The stupidest people in the world
Modern-day wingnuts may well be the dumbest group of organisms in the history of the known universe. Let’s imagine what would have happened if they’d been around in 1865:
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ELITIST PRESIDENT LINCOLN TAKES WIFE TO ELITIST ANTI-AMERICAN PLAY AT FORD’S THEATRE!
Despite the fact that the South is still devastated in the wake of his War of Northern Aggression, elitist President Abraham Lincoln is somehow finding the time to take his family to a fancy theatre production! Tonight, Lincoln plans to bring his wife to Ford’s Theatre to see a production of “Our American Cousin,” which has been described as a “farcical comedy whose plot is based on the introduction of an awkward, boorish American to his aristocratic English relatives.” Think about that — just days after the end of the war, with much of the South laying in ruins, our president is watching a “comedy” that mocks America’s heartland! How can the president sit and watch as America is mocked, even as Americans across the nation struggle to make ends meet? Why does the president insist on trashing American values while at the same time promoting alleged “unity” with the South?
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We need a smarter opposition ideology in this country. The current crop isn’t cutting it.
The Republican Party of the Dixie Confederate Free Market Baptist Uprising has spent the last 30 years dominating the policy of the nation.
I think we can afford a few years, maybe decades, in which they have no prominent role to play.
Why is it so important that we have a well-developed conservative opposition right at this moment so that they can shitty up whatever policy debate there is?
My worry is that the unemployment won’t be better by next year’s midterms and the GOP will retake the House despite the fact that it’s completely unfit to govern in its current incarnation.
The GOP will have gains in the House, because they’ve pretty much reached rock bottom in terms of how many seats they can lose.
But retake the House? Absofuckinglutely not.
Watch. They’re going to steal this for their campaign slogan.
Brad, please stick to the humor, because your quantitative analysis is weak-to-nonexistent. you were hyperventilating before the last election cycle, too. Do you know how to read a fucking poll?
because your quantitative analysis is weak-to-nonexistent.
I panic. It’s what I do best.
Again, though, things can change very quickly. If people are still really suffering and unemployment is in double digits anything can happen.
History will repeat itself.
The current opposition party will rename itself the “Know-Nothings” in a fit of honesty, a new opposition party will develop on the left under the name “Mensheviks,” and Zombie Reagan will stand in front of the Mexican border and say, in tones of trembling sincerity, “Mr. Obama, tear down this wall.”
I want to work this into a bumper-sticker.
I see, Mr. Never-Voted-In-My-Life-Before.
Wrong thread alert!
If people are still really suffering and unemployment is in double digits anything can happen.
Including an enraged populace re-thinking capitalism and restructuring wealth systems. Unlikely, of course, but as you say, anything can happen.
“My worry is that the unemployment won’t be better by next year’s midterms and the GOP will retake the House despite the fact that it’s completely unfit to govern in its current incarnation.”
“Brad, please stick to the humor, because your quantitative analysis is weak-to-nonexistent. you were hyperventilating before the last election cycle, too. Do you know how to read a fucking poll?”
Don’t listen, Brad, There’s absolutely no need to back down from a statement that is nothing more than simple common sense.
As Digby put it not that long ago: “Obama’s popularity isn’t a magic bullet.” If our beloved Corporate Democrats continue as they have been ever since the election – i.e. implementing the GOP’s agenda with a ‘respectable’ facade plastered on – it won’t surprise me in the least if the voters turn away from them in disgust. We’ve all seen this game play out far too many times before, haven’t we?
I think I’m having a seizure.
Easy, dude. Yes extensive unemployment is highly correlated with political turmoil. But, the the reporklican solution is to cut SUI payouts and govt amelioration programs. Its already too late for them to change their policy prescriptions. Dude, reporklicans want to cut tariff protection for agri-families! Obama still has plenty of room to move to the left for economic stimulus if the recovery lags.
I’ve heard this before. Odds are it has the same likelyhood of previous worries that McCain was gonna win.
Where are the dancing badgers? The rabid pelican?
And Brad calls this “panic”.
Hmph!
The dancing badgers was one of the funniest things EVAR! Ok, one of several… one of many… alright it was pretty damn funny.
Every once in a while we have to talk Brad down from the ledge. I consider it repayment for the previous 11 months.
So.. in that spirit here’s my take.
Yes, anything can happen and John D. is I think correct that Obama’s popularity isn’t guaranteed. But I think he’s up to it. I saw him win against considerable odds and would be loath to second guess the man’s political instincts.
He also has an enormous amount of power as pres. and could easily announce a federal program of some kind, assured to be popular, in the face of rising unemployment. Do not under estimate the O Man, the road is littered with the bodies of those who did.
I think it’s true we’re in for tough economic times but I believe Obama will navigate them successfully to a second term. At this time there isn’t anyone I’d rather have as pres. and I supported Hilary in the primaries.
If people are still really suffering and unemployment is in double digits anything can happen.
Up Sealand! Buaidh No Bas!
Don’t worry. Conservative thinkers are developing plenty of shrewd policy options that will be highly attractive to voters. For example, here’s a recent proposal from our friend Plumb Bob for a federal law that would require American citizens to play with poopoo. Republicans know that nothing can stand up the explosive power of anal-expulsive ideology.
“I didn’t hear an AROO! outta that guy.
You better watch your ass.”
Because sending the dirty elites out into the fields to do heavy manual labor worked so well for Mao and Pol Pot.
I have full confidence in our current wingnuts’ ability to double down, even triple down, the stupid. There are depths of stupid to which (of which? from which? I don’t have y’all’s book larnin’) they have yet to plumb.
Where are the dancing badgers? The rabid pelican?
The flocks of wild parrots?
i’d like brad to continue with both the humor and the occasional panic.
Agreed. The further removed they are from power the crazier they’re likely to become, and the crazier they become the more likely it is that they’ll be further removed from power. The Republicans don’t seem to know how to position themselves to take advantage of problems that Obama is liable to run into, at this point they’re so engrossed in their posturing and internal squabbles that they don’t even seem to care. My guess is that even if they’re presented with golden opportunities in the next couple of years, they’ll still blow it.
Of course, I’ve been wrong plenty of times in the past.
Busted!
They only had “warm glow” tags in 1865, “blink” tags weren’t until at least the 1890s! Oh, & another thing: shouldn’t all those sirens be spinning lanterns?/??
Oh you cunning liberal devils – you ALMOST fooled me.
If the tone of terror wasn’t coming from Brad I’d be calling a flag on the play for unwarranted concern-trolling & assessing a 10-yard penalty … contrarian bastard that I am, I think the GOP could indeed lose some of what little juice they have left the next time they have to face the electoral music.
Don’t underestimate just how badly they’ve chumped their public image since losing power, Steele’s total fail as a real party leader – nor the potential toxic hangover from mindlessly slagging back against a series of shrewd initiatives being put forward by a very popular new POTUS.
Can the GOP of 2009 claw their way through the bottom of the barrel & deep down into the mud underneath it?
YES THEY CAN!
Yeah, I think that’s possible Jim. The GOP along with their base are still in deep denial. If they lose big in the upcoming midterms that may be the wake up call for them. But so far they don’t really believe that they lost the past election. They think it was some kind of fluke easily fixed. Or that ‘Barry’ cast some kind of witchy spell on everyone and that pretty soon people will wake up and elect them back into office. Not gonna happen, not right now.
I sometimes forget that, mentally and emotionally, you are children and children have short memories.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132×1500546
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132×1500546
I keep forgetting that, like children, you libs have short memories.
I keep forgetting that, like children, you libs have short memories.
While on the other hand, you won’t allow us to forget that you’re a stupid sack of crap. Like we need reminding.
The same complaints were just made about Obama’s inauguration, so I guess liberal’s aren’t the only ones with child-like short memories.
“liberals” sans apostrophe, sheesh.
OT: The bastards have murdered Dr. Tiller.
Another example of right-wing violence
Besides, righties are complaining about a fucking DATE NIGHT after gobbling Bush cock for 8 years of record setting vacation taking. Maybe Obama should have cleared some brush.
8 years of record setting vacation taking
That was terrorist brush he was clearing.
He has memory problems when it comes to remembering other people’s memory problems.
There are depths of stupid to which (of which? from which? I don’t have y’all’s book larnin’) they have yet to plumb.
should be: …depths of stupid which …
We need a smarter opposition ideology in this country. The current crop isn’t cutting it.
Personally, I’m thrilled with this crop of potato heads representin’. I hope they keep the stupid shit up for a long long time as it will guarantee the Republican Party stays dead in the polls.
Beyond the base base, the so-called elite of the Party can’t restrain themselves either. Bill Maher came up with a fabulous retort to Republican Heather Wilson’s ’subtle’ dig, on his show last night.
Unless it’s “to which they have yet to plunge”. I like that image. It’s an accurate representation of the bottomless pit they are cliff-diving into.
These people were around in 1865, and even more unfortunately, 1861. The Southern Poor White Trash that are the Republican Base now went to war and fought and died in order to preserve a labor system that made the only thing they had to sell in order to survive, their labor, worthless on the open market.
Cutting off your nose to spite your face, it’s not a bug, it’s a feature!
I prefer improbably mixed metaphors, meself.
How’s about:
There are depths of stupid which they have yet to plumb, as they soar off the cliff and ride the barrel over the falls, only to claw their way through the bottom of the barrel into the mud underneath the river.
I was not aware that the mountain bike George W. Bush always rode was really his only means of transportation. What a frugal fellow he was, and how mindful of our taxpayer dollars.
Gah! The elitism, it panics me!
There have been times when poor Southern Whites realized that they were being screwed and did something about it. There were some political alliances between poor Whites and newly freed Blacks during Reconstruction and there were IWW-inspired labor alliances in Louisiana in the early years of the 20th century. I don’t know much about the late-19th century populists, but I believe there were Black-White alliances in the early years of that movement, too.
All of these attempts at sanity were crushed by the local power structures.
Poor Southern Whites have usually fought for the wrong side, but I don’t think that they’re necessarily destined to do so for all eternity.
Gah! The elitism. It panics me.
FYWP. Also.
Snorg:
Having grown up in their homeland, Western Washington, I’m ashamed of not thinking of the Wobblies. Yeah, you’re right, anything can happen when people suddenly see how they’ve been hoodwinked. It might not be pretty.
The eyebrows panic said,
Oh very good. Now Thatcherise him. I dare you.
Further suggestions for Noonan-related activities.
Well they probably wouldn’t have been carping about Lincoln’s security detail. Probably.
I can hardly believe what I read. Someone actually called Lincoln an “elitist” and raked him over the coals for going to the play at which he was assassinated. Perhaps this excuses the assassin? I don’t want to read any more of it. Might get some on me. Sadlyno is brave diving into the stupid.
Well, the usual Republican tactic here is to blame black and brown people for taking the jobs that “belong” to “real Americans” who deserve them (see Helms, Jesse).
Not sure if that would work here, since it’s the Republican governors who are making a big deal out of refusing Obama’s offer of money to extend unemployment benefits.
My worry
Do you do anything else?
And frankly, your worries have a very poor history of coming true.
Never thought about it exactly like that, but yeah, exceptional way to put it.
Well, normally, they are continually conned by the Rich Southern Whites whose boots are on their necks that “if they just get with the program, those boots’ll come up real soon and y’all can be just like us, plantation and all.” So they get with the program, hating anyone else at their economic level because soon, oh soon, they will get to be all high and mighty too. God forbid anyone dusky actually succeeds in a meritocracy, it’d just be “affirmative action”, and thats just keeping the good White Folks down that much longer.
Of course, it ain’t never gonna happen. It’s Lucy with the goddamn football, generation after generation, and, like Charlie Brown, said PSWs are too fucking stupid to just take the last step a bit to one side and kick the motherfuckers in the head. Instead, they are doomed to lay on their collective back crying “Auuughhhh! Niggers!” for all eternity, a sad, but reliable electoral bloc.
And frankly, your worries have a very poor history of coming true.
Thank goodness.
I’m beginning to appreciate the pants-a-poopin’ posts; they’re a feature of S, N! sort of like the posts at Balloon Juice where John Cole says “Conservative Icon X has just died. Don’t say anything mean about him.” Then the commenters say “That supply-sider, death-squad-supporting goon? Where’s his grave so I can whizz on it (as soon as I’m done eating all this asparagus)?” and Cole gets all mad.
As I mentioned earlier, it already has – two or three times.
Different “it”, I do believe. My implication was that the oligarchs are never going to let the crackers into the club. Even though they always say “It’s a maybe, as long as you’re white, we might pick ya. Then you’ll be set.” It ain’t never gonna happen.
Occasionally the rubes shrug off the blinders. Sure. When it becomes more than simply undeniable just how hard they’re getting fucked over, there is the slim possibility of pushback. Even that doesn’t happen much. Twice or thrice, and of unfortunately short duration, I’ll give you. Then, as you said, it gets broken up.
Strong pushbacks haven’t happened much anywhere in the US. It has happened in the South, probably stronger and of longer duration than you realize, though it was a looooong time ago. You might want to check this out (by ‘southwest’ he means Oklahoma, east Texas, and west Louisiana). And note that the rednecks involved weren’t trying to get “into the club” – they were trying to get rid of the club.
If you’re saying that modern-day rednecks are almost certain to remain overwhelmingly hostile to the left for many years to come, yeah, you’re very probably right. But never say never.
Oh, I won’t say never. Yes, the last time the robber barons decided that they owned every ounce of all of us and then ass-augered the country down a bottomless pit, flirting with Socialism, in a very real way, not just wingnut pants-pissing, was quite common. The New Deal, rather than being the bane to capitalism the wingnuts think, prolonged the viability of a system that many were plenty fed up with, thank you very much. The Cold War allowed the Moneyed Motherfuckers to turn Socialism into a dirty word, with Tailgunner Joe and his ilk leading the charge, delusional and for all the wrong reasons.
And here we are.
Brad, if you’re worried that a complete tanking of the economy will help the righties in ’12, I wouldn’t be so sure. Americans may have a stupid streak, but we know who has been robbing us blind. It takes some serious overstepping of the line by the privileged to put us into torches and pitchforks mode, but it is possible. The “social conservatives” will be the last to join the mob. They, even more than most, are virtually unable to admit, accept and correct the fact that they have been wrong. It’s part of why they are “social conservatives”. The banksters and their buddies are pushing pretty hard, though.
If the shit really, really hits the fan, we could yet see some major realignments. I’ve been saying for years that it was going to need to get much worse before folks would make it get better. It’s definitely moving down the road, though it ain’t there yet. I shudder to think the world that would need to be to do the job.
…Zombie Reagan…
Is there some other kind of Reagan?
Reagan Prime?
…For example, here’s a recent proposal from our friend Plumb Bob for a federal law that would require American citizens to play with poopoo…
Brilliant! And not at all intrusive, I’d say even the most casual Sadlies handle poopoo now and again, even if it’s just to verify the link on a Krauthammer post.
…It was a thoughtful article, Shulman’s was….
I feel funny saying “context is everything” but…but…but…butt…butt…
Just had a lovely Sunday barbecue with my sister in law, listening to her talk about her and my brother’s struggle to stay alive; he’s working night shift for this completely duplicitous company that job shops stuff for one of a larger meglo-marketers; at night, he and whatever crew they can dredge up from the temp agencies set up displays. Slightly dangerous work, because the help is incompetent, and there’s speeding forklift drivers racing around trying to restock the shelves before dawn. They promised him the work would be in his area; what that actually means is anywhere in a 200 mile circle, and they’ll tell him where he’ll be working the night before, so he can count on some long, long commutes. Two kids, unemployment ran out, so he’ll be working the night shift and driving back home. I don’t have the money to help out. All I can do is listen to this story and get more furious at the way we’ve been played by these liars who assure us that work is out there for those who want it, that this system provides the maximum opportunities for everyone, and that fixing the social safety net would just be trimming the sails of the capital producing class.