Category: American Culture
Intelligent, Clever, or Stupid
Everyone misspeaks in public from time to time. It really is unfair to pick on politicians for the occasional gaffe. But it is fair to ask at what point such gaffes are valid signs of a fundamental problem. I think Dan Quayle simply needed to stick to the prepared statements—he did not “wing it” very well, but he kept trying, and slipped repeatedly on his inherent inability to compose cogent remarks on the fly.
But Romney is beginning to show some serious problems. Never mind his 47% statement, he was arguably playing to his crowd. But his recent remarks about being unable to open the windows in an airliner are very troubling.
Pediatricians warn about trampoline use
Sure, I chuckled at the episode of the Simpsons where hundreds of neighborhood children were injured on Bart’s trampoline, in a scene reminiscent of “Gone with the Wind.”
But how dangerous are trampolines? It turns out that they are quite dangerous.
Trampolines are too dangerous for children to use, the American Academy of Pediatrics said Monday. Citing nearly 100,000 injuries in 2009, the academy issued the warning in a statement published in Pediatrics and noted that the safety nets added in recent years don’t make much of a difference.
William Black explains Mitt Romney’s 47% comment
William K. Black is spot on in his analysis of Mitt Romney, the candidate of America’s Social Darwinist Party (aka the Republican Party):
Romney’s initial non-apology for his dismissal of the 47 percent claimed that he was not “elegant” in his statements, but that is a deliberate effort to divert our attention from the real point. His consignment of nearly half of all Americans to the trash heap was deliberately crude because his fellow plutocrats love the crudeness of his dismissal of those they see as immoral moochers. His speech demonstrated perfect pitch for his audience because his plutocratic peers are the only Americans who Romney knows and understands.
Insanity abounds at the Values Voter Summit
At “The League of Ordinary Gentlemen,” Tod Kelly reports on what he heard at the Values Voter Summit. This is pretty amazing stuff. It would be difficult to make up things this bizarre. Here’s an example:
The greatest challenge to our security and our Constitution we face in the 21st century is gay soldiers being able to marry. (Steven King, US Rep-Iowa)
Kelly’s bonus observation was quite interesting to me:
Friday morning before Paul Ryan came out, they showed a video presentation honoring the Heritage Foundation. The video ended with stills of famous conservatives that had worked with the foundation, and each got a different level of applause by the audience, based on how popular the pictured conservative was. Not surprisingly, the picture of Paul Ryan got the loudest. The next biggest cheers went to a picture of Limbaugh, followed by one of Hannity, and right behind him was George W. Bush. One of the pictures that got the least, shockingly, was the picture of Reagan, who got what might be called a polite, golf-clap smattering. This may have been the most surprising moment of the conference for me.
I do think we have gotten to the point where Ronald Reagan is far to liberal for the leaders of today’s Republican Party.
George Carlin discusses political talk
George Carlin was at his best when discussing the obfuscatory language used by politicians:
In case the moon landing had failed
I didn’t realize that a speech to be given by Richard President Nixon had already been outlined in case the moon landing attempt had failed.
Modern day conservatives even too much for Judge Richard Posner
A conservative federal judge appointed by Ronald Reagan said in an interview published Thursday that the Republican Party has gone “goofy” and that “these right-wingers who are blasting [Chief Justice John] Roberts are making a very serious mistake.”
GOP platform for 2012
Think Progress reviews the highlights of what is, for the most part, a massively dysfunctional set of priorities. I am in favor, though, of ongoing audits of the Federal Reserve. I do need to give credit where it is due.
Military Voting Philosophy
I remember the presidential election of 2004, during which the armed services were flooded with the message that it was seditious to speak out against your Commander in Chief, and certainly bad to consider voting against your own commander. Luminaries of the time like Ann Coulter published the principle that anyone who casts doubt on ones president is a traitor. This was a solidly accepted conservative plank.
But the message fed to members of the armed forces has changed for the 2012 election:
This image has been going around on Facebook, among other sources. I suspect that the message they receive about their Commander in Chief is different than before. There also is a busy meme insinuating that Democrats are busily working to deny military members their right to absentee vote.
Does this mean that the military is a Republican organization? Or does it cleave to one of the Three Tea Party branches?
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