If you want to read some first-rate writing that harpoons one of America’s best-known liars, check out Matt Taibbi’s new article in Rolling Stone, entitled, “Without a Prayer.” Here are a few of his gems, but really do go read the full article. Not many writers are this dangerous with a pen:
McCain’s chosen stump locations are invariably VFW halls or factory sites — where he tries to win over working-class crowds by telling them that their jobs aren’t coming back. As the nominee of a party that has swept two straight elections by hawking cheap pieties and ramming one preposterous lie after another down the public’s throat, McCain’s agnostically bummerific public-speaking strategy is a curiosity, to say the least . . .
The Republican party returned to power at the beginning of this decade thanks to a brilliantly innovative political hybrid represented in its most advanced form by the Bush-Cheney ticket — a high-tech engine of ruthless neocon capitalism wedded to a half-literate aristocrat dunce hiding his alcoholism in born-again Christian platitudes. Add corporate money to fundamentalist-Christian demographics in a country as dumb and superstitious as America, and you can vaporize a century’s worth of Al Gores and John Kerrys . . .
Or check out this one:
The marriage of fundamentalist Christianity and the conservative movement has been a powerful force in world affairs. It has been the best smoke screen the archpriests of supply-side economics could possibly have had, giving Wall Street a populist in with the very people victimized the most by their union-busting, deregulatory policies. It turned out, for decades, that Bible-thumping Americans didn’t mind having their jobs shipped to China, so long as someone was worrying about the air supply to Terri Schiavo’s brain lump. As political cons go, this was the ultimate gift that kept on giving.
One of the themes of Taibbi’s article is that McCain is starting to make himself more visible at his alleged church as the election approaches. How incredibly convenient (you might think). To me, McCain’s behavior soundly disproves the existence of a sentient and omnipotent God. If any behavior calls for a well-aimed lightning bolt to blow a major league hypocrite’s butt out of the church and onto the sidewalk, this is it. Especially ironic, in that McCain is so well known for his “barbecues.”
As anyone can see, I can’t hide my displeasure with McCain. And I’m getting tired of talk and more talk. I want to see some real changes in November, and there’s good hope that we will actually see substantial change. If only the corporate media would give McCain a well-deserved swipe or two every day to let the People know they are getting suckered for the third time in eight years. If only the corporate media would just put the facts about McCain on the table for the voters to see.
Have you heard about McCain’s advertisement that draws on an image of Britney Spears and criticizes Obama for his celebrity status? Here’s another guy who sees straight through McCain. It’s Marty Kaplan, who has analyzed what McCain’s latest advertisements say about you:
McCain is saying that the people who believed in Bobby Kennedy, the Americans who made him a star, were just as ditzy to believe in his message about ending the war and reducing inequality as they were to worship Marilyn Monroe. The people who rallied on the Mall in amazing numbers to hear Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream, the people who wanted to follow him out of Vietnam, were naive starf***ers; by turning their backs on Nixon and Kissinger, by putting joy ahead of sacrifice, they were undermining America in the world and our troops in Southeast Asia. Those McCain ads are as much about you as they are about Obama. If you believe in all that global warming and gay marriage stuff, you’re as dumb as a Lindsay Lohan fan.
So what are the roots of the neocon sentiments? Kaplan explains:
Don’t forget: the people behind McCain loathed Bobby and Martin at the time. Today, they’ll do anything they can to make it feel embarrassing to imagine that those leaders might have an heir in Obama. The message of McCain’s ads is that change is for chumps, belief is for boobs, fame is for charlatans, and that the calendar in America will be forever set on Groundhog Day 1968 until all the war protesters, uppity women, tree-huggers, faggots and dirty f*****g hippies finally go back to the places where they belong.
Great article! I sometimes forget how subversive the ol' Stone can be, so thanks for the headsup.
Drop by my place sometime!
Cheers
.m.
Ultimately, the right under KKKarl Rove and his ilk want to kill off the paradigm of change as requiring an activist government. By blaming all the ills of today's society on "liberals" and promoting themselves as the "values" party the current fascist corporatist GOP is going for the twin kill, government will again only serve the propertied and we'll all be consigned to uneducated consumerism as dictated by our masters.
By demonizing "liberals" we have people killing others because they are have a "mental illness" according to misanthrope Savage, or they are "baby killers" like the wackos who stalked and murdered innocent doctors and blew up the Olympics and didn't get the death penalty from Bush, a "law and order" conservative.