Normally, I don’t think comparing your political opponents to terrorists is such a good idea. But I’m afraid that this, from the DNC, is accurate:
“The Republican Party has thrown in its lot with the terrorists – the Taliban and Hamas this morning – in criticizing the President for receiving the Nobel Peace prize,” DNC communications director Brad Woodhouse told POLITICO. “Republicans cheered when America failed to land the Olympics and now they are criticizing the President of the United States for receiving the Nobel Peace prize – an award he did not seek but that is nonetheless an honor in which every American can take great pride – unless of course you are the Republican Party.
“The 2009 version of the Republican Party has no boundaries, has no shame and has proved that they will put politics above patriotism at every turn. It’s no wonder only 20 percent of Americans admit to being Republicans anymore – it’s an embarrassing label to claim,” Woodhouse said.
I honestly believe, at this point, that if, God forbid, the United States were hit with a major terrorist attack, there would be cheering in the office of the Weekly Standard.
Hunter Gathers
Followed by an orgy.
Evolved Deep Southerner
It’s about time the GOP actually tasted the shit sandwich they’ve been foisting on the world for the last decade or two. I look forward with particular pleasure to watching our redneck demagogues down here in Georgia react to that kind of tarring.
Tattoosydney
@Hunter Gathers:
I’m thinking Fred Barnes is the top and Kristol is the bottom.
Ugh. I have to go and wash out my brain with bleach now.
dadanarchist
Oh man, did the Democrats start eating their spinach or something? Alan Grayson beotchslaps the GOP and now this, all in the same week? Wtf?
The sobbing and handwringing over this statement may surpass the original butthurt over the award.
Whatever happens, however, me likee.
Malkinfreude forever!
LarryB
Rep Grayson, forcefully making the same point on the floor of the House:
(h/t DKos).
MattF
It’s starting to dawn on the Republicans– y’know, about that colored guy who came out of nowhere and beat the Clintons– that they have a big problem. So, they’re unhappy. And, here and there, a few Republicans, the ones with IQs over 85, may even be starting to realize that ‘scream louder’ is a tactic, not a strategy.
SpotWeld
Obama is honored, and by association the US is honored.
Somehow the GOP is victimized…
Delta
I don’t think anyone doubts this. In fact, I’m pretty sure that they are all mentioning this in their hourly prayers to Jebus.
El Cid
That’s awesome. And particularly well deserved, given the weirdo freakouts of the last years about Rachel Ray daring to wear a scarf (Arafat! Terrist!) and NANCY PELOSI WENT TO SYRIA OMG LOGAN ACT…
J.D. Rhoades
About damn time the DNC got some hair on its balls and gave back some of the “objectively pro-terrorist” crap they’ve been quietly eating from the Rethuglicans for years. And I agree, the petulant demands for an apology from the ‘Thugs are going to be music to my shell-like ears.
LorenzoStDuBois
Eh, looks like my take on this won’t be too popular here, but the country is in crisis, we’re not doing too great on the wars or the economy. I just don’t fault the Republicans for taking the opportunity to note that he’s not measuring up to all these accolades (the fact that their motivations and prescriptions are completely backwards are a different conversation.)
And just because you agree with terrorists on some things is a disastrous reason to be criticized. Just check out OBL’s reading list for Americans. Let’s face it, the books kick ass, and are some of the best works on the left. Does that make us like the terrorists?
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/bin-ladens-reading-list-for-americans/
smiley
@Evolved Deep Southerner:
I anxiously await the letters to the editor in the next few days.
rock
This is ridiculous. Republicans are not throwing in their lot with terrorists and you know it. What crap. It was crap when Republicans said it and it is crap now.
The RNC’s Steele may be an idiot, but he is actually right (I know…the universe reels) when he said there were more deserving people out there and that Obama deserves no award for his performance thus far.
I despise the Nobel committee for creating a situation in which I have to agree with asses.
ironranger
Rs repeatedly accused liberals of ardently hoping we would fail in Iraq & Afghanistan. They have projection down to a science.
LorenzoStDuBois
Rock, you and me both.
Though I’ll concede, that language in that press release is, from a political standpoint, really good. That’s how I want Democrats to act.
Of course they only do it when I actually disagree…
Redshirt
Give ’em hell! ‘Bout dang time Democrats start simply speaking the truth about the Republicans. For far, far too long they have remained in an era of politeness and etiquette, and while I am all for those qualities, you cannot continually engage in politeness with a person or group who is going to burn your house down.
Hope this trend continues. Maybe the attitude will effect MSM coverage. Probably not, but one can hope.
DougJ
This is ridiculous. Republicans are not throwing in their lot with terrorists and you know it.
I really think they have. I don’t say this lightly.
Sanka
Comparing a terrorist attack to being awarded the Olympics?
The word asinine comes to mind.
El Cid
Actually, Republicans identify with terrorists all the time. For example, right now elected Republicans make special effort to defy the (admittedly lackluster and half-minded) U.S. foreign policy and go down and kiss the ass of the death squad riddled Honduran military’s latest overthrow of the civilian government, and none of them give the slightest shit about the Honduran Constitution imposed under the Reagan-backed death squad military government of 1982.
gbear
This is one of the most perfect paragraphs I’ve read all week. Not a wasted word, no straying off target, and completely true.
SiubhanDuinne
@smiley
@Evolved Deep Southerner
You know what I look forward to seeing, is Muke Luckovich’s editorial cartoon on this. Might even be worth spending money on the dead-tree edition of the AJC.
SGEW
I disagree, strongly.
Terrorist organizations (i.e., elements of the Taliban, Islamic Jihad, et. al.), Arab nations (e.g., Kuwait), Iran, and the Palestinian authorities (what “authority” there may be) are criticizing the Nobel committee’s decision because they believe that Obama has done nothing substantive whatsoever to help their causes for Justice (capital J), and that he is complicit with or actively engaged in violent harms against their people (bombings, drones, shootings, etc.). This is a valid critique.
The Republican party would eat their own heads before they advocated for Arab, Persian, or Palestinian causes, in lieu of violent harm against their people. Their two positions are diametrically opposed.
The Right Wing’s honest critique[1] of the prize is that it’s aspirational and/or naive; that it values transnationalism over unilateralism; it supports climate change science; and that it’s primarily political. Not quite what the Taliban spokesperson’s objection is.
However, the critique such as Greenwald’s is that the prize is both hypocritical (see, also, Kissinger, Henry (as discussed in previous thread)) and pointless in the context of the U.S.’s position in the world. Note the similarity to the Middle Eastern perspective (and other criticisms from the “left”). Again, all valid criticisms. But should we call Glenn Greenwald a “terrorist sympathizer”? We’re all familiar with that road.
However, you have an excellent point, re: Insane Right Wing Rejoicing Over America’s Misfortune Out Of Pure Spite And Madness. But one should be appropriately wary of making parallels with “terrorists.”
[1] Yes, yes, I know, they’re only opposing it because Obama won, and they’re assholes. But there is a valid critique.
El Cid
FWIW, in his live speech, Obama has admitted that he doesn’t feel he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize as have many of the previous winners, but since it represents an aspiration to inspire a nation to further action, he will accept it on behalf of the American people and their desires for a better world.
That’s class.
In the Republican response, John Boehner will cry and throw Democratic bills on the ground and stomp around, and Glenn Beck will spell out COMMIE on a chalkboard while hawking gold coins.
EconWatcher
As usual, the Repubs are fouling all over themselves. But still, you gotta admit, the award of the Peace Prize is kinda stupid.
The Moar You Know
@rock: Bullshit. They’ve been cheering on every defeat America has endured, from the collapse of the automotive industry to the failure to snag the 2016 Olympics, loudly and publicly. Their leaders are on record as saying they want the country to fail under the current president. They greet each dip in the economy with loud cheers, and hail it as proof of American failure. One of their state governors has gone so far as to call for secession. And today, the press releases from the GOP and from Al-Queada on our president being honored with the Nobel Peace Prize are indistinguishable from each other.
So don’t come waltzing in here spewing a bunch of horseshit about how the Republicans aren’t throwing in their lot with the terrorists. They are. They’ve been doing it since before Obama took the oath of office.
Brick Oven Bill
Re: A Fair Comparison; and
Re: The Republican Party has thrown in its lot with the terrorists – the Taliban and Hamas.
Hamas Charter, Article One:
The Movement’s programme is Islam. From it, it draws its ideas, ways of thinking and understanding of the universe, life and man. It resorts to it for judgement in all its conduct, and it is inspired by it for guidance of its steps.
Afghanistan Constitution:
Afghanistan is an Islamic Republic, independent, unitary and indivisible state. The religion of the state of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is the sacred Religion of Islam. In Afghanistan, no law can be contrary to the beliefs and provisions of the sacred religion of Islam.
This is what is called, in rational discussions, a ‘gross conceptual error.’
Nobel Peace Prize. Heh.
Mnemosyne
@rock:
I guess Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX) didn’t get your memo:
Sorry, but once the Republicans start speaking favorably of the fucking Taliban and saying that they need to use the same tactics, they’ve compared themselves to terrorists. DougJ is only repeating what Republicans have said about themselves.
Just Some Fuckhead
Obama hasn’t done anything to this point to deserve the Nobel and he acknowledged as much in his speech. I could be a little more gracious but his speech interrupted The View. Fuckers.
Chaz
Sh!theads? Yes. Terrorist sympathizers? A step further than I care to go.
I, too, enjoy the Malkinfruede. But we can afford to keep it classy.
Demo Woman
@The Moar You Know: I’ve been linking to Luckovich’s cartoon today in every post so it seems appropriate here also.
Shawn in ShowMe
Quick question for the board, no snark:
If not Obama, who should have won the Nobel peace prize this year?
Bostondreams
@rock:
The committe has explicitly stated that the award does not always go to individuals for past actions, but to encourage future ones.
LarryB
@LorenzoStDuBois: Commenters on the Right are correct to note that this prize is another slap in the Bush/Cheney face by the international community. However, I think the old saw “It feels so good when it stops” applies. To a lot of people, Obama could look like Ghandi compared to the previous administration without doing anything, and he’s been better than that.
Savage Henry
Sarah Palin: What’s a Nobel Prize?
Derelict
@SpotWeld:
Of course the GOP is victimized. Nobel Peace Prizes seem to land in the hands of Democrats far more often than Republicans. Indeed, the only Republican I can recall ever receiving one was Dr. Doom Kissinger. (Some might point to Teddy Roosevelt, but I do believe his policies and politics put him squarely in what would be considered extreme far-left lunatic fringe territory today.) Otherwise, the parade of honored Democrats is starting to get pretty long:
Wilson
Carter
Gore
and now: Obama
celticdragon
It does occur to me that they do hate Obama more then they love America.
Tattoosydney
@El Cid:
Using his O-jitsu to remind the sane 73% that the world is a good place, that hope can be a force for change and that there is still work to do, while making the wingnuts look like whinging dickheads (not that that is difficult). Class indeed.
PanAmerican
Who was the jackass that yelled out “what are you going to do with the money?”
Ash
Wait, has Hitler ever won the Nobel? Cause if he never did, someone in Oslo obviously isn’t aware of how things work.
The Moar You Know
@El Cid: He’ll spell it “COMIE”.
El Cid
By the way, I’m sorry to have to remind people, but from the point of view of many in the international community, they weren’t quite sure that America’s crazies would permit Barack Obama to literally survive this long, and having seen a succession of American liberal leaders gunned down, I think they preferred to do something sooner rather than too late. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read and heard comments from people around the world literally fearing for Obama’s life, so I think this might have been a factor.
SGEW
Important Clarification Needed
“Terrorist” = ?
Are we specifically talking about Al-Qaeda? The Taliban? (And Taliban pre or post invasion?) Hamas?(!) Islamic Jihad in Palestine? In Iraq? In India?! If so, this is egregiously incorrect.
Secondly: If the contention is that the Right Wing is actively rooting for misfortune to fall on the U.S., in order to politically damage their partisan opponents, that’s one thing. (It’s one hell of a thing, but pace.)
Directly associating them (or anyone) without cause to specific organizations with their own distinct ideologies, policies, and contexts is another. And, in this case, preposterous.
If the context was, say, a hurricane (“Republicans Cheer for Storm Damage, Casualties” is a headline I can imagine reading sometime soon), one could say “Republicans throw in their lot with natural disasters,” and it would make rhetorical sense. But “terrorists” are more than random misfortunes – they are human associations with their own motivations, autonomy, and agency, with a substantial impact on world affairs – and making such direct imputed associations is not only unfair but confuses the issue.
gbear
Obama’s Nobel would be a great name for a rock band.
r€nato
I fully expect the right to advocate setting up their own Peace Prize, funded by Rupert Murdoch. The first one would be given to GW Bush, since the essence of conservative philosophy in our times is to do whatever annoys a liberal.
This is not exactly a bold prediction.
Svensker
@El Cid:
fIXT
Ash
@PanAmerican: My money’s on either Jake Tapper or Ed Henry.
geg6
OT, but I am finding my newfound boyfriend, Rep. Alan Grayson, to be the kinda guy I was hoping he would be. Gawd, I adore this man.
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/have-democrats-found-their-vocal-cords.html
LorenzoStDuBois
I don’t know… the tenor here is just a little bit creepy to me coming from a left-wing and intelligent set of readers.
“Openly defying US foreign policy…”
“They want America to lose…”
“Throwing their lot in with the terrorists…”
“The success of the President it the success of all Americans…”
We’re being a little too much like them. We’re not like them. We’re not POTUS worshiping, American government defending, protocol-defending, zealots like they are. Are we?
Svensker
Gah — sniped by The Moar. :)
Geeno
@SGEW:
I’m thinking terrorists in the Timothy McVeigh-Eric Rudolph mold.
Mnemosyne
@SGEW:
See the quote in #27 of Republican Pete Sessions favorably comparing the Republicans to the Taliban and tell me again how “preposterous” it is for us to repeat the Republicans’ own words.
slippy
@rock: @LorenzoStDuBois: @Sanka:
Republicans want Obama to fail. This is clear and they haven’t even tried to hide it.
By extension, Republicans want America to fail. Because if Obama succeeds, America succeeds. He’s the leader of this nation. If Obama fails, we’re all in trouble.
Osama Bin Laden wanted America to fail.
Ergo, Republicans want what Osama Bin Laden wanted. They want it just as badly, and as far as I’m concerned for the same reason: spite and hatred.
Fuck all Republicans. Everywhere. All the time. Every last one of you. You are either an American, or you’re a fucking filthy America-hating Republican.
gbear
It could be seen as important and helpful to the rest of the world that the US has elected a president who actually sees and acknowledges the needs of the rest of the world rather than seeing it as a collection of suckers to be played for the benefit of US corporations. I can understand why the Nobel committee felt they had to recognize this change in America’s approach to planetary issues.
If this is seen as a slap in the face to Bush, it’s only because Bush was such a total fucking asshole with foreign policy.
liberal
@SGEW:
Well put.
jenniebee
What gets me is that anybody wants him to turn down the prize. I can’t think of anything more arrogant and rude than turning down an award someone has decided to honor you with.
Mnemosyne
@LorenzoStDuBois:
So far, we’ve had two different Republican delegations going to foreign countries (China and Honduras) and telling the leaders of those countries that they shouldn’t listen to the US government. In the case of China, the Republican who went actually said that the US won’t be able to pay back all of the bonds that China has bought and that China should stop lending to us. The reps who went to Honduras did so with the explicit intent of supporting the current government, which the US and every other country in South and Central America refuses to recognize.
Please explain to me what that is other than “openly defying US foreign policy.”
Legalize
Of course the American Taliban would cheer. They’ve been openly fantasizing about another attack since 9/11. Another attack during Obama’s presidency would be the happiest day of their collective “lives.” The Olympic gloating would look humble by comparison.
smiley
@PanAmerican:
@Ash:
I would’ve guessed David Gregory but he probably wasn’t there.
LorenzoStDuBois
@Mnemosyne
You missed the point. It is openly defying US policy. I’m saying why are we pretending we suddenly care so much about this.
You’re damned right I wanted our politicians to openly defy our policy going into the Iraq war. I want to reserve the right to support a politician who does this.
Sorry, but a lot of people are crossing the hypocrisy line here.
liberal
@Mnemosyne:
But he’s only referring to tactics, at the most abstract level.
I wish the Democrats would adopt strategy and tactics that would move towards “wiping the Republican Party off the face of the earth.” Does that mean I’m like Ahmadinejad?
El Cid
@Mnemosyne: And I don’t mind openly defying U.S. policy, as long as you have the stones to admit it and deal with it. Had I been a Congressional representative I’d gladly have been labeled a traitor and jailed for fighting against Reagan’s death squad and terrorist buddies throughout Central America and Southern Africa.
Delta
Proving once again that people around the world are quite sensible.
Of course not. Have you not seen us rip on Obama’s policies time and again when he wasn’t ardent enough in pursuing health care reform, or didn’t act quickly enough to close Guantanamo, or when he indicated a complete lack of interest in prosecuting anyone over torture? The left has its faults, but one failing we do not have is an unwillingness to criticize our own.
Cain
@LarryB:
It is “Gandhi” not “Ghandi”. Thanks.
sri
The Moar You Know
@LorenzoStDuBois: Who’s this “we” you’re referring to? You got a bug in your pocket?
The Saff
@jenniebee:
Oh, me too, jenniebee. And after humbly acknowledging that he didn’t think he deserved the award, he said:
Good on the president, I say. I’m happy for him. Oh, and it’s Bo’s birthday today (he shares a birthday with John Lennon).
liberal
@LorenzoStDuBois:
Agreed.
The reason I care in the case of these Rethuglican a$$holes is that they routinely bitch and moan when Democrats (or leftists or…) criticize the US from foreign soil.
Glenn Greenwald had a great post on this. His point wasn’t that Republicans shouldn’t be making criticisms from abroad, but rather that they were thorough hypocrites for doing so.
slag
Terrorism: the use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims.
Personally, I do think that GW’s Administration frightening us into war was a terrorist act. But I have a low bar for that kind of sweeping, hyperbolic, fear-mongering behavior.
While Republicans have made no secret of the fact that a defeat for the country is a win for them, and have intimated violent inclinations on more than one occasion, I don’t yet think it’s reached the level of terrorism. Just wait another year or so for them to get more organized. Timothy McVeigh was not necessarily an aberration.
Unfortunately, we all have our violent and warlike tendencies. But it’s undeniable that those tendencies are a hallmark of rightwing extremism, particularly.
Will
@DougJ:
Seconded.
Cain
@r€nato:
God I hope they do it. I can finally turn off my tv, and just live in blogosphere for next year or so because I won’t need any entertainment more than that.
cain
dmsilev
Bill Kristol continues his spiral down into self-parody:
I thought the mistake of blaming Sweden rather than Norway was a nice bit of icing on the cake.
-dms
Martin
Is it, though?
We award people when they step in front of those who are screwing things up and set them right again. Isn’t Obama doing exactly that? And you need to look more broadly than just the economy and whatnot. Remember Al Gore won the same prize over global warming because it was viewed as a potential obstacle to peace around the world should climate change continue getting worse.
If you look at Obama from that angle, he’s already done quite a lot simply reversing the nation’s course from where it was with Bush.
Shawn in ShowMe
But they’re openly defying peaceful policies.
El Cid
Yes. The Surge made Iraq much more peaceful when it began right as the ethnic cleansing of Baghdad was completed, so now Iraq is much more peacefuller than it was at the very worst of its post invasion warlord chaos hell. A true miracle of history.
bob h
George Packer was on WNYC this morning advocating that Obama decline the prize until he had actually accomplished something. This nation has its head so far up its ass it is not funny.
Fulcanelli
Whoever made that great video of the Wingularity Butthurt Threat Level is going to need to add another level at the top for when Obama donates his Nobel Peace Prize money to:
ACORN.
Bwahahahahahahahaha, bitches! FTW.
SFAW
LSD @ 48 –
Although hyperbole is unhelpful when trying to make a point, it is the unfortunate reality that applying various phrases and designations to the right-wingers is not nearly as hyperbolic as it should be (in a rational world).
“Openly defying US foreign policy…”
“Throwing their lot in with the terrorists…”
When Pelosi went to Syria, how did the Rethugs respond? Quoth Eric Cantor: “The Speaker and many of her Democratic allies have become so drunk with grandiose visions of deposing Bush that they break bread with terrorists and enemies of the United States. ”
“They want America to lose…”
How many times has Rushbo said he wants Obama to fail? And if Obama fails (economy, war, climate change, anti-terrorism) where does that leave the US
“The success of the President it [sic] the success of all Americans…”
There’s a big difference between this statement and the Bush-idolatry that was emblematic of Republicans for eight-plus years. This statement is another way of saying it’s a gift/prize to be shared by all Americans. With Bush, it was a case of “If you don’t support Bush, you’re a traitor.”
So, to you and the rest clutching your pearls about unflattering descriptions of right wingers: just because it’s harsh, doesn’t mean it’s inaccurate.
Now, that being said: he shouldn’t have been nominated, let alone won. Nominations closed in February, he gets the nom a month after Inauguration? Please. Give it to the Dalai Lama, Suu Kyi, or George Mitchell for christ’s sake. Wait until Obama has done something other than 11-dimensional Vulcan chess etc.
El Cid
Remember, when Barack Obama shook Hugo Chavez’ hand it was like a million 9/11’s plus a billion Munichs all wrapped up into one giant galactic sized surrender of Uh-merka to its enemies, enemies who provide a substantial portion of domestic U.S. oil needs.
liberal
@SFAW:
Of course. But the valid inference is that “Rethugs are hypocrites,” as Glenn Greenwald said, not that “openly defying US foreign policy” in abstract is wrong.
gbear
George Packer was on WNYC this morning advocating that Obama decline the prize until he had actually accomplished something.
This nationGeorge Packer has its head so far up its ass it is not funny.Cain
@LorenzoStDuBois:
We’re talking about the left here. We’re never happy so it’s kind o fhard to be worshipping anybody. I mean this very post is an example of this attitude. This blog is a partisan site in the sense that we’re mostly against assholes and that includes democrats and republicans. I’ve seen people from both parties put up here and shot metaphorically.
Let’s not start getting all concerned because dems finally are starting to get aggressive with republicans. Let them get a taste of their own medicine for a little while and while we’re at it, let’s smack wolf blitzer too. God I can’t stand that guy.. he’s a walking and talking limp handshake.
cain
Mnemosyne
@LorenzoStDuBois:
Why do we care that the Republicans are actually doing the things that they claimed for 8 years that Democrats were doing when they actually weren’t?
Think of it this way: if your neighbor called you a pedophile, you would be indignant. If you then found out that your neighbor was diddling a 10-year-old, you’d be incensed. I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t be saying, “Well, if I had been a pedophile, he would have been right to denounce me, so it’s all the same thing.”
SenyorDave
I’m thinking Fred Barnes is the top and Kristol is the bottom.
Ugh. I have to go and wash out my brain with bleach now.
@Hunter Gathers:
You’re right about the brain bleaching, otherwise that mental image might turn me off of sex for a long time.
DougJ
I wanted our politicians to openly defy our policy going into the Iraq war.
Unless you have a very different definition of “defy” than I do, I completely disagree. I wouldn’t have wanted Democratic Congressmen in Iraq after the invasion, supporting this faction or that.
That’s pretty much what Republicans are doing in Honduras.
trollhattan
#5 LarryB
Wow, after watching that Grayson vid I feel like taking up smoking so I can unironically say “I need a cigarette.”
The BLT line is one for the ages. I see a tshirt….
Mnemosyne
@liberal:
Uh-huh. So he doesn’t actually want to overthrow the government and sequester all women in their homes, only letting them out if their entire bodies are covered. He just really admires the people who did and thinks the Republican Party should emulate their tactics.
And that’s better … how, again?
Given that Ahmadinejad is a blowhard puppet of Khameni without any actual power, you may well be like him since the guy is all talk and no action. If you actually do think that Republicans should be marched off into death camps and exterminated, then I think we should all be glad you’re not anywhere near the levers of power.
Evinfuilt
Republicans are suffering a severe case of Fatwah envy, if only they weren’t peace loving christians they’d be real terrorists instead of just using terrorist PR tactics.
We’re also about to see the Village go total concern troll on Obama.
DougJ
Pelosi’s trip to Syria was not “openly defying US policy” either.
Until someone finds something comparable to what Republicans are doing in Honduras…
And, no, I don’t mean something involving Sean Penn.
LD50
@LarryB:
Okay, that’s where I draw the line.
georgia pig
@LorenzoStDuBois: I somewhat agree with respect to those statements, but one thing seems to be missing here. The statement by the DNC is dripping with obvious hyperbole and sarcasm. Does anyone really think that the DNC thinks Repubs are aligned with the Taliban? Of course not. When Republicans were accusing democrats of treason, they were being serious.
Janefinch
Substitute “Democrat” for “Republican” and this post could have appeared on any pro-Bush blog. Neither is true…what next, the inevitable pseudo-thoughtful, “I hate to say this, but I really think Republicans are Nazis”?
LD50
@r€nato: If Andrew Schlafly can rewrite the Bible replacing ‘Pharisee’ with ‘liberal’, this makes total sense. Next thing you know, they’ll be printing their own money.
Mnemosyne
@Janefinch:
As long as you pretend that Democrats have actually compared themselves to the Taliban as Republican Rep. Pete Sessions did and said that Democrats should emulate Taliban tactics then, yes, you’re right, they’re all the same.
Also, if wishes were horses, beggars would ride, so we need to start putting money towards saddles for homeless people so they can ride all of the horses they have.
trollhattan
We’re so used to Republicans making absurd accusations it’s become noise. A fresh example (via Sully)
A whale of a lot less defensible then pointing out that the entire Republican part and their enablers reflexively oppose everything the president does, including taking his wife out for an anniversary dinner (family values!). Patriots all.
Origuy
@LD50: Bookmark this. I think we’ll see the script of “Free America” before the end of Obama’s first term, probably within a year. The Masonic symbols will be replaced by crosses and “Federal Reserve Note” removed. Wingnuts will try to pay debts with it and cry “martyr” when they get arrested.
trollhattan
Uh, “party.” Sheesh.
Jamey
I’ll go ya one further: If a terrorist bomb took out the Weekly Standard offices, I’D cheer.
SFAW
liberal @78
DougJ beat me to it: Pelosi was not openly defying US foreign policy. It was yet another case of Republican projection. See also Mnemosyne @81.
Janefinch @90
I’m guessing you haven’t read a lot of pro-Bush blogs. The level of insanity and hatred aimed at anyone to the left of Jesse Helms is stunning. (Of course, that was before the “Bush wasn’t a real conservative” meme started popping up.)
LD50 @91
Next thing you know, they’ll be printing their own money.
And printing the dollar sign on cigarettes.
We can only hope. Of course, I know just the place in Nevada for the 2010 version of Galt’s Gulch.
SFAW
I’ll go ya one further: If a terrorist bomb took out the Weekly Standard offices, I’D cheer.
I don’t know – the resulting cloud of Cheetos dust would contaminate everything within a mile. Do we really want their neighbors to suffer that way? (Well, the rational ones, that is. Once the wingnuts heard about it, they’d be down there trying to huff as much of it as they could.)
Jane2
@SFAW: actually, I have. Hyperbole is hyperbole, and the terrorist/Nazi analogies are dishonest on either side. Wingnut vitriol and invective is not terrorism.
Mayor Quimby
Typical absurd comments from the DNC. Does anyone believe a word that comes out of that organization?
And for the Dems to be calling any opposition to Obama as un-American is laughable. He and his myrmidons were cheering as each coffin was unloaded from Iraq or Afghanistan.
liberal
@Mnemosyne:
You apparently didn’t understand my qualifier, at the most abstract level.
1. Where did Ahmadinajad actually say all Jews or citizens of Israel should be exterminated?
2. My point is one of comparing facile interpretations of quotations, which you apparently missed, which isn’t surprising.
liberal
@georgia pig:
That’s a fair point.
anonevent
@LorenzoStDuBois: if you think we’re (Democrats) becoming like the Republicans, automatically fawning over the President, go read talkleft. We’re still Democrats.
Comrade E.B. Misfit
Of that, I have not the slightest shred of doubt. Wingnuts and Tea-Baggers would be very pleased if a city was to be hit with a dirty bomb.
“Party first” is their mantra, and it has been that for a very long time.
SFAW
Jane2 @99
Hyperbole is hyperbole, …
That’s like saying “crime is crime”. There’s a difference between snatching a purse and beating someone’s head in with a baseball bat (not to get too hyperbolic about it).
Are they both crimes? Yes.
Are they equivalent, outside of there being a perpetrator and a victim? Hardly.
… and the terrorist/Nazi analogies are dishonest on either side.
I guess that depends on what’s the basis for the comparison. The right wingers, taking a page from Karl Rove’s playbook, are now using the “Nazi” meme about almost every progressive thing Obama’s trying to do. (Well, not quite “almost every”, although sometimes it seems that way.) No basis, other than to scare people. And in general, there is no smear, no vicious or vile meme, no shriek that they will not use to demonize Dems/progressives/libs.
The DNC press release, on the other hand, is firing a shot across the bow of the Rethugs. After 8+ years of the Rethugs designating anyone who dares disagree with them as unpatriotic, un-American, objectively pro-terrorist, or traitorous, it’s in interesting exercise – especially when both they and Al Qaeda are trashing Obama and the Prize. Andy McCarthy (at NRO) wrote at 7:22 this morning:
So the DNC’s release is hardly in the Rethugs league for vitriol.
Wingnut vitriol and invective is not terrorism.
No, but eliminationism is, at some level. And that’s what they’re all about. And if you really spent a lot of time at the right-wing blogs – hell, if you spent 30 minutes a year – you’d know this is true.
Mnemosyne
@liberal:
So let’s get this straight:
Republicans calling Democrats terrorists and traitors: normal
Democrats pointing out that Republicans have called themselves terrorists and traitors: an unacceptable lowering of the discourse
Again, this isn’t just a case of, “They called us a bad name, so we’re going to call them the same bad name.” Republicans compared themselves to the Taliban. Are we supposed to pretend that they didn’t?
Woody
Only 20% may ADMIT to being Pukes, but 46% of voters went for arguably the least competent ticket in HISTORY last November, and i reckon that number hasn’t declined significantly…I do not admit to ANY “party” label, but vote far more often for folks aligned with the Dims. Anecdote isn’t data, I know…just sayin’…
Bender
So it’s official: DougJ is a loony.
The Nobel is a joke, and most are dogging the Nobel Committee, not Zero. As one who lived in Atlanta post-Olympics, the Games are public bad. Making fun of Zero for the Olympics farce is like the left making fun of Bush for not being able to find the door in that room.
Here’s what rooting for terrorists looks like, when we’re talking about American lives, not trivial things like awards and Olympics:
Not the same thing at all, is it, Doug?
Janefinch
@SFAW– “They do it because they’re wingnuts; therefore it’s ok if we do because our reasons are better” is polemic, not a reasonable argument.
Hell, *I* (and a fair number of liberals) am trashing Obama and the prize…he dosen’t deserve it. Does that make me pro-terrorist? Or heaven forbid a Republican?
SFAW
Janefinch @109
It would help if you didn’t mischaracterize my “argument”. That’s at least the second time you’ve done it. And, to paraphrase Inigo Montoya, you probably need to look up “polemic”.
False arguments are not helpful to either side – if they’re put forth as serious arguments. I hardly think the press release issued by the DNC is being put forth as a serious argument. Was it mildly inflammatory? Sure.
Have the Republicans behaved in such a way as to lend some credence to it? Sure (viz. Sessions, Coulter, World Nut Daily, usw.)
Would the DNC have issued it if the right wing had not started shrieking? Probably not.
Is it as intellectually (and factually) dishonest as the bile spewed by the Republicans for the last 15 or 20 years? Not even close.
Is it a problem that the DNC has decided to get in the right wing’s face? Well, I guess to some it is. I guess that’s what the Green Party is for.
I don’t think he deserves it, either. So how does that mean I (or anyone else) should feel the need to “trash” him? Or is that your way of displaying your cred? (“I’m no liberal/conservative, but I just can’t believe that So-and-so would do this”)
No, but the 500 pounds of fertilizer in your hi-cube van does.
Jury’s still out on that one.
Janefinch
@SFAW: You might consider not mischaracterizing what I said…all the parsing and snotty little comments in the world don’t make your opinion any more than an unsubstantiated opinion, even on the internet.
I will repeat, since parsing merely serves as an attempt to control the topic, that it is not acceptable for either Republicans or Democrats to characterize the other side as terrorists or Nazis.
SFAW
Jane –
Thanks so much for your witty and insightful reply. “I’m rubber and you’re glue” always adds to the discussion, don’t you think? (Of course you do, otherwise you wouldn’t have tried it.) I’m so glad you were able to bring that to the table.
As far as the “unsubstantiated” thing: you’re projecting again, but that’s one of those little things that lets me give your reasoned comments all the credit they deserve. And helps us realize that you probably are a Republican.
Jane2
@SFAW: kind of like “I know you are but what am I” that you’re engaging in. The “you probably are a republican” cut me to the quick…you internet wit, you! Now go ahead…you have the last word!
lumpenprole
They’ve already fantasized about and practiced an righteous “I told you so” rant for just that moment. The hysterics will be alarming.