JHB
JHB's Journal
Today I discovered that Grover Norquist agrees with me about something...
It's a conservative meme that liberals are stuck in 1968. The conservative bomb of a movie "An American Carol" had a whole musical number about it complete with choreographed tie-dyed, sandal-wearing, long-gray-haired university professors.
My counter has been that if you're going to reduce it to something dopey like that, then conservatives are stuck in 1978 (give or take a year): taxes are high, the economy is stagnant, crime is high and going up, looting of stores in the blackout and "the Bronx is burning" are still fresh in everyone's minds, Team B confirmed (for conservatives) that the Soviets were just chomping at the bit for world conquest (invading Afghanistan, overthrowing the legitimately-inherited dictatorship in Nicaragua, yadayadayada), every union is just like the mob-controlled Teamsters (and strict union rules cripple business), regulation is too tight, etc. etc. etc. Everything from views that were reasonable for that time to complete paranoid delusions were set in stone (and embossed with Ronald Reagan's profile).
Back to Norquist: from a 2009 "First Person Singular" column in the Washington Post:
And when was it that Norquist turned 21? Why, in 1977, of course.
Thank you, Grover, for being so intellectually stunted as to prove my point with your own.
And let's not forget to add: by his very words, Norquist is obsolete and should be put out to pasture.
Bookmarked
“People who just want stuff”: 1860
With all the conservative whining and wailing going on about Obama’s re-election, saying that he won because of “people who just want stuff” and other assorted poutrage, it’s worth noting that this is a trope they’ve been playing for a very, very long time.
Below is a conservative political cartoon from 1860, engraved by Currier and Ives and published in Harper's Magazine.
Back then, when “The Party of Lincoln” was actually running Lincoln for president, it was considered the liberal/left party.
See if you recognize the playbook:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2003674590/
"The Republican Party Going to the Right House"
Lincoln rides in on a (fence) rail, carried by Horace Greely (anti-slavery editor of the New York Tribune), leading his followers into a lunatic asylum.
GREELY: "Hold on to me Abe, and we'll go in here by the unanimous consent of the people."
LINCOLN: "Now my friends I'm almost in, and the millennium is going to begin, so ask what you will and it shall be granted."
Younger Woman: "Oh! what a beautiful man he is, I feel a passionate attraction' every time I see his lovely face."
Bearded Man: "I represent the free love element, and expect to have free license to carry out its principles."
Man with trim beard and hat: "I want religion abolished and the book of Mormon made the standard of morality."
Caricatured black man: "De white man hab no rights dat cullud pussons am bound to spect' I want dat understood."
Older woman: "I want womans rights enforced, and man reduced in subjection to her authority."
Scruffy man with bottle: "I want everybody to have a share of everybody elses property."
Barefoot man: "I want a hotel established by government, where people that aint inclined to work, can board free of expense, and be found in rum and tobacco."
Seedy top-hat man: " I want guaranteed to every Citizen the right to examine every other citizen's pockets without interruption by Policemen."
Man at the end: "I want all the stations houses burned up, and the M.P.s killed, so that the bohoys can run with the machine and have a muss when they please."
Let’s go down the list, shall we?:
Supported by "liberal media": Check
Liberals will embark on profligate giveaways to THOSE PEOPLE? Check.
Flighty, emotional, entranced by charisma/celebrity? Check.
People conservatives consider sexual deviants? Check.
People conservatives consider religious deviants? Check (and how ironic, this particular turn).
Grasping minorities after special rights? Check.
"Feminazis"? Check.
There's a vast army of layabouts, terrorists, and outright thieves who want to take your hard-earned stuff? Check, check, check, and check.
A hundred and fifty years later, and they're playing the same effing tune.
Heritage Foundation calls for war: "Stand with Us"
The chickenhawk speaking is Michael A. Needham, CEO of Heritage Foundation offshoot Heritage Action for America, Another champion of the free market who has spent his entire adult life not making a living in one.
Chief Executive Officer
Heritage Action for America
Nonprofit; 11-50 employees; Political Organization industry
April 2010 – Present (2 years 8 months)
Heritage Action for America is a grassroots advocacy organization dedicated to promoting conservative values, policy priorities, and ideas.
Special Assistant
Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee
Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Political Organization industry
2007 – 2008 (1 year)
Chief of Staff and Director
The Heritage Foundation
Nonprofit; 201-500 employees; Think Tanks industry
2004 – 2007 (3 years)
Michael A. Needham's Education
Stanford University Graduate School of Business
MBA
2008 – 2010
Williams College
BA, Political Science & Economics
2000 – 2004
I especially love his talk about "not abandoning our posts" when military service is conspicuously absent from his resume during a time of war.
Remember the 2007 video about the College Republican convention, how they all supported the war and the military...as long as it was someone else? "Stay at your post" Mike was a little older, but the exact same type.
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