Everyone’s talking about this from the Ken Buck-Michael Bennett debate this morning on Dancing Dave:
Before moving on, Gregory pressed further, asking, “You don’t think it’s (homosexuality) something that’s determined at birth?” Buck replied, “I think that birth has an influence over it, like alcoholism and some other things, but I think that basically you have a choice.”
Buck is a whack job and I hope he loses. But, in terms of his votes, he’ll be mostly the same as presidents Graham, Collins, and Snowe. He just won’t look as serious pursuing the Republicans’ destructive agenda.
jacy
Did anyone bother to ask Buck the heartwarming story of the day he CHOSE heterosexuality? I’m sure he must remember it clearly, like any good American right of passage.
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@jacy:
Who’s to say that’s really the choice he made?
WereBear
@jacy: That’s my favorite line to combat such crap… I usually get some stuttering and spluttering in return.
This is also why I feel that having the Republican Party being full of deeply deeply closeted gay men leads to this institutional sense that some people choose homosexuality because the sex is just that good; and it’s an ascetic self-denial to pass it up and going for the boring hetero because it’s what god wants.
Makes no freakin’ sense, but there you go.
John Bird
Lord, what a concession. If a behavior is genetically influenced, the next question to determine policy is whether that behavior is deleterious to society.
Alcoholism clearly is.
Homosexuality clearly isn’t, as the defense attorneys in Perry v. Schwarzenegger have discovered. There simply is no good argument to be made that recognizing gay rights and gay marriage has any bad effect on society whatsoever.
Silver
Having one drink doesn’t make you an alcoholic.
Suck one cock, however…
Larry Craig in the handicapped stall will tell you all about it.
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@John Bird:
But should we let alcoholics marry?
Violet
This is true. But if enough crazy people get elected to the Senate they’ll have different priorities than Graham, Collins and Snowe. They are much more to the right, and the people who elect them have very different priorities than the three you mention. Get enough crazy teabaggers in the House and/or Senate and the GOP powers will have to take their interests more seriously.
Jewish Steel
And everybody says, “Is he alright?”
Sickbed of Cuchulain (sp?) could be my favoritest too.
gbear
Gay sex gets you through times of no alchohol better than alchohol gets you through times of no gay sex. Trust me on this.
Pat Sajak
Let’s look at the broader picture here: should gays really be allowed to vote? This is particularly true when a gay marriage referendum is on the ballot, but in general, teh gays have so much at stake on the outcomes of elections, is it really fair that they get to vote in them?
Omnes Omnibus
Say, where did I see this guy? In Red River? or A Place in the Sun? Maybe the Misfits? Or From Here To Eternity?
bryanD
“There simply is no good argument to be made that recognizing gay rights and gay marriage has any bad effect on society whatsoever.”—john bird
Simply? Non! When the ongoing US army/air force 25-year intersex soap opera spills over into the USMC, while crossing sexes back and forth, we have a major problem.
Plus the traditional after-shower male-on-male “pile-on” will be too filled with tension and recrimination instead of yuk-yuks.
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Glad someone got this! Great song and been trying to work into titles since forever.
Radon Chong
@jacy: To be fair, if you follow the example of many of his fellow conservatives, he may be fighting hard to choose heterosexuality every day.
Nick
In college, I met a kid who was gay and wanted to kill himself. He said his parents sent him to a church camp to be “reclaimed for Christ” and when he left, he hated himself more because he was convinced he was evil and abnormal and “not worth being alive.” Anyone who panders to this kind of anti-gay garbage might as well just pull the trigger of the gun in the mouths of every suicidal LGBT teen in America
Ken Buck wants gay teens to kill themselves.
Loneoak
How one comes to choose their sexual orientation really isn’t all that complicated if you look at it from a GOP’er perspective. Republicans *choose* to sleep with their wives once a week, and *choose* to use the glory hole at the rest stop/airport/locker room three times a week. It’s the only morally legitimate lifestyle.
Omnes Omnibus
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: Jewish Steel had it before I did.
asiangrrlMN
@gbear: Right on. Sex is better than alky-hol any day of the week. Oh, and fuck off and die, Ken Buck.
@Nick: Sarah Silverman has a vid on this. I thought she could have gone further, but she’s right. The basic attitudes against homosexuality woven into our society (and especially the religious sectors) only support the more egregious behavior/ideas that we see being expressed.
Omnes Omnibus
DougJ, I seem to detecting a theme in your recent posts. while not cheering for a Republican takeover, you seem to believe that, if it happens, it would be best for the craziest people to do the craziest things. Basically, you want to rip the mask of respectable conservatism off the GOP, is that right?
KCinDC
Like Glenn Greenwald, I think too much emphasis is being put on nature versus nurture (“choice”) in homosexuality. Suppose tomorrow it were somehow that homosexuality was, as Buck says here, not completely determined by genetics. Would that be relevant to determining whether LGBT people should gave equal rights? I say no. “Choice” is irrelevant.
Religion is not genetically determined, yet we believe in freedom of religion. Some things that are at least partly genetically determined, on the other hand, might be detrimental to society and not the sort of thing that should be accepted as simply an alternative way of being. For example, I wouldn’t be surprised if serial killers turned out to have some genetic characteristics in common. That wouldn’t mean that they should be protected from discrimination.
LGBT people should have equal rights whether or not their characteristics are genetically determined.
Bob Loblaw
@Omnes Omnibus:
Which is really dumb and unrooted in historical tradition.
There’s no difference between Ken Buck and “Personal Friend of the President” Tom Coburn.
Mustang Bobby
Yes, I remember it as if it was yesterday, filling out my application to go to the Homo Academy when I was in Grade 8. I had my choice of Flower Arranging, Theatre, Fashion Design, and Hairdressing. I went with Theatre, and for sports I chose swimming because I like hanging out with other boys in Speedos. (Especially the “hanging out” part.) But I flunked out of the Fashion Seminar because I buy all my clothes at the aisle one over from auto parts.
I used to live in Colorado. I thought I was moving to a less progressive state when I moved to Florida, but seeing as how the ban on gay adoption has been overturned and the state will let the ruling stand and we elected Charlie Crist as governor (wink wink nudge nudge), I was misinformed.
Comrade Kevin
Yes, but what of Montgomery Clift?
Jewish Steel
@Omnes
Yes, but you had the best part of the song which I could not call to mind.
Worst case scenario is for these loons to suddenly be granted, by grace of the MSM, Serious Person status. I find it very easy to imagine, though.
Omnes Omnibus
@Bob Loblaw: You noticed my reference to the “mask of respectable conservatism,” yes?
Yutsano
Yay! Excuse to link this song!
@Omnes Omnibus: I’ve just come to the conclusion Bob is a leftist version of an evangelist. He is so convinced he’s RIGHT that he won’t rest until we are all converted to his exact way of thinking. It’s just another variation on authoritarianism. Or this is just a long-winded way of saying DNFTT.
Loneoak
@KCinDC:
I completely agree with you and Greenwald — the causality of sexual orientation is entirely irrelevant to the civil rights owed to everybody regardless of their orientation. I’d add to it that everyone who claims to know anything about the causal chain that leads to sexual orientation is full of crap. We cannot even remotely begin to disentangle biology from culture from chemical environment at this point, and we may never have the measurement practices that would allow us to settle the question. So not only is the nature/nurture question philosophically irrelevant to the civil rights issues, it is an entirely unanswerable question for the time being, at least in any detail.
Bob Loblaw
@Omnes Omnibus:
What on earth do you think that first sentence was in response to, then? Your desired narrative died decades ago.
That's Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN)
Am I the only one who has noticed that the teabag candidates that are widely accepted as being the nuttiest of the wignutty are all women? Is Sharon Angle really any more crazy than Ken Buck? Is Christine O’Donnell really any more insane than Ron Johnson? Or Joe Miller?
Can anyone come up with an innocent explanation as to why it’s the females that get all the attention for being nuts?
Odie Hugh Manatee
OT: The kids left Tru TV on and while I working on a project I hear an Ohio cop talking to two underage kids who were walking around drinking booze. One of the crew-cut kids gets mouthy with the cop after he is cuffed, saying that if he didn’t have the cuffs on he would “teabag the cop”. I thought I heard wrong but the kid then threatened the cameraman too, saying “If I didn’t have these cuffs on I would teabag you too!”.
Teabagging, the new threat!
If some drunk kid threatened me with a violent teabagging I would laugh so hard I’d probably have a stroke.
Omnes Omnibus
@Bob Loblaw: Not my narrative.
JPL
@That’s Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN): Ken Buck might make some headlines tomorrow. CNN will probably have a poll asking whether or not alcoholism and homosexual are the same. Bill Maher brought a lot of attention to O’Donnell.
beergoggles
@Omnes Omnibus: “you want to rip the mask of respectable conservatism off the GOP”
When did bachman and vitter and the rest of the current gopers become respectable?
Suffern ACE
@That’s Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN): Nope. You aren’t the only one who noticed that. Just like Pam Geller’s opinions are pretty much the same as Robert Farah’s and Michelle Bachman and Jim DeMint could have been separated at birth…
That's Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN)
@JPL: Sure, but it’s not as if there isn’t videotape of Ron Johnson saying all sorts of insane things, including testimony before the Wisconsin legislature defending pedophiles.
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, I don’t want Buck or O’Donnell to win, but I want people to admit that Republicans have been crazy for a while, yes. I started thinking about this the other day with O’Donnell in particular and it just me, my god, these nuts have done an unbelievable amount of crazy shit the last ten years, much of it very destructive. And we’ve been continuously told how serious they are the entire time. Yeah, I want that to end. Can you blame me?
JGabriel
Slightly OT: Sarah Palin complains that Democrats look at the world the same way… Rich Lowry looks at her.
4tehlulz
@That’s Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN): Angle’s implied call for armed resistance to the soshe’llizms is about as crazy as it gets.
beergoggles
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: “we’ve been continuously told how serious they are the entire time”
They’ve always done it and they’ve always been taken seriously – do you remember man-on-dog santorum? If you think the media is going to call them on it, I want what you’re
smokingdrinking.Omnes Omnibus
@beergoggles: Obviously, my metaphor failed. I was attempting to say that the craziness has been there, but, to the general public, it is covered by a “mask of respectable conservatism.” It seemed to me that DougJ’s provocations over the past few days have been built around the idea that this “mask” needs to be torn off to reveal the crazy that is already there. Does this make more sense as an explanation of my previous comment or should I just call it metaphor fail and give the fuck up?
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@Omnes Omnibus:
I think you explained it fine, I know exactly what you mean.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: FWIW I got it.
Bill Murray
@Suffern ACE: But the women are purtier and therefore easier to put on TV. Well except Angle who doesn’t get on as much. As TBogg says, it’s all about the boobies
Omnes Omnibus
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: No, I can’t. I, however, do blame myself for my mask metaphor.
Omnes Omnibus
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: @Yutsano: Thanks, I feel a little better.
JPL
The President and the First Lady are going to speak at a rally in Ohio at 8. John Legend performs at 7. link
OT.. nice crowd btw but Beck’s gathering 10000 gets more air time.
RSR
You know that homosexuality never really cooks out, right?
Oh, wait, that’s alcohol. Flambé sounds gay though.
Tom Q
@Omnes Omnibus: The question is, does showing up crazier actually work to rip off the mask or does it just normalize previously off-base thinking? Chuck Grassley was all over the TV last year saying Obama’s healthcare would kill Grandma, and, in media coverage, he never stopped being Good Old Chuck. John McCain could call for compulsory execution of anyone voting Democrat, and the Broder crowd would chuckle that it was just what he needed to do to placate his voters, he’d still be the same wonderful centrist.
I guess your argument is, it’s what the people will see, not what the press will report. And, in the ’98 impeachment scenario, the people did tune out DC pundits. But right now they’re poised to overwhelmingly re-elect Grassley and McCain despite their out-there-for-everyone-to-see crazy pandering. So I question how much of this will truly change people’s views, and how much it will just introduce more tolerated poison into the national bloodstream.
Dennis SGMM
@Omnes Omnibus:
Mr. and Mrs. American Voter largely take their cues from the idiot box. If Sharron Angle, or Rand Paul, or any other batshit crazy Republican is shown and the blow-dried news reader doesn’t identify them as batshit crazy and briefly explain why then Mr. and Mrs. AV just assume that they’re Serious People Whose Views are Worthy of Consideration.
When the economy imploded in late 2008 the tone of the reports I read (Don’t watch TV) was as if the economy had been struck by a rogue asteroid: no one was really responsible. I doubt that any of the broadcast or cable news outlets did much better. Thus, the same party that instituted and abetted the implosion are now poised to retake the House and maybe the Senate. It took the implosion to provide the Democrats with razor thin majorities in Congress and it only took two years for those majorities to be in jeopardy.
Until people like Newt Gingrich are introduced with, “And now I’d like to welcome Newt Gingrich, a serial philanderer who left the office of House Speaker under a cloud…” Or John McCain is introduced with “Welcome, John McCain, a doddering old Reagan-era artifact who garnered his party’s nomination for president by running against himself…” the Democrats are fucked.
Brachiator
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.:
Is this the new pre-defeatism? That all Republicans and Tea Party People are the same, so it really doesn’t matter whether or which of them get elected?
Which people are supposed to admit this, and what is supposed to happen after they make this admission?
I see what you are getting at, but is it really anything more than an expression of frustration?
Omnes Omnibus
@Tom Q: I don’t know the answer to that. I don’t necessarily sign on to the concept. I was just stating the premise that I saw behind DougJ’s recent posts.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Perhaps I’m being unreasonable (and unserious), but I feel America is a better place when there are fewer fucking bigots in power. Fuck Buck with a chain saw.
And frankly, I don’t think it will be a huge win when/if scientists locate a Gay Gene. All that will mean is I have to listen to 9,000 fucktards squawk about how parents can best reduce the effects of this horrible genetic flaw.
Brachiator
@KCinDC:
Exactly.
There was an old formulation that said that people should not be discriminated against because of “race, creed, or color.” I always figured that “creed” included what a person freely chose to believe. So it never made sense to me for anyone to say that it was acceptable to discriminate against gay people because they supposedly “chose” their “lifestyle.”
sven
I’m at a cafe right now and the folks at the table next to me are having a lengthy discussion about how the government is putting ‘aluminum-barium’ in the exhaust of all jet aircraft. I think they mean the contrails rather than exhaust but I’m not certain.
Does anyone know WTF they are talking about?
I’m about to hit the Google but thought someone might know the source of this (what I assume is a) conspiracy theory.
MikeJ
@sven: Laugh loudly at anyone you hear talking about chemtrails, unless they mean the song by Beck, which is kinda spacey and cool. Not something to base public policy on tho.
Nick
@KCinDC:
If it was discovered as a “choice.” it would be easy to ban such “choice.” Americans only like people to have a choice they agree with (see; mosque in lower Manhattan(. Granted while I think most Americans would be ok if the choice of being gay, the idea of limiting said choice would be there.
If, on the other hand, homosexuality is discovered to be the same thing as gender or race, then they have to accept it cannot be done away with or limited.
Brachiator
@kommrade reproductive vigor:
There will probably be a lot of stupid, horrible, thalidomide level mistakes caused by parents attempting to select out a supposed genetic flaw or trying to guarantee a genetic advantage.
The idea that genes only do one thing is so incredibly boneheaded that it is readily understandable how people believe it. I can easily imagine parents “selecting” to get a genius, and also getting a sociopath.
jaleh
@JPL:
OT.. nice crowd btw but Beck’s gathering 10000 gets more air time.
It really pisses me off and you don’t even see this in Huffpost.
What’s with that?
RSR
@sven: Holy crap, that’s a barrel of crazy. This is a comment on a youtube refuting (refudiating?!?) the danger of ‘chem-trails’–
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fawSQl-f8zA
JPL
Did Buck propose a ten step program?
Dennis SGMM
@sven:
There’s a “Chemtrail Conspiracy” theory rife among wingnuttia that posits that the government has been introducing any number of things designed to sap and impurify our precious bodily fluids into the exhausts of jet aircraft.
When I explain that aircraft have been leaving contrails since they were able to reach the speed and altitude to do so in the 1930’s the wingnuts explain that these are different and that someone told them that… When I ask them how the gov could get anyone to spray the US with chemicals that would also harm themselves, their families and their friend the conversation is over.
Brachiator
@Nick:
I think that this is a particularly American fallacy, but it does not protect against ugly consequences.
So, someone could say that homosexuality is a choice, so it must be banned.
Someone else could say that homosexuality is genetically determined, but since being gay is an abomination (because the Bible says so, for example), homosexuals must be eliminated from the human population.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Sure. Witness the GOP’s warm and respectful treatment of women and minorities.
MikeJ
@Dennis SGMM: I would like to think that it’s limited to wingnuttia, but there are enough stupid people on the left who believe in chemtrails to make it bipartisan.
sven
@RSR:
Ok, that was 10 minutes of my life I will never get back. After visiting several ‘chemtrail’ conspiracy websites this is what I have learned:
Apparently we are being continuously sprayed with dangerous chemicals by every passing aircraft.
No one is certain which chemicals, although most theories involve barium.
The spraying is intended to…
control the weather (or)
destroy food production (or)
ruin world wide radar systems (or)
slow global warming (or)
in the words of one particularly honest FAQ, “I wish we knew!”
You have all been warned.
JPL
From the NYTimes
hahahaha
24 percent of New Yorkers are bat shit crazy.
Brachiator
@MikeJ:
I heard an interview with Jesse Ventura yesterday where he insisted that 9/11 was an “inside job” and that every major war has been planned in advance by … somebody. It’s never exactly clear who makes up this ominously omnipotent group.
But this stuff easily fits with Tea Party sentiments, because it is always the ordinary, non-elite common Real(tm) and usually white American who is the only one capable of recognizing the truth and doing something about it.
kommrade reproductive vigor
@Brachiator: Not to mention assholes insisting that kids be tested before they’re allowed in the locker room.
I wonder how Sullivan would feel about Bell Curve II: Turns out The F^gs Aren’t So Bright, Either.
JPL
@jaleh: Nothing on the front page of msnbc or cnn but they have Sarah’s latest tweets.
Nick
@JPL: what I love about this poll;
Pretty sure that 22 percent is from Upstate because the MTA just hiked its rates and the city went fucking nuts. Either that or people are hypocrites.
Brachiator
@sven:
Wow. Are barium enemas part of the conspiracy, too?
This also appears to be the new national average.
sven
@MikeJ:
This chemtrails stuff reminds me of this video about evolution.
It is worth watching if just for the very last line…
Uloborus
We interrupt this topic I haven’t even read to say: Conway just debated Paul. It was a massacre. It’s not just that Paul sounded like an idiot – hey, Repubs will forgive a lot. Paul spent the entire debate on the defensive, much of it whining about how his opponent was mean. Traditionally that’s considered a very, very bad debate performance.
I’ll look out for an Open Thread to mention this in its proper place.
JPL
@Uloborus: nice
SIA
@JPL: Ooh thanks for the tip. I am listening to him now on the website. BO has a way of cheering me up.
SIA
@Uloborus: More good news. Do you have a link? Conway’s one I’ve contributed to. Go Jack! (And it’s not really OT – discussing the crazy teabaggers)
morzer
@That’s Master of Accountancy to You, Pal (JMN):
Because of Grand Fucknutter and Inquisitorial Hypocrite Sarah Palin.
gwangung
Of course, nowadays, that just means those poor conservatives are being persecuted by those mean liberals.
freelancer
@sven:
oy vey. We are all Africans.
I love the students’ a priori dismissal that evolution cant be true because “it just don’t make no sense”.
The same could be said by a young math student when asked to learn Calculus, their reasoning is a mile wide and an inch deep.
Brachiator
@kommrade reproductive vigor:
Ironically, Sullivan appears to be firmly in the camp of those who believe that if you can show that homosexuality is genetically determined, then social acceptance will follow.
Nick
@Uloborus:
for whom? The conventional wisdom I saw was that Paul kicked Conway’s ass.
Anya
@SIA: Me too. The president is very hoarse. He’s been over using his voice so heavily to counter all the negativity! The crowd is HUGE!!
Obama in Ohio
Anya
@gwangung: voters who choose Paul over Conway are too stupid to live.
Corner Stone
@Nick: There ain’t nothing you won’t piss all over.
Southern Beale
I know this isn’t an open thread but this picture of the old cat and the new kitten cracked me up.
Brachiator
@sven:
I need a drink.
In a related vein, I keep seeing that the noxious nativism of the Tea Party is not just an American phenomenon. In Sweden, an anti-immigrant party won seats in parliament for the first time. And now, we have this from German chancellor Angela Merkel:
Democracy. Civil liberties. Tolerance. Just idle dreams. Unless people fight back.
Barb (formerly Gex)
The thing that always continues to bother me that I have never seen anyone address is the man-woman dichotomy that is used to underpin the arguments against homosexuality.
We all know that there are people born hermaphrodites. Presumably for centuries good Christian doctors have been chopping off the franks and beans and presenting these children to the world as girls. And then go on talk about how the male-female dichotomy is what is right because it is natural.
Is the Bible wrong? Did God make a mistake? Is it immoral for these people to have sex with anyone? Why are they never pressed on this?
kommrade reproductive vigor
@Brachiator: You know, it’s not an uncommon belief. And I guess people who are on the fence about gay rights might be swayed by Serious Scientific Proof that being gay isn’t something you wake up one day and decide to do.
But anyone hoping for a magic bullet that will cure homophobia (or any other form of bigotry) and all the b.s. that flows from it needs to wake up.
Corner Stone
“Angerer” is one of the better last names for an NFL linebacker.
Ash Can
@Corner Stone: Actually, I’d like to see links from both Nick and Uloborus on this. It ain’t just piss if it’s true.
Ruckus
@sven:
Just a question for the bigger picture.
I thought that wingtards didn’t believe in global warming, why would they believe every aircraft was doing something to lessen it?
Not to mention ruining radar? That sounds safe.
Uloborus
@Ash Can:
I have no links. I watched the full debate on TV. I went lookin’ for videos online, but haven’t found them yet.
Anya
@Nick: That’s not possible because Paul has no valid argument. He is either evasive so that the voters won’t hear about his true believes or he has no clue. On the other hand, Conway is a credible candidate. It’s a testament to his strength that the race is this close.
SIA
@Anya: I hope his voice lasts a couple more weeks!
I just watched a clip of the Conway-Paul debate. Will watch the entire debate later, but Paul comes off as really arrogant. In the short clip I saw, Conway gave some good specifics and a few jabs at baby doc.
Brachiator
@Barb (formerly Gex):
Sex reassignment surgery is actually fairly recent. And controversial. Doctors who believed that sexuality was not fixed or determined by anything other than genitalia and social conditioning have harmed a number of people.
The joke answer is that hermaphrodites can have sex with themselves.
More seriously, I have heard religious people claim that all kinds of things, from mental illness to homosexuality, resulted from man’s original sin, and that these things did not exist in the Garden of Eden.
So, for them, you have to blame Adam and Eve, not God, for hermaphrodites.
Nick
@Anya: I read that Paul had the upper hand because he was attacking Conway over the “Aqua Buddha” ad and it made Conway look bad. Maybe the rest of the debate went well. I’d imagine the media wouldn’t write about any of that.
Corner Stone
@Ash Can: My point being that it would not matter what actually happened in the debate. Nick would come back and “report” that the D candidate was getting the worst of it in the “media”.
I didn’t see the debate myself so I don’t have a comment on it specifically.
ETA – Hmmm, see above.
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
@Barb (formerly Gex):
So you say. I see it as a lifestyle choice.
John Bird
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.:
I think the question is, should they let me marry the bottle, and the answer is yes.
sven
@Ruckus:
Al Gore is fat, that’s why.
Actually, the chemtrails conversation I eavesdropped included a segue into global warming. From what I overheard,
chemtrails = conspiracy because “I always wondered what those were”
global warming = conspiracy because “Carbon never hurt anyone”
(exact quotes)
Conspiracy theories give the feeling of being ‘in the know’ without any of the hard work involved in serious study.
NR539
I don’t understand, why is this not true? This is ALWAYS the case.
KCinDC
I hear that Paul condemned Conway as someone who’d “stoop to the level of attacking a man’s religious beliefs.” How does that make sense unless Paul is saying he’s really and truly an Aqua Buddhist?
Anya
@Nick: The media only reports on stupid stylistic points. What matters is what the people of Kentucky think.
Obama spoke on a rally of over 35,000, the media will report about how tired he sounded. They will not talk about the crowd enthusiasm or anything positive. You just watch.
John Bird
@Brachiator:
It’s that “battles an economic slump” that’s really telling, although, of course, white supremacist sentiment returning to Europe is like geese returning to Canada.
But those “economic” concerns – we all know what that means in European politics. That is, the worry isn’t actually over whether new immigrants assimilate properly, but over second- and third-generation non-whites taking good white people jobs.
Uloborus
@Nick:
Yes. Look at what you just typed. Paul’s BEST moment was being heavily on the defensive and whining that he was being treated badly. Being on the defensive is not usually considered a good thing.
Conway was always on the attack, had numbers, quotes, references, moral pleas, and I personally thought his best line was ‘As attorney general of Kentucky I’m always amused to get a lecture in constitutional law from a self-certified ophtalmologist.’
Paul also spent the entire time playing to his hardcore Tea Jerker base. Debates are supposed to be about convincing moderates, not defending your ability to get the vote of your most loyal supporters. Which is what the Aqua Buddha thing is about, isn’t it?
Joseph Nobles
In his closing remarks, Paul stuck out his lip and said he wouldn’t be shaking Conway’s hand because of his attacks on Paul’s religious beliefs and Paul’s family. If Paul had said, “I’ll shake your hand even though you’re making a big deal about some silly stupid thing I did in college,” I’d be on his side in this one issue. Instead, Conway is “attacking” Paul’s religion? Pout, pout, pout, somebody’s fees-fees got all hurt.
Ash Can
@Uloborus: I see. Thanks anyway. I’ll keep an eye out too.
@Corner Stone: You’re just whining about Nick for the sake of whining about Nick. BFD.
Corner Stone
@Ash Can: Yeah. I’m not making a point that’s actually backed up by what happened here.
Go fuck yourself jackass.
ETA – or go look at #103 from someone who *actually* watched the debate and didn’t “hear” from friends what “happened”.
And fuck yourself again jackass.
NR539
@Joseph Nobles:
oh that gives Conway a leg up.
maye
Are there moderates in Kentucky?
Nick
@Joseph Nobles: That’s a plus for Conway
Cat Lady
When did America get so fucking dumb?
ThresherK
@Uloborus: Debates are supposed to be about convincing moderates, not defending your ability to get the vote of your most loyal supporters.
The teabaggers are incredibly overrepresented in the media, espeically on TV. I’d love to know what local KY media is doing; if Paul’s consuming too much of it he may be fooled into thinking the small splinter are a majority.
Nick
@Cat Lady:
July 2, 1964
TR
@Nick:
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 made this country dumb?
I’ll let you explain which side of the racial line you’re blaming for all this before I respond, because if you’re blaming the beneficiaries of that act …. yeah.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Brachiator: We don’t have to guess at this. On NPR I heard a priest address this very issue. You see, we’ve also seen genetic and biological causes of violent behavior. That doesn’t mean we don’t sanction violence. So even if you can prove that being gay is natural it wouldn’t change their minds.
The largest problem they have is they don’t understand the idea of consenting adults. The idea that violence against an unwitting participant is the same as love shared by two people only makes sense if your of the “gays always cram stuff down people’s throats” crowd.
Nick
@ThresherK: .
Here’s one local story on it;
http://www.whas11.com/news/politics/105146309.html
TR
@Uloborus:
Outstanding.
@Joseph Nobles:
I wish Conway had responded to that by saying, “I apologize if I have offended any of the followers of Aqua Buddha.”
ETA: I see KCinDC had the same thought. Seriously, that response makes it sound like Paul really *is* an Aqua Buddhist.
The Conway campaign should issue a statement apologizing to all of that faith.
freelancer
@Nick:
golf claps to the racist troll.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Brachiator: I get nervous when Germany gets itchy about minorities.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Brachiator: In other words, it’s wrong because shut up that’s why.
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: I see it more as a symptom of indecision.
Nick
@TR:
yes
white people supported social programs with the understanding that they’d be the first to benefit from it. that’s why Social Security initially didn’t include minorities. Once the Civil Rights Act passed, Republicans and conservatives drilled it into white people’s minds that they would have to wait until black people and other minorities get theirs first before them, so in lieu of not being able to suppress minorities, they decided instead that best way to do it is oppose social programs or expansion of them that would benefit them since they wrongly believe they won’t benefit from them anyway, since they’re white and not poor.
In the process, those in charge continue to keep minority areas underfunded and underdeveloped, so that they continue to be poor and in need of social programs to take care of them, and white people can continue to be resentful of it.
gbear
@Cat Lady:
How about on October 7, 1996, the day that Fox news went live?
Does anyone know how much John makes if I click an ad? I want to make Michele Bachmann have to pony up for her presence here.
Cat Lady
@TR:
Without looking up other things that happened on that particular day, I’m going to assume Nick meant that that was the first day that White America officially started to lose its collective shit. It’s a solid hypothesis.
beergoggles
@Cat Lady:: “When did America get so fucking dumb? ”
America was always dumb. It’s just that the
straussiansconservatives realized they could use the dumb fundies to make even more people dumb by destroying our support systems and education and infrastructure and they just created a positive loopback cycle that will eventually consume us all.beergoggles
@Omnes Omnibus: Nothing wrong with ur metaphor dude. It’s just DougJ’s premise I was disagreeing with..
TR
@Cat Lady:
I’d agree, except for the part where the powers that be purposefully keep black areas underfunded and underdeveloped. That’s a little too birther-truther for me.
burnspbesq
@kommrade reproductive vigor:
I wouldn’t want to the the CFO or CMO of a big pharma company on that day. There will be huge demos outside their offices, demanding that they drop everything else and spend every penny of their research budget to find a silver bullet that will turn off the receptors of the Ghey Gene.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@TR: It sounds less loopy if you realize that they want to keep everyone poor and underfunded except for the oligarchs.
burnspbesq
video of the KY Senate debate here.
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/296055-1
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: Jeans are gay?
ThresherK
From the WHAS link:Kentucky Senate race turns bitter in debate
If Kentucky is like anyplace else, “turns bitter in debate” means a Democrat has had the nerve to voice exception to something a Republican said. It is a sure sign of impending “excessive partisanship”.
Nick
@ThresherK:
FTW
kommrade reproductive vigor
@burnspbesq: No. Shit. You might even see some rabidly anti-choice creeps make an exception. “Abortion should be illegal even when a 12 year old girl gets pregnant after being gang raped by five male relatives. But if the fetus has the Gay Gene …”
The RCC in particular struggles with this concept.
No really, you’re being too kind. Their problem is they need someone to hate. Period.
If every single member of all the different “others” they despise were to disappear from the face of the Earth on Monday, by Wednesday the fucktards would be organizing groups to Do Something about the Brunette Menace and the Hazel-Eye Threat.
Gingers would be shot on sight.
Uloborus
@kommrade reproductive vigor:
There was a time when they were. Elf babies, you know.
That was not a joke.
freelancer
@burnspbesq:
Wow, Paul was super whiny.
Nick
…yeah
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/10/rand-paul-to-jack-conway-you-demean-kentucky.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+tpmelectioncentral+(TPM+Election+Central)&utm_content=Twitter
Suffern ACE
@Brachiator: It makes sense. Merkel wants to tighten belt. Easier to cut benefits for Turks since they aren’t popular at all and declare that the problems aren’t from the unnecessary belt-tightening, but from the failure of the Turks to read Goethe as well as the German’s do. Oh, she wants the educated immigrants to come because Germany needs those engineering degrees. Its just the poor ones who are too expensive to deal with. Poor and stupid apparently.
Poor Turks are a lot like central Americans. Poor cause they have a culture of poverty that just can’t assimilate into industrious northern european culture. Nothing to do with how the elites in those countries have arranged things. And if they work hard for low wages, its best to hit them over the head for that, too. Once they read Goethe or stop reading about Cesar Chavez they’ll be so assimilated that you just won’t be able to tell them apart from poor whites any longer. Then we’ll be happy that they are here.
Anya
“run like a man” is there a teabager consultant telling these candidates to question someone’s manhood?
Bob Loblaw
Whelp, thanks to the Sharon Angles and Jack Conways of the world, we’re really reaching for the bottom of the barrel this year when it comes to religionizing our politics.
That’s just great. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am that the first part of that quote is irrelevant, by the way, next to the accusation that follows. Worshiping false idols…there really is no fucking hope for the South.
Brachiator
@Barb (formerly Gex):
It’s not that they don’t understand the idea of consenting adults. It’s that they reject it because it doesn’t fit their world view. It’s much like the link to the high school students. Because they believe in literal creationism, that God created plants, animals and individual races as independent, discrete groups, they don’t have room in their minds to even consider evolution.
And so it would be pointless to talk about the biological basis of sexuality to someone who believes that since God said homosexuality is bad, then there is no way that this “choice” should be respected as the decision of a consenting adult. Any consent, is by definition, defective.
And, since homosexuality is a sin, children must be protected from anyone might lead these little lambs astray into the wrong “choice.” This would cover not only school teachers, etc., but also any positive depiction of gays in the media.
The sad thing is that even as greater tolerance, especially among younger people, is becoming commonplace, you have a push back by the Tea Party People and folks like Paladino in New York.
Bigotry is slowly spreading, with some fighting back. The French expel Gypsies. Swedes elect anti-immigrant people to parliament for the first time in their modern history. Germans start talking about people who cannot easily be assimilated. The US starts heating up the anti-Latino and anti-Muslim sentiment. Bill O’Reilly ups the ante on anti-Muslim bigotry on national TV, and the fallout over this is just beginning.
Uloborus
@Brachiator:
Yeah. There are no arguments to convince them. Logic is something they use – badly – to try and sway people who stubbornly refuse to understand that homosexuality is inherently evil because God Said So. They have their justification right there. And you can’t even make a biblical argument, because it’s Because I Was Told God Said So When I Was In A Formative Moment. You’d have to change their past.
And even that’s not really enough, because most of them cling to the idea as a rationalization of raw fears and hates that have nothing to do with any logic at all.
Everything else follows.
Suffern ACE
@Brachiator: I don’t know if bigotry could be said to be slowly spreading. I mean, it is not some outsider group that has declared that “multicultural society has failed at all levels” (Except for the level that includes engineers. We need those!). That would be the head of the German government. And it isn’t some outsider group calling for the relocation of a small number of gypsies to their “homeland” (India? Romania?) and making a big show of removing them. That would be the head of the French government.
Brachiator
@Suffern ACE:
I see your point.
But consider: France has not moved against all its Gypsies, and is seeing push back by the French people and by the EU. Merkel has encountered opposition for her views. Other members of the Swedish parliament closed ranks to make sure that the anti-immigrant faction would have no influence. The BNP failed to win any seats in the recent British elections.
It’s not just what the heads of government clamor for. It’s what happens when the larger populace gives in and endorses bigotry.
Steeplejack
If any front-pager is still up and about, we have a hyphen bomb in the thread upstairs.
Morzer at 120, your name shall live in infamy.
Steeplejack
@Steeplejack:
Ah, thread healed. My work here is done.
The Golux
@Yutsano: I’ve always dug that song – but what a great video!
morzer
@Steeplejack:
If I reach 120, it can live in Alaska for all I care.
GregB
Would this make someone an cockaholic?
Anne Laurie
@GregB: Commentor on Gawker said “I wish my dad had been addicted to cock instead of booze.”
‘Course, Karl Rove might not agree.
EdTheRed
@Comrade Kevin:
What of Montgomery Clift? We can make this work; just shoot his right profile.
Brice Skowron
Love rules his kingdom without a sword