"... to shape the media narrative in ways to benefit Obama, above and beyond ferreting out the truth about any and all candidates, must now be
abandoned. Ezra Klein has already been caught in a bald-faced lie about his discretion in picking members; and the notion that this was simply a water-cooler collection of journalistic thoughts is also belied by the emails now published by the Daily Caller."
Sullivan seethes.
This is your liberal media, ladies and gentlemen: totally partisan, interested in the truth only if it advances their agenda, and devoid of any balls whatsoever.
Devoid of any balls. Sullivan, by contrast, had the balls to question Sarah Palin's uterus.
Posts
143 comments:
Does this mean Sullivan is becoming a conservative again? Or is he going completely off on his own now?
Tim, you need to read the linked post. It's the most insane Andrew-Sullivan-Can't-Stop-Obsessing-About-Sarah-Palin's-Ueterus post yet! Fun for the whole family!
Sully must be schizo because usually he sounds like a garden variety Socialist and that quote above almost sounds rational! What give with that a'hole?
Cheers.
Really, how is it that The Atlantic thinks Sullivan's completely insane rantings about Palin's "alleged" fifth child helps their credibility? WTF? WTeffingF?
So many closet birthers! Who knew? *LOL*
Sullivan's Changeling-List has only one member. Collusion is impossible.
When the other side starts to destroy itself, stand back and watch in silence. No more questioning Sully to get the last word in. Good job Trigg's mother.
You're quite right Icepick. There's that context thing again.
He's vindicated! But he hates those who agree with him for not having his courage to publicly question Trig's maternity. Or something.
Still, gotta love that he's saying exactly the same thing about the lefties he's been in bed with the last half dozen years as he's been saying about the righties during that same period.
Does Sullivan still think that Trig Palin is not Sarah Palin's son?
Klein's advice to let it be was sound. As he said, "best case scenario" she's raising her grandson for her daughter, which makes her look good.
The worst case scenario means your career goes the route of Andrew Sullivan.
Two corrections:
First, I misspelled uterus.
Second, I cannot state for a fact that it is Sullivan's most insane post yet on this matter, as I haven't read his entire archives. I should have stated, "It's the most insane post of the dozens of his posts I've read concerning this matter."
I apologize for any confusion I have caused.
The Sullivan aspect bores me.
What is fascinating is comparing how I remember the 2010 election with all the new facts we are learning about Journolist.
The collusion about Obama is interesting, and it must make Hillary Clinton hopping mad. There's a fascinating story there.
However, what struck me as particularly odd then but makes so much sense in light of all this is how the vice-presidential candidate plucked from obscurity kept receiving so much attention. The constant invective against someone so trivial in the overall scheme of things seemed so weird at the time. I kept thinking: why? How could so many people devote this much time to such a footnote of current events?
Anyway, there could be an irony here: It could be that Palin is pretty Plain and that the odd animosity of Journolist propelled her to heights she would never have otherwise achieved. And without that animosity, her star may fade.
It sounds like Sullivan is trying to ingratiate himself back into Conservative circles, having failed to make himself credible to the Lefties.
He'd like to be Alcibiades, but it won't work.
Sullivan writes: If you want to know why the allegedly liberal media didn't touch - and still won't touch - this story, look no further. It has nothing to do with the facts, and everything to do with their politics.
You know, Sullivan is probably right here. It does have everything to do with left-wing politics.
But what is most telling in Sullivan's bifurcation of the world into a faceoff between "facts" and "politics" is what is missing.
Morals.
Ethics.
Integrity.
Hell, even some scruples could fill in the blank.
I don't get it.
I don't get it.
Sullivan took a huge credibility hit with his obsession over Palin's uterus. Turns out the JournoList hacks wanted to take the same path, but they were afraid of backlash so they colluded to not go there.
Shorter: Andy's mad he didn't get the memo
To paraphrase C.S. Lewis:
We have assholes but Sullivan is an a-soul.
Sullivan is spot on with his writings here. Regardless of whether you think he's nuts for the Palin/Trig hypothesis, it is crazy to think that a number of journalists were choosing to avoid any story or story angle because they feel it might hurt their chosen candidate.
Too bad this story is such inside baseball that the general public won't really hear much of this or care about it.
You "remember the 2010 election", Seven Machos? Can I borrow your time machine? I need to do some discreet betting on next year's sports events.
Seven...What makes us want to see the choice of Palin as a trivial event? The sensitive (mostly Hebrew) students of government in Journolist quickly saw her like Samuel, and later King Saul, saw a trivial shepherd boy who was the least of the sons of Jesse, of tiny Bethlehem.
Okay, I'll bite. All these leftist journalists were knaves who speculated in what they believed to be a private forum about the mother of one Trig Palin. But they were smart enough to keep their suspicions in check because they sensed, even if for the wrong reasons, that going public with bizarre conspiracy theories would make them look like idiots.
Sullivan is a leftist knave who actually went on a public crusade about the mother of one Trig Palin. And he looked like an idiot.
And he is now bragging about it?
Excuse me, Weevil. 2008.
Trad -- If you are looking for a David figure in modern politics, that would be Bill Clinton without question, all the way down to Bathsheba and being favored by God despite some very questionable behavior and policies.
This just in: the Atlantic has fired Sullivan and hired Mick. Explains editor James Bennet: "We wanted someone who's less of a monomaniac."
Fen said...
"...but they were afraid of backlash so they colluded to not go there."
Still don't get it. You mean then that there were a few email exhanges by 1% of the members saying that it would be in poor taste to go there and just leave it alone...and ...
Nope. Still don't get it. Is there anything in the emails about UFOs invading? I don't read about it anywhere much so I'm kinda figuring that the same thing happened.
Pigs flying too. ... that isn't ANYWHERE...damn those lefties are sneaky!
I don't get it.
I'm going to agree with Hi Def House on this one. What is Sullivan's point? I get the sense he feels like he was left hanging, looking like a loon when the liberal bloggers were thinking the same thing.
My read of their comments were;
this is dangerous and crazy to boot!
Seven...Clinton seems more to me like a King Saul figure. And then there is Barack the Amalikite.
Paul -- At least birther theories have some theoretical impact on the actual politics of the world. Arguing about who is the real mother of this Palin kid is a little below TMZ's Wonder Wall in terms of value.
Clinton seems more to me like a King Saul figure.
Well, Trad, I don't want to veer off topic here. But I must say that you are dreadfully wrong. I am certainly not the first person to observe that Clinton has a magical, charismatic quality and luck that makes him similar to King David, who was simply "favored by God" for reasons that are never explained. I have never heard anyone call Clinton a Saul. Saul, very much unlike Clinton, had little in the way of luck or political smarts.
Al Gore is actually Saul -- someone who looks the part but just can't seem to pull it off politically and who, again for reasons we are not given, seems to be "not favored by God."
I think that Sullivan's point is that he feels that the other journalists believed the same things that he does about Sarah Palin's Uterus. So he feels vindicated.
But did they believe it?
Or were they just "wow, flying to Alaska after your water breaks is weird" and maybe playing with the idea that something was up because they were looking for something to be up. But realizing that the chances were next to nil and they'd only look stupid, and they'd look *particularly* stupid on the slim to none chance that Trig was her grandchild, they decided to find some other way to slander her.
Talking about what is effective dirt or not doesn't say a darn thing about what might be *true* dirt or not.
One more add. I'm skimming the Daily Caller stuff and it's just painful. The liberals are torn between paranoia and bloodlust.
Paranoia (Lindsay Beyerstein): "It wouldn’t surprise me if the McCain campaign were to leak doctored evidence for the sole purpose of discrediting it and destroying the journalist who published it." Really? It wouldn't surprise you that the Republicans are spreading rumors that their own Vice Presidential candidate faked her own pregnancy? Really?
Bloodlust (Kathleen Geier): "I do relish the idea that if this were true and discovered, Palin would take the crown from Eagleton as the most disastrous veep choice ever." Really? You relish the thought that the second female major party V.P. candidate faked her own pregnancy? Really?
Ezra Klein did himself no favors when he gave his friends this outlet.
It's also amazing how completely ignorant many of the posters are of pregnancy and childbirth. It's as if Doogie Howser and all his pals went into journalism instead of medicine (where they'd at least be book smart).
I will point out that Maggie Mahar is golden on this thread. I don't know who she is, but she pushes back firmly, not that any of the kids noticed. She's almost the only adult in the room.
Brad DeLong is the other. He stays sane. And he's terse. So cudos to him.
I couldn't read Sullivan's entire post. I swear to God, the man needs a psycho-neurologist, if there is such a thing.
wv: endis-- That part of Andrew Sullivan which he is unable to distinguish from a hole in the ground.
The Journolist e-mails read like a discussion in the Pravda newsroom, where they discuss which photo to airbrush, and what name will be disappeared in the next issue.
Ann -
A question regarding the anti-trust liabilities resulting out of this. I KNOW that in any other industry, 400 supposed competitors discussing how to collude (even phrased in the "no, don't collude, that would be wrong, but here's exactly what I'm going to do and why it's the right approach...") would lead to felony convictions for the corporations (aka death) and jailtime for everyone involved as well as lifetime bans from the business.
How does journolist not rise to this level? Could this be the vehicle of the death of the mainstream media, corporate felony convictions? And, be still my beating heart, consent decrees/probation terms that prevent any involved from any involvement in journalism or government?
Would be so nice to have Ezra Klein and Paul Krugman disenfranchised (and generally banned from world travel) thanks to a felony conviction!
Sullivan is like the fat kid in grammer school that we egged on to throw the spitball at the teacher (him thinking that we were all going to throw ours together). But we colluded against him, and he got caught standing there, alone.
When you know the The Truth, you don't have ferret out the facts. They ran away from this story not because of its irrelevance or improbability but because of its ineffectuality in advancing the Obama cause. The Edwards story was relevant and probable, but they ignored it because of its toxicity to the Democratic cause....I agree with Seven Machos that one of Palin's most attractive qualities is the hate she inspires in liberals. Whatever her qualifications as a Presidential candidate, it must be admitted that she is an attractive, likable, and decent woman. There is no reason to hate such a woman save bigotry. One of the journolisters frankly wonders whether her hatred of Republicans is causing her to give this story credibility.
Socialist?!? Sully is a COMPLETE Communist!!!!!!
Also, I heard about something called a "tu quoque". I didn't understand it - I'm a teapartier after all - but I think it applies in this case.
-- This comment was sponsored by the Tea Party History Project, keeping track of OUR history!!
This painting has balls:
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/J/johns/twoballs.jpg
Sometimes balls is just balls.
Sully still going at Palin's womb? Is he fucking insane?
"Is he fucking insane?
He can sleep with anyone he wants.
@ Tyrone --
Yes. neuropsychiatry
I don't get it.
You never do.
We don't want you back, Andrew.
Black Panthers, jounolist, and and an obscure USDA official. That's the three most important issues facing us today as far as conservatives are concerned.
So, the author/proprietor of The Daily Dish wasn't in the JournOList loop? Ouch!
I was just not disciplined enough to curtail what this blog airs in order to conform with what many Journo-listers believed were the interests of the Obama campaign.. . .
[W]hen I was pilloried for saying out loud what the entire chattering class was saying in private.
"He left River City the Liberry Building, but he left all the books to her!"
Maybe those balls he mentions are steel ball bearings he likes to roll around in one hang as he recalls the geometrical logic that lead to Trig eating the frozen strawberries.
Avert your eyes, everyone.
That's the three most important issues facing us today as far as conservatives are concerned.
The Red Sox are up 2-1 in the sixth. Otherwise I'm just killing time.
I'll bite again, Garage. What are the three most pressing issues for the party that holds the presidency and vast majorities in both Congresses?
Come on, dude. It's not like the Democrats are going to pass any laws or anything. So that's out. Would you like to talk about the disaster that is the war in Afghanistan? The disaster that is the economy? Obama's next vacation destination and/or round of golf? The oil spill?
Tell us, Garage. Which steaming pile of shit that Obama owns politically would you like to discuss?
I'll bite again, Garage. What are the three most pressing issues for the party that holds the presidency and vast majorities in both Congresses?
Jobs jobs jobs. I have plans but nobody listens to me.
Does this mean Sullivan is becoming a conservative again?
No, this means that Sullivan is hoping there will be a few openings appearing shortly, so he can move up the "pyramid."
Sorry, but when the hell was Sully ever a conservative, except by his own weird self-definition? He was only a Charles Johnson conservative.
And he's certainly not trying to suck up to conservatives now. He's trying distance himself from Journolist. And also pay them back for not letting him join. And earning points by showing his superiority over all those "biased Liberals".
Same old Sully. He's always right and smarter than everyone else.
garage - what is the failure in Chief doing about job, jobs, jobs except letting the Bush tax cuts expire thus losing more jobs, jobs, jobs...
I have plans but nobody listens to me.
Does it involve raising taxes? Spreading the wealth around? How about raising the minimum wage or requiring some new form? A new WPA?
We're dying to know.
AS is pissed he wasn't invited, but is really glad he wasn't, but feels vindicated even though he wasn't. And nobody is paying attention to Sarah's innards except him anymore.
What struck me, reading today's DC dump, apart from the JournoListers insanity, cruelty (there were exceptions as noted above), ignorance of things natural, and *terrible* inability to handle numbers and probability, was that Sarah Palin, the person, impressed them positively and that is what drove them absolutely whacko dissecting her decisions as as mayor, her "irresponsibility," her parenting, her "crackpot church" .... you name it.
Truly irony is lost on these thirty somethings who think they were chosen to run the world.
Did one single one of them ever ask how Obama ran and gave away the Annenberg Foundation money? How he *got*the job?
Did one single one of them not think it irresponsible of Obama to vote "present" most of the time and lose not only his Columbia thesis, but his Illinois state senate office records?
Did one single one of them ever think that a black radical "Christian" preacher who honored Louis Farrakhan and screamed from the pulpit to his large congregation that God should damn Amerikkka was a crackpot leading a crackpot church?
Actually, when I see how they played the points out on Sarah Palin, almost makes one think she might have gotten a bad rap from a bunch of bad apples.
I think she really did scare them.
And no, I don't think their criticsm made her. I think it contributed to move her out of the governor's office, but she would have been in the Lower 48 anyway. (They would have been smarter to back off and left the Palins alone though.)
She's not going away anytime soon.
When it will be that AS stops talking about her private parts, I'm not taking any bets, unlike the guys who were sure Palin would not be on the 2008 ballot.
wv frelyba
A freeper marries a womens libber
Reading the linked exchanged I'm once again struck at how ignorant these people are about pregnancy. They aren't simply naive, but thunderously ignorant. Going with Occam's razor, I against posit that few on that list has ever known someone who was pregnant; they live in a world of DINKs who have nothing but contempt for those who have children. (This list isn't the only place you see this snobbery in full force.)
Reading the linked exchanged I'm once again struck at how ignorant these people are about pregnancy. They aren't simply naive, but thunderously ignorant. Going with Occam's razor, I against posit that few on that list has ever known someone who was pregnant; they live in a world of DINKs who have nothing but contempt for those who have children. (This list isn't the only place you see this snobbery in full force.)
@Seven Machos, I'll vote for a three-letter word: J.O.B.S.
Not that I actually expect the Obama admin to do anything useful about them. [Or to talk about them, really, since it damages their cause by further demonstrating the futility of their economic policies.]
Garbage has never had a useful thought in his life, so don't expect a real answer.
Does it involve raising taxes? Spreading the wealth around? How about raising the minimum wage or requiring some new form? A new WPA?
No, no, no, no, yes.
Garbage has never had a useful thought in his life, so don't expect a real answer.
That wasn't very nice.
the journolist quote that leaves me dumbfounded is (paraphrased because i'm too lazy to look it up) 'obama choose a VP to help him govern, but mccain chose a VP to help him get elected'.
help him govern? joe biden? ahahahahahahahahaaaaaa...
Does it involve raising taxes? Spreading the wealth around? How about raising the minimum wage or requiring some new form? A new WPA?
No, no, no, no, yes.
The fact that the government hiring temporary workers will only slow and retard private-sector recovery notwithstanding, how do you propose paying for your new grand scheme without raising taxes and spreading wealth around?
Anyway, I'm sure your plan is touching in that Pay It Forward kind of way.
Let me apologize as I continue to delete duplicate comments.
I have no idea what happened except it was strikingly like Groundhog Day on blogger. I could not escape.
how do you propose paying for your new grand scheme without raising taxes and spreading wealth around?
We could start by spending the hundreds of millions we pay overseas contractors, here instead.
It could be done, perhaps not easily, but still could be done. Which is precisely why it won't of course. That's one idea. You have any ideas?
Yeah, I got ideas. Cut taxes, particularly corporate taxes (as virtually all employers are incorporated in some way). Simplify the tax system generally.
Watch people invest and watch jobs get created.
As for "overseas contractors," that is a drop in the budget ocean.
I and the Teaparty Liberty League have been compiling a list of COMMUNISTS on Althouse... and Garage's name is on the list!
If you truly care about jobs, the only solution is - of course - the teaparty SOLUTION! Our Federation PLAN realizes that corporations are the lifeblood of America and they must be protected from Obama's SOCIALIST TROTSKYITE minions. Our COMMONSENSE solutions include: declaring a decade-long tax break on oil companies based out of Wichita - the Heartland of AMERICA! We also suggest putting together a JOBS Council consisting of former legislators who can guide our economy back to health. The Council will be open to all former legislators from Texas who RUN FreedomWorks. These commonsense PROPOSALS will soon lift the U.S. back onto the ROAD to hope, growth, and opportunity!
-- This comment was sponsored by the Tea Party History Project, keeping track of OUR history!!
Oh God, it's Wacko.
Dude, if we could just get rid of all the immigrants or put them in concentration camps, our problems would be solved. We'd have less wealth, fewer consumers, and few people to create wealth. Also, I believe Andrew Sullivan is an immigrant.
Immigration must be stopped.
@GM Black Panthers, jounolist, and and an obscure USDA official. That's the three most important issues facing us today as far as conservatives are concerned.
A corrupted, racist Department of Justice.
That's a problem.
A group of people (large) in positions of influence and power use their collective bias and bigotry to control the news flow affecting the election of the President of the United States.
That's a problem.
A large national group of black colored people chooses to criticize a grassroots loosely organized group of fellow Americans -- which includes a much more varied and diverse representation of Amercan races and cultures -- as being "racist."
At a meeting of this monochromatic national group the audience resonates with the racist observations, 25 years old though they were, of an obscure USDA black official. She is summarily commanded to resign by the black White House and it goes downhill from there.
The rest of the story includes some clearly overt contemporary racist comments on the part of the obscure USDA official, who, it turns out has a racist commenting husband and was the beneficiary of a huge settlement (from us) which she and her husband shepherded through.
That's a problem.
This is post racial America, and you voted for the post racial president.
Stop trivializing amd Cabalisting.
"Seven Machos", of course, has a history of lying. In the current case, it's lying about my position. And, even those who want a moratorium don't want to get rid of all immigrants or immigration.
When reading comments by "Seven Machos", bear in mind that it has a habit of lying.
And, here's a question for others of a libertarian bent: if we replaced all future Mexican immigration with immigration from, say, India, wouldn't that do wonders for our economy?
JAL: a related problem is that the leaders complaining about the issues you list are either incompetent or corrupt (or a combo).
That explains why, for instance, the 'partiers in effect support far-left concepts like "diversity" (in the far-left sense), bean-counting, and so on.
The loudest, dumbest, most emotionally-challenged voices have pushed themselves to the front of the line, making opposing the things you list very difficult.
"Seven Machos", of course, has a history of lying.
Try threatening to discover his real identity and sue him. Haven't done that for a while.
It's been at least a week.
Jobs jobs jobs. I have plans but nobody listens to me.
I'm guessing: "raise taxes" on "the people who aren't paying their fair share", and "spend lots of money" on "important programs to stimulate the economy"?
Hey, just because it never worked before doesn't mean it won't work this time. Law of averages, right?
Rev -- He wants to defund the "overseas contractors."
We could start by spending the hundreds of millions we pay overseas contractors, here instead.
LOL.
The $787 billion stimulus didn't manage to do anything except drive unemployment up to around 10%, but GasRage has a cunning plan that will cost only a few more hundred million more....
These commonsense PROPOSALS will soon lift the U.S. back onto the ROAD to hope, growth, and opportunity!
If the tea partiers were as smart as you, Lonewacko, they'd realize that the best course of action to accomplish their goals would be to endlessly linkwhore in the comments section of blogs that actually have readers, and then threaten libel suits against everyone who ridicules them for spamming.
Instead, those fools have actually organized themselves and become active in the political process.
We could start by spending the hundreds of millions we pay overseas contractors, here instead.
My company is preparing to hire quite a few overseas contractors in order to rapidly expand our product offerings. The alternative to hiring those overseas contractors isn't "hiring Americans to do the work". It is "not doing the expansion". The expense can't be justified at the price it would take.
Once our product offerings are expanded that means a lot of work for Americans, plus of course better products offered TO Americans, with the profits going to the tens of thousands of Americans who own our stock. But some people are so terrified at the thought that a foreigner might earn a dollar that they'll happily forgo making two dollars of their own.
Here's an even better idea:
REPEAL THE CORPORATE INCOME TAX COMPLETELY
1) First and foremost, corporations don't pay taxes, we do. When corporations have to pay taxes, they simply increase the prices of what they sell to us. It's a hidden tax on the ultimate consumers: us. Eliminate it, and let the market forces take over to drive prices down.
2) It will bring capital home. Many domestic corporations such as Microsoft keep their earnings in their overseas subsidiaries because it is taxed at a much lower rate there. Eliminating the corporate income tax would create of rush of returning capital to this country.
3) It will create new investment by reducing the cost of doing business here in the US and make us ultra-competitive on the global market.
4) It will invert the flow of capital from foreign corporations which will then do what our domestic corporations have been doing. Just as Microsoft (and even the band, U2) have shown, when you tax earnings at a high rate, the money simply moves to the lower tax rate nation. If our taxes our lower than their home countries, then foreign corporations will move operations and investments here instead.
5) It eliminates inefficiencies in the market. Much of what corporations do is caused by distortions in the marketplace created by taxation. Remove the need for tax dodges, tax shelters, tax havens, etc., and all of a sudden capital is flowing to the most efficient use possible.
6) The effect on the economy would be immediate and stunning in the scale of capital movement to the US market.
JOBS, JOBS, JOBS at all skill levels as manufacturing, operations and administration jobs all move back to the US to take advantage of the new tax situation.
The increased overall economic activity and jobs would easily overcome the downside of the loss of that tax revenue. People returning to work rather than being a drain on the budget through the social services they consume, personal income taxes from people who are now working, sales and excise taxes from the turnover, etc.
It would likely solve the current state budget problems as well.
I think that Sullivan's point is that he feels that the other journalists believed the same things that he does about Sarah Palin's Uterus. So he feels vindicated.
Exactly. He thinks they colluded with each other to hide their true beliefs, which were that SULLY WAS RIGHT!!!!
Mel Gibson's final film role: Playing Andrew Sullivan in "Journolist, The Movie."
Zach Braff would play Ezra Klein.
Pogo said...
"The Journolist e-mails read like a discussion in the Pravda newsroom, where they discuss which photo to airbrush, and what name will be disappeared in the next issue."
Nope. Not by a long shot. This isn't any more than water cooler talk except to the paranoia crowd.
This isn't any more than water cooler talk except to the paranoia crowd.
This is rich coming from the fool who things a bunch of middle class working folks and blue hairs protesting massive government spending constitute "the biggest threat to the Republic."
Hoosier Daddy said...
" a bunch of middle class working folks and blue hairs protesting massive government spending constitute "the biggest threat to the Republic."
I didn't say exactly that Hoosier - I think that I used the terms "uniformed, hyperventilating, grossly mislead, pawns and wearing idiot costumes" among other things...water cooler - well nope. i didn't do that.
"water cooler talk "
Hell, even Andrew Sullivan admits JournoList was a collusion.
C'mon; admit it. Get it off your chest, mon. I'm sure there was a time in the past when you could tell the unexpurgated truth, and didn't filter everything through a political lens.
Give it the old college try.
"even andrew sullivan"...
wow. out of the mouths of babes.
Your shift key broke, hd?
Or are you ee cummings today?
" out of the mouths of babes."
I appreciate the compliment, but possums have certain special needs, so sorry dude, I don't swing that way.
NTTAWWT.
Of Sullivan, it is best to say 'Irony it's what's for dinner"
yo..pogo
just thought i'd use lower case with you....
Phew!
I feared mebbe it was a TIA or sumpin.
garage mahal said...
We could start by spending the hundreds of millions we pay overseas contractors, here instead.
Since overseas contractors provide the food, water, gasoline, amongst other necessities of life to our troops, who would provide for them, if not for the overseas contractors? If your answer is pull out of overseas countries, who do you think could do that? And why isn't that person doing it?
I didn't say exactly that Hoosier - I think that I used the terms "uniformed, hyperventilating, grossly mislead, pawns and wearing idiot costumes" among other things...water cooler - well nope. i didn't do that.
Mmmmm...uh yeah ya did.
The point of my "ire" was the inclusion of the "Live Free or Die" phrase in the lower right of the billboard. It is the State of New Hampshire's motto. It has been corrupted by the Tea Party who links it to rebellion with guns via a total misunderstanding of the 2nd amendment. It is, in this usage, a thinly disguised threat to the government and particularly the office of the President meaning "leave me alone or you die".
And there is nothing wrong with wearing idiot costumes hdhouse. I wore my Darth Vader costume to one last month.
@ hd I think that I used the terms "uniformed, hyperventilating, grossly mislead, pawns and wearing idiot costumes"
Talking about our troops hd?
wv eutaxia
Eutaxia us, we votia you out.
"Mel Gibson's final film role: Playing Andrew Sullivan in "Journolist, The Movie."
Zach Braff would play Ezra Klein."
Mel Gibson, yes! But I'd suggest Chris Kattan as Ezra.
Black Panthers, jounolist, and and an obscure USDA official. That's the three most important issues facing us today as far as conservatives are concerned.
We could talk about Obama's 4th vacation in almost as many weeks. I guess he deserves it now that he's stopped that leak... and stopped drilling causing the loss of more jobs in the Gulf states. Come to think of it, we would appreciate if he thought less about cutting jobs, jobs, jobs and took more vacations.
"And, here's a question for others of a libertarian bent: if we replaced all future Mexican immigration with immigration from, say, India, wouldn't that do wonders for our economy?"
In the end, Columbus will have been looking for India.
@HD:
I didn't say exactly that Hoosier - I think that I used the terms "uniformed, hyperventilating, grossly mislead, pawns and wearing idiot costumes" among other things...water cooler - well nope. i didn't do that.
You mean like all those Iraq War protesters who were sure the whole thing was a "war for oil" during the Bush years? Who were sure the reason we invaded was to keep gas under $2 a gallon? And we invaded Afghanistan to build a pipeline for UNOCAL? Who dressed up in pink costumes, and were pawns of ANSWER among others? Who were sure Valerie Plame was outed personally by Dick Cheney to Robert Novack? Who said the war was hopelessly lost, and that the only (other) reason we invaded was because Bush hates the brown people in the Middle East, and he was a theocrat trying to save Israel?
And had speakers at rallies say the country couldn't re-elect Bush because it would result in women performing back-alley abortions with coat hangers? Women would be forced to stay home, and be property of their husbands, like in Saudi Arabia?
Somehow Bush got through 7 years of this. How come Obama can't get through 2 years?
Democrats haven't had a new idea since Franklin Delano Roosevelt died. Well, except maybe bombing the shit out of Japan, but that doesn't count.
Intellectual property can't be stopped or taxed at the border.
So you want American companies to quit farming IT development out to India? Great. How about all the big financial firms fire their in-house IT staffs entirely and buy complete turnkey systems from Tata? Wow, big difference.
Maybe some of the people who complain about offshoring should quit buying BMWs.
Don't Forget, Andrew Sullivan described himself as "the most popular one-man political blogger in the world" (I guess Glenn Reynolds was not in the running, and of course Sullivan had not yet disclosed his team of unnamed blog staffers who would post for him at the time).
Inspector Sullivan will find the truth about Sarah and her whelp grandson Trig!
@JAL (11:04) -- "ignorance of things natural, and *terrible* inability to handle numbers and probability"
Good call on the innumeracy. I noticed that as well, but was more focused on the ignorance of things natural. The low point for innumeracy is Kathleen Geier's Aug 31, 2008, 1:08am entry where she demonstrates complete confusion about the difference between per-capita numbers and per-pregnancy numbers.
deborah said...
"Mel Gibson's final film role: Playing Andrew Sullivan in "Journolist, The Movie."
But like those Window commericals, only when Sullivan is thinking of himself. Otherwise Sullivan should be played by Perez Hilton in his first film role.
The $787 billion stimulus didn't manage to do anything except drive unemployment up to around 10%, but GasRage has a cunning plan that will cost only a few more hundred million more....
The stimulus was approx half in tax cuts. Not very good bang for the buck. Had there been a large WPA program in there, we probably wouldn't be at 10% unemployment right now.
@Fred, you're not getting my vision...temple vein-pounding, spittle-flying Mel. Perez maybe for Ezra.
Hilarious, from your Ace link:
"Andrew Sullivan is furiously crunching numbers on his Texas Instruments calculator and punching out big Excel spreadsheets showing that this all could have happened just the way he claimed. His numbers work out if he's allowed a single premise -- somewhere in the Palin household is a free-range "emergency uterus.""
Hoosier Daddy said...
" a bunch of middle class working folks and blue hairs protesting massive government spending constitute "the biggest threat to the Republic."
HD said...I didn't say exactly that Hoosier - I think that I used the terms "uniformed, hyperventilating, grossly mislead, pawns and wearing idiot costumes" among other things...water cooler - well nope. i didn't do that.
Here's exactly what you said.
Well by golly, Faux and the Tea Party scare me too. I saw a cross burning in southern Ohio in the middle 50s. I could see it from our back 2nd story deck. That scared me but over time I found that these folks were just the worst we have among us and let it go at that.
Now I'm not so sure that the Tea Party isn't a greater threat to the republic.
So the Tea Party movement, a group of people arguably more diverse than the nearly monolithic NAACP is a bigger threat to the republic than a violent, bigoted fringe group that has almost zero influence...and no, I'm not talking about the NBPP, although the shoe does fit.
Have you traveled abroad extensively, HD? I'm just wondering how many cesspools you've trudged through to have such a learned opinion on what actually constitutes a real threat to a sovereign government.
The stimulus was approx half in tax cuts. Not very good bang for the buck. Had there been a large WPA program in there, we probably wouldn't be at 10% unemployment right now.
Please, for the love of God, cite your source that shows $393.5 billion in the stimulus legislation coming from tax cuts.
@Garage:
The stimulus was approx half in tax cuts. Not very good bang for the buck. Had there been a large WPA program in there, we probably wouldn't be at 10% unemployment right now.
What projects would they have done, garage? You're talking temporary jobs, too. Like the census workers. The stimulus included money for projects, like paving roads, as is being done in my state.
What long-term things would this new WPA have done?
Scott M said...
"So the Tea Party movement, is a violent, bigoted fringe group that has almost zero influence..."
if you say so Scott...yea..sounds about right.
Scott M said...
"Have you traveled abroad extensively, HD?"
yes.
if you say so Scott...yea..sounds about right.
Thanks for jumping the shark, HD. Point to the violence. Point to the bigotry. Then, through some sort of intellectual yoga, try and frame the tea partiers as fringe.
If that were the case, the DNC and their assembled useful idiots wouldn't be worried about them. That would include you, as you appear to be.
One more add. I'm skimming the Daily Caller stuff and it's just painful. The liberals are torn between paranoia and bloodlust.
The crazy part is that there seems to be not one soul who said, “um, isn’t it far more likely that an older mother would have a down syndrome baby?”. Is this because they’re all men? Really, I’m glad that a least a few souls were smart enough to realize even if it were true it wouldn’t really be a big story, but someone should have realized the likely hood of its being true was SO, SO Small.
Sullivan is still crazy. No surprise there. This was the dumbest conspiracy theory ever!
"Sullivan, by contrast, had the balls to question Sarah Palin's uterus."
Must have been an interesting interrogation. Did he get it to talk?
Guys, garage doesn't want to shown that he been fed with a shovel for the last 40 years. He just wants to be left alone in piece with his pcbs propaganda from CNN and NYTs.
Please, for the love of God, cite your source that shows $393.5 billion in the stimulus legislation coming from tax cuts.
It was 288 billion total in tax cuts, or 37%. So I was off.
It was 288 billion total in tax cuts, or 37%. So I was off.
I certainly appreciate the correction. Even if your second number is more correct than your first, somehow $105.5 billion strikes me as more than being off.
I stand corrected, thank you Mark Kleiman.
Mark Kleiman
Aug 30, 2008, 1:03am
Absolutely don’t touch it. Even the Kossacks are voting to leave it alone. Even if it were true, it would be as much to her credit as anything, and bringing it out would be horribly cruel to the daughter and the infant. And given the statistics about Down Syndrome and age, how likely is it to be true anyway?
Yuck yuck yuck.
You know what reichwingers, we're taking over now. So just STFU and bow down to your new master.
.
Andrew Sullivan: When he's right, he's right, and when he's wrong, it's because he disagrees with me.
.
Shorter story, the Journolist members had shame, Sullivan doesn't.
I need a "Crazy-to-Sane Translator" to understand Sullivan.
@Seven Machos
However, what struck me as particularly odd then but makes so much sense in light of all this is how the vice-presidential candidate plucked from obscurity kept receiving so much attention.
It works the other way as well. Remember how every single story on Biden talked about his foreign policy credentials, how he's a foreign policy genius, just for having served on the Senate Foreign Relations committee? And barely any of them mentioned his propensity for Quayle-like gaffes?
It was 288 billion total in tax cuts, or 37%. So I was off.
Specifically:
15%: Temporary tax credit for the poor and middle class.
9%: The ritual yearly "temporary" reset of the AMT
13%: Targeted tax credits for cars, houses, college tuition, unemployment, etc.
And? Tax cuts were the single largest component of the stimulus. What is your point?
We're a bit off topic, GM, but I'll bite.
It doesn't matter what one answers to your question. I would ask if you if you thought the stimulus worked. Judging by previous threads, I would say you would be of the opinion that it did. Judging by this thread, I would have to say you don't. Either way it's tricky.
If you say it did work, you could easily say the tax breaks didn't do anything to help, while all of the porkulus parts did, ie, payouts to states to shore up budgets, "infrastructure" shovel-ready projects, etc. If you say the stimulus didn't work, you could say its because over a third of it, by your revised percentage, was tax cuts.
Let me sum up my point of view on the matter simply. It's never wrong to let people keep more of their own money.
And? Tax cuts were the single largest component of the stimulus. What is your point?
The point is the word 'temporary'. Temporary tax cuts, as those Bush did with the rebate ended up either in savings or paying down debt.
For example: When someone gets a one time $XXX.XX tax rebate its a one time shot into the system. When someone gets a $XXX.XX tax cut it then becomes a monthly shot into the system.
The question you need to answer garage is whether the wage earners are better at stimulating the economy or the government. If you believe its the latter than obviously a 100% tax rate is what we need no?
Scott
Not smart to unpack all of it, but I would say the stimulus really didn't work as intended. Certainly not as good as they wanted to. I'm not blaming it on the amt of tax cuts, I just don't think enough was focused on job creation. And debt service obligations are what I believe is really killing this economy.
The question you need to answer garage is whether the wage earners are better at stimulating the economy or the government. If you believe its the latter than obviously a 100% tax rate is what we need no?
But there is no guarantee a tax cut will be spent.
But there is no guarantee a tax cut will be spent.
True. It can be invested thereby providing additional capital for companies to produce goods and services. Unless of course you have some meaningful statistics of a significant percentge of wage earners who are stuffing their money in mattresses.
I just don't think enough was focused on job creation. And debt service obligations are what I believe is really killing this economy.
Spoken like a true tea partier ;-)
Garage,
I answered you over in the ABC/Obama lovefest thread by mistake.
I have to agree with Hoosier, though. You seem to be coming around.
By the by, why was it not smart to "unpack" it, as you said?
@Garage:
A tax cut may not be spent - it may be invested instead. Which means capital is available in the market for someone to borrow, expand a business, etc.
Even if you put the money in the bank, then the bank can invest it. That's what they do. They can simply put the money into bonds drawing interest, but that means a municipal project that requires a bond sale is able to proceed.
The only way this doesn't work is if someone takes their tax cut in cash and puts it under the mattress. Which is possible, I guess.
Of course, then, there's the problem of people investing in things government doesn't approve of, but that's a different issue.
By the by, why was it not smart to "unpack" it, as you said?
I meant I wasn't smart enough to unpack the entire stimulus, how it played out, what would have happened if there was no stimulus, etc. All I know is there seems to be a pathetic response to 10% unemployment, and I just don't get it. There are more than 20 million nonemployer businesses in the U.S. Make them an offer they can't refuse on hiring their FIRST employee. There are a lot of things that can be done that aren't being done.
I have a quick and easy fix to stimulate the economy and help the banks and start the housing market up again.
I would simply end the classification of rental income as "passive income" which originated in the Tax Reform Act of 1986. What this classification bascily does is eliminate the deductablity of Rental Real Estate losses against other forms of income such as wages, dividends, interest and other so called "portfolio" income. Now why is that important?
When I was a baby accountant a lot of people would buy a rental property and not care if they lost money because they could "write it off on their taxes." With the advent of passive income rules, it is really stupid for anyone who makes more than $150,000 to have rental real estate losses as they will generally not be deductable in the current year. If we eliminate passive rules many in the upper middle class would think it wise to invest in real property because it will most likely appreciate over time. It does that now but does not give an immedaite benefit. By making it fully deductable for anyone to charge against other forms of income would jump start the housing and more importantly the lending industries as people who actually have money might buy properties as an investment and get a tangible immeadiate benefit in current tax deductions. It would be a rising tide that would lift all boats as it would pur more properities out for rental and they could be rented at a "loss" since there would be a valid tax deduction. Thus more units would be on the market at a better price.
Now you might say that the government might lose out by getting less tax revenue. Not really because it would collect on the property transfer tax and on the capital gains as properties change hands as investors acquire them. But in general it would get the stagnent parts of the economy moving again and that would be a very good thing.
The Big O would never do that in a million years.
Now back to the fart jokes.
Also one of the main reason why people do not add employees is the ancillary taxes and fees that accumulate when you have people on the payroll.
It is not just the employer's portion of social security and medicare. It is unemployment insurance both federal and state. Workers Compensation insurance which puts more small businesses out of business than any other factor. And coming soon this new fedeally mandated health care which will add even more incremental costs to each new employee. In short it doesn't pay to hire someone new. You have to make do with what you have and everybody has to work harder.
And no one works harder then the owner of a small business. He is there before the employees get there and is there long after they are gone. That is if he wants to stay in business.
Government does all it can to put you out of business.
Ok.... wait a minute.... priest, a minister and somebody from Journolist walk into a bar.........
(that's sarcasm for the dim blubs like AlphLiberal)
Sullivan, by contrast, had the balls to question Sarah Palin's uterus.
Sullivan makes a grand inquisitor at so many levels.
And? Tax cuts were the single largest component of the stimulus. What is your point?
I was just providing more information.
But saying "tax cuts were the single largest component of the stimulus" is incorrect. The two components of the stimulus were tax cuts (37%) and government spending increases (63%). So tax cuts were the smaller of the two components. You're right, though, that the tax cuts as structured were a lousy form of stimulus. There are several reasons for this:
(a): They were targeted primarily at lower-income Americans, not at investors.
(b): They took the form of tax credits rather than rate cuts, meaning that people didn't get any extra money from them until April 2010.
(c): They were short-term tax cuts. Studies show that when people know their tax rates will be going back up, they hang on to tax refunds instead of spending them.
(d): They were funded by borrowing money. This cancels out most of the economic benefits from tax cuts (the people who claim the Bush tax cuts were a massive boon to the economy are wrong).
If the government was absolutely determined to keep offering sacrifices to the Church of Keynes, the intelligent way to do it would be immediate, permanent cuts in corporate and personal income tax rates, with corresponding spending cuts as the stimulus ramped down. This would have the effect of immediately funneling those hundreds of billions of dollars straight to the American people.
But there's no opportunity for graft that way. So don't hold your breath. :)
@ Mark Which means capital is available in the market for someone to borrow, expand a business, etc.
I have heard an ugly rumor that people are deemed too stupid in this new finance bill to know when where why and how to lend money or invest money in start ups. I have heard (ugly rumor I am sure) that in order to bankroll your brother-in-law's paintball security system idea you would need to verify that you a couple hundred thousand dollars behind you. One could put it in a bank and let the bank do the heavy lifting -- but as my friend who unfortunately opend a fabuloud little boutique in Biltmore Village two years ago discovered -- the banks don't even want to talk to small business persons with impeccable credit. (The business is now gone. And the part time help she employed ....)
Anyone heard these rumors?
Garage -- they're not going to pay attention to you or Trooper because They want it all. All of us have to belong to Them.
Gotta run. John Galt is calling.
Revenant: "But some people are so terrified at the thought that a foreigner might earn a dollar that they'll happily forgo making two dollars of their own."
Ain't that the truth. Same goes for the fear that a rich person might make a buck.
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