My Peak Wingnut theory has got to be an early front runner for the von Hoffman award of the year. Obama has not even won the election, yet here is a 67 page, 192 footnote pdf file titled “An Examination of Obama’s Use of Hidden Hypnosis Techniques in His Speeches.” Deep in the spittle, you can find insights such as the following:
Worse yet, his hypnosis probably has at least some effect on millions. Jews voting for the candidate endorsed by Iran, Hamas, Farakhan, and Khalidi should be a wake up signal that something is not Kosher.
Whatever the outcome on Tuesday, this is going to be the longest four years ever.
Warren Terra
I think I can speak for all Obama supporters when I say that Barack Obama is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.
Sorry, couldn’t resist the obvious hypnosis joke.
r€nato
John, I think I can safely speak for all of us when I say that we are willing to forgive and forget your having been a wingnut… but we’ll never let you live down ‘Peak Wingnut’!
Zifnab
Hahaha! Win!
My god, do these people even read the shit they post? Does anybody? This is definitely approaching the outer limits of batshit insanity.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
Whatever the outcome on Tuesday, this is going to be the longest four years ever.
I know what you mean, but if you’d been a Democrat for all of the last eight, you’d know from long.
handy
I like listening to Obama’s speeches. They’re much better than Cats. I want to hear them again and again and again.
Weird. Can’t seem to figure out why.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
@Zifnab: This is definitely approaching the outer limits of batshit insanity.
So you’d think – but that’s claiming that we’ve reached peak wingnut, isn’t it?
r€nato
Dear Wingnuts:
Suck. On. THIS:
President.
Barack.
Hussein.
Obama.
Dennis - SGMM
Well, sheesh, it has to be hypnosis. It can’t possibly be that the Republicans have fucked up the country so badly that it will take years to recover.
r€nato
So is that what Obama was really studying at Harvard, instead of law? Complex hypnosis techniques? I bet his professor was Ward Churchill.
Captain USA
This is trough wingnut.
Jiminy Jilliker
You…you didn’t actually read through that did you? Really? The whole thing?
Comrade Stuck
Actually, it’s more likely we’ve reached Peak Sanity and are now entering a dimension heretofore unknown and unexplored. There will need to be new courses of study developed to understand the expanding horizons of newly discovered retro-evolution. It was probably there all along and just locked up tight in the dark bathroom stalls of the wingnut psyche, until Sarah Serendipity came along with the key.
r€nato
I hope Obama uses his awesome invincible hypnosis powers to convince Congress to pass bills mandating a withdrawal from Iraq, universal health care, and sending Bush/Cheney to The Hague to stand trial for war crimes.
I mean, if he can hypnotize a nation of 300 million, doing the same to 535 people should be child’s play.
r€nato
LOLZ that’s nothing, try reading the Time Cube site.
Dennis - SGMM
No, silly. All black people know these techniques. That’s why they’ve always thrived in America.
Comrade Stuck
America, The Manchurian Nation
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
@r€nato: I mean, if he can hypnotize a nation of 300 million, doing the same to 535 people should be child’s play.
Even hypnosis can’t penetrate the Gingrichian programming that causes Congressional Redoublechins to oppose anything a Democrat does, says, suggests, or thinks about. It’s purely reflexive and would work even if their brains were scooped out, leaving only the stem to control autonomic functions.
Which may already have happened.
The Dangerman
Obama: "You will go shopping and spend 150,000 on clothes; you will go shopping and spend 150,000 on clothes; you will go shopping…
Palin: Yes, Master.
kommrade jakevich
Yes that is indeed a puzzler. Why else would Jews fail to vote for the ticket that includes a whack job who thinks they’ll suffer eternal torment if they don’t accept Jesus Christ as their savior?
Gasp! Do you think it is because Jews have individual opinions about what is best for themselves and their country and vote accordingly??
Nah, that would be as absurd as thinking other sub-sections of the population form individual opinions. It must be that Ovinator Michelle carries in her purse.
Christ you’re a fussy s.ob. Cole. If you equate four years of fReichtards wailing in the wilderness with four more years of fReichtards romping in the White House you need to drink more. Or less. Something. Get a grip.
handy
Funny I was actually reminiscing sweetly about Paula Jones, Jennifer Flowers, Whitewater, Vince Foster, and Monica Lewinsky when Clinton was prez. So, yeah, we’re not seeing anything really different now.
pragmatic idealist
No way in hell that the next four years are longer than the last four.
Jon H
I haven’t smoked a single cigarette since I started listening to Obama’s speeches.
GSD
Being from NH and having seen Obama several times….I now know why after every event I have a cigarette and my ass hurts.
-GSD
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
@Jon H: I haven’t smoked a single cigarette since I started listening to Obama’s speeches.
If you’ve run out, Obama might share some of his.
He shared peanut butter and jelly, why not cigarettes?
Or did he manage to quit? From personal experience I know quitting smoking is a major bastard.
ninerdave
What are you kidding me? That’s fucking hysterical. If they are just getting started in delivering the crazy, it’s going to be high comedy.
r€nato
Agree with komrade jakevich. John, look at the silver lining; you will have no end of easy topics for blog posts. Think of it as your opportunity to make up for not having a blog during the Clinton years, when you could have blogged endlessly about the insane bullshit peddled about him.
Dennis - SGMM
Obama to OPEC in Patented HypnoVoice™:
"…and oil will be twenty dollars a barrel."
What could go wrong?
Zifnab
@Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist: Seriously. Hypnosis? Where else do they have to go? They already called him the Anti-Christ. Maybe he’s Xenu returned to devour the souls of angry Thetans? (see: Scientology)
I mean, any more nonsensical and they’d literally just be babbling gibberish. I contend that there is a rational limit to the way in which you can string English sentences together that could exceed this level of crazy. John wasn’t wrong, he was just a little ahead of the curve. This is just a crazy "bubble" as it were. Eventually the bubble pops. They all do.
Brian J
So I turned on "Hannity & Colmes" after watching Obama with Bill Clinton on MSNBC. Hannity and Rudy! Guiliani are repeating a mix of lies and distortions about Obama involve his tax cuts, his broken promises regarding public financing, his opposition to spending for our troops, and whatever else they could remember from their list of nonsense talking points. It’s really quite amazing that people watch this and think it’s even remotely engaging. Say what you will about people like O’Reilly, but even he doesn’t do the robot-like stuff that Hannity does.
I have to say, it’s really something to watch Hannity and Rudy! talk about Obama’s tax credits without any knowledge of the history of these types of plans for the last three decades. More specifically, if Obama is a redistributionist, so is Ford, Reagan, and both Bush I and Bush II. Rudy! also made the absurd claims that McCain isn’t going to give people tax credits to afford health care and that a deduction and a credit were the same thing. I think this level of stupid is starting to blind me.
theturtlemoves
Just to be clear, Ted Kaczynski is still in prison, right? Because… Damn.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
@Zifnab: Eventually the bubble pops. They all do.
You’re probably right. But I’ve been repeatedly surprised by how much even more crazy the wingnuts could get without descending into total nonverbal anti-sense. I have a hunch that there’s still a way they can go.
Xanthippas
Please tell me you have not "read" that whole website. If so, I am sorry for the day of your life that you will never get back.
Yeah, but the first six months will be nice. We can just respond to everything with "Suck it. Obama won."
Shibby
What the hell is it with all the Jew-baiting?
We are frigging 2.5% of the U.S. population.
We vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic party.
I’m tired of having to explain to all my friends why there are so many dipshit Jewish Neocons.
demimondian
@Zifnab:
The Sarah Palin drones prefer that you refer to it as "speaking in tongues".
Phoenix Woman
"I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear…"
r€nato
ordinarily, I’d disdain gloating.
But after the last 8 years, I think we’ve earned the right. The Goopers haven’t exactly been magnanimous in victory (or theft).
Next Tuesday we’ll show them what a real mandate looks like.
Comrade Stuck
The Clinton years will seem like tea with the frieking Queen compared to what Obama will have to deal with. And the country is so fucked up right now, the combined smarts of Lincoln, FDR, Clinton and Albert Einstein would not be able to unfuck it any time soon. The good news is, there is a current probability Obama will have a solid governing majority and a mandate with a high vote total, assuming the polls are correct– a tricky assumption. But the venom from the distilled wingnuttery we will have to beat back, will be altogether something new and breathtaking. IMHO
r€nato
I’m really going to enjoy repeating, "President Barack Hussein Obama". Just sayin’.
Brian J
I think it has something to do with the fact that the Republicans believe some areas hold enough Jews who, if fed enough nonsense, will believe that the Democrats aren’t sufficiently pro-Israel, will vote against them, and then deliver the state to the Republicans.
r€nato
I think Obama is a much more sympathetic figure than Clinton ever was. I mean, Clinton was a good president and a great communicator but there’s no denying that he was, well, ‘slick’ and a poon hound (and his taste in poon was decidedly downscale).
Obama is a lot more sympathetic a figure plus he’s going to be the first black president. I think he’s going to have a pretty hefty coating of Teflon. In fact, I encourage the wingnuts to turn it up to 11; they’re going to prolong the GOP’s 40 years in the wilderness.
Jon H
"I’m really going to enjoy repeating, "President Barack Hussein Obama". Just sayin’."
I look forward to the inauguration of the Obamabashi.
Jon H
"I think he’s going to have a pretty hefty coating of Teflon."
Hopefully there’s plenty of Kevlar in there too.
Brian J
Don’t sink to their level. Simply act happy and grateful, but professional and serious, as if you are working with Obama to get things done. In other words, pretend the goons on the right don’t exist as you are going about being an active citizen working to make this country better. That will drive them up the wall.
Jay Severin Has A Small Pen1s
You can rest assured…no one willing or able to read a 67 page document would vote for McCain. The content is moot.
handy
All that time these jokers have acted all concerned about how the DFHs weren’t "respecting the office" of the President, and kept insisting "You may not have voted for him, but you should support Bush." How much you wanna bet they apply the same standard to themselves.
Comrade Stuck
Dems having the WH AND a filibuster proof Senate Majority will drive them up the wall and into low orbit around the Earth. We could attach Satellites to their asses and save NASA a bundle.
skippy
obama is a master hypnotist.
i found mrs. skippy clucking like a chicken after the obama infomercial.
Brian J
Those are both incredibly funny and very sharp comments.
Who knows if Obama will be hurt by the same ethical problems that injured Clinton? At the very least, we won’t have any sex scandals, but even if there are damaging things to come out Obama that we don’t know about, I think Obama benefits from seeing what happened to Clinton and how Clinton responded to it. Hindsight is, even in this form, very clear. Besides that, let’s assume that in April or May of next year, the same people are screaming about the same stuff. If the stuff about Ayers or Wright isn’t sticking now, who the hell is going to care months down the line, when he’s elected? This isn’t to say those on the right like Sean Hannity won’t manufacture controversies out of thin air, of course, but again, Obama will have some knowledge about how to respond.
Joshua Norton
Oh, I’m sure they could make it through all the words, but wingers have proven time and again that they have no concept of what they mean. A Chatty Kathy doll has more comprehension of what she’s saying than a wingnut repeating what Rush said about socialism.
Polish the Guillotines
"Under my influence you will relinquish your willpower and become my slave." — The Crimson Ghost
eyeball
Have you peeked into The Corner lately? The stench of flop sweat and cheetohs farts is really rank. Hypnotized by hate.
gbear
Yep, and someone is going to have to cover for Sadly, No! when they drop dead from overstimulation and exhaustion.
Joshua Norton
Oh, I’m sure they could make it through all the words, but wingers have proven time and again that they have no concept of what they mean. A Chatty Kathy doll has more comprehension of what she’s saying than a wingnut repeating something Rush said about Marxism.
Joshua Norton
Interesting. The middle part of social ism must set off the "moderation" alarm. I replaced the word with Marxism and it sailed right through.
Frank Jacobs
John, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear you were in a coma for the last eight.
The next four years should feel as long as this past alone. Insha’Allah.
Far Left American Hater Incertus
So, Barack Obama is Hypnotoad?
Jeff
It’s not us, its the Rapturists. The staunchest Republican, pro-Israel, Jewish guy I know is my brother-in-law who voted for Obama.
Johnny Pez
@Zifnab:
Have to disagree. There will be no "peak wingnut". They’re just going to get crazier and crazier until a tiny core of true believers tries to hitch a ride on a comet via ritual suicide.
Johnny Pez
And K-Lo will be the cult-master. (Or should that be cult-mistress? Nah, image is too disturbing.)
Polish the Guillotines
Appended for maximum wingnut.
It’s going to be the best inauguration ever. Wingnut heads will pop like subsidized ethanol corn in a coal-powered microwave.
James F. Elliott
Thank you for this.
iluvsummr
@Comrade Stuck: After losing, McCain could pull one last mavericky move, declare his undying allegiance to his new president, Barack Hussein Obama and urge all his former supporters to back Obama because, you know, country first. Wonder how long it would take for Palin to declare him a godless communist if he did that.
OT – Just thinking about the non-politicians who’ve been sucked into the campaign for better or worse: Ayers (the Chronicle of Higher Education today linked to a petition signed by 4000+ professors asking people to lay off him for shit that happened 40 years ago), Reverend Wright (he might just decide to make a permanent home in Ghana – no one’s heard from him since he left for West Africa months ago), Father Pfleger, Joe the Plumber (by the time he’s done cashing in he’ll really be able to afford that 250K plumbing business), etc. There should be a rule against involving non-politicians who don’t have a massive ad budget to rebut whatever half-truths get aired about them.
ninerdave
@Phoenix Woman:
As a commie from the wacko SF Bay Area, I welcome our new muslimoterroistingmarxist overlord.
I want to pay 99% tax for the betterment of Allah.
Blue Raven
The hypnosis can’t be working. I haven’t lost an ounce since he started campaigning.
Mike
It used to be Hispanics who should (but don’t) vote Republican because of their family values. This year, it’s Jews who should vote GOP (but don’t) because of Israel. I guess that’s progress of sorts.
Anyway, in case it needs saying:
1. Jews have concerns other than Israel.
2. Obama will be fine for Israel.
3. Starting lots of wars in the Middle East is not good for Israel.
4. Insisting (as the neocons do) that the furthest right-wing Israeli position on the Palestinians is the only legitimate one is terrible for Israel.
rachel
Something tells me he’s too dumb to keep it, though.
AnneLaurie
WIN!
Conservatively Liberal
I decided to closely examine the half hour show that Obama did. I played it backwards and sure as hell the wingnuts are right, interspersed throughout the show is evidence that Obama has enlisted the most powerful hypnotist of all.
We are doomed! Doomed I say!
Plus I could clearly hear Charles Manson asking for a cheeseburger with pickles. Absolute evil!
CIRCVS MAXIMVS MMVIII
The last eight were long and tedious, I’m hoping the next four (hopefully eight) will be much better.
As for when the retards state they will not support their president, I will just say "So much for Country First".
Redhand
Can’t resist the Godwinism, but we all know that Hitler also had a hypnotic effect on das Volk.. Obama’s gonna be even worse, because he can even mesmerize da Chews.
Actually John, this may be the greatest four years ever. Wingnut heads are exploding all over America, and the guy hasn’t even won the election yet.
BruceK
This may be a bit over the top, but as long as people are exchanging words instead of metal, we haven’t hit Peak Wingnut yet.
"We may not have parted on the best of terms. I realize certain words were exchanged. Also, certain … bullets."
MattF
And, you know, he did share his toys in kindergarten. No lie.
bellatrys
I think what John means is that we will see outpourings of Teh Crazy from the conservative punditry (pro and am) that will make the Clinton years seem like sweet sanity, and that they being so far removed from Observable Reality will be mentally exhausting to deal with in a way that their current rantings haven’t yet achieved: it’s one thing for wingnuts to be shrieking "He’s going to put us all in reeducation camps and turn us all into funky Islamofascistic hippies!" because, you know, he hasn’t been elected yet, everything is still in potentia even if some potentialities are as remote as the discovery of the hidden lunar cheese mines.
But after when they’re STILL shouting this – well, that disconnect (the ethical one was mostly it, but also the farfetchedness of the Drudge-and-Scaife inspired claims) between the panics and paranoias about Bill Clinton’s admin (UN-run reeducation camps! we’ll all be turned into Gay Atheists! Our wives will be made his concubines! You just don’t know about it because they assassinate everyone who challenges them!) and the bland middle-of-the-road government that we actually did have, made me seriously reconsider the sanity as well as the reliability of our movement authority figures.
Kind of what Hilzoy spoofs here:
This means that bloggers, and other thinking beings having to occupy the same airspace as these willful idiots, will frequently be reduced to pointing, flailing, and going "asdfjkl!" because it’s really hard to deconstruct pure essence of gibberish from a dialectical or rhetorical angle. It’s taken a heavy toll on Scott and s.z., frex, tackling Pastor Swank for all these years.
Now imagine a thousand Pastor Swanks typing away at a thousand keyboards…
Rick Taylor
I don’t know I think you were on to something. Something is different; the nuttiness is getting so intense the mainstream is starting to notice it. Even some Republicans are starting to get uncomfortable with it. Up until now, the common wisdom has been it’s the Democrats who are weighed down like an anchor by the nutroots, those crazy leftists who they have to appease but at the same time who pull them out of the mainstream and make them unelectable and unserious. That narrative never made much sense, and it’s going to get even harder to maintain after this election.
Josh Hueco
Okay, I take back anything I ever may have said about Texans being reasonable.
Seanly
I’m waiting for Republicans to turn on Palin for sullying their good name. I predict that we actually see some wonder if Palin was a Democratic plant meant to sabotage the awesome McCain campaign. I want to see bloody internecine Republican warfare!
Napoleon
Sweet, our local (Cleveland Ohio) NPR station did a local story on the local McCain office (tomorrow is an Obama office) and the volunteers. They catch one of them on the phone calling, and of course you can only hear his end of the call. It went something like (cue p-off voice) "well good luck with your socialist party". Unreal. I suppose the person may have said they were voting socialist (you know, one of 100 people in the county that may do so) or said he was voting that way to get under the McCain supporters skin, but what do you want to bet the volunteer just was verbally abusing an Obama supporter?
MR. Bill
Let me second the folks who say the Jew-baiting is mostly for the consumption of the Rapturists. I live in wingnut land, and the fantasies of Mr. LeHaye and Mr. Jenkins are taken as Gospel by too many of the ‘low information’ voters. They love Israel, or at least, the idea of ‘Jews in the Promised Land’, and can’t tell the Likhud from the ‘Children of Israel’ in the Bible. They look forward to their slaughter and the conversion of a few. They don’t actually like Jews, except for that nice Joe Leiberman…
I can’t explain the existence of Dr. Krauthammer, or D. Frum, or other Jewish Neocons, except as some genetic experiment gone wrong.
Dennis - SGMM
Can you say "Loot the Treasury?" I thought you could:
Banks to Continue Paying Dividends
And why did the government give these banks permission to pay our money out in dividends?
Sweet. So just how distressed were these banks in the first place if they felt comfortable about refusing to participate? Or did they know that Bushco would be more than willing to participate in a transfer of over $80bn of public funds to bank shareholders? It’s comforting to know that some Americans won’t have to face the tragedy of giving up their private jets.
Conservatively Liberal
I believe that Obama will win this but I can’t wait for it to get over with. I know that there are far too many people in the middle who are voting Obama but they are still looking for that one reason not to do so and to be able to justify it without looking bad.
Reached peak wingnut? Hardly. But the more the extreme right foams at the mouth the more the moderates on the right get uncomfortable with it. I have seen some pretty nasty general elections in the past but this year new record lows have been set on the right. It is heartening to see some on the right calling bullshit on McCain and Palin and their antics, it confirms to me that the extreme right are trying to take over the show for themselves.
If McCain loses, there is going to be a bloodbath on the right. The social-, fiscal- and neo-cons are going to be pointing fingers at each other and a struggle is going to erupt as to what direction their party would need to take to recover its footing. The social cons are going to be the nastiest to deal with as there is no low that these so-called christians will not stoop to in their lust for power and control over everyone else. They have the perfect christian nation in mind and most of us here would not be welcome in it unless we conform.
They like to talk about ‘reeducation camps’ but is that any different from what they want to impose if they gain control of the country? Of course, since their dictates have the backing of god then they must be right and everyone else is wrong because they are godless or worship the wrong god. Right?
With the rabid Palin fans that have collected there, I think RedState needs a name change. May I suggest RaptureReadyState ? I don’t see how they expect to be taken seriously as a site for political discourse when all they do is quash and kind of discussion if it does not agree with their ideals.
One other note is that if Obama is the Anti-Christ and they are Rapture Ready, then why are they fighting against electing Obama? Do they think they are stronger than their biblical prophecy. Do they think that they can foil god’s plan for the end of things? As much as these nuts pray for Jeebus to return so they all can go to heaven you would think that they would joyfully stand aside and let the bible do its thing. Instead they are out there warning that Obama is the Anti-Christ and not to vote for him.
I know I should not expect deep thought from people who think the world is 6,000 years old, that Jeebus had a pet Pterodactyl and Mary rode to market on a Stegosaurus, but I just can’t believe how stupid and shortsighted these people are.
filkertom
Yes, Mustard.
Lordy, what a piece of work. I wonder what superpowers McCain and Palin have?
Comrade Stuck
GrannyPower on the REAL Straight Talk Express.
J.
That may explain why I felt surprisingly refreshed after watching Obama’s informercial last night, and why I started barking every time I saw McCain’s face or heard his name this morning. Hmmm…
PaulW
Part of me is hoping that the far right isn’t going to do as much damage as they did during the Clinton years. Mostly because Obama *ISN’T* Bill Clinton. The far right was able to prolong their inane costly witch-hunting on the Clintons simply because Bill kept doing things (like making questionable business deals, dodging rules and regulations, and oh yeah getting blowjobs from women not his wife (and can you blame him? but i digress)) that made it possible for the vast right wing conspiracy to hunt him in the first place. Clinton’s only saving grace that whole time was that the far right were so desperate to nail him on anything they kept overplaying their hand: when they did get him for the Lewinsky stuff is was so off-track (the original investigation was on Whitewater, remember?) and so harmless with regards to presidential responsibilities (did Lewinsky threaten national security? other than lie to a civil court case that was questionable to begin with (and wasn’t Paula Jones’ case thrown out in the end for being worthless?) did Clinton really break any major law?) that the majority public sided with Bill and sent half the GOP congressional leadership packing.
So is Obama going to be another Clinton? Hell no. The wingnuttia is going to be able to yell and scream for a few weeks, months tops, but sooner rather than later their act is going to get tiring and people will tune out in droves… especially if all they have is "Obama’s a marxist commie" or "Obama’s a secret muslim" or "Obama’s black (duh)" If that’s all the far right has, expect FOX news to be watched less than the Crochet Channel…
Rick Taylor
One of the early suggestions I remember an economist making as part of a list of alternatives to the administrations plan was to order the banks not to pay dividends. The rational was the banks couldn’t do this on their own, because if anyone did it would signal weakness.
maxbaer (not the original)
Is the hypnotism thing what Bush was trying when he gazed into Putin’s eyes? Maybe that’s why Obama wants to meet with Ahmadinejad. He’s going to hypnotize him into becoming a socialist like the rest of us.
ppcli
Quote:
"Yeah, but the first six months will be nice. We can just respond to everything with "Suck it. Obama won." "
.
And then after that, we can say "Get over it, Justice Scalia".
mak
The Good News is that if the anonymous wingnut author is right, the election should be even more lopsided than we could have hoped, since Obama has not only mesmerized all of us who publicly support him, but has also, apparently, implanted a latent suggestion that in many will not become evident until they reach the voting booth. One can only hope.
cleek
peak wingnut is going to come with the smell of nitrocellulose, i’m afraid
Emma Anne
The far right was able to prolong their inane costly witch-hunting on the Clintons simply because Bill kept doing things (like making questionable business deals, dodging rules and regulations, and oh yeah getting blowjobs from women not his wife
Actually, only the last is true. Everything else was made up. The fact that people still don’t know that makes me a bit nervous. But we have the blogosphere now, so I’m not *terrified*.
Emma Anne
The Clinton years will seem like tea with the frieking Queen compared to what Obama will have to deal with.
I think people who say that don’t really remember what Clinton had to deal with. It started the day he started running (Clinton death lists, drug running) continued through his terms of office (Vince Foster, FBI files, killing people’s cats, assassinating Ron Brown) and didn’t stop until he left (trashing the white house, stealing stuff from Air Force 1).
Nicole
Remember during the primaries when John said one of his objections to Clinton was that he couldn’t take four years of wingnut attacks? Ah, such wide-eyed innocence.
I have a friend whose mother says she is not voting for Obama because he looks like the Antichrist on the covers of the "Left Behind" novels. Seriously.
Comrade Stuck
I remember very well, and I sincerely hope your right that it won’t be worse for Obama.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
…and didn’t stop until he left (trashing the white house, stealing stuff from Air Force 1).
It went on quite a bit longer than that – everything that went wrong with the country until, say, Katrina was CLINTON’S FAULT! It sort of tapered off around then.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@Brian J:
Do I at least get to say "Savor, bitches!" on Wednesday morning? ‘Cause I’m kind of looking forward to that.
Zifnab
@Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist: Not for lack of trying.
But Clinton had to deal with a growing Republican Majority within 2 years of taking office. He was hamstrung by repeated obnoxious investigations into Christmas Card Lists and twenty year old land deals. Obama will have a comfortable majority in the House and potentially a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Apples and Oranges. From a Congressional perspective, it will be a completely different ball game.
It is ironic that Obama is running so hard on the "sensible and bipartisan" platform when, at the end of the day, he probably won’t need to cross the aisle more than a couple of times in his first hundred days.
Jack H.
Republicans have been using NLP techniques for quite a while now. The ‘create your own reality’ idea comes from this psychology for car salesmen school.
King of Pants
Whatever the outcome on Tuesday, this is going to be the longest four years ever.
Only if you give these pathetic basket cases the attention they so crave.
Cyrus
@Brian J:
I sure hope you’re right. Ever since John Edwards’ affair was in the news, I’ve waited in quiet dread for a similar revelation about Obama. I mean, come on, would anyone honestly be that surprised? Something like a quarter of the population commits adultery at some point in their lives, and the attention-seeking, smooth-tongued, power-loving personality of a politician seems more prone to it, and a successful politician has far more chances than the average schlub.
Marital fidelity shouldn’t matter, but somehow it does. A scandal like that (a serious, credible one, not yet another wingnut playing six degrees of separation between Obama and other left-wing boogeymen) would look very, very bad.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
OMG!OMG!OMG! We are NOWHERE near Peak Wingnut.
PLeasepleaseplease follow this link to Atlas Shrugs to find out who Obama’s REAL father is. I shit you not, this is the BEST THEORY EVER.
Hint: Barack really should have been a redhead.
(H/t to Ezra Klein, who is on a roll today. If you can’t stand going to Atlas Shrugs, Ezra will give you the gist.)
iluvsummr
@Jack H.: NLP? Please explain (only NLP I know is natural language processing but I doubt that’s what you’re referring to).
Anarch
All glory to the HypnObama :|
Polish the Guillotines
Man. One of my brilliant comments got thought-raped by the frickin’ spam filter last night. It’s all the way gone.
On the upside, it’s supercool not seeing the Black Screen of Censorship anymore.
Ever forward.
Sherrell
@r€nato:
ha! win!
TenguPhule
Better the wingnut under your foot then the other way around.
Matthew
If it didn’t already get mentioned, I liked the use of "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" in the "personal note" at the end. The wingnuts sure love them some LOTR references.
rufus
I think I can speak for all Obama supporters when I say that these aren’t the droids we’re looking for.
Jack H.
NLP = Neuro Linguistic Programming. Right wing business types just know about this stuff like left wing Boulder types know about Spiral Dynamics.
[email protected]
I noticed the very first person to respond referenced "The Manchurian Candidate". Very nice. These nuts are going to go on a paranoia tour-de-force for the next four years once Obama wins. I’ve read some pretty loony "GOP conspiracy" theories, but these Obama Conspiracy nuts have really stepped up. I hope at least some of them are getting therapy.
eyelessgame
One glimpse (from when it was only the recent past) into those happy days of the Clinton wingnut explosion:
http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/2002/06/18_Helicopters.html
Bill in Chicago
From A to B . . .
The man who started the Obama-is-a-secret-Muslim ball rolling is literally a certifiable nut job who was dinged from the Illinois bar because he was diagnosed with a variety of psychiatric disorders:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/us/politics/13martin.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
He now appears to be the true leader of the Republican Party faithful (sorry Sarah Palin):
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/30/taxans-obama-muslim/
Conservatism in America – it’s not an ideology any longer. It’s a psychiatric disorder.
Greg
you are going deeper
"government by the people for the people"
deeper still
"building the economy from the ground up"
you will do as i command
"this is your country i am asking you to believe in yourselves, to hope and make this happen"
ok, i am hypothesized and it feels just fine
The ultimate conversion is to go door-to-door for Obama, it is fun and it gets you to make obama’s message your own… that it his genius – the exact opposite of "mind control"
metame
I loved his speech. It was better than Cats. I’m going to vote for him again and again…
Miss Priss
If he’s hypnotized all of us, why hasn’t McCain "suspended" his campaign for good and jumped on the Obama train? How come the republican’s mind’s aren’t being controlled?
Oh, I know… it’s only the mindless democrats that would fall for such trickery.
That damn Obama. He had me from hello.
Peter Principle
I think I can speak for all Obama supporters when I say that Barack Obama is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.
Why don’t you pass the time by playing a little solitaire?
Heavy D
The language of politics being coercive…imagine that. Larry Flynt published, The Secret Life of Ronald Reagan (1984) where amongst other amongst a host of crimes, it was alleged that Reagan had holed up in some NeuroLingustic institute for an entire month where he learned the dark art of Neuro- Linguistic Programming. I’m trained in Clinical Hypnosis with a great deal of training and experience with ‘conversational hypnosis’ or the art of weaving hypnotic injunction into conversational speech. Hypnosis is not dark magic, it is the facilitation of a focused state of attention. It’s about setting up suppositions with propositions, "when you’re ready to relax I want you to take a deep breath." I’d challenge any of you not to take that next breath! Any endeavor that involves convincing people has it’s language games. Show me a politician or a salesperson who doesn’t have some innate ability at coercive language and I’ll show you someone who will be looking for another job. Do politicians and their message people supplement their natural talents at manipulation with tidbits from hypnosis, neuro-lingusitic programming, and rapport building? It naive to think they wouldn’t. Is Barack using hypnotic injunctions to entrance and manipulate millions of people? Get real … that’s totally bat-shit crazy.
What’s your reason for voting: http://www.djheavyd.com/scratch/2008/10/voting-reason/
purpleOnion
Does this mean we will no longer have to listen to pundits who make a living off of kissing the right wing’s ass? Oh please, I shouldn’t even think such things. Hannity fired, O’Reilly eating oats in a pasture somewhere, Rush Limbaugh in Bimini having Oxycotin parties, Beck, Savage, snide Cokie Roberts screaming, but my father was a big shot, Buchanan, (both,) living in whatever favorite fascist state they desire, Hughes, Couric, Williams, Will, Krauthammer, and more who actively betrayed the American people for the Republican Party should be exiled to a desert island where they can do no harm. I don’t know what should be done about the "liberal" shills who served their right wing masters, but it should have something to do with padded cells and sticky candies.
We must not forget Ari Fleisher who for becoming a member of the People for an American Fascist Party Way, and continuing to spread a steady stream of lies against our democratic republic should join the following criminals. There should be a special place in hell for Gonzales, Addington, McConnell, Rockefeller, and anyone else who formed the Maginot line around Cheney. Cheney should be stripped naked, given a knife, and dropped by helicopter in the middle of whatever country in Africa still has cannibals, since he likes "dog eat dog" philosophy so much it should fulfill his fantasies without harming other Americans.
Groups like "The Club for Growth" and "The Federalist Society" need to be retired since they both have a similar intent – to corrupt lawyers and undermine the Constitution. Both groups would prefer that government is run by corporations i.e. fascism.
Too bad we cannot fire Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito. We have to suffer through looking at their mugs wishing they were mug shots for quite some time. Yes, there should be a litmus test for judges. Do they swear to uphold the Constitution as it evolves and protect the rights of individuals using precedent, logic, applying a balanced judicial temperament, and not ideological nonsense? There should be activist judges if their activisim is defined as observing the intent as well as the word of the Constitution.
It seems that some people have forgotten that the government’s role is to serve the common good, not make out like bandits due to the trust given them by constituents and not to function as a group of lawyers who serve large commercial interests. Our system of government was in free fall due to those behaviors.