Yesterday, I wrote about what the “Ground Zero” mosque disaster reveals about the Republican Party. In short, it reveals that the Bush administration was a false dawn. Bush, for all his flaws, believed that the GOP should be a universalistic party based on traditional values, a big tent for “faith-based” conservatives of all races and creeds: Muslims, Hispanics, Mormons, African-Americans, whatever. Now it is clear that the post-Bush GOP is a far nastier creature: A party seething with hatred towards vulnerable religious and ethnic groups. Despite the pretense that the GOP’s anti-mosque crusade is based on what Imam Rauf and company believe, it has more to do with who they are. It’s telling that the people Republicans are turning to for their anti-mosque street cred are not “moderate, peace-loving” Muslims, since even Muslim Republicans are disgusted by their party’s actions. The GOP’s new heroes are former Muslims like Nonie Darwish and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. That’s one way to escape the new Republican bigotry. Maybe the folks the GOP wants to harass in Arizona should try becoming former Hispanics.
This a great example of two forms of liberal writings. First is the one that everyone who’s been to college will remember is the “People who disagree with me are bigots” genre. Second is the “Why aren’t conservatives today as cuddly as the reasonable conservatives of yore” genre. What’s impressive is that Beinhart a.) weaves these two together so well, and b.) has already lumped W. into the “cuddly conservatives of yore that today’s conservatives can’t live up to” category. That was fast.
But more importantly, Beinhart faults Republicans for siding with Ayaan Hirsi Ali against “vulnerable religious minorities.” When your definition of a “vulnerable minority” excludes a woman who’s had to flee two continents because of violent threats by religious fanatics but includes those fanatics’ coreligionists, methinks the moral compass is a bit off.
The Drudge Report is known for its, shall we say, provocative headlines. The one that appeared this afternoon is so beyond the pale I hope someone gets fired:
Way to raise the level of discourse, jackass.
Jamie posted this at 5:38 PM HKT on Tuesday, August 17th, 2010 as Journalism
Reviewing some of my personal writings this evening, I found this paragraph in a write-up of a “peace” protest I covered in 2002:
Another block to the east, holding signs and pacing back and forth on the steps just north of the Capitol Reflecting Pool, was Zeouss. He was Greek, as his name, thick accent, and complexion attested. He had a scraggly goatee and scraggly, bushy hair. His pants, shoes and shirt were dark colored and of fair quality, and he had a trash bag on his shoulder, probably left from when it rained. He appeared unwashed, and his hand felt filthy, but the quality of his clothes and the fluidity of his anti-Semitism led one to believe that he was an eccentric academic rather than a bum.
Apollo posted this at 12:21 AM HKT on Tuesday, August 17th, 2010 as Ourselves
Here is Laura Ingraham discussing The Lower Manhattan Islamic Cultural Center on December 21, 2009 with the imam’s wife, Daisy Khan:
Ingraham: Let’s talk about the Islamic center at Ground Zero… Questions– I can’t find many people who really have a problem with it. Bloomberg is for it. Rabbis in New York say that don’t have any problem with it. Why near ground zero? Why’d you choose that space?
Khan: Well, I think the closeness of the center to Ground Zero, first and foremost, is a blow to the extremists. And you know we Muslims are really fed up, Laura, of having to be defined by the actions of the extremists. You know, we are law-abiding citizens, we are faithful people, we are very good Americans, and we need to project a different image of Islam. One of tolerance, love, and the kind of commonalities that we have with other faith communities. And the center will be dedicated to promoting what it means to be Muslim, but what it also means to be American. And that is the real message that needs to get out.
Reasoned, constructive discussion. Under pressure from Ingraham, Khan backpeddles some of her husband’s more troubling comments, but it ends with the two of them pushing for common values. If anything, it’s a little saccharine.
Here is Laura Ingraham, more recently, on Fox Friends (exact date unknown):
Fast forward to the 2:00 mark to get to her comments.
Ingraham: Well it depends on the meaning of the phrase ‘distinguished Muslim cleric’. You know when I hear that I’m thinking okay what does that exactly mean. Does that mean that you disavow terrorism? Does that mean that you say that ‘Yes Hamas is a terrorist organization?’ Does that mean that you would say that the United States is not responsible for what happened on 9/11? And when we look back on his comments, and I know you guys have covered this, I mean this isn’t even a close call. For this Imam to describe the United States as an accessory, essentially, to murder in that interview after September 11th and then to refuse to acknowledge that Hamas is a terrorist organization. That seems to be pretty much a disqualifier from flying on the taxpayers dime, but not in this administration, the radical usually wins out in this administration.
And later:
Ingraham: Again think about this, think about if heaven forbid some Christian right wing group somewhere located in the world attempted an attack on Mecca or Medina, and it was successful. Can you imagine how they would be received if they said ‘Oh well we want to build…’ a group comes along as says ‘We want to build a mega-church right next to Mecca or Medina’. I mean do you think they would be welcomed in the Middle East for doing that? No they would be described as provocative and unnecessarily aggressive and it wouldn’t be tolerated. Now look we’re different from Saudi Arabia, and I’m glad we are, but again this is an unnecessary and aggressive move against people who, our country has been nothing but kind and welcoming to people who want to play by the rules.
No mention of the fact that the proprietors of the Lower Manhattan Islamic Cultural Center actually are playing by the rules. This is what modern populist conservatism has come to, naked bigotry and demagoguery solely for political expediency.
It makes me sick.
(First video H/T to Tom, co-authored by Tom)
Jamie posted this at 1:47 PM HKT on Monday, August 16th, 2010 as Conservatism
Reading this news story, I thought, “Surely they’re blowing things out of proportion.” But then I glanced at the preposterously long text of the initiative (seriously, can no one write laws anymore with less than 10,000 words?) and the Chamber of Commerce’s accessible legal summary (caution: PDF). I’m not a lawyer yet, but some of the Chamber’s points seem to be valid.
If that’s the case, though, it says a lot less about Prop. 19 than it does about the overregulated status of the California workplace.*If California employers are already so restricted that they can’t discriminate among applicants based on legal, recreational drug use, is it really Prop. 19’s fault that its passage would result in employers not being able to refuse to hire applicants because they’re potheads? If current regulation requires that employers make “accommodations” for employees who consume mind-altering prescription drugs, is it really Prop. 19’s fault that its passage would result in employers having to make “accommodations” for employees who smoke prescribed marijuana?
From a heighten-the-contradictions approach, the Chamber should welcome Prop. 19 to help show Californians how overregulated employers already are. If, after Prop. 19, employers start getting sued for firing employees who smoked pot on the job, even a state as regulation-happy as California might realize it’s gone too far.
*A little anecdotal information. During my six years in the Golden State, I worked for five paying employers. Since I left several years ago, I have received settlement checks from 2 of them as a result of class action lawsuits. At both of those workplaces, I was subjected to the supposedly illegal activity that resulted in the settlements, but I’m not at all convinced that either employer did anything wrong. In fact, both were, in my opinion, engaged in perfectly reasonable business practices that did not oppress me one whit. But California is the sort of place where reasonable business practices will cause you to pay the college bills of plaintiff lawyers’ children.
This post from Chuck DeVore (who, now that he is no longer seeking votes does not need to restrain from insulting Californians) breaks down states by whom they voted for in 2008, and then their per capita state debt totals.
Those with a right-wing presumption will not be at all surprised to be told that the 12 most indebted states voted for Obama. Indeed, those 12 states also voted for Kerry and Gore. And 7 of the 8 states with the lowest debt totals voted for McCain (and Bush, twice). Indeed, the 13 states with the lowest debt were part of Bush’s victory in the halcyon days of 2004 (when a mere 12 digit deficit made Democrats pretend to care about spending).
The average debt for the 22 McCain states was $749 per capita. Obama only gained the support of 6 states that had debt limits below that amount, and of those, 4 had voted for Bush at least once.
Of course, there’s no conclusions to be drawn from this. When our president and the Congress controlled by his party sends tens of billions of dollars to bail out profligate state governments, you’d be nothing more than a partisan hack to infer that he was doing so in order to pay back his supporters. I’d say “Tsk tsk” and shake my head at you if you noticed that the average per capita debt of the Obama states is greater than the per capita debt of any McCain state, and concluded that there was anything partisan about federal handouts to the states. Hell, I’d probably call you a racist.
I really don’t know what to think of Glenn Beck. There is no doubt he is a genius broadcaster, a seemingly true to form Libertarian-Conservative and a powerful force in conservative politics. The problem I’ve had lately is that he seems to be bat-shit insane. Whether its the bizzare chalk board rants about a hidden socialist conspiracy or his accusations that Obama is a racist, I just can’t seem to get behind this guy.
O’REILLY: Do you believe — do you believe that gay marriage is a threat to the country in any way?
BECK: A threat to the country?
O’REILLY: Yeah, it going to harm the country?
BECK: No, I don’t. Will the gays come and get us?
O’REILLY: OK. Is it going to harm the country in any way?
BECK: I believe — I believe what Thomas Jefferson said. If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket, what difference is it to me?
Thank you! Although I now await the avalanche of people explaining why Beck isn’t a real conservative.
But wait! There’s more. Beck is doing a one hour special on Calvin Coolidge – perhaps the greatest conservative politician in American history not named Ronald Reagan. According to The Prophet Jonah it will include an interview with Amity Shlaes author of perhaps the best book on understanding The Great Depression I have ever read.
Glenn is really causing a lot of cognative dissonance over here at Jamie’s House. Fifty percent of the time he’s a loon, the other fifty he might be my favorite popular conservative.
Hugh Hewitt is a charming and honest partisan. He got off a sharp retort in Larry King Live though:
We’ll see if Republican do so well as Mr. Hewitt hopes. By all rights, they should, but it’s entirely possible they’ll snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Hubbard posted this at 3:49 PM HKT on Wednesday, August 11th, 2010 as Politics, The Right Words
Normally, David Frum is one of the more reasonable voices on the right. But I cannot follow his logic here:
Think for a minute: Why do people oppose same-sex marriage in the first place?
They do so because they fear that otherwise America’s young people will end up like … Bristol and Levi: having sex and raising children without regard to marriage.
For all the reasons I’ve heard that people oppose gay marriage, I have never, ever, heard that one. Because, see, having sex and raising children without marriage is what gay people are doing now. And, even without gay marriage, so are Bristol and Levi.
Hubbard posted this at 7:55 PM HKT on Monday, August 9th, 2010 as Here and Queer
Christopher Hitchens, as tart as ever, lets the really-too-sappy-for-this Anderson Cooper interview him. I’d imagine that Hitch’s final words will be similar to Joan Crawford’s. When her nurse started praying for her, Crawford snapped: “Dammit, don’t you dare ask God to help me!”
Hubbard posted this at 5:49 PM HKT on Friday, August 6th, 2010 as Hitch-slapped!
Mr Stender, 43, said: “I built the bus for two reasons. The first is to entertain people because, come on, it’s a jet bus.
“The second, is to keep kids off drugs. Jets are hot, drugs are not.”
That sound you hear at the end of the video is the sound of a million joints hitting the ground as kids give up the wacky weed and head for their neighborhood jet propulsion laboratory.
Apollo posted this at 5:38 PM HKT on Thursday, August 5th, 2010 as Heroes
