Figure things have been politics free (or close to it here), so I figured you all needed a place to vent your spleen before you explode. What have we missed?
Open Thread
by John Cole| 50 Comments
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Mary G
The “dedicated Democrats” I yelled at over Thanksgiving for spouting the “both sides do it” propaganda are now enamored of Americans Elect & getting rid of both the parties.
Once again, when I pointed out what I see as the problems, their response was “Mary, you should really write a blog.”
Oy.
Anya
I saw the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo tonight, and I really liked it. I am yet to see a disappointing Daniel Craig movie. I was a bit annoyed though that they changed some elements of the story but, it was still enjoyable.
Anyone seen it yet?
Linda Featheringill
@Mary G:
There seems to be a feeling [specter?] haunting the country that our political system isn’t working. I realize that a third party probably wouldn’t cure the problems but that’s not my point. I think this dissatisfaction with the current political system is important.
C.J.
A Libertarian friend has gone full scale Ron Paul mouthpiece on Facebook. Alas, he completely ignored my comment with a link to the newsletter scans after he handwaved them as “not really that racist.”
Spaghetti Lee
@Mary G:
Did you tell them who was really behind AE and what you suspect their goals are?
Joseph Nobles
@Anya: As long as they trimmed down the rape scene by like 90%, I’ll deal with other changes. Man, was that excrutiating in the Swedish version!
Mark S.
To the fainting couches! Newt’s account of his first divorce was less than truthful.
But Newt already possessed delusions of grandeur 30 years ago:
MikeJ
@Spaghetti Lee:
How can you? They keep it all secret, which should make one suspicious by itself.
Trentrunner
@C.J.: Post actual quotes. I’ve been pimping RP_Newsletter twitterfeed (not mine) for a few threads now.
There are some choice excerpts that are nothing but out-and-out unvarnished honey-have-you-seen-my-white-hood?-yeah-it’s-in-the-second-drawer-under-your-confederate-flag-t-shirt racist.
Like:
Hill Dweller
Just to piggyback on Mary’s entry, I’ve come to the realization I don’t especially like my family. I love them for all they did to raise me, however poorly; enabled me to live a fairly comfortable childhood; and funded my education, but I just don’t like them.
They are all upper-middle class, some upper class, but are completely ignorant of anything outside their respective professions. They’re satiated, having achieved their goals, and don’t give a shit about anyone else, save a meager pro forma donation to a charity that, I suspect, assuages their guilty(?) conscious, buried deep long ago.
I’m tired; tired of dealing with my family, who is a nice microcosm of the country. White, paradoxically educated and ignorant; quick to blame the ‘other’, and obstinate. I tried to explain Obama didn’t ‘quadruple the nation’s debt’. Hell, I tried to explain a lot of things, but I’m not sure it changed a thing. In fact, I had the feeling their internal dialogues were nothing more than ‘bless his heart’.
It’s hard not to believe we’re f’d.
Trentrunner
More from the Ron Paul Newsletters, racist edition:
Trentrunner
More RP Newsletter gold. Who knew Ron Paul was gangsta before it was cool?:
That’s some straight-up Tupac shit at the end there. Whoa.
Amir Khalid
@Anya:
I take it you missed The Golden Compass.
burnspbesq
What the heck just happened in the India-Australia match? I thought they weren’t using replay because India objected (and got two wickets yesterday on bad calls that would have been reversed if replay were in use). So why is the umpire on the radio, and who is telling him to overturn the out call against Dravid?
Dream On
@Hill Dweller: Are you a long-lost relative? Seriously, I relate completely.
Darnell From LA
But, but….Ron Paul would legalize weeeeeeed, man!
Jerzy Russian
@Hill Dweller:
I have had this happen, but with most of my aquaintances from high school, rather than with my immediate family. That is the power of Facebook. Was everyone a right winger back in the day (and I did not notice or know any better), or was the wingerhood acquired later in life?
gaz
just pwned skyrim – I have infinite everything (gold, health, stamina, magicka) – level 51 – and I never completed any quests other than the tutorial and joining the college (which I didn’t have to do). No console debug cmds, so Steam Acheivments still work. heh.
Time to stick a fork in this game – it’s done- hell, I did it faster than oblivion – maybe I’ll sell it on ebay.
mmc
The thing I can’t figure out is why hasn’t other stuff in the new letter exploded? I had a friend who actually subscribed and I remember the issue that suggested you should renounce your American citizenship and apply to one of several countries that would give you a better tax deal–it seems several countries were quite willing to give you citizenship for the proper fees.
Anya
@Joseph Nobles: It was still excruciating. As someone who works with victims of sexual abuse it was particularly painful.
@Amir Khalid: I missed that one and the one about the Nazis. Even if it was Daniel Craig, I was not in the mood for another movie about Nazis. I also hated the Northern Lights, so I didn’t watch the movie.
Nemo_N
Everyone is a millionaire now:
nytimes.com/2011/12/27/business/tv-prices-fall-squeezing-most-makers-and-sellers.html?_r=1&hp
But vidyagaems still cost thousands of dollars, right?
Anya
@Trentrunner:
How’s that any different from the shit that comes out of Gingrich’s mouth all the time? He says similar stuff in front of MTP and other “respectable” media shows.
Elias Schewel
the best part about Ron Paul’s ascendancy in Iowa is that it leaves open the possibility that in a debate coming up, Mitt Romney will be asked whether he supports the Civil Rights Act and if he says “yes” then he’ll further alienate his base.
Mary G
@Spaghetti Lee: @MikeJ:
That was my first point, that we don’t know who most of them are and the few we do know are Wall Street guys, who already own most of the government and don’t need any more. Refusing to disclose their backers is a big red flag.
@Linda Featheringill: I agree with you. I’m actually registered to vote “decline to state” in California. It upsets me, though, that my friends, who are all wonderful people, highly educated, and make a lot of money in the private sector, can be so intellectually incurious.
They would be outraged to hear me say so, but they rely on cursory glances at newspapers, what they hear when they watch the Sunday morning shows for a few minutes every six weeks, and around the water cooler for their opinions instead of actually reading up and thinking about what’s going on outside their bubble. They can recite whole routines from the Harvard Sailing Club, who I had never heard of, though.
Until people who vote actually do some reading and listening and thinking for themselves, and more people vote, we will continue to get the politicians we deserve.
I was heartened by two kids from a second marriage who were there. The girl is a senior in high school who with her AP economic class is putting on a benefit concert that is set to raise $750,000 to buy computers for poor kids and give scholarships to the private school she attends. The 20-year-old boy, a sophomore at San Francisco State who hadn’t spoken more than five or six monosyllables all weekend long, perked up when I mentioned the Arab Spring being set off by one guy setting himself on fire in Tunisia, and talked to me for twenty or thirty minutes about why we don’t have to worry about the Muslim Brotherhood, citing recent polling in Egypt and Turkey over the pumpkin pie. You never know.
Mary G
@Hill Dweller: While I was talking on the phone and writing my last comment, you said it better.
Redshift
@Mary G: There’s an ad for Americans Elect I’m seeing on Nate Silver’s latest post, and it shows a donkey, an elephant, and, also in red, white, and blue, a question mark.
Seems awfully appropriate, but probably not in the way they intended…
YellowJournalism
Jerzy, I know almost exactly what you’re talking about. I think the realization came the day one of my best friends from high school criticized my soon-to-be marriage because my husband wasn’t Christian. I was always feeling like I was on the fringes of that group of friends while we were in school, and now I truly understand why.
BruinKid
One of my Ron Paul friends said that because he wants to end the “racist war on drugs”, therefore that PROVES he cannot possibly be a racist. Ah, libertarian logic. :-\
Another one just complains that they’re focusing on stuff in the past instead of “talking about the issues”.
I can’t reach these people. No matter what I say, there’s like this Ron Paul forcefield around their heads that acts as a barrier to any logical discussion about his past, or how his policies would actually affect poor people in the future.
Of course, these people also have money. They’re not in the top 1%, but they’re certainly in the top 10%. It’s a lot easier to be libertarian when you don’t have to worry about where your next meal is going to come from, or paying next month’s rent.
Brachiator
@Anya:
Thought the movie was excellent. Craig was very good, and he expertly underplayed his character to support Rooney Mara, who absolutely owned the role of Elisbeth. Aspects of her character reminded me of Mouse in the Walter Moseley novels, a character capable of incredible loyalty and also incredible violence.
Also saw Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, lots of fun, with a spectacular stunt that got applause from the audience. I had a few reservations, but I don’t want to step on others’ fun who may want to go see it.
But the jewel in the crown was Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, a great story anchored by uniformly great acting. Gary Oldman nails George Smiley, seemingly plodding and stolid, but who knows how to get at the secret behind the secrets. The others in the cast are equally good. My only reservation is that a couple of (minor) points in the story resonate more fully if you know the novel or tv adaptation.
By the way, it was fun to learn that Rooney Mara has a connection to “football royalty.”
Of the various movie trailers I saw, the only one that really made an impression was Wim Wenders’ tribute film to choreographer Piña Bausch. In 3D.
dead existentialist
I watched Trainspotting on Hulu+ tonight.
I can’t wait for the
Americanofficial remake.Villago Delenda Est
Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead!
The prophet Nostradumbass
@dead existentialist: I’m not sure how they could do an American remake of that.
Brachiator
Didn’t see much mention of it here in Balloon Juice, but I just loved how the “strategic intelligence” site Stratfor got hacked. The hackers used credit information from members to make donations to various charities. Yes, the hackers were very, very bad.
Donald G
When were you in high school, Jerzy? Most of my high school acquaintances were Reaganauts in the 80’s while I was the commie hippie atheist. Even with that as a given, I friended some of the more promising ones a couple of years back – the ones I had shared gifted and honors classes with years back and others who seemed relatively apolitical.
One flamboyant yet closeted fellow (who doesn’t know that I know or how that I know) has basically turned into a clone of Marcus Bachmann, many classify themselves as Christian conservative, a number of them take a Joe Arpaio-esque line on illegal immigration and are immune to logic, reason, or appeals to the Equal Protection clause.
And let’s not get into their positions on issues like protecting gay teenagers from bullying.
To maintain my own sanity, I had to purge the friends and relatives list.
Basically, I guess that depending on when and where you went to school, and the background and belief-systems of your acquaintances, a good portion of them probably contained the seeds of greater wingnuttia within them.
The prophet Nostradumbass
@Brachiator: They opened the charities up to all sorts of horrible side effects. Way to go, Anonymous.
dead existentialist
@Brachiator: Charity through theft. It’s the Murican way!
dead existentialist
@The prophet Nostradumbass: Trainspotting . . . . Heh heh.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@Villago Delenda Est:
fuck. i had franco in the zombie pool this year, and he is a high point value selection, only a few more days to turn it around.
Brachiator
@dead existentialist:
How do you know that the hackers were American?
amk
My pug jenny, the sofa/bed occupier. Selfish bitch.
Raven
@amk: Did you see the Pug Hates iPhone?
amk
@Raven: yeah, saw that here a few days back. Cute.
arguingwithsignposts
@Raven: hardcore.
Alex
Mitt Romney: What I can promise you is this –- when you get out of college, if I’m president you’ll have a job. If President Obama is reelected, you will not be able to get a job. That’s the reason I will hopefully get young people who are in college is to say, You know what, I understand what it takes to get jobs in America.
—
Romney is insane. At some point someone will point out that he will say or do anything to get elected and is merely a hollow shell with no ideas or plans. And everyone will nod sagely and wonder how his polling is and why is it that both sides do it?
Cheryl from Maryland
Friends — you think you know someone and you don’t. I had to block a friend yesterday from the Book of Face because he was posting anti-President Obama tripe that was both vulgar and false.
I felt I owed to him to tell him why — his use of crude and incorrect ad hominem attacks could not be allowed on my wall because of my beliefs in treating the office with respect in public, that I would not spread incorrect information, and that my page was my professional as well as personal self, so all posts had to comport themselves accordingly.
So far no reaction. But it was stressful. Thank you Balloon Juice for a place where I say “Fuck, Fuckety, Fuck, the Republican candidates are all stupid clueless shit filled assholes” in peace.
Schlemizel
@Alex:
Willard: Yes, friends, all college graduates will have jobs! You will fill the cannons & be fired at Iran.
gnomedad
Ron Paul and the John Birch Society.
scarshapedstar
You missed some early fireworks displays in south Louisiana.
opie jeanne
@Anya: Our older daughter took us to see it on Christmas day. I liked it very much, but my husband had no idea what was coming and I sort of worried about his reaction but he liked it too.
dance around in your bones
@Cheryl from Maryland:
Cheryl from M-landia, boy….do I EVER hear you there! BJ is my sanity zone.
Also, I simply do NOT do the Face Borg.