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Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

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

FFS people, this was a good thing. take the win.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

If West Virginia and San Francisco had a love child.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

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Republicans don’t trust women.

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I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself. We’re allowed to grow past that.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

The new republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

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You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

Fuck that bum, let’s go Joe!

You are here: Home / Open Threads / You Know Who Else Was Time’s “Man of the Year”?

You Know Who Else Was Time’s “Man of the Year”?

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hitler-time

Glenn Greenwald, the purveyor of leaked NSA documents who is universally beloved by each and every Balloon Juice commenter, sounds peeved that Snowden didn’t get Time’s “Man of the Year” cover, which went to SQUEEE! Hippie Pope instead:

“…Snowden is clearly, by far, the person who has most influenced this year’s news events. If it were a serious magazine with minimally brave editors, then of course Snowden would have been chosen, but I never expected him to be precisely because that’s not what TIME is.”

On the other hand, maybe not?

“I don’t begrudge the choice of Pope Francis: some of his pronouncements are impressive with the potential to achieve real change.”

But yeah, no:

“It’s a meaningless award from a meaningless magazine, designed to achieve the impossible: to make TIME relevant and interesting for a few fleeting moments.”

And such small portions!

Reader Interactions

187Comments

  5. 5.

    piratedan

    why is this a big deal, yesterday who’s shaking who’s hand and selfie outrage to this? I demand a better media!

  6. 6.

    Anton Sirius

    G-Dawg is totally correct. No one affected more news cycles than he did… err, I mean, Snowden did this year.

    Of course, the pope’s actually affecting lives and stuff, but that’s way less important than click-throughs and headlines, amirite?

  8. 8.

    JR

    “And such small portions!” may be the perfect commentary on Greenwald’s rant. Very succinct.

    Nicely played.

  10. 10.

    David Hunt

    I heard on the news today when they announced that the Pope had gotten the nod from Time, that Snowden was a close contender. I can’t predict if that makes the whole better or worse from Greenwald’s prespective.

  12. 12.

    Belafon

    It’s a meaningless award from a meaningless magazine, designed to achieve the impossible: to make TIME relevant and interesting for a few fleeting moments.

    Did he just figure this out in 2013? I would have made that statement had Time voted for me.

  14. 14.

    jl

    @Belafon:

    ” t’s a meaningless award from a meaningless magazine, designed to achieve the impossible: to make TIME relevant and interesting for a few fleeting moments. ”

    Greenwald’s sour grapes led him to an insight, an ‘ah-hah’ moment.

    I wish Time had stuck with the gimmicks, like the mirror cover that announced ‘YOU!’ were the person of the year. That would be exciting.

  17. 17.

    Ripley

    I heard on the news today when they announced that the Pope had gotten the nod from Time, that Snowden was a close contender.

    Almost Person of the Year. Has a nice ring to it.

  21. 21.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Shit, the glibertarian asswipe is whining almost as loudly about this as Darth Cheney.

    Fuck him, and fuck dudebro Snowden.

  26. 26.

    scav

    Those are my small, meaningless sour grapes, mine mine all mine!! For it is I who am to be made appear relevant and interesting for a few fleeting moments! Not the subject of said leaks but Me and my trained leaky kitten and boyfriend! I’m ready for my Cover!

  28. 28.

    nate

    What has Pope Francis actually accomplished? A bunch of nice talk, but where are the changes in church policy?

    Big fucking deal. I have to agree with Greenwald, when it comes to actually changing the world in 2013, Snowden is a far better choice.

  30. 30.

    Villago Delenda Est

    All this “me me ME” crap fits the glibertarian stereotype to a tee.

    I add my praise to that already expressed on Betty’s parting shot, which needs a visa to enter South America by now.

  32. 32.

    clone12

    Glen Greenwald: never has there been another person where I more want to throttle someone whom I agree with. Maybe other than Richard Dawkin.

    Also, is there a portmanteau for sore loser/sour grape? Because if you pull off that two-for-one deal you should at least be recognize for it.

  33. 33.

    El Caganer

    Well, maybe Snowden would have been a better choice; I don’t know. Though it’s a bit rich for Greenwald to be grousing about it, since he’s not exactly a disinterested party.

  35. 35.

    EconWatcher

    @nate:

    Well, the Church has pretty definitively decided not to let the Neapolitan mafia launder money any more through the Vatican Bank, so you have to give them that. (The Financial Times did an amazing article on this a few days ago.)

    More seriously, the main effect of the Pope on the non-Catholic world (and pretty much the Catholic world too) is through rhetoric, so a change in rhetoric is a change in substance.

  37. 37.

    The Sheriff's A Ni-

    Also, I forgot what year TIME’s infamous issue came out, so I clicked the image to get a better look. I didn’t get one, but I did get Betty’s upload name: hitler-time

    Now I have mental images of Der Fuhrer hopping around in parachute liederhosen.

  41. 41.

    Feudalism Now!

    Snowmen? Who is this Snowden character? Is he that tech support guy up in Siberia?
    Dear lord, Herr Greenwald’s shorts are in quite the bunch over this. Thank goodness the power of the information that Snowden released has overshadowed the tacky histrionics and soap opera of the participants. Oh wait…

  42. 42.

    Elizabelle

    News flash:

    Hitler’s dog made the cover of Time’s Person of the Year.

    ETA: Glenn Greenwald. Not so much.

  45. 45.

    scav

    @EconWatcher: Well, and I’m not sure the legislative, enacted and enforced changes post Snowden (et al) attain much beyond vaporware sound and fury status either. In terms of “news” driving, the screaming purified sizzle is to preferred to actual, usually compromised, accomplishment.

  47. 47.

    nate

    Get back to me when the church changes its doctrine on women, on contraceptives, on homosexuals. When they stop protecting pedophile priests. When Francis puts the smack down on Timothy Dolan.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m as pleased as anyone that Francis has more progressive rhetoric coming out of his mouth, but I don’t see it changing anything in 2013.

  49. 49.

    Suffern ACE

    Ah, the age old debate. Is GG’s trolling post a parody or is it a satire. I’ll go with satire.

  54. 54.

    The Sheriff's A Ni-

    @nate: So, uh, what has Snowden changed in 2013? If Snowden ‘started the conversation’ shouldn’t Francis get the same credit for starting the conversation on reforming the Catholic Church?

  55. 55.

    low-tech cyclist

    Time Magazine threw their supposed POY standards under the bus in 2001, when they made Giuliani their POY instead of Osama bin Laden. They’d had more guts back in 1979, when the Ayatollah Khomeini was their MOY. (Ditto way earlier, when Hitler was their MOY.)

    At this late date, who the fuck cares what Time, Inc. thinks about such things?

  59. 59.

    Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader

    Haven’t seen it reported on the conservative sites but apparently Obama flew a war criminal down to South Africa in Air Force One.

  61. 61.

    Mandalay

    @Suffern ACE:

    Is GG’s trolling post a parody or is it a satire. I’ll go with satire.

    It was a carefully designed attack on Time. Hoo-ha over Snowden and Pope Francis was just a pretext for that.

  62. 62.

    Suffern ACE

    Does sexiest man alive count as a consolation prize? People is after all Time’s more profitable sister.

  63. 63.

    Another Holocene Human

    @jl: I never understood the Kardashians thing until someone online pointed out that they were courtesans. There have been periods in history where courtesans achieved fortune and no little fame. It just seems weird to those of us born into the end of the American Century when there was still a large middle class. But most periods in history had a high GINI index (and a great deal of misery) just like America today.

  64. 64.

    Trollhattan

    Is there a Brazilian edition of Time? Maybe there’s still a chance!

    Being lectured by the Pompatus of LoveDouchery is bad enough, but being lectured from another hemisphere reduces it to pure comedy.

    And since the wingnuttosphere has just in the last week codified WHY Pope Frank is the Worst Thing, Evah and are issuing their talking points hourly, this is actually a lovely thumb in their eyes. Thanks, Irrelevant “Time”!

  67. 67.

    handsmile

    I’ll leave it to the savvy for the ritual thwacking of the Greenwald pinata, but of more interest to me is that the actual winner of Time’s “Person of the Year” poll was Egyptian defense minister Abdul Fattah Al-Sisi.

    http://poy.time.com/2013/12/06/how-egypts-gen-al-sisi-won-times-person-of-the-year-poll/

    The general wrecked Miley Cyrus’s candidacy, but she twerked perennial front-runner, Turkish prime minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan, who had won the poll for the past two years at least.

    Time magazine may be little more than a bad joke to us illuminati, but evidently it still carries some clout among international readers. (I am aware that Time’s august editors are not bound by the results of the readers’ poll.)

  68. 68.

    Chris

    “It’s a meaningless award from a meaningless magazine, designed to achieve the impossible: to make TIME relevant and interesting for a few fleeting moments.”

    As I think to myself every time I hear a rejected guy assure everyone around him that he never was interested in the bitch anyway…

    … then why do you care?

  69. 69.

    Another Holocene Human

    @EconWatcher: Never dismiss rhetoric (in other words, I agree with you). If GW Bush, who had a racially diverse cabinet, etc, had said one word during the Summer of Hate (2010) he could have put a halt to a lot of the runaway anti-Muslim bullshit (and of course also diminished the Tea Party turnout that fall, which is why he was a moral coward and stayed mum) and quite possibly also slowed or diminished the GOP’s slide into the white supremacist party. But he said nothing, the crazies went crazy, and Obama picked up more of the non-white vote than ever in 2012, and there’s no sign of the crazy stopping. You know, some of it would have happened anyway. But I was disgusted that Bush, after all that happy talk for 8 years and after you genuinely forging a bit of a different path than some other Republicans before him, let the xenophobic rage boil over.

  71. 71.

    Chris

    @Another Holocene Human:

    How would anything Bush said have made a difference in 2010? He was over the hill by then, and the teabaggers were busy either forgetting he ever existed, or saying that he’d been a liberal RINO all along. If anything, his coming out against the Summer Of Hate would’ve only encouraged them to scream “see! SEE! We TOLD you he was a liberal all along!” and hate louder.

  73. 73.

    Karen in GA

    Look, it’s understandable that Greenwald is upset at being rebuffed by this august institution. Another of Time’s Clickbait Person of the Year finalists was Miley Cyrus. Miley Cyrus, ladies and gentlemen. If that doesn’t scream credibility and integrity while wearing next to nothing and rubbing a foam finger in the crotch of Alan Thicke’s slightly less talented kid, I don’t know what does.

    UPDATE I: I can see why Greenwald is so upset about this.

    UPDATE II: Well, along with the fact that “upset” is kind of his default state.

    UPDATE III: A møøse once bit my sister.

  76. 76.

    Another Holocene Human

    @Chris: Not at that point. He still had a lot of clout in the party. Michael Steele was still RNC chair. Tea Party Express was still some superPAC sending angry pensioners to scream at congresscritters.

    The hate and racism from that side is so much more unbelievably worse than in was in 2010. For one thing, they had to cloak their hate under a veil of “m0000000slims! terrrrrrists! shariah law!” as if we’re all supposed to spook and hide under the bed. Whereas right now you can go online–even on major websites–and see dozens of antediluvians freaks sharing the bad news about how much they hate based on skin color. You know, the good old American pasttime. If you’re white. And an asshole.

  78. 78.

    Karen in GA

    @handsmile: Wow — “Miley Cyrus” and “august” in the same post twice in one thread (three if you count this one). Not even sure if it’s noteworthy, but in case it is, let’s note it, shall we?

  79. 79.

    Mr. Longform

    “It’s a meaningless award …”

    It’s not an award! It’s a statement about who’s the biggest newsmaker of the year. Maybe not the pope, but it’s not a “congrats on the pope” thing. That’s why Hitler and the Ayatollah and YouTube and other unsavory characters have made the list.

  80. 80.

    Belafon

    @handsmile: And that may be because Time runs different, and in a lot of cases politically relevant, articles in other countries, especially as their cover stories. They have become irrelevant here because they do fluff pieces.

  81. 81.

    Belafon

    @Karen in GA: Consider that the true point of the Person of the Year is to get people to talk about Time Magazine, Miley really would have done the trick.

  82. 82.

    Another Holocene Human

    The TIME cover is 13 March 1933.

    The covers were basically people in the news. Not sure why they used a propaganda photo but they probably didn’t have access. You can see they got a nice arty photo for their Gertrude Stein cover:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_covers_of_Time_magazine_%281930s%29

    Goering made TIME’s cover later that year. This guy was TIME’s MOY in 1933. You probably haven’t heard of him, but he helped prevent the US from turning into a fascist hell-hole like Germany.

  84. 84.

    El Tiburon

    Happy Fucking Solstice Season. Don’t say I never gave you nuthin!

    Sing to the tune of “Rawhide”

    Trollin’ trollin’ trollin’

    Greenwald keeps blowing up
    Balloon Juice minions keep throwing up
    Keep them BJ trolls trolliing GREENWALD!
    Don’t even read him
    Just shriek and derp and dismiss him

    Move ’em on, head ’em up,
    Head ’em up, move ’em out,
    Move ’em on, head ’em out Greenwald!
    Set ’em out, ride ’em in
    Ride ’em in, let ’em out,
    Cut ’em out, ride ’em in Greenwald.

    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Greenwald!

    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    BJ front pagers need clicks
    BJ commenters can be dicks
    When Greenwald is the the main
    BJ goes totally insane
    No rational discourse or discussion
    only turds being tossed and toilets flushin’

    Move ’em on, head ’em up,
    Head ’em up, move ’em out,
    Move ’em on, head ’em out Greenwald!
    Set ’em out, ride ’em in
    Ride ’em in, let ’em out,
    Cut ’em out, ride ’em in Greenwald.

    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Greenwald!

    Trollin’, Trollin, Trollin’
    Greenwald
    He broke one of the biggest storys lately
    Yet BJ front pagers and commenters squeal like babies
    He doesn’t blow Republicans or democrat pols
    This makes BJ lemmings act like ginormouos a-holes
    Greenwald is fighting against the man
    BJ commenters to scared to make a stand.

    Move ’em on, head ’em up,
    Head ’em up, move ’em out,
    Move ’em on, head ’em out Greenwald!
    Set ’em out, ride ’em in
    Ride ’em in, let ’em out,
    Cut ’em out, ride ’em in Greenwald.

    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Trollin’, trollin’, trollin’
    Greenwald!

  87. 87.

    Mandalay

    @handsmile: Isn’t it possible that Sisi’s backer, Ahmed Abu Hashima, had a lot to do with him winning that Time poll? I get the impression – perhaps unfairly – that he is an Egyptian version of Donald Trump.

    OT: Some of the comments in your link are really interesting.

    Really OT: Abu Hashima’s wife is just stunning.

  89. 89.

    catclub

    @Another Holocene Human: ” This guy was TIME’s MOY in 1933. You probably haven’t heard of him, but he helped prevent the US from turning into a fascist hell-hole like Germany. ”

    Smedley Butler? I have heard of him.

  90. 90.

    Another Holocene Human

    @Belafon: Overseas, I’m sure a lot of people pick up TIME to get a easy-reading English take on what America thinks about foreign affairs–kind of important when America’s got all those nukes and conventional firepower and dominant navy, & so on, & so forth. Not to mention the destructive power of Wall Street at our fingertips as well.

    In the US, TIME is read by elderly people who can still correct their vision enough with bifocals to read stale news but who don’t have a computer, or it is received by old people too sick or into dementia to figure out how to stop their subscription. It is also often read in waiting rooms, but not so much any more. I guess it’s too liberal for Galtian heroes like dentists and MD specialists. Today it is more the custom to point a TV over the waiting room and have it blare FOX 24/7.

    At a certain municipal workplace’s nurse’s station they have a twist on this: not FOX, CNBC.

  91. 91.

    NotMax

    Black Friday, my aunt Fanny.

    It isn’t officially the holiday season until someone mentions Hitler and Time magazine in the same sentence.

  93. 93.

    handsmile

    @Karen in GA:

    We shall. Hi-brow, lo-brow, the BJ commentariat: “[We] contain multitudes.”

    @Belafon:

    Thanks, while I was aware of Time’s multiple international editions, I did not know news coverage/analysis in those editions was any more sophisticated or “politically relevant.” How do you come to know this? (a sincere, snark-free question, btw)

  94. 94.

    Another Holocene Human

    @catclub: I said helped– I mean, that guy helped too, but without changes to the masses’ real, material circumstances, stopping one coup would mean nothing.

    If that dude had succeeded in assassinating Hitler, do you think that would have meant the immediate, decisive end to the Nazi terror? Really depends what would have happened next, right? And The White Rose tried to spark a student uprising a few years later and was executed for their troubles. Even with thousands of Communists out of prison the best they accomplished was sabotage and hiding Jews.

  95. 95.

    Violet

    @NotMax: Re: Black Friday. Just returned from the UK where I went to a gaming store to buy a gift card for someone for a Christmas present. They had banners saying, “Black Friday specials” with various videogames and prices listed. Couldn’t believe it. I wonder if they even know what Black Friday is? They don’t celebrate Thanksgiving.

  96. 96.

    jl

    @catclub: The photo in question was of General Hugh Johnson, one of the people Smedley Butler named in the Businessman’s Plot.

    Which reminds, me to say that I think Rand Paul has the stuff of a future Time’s Person of the Year.

    Rand Paul Cites ‘Popeye’ To Explain Why He Opposes Budget Deal
    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/rand-paul-cites-popeye-to-explain-why-he-opposes-budget-deal

    Using a line from an old “Popeye” comic, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said Wednesday that the newly reached budget agreement was like paying “Tuesday for a hamburger today.”

    …

    Paul attributed the “hamburger” line to to the “Popeye” character J. Wellington Wimpy in a footnote. Paul said his office would footnote speeches and op-eds “like college papers” after he was accused of plagiarizing material from several sources.

  97. 97.

    Belafon

    @handsmile: I will have to go dig, but every so often Daily Kos (yes, them) will have a post about Time and Newsweek US News covers, comparing the US versions to the rest of the world.

    ETA: Here’s the DK diary.

    ETA2: I should also add that I’m not going to claim that what they write abroad is awesome, but considering the examples, it’s easy to tell why they’re not really relevant here.

  98. 98.

    El Tiburon

    And of course there is this. Yet it’s only Greenwald who gets pointed at by all the cool kids at BJ.

    Time Criticized For Choosing Pope Francis Over Edward Snowden As Person Of The Year

    Snowden was undeniably a figure of major consequence during the year, as Time itself acknowledged in its piece on him. In the months since the Guardian published the first round of revelations from the documents Snowden leaked, newspapers and websites in countries around the world have run article after article detailing the stunning breadth and depth of the global surveillance networks tracking the movements of seemingly everyone on the globe.

    In the days leading up to Time’s unveiling of its decision, writers at rival publications began publicly lobbying for Snowden to be chosen. “No Contest: Edward Snowden Is Person Of The Year,” the New Yorker’s John Cassidy wrote:

    In opening the eyes of people around the world to how easy it is for governments to monitor digital communications, and to how complicit major technology companies have been in these surveillance programs, he sparked a long-overdue debate about how to preserve privacy in the information age—and whether such a thing is even possible. If Snowden hadn’t come forward, the steady encroachment of the surveillance state would have continued, and most people would have been none the wiser. Now Big Brother and his enablers have been rattled, and have been forced to be a bit more open.

  102. 102.

    eric

    given that Harry Reid went nuclear in a way that dramatically alters the way our government actually functions, might he not rank up there? all of this is sill, of course, but only college football coaches are so gauche to push their own teams in the press. Or Elizabeth Warren who single-handedly revived marxism in the united states, or so it appears from what “some say” in the press.

  103. 103.

    NotMax

    @jl

    A proper footnote would attribute Elzie Segar, the actual living person who created Wimpy and put the words in the fictional character’s mouth.

    BTW, Sen. Paul, Segar also is responsible for one of the definitions of the word ‘goon’ – a slow-witted bully,

  105. 105.

    handsmile

    @Mandalay:

    Indeed possible, perhaps likely. A little digging about on the intertubes reveals that Hashima is the co-founder and chairman of the Egyptian Steel Corporation. Such an industry’s links to the Egyptian military regime would suggest that Hashima is a more formidable figure than the buffoonish Trump. And while he has his own hagiographic web page, no Wiki entry that I could find.

    As to “Really OT”: GULP! and Great News, Single Male BJ Readers! She’s his ex-wife! Here’s more info on the former Miss Lebanon contestant before you post on her Facebook page:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haifa_Wehbe

    @Belafon:

    Thanks, I appreciate your disinterring that diary link!

  107. 107.

    cleek

    @El Tiburon:

    If Snowden hadn’t come forward, the steady encroachment of the surveillance state would have continued, and most people would have been none the wiser. Now Big Brother and his enablers have been rattled, and have been forced to be a bit more open.

    they’ll have to be “a bit more open” … ? how rattling! world changing, indeed.

  108. 108.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    That’s just sad.

    I mean, to think that, after he’s made such a big deal over Snowden, yes, I guess I can understand that; but to write it and broadcast it for the whole world to look at and snicker about his hurt feelings? What kind of person does that? Is his skin that thin that this stings him as badly as it seems to? And is his self awareness that stunted that he can’t tell how this comes across? Weird…

  110. 110.

    Chris

    @jl:

    The entire story of the Business Plot always seemed weird as hell to me, because if a business cartel were plotting a coup to preserve their status in the United States, why, of all the people in America, would they have reached out to Smedley Butler as the front man in their coup? The man made no secret of his utter contempt for them and their control over the United States’ affairs.

  112. 112.

    burnspbesq

    Fuck off, Glenn. When you stop aiding and abetting felons, I will resume taking you somewhat seriously.

  114. 114.

    Kay

    I think the commie pope is a great choice, because he talks about income inequality.

    If nothing else it makes everyone horribly uncomfortable, and they feel they have to address it :)

  115. 115.

    Kay

    Although, if the Time article is the one I read (I can’t tell) they skate neatly past income inequality and onto broader “justice” so the pope may have to be blunter. I read something he said in Italy where he used the word “slaves”. He may have to hit ’em over the head with it. They’re not the sharpest tools in the shed.

  117. 117.

    Chyron HR

    @El Tiburon:

    Greenwald and Snowden are the most important men of all time, of all time of the year! All must acknowledge their greatness!

    (P.S. Stop talking about them so much, you stupid Kool Kids!)

  119. 119.

    Mandalay

    @Kay:

    I think the commie pope is a great choice, because he talks about income inequality. If nothing else it makes everyone horribly uncomfortable, and they feel they have to address it :)

    Well you’re right that Republicans have addressed it, but I see no sign that their shameless pundits are remotely uncomfortable about the situation…

    Douthat: First, that when it comes to lifting the poor out of poverty, global capitalism, faults and all, has a better track record by far than any other system or approach.

    Limbaugh: “The pope is ripping capitalism, ripping trickledown economics, ripping America. And Obama is having an orgasm,”

    Palin: he’s had some statements that to me sound kind of liberal, has taken me aback, has kind of surprised me.

    Santorum: I think that what Pope Francis is doing really makes a lot of sense for Republicans, which is, ‘we don’t need to change what we believe in.’

    If you want some really good examples of cognitive dissonance then the rationalization of the Pope’s recent comments by Republicans makes a great case study. (But not as good as BJ threads on Snowden of course.)

  120. 120.

    handsmile

    Jesus wept! (no papal reference intended)

    From El Tiburon’s HuffPo link above (#98), I learn that pond scum/whale shit Ron Fournier (see yesterday’s dpm post on that subject) would have chosen Edward Snowden as Time POY.

    While he would have been my choice as well, now I’m fully behind Miley Cyrus!

    Also, has anyone heard from Bill Donohue? Or Ross Douthat for that matter? I would have to imagine that the selection of Francis would be most disconcerting. Why, even a satanic plot!

    ETA: Wrong again. The webpage of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights congratulates Francis on his selection. Another sin by this secular humanist (who should have checked first).

  121. 121.

    Bobby Thomson

    @Another Holocene Human:

    Whereas right now you can go online–even on major websites–and see dozens of antediluvians freaks sharing the bad news about how much they hate based on skin color.

    You’ve been able to see that in any non-moderated comments section since the Internet became a public thing.

  122. 122.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @handsmile: Snowden would not have been my choice, but, like you, Fournier’s endorsement of Snowden moves me firmly in Camp Miley.

    In all seriousness, a pope who strongly and publicly focuses in economic inequality and de-emphasizes sexual issues could have a major impact. Snowden was a viable candidate, but a focus on him is perhaps too US-centric.

    @El Tiburon: Get a grip.

  124. 124.

    agorabum

    @nate: What has Snowden actually done?
    He’s helped expose a lot of the details of the NSA spying…but the spying continues. I don’t see anyone in Congress passing laws about it. Don’t see any mass movements to denounce it. It was disclosed, the American people generally clucked their tongues in disapproval, and then didn’t give it much more thought. A survey of typical American reactions from 2000 to the present shows that is pretty standard, so I can’t say that it even revealed anything new about our character; just confirmation of the past.

  129. 129.

    Mandalay

    @handsmile:

    GULP! and Great News, Single Male BJ Readers!

    Sadly, I think she must be carrying a gazillion tons of emotional baggage. From your link…

    Wehbe is a victim of parental alienation. In the 1990s, she married her cousin Nasr Fayyad when she was 18 and traveled with him to Nigeria where he worked. During her pregnancy, she returned to Lebanon and separated from her now ex-husband quoting marital problems. She had a daughter whose name is Zeinab Fayyad who also was a victim of parental alienation until she became an adult and continued to refuse to have any contact with her mother, even after she herself got married to Shaaban Reda Fawaz and had a child. Wehbe’s ex-husband and his mother have not allowed Wehbe any contact with Zainab. In Lebanon, it is customary that the father gets automatic full custody of the children.

    Wehbe has had no contact with her daughter since Zainab was one or two years old.

    Being drop dead gorgeous probably doesn’t seem very important when you constantly have to carry all of that in your head and your heart.

  131. 131.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @ranchandsyrup: There are quite a few boomers and war babies who comment as well. I would guess (ever so scientifically that the average age of a commenter here is mid 40s.

  134. 134.

    LAC

    Awww… so no picture of Snowden with the Chinless Fuck’s visage behind him on the cover of that “meaningless rag”? So meaningless to Greenwald that he has to vomit up some bile about how meaningless it is? It is eating him alive that Snowden isn’t on the cover and, that by extension, his sour chinless existence isn’t going to get the attention this week.

    No worries, when his new media empire rains down upon us like the hammer of Thor, we will be sorry and TIME will grovel at his feet to have him on the cover and ….
    scene.

  135. 135.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    You’re a Boomer, aren’t you? Right up against the line, just as I’m right up against the other side of it.

  136. 136.

    Kay

    @Mandalay:

    Palin: he’s had some statements that to me sound kind of liberal, has taken me aback, has kind of surprised me.

    Because she’s a moron and she never really listened to religious people. I don’t mean THEM. I’m talking about the general dialogue on income inequality.

    The pope makes it Big News, and they can’t dismiss him like they do the lady who works at Popeyes. Look, I know this will all turn out to be the fault of the dumb, lazy workers, but I’m enjoying this brief burst of populism while it lasts :)

    Go pope! Give ’em hell.

  140. 140.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Yeah, that’s what I meant. ’64 was the last year of the Baby Boom- birth rates at or above the 1941 (in the US, anyway) levels.

    My parents were young, too. Dad’s a war baby (’45), while mom’s a Boomer. I was born in ’65, but a lot of the later Boomers’ cultural touchstones feel as if they’re mine, too, along with the early Gen X touchstones, like Sesame Street and Schoolhouse Rock.

  141. 141.

    soonergrunt

    @Omnes Omnibus: Not even remotely. My mother was a boomer–one of the first, having been born in December, 1946. My dad was born 19 days after the war started in 1941.
    I’m the last of three. Sisters in ’65 and ’68, me in ’70.

  150. 150.

    soonergrunt

    @chopper: It’s for certain that if Time had chosen Snowden, Greenwald would be singing a different tune, and using the recognition to attack anyone who didn’t acknowledge that Snowden –and by extension, Greenwald– is an Ubermensch.

  151. 151.

    Socoolsofresh

    Love that BJ commenter’s favorite traitor/grifter/nothingburger was runner up for man of the year. Love how all year the BJ authoritarian commenters shouted down anyone thinking that the issues Snowden was bringing up had any importance. Now all you guys get is some cheap snickers at GG expense while everyone else agrees Snowden had a major impact. Never have you guys been so wrong about something. And yet think that you are still right. Oh ya, but Time magazine jumped the shark 20 years ago, amirite? Just like how all you savvy dudes knew about widespread surveillance back in 2006.

  154. 154.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Socoolsofresh:

    I recognize the reality that online privacy exists the same way a secure computer exists…sealed in the original shipping container…and that’s not even a guarantee.

    When you speak of cognitive dissonance, you’re projecting like the octoplex down at the mall…probably a showing of Sneakers.

  156. 156.

    Socoolsofresh

    @Omnes Omnibus: All year you guys were trumpeting that Snowdens leaks meant nothing, weren’t surprising, nothing new. Now he almost wins man of the year, due to the immense influence his leaks has had on the world. You guys were completely wrong. And now all you guys have is to sputter about GG being a douchebag, like that even matters to him, as he starts up his new publishing company.

  158. 158.

    Thlayli

    “Socoolsofresh” = sockpuppet.

    Seriously, has anyone ever seen a post from this nym that isn’t an attack on someone for insufficient adoration of Saint Edward the Blower-of-Whistles?

  159. 159.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Socoolsofresh: Who is this you guys? I have expressed concern about the NSA and the Fourth Amendment since the debate on passing the Patriot Act many years ago. I just don’t see Snowden as the “Man of the Year.” I don’t see how my interest in privacy requires that I be upset that Time picked the the pope rather than Snowden. That is the failure of logic on your part.

  160. 160.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Elizabelle: Yes, that’s a creepy looking wolf in the background — red tongue and all.

    Perhaps Glenn could create an award at his new media outfit and give the first one to Snowden. That’s the ticket.

  161. 161.

    Socoolsofresh

    @Omnes Omnibus: Never said I was upset he wasn’t picked. Just that its impressive that only the pope beat him out. I meant you guys as in you, botsplainer, chopper, lac, mynemo, cacti, et al. going on all year about Snowden not meaning much, just being this weird traitor/grifter. And then it was only the pope who beat him. I guess his leaks did have an impact then.

  162. 162.

    Socoolsofresh

    @Thlayli: Never called him a saint, just loved watching the sputtering for excuses on why Snowden/GG should be ignored, and then the failure to do so. I know GG called the bj commenters here authoritarian sheep a couple years ago, and thats why everyone here has such hate. But it’s funny watching you guys continue to prove him right.

  163. 163.

    ranchandsyrup

    @Socoolsofresh: I recall them saying that he wasn’t telling them anything that they didn’t know, not that it didn’t mean anything. there’s a difference.
    His leaks had a terrific media impact. Not (yet) on policy.

  165. 165.

    Medicine Man

    @Omnes Omnibus: I wouldn’t pay too much attention, Omnes. Some people just get *really* uptight when they think their idols aren’t getting enough respect.

  166. 166.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Socoolsofresh: Look Greenwald is a self-righteous polemicist who is incapable of doing the simple lawyer’s task of trying to understand the other side’s argument so that he can refute it. Snowden seems like a right-libertarian “knowledge wants to be free” guy. So I would say that neither is my cup of tea. OTOH, anyone who was paying attention when the Patriot Act passed cannot be surprised by a fucking thing in the Snowden-Greenwald leaks. I say let’s roll back the Patriot Act (and I’ve been saying since before it was enacted). Let’s put real limits on the government domestic surveillance powers. For example, nothing, not even metadata, without a warrant. And let’s make sure that there is enough supervision over foreign espionage effort that we don’t embarrass ourselves. Make sure the reward is worth the risk.

    @Medicine Man: I’m just a little bored waiting for a phone call.

  167. 167.

    El Tiburon

    @Socoolsofresh: Oh, I remember when I used to put up the good fight around re: Greenwald.

    Just go put your penis in a paper shredder; it will be more enjoyable and achieve more.

    These people around here are fucked up. BJ commenters, Charles Johnson at LGF and Bob Cesca have a major case of the brain farts. OTOH, credible pundits like Charles Pierce, the proprietor of this blog, and most of the rational universe understand the value of a hard-assed prick like Greenwald.

    Like ABL used to say: go fuck yourself in the face.

  170. 170.

    debbie

    A different Glenn, Glenn Beck, is just as peeved Time didn’t choose Ted Cruz. Of course, he’s already very suspicious of the Pope’s Marxist tendencies.

    Francis may be safe for a while because Beck’s real focus at the moment is the destruction of Disney. When he took his family there last Christmas, he was very upset to see a small celebration of Kwanza. Look out, O’Reilly!

  174. 174.

    Medicine Man

    @NR: Just having a good laugh at the ‘tude on GG.

    It wouldn’t be a problem at all if Glenn’s valiant defenders could allow people to dislike him. It’s not that folks here don’t understand the utility of a “hard-assed prick” like Greenwald, it is just that some of us do not want to have to pretend that he is fair-minded, honest person just to placate his thin-skinned fan club, especially when even said fan club freely admits that his do-whatever-it takes style of advocacy is what they like about him in the first place. Give me a fucking break.

  176. 176.

    Paula

    @jl:

    How old is GG?

    Christ, I’m sorry your buddy wasn’t crowned most popular in the high school yearbook.

    Because that’s about as relevant Time magazine is.

  180. 180.

    Luke

    @Anton Sirius: Perhaps whiny and certainly indirectly self-aggrandizing, but Greenwald’s point is correct. That’s something people should be able to agree on regardless of how they feel about the legality/morality of Snowden’s leaks.

  181. 181.

    Chris

    @Mandalay:

    First, that when it comes to lifting the poor out of poverty, global capitalism, faults and all, has a better track record by far than any other system or approach.

    Only if you define it as vaguely as “global capitalism” can you get away with that. What kind of capitalism are we talking about? The mixed economy model with strong doses of free trade and government intervention to supplement it, help it along and direct it in the spheres where The Market alone wasn’t going to do anythingis one thing, the hands-off, free for all, let-the-market-fix-everything approach that became gospel with Thatcher and Reagan is another. If you’d like to compare the results, compare the Asian/Pacific nations that emerged as small powerhouses in the seventies with the disastrous deregulation that occurred in the former Soviet Union and Latin America during the nineties. Our capitalism has “a better track record by far” than your capitalism, and it’s also a lot closer to what the Pope is preaching.

  182. 182.

    AxelFoley

    @nate:

    What has Pope Francis actually accomplished? A bunch of nice talk, but where are the changes in church policy?

    Big fucking deal. I have to agree with Greenwald, when it comes to actually changing the world in 2013, Snowden is a far better choice.

    Looks here like someone’s jimmies got rustled.

  183. 183.

    kyle

    All arguments about policy etc. aside, Betty Cracker wrote a damn funny and incisive post. Way to go!

  187. 187.

    NR

    @Medicine Man: I have no problem with people disliking Greenwald. But the vitriolic hate for and obsession with the man that some people around here have, borders on the pathological.

    And to claim he’s somehow unfair is ridiculous. He spent years criticizing Bush for doing the exact same kinds of things Obama is doing.

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