I give a balanced description, and Big Tent Democrat decides I must be insulting Obama, then a clutter of dimwitted followers in the comments proceed to react as if I'd written BTD's slanted paraphrase. Finally, a commenter named Teresa questions the interpretation:
When I first read it, I thought she was making fun of Bush play acting like "I'm the President." How he always acted so proud of himself even when we were making fun of him. Maybe you're right, though.Maybe you're right, though... and everyone slips back into a stupor.
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47 comments:
I think they struggle to understand a lot of things over there at TalkLeft. For all their professed love of intelligence, lefties sure seem to have a difficult time with nuance and complexity.
Did you notice how everyone who defended Obama's performance in the press conference thread last night said one or the other variation of "it sure is nice to have a President who speaks in complete sentences!" Not much about the substance of those sentences, mostly because there was no substance to those sentences. Lefties seem easily impressed by the appearance of intelligence. But when the greatest praise that they can muster is "he's better than George W. Bush!" or "he can form a complete sentence!", well... I think we all need to worry.
I apologize for misunderstanding your point.
I will update my post with your explanation.
Regards,
Big Tent Democrat
I stopped reading at TalkLeft once it became clear that most of the posts were merely personal insults about Althouse.
And that occurred rather quickly.
Their confidence in the situation is pretty thin when they react to stray comments this way, as if she were the only one in the audience who wouldn't clap because she believed in fairies, and Tinkerbama wouldn't live after all.
I love how they act so proud of themselves even when we are making fun of them.
It's to your credit that the commenters at TalkLeft cannot understand you.
They are perplexed by independent thinking and analysis. You provide both in abundance.
Your commenters deserve, well, comment as well. Many of your commenters did not support the Obama candidacy, yet most were clear in wishing him well as president. I doubt the same sentiment would have been found on TalkLeft had John McCain been elected president.
Palladian,
It's like they have talking points and were told to go to "the blogs" and repeat them. Of course lots of people also said they liked the speech, but couldn't understand what Obama was talking about, also as if repeating a talking point. It would be funny if many of the posts were written by Democratic and Republican plants.
Maybe people just aren't that complicated after all.
I'm a traditional Conservative boycotter of the GOP. I argue with many on the Left.
Without someone in the past to point fingers to,or someone today to mock, they have essentially NOTHING to say.
Other than getting and holding onto power, I can't figure out what it is they aspire to. I know they claim several things:
Anti-Racism: But if you're in one of hte protected groups and refuse to be on the Left, the Left uses all the ugliness of Racism against them
Anti-Bush/GOP-Drunk-Sailor-Type-Spending: The only they were against is that they weren't writting the spending bills. They have no problem endebting the US further to China. They have not gienv any thought of if China even wants to loan us more money. THey have no consideration of what is going to happen to the US Dollar
Imperial Executive: Obama is appointing unprecedented number of "Czars" to bypass the Senate-involved Cabinet appointment system.
Tolerance: The Left is the opposite of that
Anti-"Bush is Silencing Dissent": Bush never did that... but look at what Obamais doing .. calling out by name people in private sector who should be ostracsized! News networks that are critical of him!! Now their political party launches campaigns against private people.
Can you imagine if Republicans did this?
Ok, so they're not actually for any of that stuff above...
It's all about power.. it's all about controling all of our lives.
We're under assault and our Liberty is at risk from this Obama - Reid - Pelosi tryanny.
With coming collapse of the US Dollar, people need to think in terms of the basics.. existentially. People need to consider that it's possible there will not be a Federal Govt in 2012. or there will not be 50 Sovereign States in Federation but instead a tyrannical Union.
These people must be flushed out or our nation is doomed.
I love one who calls you a 'Maureen Dowd Democrat'! Big Time guffawing over here...
Ann-igma
Oh one other thing...
National Health Care would be the biggest assault on American Liberty.. EVER.
The same people who think the NSA listening in to phone calls to maniacs in Pakistan is the same thing as eavesdropping on their (the dissenters) phone sex (which the NSA does anyway. big deal)
want us to submit from birth to death to Government institutions that will handle our most intimate and private biology and development. And not only that, that the Govt choose how to ration this service and therefore our very physical well being is subject to a political process and the corruption that infects it.
Our Constitution is dead if this thing ever comes... well it's dead already.
The Left wants the tentacles of Government all over us.. regulating our every move , our every word, our every thought.
And THEY want sole control of that Government.
I rather die fighting against that then submit to it.
I found TalkLeft an interesting place to lurk during the primaries to read what the pro-Hillary Dems were up to, especially when so many of them went PUMA. Scouting the opposition, so to speak. It was usually entertaining, even if I often disagreed strongly with what they were saying. I didn't bother registering to comment there, because I would have quickly been banned.
However, many of the commenters there had strong cases of BDS. I knew this going in, and it helped me know which commenters to scroll past. Anybody writing anything about President Bush there suggesting him to be anything less than the Antichrist would have caused the other commenters to turn on the offender like a pack of rabid wolves.
I'm not really interested in how Obama walks, but I'm a guy.
What runs Obama is his image of himself as calm unflappable executive.
Put a little effort into economics, into military science, and so forth, someday, so your advisors don't roll you every day.
The image isn't working.
Althouse, do not be troubled by the rumblings of people who cannot think without their unmet relational needs polluting the process.
Nobody should critique big Mama government: She might get angry with us.
Trey
Sadly, this is Obama's first experience at being an executive of anything.
It is showing.
Trey
So you also appear as a Maureen Dowd Democrat with really weird reaction to stuff in the eyes of these digital Revolutionaries. You had better stick to being an overbearing tree disguised as sensitive flower.I still eagerly await your Supreme Court appointment confirmation hearings, in which you have to explain yourself.They will still not appreciate an intellgence not committed to the Party Line, like Yuri Zhivago who would never give up on seeing the beauty of life.
Along with his walk, Obama's casual, "Thanks, guys!" to the press is quite telling.
TMink said...
Sadly, this is Obama's first experience at being an executive of anything.
It is showing.
Trey
That is not true. Though it's not your fault , the media suppressed his past.
Obama was the chair (or puppet of Ayers) at the Chicago Allenberg Challenge ...which was a failure.
And before that, Obama and his wife started Public Allies in Chicago. Which is basically a boot camp for Communists.
So he does have some executive experience... being the executive of organizations which seek to inculcate Marxism into the youth.
My favorite comment:
"She is a law professor? I thought Althouse was just another nutter with a blog".
LOL
I thought it interesting that many of the commenters here took the Althouse comment as a jumping off point to talk about swagger.
Stupid people are stupid.
"Who is she? Never heard of her. She must be an idiot!"
The depth of TalkLeft. Wouldn’t know intellectual honesty if it shoved its fingers up their nose.
Or maybe they just don’t like NYU Violets.
Lefties seem easily impressed by the appearance of intelligence.
The left has always been concerned more about appeareances than actual substance. Take Obama's Elkhart appearence yesterday. It was all about appearances because of those poor laid off RV workers.
Never mind that during campiagn season Obama railed against SUV owners and how we shouldn't drive them anymore but now that the economy is in the crapper, any laid off worker will do, even one from an environmentally unfriendly industry as RV manufacturers.
But make no mistake, no one from the media would dare question the irony of that.
Big Tent Democrat @ 6:32 AM:
Your apology shows class. Well done.
"She is a law professor? I thought Althouse was just another nutter with a blog".
It's such a fine line between (law professor) and (another nutter with a blog).
Damn! A sincere apology from a left wing Democrat. See, Obama is improving the discourse.
Now, about Harry Reid . . .
[I did find Althouse's comparison of the two Presidents walking away from their press conferences somewhat obscure and mysterious, though it did not occur to me that it was an Obama insult.
I thought you were too hard on Obama last night. It's almost too easy to criticize him for being so "boring," but come on, you're a professor, and I'd think you could appreciate a boring professorial speech. But, I didn't see that final comment about Bush/Obama walking away as mean or critical, it was just sort of inane and meaningless.
Palladian said:
For all their professed love of intelligence, lefties sure seem to have a difficult time with nuance and complexity.
Ah yes, and tell me again what you didn't like about the Obama press conference?
there was no substance to those sentences.
Obama had to do a sales job for his bailout, and a press conference let him get his message out to the people, with the minor penalty of being exposed to random questions that would drag him off-topic.
Answering questions, Obama made me think of someone tiptoeing through a minefield. But he made it.
I did find Althouse's comparison of the two Presidents walking away from their press conferences somewhat obscure and mysterious
All the more because she contrasted Obama's actual walk with an imagined Bush walk, if I recall correctly.
now that the economy is in the crapper, any laid off worker will do, even one from an environmentally unfriendly industry as RV manufacturers.
Superficially, this criticism makes sense. But consider how the bulk of RV owners actually use their vehicles. Most of the ones I know drive them only one week (and a couple of weekends) a year. They do not take them more than a couple of hundred miles away, and when they get there, they use their regular cars to shuttle around.
Similarly, snowbirds drive south in winter and north in spring, staying put for the balance
of the time.
In contrast, SUV owners drive their fuel hogs every day.
RVs do take a lot of resources to build, but those are good things in terms of economic output. Further, since the market for giant RVs is limited to the US and Canada, the component and subassembly makers tend to be located here as well, easing our trade deficit.
You can object to this if you want.
You gave them permission and they went for it.
Palladian said...I think they struggle to understand a lot of things over there at TalkLeft. For all their professed love of intelligence, lefties sure seem to have a difficult time with nuance and complexity.
That's because for the Left politics is their religion. There is Good and Evil, you're either With Them or Against Them.
No nuance needed.
Superficially, this criticism makes sense. But consider how the bulk of RV owners actually use their vehicles. Most of the ones I know drive them only one week (and a couple of weekends) a year. They do not take them more than a couple of hundred miles away, and when they get there, they use their regular cars to shuttle around.
Anecdotal to be sure. You're telling me that someone is driving a rolling house for only a couple hundred miles? And they only drive them a couple times a year? Quite an investment for so little use don't you think?
RVs do take a lot of resources to build, but those are good things in terms of economic output.
I finally figured that tingling in my leg is you pulling on it.
Its people like those at Talk Left that have soured me to the Democrat Party. I just have to tell myself that some... most I hope ... of the left aren't like that.
They aren't right?
Ah yes, and tell me again what you didn't like about the Obama press conference?
I thought the whine about kids being taught in a school built in 1850 was priceless.
Evidently President Genius isn't aware when the house he currently resides in was built.
I actually own a small amount of stock in Winnebago. Some day I will use it light my campfire. Except I won't because it the stock is just a digital record. Stock issuers don't seem to print those beautiful paper documents anymore.
Former Law Student -- the RV thing goes along with the historic school building as perfectly illustrative of the fudge factor in Obama debt pacakge. It makes sense to give laid off workers a safety net as they look for new work. It doesn't make sense to bail out disfunctional companies -- or disfunctional states and cities. To do so is to turn the economy into a kind of wax museum of old ideas.
As for the TalkLeft broohaha, that illustrates, to me, the most boring blogging there is -- blogging about other bloggers. Here at Althouse, the commentaries were busy commenting about Obama, Bush, swagger, and pose. Over at TalkLeft they were sputtering about Althouse. God, how boring.
Quite an investment for so little use don't you think?
It doesn't make sense to bail out disfunctional companies
I couldn't agree with Hoosier Daddy more on the senselessness of owning an RV, and the lack of economic acumen on the part of their owners.
The last time RV sales cratered, during the OPEC oil shock of the late '70s, my friend who had bought an RV refused to drive it at all.
Meanwhile, Winnebago scrambled to find other products to make, to keep its workers busy till the RV market recovered. Maybe RV makers are not as nimble and flexible as they once were.
I couldn't agree with Hoosier Daddy more on the senselessness of owning an RV, and the lack of economic acumen on the part of their owners.
Well, when you lose your house, you can always live in your RV. Park it at your brother in law's house or something. Better than the back of your car...doncha think ;-D
Cousin Eddie: It's a fine looking vehicle ain't it Clark?
Clark: Yes Eddie. It looks so nice sitting in the driveway.
Cousin Eddie: Well don't you go fallin in love with it cause we're taking it with us when we leave here next month.
And my person favorite:
Cousin Edddie: Shitters full!
Vince, I sit corrected. Thank you.
Trey
Anyone's first mistake was caring what Althouse thinks about what TL thinks about Althouse. Everything else flows from there.
No doubt teen girl vloggers at Youtube do something similar all the time.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is being looted for trillions of dollars. If anyone wants to do something about it, help me push this plan.
Hoosier Daddy said...
"I thought the whine about kids being taught in a school built in 1850 was priceless. Evidently President Genius isn't aware when the house he currently resides in was built."
Yep. Moreover, he connected his whine about the building's age to the concern that when a train passes it, all business has to stop because it's too loud. Why does he think that a modern building is inherently better soundproofed than an older building? Older buildings tend to be constructed from stone or brick; modern buildings are generally constructed from wood, sometimes with a thin brick facade. The former is more likely to resist incoming noise. Not far from where I sit, they're building a new federal courthouse right next to some train tracks, and having been in an older, sounder building a block away when a train passes, I promise you that proceedings will come to a deafened halt every time a train passes. The age of the building has nothing to do with it. Like so many of his statements, it's legerdemain: He says something and hopes his audience won't pay close attention or think critically.
LoneWhacko, do you think you could try either contributing productively, instead of hurling some insults at your host and then appropriating her blog to advertise your own, or else just shoving off? Practically everything you've posted here recently is either a whine that no one paid attention to you before, or a plea for attention now. Maybe if you built a reputation as a thoughtful commenter here, readers here would be more interested in reading your comments elsewhere.
Simon said He says something and hopes his audience won't pay close attention or think critically.
Well in his defense he did exactly that on the campaign trail for two years and got elected.
Think about it, he won the state of Pennsylvania, a state heavily dependent on the coal industry even though he essentially told them he'd do everything in his power to put them out of business in favor of windmills and unicorn powered energy plants.
VDH has a few modest suggestions for our president.
...If one must repeat one's self, a five-second "Don't worry, we're going to make it fine," or "We've been through far worse together" is worth hundreds of long convuluted Chicken-Little riffs on "worst since the Great Depression", "catastrophe," and "impending disaster." Markets are not always rational, and, as reflections of human nature, they can be lectured into psychological depression....
Alas, common sense seldom trumps partisan politics in Washington.
"In contrast, SUV owners drive their fuel hogs every day."
Titus, is that you???
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