AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

I generally remember what I have written, including things I wrote as early as third grade.

My sentence structure and vocabulary are better.

I have a better grasp of history, but, considering how little you know, that is damning with faint praise.

I often feel with you, ci, that when the shoe is on the other foot, it pinches you.

The last time you tore into me was after I had been purposefully modeling my style on yours for three days.

I try my best to be specific when I challenge anyone on a2k; generalities really don't have much credibility in debate. e.g., All Muslims are terrorists.

How dangerous is glenn beck?

This is from a peace group that exists in a college town in Western Massachusetts:

Last Saturday the Glen Beck 9/12'ers, moving into Northampton from all over the Valley, were out in a force of about 24 people. They amplified their look by carrying along many huge yellow "Don't Tread on Me" flags. Their signs are hostile to us peace activists.

Both sides, I would have to say, kept the peace. For our part, we are committed to non-violence, and we had 6 trained Peacekeepers present. The Beckers were mostly well-behaved.

Beck is way LESS DANGEROUS than PrezBO.

I have to answer you on generalities v. specifics but am rather busy with real life issues. I continually circle around one image: if someone were to write a novel in which okie or ican or david appeared as a character, do you think the characterization would be accepted by a publishing house reviewer?

I tend to think not. Yet, for many of us who participate in this forum, they are a large part not only of our perceptions of the American right but of our experience with the right. While I generally try to avoid political conversations with people I do not know well, I have tended to overhear some righties around me. In the main, they tend to neither be as extreme, simplistic (or simple minded) or as ankle-biting as the group here. On the other hand, were one to venture on to others fora, with the AARP outlet being the worst (let me qualify that statement by saying that I have not, nor would I ever participate in a right wing forum), one would realize that there are people out there who are less informed, more militant, more paranoid and more egocentric than our own homegrown Big Three.

Then, there is the matter of what is presented from the so-called leadership. Do I personally think that sarah palin or michelle bachmann really have power and honestly represent leadership? No. but those women are dangerously stupid and their public personas are those of hysterical (and, in the traditional sense, unladylike) women.

I posted above a short piece from an email I received today. If anyone does not see the danger beck poses, they are insensible.

Where is the evidence of calm and reasoning from the right? A few of the national level pundits. Cite them here and watch the Big Three snark at them.

This email is either deceptive, or you didnt post the whole thing.

Unless you left part of it out, what signs were hostile?
The "dont tread on me" flag was carried by the colonists in the American Revolution so it has a history in the US.

There is no other reference in what you posted to any other signs.

Also, what are "trained Peacekeepers"?
Is that another way of saying police officers, or is it a reference to something else?

I'd thought that you've been in the navy, MM?



The first US Navy Jack (1775)

pom, You don't need to tell sensible people by using a sledge hammer all the time; they already know.

And now for something completely different:

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/372155/january-25-2011/nazi-ometer?xrs=eml_col

By JUDY LIN, Associated Press – Fri Jan 28, 5:52 am ET

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Rush Limbaugh's imitation of the Chinese language during a recent speech made by Chinese President Hu Jintao has stirred a backlash among Asian-American lawmakers in California and nationally.
California state Sen. Leland Yee, a Democrat from San Francisco, is leading a fight in demanding an apology from the radio talk show host for what he and others view as racist and derogatory remarks against the Chinese people.
In recent days, the state lawmaker has rallied civil rights groups in a boycott of companies like Pro Flowers, Sleep Train and Domino's Pizza that advertise on Limbaugh's national talk radio show.

"The comments that he made — the mimicking of the Chinese language — harkens back to when I was a little boy growing up in San Francisco and those were hard days, rather insensitive days," Yee said in an interview Thursday. "You think you've arrived and all of a sudden get shot back to the reality that you're a second-class citizen."

During a Jan. 19 radio program, Limbaugh said there was no translation of the Chinese president's speech during a visit to the White House.
"He was speaking and they weren't translating," Limbaugh said. "They normally translate every couple of words. Hu Jintao was just going ching chong, ching chong cha."

He then launched into a 20-second-long imitation of the Chinese leader's dialect.

The next day, Limbaugh said he "did a remarkable job" of imitating China's president for someone who doesn't know a language spoken by more than 1 billion people.


"Back in the old days, Sid Caesar*, for those of you old enough to remember, was called a comic genius for impersonating foreign languages that he couldn't speak," Limbaugh said. "But today the left says that was racism; it was bigotry; it was insulting. And it wasn't. It was a service."

A telephone and e-mail to Limbaugh's station operator Clear Channel Communications Inc. was not returned Thursday. Clear Channel's Premiere Radio Networks Inc. is home to Limbaugh, Jim Rome, Ryan Seacrest, Glenn Beck, Bob Costas and Sean Hannity.

An e-mail to Limbaugh's show requesting comment was also not returned.
Yee has been joined by Asian-American state and federal lawmakers who say Limbaugh's comments are inciting hate and intolerance amid a polarized atmosphere. A number of civil rights groups, including Chinese for Affirmative Action, Japanese American Citizens League and the California National Organization for Women, have joined Yee in calling on sponsors to pull advertisements from Limbaugh's program.

An online petition has been created on Yee's website.

"I want an apology at the very least," said New York Assemblywoman Grace Meng, a Queens Democrat. "Making fun of any country's leader is just very disrespectful for someone who says he is a proud American."
She added: "He was, in his own way, trying to attack the leader of another country, and that's his prerogative as well, but at the same time he offended 13 percent of New York City's population."

There are about 14 million, or 4.5 percent, Asian-Americans in the United States, more if counting those of mixed races.

In California, Asians make up more than 12 percent of the state's 38 million population.

While Asian-American lawmakers demand an apology from Limbaugh, some are increasingly concerned for Yee's personal safety. Public officials have been put on alert after the deadly rampage in Tucson where U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot while meeting with constituents.

Shortly after condemning Limbaugh's remarks, Yee said he received racist death threats to his San Francisco and Sacramento offices. The lawmaker also received a profanity-filled telephone message Thursday.

The caller, who did not identify himself, called Yee a "cry baby" and urged him to resign from office.

Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Tony Beard Jr. confirmed the Legislature has launched an investigation and is cooperating with other security agencies.
He said Yee had received similar faxes in April after he called on a state university to disclose how much it was paying Sarah Palin for a fundraiser.
"We need to stand up for civility and be respectful of one another. Otherwise the consequences are dreadful as we can already see in the death threats against Senator Yee," said Rep. Judy Chu, a Democrat who represents a large Asian district outside Los Angeles.

Yee, who has a chance to become San Francisco's first elected Asian mayor, said he has no plans to change his behavior because doing so would amount to "stepping down." He said his staff has received additional security training.
"It's just been a disappointing experience," Yee said. "I'm not angry about it, more disappointed that in the year 2011, we still have individuals who are racist."

Threats to minority lawmakers are not new. California state Assemblyman Paul Fong said he was the target of racist comments in 2009, when he introduced a resolution officially expressing California's regret for the way it treated Chinese living in the state.
___
Associated Press writers Don Thompson in Sacramento and Michael Gormley in Albany contributed to this report.

* Yes, Sid Caesar imitated accents, but, mostly French and Italian accents. He demonstrated on a talk show how he created an accent out of non-sense syllables by stressing the vowel sounds.

Sid Caesar's comedy was satire. When he did an accent, it was usually in the context of a skit about the then new French Wave and the Italian cinema. I learned of the film The Bicycle Thief from a Caesar skit.

Caesar also satirized early rock and roll musicians as well as jazz musicians from the be bop era.

His show would probably be considered intellectual fare today.

I'm assuming the last two paragraphs of your post are quotes from a member of the "peace group."

Do you know why the person believes Gadsden flags express hostility to self-described peace activists?

Can you tell me what a "trained Peacekeeper" is?

I'm genuinely curious and don't want to jump to a conclusion: How do you think these comments answer your question about how dangerous Glenn Beck may be?

Anyone heard the Tracy Morgan comment on sarah palin?

The same Tracy Morgan that called you a plain old fool?

okie/ican is always harping on George Soros, about whom no leftist gives a tinker's damn. The real threat to America is from the Koch Brothers. This is from the Sierra Club:




The Koch Brothers are Holding a Secret Meeting this Weekend to Forward their Anti-Environment Agenda.



Spread the Word!
The Northeast may be digging out of the latest snow storm, but sunny Palm Springs is where the weather is truly turning sinister.

This weekend, the billionaire Koch Brothers are holding a secret, closed-door meeting with the oil industry, the Tea Party and conservative, anti-environmentalists. Their goal? To block clean energy and regulations that protect our health in 2011.

We cannot allow two radical billionaires to set a divisive agenda for our country -- add your name to the growing opposition to Koch Industries.

Who are the Koch brothers? They are corporate polluting billionaires who used their $35 billion fortune to fund the Tea Party and the radical right.

Like breathing clean air that won't kill you? Koch Industries emits more air pollution than BP, and the Koch brothers fought EPA regulations of pollutants like leukemia-causing formaldehyde.

Worried about corporate lobbyists taking over in Washington, DC? The Koch brothers vastly outspent even ExxonMobil in funding organizations fighting clean energy legislation from 2005-2008.4

The Koch brothers have run their radical, anti-environment campaign in the dark for too long -- spread the word that our health and our environment are under attack.

Koch Industries is the scariest company you've never heard of, but with your help we can make sure everyone knows about the Koch brothers' attempt to add to their billions by abolishing life-saving regulations that protect the health of Americans across the country.

The first step to holding the Koch brothers accountable is making sure that people know what's at stake -- add your name today.

Thanks for all that you do to protect the environment,

Sarah Hodgdon
Sierra Club Conservation Director

The Sierra Club holds secret meetings all the time. They are a cynical, self-serving group financed by generally well-off folks, who would like to see the end of low cost energy and transportation for everyone. In particular they want more Federal subsidies and mandates for "renewable" electrical power generation - never mind that it costs 2 to 3 times as much as conventional sources. How would you like to see your utility bills triple ? (That will of course accelerate the offshoring of American jobs.)

A decade ago the Sierra club held up the dredging of the Port of Oakland (needed so it could accomodate modern container ships) for about ten years. Their issue was the "contaminated" dredged materials in the channel. Finally after a prolongued dealy which cost the port half of its market share, the Sierra Club agreed to a plan that would use the dredged materials to crerate artificial wetlands at the north end of the San Francisco Bay. "What about those "contaminated" materials, I asked their representative. "We both know they're not a problem" he said, "We just wanted someone to fund the wetlands".

I'll take the Koch brothers any day. The Sierra Club is a cynical, exploitive organization, interested only in its own agenda.

So are the Koch brothers, with the difference being that they have no greater goal than their own profits. And far more money.

You once again omit the fact that the federal government subsidizes 'non-renewable' oil power sources and methods of usage. To a great degree. The Sierra club, and I, don't understand why it's right to subsidize one kind of power generation, but not a cleaner kind.

Cycloptichorn

Perhaps the reason that Fox Viewers consistently score lower on surveys of world knowledge stems from the fact that Fox consistently misleads them.

Cycloptichorn

A map made by FOX News is really funny! Egypt borders east of Syria, and west of Iran. People like okie rely on them for the truth, and believe everything they say or post; no wonder he's so confused! LOL