I follow Kelly Carlin on twitter because she’s smart, funny, cute, and GEORGE FUCKING CARLIN’S DAUGHTER. So when she said something on twitter tonight, it reminded me of something we’ve posted numerous times, but really should be recognized as the most accurate political analysis of the last three decades. This:
For three decades, the rich have been getting richer and richer, having their taxes cut, while the middle class has been getting screwed. This is no accident:
This is by policy design. And now, living up to the Shock Doctrine, when the economy is in crisis, they are clamoring for more tax cuts while preaching austerity and entitlement reform out the other side of their mouth. Their poster boy Paul Ryan, the guy Sullivan and Klein slobbered over for months for his seriousness, put forth a plan that straight out said what they were going to try to do- cut taxes for the rich, slash entitlements, and give it to the rich. Like the man said, it’s a big fucking club, and you ain’t in it.
So every time tonight when you hear them, in between the Reagan hand jobs, when they wipe the Santorum off their mouths and start talking about entitlement reform, listen to George Carlin:
They’re coming for your social security!
And the folks in the media are glad to give them an assist, all while Matt Welch and Nick Gillespie and the leather jacket/hipster glasses crowd chant about Democrats and class warfare. Entitlement reform means fucking you out of your social security and health care. Period. In their world, you’re lucky to be a Wal-Mart greeter.
Dongo
Very important to note that Carlin is referring to both Democrats and Republicans, and that he doesn’t vote on principle.
Anyway, I think he’s the greatest philosopher of our time. Yes, for reals.
Jenny
Rick Parry standing on stage undressing Mittens with his eyes.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
When you “follow” someone on twitter I assume you just read their stuff?
Cat Lady
@Dongo:
Not voting on principle is one of the biggest fucking stupid things I’ve ever heard. Purity is for losers.
Dongo
@Jenny: There’s the potential for some pretty hot fanfic right there.
Dongo
@Cat Lady: Well, here’s what Carlin says about it, and I agree with him entirely:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIraCchPDhk
Jenny
Governor Parry: Amyl Nitrate or Erotic asphyxiation?
RoonieRoo
Isn’t the media giving them the assist because THEY are in the club and are the rich? The media is the beneficiary of the Repub policies. So, why would it be surprising that they do what they do?
Cat Lady
@Dongo:
The Kochs and the Tea Party thank you.
celticragonchick
@Jenny:
I think it will be something involving equine livestock.
It would irresponsible not to speculate.
celticragonchick
@Jenny:
I think it will be something involving equine livestock.
It would irresponsible not to speculate.
Dongo
@Jenny: Extreme fisting, with Mittens as the bottom (of course). Santorum watches and jacks off.
Edit: And when I say “extreme”, I mean past the elbow. No half measures here — these men are committed to their cause!
John Cole
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): Yes, although she for some reason follows me, too, which is how I found her.
Jenny
Tweety has a shovel and is trying to dig up zombie reagan for a night of madd love.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@John Cole: Cool, did you see you made Pat Lang’s Blog the other day?
DCr
Damn, Cole. You’re on fire this evening. More like this, please.
celticragonchick
@Dongo:
Uh, damn. That is a visual I don’t need.
Dongo
@Cat Lady: I can only respond with Jonathan Schwartz’s excellent Jokes About the Democratic Party post:
“1. There would still be a Soviet Union if they’d been smart enough to have two communist parties that agreed about everything except abortion.
2. Democrats : Republicans :: Getting stabbed : Getting shot. Why aren’t you enthusiastic about getting stabbed? WOULD YOU RATHER GET SHOT?
3. The Republican vision is that 20 white male billionaires will own everything and rule the world with an iron whip. The Democratic vision is completely different, in that not all the billionaires will be white men.”
Martin
When the show ‘Big Brother’ first came on TV in the US, my wife tuned in. I thought it was horrible (I already get enough emo bullshit at work and at thanksgiving) but suggested that the show would be infinitely more entertaining if every house guest had a different mental illness or personality disorder. One OCD, one bipolar, paranoid, a klepto, a nympho, etc. Cruel and almost certain to end in horrific violence, but then watching regular Big Brother already seemed to evoke that in the viewers, so it seemed only fair to limit the damage to the dozen or so inside the house.
The GOP debates now remind me of my thought experiment. Get a dozen people with various forms of insanity, stick them in suits and parade them in front of vapid news anchors, tv cameras, and an audience that is just aching for one to pull out a six-shooter and blow another one away merely to make a point, and that’s what I’m being asked to tune into – and I have to say, I just don’t have the stomach for what I thought would actually be entertaining. So, I’ll just stay here in the boat while you guys go off and enjoy yourself.
Yevgraf
I don’t recommend taking a drink every time one of them invokes Reagan, unless you want to experience having your stomach pumped.
The Dangerman
Have the Bullshit Bingo cards been passed out yet?
celticragonchick
@Jenny:
Zombie Reagan would be teh awesome in the new World War Z movie flming right now…
Martin
@Jenny: I’ve got to go with erotic asphyxiation on this one. Seems to go along with the guns for whatever reason.
Jenny
Looks like Romney forgot to take off his dog collar.
JCT
Succinct and completely true.
Fucking mind-boggling.
lamh32
ugh, I see Mark “dick” Halperin’s back as an MSNBC analyst. Just confirms my decision to stop caring about what they say on MSNBC
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@lamh32: And that fucking Noonan, makes me want to give up my pacifist ways!
Cat Lady
@Dongo:
The 20 white male billionaires with the iron whip thank you. Your ironic detachment will get us all through.
lamh32
Ok, so Ron Paul’s ad against Perry uses he’s “campaigning” for Al Gore to say that Ronny P is a way betta conservative than Ricky P.
but…does anyone other than MSM an Ronny P care?
MikeBoyScout
By George I think he’s got it!
beltane
George Carlin has a cute daughter? Please don’t tell my husband this or our marriage may be imperilled.
On a more serious note, I am realizing that we no longer have a true proletariat in this country, i.e. an industrial working class that could topple the Galtians. How would Marx refer to our current servant sector workers? What name should we use to refer to ourselves?
Jenny
My gaydar is pinging like a pinball machine.
beltane
@Jenny: Is he in a hot tub wearing a dog collar?
Dongo
@Cat Lady: Thousands of dead Afghans, Pakistanis, Somalis, and now Libyans thank you for supporting multicultural billionaires with the iron whip. I bet the sensitivity means a lot to them.
gogol's wife
The blog’s been really good today.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@beltane: Lumpenproletariat
lamh32
this is why I’m glad for Twitter and the intertubes. I would rather stick hot pokers in my eyes, while simultaneously stabbing myself in the gut as I submerge myself in a tub of rubbing alcohol.
So thx for those who will be watching.
MikeBoyScout
Movie Idea: Zombie Ronaldus Magnus vs. Zombie George Carlin
lamh32
wow my comment is in moderation?? whycome?
lacp
He’s wearing a dog collar? Did he ride to the debate tied to the roof of his car?
WereBear
Still, this isn’t medieval Europe. Every one of our Galtian Overlords got their money by selling things to lots of people who could afford to buy them.
But they are making sure that can’t happen anyq more. Then what?
lamh32
Wait is Newty still in this thing? Why?
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
live blog next thread
beltane
@lamh32: I thought Newt was out. Sheesh, these Republicans really are zombies aren’t they.
Cat Lady
@Dongo: Purity’s for losers.
JWL
OK, Cole. I always leave people alone with their beliefs. Unless they post a blog, and invite challenge.
How on earth do you square your all-but-unqualified support of President Obama with Carlin’s remarks?
Enquiring minds want to know.
In your mind, where is the point of departure that separates the insight of the one, with the action of the other?
Maude
@WereBear:
I have been wondering about that. The end of people buying enough stuff is going on now.
Does the money just go in circles? The rich buy stuff that the gig guys make and the big guys make more and the rich buy more? It doesn’t make sense.
Cat Lady
@gogol’s wife:
I agree. It’s been keeping the eyes on the prize. THERE ARE REPUBLICANS TO BEAT.
Baud
People need to learn that they are like vampires: They can’t come in unless you invite them in, like we did in 2010.
lacp
OK, now I see. Purity = loser. Promiscuity = world champion. Got it. Or maybe I don’t.
MikeBoyScout
@31 beltane:
How would Marx refer to our current servant sector workers? What name should we use to refer to ourselves?
Marx would refer to us as proletariat. For Marx it was pretty simple, you were either bourgeoisie or proletariat.
If you ask me, we should take the bull by the horns and call ourselves socialist, and be damn proud of that label.
barath
Part of what we need to recognize is that the GOP has strung us along long enough – three decades like Carlin says – that we’ve gotten to an inflection point. It’s the point at which the system is broken down enough that the old progressive solutions won’t work either.
Specifically: growth. It’s over. Take a look at the graphs – this will be the first recession in modern economic history in which per capita real GDP won’t even approach where it was before our next (current) recession hits.
The problem is that the GOP and the Dems agree on one thing: growth is good. They just disagree about how to achieve it. They’re reaching for the old answer, and it’ll no longer work because of energy limits. (As Bill McKibben likes to say – they’ve had two beers and it felt pretty good, so they’re thinking that 10 beers will make them feel 5 times as good.)
BruceFromOhio
Lately that’s been working pretty well for me! =)
barath
@BruceFromOhio:
Maybe it’s the answer then…
DonkeyKong
“Shit. I know shit’s bad right now, with all that starving bullshit, and the dust storms, and we are running out of french fries and burrito coverings. But I got a solution.”
Is this really that far of from what is being said tonight at the Ronald Reagan Memorial Vomitorium tonight?
The Populist
@Baud:
Had more people on our side of the aisle voted, they wouldn’t have come in. Shit, I hope to god we fix this in 2012 or I fear the beginning of the end for anything middle class.
elftx
with attribution, I posted part of this on my FB page…just had ta..for all the TP’s that look at it..including my brother and sister…sigh
Samara Morgan
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): yup.
my twitter stream right now is almost pure Cole interspersed with occasional bits of venom from al jazeera on what 9/11 did to the rest of the world.
its like really dark performance art.
The Populist
@MikeBoyScout:
Actually we are as close to an oligarchy as we’ve been since Roosevelt I.
If the right want to argue, Hitler loved oligarchies and try as they may, Hitler’s beliefs square pretty well with the tea party and their allies. Guess this is what they are shooting for IMHO when the right and their village enablers keep pushing for more while screwing the rest of us.
Samara Morgan
@The Populist: Distributed Jesusland can only win midterms, not general elections.
Samara Morgan
Cole is more funnier on twitter.
Dongo
@Cat Lady: Compelling justification for widespread murder. I’ll pass it on to those dead brown people.
clayton
I never shop at Wal-mart. I’d never known a Wal-mart greeter until my physically disabled 58 year old sister-in-law became one out of desperation a few months ago — in Austin.
He feet bleed every day and night. They screw her around on her schedule. She tells me of cart loads of returns of spoiled food coming back.
She’s got an advanced degree — in library science. She got fired from her job at a big law firm and then got hurt at company with no worker’s comp and when they asked her to LIE to the doctor and she slipped up and didn’t, she lost that job. And now she is suffering at Wal-mart. Sure part of it is that she can’t deal with computers, but society has just thrown her away.
Samara Morgan
Newt’s kumbayah seems not to have worked, they are all attacking Perry.
Santorum is asswhupping Perry on guardasil.
Samara Morgan
Romney redirects the attack back onto the blackityblack guy in the WH.
Samara Morgan
Bachman looks like she’s coked to the gills.
dave
THE MIDDLE CLASS GOT EXACTLY WHAT IT WANTED
numbskull
I think it is worth asking oneself “Why do I use the word ‘entitlement’?” You used it 5 times in a very short essay.
I’ve been asking this long before Lofgren pointed out that it’s another Republican framing word, used solely to denigrate fantastically successful, useful, and ethical programs by labeling them something that they are not.
I think we all need to stop using that word. First, it’s not accurate at any level. Something I pay into for all of my working life is NOT an entitlement when I retire and am “paid” from it (SS) or when I or may family gets sick and helps pay for the healthcare bills (Medicare). Second, it has an “otherness” to it, as in, “other” people (who probably look different from me, and are for sure lazy no-accounts) benefit from it while only I pay into it.
I think we need to stop using that word.
kindness
Oh, harsh John. But true.
Watched the Carlin clip before reading the rant. Man, word.
Other than Maddow & a couple others the media is completely complicit. In the framing, in the repeating of bogus talking points and in the harping of shit that just doesn’t matter to us, but to them (deficit reduction instead of increasing employment?)
dww44
@numbskull: I have long agreed. It’s “universal retirement insurance” that working Americans have paid into. How about that term? Not catchy enough, is it? Doesn’t play into one’s prejudices does it?
somegayname
@numbskull:
This this this. Don’t let them frame it. This guy (whom BJ linked to a few days ago) spelled it out.
Shiny Beads
@Jenny: Amyl Nitrate all the way.
Shiny Beads
@Jenny: Amyl Nitrate all the way.
Ogami Itto
@numbskull: “Earned benefits”
Bill Arnold
In their world, if you have children, you’re living with them, and they are also paying for your health care. Do your children understand this? Do they vote Republican anyway?
If you don’t have children, then ..
mick
cole how the hell were you ever a republican?
i believe what you are saying in this post. i am 99% sure you are sincere. i have believed this for years. how come you did not believe it for so long?
did you start experimenting with psychedelics at some point? is that what opened your 3rd eye?
i am big carlin fan. used to collect his vinyl albums, starting with Class Clown. check out youtubes of george’s older brother pat. he is trying stand-up now. he is not as good as george, but you can see george in him so much it is wild – there is george’s posture, body language, accent and attitude. i miss george.
Tom Betz
Kelly does a bang-up insightful podcast, too. Well worth the time to listen.