FOUR DOLLAR GASOLINE.
Discuss.
by John Cole| 85 Comments
This post is in: Previous Site Maintenance
by Tim F| 52 Comments
This post is in: Politics
When the next Shakespeare pens an Oedipus Rex or Richard III, his largest problem might be picking our president’s central, tragic flaw. Would he choose the epic lack of intellectual curiosity?* It would be sorely tempting to pick the overdeveloped messiah complex which blocks out the faintest hint of self-doubt. Merely separating phenomena (the oedipal masculinity gap between himself and poppy, and probably Barb as well) from epiphenomena (pathological fixation on knocking over Saddam) will take entire PhD theses. It might be easier to rewrite the rules of drama than pick a single pathology. Still, in a pinch it’s hard to disagree with this:
A prominent conservative complains: “With this White House, there is loyalty not to an idea, but to a person. When Republicans talked about someone in the Reagan administration being ‘loyal,’ they didn’t mean to Ronald Reagan but to the conservative movement.”
The president is psychologically incapable of examining an issue in depth, but he is also unable to tell disagreement from betrayal. Add together the ideological reflexivity and the gilded class demand of fealty in the place of what most of us would have called loyalty, and you have somebody who is both unable to make the right decision and incapable of revisiting it.
But then the tragedy of our last eight years probably won’t star an actor playing the president. More likely the guy taking the last bow at the end of the night will have just finished showing just how much damage a vice president can do with enough skill to exploit the president’s personal faults to the hilt, along with an almost unprecedented lack of scruples and judgment. Like one of those binary explosives A combines with B to make something that you would never have guessed by looking at either one alone.
***
(*) Pedant alert – yes, I know that Sophocles wrote Oedipus Rex. Next time I will write clearer.
by John Cole| 65 Comments
This post is in: Politics
So I am watching the debate (accidentally, I turned the tv on, and MSNBC was on), and looking at the candidates from the Democrats on stage tonight, and looking at the candidates from the Republicans, my first inclination is to treat the 2008 election like a Browns/Cowboys Superbowl- to root for injuries.
I have only caught the tail end, and I feel fortunate. There is some crazy gray-haired guy who seems to be mixing things up, and Dennis Kucinich is waving around a Constitution, and Edwards just seems so slick. Hillary Clinton is just terrible at this format. I have seen her do town hall things where she seemed downright likable, empathetic, and Presidential. Tonight, she has the forced stridency to her voice, and she appears stiff. Joe Biden seems to think he is at a cocktail party, and the way he is talking, he may very well have had a cocktail or too. He just laid he smack down on Kucinich, in fact- something about happy talk. Obama didn’t seem overly impressive, but it may be that is the impression I am getting simply because it seems like everyone is attacking him.
From the 20 minutes I have watched, the person who seemed most impressive was Chris Dodd.
*** Update ***
I am now watching the post-game wrap-up, and Chris Matthews is paining me. He is reminding me of Harry Caray, to be honest. Olberman talks about something, and Matthews just interrupts him with some random babble. A sample:
Olberman: What do you think of-
Matthews: There is a good looking couple there.
Olberman:- the way that the candid-
Matthews: And there is Mrs. Obama.
by John Cole| 64 Comments
This post is in: Previous Site Maintenance
Because there are more things I want to post about, but you all probably need a break.
by John Cole| 12 Comments
This post is in: Media, Politics, Republican Stupidity
I agree 100% with Dean Barnett at Hugh Hewitt’s:
Judging by the oral arguments today in Wisconsin Right to Life v. Federal Election Commission, it looks like the most offensive element of the campaign finance “reform” abomination known as McCain-Feingold will soon be sleeping with the fishes.
Specifically, the part of the law that “blacks out” advertisements made by anyone other than the campaigns in the final six weeks of the election season was the subject of today’s hearings. Sam Alito is apparently going to be the swing vote, and that’s good news. Good news, that is, if you like the 1st Amendment and free speech, something that some people (like the sponsors of the legislation) obviously aren’t crazy about.
Unfortunately, the part of McCain-Feingold that mandates each campaign commercial end with the candidate droning, “I’m Joe Blow and I approved this message” is merely stupid and not necessarily unconstitutional. Thus, it was not part of the Wisconsin right to Life v. FEC case and we will have to hear this annoying tag-line approximately 3 million times between now and November ‘08. Every time you hear it, I urge you to think this is the kind of nonsense some legislators think is really important.
Everytime you hear the phrase “I am XXXXXX and I approve of this message,” you should say to yourself- “I will not vote for John McCain.”
For a larger write-up on the issue, check this NY Times story.
And Now For Something Completely DifferentPost + Comments (12)
by John Cole| 30 Comments
This post is in: Media, Politics, Republican Stupidity, General Stupidity
The next step in the nanny state:
Concerned about an increase in violence on television, the Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday urged lawmakers to consider regulations that would restrict violent programs to late evening, when most children would not be watching.
The commission, in a long-awaited report, concluded that the program ratings system and technology intended to help parents block offensive programs — like the V-chip — had failed to protect children from being regularly exposed to violence.
As a result, the commission recommended that Congress move to limit violence on entertainment programs by giving the agency the authority to define such content and restrict it to late evening television.
It also suggested that Congress adopt legislation that would give consumers the option to buy cable channels “à la carte” — individually or in smaller bundles — so that they would be able to reject channels they did not want.
“Clearly, steps should be taken to protect children from excessively violent programming,” said Kevin J. Martin, the agency’s chairman and a longtime proponent of à la carte programming. “Some might say such action is long overdue. Parents need more tools to protect children from excessively violent programming.”
The commission report, which was requested by Congress three years ago, was sharply criticized by civil liberties advocates and by the cable television industry for proposing steps that both said would be too intrusive.
“These F.C.C. recommendations are political pandering,” said Caroline Fredrickson, director of the Washington legislative office of the American Civil Liberties Union. “The government should not replace parents as decision makers in America’s living rooms. There are some things that the government does well. But deciding what is aired and when on television is not one of them.”
I guess that means reports of our impending victory in Iraq will have to be aired after David Letterman. Combined with our national dialogue on race, we sure are making the world a better place. Who knew that restricting all this stuff on television and radio would just make it all go away?
by John Cole| 12 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Tell me this new story does not sound like a description of a cheesy porn:
Chinese tourism authorities are seeking investment to build a novel concept attraction — the world’s first “women’s town,” where men get punished for disobedience, an official said Thursday.
Not that I am in the habit of reading porn scripts (side question- do porno’s actually have scripts?).