While I would agree that this cartoon is provocative, I don't think it is over the top at all. It is a CARTOON people, what, are we going to act like offended muslims now? I think MichealSmith nailed it, there are a lot of disturbing things that are coming out of this womans mouth. Whenever you start advocating the state "forcing" people to do things that should be a matter of free will, you aren't just chipping away at liberty, you are smashing it with a sledgehammer. Who in 1932 Germany would have ever foreseen 1939 Germany except those that actually had plans to take it there?
All Obama does it talk about "Change" and "Hope" without really defining what he would do as a president. When she starts talking, she lets things slip out that clue you into what she really thinks of this country. When she made the remark about being proud of her country for the "first time', she let me know that she doesn't like this country the way it is. Then she starts talking about the government "demanding" that you "shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones." Demanding?? If you don't think there is something very wrong with that, you are probably a socialist, possibly even a facists. Remember, facists never admit to being facists. Many of them don't even know that they are, they just have no problem with running every littlle detail of your life because they know better than you what level of freedom you should have.
terrye
· 1 year ago
Obama does not unify, he is partisan, Obama is also cynical. So maybe the Chosen One should heal himself and leave lazy, cynical Americans to do and feel what they damn well please.
if a Republican tried to use this kind of rhetoric the press would slaughter him. The press is so biased. I was listening to some NPR report on the economy that made it sound like people have been reduced to eating their house pets. It is all so horrid out there. I can remember when Bill was in office and the unemployment rate was 5.3% {higher than now} and they were doing stories on how great it all was and impending labor shortages etc.
Now when the left get a little bad press or a cartoon that they feel is unfair they cry and whine and carry on like the brats they are.
Bonnie Ramthun
· 1 year ago
Oh, I'm shocked that a cartoonist would be shocking! Shocked!
For heaven's sake, the point of political cartooning is to illustrate ideas and make them accessible. Chris Muir is not the first to notice the parallels between Obama's cheering, fainting crowds and the German population that boosted Hitler to power. Chris is not the first to note that Michelle Obama's rhetoric is frighteningly totalitarian.
Chris Muir's art stirs up a firestorm because he is a brilliant mind matched to a brilliant talent. You want Chris Muir muzzled? You're going to have to go through me, first.
viking01
· 1 year ago
How predictable that Burford's primary, tiresome argument seems to be implying Untermensch status of those with whom he disagrees. Perhaps he's too naive to realize he's proving Muir's point about the Liberal cult mindset most directly. Analogous to the Global Warming cult which lambastes all scientists whom would dare question Prince Groupthink the Goreacle.
Again, I get the impression that Muir's spoof should be read and understood as spoken like Arte Johnson (of Laugh-In) whose anal, one-line character dressed in an SS uniform and smoking in underhand fashion would always repeat the mantra: "Veeeeery Interesting... but Schtupid."
For cartoons as well as e-mails it is difficult to convey intonation hence the usage of emoticons in emails to assure something was said tongue in cheek. I give Chris Muir the benefit of the doubt that his parody is purely intended in a Mel Brooks kind of way.
That is why with regret, I am not able to attend the forum. I understand that you have declined the campaign’s request to have Michelle Obama speak on my behalf. I ask that you reconsider. Michelle is a powerful voice for the type of real change America is hungry for. No one knows my record or my passion for leading America in a new direction more than Michelle Obama.
She's inserted herself into the campaign, and therefore is fair game. I would love to have her comment on this cartoon and explain what she really meant (as she's now doing with the "really" glitch video). All the backpedalling isn't going to work in the end -- we got the idea the first time.
But boy, did that second panel connect and send shivvers down my spine. I guess I'm too old.
Bishop
· 1 year ago
Here here. When you connect the panel to the actual words it does get a bit creepy. The whole personality cult being created around Obama is getting out of hand, and Mrs. Obama's words certainly reinforce the image.
More and more I sense Obama feeling that he will have not only the option but the right to go far beyond the mandates of POTUS were he to be elected.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Since Obama's entire career up to now has been about climbing the next rung, what happens after he becomes POTUS?
It will be time to produce. For the first time ever.
How does that usually work out?
Jay
· 1 year ago
I think using her words to make this point is a little unfair.
??????????
Then Barack should tell her to keep her mouth shut during campaign events.
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Actually, it was Barack's words I used to make this point. Click through and read the entire letter from Barack to Tavis.
Barack views her speaking abilities to be essential to his campaign, and she is the delegated person to go to black events, so the race card can plausibly be decoupled from Barack.
hunter_123
· 1 year ago
Much more important than Michelle teling us we have to shed this or work hard with that is this: Who defines cyncism? Who decides how to do away with divisions? Who is in charge of grading us for 'doing better'? Who is to say what a comfort zone is or how to come out of it? I did not like the cartoon when I first read it, and I still think it is somewhat over the top. But Michelle, to the extent that she represents what Barak wants, is creeping me out big time.
TomB
· 1 year ago
All good questions. Maybe we should like the cartoon more?
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
And the bigger question than all the Who's? is How? would Obama require us to work harder, be better, be less cynical of his government, be more involved and more informed? With socialism, the What is the Socialist ideology, the Who are those who believe the Socialist ideology, the When is "before the non-socialists destroy the world", the Where is everywhere...but the How is the Socialist government policies that have a pretty scary historical track record, and that track record unfortunately included Nazi Germany.
Michelle Obama's statement really creeps me out too. What creeps me out about Muir's cartoon is that the boys seemed to think a hot chick in a Nazi uniform was sexy instead of repulsive.
exhelodrvr
· 1 year ago
He will create a new Cabinet position for the Secretary of Hard Work
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
The reward for Hard Work - higher taxes. The punishment for not doing Hard Work - Hard Worker tax funded educations K-4 to Harvard, health care, retirement plan, forgiven mortgages, and a pony!
rbj
· 1 year ago
Demanding that I work -- is it off to jail if I want to be a bum? Demanding that I shed my cynicism -- am I supposed to be a happy, unthinking follower? Demanding that I put down my division -- Isn't dissent the highest form of patriotism? Demanding that I come out of my isolation -- do I have to take part in North Korean style celebrations? Demanding that I push myself to be better -- are we to engage in communist style self-criticism? Not allowing me to go back to my life as usual?
Nazism is just one form of totalitarian state control over every aspect of people's lives. If he truly wants to do what Michelle is saying, and having your spouse out on the campaign trail as your surrogate should be a sign of what you believe in, then this goes beyond just creepy and is downright fascist/totalitarian/communistic. There was much more to the Nazis than just gassing Jews, they did want to build a better society with everyone marching in lockstep.
I'm for once actually starting to think that Hillary would be a better (or at least, a less worse) president than Barrack.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
And remember that Mussolini coined the term "totalitarian" and he meant it to be positive.
The state would do everything for everyone and take care all of our needs and concerns.
Mussolini developed fascism as a strain of socialism.
The Nazis added the un-Italian antisemitism later on, but make no mistake, the core of National Socialism was, well socialism.
galynn
· 1 year ago
I think the next cartoon should show Barack as Vladimir Lenin or Joseph Stalin, given that he so desperately wants to establish a Socialist system in the US when he is Prezident! Oh, that wouldn't quite match with today's cartoon. Stalin and Hitler didn't really get along, did they? I vote he's more like Stalin than Hitler.
rbj
· 1 year ago
You're forgetting the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact. But of course they wouldn't really get along, they both wanted to be top dog. I agree he's more like Stalin than Hitler -- there's no indication he wants to round up & kill Jews, gays, etc.
(and yes this is all hyperbole, I doubt Obama wants to institute a one party state. At least, I hope not)
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Operation Barbarossa proved that communists are even stupider than socialists.
Stalin trusted Hitler.
When his top General called to tell Josef that the Wehrmacht was hundreds of miles into Soviet Russia, Stalin remained silent - for four hours.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Maybe a loincloth with a bone in his nose
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
That sort of depiction is only done by liberals for black Americans who wander off of the white liberal plantation.
DamnCat
· 1 year ago
"Barack Obama will require you to work."
Isn't a president supposed to work for us?
What are we electing? A president for a nation of free people or the overseer for a plantation full of slaves?
Ask not what Obabma will do for his country - ask what Obama will force his countrymen do for him.
There's a bumper sticker for you.
DamnCat
· 1 year ago
When someone acts like a dictator they should be called on it. Telling people how they have to think and is exactly that.
Read that quote again. You want to talk about offensive? Telling me that as president Obama will make me act just as they want me to is despicable, tyrannical and un-American.
Muir has it exactly right. He isn't over-the-top he's right on target. She talks like a nazi - she should be protrayed as one.
sharinlite
· 1 year ago
So, it's O.K. to make fun of every word or act by the President, Vice President, administration staff, whatever...but it is not O.K. to take a person's true actual words to mean what they mean. Are we now back to "what is, is"? She scares me as does her hubby...they are using a "religious fervor" to make their points...Hillary is into power, period. Why get upset? But, what truly puts the frights into me is that church and paster they belong to who think Louis Farraken is "man of the year" and gives him an award. That is scary!
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
Sharinlite here is some real issues of concern that Larry Johnson, of ex CIA fame, feels will be inevitably presented against Mr. O. BTW,the Obama's minister is on what ballot? Anyway here ya go: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-c-johnson/n...
William_Teach
· 1 year ago
Mrs. Obama is making Jonah Goldberg's points in his book "Liberal Fascism" rather easy to see.
Forget cynicism: she is making statements about Barak doing things that are a direct assault on the freedom of the individual as outlined in The Constitution, which is supposed to protect us from tin pot potential dictators who love government intervention in everything. Yup, fascism.
viking01
· 1 year ago
I think Chris Muir's cartoon is meant to illustrate the mass hysteria which comprises the Obama campaign and his glassy-eyed followers. Obambi's feel-good propaganda abhors a vacuum when there's so many empty liberal heads waiting to be filled with any handout promise which comes along.
The "Audacity of Hope" does have an eerie "Triumph of The Will" ring to it. I'd use that analogy instead of Arbeit macht Frei (often placed above the gates to concentration camps) because both Obambi and Adolf got their start by feeding visions of destiny and an owed-something approach to their following. The mechanized killings and re-education en masse came a bit later though Goebbels and Riefenstahl were busy early in the game with newsreel visions of Adolf gliding through clouds over Berlin in his tri-motor as happy brownshirts below did their calisthenics and goose stepping to Wagner.
It is, of course, a short step from National Socialism to genocide and politische korrektheit as Third Reich, the Soviet Union, East Germany and Cambodia readily proved last century just as the foremost Liberal sacrament of abortion proves daily.
jpm100
· 1 year ago
There is a scary looking to be led quality about Obama's supporters.
A little bit of a Freudian slip: I originally had written Obama's followers in the above in all sincerity. Perhaps I shouldn't have changed it.
philwynk
· 1 year ago
Capt Ed sez: "While Mrs. Obama's speeches on the stump are completely fair game for criticism, I think using her words to make this point is a little unfair. I'd rather see this level of satire aimed at the candidate himself rather than any of the surrogates, including the spouses."
Granted, with a hat tip to your gentlemanly instincts. However, the problem with using Obama's words directly is that he's more cagey than his spouse, and doesn't let his true stripes show. The virtue of Michelle Obama is that she's sincere; she speaks from the heart, and she means what she says. This is evident on her face, and in her voice; it's difficult to miss. So, when she says things like this that sound creepy, we need to pay attention: they sound creepy because they are creepy.
I'm pretty sure that politically, the Obamas are solidly liberal. But there's something to this messianic side; we're hearing genuine snippets, but we're not hearing the full message. Not that there's any danger that I'd vote for Obama anytime in this lifetime, but this guy is sounding more and more like what the worst anti-Mormon bigots painted Mitt Romney into -- a stealth messianic figure for some bizarre religion. It behooves us to find out precisely what this vision is, and right soon.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
TomB
· 1 year ago
I've made a similar comment a few days ago over here, at CQ. Apparently Chris Muir sees the same analogy. The same frazeology was also used by Communists (not much difference from the Nazism). And yes, it is creepy...
Herb
· 1 year ago
"Frazeology".
I love it when you guys try to get all intellectual and stuff. It's so cute.
SkyWatch
· 1 year ago
deemed worthy of the government. If I remember correctly Hillary wanted to create a new youth community organization with power to rat neighbors out (brown shirts with a new color shirt).
Both sides are messed up and the nazi references really worry me because they could (repeat could) be what is coming. The German people thought they were voting in equality among the peoples of their nation. They thought they were voting in a new and brighter future. They thought things would be just peachy . They were not bad people just people who knew that things could be easier if they just became a single unit instead of individuals. OOooopppps!
SkyWatch
· 1 year ago
Both sides are messed up and the nazi references really worry me because they could (repeat could) be what is coming. The German people thought they were voting in equality among the peoples of their nation. They thought they were voting in a new and brighter future. They thought things would be just peachy . They were not bad people just people who knew that things could be easier if they just became a single unit instead of individuals. OOooopppps!
Bush wanted to make people donate to churches deemed worthy of the government. If I remember correctly Hillary wanted to create a new youth community organization with power to rat neighbors out (brown shirts with a new color shirt).
**** wow that last post got messed up****
William_Teach
· 1 year ago
In regards to the DBD cartoon, why is that those of us on the Right have to constantly be civil and worry about the feelings of those on the Left? Seriously, to quote Kos, "screw 'em." Politics is a dirty business, and, you have to sometimes get down in the mud to play.
I'm not worried about offending any liberals/progressives/surrender monkeys, because they are getting back exactly what they give. You have to fight fire with fire.
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
I was wondering just who this cartoon appealed to. No need to rise above it huh?
shaun
· 1 year ago
This toon is great. I think there is another level to this that people are simply missing. In general, at least in conservative circles, the resort to comparisons to Hitler is a sure sign of intellectual laziness. Thus the reference to Godwin's law.
There's a bit of in your face aimed to the left in this. An exhortation to do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
If you want your views taken seriously, then take our views seriously. Give reasoned critique, not knee-jerk name calling.
When you on the left do that, we will. But, until you do, here's a can of howduyalikeit.
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
Yeah sorta like Bill O going off on the Kos conventioneers as KKK and Nazi party members huh? You mean that kind of intellectual laziness?
norm
· 1 year ago
i think a little more cleavage would have been ok.
Steve-o
· 1 year ago
You shall not make fun of our Messiah or his surrogates! This cartoon is blasphemy! SILENCE! I keel you!
sven10077
· 1 year ago
you know you've made a direct hit on a man's nuts when he starts wailing like a girl....
I'd say donks just got kneed in the groin, a direct and cogent hit.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Difference is, the donks are knocked off base by the truth. About themselves and what they think.
Republicans are knocked off base by blatant lies, much like the sewage currently spewing out of Bill Keller's office.
bikerken
· 1 year ago
I'm glad Obama is having all of those Change and Hope signs printed up though, if he gets elected, we'll need em. The Change signs will be on every street corner and in front of every Seven Eleven, the hope signs will be on fire in trashcans to keep us warm.
Pandora
· 1 year ago
"While Mrs. Obama's speeches on the stump are completely fair game for criticism, I think using her words to make this point is a little unfair. I'd rather see this level of satire aimed at the candidate himself rather than any of the surrogates, including the spouses. "
Unfair? Doesn't compute, Ed. As the candidate didn't say the words but the Mrs. did, it's she that deserves the targeting.
Unfair would be slamming her for something he said.
j-damn
· 1 year ago
When I saw the Houston crowd chanting "Yes, we can", the first thing that came to my mind was "Sieg, Heil!"
Obama and his zombies revival meetings *are* like a cross between a Southern preacher and the Nazis--of that there is no doubt.
The big difference between AH and BHO is that Obama has had absolutely no struggles [kampf] in his life--unless you count the times when he [by his own admission] didn't have enough money to buy cocaine and had to stick with plain ol' weed.
Pathetic.
People moaning about this cartoon can cram it with walnuts--where were they for the last 7 years when every other street protestor had a sign with Bush's face on it and a little mustache drawn onto it? Bush never made any statements this Naziesque, ever.
MarkTheGreat
· 1 year ago
We need to put this speech into a commercial and run it daily from now to November.
This has to be scariest thing I've heard any US politician ever say.
Cobolpoet
· 1 year ago
I thought the DBD cartoon was funny, barbed and fair game. All as it should be.
Jim,MtnViewCA,USA
· 1 year ago
I'm OK with it. Esp the "Do that again" tagline. :) It's a cartoon, and, as pointed out, a LOT less over the top than standard Left fare for years and years.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Maybe if it were a naughty nurse or, if you're into the authority thing, a policewoman outfit. But you're o.k. with a woman in a Nazi outfit?
Micah_B_Free
· 1 year ago
Are you okay with Condi Rice as Aunt Jemima? (ted roll) Woe to those easily offended...
Bike Bubba
· 1 year ago
I'm not terribly proud of knowing this, but it's actually "Arbeit macht frei"--you need the t at the end of the second word, or else it becomes a command in the 2nd person (informal) instead of a statement in the 3rd person.
And I think this is apt; the ugly reality is that Mrs. Obama has proposed a level of central control that is reminiscent of fascist regimes. The proper application of Godwin's Law is that a comparison to Schicklgruber should be apt, not that it should not be made at all. This one is apt.
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
I have no problem with the Nazi comparison, because more people are likely to get the inference.
However, I think that an even apt comparison would be to the British Labour Party pols who extended the Control of Engagements Order beyond the end of WW2.
I reckon that most people have no idea that the British government in the late 40's could tell its subjects where and what they would be working at. I also reckon that this power is near the top of the wish list of every leftist in existence.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
How Obama will "empower" you (got this from the National Review Corner):
Taken in the context of Jonah Goldberg's "Liberal Fascism," I can understand the point of the satire and sympathize with it. Obama's rhetoric (and his wife's) often sounds anti-democratic to me: We're all supposed to unite behind a leader and forget our differences, and arguing over those differences (or even advocating a different point of view) is somehow un-American.
I don't think for a second Muir was saying the Obamas are Nazis in disguise, with all the horrors that implies. However, it's indisputable that fascist and "progressive" ideologies share common roots. That, I believe, is the key to Muir's satire.
I don't think, however I would have drawn that middle panel, either, Ed. Remember the justified criticism of Ted Rall for his depiction of Condi Rice as "Aunt Jemima" or a "House Negro?" He showed bad judgment in his satire of Rice, and I think Chris did a bit here, too, in his criticism of Obama. I think the same point could have been made in another way. The difference is that Rall regularly does this, while Chris has done it only this once that I know of.
BTW, I'm a big fan of DBD. :) --Anthony (Los Angeles)
UncleAl
· 1 year ago
For heavens sake! He DIDN'T draw Michelle Obama as a Nazi. This panel doesn't begin to compare to Ted Rall's crap.
Anthony Ragan
· 1 year ago
I didn't say he did. He did, however, draw Sam as a brownshirt and giving the fascist salute -- to whose words, again? My point is that, like Rall, but not nearly as egregiously, I think Chris crossed a line of bad taste. It doesn't affect my enjoyment of his comic strip, and I happen to agree with the notion that progressivism and fascism have "common genes," but I do think he went a bit far.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>Obama's rhetoric (and his wife's) often sounds anti-democratic >to me: We're all supposed to unite behind a leader and forget >our differences, and arguing over those differences (or even >advocating a different point of view) is somehow un-American.
You've been away the last 6 years?
SDN
· 1 year ago
No, I've been right here on this planet. What color is the sky on planet Burford?
Old Texas Turkey
· 1 year ago
CAp'n, while your view to leave candidates families out of the line of fire has some resonance with me, I would add that in addition to the Bushitler, the far left has also gone after his wife and daughters as well in a despicable manner.
The strip above is a commentary on public positions taken by a spokesperson for a campaign, I'm sorry, they are putting themselves out in the limelight, so have to expect to be criticized. Calling Laura a drug addict and the kid's as whores is not the same thing.
Tom Shipley may not like that, but then he does come from the mindset that everything is fair game when you are hurling insults at a conservative.
Arch
· 1 year ago
Let's look at three definitions:
Fascism is defined as an authoritarian and nationalist, right-wing system of government and social organization. Characteristics include a belief in national, ethnic or racial supremacy, a contempt for democracy, an insistence on obedience to a powerful leader and a strong demagogic approach.
Communism is defined as a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned, and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.
Demagogue is defined as a political leader who seeks support by appealing to popular desires and prejudices rather than by rational argument.
Obama, it seems has the worst of all worlds.
jerry
· 1 year ago
Arch:
Your definition of Fascism reflects the Stalinist revision of the term after the election of Hitler to Chancellor in 1933. The Nazis claimed to have a superior worldview to Marxism and Stalin had to discredit it as a rival revolutionary ideology. Prior to this Fascism was considered a nationalistic leftwing socialistic ideology. Mussolini and Lenin were correspondents. Lenin always considered Mussolini a fellow social revolutionary.
Electric Ferret
· 1 year ago
I don't really care one way or the other about the cartoon.
I'm just thankful I still live in a country where this can still be printed and discussed without the cartoonist having to go running for his life like in Europe.
Further, I note more and more these days on TV that comical or irrelevant depictions of Jesus as a character are used. That's fine. But I know they will not ever, no way, produce such shows using Mohammed. They're scared to. And that is very concerning.
One day here in America cartoonists may be running for their lives as well. That day is not today, so the more power to Chris Muir.
jfm
· 1 year ago
Is Barack Obama the new Messiah? Try substituting "Jesus" for "Barack" in Michelle Obama's statement:
"Jesus will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Jesus will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed."
The politician as savior is a dangerous idea.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Michelle Obama has never in her adult life been proud of her country until now. Now that her husband looks to be the choice of the Democratic voters and those voters are responding to the message of a desire for Change. Change that will require you to work, to shed your cynicism, come out of your isolation, be better people, be involved, and be informed. The position is pretty clear.
The scary question still remains...HOW will you require us civilians to do this Mr. Obama?
Either way the cartoon is distasteful in that it compairs a candidates wife to a Nazi AND suggests that women in Nazi uniforms could be considered something other than offensive. Additionally, the cartoon is brilliant in a way that could lead to useful discussions about ideologies, socialism, facism, political aspiration, and the importance of words and their consequences. After all, when Michelle speaks on behalf of her husband, are they "Just Words?"?
Any cartoonist dealing in political satire should be proud when their work crosses over from being just funny to something that sparks heated discussion. At least I think so, but maybe I'm too cynical.
TomB
· 1 year ago
The cartoon may be distastefull, but summs up my fears quite well.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Which is why it is also brilliant and may open up a discussion between those who fear this may be true and those who think it is utterly ridiculous.
I for one hear a politician speak words like Obama's, which are to me frankly frighteningly self-important and Messianic; and Michelle Obama's words, which are to me frighteningly Leftist and Socialist, and think it's utterly ridiculous to then compare her to a Nazi. When she or her husband finally begin to define some actual policies beyond generalities, I'll decide which scary historical figures fit a justifiable comparision.
In my personal opionion, the True Believers on either side of the political spectrum have the potential to espouse the facism and authoritarianism that best serves their ideology, and the rest of us should be constantly aware of this potential.
TomB
· 1 year ago
The danger here is, that you can't really oppose and vote against many of those "ideas", like who would honestly vote against peace, or good education for everybody, or good health, or good weather, or equality, or justice, or 72 virgins, or happines for everybody? No I am not making fun of the process, I am afraid of a danger, voted to power by wishfulthinkers.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Good point.
jerry
· 1 year ago
Tell me do you feel the same way when you see someone wearing a Che or Lenin teashirt?
TomB
· 1 year ago
I don't know if you were asking me, but YES! The difference however is, that the said Che, or Mao, or Lenin T-shirt on a street is usually worn by a parrot, and when I see it on a wall of an election office, - now it is not a parrot anymore.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
I feel it's distasteful or ignorant and when I'm feeling especially chippy I engage the wearer and debate, usually to find massive ignorance and an inability to debate.
So yes, I feel the same way. Distasteful to mean does not mean censured for everyone.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Absolutely.
I hunted down some little punk wearing a Rage Against the Machine's "Evil Empire" t-shirt (American Flag below evil empire).
He was "like dude, it's just a band".
Maybe they think Che's the lead singer of Santana or something.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Oops above should read "Distasteful to me does not mean censured for everyone". Also, Che t-shirts are not political satire cartoons. But I still feel the same way, whethor it's a cartoon, art, fashion, or some other form of expression opinion or ideology. You win ideological battles with superior ideas, not power of censure.
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
Here is Scott Horton the other day discussing Fascism relative to Jonah's new book. the begging is quoted from Robert O. Paxton's 2004 book Anatomy of Fascism: Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.
Paxton then proceeds to isolate a series of “mobilizing passions” which may be used to identify a political movement as “fascist.” His list is one of the great treasures of the current scholarship on fascism:
a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of any traditional solutions; the primacy of the group, toward which one has duties superior to every right, whether individual or universal, and the subordination of the individual to it; the belief that one’s group is a victim, a sentiment that justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against its enemies, both internal and external; dread of the group’s decline under the corrosive effects of individualistic liberalism, class conflict, and alien influences; the need for closer integration of a purer community, by consent if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary; the need for authority by natural chiefs (always male), culminating in a national chieftain who alone is capable of incarnating the group’s historical destiny; the superiority of the leader’s instincts over abstract and universal reason; the beauty of violence and the efficacy of will, when they are devoted to the group’s success; the right of the chosen people to dominate others without restraint from any kind of human or divine law, right being decided by the sole criterion of the group’s prowess within a Darwinian struggle. There is no “fascist” movement in the United States today. Neither are there significant “fascist” political candidates. On the other hand, a wealth of fascist ideas have crept into and influence the nation’s political dialogue. These ideas should not be suppressed or excluded for it would be impossible to do so and maintain the integrity of our democracy. But it is vitally important for the population to understand the historical attachment and roots of these ideas. Here is the link to Scott's article for those that are interested in the whole thing: http://harpers.org/archive/2008/02/hbc-90002426
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
sorry about my spelling"beginning" if you would....
onlineanalyst
· 1 year ago
Those descriptors appear to define the Left, particularly the radical Left, as fascists.
newton
· 1 year ago
Did anyone look at the third panel? Did anyone see the real point here?
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
Yeah that's a typical weasel clause, sorta like ABC running a story that they wouldn't cover but they would report the National Enquirer had run the story. Also the symbolism drowns out any attempt at reason for the association presented.
Shenyurt
· 1 year ago
great post..
kebam
· 1 year ago
I thought it was hilarious. On another board we are talking about the Obama being the next either fuher or next Marshall Applewhite then this popped up.
Like the writing in the bathroom says: "Here I sit, broken hearted.........."
I had all kind of pithy remarks and observations ready but after reading all the postings I truly am broken hearted. So much intelligence and so much caca.
That's the enjoyable thing about blogs...we can post with impunity and invisibility. After all, where are you? And you don't know where I am. You can only presume to know me by what I choose to post whether that is my true belief or not. It may be only to "stir the pot".
And there is no pot more easily stirred than that one between liberals and conservatives. In all my years (64), I've never made a true convert. Birds of a feather and all that.
Keep up the good writings and I will continue to enjoy.
MikeA
· 1 year ago
IT-IS-A-CARTOON!
I want to congratulate Chris Muir for producing a three panel cartoon that was able to create this much thought and discussion. Regardless if you agree or disagree with any perceived point, he made you think; and did so with very few words. I consider that brilliant.
We are all free to accept, reject or argue with any point we think Chris was trying to make. Those who even hint at wanting Muir censored for any reason, to any degree, are far more scary than the cartoon, its content or even a perceived Nazi Obama.
Again, IT'S-A-CARTOON!
Theflyman
· 1 year ago
Mike Luckovich is much better without needing all the attention. I guess it's kind of hard to be funny and conservative at the same time, so might as well go with inflammatory symbolism huh?
MikeA
· 1 year ago
"Better" is a relative term. But I agree with your point that Luckovichdoes not need attention. And that is probably fortunate for him. Not particuarily profitable, but fortunate.
sarah
· 1 year ago
why are her breasts falling out of her shirt?
MikeA
· 1 year ago
Well, on closer, examination, I'd say it is because a button or two are missing.
Micah_B_Free
· 1 year ago
not falling out enuf for Norm.
njcommuter
· 1 year ago
Why is she falling out of her blouse? Well, if you've followed the past few strips you'd know that she'd been nursing her kids. She might even be ready to go back to that task.
Conservatives are supposed to take the long view, folks. We're supposed to remember what happened yesterday, and even take a few lessons from history so that we have something to conserve.
Seaberry
· 1 year ago
Great cartoon, and it fits what both Obama and her have been saying!
Herb
· 1 year ago
"Try googling "Bushitler" to see the point of Muir's satire here today."
Or try searching "Hitlery" in the comments on this very site.
If there was anyone who still wasn't sure that that the right has utterly jumped the shark, this cartoon removes all doubt.
eh nonymous
· 1 year ago
Google results: 36,800 hits for "bushitler"; "135,000" hits for "hitlery." Not to make it partisan, I think we can all agree that in either case, it's lazy. And so is Muir's cartoon.
jharp
· 1 year ago
Just finished reading this thread and to be honest I have never seen anything like it.
Coming from the folks who want to give the president the power to listen to our phone calls, look at our e mails, imprison Americans indefinitely without charges or a lawyer, and torture our prisoners I am at a loss for words.
How about it folks. Do you want Senator Obama to have all of these powers?
You had better think long and hard and do something about it now as he is going to kick Senator McCain's ass in the general election.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
George Bush is listening to my phone and reading my emails? How does the man get so much done in a 24 hour day! I do fear that he will some day grab me out of my bed at night, imprison me with no contact to the modern world, and torture me.
By the way, be careful posting this anti-Bush stuff online. He's in Africa right now, watching you, and when he gets back he might come a-knockin.
njcommuter
· 1 year ago
If the communication is across the border, I sure as hell want the executive branch to have that power. On the other hand, I don't want the FBI collecting dossiers on political enemies like they diid for the Clintons.
jharp
· 1 year ago
Where do I start.
1) They always have had that power WITH JUDICIAL OVERSIGHT
You know, three co equal branches of government, checks and balances
So if you travel to Europe and phone your wife at home you believe your call should be monitored by the government.
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
The Executive branch has always had the power to monitor the communications of our Congressionally declared enemies without judicial oversight.
jharp
· 1 year ago
"Congressionally declared enemies"
First time I have heard this term. Please enlighten me.
Does this include American citizens?
jharp
· 1 year ago
njcommuter,
This is exactly why we have judicial oversight.
I very much hope you understand this. And also please understand judicial oversight is exactly what George Bush feels is no longer necessary.
viking01
· 1 year ago
Whoa there! Judicial oversight is what gave us Kelo vs. City of New London and up-ended private property rights. How quickly Constitutional rights can be dissolved or weakened by the slam of a pernicious socialist gavel.
Take Mrs. Obambi's practically alluding that whatever is not voluntary shall be mandatory. Big sista accidentally leaks big brutha's big pictcha. That kind of spousal power trip 'tude could make Janet's famous Waco barbecue look like a day at the beach. Obambi dare not make Michelle sad lest his smile not glimmer so brightly while he's out tempting the dupes. Then there would have to be a co-presidential trade to patch things up. Much like Bubba traded Hillarycare and Travel Office to the keeper of his 'nads so he could keep boinking the employees. My how the Democrats change.
jharp
· 1 year ago
"Judicial oversight is what gave us Kelo vs. City of New London and up-ended private property rights."
I agree the republican majority of the Supreme Court made a poor decision. So let's just pitch the constitution then. Is that what you're saying?
And there is a procedure in place to remedy such decisions.
The rest of your post is nonsense.
viking01
· 1 year ago
Goodness jharp that response was beyond weak.
A couple of distant relatives in the German resistance got knocked off by "procedure" being conveniently executed by Hitler's hanging judge. It was all in accordance with legal "remedy" of a sort. jharp implies any ruling is a remedy therefore it must be okay. Too late to tell them I suppose.
The Kelo decision is what "pitched" the Constitution. Eminent domain was applied to purely political seizure of property for redistribution for private development not for public works such as bridges etc. as is its purpose. If the danger in that eludes poor jharp then he's beyond help.
It's little different than Slick and Hill seizing the Sierra Club tree house right in the middle of jharp's "Save the Squirrels" lecture then knocking it down to develop Whitewater and Castle Grande. Sorry there jharp maybe you shouldn't have blindly trusted "procedure."
sven10077
· 1 year ago
"nonsense"
Kelo:
Majority Opinion
John Paul Stevens Anthony Kennedy David Souter Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer
Dissenting
Sandra Day O'Connor William Rehnquist Antonin Scalia Clarence Thomas
I am often left pondering what alternate universe you inhabit that has:
a) supreme court justices broken down by "party" as much as you and Chuckles Schumer may try to turn SCotUS into another round of partisan beach blanket bingo it is not and should not be-the divisions are along the lines of liberal/conservative and "interprative"/strict constructionist
b) where this planet that the "ayes" in Kelo inhabit where they are in fact Conservative Icons and Scalia is some sort of raging moonbat
You have a recurring theme of simply regurgitating DNC talking points and/or trying to obfuscate the political reality involved.
Everyone knows that Kennedy is a "maverick" ie media loving closeted moonbat.
again, thanks for playing
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
I hope that in the new Indiana Jones movie, Harrison Ford mumbles, "Democrats...I hate those guys".
AH_C
· 1 year ago
I thot that as political cartoons go, it packed a tome in just a couple of panels. Touche & pot meets kettle
Gaunilon
· 1 year ago
For seven years, we have heard the Left compare George Bush to Adolf Hitler. I find the sudden outrage over Chris Muir's deliberate poking of this impulse more than just a little hypocritical.
What the Left does is the Left's business, and since the Left is completely bereft of class we should not be using them as any kind of standard. To compare a candidate's wife to Goebbels is beyond the pale.
I've pointed out Muir's lack of class before. The strip is worthless and the site would be better off without it.
Douglas Watts
· 1 year ago
Ed, the Michelle Obama spiel is basically "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." I admit though, that the syntax and tone of it is a bit weird. I think Michelle Obama has to either zip it or get much better at public speaking.
James Guglielmino
· 1 year ago
What you are really saying is that every tool can be a weapon and every weapon can be a tool. I really do find it unsavory in a way that progressive income tax requires that I pay over 30% and some pay nothing but I find it more, no, far FAR more unsavory that flat income taxes result in a tiny increase in the very, very wealthy, a dimunition in the numbers of middle class and an ever increasing increase in those in poverty, a perfect formula for making us a feudal society. What I am getting at, in an indirect way, is that while the full name of the Nazi party is what you say it is, suggesting that Obama OR FDR are similar in any real way to Nazis is like saying that a shovel is like an Atomic bomb. Really, this is nonsense and it is hard to believe that anyone here really believes it.
nightjar
· 1 year ago
"We must work as one, and that's why I came today," Bush said to applause from the more than 2,200 delegates."
Bush to NAACP Does the above cartoon follow the edict of Herr Bush?
As one nation, as opposed to one that insists on the divisiveness of identity politics?
Your point is?
nightjar
· 1 year ago
Who said anything about identity politics, except you? First you guys make the "socialist" smear that the Obama govmint is gonna give handouts to the poor and lazy(the same in your mind) then when M Obama makes a perfectly capitalist remark advising we expect you to work for what you get, you claim the new smear from idiot Goldberg that the Obama's are just being their fascist - excuse me "liberal fascist " just selves.
The truth is , you got nothin' except half-baked turds slung up against the wall hoping something will stick. With that cartoon and other postings Ed is rapidly crawling into the same hole with DU and other fringe left groups. But you'll have gotten even, right.
"We must work as one" in the context of Bush talking to the NAACP is pretty clearly a call for an end to racism and identity politics, but I see your point that Bush's statement sounds a lot like Michelle's. However, they're NOT the same. Bush says "we must work together"; Michelle says "Barack will require you to work." The first statement establishes a contrast between working together and working separately; the second establishes a contrast between being required to work and not being required to work (and given Obama's past record, your guess that it's just "a perfectly capitalist remark" is unlikely; Michelle's most likely got that "mandatory community service" thing in mind, not something like the '94 welfare reform).
nightjar
· 1 year ago
A lot of people have espoused "mandatory community service" as an alternative to say the draft -- if that's what your talking about. You obviously haven't heard the speech in question and she was speaking of mainstream liberal terms rebutting RW attacks of guvmint help. as handouts. Kinda like welfare reform.
You take the twisted version from Hewitt and Ed and run amok. This fascist play on social programs is a sick angle of attack that will finish what credibility the conservative right wing has currently. So I say have at it. Bush approval 19%
Micah_B_Free
· 1 year ago
and dem controlled congressional approval?
nightjar
· 1 year ago
You mean the thoroughly filibustered by senate republicans congress. Not any better. But that will change in 2009.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
No, I'm talking about the plan to make $4,000 college credits mandatory (and watch tuition jump up in response - "yes, we can" find something to spend $4,000 extra per student per year on) in return for mandatory community service (I couldn't determine how long, but one potentially unreliable source said two years). The video is here. So the result is, the poor pay about the same for college tuition (first they pay tax - how else will government pay for tax credits? - then they notice the tuition hasn't actually gone down), the rich and middle-class pay more, and there's a mandatory community service period (presumably afterwards - and how to compensate for the accompanying deterioration of job skills?). And that's the innocuous plan - remember FDR's "Civilian Public Service" camps for conscientious dissenters who refused the draft? That sounds like your suggestion, actually...
Barack's "welfare reform" would have people get MORE aid from the government and do "mandatory community service"; traditional welfare reform has people get LESS aid from the government and get jobs. Slight difference there.
Twisted version? Is that not what she actually says? Hewitt's link is to an audio recording, not a "twisted version".
nightjar
· 1 year ago
What Obama was proposing in the video has been around for decades for certain professions, i.e. doctors and teachers where they get help for school and promise to work in needed locations for a year or two. Ever watch Northern LIghts". If Obama expands that program it's hardly news and would be a good thing. And BTW Barrack clearly says we will ASK you for community service.
Your statement about middle class being squeezed from such a program is more non-sense. The middle class has taken a beating Bush policies for 7 years now and they know it, which is a big reason they dislike him.
Obviously you don't know much about the concientious objector program that was begun in WW 2 and is in place today. There were no gulag like forced labor camps as more than half were given non-combat jobs in the military and the rest helped with the war effort in other ways. They were (are) religious people ie Quakers, Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses etc... Conscientious Objectors During World War II
And your mixing college financial aid with traditional welfare programs. Show me where Obama's plan calls for more "welfare" and less jobs. What a silly statement.
The "twisted version" is one with out of context quotes attempting to portray as some authoritarian (fascistic) figure proposing forced labor.
pl
· 1 year ago
I'm sorry I gave you a hit. I reached this page by accident. Could you make sure your advertisers know that?
docjim505
· 1 year ago
I'm glad that you posted about this.
The cartoon is waaay over the line.
Michelle Obama may be many things, but implying that she is a nazi is despicable.
As for the argument that the left does it, too ("Try googling "Bushitler" to see the point of Muir's satire here today."), I say that we ought not to use the disgusting behavior of the left to justify bad behavior on our side.
Muir ought to be ashamed of himself.
docjim505
· 1 year ago
Follow-up:
President Kennedy told us (well, others: I wasn't alive when he was in office) to ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what you can do for your country. Most Americans were inspired. When the Rev. Dr. King talked about his dream, he was talking about unity. Most Americans were inspired.
My point is that "collectivist" rhetoric can be used by both sides, for good and for evil. If I say that I'm proud to be an American, if I love my country and think it's the best in the world, if I admire the men and women in uniform who defend our country... Does that make me a fascist because they, too, emphasized hyper-patriotism and militarism? Of course not. Nor does Michelle Obama's talk about her husband "requiring us to work" or "demanding that we shed our divisions and cynicism" make her a nazi, or anything close to it.
Satire is one thing. Muir's cartoon today is something else: offensive and ugly.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Asking someone to do something, or telling other you have a dream of something, is FAR different from requiring someone to do something, especially when that person has the power to require you to do it, and won't detail specifics of how they plan to require you to do it until after they have that power.
Satire is often offensive or ugly...agreeable and cute satire generally sucks.
UncleAl
· 1 year ago
Seems like docjim doesn't get this one.
docjim505
· 1 year ago
No, I get it. I just don't like it.
docjim505
· 1 year ago
I see your point, and it's hard to argue. As I wrote in response to John's post, there is a large degree of "knee-jerk" in my response to the cartoon.
I would also say that the nazi comparison is so overused that Muir's use of it smacks of laziness. Could he have made his point - perhaps even made it more sharply - without drawing "Sam" as a brownshirt?
Again, I think about how often the left uses the term "nazi" to smear anybody they don't agree with. It's disgusting, and I would much prefer that our side didn't fall into that vice.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
I agree, as I think my other posts on this topic show, and I think it was distasteful. But I also think there is a useful place for distasteful. Both the Left and Right need to remember history, so as not to repeat it. And when the Left uses Bu$Hitler to label the Bush Admin, it's up to responsible parties to correct the misrepresentations, where they exist. And when the Right uses Nazis to label a Socialist leaning politician, responsible parties should argue the differences, where they exist.
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
To repeat my comment buried high above, a better choice might have been a British Labour Party pol speaking about the Control of Engagements Order.
Except that no one would have understood the reference.
Folks understand the meaning of the brownshirt.
John
· 1 year ago
So....Hitler and Nazis are images that the Left can use with impunity against the right (even though National Socialist policies have nothing in common with conservative politice except patriotism and a tendency to highlight the flag), but the right can't return the favor?
Is there some commandment that the right shall not giveth the left a taste of their own medicine? If the shoe fits...in this case, the rhettoric of the government forcing people to "change" not just their actions but their beliefs (!) then why not compare them with the bogey man they're ALWAYS accusing our side of "secretly" being?
docjim505
· 1 year ago
Perhaps it's a knee-jerk response on my part: I DETEST nazis. If it were up to me, it would be legal to shoot them. No, I take that back: you'd be paid a BOUNTY for shooting them. Plus, after a lifetime of seeing lefties compare everybody they don't like to Hitler, it tends to grate.
I also believe that two wrongs don't make a right. Even more, I think that (generally) getting down in the gutter with your opponent isn't a good idea. "He does it, too!" is not a good excuse for bad behavior. Think about it: do you really, really want to behave like lefty scum such as Michael Moore, the Code Pink idiots, or some of our resident lefties?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
I detest Nazis also.
Check out the comments down thread that just because someone is a racist that wears swastikas and celebrates Hitler's birthday, that does NOT make them a "Fascist."
You see? They are free to wallow in every aspect of Fascism and even play Nazi dress-up but they AREN'T Fascists. It's the old everybody-is-crazy-but-me strategy.
Homophobia is what made the GOP a magnet for closeted gays. In the same way "Liberal fascism" is a huge neon sign saying "Neo-Nazis Welcome! Free HBO! Continental Breakfast!"
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Uh, no. Racism may be an aspect of Fascism, but it's an aspect of many detestable things. Swastikas and Hitler's birthday are aspects of Nazism, which is both less and more than Fascism (as a political ideology, narrower, but it also has nonpolitical components). Thus, one can be a racist who wears swastikas and celebrates Hitler's birthday and not be a fascist. It's called logic, not everybody-is-crazy-but-me.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Logic is apparently bit slippery and flexible in your hands, because on the one hand, your definition can of Fascism can exclude Nazi and Nazi wannabees, but it includes Head Start teachers, FDR, and pretty much anyone you disagree with.
You notice, I'm not calling Jonah a Fascist either. I'm calling him a shameless user of Fascist rhetorical techniques and themes as they were laid out by Hitler in Mein Kampf. Mein Kampf is a handbook for political propaganda, which Jonah is recycling. And in this campaign, which is showing explosive racism, Jonah's rhetoric will get mixed with racism. By real Fascists. Well not according to you, but according to the people that will be ridiculing them, yes.
Isn't it a little uncomfortable defending Nazis? It's going to be a full time job.
It's incredibly bad timing for the GOP that Obama will likely get the nomination just as they were getting serious with the Mein Kampf program.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Hey, saying white supremacist racist Nazi groups aren't necessarily fascist groups doesn't make them any less detestable. I'm not DEFENDING them by any stretch of the imagination. I'm just saying they don't necessarily follow the fascist political ideology while they dream about gassing Jews.
This rhetorical argument you use, it makes no sense to me. "Well, if you make this argument, then bad people become less bad and good people are cast in a bad light! Oh no!" It's a poor variant on proof by contradiction that doesn't actually prove anything.
njcommuter
· 1 year ago
Offensive? Ugly?
Is it the satire that is offensive and ugly, or does the satire mirror something which is offensive and ugly once you remove the chrome and window dressing?
michaelreynolds
· 1 year ago
The defense of this cartoon is uncharacteristically dishonest and frankly stupid.
To equate a statement -- by a candidate's spouse -- to the effect that her husband will call on people to work, become involved, become better educated, to commit, to shed apathy, with fascism is so staggeringly dishonest that it casts doubt on the integrity of this blog. A blog I check three or four times a day and that, until now, I have respected.
This isn't a close call. Shame on Ed Morrissey. Shame on the commenters who have twisted logic to equate a woman who espouses liberal views with people who arranged the mass-slaughter of entire races.
This is disgusting. Shameful. Contemptible. And I suspect Mr. Morrissey knows it, but rather than admit an error, rather than admit that the cartoon is inexcusable, he is choosing loyalty over truth and hiding behind a bland call to let commenters hash it out.
Ed, you are, in effect, a publisher here. You are a small-scale New York Times. If you won't step up and take responsibility, loyalty be damned, you have no further standing to criticize media which, for all their many travesties, have not yet sunk to this level.
exhelodrvr
· 1 year ago
Do you think it was wrong to publish the cartoons that the Muslims found offensive?
Have you protested like this every time for the past seven years when Bush has been compared to Hitler? Or when Republicans have been called Nazis?
Do you deny the parallels between what Michelle Obama said and some of Hitler's statements?
michaelreynolds
· 1 year ago
I ran the Muslim cartoon on my blog. Twice. Do you not get the difference between Muslims threatening murder in response to a critical cartoon, and my peaceful objection here?
There are no parallels between M. Obama and Hitler. It takes a sick, twisted mind to invent them, not to mention a mind empty of historical knowledge.
exhelodrvr
· 1 year ago
There are no parallels? Apparently you are totally unfamiliar with Hitler's policies, and totally unfamiliar with her speeches. You realize that Hitler did have other policies besides killing Jews, don't you? And that they were highly socialist in nature.
Of course, you are ignoring the question about whether you protest like that every time Bush and/or a REpublican is compared to Hitler and to the Nazis. You must spend all day at the Huffington Post and Daily Kos doing that; how do you find the time to log on here?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
It's wrong to throw crude, primitive political propaganda into an election in order to subvert the process, but it's something we've always had to live with.
It's just like every Thanksgiving, Uncle Bob is going to get dead drunk, pick a fight with his sister, and wander into the bedroom before puking on everyone's coats, passing out on the floor and pissing his pants.
It would be a lot more considerate if he'd do this any other day of the year, but no it has to be Thanksgiving. Likewise, this is simply what the GOP does during elections, that and crying that they are being disrespected if anyone objects.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
In your analogy, Auntie May HAS done that, EVERY other day of the year, but you only ever complain about Uncle Bob. Mr. Reynolds has some standing to complain, since he has no previous record regarding the Bushitler nonsense; you do not.
Mr. Reynolds, there is a telling generalization in your complaint. First you complain that Michelle's statements are being equated with fascism. Then you complain that Michelle and Barack are being aligned with the Nazis. I give your second complain merit, for sure, but not the first, since Michelle's statements that Barack will "require" (NOT call for, but require) work, involvement, education etc (presumably at the government's discretion, as that's the only way to make that sort of requirement) DO equate with fascist ideology (or at least the socialist "government will take care of everything and require all you can give" way of thinking). As I see it, the step you complain about is the jump from fascist ideology to mass murder on Hitler's scale, and I agree wholeheartedly there.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>Michelle's statements that Barack will "require" (NOT call for, but require) >work, involvement, education etc (presumably at the government's >discretion, as that's the only way to make that sort of requirement) DO >equate with fascist ideology
And you could say the exactly same things about the Boy Scouts.
As I've said, Goldberg embraced all the rhetorical themes of Mein Kampf. He's left out the explicit racism, although the Arabs substitute very nicely for the Jews. But Obama's primary wins have provided the spark to unleash a flood of racism, and some of DBD's fans on this site are practically having orgasms at the sight of a swastika.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Ed said he wouldn't have done this cartoon if he had been a cartoonist, but that he would also not censur the Muir cartoon by taking it off his site. What is your problem with this? What is your position on the Danish cartoonists....I'm curious? Also curious if you thought the cartoons equating Repulbican African Americans to house slaves and Uncle Tom's should have been censured too?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
I didn't ask him to take it down.
>What is your position on the Danish cartoonists....I'm curious?
What is your position on Robert Mapplethorpe's "Piss Christ?" Do you "get it" now?
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
I wasn't responding to you BurfordHolly, I was responding to michaelreynolds, unless you are one in the same.
My position on Piss Christ is Maplethorpe had every right to do it and display it, and that tax dollars shouldn't be used to finance or promote it. And I have every right to call Maplethorpe a Post-modern fraud who gained fame using the lazy "contraversy is art" lie.
I have a Bachelor's Degree in pre-Architecture, with a double major in Art History and Engineering, and a Master's in Architecture during which I had the honor of 6 more Master's level art history courses. I don't believe in censure, whethor or not I strongly agree with the message or not.
As for michaelreynolds, or you, asking to take it down...as I stated Ed didn't defend the cartoon, said he wouldn't have done it, but also wouldn't take it down to censure it. So what are you or michaelreynolds complaining about?
rbj
· 1 year ago
There's a huge difference between "I call upon people to work, to be involved and to not be cynical" and "I demand that you work, be politically involved and not be cynical, oh and not be divisive (i.e., agree with me)."
TomB
· 1 year ago
What about your freedoms (yes, also NOT to be better educated, or NOT to work)?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Is the America Enterprise Institute hiring?
jharp
· 1 year ago
michaelreynolds,
Thank you kindly for saying to so well.
I visit often as I thought it was of the more same right wing blogs. I have since changed my mind.
It really befuddles my mind to read such nonsense.
I can only guess that desperate people say desperate things.
Tom_Shipley
· 1 year ago
So Ed, you think comparing Obama (or his wife) to Hitler has some merit?
MichaelSmith
· 1 year ago
Modern liberalism and Nazism share the same fundamental premise: they are both based on the notion that the “needs” of some individuals trump the individual’s rights to his property and, if necessary, his freedom – and that government must have the power to force individuals and businesses to make whatever sacrifices are necessary to fulfill those “needs”.
Remember that the complete name of the Nazi party was the “National Socialist Worker’s Party of Germany”. Here is a portion of the Nazi party platform:
“We ask that the government undertake the obligation above all of providing citizens with adequate opportunity for employment and earning a living.”
“The activities of the individual must not be allowed to clash with the interests of the community, but must take place within its confines and be for the good of all. Therefore, we demand: ... an end to the power of the financial interests.”
“We demand profit sharing in big business.”
“We demand a broad extension of care for the aged.”
“In order to make possible to every capable and industrious [citizen] the attainment of higher education and thus the achievement of a post of leadership, the government must provide an all-around enlargement of our entire system of public education .... “
“We demand the education at government expense of gifted children of poor parents.”
“The government must undertake the improvement of public health—by protecting mother and child, by prohibiting child labor.... by the greatest possible support for all clubs concerned with the physical education of youth.”
“[We] combat the... materialistic spirit within and without us, and are convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only proceed from within on the foundation of The Common Good Before the Individual Good.”
Modern liberalism advocates all of this.
No, Obama doesn’t plan to single out one group for mass extermination the way Hitler did the Jews. But he does have to have a scapegoat – as well as a means of financing his programs. Thus, he plans to further demonize, regulate, punish and tax both the most successful of American businesses as well as the most successful individuals, the high income taxpayers.
No, Obama doesn’t plan to launch a war against neighboring countries. But this apparent pacifism is only a superficial difference versus the militancy of the Nazis. Obama doesn’t have to launch a war against other countries – he has the world’s largest economy to loot to pay for his socialistic schemes. So Obama’s war will be an internal war – a war against America’s most productive individuals.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>based on the notion that the “needs” of some individuals trump >the individual’s rights to his property and, if necessary, his freedom
You can say the same thing about 5th grade math class - you are denied your cell phone and made to sit in rows and so on and so on and so on
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Schools are quite similar to nanny-state or fascist (depending on your school and your pov) societies; the reason why it works *better* in schools is twofold. First, in schools the adults actually DO know better than the kids; in fascist or socialist states, politicians merely PRESUME to know better than the people. Second, in schools there is an enforcement mechanism (effectiveness varies) to prevent or mitigate harm done by a bad teacher or principal or other authority figure, that being the parents; fascist and socialist societies have no such mechanism. Having been in school for the last dozen years, I would not recommend the school system as a model for society (especially not my current school as it is Jesuit; religion and politics don't mix well in society or the classroom).
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
I heard Jonah Goldberg on Beck last night, lumping Obama, FDR and Hitler together. Because FDR was a liberal, he was really no better than Hitler, and by Goldbergs reasoning the Greatest Generation was no better than the guys running Aushwitz.
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Well, FDR did issue Executive Order 9066, which wasn't acknowledged as error until Ronald Reagan's Presidency. President Franklin Roosevelt actually did what a whole bunch of liberals accuse President George Bush of wanting to do.
And, from a policy standpoint, Hitler was a socialist, just as FDR was and Barack is now. Hitler's ideas of wealth redistribution were ethnically oriented, as both Barack's church values and Michelle's comments indicate their thoughts lie. The point in common is that Hitler wanted wealth redistribution and upliftment of the poor by the state. The history of Volkwagen's nationalization by the German Government is instructive.
Gerry
· 1 year ago
Difference being Hitler tried to wipe out an entire race of people. Neither Obama nor FDR had anywhere near that kind of evil within them. You guys trying to ease the Dems into a camp with Hitler just because he wants to help take care of Americans who have nothing (socialism is NOT a bad word), is shameful.
HowardDevore
· 1 year ago
So lets be honest then- you have no problem with the facism of Hitler, just the antisemitism he put into practice.
Maybe I should go pick up Goldbergs book now, Im starting to get spooked by the left more & more
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Well spoken!
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
Yeah. Obama and FDR just want( to make me and my children slaves to the state.
That's so much better.
The Dems are not helping take care of "Americans who have nothing." They are forcing me to do so on pain of imprisonment.
The left prior to WW2 proudly proclaimed that they were fascists. It is a testament to their (your) deeply superficial level of thought and morality that Germany's experiment caused them (you) only to abandon the name and not the ideas.
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
You are right. But all three spring from the same philosophic well. Hitler just chose a slightly different bogey-man to which to deny rights.
And I disagree about the badness of socialism. Socialism is stealing. You can see that wherever it holds sway. I think I have the right to keep or give whatever my hands produce, while the socialist would take from me regardless of my wishes.
To these guys, giving people medical care is exactly the same as murdering them.
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
To me, forcing me to pay for your medical care is slavery.
And socialism -- the subjugation of the individual to the state -- is thoroughly evil.
quickjustice
· 1 year ago
"Giving people medical care is exactly the same as murdering them". Actually if you were a Jew or a gypsy in Hitler's Germany, it was.
And placing doctors under control of the government makes it possible to turn them into killers by government-imposed rationing, if not by gas chamber.
AH_C
· 1 year ago
Not to mention using doctors to extract precious metals from victims and to tan the skins and not the suntan variety
quickjustice
· 1 year ago
Fred Siegel says that the flaw in Goldberg's analysis is his omission of the libertarian impulses in the Democrat Party which do exist, however fitfully. If you read Amity Shlaes's recent masterpiece, "The Forgotten Man", you'll see that the New Deal, and FDR's brain trusters, drew heavily upon Mussolini's fascist economic model in Italy for their inspiration.
And Burford, you're mixing apples and oranges. FDR's New Deal was fascist in its economic origins, and it failed. In fighting Nazi Germany and fascist Japan, FDR united the country, and brought Republicans into his Administration for the war effort.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
The flaw is Goldbergs omission of actual American fascism as it appears in various violent white supremacists groups, including those that wear swastikas and celebrate Hitlers birthday, which are very active criminal and terrorist groups.
Goldbergs book is essentially a big valentines card and pizza sized heart shaped box of chocolates to those guys.
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Those little Nazi groups make a lot of noise and wield little power. The Democrats make a lot of noise and wield a lot of power.
Which group do I fear the most? Answer: The Democrats.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Oklahoma City
Otter
· 1 year ago
And nearly 11,000 islamic terror attacks around the world since 9-11. By people whom Hitler thought were terrific. What's your point?
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Again, Executive Order 9066. Not to mention the entire Civil War.
sven10077
· 1 year ago
nice place,,,,
Unabomber
docjim505
· 1 year ago
"Existential threat"
Don_Miguel
· 1 year ago
The flaw is in your thinking that violent white supremacists groups are fascist in ideology. They are nothing more than what you say: "criminal and terrorist groups." American fascism is what used to be known as "progressivism." The progressives were a precursor to European fascism; first Mussolini and then Hitler. Both American progressives and European fascists were socialist ideologies (collectivists, statist, etc.) that differed from the other infamous socialist ideology communism by tossing in concepts like nationalism, euthanasia and anti-Semitism. While neo-Nazis, the KKK and other such minor movements are racist, anti-Semitic (and surely would approve of euthanasia for the “right” kind of people), they certainly aren’t socialists.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>The flaw is in your thinking that violent white supremacists >groups are fascist in ideology.
We have a winner! That remark has earned you ridicule across the Tubes. Take a bow!
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
So even if they wear swastikas and call themselves "fascists," they aren't fascists by your definition.
That really is breathtaking.
philwynk
· 1 year ago
If I wore a donkey pin, called myself Burford Holly, and robbed a bank, would your saying "He's not really me" be equally breathtaking?
Just because an angry teen idiot slaps on a swastika and says "I'm a fascist" doesn't make him one. There are valid intellectual criteria at stake.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
So it's not like being born again?
philwynk
· 1 year ago
When my kids got born again, they apologized to me for having been unruly, stopped living in sin, got jobs, and started living responsibly. When I got born again, I broke an addiction and started treating people decently.
None of us have ever slapped on swastikas, so my comparison can only be by inference; but I understand kids with swastikas are more apt to beat people up and burn things. So, no, I don't think it's like being born again.
How civil of you to think otherwise, though. Liberals never fail to impress me with their kindness and intellectual honesty.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Did you overcome your false pride?
False pride is the keystone of addiction.
Desperate false pride is also the source of racism.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
If you're drawing this "false pride" inference from philwynk's attempt to differentiate between Christian rebirth and slapping on a swastika, you're an idiot. I say that as an atheist.
Anyway, getting back to the point: violent white supremacist groups who wear swastikas are NOT necessarily fascist. For example, they may be anti-Semites without any particular political philosophy who worship Hitler for killing Jews and want to emulate him. In other words, you're going to have to provide more detail if you want to convince me that those are actually fascist groups and not just anti-Semites who identify with a fascist.
unclesmrgol
· 1 year ago
Wow. That's deep.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Deep enough that people lose their homes, jobs, family, and lives over it because pride won't let them change enough to quit their addiction.
Deep enough that it's one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
"Pride goeth before the fall."
If you've never given it any thought. maybe you should.
AH_C
· 1 year ago
Mis-spouting Biblical passages is only digging yourself in deeper.
AH_C
· 1 year ago
Desperate false pride is the hallmark of progressive donks. Just ask Michelle Obama about what she's proud of.
In digging a new pothole (pride), you managed to come full circle and fill the original.
Don_Miguel
· 1 year ago
The only thing that is breathtaking is your lack of reading comprehension.
Jimmie
· 1 year ago
Except that white supremacist groups are not fascists. They are Nazis. There is a difference.
Of course, reading the guy's book or paying attention to what he actually says helps when engaging in criticism.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
If Nazis aren't Fascists, why does "Liberal Fascism" have a smiley Hitler on the cover?
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Sorry, wrong. White supremacist groups aren't necessarily Nazi groups. They're groups that sympathize with some of Hitler's goals. A big-government liberal may sympathize with Hitler's aim to provide universal healthcare (somebody quoted it above) while being horrified by his plan to exterminate the Jewry, and a white supremacist group may identify with the plan to exterminate Jews while not giving a d*** about the other political goals Hitler had. Neither of those groups are fascist (well...I suppose it depends on what else the big-government liberal identifies with from Hitler's program, since extermination of a minority group is not a necessary component of fascism...)
rhabicht
· 1 year ago
Read it again, and answer this for yourself.
MalCarne
· 1 year ago
Bravo, Michelle.
Cynicism has become the New Laziness for my generation. Letterman and Colbert are particularly virulent carriers of the disease. There's been a long-standing thread in Generation X that the world is wrong and awful, but all you have to do is recognize it, shrug, and smirk.
If Michelle Obama's trying to force young people out of that rut into action, power to her.
Also, it looks like Chris Muir's managed to mangle the quote. "Uninformed", not "uniformed". Much less Brownshirtish in its actual context...
philwynk
· 1 year ago
Michelle Obama telling me (54, continually self-educated, IQ 150, Master's Degree, analytical reasoning scores in the 99th percentile) that I'm "uninformed" and "cynical," and that I won't be "allowed" to be those anymore -- this is not Brownshirtish in its actual content?
Son, you're trying very, very hard to make this seem innocent, but it is not innocent, and we're not going stop examining this until we find out what's underneath it. Nor should we.
And for what it's worth, I'm not only not of your generation, I'm neither cynical nor lazy. Speak for yourself.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
MalCarne
· 1 year ago
But when Michelle Obama was speaking at that rally, she *was* speaking to people my age. That's who the audience at that speech was. She wasn't talking to you.
First misinterpret, then hyperventilate. Yeah, that'll be a winning strategy.
Like it or not, Barack Obama has a lot more in common with Reagan than John McCain... unlike McCain (and like Reagan), he's very charismatic.
Face it. Odds favor him being the next President. Deal.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
By "my age" you mean people in the 18-24 demographic, correct? As an intellectually curious, analytical, (generally) sincere member of generation X (why'd they start naming the generations, anyway? Did it start with the Greatest Generation of WWII or is that just the oldest one anyone remembers?), I'm insulted by Michelle's casting of me as a cynical, uninformed, divisive, lazy, isolated bum who needs to get with it, and frankly scared by her intimation that Barack will try to MAKE me be what, by and large, I already am.
Moving on to your most recent comment - your suggestion that Philwynk shouldn't be commenting because he's of the wrong generation is ridiculous. Even if Michelle was talking to people your age, the policy Barack implements to effect the changes Michelle was talking about will affect everyone, not just generation X.
Regarding charisma, it's merely one virtue a politician has, that being the ability to get people to listen to and agree with what he's saying, thus making it more likely that he can be effective as President. However, effectiveness is detrimental if the programs the politician is pushing with his charisma are detrimental. Charisma is only an amplifying factor, making a good politician better, and a bad politician worse - though both will sway crowds. Thus charisma is useless in judging a politician.
On the odds, if Michelle or Barack make more statements like these, his odds will lengthen rapidly once people take notice. Of course, this being politics, it's more likely that something from his time in the Chicago legislature will surface to drag him down than that people will actually start listening and realizing that Obama's program is gilded socialism.
philwynk
· 1 year ago
First of all, I simply can't fathom the emptiness of a soul who views every thought or comment in terms of its value as a "strategy." I'm looking for truth, not for winning sound bites. If you're stuck on sound bites, you have my pity.
Second, I'll grant you that IF her audience was college kids (not everybody at UCLA is a kid) then addressing the cynicism of that generation is appropriate -- but not the way she did it. "BARACK will make you work?" "BARACK won't let you be lazy?" Get real. Maybe addressing cynicism is age-appropriate, but that's BORG crap. "You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile." Scary shit.
You're still reaching, and you need to give it up.
"Barack has more in common with Reagan." If by that you mean he's charismatic and has a message that people like to follow, Bill Clinton also had those characteristics, and so did Adolph Hitler. The difference between Reagan, on the one hand, and those other two, is that Reagan, at the core of his being, was morally good. The difference between Clinton and Hitler was that Clinton was, at the core of his being, nothing but an appetite, so his effect was banal, while Hitler was raw, hateful madness, and it destroyed Europe.
All three, taken together, illustrate that the ability to move crowds is not to be mistaken for decency, and produces an effect according to the hidden characteristics of the soul doing the leading. We do not know what Obama is made of on the inside. Michelle O seems to be giving us little hints, and they're not good. That's why we need to dig deeper and find out what's there.
Yeah, Obama has an advantage, and may win, but if he does, it'll be because there are so many Americans who don't know the difference between a rhetorical wizard and a decent man. Trust me when I tell you, one does not imply the other.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
MalCarne
· 1 year ago
"First of all, I simply can't fathom the emptiness of a soul who views every thought or comment in terms of its value as a "strategy." I'm looking for truth, not for winning sound bites. If you're stuck on sound bites, you have my pity."
..in which case, why are you parroting the whole "Obama is a cult" meme/Liberals are Nazis meme? I mean, come on, folks. This was pegged as the next line of attack on Obama just days after the Paul Krugman hit job. Y'all's script is showing.
TrollFeeder
· 1 year ago
Liberals are fascists. Nazis were fascists.
Similarly, pigs are animals; frogs are animals.
You are the one who writes that Liberals are Nazis. Do you also claim that pigs are frogs?
Look. I like McCain. Unlike most of the dittoheads who claim to be conservatives, he makes up his own mind. I'm looking forward to hearing him and Obama debate.
But honestly, calling Obama Jim Jones and Adolf Hitler? *That's* your idea of debate? Come on, grow up. If you want to talk about issues, fine, but calling a candidate "creepy" because people believe in his message? Who's deserving of pity here?
philwynk
· 1 year ago
...and here's where you were all made, folks:
Please.
This is like saying "Isaac Newton was the first to codify calculus, therefor Isaac Newton created the relationship between the slope of the line and the area under the line."
No, Media Matters didn't create the creepy feeling of the Obama campaign. Yes, they benefit from pointing it out. If you actually believe any of us here give a rat's whisker what Media Matters thinks, you need to stop taking whatever it is you're taking.
As to what sort of "debate" we have in mind, if you find it perfectly reasonable that grown adults are listening to a nice-looking man saying "change" and "hope" and "together, " and responding, teary-eyed, "this isn't running for President, this is going to change the world," then frankly, I'm not interested in debating you. But whether you like it or not, I'm going to find out what the guy is made of.
It's not just that people are following, it's that THERE IS NO MESSAGE. I've written about this elsewhere. Obama does not have a unique message. His message is wholehearted progressivism, with "let's work together" pasted on. His approach to unifying is unrealistic. The message is succeeding at this moment because we've all just faced 8 very unsettling years, during which time the common denominator of every jolt we've received is "things are not as stable as they appear on the surface." This is a petrie dish for demagoguery, and sure enough, now there's a demagogue growing on the agur.
This is PRECISELY what happened to Germany in the early 1930s. That doesn't make Obama Hitler, unless he's mad. But it does mean we're at a point where we can fall for just about anything, and the fact that he's charismatic says exactly NOTHING about what it is we're falling for.
You want to swallow what's in the dish? Go for it. But I'm going to find out what's there first, and I'm going to broadcast what I find.
MrMichael
· 1 year ago
As for the uniformed, uninformed question... I actually wrote to Chris about this as a possible typo. He said basically that the whole thing has misspellings and 'unt's and 'vill' and missing words... it's showing Sam mangling the quote in a bad attempt at a German accent. It's supposed to be wrong.
The cartoon isn't very funny to me. :shrug: It isn't offensive, either.
TomB
· 1 year ago
Sig -Heil - Sig - Heil - Sig - Heil....
MalCarne
· 1 year ago
I would like to think that there's a middle ground between torpid cynicism and fascism, thank you.
Or was it Hitler that asked "Ask not what your country can do for you..."
TomB
· 1 year ago
"Ask" I like: "Require", "Demand", "Push", "will never allow you" I don't like: Call me old fashioned...
hunter_123
· 1 year ago
I guess given that you are an example of modern education, it is no surprise that you cannot tell the differnce between a question and an order.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>Or was it Hitler that asked "Ask not what your country can do for you..."
It is now the moment when by common consent we pause to become conscious of our national life and to rejoice in it, to recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for our country in return. ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Memorial Day speech in Keene, New Hampshire (30 May 1884)
As has often been said, the youth who loves his Alma Mater will always ask, not "What can she do for me?" but "What can I do for her?" ~ Lee Baron Russel Briggs, in "College Life", Routine and Ideals (1904)
In the great fulfillment we must have a citizenship less concerned about what the government can do for it, and more anxious about what it can do for the nation. ~ Warren G. Harding Speech at the Republican National Convention, Chicago, Illinois (7 June, 1916)
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
But nowhere do these people advocate that the government REQUIRE the citizenship to be "anxious about what it can do for the nation." They do not advocate for government to demand that we "pause to become conscious of our national life...and to ask ourselves what we can do for our country..." What these people do is describe an ideal for people to strive for, not an ideal for Barack Obama to legislate into existence (how else is he going to "require" these things of the people?).
There is a HUGE difference between charitably giving of yourself to others (by the way, America leads the world in that by a large margin) and a third party forcing you to give to another. It's "ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what you can do for your country." It's NOT "your country will not ask what it can do for you, but rather demand of you everything you can do for your country."
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Ummm, wouldn't a real fascist do something like draft your ass so he could order you what to do and shoot you if you ignored him?
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Depends on the fascist. But since Michelle's words sound more like the sort of statist nonsense socialists spew than what is normally considered fascism, it'd be more instructive to look at a socialistic society, specifically China during the Cultural Revolution. Mao told his revolutionaries that the bourgeoisie were being forced to give their valuables away so as to better achieve the revolution, and so the revolutionaries went and did the enforcing. Then some of the revolutionaries took the role of the bourgeoisie when Mao needed another outburst of patriotic fervor. Red Scarf Girl describes this process from a first-person perspective. Basically, instead of what you described, Michelle's speech depicts a society where the leaders force you to give everything to everyone else (translation: give everything to the state, because it's the only body that can ensure "proper" redistribution) and shoot you if you don't.
Jimmie
· 1 year ago
No, he would not. he would do what Mussolini did, which was to create a national crisis by which he could rally them to a common purpose - the betterment of the state. Once done, the state would then exercise control over the people for their own welfare, or "the common good" if you like. He would use the coercive power of the state to force corporations into production that benefited the state.
Sounds kind of familiar to me.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>No, he would not. he would do what Mussolini did, >which was to create a national crisis
Too bad he didn't think of the threat level color code so he could declare an "orange" threat level whenever he needed a bump.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Mussolini didn't need one. But show us a time when a US president has done that and maybe you'll have something.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
I think people defending Muir are looking for the middle ground between fascism and profound retardation
galynn
· 1 year ago
Please stay off of insulting people with developmental disabilities. It is so unbecoming for a liberal!
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
You have a point, that particular type of stupid takes years of hard work. It's a black belt in stupid.
Otter
· 1 year ago
You have certainly Earned it.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Something we can all agree on.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Thank you, Sensei
Herb
· 1 year ago
Well played, Burford, though your efforts are wasted on this crowd.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Captain, the dam has broken. As I said several months, Goldberg's book was going to be a boat anchor around the neck of the GOP as the rank and file latches onto the "Mein Kampf" themes and starts quoting Nazi ideology without even realizing it.. After several months of the GOP protesting that Democrats are the *real* racsists, Obama's wins this week released the flood. O'Reilly's talking about "lynching," the yobs here have got hard-ons at the sight of a swastika
MarkJ
· 1 year ago
Yeah, Burford, don't you just hate that Jew Goldberg? The nerve of him, actually putting forth a reasoned, coherent, iconoclastic thesis, buttressed by independently verifiable evidence, and, even worse, challenging readers to discuss it and draw their own conclusions.
How un-0bamian of him, huh?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Interestingly, Obama's been whipping Hillary in many Jewish areas.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Why even bother talking to the Captain when all you're trying to do is insult and slander conservatives in general? Blogger.com is free.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Well if you think this stuff is so clever, you could also have your own blog, and put big banners ads with blinking swastikas across the top with the slogan "fight liberals." Wow, that would just be so clever and hip.
Math_Mage
· 1 year ago
Well, as it happens, I have a blog (though I spend more time here), but I have no particular reason to dedicate it to fighting the liberal tyranny or the Republican fascists or the Great CIA Coverups of the 20th Century. If you think I'm worshiping this cartoon, reread my comment replying to your Uncle Bob metaphor. I don't like the portrayal of Michelle Obama as a Nazi Brownshirt; at the same time, I find it ironic that you're worked up over this and simultaneously saying that conservatives all love Nazis. Furthermore, the position that a President will require others to work, be involved, shed their cynicism and divisiveness etc, implies a helluva lot of power given to the President to do so. Would you be more comfortable if I said that it wasn't fascist, but "merely" statist at its most extreme? Or do you think she merely misspoke and wanted to say "Barack will ask/request/urge/hope/want you to do x, y, and z"?
Tom_Shipley
· 1 year ago
OK, so it's not even March and Obama's being compared to socialists and Nazis.
I really won't be surprised if people start calling him the anti-Christ by November if he gets the nomination.
It's all about scare tactics.
TomB
· 1 year ago
You SHOULD be scared if somebody wants to fix your soul.
Bennett
· 1 year ago
No one's using scare tactics because scare tactics don't work. We are making fun. Ridicule is what works.
Remember, we are Americans. We are afraid of nothing.
Except you when you the nurse forgets your morning dose of psychotropic medication.
rbj
· 1 year ago
Tom_Shipley,
Would you care to explain what Mrs. Obama meant by these remarks? I'd really like to know how to view them as anything but a scary demand that we all think alike according to Barack's dictates.
MalCarne
· 1 year ago
Watch "The Colbert Report" and you'll get it, trust me.
That's the cynicism she's talking about. And let me tell you, it's really annoying.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Oh good...one of Obama's policies is to ban Comedy Central? But what about my South Park???
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
Oh, and if you're annoyed, turn the channel or read a book. I can't turn off the government policy or law created by a Socialist to "better me" when I'm annoyed.
Ross
· 1 year ago
I give you a hearty "AMEN, brother!"
You should copyright that and send it to McCain/RNC as their platform for the 21st Century.
jvandahm
· 1 year ago
I expect a McCain staffer or at least several RNC people read the Captain's blog, and perhaps one of them will make it this far down the comment section. If so, I hereby offer it as a freebie. Try it out in the general election, and if you like, come find me for more. The next ones won't be free though...I'm a Capitolist after all. :-)
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
OK, you've heard me many times say that Jonah Goldbergs book is merely "Mein Kampf" warmed over, to make the rhetorical trick laid out in "Mein Kampf" (Saving you from wimpy teachers, pacifists, atheists, trade unions, liberal press and people who "stab the troops in the back," while protecting the white blood of the fatherland from pollution by swarthy middle easterners) more acceptable.
Now DBD uses an actual swastika (OK let's not split hairs over it being part of a swastika).
I'm sure someone will say "Hey we're standing up the Free Speech here, your complaints about using Fascist symbolism just proves you're a liberal fascist." Because, you know, flying swastikas just proves you're a Real American.
And of course, you have the male characters making goo-goo eyes at the redhead. Clearly, the message here is that Nazis are SEXY. It's the classic advertising formula - if something makes you appealing to the opposite sex, people will run out and buy it. So that is selling Nazism to the DBD audience like it's a fast car.
Plus, this appeals to a certain demographic - the Nazi porn consumer, and the passive male that fantasizes about the dominatrix with the jack boots and riding crop.
That really hits the grand slam in terms of being pathetic at so many levels simultaneously.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
"OK, you've heard me many times say that Jonah Goldbergs book is merely "Mein Kampf" warmed over"
Have you read the book?
I'm reading it now. You have no earthly idea what it's about, do you?
What it does is trace the origins of fascism, from Mussolini and to Hitler. And he documents how many "progressives" such as Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, among others, were attracted to fascist ideas.
Mussolini was a committed socialist/atheist who was raised by a prominent socialist and who was admired by Lenin. Many progressives expressed great admiration for fascism during the 20's and the early 30's.
Goldberg makes the case that there is no single definition of fascism but that forms of it have been practiced in many countries and in ours, it's more a form of Americanized mommy fascism, if anything.
quickjustice
· 1 year ago
Amity Shlaes's book, "The Forgotten Man", persuasively makes the case that FDR's New Deal was largely borrowed from Mussolini's fascist Italy.
jerry
· 1 year ago
Francis Perkins, FDR's first Secretary of Labor, made the same point in a cabinet meeting in the mid 1930s.
sven10077
· 1 year ago
Bingo!
Nice catch Jerry.
I *almost* feel sorry for poor Buford he has been fed "Evil right-wingers nazis Chimpy!" for so long he cannot fathom that on several levels and by several members of FDR's own cabinet the New Deal was "soft fascism". The attacks on idustry were calculated to force the sublimation of fiduciary duty to sharerholders to some nebulous notion of "civic duty".
“Why should the Russians have all the fun of remaking a world?”-Stuart Chase(FDR booster in the press)
“The future is becoming visible in Russia.” Rexford Tugwell(aid to Henry Wallace)
'I don't mind telling you in confidence,' FDR remarked to a White House correspondent, 'that I am keeping in fairly close touch with that admirable Italian gentleman'" FDR
"It's the cleanest … most efficiently operating piece of social machinery I've ever seen. It makes me envious" Tugwell (this time on Italian Corporatism)
Stalin was a command controller, as was Hitler and Mussolini....fact is so was FDR, the New Deal and most lib programs suffer from a fatal flaw they need a perpetual state of emergency for the Federales to maintain their power.
Leftbats argue "Chimpy's war!" does that for the right but as God is my witness I have seen Donk exhortations of "a pending economic meltdown(when they lack power) for about the last 30 years.
sven10077
· 1 year ago
Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal. It was Mussolini's success in Italy, with his government-directed economy, that led the early New Dealers to say "But Mussolini keeps the trains running on time." Ronald Reagan in May 17, 1976 Time Magazine.
The New Deal is plainly an attempt to achieve a working socialism and avert a social collapse in America; it is extraordinarily parallel to the successive 'policies' and 'Plans' of the Russian experiment. Americans shirk the word 'socialism', but what else can one call it? H.G. Wells
Oh and particularly "charming" as regards Mrs. Bowsmile's wife's pablum for the sheeple....
Why need we trouble to socialize banks and factories? We socialize human beings. Adolf Hitler to Herman Rauschning.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
OK, I'll type real slowly.
People have been writing scholarly books about how fascism and communism become totalitarian for the last 50 years.
Hitler accused the left of planning to become fascists, claiming the Jews were going to exterminate the Aaryans. He did this to excuse his own program of fascism, including "preventative" war.
If you rip off the scholarly works to only complain about the left, you recreate Mein Kampf, with footnotes.
And I don't mind saying that in "Liberal fascism," Jonah Goldberg has rewritten "Mein Kampf." Over and over and over. It's already doing really well on Google!
jerry
· 1 year ago
Yes Burdord, communist scholars have been saying this since the 1930s when Stalin declared Nazism/Fascism to be rightwing counter-revolutionaries. Lenin didn’t think that Fascism was bad, just wrong. But who is the Lenin guy after all.
The origin of Fascism is found in the writings of the French radical syndicalism Georges Sorel. Oddly enough modern leftism is founded on the same principles. The entire post-modern anti-western multicultural establishment was transmitted through Paul De Man of Yale University during the 1960s and 1970s. De Man’s Nazi past was exposed in the early 1990s shortly after his death.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
You can play exactly the same game with any group, go backwards in time and claim that any individual's statements "prove" something about that group or a group with a similar name several generations later.
By that standard, I can prove that you are controlled by the Pope, or the ghost of John Lennin, or Loyd George, or the Girl Scouts of America.
Likewise, you could "prove" virtually anything based on my ancestry including a Union soldier, a Klansman, an America Indian, a cop, and a Mason.
jerry
· 1 year ago
What are you mumbling about? I am willing to bet that you never heard of Georges Sorel or Paul de Man until now. Do you know the intellectual relationship between Sorel and Mussolini? You are just a name caller trying to cover up your own ignorance.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Who's the other guy that pulls the same stunt - if you haven't read this book, you're just ignorant, so I go look up his list of "must read" books which aren't even in print.
jerry
· 1 year ago
Burford:
You confirm my characterization of your shallow intellect.
When you come to post here be advised that there are people who are much better read then you are.
Tell me are you a freshman as some Podunk college who barely knows when the Civil War happened? wro
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Thanks, nice to know that you haven't read Sorel either, and that you have an internet connection.
Now, I can back to my bookshelf and find out what other scholars say about Sorel and his impact, as well as what people say about whatever twaddle jonah is selling and that you are repeating.
Is there some point you're trying to make?
Nathan
· 1 year ago
Literary critics are essential to understand Nazism because....why exactly?
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
And of course, that's Goldberg's other trick, is to misquote his source material, and to put out those secondary or tertiary sources as definitive. And you know, there's not much wrong with that, if the interpretation of the original sources stands up. But don't go pretending you read Sorel.
Am I going to read Kirkegaard? I don't think so. I might read ABOUT him. But it would be from an author that Kirkegaard scholars weren't ridiculing as a complete idiot like they are with Goldberg. Experts in the field say that he omits about 75% of what is out there, and he makes a mess of the remaining 25%.
Have I read of George Sorel? Ummm No. He died in 1922. And neither have you, but Jonah probably misquoted him and now you're going to pretend you read him (in French no doubt) and this proves something.
Quit being such a poser.
jerry
· 1 year ago
Well there Burford, history didn't start when you were born probably sometime in the mid to late 1980s. Your feeble attempts at covering up your ignorance are duly noted. prob
jr565
· 1 year ago
Who are these experts? And if you aren't reading the source material how do you knwo that Goldberg is in fact wrong? You're so ignorant of the actual writings of people like Sorel, het completely certain that Goldberg is wrong about him, even though you haven't read him either.
NoDonkey
· 1 year ago
Exactly, if what Goldberg has written is false, it would be easily found out and his reputation destroyed.
That would have happened already, given how just the cover has driven the left crazy.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
>Exactly, if what Goldberg has written is false, >it would be easily found out and his >reputation destroyed.
That bus left the station a long time ago
jr565
· 1 year ago
Oh? other than the left saying Goldberg is an idiot, i don't hear much. Certainly not much in the way of substance. Then again, substance isn't something that left usually provides. Though brevity is the soul of wit, its hard to come up with profound statements on bubmer stickers.
jerry
· 1 year ago
We have an interloper (or is Burfrod using another login to Moby his tormentor) probably another college freshman. I got to read Sorel way back in my high school history class back there in the pre-historic 1960s. So I have read these guys and good deal of by and about Paul de Man. I suspect you never heard of him either since you left him out your attempted denigration of my knowledge which clearly superior to yours or Burford’s.
It is pretty clear that Burford never heard of Sorel or de Man prior to my citation. I doubt you did either.
jr565
· 1 year ago
sorry jerry, if you were referring to me as an interloper, my comment was directed as burbord. Not questioning your credentials, just pointing out what a ignoramus burford is. He hasn't read Sorel Or Goldberg, yet hes sure goldberg is wrong.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Oh yah? Have you read Baumgardner? I read him when I was like 5. In the original Bavarian! So there!
Now I want to read that book even more. Considering it ties the Left to the failed policies you describe, and Mein Kampf was and IS a Favorite of those 'swarthy middele easterners,' to use your racist words.
BurfordHolly
· 1 year ago
Dude, people have been covering that topic for the last 50 years. Get a library card.
Otter
· 1 year ago
I read constantly. Have you actually read Goldberg's book, or are you just monkeying someone else's bitter report on the book?
Barnestormer
· 1 year ago
Wow, that's some imagination. I trust you're keeping your inkblot collection off the Web and otherwise inaccessible to minors. Especially if they ARE minors.
Bishop
· 1 year ago
And I'm sure you spent just as much time excoriating those who have used the same imagery to portray just about everyone even remotely connected to the Bush administration.
You don't have to go far to find a swastika in full use by sensitive libs; I would suggest the current Code Pink demonstrations occurring in Berkeley for a full definition of "pathetic". You better head over there and get them to stop.
Brad Bettin
· 1 year ago
You're kidding, right?
Ever hear the one that ends "or open your mouth and remove all doubt"?
All Comments
All Obama does it talk about "Change" and "Hope" without really defining what he would do as a president. When she starts talking, she lets things slip out that clue you into what she really thinks of this country. When she made the remark about being proud of her country for the "first time', she let me know that she doesn't like this country the way it is. Then she starts talking about the government "demanding" that you "shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones." Demanding?? If you don't think there is something very wrong with that, you are probably a socialist, possibly even a facists. Remember, facists never admit to being facists. Many of them don't even know that they are, they just have no problem with running every littlle detail of your life because they know better than you what level of freedom you should have.
if a Republican tried to use this kind of rhetoric the press would slaughter him. The press is so biased. I was listening to some NPR report on the economy that made it sound like people have been reduced to eating their house pets. It is all so horrid out there. I can remember when Bill was in office and the unemployment rate was 5.3% {higher than now} and they were doing stories on how great it all was and impending labor shortages etc.
Now when the left get a little bad press or a cartoon that they feel is unfair they cry and whine and carry on like the brats they are.
For heaven's sake, the point of political cartooning is to illustrate ideas and make them accessible. Chris Muir is not the first to notice the parallels between Obama's cheering, fainting crowds and the German population that boosted Hitler to power. Chris is not the first to note that Michelle Obama's rhetoric is frighteningly totalitarian.
Chris Muir's art stirs up a firestorm because he is a brilliant mind matched to a brilliant talent. You want Chris Muir muzzled? You're going to have to go through me, first.
Again, I get the impression that Muir's spoof should be read and understood as spoken like Arte Johnson (of Laugh-In) whose anal, one-line character dressed in an SS uniform and smoking in underhand fashion would always repeat the mantra: "Veeeeery Interesting... but Schtupid."
For cartoons as well as e-mails it is difficult to convey intonation hence the usage of emoticons in emails to assure something was said tongue in cheek. I give Chris Muir the benefit of the doubt that his parody is purely intended in a Mel Brooks kind of way.
She's inserted herself into the campaign, and therefore is fair game. I would love to have her comment on this cartoon and explain what she really meant (as she's now doing with the "really" glitch video). All the backpedalling isn't going to work in the end -- we got the idea the first time.
But boy, did that second panel connect and send shivvers down my spine. I guess I'm too old.
More and more I sense Obama feeling that he will have not only the option but the right to go far beyond the mandates of POTUS were he to be elected.
It will be time to produce. For the first time ever.
How does that usually work out?
??????????
Then Barack should tell her to keep her mouth shut during campaign events.
Barack views her speaking abilities to be essential to his campaign, and she is the delegated person to go to black events, so the race card can plausibly be decoupled from Barack.
is this:
Who defines cyncism?
Who decides how to do away with divisions?
Who is in charge of grading us for 'doing better'?
Who is to say what a comfort zone is or how to come out of it?
I did not like the cartoon when I first read it, and I still think it is somewhat over the top.
But Michelle, to the extent that she represents what Barak wants, is creeping me out big time.
Maybe we should like the cartoon more?
Michelle Obama's statement really creeps me out too. What creeps me out about Muir's cartoon is that the boys seemed to think a hot chick in a Nazi uniform was sexy instead of repulsive.
Work - Hard Worker tax funded educations K-4 to Harvard, health care, retirement plan, forgiven mortgages, and a pony!
Demanding that I shed my cynicism -- am I supposed to be a happy, unthinking follower?
Demanding that I put down my division -- Isn't dissent the highest form of patriotism?
Demanding that I come out of my isolation -- do I have to take part in North Korean style celebrations?
Demanding that I push myself to be better -- are we to engage in communist style self-criticism?
Not allowing me to go back to my life as usual?
Nazism is just one form of totalitarian state control over every aspect of people's lives. If he truly wants to do what Michelle is saying, and having your spouse out on the campaign trail as your surrogate should be a sign of what you believe in, then this goes beyond just creepy and is downright fascist/totalitarian/communistic. There was much more to the Nazis than just gassing Jews, they did want to build a better society with everyone marching in lockstep.
I'm for once actually starting to think that Hillary would be a better (or at least, a less worse) president than Barrack.
The state would do everything for everyone and take care all of our needs and concerns.
Mussolini developed fascism as a strain of socialism.
The Nazis added the un-Italian antisemitism later on, but make no mistake, the core of National Socialism was, well socialism.
(and yes this is all hyperbole, I doubt Obama wants to institute a one party state. At least, I hope not)
Stalin trusted Hitler.
When his top General called to tell Josef that the Wehrmacht was hundreds of miles into Soviet Russia, Stalin remained silent - for four hours.
Isn't a president supposed to work for us?
What are we electing? A president for a nation of free people or the overseer for a plantation full of slaves?
Ask not what Obabma will do for his country - ask what Obama will force his countrymen do for him.
There's a bumper sticker for you.
Read that quote again. You want to talk about offensive? Telling me that as president Obama will make me act just as they want me to is despicable, tyrannical and un-American.
Muir has it exactly right. He isn't over-the-top he's right on target. She talks like a nazi - she should be protrayed as one.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-c-johnson/n...
Forget cynicism: she is making statements about Barak doing things that are a direct assault on the freedom of the individual as outlined in The Constitution, which is supposed to protect us from tin pot potential dictators who love government intervention in everything. Yup, fascism.
The "Audacity of Hope" does have an eerie "Triumph of The Will" ring to it. I'd use that analogy instead of Arbeit macht Frei (often placed above the gates to concentration camps) because both Obambi and Adolf got their start by feeding visions of destiny and an owed-something approach to their following. The mechanized killings and re-education en masse came a bit later though Goebbels and Riefenstahl were busy early in the game with newsreel visions of Adolf gliding through clouds over Berlin in his tri-motor as happy brownshirts below did their calisthenics and goose stepping to Wagner.
It is, of course, a short step from National Socialism to genocide and politische korrektheit as Third Reich, the Soviet Union, East Germany and Cambodia readily proved last century just as the foremost Liberal sacrament of abortion proves daily.
A little bit of a Freudian slip: I originally had written Obama's followers in the above in all sincerity. Perhaps I shouldn't have changed it.
Granted, with a hat tip to your gentlemanly instincts. However, the problem with using Obama's words directly is that he's more cagey than his spouse, and doesn't let his true stripes show. The virtue of Michelle Obama is that she's sincere; she speaks from the heart, and she means what she says. This is evident on her face, and in her voice; it's difficult to miss. So, when she says things like this that sound creepy, we need to pay attention: they sound creepy because they are creepy.
I'm pretty sure that politically, the Obamas are solidly liberal. But there's something to this messianic side; we're hearing genuine snippets, but we're not hearing the full message. Not that there's any danger that I'd vote for Obama anytime in this lifetime, but this guy is sounding more and more like what the worst anti-Mormon bigots painted Mitt Romney into -- a stealth messianic figure for some bizarre religion. It behooves us to find out precisely what this vision is, and right soon.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
And yes, it is creepy...
I love it when you guys try to get all intellectual and stuff. It's so cute.
Both sides are messed up and the nazi references really worry me because they could (repeat could) be what is coming. The German people thought they were voting in equality among the peoples of their nation. They thought they were voting in a new and brighter future. They thought things would be just peachy . They were not bad people just people who knew that things could be easier if they just became a single unit instead of individuals. OOooopppps!
Bush wanted to make people donate to churches deemed worthy of the government. If I remember correctly Hillary wanted to create a new youth community organization with power to rat neighbors out (brown shirts with a new color shirt).
**** wow that last post got messed up****
I'm not worried about offending any liberals/progressives/surrender monkeys, because they are getting back exactly what they give. You have to fight fire with fire.
There's a bit of in your face aimed to the left in this. An exhortation to do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
If you want your views taken seriously, then take our views seriously. Give reasoned critique, not knee-jerk name calling.
When you on the left do that, we will. But, until you do, here's a can of howduyalikeit.
SILENCE! I keel you!
I'd say donks just got kneed in the groin, a direct and cogent hit.
Republicans are knocked off base by blatant lies, much like the sewage currently spewing out of Bill Keller's office.
Unfair? Doesn't compute, Ed. As the candidate didn't say the words but the Mrs. did, it's she that deserves the targeting.
Unfair would be slamming her for something he said.
Obama and his zombies revival meetings *are* like a cross between a Southern preacher and the Nazis--of that there is no doubt.
The big difference between AH and BHO is that Obama has had absolutely no struggles [kampf] in his life--unless you count the times when he [by his own admission] didn't have enough money to buy cocaine and had to stick with plain ol' weed.
Pathetic.
People moaning about this cartoon can cram it with walnuts--where were they for the last 7 years when every other street protestor had a sign with Bush's face on it and a little mustache drawn onto it? Bush never made any statements this Naziesque, ever.
This has to be scariest thing I've heard any US politician ever say.
It's a cartoon, and, as pointed out, a LOT less over the top than standard Left fare for years and years.
Woe to those easily offended...
And I think this is apt; the ugly reality is that Mrs. Obama has proposed a level of central control that is reminiscent of fascist regimes. The proper application of Godwin's Law is that a comparison to Schicklgruber should be apt, not that it should not be made at all. This one is apt.
However, I think that an even apt comparison would be to the British Labour Party pols who extended the Control of Engagements Order beyond the end of WW2.
I reckon that most people have no idea that the British government in the late 40's could tell its subjects where and what they would be working at. I also reckon that this power is near the top of the wish list of every leftist in existence.
http://
people.csail.mit.edu/adonovan/dilbert/show.php?day=09&month=03&year=2002
I don't think for a second Muir was saying the Obamas are Nazis in disguise, with all the horrors that implies. However, it's indisputable that fascist and "progressive" ideologies share common roots. That, I believe, is the key to Muir's satire.
I don't think, however I would have drawn that middle panel, either, Ed. Remember the justified criticism of Ted Rall for his depiction of Condi Rice as "Aunt Jemima" or a "House Negro?" He showed bad judgment in his satire of Rice, and I think Chris did a bit here, too, in his criticism of Obama. I think the same point could have been made in another way. The difference is that Rall regularly does this, while Chris has done it only this once that I know of.
BTW, I'm a big fan of DBD. :)
--Anthony (Los Angeles)
>to me: We're all supposed to unite behind a leader and forget
>our differences, and arguing over those differences (or even
>advocating a different point of view) is somehow un-American.
You've been away the last 6 years?
The strip above is a commentary on public positions taken by a spokesperson for a campaign, I'm sorry, they are putting themselves out in the limelight, so have to expect to be criticized. Calling Laura a drug addict and the kid's as whores is not the same thing.
Tom Shipley may not like that, but then he does come from the mindset that everything is fair game when you are hurling insults at a conservative.
Fascism is defined as an authoritarian and nationalist, right-wing system of government and social organization. Characteristics include a belief in national, ethnic or racial supremacy, a contempt for democracy, an insistence on obedience to a powerful leader and a strong demagogic approach.
Communism is defined as a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned, and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.
Demagogue is defined as a political leader who seeks support by appealing to popular desires and prejudices rather than by rational argument.
Obama, it seems has the worst of all worlds.
Your definition of Fascism reflects the Stalinist revision of the term after the election of Hitler to Chancellor in 1933. The Nazis claimed to have a superior worldview to Marxism and Stalin had to discredit it as a rival revolutionary ideology. Prior to this Fascism was considered a nationalistic leftwing socialistic ideology. Mussolini and Lenin were correspondents. Lenin always considered Mussolini a fellow social revolutionary.
I'm just thankful I still live in a country where this can still be printed and discussed without the cartoonist having to go running for his life like in Europe.
Further, I note more and more these days on TV that comical or irrelevant depictions of Jesus as a character are used. That's fine. But I know they will not ever, no way, produce such shows using Mohammed. They're scared to. And that is very concerning.
One day here in America cartoonists may be running for their lives as well. That day is not today, so the more power to Chris Muir.
"Jesus will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Jesus will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed."
The politician as savior is a dangerous idea.
The scary question still remains...HOW will you require us civilians to do this Mr. Obama?
Either way the cartoon is distasteful in that it compairs a candidates wife to a Nazi AND suggests that women in Nazi uniforms could be considered something other than offensive. Additionally, the cartoon is brilliant in a way that could lead to useful discussions about ideologies, socialism, facism, political aspiration, and the importance of words and their consequences. After all, when Michelle speaks on behalf of her husband, are they "Just Words?"?
Any cartoonist dealing in political satire should be proud when their work crosses over from being just funny to something that sparks heated discussion. At least I think so, but maybe I'm too cynical.
I for one hear a politician speak words like Obama's, which are to me frankly frighteningly self-important and Messianic; and Michelle Obama's words, which are to me frighteningly Leftist and Socialist, and think it's utterly ridiculous to then compare her to a Nazi. When she or her husband finally begin to define some actual policies beyond generalities, I'll decide which scary historical figures fit a justifiable comparision.
In my personal opionion, the True Believers on either side of the political spectrum have the potential to espouse the facism and authoritarianism that best serves their ideology, and the rest of us should be constantly aware of this potential.
The difference however is, that the said Che, or Mao, or Lenin T-shirt on a street is usually worn by a parrot, and when I see it on a wall of an election office, - now it is not a parrot anymore.
So yes, I feel the same way. Distasteful to mean does not mean censured for everyone.
I hunted down some little punk wearing a Rage Against the Machine's "Evil Empire" t-shirt (American Flag below evil empire).
He was "like dude, it's just a band".
Maybe they think Che's the lead singer of Santana or something.
Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.
Paxton then proceeds to isolate a series of “mobilizing passions” which may be used to identify a political movement as “fascist.” His list is one of the great treasures of the current scholarship on fascism:
a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of any traditional solutions;
the primacy of the group, toward which one has duties superior to every right, whether individual or universal, and the subordination of the individual to it;
the belief that one’s group is a victim, a sentiment that justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against its enemies, both internal and external;
dread of the group’s decline under the corrosive effects of individualistic liberalism, class conflict, and alien influences;
the need for closer integration of a purer community, by consent if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary;
the need for authority by natural chiefs (always male), culminating in a national chieftain who alone is capable of incarnating the group’s historical destiny;
the superiority of the leader’s instincts over abstract and universal reason;
the beauty of violence and the efficacy of will, when they are devoted to the group’s success;
the right of the chosen people to dominate others without restraint from any kind of human or divine law, right being decided by the sole criterion of the group’s prowess within a Darwinian struggle.
There is no “fascist” movement in the United States today. Neither are there significant “fascist” political candidates. On the other hand, a wealth of fascist ideas have crept into and influence the nation’s political dialogue. These ideas should not be suppressed or excluded for it would be impossible to do so and maintain the integrity of our democracy. But it is vitally important for the population to understand the historical attachment and roots of these ideas.
Here is the link to Scott's article for those that are interested in the whole thing:
http://harpers.org/archive/2008/02/hbc-90002426
Thanks, Chris and Ed
"Here I sit, broken hearted.........."
I had all kind of pithy remarks and observations ready but after reading all the postings I truly am broken hearted. So much intelligence and so much caca.
That's the enjoyable thing about blogs...we can post with impunity and invisibility. After all, where are you? And you don't know where I am. You can only presume to know me by what I choose to post whether that is my true belief or not. It may be only to "stir the pot".
And there is no pot more easily stirred than that one between liberals and conservatives. In all my years (64), I've never made a true convert. Birds of a feather and all that.
Keep up the good writings and I will continue to enjoy.
I want to congratulate Chris Muir for producing a three panel cartoon that was able to create this much thought and discussion. Regardless if you agree or disagree with any perceived point, he made you think; and did so with very few words. I consider that brilliant.
We are all free to accept, reject or argue with any point we think Chris was trying to make. Those who even hint at wanting Muir censored for any reason, to any degree, are far more scary than the cartoon, its content or even a perceived Nazi Obama.
Again, IT'S-A-CARTOON!
Conservatives are supposed to take the long view, folks. We're supposed to remember what happened yesterday, and even take a few lessons from history so that we have something to conserve.
Or try searching "Hitlery" in the comments on this very site.
If there was anyone who still wasn't sure that that the right has utterly jumped the shark, this cartoon removes all doubt.
Coming from the folks who want to give the president the power to listen to our phone calls, look at our e mails, imprison Americans indefinitely without charges or a lawyer, and torture our prisoners I am at a loss for words.
How about it folks. Do you want Senator Obama to have all of these powers?
You had better think long and hard and do something about it now as he is going to kick Senator McCain's ass in the general election.
By the way, be careful posting this anti-Bush stuff online. He's in Africa right now, watching you, and when he gets back he might come a-knockin.
1) They always have had that power WITH JUDICIAL OVERSIGHT
You know, three co equal branches of government, checks and balances
So if you travel to Europe and phone your wife at home you believe your call should be monitored by the government.
First time I have heard this term. Please enlighten me.
Does this include American citizens?
This is exactly why we have judicial oversight.
I very much hope you understand this. And also please understand judicial oversight is exactly what George Bush feels is no longer necessary.
Judicial oversight is what gave us Kelo vs. City of New London and up-ended private property rights. How quickly Constitutional rights can be dissolved or weakened by the slam of a pernicious socialist gavel.
Take Mrs. Obambi's practically alluding that whatever is not voluntary shall be mandatory. Big sista accidentally leaks big brutha's big pictcha. That kind of spousal power trip 'tude could make Janet's famous Waco barbecue look like a day at the beach. Obambi dare not make Michelle sad lest his smile not glimmer so brightly while he's out tempting the dupes. Then there would have to be a co-presidential trade to patch things up. Much like Bubba traded Hillarycare and Travel Office to the keeper of his 'nads so he could keep boinking the employees. My how the Democrats change.
I agree the republican majority of the Supreme Court made a poor decision. So let's just pitch the constitution then. Is that what you're saying?
And there is a procedure in place to remedy such decisions.
The rest of your post is nonsense.
A couple of distant relatives in the German resistance got knocked off by "procedure" being conveniently executed by Hitler's hanging judge. It was all in accordance with legal "remedy" of a sort. jharp implies any ruling is a remedy therefore it must be okay. Too late to tell them I suppose.
The Kelo decision is what "pitched" the Constitution. Eminent domain was applied to purely political seizure of property for redistribution for private development not for public works such as bridges etc. as is its purpose. If the danger in that eludes poor jharp then he's beyond help.
It's little different than Slick and Hill seizing the Sierra Club tree house right in the middle of jharp's "Save the Squirrels" lecture then knocking it down to develop Whitewater and Castle Grande. Sorry there jharp maybe you shouldn't have blindly trusted "procedure."
Kelo:
Majority Opinion
John Paul Stevens
Anthony Kennedy
David Souter
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Stephen Breyer
Dissenting
Sandra Day O'Connor
William Rehnquist
Antonin Scalia
Clarence Thomas
I am often left pondering what alternate universe you inhabit that has:
a) supreme court justices broken down by "party" as much as you and Chuckles Schumer may try to turn SCotUS into another round of partisan beach blanket bingo it is not and should not be-the divisions are along the lines of liberal/conservative and "interprative"/strict constructionist
b) where this planet that the "ayes" in Kelo inhabit where they are in fact Conservative Icons and Scalia is some sort of raging moonbat
You have a recurring theme of simply regurgitating DNC talking points and/or trying to obfuscate the political reality involved.
Everyone knows that Kennedy is a "maverick" ie media loving closeted moonbat.
again, thanks for playing
What the Left does is the Left's business, and since the Left is completely bereft of class we should not be using them as any kind of standard. To compare a candidate's wife to Goebbels is beyond the pale.
I've pointed out Muir's lack of class before. The strip is worthless and the site would be better off without it.
Bush to NAACP
Does the above cartoon follow the edict of Herr Bush?
<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2... - 'We must work as one,' Bush says in 1st NAACP address
Your point is?
The truth is , you got nothin' except half-baked turds slung up against the wall hoping something will stick. With that cartoon and other postings Ed is rapidly crawling into the same hole with DU and other fringe left groups. But you'll have gotten even, right.
On the upside Herr Bush did set a record today
American Research Group
You take the twisted version from Hewitt and Ed and run amok. This fascist play on social programs is a sick angle of attack that will finish what credibility the conservative right wing has currently. So I say have at it.
Bush approval 19%
Barack's "welfare reform" would have people get MORE aid from the government and do "mandatory community service"; traditional welfare reform has people get LESS aid from the government and get jobs. Slight difference there.
Twisted version? Is that not what she actually says? Hewitt's link is to an audio recording, not a "twisted version".
Your statement about middle class being squeezed from such a program is more non-sense. The middle class has taken a beating Bush policies for 7 years now and they know it, which is a big reason they dislike him.
Obviously you don't know much about the concientious objector program that was begun in WW 2 and is in place today. There were no gulag like forced labor camps as more than half were given non-combat jobs in the military and the rest helped with the war effort in other ways. They were (are) religious people ie Quakers, Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses etc...
Conscientious Objectors During World War II
And your mixing college financial aid with traditional welfare programs. Show me where Obama's plan calls for more "welfare" and less jobs. What a silly statement.
The "twisted version" is one with out of context quotes attempting
to portray as some authoritarian (fascistic) figure proposing forced labor.
The cartoon is waaay over the line.
Michelle Obama may be many things, but implying that she is a nazi is despicable.
As for the argument that the left does it, too ("Try googling "Bushitler" to see the point of Muir's satire here today."), I say that we ought not to use the disgusting behavior of the left to justify bad behavior on our side.
Muir ought to be ashamed of himself.
President Kennedy told us (well, others: I wasn't alive when he was in office) to ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what you can do for your country. Most Americans were inspired. When the Rev. Dr. King talked about his dream, he was talking about unity. Most Americans were inspired.
My point is that "collectivist" rhetoric can be used by both sides, for good and for evil. If I say that I'm proud to be an American, if I love my country and think it's the best in the world, if I admire the men and women in uniform who defend our country... Does that make me a fascist because they, too, emphasized hyper-patriotism and militarism? Of course not. Nor does Michelle Obama's talk about her husband "requiring us to work" or "demanding that we shed our divisions and cynicism" make her a nazi, or anything close to it.
Satire is one thing. Muir's cartoon today is something else: offensive and ugly.
Satire is often offensive or ugly...agreeable and cute satire generally sucks.
I would also say that the nazi comparison is so overused that Muir's use of it smacks of laziness. Could he have made his point - perhaps even made it more sharply - without drawing "Sam" as a brownshirt?
Again, I think about how often the left uses the term "nazi" to smear anybody they don't agree with. It's disgusting, and I would much prefer that our side didn't fall into that vice.
Except that no one would have understood the reference.
Folks understand the meaning of the brownshirt.
Is there some commandment that the right shall not giveth the left a taste of their own medicine? If the shoe fits...in this case, the rhettoric of the government forcing people to "change" not just their actions but their beliefs (!) then why not compare them with the bogey man they're ALWAYS accusing our side of "secretly" being?
I also believe that two wrongs don't make a right. Even more, I think that (generally) getting down in the gutter with your opponent isn't a good idea. "He does it, too!" is not a good excuse for bad behavior. Think about it: do you really, really want to behave like lefty scum such as Michael Moore, the Code Pink idiots, or some of our resident lefties?
Check out the comments down thread that just because someone is a racist that wears swastikas and celebrates Hitler's birthday, that does NOT make them a "Fascist."
You see? They are free to wallow in every aspect of Fascism and even play Nazi dress-up but they AREN'T Fascists. It's the old everybody-is-crazy-but-me strategy.
Homophobia is what made the GOP a magnet for closeted gays. In the same way "Liberal fascism" is a huge neon sign saying "Neo-Nazis Welcome! Free HBO! Continental Breakfast!"
You notice, I'm not calling Jonah a Fascist either. I'm calling him a shameless user of Fascist rhetorical techniques and themes as they were laid out by Hitler in Mein Kampf. Mein Kampf is a handbook for political propaganda, which Jonah is recycling. And in this campaign, which is showing explosive racism, Jonah's rhetoric will get mixed with racism. By real Fascists. Well not according to you, but according to the people that will be ridiculing them, yes.
Isn't it a little uncomfortable defending Nazis? It's going to be a full time job.
It's incredibly bad timing for the GOP that Obama will likely get the nomination just as they were getting serious with the Mein Kampf program.
This rhetorical argument you use, it makes no sense to me. "Well, if you make this argument, then bad people become less bad and good people are cast in a bad light! Oh no!" It's a poor variant on proof by contradiction that doesn't actually prove anything.
Is it the satire that is offensive and ugly, or does the satire mirror something which is offensive and ugly once you remove the chrome and window dressing?
To equate a statement -- by a candidate's spouse -- to the effect that her husband will call on people to work, become involved, become better educated, to commit, to shed apathy, with fascism is so staggeringly dishonest that it casts doubt on the integrity of this blog. A blog I check three or four times a day and that, until now, I have respected.
This isn't a close call. Shame on Ed Morrissey. Shame on the commenters who have twisted logic to equate a woman who espouses liberal views with people who arranged the mass-slaughter of entire races.
This is disgusting. Shameful. Contemptible. And I suspect Mr. Morrissey knows it, but rather than admit an error, rather than admit that the cartoon is inexcusable, he is choosing loyalty over truth and hiding behind a bland call to let commenters hash it out.
Ed, you are, in effect, a publisher here. You are a small-scale New York Times. If you won't step up and take responsibility, loyalty be damned, you have no further standing to criticize media which, for all their many travesties, have not yet sunk to this level.
Have you protested like this every time for the past seven years when Bush has been compared to Hitler? Or when Republicans have been called Nazis?
Do you deny the parallels between what Michelle Obama said and some of Hitler's statements?
There are no parallels between M. Obama and Hitler. It takes a sick, twisted mind to invent them, not to mention a mind empty of historical knowledge.
Of course, you are ignoring the question about whether you protest like that every time Bush and/or a REpublican is compared to Hitler and to the Nazis. You must spend all day at the Huffington Post and Daily Kos doing that; how do you find the time to log on here?
It's just like every Thanksgiving, Uncle Bob is going to get dead drunk, pick a fight with his sister, and wander into the bedroom before puking on everyone's coats, passing out on the floor and pissing his pants.
It would be a lot more considerate if he'd do this any other day of the year, but no it has to be Thanksgiving. Likewise, this is simply what the GOP does during elections, that and crying that they are being disrespected if anyone objects.
Mr. Reynolds, there is a telling generalization in your complaint. First you complain that Michelle's statements are being equated with fascism. Then you complain that Michelle and Barack are being aligned with the Nazis. I give your second complain merit, for sure, but not the first, since Michelle's statements that Barack will "require" (NOT call for, but require) work, involvement, education etc (presumably at the government's discretion, as that's the only way to make that sort of requirement) DO equate with fascist ideology (or at least the socialist "government will take care of everything and require all you can give" way of thinking). As I see it, the step you complain about is the jump from fascist ideology to mass murder on Hitler's scale, and I agree wholeheartedly there.
>work, involvement, education etc (presumably at the government's
>discretion, as that's the only way to make that sort of requirement) DO
>equate with fascist ideology
And you could say the exactly same things about the Boy Scouts.
As I've said, Goldberg embraced all the rhetorical themes of Mein Kampf. He's left out the explicit racism, although the Arabs substitute very nicely for the Jews. But Obama's primary wins have provided the spark to unleash a flood of racism, and some of DBD's fans on this site are practically having orgasms at the sight of a swastika.
>What is your position on the Danish cartoonists....I'm curious?
What is your position on Robert Mapplethorpe's "Piss Christ?" Do you "get it" now?
My position on Piss Christ is Maplethorpe had every right to do it and display it, and that tax dollars shouldn't be used to finance or promote it. And I have every right to call Maplethorpe a Post-modern fraud who gained fame using the lazy "contraversy is art" lie.
I have a Bachelor's Degree in pre-Architecture, with a double major in Art History and Engineering, and a Master's in Architecture during which I had the honor of 6 more Master's level art history courses. I don't believe in censure, whethor or not I strongly agree with the message or not.
As for michaelreynolds, or you, asking to take it down...as I stated Ed didn't defend the cartoon, said he wouldn't have done it, but also wouldn't take it down to censure it. So what are you or michaelreynolds complaining about?
Thank you kindly for saying to so well.
I visit often as I thought it was of the more same right wing blogs. I have since changed my mind.
It really befuddles my mind to read such nonsense.
I can only guess that desperate people say desperate things.
Remember that the complete name of the Nazi party was the “National Socialist Worker’s Party of Germany”. Here is a portion of the Nazi party platform:
“We ask that the government undertake the obligation above all of providing citizens with adequate opportunity for employment and earning a living.”
“The activities of the individual must not be allowed to clash with the interests of the community, but must take place within its confines and be for the good of all. Therefore, we demand: ... an end to the power of the financial interests.”
“We demand profit sharing in big business.”
“We demand a broad extension of care for the aged.”
“In order to make possible to every capable and industrious [citizen] the attainment of higher education and thus the achievement of a post of leadership, the government must provide an all-around enlargement of our entire system of public education .... “
“We demand the education at government expense of gifted children of poor parents.”
“The government must undertake the improvement of public health—by protecting mother and child, by prohibiting child labor.... by the greatest possible support for all clubs concerned with the physical education of youth.”
“[We] combat the... materialistic spirit within and without us, and are convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only proceed from within on the foundation of The Common Good Before the Individual Good.”
Modern liberalism advocates all of this.
No, Obama doesn’t plan to single out one group for mass extermination the way Hitler did the Jews. But he does have to have a scapegoat – as well as a means of financing his programs. Thus, he plans to further demonize, regulate, punish and tax both the most successful of American businesses as well as the most successful individuals, the high income taxpayers.
No, Obama doesn’t plan to launch a war against neighboring countries. But this apparent pacifism is only a superficial difference versus the militancy of the Nazis. Obama doesn’t have to launch a war against other countries – he has the world’s largest economy to loot to pay for his socialistic schemes. So Obama’s war will be an internal war – a war against America’s most productive individuals.
>the individual’s rights to his property and, if necessary, his freedom
You can say the same thing about 5th grade math class - you are denied your cell phone and made to sit in rows and so on and so on and so on
And, from a policy standpoint, Hitler was a socialist, just as FDR was and Barack is now. Hitler's ideas of wealth redistribution were ethnically oriented, as both Barack's church values and Michelle's comments indicate their thoughts lie. The point in common is that Hitler wanted wealth redistribution and upliftment of the poor by the state. The history of Volkwagen's nationalization by the German Government is instructive.
Maybe I should go pick up Goldbergs book now, Im starting to get spooked by the left more & more
That's so much better.
The Dems are not helping take care of "Americans who have nothing." They are forcing me to do so on pain of imprisonment.
The left prior to WW2 proudly proclaimed that they were fascists. It is a testament to their (your) deeply superficial level of thought and morality that Germany's experiment caused them (you) only to abandon the name and not the ideas.
And I disagree about the badness of socialism. Socialism is stealing. You can see that wherever it holds sway. I think I have the right to keep or give whatever my hands produce, while the socialist would take from me regardless of my wishes.
As Barack said, Michelle and I have to live in the world and pay taxes and pay for our kids and save for retirement". Well, I do too, and I'd like to keep as much of my earnings as possible to enable the same dream that Barack has (although, at over $950,000 per year, he and Michelle are far better off than I am). That's why he won't be getting my vote.
And socialism -- the subjugation of the individual to the state -- is thoroughly evil.
And placing doctors under control of the government makes it possible to turn them into killers by government-imposed rationing, if not by gas chamber.
And Burford, you're mixing apples and oranges. FDR's New Deal was fascist in its economic origins, and it failed. In fighting Nazi Germany and fascist Japan, FDR united the country, and brought Republicans into his Administration for the war effort.
Goldbergs book is essentially a big valentines card and pizza sized heart shaped box of chocolates to those guys.
Which group do I fear the most? Answer: The Democrats.
Unabomber
>groups are fascist in ideology.
http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/8817.html
We have a winner! That remark has earned you ridicule across the Tubes. Take a bow!
That really is breathtaking.
Just because an angry teen idiot slaps on a swastika and says "I'm a fascist" doesn't make him one. There are valid intellectual criteria at stake.
None of us have ever slapped on swastikas, so my comparison can only be by inference; but I understand kids with swastikas are more apt to beat people up and burn things. So, no, I don't think it's like being born again.
How civil of you to think otherwise, though. Liberals never fail to impress me with their kindness and intellectual honesty.
False pride is the keystone of addiction.
Desperate false pride is also the source of racism.
Anyway, getting back to the point: violent white supremacist groups who wear swastikas are NOT necessarily fascist. For example, they may be anti-Semites without any particular political philosophy who worship Hitler for killing Jews and want to emulate him. In other words, you're going to have to provide more detail if you want to convince me that those are actually fascist groups and not just anti-Semites who identify with a fascist.
Deep enough that it's one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
"Pride goeth before the fall."
If you've never given it any thought. maybe you should.
In digging a new pothole (pride), you managed to come full circle and fill the original.
Of course, reading the guy's book or paying attention to what he actually says helps when engaging in criticism.
Cynicism has become the New Laziness for my generation. Letterman and Colbert are particularly virulent carriers of the disease. There's been a long-standing thread in Generation X that the world is wrong and awful, but all you have to do is recognize it, shrug, and smirk.
If Michelle Obama's trying to force young people out of that rut into action, power to her.
Also, it looks like Chris Muir's managed to mangle the quote. "Uninformed", not "uniformed". Much less Brownshirtish in its actual context...
Son, you're trying very, very hard to make this seem innocent, but it is not innocent, and we're not going stop examining this until we find out what's underneath it. Nor should we.
And for what it's worth, I'm not only not of your generation, I'm neither cynical nor lazy. Speak for yourself.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
First misinterpret, then hyperventilate. Yeah, that'll be a winning strategy.
Like it or not, Barack Obama has a lot more in common with Reagan than John McCain... unlike McCain (and like Reagan), he's very charismatic.
Face it. Odds favor him being the next President. Deal.
Moving on to your most recent comment - your suggestion that Philwynk shouldn't be commenting because he's of the wrong generation is ridiculous. Even if Michelle was talking to people your age, the policy Barack implements to effect the changes Michelle was talking about will affect everyone, not just generation X.
Regarding charisma, it's merely one virtue a politician has, that being the ability to get people to listen to and agree with what he's saying, thus making it more likely that he can be effective as President. However, effectiveness is detrimental if the programs the politician is pushing with his charisma are detrimental. Charisma is only an amplifying factor, making a good politician better, and a bad politician worse - though both will sway crowds. Thus charisma is useless in judging a politician.
On the odds, if Michelle or Barack make more statements like these, his odds will lengthen rapidly once people take notice. Of course, this being politics, it's more likely that something from his time in the Chicago legislature will surface to drag him down than that people will actually start listening and realizing that Obama's program is gilded socialism.
Second, I'll grant you that IF her audience was college kids (not everybody at UCLA is a kid) then addressing the cynicism of that generation is appropriate -- but not the way she did it. "BARACK will make you work?" "BARACK won't let you be lazy?" Get real. Maybe addressing cynicism is age-appropriate, but that's BORG crap. "You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile." Scary shit.
You're still reaching, and you need to give it up.
"Barack has more in common with Reagan." If by that you mean he's charismatic and has a message that people like to follow, Bill Clinton also had those characteristics, and so did Adolph Hitler. The difference between Reagan, on the one hand, and those other two, is that Reagan, at the core of his being, was morally good. The difference between Clinton and Hitler was that Clinton was, at the core of his being, nothing but an appetite, so his effect was banal, while Hitler was raw, hateful madness, and it destroyed Europe.
All three, taken together, illustrate that the ability to move crowds is not to be mistaken for decency, and produces an effect according to the hidden characteristics of the soul doing the leading. We do not know what Obama is made of on the inside. Michelle O seems to be giving us little hints, and they're not good. That's why we need to dig deeper and find out what's there.
Yeah, Obama has an advantage, and may win, but if he does, it'll be because there are so many Americans who don't know the difference between a rhetorical wizard and a decent man. Trust me when I tell you, one does not imply the other.
(Unrelated to this topic, please visit my political blog, "Plumb Bob Blog: Squaring the Culture," at http://www.plumbbobblog.com. Thanks.)
..in which case, why are you parroting the whole "Obama is a cult" meme/Liberals are Nazis meme? I mean, come on, folks. This was pegged as the next line of attack on Obama just days after the Paul Krugman hit job. Y'all's script is showing.
Similarly, pigs are animals; frogs are animals.
You are the one who writes that Liberals are Nazis. Do you also claim that pigs are frogs?
http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/printedition...
Look. I like McCain. Unlike most of the dittoheads who claim to be conservatives, he makes up his own mind. I'm looking forward to hearing him and Obama debate.
But honestly, calling Obama Jim Jones and Adolf Hitler? *That's* your idea of debate? Come on, grow up. If you want to talk about issues, fine, but calling a candidate "creepy" because people believe in his message? Who's deserving of pity here?
Please.
This is like saying "Isaac Newton was the first to codify calculus, therefor Isaac Newton created the relationship between the slope of the line and the area under the line."
No, Media Matters didn't create the creepy feeling of the Obama campaign. Yes, they benefit from pointing it out. If you actually believe any of us here give a rat's whisker what Media Matters thinks, you need to stop taking whatever it is you're taking.
As to what sort of "debate" we have in mind, if you find it perfectly reasonable that grown adults are listening to a nice-looking man saying "change" and "hope" and "together, " and responding, teary-eyed, "this isn't running for President, this is going to change the world," then frankly, I'm not interested in debating you. But whether you like it or not, I'm going to find out what the guy is made of.
It's not just that people are following, it's that THERE IS NO MESSAGE. I've written about this elsewhere. Obama does not have a unique message. His message is wholehearted progressivism, with "let's work together" pasted on. His approach to unifying is unrealistic. The message is succeeding at this moment because we've all just faced 8 very unsettling years, during which time the common denominator of every jolt we've received is "things are not as stable as they appear on the surface." This is a petrie dish for demagoguery, and sure enough, now there's a demagogue growing on the agur.
This is PRECISELY what happened to Germany in the early 1930s. That doesn't make Obama Hitler, unless he's mad. But it does mean we're at a point where we can fall for just about anything, and the fact that he's charismatic says exactly NOTHING about what it is we're falling for.
You want to swallow what's in the dish? Go for it. But I'm going to find out what's there first, and I'm going to broadcast what I find.
The cartoon isn't very funny to me. :shrug: It isn't offensive, either.
Or was it Hitler that asked "Ask not what your country can do for you..."
"Require", "Demand", "Push", "will never allow you" I don't like:
Call me old fashioned...
It is now the moment when by common consent we pause to become conscious of our national life and to rejoice in it, to recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for our country in return. ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Memorial Day speech in Keene, New Hampshire (30 May 1884)
As has often been said, the youth who loves his Alma Mater will always ask, not "What can she do for me?" but "What can I do for her?" ~ Lee Baron Russel Briggs, in "College Life", Routine and Ideals (1904)
In the great fulfillment we must have a citizenship less concerned about what the government can do for it, and more anxious about what it can do for the nation. ~ Warren G. Harding Speech at the Republican National Convention, Chicago, Illinois (7 June, 1916)
There is a HUGE difference between charitably giving of yourself to others (by the way, America leads the world in that by a large margin) and a third party forcing you to give to another. It's "ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what you can do for your country." It's NOT "your country will not ask what it can do for you, but rather demand of you everything you can do for your country."
Sounds kind of familiar to me.
>which was to create a national crisis
Too bad he didn't think of the threat level color code so he could declare an "orange" threat level whenever he needed a bump.
How un-0bamian of him, huh?
I really won't be surprised if people start calling him the anti-Christ by November if he gets the nomination.
It's all about scare tactics.
Remember, we are Americans. We are afraid of nothing.
Except you when you the nurse forgets your morning dose of psychotropic medication.
Would you care to explain what Mrs. Obama meant by these remarks? I'd really like to know how to view them as anything but a scary demand that we all think alike according to Barack's dictates.
That's the cynicism she's talking about. And let me tell you, it's really annoying.
You should copyright that and send it to McCain/RNC as their platform for the 21st Century.
Now DBD uses an actual swastika (OK let's not split hairs over it being part of a swastika).
I'm sure someone will say "Hey we're standing up the Free Speech here, your complaints about using Fascist symbolism just proves you're a liberal fascist." Because, you know, flying swastikas just proves you're a Real American.
And of course, you have the male characters making goo-goo eyes at the redhead. Clearly, the message here is that Nazis are SEXY. It's the classic advertising formula - if something makes you appealing to the opposite sex, people will run out and buy it. So that is selling Nazism to the DBD audience like it's a fast car.
Plus, this appeals to a certain demographic - the Nazi porn consumer, and the passive male that fantasizes about the dominatrix with the jack boots and riding crop.
That really hits the grand slam in terms of being pathetic at so many levels simultaneously.
Have you read the book?
I'm reading it now. You have no earthly idea what it's about, do you?
What it does is trace the origins of fascism, from Mussolini and to Hitler. And he documents how many "progressives" such as Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, among others, were attracted to fascist ideas.
Mussolini was a committed socialist/atheist who was raised by a prominent socialist and who was admired by Lenin. Many progressives expressed great admiration for fascism during the 20's and the early 30's.
Goldberg makes the case that there is no single definition of fascism but that forms of it have been practiced in many countries and in ours, it's more a form of Americanized mommy fascism, if anything.
Nice catch Jerry.
I *almost* feel sorry for poor Buford he has been fed "Evil right-wingers nazis Chimpy!" for so long he cannot fathom that on several levels and by several members of FDR's own cabinet the New Deal was "soft fascism". The attacks on idustry were calculated to force the sublimation of fiduciary duty to sharerholders to some nebulous notion of "civic duty".
“Why should the Russians have all the fun of remaking a world?”-Stuart Chase(FDR booster in the press)
“The future is becoming visible in Russia.” Rexford Tugwell(aid to Henry Wallace)
'I don't mind telling you in confidence,' FDR remarked to a White House correspondent, 'that I am keeping in fairly close touch with that admirable Italian gentleman'" FDR
"It's the cleanest … most efficiently operating piece of social machinery I've ever seen. It makes me envious" Tugwell (this time on Italian Corporatism)
Stalin was a command controller, as was Hitler and Mussolini....fact is so was FDR, the New Deal and most lib programs suffer from a fatal flaw they need a perpetual state of emergency for the Federales to maintain their power.
Leftbats argue "Chimpy's war!" does that for the right but as God is my witness I have seen Donk exhortations of "a pending economic meltdown(when they lack power) for about the last 30 years.
Ronald Reagan in May 17, 1976 Time Magazine.
The New Deal is plainly an attempt to achieve a working socialism and avert a social collapse in America; it is extraordinarily parallel to the successive 'policies' and 'Plans' of the Russian experiment. Americans shirk the word 'socialism', but what else can one call it?
H.G. Wells
Oh and particularly "charming" as regards Mrs. Bowsmile's wife's pablum for the sheeple....
Why need we trouble to socialize banks and factories? We socialize human beings.
Adolf Hitler to Herman Rauschning.
People have been writing scholarly books about how fascism and communism become totalitarian for the last 50 years.
Hitler accused the left of planning to become fascists, claiming the Jews were going to exterminate the Aaryans. He did this to excuse his own program of fascism, including "preventative" war.
If you rip off the scholarly works to only complain about the left, you recreate Mein Kampf, with footnotes.
And I don't mind saying that in "Liberal fascism," Jonah Goldberg has rewritten "Mein Kampf." Over and over and over. It's already doing really well on Google!
The origin of Fascism is found in the writings of the French radical syndicalism Georges Sorel. Oddly enough modern leftism is founded on the same principles. The entire post-modern anti-western multicultural establishment was transmitted through Paul De Man of Yale University during the 1960s and 1970s. De Man’s Nazi past was exposed in the early 1990s shortly after his death.
By that standard, I can prove that you are controlled by the Pope, or the ghost of John Lennin, or Loyd George, or the Girl Scouts of America.
Likewise, you could "prove" virtually anything based on my ancestry including a Union soldier, a Klansman, an America Indian, a cop, and a Mason.
You confirm my characterization of your shallow intellect.
Sorel dates from around 1900. Here is his Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Sorel
You may find some his works here: http://books.google.com/books?as_auth=Georges+S...
Here is Paul De Man’s Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_de_Man
And here are some of books about him and by him: http://books.google.com/books?ct=title&q=paul+d...
When you come to post here be advised that there are people who are much better read then you are.
Tell me are you a freshman as some Podunk college who barely knows when the Civil War happened?
wro
Now, I can back to my bookshelf and find out what other scholars say about Sorel and his impact, as well as what people say about whatever twaddle jonah is selling and that you are repeating.
Is there some point you're trying to make?
Am I going to read Kirkegaard? I don't think so. I might read ABOUT him. But it would be from an author that Kirkegaard scholars weren't ridiculing as a complete idiot like they are with Goldberg. Experts in the field say that he omits about 75% of what is out there, and he makes a mess of the remaining 25%.
Have I read of George Sorel? Ummm No. He died in 1922. And neither have you, but Jonah probably misquoted him and now you're going to pretend you read him (in French no doubt) and this proves something.
Quit being such a poser.
You're so ignorant of the actual writings of people like Sorel, het completely certain that Goldberg is wrong about him, even though you haven't read him either.
That would have happened already, given how just the cover has driven the left crazy.
>it would be easily found out and his
>reputation destroyed.
That bus left the station a long time ago
Though brevity is the soul of wit, its hard to come up with profound statements on bubmer stickers.
It is pretty clear that Burford never heard of Sorel or de Man prior to my citation. I doubt you did either.
He hasn't read Sorel Or Goldberg, yet hes sure goldberg is wrong.
OK, somebody else's turn.
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2008/02/hbc-9000...
And always good stuff regards Jonah here:
http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/
And as an added treat, you can probably find someone ridiculing you personally.
You don't have to go far to find a swastika in full use by sensitive libs; I would suggest the current Code Pink demonstrations occurring in Berkeley for a full definition of "pathetic". You better head over there and get them to stop.
Ever hear the one that ends "or open your mouth and remove all doubt"?