access audio and video files that let people hear your actual quotes first-hand.
The dawn of the Web gave the ordinary people a voice that, for the first time in history, could potentially rival the traditional corporate media. Indeed, Daily Kos, with its millions of visitors, does rival the likes of Fox News in audience size. And YearlyKos sums up everything that the GOP/Fox News/Wingnut crowd hates about today's new era of media democracy.
However, the Web hasn't yet succeeded in ending ignorance in America. For every Daily Kos or BuzzFlash, there are wingnut sites that still spew out White House propaganda and talking points on a daily basis. Unfortunately, the Web can transmit lies and ignorance just as quickly as it sends out the truth.
But on the whole, the Web has been a boon for those of us who've long been disappointed in the failure of the corporate MSM to bring the truth to the people. As long as the progressive Web is around, the GOP propagandists will no longer have a stranglehold on the nation's political discourse, as they did as recently as the mid-1990s.
Which bring me to a final point: how long can this golden age last? I've never been one for conspiracy theories. But I just can't believe that the nation's ruling elite are going to allow this state of affairs to continue forever.
People like George W. Bush and his billionaire allies have utter contempt for democracy and a truly free exchange of ideas. No doubt, at some point, they will attempt to crack down on the progressive Web. I suspect they'll even give this crackdown a friendly-sounding, market-tested Orwellian name like "The Internet Freedom Act."
But until that day comes, let's enjoy the likes of Daily Kos, Progressive Daily Beacon, BuzzFlash, Crooks and Liars, OpEdNews.com and the rest of the progressive Web, which have ushered in a Golden Era of truth in America.
Once upon a time, it was easy to be a GOP propagandist.
Up until the mid-1990s, Republicans could spew out lies all day long and rarely had to worry about any watchdogs holding them accountable. Oh sure, there were a few obscure leftist print publications here and there, but they had tiny circulations and were often difficult to come by.
Back then, the GOP propagandists certainly didn't have to worry about the corporate mainstream media keeping them honest. Indeed, the likes of CNN, The Wall Street Journal, and even The New York Times were quite happy to carry the GOP's water.
With the dawn of the Web, it began to dawn on the GOP propagandists that they were no longer able to spew out lies without being challenged.
Suddenly, anyone could set up a Web site for relatively little cost and effort and instantly have a potential worldwide audience.
GOP propagandists like Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly soon discovered, to their horror, that they could no longer peddle their daily lies and bullshit and have no one to challenge them.
This, I believe, is the real reason that the likes of O'Reilly and Limbaugh have been attacking sites like Daily Kos and events like the latter's YearlyKos convention. And despite O'Reilly's boasts of success in countering Daily Kos, it's obvious that he is scared shitless these days (as evidenced by his hysterical, over-the-top denunciations of the site).
O'Reilly and Limbaugh and their ilk have found that everything they say these days is going to be picked apart, analyzed and fact-checked by the progressive Web. As a result, the GOP serial liars have been exposed for the frauds that they really are.
Watchdog sites like Media Matters terrify the GOP propagandists. The latter have discovered that once they tell a lie, it is promptly dissected and debunked and then lives forever on the Web---only a mouse click away for any truth seeker.
The old GOP propagandists' old tricks no longer work in cyberspace. No longer can GOP liars like Dick Cheney fall back on their usual tactics (like claiming they were misquoted). On today's Web, your words live forever in easy-to-access audio and video files that let people hear your actual quotes first-hand.
The dawn of the Web gave the ordinary people a voice that, for the first time in history, could potentially rival the traditional corporate media. Indeed, Daily Kos, with its millions of visitors, does rival the likes of Fox News in audience size. And YearlyKos sums up everything that the GOP/Fox News/Wingnut crowd hates about today's new era of media democracy.
However, the Web hasn't yet succeeded in ending ignorance in America. For every Daily Kos or BuzzFlash, there are wingnut sites that still spew out White House propaganda and talking points on a daily basis. Unfortunately, the Web can transmit lies and ignorance just as quickly as it sends out the truth.
But on the whole, the Web has been a boon for those of us who've long been disappointed in the failure of the corporate MSM to bring the truth to the people. As long as the progressive Web is around, the GOP propagandists will no longer have a stranglehold on the nation's political discourse, as they did as recently as the mid-1990s.
Which bring me to a final point: how long can this golden age last? I've never been one for conspiracy theories. But I just can't believe that the nation's ruling elite are going to allow this state of affairs to continue forever.
People like George W. Bush and his billionaire allies have utter contempt for democracy and a truly free exchange of ideas. No doubt, at some point, they will attempt to crack down on the progressive Web. I suspect they'll even give this crackdown a friendly-sounding, market-tested Orwellian name like "The Internet Freedom Act."
But until that day comes, let's enjoy the likes of Daily Kos, Progressive Daily Beacon, BuzzFlash, Crooks and Liars, OpEdNews.com and the rest of the progressive Web, which have ushered in a Golden Era of truth in America.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Wingnuts Denounce "Tin-Foil Hat" Liberals While Embracing Paranoid Conspiracy Theories
By MARC McDONALD
Browse any right-wing blog or listen to wingnut radio these days and you're confronted by a steady stream of angry voices denouncing "tin-foil hat" liberals and their "conspiracy theories."
The wingnuts are convinced that we liberal "conspiracy buffs" believe in some far-out things.
According to the wingnuts, we believe that Bush lied America into war. And we believe that the 2000 and 2004 elections weren't honest. And we suspect that maybe the White House puts the interests of Halliburton over the American people.
Pretty wacky stuff, huh?
The only problem is that a majority of the American people have similar questions these days. Which I guess means that America has become a land of tin-foil hat wearers.
However, there's a rich irony with the wingnuts denouncing conspiracy theories. After all, these people wrote the book on conspiracies. You won't find a more paranoid group of people in the nation.
The fact is, wingnuts believe that just about everything is part of a conspiracy these days.
Global warming is a liberal conspiracy. The media is a part of a liberal conspiracy. Iraq War opponents are part of a liberal conspiracy. Anyone who questions Bush is conspiring to harm America. And polling companies that show that Bush has a low approval rating are part of a liberal conspiracy.
According to the wingnuts, even the U.S. Navy was part of a liberal conspiracy, when it awarded John Kerry military honors that he didn't really deserve.
And the latest liberal conspiracy, according to the wingnuts, is that we're secretly working to shut down their beloved Rush Limbaugh, and the rest of wingnut radio.
This paranoid behavior on the part of the wingnuts is nothing new. In fact, it reached a fever pitch during the Clinton administration. Back then, talk radio and the wingnuts were constantly embracing every wacky anti-Clinton conspiracy that came down the pike.
According to them, Clinton conspired to "murder" Vince Foster. Clinton also murdered Commerce Secretary Ron Brown, who died in a "mysterious" plane crash. As Arkansas governor, he conspired to murder dozens of people who "knew too much." And when he wasn't busy murdering people, he was raping women left and right.
I rarely can bring myself to admit that the wingnuts do something better than the Dems. But in this case, I'll make an exception. Liberals' "conspiracy" theories are definitely no match for the wacky conspiracy theories on the Right.
And when the wingnuts aren't accusing us of far-out conspiracy theories, they're accusing of something called "Bush Derangement Syndrome."
Apparently, it seems, we hate Bush for no particular reason. And our hatred is therefore irrational. To dare suggest that maybe Bush had something to do with the fiasco in Iraq, we're guilty of a serious case of Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Here, again, though, the Left simply can't compare to the wingnuts, when it comes to unhinged hatred.
After all, even the fiercest progressive critics of Bush are no match for the foaming-at-the-mouth, mad-dog crazy Clinton haters of the 1990s. We're seeing a revival of these nutcases today, as they prepare to go after Hillary Clinton.
There's a big difference between the Left's hatred of Bush and the Right's hatred of Clinton, though.
We progressives hate Bush for lying America into an illegal, reckless, immoral war that has seriously damaged America's standing in the world.
By contrast, the wingnuts hated Clinton for: what, exactly? Lying about a blow job?
I mean, even the fiercest of Clinton's critics have now quietly tip-toed away from the wild charges they made against Clinton in the '90s.
Are there still wingnuts out there who really believe Clinton murdered Vince Foster? If so, they're strangely quiet about it, these days. After all, immediately after the Clinton era ended, I didn't hear another word about that crazy conspiracy from the wingnuts.
But I get the feeling that, even after the Bush era ends, there will still be many progressives who'll continue to seek answers and justice for the White House's very real crimes in the nightmarish years since 2000.
Browse any right-wing blog or listen to wingnut radio these days and you're confronted by a steady stream of angry voices denouncing "tin-foil hat" liberals and their "conspiracy theories."
The wingnuts are convinced that we liberal "conspiracy buffs" believe in some far-out things.
According to the wingnuts, we believe that Bush lied America into war. And we believe that the 2000 and 2004 elections weren't honest. And we suspect that maybe the White House puts the interests of Halliburton over the American people.
Pretty wacky stuff, huh?
The only problem is that a majority of the American people have similar questions these days. Which I guess means that America has become a land of tin-foil hat wearers.
However, there's a rich irony with the wingnuts denouncing conspiracy theories. After all, these people wrote the book on conspiracies. You won't find a more paranoid group of people in the nation.
The fact is, wingnuts believe that just about everything is part of a conspiracy these days.
Global warming is a liberal conspiracy. The media is a part of a liberal conspiracy. Iraq War opponents are part of a liberal conspiracy. Anyone who questions Bush is conspiring to harm America. And polling companies that show that Bush has a low approval rating are part of a liberal conspiracy.
According to the wingnuts, even the U.S. Navy was part of a liberal conspiracy, when it awarded John Kerry military honors that he didn't really deserve.
And the latest liberal conspiracy, according to the wingnuts, is that we're secretly working to shut down their beloved Rush Limbaugh, and the rest of wingnut radio.
This paranoid behavior on the part of the wingnuts is nothing new. In fact, it reached a fever pitch during the Clinton administration. Back then, talk radio and the wingnuts were constantly embracing every wacky anti-Clinton conspiracy that came down the pike.
According to them, Clinton conspired to "murder" Vince Foster. Clinton also murdered Commerce Secretary Ron Brown, who died in a "mysterious" plane crash. As Arkansas governor, he conspired to murder dozens of people who "knew too much." And when he wasn't busy murdering people, he was raping women left and right.
I rarely can bring myself to admit that the wingnuts do something better than the Dems. But in this case, I'll make an exception. Liberals' "conspiracy" theories are definitely no match for the wacky conspiracy theories on the Right.
And when the wingnuts aren't accusing us of far-out conspiracy theories, they're accusing of something called "Bush Derangement Syndrome."
Apparently, it seems, we hate Bush for no particular reason. And our hatred is therefore irrational. To dare suggest that maybe Bush had something to do with the fiasco in Iraq, we're guilty of a serious case of Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Here, again, though, the Left simply can't compare to the wingnuts, when it comes to unhinged hatred.
After all, even the fiercest progressive critics of Bush are no match for the foaming-at-the-mouth, mad-dog crazy Clinton haters of the 1990s. We're seeing a revival of these nutcases today, as they prepare to go after Hillary Clinton.
There's a big difference between the Left's hatred of Bush and the Right's hatred of Clinton, though.
We progressives hate Bush for lying America into an illegal, reckless, immoral war that has seriously damaged America's standing in the world.
By contrast, the wingnuts hated Clinton for: what, exactly? Lying about a blow job?
I mean, even the fiercest of Clinton's critics have now quietly tip-toed away from the wild charges they made against Clinton in the '90s.
Are there still wingnuts out there who really believe Clinton murdered Vince Foster? If so, they're strangely quiet about it, these days. After all, immediately after the Clinton era ended, I didn't hear another word about that crazy conspiracy from the wingnuts.
But I get the feeling that, even after the Bush era ends, there will still be many progressives who'll continue to seek answers and justice for the White House's very real crimes in the nightmarish years since 2000.
Friday, June 08, 2007
Joe Klein, Who Claimed Liberals "Hate America," Now Slams Progressives' "Bile"
By MARC McDONALD
Time magazine blogger Joe Klein is upset with the way the progressive blogosphere is treating him these days. In his latest piece, "Beware the Bloggers' Bile," Klein expresses bafflement that he's been criticized by liberal bloggers recently.
Klein writes that much of the progressive blogosphere these days is "is being drowned out by a fierce, bullying, often witless tone of intolerance."
Klein expresses dismay at his critics and tries to play up his supposedly liberal credentials. He writes that he's being unfairly targeted. As far as he's concerned, "the left-liberals in the blogosphere are merely aping the odious, disdainful—and politically successful—tone that right-wing radio talk-show hosts like Rush Limbaugh pioneered."
Wow, that's a pretty heavy charge.
There's only one problem that the supposedly reasonable and "unfairly" criticized Klein fails to point out.
The fact is, Klein himself has been guilty of the most vicious, Rush Limbaugh-like attacks on liberals in recent years.
Here's an example (as reported last year by Media Matters). On April 11, 2006, Klein declared that Democrats wouldn't find success among voters "if their message is that they hate America -- which is what has been the message of the liberal wing of the party for the past 20 years."
Let me see if I understand this correctly: Klein claims liberals "hate" America. And then he turns around and claims that the progressive blogs are guilty of "intolerance" and Rush Limbaugh-like tactics because they dared to criticize him.
Time magazine blogger Joe Klein is upset with the way the progressive blogosphere is treating him these days. In his latest piece, "Beware the Bloggers' Bile," Klein expresses bafflement that he's been criticized by liberal bloggers recently.
Klein writes that much of the progressive blogosphere these days is "is being drowned out by a fierce, bullying, often witless tone of intolerance."
Klein expresses dismay at his critics and tries to play up his supposedly liberal credentials. He writes that he's being unfairly targeted. As far as he's concerned, "the left-liberals in the blogosphere are merely aping the odious, disdainful—and politically successful—tone that right-wing radio talk-show hosts like Rush Limbaugh pioneered."
Wow, that's a pretty heavy charge.
There's only one problem that the supposedly reasonable and "unfairly" criticized Klein fails to point out.
The fact is, Klein himself has been guilty of the most vicious, Rush Limbaugh-like attacks on liberals in recent years.
Here's an example (as reported last year by Media Matters). On April 11, 2006, Klein declared that Democrats wouldn't find success among voters "if their message is that they hate America -- which is what has been the message of the liberal wing of the party for the past 20 years."
Let me see if I understand this correctly: Klein claims liberals "hate" America. And then he turns around and claims that the progressive blogs are guilty of "intolerance" and Rush Limbaugh-like tactics because they dared to criticize him.
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