Robert Stacy McCain should be pleased that Thers decided to attack me on the same day, because I wouldn't have rewarded his attack with a link if it wasn't funny to find myself in the "Clowns to the left of me/Jokers to the right" position.
McCain's post is titled "Ann Althouse: Rube." The word "rube" denotes a dumb rural character, but McCain uses it not for it's actual meaning, but because he's noticed there's a way that Glenn Reynolds uses it, and he seems to imagine that using Glenn's word will bring Glenn in on his team. Which is fine with me, because I've ducked down the alleyway, and Stacy is going to be fighting Thers, who might have "Eli" with him. I doubt if Glenn answers to the dogwhistle "rube," but I do think the fracas will be more amusing with Glenn there. (By the way, the expression "hey, rube" is traditionally "a rallying call, or a cry for help, used by carnies in a fight with outsiders." It's not a way of saying "I think you are a dummy from country.")
Anyway, Stacy's in a dither because, last Friday — predicting Obama's 2012 campaign strategy and referring to the emotionalism of the 2008 Obama campaign — I dropped a footnote to say that even though I voted for Obama, I wasn't caught up in the emotionalism. I observed it and critiqued it. I was in my high vantage point. I was sober and rational, but — confronted with the 2 major party candidates — I picked Obama. I have never apologized for that choice, because I still think McCain — John McCain — would have been worse, and the Republican Party would be in a far weaker spot right now if McCain were President. You can disagree with me, but don't portray me as another "Yes We Can" dreamer. My 2008 posts are all there in the archive. You can see how distanced I was from the Obama love cult.
But Robert Stacy McCain doesn't seem too familiar with the Althouse blog... or even the one post he purports to write about. He's bouncing off of some other blogger's post about me (in the style of Emily Mills who attacked me using material she got not from my blog but from some other blogger who purported to know what I'd written). (Stacy also nicks a photograph from my Flickr stream and uses it without complying with the Creative Commons license I was nice enough to provide.) Anyway, Stacy's point seems to be that I was wrong to vote for Obama. But my post wasn't even saying I made the correct choice, only that I chose based on sober reasoning, not emotionalism.
In any case, R.S. McCain doesn't say I should have voted for John McCain or that every rational person choosing between McCain and Obama would have picked McCain. In fact, sounding damned emotional, he says: "If you put a gun to my head and told me to vote for John McCain, I’d tell you to go ahead and pull the trigger." He calls McCain "a treacherous bastard." Okay, then, why wasn't it rational to vote for Obama? At the point of voting, either McCain or Obama was going to be President. Pick one. No, R.S. McCain voted for Bob Barr. Like that was rational!
At least McCain's commenters are critical. Donald Douglas is the first commenter, linking to his own post: "Ann Althouse a Rube? Nah, Robert Stacy McCain's Just Trolling for Traffic." He accuses McCain of liking to post my picture, and Douglas posts another picture of me. (Douglas does make that picture link back to the Flickr site, but he too fails to follow the Creative Commons license, because he doesn't include the photographer's name. Douglas chose a picture taken 30 years ago by my first husband. McCain chose a picture taken last year by my present-day husband.)
Now, let's swivel leftward and see what's going on with Thers. Thers has been attacking my blog for many years, and usually I ignore him. I don't know why he's so fixated on me. He didn't post a picture of me, so take that for what it's worth. He illustrates his post with a video clip called "Detachable Penis" from a band called King Missile, so apparently he's trying to waggle his wiener in my direction. Thers is writing to defend his confrere Eli, whom I took a shot at yesterday, because he said something stupid that everyone was attacking yesterday because it was on Memeorandum. I don't know who, exactly, detached Eli's penis, but I got my cut in, and I understand that it caused Thers sympathetic pain.
Thers quotes me saying something that exemplifies the way I speak when I'm observing the fray from a high vantage point: "People who are immersed in politics ought to take a good look at their own minds." His idea for a comeback is pretty prosaic. Do you even have to go over there and read it? You can guess: I don't follow my own advice. It's the "I know you are but what am I?" Pee-Wee Herman-type riposte that's supposed to answer a personal attack, which that quote of mine isn't. And Thers, of course, doesn't follow my advice either. He's not self-reflective. He attacks me:
All the evidence shows that Althouse has been long separated from her mind; if she originally removed it in order to give it a proper gawking, that is a perfectly laudable motive.A grisly image. A man who's musing about his detachable penis pictures a woman with her brain removed from her skull.
And let us be charitable!A reflexive line, by a man whose conscience perhaps nagged him. He knows that after the Tucson massacre, we weren't supposed to be using graphic metaphors like that. He could have edited that out, but writhing over Eli's detached penis, he had to lash out.
Perhaps there is a perfectly sound reason that as soon as her mind departed her skull it promptly escaped, never to be heard from again; and very likely all she had on hand to fill the resultant cranial void was Franzia and guano.He's straining so hard for comedy, and he can't decide whether to call me a drunk or a shithead. And what's with the Franzia? Didn't he get the memo about Paul Ryan? Yesterday was the day to attack right-wingers for drinking expensive wine.
Then he gets to my little joke on Eli: "I have no interest in these hysterical little men who obsess about whether their 'base' is getting served or stiffed." He rolls his eyes and says:
Althouse is watching consonants whirling through onion rings, yet once more.See? Go to those links. He's been reading my blog for a long time, and he remembers my old comic riffs about genitalia. Unlike Stacy McCain, he's familiar with the archive here, and he's been trying to to get the better of me in the genitalia humor department for years. But he can't. He says:
She’s got a dirty mind, don’t she, Yossarian? The dirtiest.So... a reference to "Catch-22"... disembodied. The book is funny. The detached reference? The sad waggling of a man who would be erudite, who's trying to show that he's smart and the woman is dumb. A literary reference. I typo'd "litterary" a Freudian slip, indicating that I think his writing is trash. He ought to pick that thing up.
I've got a "dirty mind"? Oh, okay. Thanks. I suppose Freud had a "dirty mind" too. Isn't it funny the way lefties are, at bottom, puritanical about sex? Sex is dirty? As Woody Allen famously said: "Only if it's done right." And if it's done left, it's done with a detachable penis. Put some ice on it. Maybe you can get somebody to sew it back on.
Quick, because here comes Robert "Stacy" McCain, fists a-flying!
Posts
184 comments:
I voted for Bob Barr too. So what? I'm of clear conscience right now.
This seems like a tempest in a tea pot over who has the real spout. Our perspectives should change as new knowledge and facts become available and sometimes Althouse does that.
Damned funny, Althouse.
Don't be a rube, Professor, you didn't have to vote for either of them. You simply could have skipped the choices for POTUS and entered votes for other races on your ballot. It really was that simple.
"You simply could have skipped the choices for POTUS and entered votes for other races on your ballot. It really was that simple."
Obviously true, but the question is why is that rational? And more precisely: Why is only that rational?
The answer to the more precise question is obvious: It's not.
"Don't be a rube, Professor..."
What definition of "rube" are you using? Don't be a misnomer-user.
Why is what I suggested, irrational.
The avant-garde version of the word rube.
Still, you do need to apologize to America for voting for Obama.
The way I see it you didn't do anything any different than what a lot of Republicans preached during the election. Obama might destroy the country but we would hopefully be able to pick up the pieces and rebuild over time.
McCain by contrast would have just contented himself with kowtowing to Democrats and destroying the GOP brand, thus leaving the country for the wolves to rip apart even worse, and with no way to stop them or to moderate their excesses.
The question isn't why did you vote against him, it's why did people like me vote for him?
When yelling "rape" isn't enough to get attention ... we're getting "choke hold." And, my new favorite, "my husband will puff out his chest."
First, of course, I'd need to remarry. I can't imagine such a man would be less than 80. So, how would the threat work, if he was bent over like a pretzel?
Stacy McCain wants business.
He wants to see more people coming to his blog.
I don't take him seriously.
And, the only time I go there is when Glenn Reynolds gives him a link. But I usually just fall off.
By the way, I find Stacy McCain's "charging language" offensive. Just causes me to say: Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Not a way to build an Internet blogging model, if you want my opinion.
I think the new "attack" mode ... used by democraps ... isn't on par with Nixon's old dirty tricks. Isn't even close.
This time what I see is full of farce. Like when I read Rupert Murdoch became super-wealthy in the newspaper industry ... because ... besides the deals ... He wasn't beyond "throwing a ferret down an innocent person's pants," just to get a story headlined. And, when he's caught out paying off police and politicians ... the red headed lady ran into the press room shouting: "REVERSE FERRET" ...
Now, part of the news stories always has me looking to see if the ferret is flying out of a pair of pants.
why is that rational?
Because there are no rational explanations for voting for Barack Hussein Obama and we told you this at the time. And you did so anyway. Which was irrational.
Look. Many of us, your readers, forgive you for voting for Obama. We still do. Just don't tell us you were being rational when you voted for Obama. You were not.
I love it when you go after the little lefty blogger critters. But you ought to do something about repeating the same refrain that your vote for Obama was somehow intellectually superior to those of other cult driven critters. The man has proved himself a dud and even incompetent and has not even come close to the expectations you had of him. If you marveled at his skills to 'trick' the public to vote for him, how did it translate to governing the country for which he never had any skills nor experience? It was a monumental leap you took that was not much different from the cult critters.
Well, I linked the pic, and you still nicked me on Creative Commons grounds. I can just imagine taking your law school exams!
And I know this is how you're spreading the link love, being clever about it at the same time. You're good, Ann! (And Thers is obsessed, if you didn't know.)
For the last time:
Nobody gives a fuck about the Creative Commons license.
As for the rest, you're being silly and slippery, as usual, thinking it's clever. It's not. It's the kind of shit you can't get away with in person, especially not in front of a crowd looking for an honest dialogue. (You'd be booed for such tactics.) You fucked up, and that's all there is to it - and there was nothing rational, or looking at it all from on high, about it.
So, this is Althouse as a removed observer.
Avoiding the fracas?
Sheesh, she must think her readers are stooooopid.
Ann's vote for Obama had real consequence unlike most of us. Wisconsin is a blue state that gets redder each election unlike say Michigan where I live. MI hasn't gone Rep since '88. If enough of her fellow rational minded independents switch from Obama he could lose WI's electoral votes which he'll dearly need in 2012 if current projections hold.
McCain by contrast would have just contented himself with kowtowing to Democrats and destroying the GOP brand, thus leaving the country for the wolves to rip apart even worse, and with no way to stop them or to moderate their excesses.
I love how everyone's now psychic about what McCain would've done or whatever. They can all see the non-existent future or past, assured it all played out, or would've played out, exactly as they now say, as though time, other people, circumstances, etc., would've held no role in any of it. It's just them and John McCain on tight script in their minds.
At least those of us who said Obama would suck have reality on our side.
Perhaps if you lost the "high vantage point" chatter and took your lumps like the rest of us you might get some more buy-in.
Re: Thers and RSM: Yawn.
Re: Obama vote, I disagree with the reasoning for doing so. You could say that McCain would've sucked and the Republican party would really be swirling down the drain. I agree with that.
But, I don't think we'd have had Obamacare or such impositions on the energy industry. I'm not foolish enough to think McCain would have abstained from taking some Mavericky-approaches to increased spending, though, as he loves to appear bipartisan. Would we still be suffering economically? Probably, but I think we'd be more adrift than plunging down the ravine. Military and foreign policy would've been similar except McCain wouldn't have won a Nobel for being everyone's vessel of projected hopes and dreams.
I suppose one could argue a McCain win would've kicked the can down the road and emboldened the Dems to enact the same soul-crushing policies in 2012 if/when they captured the POTUS.
I'm not sure a McCain win would've been a GOP deathblow as many have said. I think he would've sucked overall, but not as bad as the current bunch.
I blame both of you for this Obama mess. You voted for Obama in a state that was going to go for Obama anyway. Stacy McCain voted for Bob Barr in a state that was going for Obama anyway...
Hey, that means neither one of you really caused Obama to get elected. While Stacy's cousin John had some significant issues of his own, the truth is he would have been a better president than Barack Obama.
AA, I accept that your decision was rational and I accept the logic of it, but do you think you were actually able to vote AGAINST the first viable Black President? Would you be able tell us all that you did that?
I believe there is a mental calculation right near the surface of awareness that tells a lot of us that we can handle the embarrassment of being wrong, but looking like a racist is worse than getting caught on main street naked a noon.
A lot of conservatives have outgrown this after being called racist forever, but I think it's still a calculation that runs in every liberal. You need to stop caring to get past it, and for a liberal, caring is everything.
Right, but what do Thers and McCain think about hairless women? That'll be the true test of their character.
Peter
And both RSM and Ann Althouse knows that John McCain would have been better than Barack Obama as President.
If only to have folks like Andrew Sullivan flipping out that Sarah Palin was Vice President.
I'll break my Google posting embargo long enough to say...
Robert Stacy McCain is clearly trolling for hits here.
He's into the performance art of blogging. Sort of like you, only from a different angle.
In blog wars, one is usually fighting below their weight class, the other is a link whore.
This is where I do the FDR "a plague on both your houses" thing.
Yes, when we all saw the Joe the Plumber clip and the videos of Little Zero wanting $8 a gallon gas, Ann should have come to her senses and realized she, as so many others, were being scammed by the "sort of God".
That said, as I've noted before, people like Stacy McCain are the ones to blame for Zero. This business of, "I refused to choose the lesser of 2 evils so don't blame me, I voted for Bob Barr". McCain and the other 10 that did, along with the 7 million "Conservatives" who stayed home because they were willing to see the country reduced to the Weimar Republic rather than soil their delicate little patties voting for Junior McCain are the ones who put Little Zero in office.
Plenty of people were scammed and most should have had better sense, but the ones who knew what was coming, but did less than nothing are the ones I blame.
Would we have had Stimulus I and II, JuniorCare, GunRunner, kowtowing to every dictator in creation, the betrayal of our troops overseas, and Government Motors? Don't think so.
(I know we probably would have had amnesty, but Pelosi Galore and Dingy Harry would not have been allowed to write bills unchecked)
PS Don't be too hard on Donald Douglas, Ann. Even though he has the slowest blog in Creation, he did pay you a nice compliment.
To we conservatives the only rational reason to vote for Obama is to teach the repubs a lesson!
You are really reaching to say that the country would be worse off with McCain. It probably makes you feel better about your vote but there is no evidence I know of to support your statement. McCain was not the best we might have chosen in 2008 but he was light years ahead of Obama.
He had a history of voting against pork and excessive spending. He was wrong on immigration, probably due to a fifth column adviser. Everybody got snookered by Paulson on TARP but Obama sat there and pretended it was his idea. At least McCain was worried about it.
No, professor, you got taken in by the Obama package and it does no good to pretend McCain would have been worse.
oops, I meant wee!
I checked to see why you'd be ducking down the hallway (it can't be because of a fight, we know you) and I think I found it:
Instead of claiming she “made a rational choice,” she needs to begin asking herself why — and honestly telling readers how — she was so completely deluded as to believe that Obama would be successful,...
Yep, that's the kind of thing our Annie will duck out of, with a bad excuse attempting to make it look like someone else is unreasonable. Sigh.
And you, a law professor,...
Any decision can be rationalized, but that does not make it a rational decision. And rationalization is fun; look, here's Stacy having a ball with it: "No American should ever feel compelled to vote for a candidate they believe to be the lesser of two evils, and I didn’t." Of course they should! That's what every election involves (the greater evil wins or loses), so to pretend it's otherwise is to justify one's refusal to play the game.
The difficulty for folks who say "look, McCain would have done this that or the other" is that those predictions are impossible to prove because McCain lost. In essence, they're just guesses. By contrast, the winner has behaved exactly how his critics predicted. Nothing to be done about it. The more important point, which I think is what Stacy's getting at, isn't 2008, it's 2012. Recriminating about who did what and why is fun enough, but it's only helpful to the extent it's addressing this question: Now that we know how things played out after 2008, and the anti-Obama arguments have been proved, are the people who voted for Obama--whether it was rational or rationalized, rubes or not--going to see through the act in 2012?
Oddly enough, I once called the phone number supplied on the Absentee Ballot ... to ask if I had to vote in all categories. Or if I could, in fact, skip one. (I wanted to skip where a judge was running unopposed.)
I was told no one had ever asked that question, before. And, the answer to it was unknown.
You know, if you vote for TWO, from a list ... let's say for President. You DISQUALIFY YOUR CHOICE ON IT'S FACE.
Remember Florida?
In a sense a ballot is the same as a teacher's quiz sheet. Where your answer sheets are put through a mchine that counts them.
IF you pick two boxes ... Your answer is disqualied. Even if one of your picks was the correct answer.
Ballots of funny that way.
If a person fills out an absentee ballot, and does not PRINT and sign the envelope ... the ballot envelope isn't even opened. A disqualified ballot sits inside.
But, yes. Except for Althouse announcing that she picked Obama, rather than McCain. Back in 2008. She is showing you she went with the majority winnah.
I picked neither.
But then I used to hear my parents joking about Harold Stassen.
And, I knew for peace in families ... a lot of people will say they voted for one person. When they really voted for another. (Like a woman not wanting her husband to know she voted for JFK, because of his sex appeal. And, she knew the vote would frost her husband's manhood into question.) That's either funny. Or kind.
But if you want to rehash 2008, both Obama and McCain were terrible choices.
That's because politicians don't respect us! They don't think they have to offer up the best guy. Only the one "best connected."
Yet, I still vote. The act of voting is patriotic.
Here's another example of rationalization masquerading as being rational:
Lonetown said... "To we conservatives the only rational reason to vote for Obama is to teach the repubs a lesson!"
It sounds reasonable until you realize it's insane and counterproductive.
The Crack Emcee-
I love how everyone's now psychic about what McCain would've done or whatever.
You aren't required to be psychic to know what McCain would have done, all you had to do was listen to him or study his history in the Senate.
There was McCain-Feingold, his support of Cap And Trade, Comprehensive Immigration Border Reform, his constant harping about "reaching across the aisle to get things done for American people", which by the way is code for, "we'll let the Democrats get away with pretending to want twice as much as what they want then give them everything they actually do want."
If being able to see and hear what's going on right in front of you is psychic I guess you have a valid point, otherwise not so much.
People here are actually arguing over whether a vote for Chairman Zero was rational? Unreal, it's as if they (conservative Obama voters) listened to his words and never once considered his actions. That is the exact opposite of rational.
By the way I voted for McCain literally hoping the fool would die in office the minute he took the oath and Palin would take over. We all have our little rationalizations.
I agree with Ann's implied tenet that you have to vote for somebody. One of the candidates will hold positions closer to your own, no matter how big a moron you think he is.
Ann, I picture you in October '08 or so teetering like a one-legged tightrope walker. This way or that? Think, damn it! I think you fell the wrong way, because you overthought.
McCain might have been worse, but "might have been" can cover a lot of ground. I definitely didn't love the guy, but I'm pretty sure he would be closer to sanity on the debt ceiling, Libya, Gunwalker, and other issues beyond number.
Those who are holding out hope that AA will admit she screwed the pooch in '08 by voting for Obama, give it up. It won't happen. We could psychologize it, but we don't need to. It's simply because that's who she is, and that's how she bottom line self-identifies: a liberal and a Democrat. And she's said so over and over again. What makes AA different from just about all other liberals is she flirts with the right in a friendly and honest way. Why does she do this? I dunno. Maybe intellectual stimulation. That'd be my guess. But I'm also guessing in her heart of hearts she doesn't regret voting for Obama, and if she could do it all over again she'd do it again.
The Pagan Temple,
You aren't required to be psychic to know what McCain would have done, all you had to do was listen to him or study his history in the Senate.
Again - you're not taking whatever reality would've unfolded before him into consideration. It's like saying anybody could've predicted 9-11 when voting for Bush. Impossible. Mccain would've had advisors, Palin as VP, and a right-wing determined to get him in line.
To say you know anything of the kind is,...well, pagan talk.
I tripped over McCain's piece last night and knew this was coming, but I was surprised she waited this long to strike.
But, then revenge, dish, cold.
I do think Ann's been regretting her vote (I know, I'm going to get it...), but, like the rest of us, doesn't like to admit being wrong on something this momentous.
McCain carries a lot of weight in the Libertarian end of the blogosphere, so I see why she answers him. What I don't understand is why she cares what anyone at firedoglake says.
The word "rube" denotes a dumb rural character …
True. The “rural” is particularly galling, I think. Althouse is a sophisticated, well-educated urban type. “Dupe” isn’t quite right either, because it implies the subject was deceived by others. Is there a one-word noun for an intellectual who rationalizes themselves into a poor decision and subsequently continues with the self-deception long after the reality has become evident? Help her out, readers. I must warn you that “useful idiot” is not allowed because it’s 2 words.
I picked Obama … because I still think McCain … would have been worse, and the Republican Party would be in a far weaker spot right now if McCain were President.
Ha ha ha ha. Guffaw. Bending over in mirth.
But my post wasn't even saying I made the correct choice ..
What say you, readers? How could Stacy possibly have the brass balls to even imply that Althouse believes her vote for Obama was a good thing to do? After all, in that one post she never said anything like that. Naw, I’ve already anticipated your obvious response and must caution you that it is not allowed under Althouse Rules for Stacy to use, even in an indirect manner anything written by Althouse other than what was contained in that one specific post. Even if it’s true. Even if it’s patently obvious. Just don’t go there.
G Joubert,
What makes AA different from just about all other liberals is she flirts with the right in a friendly and honest way.
Friendly, yes. Honest? Not so much,...not about certain things anyway. She's slippery - which is better than most libs, but still lacking integrity.
I read FDL for pure entertainment and I just knew that when you mentioned Eli's post that more hilarity would ensure.
My obsevations of FDL have lead me to conculde that they are all so deeply brainwashed and utterly ruled by there emotions that the advice you give to take a step back is completely beyond their comprehension or inclination. It is so much easier to be angry and so much more comfortable to be deluded.
The popcorn is popping as I write this!
Ann's vote only matters to her and those who comment on it. Wisconsin was going to be a win for the commie chain smoking half-black racist Obama regardless of how any one blog writer voted.
WV: chini - yep, the chini like Obama, too - they are comrades.
Tyrone Slothrop said...
"I definitely didn't love the guy, but I'm pretty sure he would be closer to sanity on the debt ceiling, Libya, Gunwalker, and other issues beyond number."
I tend to think that any President would have acted on Libya, and that the only insanity on doing so was (1) waiting so long and (2) not seeking Congressional approval once the ball was rolling.
Many years ago, whilst serving my country in a far off land, I became acquainted with a mean bastard who was the First Sergeant of our Company, and who had the obnoxious habit of digging through the wet garbage each evening while passing the self-policing exit portion of the chow line of the mess hall. He would gather sloppy chunks of meat that had been discarded by some troop or other after eating supper.,
"Top" did this in order to have ammunition with which to provoke dog fights for his entertainment pleasure. He had a pet dog by the name of "Head," who looked a little like a bull terrier, but with a proportionally larger head, hence his name. As was true with every dog in Viet Nam, he had a little curly tail. And his legs were roughly the length of a basset hounds, so shorter than those of a bull terrier. His out of proper proportion egg-shaped head was approximately comparable to an ostrich egg, compared to what would have been a hen's egg normal. Needless to say, this made him a great fighter.
"Top" would typically dangle a piece of steak under the nose of some other dog, then under the snapping jaws of Head so that each would get a good solid sniff. He would then toss the meat in the dirt right between the two of them, and watch the face-off.
Head NEVER lost one of those confrontations, but they were always (at least momentarily) fast and ferocious.
Now, I didn't like Top. Still don't.
But Ann, I must say that I do admire your tactical skill in throwing this red meat post between the two in an effort to induce a good old fashioned dog fight.
I like it a lot, as a matter of fact. Son of a gun . . . this may be your finest post evahhhhh!
Heh!
Well, at least I knew in advance that Obama was evil and would destroy the country and that McCain was not much better.
I didn't need to try to fool myself that my logic was coldly rational. I was NOT taken in by Obama's cult of personality or McCain's waving of the patriotic war hero flag.
Both were incredibly flawed candidates.
I also knew that if we elected yet another Democrat-lite candidate like McCain we would just slowly continue our death spiral into socialism.
However, I didn't expect that Obama would run so fast and pell mell to the cliff. In retrospect, that was a good thing. We now see our peril chasing us over the cliff and objects in the mirror are much closer than they appear.
Ann trying to pretend that she knew this stuff before hand, when she was obviously taken in by the false persona of Obama as a 'steely willed whatever' is ludicrous.
Just admit it. You were swayed by emotion.
The Crack Emcee-
you're not taking whatever reality would've unfolded before him into consideration
That's not necessarily true. Of course there are always unforeseen circumstances, but even then you can gauge how a person is likely to act under certain scenarios by their past history. I don't recall anyone ever having a problem speculating how Gore would have handled 9/11, nor did I disagree with their assessment.
In McCain's case, what do we have when it comes to such an emergency? We have a man who said repeatedly Gitmo should be closed down, that water-boarding was "torture" and that it did not work under any circumstances, and who I have no doubt in any wartime scenario would have agreeably allowed Democrats to get away with hamstringing and politicizing any war effort he engaged in to the same extent Bush did. Only McCain would have probably been worse, being as he's so bipartisan and such.
The only good thing would have been that his "beloved friend" Ted Kennedy would have no longer been around to offer him "guidance", and "support".
I was two-thirds of the way through this post, and I realized, Althouse, that I didn't have a clue what the supposed kerfluffle is about.
I still don't.
Apparently, it's about nothing.
The only thing I do get out of these repeated posts is how dispassionate, rational, cool headed, etc. that you think you are, Althouse.
First, I don't think these characteristics are quite as admirable as you do.
Second, you aren't.
This is your vanity speaking.
Obama fooled a lot of people. He proved to be a disastrous choice, but only in pushing in one fell swoop what had been happening piecemeal for three generations.
I very much doubt the mendacious semi-socialist RINO McCain would have been worse, but he would have made some of the same stupid economic choices.
We are headed for a big fall, I fear, and Obama made it a sudden and grotesquely corrupt swan dive, over McCain's slow and less corrupt stumble into oblivion.
1) When did AA become a conservative? She takes conservative positions on some issues and attacks liberals/leftists - but that doesn't make her a conservative or a Republican.
2) McCain would have gotten us into 4 different war by now.
3) Under McCain the Democrats would now control Congress and have more seats then they did in 2009.
4) McCain was an economic idiot. He not only supported TARP and mortgage modifications, he opposed the Bush Tax cuts, supported Cap and Trade, and thought that if we could balance the budget by getting rid of earmarks.
5) All the Republicans that opposed Obama would have supported McCain and his "lets give the Democrats half-a-loaf" approach.
rc, if you're saying A-stan, Iraq, Yemen, and Somalia are different wars, you're wrong.
They're all campaigns in the War on Terror, not unlike New Guinea, the Aleutians, Burma, Italy, and Southern France in WWII. Dubya let the media and the Demos start this nonsense that A-stan and Iraq were separate "wars" and allowed them to get away with it.
Whether we'd be in Yemen and Somalia under Junior, we can all take our best guess, but I'd don't think we'd be in Libya, which is a separate conflict altogether, wasting $9 mil a day.
I read as much of Ther's piece as I could stand.
She's an hysterical fag hag. The fag hag line on Bachmann, as I understand it, is that Bachmann is a thought criminal because her husband offers therapy to gays who want to be straight.
For the fag hag left, anything short of smooching gays' asses and telling them they're saints marks one as a theocratic extremist.
The Robert Stacy guy isn't even interesting. What's the point of rehashing the last election?
Ms. Althouse, wonderful response but the tags are the best part.
Apparently, it's about nothing.
I'm thinking it's a slow news day. If this breaks 125 comments, then I'll be surprised.
As for the Barr vote business, the best piece of political advice I ever got was from my mother, the day before the 1968 Presidential election.
I happened to be in Wilmington at the time and she asked me, in a very matter-of-fact manner, if I had given any thought to who I was going to vote for in the first Presidential election in which I would cast a vote. I proudly announced to her that, yes I had and that I was going to write in Eugene McCarthy's name.
She looked at me, smiled and said:
"Oh . . . well that's nice. Of course, someone is going to win."
She then turned and walked back into the other room. Not another word was spoken between us about the election.
Damn!
Needless to say, I did not vote for Gene McCarthy the next day, and since then I have always been grateful that my mother had persuaded me not to throw away my first vote in a Presidential election.
The double-entendre blade of Althouse: beware its bite!
Wonderful stuff. Heh.
Whatever gets you through the night Ann. The fact is that it took a lot of balls to stand up and say the truth about Obama in 2008. And you didn't have it. You rolled and talked yourself into voting for an obviously dangerously incompetent candidate because you didn't have the nerve to face the truth. Now that Obama has turned out to be worse than even his worse critics imagined, you get no credit for stating the obvious now.
You will never live that vote down Ann. When it counted and it was hard, you and millions of other Americans who should have known better failed. Accept your piece of the blame for this disaster and stop lying to yourself and your readers.
rcocean said...
McCain would have gotten us into 4 different war by now.
Tell me, rc, how many wars are we presently in? I'd call bombing other countries as "war", wouldn't you?
The biggest reason why McCain would have been better than Obama is there would have been no healthcare reform. The Democrats would never have given a Republican President a piece of their dream. You can say that well maybe things will be better in the long run since Obama is destroying the Democratic Party. But that remains to be seen. And I am not sure voting for the worse candidate in hopes he destroys the other side is particularly noble or smart.
I don't know why he's so fixated on me
I cannot believe you are that naive.
The ONLY benefit to the country from voting for McCain was to prevent Obama from thinking that he had a mandate.
(Didn't work, but....)
What Ann is saying about the need for those too closely connected to politics is right.
Passionate personalities who care deeply about politics need to be able to control their emotions nearly as often as they unleash their passion.
Eli and those like him can be found across the political spectrum but their rants and musing do little to advance political debate and rarely lead to productive solutions.
OK, so Obama may or may not be worse than Bush. McCain may or may not have been worse than Obama.
What bearing does this thought experiment have on today's reality?
Obama and the Democrats, for lack of any other argument, have lately resorted to attempting to create an 'alternate history' to defend their polices and convince voters that things will be worse under future GOP leadership.
As just one example, they imagine a world where current social security and medicare recipients will lose benefits, yet there is nothing in the current GOP proposals that harm those currently in the system.
I am still years away from retirement and I am under no illusion that these programs will be around for me in their current form.
I see children growing up in a world where they will be burdened by debt. The debt of incurred by their grandparents and parents as well as the debt they may incur to pay for an education that may or may not reward them with a job that allows them to see a postitive return on that investment.
Given what we have seen of Keynesian economics, increased government regulation, and the uncertainty this has caused for the private sector, along with the exploding unfunded entitlements, I would be hard pressed to imagine an alternate history that would lead me to vote for a second term for Obama.
That is what we should be discussing.
Blog Wars: Althouse edition:
Who didn't see this coming?
Like with Rule 5, Stacy uses Blog Wars to drive traffic.
That said, his blog post has merit, just as Alhouse's blog post has merit.
I read the "Rube" post this morning. I really didn't think it warranted a full frontal counter-attack, but here we are.
Cutting to the chase:
-Althouse tosses a grenade, then ducks back into the foxhole and informs Insty that it is now his duty to defend the high ground while she pens notes of the ensuing battle.
-Althouse insults her readers by informing them of word definitions, and them meaning of said words do not mean what they mean unless they are defined what they mean by meaningful definitions.
-Althouse pulls Shiney Things out of her pocket, deflecting attention away from the genesis of the whole fiasco.
I'm running long, so I conclude:
Althouse offers her criticism of her readers to make them better.
Her readers ought do the same.
Both should be adault enough to take it, and all the kiss-asses should get a room.
If you voted for Bob Barr, you have crossed the Rube-icon into Looneyland and you can't come back. Actually, if you crossed the Rubicon you'd be in Gaul, and others would say, "You have the Gaul to say my choice was irrational?" Then you'd be forced to search the local geography for more puns to retort.
And I don't find the "McCain would have been worse" argument very convincing, for the simple fact that we have no damn idea what he would have done as President. It's a bit of fantasy to help make one's choice to vote for Obama seem more rational by imagining how little of a difference there would have been between the two presidencies. It's fair to speculate he would have continued TARP and the bailouts and the stimulus. But would he have spent 18 months shoving healthcare reform down our throats? Doubtful. That has been Obama's signature failure. Well, actually, his literal signature failure was auto-penning the Patriot Act. But I think most on the left agree it was Obama's signature failure in both the literal and metaphorical sense.
Crack Emcee:
Friendly, yes. Honest? Not so much,...not about certain things anyway. She's slippery - which is better than most libs, but still lacking integrity.
Sometimes a little slippery, yeah, I know what you mean. But I don't take it as a lack of integrity. I take it as a tell, showing that underneath it all at her core she isn't one of us. Honesty and integrity though? Her posts on Rush Limbaugh, for instance, are exceedingly fair, whereas dishonest liberals invariably go straight for the oxycontin snark, or his weight, or serial marriages, or whatever --anything but an honest treatment of what Limbaugh says. I give AA credit for that.
The interesting thing is watching what she says about the upcoming (2012) election. It's almost something akin to what we learned first year about common law and code pleading, the concept of the negative pregnant, what is not being said. Will she vote for Obama again? Depends on who's running I guess. I'd say the chances are at least 50/50 she'll vote for Obama again.
You fucked up, and that's all there is to it - and there was nothing rational, or looking at it all from on high, about it.
Crack - sometimes you're just an asshole. Althouse explained very valid reasons voting for Obama. Would it be a good thing if the GOP brand was destroyed right now because we did the emotional thing and elected McCain?
So, this is Althouse as a removed observer.
Avoiding the fracas?
Sheesh, she must think her readers are stooooopid.
pbj - yeah it's called cruel neutrality. Ever heard of it?
Voting for Obama in 2008 was stupid, ignorant and you should've known better, if you'd been paying any attention at all.
Which is why I read Jeff Goldstein instead.
The single biggest risk of McCain being elected was him dropping dead in 2010 and Sarah Palin would be President. That would be truly the end of the GOP. Thankfully Althouse helped save us from that possibility. Now the GOP is on the ascendancy again, and the Dem brand is in danger.
Look you don't like McCain-type candidates - WORK in the primary system to get someone better. Work you ass off if you care that much.
KenK said...
I voted for Bob Barr too. So what? I'm of clear conscience right now.
=================
That , or a vote for Mickey Mouse or similar evasion of ducking responsibility in making a choice between the two viable candidates...
is like Obama saying he had a clear conscience by voting "Present".
Or the Congress Rep who calls in sick and not voting on a critical vote to CYA so she doesn't alienate any special interest group.
A 3rd Party vote for someone with no shot is either a "I sent them a message! protest that hardly anyone takes the message seriously...
Or a path out for the wishy-washy.
Man up next time, KenK.
(And AllenS - a person who does not bother to vote does not gain a moral high ground over those that do show up to make their vote count.)
Hey look I voted for McCain because living in a blue state I just wanted to minimize Obama's margin of victory.
"What's the point of rehashing the last election?"
Word. I totally do not get the "Confess your sin, and beg my forgiveness!!!" school of thought here. You did what you thought best.
For what it's worth, I voted for the McCain et al., and I don't think things would be substantially better if they won. (Marginally better, perhaps.) The governing class, left and right, are committed to driving the country over a cliff. They just have different preferred launching points.
Big picture folks. We've got to save the country and the way to get there:
#1 - survive the Obama term
#2 - get the GOP back in the majority(House done, Senate in 2012)
#3 - get the Presidency back in 2013 to make sure we keep the majority on the SCOTUS.
#4 - make sure real debt reduction occurs
Victor David Hanson suggests that voting for Obama may have been caused by insanity.
Prof. Althouse: maybe you can cop a temporary insanity plea?
For an intelligent person as the proprietor of a blog like this and an academic who supposedly is interested ABOVE ALL in "truth for its own sake" imo the only ethical position for AA to take in 08 was to shriek to the rafters as a public service the true nature of that Charlatan and buffoon Obama--a man whose ideology was EASILY ascertained/verified from the public record then extant--and abstained from voting if, for no other reason, to maintain the intellectual integrity of her work product.
Alex said...
The single biggest risk of McCain being elected was him dropping dead in 2010 and Sarah Palin would be President.
No, that would have been the payoff. I saw more than a few yard signs re-cut to show Palin / McCain.
That would be truly the end of the GOP.
No, but it may well have been the end of the RINOs.
Victor David Hanson suggests that voting for Obama may have been caused by insanity.
So Hanson wants voting purity at all times no matter the consequence to the country. Republican first, American second. Maybe Hanson is the insane one. Frankly I've soured on him the last few years.
No, but it may well have been the end of the RINOs.
Pure insanity. I guess you're one of THOSE types.
If anyone remembers I was raging about the election result in '08 and ranting endlessly against Ann's vote. But I've matured and grown since then.
"Still, you do need to apologize to America for voting for Obama."
1- No one needs to apologize (in the sense of expressing sorrow or shame) for anything, not now, not nowhere, not ever.
2- apo logos means standing before someone (a posture of authority, honesty, courage and humility) to have a conversation based on reason (Logos) in the classical sense of the congruence of universal structure (Logos) with man's power of ratiocination. Apology has nothing to do with feeling sorry for doing or being something. The word for that is contrition.
3- I am sorry Althouse voted for the charlatan, that she did not read that, but my sorrow (and anger, which is my problem, not hers) places no demand on her. She does what she is and is what she does, as is the truth of each of us. We make our own fate and this brief moment we share one way or another is fleeting and ultimately trivial.
4- Apologizing for anything is pure deceit and pure powerlessness all in one (deceit, of course, is the recourse of the mean and powerless). If one feels one has done something wrong, one says one did wrong and takes the consequences, which are final. That's it. History only runs forward and with good practice it also runs upward.
5- Stacy was trolling for traffic with this. Every blogger trolls for traffic with every post. It is their reason for blogging. Only the silent are not trolling for traffic. However, Stacy also reflects in his post, which I read at the source yesterday, a powerful resentment, whether justified or not, of those who, like Althouse, self-justify post facto regarding a hurtful act, no matter how calmly and measured-ly taken. Calm and measured acts, rational decisions, can be fruits of delusion just as easily as raging and impulsive ones can be (and cannot be). (Surely somewhere in law this fact of life stands noted?) For this reason wisdom commends the fruits of actions, now the actions themselves, as the evidence of their help or harm. Stacy and less prominent persons, myself included, are saddened when great minds, to include their own if they could be so assessed, use their intellectual brilliance, verbal repertoire and literary license to hide from themselves their susceptibility to delusion in all matters and times, no matter their intentions or efforts to prevent. There is the real harm. For this reason wisdom also commends a constant attitude of the penitent. It is realistic.
It's not that you are a "dreamer" you are shirking your duty as a "law prof" by not Teaching. You should know that Neither Candidate was an eligible natural born Citizen. McCain was born in Panama, and needed USC 8 Sect. 1403 to make him a Citizen. Obama was born British, of a British subject father, and needed the 14 Amendment to make him a US Citizen.
Natural born Citizens need NO STATUTE (hence the term "natural", i.e, indigenous, naturally occuring) to make them US Citizens. They are born in the US of 2 US Citizen parents, what else would they be?
I guess that's why law grads know nothing nor care about the US Constitution.
Great line from David Mamet who was on Stossel last night:
“ … every Republican says they are Republican and every Democrat says they are an Independent.”
This is only generally true of course but it fits Althouse.
I would put a bit more bluntly: You are what you vote for.
tl;dr
short list of things I don't care about:
-who voted for whom, unless the election outcome hinged on a single vote;
-blog wars
If Ann hadn't voted for Obama, then Obamacare would not have passed. And if Obamacare had not passed, I would not have learned the trick to non-lumpy oatmeal, which is buried on page 1,632 of the Affordable Care Act: Rinse and drain the oats twice before boiling.
This nugget of brilliance is so invaluable, I'm compelled to make a YouTube parody of "Leave Britney Alone," and make it about Ann Althouse. "SHE'S A HUMAN BEING! LEAVE ALTHOUSE ALOOOOONE!"
I watched Cobb last night. Meh. It was okay but I do not care for blends of fiction and fact that try to sell you on the truth (without full disclosure of where the two lie).
But charging with fists (or spikes) raised is a very Scotch-Irish/Southern thing to do. And RSM is a son of the South.
Mick for Scotus, or at least Mick for being recruited as a law professor teaching ConLaw.
Mick for Scotus, or at least Mick for being recruited as a law professor teaching ConLaw.
Mick / Herman 2012 anyone?
wv: culati. Pilates in culottes? I googled "koolats" not knowing how to spell "culottes" and the third item down was an item from AtheistParents.org: "Jeans vs. Koolats?" I guess children's trousers are a big concern for non-believing parents. Makes sense. The whole spiritual dimension of their children's lives is null, so you've got to worry about something.
As to the merits-
NOT ME!
is worse than Yes We Can
-Althouse claims to have been above 'cult of personality', and weighed Obama on his merits. Yet, his only merit was his 'cult of personality' rhetoric.
-making a poor decision due to 'caught in the moment' emotionalism is easily forgiven. Arriving at the same decision after thoughtful calculation is what?
Mindful of being consistently reminded by the pundits that Obama was a law professor, it begs the question:
Is it a law thing?
Never overturn your own ruling--double down at all costs?
Quick, because here comes Robert "Stacy" McCain, fists a-flying!
And here is Althouse, claiming she was choked.
Althouse, McCain is no more a joker than you are a clown.
What strikes me most about this post is Althouse's arrogant conceit that she is above it all, looking down with cool intellectual detachment at the rest of us.
I've never joined other commenters who wanted Althouse to apologize for her vote, but her continuing strained defense of it is past ridiculous. The constitutional law professor voted for a candidate who lamented that the Constitution is outmoded and just gets in the way of what he wants to do (good thing, that -- can you imagine where we'd be if it didn't get in his way?) She voted for a known Marxist and admitted anti-white racist.
But that's OK, because she was in her "high vantage point". And two years afterward she's still pissing on us and telling us it's raining.
Most of us are not rubes -- at least not enough to believe this nonsense.
Fred4Pres said...
But charging with fists (or spikes) raised is a very Scotch-Irish/Southern thing to do. And RSM is a son of the South.
I thought the Scotch-Irish/Southerners learned the folly of such things at places like Antietam.
WV "noratini" The special shaken, not stirred my aunt liked.
But that's OK, because she was in her "high vantage point". And two years afterward she's still pissing on us and telling us it's raining.
Oh poor you. How has Althouse been pissing on you? Poor thing!
Quick, because here comes Robert "Stacy" McCain, fists a-flying!
*trips Stacey*
Dumbass.
When there's no explanation for wordiness:
hypergraphia: an overwhelming urge to write. It is not itself a disorder, but can be associated with temporal lobe changes in epilepsy and mania in the context of…
short list of things I don't care about: -who voted for whom
Excellent. Short list of things I find that are fun to do:
– pointing out hypocrisy and self-deception on influential blogs.
Let’s start a bunch of short lists.
If McCain would have been elected, what things would be reasonable to expect? (And remember that the person John McCain wanted as VP was liberal Democrat and "more wars for Israel!" Joe Lieberman - dissuaded from his fellow neocon rock star only by staff calling him insane and threatening mass resignations on the eve of the Convention)
1. McCain would have rammed through cap and trade in a "bipartisan" deal that favorite special interest groups inside the Beltway Republicans succor quite happy (Wall street, the corporatists and globalists) allying with his "good friend Algore"'s followers and raping the middle class dupes.
2. Utter cluelessness on the economy. McCain starts with his 2008 campaign plan to directly transfer 500 billion in American treasure to wealthy mansion owners and real estate speculators now "stuck with more mortgage that they can bear." - which collapses when it is revealed who benefits. McCain, chastened, then accepts the Goldman Sachs and Wall Street/union plan to rescue the economy.
3. GITMO promptly closed on grounds a War Hero like him or Kerry knows best.
4. NO Obamacare, as McCain would have been busy with his major war in Iran, oil at 200 a barrel and burning Saudi oil fields.
5. McCain ramming Amnesty for 12 million illegals through and the "family reunification plan" involving 30 million more - made far easier because he would have had solid Democrat majorities in the House and Senate to deal with be 2010.
6. Palin (detested by McCain and his staff by campaign's end) would have been assigned her Dan Quayle role, quit after 6 months on "more time with family grounds".
Palin would busy herself with Fox news million+ contract, best-selling books. And talk of her and other REligious Right characters launching the "America and Jesus Patriots" Party.
His "good friend Joe" is his bipartisan VP replacement nominee, easily passing Senate confirmation save one Dem vote and 12 Republican ones.
7. McCain nominates and gets his "dear friend" Olympia Snowe and another "dear friend" Lincoln Chaffee as Supreme Court justices amidst rumors of him considering Caroline Kennedy or defeated candidate Barack Obama in return for more 100s of billions for his huge new Iran War to Save Israel...He explains to the hush puppy munchers that Goddess Palin doesn't have a law degree. And he basically has to nominate who the Dems want, given their supermajorities.
The Pagan Temple,
Your name's really gone to your head:
In McCain's case, what do we have when it comes to such an emergency? We have a man who said repeatedly Gitmo should be closed down, that water-boarding was "torture" and that it did not work under any circumstances, and who I have no doubt in any wartime scenario would have agreeably allowed Democrats to get away with hamstringing and politicizing any war effort he engaged in to the same extent Bush did. Only McCain would have probably been worse, being as he's so bipartisan and such.
And with Bush we had a man who doesn't do nation-building. Will you please stop now? You're arguing for the impossible.
No one can know what never happened.
Short list of things I don’t care about:
The long lists of things folks dream up to excuse their lack of support for John McCain or their “reluctant” vote foe Obama.
Love the list concept. Thanks.
Mick - "I guess that's why law grads know nothing nor care about the US Constitution."
Or it could be that anyone with a formal education in constitutional law knows your fetish about the 1868 "accident of birth locale" did not wipe out the Founder's ideas. That citizenship by blood and ties to be loyal to only America was what "natural born" meant.
That is one of the big proplems with you Birther cranks. Armchair constitutional scholars that have as much insight and brains as the "missiler Truthers" that ignorantly think it possible that an entire US Navy battlegroup of 6500 men and woman knew of a Navy missile downing a TWA jet and all decided to keep it secret, not tell a soul.
Frankly, if there is stupidity, it is with those that think birth on US soil translates into someone that has fealty for America and is "natural born American". One Saudi terrorist we caught, fairly high up in Al Qaeda was found out to be a "natural born US citizen" and that Bushies were thinking of charging him with treason. His lawyer properly responded:
1. He was born to two Saudi students that hated America by the time he was born and finished studies. By sheer accident of circumstances.
2. He went back to KSA and was never told he was born in the USA, never learned English or a thing about America. Never was told he owed one iota of fealty or loyalty to America.
3. But since the Al Qaeda was a US citizen (and Mick's idea of a legal candidate to be President but probably unelectable) - his client while obviously not treasonous in any way WOULD claim all those juicy rights he got as a US citizen..
Bottom line? Don't mess with Ann!
Crack - you are clearly a fanatic with no grasp of practical realities of politics. You just know what you want and throw your tantrums when you don't get it. Grow the fuck up.
Election 2008 is OVER!
McCain didn't win.
The democraps were prepared to fight for Obama. And, voting for him, instead of McCain, throttled the political pig fest we would have seen ... If McCain inched closer.
He didn't.
END. OF. STORY!
Fun Freudian spelling error in my last comment: Foe = Obama
Freudian slips are fun. They're telling misspellings.
What's interesting is that I viewed this video on Friday-
"A progressive's epiphany"
A story of an intelligent, thoughtful, professional woman, that came to realize her mistaken vote for Obama, and her reason's why-
I linked it to IOTW for the benefit of the comments.
Now, here we are today..in a discussion of another thoughtful, professional woman, reflecting on her vote...
Alex,
We're at cross-purposes today, buddy. You're typing with one hand, and I know it. Now go find somebody else to play with, because I'm not biting.
Either that, or put a bigger worm on it.
Quick, because here comes Robert "Stacy" McCain, fists a-flying!
Not the most fearsome of images. And as Fen pointed out above, one that likely ends with The Lesser McCain flat on his face, sputtering.
R.S. McCain strikes me as a British ship. Or as a person who stays up at night conducting seances and harassing spirits over their votes for Grover Cleveland when James Blaine was obviously the better choice. Stupid ghosts.
As long as the NYTIMES and the liberal media get to somehow manage to pick our Republican presidential candidates, we republicans will have to hold our noses and vote for the least objectionable candidate which will of course be the Republican. I do agree with Althouse that John McCain probably would have been a lousy president and the liberal media would have created a lot of McCain hatred like they did with Bush.
God almighty. Why does Althouse have to go crazy when anyone says something about her she doesn't like? Can't bear to try to sort out all the offenses and various defenses she lines up. Think of all the people she has slammed about in this blog...NYT writers, men in shorts, whatever. Let it go. Get over yourself, AA.
RS McCain is probably kissing the ground Althouse is perched on right now, for all the notoriety he's going to get by insulting *upward*.
RSMcC. is the guy who was wrongly accused by Chas.Johnson from LGF, of being a racist. He isn't racist-he's just kooky. (IE: Voting Bob Barr.)
RSMcC. latched on to the Teabaggers when he believed they were relevant, and slobs his knob all over one of the head Teabaggers, Dana Loesch (Breitbart's protege.)
Political commentary has become a giant flea market, where everyone has something to sell. Shirts, blogs, online news, ad space, etc. etc. etc.
Thus, RSMcC insulting upward to involve Althouse, Reynolds, et al.
Ugh.
Now that we know how things played out after 2008, and the anti-Obama arguments have been proved, are the people who voted for Obama--whether it was rational or rationalized, rubes or not--going to see through the act in 2012?
On the evidence before us, it looks like the answer will be "no".
The problem with Ann’s defense is that it’s not just weak but – like 4th of July fireworks – spins off in all directions in an attempt to confuse. What’s disturbing about people like Ann is that they are teaching our kids, but don’t have the ability to be introspective. They act on emotion while believing they are acting logically.
How is it logical to believe that someone who runs the kind of “Seinfeld” campaign that Obama ran, who hung out with the kinds of people that he did, who created cult of personality, who wrote two books revealing himself as obsessed with race and radicalism is actually, in Ann’s words: a
“solid, normal person” with “steely nerve, ... intelligence, and ... groundedness.”
To take her at her word she literally believed that Obama the campaigner was not Obama the man:
"The entire plan to bring Obama into office depended on the glorification of the man, whose actual experience was so bizarrely limited that it took some nerve to claim to be ready. Magic was required. The cult grew up not as he held power and needed to respond to a crisis. The cult was the campaign to bring him into power. It depended on our projecting all sorts of hopes and dreams onto him, and he knew it.
Sure, she told herself, she knew the REAL Obama, the pragmatist who would surmount the political divide, heal our age-old racial wound, fix the country’s problems, and this is why she vote for him because she knew the Obama that lived in her heart:
And I like to think that, now that he's President, with his steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness, he'll do the job that must be done. The trickery is over."
By the way, “Rube” is the perfect term for someone from the wilds of Wisconsin who is gullible enough to buy the unicorn crap that Obama shoveled, and to this day thought that she made a smart decision.
Sadly, you're not down in the arena, sweating, bleeding, kicking sand. Instead, you chose to sit in the grandstand, above it all,sipping chilled chablis and criticizing the sword parries of the desperate combatants.....I myself have sufficient hot air to rise above not just the arena cliche but also above even the spectators in the stands. Here in my blimp I keep my eye on the voyeurs, I look down on you all and make the following observation: Why do women whether they're combatants, spectators, or cheerleaders always aim for the gonads? The most important thing about many men who participate in public life or criticism is not their reproductive capacity.....I can see many areas of life where a penis would be important, but in the public forum not so much. You frequently engage in concave weinerisms.
Election 2008 is OVER! McCain didn't win. The democraps were prepared to fight for Obama. And, voting for him, instead of McCain, throttled the political pig fest we would have seen ... If McCain inched closer. He didn't. END. OF. STORY!
Nothing to see here. Move along, folks.
… concave weinerisms …
Love it!
Love ya Ann, but on more than one occasion during the run-up to the election, you said you were enchanted by the idea of Obama's little girls romping around the White House--the triumph of sentimentality over rationality.
@ Prof Ann
I'm sure you thought the process you went through was rational. That doesn't make you unusual or praiseworthy - 99.9% of the voters who cast a vote for President in 2008 consider their vote "rational."
In the long run, what matters is the quality of their "rational" decisions.
As it turns out, the Obama voter who thought her mortgage & gas worries were over and the college professor who thought Obama smart & capable enough to be a good steward of the Presidency were W-R-O-N-G.
"I picked Obama. I have never apologized for that choice, because I still think McCain — John McCain — would have been worse, and the Republican Party would be in a far weaker spot right now if McCain were..."
So we're left to infer that you voted for a bucktoothed communist with nothing in his resume more substantial than organizing a street protest...for the republican party's sake?
Gee. Gutless much?
Chuck - you clearly have no vision. I wonder how you manage to drive.
A silly blog post with silly common taters.
Reap what you sow, Ann.
~
Cedarford said...
(And AllenS - a person who does not bother to vote does not gain a moral high ground over those that do show up to make their vote count.)
I have never claimed to have moral high ground, only to point out that you do not have to participate in an election where both candidates stink.
I've been leaning towards total contempt for the Republican and Democrat nominees, however.
AA:Rube. Definition:intellectual bumpkin regardless of her Law Prof status. She convinced herself Marxist Obama was not going to be President Obama because she needed to vote for Obama.
See DBQ @ 11:11
Pogo @ 11:19
John @ 11:50
High vantage point my ass.
"Great line from David Mamet who was on Stossel last night:' … every Republican says they are Republican and every Democrat says they are an Independent.' This is only generally true of course but it fits Althouse. I would put a bit more bluntly: You are what you vote for."
Yeah? What does that mean in my case? I voted for Gore in '00, Bush in '04, and Obama in '08. And I voted for Scott Walker in '10. Obviously, I'm an independent. Deal with it.
Althouse seems to be center-right on the issues. Free-market oriented, socially liberal, strong on national defense(but not stupid wars) and doesn't tolerate fools.
I do agree with Althouse that... the liberal media would have created a lot of McCain hatred like they did with Bush.
That says nothing, because that's the mode the media is in, regardless of the R nominee/president. I can't think of one running or not that won't be pilloried if elected.
Frankly, I'm thinking voting for Barry "rationally" is far more embarrassing than saying you got caught up in emotion.
Everyone gets emotional now and again and acts stupidly, but how anyone could rationally believe he would be a good president is simply mind-boggling.
@Moneyrunner You're just on a different wavelength. The Althouse blog is not your thing. It's not like other blogs. It's something I do for the intrinsic reward of writing, with the bonus of knowing a lot of people like to read it. I'm glad it's unsettling to a lot of people. It's not for everyone, and I really don't care what the people who don't like me would prefer to read. Go read whatever you want. But I do know what I am doing, and I have a particular sense of humor and flow of consciousness, and that's not going to change.
Mick said...
I guess that's why law grads know nothing nor care about the US Constitution.
Which explains the comment by the DNC-
There is no law that says the President must follow the Constitution.
Law professors, citing case law and dissenting opinions seen nodding in agreement; as a "teaching tool"
"Love ya Ann, but on more than one occasion during the run-up to the election, you said you were enchanted by the idea of Obama's little girls romping around the White House--the triumph of sentimentality over rationality."
No, it isn't. Because I didn't use it as a basis for my vote. There's nothing irrational about enjoying the charm of children.
The Crack Emcee-
You're arguing for the impossible.
You're putting words in my mouth, I never said it would be possible to know everything a person would do in every unforeseen occurrence, but you can make a pretty good judgement call as to what he is likely to do in a general sense. Otherwise, why bother to vote at all? Or hell why not vote for Dennis Kucinich he's likely to be another Genghis Kahn as commander-in-chief during a war for all we know.
"But I do know what I am doing, and I have a particular sense of humor and flow of consciousness, and that's not going to change."
Talk about hitting a nerve! And your voting record you cite is not "independent"...it's WHACKY...unprincipled "flow of consciousness"
"I picked Obama. I have never apologized for that choice, because I still think McCain — John McCain — would have been worse, and the Republican Party would be in a far weaker spot right now if McCain were..."
I picked up on that too. It’s an example of what I described as Ann’s defense being like 4th of July fireworks – spins off in all directions in an attempt to confuse.
I was not a big McCain fan; I disagreed with a number of his positions, but believed then and believe now that he was the lesser of two evils. Whatever his faults, I did not have to wonder about whose side he was on.
It’s fairly easy to claim, as Ann does that Obama has been good for the Republican Party. In fact, I agree. In a large part Obama was the inspiration for the Tea Party. But that is hindsight.
Let me repeat, because it can’t be repeated often enough what Ann claimed after Obama’s election.
“And I like to think that, now that he's President, with his steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness, he'll do the job that must be done. The trickery is over."
That’s not Ann foreseeing that Obama would preside over a trillion dollar stimulus that didn’t stimulate, or a double digit unemployment/underemployment rate, a “shovel-ready jobs” program that’s the subject of jokes by the man who promised them, $4/gallon gas, millions of people losing their homes, wars in Libya and Yemen, and a “smart diplomacy” that has turned allies into adversaries and made enemies contemptuous.
The implicatgion that a vote for Obama was designed to strengthen the Republican Party is a Red Herring and an insult to our intelligence.
Gee, Grackle, at @1:56 PM
There's really no need to "move along, nothing to see, here."
I just expressed my opinion.
Back in 2008 McCain lost to Obama 48% to 52%. That's after the results were tabulated and counted.
A majority of Americans in this contest, voted for Obama.
And, then I aded my opinion ... IF McCain had inched closer ... you would have seen a pig fest that would have made Bush/Gore 2000 LOOK LIKE A WALK IN THE PARK!
Obama was not hated when he was sworn in. Again, a majority of Americans sounded supportive to me.
I didn't vote for Obama.
But I didn't think he'd mess up as badly as he did. And, I felt my first misgivings when Obama, from the White House ... went "off message" (whatever that means) ...
And, said "Officer Crowley, in Cambridge, Acted Stupidly, when he arrested the harvahd scholar Gates. How could a harvahd scholar, I was led to believe, ever look like someone "breaking and entering?"
I actually thought then that the scholar Gates was a total schmuck.
My opinion of obama slid downhill ever since.
But I never ONCE felt a jab that I missed McCain "winning." The bastard didn't even come close!
And, I don't miss the putz, dubya, either.
"It’s fairly easy to claim, as Ann does that Obama has been good for the Republican Party. In fact, I agree. In a large part Obama was the inspiration for the Tea Party. But that is hindsight."
Y'know what's really great for the fire department's image? Arson. So supporting an arsonist is really throwing your support behind the fire department.
Edgy and clever is way cooler than honest. Ann understands this.
"No, it isn't. Because I didn't use it as a basis for my vote. There's nothing irrational about enjoying the charm of children."
Funny you should use that word, because a superficial quality like "charm" was Obama's sole qualification for the job. Who needs a steady income and a roof over their head when we have O's soaring rhetoric? In any event, I haven't seen many pics of Malia and Sasha "romping" at 1600 Penn Ave, so your wish went for naught.
One more point Ann, would you say that someone who makes a decision between two people and the person she chooses turns out to be a disaster, and moreover is exactly what many others were warning her about; has this person made a rational decision? In your estimation do the consequences of decisions reflect on the reasoning process that led to that decision? Or – in your world - is it always the case that other decisions, other paths, other courses were worse? Congratulations, under those circumstances you’re never wrong.
Two things:
1) Let it go, Pagan. If you're not bright enough to concede the obvious, I don't care to waste time with you.
2) As I read, I've been looking at different people's avatar photos, and Chuck's one of those white guys I think can probably kick my ass. Thick neck, Robert Mitchum eyes - yeah, I'd hate to face that sombitch.
He also doesn't think Ann's clever. Comes with the territory.
AllenS:
Sorry for the imprecise language, I meant 4 *additional* wars:
1) Invading Iran
2) Storming Tripoli with Marines (I don't consider bombing a war)
3) Sending Troops to Southern Sudan
4) A new cold war with Russia
Not to mention President McCain and his crazy Secretary of State Lindsey Grahame would also be planning a 5th war to "free" Venezuela.
Right, but what do Thers and McCain think about hairless women? That'll be the true test of their character.
@ Peter
I really do have to admire your tenacity.
:-D
"I picked Obama. I have never apologized for that choice, because I still think McCain — John McCain — would have been worse, and the Republican Party would be in a far weaker spot right now if McCain were..."
I agree on that concept, but please.... you did not think that WHEN you voted for Obama. I sincerely doubt your concern was for the GOP.
Be honest. You did not think about the fate of the Republican Party when you voted for Obama. Did you?
You can rationalize that now. But then???
"Chuck's one of those white guys I think can probably kick my ass."
I'd sooner kiss your cheek than kick your ass.(but, yes, I can beat the shit out of most people alive) I like you blog long time.
I think Ann is clever. Thing is, honest beats clever every time.
DBQ--
I did. I couldn't bring myself to cynically vote for Obama, but I knew what was coming when he won.
I agree re Peter: He is a man who is undeterred in his purpose.
"Had McCain been elected, he certainly would have done this"
When your logic must be expressed in the subjunctive mood in a pluperfect tense (or whatever the grammar nazis call it), it's pretty weak.
Even back in the past athe time of the election, when the Althouses and Cedarfords were busy speculating on what McCain would do, it was speculation. We must address the certainty of what McPalin would have meant for the country for the argument to have merit.
And it's never too late for Althouse to recalibrate her admiration for Obama.
tl;dr
You're a sucker, Althouse. None of your bitching changes that.
No leadership or executive or management experience as a community organizer, voting mostly present (when present) in the IL and US Senate, surrounding by Bill Ayers and "God damn America" types.... Tell us again why that (Obama) was a rational choice to be leader of the US. His "hope" became your fantasy.
Now we live with the nightmare.
You know, I think Prf. Althouse's vote for Obama was a poor choice. But I don't think that that opinion of mine is an excuse for rude and juvenile comments
The Crack Emcee said...
Chuck,
I'd sooner kiss your cheek than kick your ass.(but, yes, I can beat the shit out of most people alive) I like you blog long time.
Thanks, dawg - wasn't expecting that.
I think Ann is clever. Thing is, honest beats clever every time.
Agreed. I knew you was one of the good ones.
John said...
"Whatever gets you through the night Ann. The fact is that it took a lot of balls to stand up and say the truth about Obama in 2008. And you didn't have it. You rolled and talked yourself into voting for an obviously dangerously incompetent candidate because you didn't have the nerve to face the truth. Now that Obama has turned out to be worse than even his worse critics imagined, you get no credit for stating the obvious now.
You will never live that vote down Ann. When it counted and it was hard, you and millions of other Americans who should have known better failed. Accept your piece of the blame for this disaster and stop lying to yourself and your readers."
There's nothing new under the sun. Three years ago, I'm sure I remember carping of the same kind going the other way:
"Whatever gets you through the night Ann. The fact is that it took a lot of balls to stand up and say the truth about Bush in 2004. And you didn't have them. You rolled and talked yourself into voting for an obviously dangerously incompetent candidate because you didn't have the nerve to face the truth. Now that Bush has turned out to be worse than even his worse critics imagined, you get no credit for stating the obvious now. You will never live that vote down Ann. When it counted and it was hard, you and millions of other Americans who should have known better failed. Accept your piece of the blame for this disaster and stop lying to yourself and your readers."
*shrug*
I consider myself a friend of Robert Stacy McCain, but the man is a blogwhore (pronounced blog-hoou-er). He can't help himself.
Simon,
There's nothing new under the sun. Three years ago, I'm sure I remember carping of the same kind going the other way,..
Yeah, well, there's just one little problem with that:
I guarantee you, in three years, there will NOT be signs popping up with Obama's face saying "Miss Me Yet?"
Ann Althouse said...
"Love ya Ann, but on more than one occasion during the run-up to the election, you said you were enchanted by the idea of Obama's little girls romping around the White House--the triumph of sentimentality over rationality."
No, it isn't. Because I didn't use it as a basis for my vote. There's nothing irrational about enjoying the charm of children.
Okay, I definitely voted for McCain and not Obama, but the thought of the depravities that Meghan would have engaged in while at the White House makes me ill. And if RSM is a bit of a blogwhore, Meghan McCain would have made Patty Reagan and Ronnie Reagan, Jr. (combined) seem like Julie and Trish Nixon in comparison. Yes, Meghan McCain would raised to a new level first family children out of control and in need of an intervention. The Secret Service might have had to put her down--or at least sedate her.
If the question was kids only, I prefer Malia and Sasha hands down over the McCain brood...although I would not mind one day seeing a new crop of kids there. With interesting names of course...
Fred4Prez,
Unfortunately, Malia and Sasha are probably the only black kids doing O.K. financially as a result of Ann's *rational* choice.
She thought it through, damn it, she really thought it through,...
McCain was looking for extra traffic to his website?
First there was the "instalaunch". Now that Althouse is being sought after by bloggers to send them extra views, we will start to hear about the "Ann-a-lanche" or some other ideration. Is there already one that is commonly used?
I generally don't care very much care for flame wars between bloggers. The fact that all three of you (five of you? seven million of you?) even have blogs means that you have particular points of view. Someone else thinks that your point of view is horseshit or worse. Should you care? If you posted something about killing baby seals being wrong, there'd probably be someone "coming at you with fists raised."
It was moronic to vote for Obama -- ther is no rational basis that one could have. It was patently obvious how defective he was and what a disaster he would be for the country and all us real people. I was literally sick to my stomach for two days after the election. You fell for something and that makes you a rube. You will stay a rube if you don't admit to yourself that you were suckered. That is what a rube is, someone easily suckered, I.e. you!
McCain had flaws but we wouldn't have Obama Care and massive deficits. Your suggestion that the GOP wouldn't be in as good as a position is silly -- you can't know that, and in any case the country would be better off. Silly rube. So, be our guest, don't learn anything by getting suckered and get suckered again.
Want to buy a bridge real cheap, sucks?
Simon: While I appreciate the gesture, I'm afraid if I shrugged at each Althousian inconsistency, I'd be hospitalized for shoulder spasms.
Being an opera lover, the best you could say about Althouse is in this famous Verdi aria, the opening words of which translate something like,
This woman is flighty
Like a feather in the wind,
She changes in voice — and in thought.
Always sweet,
Pretty face,
In tears or in laughter, — she is a liar.
That may be a bit strong, as it looks like Althouse lies mostly to herself.
Meant "sucka"
The interesting thing about The Professors pick in 2008 was that it accomplished 3 important goals:
The GOP RINOs were exposed as useless fluff.
The first black President deal shot its wad. We can ignore the siren song of MLK's guilt trip for the first time in 45 years.
The underground network and zeal of the Green/Marxist's organized plans for eliminating 80% of the world's population and stealing their stuff has become obvious with every destructive act after destructive act of the Obama-Soros hit team.
Thanks for the lesson, Professor.
Now, part of the news stories always has me looking to see if the ferret is flying out of a pair of pants.
Best Carol_Herman comment...evah!
But, traditionalguy, was the lesson worth the tuition?
Those student loans are damned hard to pay off.
There's a whole lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth here over the voting decisions of a professor that occurred almost three years ago. I'll bet the wailing and gnashing of teeth will be even more pronounced and entertaining if and when Althouse declares that she will vote for Obama for re-election. That's gonna be awesome.
Could be, somefeller. As our opera composer had it, "la donna è mobile." "The lady is fickle."
But as to wailing & gnashing, I'm more into head-scratching and shrugging, as befits the object of such exercises.
somefeller,
I'll bet the wailing and gnashing of teeth will be even more pronounced and entertaining if and when Althouse declares that she will vote for Obama for re-election. That's gonna be awesome.
Agreed, but not as good as her rationalizations. What will they be? We have to allow him to "finish the job"? (Also known as "finishing us off")? The Republican (whoever it is) was too erratic/far to the right/unstable/unwilling to compromise/whatever?
What will it be next time?
A recently overheard convo at MeadeHouse...
Althouse: "Meade, I'm afraid I've done it again."
Meade: "For Petes sake! I'll have to harvest the garlic to make room for two more!"
Meade exits, grumbling soto voce: "...they never learn. Hello! Law Professor!"
Althouse returns to her wheelhouse and resumes sharpening pikes.
What will it be next time?
The answer will come in its duly appointed time. No earlier, no later. So just chill...'till the next episode.
R. S. McCain shoots from the hip. For whatever reason, I have him on my blog favorites list, but I rarely can stand to read him.
However, I was shocked the other day to find that McCain has picked sides in the blog war going on between Pam Gellers at Atlas Shrugs and the Baron and Dymphna over at GoV.
With the same intensity that Geller waged war with Charles Johnson at LGF, she overreacted to Baron Bodissey's vigorous assertion that the English Defence League was not neo-fascist as Atlas Shrugs claimed that they were.
Into the controversy steps Stacy McCain to say that he is with Geller in this dispute, despite the admission: "I come to this controversy without any knowledge of the backstory that caused Baron Bodissey to address an open letter to Pamela . . ."
I can tell you that RSM has the stubbornness of a bulldog and the memory of an elephant when it comes to continuing blogger fights as his continuing exchanges with CJ at LGF would indicate. Why ... Charles actually kicked him off of LGF, which puts The Other McCain in the same category as me and probably 5,000 other "cons."
The irony in all of this is that the Baron was kicked off LGF long before McCain and Geller and, even more confusing, Geller and GoV have been the leading blogs writing for in defense of and for the freedom of Geert Wilders, who was being prosecuted by the Dutch for "crimes" against Muslims.
WHEN Althouse declares that she will vote for Obama for re-election.
FIFY.
Cedarford said...
"Mick - "I guess that's why law grads know nothing nor care about the US Constitution."
Or it could be that anyone with a formal education in constitutional law knows your fetish about the 1868 "accident of birth locale" did not wipe out the Founder's ideas. That citizenship by blood and ties to be loyal to only America was what "natural born" meant.
That is one of the big proplems with you Birther cranks. Armchair constitutional scholars that have as much insight and brains as the "missiler Truthers" that ignorantly think it possible that an entire US Navy battlegroup of 6500 men and woman knew of a Navy missile downing a TWA jet and all decided to keep it secret, not tell a soul.
Frankly, if there is stupidity, it is with those that think birth on US soil translates into someone that has fealty for America and is "natural born American". One Saudi terrorist we caught, fairly high up in Al Qaeda was found out to be a "natural born US citizen" and that Bushies were thinking of charging him with treason. His lawyer properly responded:
1. He was born to two Saudi students that hated America by the time he was born and finished studies. By sheer accident of circumstances.
2. He went back to KSA and was never told he was born in the USA, never learned English or a thing about America. Never was told he owed one iota of fealty or loyalty to America.
3. But since the Al Qaeda was a US citizen (and Mick's idea of a legal candidate to be President but probably unelectable) - his client while obviously not treasonous in any way WOULD claim all those juicy rights he got as a US citizen.."
It is hard to figure by that screed whether you agree or not. I you are speaking of Hamdi, who SCOTUS said was "Born an American Citizen in Louisiana", then that whole case proves my point. He was born to 2 Saudi students on US Student Visas, and because of flawed stare decis of Wong Kim Ark was judged to be an "American Citizen" (with no citation). They never said he was a natural born Citizen, and should not have even said he was a Citizen, since Wong Kim Ark was held to be an American Citizen since he was born to domiciled Resident Aliens. Hamdi's parents were not legal residents, only here on Student Visas, like Obama Sr.
Many would say that because he was "born a US Citizen" that makes him a natural born Citizen, which is nonsense, since there are many decared "Citizens at birth" in USC 8 S. 1401 that are clearly not eligible natural born Citizens, like those born abroad of 1 US Citizen, and 1 Alien.
Clearly Hamdi just proves my point, that simple birth in America in no way confers the Attachment and Allegiance to country that is inherant in natural born Citizen, born in the US to 2 US Citizens. Some idiots would say that a man like Hamdi is eligible for POTUS after 14 years residence in the US---- Nonsense.
Further Hamdi should never have been given due process rights, since simple birth on US soil to aliens fails the Citizenship clause of the 14Amendment, which requires that he be "subject to the jurisdiction" of the US, and he clearly was not.
rcocean said...
(I don't consider bombing a war)
Obviously, you've never been on the receiving end of incoming.
You think McCain would have started more wars, but that is only a guess on your part.
I voted for Gore in '00, Bush in '04, and Obama in '08. And I voted for Scott Walker in '10. Obviously, I'm an independent. Deal with it.
Hmm … OK, I’m going to deal with it and put aside my snark stick for awhile and get serious. Given your voting record I will readily concede that you have truly been an independent.
So I humbly apologize for mischaracterizing you on that issue. Your point is well taken. I was wrong. I see you better now, I think. I look forward to learning more.
But I still believe the Mamet quote is apt in many cases(not yours). Lefties often seem to seek to present themselves as impartial, independent and politically open-minded yet I’ve found the opposite to be generally true. In my experience conservatives are much more open in regards to their affiliations, intentions and what they allow in the way of dissention. Not all, but generally.
And on other issues also I’m not yet ready to concede, such as the idea that Obama being installed in the Whitehouse is somehow better for the GOP. I feel I’m open to a superior argument on any issue but that one strikes me as particularly tortuous. What about what’s good for the nation’s future? The larger view? We little folk count on people like you to comprehend and define the big picture. To paraphrase someone else, nuance is my cousin’s middle name, not mine, but it seems to me that it’s always better to win than to lose.
Speaking of winning and losing, I don’t see Obama losing the ’12 election. Despite the internet, despite Fox, despite talk radio, the cold, hard fact is that despite some failures, on the whole the MSM controls public opinion. I believe he’ll then use executive fiat to advance the Progressive agenda even further – stuff he doesn’t have the balls to do before November, 2012. Once Obamacare becomes embedded, as it will if he’s re-elected, and creates a public expectation of free healthcare from the government, the game is all but over. Other parts of the economy will inexorably follow once that tipping point is achieved. I fervently hope I’m wrong but I’m afraid that is the reality. Any crisis, economic or otherwise, will be ruthlessly used to consolidate and enlarge power – indeed already has been.
This all started with his election. A huge mistake for America. We were doing fairly well until then, it seems to me. A stumble here, a fall there, a few scrapes on the collective American psyche but all in all still the America in the history books written before the 60s, the America of the Durants, still optimistic and strong, the most benign great power the world has ever seen. His re-election in ’12 will seal the deal for irreversible decadence, I’m afraid, but I will of course continue to yammer on in my foolish way. Maybe I’ll get lucky and occasionally hit the mark.
Perhaps you started this blog as a lark simply to have some fun and sharpen your writing skills but you must suspect that it’s become more than that. You must be devoting a goodly amount of time to this creation of yours. Your blog is influential, maybe even more than you know. The comment you attract is of a high order; the repartee is lively and witty. You have standing and a certain prestige. You and your kind, the academics, are supposed to be the caretakers, the inculcators of culture, the solvers of the puzzle, the leaders of the sweet song.
So I will appeal now to your sense of responsibility. Use your talent to fight the good fight - for the sake of self preservation if nothing else. The Obamalanders of the frighteningly near future will not look kindly on such as you. Or me. Or many of those who comment here. They seek to control the internet, a constant irritant to their complacency. Independent, uncontrolled media disturbs them. And if you believe academia to be somewhat stifling and politically correct now imagine it 5 or 10 years from now if Obama gains a second term. Is that what you want for the future of your profession? Become his enemy for he is certainly yours.
Carol Herman said: Gee, Grackle, at @1:56 PM There's really no need to "move along, nothing to see, here." I just expressed my opinion.
Carol Herman, I thought you were telling me(and others) to shut up. I will never shut up. Was I wrong?
God, you really are insufferable when you start up this "cruel neutrality" bullshit. Arrogant pseudo-intellectualism isn't a particularly lovable trait even when it's honest, but it's abhorrent when it's used to cover up rampant class bigotry. You were *not* being rational in '08, you managed to both petulantly rebel against Daddy *and* indulge in "not our kind, dear" at the same bloody time.
And no matter how you kick and stomp your pointy little feet, "rube" means exactly what they use it to mean. Most of the world doesn't speak carny, and thank the hypothetical for that!
But whatever, I guess your status anxiety requires the occasional Political Spock cosplay to prove you're not a snob or an emotional pre-feminist stereotype.
If you lecture as well as you write, your students are very lucky. Subtle and well-argued, just like I'd expect from a law prof.
Robin wrote You know, I think Prf. Althouse's vote for Obama was a poor choice. But I don't think that that opinion of mine is an excuse for rude and juvenile comments
Wait, we're supposed to have excuses to make rude and juvenille comments?
Wouldn't it be a change?
A hopeful change, even!
RSM is a neo-confederate dirtbag. What's the appeal, Prof. Reynolds?
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