Althouse: At the Black-and-White Café...

February 16, 2013

At the Black-and-White Café...

... opposites attract.

24 comments:

Big Mike said...: I got a large charge out of this.; 2/16/13, 7:50 PM
pm317 said...: ... opposites attract.

I don't see any attraction..they are far apart and seeming in their own world.; 2/16/13, 7:56 PM
I Have Misplaced My Pants said...: I put off my chores for a while this afternoon to poke around on Google Earth looking at Mee-lee-wau-kay [which is Algonquin for 'the good land' at least to Wayne's World devotees like myself] neighborhoods. Goodness, but do you ever have wonderful trees up there.; 2/16/13, 8:43 PM
edutcher said...: Thank you, Madame, somehow the snowy ground with that beautiful blue sky above it seems to say, "Spring's a-comin'".

PS Who's the white dog?; 2/16/13, 8:46 PM
Anonymous said...: If these dog pictures make the world Safer for just one bikini model it will all have been worth it.; 2/16/13, 8:46 PM
pm317 said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 2/16/13, 8:54 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: @8:54... Sorry you decided to delete that... but I think its actually well said and very well thought out.

So, I'm quoting the whole thing... to be on the safe side.

I think the newly emerging conservative critique of O is the correct one. Namely, that we are all making a continuing mistake of trying to understand his competencies and achievements (good or ill) by the standards of fellow priority-driven executives. He is not an executive, and not a wonk. Rather he is a vain and fragile man who thrives by setting himself above the straw men of his rhetoric.

We viewed O as another Carter, or worse, and anticipated with relish his corresponding downfall. But Carter erred in that he actually tried to carry out his flawed agenda, and was eventually held to account. O has no intention of carrying out his agenda, and therefore will never be held to account because he will never achieve anything. We mistook this for incompetency and laughed at it, but the joke is on us--it is uber-competency from the standpoint of a hollow man who craves adulation above all else.

In this sense, we have more of a third world autocrat in the White House rather than a European plutocrat. What would Don Castro be without fifty years of tilting at the American windmill to justify his people's misery? What would have become of Arafat had he actually made peace with Israel? Not only would Palestine no longer have need of the pervy old terrorist, but he have been judged by his peers on the results of the deal, which is ultimately why he walked away from the Wye River talks even though (or rather, particularly because) they offered him most of what he demanded.

I suspect that Obama himself will find a way to put a shank into Obamacare before the end. Not because of economic reality, but because it is his nature. Better to see it go down and spend the rest of his life complaining to sympathetic audiences that it would have been great had only the racists not opposed him. Letting it stand risks hanging real world results hang around his neck, and the one thing he cannot bear is true self-reflection.

So we cannot beat Obama, not because he is better than we but because he refuses to take to the field. We can only outlast him. Fight a rearguard action in the other two branches of government and wait for Jan 2017.

Sorry for the length. I needed to get that out, and I certainly cannot say it at work.

ACCO; 2/16/13, 9:08 PM
traditionalguy said...: Coming around into the home stretch, it's Zeus by a nose!; 2/16/13, 10:16 PM
Fritz said...: Dogs are color blind; in more ways than one.; 2/16/13, 10:46 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: Someone I care deeply for; and always will love, and owe my life and my happiness and joy to, is now in Alabama near Gulf Shores. Perhaps unexpectedly alone.

I think, but my memory is foggy today.

Her friend whom she came to see is not well.

What is to do there, wind and all, for a nature-loving good-time-making best-of-all-worlds Packers fan who happens to disagree with me on politics to the point of mutual refusal (refrussian?) to talk about it so we all stay happy?; 2/16/13, 10:55 PM
kentuckyliz said...: Lem--astute. Resonates. Makes sense.; 2/16/13, 11:17 PM
Nichevo said...: NotquiteunBuckley, I feel a certain sympathy for you when you post, and anyone invoking WFSB has my regard: but you keep posting gibberish. English wasn't his first language either but he got really good at it. Is this a shtick that I am NOT getting?; 2/16/13, 11:33 PM
Anonymous said...: Oh good, you think it's gibberish too? I was worried I might be the only one not getting his meaning.; 2/16/13, 11:43 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: I really gave my best plea.

It was an honest one.; 2/17/13, 12:16 AM
Guildofcannonballs said...: Although that would have been an helluva exit, one more last thought for this about-to-end-day is that Shouting Thomas citing SRV is cool.

Cool that never ends.

I played SRV via jukebox for years.

I couldn't comment when the thread was prescient because I would, as I am now but much, much more so, a big damn ass.; 2/17/13, 12:30 AM
Guildofcannonballs said...: of the rodeo a sweetheart so-called must come from something because something has, indeed, and I will show you whether you feel positive emotions or not based on that, something.

Some.

Thing.

Per Carrey, James.; 2/17/13, 12:52 AM
Chip Ahoy said...: Zeus smells the patch then Abby smells the same patch, so what's in the patch? Mice, I bet. Or vole or mole or whatever it is the hawks get. Or something so mundane as dog wee. My own dogs went straight for anything rotten.; 2/17/13, 1:43 AM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Lem--astute. Resonates. Makes sense.

That's what I meant to say...
Thanks Kliz.; 2/17/13, 6:39 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Zeus smells the patch then Abby smells the same patch, so what's in the patch? Mice, I bet. Or vole or mole or whatever it is the hawks get. Or something so mundane as dog wee. My own dogs went straight for anything rotten."

That's not Abby, but just another dog Zeus met at the dog park.; 2/17/13, 6:46 AM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: That's not Abby...

The MeadeHouse Abby is more uptonty?; 2/17/13, 6:56 AM
Aridog said...: Lem quoting "ACCO"...

... we have more of a third world autocrat in the White House ...

I agree...and have been saying that for a couple of years now.

I thought the post was worthwhile and reflects the Obama inclination to do only those things to completion that aggrandizes him. In other words, he risks something only if he has deniability in hand or can simply just not report failures.

Think about it: On 11 September 2012 we've heard offically that nobody knew anything...not the President, not the head of the CIA, not the head of the Defense Department, not the Secretary of State, not the commander of AFRICOM, and not even the deputy White House security advisor who was running things North African.

Nobody. Got it? The STE phone was broke, or the old STU III phone was broke, the DOD and State global servers were all down, the firewood was wet so no smoke signals....waaaaggghhh! [Envision John Belushi pleading with Carrie Fisher in "Blues Brothers"].

Obama's administration is the epitome of organized denial.; 2/17/13, 7:54 AM
Rusty said...: Chip Ahoy said...
Zeus smells the patch then Abby smells the same patch, so what's in the patch? Mice, I bet. Or vole or mole or whatever it is the hawks get. Or something so mundane as dog wee. My own dogs went straight for anything rotten.

Our husky thinks she's a very good mouser. She is funny to watch. She pounces, all four feet in the air, head down and buries her nose in the grass, sniffing madly. Occasionally she gets a mouse. She plays with it for awhile and is always greatly surprise when the mouse no longer wants to play with her. She never eats them. They are temporary playmates until they die.; 2/17/13, 8:03 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: There's about the same amount of snow on the ground in Bavaria right now, and more dogs, and many, many, many more smokers. Blech.; 2/17/13, 9:15 AM
Menahem Globus said...: No offense to Zeus or the Abmeister but Sammies are the best dogs on Earth.; 2/17/13, 7:25 PM