If you watched Rachel Maddow last night, you saw a montage of righties on Fox News pooh-poohing the idea that Middle Easterners (outside of Israel, of course) could manage democratic government. Democracy is just not in their DNA, or culture, or something.
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And as I watched this, I thought, what the bleep — aren’t these some of the same people who pimped the war in Iraq as a campaign for freedom? For democracy? They sure weren’t pooh-poohing democracy in a Muslim country back when Dubya was president.
Well, folks, so much for freedom.
Pretty much in isolation on the Right, the crew at National Review Online still seems to think it was good that Mubarak resigned. However, they are now hedging their bets. Andrew McCarthy is warning us that the Muslim Brotherhood could screw it all up. In fact, he already is blaming the Obama Administration for losing democracy is Egypt, because the Obama Administration obviously doesn’t understand how awful the Muslim Brotherhood is. And we know what a reliable expert Andrew McCarthy is when it comes to, you know, Muslim stuff.
There is some talk in leftie media about how the GOP has lost control of the message machine, because Glenn Beck et al. are calling the Egyptian uprising the beginning of the end of the world. But as usual I agree with Steve M. on this — ultimately, what matters to the GOP is keeping the rubes in a state of fear and outrage so they’ll reliably march to the polls and vote to screw themselves. And scary Muslims trying to take over the world work just as well as scary Communists trying to take over the world. (In fact, Beck seems to think the Communists and the Muslims are in cahoots, even though that makes no sense at all. But of course, it hardly matters that it makes no sense, does it?)
Elsewhere — aspiring Republican presidential nominee Tim Pawlenty shows us where the rightie wind is blowing by doing the ol’ flipflop. A few days ago, Pawlenty firmly was declaring it was time for Mubarak to step down. Now, he’s calling Mubarak “our friend” and criticizing the Obama Administration for siding with the uprising.
Most of the other hopefuls either sided with Mubarak all along (i.e., Huckabee) or were critical of whatever the Obama Administration was doing without clearly saying what they would do (i.e., Palin and Gringrich), or have avoided the issue altogether (i.e., Barbour). I believe the only “hopeful” still in the “Mubarak must go” column is Mitt Romney, who carefully avoided the subject of Egypt at CPAC. Michael Scherer writes,
Mitt Romney made no mention of the historic events in Cairo, even as his speech roughly coincided with news that Mubarak had resigned. John Thune, who is speaking as I write, seems to be speaking in a vacuum, with lots of talk about Ronald Reagan but no mention of the international events that Ronald Reagan would be focusing on were he still alive. Newt Gingrich barely glossed on Obama’s foriegn policy, but focused on Iran and Hezbollah. Santorum talked about Egypt, but was nearly unintelligible. He accused Obama of siding with the Iranian regime after protests erupted there–a claim that is, it must be said, factually shaky–and siding with the protesters in Egypt even though the regime was “a friend.” The implication was that Santorum supported the Mubarak regime, but then he added, “Now I am not saying we should not side with protesters.”
CPAC — Clowns Passing as Conservatives
I have to admit I had a lump in my throat yesterday when I heard Mubarak finally agreed to step down. He was a bad man.
When I see the idiots like Frank Gaffney and Glenn Beck spew their crap about freedom and liberty and the end times baloney, and the neo-con tired old myths, I get a wee bit peeved.
O.I.L; Operation Iraqi Liberation; nope, it’s O.I.F.; Operation Iraqi FREEDOM.
Them sand nigras can’t handle no freedom, everbody knows that!
Glenn Beck, Frank Gaffney, and the rest of those evil FOX clowns are poisioning the well. I hope for a big sinkhole in FOX central.
It’s a damned good thing we gots us a commie Muslim for a president so he can hang all them traders! ( yeah, I was once called a “trader” on a righty site, kind a like moran.)
Rachel, as usual, does a great job of summarizing. She’s by far the best newperson on TV. Why doesn’t she have a syndicated column, too?
And I always knew that the “Crazy Pool” had a pretty deep end, but I’m starting to realize that it’s really bottomless.
Example:
Socialists + Communists + Islamic Fundamentalists joining forces. Yeah, OK… That’s as grounded in reality as saying that the NY Jets need a defensive lineman, and that they should draft Santa Claus, because he’s a jolly big fat elf who can stop the run, rush the passer, and provide some needed team morale. Plus, he’s good under pressure as the season ends.
Socialists + Communists + Islamic Fundamentalists joining forces. Glenn, Glenn, washing peyote and Oxi down with a whiskey chaser while toking on a bong before showtime is never a good idea. Never!
My other favorite lines:
The guy who says maybe they can have liberty without democracy.
Hummana-hummana-hummana… Double take… FTW?
And Beck talking about ‘storing food.’ Did you see the photo? Glenn looks like he’s got a real good head start there. His jowls look like he’s storing all of the meat and grain that Kansas can provide annually. He’s got more ‘chin’s’ than the Hong Kong phone directory.
Conservatives, Alice wants her looking glass back.
Oops! It’s too late, it looks like they decided against the rabbit-hole and instead went down a worm-hole into a new dimension of crazy.
Storing food is a Mormon thing, although I’m not sure why. About a zillion years ago I was production editor on a book about homemaking by a Mormon lady, and she went on about food storage. She kept canned food under her bed, as I remember.
One of her recommendations was to store potatoes in the legs of old pantyhose, with a knot tied between each potato, and then hanging the “legs” somewhere. She also had directions for making oven mitts out of worn-out ironing board covers. However, it doesn’t seem to me that I will ever wear out an ironing board cover.
“Storing food is a Mormon thing, although I’m not sure why.”
They got kicked out of a lot of places they settled before finding suitable barren desert in Utah. Their big Temple in Navoo was burned to the ground by the locals. The antipathy may have to do with the multiple wives-thing, and having to be prepared to leave quickly may be the reason they store food.
I forget where I heard it, but Beck was refered to as the “golden gopher”.I wish he’d just go away before someone gets hurt or worse.
Some people just won’t take advantage of a chance to do the righ thing! After two weeks away from the computer doing eldercare, I find Egypt can topple a tyrant yet the R’s can’t get so far as two-dimensional policy undersanding with a clear, unopposed opportunity. Can’t watch the Beck above. Don’t need to.
I watched ZOMBIELAND today and found it to have startlingly sharp political satire of the conservative “movement” as its title indicated it would.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/02/12-2
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/eric-boehlert/34312/fox-news-insider-stuff-is-just-made-up
I think you may have overlooked psycho American exceptionalism and crypto-racism on the right.
It’s not that the former war pimps don’t believe that Middle Easterners can do democracy, it’s that they don’t think they can do it without having it bestowed upon them by the bombs and soldiers of the Greatest Damn Country on God’s Green Earth, and a few years and millions of dollars of no-bid contracts to help teach them.
Obviously, if they go trying it on for themselves, they’ll just screw it up and get duped into electing those damn terrists. Which is why it’s better for them if they have an overseer like Mubarak, who knows his place and listens to us, instead of getting all uppity and thinking they can decide things for themselves.
It’s not hypocrisy, it’s just the usual right-wing bigotry, mixed with the usual opposition to whatever Obama thinks is a good idea.
“aren’t these some of the same people who pimped the war in Iraq as a campaign for freedom”
Yeah sort of, if I recall correctly the “freedom card” was only played after the WMD card turned out to be a dud. So they didn’t believe in freedom anymore for Iraq then than they do for Egypt today. Come on Maha don’t you know those ragheads are incapable of managing on their own, why if left to their own devices they’ll certainly choose some ancient religious doctrine. It’s up to Obama to make sure they pattern their new government on Christian values, just like we did!
Still waiting for moderation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sj_U6vObUA&feature=related
This is off-topic; but, I think important. Wisconsin’s Republican Governor is trying to take away the bargaining rights of state workers. He has even threatened to call out the National Guard to prevent any one from even the smallest indication that they might want to peaceably assemble and exercise their rights to free speech. I think we need to start focusing on a fight for freedom here in America. I also think this Governor should be required to watch for a solid 24 hours of video of the shootings at Kent State. Are we going to relive that soon?
“threatened to call out the National Guard” Hey live feed shows Cairo Egypt, pretty cool.
erinyes,
I don’t know about the “Golden Gopher,” but I suggest calling him ‘The Hairless Hamster,’ or ‘The Albino Prarie Dog.’
I’m sure everyone’s seen at least one of these video’s – the hamster doing his best Dr. Evil glare while very dramatic chords sound.
If I had any technical skills, I’d edit what Beck is saying, like in the Maddow clip above, to the hamster/prarie dog so that while he keeps spouting his scary nonsense, the hamster would be on an endless video loop.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBRI3iHmLys&feature=related
Oh, and everytime he talks about Obama, we could show the following clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW-LNiMBpAE&feature=related
I hope these links work.
I’m wondering if the GOP candidates aren’t strategizing (I can make up words if I want. Why should Sp have all the fun?) for a 2016 run. Winning the nomination but loosing the race is generally the kiss of death. I think the GOP candidates may be sizing up the conservative fragmentation and Obama’s rising popularity and trying to figure out how to deed the honor of the nomination to someone else in the GOP.
Thanks Bonnie, as the name would indicate, I’m a Badger. Just to be clear, Walker threatened to call out the NG in case the prison guards went on strike. But the rest of us understood the implied threat. Walker is a Tea Bagger governor who is hell bent on breaking the unions (the main concern for the emergency budget bill is the elimination of collective bargaining), giving jobs to his cronies and, of course, cutting taxes for the wealthy and businesses. This is unprecedented in the past 100 years in the United States. The only analogy I can think of is Peron and Pinochet in South America when they broke the unions, gave away massive parts of the economy to their friends and killed the life and hope of 95% of the population. There are mega rallies on Tuesday and Wednesday in Madison and I am planning on attending. I’ll keep you updated.
Thanks for jumping on this…we knew it was coming. The prototypical conservative view by an untraveled, provincial and under-read group upholds a view of the “generalized other” as sub-human. This happens without regard to our Kasczynskis and McVeys, the intolerant religious right and those who speak glowingly about second amendment alternatives. Fox makes Al-Jazeera out to look like Mcneil-Lehrer.
They overinflate the Muslim Brotherhood without respect to facts or proportion with the same ominous tones that were used to speak about the “black problem” earlier in this century.
Isn’t it clear what they’re doing? They’re ascribing their own unspoken hatred to the other and it spooks the bejesus out of them. They KNOW what is in middle easterners hearts and minds because it has to be worse than what’s in theirs.
This racism and ethnophobia has to be seen for what it is. Hopefully our diplomacy which has been almost non-existent during the Bush administration, except via the barrel of the gun or the receiving end of a bomb, can now get a chance to prove itself.
9-11 is over. GOP 2012 candidates know they can’t continue to leverage the sort of fear that worked in the years following 9-11. I don’t know whether to hope they keep it up and lose or stop because it’s amplified by media and so bad for the body politic. Some of the candidates seem to recognize how bad for them this is, others don’t.
For me I’m sick and tired of the ignorance, racism and ethnophobia. I’d like to have that weight lifted. Apparently the right can’t trust themselves with a moment of jubiliation and relief unless their clamping down on someone’s throat with a boot. That’s just how their wired.
Apparently the right believes there can only be dictatorship in other countries…that the sub-humans can’t possibly possess their understanding of democracy… Pfffttt, if given half a chance the right would end our Democracy. What the hell do they think the so-called 2nd amendment alternatives imply when cited as a cure for what they can’t seem to get by voting???
The more articles like this one from LATimes on Beck appear in the mainstream the more I can relax a little.
Bravo, maha – CPAC, Clowns Passing as Conservatives. I love it. Someone on another site has coined the term Pig Newton, which I shall also store in my The-Nature-of-Conservatism-in-Modern-America file – at this point in need of its own file cabinet.
buckyblue,
Good for you!
Please stay safe.
And watch out for the Pinkertons. Yeah, I know they’re gone, but they’re out there anyway, just under a different name. And I wonder, since back in the day they were such useful tools for people like some of our current leaders, if they won’t be making a comeback in name.
I also wonder if years from now, people won’t be asking survivors here, “Didn’t you realize that ‘The Fourth Reich’ was forming all around you? Why didn’t you do anything about it?”
Some of us can attest that we tried.
Boy, am I in a bleak mood today.
Pat… excellent link!
The author, entertainer and onetime stand-up comedian has had many low moments in his relentless pursuit of the lowest common denominator, but this week’s embrace of fear and loathing may have been the nadir.
I watched the video of Beck’s “go to hell” moment and I was blown away trying to understand how a clown and total buffoon like Beck can possibly draw an audience who really buys into his rubbish. I wonder if Beck’s mind is as twisted as the ideas that come out of it, or if he’s just working the rubes for his own profit. What scares me the most is the fact that he has risen to the point he has in the public arena by peddling the nonsense he has. It doesn’t speak well for the American public.
” It’s up to Obama to make sure they pattern their new government on Christian values …”
Bigotry seems to flow in te Mahablog too 🙂
I second c u n d gulag’s comment on “sarcasm.”
allwarisbad,
Read that comment by uncledad again, and see if you can detect something called
‘sarcasm?”
In case you either don’t know what that is, or forgot, here’s a link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcasm
Enjoy the rest of your Sunday evening…
There is an undiscussed attack on government employees in Wisconsin, as reported, in Florida, where the governor wants to do mass layoffs. On NPR last week I heard serious discussion of the option for states to devise a limited bankruptcy where the primary target is pensions. There is a pattern here.
As a government employee, a mailman, I cannot strike and don’t WANT to. If we can’t agree in contract negotiations, it’s mandatory for both sides to enter into and accept the decision of arbitration. This is the flip side of the coin that says we can’t strike. Most police and firefighters unions have it – IMO, they also don’t want to strike but want a fair deal. Collective bargaining by government employees is essential to guarantee essential services for the public but give workers representation.
I think the overall strategy is to push government employees into actions that the right will portray as greedy and elitist.
@Doug: exactly right. My school district has been two years without a contract, and we were going to get to arbitration. It now seems evident that the Board of Education was simply waiting for this day. I live in a very conservative community (think Jim Sensenbrenner), so there is not a lot of love for the teachers that educate their kids. In my view it’s exactly what Naomi Kline wrote about in “The Shock Doctrine”. The ‘Emergency Budget Bill’ (union busting bill) was made public last Friday, Governor Walker wants a vote Wednesday. We’ve heard his budget which is soon coming is even worse to public education. One thing I think he has done is galvanize the left. I’m hoping that the people who decided to stay home last Novemeber, or maybe take a chance on a Republican, will see their mistake. This is radical, right-wing bullshit stuff that many find distasteful. I won’t give you the whole litany of stuff he has done in the month hes been in office, but nice perk government jobs to supporters and friends is the norm. It’s almost making me wish for the good old days of George W.