Tuesday, 28 August 2012

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Obama’s the only President who’s ever bowed, except for all the others. A Republican PAC full of former Navy Seals, Special Operations for America, will be releasing an ad entitled “Bow to Nobody” at the RNC: Ryan Zinke, the former Navy SEAL who started the super PAC, spoke exclusively with Breitbart News today. “The ad itself accurately portrays where this President is,” said Zinke. “It accurately portrays his core belief that America should not lead. This president is shaping America to be one of the followers, to relinquish our role as a world leader. I didn’t fight 23 years as a Navy SEAL to watch America bow to anybody.” He continued, “It’s not just the king of Saudi Arabia. My friends from WWII that fought in the Pacific theater—when they see the president bow to the emperor of Japan, I’ve seen veterans cry[.]” When asked whether it was inappropriate for former SEALs to speak out, as some on the left have alleged, Zinke answered, “If the veterans can’t speak out, who can? I think it’s a duty of every veteran and every citizen to be actively involved in our political process, especially when the president sets out to negotiate away our rights under the Constitution. There have been other veterans—TR, Eisenhower, JFK—they’ve been active in speaking out and shaping the policy and politics of our country[.]” For reasons that will become abundantly clear, that emphasis is mine. Zinke’s logic is that he shouldn’t fight to protect American freedom if the President is going to go bowing around the world willy-nilly. Moreover, he feels entitled to take this stand because other former military men, including the man who was once the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower, remained “active in speaking out and shaping the policy of our country[.]” Implicit in Zinke’s claim is that someone like President Eisenhower would never diminish the office of the Presidency by bowing to foreign leaders. One problem: conservatives already floated this notion that the President never ever bows so I already know a little something about President Eisenhower: the man could not stop bowing. Hi there, Pope John XXIII! Howdy to you, wife of Italian Prime Minister Giovanni Gronchi! Hello again, Archbishop Iakovos of New York, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Church of North and South America! Long time no see, Charles De Gaulle! By Zinke’s logic, I believe that last bow means we have all been French since 2 September 1959. Eisenhower clearly demonstrated by that bow that the American President is a subordinate of the French, which means that for the past 50 years America has been a French territory with pretensions of sovereignty. Mon Dieu! (Most of this post was originally published here on 15 November 2009. It seems stupid didn’t evolve much in the last three years.)
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Yes, Governor Christie, I'm sure this will impress him. You have to feel for Chris Christie. The biggest political speech of his life and he backdrops himself thus: If that looks familiar, that's because if you have anything resembling taste it damn well should: Christie loves him some Springsteen. Grew up listening to and idolizing the Bard of the Badlands. The feeling's mutual: Despite heroic efforts by Christie, Springsteen, who is still a New Jersey resident, will not talk to him. They’ve met twice—once on an airplane in 1999, and then at the 2010 ceremony inducting Danny DeVito into the New Jersey Hall of Fame, where they exchanged only formal pleasantries. (Christie does say that Springsteen was very kind to his children.) At concerts, even concerts in club-size venues—the Stone Pony, in Asbury Park, most recently—Springsteen won’t acknowledge the governor. When Christie leaves a Springsteen concert in a large arena, his state troopers move him to his motorcade through loading docks. He walks within feet of the stage, and of the dressing rooms. He’s never been invited to say hello. On occasion, he’ll make a public plea to Springsteen, as he did earlier this spring, when Christie asked him to play at a new casino in Atlantic City. “He says he’s for the revitalization of the Jersey Shore, so this seems obvious,” Christie told me. I asked him if he’s received a response to his request. “No, we got nothing back from them,” he said unhappily, “not even a ‘Fuck you.’” Did I write "mutual"? I meant the opposite of mutual. You have to wonder about someone who embraces a musician this deeply without listening to a damn thing he sings. The disconnect between lyric and listener is borderline sociopathic: if you spend your nights ears-deep in working-class tales of toil and despair and your days enacting policies that guarantee a future full of working-class tales of toil and despair, people may begin to suspect that you've embraced some strange form of patronage-by-poverty. They may begin to think that you're trying to manufacture the social conditions necessary to create a newer, "better" Springsteen whose "convictions" won't interfere with yours because you'll have whispered the Gospel of the Free Market in his ear from the moment you turned him into a foundling. Not that you murdered his parents, mind you, they're just not in his life anymore. And then years later, when you successfully run for President, you and your pet Springsteen will tour the country and your rallies will begin with your pet's new hit, "Burn Down the U.S.A.," a rousing tune about the virtues of small government. People may begin to consider that you indulge in this pathetic fantasy because you're as small of mind as you are large of body, and the man whose approval you so desperately seek won't even begrudge you a "Fuck you." JUST IN CASE SOMETHING OR OTHER (WITH PRETTY DAMNING LYRICS):

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