Partisan Stupidity
 

At this point in the process I still support Obama because we need to make a clean break with the Bush administration. That said, my support does not completely blind me to partisan stupidity.

Radar produced this gem.
McCain's running mate won't be any help to him at all, unless it's to help him get his depends undergarments on. She's got no real experience, she's under investigation for corruption, she faked a pregnancy recently to hide the fact that her teenage daughter was pregnant, and she actually doesn't believe in evolution. Anyone over the age of 6 who doesn't believe in evolution is either retarded or insane.

I propose we use this thread to call people out when they are being partisan idiots. I feel that the biggest problem we face as Americans is the playground character of our politics. The country cannot be governed if it is continually at war with itself. We need to limit the stupidity and acknowlege that people, who view the world much differently than we do, are not evil. When we cast falsehoods like candy at mardi gras, we are doing evil and we prove to the other side that we are evil. So Radar, this STFU is for you.

I'm calling myself out pre-emptively.

Griff: When we cast falsehoods like candy at mardi gras...


Nice line.

Oh, and I agree with you. But that line is gold.

I also like that line. I don't appreciate the tone of Radar's post.

He is correct that she is under investigation. If the charges are proved true, which is unlikely in the next two months, it would have brought up serious questions on her professional judgment, inviting comparisons to Nixon's "enemies list".

I have not heard anything about a teenage daughter being pregnant. It doesn't matter because it does not have a bearing on her fitness. If she lied about it to the press or anyone else, that's a personal issue. I would also like Radar to post a link or any kind of attribution to back up the statement.

Her stance on creationism does seem to paint her as a conservative ideologue.

McCain is entering office as one of the oldest US presidents. Even given the fact that '50 is the new 30' or whatever, he has had serious health issues. Even some Republicans are trying to get him to agree to serve only one term (try getting that promise to stick). This means that she will be under increased scrutiny because going into office she is probably more likely to end up serving as president than any vice president in recent history.

Still, Radar cheapens his message by resorting to quips like 'Depends'. I am proud to say that while I do not know any liberals who decorate their workspaces with extremely negative clippings, stickers, etc, I have seen work areas with anti-liberal items that I find offensive no matter who is the target.

I have seen stickers that literally demonize Obama (an O with little horns) on office walls. I have not seen pictures of McCain in diapers anywhere that I've been.

There are a lot of jokes about Cheney, but most of them lack the vitriol I hear when I listen to conservatives talk about liberals.

Most of the really awful stuff towards McCain seems to be coming from 'libertarians' and conservatives.

Playground is exactly the right word for it.

We have to be aware that, at this time, there are people on both left and right whose job it is to listen to all news and political statements 24x7, and isolate each and every moment to see whether it can be mined in any way for political purposes.

Half of these isolated moments are completely bogus. Little throwaway statements, casual contradictions, things stated in humor... it's all fair game to some assholes like (from the left) Thinkprogress and Media Matters, (from the right) Free Republic, and Drudge. They know exactly the game they're playing, and excuse it because the other side does it too.

The candidates themselves seem more wise to what the people want and need, and both have been utterly gracious at critical moments.

No vitriol about Cheney? Dick Cheney? Are you fucking kidding me??

See, Rich can't hear properly. He needs some sort of hearing test because he can only hear out of one side.

Most of us suffer from it to some degree. This is the result of the playground.

Edit: but it was nice of Rich to put his post in this thread, so we don't have to copy it here, eh?

A lot of jokes, and some anger, but I haven't seen anything like I've seen from the right. Also, decorating your work area with this kind of stuff implies a commitment to the idea that I just find lacking from everyone else.

Maybe liberals are more apathetic and disorganized.

Oh, perhaps it's not tone deafness, then, you just think everyone around you is everyone. Common mistake.

Meanwhile, first page of Google image search for, generically, "cheney", yields:

http://cellar.org/2008/cheney-dfmtn.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/DaddyDickCheney.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/darth_cheney.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/darth_cheney2.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/cheney_drevil.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/darth_cheney_2.jpg

http://cellar.org/2008/dick-cheney-angry.jpg

And that's just the first page. You have to go eight pages into a similar GIS for "Obama" to get the same amount of material.

The biggest difference I see between right and left winged propaganda is that the right wingers use material that hits closer to home.

It would be like two seventh grade bullies calling someone a fag. But one uses fag as just another insult that has very little actual truth behind it and one using it on an child that is insecure and confused about his sexuality.

Both right and left wingers use the term fag, but right wingers use it more efficiently as an insult because it tends to bring up some "truthful" confusion and hostilities.


To be fair though, if radical left wingers had the opportunity, they would do the same.

We need to follow the candidates' lead. I think they both get it. I would suggest that folks should call out the people on their own side if they really want to change the tone of discourse. I've been guilty of smearing McCain but I intend to stick to the issues from here on out.

..And Cheney has been in office and a candidate for over 8 years to Obama's 1.

And I'm just taking a sampling of the places I see. I'm not necessarily talking about my workplace, but every office I've been in for one reason or another. People do not put up the 'I hate Republican' stuff up like I see conservatives do.

Maybe that's why talk radio has Rush and Beck, etc, and the liberals have junky Air America. Conservatives like red meat speech, and liberals don't. It's hard to sell bitter hatred if the audience isn't buying.

While the web might have some examples, it's all amateur hour. Noone is paying 400 million dollars to Al Franken.

Results 1 - 18 of about 2,120,000 for cheney

Results 1 - 18 of about 32,500,000 for obama

http://cellar.org/2008/michael_moore.jpg

No market for Demmy snark? ($220M worldwide gross for F9/11.)

http://cellar.org/2008/Keith_Olbermann.jpg

Is that so? (Key demographic ratings getting close to O'Reilly.)

http://cellar.org/2008/stephen-colbert.jpg

No-one's buying??

http://cellar.org/2008/BillMaher.jpg

On any media?

I thank you once again for posting in this thread so we don't have to copy and paste.

The liberals wouldn't come up with this.... would they?

You see, that is the kind of tasteless snarky humor that cheapens political discourse.:mad2:

Damned funny, though.:p

BTW, I'm not sure how much of Colbert's viewership is from liberals and how much from conservatives who don't understand sarcasm.

Not just amateur hour: no less than the New Republic claims Palin "named two of her children after witches".

Turns out one of her children is Willow, from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", and Piper, who is apparently a character on "Charmed".

Turns out Willow was named before Buffy aired.

If you have nothing to say about a candidate, just mock her relentlessly.

You realize, Rich, that I'm putting these in here just so you have a "worldview" greater than that of your office space.

Thanks for posting that in this thread so we don't have to copy and paste.

Willow, Alaska.
Had lunch there, it's beautiful.

Willow,
"A reluctant dwarf must play a critical role in protecting a special baby from an evil queen."
I loved it.


Looks like the Gov was pretty mainstream, hardly condeming...

If you have nothing to say about a candidate, suggest that she willingly risked the life of her unborn child

...then have pro Alan Colmes point to your post, only to remove his story when people pointed out that it was false, and rude beyond belief

...but even that first blogger, in the midst of spreading his own cruel rumor, knew that the cruel rumor-mongering Radar repeated was a piece of shit:

UT - stop telling the truth! It confuses those who only want to believe the lies.

Apparently we can't call our own fouls even when our candidate asks us to. I give this thread a fail. Enjoy the partisan nonsense and later wonder why the center didn't come out to vote for your superior candidate.

The difference in this case are the attacks on her family, her new baby, her 17 year old child. The attacks came mostly from left-wing-nut bloggers and then were subsequently picke up by the mainstream liberal press and tossed about as if they were true. When the right was making their attacks it was usually from single individuals like Rush, Hannity, or that digdong Coulter. And there it ended. They were cast off as extremists for their comments. Not in this case. In this case the press has run with the false stories as if they were true. That is the difference.

A few more nice pictures posted during the Bush years:

http://www.dudehisattva.com/2006_archive.htm

If false rumors have been routinely passed off as true by the mainstream press, you will have no trouble at all linking to just one example. A link to a story in the Washington Post or New York Times, for example. This is one that you really should back up with a link, especially in this thread about partisan stupidity.

You really think right wing attacks come only from a couple of talking heads? What about all the e-mail circulations? You post about them from time to time here on the Cellar. Forgot about them, huh?

Now that I think about it, I really became addicted to the cellar in the buildup to the 04 election. It's fun to see the claws come out on both sides. We had Mari***ko popping up with stories about GWB knocking on her door just to junkpunch her and steal her rent check... ah, the good ol' days.

OK - I just got this from a right winger - any truth to any of it???

Snopes has it.

Well, UT, that'd be 220 million reasons to believe some folks just aren't as smart as I sometimes am, right there. True, it's easy not to be a Michael Moore fan, and there are things around like Moorewatch.com to weight the other end of the seesaw.

Is that Colbert or Ioan Griffith?

Rich, candidate for what office? Cheney's said he's never running for President, and he's sticking to that.

Partisan? Yeah. Idiotic? Not on your tintype, baby. Check the guys who most often call me an idiot -- are they really heavy with credibility?

MM is an idiot.

You're the Reverse Radar.

MM... Marilyn Monroe?

idiots in your mouth, not in your hand

God, I will definately take that as a compliment. :lol2:

Maybe Marilyn Manson... inquiring minds want to know...;)

Michael Moore???

Bingo! Actually in direct reference to the post immediately above MM as noted by UG.

oh great! I guessed right and now I'll have to listen to tw tell me I'm unamerican because of it.

Actually I have been meaning to ask you classicman - why do you hate America?

lol - thanks Sundae, I needed that.







edit:
OMG - you were kidding - right?

Shawnee, in that I'm the more sensible one, perhaps. (Do I err in supposing this was to me?)

Very few of my opposition act from principle; usually their motivations are intellectual dishonesty or willful ignorance. The only principled opposition I see regularly is DanaC's, and I don't see her as altogether free of that willful ignorance. She wouldn't hold the views she does of gun control and why I oppose it if she knew anything of its measurable effects -- the only ones that show up in history. In short, principles, yes; au courant on some things, no. Sundae Girl and Aliantha disagree with me from time to time, again on principles, but we never fight. Radar and tw, I fight -- they're toxic. I may have more in common with Undertoad than I know for sure -- there was his remark about being a "former hard-ass libertarian."

Embrace your inner social contract.

Thought I was doing that! But isn't it hard to type doing that?

(Well! 4K posts.)

Heh, and you joined in 2002? slacker. :rolleyes:

Damn it Merc, don't encourage him. :rolleyes:

Time for some campaignin'

http://www.peteyandpetunia.com/VoteHere/VoteHere.htm

I love it! thanks Dar.

Alaska G.O.P. Still Backs Re-election for Stevens
I know they don't want to lose yet another seat, but WTF?

I see their point. The timing of this is unfortunate. It's too late to replace him with another R who would almost certainly win. The people of Alaska want a R in that Senate seat. This is the only way for that to happen. I don't have a problem with it. It's fair.

Especially if everyone voting for him understands that they're really voting just to keep the seat Republican. It's no different than the people who always vote a straight ticket. Honestly though, I don't think it'll work anyway. Not everyone will buy in to voting for an unknown generic Republican, and the race was already close before this conviction happened.

I think it goes against everything for him to continue his campaign. I hope he loses and loses LARGE.

Wasn't there a Democrat in congress a couple years ago who died, and it was too late to change the ticket, so the wife or somebody took the seat instead? I'm having a mental block and can't think of the name. If I could remember the name, I'd be able to look it up to see what happened there. I remember there was some partisan bickering over that one.

The wife beat Ashcroft.

I believe it depends on state laws. But in that case, the winner had (already) died. Therefore the Governor could appoint a replacement for his seat. The wife was selected by the state's Governor.

Stevens could win, and then resign. Palin might nominate someone else to take the seat. Partisan politics are more important than the voters or nation.

Ah yes, thanks. It was Carnahan.

I remember that as well, but I think that is different than running after being convicted of a crime.

Well, technically the conviction might still be thrown out on appeal. A death, not so much.

Good point clod - I hadn't thought of that.

T'was The Night Before The Elections

'Twas the night before elections
And all through the town
Tempers were flaring
Emotions all up and down!

I, in my bathrobe
With a cat in my lap
Had cut off the TV
Tired of political crap.

When all of a sudden
There arose such a noise
I peered out of my window
Saw Obama and his boys

They had come for my wallet
They wanted my pay
To give to the others
Who had not worked a day!

He snatched up my money
And quick as a wink
Jumped back on his bandwagon
As I gagged from the stink

He then rallied his henchmen
Who were pulling his cart
I could tell they were out
To tear my country apart!

" On Fannie, on Freddie,
On Biden and Ayers!
On Acorn, On Pelosi"
He screamed at the pairs!

They took off for his cause
And as he flew out of sight
I heard him laugh at the nation
Who wouldn't stand up and fight!

So I leave you to think
On this one final note-
Don't be a slacker
GET OUT AND VOTE!!!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I agree with the last line and thats about it -
I know there is a McCain version out there.
Please post it. Its only fair.

...unless your lawyer is from Philadelphia. Those guys make even Death nervous.:thepain:

I shake Bruce's paradigms and unquestioned assumptions rather a lot. Bothers him. :cool: