Speaking to reporters today, President Obama drew a sharp line under his comments last night, insisting that his defense of the right to build a mosque does not mean he supports the project.I had to Google "Mike Bloomberg." Oh, Mayor Bloomberg. Do we call him Mike?
"I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding," he said.
Obama's new stance is logically consistent with his words last night, if a bit less "clarion," as Mike Bloomberg called the first remarks.
Anyway... Ben, Mike... everybody... could you possibly take the trouble to pay attention to words?
And read the Althouse blog. It was all always obvious, as I told you here and here.
Obama's new remarks, literally speaking, re-open the question of which side he's on.Re-open the question only because you foolishly visualized a closed question.
"Literally speaking" ... what the hell does that mean? If you knew how to be literal, you wouldn't have read more into the old remarks than was there. You read subjectively. You let idiotically soaring hopes cloud your eyes.
Obama has made his brilliant career out of saying the most crashingly banal things to people who hear what they want to hear. Could everyone please wake up? Please!
Most of the mosque's foes recognize the legal right to build, and have asked the builders to reconsider.Allow me to help you solve your little puzzle? You are a chump. You need to wake up, smarten up, and realize that words have meaning.
But the clarification is, in political terms, puzzling. The signal Obama sent with his rhetoric last night wasn't that he had chosen to make a trivial, legal point about the First Amendment. He chose to make headlines in support of the mosque project, and he won't be able to walk them back now with this sprinkling of doubt. All he'll do is frustrate some of the people who so eagerly welcomed his words yesterday as a return to form.
पोस्ट्स
२४६ टिप्पण्या:
246 पैकी 1 – 200 नवीन› नवीनतम»Yes but...
YOU have said that you think that building the mosque is a bad idea, no matter it's legal.
Has Obama said it was a bad idea?
No, he hasn't.
He very carefully did not say it was a bad idea.
So how is that agreeing with you?
"Yesterday I was lying but today I am telling the truth."
Bob Arum Boxing Promoter.
Yeah, exactly what Synova said.
He, like Althouse draws a distinction between the right to do it and whether it ought to be done. But he doesn't say that the developers shouldn't build the mosque.
Yes, Ann, you predicted that Obama's lawyerly word parsing made his endorsement less assertive than it appeared to us mere mortals.
But a President who can't be understood without a lawyer as an interpreter is pretty useless.
"Obama has made his brilliant career out of saying the most crashingly banal things to people who hear what they want to hear."
And one of those people was Ann Althouse, who heard what she wanted to hear and then cast her vote for The One who fed her illusions.
By the way I am going to a memorial service this September for several firemen who died on 911
Would the supporters of this project like me to publish the address so you can spit in the families face in person?
"If this center is being built to mend interfaith relationships, it is already an epic failure."
Darleen Click
You are a chump."
Atta girl.
"Obama's new remarks, literally speaking, re-open the question of which side he's on."
No they don't. We all know which side he's on. The new remarks only re-open the question of which side his people think he should appear to be on.
Ann, had President Obama pointed out the freedoms of America and how Muslims have more freedom here than anywhere in the Muslim world, and then said the Cordoba Center should not be built in that location, that would have been great.
No extraordinary legal action. Just criticism because it is a bad idea.
Althouse voting for Obama is a kind of political version of Münchausen syndrome by proxy. Or something.
I probably should have said "shouldn't do it" rather than "bad idea." Just to be more clear.
"By the way I am going to a memorial service this September for several firemen who died on 911
Would the supporters of this project like me to publish the address so you can spit in the families face in person?"
They don't do anything in person, TY. Haven't you noticed that's how they operate?
And anyway, Ground Zero is just a place stupid micks and Jews get sentimental about. Right thinking people are way above all that kind of nonsense.
Literally speaking means taking no account of convention.
I find it very hard to understand how some people cannot see that Obama was endorsing the mosque in his original speech.
"This is America," he snipped, as he recounted basic notions of freedom of religion that virtually no one is disputing. This is America... thanks, detective, I was unclear on the concept.
He even walks back a bit in today's walkback:
“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there,” Obama continued. “I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding. That's what our country is about. And I think it's very important as difficult as some of these issues are that we stay focused on who we are as a people and what our values are all about."
Well for crying out loud, who we are as a people is a people that by a significant margin opposes building the mosque there. There is virtually nothing difficult about building it anywhere else.
Tommy Gavin: See, that? See, that, huh? I got that 12 stories up in a raging inferno up in Harlem. In an apartment, lookin' around I lost my halgen, couldn't find it. But I did find someone's grandmother. I had to hand her out in a bucket to save her, had to punch my way through a window. She died about an hour later. See that one? Take a look at that one. That was a drunken asshole up in the Bronx he fell asleep smoking in bed, well, he started the fire. He was trying to crawl out, I brought him down, I was trading my mask off with him coming down the stairs, the stairs give way and I fall through a half of story on to these metal spikes. He lived, but four kids and their mom died. I knew, 60 guys, who died on 9-11. And you know what the funny part is? I betcha 'ya, all the people in this bar, you could name five finalist from American Idol but they can't name one, one name of the 343 men who gave their lives from the FDNY on 9-11, huh. Anybody got a name? One name, huh? Anybody got a name of a dead fireman, huh? No, nobody, didn't think so.
(Rescue Me, Season 3 Episode 10)
How do you throw a mosque under a bus anyhow?
That bus is going to snap an axle pretty soon.
Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.
Damn, Lady, you broke the code
Palladian said...
No they don't. We all know which side he's on. The new remarks only re-open the question of which side his people think he should appear to be on.
That sums it up well.
Ground Zero is just a place stupid micks and Jews get sentimental about. Right thinking people are way above all that kind of nonsense.
On the other hand, those stupid Micks and Jews along with the NYC financial types at GS and Morgan Stanley have normally donated well to the Dems and Obama in particular. Perhaps they will get smarter by 2012.
Tommy: [looking at a 9/11 Memorial] It's hard to believe it's been five years, man.
Franco: Yeah I saw a thing about this in the Times, the picture didn't do it justice.
Lou: You realize the only reason this is here, is because firefighters and regular people, wanted to honor the guys we lost. There were no politicians involved.
Tommy: No. The Chief of the Department, did I tell ya, when they did the unveiling... his speech, he said "All we got was empty promises from empty suits."
Lou: You know I feel for those families over there. Waiting for a memorial for their loved ones, we already got ours.
Tommy: You know, the guys from this house, they lost a lot of brothers that day... they wrote on the back of this thing, they put personal prayers, put personal notes, and remembrances, of all the brothers they lost that day... and then they sealed it up so that nobody will ever be able to read what they wrote.
Lou: That's the way it should be, it stays between brothers.
Franco: Each other is all we got, right.
(Resue Me, Season 3, Episode 13)
This is the closest Althouse is ever going to come to admitting that those pajamas didn't say anything but "GOOD NIGHT".
""I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding," he said."
So why is it so important to address only one side of the question with an opinion? Is the WTC and our nation's feeling about it not important enough, or just not appropriate for the classroom you both think he's standing in front of.
Balko on the ying and yang of right and left.
Althouse, you are threading the needle with parsed words, as is Barack Obama.
Doesn't matter, I guess. No issue here.
You can just continue to post topic after topic in support of gay marriage, while all the while turning a blind eye at what Islamists do to gays abroad, and now here.
You do remember the gays killed in Minnesota by Islamists, don't you? They want to kill all the gays, especially here in America.
Parse away, parse away. Parse this:
Dr Muzammil Siddiqi, director of the Islamic Society of North America, says "homosexuality is a moral disease, a sin, a corruption… No person is born homosexual, just as nobody is born a thief, a liar or a murderer. People acquire these evil habits due to a lack of proper guidance and education." Sheikh Sharkhawy, a cleric at the prestigious London Central Mosque in Regent’s Park, compares homosexuality to a "cancer tumour." He argues "we must burn all gays to prevent pedophilia and the spread of AIDS," and says gay people "have no hope of a spiritual life." The Muslim Educational Trust hands out educational material to Muslim teachers – intended for children! – advocating the death penalty for gay people, and advising Muslim pupils to stay away from gay classmates and teachers.
I'm, happy for your that you and Obama agree. That's much more important than a few lives.
"Obama agrees with me..."
Even if it was true, I would never admit it. Maybe two years ago, but not anymore. More out of style than tie dye, which I do wear when I just don't care what people think of me.
Doesn't "reopen" jack squat...he's for it...takes an idiot not to know that...parse all you want.
With today's *clarification* Obama is not really on any side of this controversy. One from colmn A, one from column B. How nice and inoffensive and unlearderlike. I truly don't think we know where he stands on this.
AMEN! You are soooooooooooooooo right. The media and progressives are doing it again -- creating what they want to hear, rather than listening to what he said. "Literally speaking"? How embarrassing. Here's my take: Media Continues to Misstate Obama's Position on Mosque (Updated)
"You need to wake up, smarten up, and realize that words have meaning."
Ann is exactly right and yet completely, tone-deaf wrong. O's statement yesterday was couched in legal terms, and as such, was a truism. But O wasn't addressing a 1-L conlaw class, and it's silly to parse a statement by the president on a divisive issue as if he were. It's also unhelpful to claim, as Ann does, that "meaning" is an attribute of words. If it were, satire and irony would be incomprehensible. Lawyers in their lawyerly mode (I'm one), parsing statutes, cases and the like, don't have to deal much with satire, irony, double-entendre and all the many ways people say one thing and mean another. Except at a trial, that is, where all of those aspects of life are frequently front and center.
Ann pretends that O was just in 'parsing' mode yesterday. Who is she kidding? He is quite good at the say-one-thing-but-mean-another mode of communication. IMO, that's what O was doing yesterday with his little legal-lecture-that-wasn't. The proof is in the reaction to it, especially from the ardent lefties. (There's a fair sample of the cheering squad reaction at RCP from some of the usual suspects.)
Yes, words do have meaning Professor but that video conveys his true feelings. So watch it and see what you think.
With his backtracking today, Obama is trying to vote present.
Yes, he's for the mosque and everyone knows it. The message has been sent, he's with the base on one of their pet issues. This semi-walkback is just a sop to the bitter, clingy rubes in flyover country and the scared-shitless Democratic congresscritters who represent them (for now). I don't know that anyone will take it particularly seriously, it's obvious where his sympathies lie.
"Would the supporters of this project like me to publish the address so you can spit in the families face in person?
Publish it only so we can come express our love and sorrow for their loss.
Hey, remember when Obama said he wouldn't raise taxes? And he'd end DADT? And he supported gay marriage? And he'd pull troops out of Afghanistan?
Quite the parser, ol' Barry.
Was this by plan?
Say the positive thing at Ramadan dinner so it will be in the Islamic press.
Then later walk some of it back when it likely won't.
AJ Lynch: Words have meaning, but you trust "feelings" that you get from a video? Give me a break!
Althouse wrote:
"Most of the mosque's foes recognize the legal right to build, and have asked the builders to reconsider."
Thank you for pointing that out. That needs to be said loudly and repeatedly, since it'll make it harder for Lefties and the media to rewrite history when this controversy finally dies down.
It's not his place to take a stance on whether it "should" be built.
"Which side he's on..."
Let's see: He's on the side of the first amendment, and the right of people to do with their own private property what they wish. Beyond that, what other side is there for a president of all the citizens to take?
If you want a fucking "culture warrior" go and vote for Bill O'Reilly. But someone that nasty has a way of not ever making it through a primary, if you haven't noticed.
The best the Birchers can get these days is Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin, etc., etc. - and we all know how their poll ratings compare. Can anyone get a clue and just fucking accept for once the fact that successful presidents aren't about taking up your personal torch of cultural animus against every contentious issue that the Bill of Rights allows for, for crying out loud? Some things call for a little blandness. Go fight the ROP on your own time, on your own rabid blogrolls, and without the support of the one who presides over all the people and has no choice but to respect all their rights.
The inability of the right to understand the above exemplifies the reason for the continued furtherance of their own irrelevance.
Good night.
"Most of the mosque's foes recognize the legal right to build, and have asked the builders to reconsider."
As they have every right to do. And I would expect contractors, unions and others who might supply the trades and materials needed for that build can refuse the job if they want to.
And I would expect contractors, unions and others who might supply the trades and materials needed for that build can refuse the job if they want to.
Oh really, Beth?! Next thing you know you're going to argue that they have the right to strike and to form unions and to do all sorts of other nasty things that get in the way of the right-wing agenda you crazy socialist...
"It's not his place to take a stance on whether it "should" be built."
He should just stick to local law enforcement issues he knows nothing about - "the police acted stupidly".
I know what side the President is on. And it is not mine. Never was. Never will be.
And that's ok. That's what elections are all about. He won fair and square. To the victors go the spoils.
But I could only wish he could find it in his heart like Governor Patterson to speak out and try to find an alternative site that does not tear at the hearts of so many Americans. To show some of that sensitivity to the feelings of others that he always chides us to feel when he wants something.
He has no place in his heart for those Americans. He can barely be bothered to pay them the most insincere form of lip service.
"And anyway, Ground Zero is just a place stupid micks and Jews get sentimental about"
Bwahaha. Despite C-fudd's faux outrage at the GZ mosque he has always expressed a lot more contempt for 9/11 rescuers than his Jew-baiting Islamofascist buddies.
There goes Gary Rosen brilliantly arguing that two supposed wrongs make a right.
I expected very little of President Obama on this issue.
He has exceeded my expectations.
No, the people who supported him, work(ed) for him, and voted for him are chumps. The ones who saw him for what he really is are the ones that are right in rebuking this pile of putrid shit we call a president. I said before that I'm done with leftards and I will do anything in my power to bring them and their ideology down. The time for any tolerance for them and their ideology is over. Call it political/ideological genocide. I don't care, but the war is on and president chump just told us what side he is on.
Well at least you're getting some traction Trooper by getting him to recognize (disagreement over) the supposed "wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there." And he is at a level more regionally removed and more constitutionally accountable than the governor of New York for crying out loud.
Plus, I love the implied assumption that Henry Louis Gates' arrest somehow involved a great deal of local sentiment that Obama just oh so recklessly and heartlessly disregarded...
"The inability of the right to understand the above exemplifies the reason for the continued furtherance of their own irrelevance.
Mark it well, folks, because Ritmo's thinking is an precise example of how civilizations fall.
The American left is so drunk with opposition to the American right that they proudly support the Right's stated opponent, even though that opponent would happily kill the left first, were they to take power.
".....realize that words have meaning."
Rush has been saying this for 20 years.
He has the bully pulpit and the ability to effect positive change on this issue.
Of course he does not see fit to constructively engage those who find this a terrible and disheartening affair.
We do not count in his estimation.
We do not enter into anything other then the basest of political calculations.
We do not matter to this President. Never did and never will.
Jihadis are the right's biggest fan and their biggest benefactor, not that someone so ridiculous to name himself after the stupidest VP ever would know it, his bogus speculations about civilization notwithstanding.
It's in bin Laden's interest to refuse to distinguish between all Muslims and those who are enthusiastic about helping him carry out his agenda, and one the radical, "cultural" right is stupid enough to get on board with.
#12 | Phelps | August 14th, 2010 at 6:20 pm
Short phelps version: you absolutely can build it there. It is an incredibly stupid move which will set harm the image of Islam in America for decades, which is well within your rights. There is no more basic freedom than to commit a hideously stupid and offensive act.
+5
Comment from Balko's site. Although you would have thought 9/11 on its own would have been considered a stupid move that hurt the image if Islam in America.
What the heck do you want him to do, Trooper? How exactly would you like him to engage raw if anti-constitutional base emotions and what would the people asking for his succor hope to get from it?
I would ask him to appeal to the simple decency and humanity of the Muslim organizers and ask them to rethink this project at this location. I would ask him even offer to aid them if they could find it in their hearts to move this project as Governor Patterson has offered to do. I would ask him to offer the bare minimum of understanding and compassion that he seems to ladle over everyone else in the world other than the familes and loved ones who find this project an appalling slap in the face.
But I don't expect him to find that in his heart. His heart lies elsewhere.
A fight between one-fifth of the world and America's guarantee of religious rights and property rights for all its citizens? How exactly is the president supposed to engage that and tactically what is the gain that anyone in America or anywhere else could expect of it?
At some point, someone on the right, is going to have to stand up and recognize how short-sighted this is.
Actually, the Bush administration already did. But I guess their out-of-power successors don't have to worry about accountability for America's interests or the constitution so for them its a different story.
Trooper,
What do you find in your heart for the Muslims who died when the towers fell? I seriously want to understand your take on this. Are they also supposed to see the conflict you do? Are they supposed to renounce their religion on bin Laden's account?
I want to know your answer to that.
The constitution will not be violated if these people could find it in their hearts to move this project a few blocks away.
At least to a site that does not actually have debris from 911 on it.
But that would be too much to ask from the wisdom and compassion and the desire to build bridges of the people behind this effort.
And it is of course to much to ask of this President.
He can continue to reach out to the Moslem world.
He can just ignore us stupid micks and jews.
The Atlantic had a blogger who pointed out that there is a Muslim chapel in the Pentagon.
Where is the outrage over this? Are you aware of what happened to the Pentagon in 2001?
How many blocks away from the towers are supposed to be declared a Muslim-worship-free zone?
At some point I would hope you could see how arbitrary this eventually becomes.
Trooper York said...
I would ask him to appeal to the simple decency and humanity of the Muslim organizers and ask them to rethink this project at this location. I would ask him even offer to aid them if they could find it in their hearts to move this project as Governor Patterson has offered to do. I would ask him to offer the bare minimum of understanding and compassion that he seems to ladle over everyone else in the world other than the familes and loved ones who find this project an appalling slap in the face.
But I don't expect him to find that in his heart. His heart lies elsewhere.
8/14/10 8:00 PM
Trooper, you make so much sense sometimes it hurts.
Exactly, Trooper. They want this site because of the significance to THEM. Otherwise, in the interest of outreach and tolerance, they would move their planned mosque. No, outreach and tolerance is demanded of them, but not returned in any way. It's really very simple to see if you care to look.
Headline on NYT website right now:
Obama Strongly Backs Islam Center Near 9/11 Site
See? He chumped them all.
Did he say that? No. But they read/heard the code Friday night.
The best thing he could have done after that was to have kept his mouth shut. But he is bound and determined to put himself in the middle of this. Can't stand being behind that closed door.
(I am not sure why he would throw the mosque under the bus, Palladian.)
But it might be fun to watch.
A least it's a distraction from this.
I don't ask anyone to renounce their religion. Not Moslems. Not Christians. Not Scientologists.
I saw on NY One the local News station a Moslem family that was against this cultural center.
They can build it out of the radius of the falling of the towers.
But that would defeat their purpose.
I truly don't think we know where he stands on this.
I beg your pardon; one knows exactly what to think.
Lizzy, Pride and Prejudice
Darcy,
I was at the ATP today! First match cancelled because of an injury, second match rained out.
Ritmo, easily distinguished.
There are chapels in the Pentagon catering to military member's religious needs. So of course a mosque in the Pentagon is not offensive. At least not to me. Again, had some mosque been opened here to cater to local Muslims in Tribeca--that would be fine.
This proposed 15 story Islamic cultural center is being located at this site because it is close to ground zero. That is the rationale for it. It is a political statement and a very poor one.
Where is the radius of the falling of the towers? The towers fell vertically, not horizontally. Do you want a radius as wide as the towers were tall?
Hi knox! That...is that the women's tourney? Cool!
The landing gear from one of the planes fell on top of this building.
Perhaps there might even be the DNA of the victims.
That is why this is not an appropriate place.
Even a block or two away would suffice.
But that is not what they are after here. And we all know it.
There are none so blind as can not see.
I'm going to make it a new policy to simply skip ever Ritmo post.
Fred, you could easily ask Muslims to build a chapel outside of the pentagon and as far away from it as Tribeca is from Ground Zero. I can see a definitional difference between the religious needs of military personnel and those who just happen to work in the neighborhood of Ground Zero, but not a practical one.
If it is indeed a political statement to build there, why is the assumption that it's only an evil one? We can say it's in poor taste, but there's a difference between poor taste and evil intent. And no, I don't automatically accept that the property owner has the same interpretation of sites of worship as those who obsess about Islam's role in proclaiming the same kind of victory over others that Christianity has since the conversion of Constantine.
It's more than a block, perhaps two away, Trooper. The maps are published and widely available to anyone who can see them. Is that fact not salient?
At some point, someone on the right, is going to have to stand up and recognize how short-sighted this is.
At some point, some moderate Muslims are going to have to stand up and recognize how short-sighted this is.
Fixed!
Almost all of the opponents of the mosque have made a clear distinction between the legal right to build the mosque and whether it should be done.
My wife and I have the legal right to get a divorce, but we don't want to do it.
Opponents have argued that Muslims should not want to build a mosqe on the WTC site.
It is only hysterical and feebleminded lefties who have argued that opposing the mosque means opposing the free exercise of religion.
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
Jihadis are the right's biggest fan and their biggest benefactor, not that someone so ridiculous to name himself after the stupidest VP ever would know it, his bogus speculations about civilization notwithstanding.
It's in bin Laden's interest to refuse to distinguish between all Muslims and those who are enthusiastic about helping him carry out his agenda, and one the radical, "cultural" right is stupid enough to get on board with.
Further exemplification of how leftards support, defend, and view Islam as a means to interpret it to the lesser people. You aren't just a tool, you're a stooge.
I expect Obama to have as much to say about Muslims building places of worship in the vicinity of Ground Zero as any other president has regarding the SCOTUS decision to allow Nazis to march through Skokie Illinois.
And Meth-Head-erest is a rabid mouth-breather and a Western version of Mohammed Atta. We tolerate him just the same as long as he doesn't commit crimes in the furtherance of his hatred.
There were some great discussions on this subject and the subject of gay marriage recently. Sorry Meadowlark showed up.
Of course Machos doesn't have any views of his own worth defending, so his showing up in the role of disappointed emcee is to be expected.
Ritmo, the landing gear from one of the planes that crashed into the WTC landed on the Burlington Coat Factory building, where the Cordoba Center is proposed to be built.
Coincidence? There are no coincidences.
And I said Tribeca only because that is the nearest residential neighbor to the WTC, starting about two or three blocks north. But having lived and worked there, I can tell you that there is no Muslim enclave nearby. There is no significant Muslim community anywhere near the WTC site.
Was it a coincidence that there was no significant Nazi community in Skokie, Illinois, Fred? And America spent more blood and treasure fighting Nazis and defending the action to do as a way of preserving civilization than it has fighting "Islam".
"I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding,"
Pure Obama. He was telling us what we already knew, and providing nothing helpful whatsoever to solving the problem at hand.
So why comment at all? Althouse seems to think that it's part of a pattern of deliberately (?) saying things that people can interpret as agreeing with their own position.
This could be right. It could also be that he is banal, in love with the sound of his own voice and lacks the clarity or courage to say something useful.
Obama: The mosque may be a bad idea. It may be a good idea. Guess whether I have an opinion, and try to figure out why I would say anything if I don't. Then guess what the opinion is."
Nice leadership, Mr. President.
Godwin's Law broken, mangled, and dribbled upon at around post 80.
Very, very sad.
It's called weaseling; he doesn't want to give anybody the impression he actually took a stand.
I don't give to fucks what the leftards have to say about this. This mosque is clearly a big FUCK YOU to American, New Yorkers, and to the families, and the murdered on 9/11. They have waited until this fool of a president and his internal and external weaknesses played out until to make their move. They sat on this for years and now they strike out like this. This isn't about building bridges, and most of you people, included Schtickmo do not understand Islam in any way, shape, or form. It's a religion that at it's foundation is born of violence, hatred, deceit, and malice. Just because it comprises 1/5th of the worlds populations does not mean it is a religion worthy of merit. If anything it's adherents have become even more savage than ever before. 9/11 proves it even above and beyond what happened in '93 and furthermore worldwide. Islam isn't a religion of peace since the ones that carried out 9/11 and killing muslims in it's wake saw them as either sacrifices for Allah or apostates. Either way they lose and we do too by having a president that is two faced just like every muslim is out there. They can lie, cheat, steal, and kill you with malice and impunity because you aren't one of them. They are willing to bide their time for as long as it takes to accomplish their stated goals. They've said as much and we just ignore them as raving lunatics not worthy of our attention.
Anyone here who thinks that this mosque is about bridge building between societies is an unmitigated fool. Why go to the effort to stick a finger in the eye of the people of New York in the name of reaching a hand out in peace while the other one is holding a dagger behind the back. America is being laughed at by these sub-human animals and there is a whole host of people like Schtickmo, that Chomskite piece of shit that he is, ready to come to their defense at the drop of a hat and trying to use religious tolerance, of all things, as an excuse to defend the indefensible.
Poor Obama. All his life saying shit like this was met with a flood of rapturous approval. Now, he's got to lead and it is met with people saying so what the fuck are you actually saying you want to do?
Only a fucking idiot and a perverter of Godwin's Law wouldn't recognize that the right and real-life example of Nazis to offend a community is no different a question to a president than the right and real-life example of Muslims offending a community.
Next thing you know, Machos will declare no precedents in the Skokie case. Because, you know, that would violate Godwin's Law.
What a moron.
This time the Nazis are totally relevant. This time is different.
Dribble on, Dribbler.
Ritmo,
I was a kid when the Nazis marched in Skokie. Nazis suck. They marched in Skokie because it had a large number of Holocaust survivors. But they had a free speech right to march.
That doesn't redeemn them in any way. They still suck.
As do the promoters of this Cordoba center.
And still he has a higher approval rating at this point in his presidency than either the twice-elected Reagan or Clinton had in theirs.
Machos is a moron.
I actually went to his blog and posted this in response to another post he uploaded along these lines.
He just doesn't get certain things. That mask is cutting off the blood flow through his carotid arteries.
"I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there".
Then why comment at all? There can't be more than a dozen people in the entire country who believe that it's illegal to put a mosque close to Ground Zero.
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
"It's not his place to take a stance on whether it "should" be built."
"Which side he's on..."
"Let's see: He's on the side of the first amendment, and the right of people to do with their own private property what they wish. Beyond that, what other side is there for a president of all the citizens to take?"
Bravo!
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
And Meth-Head-erest is a rabid mouth-breather and a Western version of Mohammed Atta. We tolerate him just the same as long as he doesn't commit crimes in the furtherance of his hatred.
Really? Mouth breather is the best you can do you rancid stooge apologist? And now you have the nerve to compare me to a terrorist murder on top of that? See folks, this is the type of evil that you have to deal with. He calls us haters while defending the religion of death and it's adherents in the name of religious freedom. You've been called out, filth.
Godwin's Law is used to prevent someone from invalidating a person or their argument by comparing them to Nazis. Not as a way to validate an argument based on precedent.
Machos doesn't even understand the point of Godwin's Law.
What a bubble-dweller. Someone should build something offensive to him a block from where he lives. Oh wait! The post on Oprah...
Everyone should go to my little vanity blog. I just posted an insightful idea there that Obama is pretty much exactly like Herbert Hoover -- a one-termer technocrat who can't solve problems and can't lead people.
You should comment at my blog instead of this one, Dribbler. This blog is better with serious discussions and your dribbling clutters them up, always. Come be frivolous at my blog. Everybody wins.
Ritmo, I think most here would agree that the American Nazi Party had the right to march through Skokie but were complete and utter assholes for actually doing so.
Kind of like this whole Mosque business.
Whoever mentions Nazis in a thread automatically loses any argument.
So, I win by default and I wasn't even here arguing.
Awesome.
I take that back, Meth-head-erest. Mohammed Atta probably had more discipline and restraint than you do. Although the two of you have just about the same level of intolerance, unwillingness to think rationally and interest in blindly following orders.
I'm not surprised I hit the right nerve with that comparison. I'm happy to know I was right and that it stuck.
Have a good night!
I sometimes wonder if obama is trying his best to become a one termer. I can't think of a dumber statement or backtracking statement to make. Maybe we got him all wrong he's a secret republican mole! What better way to destroy the democratic party for generations?
Maguro: What did any president ever have to say about the unmentionable (by the disingenuous Macho standard) precedent of Skokie?
Any SCOTUS judge or legal scholar who refers to Skokie will automatically lose the argument. Or so says double dribbler Machos.
Justices, lawyers: Consider yourself informed.
The Nazis never actually did march in Skokie. They fought for (and won) the right to do so, but they actually marched in Chicago instead.
I guess this is Machos' way of informing me that I'm supposed to be impressed with his Glenn Beck-like ability to draw a diagram linking the word "technocrat" with "Obama" and "Herbert Hoover". Maybe he just learned the word "technocrat" and found his ability to use it in a sentence might somehow make for an argument any more impressive than his other political obsessions.
The Nazis never actually did march in Skokie. They fought for (and won) the right to do so, but they actually marched in Chicago instead.
That would be the perfect ending here. The people who want to build the Mosque have the right to do it but, since it's such a tacky thing to do, they actually build the mosque in Chelsea, between two gay bars.
Obama took a stand by simply addressing the subject, and no amount of after-the-fact parsing removes a single brick. He wants the mosque, the sooner, and bigger, the better. Otherwise he would've just kept his big, jive-turkey-trap shut.
You amuse me to no end, Curly.
Clearly counsel from the president is what caused the Nazis to ultimately march elsewhere.
1. Obama does not agree with Althouse. She said it was legal but unwise. He said it was legal and would not pass any judgment on its wisdom.
2. Obama is the chump here. He stuck himself out there with an unnecessary comment that's getting him nowhere. It makes no supporters of or concessions to those who disagree with him. Instead, it makes them further doubt him. And clearly, from Smith's post, it makes doubters of his supporters too.
Of course, this can also be inferred from his lawyerly follow-up. In short, he belatedly realized he was talking out of his ass.
If you think Obama is like Herbert Hoover then you're gonna love what comes next!
I think a reasonable compromise would be to allow the mosque to be built after "Mike" visits Mecca.
If you know what I mean.
http://wikitravel.org/en/Mecca
Going for the greatest of douches award?
*skips Ritmo*
...then you're gonna love what comes next!
The election of Sarah Palin, for two terms, and then the election of Xhris Christie for two terms? Paul Ryan as Speaker and Jim DeMint as Majority Floor Leader?
We can only hope, right Ritmo?
I don't think the Republicans are going to put up a clone of Roosevelt, Curly.
Oh, Fuck this parsing bullshit and Fuck Obama for even IMPLYING a mosque was a good idea. Fuck him twice. Fuck him three times. A victim doesn't allow the perp to build a monument to himself on the site of the crime in the name of any ideal whatsoever.
Allow me to help you solve your little puzzle? You are a chump. You need to wake up, smarten up, and realize that words have meaning.
While those might be sage words for OBama supporters, if you didn't vote for him you have nothing to wake up about, since you saw through this garbage prior to the election. Of course, you can fool some of the people some of the time ....
jr -- McCain was the worst presidential candidate since I became sentient of politics. We have to remember that.
And maybe he would have been a great president. I don't know. But he was a dreadful candidate.
Ritmo wrote:
Where is the radius of the falling of the towers? The towers fell vertically, not horizontally. Do you want a radius as wide as the towers were tall?
I live in NYC and was in NYC the day of the towers collapse. I lived on 22nd street at the time and the towers were down in the financial district, a couple of miles away. And you could smell the debris as midtwown for months. So the radius of the attack extendeded far beyond the immediate vicinty. But I'm willing to compromise. I don' think you have to block building up a mosque all the way up to midtown, but perhaps if the site is close enough to have debris fall on it, then perhaps it's too close for comfort.
"Never try to smarten up a chump." W.C.. Fields
Seven machos wrote:
jr -- McCain was the worst presidential candidate since I became sentient of politics. We have to remember that.
Worse than Obama? Really? You can question his republican bonafides all you want. God knows he wasn't beloved by many on the right. But worse than a guy who palled around with terrorists, and proclaimed his own campaign as the time when the waters would stop rising and the earth would start healing itself? A guy who other than his decades of life surrounded by radicals had absolutely no other experience that anyone could point to that would suggest who he was or that he would make a good commander in chief.
Perfect example of making the perfedt the enemy of the good. Because Mccain wasn't perfect or even that good, many conservatives and many moderates even allowed themselves to be hoodwinked by perhaps the most unsubstantial candidate we've seen, certainly in the past 20 years. It wouldn't take that much perception to see that this emperor had no clothes, it's just too bad that people like Buckley Jr and Parker were so busy worrying about Palin being one step away from the white house that they let this guy in. And thought they were smart to do so. They look awfully stupid with so much egg on their face.
jr -- Let's define "good candidate." Good candidates can energize people to vote for them and energize people about what the future will be like once they are in office.
Were you at all excited to vote for McCain? Were you energized about a McCain presidency. I was not. If you say you were, I will not believe you.
Also, you are confusing who Obama actually was as a candidate versus the vision of himself and his positions he was able to put forth.
OK, I think I get it.
When I first read this post, I thought that Althouse thought that Obama agreed with her. But this title is in quotes, so she's just quoting someone. But there is no such quote in the linked article.
So I guess she's quoting what she thinks is the general reaction that Obama is trying to elicit, sometimes successfully, with his blank-slate empty non-committal rhetoric: He's trying to make people see what they want to see, and assume that he agrees with them. Or she's quoting, specifically, the thoughts of the author of the linked article.
And I guess she's pointing out what a slick little weasel Obama is.
I guess. I'm not really sure, to be honest.
Can someone with better reading-comprehension skills than mine help me out here?
lucid: Opponents have argued that Muslims should not want to build a mosqe on the WTC site.
It is only hysterical and feebleminded lefties who have argued that opposing the mosque means opposing the free exercise of religion.
Once again, the site two blocks away is somehow magically "on the WTC site."
What was that about words having meaning?
The Port Authority offered St. Nicholas $20 to relocate to a larger property a block away, provided that they follow some guidelines, including a height limit.
Any critics want to tell me how much public money should accompany an offer to move Cordoba House say, 4 blocks away, with similar height restrictions?
The mosque builders made it perfectly clear just EXACTLY how much they REALLY want to build bridges and promote understanding in their response to Greg Gutfield's suggestion to build a gay bar next door to the mosque.
Their response?
You’re free to open whatever you like. If you won’t consider the sensibilities of Muslims, you’re not going to build dialog.
And in a single Tweet, they pulled the curtain off of their TRUE desire in building this mosque: they have no desire to "build dialog" or they would "consider the sensibilities" of the 9/11 victims.
So for all of Ritmo's prattling, the mosque builders themselves call BS on the whole charade.
But of course, Ritmo already KNEW that, but still pretended that the mosque builders were pure of intent in this whole thing in order to paint opponents in the worst possible light.
Where I come from, we call that DESPICABLE LYING.
Trooper, @ 7:41, wins the thread.
Seven Machos wrote:
Were you at all excited to vote for McCain? Were you energized about a McCain presidency. I was not. If you say you were, I will not believe you.
Also, you are confusing who Obama actually was as a candidate versus the vision of himself and his positions he was able to put forth.
Seven, Obama was the one who proclaimed his candidacy was all that. Yes, his acolytes proclaimed him as a new messiah, but he was one of the biggest hypers of his mythology. We are the ones we are waiting for. Obama will not let you go back to your uniformed lives. We will look back in time and say, this was the time when the earth was finally healed. It's bad enough listening to a cult of personality hyping a candidate, but when that candidate is hyping his credentials as a savior, it's enough to make reasonable people gag.
And while I can say Mccain wasn't my first choice (or second choice) I prefered him to Huckabee and I have seen worse. No, I wasn't exactly excited, but why do I have to be excited? I'm not seeing The Jonas Brothers. I don't need a president who's a rock star who causes me to have a thrill run up my leg. Rather I would prefer competence, and at the very least not someone who's going to sabotage the system.
Seriously, prior to the campaign Obama admitted that his cap and trade policy would NECESSARILY bankrupt the coal industry. How could anyone from a coal state, or who actually believes in a market economy or understands our energy needs actually give the reigns of our economy to someone who stated that as his goal?
the slack-cunted old bottle blonde has finally lost it
Seven, I would put Mondale up there as one of the worst candidates of my lifetime, but unlike Gore, he won his home state.
Any Republican would have had a tough run in 2008. The same can not be said of 2000. Gore lost in a year that most Democrats would have had a decent chance to win the election.
Ergo, Gore is the worst presidential candidate of my lifetime.
The Muslims who died that day at the WTC did not die there because they were Muslims but because they were westerners. The mosque thus honors their attackers more than it honors them.....If any Christian sect were as overtly hostile to gays and women as Islam, I wonder how many on the left would so energetically defend their rights......The ineptitude of Obama's obfuscated clarification is scary. He inspires dread. Some day a crisis is going to occur and his instincts will lead him to do exactly the wrong thing.
YOU have said that you think that building the mosque is a bad idea, no matter it's legal.
Has Obama said it was a bad idea?
No, he hasn't.
He very carefully did not say it was a bad idea.
So how is that agreeing with you?
I'd like to see the answer to Synova's question asked back in the very first comment, too.
(Preferably without a resort to hypotheticals which rewrite the premise.)
OK, I fucked up.
Those quotes around the title of the post only appear in this comments section. On the main page of the blog, there are not quotation marks.
So Althouse actually believes that Obama agrees with her?
This can't be. She must be making some other point obliquely.
Right? Anyone? Buehler?
I mean, he actually says: "I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there."
He says that he won't comment on it -- that he will not say that it's wrong, or a bad choice. That's not agreeing with Althouse. Althouse says that the mosque organizers have every legal right to put up a mosque; but that it's wrong for them to do it, and a bad decision. I believe that she compared it to abortion -- she thinks that women should have the right, but it's not something that she would personally decide to do.
In contrast, Obama says that they have every legal right to do it, and that he won't comment on whether they should.
So she can't possibly think that he agrees with her. Maybe she's in character here, and she's acting as though she's taken in by his vagueries.
Right?
Or did Althouse say that Obama shouldn't comment one way or the other about whether they should build it? Because if she did, I don't remember that.
Words have meaning to those who interpret them. I think some believe he was implicitly endorsing the mosque with his remarks last night. But my reading that he was doing what we expect a US President to do; and that is to say people have freedom of religion and a right to build a mosque.
His statement today is more along the lines of letting us know how he feels personally about it. [I actually think he supports it despite the controversy but polls will make most Presidents pause].
That would be the perfect ending here. The people who want to build the Mosque have the right to do it but, since it's such a tacky thing to do, they actually build the mosque in Chelsea, between two gay bars.
That's it, Seven. Excellent.
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
I take that back, Meth-head-erest. Mohammed Atta probably had more discipline and restraint than you do. Although the two of you have just about the same level of intolerance, unwillingness to think rationally and interest in blindly following orders.
I'm not surprised I hit the right nerve with that comparison. I'm happy to know I was right and that it stuck.
Have a good night!
Yes, I am intolerant. Intolerant of leftards like you and the putrid ideology you hold in that diseased head of yours. How that relates me to Atta as being intolerant of anything else western and not fanatically islamic is a fantastical stretch to make, but then again, your type of irrationality allows you to defend evil wherever it exists and then to call it tolerance. Those who defend evil are complicit with evil. Who's orders do I follow, hmmm? I'm sure a little Chomsky-ite such as yourself fawns at his every utterance, but the difference between us is that I call out your bullshit, you just roll in it.
You don't need to wish me a good night, I'm already having one.
Gore was pretty bad.
I find it interesting how the person who finished second in the presidential voting frequently becomes seen as a huge loser in the public mind. Mondale, Dukakis... I mean, here we have a person who has accomplished more than most everyone by being nominated. When they lose be a few percentage points, they become poster children for loserdom.
I don't know why they would choose not to build this mosque as close to ground zero as they can. If their motives are what most of us suspect them to be, I don't think "tacky" matters much to them.
Decapitation is pretty tacky too. Doesn't stop them.
I really don't see why we should extend property, speech, and religious rights to agents of enemies of our country. And they're clearly agents of our enemies. If they weren't, they wouldn't be building here of all places; at the first hint of this controversy, they would have immediately moved it 10 blocks away.
I read that one of the major "investors" in this project was a near-minimum-wage delivery man just a few years ago. Only in America could such a person become a high-rolling real estate mogul overnight. Or it might have something to do with that tour of the UAE he took a few months ago, pitching this plan to people who would like nothing better than a prancing victory lap around the smoldering hole.
Obama was speaking at a dinner celebrating Ramadon. It's silly to say he wasn't attempting to score political points with Islam, the guests, and the hysterical left.
His statement the next morning was just trying to have it both ways.
Like most politicians, he's a slime lizard, but one who has elevated slime lizardry to an art form.
it's such a tacky thing to do, they actually build the mosque in Chelsea
Is tacky allowed in Chelsea?
Why not just have the gay bars move to the mosque? If the mountain (mountin'?) won't go to Mohammed....
The point of private property is that, within the restrictions of zoning laws, it isn't anyone's business whether it's a "good idea" to build something or another on your property.
I take Ann's point that Obama is trying to have it both ways, to rally defenders of the First Amendment while not offending 9/11 survivors and others offended by the idea of this mosque being built where it's being built.
But since he's not a member of the NYC government, the only issue about which Obama has any business commenting is the broad national interest in protecting the rights of property owners and freedom of religion, both of which are on the line here.
I understand the rage TY is tapping into. But these rights cannot be conditional on our feelings about a particular circumstance. There are millions of survivors of horrible crimes in America, with particular issues and associations that come up having to do with the location of the crime among many other possibilities. If we start giving crime victims veto power over building decisions because the owners aren't being sufficiently sensitive, then those rights might as well be crossed out as dead letters.
Example: The Ambassador Hotel in LA which is now the site of a school complex. Robert F. Kennedy was murdered there. Some years later, the owners closed the hotel and ballroom and wanted to sell it. Should the Kennedy family have had veto power over what the new owners would do with it? What if they wanted to put the NRA's headquarters there? Or the Syrian consulate? Would the owner of the hotel property have to be controlled by the feelings of the Kennedy family?
It's liberals who are supposed to be in favor of governing haphazardly according to "feelings" and "sensitivity." Conservatives, which many of you are, are supposed to be the ones who stick to principles. The right-wing pounce on Obama for these remarks seems opportunistic to me. Or, at best, an emotion-fueled detour away from what you really stand for.
Is tacky allowed in Chelsea?
Are you kidding? Chelsea is gay Manhattan (for anyone who might not know) and one plank of American gayness is most assuredly camp, and camp is fun largely because it is tacky.
I really don't see why we should extend property, speech, and religious rights to agents of enemies of our country.
Because the Constitution tells us to.
If they are truly "agents of enemies of our country" in a national-security sense, then investigate them, prove your allegation that they are agents, and arrest them.
Ritmo wrote:
"Clearly counsel from the president is what caused the Nazis to ultimately march elsewhere."
Nah. It was probably the intense public opposition to their stunt, which harmed them far more than it helped them.
Also, President Carter did weigh in on the issue. Within a few months of the Supreme Court decision, he established the President's Council on the Holocaust, whose recommendations included building a holocaust museum in DC. Fueled by the public outcry over the Skokie controversy, Congress passed (and Carter signed) a law based on those recommendations, which is how we got the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.
He also spoke at the (first) Days of Remembrance ceremony at the Capitol the following year.
Just because presidents tend to avoid speaking directly about court cases (which would be seen as extremely prejudicial) doesn't mean that they don't comment in other ways.
I really don't see why we should extend property, speech, and religious rights to agents of enemies of our country.
There is no proof that these people are agents of any enemies beyond the fact that they are Muslim. If all Muslims are agents of enemies of our country, then we got a big problem on our hands, and I really to to keep an eye on one of the dudes I work with.
Seven Machos said...
Is tacky allowed in Chelsea?
Are you kidding? Chelsea is gay Manhattan (for anyone who might not know) and one plank of American gayness is most assuredly camp, and camp is fun largely because it is tacky.
You should have heard the collective gasp when I told a friend, while we were in Chelsea leaving the New Museum of Contemporary Art, and heading to the fashion institute, that lisping wasn't genetic.
MadMan said: "...(mountin'?)..."
Are you channeling Trooper York?
John Stodder, I don't think that property rights are usually granted to those with which we're at war. Clearly these people are acting on behalf of our enemies. If they weren't, they wouldn't hesitate to move this mosque farther from this site.
But they won't, because the people actually paying for the mosque insisted on this location. This is about more than feelings and sensitivity -- this is a flag of conquest. That's how it will be seen in the Muslim world. This will make us the weak horse in their eyes; this will be a huge setback for any potential reformers of Islam.
We are not at war with Islam.
Not with all of Islam; but we're at war with the people who want to do an endzone dance on our dead. Or at least, they're at war with us.
If we're not at war with them, then I guess they've won. I, for one, welcome our new Muslim overlords.
Pasta -- How many blocks away from the hole that was the site of the World Trade Center should every mosque be?
I agree with you that this mosque is a bad idea. However, I am almost embarrassed at how much my fellow conservatives are demagoguing this thing and overstating the case.
As long as there's pole dancing within a block of the Cordoba House, the forces of decadence and liberty win.
Seven, tip of the hat to ya. Stodder, too.
I agree with you that this mosque is a bad idea.
It's more than a bad idea, it's a deliberate provocation. I don't buy Feisal Rauf's schtick about wanting to build bridges and improve inter-faith relations for a second. The idea is self-refuting, no one interested in such things would ever consider that site appropriate for a 12-story mosque.
He has his constitutional rights, but there's no reason to take Feisal Rauf's protestations of good faith at face value.
Seven, I can't prove it, but I'd be willing to bet that the meme that this is a "mosque at ground zero" was actually started, not by the right, but by the investors in this project.
It's a flag of triumph, because they SAY it is.
So how far from ground zero should mosques be? A few blocks farther than this one.
If this one was at the site, then they should be 3 blocks away. If they had been planning on building it 5 blocks away, then the acceptable radius would be 8 blocks. Just so they can't put it where they'd originally planned. Then it won't be seen as a "mosque at ground zero", and it won't be seen as a victory.
And this isn't just a matter of symbolism. Islam spans many cultures, but most share a few characteristics, including a respect for strength, disdain for weakness; betting on the strong horse and all that. Allow them to plant that flag on our soil, and you can kiss goodbye any chance of the Muslim reformation that we all hope will bring them out of the 7th century, as Muslims run from the weak horse of westernization.
We haven't lost 4000 young men and women in combat just to allow jihadist Islam (those parts of Islam with which we are at war) to claim such a victory bloodlessly, and to undo much of the good that we've done at the cost of those casualties. I really don't know how the importance of this could be overstated.
And what are the arguments FOR building it here, really? To save a few Muslim families 3 blocks walk on their way to prayer? To demonstrate our commitment to property rights by extending them to our enemies, during a hot war? (That's really crucial in trying to win hearts and minds in the Muslim world -- a suicidal commitment to abstract principle). Jesus Christ on horseback.
I gotta hand it to escaped Bellevue resident, "Methadras". When it comes to calm, reasoned discourse on the right, nothing beats this:
Yes, I am intolerant. Intolerant of leftards like you and the putrid ideology you hold in that diseased head of yours. How that relates me to Atta as being intolerant of anything else western and not fanatically islamic is a fantastical stretch to make, but then again, your type of irrationality allows you to defend evil wherever it exists and then to call it tolerance. Those who defend evil are complicit with evil. Who's orders do I follow, hmmm? I'm sure a little Chomsky-ite such as yourself fawns at his every utterance, but the difference between us is that I call out your bullshit, you just roll in it.
He's a credit to his cause.
OTOH, it's nice to know that 7 Nachos can come out on the side of sanity when no one he's embarrassed to admit it to is listening.
I'm don't know if I even fall within the range of conservative so fuck your "fellow conservative" guilt-tripping too. (Voted for Hillary, then Palin.)
That this could even be used as a red herring shows an extent of dry rot into the structural beams that I never imagined could exist even in New York at its most frivolous.
But hey, they suffered through it, they breathed the ashes of their fellows and likely remember even the smell. If they want to allow a mosque anywhere in the vicinity, if they think that's healthy instead of twisted and sick, God help them.
It reminds me of the proposed plantings in the shape of a crescent at the PA site.
Michael Haz: You do remember the gays killed in Minnesota by Islamists, don't you?
Okay, I'll bite. I've lived in Minnesota for 15 years, and I'm not aware of any case of multiple murders here of gay men by Islamists.
So either the media has been really good at covering this up, or I'm really stupid.
John Stodder said: "If they are truly "agents of enemies of our country" in a national-security sense, then investigate them..."
I guess we should probably investigate all those people we're launching drone attacks against, and lobbing cruise missiles at. But when one side says that they're at war with us, and we decide that we're not in a war, but rather in an episode of Law and Order: Criminal Intent...that doesn't bode well for our side.
Sort of like if one guy thinks he's in a knife fight with me, but I think we're in a tango contest. Probably won't work out well.
And this misses my point entirely: Their allegiances are clear from their refusal to move the mosque out of simple decency. If they weren't jihadists, they'd move the mosque in a heartbeat.
Seven Machos said...
We are not at war with Islam.
You and I diverge on this point and I suppose we diverge on it greatly, but I deeply believe we are at war with Islam and have been for a long, long time.
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
I gotta hand it to escaped Bellevue resident, "Methadras". When it comes to calm, reasoned discourse on the right, nothing beats this:
Yes, I am intolerant. Intolerant of leftards like you and the putrid ideology you hold in that diseased head of yours. How that relates me to Atta as being intolerant of anything else western and not fanatically islamic is a fantastical stretch to make, but then again, your type of irrationality allows you to defend evil wherever it exists and then to call it tolerance. Those who defend evil are complicit with evil. Who's orders do I follow, hmmm? I'm sure a little Chomsky-ite such as yourself fawns at his every utterance, but the difference between us is that I call out your bullshit, you just roll in it.
He's a credit to his cause.
And you are a discredit to yours. What is really poignant is that you pass off your vacuous nonsense as sanity. Aside from The Constitution laying out the particular rights of religious freedoms therein, it doesn't say that I or anyone else has to be a simpering nodding head to the requirements that the adherents of the religion of death (Islam) as a role you've gleefully undertaken. Oh sure, you can prattle on and characterize whatever I say as somehow being wrong or insane, or whatever other musings make your little pee-pee feel better about itself, but you show your true self when you defend the indefensible, constitutionally or otherwise.
When you let a rabid dog into your home, don't cry like the little bitch that you are that you were bitten. On the other hand, you could always enhance your career prospects in the trades by becoming one of the many pavers on the road to hell.
OTOH, it's nice to know that 7 Nachos can come out on the side of sanity when no one he's embarrassed to admit it to is listening.
Hey Seven, will you look at that, you've gotten the seal of approval from Schtickmo himself. Man, a gold star, a glass of milk, and a cookie are awaiting you from such a rousing endorsement.
Hey Schtickmo, the white noise you peddle around here is nothing compared to the overt intentions that the followers of the moon god have for you and everyone else. You want to pretend that you are on the side of sanity and that Seven has reached across the ideological bridge to join you in that endeavor, that's fine with me. I'm not his ideological keeper. Once a tool, always a tool, master stooge.
You're not stupid, Peter. But it appears Methadras has bribed a Bellevue orderly and is on the loose again!
He promised he'd return to the grounds by bed-check and even agreed to take his Risperdal and Xanax before eloping. But as everyone on the ward will tell you, what he's capable of at this point is anyone's guess.
Ritmo Urban Dribbler -- The reason everyone here hates you is because you always, always attack people in an ad hominem way. I will leave the fact that you cannot write clearly aside for now. I insult you, because you do it to others.
I think that, if you would respect the people in this community, you'd find that virtually all of them have interesting things to say. Whereas you generally don't, because it's no fun to read insults and thick pretension all the time.
You cannot make this about me.
You cannot hide your embarrassment over the fact that someone as unhinged and hateful as "Methadras" views you as an ideological equal and is let down by your disagreement with - nay, your disapproval of him. You think that by talking about me you can do this, you think that you can shift the discussion, but you're fooling no one. I realize that you're too political and disingenuous to admit as much now, but you did earlier. So it's ok.
What is interesting is a matter of opinion. What is thoughtful, less so. And what is decent, well it's certainly not you. It's guys like Trooper who can honestly state where they stand and not feel threatened by people who disagree with them, and perhaps even respect them for their honesty and thoughtfulness. Do I ever attack him? The ad hominems are simply a function of a blog that welcomes people who are prone to thinking in caricatures of everyone whose ways of thinking they are personally unfamiliar with. I don't mind reciprocating.
As for your opinion on writing, I can't and won't pretend that reducing every idea to a soundbite is a sign of eloquence. It's a sign of insecurity over the ambiguity and complexity inherent in life. It scares the shit out of you to go beyond a black-and-white mindset and your gainsaying over Meth's bullshit proves it.
If I want thoughtful and interesting, I know where to find it. I'm here for different reasons.
When you decide to be consciously honest, I'm sure I'll find you infinitely more interesting. Until then, I know not to expect anything more from you than your usual and predictable vanities.
But as much as a hack as you are, this is the closest you've come to disclosing even a scintilla of honesty - whether you realized it or not. I certainly prefer it to the BS and would welcome it with open arms if you somehow managed to come by it intentionally and some never-before seen honesty.
But you're too small for that now, aren't you?
It's ok. Time waits for no one.
Ritmo, you make it about you. Your attacks on people are tiresome and predictable.
It's more than a bad idea, it's a deliberate provocation.
That might be true. But they have the right to make this "deliberate provocation," so long as they aren't breaking the law.
How would you draw the line legally in a way that stopped this project and wouldn't be used by, say, advocates of gay rights to stop a Baptist church?
No one reads posts that long.
It seems to be about me and Methadras and your piss-poor writing.
I like Methadras.
Your writing is piss-poor. Here's some advice: don't write in a piss-poor, boring, long-winded way when you are trying to defend your writing. The irony overloads the reader and nothing else matters.
Also, Dribbler, you seem to laboring under the illusion that I have just now come out with my belief that this mosque is tacky but morally fine with me.
This simply is not the case. I have been harping on this for days. If anything, my opinion has become more conservative as many of the conservatives here have made me see how tasteless the whole project is.
In the post above, I get the impression that Machos defends his short attention span and a rambling psychotic (whose posts are anything but short).
I'm not sure if it was as eloquent as his usual soundbites, and it didn't have pictures. But at least it didn't have very scary things like paragraphs, dependent clauses, and ideas too complex to be prone to demagoguery. That would be really, really bad!
For someone as dishonest as 6 Nachos, at least, that's the best we can expect. And really, should anyone expect anything more?
John Stodder -- Well, that's easy. Zone a radius around the World Trade Center area as free of all religious institutions.
But that's not exactly what the opponents of the mosque want, either.
The big question is - why are lefties so hot & bothered to support THIS mosque?
Your inability to accept a distinction between your tastes and your morals is so noted.
Seven Machos - we were attacked on 9/11 by Muslims. Why should there be a "religion free zone" around the WTC-area when Christians, Jews, Hindus didn't attack us? Enough with this "a pox on all their houses" mentality.
Your inability to accept a distinction between your tastes and your morals is so noted.
Curly, I said that:
1. There is nothing wrong with the mosque being there morally.
2. Putting a mosque there is tacky and tasteless.
Therefore, obviously, I have posed a difference between my own as well as any universal morals and taste.
You are just trying too hard, Dribbler. It's sad. I got an Instalanche on my obscure little vanity blog that would never have happened had you not tried in vain to insult me about it.
Just stop, dude. Stop flailing.
Alex -- I made no such argument. I was just responding to Stodder about how New York City might constitutionally prevent the mosque from being built.
I have not said that I would be for or against such a law.
Ritmo is known for his horrible taste. No wonder he supports the mosque.
I could care less about how much of the bubble here you can pinch off into your own self-contained universe. It's probably for the best, though. And I didn't know what an "Instalanche" was, but I do know that while you can spell "Glenn Reynolds" you did not know how to spell "Barack Obama".
7, you going to defend Alex's lie that I "support" a mosque?
I note that we have the same stance - other than for the part about how you think taste is somehow in any way salient to all this.
Thank you for alerting me to that spelling error, Dribbler.
I am not here to intervene between you and Alex.
Taste is vital to everything and most moral problems are actually merely matters of taste.
As I predicted. A defense of accuracy is apparently not part of your tastes or part of your morals.
But vanity is. Enjoy your celebrity status in the land of the sound-bite. Perhaps next you can join Ashton Kutcher in his bid to become the most followed person on Twitter.
I hope that wasn't too insulting.
Dribbler -- I don't have any idea what your position is because your writing is like a dense, dull swamp of words and because your posts are too long. Good writing is writing that is easily understood, Dribbler.
Even if I had some desire to defend you, which I don't, how could I defend when I don't know what it is I am defending?
That sounded more snide than I meant it to. If you really enjoy being cited by a guy who uploads as many single-sentence posts as the text messages a teenage girl sends to her friends, so be it. It's all good. I won't piss on your parade.
But I do think it would behoove you to have a higher opinion of accuracy. For the sake of a tasteful morality.
Even if I had some desire to defend you, which I don't, how could I defend when I don't know what it is I am defending?
It's ok. If worse came to worse I would get a lawyer for whom more than five sentences does not cause an aneurysm.
What gets me is that Althouse and the other libs still try to figure what Obama is about by listening to what he says. What he says means nothing. What is he doing and why is he doing it. It is his actions that matter, not what he says. I don't give a d*mn whether the words have meaning or not. I do care whether his actions have meaning or not because there is where the problems lie and there is where he is showing us what he really thinks and there is where we see just how bad a leader he is. Just like Clinton, words mean what he says they mean. It is his actions you have to watch.
I firmly believe that our intelligentsia lost their way in 2008 simply because they are so used to dealing with words that they equate his words with actions. Then when his actions don't match up they feel as if he was cheating them. If they had paid any attention to his actions in 2008, they would have seen what he really was and probably not have voted for him. They would have realized that he definitely was not ready for prime time.
If they are truly "agents of enemies of our country" in a national-security sense, then investigate them, prove your allegation that they are agents, and arrest them
And if [as in the case of Osama Bin Laden] we dont believe we have enough evidence to convict, let them go.
And see what happens next.
"hey Mohammed, you screwed up big time! We didn't have a case until you incinerated 3 million New Yorkers..."
Good writing is writing that is easily understood, Dribbler.
So what is to be done if you are writing for a crowd that does need Ritalin in order to concentrate, like at Althouse? I guess you are saying that because the commenters here hate detail, anyone who posts here should just avoid detail.
I guess I assumed that the audience here would not have a burning hatred for detail. I apologize for expecting better of them.
Ritmo: If worse came to worse I would get a lawyer for whom more than five sentences does not cause an aneurysm.
I think we'd all prefer you simply get an editor.
Its ironic that you consider your inability to form concise precise statements as a measure intellectual sophistication.
Saying that somebody needs Ritalin is a perfect example of over-the-top insult. It's not funny. It's silly.
You have some sort of inability to argue the substance of any issue without resorting to personal invective.
As Peter said, it's boring.
Machos,
Your first comment ever to me was an insult. It was veiled in a comment in which you pretended to be interested in an honest answer regarding sustainable farming, but I could tell the insult mattered more to you.
From that moment on I never took you seriously.
Look at your blog. Do you ever post anything where you consider both sides of an issue? Here's the answer: No. But I am being lectured on respecting others from someone who can only appreciate a single view of anything.
You said that good writing is writing that is easily understood. Missing in this little tidbit is the importance of audience. If you can't stomach an idea that is greater than five sentences in length, how am I supposed to respect you as a reader?
Life is not only not as simple as you wish it were, it's disrespectful to assume that everyone should be catered to as if they have to believe it is. As I said, I show respect by assuming someone can either comprehend, or learn to comprehend an idea more complex than five sentences allows. If you can't, it is you who are disrespecting the audience, not me.
The channeling of the borstal institution with the integrative power complex absolutely does not require that the cardinal initiative is ineradicable, has many disaccordant functions, and exponentially escalates the diathesis of deviative visible-speech data to a propinque peu de chose."
Keep it up, Ashton. As if your comment isn't over the top and silly.
Mine was completely serious. But because it wasn't scripted in the format of a television commercial, Machos can't respect it.
Interesting definition the little asshole has for respect. My comment regarding Ritalin and short attention spans stands and is vindicated by Machos himself.
He's about as genuine as a three-dollar bill.
I think we'd all prefer you simply get an editor.
Its ironic that you consider your inability to form concise precise statements as a measure intellectual sophistication.
I don't know about Fen, but my editor says that either a comma or the word "and" should come between "concise" and "precise". Better yet, one of those words should be deleted. They are so similar they are redundant.
Regarding the second single-sentence paragraph, Fen might want to learn the value of the preposition. In English, we use the word "of" to denote the genitive case.
And lastly, editors also have to check their facts. Fen spent a weeks-long temper tantrum insisting that I learned a Latin phrase from the TV show he saw. He was forced to finally drop the matter once I linked my use of it on an Althouse post from months back.
I haven't read all 191 or so comments that precede this one, and I'd guess that this comment is much in agreement with many above, but: Obama was tone-deaf on this one, and morally deaf in addition. I'm surprised and ashamed. He's not a SCOTUS asshole and should not act like one.
That's some great dribbling if you want to make friends and influence people and find common ground, Dribbler.
It's also pretty funny to see a guy who thinks that dribble and drivel are the same thing make pronouncements on grammar and usage.
Because it's all about the messenger to you, Ashton, and not the message.
I place full faith in Machos' inability to find common ground with either Americans or a billion Muslims on the mosque issue.
Ritmo's been reduced to grammer and spelling flames. We'll pause while you google the difference between precise [exact] and concise [brief]...
Perhaps I should have used smaller words for you. No one is attacking your grammer. We're attacking your style.
You put Glenn Greenwald to sleep.
And a good idea is a good idea regardless of who agrees with it. You mistake popularity with correctness. Not surprising.
And I suspect your verbosity is a cover for your weak arguments.
It's GRAMMAR YOU PINHEAD!!!
Does someone need to call in O'Reilly to reduce this to talking points for you?
How many doses of Ritalin are you missing for the week?
What message? No one knows what you think, Meadowlark. They just know that you are an asshole.
Incidentally, I have disagreed with Fen here and I think he still likes me. I still like him. I have found common ground with many of the left-liberals who post here.
It's really very easy to avoid being an asshole.
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