[MD] Gun smoke in the shape of a fake letter and not a mushroom cloud

[Ian Glendinning]

Hi DMB,

I totally share your outrage in the first para, and your optimistic
hope in the second, in Obama.

I love that Obama quote by the way, heard it a dozen times yesterday.
"These guys think its funny to mock what's true ... It's like they
take pride in being ignorant."

This is the pervasive hypocrisy of which I speak. And note also the
words "it's like" ... even Obama's rhetoric can't quite believe it's
actually true .... more that it's "as if" it were true. (Paul Turner
and I corresponded on that a while  back.)

You conclude against mainly the GOP, but at the start of that para -
like Marsha - you indicate that your general distaste is with the
stink of either / both "parties". You also generalize often with
"they" and "them" (and Obama "these guys") as the object of your
disgust.

For me the question is if it's both parties (and their voters), who is
this "they" ? Is everyone (individually) dishonest and lacking
integrity, or is it a number of "bad-apples" ? If it's a few bad
apples, what's wrong with the rest of us, that goes along with their
decisions and rationale, for the most part, until outraged ?

For me the real bogey-man is SOMist rationale itself, the "system",
not they (we all) as individuals, at least not beyond a few. My fear
is that if we wrongly identify the problem (and the solution as hope
in one individual to save the world ... not without its own risks) any
progress is fragile and temporary.

Thanks for the link and the Suskind book reference BTW.
Ian

On Wed, Aug 6, 2008 at 5:27 PM, david buchanan <dmbuchanan at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hey MOQers:
>
> Have you heard about Ron Suskind's book yet? There are lots of ways to get the word. The author is doing interviews all over the place, but I heard it from Olbermann first...
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzVsV5z8mYw&feature=related
>
> Sadly, this is a window on their general way of doing things. They put polluters in charge of environmental protection, put union busters in charge of labor law and even the Justice department was stacked with political hacks. Conservatism used to be a respectable position, but in my adult lifetime, since Raygun, they've become monsters. They don't just take bribes and cheat on their wives anymore. Worse than Watergate cause nobody was killed and it didn't cost a trillion dollars. This goes way beyond the bounds of normal human folly. Domestic spying, torture, secret imprisonment, political persecution, censorship, abuse of power and now a fabricated pretext for war. These are very high crimes indeed. By their fruits ye shall know them? Based on their fruit, I'd say these guys belong behind bars or at the end of a rope. Not so much because they deserve to suffer but there needs to be a large public ritual, a concrete demonstration of disapproval for the sake of posterity. Thi
>  s authoritarian style of government has to be condemned with great pomp and ceremony. We need some goats and a freakin exorcist! If this party retains control of the government, I think democracy will die here. If McCain wins Arizona by 1% and loses everything else by at least 5%, that'll demonstrate a thing or two pretty clearly.
>
> the good news, in my view anyway, is that I don't just have to be against them. I've always had to hold my nose in the voting booth cause the choices stink but this time I can vote with a smile. Obama's intelligence, humor, clarity and centerness are very impressive. Its a real breath of fresh air after nearly 8 years of drivel and lies. He was always against this stupid war. He's against stupidity in general. Yesterday he said something about the Republicans that really warmed my heart. He said something like, "These guys think its funny to mock what's true. (Properly inflated tires save gas.) Its like they take pride in being ignorant." The crowd applauded, cheered, rose to their feet for a standing ovation and laughed pretty hard too. My point? I want to believe that most Americans are just as horrified as I am, that everybody sees how awful the GOP has become. Well, everybody but the GOP, that is. But I bet a lot of them are freaked out too.
>
>
>
>
>
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