Jun 4, 2012
Conform And Be Dull
This is nothing new. The marketeers (commercial and political) know about all this, and they use it to manipulate us at every turn.
The Asch Experiments:
Of particular interest to me (in the context of the current political climate) is the bit regarding united opposition at about 3:00.
Now, try not to think about DumFux News, and the simple fact that there's an awful lot of "low-information voters" (aka the independents) out there who pay no attention to what's happening until it's time to decide; and who then simply try to get a feel for which way the wind is blowing so they can vote according to what they perceive as the "majority sentiment".
The Asch Experiments:
Of particular interest to me (in the context of the current political climate) is the bit regarding united opposition at about 3:00.
Now, try not to think about DumFux News, and the simple fact that there's an awful lot of "low-information voters" (aka the independents) out there who pay no attention to what's happening until it's time to decide; and who then simply try to get a feel for which way the wind is blowing so they can vote according to what they perceive as the "majority sentiment".
Jun 3, 2012
Disconnected
Almost every opinion survey tells us a coupla things that have now passed into "facts" of Conventional Wisdom.
First, approval ratings for Congress are always somewhere down around 10%. And yet, in spite of those numbers, sometimes 60% of us show up to cast our votes - obviously trying in some way to fulfill the promise of self-governance.
Second, approval ratings for US Military always come in up around 70%, but fewer than 1% of us are signing on to serve.
We've become extremely well conditioned to a weirdly reflexive Political Correctness that requires a basic hypocrisy.
We claim to hate The Government, but we love trying to make something useful of it.
And we profess an undying love for the Military, but we hate the tho't of wearing the uniform ourselves.
And God help you if you ever say anything like that in public.
Like my mom always said, "Conform and be dull".
First, approval ratings for Congress are always somewhere down around 10%. And yet, in spite of those numbers, sometimes 60% of us show up to cast our votes - obviously trying in some way to fulfill the promise of self-governance.
Second, approval ratings for US Military always come in up around 70%, but fewer than 1% of us are signing on to serve.
We've become extremely well conditioned to a weirdly reflexive Political Correctness that requires a basic hypocrisy.
We claim to hate The Government, but we love trying to make something useful of it.
And we profess an undying love for the Military, but we hate the tho't of wearing the uniform ourselves.
And God help you if you ever say anything like that in public.
Like my mom always said, "Conform and be dull".
Jun 1, 2012
May 31, 2012
Pick 'Em
When it comes to policy regarding the US Economy, what we hear over and over from "conservatives" is that the Gubmint shouldn't be in the business of picking winners and losers. And yet, here's a nearly unanimous GOP saying they'll continue subsidizing fossil fuels at a rate of 6-1 over alternative fuels. And they'll do it in spite of what their pets over at DoD ask for every time they get a chance.
From Wonkette:
More from The Burrill Report.
From Wonkette:
We remember a time when if “the generals” wanted solid-gold ballwashers, they got solid-gold ballwashers! But now, it seems, the Republican members of the House are a little more frugal. Oh, not for the important stuff, like building East Coast Star Wars installations that the Pentagon doesn’t want — no, that they will get. But for stupid stuff, like biofuels to power their infernal machines, and this:Seems like the whole world is waiting for us lead on this shit, and it looks like we're just standing around with our dicks in our hands, wishing it was 1965 again so we didn't have to worry so much about all this complicated stuff.
The Conaway amendment included in the fiscal year 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (H.R. 4310) was meant to limit the Defense Department’s participation in an interagency agreement with the departments of Energy and Agriculture to spend $510 million to construct biorefineries capable of producing “drop-in” biofuels for the use by the Navy in its ships and jets, according to a summary.
More from The Burrill Report.
May 30, 2012
And Now This Other
The Fail Parade continues. This time, "conservatives" are using the power of the gubmint to block the construction of a house of worship.
Lyin' sacks of shit.
Construction of a suburban Nashville, Tenn., mosque that was supposed to have been completed in 2010 has been halted and could be stopped for good after Chancellor Robert Corlew ruled Tuesday that the public wasn't given the proper notice two years ago at a meeting to approve the site plan.
Technically, it means the Rutherford County Planning Commission could still approve the site near the city of Murfreesboro, but its chances of completion are diminished.I guess freedom of religion is important as long as the religion in question is Politically Correct.
Lyin' sacks of shit.
And Now This
You know without thinking that motherhood is one of the absolutes when it comes to what "conservatives" are always yammerin' about - but of course they absolutely refuse to give any new mom any kind of break or some small thing to help her and the baby and the rest of her family handle the disruption.
One more example of how "conservatives" are a bunch of lying sacks of shit.
One more example of how "conservatives" are a bunch of lying sacks of shit.
May 29, 2012
Support The Troops
Gosh - when you send people to fight 2 wars over 10 or 12 years, and they have to go thru 2 or 3 or 5 or 8 deployments of 15 - 30 months at a time, some of them will need healthcare for a very long time after they get back, and some of them will need an ever-increasing level of care because their injuries turn out to be progressive or occult or degenerative in nature.
But one of the things I probably should've seen coming and didn't was that now the Anti-Entitlements crowd is pissin' and moanin' about "veterans gaming the system". Well, I'm gonna go with my first reaction on this one: Fuck you. OK, so yeah - some of that's gonna happen. Big fuckin' deal. You're the bunch of posturing chickenhawks who wanted all this war shit in the first place; you guys are always screechin' about fallen heroes; and you're the pricks who're always posting all that maudlin shit about what we all owe to the soldiers - well now it's time to pony up, cupcake. And where are you? You're nowhere. You're hiding behind the cutesy little magnetic ribbons on your SUV. You're pretending to care about what happens to these men and women by spending a good 15 seconds every few days posting some stupidly drippy bumper-sticker sentiment on your facebook page. But you're out now - it's just too obvious that by balking at the real cost of your war-mongering, you reveal for all to see that you care more about your ideology than you do about the people you claim make this country great.
I'll say it again in case you missed it: fuck you.
USA Today - A staggering 45% of the 1.6 million veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are now seeking compensation for injuries they say are service-related. That is more than double the estimate of 21% who filed such claims after the Gulf War in the early 1990s, top government officials told the Associated Press.
What's more, these new veterans are claiming eight to nine ailments on average, and the most recent ones over the last year are claiming 11 to 14. By comparison, Vietnam veterans are currently receiving compensation for fewer than four, on average, and those from World War II and Korea just two.This seems to come as no big surprise to lot of us - you know, the ones who actually think about shit.
But one of the things I probably should've seen coming and didn't was that now the Anti-Entitlements crowd is pissin' and moanin' about "veterans gaming the system". Well, I'm gonna go with my first reaction on this one: Fuck you. OK, so yeah - some of that's gonna happen. Big fuckin' deal. You're the bunch of posturing chickenhawks who wanted all this war shit in the first place; you guys are always screechin' about fallen heroes; and you're the pricks who're always posting all that maudlin shit about what we all owe to the soldiers - well now it's time to pony up, cupcake. And where are you? You're nowhere. You're hiding behind the cutesy little magnetic ribbons on your SUV. You're pretending to care about what happens to these men and women by spending a good 15 seconds every few days posting some stupidly drippy bumper-sticker sentiment on your facebook page. But you're out now - it's just too obvious that by balking at the real cost of your war-mongering, you reveal for all to see that you care more about your ideology than you do about the people you claim make this country great.
I'll say it again in case you missed it: fuck you.
Rightspeak
A good short piece from Krugman at NYT - lifted in its entirety.
The New Political Correctness
Remember the furor over liberal political correctness? Yes, some of it was over the top — but it was mainly silly, not something that actually warped our national discussion.
Today, however, the big threat to our discourse is right-wing political correctness, which — unlike the liberal version — has lots of power and money behind it. And the goal is very much the kind of thing Orwell tried to convey with his notion of Newspeak: to make it impossible to talk, and possibly even think, about ideas that challenge the established order.
Thus, even talking about “the wealthy” brings angry denunciations; we’re supposed to call them “job creators”. Even talking about inequality is “class warfare”.
And then there’s the teaching of history. Eric Rauchway has a great post about attacks on the history curriculum, in which even talking about “immigration and ethnicity” or “environmental history” becomes part of a left-wing conspiracy. As he says, he’ll name his new course “US History: The Awesomeness of Awesome Americans.” That, after all, seems to be the only safe kind of thing to say.
Actually, this reminds me of an essay I read a long time ago about Soviet science fiction. The author — if anyone remembers where this came from — noted that most science fiction is about one of two thoughts: “if only”, or “if this goes on”. Both were subversive, from the Soviet point of view: the first implied that things could be better, the second that there was something wrong with the way things are. So stories had to be written about “if only this goes on”, extolling the wonders of being wonderful Soviets.
And now that’s happening in America.
A Cost Of Freedom
The rubes love chanting "freedom ain't free". It's one of those useful and catchy phrases that can make it sound like they have the high ground - that they have some deeper understanding of a complex issue, when in fact simply by uttering the words and then claiming to win the argument because it takes the other side a lot longer to articulate a coherent position shows a level of ignorance that depresses the shit outa me.
That kind of opening paragraph is usually instigated by something having to do with National Security, but this time it's all about a little kid in Ohio.
That kind of opening paragraph is usually instigated by something having to do with National Security, but this time it's all about a little kid in Ohio.
Ohio boy, 3, shoots self in head
Tuesday May 29, 2012 12:30 AM
MOUNT VERNON, Ohio (AP) — A 3-year-old boy is in critical condition after shooting himself in the head.
WBNS-TV reports (http://bit.ly/KBZKiC ) that the shooting happened shortly before 6:30 p.m. Monday at a house northwest of Mount Vernon. The boy's grandfather, parents and two younger siblings were at home when it happened.
The station says that family members say the gun was sitting on top of a television.
Knox County Sheriff's Capt. David Shaffer says a firearm was recovered from the house. He says the shooting is an "unfortunate accident."
The incident is being investigated.Enjoy your little slice of freedom at the expense of your kids, you stupid fucking rednecks.
May 25, 2012
Maybe Someday
...they'll make something useful out of me.
(Father John Misty, with a hat tip to Balloon Juice)
I guess it's all part of what I see as our evolution.
Periods of transition are always dangerous and exciting and interesting and confusing and frightening and and and.
(Father John Misty, with a hat tip to Balloon Juice)
I guess it's all part of what I see as our evolution.
Periods of transition are always dangerous and exciting and interesting and confusing and frightening and and and.
Parade Of Stoopid
The reason we get incredibly radical nonsense from our "leaders" is simply that we are willing constituents.
I am responsible for everything I think, say and do. Me. I'm not under the spell of some cosmic mesmerizer. And I'm not going to follow blindly along behind anybody who claims to possess some kind of special magic; or needs me to believe that his particular decoder ring is the only one that works when it comes to figuring out what Gondorff The Magnificent really meant by whatever it was that some half-literate guy wearing a goat skin singlet scratched into a clay tablet 1700 years ago.
I can be persuaded or inspired or cajoled and manipulated - but if I decide to act, the decision is mine.
I am responsible for everything I think, say and do. Me. I'm not under the spell of some cosmic mesmerizer. And I'm not going to follow blindly along behind anybody who claims to possess some kind of special magic; or needs me to believe that his particular decoder ring is the only one that works when it comes to figuring out what Gondorff The Magnificent really meant by whatever it was that some half-literate guy wearing a goat skin singlet scratched into a clay tablet 1700 years ago.
I can be persuaded or inspired or cajoled and manipulated - but if I decide to act, the decision is mine.
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