That phrase, according to political scientists who study conspiracy theories, is characteristic of politicians who seek to exploit the psychology of suspicion and cynicism to win votes.Yeah, there's something going on there with Trump saying there's something going on there. I'm prompted to try to piece together what scary, sinister plans Trump may be conspiring to conceal. So many layers!
The idea that people in positions of power or influence are conspiring to conceal sinister truths from the public can be inherently appealing, because it helps make sense of tragedy and satisfies the human need for certainty and order. Yet politicians hoping to take advantage of these tendencies must rely on vague and suggestive statements, since any specific accusation could be easily disproved.
"He's leaving it to the audience to piece together what he's saying," said Joseph Uscinski, a political scientist at the University of Miami, in a recent interview.... Uscinski noted that Trump has used the tactic throughout his campaign to gain support by appealing to voters' fears and cynicism. "The one thing that’s remained absolutely consistent is his penchant for conspiracy theorizing," Uscinski said.
Meanwhile: "Trump revokes [Washington] Post press credentials, calling the paper ‘dishonest’ and ‘phony’" — writes Paul Farhi at — of all places — WaPo.
“Based on the incredibly inaccurate coverage and reporting of the record setting Trump campaign, we are hereby revoking the press credentials of the phony and dishonest Washington Post,” read a post on Trump’s Facebook page.What was the original headline?
Another post said, “I am no fan of President Obama, but to show you how dishonest the phony Washington Post is, they wrote, ‘Donald Trump suggests President Obama was involved with Orlando shooting’ as their headline. Sad!”
Trump was referring to an article that posted online Monday morning that was headlined, “Donald Trump seems to connect President Obama to Orlando shooting.” The article was the most-read on The Post’s website at the time. Its original headline, which Trump accurately cited in his Facebook post, was changed about 90 minutes later. The newspaper changed it on its own, before Trump’s complaint.
ADDED: The original headline — included in the blocked quote — was "Donald Trump suggests President Obama was involved with Orlando shooting." Sorry for leaving that question at the end of this post. I had meant to delete it. What a crazy, embarrassing headline! But "The newspaper changed it on its own, before Trump’s complaint." There's some low-level self-praise!
IN THE COMMENTS: rhhardin — known for his gnomic comments — gets off a string of gems:
1. "What was the original headline?"/More Mush from the Wimp.
2. Something's happening here./Everybody look what's going down.Here's "The Unicorn in the Garden," for understanding #6.
3. Suspicion is looking up, etymologically speaking. I don't know if a toga was involved.
4. Weasel words have a musky smell.
5. Terrorists don't hate. They're fine upstanding participants in a stable culture. Just keep the culture in their own country.
6. The unicorn ate it gravely./Finest line in Thurber.
Posts
174 comments:
I have no problem with him pulling the credentials. He has no obligation to keep Democrats following him.
As far as his wording, what is he doing appreciably differently than other pols have done for years? Hillary has tortured language for decades now to lie.
The one thing that’s remained absolutely consistent is his penchant for conspiracy theorizing," Uscinski said.
Wow...I wonder if anyone else in the presidential race has a penchant for conspiracy theorizing? Maybe somebody concerned with a vast right wing conspiracy?
Nah..I'm sure if there was, this guy would have mentioned it in the interests of fairness and objectivity.
The WaPo has always been dishonest. Nothing new here. Their great claim to fame-Watergate was no feat of investigative journalism, it was simply a senior FBI agent spoon feeding the reporters. No great job of sleuthing on their part.
"You have the right to speak, you don't have the right to expect a platform."
"You have the right to speak, you don't have the right to have me listen to you."
"Speak, but remember: actions have consequences."
Sleazy Washington Post got what was coming to it, and what it's supporters have been sanctimoniously claiming is the issue of free speech. Stuff them. They have as much 'right' to a press pass as I do - or is the next argument from the left that if you're a billionaire's personal megaphone, you actually have more 1st amendment rights than the rest of us.
The Trump train continues onward through the long night, but fear not: it is always darkest before the Don.
The idea that people in positions of power or influence are conspiring to conceal sinister truths from the public can be inherently appealing, because it....
...so often happens to be true.
FIFY.
"Donald Trump Suggests President Obama Was Involved With Orlando Shooting” was the original headline. Trump said nothing of the sort. This is very characteristic of the WAPO's coverage of Trump.
Here's my comment from the WSJ: "I glance at the WAPO web page daily. Their bias against Trump is incredible, as is the inaccuracy of their headlines. They have that right to do as they wish, but Trump need not make it any easier for them. In the First Amendment along with free speech we have "freedom of assembly" which the courts have interpreted as " freedom of association". Trump chooses not to associate with the WAPO. That is his right."
"Trump was referring to an article that posted online Monday morning that was headlined, “Donald Trump seems to connect President Obama to Orlando shooting.” The article was the most-read on The Post’s website at the time. Its original headline, which Trump accurately cited in his Facebook post, was changed about 90 minutes later."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/trump-revokes-post-press-credentials-calling-the-paper-dishonest-and-phony/2016/06/13/f9a61a72-31aa-11e6-95c0-2a6873031302_story.html
It's clear Trump is suggesting Obama is a Muslim, or at least Muslim sympathizer, and from there it's a short step to terror sympathizer.
The (revised?) headline: “Donald Trump seems to connect President Obama to Orlando shooting.” is over the top, but not outright dishonest. Obama refuses to call things by their right names and Trump is calling attention to that and is inviting us to draw the worst conclusions we can think of. I just think Obama's a coward and a bit of a fool, but others think far worse thoughts about him.
Trump uses whatever tools he has to win. This is true of Hillary as well as pretty much any politician who has become a major parties presumptive nominee for president.
People often forget, Hillary famously cited a "vast right wing conspiracy".
On MSNBC's Morning Rino today, they spent an extensive amount of time dealing with Trump's comments. I thought their heads were going to explode. All of them. It was hilarious to watch.
Trump's growing on me.
I'm not sure I agree with Trump's solution to the terrorist problem but I am sure of one thing: the U. S. media wants to take him down. In the primaries, they failed at that and instead, by reason of their mass coverage, lifted him to the nomination.
They think they're going to win the next round. So they go on their merry way, twisting his words, excoriating him at every turn. My guess is it won't work again, though it's too early to tell.
"That phrase, according to political scientists who study conspiracy theories, is characteristic of politicians who seek to exploit the psychology of suspicion and cynicism to win votes.
The idea that people in positions of power or influence are conspiring to conceal sinister truths from the public can be inherently appealing, because it helps make sense of tragedy and satisfies the human need for certainty and order. Yet politicians hoping to take advantage of these tendencies must rely on vague and suggestive statements, since any specific accusation could be easily disproved."
Someone should ask this professor his conclusion on both of the Obama campaigns and pronouncements as president as well as opine on the Clinton campaigns.
The URL usually has the original headline when they change it.
The original URL reads:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/06/13/donald-trump-suggests-president-obama-was-involved-with-orlando-shooting/
Yeah. That's a terrible headline, and implies that Trump was saying Obama was there, involved with the shooting. CNN reports that was the title too.
If it had been the first WaPo "mistake" that grossly mischaracterized Trump statements, I'd let it slide with a warning. But, given how grossly wrong that headline is, we might as well let the revocations continue, Pour Encourager Les Autres.
When Sarah Palin said Obama was "pal-in' around with terrorists" the media went nuts. But, of course, they never considered the truth of her claim. Obama did open his campaign in Bill Ayers' living room. Bill Ayers did do terrorist things, including his semi-failed "Day of Rage." He is unrepentent to this day.
Trump's tweet quotes the original headline, Professor. He's not wrong--that's an outrageous distortion of what he said and was designed to both make Trump look bad and get clicks.
There's not much about Trump as a politician that I like, but kicking the WashPo & Buzzfeed in the ass is the right thing to do and I'm not sorry Trump's doing it.
The Media is your opponent, Republicans and people not on the Left. They oppose you and wand to do you harm. Act like you understand that--Trump might be taking these actions because he's personally offended (his ego certainly seems to demand that), but nevertheless it's the correct attitude: the Media is against you and should not be treated as neutral (or a friend). Fight back.
When a Republican loses the Washington Post ...... and feels good about it ....... it's time to plant the victory flag.
Cover ups are the best work done in DC. There is no shortage of conspiracy material Trump can expose. The shameful thing is that so much Trump hints at keeps being discovered a month later. It is like Trump's campaign has been designated the Releaser of Hidden Things Department.
Wait, isn't this just more Republican whining about how the press doesn't respect them?
[Also: I consider changing the headline and not the URL laziness. The WaPo needs to change the URL as well. I don't care if that is cascadingly inconvenient to everyone who linked there, build a re-direct to the new URL on your site. The URL is just as wrong.]
What was the original headline?
More Mush from the Wimp.
The potential wrinkle with all this Obama bashing is that he may be right. It turns out the shooter was a closeted homosexual, having asked men out on dates previously, as well as attending gay clubs. The killings seem to arise from the harsh conflict between his own sexuality and the beliefs of his lunatic father. The killer was clearly an appalling person for whom no death would be too good, but probably not your classic Islamic terrorist.
"Wait, isn't this just more Republican whining about how the press doesn't respect them?"
--> No. This is doing something about dishonest reporting. You know how Hillary ropes off areas and arranges only to allow certain questions to be answered? It's like that, only Republicans doing the push back.
The fact is, BuzzFeed, Huffington-Post and WaPo -- the three I know that Trump has decided to revoke privileges from -- have earned that revocation. Does the HP still only cover Trump as entertainment? If so, then they don't deserve the privilege of a press pass if they refuse to treat him with respect. If BuzzFeed openly declares they are hostile to him, why take up valuable space at your events with someone who has declared to not intend to give you a fair hearing? The WaPo deliberately mischaracterized what he said to make him look evil -- why give them an Nth chance?
When there are lots of media who AREN'T incompetent, disrespectful or looking to sabotage you -- why give those guys special privileges instead of fair journalists?
Trumps song:
https://youtu.be/372436tJiaM
Max Ehrenfreund seeks to exploit the psychology of suspicion and cynicism to win page clicks and sell advertising.
As the InstaPundit has pointed out countless times, the press are nothing more than "Democrat operatives with bylines." Why make it easy for an organization that's doing everything possible to ensure your defeat?
tim maguire said...
It's clear Trump is suggesting Obama is a Muslim, or at least Muslim sympathizer, and from there it's a short step to terror sympathize.
If Obama actually was a Muslim sympathizer, what would he be doing differently? Giving them priority on immigration? Blocking use of the phrase "Islamic Radicals"? Shutting down FBI investigations of Muslims?
Something's happening here.
Everybody look what's going down.
"Wait, isn't this just more Republican whining about how the press doesn't respect them?"
So, lets not hear any more complaints from lefties about Fox News, ok?
As a lawyer, I use "appears to" and "seems to" all the time. They're weasel words. They're the same as "some might say . . ." They mean nothing, while insinuating much. And, if you're in the news business, "appears" and "seems" and "some might say" isn't NEWS, because it's always true, and therefore unnewsworthy. SOME might always say ANYTHING. If "seems" and "appears" is untethered from "would seem, or appear, to a rational, disinterested observer," then it's pointless. But if you mean that a rational, disinterested observer would conclude X, and you count yourself as a fourth estate rational and disinterested, etc., then, just go ahead and declare "X." I prefer the first headline. It's WRONG, but at least it's NEWS. Here's how they could have fixed it to stay news and also be right "Trump Suggests Obama Behind Muslim Terror in General, Orlando Massacre Possibly in Particular."
For years Instapundit has been correct in noting that many in the media are Democrats with bylines. This is the logical conclusion to this.
What we want as a society is a bulldog media who is tough with all politicians. But what we see is the media only going after Republicans time and time again. When they go after Democrats it's because they are forced to by bloggers like Drudge or gossip papers like the weekly world news.
They've left us no choice but to give them the finger.
If they went after both sides equally, then you'd have an argument to make. But no one can .and that argument with a straight face.
Sing it along with Frida.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p98PjtSfNWo
Define "Classic Islamist terrorist".
Is there a classification system now?
The bottom line is that his gayness didn't teach him to hate, his religion did.
Suspicion is looking up, etymologically speaking. I don't know if a toga was involved.
:The idea that people in positions of power or influence are conspiring to conceal sinister truths from the public can be inherently appealing:
Uhh...
Hillary's e-mails
Lois Lerner's hard disks
President Obama's 'Least' Transparent Administration Ever
Have to Pass the Law to See what is in it
Nope. No reason why people might believe that Politicians aren't being forthright. None at all.
AReasonableMan said..The killer was clearly an appalling person for whom no death would be too good, but probably not your classic Islamic terrorist.
Who is your "classic Islamic terrorist," ARM? Not the Tsarnevs--we radicalized them by not accepting immigrants openly enough, or something. Not the San Bernadino murderes--we radicalized them by not being friendly enough in the workplace, or something. Not Hasan (Fort Hood)--we radicalized him by waging illegal wars in the middle east and not respecting Islam enough, or something. It's weird that none of the people we think of as Islamic terrorists fit your definition of that term, but you have a subtle, nuanced mind and I clearly don't.
The only real question, of course, is how this current mass murder is MY fault. If it turns out that it's my fault because I don't support the LGBT community enough, that'll work--otherwise of course it's my fault for supporting firearm ownership and/or not being inclusive enough towards muslims generally.
Yeah...I been hearing things...(looks to each side)...lots of things. You didn't hear it from me, okay?
Weasel words have a musky smell.
I don't think "There is something going on there" was as much a suggestion of conspiracy as genuine puzzlement as to what is going on in Obama's head with regard to Islam - just in his head, "conspiracy" means sharing whatever it is with other people, which is something I do not think Obama is much inclined to do.
Doesn't the widely used term "rigged" -- as applied to the economy, Wall Street, or party politics -- also imply some form of nefarious conspiracy?
Terrorists don't hate. They're fine upstanding participants in a stable culture.
Just keep the culture in their own country.
The killer was clearly an appalling person for whom no death would be too good, but probably not your classic Islamic terrorist.
Good grief - he was ethinically and Afghan, ARM. Do you know anything about Pashtun Islamic culture? Anything at all? There is absolutely nothing surprising about a homosexual Afghani Islamic terrorist.
Gee, don't I recall events where the current POTUS barred Fox?
Why yes, yes I do.
What percentage of Democrats agree "Bush Did 9/11?" I remember polls from 2010 or so, and it was quite a lot of 'em. How many Democrats believe that the HIV/AIDS was created by scientists and/or deliberately spread by the government/CIA? More than you might guess...
For some reason the Media seems to believe that only people on the right believe kooky conspiracy theories, though.
Eh, just more whining! What a whiner I am.
It's clear Trump is suggesting Obama is a Muslim, or at least Muslim sympathizer, and from there it's a short step to terror sympathizer.
It's blatantly clear he's a sympathizer. You'd have to be to constantly note all of these "senseless" killings done by Muslims.
The original headline was "Donald Trump suggests President Obama was involved with Orlando shooting".
AprilApple said...
Define "Classic Islamist terrorist".
Regular attendance at gay Florida night clubs, asking out a fellow male police trainee on a date, hooking up on grindr all sound more like something Titus might do (perhaps not the police trainee) and all suggest an obvious counter-narrative, a man deeply conflicted between his own sexuality and his father's harsh beliefs. I am in no way defending this person. Killing out of gay panic is no better than killing for Jihad.
Rocketeer said...
Good grief - he was ethinically and Afghan, ARM. Do you know anything about Pashtun Islamic culture? Anything at all?
Unlike you, I actually know some Afghani's socially. Like any group they hold a range of opinions. I also read what his father has said about gays, which is the relevant issue.
Classic Islamic terrorist? You mean like the 9/11 hijackers who decided to have a good time in Las Vegas before deflowering the virgins in heaven on 9/11? Is that classic? Scratch an Islamic terrorist and find a sexual pervert with a license to kill.
Anyone who discounts conspiracies at this point is inexperienced or not paying attention.
"Killing out of gay panic is no better than killing for Jihad." Is that the narrative now, killing out of gay panic? Need to be kept up to date because it was mere minutes ago that it was the fault of the pistol and the AR-15 that walked into the nightclub dragging the Patriarchal oppressor along.
WaPo's original headline: "There's something going on...."
AReasonableMan said...Killing out of gay panic is no better than killing for Jihad.
Right, but if it was gay panic then you get to blame people who don't "support the gay community," so that works out pretty well. Of course if it was "classic jihad" then you'd get to blame people who support aggressive foreign policy/wars, and as I mentioned either way you get to blame people who support 2nd Amend. rights either way (since he used some guns).
So yeah, I see what you mean--it's my fault no matter what, it's just that you're trying to refine exactly WHY it's my fault. Gotcha. Precision is important!
Limited,
Great 80's song. There's Something Going On. I remember I thought Frida was hot in the video. Then I go look at Wikipedia and I find out she's 70.
Unlike you, I actually know some Afghani's socially. Like any group they hold a range of opinions. I also read what his father has said about gays, which is the relevant issue.
Unlike me, huh? That's a pretty bold - and thorougly WRONG - assumption. Congratulations, ARM - "some of our best friends are Afghani!" Yay us, aren't we so wordly?
Now to the point: the "relevant issue" is your assertion that there is some sort of "classic terrorist" and that "homosexual" could not possibly fit into that definition. The universwe of Islamic terrorists hold a range of sexualities. As in most matters, you are not only wrong, but ignorantly wrong.
“When you control information, or manipulate it, you don't need force to keep people under your thumb. They stay there willingly.” ― Veronica Roth
ARM is a good reason I vote Republican.
His side, let's call it the "reasonable" side, call this attack repressed sexuality and gay panic. Or something along those lines. They could call it an aversion to unicorns for all I care.
The other side sees this for what it is. An attack on our society and our way of life by radical Islamists.
I'd rather have my government fighting radical Islam, then delusional, unicorn hating repressed gays.
The more accurate headline would have been "President Trump suggests Obama was involved with Orlando shooting"
It's not paranoia if they are really out to get you.
To steal from Tolstoy, right wing terrorists are all alike, but each Muslim terrorist is utterly unique in his circumstances.
The death of PC
Belmont Club
Trump may have no more competence than Hillary, but at least he knows he will need competence while Hillary has not yet realized it.
In short, a reportedly gay Muslim Democrat goes into a bar and murders 49 people (wounding over 50 others) and it's the Republicans' fault. Gotcha.
@AReasonableMan
A reasonable explanation from a reasonable man. A likely answer which is being reported widely in the media as more evidence to support that path is discovered.
While we wait for the truth or near as we can get to it with a dead murderer let's party on with the Trump conspiracy circus. Party on!
The unicorn ate it gravely.
Finest line in Thurber.
The Post's executive editor Marty Baron responded:
"Donald Trump's decision to revoke The Washington Post's press credentials is nothing less than a repudiation of the role of a free and independent press."
Apparently Marty just wanted to reinforce Trump's statement.
Ann Althouse said...What a crazy, embarrassing headline!
No ma'am--they're not embarrassed. The SHOULD BE embarrassed by that headline, but they aren't. That's what makes Trump's response reasonable. You cannot rely on their own sense of professionalism (insomuch as giving the appearance of neutrality or evenhandedness is an aspect of journalistic professionalism) to dictate or enforce good behavior.
They've shown themselves to be opponents, and opponents who don't fight fair, at that. The proper response is to treat them that way.
The headline is outrageous and Trump's action is out of the ordinary, but these are the times in which we live. I can't remember if it was Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, but SNL used to have one of them as a character who just repeatedly reacted with "I'm outraged!" when presented with any story. I think that's America now--I'm outraged!
Off-subject and old news from a few days ago.
Trump stiffs the working class stiffs.
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/10/politics/donald-trump-unpaid-bills-reports/
Who’d have thought that.
Trump's tendency to say there's something going on is a sign of his latent homosexuality.
To use the comic intellectual put-down of the 60s.
AReasonableMan said...
Regular attendance at gay Florida night clubs, asking out a fellow male police trainee on a date
Shades of the Stone's "Cocksucker Blues".
The dead murderer's party was Democrat. Registered. Just in case the gayness takes over the narrative.
Okay, cue the music from the X-Files. From what I understand through reading about spies, the phrase, conspiracy-theory, is a CIA construct. Althouse has access to the OED so she could look it up and tell us when the phrase arrived in our language and especially, when it came into everyday usage.
Go Trump 2016, Ivanka Trump 2024!
Yeah, the left is going BAT SHIT crazy now that their PC nonsense is getting exposed for what it is, an idiotic ideology that is getting people killed. They reach for anything that comes to the mindless when the reality of their bullshit meets the real world, GUN CONTROL! HATE CRIME! LONE WOLF! bla bla bla, anything but the truth.
America is getting a taste of what Israelis have been dealing with for over 60 years, hopefully, Americans will toss these nitwits aside come election time or, expect more of the same.
A register Islamic radical Democrat. figures.
It's a big bed.
Unknown said...
Off-subject and old news from a few days ago.
Trump stiffs the working class stiffs.
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/10/politics/donald-trump-unpaid-bills-reports/
Who’d have thought that.
6/14/16, 10:48 AM
Be a super sleuth councilor and do your discovery on the Clinton's. It ain't a pretty picture either. At least Trump isn't a traitor. Working class stiff don't like traitors either. Or grifters.
Trump was a birther. He bought into the anti-vaccine movement. In February of this year, he had this to say about 9/11: "you will find out who really knocked down the World Trade Center. Because they have papers in there that are very secret, you may find it’s the Saudis, okay? But you will find out." Trump approvingly cited the National Enquirer in its linking of Cruz's dad to the Kennedy assassination.
It is almost beyond argument that he has conspiratorial tendencies.
Althouse is good at finding critics of Trump who go too far, but someone overstating the case does not mean all is well with the man.
Right. Because the left has never offered any unsubstantiated—hell, inarticulated—hints, rumors, innuendo about Halliburton, Cheney, the Skull and Crossbones, Big Oil, Big Pharma, The Carlyle Group, Wall Street, etc. etc. etc.
"There's something going on." "Follow the money." Actually, I still prefer Ian Fleming's formulation:
"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action."
To be clear about this the gayness caused him to call 911 and pledge allegiance to ISIS but the gun caused him to scream alahakbar when he was killing. Or maybe the other way around. But homophobia and Republicans.
" Writ Small said...
Trump was a birther." So did Hillary and let's not forget the mother of all conspiracies "the vast right-wing conspiracy".
Writ if you have any doubt follow up on Paul Snively's comment.
"A register Islamic radical Democrat. figures.
It's a big bed."
LOL @ April, i hate to laugh at a time like this but hey, that's dead funny!
Trump's intended implication, I believe, is not that Obama is sympathetic to Islamic radicalism but rather that he is overly sympathetic to Islam itself, having grown up for much of his life around Muslims. He cannot face the possibility that Islam itself might be the problem. What would Muhammad do is a good question to start with. By his own admission and that of his followers he was a killer, robber, rapist & warlord. He is also held up as a perfect model of what a good Muslim should be. Though these are non-controversial statements among scholars of Islam, few non-Muslims are aware of these facts. Nor is it clear that our Founding Fathers were fully aware of them when they wrote the 1st Amendment. They make us uncomfortable.
Since everyone is doing links, let me add Al Kooper's great "Something going on"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOSOtiaS_xY
Banning WaPo, just the first step in "opening up" those libel laws.
Birtherism, anti vaxxer, Obama as secret radical Islamic terrorist, oh let's not forget about Senator Cruz's daddy being connected to the JFK assassination. Yeah the right wing base surely picked a winner
Ok, the troll has arrived. Now the serious discussions can begin.
"Banning WaPo, just the first step in "opening up" those libel laws."
-- Organizations and people can elect what media they are willing to engage with. It was why Hillary Clinton's team, as we can see from what emails have been leaked/released, is so careful in extracting promises from reporters prior to interviews.
If Trump *sued* the WaPo, maybe it would have to do with libel laws. This has to do with a man being insulted to the point he says, "You know what? You're not invited to my party any more, I'm inviting Johnny, who doesn't flip me off and pee on the carpet."
Bart: OK, it's not painfully clear the adults are definitely paving the way for an invasion by the saucer people.
Milhouse: You fool! Can't you see it's a massive government conspiracy? Or have they gotten to you too?
Lisa: Hey! Hey, hey, stop it! Stop it! Why are you guys jumping to such ridiculous conclusions? Haven't you ever heard of Occam's Razor? "The simplest explanation is probably the correct one."
Bart: So what's the simplest explanation?
Lisa: I don't know. Maybe they're all reverse vampires and they have to get home before dark.
Everyone: Aah! Reverse vampires! Reverse vampires!
eric said...
The other side sees this for what it is. An attack on our society and our way of life by radical Islamists.
I'd rather have my government fighting radical Islam, then delusional, unicorn hating repressed gays.
Hillary was perfectly happy to call it radical Islam. She would also be perfectly happy to kill a mentally disabled man in order to get elected.
Hillary has an unerring ability to misread any situation. Obama is a conservative person who sees every side of an issue. However, if you want to vote for Hillary, I can't stop you.
Matthew Sablan,
More accurately it's more likely, "those who don't kiss my ass get banned bigly".
"Here's "The Unicorn in the Garden," for understanding #6."
I followed the link and it depressed me. This was a student piece and they felt the need to put a "glossary" at the bottom of the very short piece because (presumably) they can't be confident that the students understand some or all of the following words:
booby: in this context, a crazy person (probably from the name of a stupid extinct bird).
booby-hatch: a mental institution, a place where the insane are kept.
breakfast nook: a little side room for eating breakfast.
browsing: sampling or tasting here and there.
"crazy as a jaybird": extremely crazy or hopelessly insane
cropping: clipping or cutting close to the root.
cursing: using dirty or obscene speech.
"Don't count your boobies until they are hatched": from the American expression "Don't count your chickens before they are hatched", meaning "Don't count on things to turn out exactly as you planned them."
gloat: a look of malice or greed.
institution: a mental institution, an insane asylum.
moral: in this context, the "lesson" of the story.
mythical: relating to a myth, hence not real.
psychiatrist: a mental doctor
solemn: grave or serious
strait-jacket: an armless belted jacket used to confine the violently insane
subdue, subduing: capturing, seizing
unicorn: a mythical beast which looks like a horse with a horn in the center of the head.
WWTW (What Would Thurber Write?)
Fernandinande said...
Shades of the Stone's "Cocksucker Blues".
Had never read the lyrics until now. Was not what I was expecting, even given the title.
The only real question, of course, is how this current mass murder is MY fault. If it turns out that it's my fault because I don't support the LGBT community enough, that'll work--otherwise of course it's my fault for supporting firearm ownership and/or not being inclusive enough towards muslims generally.
Well. And GUNS!!!!
"More accurately it's more likely, 'those who don't kiss my ass get banned bigly'."
-- Have CNN, Fox, or the NYT had their credentials revoked? They've all been critical of him. As far as I know, they have not.
The three I know that have are: WaPo, Buzzfeed, HP. All three of which have legitimately earned their revocations. In order: WaPo lied about Trump, and did not post a correction. BuzzFeed openly declared their hostility for him and leaders in BuzzFeed held an event to support Clinton. HP spent months refusing to cover Trump seriously, insisting he be covered in the Entertainment section, not politics.
Lying about him, no correction? Perfectly justifiable revocation.
If BuzzFeed has openly declared to be Clinton operatives, no reason for them to be welcome at events.
If HP doesn't want to cover Trump, well, then, I guess he won't make it easy to cover him.
I don't like Trump, but in revoking those three organizations' press privileges, he's not doing anything wrong.
Rocketeer said...
As in most matters, you are not only wrong, but ignorantly wrong.
The relationship between gay Floridian culture and Afghani goat fuckers is roughly analogous to the relationship between the Salon de Paris and your living room.
rhhardin said...
Something's happening here.
"It can't happen here
I'm telling you, my dear
That it can't happen here
Because I been checkin' it out, baby
I checked it out a couple a times, hmm."
About goats -- if a Republican said that, it would have been racist.
"Obama is a conservative person who sees every side of an issue"
ARM,
Comedy gold. In actuality the guy can see every side except the actual factual side. Hey, you still can vote for Jill Stein in November if you can't bring yourself to vote for the criminal. Funny thing is Obama for four years couldn't see the side of Hillary's criminality and treason-that's the charitable view.
I think it is not just about Muslims. Remember the peculiar bow to the Japanese emperor and his wife? The imperial couple kept their faces straight, but they surely must have wondered what was with this American president. Likewise his visit and peculiar bow to the king of Saudi Arabia, who is a Sunni and greatly opposed to the Shia Iranians, who otherwise seems to be especially favored by Obama.
Could be just an idea inherited from his anthropologist mother that all religions and local traditions are fundamentally equal and must be respected.
My favorite quote for this situation is from the character Garak from Star Trek: Deep Space 9:
"I believe in coincidences. Coincidences happen every day. But I don't trust coincidences."
Garak was usually correct about his paranoia, but then again he was a former member of an intelligence agency that was up to its eyeballs in conspiracies of foreign, domestic, and internal origin. Ironically, said organization was destroyed because it failed to paranoid enough. Garak didn't have that problem.
Honestly, on the whole the media is clearly on one side of the political aisle and their pretense of objectivity has worn down to almost nothing. Anyone who fails to see this is a fool. Trump should believe the Washington Post is out to get him because the Washington Post is out to get him. That's not a conspiracy, just a realization of fact. Some of the other stuff, not so much.
Obama is a conservative person who sees every side of an issue.
That surely is what Obama thinks of himself too.
AReasonableMan said...
Had never read the lyrics until now. Was not what I was expecting, even given the title.
Apparently they wrote it to finish out a contract they wanted to get out of, with a song that couldn't be played on the radio.
"Memo from Turner" is a somewhat similar, but creepier. Prefer the version that starts with Ry Cooder's slide.
It is pretty funny watching the narrative now trying to be formed on the Left- that Mateen was a closeted gay guy driven to massacre gays. The only problem with the narrative is that homosexuality is punishable by death in Islamic Law, and this punishment is either officially sanctioned by Islamic governments across the world, or tacitly approved by non-punishment of murderers of such people. This narrative is already a failure on its face.
It's the perfect way to imply something stupid and irresponsible so that when you're called on it you can say "hey, I'm just pointing out that others are saying this stuff! I never meant that [Cruz's dad helped kill JFK/Obama was born in Kenya/Vaccines cause autism/Bush knew 9/11 was about to happen]." Just another example of Trump being a twat.
As for Obama, I'd like to hear some specific criticism of what he's doing in the terror war that (a) doesn't go into the batshit direction of him actually trying to undermine the anti-terror efforts and (b) doesn't keep harping on his choice to avoid calling the killers "Islamic". Agree with him or not, we know why he doesn't call them Islamic, and even if he's wrong to not do so, this has no effect on the war on terror itself.
Obama has done plenty to curtail our civil liberties and has been very fond of drone strikes, and if you're libertarian you can say he's been doing too much of that and it doesn't help, and if you're more statist you can say he should do more of it. And of course there are lots of things we ought to be doing (infiltrations, targeted assassinations, better domestic intelligence). But once we're in the realm of "Obama clearly is fighting on the other side" I have to check out. That belongs in the same place as the theories that Bush invaded Iraq just to help his oil buddies somehow.
"Miriam said...
Banning WaPo, just the first step in "opening up" those libel laws.
Birtherism, anti vaxxer, Obama as secret radical Islamic terrorist, oh let's not forget about Senator Cruz's daddy being connected to the JFK assassination. Yeah the right wing base surely picked a winner"
Ten pounds of stupid in an eight pound bag. How do you manage? And what constitutes "the right wing base?"
....are fundamentally equal and must be equally respected.
But they are not all equal, and in any case I would be more comfortable with a president who paid more attention to our side of whatever issue is being considered.
The killer was clearly an appalling person for whom no death would be too good, but probably not your classic Islamic terrorist.
Akin to the now infamous “But was it rape rape?” utterance. The shooter wasn’t a terrorist terrorist, just another repressed homosexual who snapped.
… there are lots of media who AREN'T incompetent, disrespectful or looking to sabotage you …
Hahahahaha. A real knee slapper! Thanks.
… In February of this year, he[Trump] had this to say about 9/11: "you will find out who really knocked down the World Trade Center. Because they have papers in there that are very secret, you may find it’s the Saudis, okay? But you will find out." Trump approvingly cited the National Enquirer in its linking of Cruz's dad to the Kennedy assassination.
Not so fast. From a NYT article dated 05/17/2016:
The legislation is moving through Congress as the Obama administration considers whether to declassify a portion of a 2002 congressional investigation of the Sept. 11 attacks that cited some evidence that Saudi government officials and other Saudi citizens living in the United States had a hand in the terrorist plot.
Those conclusions have yet to be released publicly, but recently the National Archives posted a separate document on its website that appears to offer a glimpse at what the still-classified 28 pages contain.
The document, dated June 6, 2003, is a series of memos written by Sept. 11 commission staff members compiling numerous possible connections between the hijackers and Saudis in the United States.
http://tinyurl.com/hocvbx4
Looks like this particular crazy Trump conspiracy theory isn’t so crazy after all.
Regular attendance at gay Florida night clubs, asking out a fellow male police trainee on a date, hooking up on grindr all sound more like something Titus might do (perhaps not the police trainee) and all suggest an obvious counter-narrative, a man deeply conflicted between his own sexuality and his father's harsh beliefs. I am in no way defending this person. Killing out of gay panic is no better than killing for Jihad.
9/11 hijackers didn't live very Muslim lives before 9/11...
As for Obama, I'd like to hear some specific criticism of what he's doing in the terror war that (a) doesn't go into the batshit direction of him actually trying to undermine the anti-terror efforts and (b) doesn't keep harping on his choice to avoid calling the killers "Islamic". Agree with him or not, we know why he doesn't call them Islamic, and even if he's wrong to not do so, this has no effect on the war on terror itself.
Allowing Hillary to overthrow Khaddafy was a mistake. Making pronouncements of a red line Assad cannot cross and then doing nothing as he does so was a huge mistake. Ignoring immigration law wholesale is a huge mistake. Demanding we accept an invasion of Syrian military-aged men is a huge mistake.
I'm not sure if his goal was to insure more Americans were killed, what he'd do differently. I think giving Islamists a safe space to stay, showing that we're weak and unwilling to fight, AND then inviting them in aren't solid plans.
Trump goaded Obama into responding with a speech. Obama decried the talk of "some people with a twitter account". It was a 15 minute tirade about how it's un-American to condemn an entire group of people, race or religion, over the actions of an individual.
It was good stuff. If I didn't have a "but what about..." thought after every sound bite in that speech, it would have been inspiring.
There is something going on.
The twists and turns of spin about why a Gay Nightclub targeted by a Muslim DHS Employee after he had scoped out Disney World as his first target is bringing out a flood of disinformation.
The Leftists insist now that the Allah Ackbar shouting ISIS pledged Shooter was motivated by Right Wing Christians anti-gay speech.
Meanwhile the Chik-Fil-A Southern baptist guys were giving out free food on Sunday to the Blood Donor lines.
And it turns out that Hillary's State Department intervened to stop FBI investigations of Omar several years ago. And the Saudis are getting mad at Hillary for not doing better after they gave her 20% of her donations to run.
And Mormon Romney is looking down his nose at Trump for defending Americans first.
Trump has never had so many targets to hit. He needs to focus or he may miss them all.
Lateen's wife drove him to Pulse, helped him buy the ammo.
Could be just an idea inherited from his anthropologist mother that all religions and local traditions are fundamentally equal and must be respected.
Except for those who “cling to guns or religion.” Not THOSE “local traditions,” right? Is it any wonder that some might believe that Obama’s religious tolerance seems to extend to Muslims and no further? Obama forces nuns to give out contraceptives. Does he ever force Muslims to do anything against their religion?
And the Christians on their high horses
Go read Kevin Dujan at Hillbuzz.com, he has a pretty good theory why they space out their attacks, and haven't hit a bigger target, like Disneyland.
grackle wrote:
Is it any wonder that some might believe that Obama’s religious tolerance seems to extend to Muslims and no further? Obama forces nuns to give out contraceptives. Does he ever force Muslims to do anything against their religion?
I'd love to see some gays go into a bakery owned by muslims and ask for a wedding cake and have the baker refuse.
then watch the libs head explode.
ARM says Hillary was perfectly happy to call it radical Islam.
He doesn't note she also said
"Let’s be clear: Islam is not our adversary. Muslims are peaceful and tolerant people and have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism."
So peaceful that they drive their gay adherents to mass murder?
Or was this guy an Islamic Radical?
The story changes too quickly for me to keep up.
If the Muslim bakers refused to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple they too can be sued, just like anyone else.
Christians, and Mormons, are targeted in their communities not by motive of principles, but as competitors to left-wing political groups and dissenters from the "secular" pro-choice Church. Muslims are left-wing ideologues who are allies of convenience until they become competitors of like-mind (e.g. socialists vs communists vs fascists).
"Trump has never had so many targets to hit. He needs to focus or he may miss them all."
LOL! Good luck with that.
In the meantime, Obama gave an excellent speech. This is what it is to be Presidential. Trump could take a lesson if he weren't so....
**Sighs** I'll bite: [b]As for Obama, I'd like to hear some specific criticism of what he's doing in the terror war that (a) doesn't go into the batshit direction of him actually trying to undermine the anti-terror efforts and (b) doesn't keep harping on his choice to avoid calling the killers "Islamic". Agree with him or not, we know why he doesn't call them Islamic, and even if he's wrong to not do so, this has no effect on the war on terror itself.[/b]
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/02/21/fbi-purges-hundreds-training-documents-after-probe-on-treatment-islam.html
https://www.yahoo.com/news/obama-administration-pulls-references-islam-terror-training-materials-044605689.html
Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Cole confirmed on Wednesday that the Obama administration was pulling back all training materials used for the law enforcement and national security communities, in order to eliminate all references to Islam that some Muslim groups have claimed are offensive.
“I recently directed all components of the Department of Justice to re-evaluate their training efforts in a range of areas, from community outreach to national security,” Cole told a panel at the George Washington University law school.
The move comes after complaints from advocacy organizations including the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and others identified as Muslim Brotherhood front groups in the 2004 Holy Land Foundation terror fundraising trial.
Note: this was from 2011-2012, Before the Boston Marathon bombing, to say nothing of of Orlando. Perhaps it [i]might[/i] be helpful and relevant for the FBI agent interviewing Mateen to know about Islam's mandating the death penalty for homosexuality in most schools of jurisprudence? Or it also might be important for DHS to alert gays that they are prime targets and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan is considered favorable for terrorist attacks by ISIS. http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/06/a-massacre-on-a-beach/396929/
"And what constitutes "the right wing base?""
Look inthe mirror monkey boy.
The woman who voted for the Iraq war, then voted against the Iraq war, then engineered the overthrow of the government of Libya, then did nothing when an Islamic mob attacked our embassy in Libya and murdered our ambassador and US security personnel, has now declared that Donald Trump is unqualified to be president.
Duly noted.
Miriam said...
"And what constitutes "the right wing base?""
Look in the mirror monkey boy.
Whoa, everyone knows that references to monkeys are racist and hurtful.
DELETE YOUR ACCOUNT.
Looks like Trump has knocked Obama off balance.
In one of the few news conferences he participates in, he was visibly hurt by those who say he is afraid to say the words "radical Islam".
You could see his ears wiggling. I thought they switched to a Dumbo cartoon for a second.
He looked like he wanted to cry...
Interesting how the Russians hacked into the DNC computers. Now why would they focus on the DNC? Trump calling in a favor from his pal Putin? How's that for a conspiracy theory? Is there "something going on" here??
Troll is bouncing around like Ricochet rabbit. Entertaining.
coupe said...
Looks like Trump has knocked Obama off balance.
In one of the few news conferences he participates in, he was visibly hurt by those who say he is afraid to say the words "radical Islam".
You could see his ears wiggling. I thought they switched to a Dumbo cartoon for a second.
Whoa, racist to say anything about his ears; he is sensitive about his little Miriam ears.
DELETE YOUR ACCOUNT.
The Hairybuddha remembers someone saying,
"vast right wing conspiracy..."
Obama on ISIL:
"it is a difficult fight we are making progress . . . our campaign is firing on all cylinders"
How inspiring!
"Something" is vague... it signals confusion or vagueness or a lack of clarity or understanding.
"going on" is vague... it denotes processes or thoughts or conclusions that are mysterious to the outside observer, things that are at odds with appearances.
There's something going on there. There are things that puzzle me, that trouble me. Things like, what is he thinking? What is he doing? Why is he doing these things/thinking these things? It doesn't add up. It smells bad. It doesn't pass the smell test. It's not right. His words don't match his actions. His intent is not immediately apparent.
None of the above statements imply any sort of nefarious conspiracy. All have been uttered-- without any great hubbub-- in hundreds or thousands of interviews on the Sunday morning talk shows over the decades.
We choose now, 2016, when there is a threat to Hillary the InEVITAble, to view them as sinister.
Priceless.
If only he would've said "radical Islam" it all would be OK.
Because ISIS is confused as to our intentions toward them otherwise.
"What a crazy, embarrassing headline!" Not crazy: calculated, and a fair reflection of their actual state of mind. Embarrassing only because the pushback was a bit stronger than they expected. Progs aim to destroy and can't be shamed.
If the Muslim bakers refused to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple they too can be sued, just like anyone else.
But we both know it won't happen, and if it did, not only would the legal system not go after the Muslim bakers, the media wouldn't give the story a single bit of coverage.
If you were attempting to be honest, you might have mentioned that.
People here are asking what would happen if someone tried to get a Muslim bakery to bake a gay wedding cake. It's been done. A year or two ago, someone with a TV crew went to a dozen Muslim-owned bakeries in (I think) Dearborn. Every single one refused, none has so far been sued or prosecuted or even boycotted, no one is surprised at the double standard, and only evil 'right-wingers' are disgusted by it.
The problem isn't Obama's big ears, it is his fat head. In his speech today, he said that he is for 'common sense' gun control measures . . . lol, who isn't? Has anyone ever said 'I am against common sense gun control measures!'
He then said that these common sense gun control measures would be consistent with the 2nd amendment, followed by a plea to use the secretive, no-appeal 'no fly list' to ban individuals from buying firearms. What the hell does he think Mateen would have done if he had been denied a long gun permit? Stayed home watching Seinfeld reruns Saturday night? The man was a security professional, for God's sake. He was trusted with guns. He had been investigated by the FBI X 2 and cleared each time (can't say the same for Hillary).
"Every single one refused, none has so far been sued or prosecuted or even boycotted, no one is surprised at the double standard, and only evil 'right-wingers' are disgusted by it."
That is because gay activists aren't interested in fighting persecution or inequality, they are interested in persecuting Christians. It bothers them more that Christians think that they are sinners, than that Muslims want to kill them.
Can't find a transcript, yet, but here is a video of Obama's words to the press today:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/live/president-obama-delivers-statement-press-1
He sounds unhinged. He thinks that the most important thing linking the Orlando killer, one of the San Bernardino killers, and the Fort Hood killer is that they were American citizens. I guess that explains his war against the American people.
What most Trump opponents dispute, in my view, are the factuality of his facts, so to speak. We don't think his discourse is tethered to reality as we know it. Please stop questioning our integrity, our patriotism, etc. You are, of course, welcome to dispute our level of knowledge or intelligence. But if that is all you do, and all that we do, then we have a schoolyard scuffle, not a reasoned argument concerning the facts...
Explain to me how that makes any of us safer.
Over to you.
"Obama is a conservative person who sees every side of an issue. "
If you like your insurance, you can keep your insurance.
Repeat this 36 times. After that, explain how a man who "sees every side of an issue" could have said it.... Good luck.
David writes: I followed the link and it depressed me. This was a student piece and they felt the need to put a "glossary" at the bottom of the very short piece because (presumably) they can't be confident that the students understand some or all of the following words:
booby: in this context, a crazy person (probably from the name of a stupid extinct bird).
It's even more depressing than you think, David. The very first definition in that teaching glossary is wrong. "booby" comes not from the ostensible stupidity of the extinct dodo, but rather from the behaviors of actual, live boobies (a group of seabirds in the genus Sula). Wikipedia claims the bird's name originated with Spanish sailors: "Their name was possibly based on the Spanish slang term bobo, meaning "stupid", as these tame birds had a habit of landing on board sailing ships, where they were easily captured and eaten." (Of course, those birds weren't tame, just unafraid of humans, like so many critters in the Galapagos and other isolated places.)
Also, the solemn but silly-looking dancing of the males during courtship and nesting time has to be seen to be believed.
"What most Trump opponents dispute, in my view, are the factuality of his facts, so to speak. We don't think his discourse is tethered to reality as we know it. Please stop questioning our integrity, our patriotism, etc. You are, of course, welcome to dispute our level of knowledge or intelligence. But if that is all you do, and all that we do, then we have a schoolyard scuffle, not a reasoned argument concerning the facts...
Explain to me how that makes any of us safer."
Explain how Trump intimating that Obama is a secret extremist Muslim sympathizer who some how is connected to the Orlando shootings. How is it respectful to the office of the Presidency to throw dreck like that out there for the weak minded to chew on? Explain how that makes any of us safer?
As a security professional who had been investigated and cleared by the FBI and with a fully legally acquired firearm, it seems highly unlikely that any potential future hypothetical legislation would have prevented this. No matter how much the left wants to deny it, you can not simply legislate away firearms in the USA. There are literally hundreds of millions of them out there. And you're not going to confiscate them either without insurrection, not in the USA. This is not Australia. Nor should it be. We're a nation founded by fiercely independent frontiersmen. We pride ourselves on not expecting or relying on help from big brother. We will not disarm ourselves en masse and hope to never have to defend ourselves.
And there's no "common sense gun control measure" that could be enacted that would or could realistically guarantee that this sort of thing could never happen again.
We live in a scary world, filled with dangerous people who want to do harm, whether due to religious zealotry or mental imbalance. You can not wish away the bad things any more that you can simply legislate them away. This is the real world. Horrible tragedies happen and will continue to happen.
"Explain how Trump intimating that Obama is a secret extremist Muslim sympathizer who some how is connected to the Orlando shootings. "
-- Trump didn't say that. That's why WaPo had to change their headlines. They were not telling you the truth.
"Allowing Hillary to overthrow Khaddafy was a mistake. Making pronouncements of a red line Assad cannot cross and then doing nothing as he does so was a huge mistake. Ignoring immigration law wholesale is a huge mistake. Demanding we accept an invasion of Syrian military-aged men is a huge mistake."
I think Obama's foreign policy has a lot of mistakes, and a number of things I'd rather be done differently (and in some cases the GOPers are no better--I don't see how getting into Syria helps us). But as far as Obama actually intentionally undermining the anti-terror effort? That's just too much to swallow, absent any major revelation of the Manchurian Candidate variety.
It's like when Bush's critics couldn't just leave it at "Bush screwed up" and they had to come up with crazy theories about him lying his way into Iraq (even celebrity moron Trump bought into this, he's not so different from Rosie O'Donnell after all) or Cheney trying to help Halliburton. It gets a little tin foil for my taste.
Besides, Obama's gone soon--I'd like to know what we're going to do differently to make the country safer. I'm sure there are good ideas out there, but right now it sounds like one candidate wants to close the gun show loophole and the other one thinks asking immigrants if they're Muslim will be the foolproof way to block potential bombers. I don't have a lot of faith here.
Hillary is under criminal investigation by the FBI. She probably doesn't possess a firearm, but common sense demands that her security detail -- who do possess firearms -- be briefed on the proper method of securing their firearms when in her presence. She might grab one and start killing gay people at any moment. We know from no less an authority than the president of the United States that being an American with easy access to firearms is the most important indication that a person may become a mass shooter.
University of Wisconsin students to undergo mandatory ‘cultural competency training’
Who are these parachuting trolls like Miriam?
There could be a business model there. ParachutingTroll.com. Sell your services to activist groups. "We don't care! We'll help you tear down the people you hate!"
Difficult to price it. How do you count reads on this blog? For now, it would have to be an hourly or salaried job, where you're paying for the work on spec, the way we used to do, hoping it might actually drum up business.
But as far as Obama actually intentionally undermining the anti-terror effort?
Would "accidentally" or "intentionally" really make a difference now? A complete fuck up screwing up our attempts to deal with terrorism is no better than somebody intentionally trying to ruin it.
Keep in mind he also wanted to close Gitmo --- a monumentally stupid idea --- that required Congress to tell him no for a change.
I don't see Trump saying that Obama is doing it on purpose. He seems completely and intentionally blind to reality. Obama refuses to see that Islam is a pretty big problem at this point.
I'm currently reading a good book on the fall of the French Third Republic (by William Shirer). Reading it, I don't think the French military INTENTIONALLY lost to Germany. But they were so myopic in vision and so unwilling to face reality that they made the defeat inevitable.
Obama is our General Gamelin.
Explain how Trump intimating that Obama is a secret extremist Muslim sympathizer who some how is connected to the Orlando shootings.
Given that he didn't, I see no reason anybody should do so.
releasing the gitmo 5 for bergdahl, purging the fbi training materials, giving 150 billion dollars to iran, re the rhodes roadshow, forcing out mubarak in favor of morsi, qaddafi in favor of bel hadj and company,
“College is often the first time where people are exposed to people who are different from themselves,” said Joshua Moon Johnson, who leads the university group that investigates reported incidents of racism or other bias. Johnson said the training is meant “not to tell people how to think, but to tell people how to critique the ways in which they think.”
http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/education/university/on-campus-uw-madison-rolling-out-cultural-competency-training-for/article_c3ea7957-fb65-568e-8d40-2e185d8677c0.html
This 'Joshua Moon Johnson' person should be fired for making assumptions about students he has not only never met, but have not even been enrolled. He is making assumptions about people based on their racial identification.
Also because his quoted words are totalitarian gobbeldy gook.
Rhardin, My daughter was going on about a sound in her car. I could not hear it. Finally I opened the the hood,it sounded like "pins in a tumbler." True story.
I don't like Trump; I feel like I need to stress this or people will think I'm just a Trumpeteer or whatever the current pseudo-slur of the day is.
But, what I don't get about this: Trump says stupid things frequently. By lying and making up stupid things for him to fake-say, it makes me less likely to believe the NEXT stupid-thing-Trump said claim.
The Chi-coms pay fifty cents for a disrupted thread. Posters like Miriam, who are really only trying to limit the damage to Hillary by changing the subject, are called fifty centers.
I know, so the purging of the fbi's counter terror sections lead to this,
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/06/14/source-orlando-attacker-s-ties-to-american-suicide-bomber-in-syria-deeper-than-thought.html
Brando, It's not that we should go into Syria, it's that Obama should not be squandering US credibility by making threats he would never carry through.
At his presser today Obama laid out his priorities post-Orlando:
-Make it more difficult for Americans to buy guns for self defense.
-Redouble efforts to fight discrimination against people whose religion tells them to murder gays and Jews.
-Remind Americans of what he thinks they should value.
Papa Cruz WAS a Castro stooge (he claims he didn't know Castro was a Communist.) And Papa Cruz DID hand out Castro flyers in Dallas at the same time Oswald did. That's why it was plausible that Papa Cruz and Oswald were in the same picture. The National Enquirer presented the story and Trump simply pointed to it. Did Papa Cruz run to Canada to avoid all the investigations after 11-22-63 ? Only he can tell you that, and Trump never brought it up.
I was looking at some date about the number of Christians killed worldwide by Muslims last year--100,000. I wonder if all those Muslim killers were classical Muslim terrorists.
"Would "accidentally" or "intentionally" really make a difference now? A complete fuck up screwing up our attempts to deal with terrorism is no better than somebody intentionally trying to ruin it."
It wouldn't make a difference in effect--any more than the twin towers going down just the same if Bush knew they were going to be attacked or just hadn't been expecting it. But surely you see the difference--a critic who says "Bush should have been more prepared for 9/11" is at least making a worthwhile if debatable comment compared to someone who says "Bush knew it was going to happen, and he let it happen because oil!" After all, if the former, we can learn from mistakes. If the latter, it means all we have to do is not have evil people running our country.
tim in vermont, but how do you measure or count a disrupted thread?
Presumably it would have to be weighted according to things like how many hits the blog gets (not that difficult), how long the thread is (difficult to measure), and how much credit the troll can take for the disruption (subjective).
The counter-attack would be to prove that several sock-puppet trolls are actually the same person or a company behind them. That counter might not be effective, though, because most people just cruise through the interwebs without noticing much commonality.
The Russians reading DNC files is like a brother reading his sister's diary.
"Brando, It's not that we should go into Syria, it's that Obama should not be squandering US credibility by making threats he would never carry through."
Well, that's another debate--I haven't seen any plan to go into Syria that looks like it'd do us much good. We don't even have a side we can take. I'd rather see us build hit squads to track, infiltrate and decimate terror cells, breaking them down until all that's left are their backups' backups, armed with a spork.
Not that anything is 100%--this latest terrorist apparently wasn't tied to or directed by any organization, and was even born here--we can't stop that any more than we can stop the other hundreds of mass shooters we've seen lately. But at least we can reduce the active terror cells that may have the means and will to launch bigger, more destructive attacks.
"How is it respectful to the office of the Presidency to throw dreck like that out there for the weak minded to chew on?" --
Seriously.. after everything the Left did and said about GWB, we're suddenly supposed to be "respectful" of the Presidency? That shipped sailed long ago sister.
At his press conference, Obama did not criticize the Muslim-American community.
He did criticize Trump and the GOP.
There is something going on.
The Russians reading DNC files is like a brother reading his sister's diary.
keeper, this.
it sounded like "pins in a tumbler." True story.
If it sounds like pins dropping, it's a clavichord.
I'm not sure whether it's JournoList or the death of newsprint advertising that's brought us to this sad, sad pass. As far as I'm concerned, destroy 99% of our current media (by peaceful means, obviously).
"Seriously.. after everything the Left did and said about GWB, we're suddenly supposed to be "respectful" of the Presidency? That shipped sailed long ago sister."
During the CBS debate in South Carolina on Saturday, GOP front-runner Donald Trump blamed former President George W. Bush for the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.
After Florida senator Marco Rubio said that Bush had "kept us safe," Donald Trump shot back: "How did he keep us safe when the World Trade Center came down?"
"I lost hundreds of friends, the World Trade Center came down during the reign of George Bush," Trump said, while the crowd's boos nearly drowned him out. "That is not safe, Marco, that is not safe,"
Trump goes Code Pink on GWB
Miriam, that one looks like a 'bot post. You gotta do better to earn the big cents.
Russians hack DNC to steal dirt on Trump.
"Some may be concerned that the Russians might be able to use the information stolen from the DNC's network against President Trump or businessman Trump in some future negotiation. There is also the possibility, considering Trump advisor Paul Manafort's connection to Putin, Trump may now have Democrats' opposition research on him. On the other hand, as suggested in the article, the dirt dug up by the Russians in their hack of the DNC's network is likely to be made public anyway."
In preparation for what will surely be a heated Republican convention, Donald Trump has hired an experienced political operative to help wrangle GOP delegates: Paul Manafort, a strategist with three decades of Republican conventions under his belt, who has also worked for some unsavory international clients.
That roster includes the pro-Russian former president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, who was deposed in a popular revolution in 2013.
As Quartz reported earlier this month, Trump’s foreign policy advisors also include Carter Page, a former advisor and current shareholder in the state-controlled Russian natural gas giant, Gazprom, who has advocated for a less adversarial US stance toward Moscow. Bloomberg spoke with Sergey Yatsenko, a former Gazprom official who is now an official adviser to Page’s firm, who said Page “understands what’s going on in Russia … He doesn’t make strong judgments.”
Oh my is something going on?
Miriam--
"Explain how Trump intimating that Obama is a secret extremist Muslim sympathizer who some how is connected to the Orlando shootings. How is it respectful to the office of the Presidency..."
I take it you were agreeing with my former comment. But at first I read your comment to say "how [is] Trump intimating..." I think a lot of commenters on Republican-leaning sites are not clear that Trump was insinuating what the WP said he was... My husband, for instance, thinks that WP shot itself in the foot with that headline. They should have let the Trump's comments stand alone and then quoted other supporters to show how others interpreted those remarks.
To me, the essence of insinuation is plausible deniability, no matter how vile the insinuation: "I never said that!" When asked to clarify, Trump refused with something like, "my followers know what I meant."
To judge by many comments, not here of course, but at other sites, many believe Obama to be a Muslim. Something like 55% of Republicans seem to believe this, IIRC. So if such poll numbers are correct, we can perhaps guess what most Republicans think Trump said...
An honest man would have said what he meant clearly, in my opinion, and been happy to clarify. But I'm only one voter. YMMV
Robin, ah yes, I see we are in agreement.
The transcript of Obama's ISIL press conference has been released:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2016/06/14/remarks-president-after-counter-isil-meeting
The man is incoherent when his speeches are not prepared. In his rambling, off the cuff remarks, Obama said:
We hear language that singles out immigrants and suggests that entire religious communities are complicit in violence. Where does this stop? The Orlando killer, one of the San Bernardino killers, the Fort Hood killer -- they were all U.S. citizens.
So he cites three of the mass shooting in recent history, all of which were committed by devout Muslims for explicitly religious reasons, with all of the perpetrators being either new immigrants or first generation immigrants (it is being reported now that Mateen's second wife, a Muslim immigrant from Uzbekistan, abetted his murder spree).
After making this argument for decreasing Muslim immigration and increasing surveillance of Muslim first generation immigrants, Obama continues:
Are we going to start treating all Muslim Americans differently? Are we going to start subjecting them to special surveillance? Are we going to start discriminating against them because of their faith? We’ve heard these suggestions during the course of this campaign. Do Republican officials actually agree with this? Because that's not the America we want. It doesn't reflect our democratic ideals. It won’t make us more safe; it will make us less safe -- fueling ISIL’s notion that the West hates Muslims, making young Muslims in this country and around the world feel like no matter what they do, they're going to be under suspicion and under attack. It makes Muslim Americans feel like they're government is betraying them. It betrays the very values America stands for.
Loony or just stupid? You make the call.
What a stellar analysis.
In other news, synonyms have been found for "hocus pocus." And "abracadabra."
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