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April 19, 2006

Comments

Yup, Savage is definitely on the angry right.

"If 'mainstream conservatism' means 'popular with enough conservatives that you can't call him a member of a 'fringe' with a straight face', then he, Ann Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh are mainstream conservatives."

Funny, someone else from the kitten just today made that very argument. Who says we're not an echo chanber?

You know, if these people want people destroyed, they should do the deed themselves, not just incite it done. I say give him a nuke and a B-52 and see what he can do.

I don't think we should worry about people spreading an "angry left" phrase. I also don't think that those of us in the middle or left should try to deny or minimize the phrase--to do so puts us on the defensive. Instead the response should be, "Yes, we're angry, and if you aren't, you must not be paying attention."
People like Savage aren't angry. I can't quite come up with a one word definition for them. Something about being primitive, respresenting the worst in human intinctive behavior, regression to our territorial pack-hunter ancestry etc.

I can't quite come up with a one word definition for them.

"Rabid" works for me.

"I say give him a nuke and a B-52 and see what he can do."

Well, O.K., now Washington D.C. and the Federal Government are dust with a very long half-life. Then Savage would ask for another nuke to take out his second-place enemy: all Muslims.

Give ME a nuke and a B-52. Show me where Savage is. Maybe he's having dinner with Limbaugh, Norquist, Coulter, Boortz, and Delay.

Have the waiter bring them each a pair of Depends.

Then ... Kaboom.

The word?:

Demagogue.

Add "rabid" to it if you like.

And spittle-flecking.

One word?

Wealthy.

"Rabble-rouser" ?

hilzoy: "it's liberals who have problems with anger these days."

I know you are trying to point out that liberals aren't the only ones with anger problems. But I really don't think liberals have a problem with anger.

Many of them are angry, including myself, but that isn't a problem. It is what we are angry about that is the problem.

As lily points out, there is no reason to be ashamed of being called "the angry left."

Just like when Poppy Bush campaigned talking about the "l" word. I never understood why democrats didn't come out and say that yes they were liberals and darn proud of it, and then explained why.

And yes, I am angry, although I don't go around calling those on the right traitors and advocating killing whole groups of them. That is not anger, that is hatefulness.

John: true enough.

What are they?

Hutu.

What do they do?

Hutu trash talk. Very organized and coordinated. At the behest of a governing power. To galvanize anger into a malleable force. Against an enemy. An internal enemy.

Who would that be?

Liberals, the culture, the U.S. Federal Government outside the walls of the Pentagon, taxes. Did I say taxes? Muslims?
When it is convenient.


To what end?

We don't know the punch line yet. Well, I don't.

McManus might.

Actually, I was listening to Savage the other day (lots of conservative talk radio to listen to here in OK) and musing about how he has been attacking Bush based on the same hysteria that Bush has cultivated when it occured to me: This is the "Hysterical Right".

The problem with hysterical people is that they can't really be reasoned with. They see all issues through an intensely focused and very distorted lens. So when your actions seem funny when translated through their lens, they turn on you in a heartbeat. This is why one ought not cultivate hysteria. It is good leverage for a while, but ultimately it undermines any type of non-hysterical policy on anything and everything.

"Give ME a nuke and a B-52. Show me where Savage is. Maybe he's having dinner with Limbaugh, Norquist, Coulter, Boortz, and Delay."

The funny thing is that that is funny....

But when Mark Steyn proposes about the same thing as does Savage, we're supposed to take him seriously (or else so-called libertarian law profs get all snivelly at you).

Anderson,

Given the same law professor vociferously argued there was no such thing as a Constitution-in-exile movement while simultaneously promoting his book entitled Restoring the Lost Constitution, I take his pronouncements as being of very little value.

It's amusing how many conservatives will maintain that Rush is just an entertainer and no one takes him seriously, etc., when the Vice-President of the United States makes regular appearances on his program. Just the other day he had Rumsfeld on.

It's amusing how many conservatives will maintain that Rush is just an entertainer and no one takes him seriously, etc...

Ha! I just totally misread that as "Bush"...

It's amusing how many conservatives will maintain that Rush is just an entertainer and no one takes him seriously, etc..

if you've been marinated in Republicanism your whole life, Rush probably would seem like mere entertainment. he probably sounds like he's just stating the obvious when he says 'librilz hate A-Merica!", if you already believe that.

Given the same law professor vociferously argued there was no such thing as a Constitution-in-exile movement while simultaneously promoting his book entitled Restoring the Lost Constitution, I take his pronouncements as being of very little value.

But he didn't use those exact words. It only counts if you use the magic words!

Y'all realize that the angst about anger is really a dead giveaway for being a liberal. 'I'm not angry, I'm being objective, damnit!!' When I see demagogues on the Right get angry, they never really seem to be concerned about objectivity.

In an unfortunate way, it might be useful to have "Angry Lefties" or, if you are from Euston, the "indecent left". The volubality of the lunatic fringe may have served to make what would previously seemed to be marginal ideas less extreme. Torture? Well hey, we aren't killing em all and letting god sort em out...etc.

Or it might just lead us to Goldstein's second civil war...

John, the Hutu v. Tutsi hatred ran considerably deeper, longer, than any of the hatreds the American Right is inflaming.

The American Right's hatreds more closely resemble a drug jones: a habituation-tolerance cycle requiring higher doses to reach the desired state of euphoric rage. The higher doses take the form of escalating threats against a wider range of targets.

I don't know how likely a Kristalnacht actually is. The thugs who chased election officials through the streets in Florida, who gathered outside the Vice President's mansion in to howl at Al Gore, and who tried to precipitate a riot outside Terri Schiavo's nursing home, certainly show a real potential for targeted mob violence.

However, in all but one case, SFAIK, no law enforcement presence dissuaded the rioters/attackers. The one case in which law enforcement did take a stand (outside the Schiavo nursing home) resulted in the would-be rioters backing down - granted, because Jeb Bush did; I don't know what would have happened if he'd urged the mob onward.

For a Kristallnacht to be our future would require a completely co-opted police force and military - or such overwhelming numbers of thugs that law enforcement doesn't go near the scene at all. I don't, currently, see that as a possibility.

That's "currently," mind you. We have three more years of Bush's incompetence, corruption, and criminal negligence still to endure.

A war with Iran that goes badly, an economic wobble caused by $100+/barrel oil, another few hurricane-devastated cities left to drown and rot, a flu epidemic that's anything like the one in 1918 and, above all, another terrorist attack on US soil... any combination of those events, and the use that Bush and the Right will make of them, changes the scenario considerably.

All these rabid right talkers have figured out how to make a lot of bread by appealing to the worst instincts of fearful listeners. They don't believe it themselves. They would switch over to the liberal arguments if that made more money. Their present audience is easier to jive.

Is the "angry left" meme even alive anymore? Seriously?

Is the "angry left" meme even alive anymore? Seriously?

In the same way that any other meme useful to the administration seems to rise from the grave to wander through a shopping mall in Ohio...

Hey, what is it about Ohio?

According to the news, of the last five PowerBall Lotto winners, four were in Ohio. Even if Ohioans are buying tickets at some insanely higher ratio than any other state's residents, that shouldn't make any difference in the odds of winning, should it?

Maybe Diebold runs the PowerBall drawings :)

Even if Ohioans are buying tickets at some insanely higher ratio than any other state's residents, that shouldn't make any difference in the odds of winning, should it?

every ticket bought by any group raises the odds for that group winning (assuming they pick different numbers, randomly) by a very small amount.

maybe i'm worng - i've always hated probability.

The left has many problems these days, if you want to add angry to that list... well OK.

/snark

If you want to tar conservatives with the slime of one wacko, you might want to chose someone that conservatives actually embrace. Nebulas statistics such as 8 million listeners doesnt cut it outside the echo chambers. After all, just because I listen to Air America doesnt mean I embrace their POV.

bains, what criteria do you suggest we use to determine popularity besides, uh, popularity?

Ok, I'll bite...you're kidding, right bains?

f you want to tar conservatives with the slime of one wacko, you might want to chose someone that conservatives actually embrace.

But there are so many... it's hard to choose a favorite.

four were in Ohio.

For a lot of Ohioans, the Lotto is the only viable retirement plan left.

popularity, more accurately listenership, is one thing, but that's not what Hilzoy was impling.

e.g. Conservatives are angry because Michael Savage is angry (I'd argue that he's beyond angry), and he must be representitive of conservatives because he has 8 million listeners.

If you accept painting by such broad brushes, then you've no standing to complain when you are similarly painted into a corner - say painted as the angry left.

I guess the logical question is "Why do 8 million people listen to Savage if they don't agree with what he says?"

bains: actually, I don't think he's representative of conservatives. I do think that if you're looking for someone who is representative of the right or the left, Michael Savage is more representative of the right than Mary Scott O'Connor is of the left. But that's just comparative: I would never say that Savage somehow represented, say, Sebastian.

You are totally blind, hilzoy. Michael Moore sat next to Pres Jimmy Carter at the 2004 Democratic Convention, for crimenintly.

And where were Savage and Coulter at the Republican Convention?

Sheesh.

I'm trying to remember which public figures Michael Moore advocated killing again. DaveC, could you help me out here?

And when did Michael Moore call for the killing of 100 million people? Or suggest the only way to reason with conservatives is with a baseball bat? Or wonder why the Washington Times wasn't blown up along with the Pentagon on 9/11?

Sure, there are "angry" partisans on both sides. There may even be an "even number" of "angry partisans". But it's a false equivalency to say that the rhetoric from the partisan media figures is equally violent. Read Dave Neiwart's Orcinus. Limbaugh, Coulter, Savage, and Malkin's eliminationist rhetoric is absolutely worse in tone, effect and frequency than anything coming from Michael Moore, Al Franken or Randi Rhodes.

I think you are in the category of folks who wonder "how could a conservative / Republican get elected, nobody I know voted for them"

My wife and kids and in-laws all theoretically hate conservatives and Republicans even though I support Pres Bush.

But here I am.

I vote at least 35% Democrat, because I live in Illinois. But I have kids, am married, care about national security, is it so awful that I would choose to vote for the candidate that best addresses my concerns?

Gary often complains that I make these blanket statements, but that's a pretty broad brush you've got going there.

Oh, and the audience for the "angry right" is far larger than the audience for the angry left. Not to suggest this means all conservatives are represented by Limbaugh/Coulter listeners. But the popularity (10s of millions voluntarily listening, also pushed on VOA radio), coupled with their obvious access to influential Republican figures (like Rumsfeld and Cheneye) shows that right-wing talk-radio is an influential force in the Republican party.

The best the right can come up with is commentators on Kos, or some obscure professor. On the left all we have to do is turn on Fox news or the radio. Hell, even people like Michael Medved come close to regularly calling for the death of liberals (or saying it wouldn't be bad if they did die because they're immoral).

There's a difference.

Here is the MM Michael Moore link

Excerpt:

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush? You closed down a friggin' weekly newspaper, you great giver of freedom and democracy! Then all hell broke loose. The paper only had 10,000 readers! Why are you smirking?

They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win.

So that's what liberals and Democrats stand for? They invited this guy to be a honored guest of an ex-President?

Is it because he's an Academy Award winner? Do you think Oliver Stone correct about evrything too?

Hell, even people like Michael Medved come close to regularly calling for the death of liberals (or saying it wouldn't be bad if they did die because they're immoral).

I gave you the quote and the link from Michael Moore , be so kind to do the same for me from Michael Medved.

You are blind. When I get back from my Mamaw's funeral, I will post a list of 2004 Sixty Minutes shows with links that were anti-Bush, and talk about that. Zinni is not a 2006 phenom. He was on the 60 minutes line-up with Moore, Richard Clarke, Paul O'Neill, yes Zinni, and on and on, probably half the weeks of that year had anti-Bush shows.

But you guys think that your views are "suppressed"? Give me a break - Note: Zinni, election year, big headlines, etc.

Draw your own conclusions

"They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win."

This is a predictive statement. In context, it was meant as a condemnation of certain aspects of the prosecution of the war effort. He was telling President George that he had misjudged his war task in many of the same ways King George had misjudged his war task.

On the other hand, "Savage added: 'Would you rather we disappear or we die? Or would you rather they disappear and they die? Because you're going to have to make that choice sooner rather than later.'"

While in some ways this has a foot in the realm of descriptive logic Moore uses, the emphasis on the choice between self- and other-destruction means a stance closer to the pulling of triggers.

Moore says "they"; Savage says "you" & "they".

To me, there's a difference.

But I have kids, am married, care about national security, is it so awful that I would choose to vote for the candidate that best addresses my concerns?

If you voted for Bush, you didn't.

Gary challenged me to link to Michael Yon, Micheal Totton and ITM. (Yon and ITM are worried.) I don't have a heckuva lot of time for analysis, but these seem like pretty important posts:
">http://www.michaelyon-online.com/wp/of-words.htm"> Michael Yon

Michael Totten

Iraq The Model

My sincere codolences to Mohammed and his family.

I'll buy in to this

How about you?

But you guys think that your views are "suppressed"?

Uh - no. That's not the topic here.

The topic is whether the characterization of the left as angry is accurate, in comparison to the right.

Until you start producing quotes of popular left figures calling for/celebrating in the death of members of the right, producing signs that 60 minutes has an "anti-bush" bias doesn't actually seem relevant to the topic.

The quote you use from Michael Moore is a criticism of the language used by the Bush administration. He is arguing that describing iraqis resisting our occupation of their country as "terrorists" or "the enemy" is a deliberate twisting of the language. Whether you disagree with him or not, to compare the anger of Moore's statement with the anger of someone proposing the nuclear annihilation of Muslims boggles the mind.

DaveC: I vote at least 35% Democrat, because I live in Illinois. But I have kids, am married, care about national security, is it so awful that I would choose to vote for the candidate that best addresses my concerns?

No, not at all. But since you vote for the candidate who doesn't "best address your concerns", why ask? You have kids, so you vote for the party that wants your kids uneducated and poor: you're married, so you vote for the party that wants to pass a Constitutional amendment against marriage: you care about national security, so you vote for the party that puts profit ahead of national security. This isn't awful, it's just kinda weird. People do it all the time.

I can't quite come up with a one word definition for them.

How about "opportunistic"? I've listened to Paul Savage, so I may in fact count among his 8 million listeners. Paul doesn't have much to say that I agree with; he's more the radio equivalent of Jerry Springer(12 million viewers, once upon a time). Or: his show holds the helpless fascination of an accident on the freeway. You don't want to look, but you can't help yourself. He's the World Wrestling Federation of radio.

I don't criticise him because there's very litte he says that's unworthy of criticism. Usually you'd like to sort of nudge people back on the path of correctness via criticism, but correctness isn't even on the same map as Michael. I mean, this is a guy who (apparently earnestly) makes frequent references to "the gay mafia".

I mean, this is a guy who (apparently earnestly) makes frequent references to "the gay mafia".

Proving that he knows nothing about the gay mafia, because if he did, he'd know better than to talk.

Did anyone see my copy of the gay agenda? I dropped it somewhere.

I will post a list of 2004 Sixty Minutes shows with links that were anti-Bush, and talk about that. Zinni is not a 2006 phenom. He was on the 60 minutes line-up with Moore, Richard Clarke, Paul O'Neill, yes Zinni, and on and on, probably half the weeks of that year had anti-Bush shows.

could you post some links where Dan Rather or Morley Safer says "We need to execute people like McVeigh in order to physically intimidate conservatives, by making them realize that they can be killed, too" ? at least that would be relevant.

The first rule of the gay mafia is you don't talk about the gay mafia.

One of the things I admire about some people on the right is their persistant belief that anybody who criticizes Bush or things this administration has done represents an "Anti-Bush" faction.

It does not matter if the statements by those people have the facts behind them. What matters is that they have dared to bring up something that is critical.

If DaveC wants to present an anti-Bush bias, then it is incumbent upon him to show that what was presented was not based in fact.

Oh, and Slarti, you may be able to realize that Savage rarely is in contact with reality, but my guess is that a large segment of his audience does not. There are people who believe everything they read in the tabloids like the National Enquirer.

In fact, the two sets of people may be identical.

my guess is that a large segment of his audience does not

Completely agree. Just as, for instance, there are people who believe that the people one sees starring in the WWF Smackdown du jour are just like that in real life. Or, worse, that what they're seeing IS real life.

People whose lives are screwed up probably watch Jerry Springer for the misery-loves-company effect, though, or (probably more prevalently) the life-is-good-because-others-have-it-so-much-worse effect.

Another strong effect could be the outrage-addicts. Some watch him because they're outraged that he could be so damned mean, while others watch him because they enjoy being inflamed by him. A liberal smearing of Preparation H could take the latter out of the picture, maybe.

BTW, completely OT, the occasionally brilliant Pearls Before Swine is occasionally brilliant today.

Slarti,

What is your opinion on how Get Fuzzy is coordinating with Pearls before Swine this week by copying PbS's comic and then adding GF's characters to it?

And where were Savage and Coulter at the Republican Convention?

Coulter has been an honored and popular guest at conservative gatherings. And Limbaugh, an equally vile figure, has a huge daily audience and is clearly a major spokesman for the Republican Party Are you suggesting hs audience doesn't, by and large, agree with him?

Savage is to conservative thought what International ANSWER is to liberal thought: The Lunatic Fringe. Savage regularly bashes Republicans. He does not represent the mainstream of conservatism and is widely reject by the mainstream. Just as I would not expect you to justify the Stalinst ravings of International ANSWER, don't ask mainstream conservatives to justify the ravings of that ape Michael Savage.

DaveC - You keep changing the subject to avoid discussing the issue at hand. As others have pointed out, I wasn't discussing whether or not the left's views are supressed. I also wasn't disputing the existence of the angry left. I'm not even going to dispute that there are probably some on the far left who actually sympathize (not just understand, but sympathize) with terrorists.

But you have utterly failed to show that the rhetoric from public, prominent Democratic partisans is as heated, eliminationist and violent coming from the left. Try this post for an example of the unhinged right.

The popular media figures on the left are, at most, calling for Bush's impeachment and Rumsfeld's resignation. They're not saying conservatives need to be shipped to Gitmo for re-education. Or that conservatives need to be physically intimidated so they "know they can be killed". Or that Oklahoma should be bombed because it voted for Bush. And we don't regularly go around calling conservatives traitors, treasonous, and calling for them to be tried for sedition.

You also seem oddly fixated on Conventions, as if Limbaugh not being there makes him a fringe figure, despite Cheney and Rumsfeld appearing on his show regularly. What about Coulter's paid (and cheered) appearance at a recent RNC event?

Despite the fact that I think Bush & Cheney's actions re: warrantless wiretapping and indefinite detention represent a completely extra-legal gutting of the constitution, I wouldn't call either of them a traitor. Horribly misguided, yes. Deserving of impeachment, scorn and anger? Yes.

Even people like Coulter I don't want murdered. I have no respect for her opinions, and little respect for her as a person given her sustained attacks on liberals. I might even "hate her", but I don't think she needs relatives to be blown up by an IED-wielding terrorist to be "taught a lesson".

So Dave. How about it? Come back with prominent Democratic media figures calling "with glee" for the death and destruction of your favorite conservatives or conservative cities and we'll talk.

Savage is to conservative thought what International ANSWER is to liberal thought

where can i find the multi-million-listener ANSWER radio show ? has ANSWER ever hosted a talk show on MSNBC ?

Here is another point of view. If it isn't the angry left, it may be the looney left.

http://maxine-log.blogspot.com/2006/04/looney-left-rant-vs-one-long-sustained_17.html

Muslim fascistic fear and hatred has to be stopped and this is not a situation we find ourselves can not be nuanced. Reasonable people do not take passenger planes and fly them into skyscrapers.

According to International ANSWER's web site it was formed on September 14, 2001. Had anyone heard of them until the protests just prior to the invasion of Iraq? I had not.

I marched in San Francisco and what struck me was the wide variety of attendees ... families with babies in strollers, veterans in uniform, to me it seemed like mostly ordinary people. Sure, there were some with other agendas (I particularly remember anti-Israel/pro-Palestinian protesters) but they were way outnumbered.

My presence at the march in no way indicates support for International ANSWER as an organization or agreement with its stated positions on any other issues. So, I grant that Michael Savage or Ann Coulter do not speak for all conservatives, and certainly not for those we meet here.

However, I have to insist that there is a big difference. Even in the '60s the strident voices on the left were more bark than bite, even more so today. The extreme left has never held real power in the United States. On the right it's a different story.

Most of the millions who listen to Savage do so for the same reason that people slow down to look at a car wreck. To suggest that all his listeners endorse his ravings is just silly. A tiny fraction do, the rest just like a good insane tirade.

I love irony. Savage isn't angry, at least not in this piece. Yet our intolerant host mislabels calm self-preservation as hatred and the usual suspects chime in with the usual lexicon of instinctive, self-reinforcing attacks. Much back-slapping ensues.

Like a collective personality disorder, the hard Left runs almost entirely on images and appearances. Like unruly children, the hard Left never holds itself accountable to unpleasant realities, prefering to attack their appearances, wishing them out of existence.

Blogs like this one prove that some people have too much time on their hands ... and too much emotion to think rationally.

The difference between Michael Savage and a car wreck: do advertisers pay money to place signs at a car wreck?

6Gun, who is this "hard Left" ? got any names ?

Bill, meet 6Gun.

6Gun: I love irony. Savage isn't angry, at least not in this piece. Yet our intolerant host mislabels calm self-preservation as hatred and the usual suspects chime in with the usual lexicon of instinctive, self-reinforcing attacks. Much back-slapping ensues.

Yes, hilzoy, shame on you for being so intolerant of eliminationist -- er, I mean self-preservationist -- rhetoric.

I think 6gun is a parody.

"I think 6gun is a parody."

One can only hope.

Other than 6Gun, there seem to be many occasional [do those numbers distinguish first ever /regular/never again?] listeners to Savage who are not fans/choir members but curious, even critical assessors of a opposing view.
Notably absent are those darling "undecideds" who refuse to join "the angry left" or "the angry right".
I'm not sure whether 6Bun's "hard Left" is an improvement on "angry Left", but I kinda think that "some people have too much time on their hands" is embarrassingly candid.
Ditto that disturbing remark that Savage is not angry but calm and self-preserving. We undecideds can rescue you 6Buns, we must.

One can only hope.

The sad thing is, it's impossible to tell the difference between parody and reality where the Angry Right are concerned. It's like the Onion becoming indistinguishable from the MSM.

"It's like the Onion becoming indistinguishable from the MSM."

Actually, I think The Onion is usually more accurate about some things.

He's right about the too much time, at least in my case. We're doing the state-mandated standardized testing which means I sit here for hours.... and hours... and hours while kids take tests, or (morely likely) sleep...

Hilzoy is a member of the hard left? Obsidian Wings is an example of a blog with too much emotion and too little rationality?

If 6Gun isn't a parody, he's posting from an alternate universe (possibly one that exists only in his head).

I think Savage is stating the fact that he believes that roughly 100 million of the 1 billion muslims out there are radical and willing to kill for Islam. That is our enemy and they will kill, so what to do? What to do?

I think 6gun is a visitor from Protein Wisdom, although I certainly could be wrong. If he ever comes back for the next volley, I urge him to read the posting rules, and keep in mind that "The Hard Left" and "those people who disagree with me" are not, in fact, interchangeable.

I'm not sure whether 6Bun's "hard Left" is an improvement on "angry Left"

i know which i'd rather be.

I think 6gun is a visitor from Protein Wisdom

... or Mars.

one word description:

"stalk·ing-horse (stôkng-hôrs) KEY

NOUN:

Something used to cover one's true purpose; a decoy.
A sham candidate put forward to conceal the candidacy of another or to divide the opposition.

A horse trained to conceal the hunter while stalking.
A canvas screen made in the figure of a horse, used for similar concealment."
...
But this is just my cryptic paranoiac-as- performance-art speaking.
...
Of course, all discussions of right wing demogoguery must link to Dave Neiwert. He is the professional who has actually been paid to study the nexus of extremism, propaganda, and praxis.

But, with all groveling and obsequious worship I can sincerely offer, Neiwert may be slightly prone to the occupational hazard of fascism-watchers. A tendency to overconnect or overinterpret. There is certainly interesting parallels to protofascism in the Savage eliminationism and Malkin's recent obvious directing the Sturmabteilung toward Santa Cruz, but sometimes I think hate-radio is just a variant of sports-culture. There seems to be a pretty large gap between the adoring crowd in the stands and the professional players on the field. The "homers" with the mikes alter the outcome of the game very little.

Course home-court advantage can be decisive in close contests. San Antonio over Dallas in 7, Detroit over San Antonio. I hope I am wrong.
...
15 hours without electricity yesterday. Luckily it wasn't one of our freakish 100 degree days, but I was still so jonesing over a lack of electronics I had to do yard work to distract myself. Pity the poor trees.

"That is our enemy and they will kill, so what to do? What to do?"

Give them NBA franchises, of course. It is a fact that countries with professional basketball teams never go to war with each other, even if it isn't. Thus speaketh the moustache of wisdom.

The points about all listeners to Savage not ascribing to his views is of course an appropriate one. After all, I listened to Limbaugh pretty regularly for a year (on AFRN, no less!), and I'm hardly the target demographic.

Still, there's something about eliminationist rhetoric that shouldn't be laughed off. Historically that sort of talk can go from ha-ha-only-joking to engrained and dangerous stereotype very quickly. And even without those consequences, the speech itself is hateful, even when it doesn't rise to the level of hate speech.

Man, I love this blog. Inadequately educated one day, insufficiently rational the next.... what's next? Incapable of abstract thinking? Excessively tidy? Just too darn mean?

Are you excessively tidy, Hilzoy?

Ward Churchill wasn't exactly unknown. His works were par for the course in Native American history and culture courses, sociology courses, etc etc. Outside of academia he was little known, but within it he was a mini-star.

All is revealed. Pajamas Media has linked to this.

... what's next?

How about "interested only in the superficial"?

And Jes: no. I was just trying to come up with some of the least likely criticisms ever. That one was prompted by the fact that my little sister and her family came to visit, and even after I vacuumed and everything she thought there was a lot of cat hair.

Outside of academia he was little known, but within it he was a mini-star.

Maybe within his subspecialty. Academia as a whole, though? Hardly.

AnonCon: I'm an academic -- and an academic who reads some native American history for fun, though it's not my field -- and I had never heard of him.

In case anyone's interested, my recent dearth of wit (or at least, of the usual number of characters per second in comments) is due to illness that's sufficiently tenacious that I'm semi-regularly checking myself for buboes.

Slarti I hope you feel better asap. How's your eye?

My eye's the best part of me; seeing maybe 20/50 or so, and only a mild ache, discomfort-wise. J/K about the buboes, although I've had these glands in my neck that have been painfully swollen for days.

The other eye; the one that's wearing the contact lens, that one's not happy. I knew there was a reason I had given up on contacts, but it took my eye a while to remember.

Remember, Slarti: flu-like symptoms are also precursors for Lyme's disease, cholera morbus, and syphillis!

"Still, there's something about eliminationist rhetoric that shouldn't be laughed off. Historically that sort of talk can go from ha-ha-only-joking to engrained and dangerous stereotype very quickly."

Cue Ahmadinejad then pan over to Rafsanjani.

:)

"Man, I love this blog. Inadequately educated one day, insufficiently rational the next.... what's next? Incapable of abstract thinking? Excessively tidy? Just too darn mean?"

Some one once yelled at me "Can't you just take something literally" and I almost laughed out loud. Nearly every other person in my life (starting with my mom and going from there) has noticed that I'm way too literal. It is the kind of thing that makes you want to look around to your left, and to your right, and behind you and say "Were you talking to me?"

On House a couple of nights ago, the patient of the week was suffering from, it turned out, the Black Plague.

Moral: don't watch medical dramas when sick. Still, it's a good show, and Hugh Laurie's character is somehow likeable and highly obnoxious, both.

My dad actually got bubonic plague forty years ago in Seattle, probably fleas from rats at the zoo. Been trying your new eyeballs out at the zoo, Slarti?

Apparently some ridiculously huge percentage of the ground squirrel population in the Four Corners area are bubonic plague carriers. One of my sister's colleagues, who was studying the phenomenon, was hauled onto campus after 9-11 to swear up and down and sign some pledge that she would not bring the plague onto campus, or she would lose her funding, get expelled, and be subject to proscecution.(!) Later, of course, she got some DHS bioterrorism-related grant, so it all worked out.

Wow, Lily. How far did symptoms get before the antibiotics kicked in?

The doctor in Seattle didn't recognize the plague. He thought my dad had some kind of cancer and nearly did a biopsy (which would have killed my dad). However, instead, the doctor told my mom to take the family back to our home in Iowa and get my dad to the family doctor. A couple days later in Iowa the family doctor made the diagnosis. I was only eight or so, so actually forty years ago was a bit of an underestimation. I guess antibiotics must of worked since my daddy didn't die.

i guess i never answered the question. He had buboes around his neck and under his arms. And a fever.

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