Hitchens for Obama
Christopher Hitchens has formally endorsed Barack Obama and makes a call to “repudiate” John McCain and Sarah Palin. Here’s the heart of his piece:
Anyone with eyes to see and ears to hear had to feel sorry for the old lion on his last outing and wish that he could be taken somewhere soothing and restful before the night was out. The train-wreck sentences, the whistlings in the pipes, the alarming and bewildered handhold phrases—”My friends”—to get him through the next 10 seconds. I haven’t felt such pity for anyone since the late Adm. James Stockdale humiliated himself as Ross Perot’s running mate. And I am sorry to have to say it, but Stockdale had also distinguished himself in America’s most disastrous and shameful war, and it didn’t qualify him then and it doesn’t qualify McCain now.
The most insulting thing that a politician can do is to compel you to ask yourself: “What does he take me for?” Precisely this question is provoked by the selection of Gov. Sarah Palin. I wrote not long ago that it was not right to condescend to her just because of her provincial roots or her piety, let alone her slight flirtatiousness, but really her conduct since then has been a national disgrace. It turns out that none of her early claims to political courage was founded in fact, and it further turns out that some of the untested rumors about her—her vindictiveness in local quarrels, her bizarre religious and political affiliations—were very well-founded, indeed. Moreover, given the nasty and lowly task of stirring up the whack-job fringe of the party’s right wing and of recycling patent falsehoods about Obama’s position on Afghanistan, she has drawn upon the only talent that she apparently possesses.
It therefore seems to me that the Republican Party has invited not just defeat but discredit this year, and that both its nominees for the highest offices in the land should be decisively repudiated, along with any senators, congressmen, and governors who endorse them.
Meanwhile, McCain continues to reap the whirlwind he has unleashed. He’s not only going to be crushed in the election, but he has clearly lost control of the whipped-up fringe that his campaign’s incendiary rhetoric set ablaze. The veteran Senator is not only going to lose his final bid for the presidency, he’s also shredding what’s left of his reputation. It’s almost sad.
October 13th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
The notion that the GOP are haters and the left warm and fuzzy won’t hold up to serious examination.
Moonbats, on the whole, are more intemperate than wingnuts.
I don’t think our liberties will be any safer under Obama than under the GOP. Perhaps less safe.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:16 pm
I’d love to see Hitchens try to explain why he thinks W made a better candidate than McCain. Sure, there was no whistle in W’s voice. He was in robust physical shape, but the man was so intellectually feeble he could hardly form a single sentence, let alone make a compelling case for himself.
And while the nomination of Palin is indeed a desperate, risky move, we now know that however safe the mediocre media thought Dick Cheney was, he turned out to represent the worst and most dangerous ideas and practices of the anti-Constitutional right. We all have a right to be worried should Palin get anywhere near the White House, but that’s primarily because she might do by accident the kinds of things Cheney did on purpose.
McCain is many imperfect things and has made some very bad decisions in his path to losing this election, but he is still by far a better speaker, a better leader, a better legislator and, most likely, a better person than any Republican president in our lifetime.
Hitchens, as usual, is just trying to align his opinions at the service of some new trend. He realizes the game is up for neoconservatism and this is his way of easing out of it, just as he eased out of Trotskyism, then conventional liberalism to become an apologist for the Bush administration.
The fact that he now flamboyantly leaps from the half-sunken S.S. McCain is a little amusing, but in a sad way.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Grumpy: don’t you pride yourself on being a hater?
My understanding is that the American right believes hating Muslims is a sign of sanity and realism — just like hating Commies was back in the day.
If not, what’s all this Evil Empire/Axis of Evil stuff about?
October 13th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
And then there’s this photo.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Oh shit – I just read that Dennis Hopper is voting for Obama as well. Frankly, I find this kind of creepy. Hitchens cast his lot with the hardcore neocons on foreign policy – and those guys are solidly in McCain’s corner, egging on his crackpot “national security” views. He’d proclaimed himself a “single issue voter” aligned with the neo-conservative hardliners on Middle East policies. I don’t see him making any mea culpas here that suggest his support for Obama is anything other than incoherent, considering his rather loud claims to date regarding Iraq and the rest of it. Hitchens is a hypocrite – a rat leaving the sinking rats. He’s trying to spare himself further embarrassment without acknowledging any fundamental flaws in his own record. Fuck him. He’s an irrelevant old coot, flaky as hell – just like McCain.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
On the other hand, I’ve read that he’s taken to drinking less (also quit smoking.) Maybe that explains some of this.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Here’s an Obama endorsement that I can get behind – bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FWenrdKswE
October 13th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Hitchens clearly states that his problem is with the messengers, not the message. Hence, it is not hypocritical, or an attempt to exit an unpopular point of view.
There’s an interesting parallel between what’s happening to McCain, and what happened to Netanyahu in Israel. Both, whether through inclination or electoral necessity pandered to the extreme right in a blatantly populist way and got dragged through the mud as as result.
October 14th, 2008 at 4:17 am
“Hitchens clearly states that his problem is with the messengers, not the message.”
As though W, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Doug Feith, Perle, Frum et. al. have been more reliable than McCain ? That strikes me as bullshit… Palin aside – who frankly could hardly screw the country worse than Cheney did – McCain probably has a slightly better record on Iraq than the guys driving Hitchens’ bus did, assuming you’re a “single issue voter” as our Hero has consistently asserted. Would Hitchens have voted for McCain had the uber-empty suit Mitt Romney been his VP ? Huckabee ? Lieberman ? (The last should have been his dream ticket.) McCain is no dirtier than W was in his campaign style – it’s straight from Rove’s playbook. I’m confused by his concern over “patent falsehoods over Obama’s position on Afghanistan” when The Hitch seemed to have no qualms about falsehoods in the course of stirring up war fever toward Iraq. (The entire case was founded on obvious lies, i.e. Iraq being either a “clear and present danger” to the US and/or some sort of logical target as payback for 9/11. He also drops a load about “capitulationists” in the longer piece.) Nor was he much concerned about “vindictiveness” as a deal-breaker under Veep Cheney when he was “slightly for Bush” in 2004, after rather fanatically promoting Bush’s single most worst decision. Hitchens is, characteristically, leaving the scene of an accident while trying not to muss his clothes.
October 14th, 2008 at 4:19 am
“most worst” ? whatever…
October 14th, 2008 at 4:59 am
I don’t care which candidate that Hitchens and other people from socialist Europe prefer. They don’t get a vote and they wish that America was weaker.
If you like socialism, you can move to Canada or Europe or Russia–some of you to China. Leave one last nation of freedom and opportunity on this planet for people who value it.
October 14th, 2008 at 5:08 am
Woody-
Hitchens became a citizen a few years back. -1 McCain. +1 all those Socialists running in 08.
October 14th, 2008 at 5:20 am
“When the facts change, I change my mind – what do you do, sir?” John Meynard Keynes
October 14th, 2008 at 5:20 am
It doesn’t matter. ACORN probably registered Hitchens before he became a citizen-twice!
October 14th, 2008 at 6:14 am
Woodster, why on earth do you continue to expose yourself to these toxic Obamabots. Absolutely nothing you say will make a farthing’s worth of difference to them.
October 14th, 2008 at 6:23 am
The “facts” relevant to Comrade Hitchens changed back in early 2002 when Bush started raving incoherently about an “Axis of Evil” and ginning up an invasion of Iraq using totally hyped and obviously disingenuous arguments. I was a supporter of the administration’s response to 9/11 until then – although I thought their failure at the Tora Bora battle was strange and unsettling. I also recognized early on our efforts in Iraq would inevitably culminate in a bigger advantage for Iran than the US (see Bob Baer’s new book, “The Enemy We Know.”) Those were key moments when “the facts changed” for assessing Bush, McCain and the rest of them for anyone with their head screwed on. Hitchens has been a bloviating fool for years. He wouldn’t recognize “fact” on serious matters of US national security or even general politics if it flew in his face – other than the “fact” that he has a near-irrational contempt for religion, which is probably the primary reason that Palin has pushed beyond the pale for him. I don’t welcome this jerk back in any fold I’m part of – he’s nearly always been full of shit to one degree or another. Writes well on English literature, but I can’t fathom why anyone would take his political drivel seriously.
October 14th, 2008 at 6:25 am
That should have read: “facts” relevant to evaluating Comrade Hitchens political wisdom changed…
October 14th, 2008 at 6:26 am
G.M., I plead temporary insanity in trying to convince the permanently insane.
October 14th, 2008 at 6:44 am
reg-
I hesitate slightly to get into another Hitchens dustup here since they are all too predictable (you’ve already trotted out his drinking. wow!).
I just have two things to say, first Hitchens can be both incredibly insightful and interesting, as well as sometimes muddle-headed. Just like most anyone I read regularly. One of my all-time favs, Vidal, sounded a bit on the loony side directly after 9/11. So I can’t find the totalizing disdain you have for Hitchens–I don’t really understand it.
Second, I don’t think your charcterization of Hitchens endorsing the lies of the Bush administration is even remotely accurate. There were lots of people back then, Berman, Hitchens etc. who knew that the Bush admin was patently ginning up the evidence, but felt that they could make common cause with the admin for larger goals. I was persuaded by this. In the real world this turned out to be an epic mistake. And probably we should not have been so deluded. But that mistake in analysis does lend itself to the reductionist criticism you are making. They are simply not the same things.
Hitchens has been relmarkably consistent, actually, if you view his actions through the lens of an internationalist, anti-totalitarian commitment. And when he supported the invasion he made a lot of noise about the required left commitment to human emancipation, and how the left had failed in that obligation.
Where I find fault with him is in his increasingly contorted arguments designed to admit no mistake. He would be much better off if he simply admitted that he fucked up on this one. He wants to be vindicated and he lets this color some of his work. He clings to the Niger connection, he makes way too much of Abu Nidal, he plays up the minor fundamentalist straitions of the Baathists, and becomes uncritical in the face of the mainly mendacious Paul Feith and his excuse making book. On Iraq he is committing the hobgoblin sin Emerson described.
He is imperfect, and he blew it on Iraq and doesn’t want to admit it. It makes him distrust Obama for example, when he has no real reason for that position. But to say that he is a “bloviating fool” is to use a sledge hammer where a scalpel is needed.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:27 am
Evidence Hitchens is a blithering idiot…
\\http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/15143?in=41:17&out=44:35
I find that bit of dialogue linked above remarkably stupid and – even worse – utterly dishonest on Hitchens part, for lack of a better word. He asserts as inevitable a complicated and dubious hypothetical scenario in the absence of his beloved invasion of Iraq, and totally dismisses a simple reading of unfortunate outcomes that aren’t really arguable. Disgusting.
Neither am I a fan of Gore Vidal. I think these guys are terribly overrated because they manage to be interesting while they’re spouting what is often tantamount to nonsense. The notion of using a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer is something both of these gadflies might take into account. Style and sheer force of intellect can easily be misdirected into a sort of bullying self-regard, and these characters come off like spoiled children more often than not.
Meanwhile, I reserve the right to be as dismissive as they tend to be. Fair’s fair. Just as I’m comfortable making a “reductionist criticism” of the reductionist horseshit Hitchens and the godawful Paul Berman were peddling post-9/11. What arrogant shits they were. The contempt they spewed for folks who displayed a modicum of common sense and caution regarding was disgusting. No excuses. I resented that crap then and I resent it even more now. Of course they were invoking some leftwing sensibilities in promoting war, but the stock “leftwing” rationales are in themselves suspect IMHO. As Hitchens notes in the dialogue I linked, he still takes some satisfaction in being dubbed a “revolutionary.” Of course, being a revolutionary implies some risk-taking larger than pissing off old Nation colleagues for appearing on AEI panels and publishing pro-war screeds in the Weekly Standard, or being harangued at a Berkeley booksigning by former comrades from some Trotskyite sect. The road to Hell, etc. etc.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:28 am
Link that hopefully will work:
http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/15143?in=41:17&out=44:35
October 14th, 2008 at 7:40 am
“Absolutely nothing you (Woody) say will make a farthing’s worth of difference to them.”
Boy, he got that right.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:44 am
Sorry – I linked to the wrong segment of that Hitchens blogginheads, wherein he asserts a string of hypotheticals and proceeds to dimiss a set of facts. Here’s the part I found particularly stupid:
http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/15143?in=44:40&out=54:14
October 14th, 2008 at 7:50 am
The only voter fraud I have seen in this cycle was the the GOP booth at a popular hot rod event in So Cal throwing away Democratic registrations.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:52 am
Sarah we love you
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnFvyh7dcuI
October 14th, 2008 at 7:59 am
I remember the screaming, nauseating school yard taunt headline of one of Hitchens’ British tabloid pieces printed after Baghdad fell:
‘Ha ha ha ah we were right!’
Whose having the last laugh, now, you smarmy c–t.
He’s appalling. Facile. Arrogant. And I have always been convinced he is one of those hacks that works for the CIA or MI6. Goofy as it sounds. He has gained entree everywhere.
I was right about Woody.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:13 am
reg “The notion of using a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer is something both of these gadflies might take into account.”
That’s more than fair I have to admit.
Anna “Whose having the last laugh, now, you smarmy c–t. … And I have always been convinced he is one of those hacks that works for the CIA or MI6.”
Speaking of bloviating fools. As charming as your penchant for dropping a c-bomb every other post is, did you really “always” think he was a CIA agent? Even back when he was the left’s darling writing for the Nation? Please.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:57 am
The assumption of many Obama supporters – not Hitchens – is that Obama’s foreign policy will be radically different from Bush’s. Obama and Biden, however, seem to be doing their best to reassure people like Hitchens and David Brooks and other neocon lite pundits that this is not the case. The idea that Joe “I’m an interventionist” Biden will have a big hand in formulating foreign policy is a scary prospect. The neocon defections on Palin (Brooks, Krauthammer, etc.) could be the first steps of a ploy to ingratiate themselves with the incoming Obamaites.
My hope is that we’re too goddam bankrupt, not only to attack Iran, but also to “save Darfur” and other liberal obsessions.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Oh, Anna, dear. Now you know that I watch Project Runway. And, what do you think about that hunk named Seal marrying the white girl who hosts the show, Heidi Klum? Why doesn’t he like men? Maybe he’s both a racist and a homophobe.
Okay, I’m through wasting my time with you guys. I’d say something about the Dodgers losing, but none of you would have a clue about it.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:23 am
Don’t rub it in, Woody.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:24 am
Last one for Anna – Similar in style to earlier Obama t-shirts saying “Bros Before Hos,” when Obama was running against Clinton, Obama supporters now proudly wear t-shirts that say “Sarah Palin is a C***.” I don’t believe that you’ll find that in the Michael Kors collection.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:24 am
Sorry, Jim. I didn’t mean that for you.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:25 am
I’m finished–really finished. You guys should try talking about Hitchens and Obama, now.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:36 am
GM – Obama “bots” toxic? Ha ha ha ha. You pathetic soul.
Take a look at McCains campaign.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Also GM, have you read the toxic stuff that Woody posts? ARE YOU SERIOUS? You might be getting as old as McCain.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:52 am
Dan O
Sorry to disappoint you but from the first time I started coming across Hitchens in 92 I found him to be…off. Smelled a rat right off the page. He was never my idea of a “left darling”.
My idea of a “darling” is Ralph Nader, James Ridgeway, Morris Dees and a ;thousand other righteous people. Not some bloated, self serving, smart ass too clever by half snot who thinks revelations about Mother Theresa’s pals an earth shattering discovery—and then gets obsessed with trying to prove Clinton is a serial rapist or whatever it was. PUH LEASE. THis guy is just a bread and circus promoter for those who think they are intelligent. I would rather read the National Enquirer–which by the way–was considered the most reliable news source during the OJ trial!
October 14th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Another thing Dan O
This right and left cat fight in this comments section…
I make my distinctions and judgments based on if someone is righteous–not if they swing to the right or to the left. I want to know if what they propose or offer is SUSTAINABLE.
To quote James Ridgeway in his assessment of the treachery leveled against Nader by those who should have been his allies: “Democrats are the meanest bunch of motherfuckers I’ve ever come across.”
But that is not an endorsement of the monumental contempt and venality displayed by the Republican power brokers.
The point is not in what one calls oneself but in how one acts on one’s beliefs.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:15 am
Also GM, have you read the toxic stuff that Woody posts? ARE YOU SERIOUS? You might be getting as old as McCain.
It’s just more projection.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:25 am
Breaking news: CNN stirs up racism.
http://michael-balter.blogspot.com/2008/10/cnn-stirs-up-racism.html
October 14th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Thanks Michael.
Here is CNN HQ number to call and complain:
404 827 1500
Hit option 2
You get a live person to record your comment
October 14th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
Michael — but wasn’t the purpose of the CNN report to identify those in need of political reeducation, and to give Obama supporters more evidence that most of the people voting against him are racist, ignorant hayseeds? As such, why are you outraged?
I also love your links in support of Bill Ayers, and in support of Troy Davis, who killed a police officer that had stepped in to protect a homeless man who was being gratuitously beaten by Davis and two other thugs.
October 14th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
No, white cornerback, the purpose of the CNN report was to smoke out racist assholes like you.
October 14th, 2008 at 2:08 pm
From today’s Times:
“Christopher Buckley, the author and son of the late conservative mainstay William F. Buckley, said in a telephone interview that he has resigned from the National Review, the political journal his father founded in 1955.
“Mr. Buckley said he had ‘been effectively fatwahed by the conservative movement’ after endorsing Barack Obama in a blog posting on TheDailyBeast.com; since then, he said he has been blanketed with hate mail at the blog and at the National Review, where he has written a column.”
October 14th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
Reg: thanks for posting that.
Fasten your seat belts cause after the election the polarization will make for a bumpy ride.
Buckley has inherited millions and it was stipulated in his father’s will that NOTHING go to Christopher’s illegitimate son. And CB refuses to acknowledge the child. Charming family. His father’s family sport as children was to skip down to the local synagogue and desecrate it.
Unfortunately, CB will be able to hunker in a well lined bunker. The bugger. There is poetic justice, after all.
October 14th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
What better measure of how low American conservatism has slid than that it makes William F. Buckley look like a level-headed genius.
His son’s a very funny guy and was probably uncomfortable for quite a long time with the moronic identity conservative movement. But I would ask the same question of him as of Hitchens: does he really think McCain is worse than W?
October 14th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
The right in America had better get over themselves. Their day may come again, I’m sure it will, but meanwhile they are looking increasingly pathetic with their emails and blog posts. They have no one to blame but themselves for the trouncing they are about to get.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Here’s a nice bit of guilt-by-association, up at Huffington Post, we’ve got every right to run with:
William Timmons, the Washington lobbyist who John McCain has named to head his presidential transition team, aided an influence effort on behalf of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to ease international sanctions against his regime.
The two lobbyists who Timmons worked closely with over a five year period on the lobbying campaign later either pleaded guilty to or were convicted of federal criminal charges that they had acted as unregistered agents of Saddam Hussein’s government.
During the same period beginning in 1992, Timmons worked closely with the two lobbyists, Samir Vincent and Tongsun Park, on a previously unreported prospective deal with the Iraqis in which they hoped to be awarded a contract to purchase and resell Iraqi oil. Timmons, Vincent, and Park stood to share at least $45 million if the business deal went through.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
Actually Chris Buckley broke with W in 2004 – he wrote in Bush Sr.’s name as a gesture of disgust with the son. I think he’s identified for quite a while with his dad’s disillusionment with the Iraq war as a “conservative” strategy.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Obama will no doubt leave the Timmons matter alone, but his surrogates will certainly run with it–and let’s hope they do.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
I had heard a garbled version of that inheritance story and thought it was about WFB cutting off another “illegitimate” son. Didn’t realize it was CB’s kid. Very creepy. I’d sort of liked the guy’s humor and relatively refreshing lack of a super-tight ass for a conservative – but that’s just trashy behavior.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Hitchens is the same idiot who was convinced Bin Laden was dead because he didn’t hold up a copy of the latest Jihadi Monthly in a video. As if Bin Laden’s life revolved around not planning death for infidels but proving some deluded hack wrong. I can’t have any respect for, nor take seriously, someone so completely lacking in introspection that he’s unable to see how guilty he is of believing what he wants to be true rather than what the facts support. He’ll get some respect from me when he admits what a flawed vessel he is and recognizes the fact that he can’t trust himself to see things clearly. Of course, this will require him to shut the fuck up about public policy. The same goes for everyone who still thinks the war was a good idea.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
“The right in America had better get over themselves.”
In some weird way it seems like they’re all they’ve got…and whatever useful corrective authentic conservatives might have played in a dialectic of political discourse over the years seems like the glimmer of a distant pass.
October 14th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
What is “today’s Times”?
October 14th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
Guess…
October 14th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
A link:
Buckley’s Son Leaves National Review
October 14th, 2008 at 6:00 pm
Perhaps the rise of the Internet has given the American right the rope with which to hang itself.
By giving the talkradio community the ability to create a global, realtime, asynchronous feedback loop, it has promoted the distillation of wingnuttery and dumbfuckery into an even more fatal brew.
The Internet allows wingnuts to go around believing that calling Obama a Marxist Muslim with a secret plan to take away your Nyquil is a mainstream idea.
Whatever legitimate critiques there are of Obama are not being made, or certaintly not being heard, above the raucous din of tens of thousands of Woodies jerking off in unison.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
If any further evidence were needed of the “Woodyization” of the “mainstream right”, National Review’s “Corner” blog currently features speculation by Andrew McCarthy (!!) that Bill Ayers was the “real” author of Obama’s memoir, Dreams of My Father. No shit…
Buckley hauled ass just in time.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
What is “the Times”?
October 14th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
You’re as dumb as The Post.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
To Michael Balter:
Again thanks for alert on CNN’s hate fest. I have passed the info on to several organizations to suggest a call to action and to a pal who is a journalism chair–he passed info on to the faculty and the incident will be used in a grad class discussion on how minorities are portrayed in the media.
Christopher Buckley was on Hardball tonight.
BB et al: being dismissive of the thugs because the McCain/Palin strategy is tanking and bringing non rationally challenged Republicans’ (proving that the concept of a rational Republican is not always an oxymoron) heads out of their asses–like maybe a tick that gets a match lit to its ass–and voting for Obama doesn’t mean the fury of the trolls will evaporate once the election is over.
An Obama presidency means then end of an era—their cover is blown and there will no longer be anything or anyone to project their fears and sense of inferiority upon. At least not with the sanction of a prevailing political sensibility.
This element is being deliberately whipped into a frenzy.
Doris Lessing’s chilling remarks with regards to the situation has been echoed to many elderly voters with whom I have spoken with. Everyone is apprehensive about what will happen AFTER Obama is elected.
Democratic country, in fucking deed when 80 year old voters are worried the candidate they voted for won’t live out his term.
That, Bunker Buster, is the final word on our debate about what lurks in American’s soul
The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted. — D.H. Lawrence.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Oops: meant to say “…situation has been echoed BY many elderly voters.
and: Americans’ soul.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Marc, I’m curious as to your thoughts about how you thought a discussion of your friend Christopher Hitchens’ endorsement of Sen. Obama might go (or not go). I think there’s some dots to be connected…
Imho, the best thing said so far, was the simple link Howie made at the top of the thread showing the photo carried on the 538 website. That picture is truly worth a thousand words.
Let’s note that CH is known as one of the most forceful advocates for the war in Iraq. A little thought experiment: whereby an opponent of the war might suspend for just a moment, if one can, and think about the ancillary arguments for the war — that the Iraqis would get a chance at democracy, that democracy could have a beachhead in the middle east, etc. Note that something of a federalist system is still holding in Iraq. That the Iraqis have an elected government (however imperfect) that is more legitimate than any other government in the middle east, save Israel. Note that nearly 5,000 US soldiers and over 100,000 and some Iraqis have died in the violence…
Now, if it is as Sen. McCain says, a testament to his judgement to advocate for the ‘surge’ and if it is a cause of some nobleness to have spent so much to come so close to victory — as McCain says in every speech — isn’t it his duty to also be an advocate for Arab and Muslim rights? Shouldn’t it be expected of McCain and his campaign to have a basic decency to respect Arabs and Muslims living here in the US? (Actually worldwide, since the world is tuned in to our election.) The answer is pretty obvious. Instead, we all get to see the grotesque spectacle of small minded racists in the crowd getting lathered up on the charge that Obama = Arab = Muslim = Terrorist. The order of the charge can be changed but the conclusion is the same.
Someone pondered on this thread if McCain was worse than GWB. I say yes. I don’t recall Bush residing over rallies that allowed Arabs and Muslims to be used as negative campaign props. Those that trade in the vulgarities as shown in the photo above, might as well be pissing on the graves of our fallen soldiers. I think Sen. McCain owes Arabs and Muslims, in the US and worldwide, an apology.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
One last little thought: It’s really a shame (well, not really) that Obama is whipping McCain so badly that he had to surrender Michigan. Then we’d get to see if McCain had the nerve to hold a ‘town meeting’ in Dearborn.
October 15th, 2008 at 2:14 am
“Democratic country, in fucking deed when 80 year old voters are worried the candidate they voted for won’t live out his term. That, Bunker Buster, is the final word on our debate about what lurks in American’s soul.”
I admire your courage in acknowledging that, for you, mere concern about a possible future tragedy is case-closing evidence. Safe to say it doesn’t take much to close your mind.
You keep repeating the notion that America is defined by the bad people who dwell in it rather than by the good ones.
I wonder where you’re from. Presumably, America, as you mentioned living abroad temporarily. If that’s the case, why don’t you consider yourself and your values to be American? Or are you too dark-hearted?
Were you educated abroad? Not influenced by American ideals and institutions?
If that’s the case, where did the educators, authors, etc. who shaped you draw their influences? Asia? Scandinavia? Latin America?
And what other countries are you willing define by their worst actors? Is Iran a dark country to you? How about Venezuela?
Does the history of Pinochet and real fascism define Chile for you? Is the Chilean heart dark? How about Haiti? They’ve had some extremely tragic political and economic troubles there, as you’ve recently pointed out on this blog. Is it because the Haitians have dark hearts?
Or is America the only country you’re willing to hold responsible for its own fate and, at that, defined primarily by its shortcomings rather than its triumphs?
October 15th, 2008 at 6:45 am
BB: you keep missing the point. You are defending America as the beacon of joy and justice. And comparing it against—laughably CHILE— where our foreign policy crapped on their democracy; assassinated their democratically elected leader and then installed Pinochet. Oh. Lets not forget Guatemala and Iran (Remember Mossedeq?) The list goes on and I suspect Marc or a few other of the posters here could, off the tops of their heads, “re educate” you.
For a crash course in American foreign policy just reach out to your local library and check out the Chalmers Johnson trilogy. His point of view is echoed by many other academics and historians.
And while on the subject of American “education” you might want to begin to “educate” yourself on that reality. Since we are such a beacon of light why is it we are about the bottom of the tables on education. Our money has to import and buy brains to come in and people our research institutions and universities.
This strange patriotic fervor you are infected with needs some serious anti biotic treatment.
And we certainly like to assassinate people–our own and others.
Gee and isn’t the Mc Cain campaign just a shining light of our sparkly collective hearts attracting other sparkly hearted Americans to shout their democratic, love filled sentiments like:
kill him and your mother should have aborted you for supporting…..
Oh yes and haven’t conservatives expressing their right to dissent and defend the opposition received a resounding confirmation from their former brethern in the form of avalanches of hate–these same trolls who froth and rave about American being the land of the free—as opposed to all other countries including the ones that we have deprived of their freedom.
Ptui.
October 15th, 2008 at 7:00 am
>more legitimate than any other
>government in the middle east, save Israel
I’m sick of the bizarre claim that Israel is a democracy. Let’s see, deport most of the native people. Bring in people from thousands of miles away on other continents, who claim to be something other than settler colonists only on the grounds that they belong to the same religion as some of the people who lived there 2,000 years ago. Set up a state based on the newcomers’ religion. Then let the immigrants and a few of the natives vote. Is this an idea of legitimacy that liberals or leftsists want to endorse?
October 15th, 2008 at 7:46 am
Stu, what is your point? That you are an anti semite prancing about in a smoke screen of political rationales or…what?
First of all your knee jerk anti semitism and assumptions about liberals and leftists lock stepped into an embrace of Israeli policies shows you ARE an anti semite—making such whining caterwaling ink stain such as: Is this an idea of legitimacy that liberals or leftsists want to endorse? LEFTISTS are the most vocal critics of Israel’s foreign policy–and JEWISH LEFTISTS at that.
Also not bothering to try and reflect on the historical forces at work nor the usual response by people to get out of harms way and protect themselves shows a total ignorance of what would be your own instinctive reaction to fear and constant threat.
A group of people had the shit kicked out of them for centuries. So…gee…lets get somewhere we can call the shots. And…oh, how convenient a holocaust that gives us just enough of an edge of guilt that we can snatch some land and hunker and bunker down. Ok…we have to kick out a few people to make room. Not the first time one group of people kicks another out to take over. (Gee like maybe the Europeans who came to “America” and slaughtered the Indians)
All in all maybe a bad idea. But given the circumstances what would you do? Its human nature, Stu. Stop squealing like a stuck pig with shit for brains and try to see things in their proper perspective. Israel IS for better or worse and clearly has some sort of point—like maybe to eventually be the lightning rod for a conflagration that will prove once and for all killing each other over religion and or ethnic differences isn’t sustainable.
You tip your hand by singling out Israel as the only country that has ever evolved through occupation. The whole fucking planet was settled that way. Get over your knee jerk solipsist view of things.
What you also don’t take into account is the huge amount of Israelis that are in violent disagreement with their country’s policies—you know like half the people here didnt want Bush for president or war with Iraq?
So.. I’m sick of people like you who who regurgitate worn out, ignorant points of view based on your bigotry. Don’t you guys every look beyond your own withered perspective to try and understand history–events from the psychological point of view?
October 15th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Anne ranted and spewed forth: “…Ok…we have to kick out a few people to make room. Not the first time one group of people kicks another out to take over. (Gee like maybe the Europeans who came to “America” and slaughtered the Indians)…”
You call over 4 million Palestinian refugees forced out of THEIR native homeland a “few” people? Yeah, really fair, democratic way of doing business Anne- it was wrong how the Indians were treated 1800s and it’s wrong now with the Palestinians.
But you’re right, to a large degree it’s human nature to kill things and the Jews do it with the best of them. And it’s not bigoted to sat that. Just like the woody’s of the world who are still fighting the civil war, the Jews are still fighting the Nazis. And the Palestinians are paying the price.
So show some fucking respect for 4 million displaced people, because one day Anne, it just might be you.
October 15th, 2008 at 9:35 am
>your knee jerk anti semitism
Ana, put up or shut up. I challenge you to cite something anything anti-Semitic I said in that post or anywhere else. Since you can’t, please stick to the subject.
>LEFTISTS are the most vocal critics of
>Israel’s foreign policy–and JEWISH
>LEFTISTS at that
What, exactly, do this reasonably accurate statement have to do with anything I said? Would it have been false to say that American slavery was bad because many white people opposed it?
Secondly, the only progressive position on this issue is one calling for the same things we would call for anywhere else: equal rights for all, no religious states, and no Apartheid rules about where anyone can live, work, or go to school based on religion or ancestry. Tepid support for a Palestinian Bantustan, which is the majority poisition on the left, contradicts all of our principles.
>Also not bothering to try and reflect on the >historical forces at work nor the usual >response by people to get out of harms way
a historical explanation is not a justification, especially when the ethnic cleansing process is still going on.
>like maybe the Europeans who
> came to “America” and slaughtered the
> Indians)
I would say, as a large scale generalization, Europeans in this hemisphere actually treated our natives significantly worse than Israel has the Palestinians. I’m not sure what this means for this argument, though.
>You tip your hand by singling out Israel as >the only country that has ever evolved >through occupation.
Bullshit. Rob Grocholski made an argument that included the premise that Israel is a democracy, and I called him on the falsehood of this premise. I don’t see that my one paragraph post should have accounted for all the bad things in the world.
October 15th, 2008 at 10:16 am
PS, I’m used to the invariable rhetorical strategy of actual supporters if Israel. Since Zionism contradicts liberal principles of secularism and equal rights, they can’t argue on the actual topic. Thus they divert attention with bullshit accusations of anti-Semitism. But WTF? You start out this way, but then actually describe Israel in some ways more negatively than I would. Doesn’t this come down to saying that “Zionism is awful, but if you say so, you’re an anti-Semite?”
October 15th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Hey folks – Stu – for what it’s worth, the point I was trying to make, was to simply use the basic rhetorical talking points about what the pro-war side (such as Hitchens, McCain, etal.) insists are postive gains and make an argument that even by those terms, McCain the candidate has a lot of explaining for the anti-Arab, anti-Muslim bilge.
Continue on with bashing each other if you wish. Try not to get any eyes poked out.
October 15th, 2008 at 10:54 am
Point taken, Rob. You did too good a job
October 15th, 2008 at 11:03 am
I guess irony is really really dead.
Stu, you lost credibility with your –what seemed a non sequitor– remark about Israel when you postulated that “Is this an idea of legitimacy that liberals or leftsists want to endorse?”
Then the rest of you weigh in taking my irony to state what should be obvious to all you ernest withered brain cretins that OF COURSE if you kick the shit out of one group of people they will–to find refuge–quite possible kick the shit out of another group. Its the human condition. Consciousness is a tough commodity to come by.
If you actually read what I wrote rather than using your knee to jerk a response as opposed to your brain you would have seen that I am of the opinion that other than for some cosmic, karmic, catalyst to eventually elevate the collective about the absurdity of bigotry—the state of Israel was a BOO BOO.
But one has to proceed from the premise that it IS therefore DEAL WITH IT.
Your boring, over arching presumption that all leftists and liberals etc ad nauseum think alike—well I made my point that, in fact, leftists violently disagree with Israel’s foreign policy and lot of those who do–are Jews…and Israelis.
You fail to take into account–when Israel bashing that the historical record will show groups of people do move in and occupy other people’s territory and for a variety of reasons.
I DIDNT SAY THIS MADE IT RIGHT. And quite frankly, I think a big fat reparation is due Native Americans AND African Americans.
The other thing that is really annoying about this stupid argument is the abuse of the word Zionism.
Your sad little protestant minds are incapable of seeing the problem as one of one group of people getting tired of having the shit kicked out of them–giving way to a mythical idea of a safe haven (oh, imagine that) and then their worst fears being realized that suggest: GEE OUR IDEA OF A MYTHICAL SAFE HAVEN WASNT SUCH A BAD IDEA AFTER ALL. So then you have boat loads of living cadavers who don’t give a fuck if you try to stop them because they have nothing to loose–and once they set foot on “the promised land” they are going to mow any motherfucker down who tries to keep it from them. Its a Darwinian, instinctual backlash that occurs. And a lot of innocent people got in the way of another group of innocent people’s desperation.
The evil in this is that one group of people is forced to such desperate acts that they eclipse the lives of another group of people.
The evil is in stupid fucking religious, ethnic bigotry.
So stop trying to tar this story with same ol rhetorical brush.
Until butt for brains people like you begin to understand the human problem from another angle–the misery endures.
I wonder if you have the fortitude in your soul to be both a holocaust survivor and the grandfather of a a grandson who was blown up by a suicide bomber WHO IS SYMPATHETIC TO THE PALESTINIANS AND HORRIFIED AT ISRAEL’S FOREIGN POLICY–or have the guts to be one of the many young Israelis who refuse to serve in the occupied territories and have gone to jail for their beliefs.
No one is more contemptuous and enraged than I am at the corruption of the Israeli state than me. But I save my real contempt for the corrupt soulless protestants who can never see anything in perspective or imagine the bigger picture. Its always about your small whining, clawing finger pointing specious spew.
When I look at a political or human situation I always see it in perspective of what are its origins.
I don’t know what will happen between Israel and Palestine and the rancor incited by the dilemma. There is an invisible web of fraternity between Muslims and as a group have their own group psychology and history that is both beautiful and terrible and has caused and is causing a lot of suffering. And the Jews have a similar invisible bond so borders mean nothing—so everyone gets dragged in the fight.
Its a psychological problem and will only be solved when both collective groups can find some common ground or reach the point where they are willing to give up the hate–or are forced to.
I see the dilemma as test FOR EVERYONE.
In this country we are going to be forced to deal with our seething hatreds. A man was lynched only as far back as 1981. So turn your snarling little heart to the problems “at home” before you think you can point a finger else where.
October 15th, 2008 at 11:22 am
The new Australian PM began his term in office by apologizing for the horror inflicted upon the Aboriginies.
October 15th, 2008 at 11:47 am
Anna, what does Protestantism have to do with anything? I’m an atheist from a mixed European and Arab background, with three Catholic grandparents and one Protestant one.
Even if Protestantism somehow affects people’s attitudes about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, I’d make an educated guess that there are disproportionately few cultural Protestants on this board and very few actual Protestant believers. The same is true of the American left in general, such as it is.
>Stu, you lost credibility with your –
>what seemed a non sequitor– remark
>about Israel when you postulated that
>“Is this an idea of legitimacy that
>liberals or leftsists want to endorse?”
If your point is that, for example, the US, started the same way, here are the differences. Israel is a sectarian state based on explicit legal discrimination by religion, something liberals and leftists should oppose in all cases. Worse, it is also a state based on a program of ethnic cleansing that is *still going on today.*
October 15th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
“Woodster, why on earth do you continue to expose yourself to these toxic Obamabots. Absolutely nothing you say will make a farthing’s worth of difference to them.”
Here’s GM Roper, riding to the rescue, saving us from emotionally driven, vacuous and irrational pro Obama sentiment, with sensible, thoughtful and somber analysis. Cue Roper..
“To say Mr. Obama is not ready for the presidency is a gross understatement. It is not simply that he lacks experience … it is also that he repudiates traditional American values and culture by embracing Marxist ideology, has been an acolyte of black racist theology, cuddled up with the anarchist activism of Saul Alinsky, and even worse … the man is simply and irrevocably dishonest. There is nothing about Barack Obama that may cause us to think he honors American tradition, or shares with us our time-honored values. Significantly, a man who works to undermine our education system through socialist engineering is a man who seeks to destroy America.
If the American people elect this man to the presidency, he will certainly destroy the cultural and political fabric of the United States, and when he has finished his work, none of us will recognize what he has left behind: The People’s Socialist Republic of the United States.”
October 15th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Marc might remember. It was off the coast of Alaska on a cruise when Hitchens make a total ass of himself. Brought a fifth of Johnny Walker to a morning panel discussion and told a really raunchy joke about Princess Di that pissed off the ladies.
I told Hitch later that the gals were looking to string him on the yardarm. His answer was, “Let’s have a drink”followed by, “I fucking hate liberals”.
He was a regular contributor to The Nation at the time and a secret hater of all it represents.
Nothing surprises me about him anymore.
October 15th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
GM and Woody are Palindrone.
October 21st, 2008 at 7:57 pm
yakety yak
March 26th, 2009 at 8:27 am
If you actually read what I wrote rather than using your knee to jerk a response as opposed to your brain you would have seen that I am of the opinion that other than for some cosmic, karmic, catalyst to eventually elevate the collective about the absurdity of bigotry—the state of Israel was a BOO BOO.