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You are here: Home / Politics / War on Terror / War on Terror aka GSAVE® / Looking in the Mirror

Looking in the Mirror

by John Cole|  August 27, 20095:54 pm| 52 Comments

This post is in: War on Terror aka GSAVE®, Republican Crime Syndicate - aka the Bush Admin.

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This is depressing because it is such a realistic portrayal of our discourse:


Is Using A Minotaur To Gore Detainees A Form Of Torture?

I’m surprised I didn’t see Captain Ed in there.

(via)

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Reader Interactions

52Comments

  1. 1.

    freelancer

    August 27, 2009 at 6:02 pm

    I wonder if in this (slightly) fictional universe, they flushed copies of House of Leaves down the toilet.

  2. 2.

    SGEW

    August 27, 2009 at 6:03 pm

    “We could use Griffons, but we don’t use Griffons, and that’s what separates us from the terrorists.”

    Spot on.

  3. 3.

    General Winfield Stuck

    August 27, 2009 at 6:08 pm

    Lmao. That video is a national treasure. The Minotaur was only 11 feet tall, not the reported 20. Perfecto!

  4. 4.

    BR

    August 27, 2009 at 6:10 pm

    Bush: ‘Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Finally Over’

    That can never be read enough times.

    What I don’t get is how the media can be so impaired that they can’t recognize what they’ve become when satirized by The Onion or by Stewart/Colbert.

  5. 5.

    Faux News

    August 27, 2009 at 6:10 pm

    There is something very erotic to that photo (according to our Republican Faux News viewers). Let me just say that if there is ANY Minotaur on man sex about to happen former Senator Rick Santorum (Wignut-PA) will be on it right away!

    Not with OUR tax dollars you liberal hippies!

  6. 6.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:12 pm

    The Onion hits it again. Between the Onion and the Daily Show, I don’t see much of a reason to check the “respectable” news sources anymore.

  7. 7.

    Zifnab

    August 27, 2009 at 6:15 pm

    @Tim: Cheers to that. If I’m going to listen to a paid actors blather nonsense disguised as news stories between expensive graphic animations and goofy commercials, at least let the actors be comedians.

  8. 8.

    joe from Lowell

    August 27, 2009 at 6:16 pm

    John Yoo’s often-misunderstood Minotaur Memo was actually an effort to clarify what sorts of Minotaur attacks went beyond the law.

    The definitively proves that the goring, trampling, and axe-boarding were legal, moonbats.

  9. 9.

    joe from Lowell

    August 27, 2009 at 6:18 pm

    BR,

    I read that story at the time, and thought it was way overboard.

    Giant deficits? Another Iraq War? I thought they were laying it on a little thick.

    Heh heh. Heh. Heh.

    Sob.

  10. 10.

    LoveMonkey

    August 27, 2009 at 6:21 pm

    You knew it was me, all along.

  11. 11.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:24 pm

    Re: the preview photo, I thought the video was going to be about Randall Terry’s group pretending to kill a senior citizen to pay for health care.

    The Moran town hall was the last stop on a 10-city tour for Randall Terry, the anti-abortion activist known for his extreme tactics.

    Terry’s colleagues put on a skit with a man in an Obama mask pretending to whip a bloodied woman, who kept saying, “Massa, don’t hit me no more. I got the money to kill the babies.”

    Terry himself dressed in a doctor’s lab coat and pretended to stab a woman in a gray wig.

    “There’s no way to pay for this thing without killing granny,” Terry explained.

    (from
    The Hill
    )

  12. 12.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:26 pm

    @Tim: Sorry, I messed up the blockquote.

  13. 13.

    tgeb

    August 27, 2009 at 6:27 pm

    You goddamn dimlibs, minotaur goring is no worse than a purple nurple. Also it is an essential part of our national defense and we would all be killed by the sand elves if not for our brave CIA demigods and their unstoppable killing machin… er “Enhanced Questing Techniques.”

    I say we give all the minotaurs enchanted battle axes and let our ۥnd amendment loving citizens carry them onto airplanes as carry-on luggage.

  14. 14.

    smiley

    August 27, 2009 at 6:28 pm

    OT and personal but have any of the academics here ever been contacted by an academic headhunter? I was today. I’m just a lowly professor (associate) at a fairly obscure regional private university (though I’m fairly well known in my obscure field of study). They contacted me about whether or not they can market me as a possible department head at other universities. I told them I’d get back to them. Curious.

  15. 15.

    Violet

    August 27, 2009 at 6:28 pm

    “…but you have to remember what it was like after 9/11.”

    “That flesh-hungry half-man, half-bull kept us safe from the terrorists.”

    “Frankly I think it’s sad that the words ‘neverending labyrinth of pain’ are synonymous with one loose cannon minotaur.”

    Holy cow, this is spot on. Did they take those lines straight from the cable blab-fests?

    @Tim: Agreed. Who needs “real” news when the fake news does better reporting.

  16. 16.

    LoveMonkey

    August 27, 2009 at 6:29 pm

    @smiley:

    That was me, it was just a joke.

    .

    .

    Alright, I’m kidding.

  17. 17.

    smiley

    August 27, 2009 at 6:31 pm

    @Tim: Blockquote does not like paragraphs. Remove the spaces between paragraphs or add additional [p] tags. I find the former a lot easier.

  18. 18.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:31 pm

    @smiley: I’m not really an academic, just a HS teacher, but that sounds pretty exciting. Regardless of what happens, it’s gotta feel good to be noticed.

  19. 19.

    freelancer

    August 27, 2009 at 6:33 pm

    @BR:

    HOLY SHIT.

    Tell me that the Onion didn’t retroactively slip that article into their archives.

  20. 20.

    SGEW

    August 27, 2009 at 6:36 pm

    @freelancer: Nope. I still remember reading the copy of that article my friend from Colorado gave me – that was when I knew that we were truly fucked.

    We warned you! We warned you all! But did you listen?!?

  21. 21.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:37 pm

    @smiley: I don’t seem to be able to edit it. :(

  22. 22.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 6:40 pm

    @freelancer: That was a frighteningly and hilariously foresighted article.

  23. 23.

    Leelee for Obama

    August 27, 2009 at 6:41 pm

    @SGEW: Molly Ivins tried before the election, and I wouldn’t have voted for GWB at gunpoint, in any case. The Onion has now lapped reality so many times I’m a bit dizzy. They are wicked clever.

  24. 24.

    Ann B. Nonymous

    August 27, 2009 at 6:45 pm

    Incredible attention to detail. The minotaur has a memoir (of course), Labyrinth of Secrecy, by Asterion with Robert Brinks.

    The ONN came up with a historically accurate minotaur name, a plausible fake ghostwriter’s name, a book cover mockup using exactly the right typeface for that sort of political expose, and then they dubbed it with a sample from the audiobook, ‘courtesy of Simon and Schuster’: incomprehensible taurine snorts and bellows. In response, the former Bush administration figure scoffs, “that’s completely unsubstantiated.”

    But my favorite still is ‘Political Talk Show Host Suddenly Very Interested in Manslaughter Loopholes’.

  25. 25.

    lamh31

    August 27, 2009 at 6:52 pm

    Watching the public viewing of Senator Kennedy’s body. Much of the family, including Ted Kennedy’s wife Vicky, is still there, and are greeting the public mourners as they come in. They are even going so far as to give the mourners hugs if they ask.

    For all their quirks, and richness, that family stays classy when it comes to public service.

  26. 26.

    Mnemosyne

    August 27, 2009 at 6:58 pm

    @Zifnab:

    IIRC, the Onion hires people with journalism experience to do their TV segments because the cadence of TV news is very specific. That’s how they can get things so spot-on. I think that at least some of their actors still do the news on small local stations in the Midwest.

  27. 27.

    Mnemosyne

    August 27, 2009 at 7:01 pm

    This is one of my favorite videos:

    “Has Halloween Become Overcommercialized?”

    Make sure you watch all the way to the end.

  28. 28.

    smiley

    August 27, 2009 at 7:02 pm

    @Tim:

    I’m not really an academic, just a HS teacher…

    Please don’t describe yourself as “just a HS teacher.” We depend on you. Every layer builds on the previous. You have a tough job. How often to you catch your students texting while you teach? I catch it often. I don’t know where you are but please keep trying to teach them. They don’t know how much you’re trying to help them. Maybe they will one day. Keep trying to be Mister Holland. I am, but with limited success.

  29. 29.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    August 27, 2009 at 7:09 pm

    Testing

  30. 30.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    August 27, 2009 at 7:11 pm

    @smiley:

    That made me smile, my DH is a High School Band Director.

  31. 31.

    joes527

    August 27, 2009 at 7:12 pm

    No laughs at the video. It is way too accurate to be funny.

    I’m still in awe of what the Onion did after 9/11. The “Holy Fucking Shit” edition was an amazing mix of humanity and satire. Those guys are genius.

  32. 32.

    Laura W

    August 27, 2009 at 7:15 pm

    Depressing?
    That was the funniest thing I’ve seen/read/heard all day! I snorted into my hands, it was so good! It takes a lot of snark for me to snort into my hands, just so you know how high that particular bar is.

    LauraW, + 2.5

    Everything is incremental.

  33. 33.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    August 27, 2009 at 7:25 pm

    test

  34. 34.

    El Cruzado

    August 27, 2009 at 7:26 pm

    It’s off-topic for this thread, but http://www.theonion.com/content/video/ninja_parade_slips_through_town is still my favorite.

  35. 35.

    beabea

    August 27, 2009 at 7:27 pm

    @Mnemosyne

    Would the reverse also be true? Because it sure seems as if CNN hires people with Onion experience. Except maybe they were let go by the Onion because the CNN people are absurdly non-funny.

  36. 36.

    Crashman06

    August 27, 2009 at 7:29 pm

    Working for the Onion must be the most awesomest job in the world.

  37. 37.

    handy

    August 27, 2009 at 7:30 pm

    Classic! I didn’t know the Geneva Convention prohibits axe-wielding bovine monsters with teeth over 9 “.

  38. 38.

    pcbedamned

    August 27, 2009 at 7:32 pm

    I’m surprised I didn’t see Captain Ed in there.

    Actually, Captain Ed and Co’s newest talking point is that Obamacare is going to pressure people to circumcise their male children

  39. 39.

    freelancer

    August 27, 2009 at 7:34 pm

    @Crashman06:

    Working for the Onion must be the most awesomest job in the world.

    I think it would come in a close third behind Astronaut and Mythbuster.

  40. 40.

    General Winfield Stuck

    August 27, 2009 at 7:38 pm

    @pcbedamned:

    Actually, Captain Ed and Co’s newest talking point is that Obamacare is going to pressure people to circumcise their male children

    That Ed, Pun Master.

    which will result in de facto diktats,

  41. 41.

    r€nato

    August 27, 2009 at 7:39 pm

    @freelancer:

    Anna Paquin’s panties has them all beat.

  42. 42.

    freelancer

    August 27, 2009 at 7:44 pm

    @r€nato:

    Dammit you’re right!

  43. 43.

    Crashman06

    August 27, 2009 at 7:45 pm

    @r€nato: Winner, right here!

  44. 44.

    freelancer

    August 27, 2009 at 7:50 pm

    @pcbedamned:
    @General Winfield Stuck:

    Captain Ed, Funke flunkie:

    http://the-op.com/media/image2.php?oid=134&i=131&cat=6200

    Whatever happened to his linguistic attachment to the word “Porkulus”? He couldn’t go two posts with out using it. Now? Nada.

  45. 45.

    Debbie(aussie)

    August 27, 2009 at 8:59 pm

    oh my gawd! Absolutely perfect.

  46. 46.

    Tim

    August 27, 2009 at 9:34 pm

    @smiley: Smiley, thanks for getting me told. As the year begins (at my new job, no less), it felt good to be upbraided like that.

  47. 47.

    Martian Buddy

    August 27, 2009 at 10:06 pm

    @pcbedamned: I’d feel a lot more comfortable laughing at that if I didn’t have this sinking feeling that “ACORN will hack your son’s foreskin off with a rusty butter knife” will be the next variation of the birther/deather insanity.

  48. 48.

    LoveMonkey

    August 28, 2009 at 1:11 am

    God, I am adorable.

  49. 49.

    hamletta

    August 28, 2009 at 2:32 am

    @freelancer: Oh, no dear. That was in real time.

    I thought it was over the top myself. Molly Ivins had written a “just lie back and think of England” column, and I thought, well, how much harm can he do?

    Like joe from Lowell says, “haha. Sob.”

  50. 50.

    Redhand

    August 28, 2009 at 7:22 am

    The part about Dick Cheney’s reported personal involvement in planning the labyrinth was absolutely priceless.

  51. 51.

    Seanly

    August 28, 2009 at 9:09 am

    I, for one, welcome our new minotaur overlords!

  52. 52.

    Rosali

    August 28, 2009 at 9:47 am

    I’m late to the party but this Onion piece on opposition to health care reform really captures the level of arguments made these days.

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