Tag: outrage

Jul 15 2010

Popular Culture (Women In Media) 20100714. Rachel versus Megyn

An allegory betwixt the Fox “News” Channel and MSNBC can be seen by examining the tactics and the demeanor of each of their two flagship women.  I must first say that I like women a lot, and find both of them physically attractive, but that is not germane to the discussion.  However, it is important.

Studies show that attractive news readers get better ratings than unattractive ones, regardless of gender.  Whilst I yield that everyone has her or his own picture of perfection, I hope that everyone will postulate that both of them are very attractive women, to level the field.  This post has nothing to do with sexual attraction, but rather intellectual ability and interviewing skills.  I just happen to think that they both are on about equal levels as far as being attractive goes.  At the risk of being called sexist, here we go.

Apr 24 2010

Meanwhile In Nazizona: Show Me Your Papers

What an unbelievably ignorant and oppressive and probably illegal “immigration” law Arizona has just passed.  In its efforts to oppress the Mexican American and immigrant population within its borders, and anyone who might appear to be in that group (some Native Americans?) Arizona has enacted a law that facilitates prejudicial law enforcement and a blatant police state.  Put simply, this law is an outrage passed by and for the radical right, and it’s designed to make life for brown people and those who aren’t very white even more difficult.

The basic provisions of the law:

The law, which opponents and critics alike said was the broadest and strictest immigration measure in the country in generations, would make the failure to carry immigration documents a crime. It would also give the police broad power to detain anyone suspected of being in the country illegally. Opponents have decried it as an open invitation for harassment and discrimination against Hispanics regardless of their citizenship status.

According to The New York Times

The Catholic archbishop of Los Angeles called the authorities’ ability to demand documents Nazism. While police demands of documents are common on subways, highways and in public places in some countries, including France, Arizona is the first state to demand that immigrants meet federal requirements to carry identity documents legitimizing their presence on American soil.

And President Obama isn’t exactly thrilled either:

Even before …the bill [was signed], President Obama strongly criticized it.

Speaking at a naturalization ceremony for 24 active-duty service members in the Rose Garden, he called for a federal overhaul of immigration laws – an overhaul that Congressional leaders signaled they were preparing to take up soon.

Saying the failure of officials in Washington to act on immigration would open the door to “irresponsibility by others,” he said the Arizona bill threatened “to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans, as well as the trust between police and our communities that is so crucial to keeping us safe.”

And the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF} notes:

“Governor Brewer caved to the radical fringe,” said a statement by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, predicting that the law would create “a spiral of pervasive fear, community distrust, increased crime and costly litigation, with nationwide repercussions.”

When is the last time you saw a new state law greeted with such an outcry?  Probably never.  This law is that bad and deserves all of this and more.

Join me below.  

Jan 11 2010

Breaking! Republicans re-discover racism!

Crossposted at Daily Kos

    In the year 2010, the Republican party has finally, officially, re-discovered racism.

    In between demanding to see President Obama’s birth certificate so that he can prove for once and for all that he is NOT a secret Kenyan Muslim and Republican demands to be able to racially profile all Muslim-Americans who might be mistaken for a terrorist based on appearance, name or faith, the Republican party has re-discovered racism in America, and all because of this comment by Democratic Senator Harry Reid.

    Despite many, many acts on their own part that could be considered racist, Republicans finally became aware of the existance of racism in America again when a Democrat supposedly did it too.

    In 2009 I catalouged racist moments made by Republicans in an article titled Just call him a N!&&ER and get it over with, Republicans. We ALL KNOW that’s what you mean. By Republican standards NONE of these instances were racist. Why? Because It Doesn’t Count If You Are A Republican.

Obviously.

    But, just for the sake of accuracy, lets review the year of 2009 in Republican racism and selective outrage.

Dec 08 2008

Whining time is over, ladies and gentlemen.

Cross-posted from Progressive Independence

No, I’m not dead.  College and upcoming finals have eaten away at my time, but after next week I’ll have a few weeks to get back into the swing of things.  Now to business.  It’s no secret that since winning the recent presidential election, the left has been in an uproar over president-elect Barack Obama’s right-wing administrative-cabinet picks.  Complaints have been all over the blogosphere as well as mainstream news web sites such as Yahoo.

Obama’s creatures are pushing back, essentially telling people to shut up, drink the Kool-Aid, and line up behind the Obamassiah.  From the second link:

Responding to rising discontent on the left to President-elect Barack Obama’s centrist cabinet picks and early policy decisions, deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand has told progressive critics to take a deep breath.

With a long list of tasks ahead of him, Obama needs liberals to stand by him as he deals with a faltering economy, home foreclosures, an auto bailout and two wars, Hildebrand wrote Sunday on Huffington Post. Even so, Hildebrand added, Obama was elected “to be the president of all the people – not just those on the left.”

‘This is not a time for the left wing of our Party to draw conclusions about the Cabinet and White House appointments that President-Elect Obama is making,” Hildebrand wrote. “Some believe the appointments generally aren’t progressive enough. Having worked with former Senator Obama for the last two years, I can tell you, that isn’t the way he thinks and it’s not likely the way he will lead. The problems I mentioned above and the many I didn’t, suggest that our president surround himself with the most qualified people to address these challenges.”

I’m inclined to tell fellow left-wingers to shut up and stop complaining as well, although for very different reasons.  It was obvious to many independent left-wing voters that Democrat Obama would govern no differently if elected than his Republican counterpart, John McCain.  More competently, perhaps, and with smarmier rhetoric, but such differences are in style, not actual policy substance.  Too many liberals, fearful of another four to eight years of GOP domination, cast their ballots for the first politician with a “D” after his name that looked like a winner, either in spite of, or many cases, ignoring, the Democratic nominee’s actual record as a legislator.

Well, guess what ladies and gentlemen: you got the president and Congress you wanted.  You who voted for Obama have no right to complain now that he’s doing the exact opposite of what you deceived yourselves into thinking he’d do.  YOU voted for this.  YOU are responsible for making it happen.

This is not to say that all is lost, or that because people voted for a right-wing Democrat he cannot be pressured into fulfilling the false hopes placed in him.  Everybody makes mistakes, and mistakes can be corrected.  The time for complaints is over.  The time for action, for marching on Washington and demanding genuine change, for not going away until we get it, is now.

Jul 11 2008

I burned through all my outrage in ’06, sorry

. . . all I got left is cynicism, snark and recycled outrage.

See, it was easy back in ’06 – when things were soooo bad. I mean, outrage was running, what – buck-and-a-quarter, maybe six bits a gallon back then, right? I was livin’ large, drivin’ the Escalade of outrage – we all were. And it was easy back then to figure out who our collective outrage should be aimed at:


Those filthy, nasty Republicans

– who, after all, were actually running things, so blaming everything on them was totally legitimate.

And I was committed to taking Congress away from those cretinous bastards so we could put a stop to the occupation of Iraq, and to warrantless wiretapping of Americans, and to the whole idea of the President as king. You know, like we did 230 years ago, right?  

Apr 14 2008

Focusing the Outrage

If you’ve read my posts you know I’m no fan of Barack Obama, and that I have a distinct tendency to display copious amounts of Righteous Indignation.  There’s a reason for that, but there is always a danger in creating outrage fatigue, so today I’m going to try to help put it all into perspective.

Sep 13 2007

The Outraged Left

I recently came across another of those simple-minded rightwing references to the outraged left offered as an epithet by those of limited cranial capacity.  Ignored is the larger context, that we may actually have good reasons for being a wee bit peeved, that our anger may in fact not be irrational but rather completely and indisputably justified. 

UnAmerican1