Authoritarianism
mikethemadbiologist | January 22, 2011Whenever some right-wing associated nut shoots someone, we always hear it described as the actions of a 'lone wolf.' Well, if that's the case then them wolves have formed themselves a pack:
-- July 2008: A gunman named Jim David Adkisson, agitated at how "liberals" are "destroying America," walks into a Unitarian Church and opens fire, killing two churchgoers and wounding four others.
-- October 2008: Two neo-Nazis are arrested in Tennessee in a plot to murder dozens of African-Americans, culminating in the assassination of President Obama.
-- December 2008: A pair of "Patriot" movement…
mikethemadbiologist | July 30, 2010In his weekend roundup, driftglass reminds us that there was a time when our mainstream pop culture villified torture and praised those who attempted to resist it:
And then Fox TV's Torture Porn Show, also known as 24, made torturing fashionable. Strength was to be had in torturing people, not in resisting it.
At this point, it's tempting to bemoan our nation's sorry fate, but Thomas Levenson offers a good explanation of how we reached this dismal point (italics mine):
....this [bizarre and obscene definition of lynching] is an example of the kind of rhetorical deceit that would have made…
mikethemadbiologist | June 30, 2008In a very good post about elitism and Republicans, Maha asks:
John McCain's recent mangling of Barack Obama's famous "bitter" remark is also illustrative:
"We're going to go to the small towns in Pennsylvania and I'm gonna to tell them I don't agree with Senator Obama that they cling to their religion and the Constitution because they're bitter," said McCain, who might have been referring to the Second Amendment right to bear arms. "I'm gonna tell them they have faith and they have trust and support the Constitution of the United States because they have optimism and hope... That's what…
mikethemadbiologist | March 6, 2008...if he weren't a fucking moron. One of the books that has gone missing in all of the criticisms of Jonah Goldberg's ridiculous Democrat-bashing screed Liberal Fascism is Wolfgang's Schivelbusch's Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939.
Schivelbusch correctly notes (as does Goldberg) that were similarities among the U.S., Germany, and Italy between 1933-1939: the state did become more involved in the economy, there was state propaganda--which was informed by what people wanted (at least superficially), and each society was…
mikethemadbiologist | December 20, 2007Driftglass is organizing a letter writing campaign to the advertisers on Chicago's hate radio station WIND. If you live in the area, help him out. Here's why:
Remember, if you choose to contact any or all of the organizations on the list;
1. Polite but firm works best to accomplish what you are trying to do.
2. This is not a Free Speech issue. Like any other American, Michael Weiner Savage is free to vomit his lunacy in letters to the editor, or on his preferred street corner, or on a blog, or scrawled in his own shit on his bedroom walls.
Instead this is about Disinvestment. This is about…
mikethemadbiologist | December 2, 2007Michael Kinsley sums up the ethical inconsistency of the Blastocyst Liberationists:
Third, although the political dilemma that stem cells pose for politicians is real enough, the moral dilemma is not and never was. The embryos used in stem-cell research come from fertility clinics, which otherwise would discard them. This has been a powerful argument in favor of such research. Why let these embryos go to waste? But a more important point is, What about fertility clinics themselves? In vitro fertilization ("test-tube babies") involves the purposeful creation of multiple embryos, knowing and…
mikethemadbiologist | November 10, 2007Rightwing nut David Horowitz just finished celebrating Islamofascist Awareness Week. One of the goals of Horowitz's exercise is to intimidate faculty and students into political correctness*. A while back, while reading Hanna Rosen's God's Harvard, this description of how one faculty member at Jesus mill Patrick Henry College**, Bob Stacey, was fired for teaching those heretical philosophers Kant and Plato struck as the kind of campus Horowitz would like:
Just before class, someone pointed out the window, where you could still see the outlines of last night's moon. "Please take your seats…
mikethemadbiologist | October 27, 2007Welcome to the world of Potemkin press conferences. FEMA held a press conference...with itself (italics mine):
Reporters were given only 15 minutes' notice of the briefing, making it unlikely many could show up at FEMA's Southwest D.C. offices.
They were given an 800 number to call in, though it was a "listen only" line, the notice said -- no questions. Parts of the briefing were carried live on Fox News (see the Fox News video of the news conference carried on the Think Progress Web site), MSNBC and other outlets.
Johnson stood behind a lectern and began with an overview before saying he…
mikethemadbiologist | October 4, 2007...and you listen. maha writes why the U.S. won't do anything to aid the saffron revolution in Burma (italics mine):
...the West flaps about, issuing statements and maybe sending an envoy or two. Please note I don't believe an armed invasion is the only option or even the most desirable option. But I believe the West is too compromised to exercise any option.
One of those compromises: the $420 billion of U.S. debt held by China. Don't the Chinese know that Republican Vice President Dick Cheney declared "Reagan proved deficits don't matter"? Maybe decifits do matter after all....
(and, boy…
mikethemadbiologist | September 27, 2007Protester in Myanmar (from here)
I don't have much to add about the situation in Myanmar; maha has some good posts about it, along with AmericaBlog. But the above picture is a study in contrasts.
The foreground speaks for itself, but if you look at the upper left background, you'll see an advertisement for the movie 300. To my mind, 300 represents a juvenile, fantastical crusade for freedom from dictatorship. But unlike 300, most struggles against dictatorships and juntas during the last century have not involved smashing things, bellowing, and rippling abdominals, but ordinary people,…
mikethemadbiologist | September 25, 2007If "Gathering of Eagles" needs a new emblem, this one is currently available
At the recent anti-war protest in Washington D.C., a pro-war group known as "Gathering of Eagles" assaulted Carlos Arredondo, a father of a Marine killed in Iraq:
Carlos Arredondo, 47 year old father of two sons, arrived in the nation's capitol on Monday, 09/10/07 to share a memorial he has made to honor for his eldest son, Alex. Carlos has visited thirty of the United States with the traveling memorial to his son Alexander. Lcpl. Alexander S. Arredondo, USMC was killed on 08/25/04. He was 20 years and 20 days old.…
mikethemadbiologist | July 22, 2007(from here)
The Kansas Republican Party has a loyalty oath that its candidates have to sign. And it's not to country, but to the Republican Party:
I, _______________, promise never to abandon my present Republican Party affiliation for the purpose of political gain. The Republican Party, both nationally and domestically, was founded on sound and principled ideals, that include but are not limited to, personal liberty, individual freedom, responsive and citizen-based Government, life-affirming values, economic growth, strong and cutting edge military, low taxes and a mutual respect for fellow…
mikethemadbiologist | July 15, 2007John Nichols, in an interview with Bill Moyers, clarifies a very important--and misunderstood--point about impeachment (italics mine):
JOHN NICHOLS: Bill Moyers, you are making a mistake. You are making a mistake that too many people make.
BILL MOYERS: Yes.
JOHN NICHOLS: You are seeing impeachment as a constitutional crisis. Impeachment is the cure for a constitutional crisis. Don't mistake the medicine for the disease. When you have a constitutional crisis, the founders are very clear. They said there is a way to deal with this. We don't have to have a war. We don't have to raise an army and…
mikethemadbiologist | May 26, 2007I go away for a meeting, and Congress goes and holds a vote about the Iraq War. Like some, I'm disgusted by the outcome, but I think many are blaming the wrong people. To paraphrase Pogo, the enemy is us. Or least part of us.
I'm not referring to the Mouth Breathing wing of the Republican Party (which is currently ascendant). One does not negotiate or convince authoritarians: empathy and abstraction are not their strong suit. The mindless Uruk-Hai will always oppose any thing deemed as 'surrender'--until their leaders point their lizard brains at something else.
No, the group I'm…
mikethemadbiologist | May 16, 2007Last night, the Republican presidential candidates were asked what they would do in a "24" situation. Intelligent Designer help us, but McCain (and Paul) were the only sane ones.
McCain noted that the "24" scenario is ridiculous. He also pointed out that torture causes us to lose our moral credibility. Doesn't McCain realize that morality is to be applied only to fetuses and prayer in schools? Giuliani and Romney went Full Metal Bauer, as digby notes:
I think it's clear that this group has come to fully understand that winning the GOP nomination is all about the codpiece. These guys have…
mikethemadbiologist | May 16, 2007The 'godly' singing "The Old Rugged Cross." Or something
The last thing most people in the Coalition of the Sane want when they are being treated for a serious illness in the hospital to have the staff try to convert you to another religion. And when you force a sick patient to choose between following the dictates of his religion or not eating in an effort to convert him, that is not 'godly', that is inhumane. It's also par for the course for Christopathic Uruk-hai.
From the Des Moines Register (italics mine):
U.S. Navy veteran David Miller said that when he checked into the Veterans…
mikethemadbiologist | May 10, 2007Remember the old joke that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged? By way of Ed Brayton, I came across this post by Kent Hovind about his time in jail. Both the post and some of the responses are fascinating (in a 'car wreck' sort of way) because they illuminate the authoritarian mind so well. Hovind has reached an epiphany of sorts about the criminal justice system:
At lunch last week, one of the inmates said, "If I could, I would bomb the Christian Coalition. They are the reason we are here." I was shocked by his statement! I love the Christian Coalition, but I understand the…