Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

He really is that stupid.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

The words do not have to be perfect.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

No one could have predicted…

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Not all heroes wear capes.

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64Comments

  3. 3.

    Violet

    Set up the grey water system tonight. Can’t wait to start using all that water that would go down the drain otherwise. Plants will be happy.

  4. 4.

    TooManyJens

    Posted this in the last thread, but it wasn’t about Michele Bachman blowing a corn dog so it didn’t really fit.

    About 70% of Democrats want to see Barack Obama renominated in 2012. Cue cries of “oh noes! he’s lost the base!”

    Except that in 1994, only 57% of Democrats wanted Bill Clinton to be renominated in 1996. And we all know how that turned out.

    http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/14/cnnorc-poll-more-dems-support-obamas-re-election/

  5. 5.

    JPL

    My favorite show to stream was In Plain Sight. It’s not deep and the case is solved fairly quickly. The difference is the quirkiness of the characters and the family members. In other words you can watch and go to bed and not dwell on it. Light. Someone recommended it to me and said you have to get beyond the first two episodes and they were correct. the first two episodes are awful…

  6. 6.

    Crashman

    @TooManyJens: I think some progressives think its fun to bitch and complain about Barack right now, but when the rubber hits the road, they’ll all realize that it’s him versus the modern American Inquisition.

  7. 7.

    Nom de Plume

    Thanks for the recommendation. I’ve got a Netflix cue a mile long at the moment (who doesn’t?), so it’s always nice to at least get a hint of what’s worth watching.

  8. 8.

    JPL

    @Crashman: I agree with you up to a point.. I’m not sending him money or knocking on doors. In GA that might not matter. I am the biggest obama supporter but at some point I want him to stand up and call the opposition traitors.

  10. 10.

    Citizen_X

    Yes, 13 Assassins is awesome.

    Did you ever see the 1962 version of Chushingura? It’s a great dramatization of the Chushingura, that is, the legend of the 47 Ronin (masterless samurai; also out to kill an evil Lord). I mention it because I think it’s a big influence on 13 Assassins. At least structurally. Chushingura is longer, about 3 and a half hours, but it works the same way: a long period of setting up the scenario, the politics and the characters, but once the action starts, it just keeps rolling. I highly recommend it.

  11. 11.

    Bizono

    Watched 13 Assassins a few weeks ago. I was surprised that it wasn’t more over-the-top-insane, like most of Takashi Miike’s movies.

  12. 12.

    dww44

    @JPL:

    I agree with you up to a point.. I’m not sending him money or knocking on doors. In GA that might not matter. I am the biggest obama supporter but at some point I want him to stand up and call the opposition traitors.

    While I agree that its long past time for Obama to stand up and call the Republicans out for their extreme partisanship and unwillingness to compromise, my emails from the very sharp new chair of the Democratic Party in Georgia, says that recent polling indicates that Georgia may not be a lost cause for Obama. A lot of on the ground work just might turn it. Of course its early days yet.

  14. 14.

    Tokyokie

    @Bizono:
    I, too, thought Miike was uncharacteristically restrained with 13 Assassins, although a restrained Miike is still more over-the-top than most directors. (The 40-minute final battle does kick ass.) And there’s apparently a 15-minute sequence in the Japanese version that was cut out for the international theatrical release. (Not sure about the DVD.) I’m really looking forward to his Ichimei, a remake of Masaki Kobayashi’s Harakiri, which is, I think, the most subversive of all the ’60s chambara films.

    And do you realize that Miike’s completed three films since 13 Assassins and is shooting a fourth. Man, the dude works fast. Kinda the anti-Kubrick.

  16. 16.

    JPL

    @dww44: Yeah..right.. I just don’t see that happening. I have a friend who helps the elderly and poor with taxes and even though they are living on ten thousand a year they don’t blame the repubs. they blame those not paying taxes. (aka blacks) This is in north GA. In the south there is someone to blame no matter how little you have and it’s tends not to be the repubs because they want to make your life better. Is it logical//of course not but the repubs are anti-government and aren’t going to take away your last dime. It’s a tough mentality to change. IMO.. it’s not a religious thing as much as an anti-government thing.

  17. 17.

    dww44

    Along the lines of what to do about the party that refuses to govern for the sake of the country, in total contrast there are all the accolades I’ve read in recent days to Hugh Carey. The late governor of NY walked into a financial mess akin to what Obama faced and faces, and apparently triumphed, although no one at the time really thought he’d succeeded. It was messy, but like Obama, he was a no-drama kind of leader and all about problem solving. Go read Linda Greenhouse’s eulogy to him at the New York Times and the comments accompanying her post.

    And, then, after watching this evening on C-Span the rebroadcast of the Prime Minister’s question time before the House of Commons, I was gobsmacked by the credit given by Cameron to his opposite Labourleader and indeed to others from across the political spectrum and by those on the other side back to him. Of course, there were fundamental disagreements about the best tactics to address Britain’s recent civil unrest and conservatives there, as here, think the real answer is unforgiving force and criminal punishment.

    Nevertheless, there’s a lot to be said for the Parliamentary system. It seems to provide for real venting and airing of the issues that seems not the case with our 2 party system and separately elected governing leader. Then again, as a general rule their MP’s are a better spoken lot than their U.S. counterparts. Sorry, but tis the truth. As I was watching, I couldn’t help but contrast with an image of Louis Gohmert on the floor of our House of Representatives talking about all that money Obama was spending on his birthday party and giving rise to at least 3 other conspiracy theories.

  19. 19.

    dww44

    @JPL: No doubt you are right that it is an anti-government thing. Honestly speaking though it’s mostly an anti-Obama thing on the part of those of whom you speak. The anti-government thing is mostly a cover for the latter.

    Nevertheless there really is an on the ground opportunity here to make sure that all those folks we got registered 3 years ago haven’t already been disenfranchised. If Obama stands up and fights before its too late it will help energize those of us on the ground. That’s what’s needed most beginning now.

  24. 24.

    Bnut

    13 Assassins was great, though I did get this feeling like I was watching an updated version of Seven Samurai. If you like martial arts flicks, Ip Man and Ip Man 2 is also streaming atm. Also, check out Election, a Hong Kong gangster flick.

  26. 26.

    lllphd

    for those of you expressing disappointment with obama, especially anyone wishing he’d just stand up and whup some ass, may i highly recommend this comment from a “tom” at washington monthly (via, ahem, sully; sorry, but …i just can’t completely quit him, he’s so good on weekends).

    here in the past, i’ve only vaguely alluded to (in the larger context of slamming our own tendencies to want the “correct” principles implemented with the same belligerence the rightwingnuts exhibit) the issue of obama’s experience as a black man informing how he manages this very old white racist male scene he’s in, but this guy truly nails it. everyone should read this, and very carefully. you’ll have to scroll down or search for his entry as “tom”, but then also take in some of the responses. all in all, it’s a marvel.

    but tom’s last line should humble us all. truly, those who are not humbled by it might want to do their own reality check.

  27. 27.

    JGabriel

    Oy vey. Douthat shills Fat Bastard for President:

    So whose door should Republicans be knocking on instead? Unless Mitch Daniels changes his mind or Jeb Bush changes his last name, the only compelling possibility remaining is Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey. … Of course Christie has obvious weaknesses: the brevity of his gubernatorial experience, the fact that he’s more moderate than his party’s base, the fact that it’s been a hundred years since America elected a president with his avoirdupois.

    Avoirdupois.

    Because you know all that Christie fat is just golden.

    .

  28. 28.

    Suffern ace

    Had an ok weekend, but am bothered still by some twentysomething self-identified “hipster” calling me a loser. Since when do hipsters self identify as such? I thought there was supposed to be some shame in the label.

  30. 30.

    Batocchio

    I want to see 13 Assassins, but was dismayed that the version that’s available has about 12 minutes cut out. I might still check it out, though…

  32. 32.

    suzanne

    @Suffern ace:

    I thought there was supposed to be some shame in the label.

    There should be. Only the Tea Party is more annoying than a murder of hipsters. I remember Amanda Marcotte wrote some contrived, self-aggrandizing bullshit (surprise) about her theory that right-wingers hate hipsters because they’re secretly jealous of authentic, freely expressed hipster joy. Myself and others responded that, no, even some progressives hate hipsters, because hipsters are annoying.

    I’m watching old episodes of Sports Night on Netflix. Wow. The 90s. The hair.

    This portfolio of photos of Frances bean Cobain is making me feel both ugly and extremely old.

  34. 34.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @suzanne:

    This portfolio of photos of Frances bean Cobain is making me feel both ugly and extremely old.

    She is rather stunning; at least, she is in those photos.

  35. 35.

    something fabulous

    OT? Must vent! Job board posting persons, please do not bother to specify that the individual be “detail-oriented” and have “excellent communication skills.” If we’ve got ’em, it’s a given, and if we don’t, you know we’re just gonna lie. What kind of job wouldn’t be better done by someone who has those? Waste of space. Boilerplate is making me cranky. Know it is the least of the issues in the whole job-hunt mess, but tonight, that’s the one making me want to urp.

  36. 36.

    sb

    @BudP: It’s streaming.

    I didn’t know anything about the film or who made it; just started watching it based on Jon’s recommendation. Horrific visuals which I guess is par for the course for Miike. I only watched the first 15 minutes before the dinner bell rang (bad timing, that) but I’m looking forward to finishing it.

  37. 37.

    Suffern ace

    @Jenny I’ve gotten in touch with my inner coot. I’m not a loser, but I can’t say I didn’t deserve some sort of insult. Apparently I was supposed to be impressed by something, wasn’t, and came off as Mr. “kids these days.”

  39. 39.

    sb

    @lllphd: I’m pretty sure that comment will go viral, if it hasn’t already.

    Terrific comment, I thought. Very well written.

  43. 43.

    NR

    @Yutsano: Oh, sure, it’s an outlier. But not much of one. Rasmussen has Obama at 44, DemocracyCorps at 45, The Washington Post at 44, Fox News at 42, Reuters/Ipsos at 45, CNN at 44, and McClatchy at 44.

    It’s not like the other polls have Obama a lot higher.

  45. 45.

    NR

    @MikeJ: You’re right. I’m sure things will pick up once Obama’s plan to cut entitlement programs is enacted by the Super Congress. As reported in today’s NYT:

    As part of this appeal to centrist voters, the president intends to continue his push for a so-called grand bargain on deficit reduction — a deal with Republicans to make even larger spending cuts, including to the social safety net, in exchange for some revenue increases…

    I’m sure that this will bring up Obama’s poll numbers as the huge hordes of centrist voters who hate Social Security and Medicare will move to support him. I especially look forward to the cuts in Social Security and Medicare helping Obama in centrist states like Florida, where old people don’t really vote in any significant numbers. And everyone knows that centrists don’t have any family members who rely on those programs–only members of the Professional Left do, but we all know that they’re irrelevant and can be written off.

    This campaign strategy is so brilliant, we clearly have nothing to worry about next year. Nothing at all.

  46. 46.

    Yutsano

    @NR: Why do you care? Isn’t that what you want? For that damn centrist Obama out of the White House so a magical Pure Progressive can take the throne?

  47. 47.

    FlipYrWhig

    @suzanne:

    I remember Amanda Marcotte wrote some contrived, self-aggrandizing bullshit (surprise) about her theory that right-wingers hate hipsters because they’re secretly jealous of authentic, freely expressed hipster joy.

    I’ve been a loyal reader of Pandagon since before the newbie ruining the blog was a fresh-faced kid named Ezra Klein, and I still miss Jesse Taylor’s once-central voice there. And I am a pretty big fan of Amanda Marcotte’s writing. But the scenester stuff is just brutal, and that post about how people — not just right-wingers — love to hate hipsters because of how much hipster joy shames their unfeeling khaki-clad lives… that was a lowlight.

    Recently she was writing about how the co-op is being ruined by all these tedious battles over symbolism, and linked it to a Missing poster for a stuffed monkey, and was generally being acerbic about hipster culture. I wondered what had happened to the argument that hipsters were only viewed negatively because they were capable of such unalloyed joy.

  48. 48.

    FlipYrWhig

    @NR: “Centrist” voters really do care about deficit reduction. It’s not very smart of them to do so. But they do.

  49. 49.

    FlipYrWhig

    @NR:

    a deal with Republicans to make even larger spending cuts, including to the social safety net

    Did the NYT listen for the important distinction between cuts to providers and cuts to beneficiaries before writing this sentence? I’m going to guess, No.

  50. 50.

    Jenny

    @NR:

    I especially look forward to the cuts in Social Security and Medicare helping Obama in centrist states like Florida

    Reagan cut social security (raised the retirement age from 65 to 67, raised payroll taxes, and taxed benefits for the first time in history) and slashed medicare during his first term and he won Florida with 65.32% of the vote. Seniors sure penalized him.

  51. 51.

    Yutsano

    @FlipYrWhig: I’m just trying to understand the sudden concern with Obama’s re-election when previous comments by NR showed nothing but contempt for the man and his policies.

  52. 52.

    Jenny

    @Yutsano:

    I’m just trying to understand the sudden concern with Obama’s re-election

    There are some people, NR may or may not one of them, who want Obama to lose so they can feel that their criticisms were vindicated.

    It’s like fans of a sports team who call in to sport talk radio shows and demand the firing of a manager or general manager because they didn’t take their advice.

  54. 54.

    JGabriel

    FlipYrWhig:

    “Centrist” voters really do care about deficit reduction. It’s not very smart of them to do so. But they do.

    Of course they do. A moderate is defined in the Balloon Juice Lexicon (by me!) as someone who gets all their news from network TV.

    And if network TV is telling them that deficit reduction is important, then that’s what they’ll “think”.

    .

  55. 55.

    Suffern ace

    @flip 47 – sounds like she needs to justify her disdain for Park Slope, after she’s moved away. Other people are wrong in their pursuit of happiness, which proves that her decision to move from the trendy neighborhood (to a trendier one?) was the right move. Egads, get that woman to manhattan soon before keeping up the pretense saps whatever youth she has left.

  56. 56.

    suzanne

    @FlipYrWhig: I read Pandagon at least twice a week, but I’d missed that post, thanks. I don’t comment often over there, but when I do, it’s as baddesignhurts.

    Amanda flummoxes me. There’s rarely been a writer that I agree with such a high percentage of the time that I nonetheless find so obnoxious, unfunny, dogmatic, verbose, etc. As an architect-ish person, I find her thoughts on urbanism/urbanity to be snobbish and privileged and entitled and shallow to the point of parody. Guess what, Amanda; SHOPPING AT WALMART HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STATE OF ANYONE’S SOUL. I miss Jesse.

  57. 57.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @suzanne: I quit reading Pandagaon a couple of years ago (coincidentally, I think, right around the time Marcotte moved to Brooklyn) when the ratio of insufferable hipsterism to substance became more than I could bear.

  58. 58.

    Samara Morgan

    i loathe Sully with the fire of a thousand suns because he is a slow-witted conservative shill and glibertarian whoremaster, but he occasionally has a good link.
    this one goes out to all the firebagging poutraged emoprogs (de Bore, NR, TK, im talkin’ atchu).

    How does Obama break the iron unity of the GOP opposition to assemble a governing majority in the US Congress?
    __
    If we progressives were not blinded by our own assumption that our history is the only history, we might see how Obama may be seeing his situation.
    __
    White progressives often think that African American elected officials are politically naive. We will far more credit to Cornel West, who has never been elected to anything, than to an elected state senator, or even the President of the United States. We think that Obama does not understand the nature of John Boehner, Mitch McConnell or Eric Cantor, as though he has not sat across the table from them. He doesn’t understand how mean they are, we think.
    __
    Obama acts entirely within the tradition of mainstream African American political strategy and tactics. The epitome of that tradition was the non-violence of the Civil Rights Movement, but goes back much further in time. It recognizes the inequality of power between whites and blacks. Number one: maintain your dignity. Number two: call your adversaries to the highest principles they hold. Number three: Seize the moral high ground and Number four: Win by winning over your adversaries, by revealing the contradiction between their own ideals and their actions. It is one way that a oppressed people struggle.
    __
    Obama has taken a seat at the negotiating table and said “There is no reason why we cannot work out solutions to our problems by acting like responsible adults. That is what people expect us to do and that is why we have entered into public service.” That is the moral high ground.
    __
    Honestly, I have been reminded more than once in the last few months of those brave college students sitting in at a Woolworth’s lunch counter, back in the day. Obama sits at that table, like they did at the counter. Boehner and McConnell and Cantor clown around, mugging for the camera, competing to ritually humiliate Obama, to dump ketchup on his head.
    __
    I don’t think those students got their sandwiches the first day, but they won in the end.
    __
    Obama is winning. Democrats are uniting behind him, although some white progressives think that they could do the job better. Independents are flocking to him. Even some Republicans are getting disgusted with their Washington leaders. Obama is not telling us about lack of seriousness of the Congressional GOP; he is showing us the vivid contrast between what we expect of our leaders and their behavior. The last two and half years have been a revelation of the essential conflicts in our society and politics.
    __
    If white progressives understood much about the politics of the African American struggle in the United States, we would see Obama in the context of that struggle and understand him better. And you don’t have to be African American to know something about the history of the African American struggle. The books and the testimony is there. It’s not all freedom songs. But you have to be convinced that it is something that can teach you something you don’t already know.

  60. 60.

    Samara Morgan

    @lllphd: the thing sully has is readership. hopefully a lot of readers will see that link and spread it.

    i read sully sometimes to see how willfully wrong he is….about Iran, religion, economics.
    once he frontpaged my letters on the Green Wave– now we hate each other.
    he has no actual clue about Islam and Iranian politics.

  61. 61.

    Samara Morgan

    and since this is an open thread….

    time to go.
    trying to stay will further destabilize Maliki’s government, but perhaps that is what the US wants….like a petulant child, wreck everything on our way out the door.

  62. 62.

    Steeplejack

    Watched half of Thirteen Assassins last night and didn’t get to see the second half. I paused it to go see about one of my brother’s dogs, and when I came back I couldn’t get it to resume or restart. Never had that happen before. It was really late and I was really tired, so I packed it in.

    The first half is very good, and I’m looking forward to finishing it in the next day or two.

  63. 63.

    lllphd

    @Samara Morgan:

    yes, sully is a very white and very condescending colonialist brit, so i share your disdain for his pseudo-insight.

    but sometimes he does recognize real insight in others. kudos to him for seeing it in obama so early on, and for maintaining his respect for that. and double kudos to him for recognizing the wisdom of this comment he linked to, that i also linked to in mine here.

    if you haven’t read it, do it now. just remarkable; it’s still resonating in me half a day later. i’m newly inspired, as i lived through the civil rights movement in the south (was in memphis when king was shot), and i realize now how little i really understand what it meant for those actually living through it; so many must still live through it, and obama is one of them.

    yup, newly inspired.

  64. 64.

    Samara Morgan

    @lllphd: i totally agree.
    and not a one of us can escape our genetic/memetic heritage….not me….not Sully.
    Sully is an apologist….he is an apologist for the Catholic church, for conservatism, and for western judeoxian culture in general.

    everyone that has a blog should put that link on their own blog.
    spread the meme.

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