SCOTUS smacks down anti-choicers
This is very good news indeed. The Supreme Court has refused to take up the appeal of anti-abortion activists who were ordered by a lower court to pay $5 million in damages to doctors featured on "Wild-West style" wanted posters and a website identifying doctors who perform abortions. Thus ends a decade-long battle between the targeted doctors and the "American Coalition of Life Activists."
The Coalition has always argued that the posters were "not threatening" and that the 1994 Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, which criminalized threatening and inciting violence against abortion doctors, encroached upon their free speech rights. By dismissing their appeal, the SCOTUS has, blissfully, treated both of those arguments with the contempt they so richly deserve.
Jessica at Feministing also notes, in response to the contention that the posters aren't threatening:
Tell that to Dr. Bayard Britton, who was shot and killed (along with his bodyguard) outside a Florida clinic after his name appeared on a similar poster.Which puts me in mind of Dr. George Tillman, who was shot (not fatally) in 1993 by a radical anti-choicer and currently finds himself the target of an Operation Rescue campaign, promulgated by Focus on the Family, which suffers from a "a creepy lack of any discouragement from violence." Considering the movement's history, no less Dr. Tillman's, the dearth of discouragement, coupled with the exhortation, "It's high time that this man is held accountable for his actions that have caused untold misery and loss of life," is indeed troubling. It seems that although the wanted posters must necessarily go the way of the dodo, the motive behind them remains consternatingly attendant.
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)
"News that Surprises Absolutely No One" Dept.
Gee, I feel so sorry for him, don't you?Ready the fainting couch! You may catch the vapors after reading this headline...
Frist Backs off Oil Co. Tax Increase
NO!!!! You're kidding!!! (Bolds mine)
WASHINGTON - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, under pressure from business leaders, retreated Monday from a plan that would have used a tax increase on oil companies and other businesses to fund a $100 gasoline rebate for millions of motorists.
Frist, the Tennessee Republican, had proposed an accounting change that would have required oil companies to pay more taxes on their inventory of crude as a way to pay the one-time rebate which GOP leaders rolled out last week as they scrambled to find ways to ease public anger over soaring gasoline prices.
In a statement, Frist said he will still push the rebate, but abandoned the accounting change and said the Senate Finance Committee planned a hearing on the issue in the near future.
So he's still thinking Americans are going to fall for the bribe. Fat chance, when a hundred bucks will fill gas-guzzling swinemobile SUVs and Hummers, oh, all of once.
Frist gave no indication how the rebate, estimated to cost about $10 billion, will be paid for, although he said he still planned to "find a way to bring our proposals to the Senate floor for a vote."
Apparently, these "Democrats only want to throw money at a problem" Republicans think that magical elves are going to supply the cash. How much have we spent on Bush's cowboy adventure in Iraq, again?
The rebate proposal, meanwhile, seemed to have little appeal among motorists who would benefit.Well, if it looks like a bribe, and it smells like a bribe....
Aids to several Republican senators, including some who support the proposal, said Monday they have received generally negative feedback from the public in telephone calls and e-mails.
Another Senate staffer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the senator was among those who have been pushing the GOP energy package, said voters know that with gas costing more than $3 a gallon the rebate likely will pay for only a couple of tanks of gas.
"It's probably one fill-up for a Sequoia," added the aide, referring to the Toyota SUV that gets 15 miles to the gallon in city driving.
But Frist said the rebate "will help people who are emptying their wallets at the pump. ... We've got to help those who are feeling pain ... as quickly as possible." Single taxpayers earning up to $145,950 and married couples earning up to $218,950 would get the rebate in August under the Frist proposal.
Mercy me, Ruth-Ann, I do believe I have the vapors! Fetch me the smelling salts and a mint julep.
Update: Upon re-reading that paragraph, I realized I read it wrong. People earning up to $145,950 would include people making below that. So this isn't simply a rich person's benefit. Mea Culpa.
It's still a bribe, though. A stupid bribe with no plan on how to pay for it. So there. Nyeah.
(Whoops, forgot to cross-post.)
Rushbo: Drug tests and no guns
Get out your tiny violins...
According to the terms of the deal that were struck so the bloviating drug fiend can escape a prescription fraud charge, Rush Limbaugh will have to submit to drug testing, continue his treatment, and not own a gun. If he complies with the terms of the agreement for 18 months, the fraud charge will be dismissed.
The Shakes household was fervently hoping he would be required to perform community service—namely compulsory retirement, which would be the greatest service to the community we could imagine. Of course, the Shakes household has little sympathy for anyone who says things like this:
"There's nothing good about drug use. We know it. It destroys individuals. It destroys families. Drug use destroys societies. Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country. And we have laws against selling drugs, pushing drugs, using drugs, importing drugs. And the laws are good because we know what happens to people in societies and neighborhoods which become consumed by them. And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up. What this says to me is that too many whites are getting away with drug use. Too many whites are getting away with drug sales. Too many whites are getting away with trafficking in this stuff. The answer to this disparity is not to start letting people out of jail because we're not putting others in jail who are breaking the law. The answer is to go out and find the ones who are getting away with it, convict them and send them up the river, too.”...while he's not busily shopping around for doctors to feed his OxyContin habit. But that's just us. We're bitches.
— Rush Limbaugh show, Oct. 5, 1995
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK)
Action Item: Net Neutrality
Evan’s got the lowdown here.
Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) threw down the gauntlet just moments ago, introducing the Network Neutrality Act of 2006 [full text HERE], which "[offers a] choice between favoring the broadband designs of a small handful of very large companies, and safeguarding the dreams of thousands of inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses. This legislation is designed to save the Internet and thwart those who seek to fundamentally and detrimentally alter the Internet as we know it."Take Action:
In an unequivocal editorial today, the NY Times put it this way:Cable and telephone companies that provide Internet service are talking about creating a two-tiered Internet, in which Web sites that pay them large fees would get priority over everything else.The Times goes on to note that if the cable and telephone companies got their way, "[it] would be a financial windfall for Internet service providers, but a disaster for users, who could find their Web browsing influenced by whichever sites paid their service provider the most money."
1. SIGN a Net Neutrality petition to Congress.
2. CALL Congress now. Especially, tell your rrepresentatives in the House to support Markey’s Net Neutrality Act of 2006, but educate your senators on this issue too, as the fight will soon move there.
3. WRITE A LETTER to Congress.
4. MYSPACE: Add "Save the Internet" as a friend.
5. Check out the BLOG RESOURCES about this issue, including "Save the Internet" logo.
6. VISIT the SavetheInternet coalition Web site for more information.
More info and the full text of Markey’s act here.
You're all a bunch of immature, foul-mouthed jerks.
Yeah, I'm talking to you, Lefty netizens!
Actually, I'm not talking to you. Mike McCurry (and here) and Joe Klein are.
McCurry:
I wonder what kind of conversations folks have when they aren't screaming at each other on the web or elsewhere?Klein:
[…]
Reading lots of comments on my last post, I guess my point got made: the culture and discourse of the Internet is not what you would teach kids at the dinner table -- unless you kept a bar of soap handy.
The Stephanopoulos moment came and went ephemerally, as TV moments do, leaving a slight, queasy residue — I knew that I hadn't explained myself adequately, but that happens a lot on television. So thanks, frothing bloggers, for calling me on my mistake. You can, at times, be a valuable corrective.Chris Bowers over at MyDD takes a look at these couple of posts and finds an emerging anti-netroots narrative that casts Beltway insiders as "the adults" and the netroots as unruly teenagers--young, rabid, inexperienced, arrogant, uninformed. Of course, none of these things are true of the netroots as a whole, or even can be seen as an accurate classification of their majority. In fact:
At other times, though, your vitriol just seems uninformed, malicious and disproportionate. You seem to believe that since I'm not a lock-step liberal — and we can talk about what a liberal actually is some other time — I'm some sort of creepy, covert conservative.
Only 42% of Dean activists reported the 2004 Presidential campaign as their first Presidential campaign, and we are less than one year away from that number dropping much further…The whole thing is worth a read, as it's a very nice response to the increasingly frequently-invoked strawman of the netroots activist as a "frothing" maniac so steeped in self-assurety and self-righteousness that s/he has made him/herself blind to her/his own ignorance of "the way things really work." A generous person will attribute the compulsion to address us this way to ignorance on the part of those doing the addressing. A less generous person will view it as a convenient deflection of the criticisms being lobbed at well-paid strategists who haven't managed to eke out a win in quite some time. You can probably imagine which side of that particular fence I fall on. Ahem.
[T]he 2006 Blogads survey suggested a median age of 46 for netroots activists, which is hardly young by any national standard…
Considering our media consumption and political engagement habits, if we are uninformed, than everyone in the country is uninformed. However, the netroots is not uninformed--it just comes from different professional and social circles than the DC political class…
The netroots were basically formed out of a long series of losses by progressives… I have said it before, and I will say it again: if "leaders" of the Democratic Party and progressive movement do not like the rise of the progressive netroots, the number one way to stymie its growth is to start winning campaigns. We wouldn't be so pissed off, active, and into "do-it-yourself" mode if we were winning. The netroots know what losing is like, and we have had enough of it…
It is important to remember that characterizing the entire three million strong progressive netroots community as all containing identical personality traits is at best crude generalization, and at worst grotesque, chauvinistic stereotype.
As for Klein's whining about being branded a "creepy, covert conservative," Digby handles that one deftly.
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK; image via Tastes Like Chicken.)
*Honk, Honk*
Pardon a little tooting of my own horn... (And forgive me taking up Shakes' space to crow...)
As of 6:00PM last night, I have officially finished my first year of graduate school. One down, two to go....
Stephen Colbert: Folk Hero
Still the Man of the Hour, Colbert's performance continues to be discussed all over the place. On last night's The Daily Show, Jon Stewart described it as "ballsalicious." Salon's Michael Scherer gives it a stellar review, calling it "Colbert's crowning moment" and "a brilliant performance" that "unplugged the Bush myth machine—and left the clueless D.C. press corps gaping."
The New Republic's Noam Scheiber was far less enthusiastic, and, aside from not finding it funny himself, accuses those of us who did of providing "evidence of a new Stalinist aesthetic on the left—until recently more common on the right—wherein the political content of a performance or work of art is actually more important than its entertainment value." Okay. It's certainly an interesting position, anyway. If I don't think it's funny, anyone who claims they do is really just an agitprop-loving crypto-Stalinist. Yowza. Atrios provides a helpful explanation as to how others might genuinely have found Colbert's performance amusing.
And Think Progress points to an article in U.S. News & World Report that confirms Bush, along with some of his staff and aides were decidedly unhappy with the tenor of Colbert's routine.
Comedy Central star Stephen Colbert's biting routine at the White House Correspondents Association dinner won a rare silent protest from Bush aides and supporters Saturday when several independently left before he finished.Ha. Awesome. Ballsalicious indeed!
"Colbert crossed the line," said one top Bush aide, who rushed out of the hotel as soon as Colbert finished. Another said that the president was visibly angered by the sharp lines that kept coming.
"I've been there before, and I can see that he is [angry]," said a former top aide. "He's got that look that he's ready to blow."
If you still haven't seen Colbert's vicious take-down of Bush and the press, go here. And if you'd like to say thanks to the newest lefty folk hero, go here.
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)
MSNBC: Plame was working on Iran
Earlier this year, in a story largely ignored by the mainstream media, Raw Story's Larisa Alexandrovna reported that CIA operative Valerie Plame, whose covert status was compromised by a White House leak in retribution against her husband, Joseph Wilson, for concerns raised about the use of pre-war intelligence, was monitoring weapons proliferation in Iran. At the time, officials to whom Alexandrovna spoke confirmed that Plame's "outing resulted in 'severe' damage to her team and significantly hampered the CIA's ability to monitor nuclear proliferation."
On last night's Hardball, MSNBC correspondent David Shuster confirmed that report.
MSNBC has learned new information about the damage caused by the white house leaks.Video of the report is available at BradBlog and Crooks and Liars.
Intelligence sources say Valerie Wilson was part of an operation three years ago tracking the proliferation of nuclear weapons material into Iran. And the sources allege that when Mrs. Wilson's cover was blown, the administration's ability to track Iran's nuclear ambitions was damaged as well.
The white house considers Iran to be one of America's biggest threats.
For a very long time, an essential part of the GOP spin on this issue has been that Plame was not covert, so leaking her name "didn't matter." If Raw Story's and MSNBC's sources are correct, this report wholly undermines that assertion--in addition to casting the gravity of the outing in a whole new light.
It also necessarily raises (at least in the mind of this cynic) the possibility that the assumptions about the White House's motive for the leak was not exclusively about political payback. The administration's rhetoric on Iran is eerily similar to that we saw during the run-up to the war with Iraq, as illustrated by this post at The Belgravia Dispatch. Knowing as we now do that the administration was bent on war with Iraq and the lengths to which they went to make that war happen, it would be foolish to think they would not endeavor to do to same if they are similarly bent on a confrontation (more here) with Iran. If Plame could have provided information that disputed Iran's nuclear readiness, which is serving as the key justification for escalating alarmism about Iran, it's very useful indeed from the administration's perspective to have her out of the picture. Just a thought...
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)
Best minds
An informational transaction:
Student: "I'm, like, looking for information on this philosopher. His name is Acquanta."
Librarian: "Do you mean Aquinas?"
Student (huffily): "No, I mean Acquanta. My professor spelled it out for me. A-C-Q-U..."
Sure. Tommy Acquanta. His thinking gave rise to the philosophical school of Tommyism.
It's all spelled out, all right.
(Cross-post hole digger...)
Day Without
Reuters' title reads: Immigrants rally across US
CHICAGO (Reuters) - From the streets of New York to the lettuce fields of California, hundreds of thousands of immigrants stayed away from jobs and boycotted stores on Monday, showing their economic clout in a bid to legitimize millions of workers in the United States illegally.
In what organizers called "A Day Without Immigrants," rallies across the country closed hundreds of restaurants, shops and factories. Construction projects were disrupted, day labor jobs went begging, children stayed home from school and waves of humanity poured through city streets.
[...]
Thousands also marched in Mexico in solidarity with their compatriots who make up the bulk of the undocumented immigrants in the United States.
It was not clear what the economic impact of the boycott would be, but the loss may not be as big as the realization that illegal immigrants make up an important part of the economy, said James Glassman, senior economist at JP Morgan.
The AP title reads: Immigrants Demonstrate Economic Clout
Illegal immigrants made their point Monday: Without them, Americans would pay higher prices and a lot of work wouldn't get done.
As nationwide demonstrations thinned the work force in businesses from meat-packing plants to construction sites to behind the counter at McDonald's, economists said there can be no dispute within the context of the contentious immigration issue that the group wields significant clout in the U.S. economy.
"If illegal immigration came to a standstill, it would disrupt the economy," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com. "It would lead to higher prices for many goods and services, and some things literally would not get done. It would be a major adjustment for our economy, for sure.
I noted in the blogwhore comments that my n'hood is pretty quiet today. A good portion of it is still being built and there is a constant buzz of machinery going here. Not today. Today, it was a ghost town:
That's the foreman's office. There would typically be cars lined up on that side of the road.
Typically there would be workers all over. I mean all over--five or six people per house. Today: no one. I saw all of five workers total.
In the city:
(AP/Don Ryan)
Chicago:
Sacramento:
(AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli)
New Orleans:
(AFP/Getty Images/Mario Tama)
Mexico City:
REUTERS/Daniel Aguilar
Denver:
They had an estimated 75,000 people! (REUTERS/Mark Leffingwell)
GWB explains it all
(SCENE- A very special White House press conference.)
BUSH: Afternoon, folks. (Nearly every hand in the room shoots up, reporters calling out “Mr. President!”) Now, now, everybody just needs to calm down here, I’d, I’d like to say my piece before we get to any questions. We all know how you folks love your questions. Heh. Anyway… Well, you’ve all heard about our plan, our attempt to help out the people of this great nation, the people who need some help because there are other places in this world that don’t believe in freedom, and we need to help them with their, their lack of belief, so that means that some people, they have to get a some of a hard time, and, well, we want to help them. Because we, because I care about people, we’re thinking about sending something back to them, while they wait for their sons and daughters to, to ride that freedom train back home over the ocean, we thought we could send them a hundred dollars- a hundred dollars- to help smooth things out. We all need a good smoothing, now and then. (Bush gets a pained expression.) But it seems like a lot, that a lot of the people out there, these brave Americans, that they aren’t understanding what we’re trying to do here. They say we’re treating them like, like- well, it’s not a not a nice word, but I’ll say it, like a female escort or a, a prostitute. Yeah. I don’t get that, folks. So I sat down, and instead of reading the paper while I did my business, I thought long and hard, and I thought, I thought- maybe people just don’t get what that means, they don’t know what a lady of the night really is? A God-fearing person, well, he or she might not have any need to know such a thing. So I thought what I would do, I would take this opportunity to clarify things. Because me, that’s a big part of my job, I’m a clarifier.
Tammy, could you come out here? (Enter Tammy, a low-rent prostitute.)Tammy, here- Tammy, say hi to everybody.
TAMMY: Hi.
BUSH: Now Tammy, she is what you would call a real and actual “lady of the night.” She works at this nice place downtown, and I thought she could help me clarify the difference of what we’re talking about.
TAMMY: Sure.
BUSH: Tammy, you and I have never met before, is that right?
TAMMY: Nossir.
BUSH: Not like some other former folks I could mention, am I right. (Tammy shrugs.) Now, now what is it you do for a living?
TAMMY: Yeah, y’know. I provide a service for a fee.
BUSH: You mean-
TAMMY: I let people screw me for money.
BUSH: Yup, uh-huh.
TAMMY: It’s a hunnred an hour. Didn’t use to be, but I live about twenty minutes out of the city, and with gas prices what they are…
BUSH: Oh, it’s tough all over on that, I hear you.
TAMMY: I used to live down south, but after the hurricane hit, there wasn’t a whole lotta money goin around, and I got this kid to raise, I didn’t really want her but, y’know, not like I could do anything where I was living, so I moved up here, and man, there’s a lot more business around here but-
BUSH: Um, good, okay, I think that about covers everything-
TAMMY: But they stuff they want you to do, it’s just frickin’ insane, I had a guy in and I’m still getting rid of the urine smell, and then I see him all over the news-
BUSH: Jerry, Tom, could you please-? (He gestures to two Secret Service agents, who drag Tammy out of the room.) Well, that- obviously, she’s an American, a bright woman with a lot of things to say, and I hope she was able to clear some things up. With this money, these checks we’re sending out- just think of all the things that money can buy. Heck, I wish I could get a check like that myself. And nobody’s getting turned into a, a woman like Tammy. C’mon, folks. Tammy, she gets paid to open her legs and let a stranger do whatever they want to her. That’s darned un-American. Nothing like that going on here. Just guys like me helping y’all out of a jam. And I’ll hope you remember that, come November.
Question of the Day
Per my earlier post, which is your favorite movie remake of another film or television series?
Mission Accomplished
President Bush, May 1, 2003
The fun continues for the McClellatron in his final days…
QUESTION: Havoc-he used the word havoc today -could he, would he, possibly stand under a sign that says Mission Accomplished today, as he did three years ago?
MCCLELLAN: Well, I think that there are some Democrats that refuse to recognize the important milestone achieved by the formation of a national unity government. And there’s an effort simply to distract attention away from the real progress that is being made by misrepresenting and distorting the past.
And that really does nothing to help advance our goal of achieving victory in Iraq.
QUESTION: So, Scott, simply yes-or-no question: Could the president stand under a sign today…
MCCLELLAN: No, see, this is a way that…
QUESTION: This has nothing to do with Democrats. I’m asking you…
MCCLELLAN: Sure it does.
QUESTION: … based on reporter’s curiosity: Could he stand under a sign again that says Mission Accomplished ?
MCCLELLAN: Democrats have tried to raise this issue. And like I said, misrepresenting and distorting the past, which is what they are doing, does nothing to advance the goal of victory in Iraq.
QUESTION: I mean, it’s an historical fact that, you know, we’re all taking note of…
MCCLELLAN: Well, I think the focus ought to be on achieving victory in Iraq and the progress that’s being made. And that’s where it is.
And you know exactly that Democrats are trying to distort the past.
QUESTION: Let me ask it another way: Has the mission been accomplished?
MCCLELLAN: Next question.
QUESTION: Has the mission been accomplished?
MCCLELLAN: We are on the way to accomplishing the mission and achieving victory.
— Transcript by Think Progress; via Crooks and Liars
Hot off the press…
…from WingNut Daily: Minuteman Project Founder, Jim Gilchrist, has said he will run for president in 2008 on the Constitution Party ticket unless the Republican Party presidential nominee is Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo. In other words, if he stays true to his word, he’s running.
It’s kind of an interesting possibility, really. Immigration is such a hot issue with the GOP base that it’s serving as the wedge issue for the midterms. (And their boy Bush is letting them down by not being insane enough on the issue.) Were it to remain hot until 2008 (a big if, I’ll grant), Gilchrist could be quite the GOP spoiler. Even the GOP might be hard-pressed to come up with someone who has wide appeal but is also as big a loose-screwed lunatic on immigration as is Gilchrist to make sure he doesn’t pull votes away from them.
Plus, he’s got christ right in his name! The Dominionists will be ever so pleased.
Bush at Correspondents' Dinner
Since Bush's doppelganger skit has been much discussed along with Colbert's performance, I thought those of you who didn't see the whole dinner on C-SPAN might like to see it. And if you had any doubt that the reception Colbert got was cold, this should clear it up. It's absolutely painful to see the media-rich audience going hogwild for Bush. Also, note his jab at McCain. Ouch.
The “Remake” Genre is Officially Dead
First of all, it’s pathetic that’s I can even reference a “remake” genre and know that everyone will know what I’m talking about, but after everything from The Brady Bunch to Bewitched, and Psycho to Starsky & Hutch, and Planet of the Apes to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (damn, Tim Burton!—although I liked CCF), how could anyone not know what I mean? Remakes are fair enough, when enough time has passed and a new treatment might be vaguely interesting, but now any old piece of shit for which some hacks can get the rights is being turned into a film—and often without the irony on which a bigscreen version of, say, The Dukes of Hazard should be predicated.
This “remake everything!” genre never should have existed in the first place; so few of them are even as good as the original works on which they’re based, no less better—i.e. worthy of a remake. But now it really, really, really needs to die, and here’s why: They’re remaking Revenge of the Nerds.
Dudes, Curtis Armstrong still looks young enough to play Booger as the college-student-who-looks-middle-aged that he was in the first go-round of this franchise. Honestly, the last installment in the series was just a little over a decade ago, and it was a waste of celluloid nearly unmatched in its profligacy. Leave the Nerds in their peace for awhile. In fact, forever.
I swear the remakes are coming so fast and furious now that the ubiquitous Ben Stiller will start having to make 12 dreadful films a year instead of his usual 6, since by June, he’ll need to be start gearing up for the remake of Duplex.
Why, media, why?
Atrios has a good question. In fact, a few good questions. Why has the press rolled over so thoroughly for Bush? And why do they:
continue to internalize every right wing critique of them, all of which come from people who "have nothing but contempt for these people." Why did Bernie Goldberg get such a wide airing for his idiotic book? Why does CNN hire Bill Bennett who thinks journalists who report on the illegal activities of the federal government should be put in jail? Why are people like Hugh Hewitt and Assrocket, who simply believe that the news media should be entirely in service of a radical conservative agenda, regularly given a platform? Why is it in the "liberal media" there are so few liberal voices ever given an opportunity to speak? How was it that the New York Times, which spent years covering a land deal in which the Clintons lost money, decided to "discourage pieces that were at odds with the administration's position on Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction and the alleged links of Al Qaeda"?So do I. I’ve seen lots of attempts at answering it, but none of them have struck me as particularly satisfactory. Mannion has suggested that the press’ hatred and resentment of Clinton and Gore segued, by means of comparison, into an appreciation of Bush, because it’s easier for them to like someone to whom they feel superior. I definitely think that’s part of it. But the rest? I’ve no clue. It’s like they don’t consider themselves Americans, like they have no personal vested interest in watching the country go down the shitter. They’ve twisted “objectivity” into what appears to my eyes to be apathy, indifference—just a collection of dispassionate spectators, laughing when it feels okay to laugh and lazily following the strongest current of opinion about what their jobs should be. Maybe they’re all just counting on jobs in the foreign press if this country becomes an authoritarian toilet. I dunno.
I don't have the answer to this basic question. I wish I did.
Thoughts?
Why does America hate America?
'RV' Passes 'United 93' to Win Box Office
Mr. Shakes forwarded this to me, with the comment, “I’d be tempted to complain about this, except that I kinda get it,” which was precisely my thought. (If you don’t know what RV is, it’s, from what I can tell by the commercials for it I’ve seen, yet another tacky Robin Williams vehicle about…a vehicle—and the bland family with the bumbling father who forces them all to vacation in it.)
Tbogg, requesting an MRE-sized box of Goobers, notes:
Ever since 9/11, the Culture Commandos of the right have bitched because "Hollyweird" has failed to give them authentic Islamojihadhiricans to hate on the silver screen and now, when they get their chance, eh...they come down with social anxiety disorder or the theater seats are too hard on their pilonidal cysts.Wah wah wah.
One day, I predict United 93 will be regarded as a lovely bit of fiction, just another part of the collective fairytale that captured the imagination of the American mainstream for awhile. I suspect lots of other people are coming around to this notion, too—whether they view the events presented within as the whitewash of actual events it likely is, or just a troubling reminder of the many people who have been victims of an administration once celebrated as uniquely qualified to save us all. In either case, who wants to see United 93?
