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You are here: Home / Watch the world die

Watch the world die

by DougJ|  April 21, 20145:32 pm| 53 Comments

This post is in: Blogospheric Navel-Gazing

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I love this:

“Praise Allah, for soon every American city shall be plagued with disaster and hardship,” al-Zawahiri said in the video, which includes several minutes of footage of young, masked al-Qaeda militants casually sipping beverages as they thumb through the latest issues of Time and U.S. News And World Report. “The infidels have brought this pain and destruction upon themselves through their arrogance and callousness. Soon, the United States will watch in horror as its bridges crumble, its desperate citizens suffer in want of medicine and paying employment, and its once vast riches are reduced to naught. The righteous warriors among our ranks must now unite, get comfortable, and look on from afar at the calamity unfolding in the West.”

“We vow that we will not cease sitting around and laughing it up until America is reduced to rubble,” he continued.

Al-Zawahiri, who is seen in the video reclining back in his chair, putting his feet up, and flipping on CNN, later shouts “Allahu Akbar!” when a story is aired about the decade-long trend of stagnant wages among American workers.

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Reader Interactions

53Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    April 21, 2014 at 5:35 pm

    We fight them over there so we don’t have to raise the minimum wage over here.

  2. 2.

    ranchandsyrup

    April 21, 2014 at 5:36 pm

    Everclear?
    Today made me want to drink some everclear and swim out past the breakers.

  3. 3.

    Davis X. Machina

    April 21, 2014 at 5:37 pm

    ….a spokesperson for al-Qaeda reportedly confirmed the terror group’s plot and praised the American people as martyrs of the highest order.

    To be fair, only roughly 45% of the electorate reliably vote Republican.

    Self-destruction in the service of The Cause isn’t quite a majority taste.

  4. 4.

    Mustang Bobby

    April 21, 2014 at 5:37 pm

    Sounds like the Taliban version of Duck Dynasty.

  5. 5.

    DougJ

    April 21, 2014 at 5:37 pm

    @ranchandsyrup:

    I really like that song. I think it’s the best song about California outside the Zevon cannon.

  6. 6.

    DougJ

    April 21, 2014 at 5:38 pm

    @Mustang Bobby:

    They have the same kind of beards.

  7. 7.

    ranchandsyrup

    April 21, 2014 at 5:41 pm

    @DougJ: I like that song too but not a huge everclear fan.
    Yes to Zevon’s California songs.
    I’m partial to Unfair by Pavement when pressed as to my fave California Song. 2nd place would be California Stars written by Guthrie. Billy Bragg and Wilco performed a nice version.

  8. 8.

    pacem appellant

    April 21, 2014 at 5:42 pm

    @DougJ: Mates of State’s cover of California is a pretty rad song about my state. And I’ll even say “the 101” when I sing along, it’s that’s good.

  9. 9.

    Hunter Gathers

    April 21, 2014 at 5:43 pm

    So what happens when the 1% runs out of shit to steal?

  10. 10.

    ranchandsyrup

    April 21, 2014 at 5:45 pm

    @Hunter Gathers: can’t remember where I saw the quote (paraphrasing): The good thing about the oligarchy is that it only lasts a short time until the kleptocracy kicks in.

  11. 11.

    Mike in NC

    April 21, 2014 at 5:45 pm

    So in other words, al-Qaida has decided to adopt the 2012 Republican platform.

  12. 12.

    Fort Geek

    April 21, 2014 at 5:50 pm

    Over at Literally Unbelievable there are plenty of rubes caught (yet again) by that bad old Onion and the Al Queda story.

    fun, fun, fun.

  13. 13.

    chopper

    April 21, 2014 at 5:50 pm

    @pacem appellant:

    eye 5 by jawbreaker.

  14. 14.

    chopper

    April 21, 2014 at 5:52 pm

    @Mike in NC:

    AH HAH HAH

  15. 15.

    Bill Arnold

    April 21, 2014 at 5:52 pm

    @Hunter Gathers:

    So what happens when the 1% runs out of shit to steal?

    The %0.1 percent steals from the test of the %1. Etc.
    Reminds me of the old comic Rush Limbaugh Eats Everything Or maybe the short story “The Savage Mouth” by Sakyo Komatsu.

  16. 16.

    Suffern ACE

    April 21, 2014 at 5:52 pm

    I know that there are seagull managers, who come in late, shit over everything and try to take ownership of everything is working, denying credit where credit is do. al-Zawahiri is kind of a seagull terrorist here. Our Oligarchs worked much harder than he did to earn those MBA so that they could work for consultants that made the decisions to destroy the American working and middle classes. Let’s give some credit where credit is due.

  17. 17.

    Trollhattan

    April 21, 2014 at 5:53 pm

    @Hunter Gathers:
    Invent Son-of-Bitcoins, sell them to the rubes and then steal them?

  18. 18.

    Davis X. Machina

    April 21, 2014 at 5:53 pm

    @Hunter Gathers: They just coast. Collect rents — because wages are for losers. Marrying each other — and screwing the help. Staying rich is far less work than getting rich.

    Once that marginal dollar’s marginal propensity to be consumed hits zero, then you go all steady state, just puttin’ the ‘ancien’ in ancien regime .

  19. 19.

    Roger Moore

    April 21, 2014 at 5:53 pm

    @Hunter Gathers:

    So what happens when the 1% runs out of shit to steal?

    When the 99% has nothing left to steal, they’ll still have each other.

  20. 20.

    jeffreyw

    April 21, 2014 at 5:55 pm

    @Hunter Gathers: There can be only one. I hope to get a job selling peanuts in the stands.

  21. 21.

    chopper

    April 21, 2014 at 5:56 pm

    @DougJ:

    best overall song about CA is ‘travelers’ by j church. can’t find a youtube link tho.

  22. 22.

    jl

    April 21, 2014 at 6:03 pm

    This makes the GOP ‘objectively’ pro-jihad, right?

    Or maybe corporate and cable news is government counter programming designed to drive the terrorists insane?

  23. 23.

    danimal

    April 21, 2014 at 6:03 pm

    So, if I understand it correctly, there is a possibility the GOP will notice AQ terrorists laughing at our national economic inequality and decide to pursue policies to decrease inequality as a way to stick it to the terrorists.

    Or, alternatively, the GOP is objectively pro-terrorist and will continue on in its ways.

    We report, you decide.

  24. 24.

    danimal

    April 21, 2014 at 6:05 pm

    @danimal: @jl: Damn you, jl! Even got in an implied Fox reference. And in fewer words.

  25. 25.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    April 21, 2014 at 6:09 pm

    OT but priceless:

    NBC analyzing poor David Gregory to see what makes his show so bad

    I can’t imagine what makes people think that David Gregory is a shallow Republican leg humper. As this video clearly demonstrates, that’s a bad rap.

  26. 26.

    Luthe

    April 21, 2014 at 6:11 pm

    @DougJ: My two favorites are a bit LA specific: “Los Angeles is Burning” by Bad Religion and “Under the Bridge” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

  27. 27.

    jl

    April 21, 2014 at 6:22 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: Why not make that dancin’ Dave video an intro for his talky show? That would juice the ratings for a few weeks. Maybe not for the whole show, but at least for the intro. They could charge more for the first few commercials.

  28. 28.

    Ash Can

    April 21, 2014 at 6:23 pm

    OK, let’s see a show of hands here. How many here had to mouse over the link to the article to be able to tell for sure that this excerpt was satire?

    ::raises hand::

  29. 29.

    Villago Delenda Est

    April 21, 2014 at 6:25 pm

    Speaking on condition of anonymity, one high-ranking U.S. counterterrorism official has described the present situation as a massive failure of intelligence.

    Well, we were warned about morans in our midst, and did nothing about it.

  30. 30.

    Ash Can

    April 21, 2014 at 6:27 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: As someone elsewhere (I forget where) remarked, some psychologist is going to make bank off the geniuses at NBC, just to tell the network brass that Dave’s an idiot and his show sucks livestock anus.

  31. 31.

    jl

    April 21, 2014 at 6:28 pm

    Speaking of watching the world die, there is an interesting string of posts at Talkingpointsmemo today on the effect of right wing nut media (mostly Fox News) on weak minded older adults and elderly. Some sobering stories.

  32. 32.

    Citizen_X

    April 21, 2014 at 6:33 pm

    Sink With California/Youth Brigade. “And actually we’re from Canada!”

  33. 33.

    kindness

    April 21, 2014 at 6:35 pm

    the 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon.

    So this story starts with The Onion. Jumps to BJ. All it needs is one more underground internet hit and it goes to Fox as real news. Just like all the rest of Fox’s real news.

  34. 34.

    MattF

    April 21, 2014 at 6:35 pm

    I expect this item will appear on Newsmax any minute now.

  35. 35.

    Poopyman

    April 21, 2014 at 6:48 pm

    @Ash Can: I didn’t even mouse over it, I totally believed it was real. And, obviously, for obvious reasons.

    Kudos for The Onion for managing to juuuust stay ahead of reality since The Republican Majority. If you had told me what today’s reality was back in the ’90s I would have been sure you were on crappy drugs.

  36. 36.

    burnspbesq

    April 21, 2014 at 6:49 pm

    It’s funny. However, al-Zawahiri really did want to kill as many Americans as possible, and was righteously made dead as a result.

    It is at least theoretically possible that he made it into Heaven, and is hanging out with Molly Ivins and Steve Gilliard, listening to the John Coltrane – Jimi Hendrix Band. But I doubt it.

  37. 37.

    D58826

    April 21, 2014 at 6:49 pm

    What will we do without the Onion!!!

  38. 38.

    Bill Arnold

    April 21, 2014 at 6:51 pm

    @jl:

    today on the effect of right wing nut media (mostly Fox News) on weak minded older adults and elderly. Some sobering stories.

    Those stories are sad. I’ve told my father that if he started watching Fox News regularly, that his TV would start malfunctioning and eventually break. Not sure that he understood that I was not joking, that this would actually happen.

  39. 39.

    burnspbesq

    April 21, 2014 at 6:51 pm

    Y’all are kidding yourselves. This is the best song about life in California.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADmUT7dCDi8

  40. 40.

    JustRuss

    April 21, 2014 at 6:52 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: Nice. This is just money:

    he is just going to ask the same sorts of “David Brooks, what does this mean for Hillary 2016?” questions even if the person he is speaking to isn’t actually David Brooks.

    MTP in a nutshell.

  41. 41.

    bago

    April 21, 2014 at 6:53 pm

    Bin Laden literally wrote a manifesto where he said he would trap America in endless Middle Eastern conflicts and watch us pay. And we did.

  42. 42.

    TG Chicago

    April 21, 2014 at 6:58 pm

    @DougJ: The Dead Kennedys might have a word to say about that. Well, one English word and two German ones.

  43. 43.

    Arclite

    April 21, 2014 at 7:03 pm

    @Hunter Gathers:

    So what happens when the 1% runs out of shit to steal?

    They start making skin lamps out of us? Apropos her last name was Koch.

  44. 44.

    D58826

    April 21, 2014 at 7:04 pm

    @Ash Can: I was torn between the Onion and some wise guy at AQ reading from the GOP script describing the country under Obama. On the other hand I was suitable skeptical about the rtock concert at the Bundy ranch, even though that seems to be for ‘real’.

  45. 45.

    danielx

    April 21, 2014 at 7:18 pm

    @MattF:

    Newsmax, Red State, the Corner…hey, it’s out there! Somebody has to report on this, otherwise how will the puke funnel be primed? How will the mighty Wurlitzer be tuned? How will wingnut welfare recipients justify their existence? Michelle Malkin needs her ragegasm this month! Ann Coulter needs a facelift!

  46. 46.

    mclaren

    April 21, 2014 at 7:21 pm

    I think the quotes got a little garbled.

    The actual person talking was a Western banker, and the monologue went like this:

    “Praise the free market, for soon every American city shall be plagued with disaster and hardship,” the wealthy banker said in the video, which includes several minutes of footage of young, masked Milton Friedman-adoring Chicago School of Economics militants casually sipping beverages as they thumb through the latest issues of Time and U.S. News And World Report. “The low-wealth masses have brought this pain and destruction upon themselves through their arrogance and callousness. Soon, the United States will watch in horror as its bridges crumble, its desperate citizens suffer in want of medicine and paying employment, and its once vast riches are reduced to naught. The righteous laissez faire warriors among our ranks must now unite, get comfortable, and look on from afar at the calamity unfolding in the West.”

    “We vow that we will not cease sitting around and laughing it up until America is reduced to rubble,” the banker continued.

    The banker, who is seen in the video reclining back in his chair, putting his feet up, and flipping on CNN, later shouts “All praise to Milton Friedman!” when a story is aired about the decade-long trend of stagnant wages among American workers.

    The monetary terrorists running America’s banks are the real danger. They’re the ones who are trying to destroy this country.

  47. 47.

    Arclite

    April 21, 2014 at 7:25 pm

    The Onion story is funny but sad because it’s true. America is a completely different country than it was 10 years ago, never mind 30 (if you watched Moyers interviewing Krugman). There are a lot of big problems, and we aren’t making any headway at all in addressing them. Quite the opposite, for every positive development like the ACA, we have several negative ones like Citizens United and the NSA wiretapping (not the revelation, but the actual data collection).

  48. 48.

    Mnemosyne

    April 21, 2014 at 7:44 pm

    @Arclite:

    America is a completely different country than it was 10 years ago.

    Since we were knee-deep in invading Iraq 10 years ago, I would hope we’re a completely different country. I don’t think 2004 was quite the halcyon time you seem to be remembering.

  49. 49.

    TG Chicago

    April 21, 2014 at 7:47 pm

    @burnspbesq: al-Zawahiri is still alive (at least, that’s the best guess). Maybe you’re thinking of al-Zarqawi.

  50. 50.

    Another Holocene Human

    April 21, 2014 at 7:53 pm

    You made me load TPM in my browser. You bastards.

  51. 51.

    Ecks

    April 21, 2014 at 8:28 pm

    @pacem appellant: California Dreaming?

  52. 52.

    Mowgli

    April 21, 2014 at 11:41 pm

    “Los Angelinos” by William Joel, Esq.

  53. 53.

    warren

    April 22, 2014 at 12:10 am

    Los Angeles by X
    “The idle riiiiiich”

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