Likud It Or Not, Syria Had To Be Blown Up
Above: Abrams, second from left, arm extended far into God of War’s posterior.
Elliott Abrams — also known by his nom de criminel Mr. Kenilworth — has written an account of Israel’s bombing of Syria’s al Kibar nuclear reactor. At the time, Abrams was one of George W. Bush’s deputy NSAs and so his version of events is an insider’s. Since Abrams is a self-described “gladiator,” a patron of butchers in Central America, a smear merchant and liar, husband of a genocidally-minded homophobic fascist, brother-in-law to one of same sentiments, son-in-law of a certifiable madman, and author of a book which demands of his co-tribalists a more ethnic purity by denouncing Jewish-gentile intermarriage in the strident tone of an old Southern anti-miscegenation tract, his story of the strike on Syria, published in his family’s magazine Commentardy, is bound to betray a certain authorial slant. And he doesn’t disappoint.
First he provides some background. Mean Condi Rice had relatively soured relations with the Israelis. She, like the rest of the administration, was fine with Israel blowing the shit out of Lebanon for a while but she didn’t want it to go on indefinitely. Bad Condi! Then the story takes off.
After the war, the head of Mossad comes to the White House to show Bush, Cheney, Hadley and Abrams some photoshops intelligence on Syrians allegedly constructing a nuclear reactor with North Korean assistance. The Israelis insist the reactor has to go. After confirming the Israeli intelligence, the top officials named above decide to keep all information about it inside the White House. There are no leaks even though Abrams stupidly leaves notes under a chair for a time. It’s determined that the reactor is designed for weapons use; it’s also quickly decided that military means of destroying it is the best recourse. Diplomatic options are considered, but Abrams opposes this line because, first, Israel wouldn’t like it; second, because Mohommed El-Baradai of the IAEA is an Egyptian and therefore of the international Muslim conspiracy; and third, because it would put the ball in the court of the appeasers who wholly constitute the State Department.
Cheney is for the United States bombing the hell out of it, surprise surprise, because doing so would make America look strong in the face of the beating we’re taking in Iraq; also, it would be useful to scare the Iranians.
No one else in the room agrees with the Vice-President even though he shoots people in the face just because it feels good. When Bush calls a show of hands for endorsement of Cheney’s plan, no one raises theirs, though Abrams is sympathetic. Mr. Kenilworth certainly likes the Cheney solution but, well, there is for him a superseding issue: Israeli public relations and prestige. Or as he puts it:
My hand did not go up (and as we left the president’s living room that day, June 17, I apologized to the vice president for leaving him isolated) because I thought the Israelis should bomb the reactor, restoring their credibility after the annus horribilis of 2006 with the Second Lebanon War and then the 2007 Hamas takeover of Gaza. It seemed to me that Israel would suffer if we bombed it, because analysts would point out that Israel had acted against the Osirak reactor in Iraq in 1981 but had become paralyzed when it came to Syria. Such an analysis might embolden Iran and Hamas, a development that would be greatly against American [lol – ed.] interests. Moreover, hostile reactions in the Islamic world against the bombing strike might hurt us at a time when we were fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq—another argument for letting Israel do the job. (I did not think there would be any such reactions, but this was an argument worth deploying in our internal debate.)
This sets the stage for Abrams to slam Secretaries Rice and Gates in his narrative as the administration’s Neville Chamberlains, both insufficiently bellicose to Arabs and insufficiently servile to Israeli interests:
Secretaries Gates and Rice argued strenuously for the diplomatic option. Gates also argued for preventing Israel from bombing the reactor and urged putting the whole relationship between the United States and Israel on the line. His language recalled the “agonizing reappraisal” of relations Eisenhower’s secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, had threatened for Europe in 1953 if the Europeans failed to take certain defense measures: They simply had to do what we demanded or there would be hell to pay.
I think Abrams’s analogous invocation of that era and that president is no accident; he knows his audience. Britain, France, and Israel were ordered similarly to get their hands off the Suez by that backstabber Ike, which remains a sore subject for most neoconmen (one hint to Chuck Hagel’s awfulness in their point of view is his admiration of the 34th President).
I tried to think my way through Rice’s reasoning, but came up with only one theory. She had simultaneously been expressing opposition to a new program of increased military aid to Israel. This indicated to me that she had an underlying strategy: She did not want Israel feeling stronger. Rather, she wanted Israel, and especially Prime Minister Olmert, to feel more dependent on the United States. That way she would be able to push forward with plans for an international conference on Israeli-Palestinian issues and for final-status talks leading to the creation of a Palestinian state before the end of the second Bush term.
This of course is something Abrams must sabotage at all costs.
Bush came down on Rice’s side. We would go to Vienna, to the IAEA; he would call Olmert and tell him what the decision was. I was astounded and realized I had underestimated Rice’s influence even after all this time. The president had gone with Condi.
Panic button time! Abrams writes a “terrific memo” to Hadley pleading on the Israelis’ behalf. It is ignored; Abrams has a sadz. Bush calls Prime Minister Olmert and tells him America’s going the diplomatic route for now and Israel is to follow its lead. Olmert politely tells Bush to fuck himself. Abrams in describing this scene quotes from Bush’s memoirs then delights Commentary readers (whose favorite in this phone conversation is a given) by calling Bush a liar. Abrams then cheerfully recounts how, two months later with still no green light from the U.S., Israel bombs the site. Abrams is there when Bush answers the phone to receive the last-minute notice from Olmert. The President says in so many words “well ok, whatever,” hangs up, supposedly tells Abrams that Olmert has guts. Abrams is sure to note that Bush won’t let Olmert’s intransigence and unilateralism negatively affect America’s relationship with Israel. He suspects Bush is secretly approving of the strike. Abrams is personally thrilled that Condi’s diplomatic angle is, for the moment, ruined.
The rest of the piece is all about how right the Israelis were and are, how the strike made Assad the hugest chickenshit ever, ready to totally capitulate to any Israeli or American demand until once again the evil Condi Rice ruined it all with her stupid diplomacy-which-is-always-appeasement stuff. Abrams concludes by asserting with typical neoconartistry that advisers don’t matter, it’s what kinda man the Preznit is that is crucial and the best are those who, in general, are eager to blow up Arabs and Persians, and in particular, are willing to defer to Israeli expertise on how to deal with the wogs.
My question is why is the term “Israel-Firster” so objectionable when people like Abrams seem in their own words to try their absolute best to make it true?
Also, too: Fred Hiatt’s resident Commentard Jennifer “Bili” Rubin is today blurbing Abrams’s new book, which she suspects will “become required reading for future generations of diplomats and Middle East observers.” I think she means required reading for convicted perjurers and saboteurs of diplomacy. Anyway, she’s never read anything written by an Abrams-Pod Person she didn’t like, and the more crazy, racist, and fascist it is the more breathlessly she endorses it.
Also, too, as well: Wow. See also Glenzilla’s update. I’m certain in just a few hours at least one Pod Person will smear the author of the Time article, a soldier who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. My money’s on Rubin.
Not only is Rubin a liar and clown, she’s a terrible writer.
Way to go, Hiatt!
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– Jenghazi Rubin, reporting from some alternate universe
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It shows just how batshit crazy the Bush administration was when Condi Rice sounds like the voice of reason in the room.
I wish we had a foreign-policy establishment with the balls to say to Israel, “If you think you can shoot your problems away, we can’t stop you. But if it all goes south, don’t come crying to us.”
My two cents worth:
I think the reason Condi wanted to try diplomacy is simply to keep the ball in her court: it was just a matter of office politics so to speak, not any ideological support or antipathy to Israeli interests.
Sorry to Godwin the thread so early, but it kind of does apply here (and it at least speaks to the Israeli mindset): does anybody really, seriously think that Israel has any reason to trust an international community that had its head in its collective ass while Hitler gained power with an already established genocidally anti-Semitic agenda, assisted the Arab powers that be in creating a perminant “refugee problem” that could be used as a cudgel against Israel, takes every opportunity possible to dismiss Israeli interests and act as if Israel is the worst country ever while turning a blind eye to far worse behavior by other nations?
The US was right to try to handle this thing through diplomacy, but when push came to shove and diplomacy was going no-where, Israel was the country that was threatened and Israel had every reason to act the way it did.
Netanyahu has a habit of “feeling threatened” any time someone looks at him cross-eyed.
So the “diplomatic scalpel” was the inability to influence anyone and the sincere wish to blow shit up and kill people? Yeah, it’s just too bad Obama has the unilateral sledgehammer of at least appearing to try to work with others and to not be so thrilled about killing folks.
Speaking as someone whose grandfather risked his life to help liberate a subcamp of Dachau while two future Israeli prime ministers were conspiring to murder Count Bernadotte, I think that check has been cashed. Israel can act like what it claims to be or it can fuck off and so can people who habitually excuse its crimes because of tribalist loyalty.
I wish we had a foreign-policy establishment with the balls to say to Israel, “If you think you can shoot your problems away, we can’t stop you. But if it all goes south, don’t come crying to us.” – Bitter Scribe
Agreed (to a large degree) actually. The problem is that too many people who are willing to say this are also too willing to push Israel toward solutions with inevitable results that those pushing for such solutions by and large would certainly not tolerate for themselves. Our foreign policy establishment needs to say to Israel: “If you think you can shoot your problems away, we can’t stop you. But if it all goes south, don’t come crying to us. OTOH, if you follow our advice and it even looks like it’s all about to go south, we gotcher back”. Of course, the Bush admin was the worst of both worlds: they not only refused to be a good friend to Israel and guide it away from futile attempts to shoot its problems away, but on the rate occassions when the Bush admin did support a less militaristic path for Israel, it refused to catch Israel’s back in terms of dealing with the inevitable fall-out (e.g. the push for elections in Gaza leading to the Hamas takeover) … and yet the Bush admin, which was about the most assholish enabler of the worst in Israel, is deemed a “friend” of Israel?
One of the problems, btw, the very real, if sometimes not entirely conscious anti-Semitic motivations of some of Israel’s critics, together with the very real state of siege that Israel has often lived under since its creation because of the violent refusal of its neighborhood to accept its very existance (in a land which has for thousands of years been the Jewish homeland even though it was under colonialist occupation for well over a thousand years), create is that too many in Israel have a siege mentality that is not conducive to solving Israel’s problems, either foreign or domestic. While certainly meaningless in terms of Israel’s foreign policies and even possibly when all is said and done not so meaningful in terms of sepcific domestic problems in the short term, at least the number of seats won by Yair Lapid’s party should send a strong signal to Likud that they can’t use Israel’s security situation as an excuse for everything anymore.
Of course, when you think of things from the Israeli perspective, what choices do they have? They can maintain the status quo which is, um, problematic. They can continue on a track (as the far right in Israel wants to do) of de facto annexing the West Bank, which will make everything Israel’s critics say about Israel being an apartheid state come true. They can try to make peace with their neighbors and facilitate the creation of a Palestinian state — which, if anything even happens as is unlikely given how past “negotiations” have worked out, could go on to elect a Hamas government that declares war on Israel and drags the region back into confliect. So what should Israel do?
My two cents worth:
Israel has been the aggressor in the Middle East at least since Sabra and Shatila.
And if Israel would rather steal more land than have peace, she can do so without our financial and military support.
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Yes, this. Perfect, as usual HTML.
DAS, you haven’t changed much since the Benny Morris thread.
Tell me how should “Israel act like what it claims to be”? Israel should do things that, whenever it’s taken baby steps in that direction, it ends up getting even more rockets lobbed at it by Hamas?
The Palestinians claim to be the natives of Israel and many on the left treat Israelis as colonialist occupiers. The Native Americans (for the record, my wife is part Native American) are the actual natives of this land. Let’s give the Native Americans rockets, let them launch them indiscriminantly at population centers and see what happens. I betcha the international community is not going to respond by saying “Americanism is a form of racism”.
The Native Americans (for the record, my wife is part Native American) are the actual natives of this land. Let’s give the Native Americans rockets, let them launch them indiscriminantly at population centers and see what happens. I betcha the international community is not going to respond by saying “Americanism is a form of racism”.
I’d be totally cool if we gave all the money we currently give to Israel to the Native Americans and started doing something to recognize how how disgustingly miserably we’ve treated them.
Sounds like a great plan, let’s start now.
Right, because America practiced ethnic cleansing 100 years ago, Israel should be allowed to do it in 2013.
It’s really simple. I, as a family farm owner, sympathize with the Palestinian whose family has tended the same olive or lemon grove for generations, only to see an IDFer on a Cat dozer destroy it because he’s a Muslim instead of a Jew and therefore must forfeit his property because G-d has given it to a Chosen race..
If some jackass tried to steal my farm by gunpoint and dozer blade because I wasn’t the “proper” race or religion, they’d do it over my dead body and I’d take as many of them with me as I could.
Especially if the entire thing is based on some utter bullshit mythology based on absolutely nothing. All the religion involved just makes it more fucking stupid — both “sides” are batshit insane.
This is the case. The Israelis even have pioneer myths.
This argument is so much like Southerners in the 1860s: “wahhh! England had legalized slavery a generation ago, why can’t we keep doing it here and now??”
Human rights and decent world opinion is a progressive thing, moral standards improve. An ugly thing that may have been tolerable if just barely for one generation will become intolerable for the next. The American frontier was cleansed by force and murder of its indigenous people by the 1890s. It was wrong. Reparations should be paid. But Israel started its same project in 1948 and continues it to the present, all the while claiming to be a beacon of morality.
I’d be totally cool if we gave all the money we currently give to Israel to the Native Americans and started doing something to recognize how how disgustingly miserably we’ve treated them.
you seem to forget that we gave them casinos, which i hear (a lot) should cancel out any past genocides or current discrimination…
ye gods! my ears are being assaulted by a taped recording of paul harvey reading some blather about ‘god made a farmer’…make it stop!
This is a really odd comment. It rests on the assumption that Native Americans want to launch rockets at people but are hindered by a lack of access to weapons.
That was the worst fucking commercial of the entire sporting spectacle. At our party we were taking bets over what it was a commercial for. I was the first to correctly identify that it was a truck ad, other guesses were “is this for some megachurch or some shit?” and “is this one of those mega food conglomorate things like ADM or something” and “fucking hell Paul Harvey is (was?) an annoying piece of shit, this is worse than that GoDaddy thing!”
<i.That was the worst fucking commercial of the entire sporting spectacle
srsly?! this was a thing during the superbowl? i paid exactly zero attention to the whole deal, being wholly absorbed in creating a list of movies i must netflix…
enh…tagfail caused by superbowl surprise as it were…
and i must admit my long-standing ignorance re: israel/palestine…i am always going to read up on it, but become distracted by other less byzantine subjects…would someone offer up a synopsis, so i can at least follow along?
this was a thing during the superbowl?
Yeah, rilly. It was ‘orrible.
Didn’t really have any interest in the footsyballs or the commercials, just an excuse to eat and drink.
In other words, a normal Sunday.
One block of religious nutters thinks another block of a different religion’s nutters is on their land. Hilarity ensues.
Yeah, rilly. It was ‘orrible.
we all know that i am now going to google that, because sadomasochistic tendencies and such…
That was the worst fucking commercial of the entire sporting spectacle
I dunno…there was a lot of competition. Like the black goldfish or whatever it was singing its love of a beer in a black bottle called “Sapphire” (aren’t sapphires red?). Or that Go Daddy ad that featured some nerd noisily sucking face with Bar Rafeli for what seemed like forever.
(In Go Daddy’s defense, they actually managed to come up with another ad that was funny, clever and not reekingly sexist. Well, unless you count the fact that all the couch entrepreneurs were male while their nagging, skeptical S.O.s were, of course, female. But you take progress however you can get it, I guess.)
Well, they are. The modern state of Israel was created as a “sorry about that genocide” gift to one set of Europeans by another set of Europeans. Few of the Europeans involved seemed to give a flying fuck about the people who were already living there.
The Palestinians claim to be the natives of Israel and many on the left treat Israelis as colonialist occupiers.
They ARE natives. The Palestinians are the direct blood descendants of the Jews who lived there two thousand years ago. Some of those Jews converted to Xianity. Most of those who did not leave converted to Islam when Mo was rockin the area. The Palestinians have closer direct ties to the land than the vast majority of the Jews living there now.
And take that “many on the left” bullshit and stuff it.
That was the worst fucking commercial of the entire sporting spectacle
ugh…i listened to some of it and then got highly, highly annoyed…okay, i love me some farmers…but, for the most part, that ad does NOT portray today’s farms…holy hellions, 90% of the farmers around here could buy and sell us all…yeah sure they work their asses off during planting and harvesting (but with the new gps tractors and what not..) but between shopping for new f-150s, buying lake cabins and going someplace warm in the wintertime, i don’t feel particularly beholden to them…
Israel deliberately forgets its history
Yeah, those were bad. But at least it was obvious what they were trying to, y’know, sell. The truck ad was bad and completely incomprehensible.
I tended to tune out the beer commercials for obvious reasons. What did catch my attention was Bud’s new “Golden Amber Lager” evidently made for rich attractive people (with ‘orrible taste). Maybe they are realizing that going after the “hurdurr NASCAR! derp” crowd has diminishing returns.
It helps that there is no actual beer style such as “Golden Amber Lager” so they can pretty much just put any crap they want in a fancy bottle and charge more for it. It’s not like anybody would be able to tell, or care.
You know what I’d like to see?
It isn’t going to happen in a zillion years, but I’d like to see what would happen if everyone in Palestine announced they were going to convert to Judaism. The old blood merchants might experience massive head explosions.
Sapphires are usually blue. If they’re red, they’re called “rubies.”
You have to pick the right sect.
My neighbor gets really pissed every time I try to build a “settlement” in his back yard.
I told him that my holy book clearly states that my ancestors lived there 2000 years ago, but he just wandered off muttering something about getting his shotgun.
You have the airplanes to take care of this before there’s a problem.
Sapphires are usually blue.
Right you are. One of these days I’ll learn: Google first, then post.
It’s pretty clear it isn’t about religion.
E.g. the Ethiopian Jews who were “coaxed” into taking Depo-Provera.
~
I told him that my holy book clearly states that my ancestors lived there 2000 years ago, but he just wandered off muttering something about getting his shotgun.
You have the airplanes to take care of this before there’s a problem.
Ooh, I hope his neighbor is a chicken farmer so they can huck poultry at each other.
FFS, to an outsider that article is inane and completely incomprehensible.
the diplomatic scalpel handed to them by the Bush administration,
If Rubin is trying to portray the Bush administration as the Jack the Ripper of Middle-East diplomacy, she is doing a fine job.
Ooh, I hope his neighbor is a chicken farmer so they can huck poultry at each other.
I eagerly await the militarised form of the birdstrike-testing chicken cannon.
Ooh, I hope his neighbor is a chicken farmer so they can huck poultry at each other.
Load the chicken-a-pult!
At the dawn of history some goatherders were mean to other goatherders and took their land. The winning goatherders made up stories about how that land was granted to them by their imaginary friend, who, by the way, created the universe, and in honor of which they decided to pile up some holy rocks. Their neighbors invaded. over and over again. Then the Roman empire squashed them like a bug and knocked down their rocks. Many descendants of goatherders are killed or sold into slavery and or shipped to the far corners of the empire.
Hundreds of years pass. Other goatherders sulked and claimed that no, indeed it was their imaginary friend (who was the same as, yet different from the original imaginary friend, in ways that seem minor but whose differences are deadly serious issue among the descendants of all of the goatherders) who created the universe and piled up some different holy rocks on top of the ruins of the original holy rocks that the Romans knocked down. Many descendants of goatherders are killed or sold into slavery and or shipped to the far corners of this empire.
More hundreds of years pass. The descendants of Romans, who are mostly completely different people who really like the extended dance remix of the imaginary friend story come visiting and bring their swords and axes and catapults and slaughter nearly everyone who lives near both sets of holy rocks. Many descendants of goatherders are killed or sold into slavery and or shipped to the far corners of the world.
A hundred or so years pass and the descendants of Romans who subscribed to the extended dance remix version of the imaginary friend story, are killed or converted or exiled from the neighborhood of the holy rocks by the group who follows the slightly different imaginary friend story. Many descendants of goatherders and followers of the extended dance remix are killed or sold into slavery and or shipped to the far corners of the world.
Many hundreds of years pass. The tiny fraction of the original goatherders decide the time has come to reclaim their holy rocks. The people living in the neighborhood of the holy rocks are disturbed, because they have seen how this plays out.
Now in musical form.
Of course, when you think of things from the Israeli perspective, what choices do they have? They can maintain the status quo which is, um, problematic. They can continue on a track (as the far right in Israel wants to do) of de facto annexing the West Bank, which will make everything Israel’s critics say about Israel being an apartheid state come true. They can try to make peace with their neighbors and facilitate the creation of a Palestinian state — which, if anything even happens as is unlikely given how past “negotiations” have worked out, could go on to elect a Hamas government that declares war on Israel and drags the region back into conflict. So what should Israel do?
DAS, don’t be such a pain in the ass, you’re making us look bad. You make peace and quit worrying about the “inevitable” down-the-line when the newly-elected Hamas government declares war on poor Israel so why should we even try bullshit. Every fucking time. You quit tossing up Godwins so as to avoid accepting culpability for the fact that the far-right/center-right coalition in charge of the Israeli government is fucking up the country for everybody else largely because they only have power as long as they can convince any other choice is an existential threat. You quit trying to chalk up America being a fuckwit to carte blanche for Israel to be a fuckwit, because if our own limitation is how much someone else is close to the bottom of the barrel, we may as well just all become Uzbekistan.
Above all, you do what’s right for Israel and you do what’s right for every other Jew in the world by QUIT MAKING US LOOK BAD.
While I like my short version, yours is brilliant. “Extended dance remix” indeed. Well played!
Keep hucking those chickens!
Load the chicken-a-pult!
Catapoult? Henager? Trebuchook?
“Cockthrower” has a simple, homey feel to it.
Related: This place in the Columbia Gorge was named (by the Native Americans originally, in their language) as “Cock Rock” for obvious reasons. The early settlers (ooh, look, I’m on topic again!) kept up that tradition, in English, until enough of them showed up that some of the wimmenfolk might’ve been offended or something so they started calling it “Rooster Rock” — that’s still the name of the state park there.
I distinctly remember laughing uncontrollably as a child after about the 10th time the family drove by that when I finally figured out why they named it that.
What did catch my attention was Bud’s new “Golden Amber Lager” evidently made for rich attractive people (with ‘orrible taste).
are you talking about ‘black crown’? i tried some last month and didn’t find it to ‘orrible…but i was seriously in my cups by that time and felt more whiskey would be a bad decision and yet didn’t want to assault my tastebuds with other options, i.e. busch light…
And all that and I forgot to shout PENIS! as is traditional in such situations. I’m ashamed.
Yes, that’s the one.
Madame, I would like to remind you that I am a snob about such things. I am contractually obligated to reflexively hate all those shitty FOREIGN Budweiser beers, else I lose my snob card. I’ll have none of your objective analysis weighing into it.
Harumph.
“Cockthrower” has a simple, homey feel to it.
If it looks like Superman it’s not a cockerel, you can tell with the capon.
That pun was a little gamey.
Related: This place in the Columbia Gorge was named (by the Native Americans originally, in their language) as “Cock Rock” for obvious reasons.
Shame on you for omitting the critical information: it is a popular gay nude beach.
Unofficial name: Size Queen Heights.
OBS –
Yesterday I braised lamb shanks in Five Pine Chocolate Porter from Three Creeks Brewing. As a drinking beer it okay to nice, as a braising liquid it was fantastic.
until enough of them showed up that some of the wimmenfolk might’ve been offended or something
ha, ha…the wimmens were probably wistful…
re: israel…thanks for they synopsi and the nina paley link…i had forgotten that that was going to be one of my study aids…perhaps i am subconsciously telling myself that i don’t really want to learn that history?
Shame on you for omitting the critical information: it is a popular gay nude beach.
that explains the nekkid cartoon guys with their wheelbarrows…
also, too…since 10:30 this morning until now, gasomoline has gone up seven flipping cents…wth?
Harumph.
sorry…fergot my place…never to correct the beer snob!
Five Pine Chocolate Porter
must…have…
Many refineries are making the switch to summer blends. The summer blends are slightly more expensive. The refineries also back off on produciton around now to do maintenance and shit. So it’s a supply thing.
Had you been paying attention to Morning Edition I wouldn’t have to tell you this shit. 😐
Some local information I am not privy to.
I’ve had a couple of their beers, but not that one. I’m seeing more of their stuff locally on tap and in bottles, so I’ll give it a try when I see it. Did you ever get around to braising anything in Rasputin Imperial Stout? I bet that’d be yummers.
…
Braising the shank
Had you been paying attention to Morning Edition I wouldn’t have to tell you this shit. 😐
fiddle-dee-dee…i used that time to watch a replay of jon stewart…
Catapoult? Henager? Trebuchook?
There turns out to be prior art for the term “catapoultry”.
i tried some of new glarus stuff weekend before last…i think i had the coffee stout…i will give it a ‘meh’…
linky
I had coffee stout once. I filed it under novelty beers that aren’t horrible but I wouldn’t drink again.
Notable for making you pee 50% sooner than you would from drinking beer or coffee alone.
If Smut makes it so I can’t retell the same joke after a several months-long waiting period he’s going in the man-guinea-l.
I make an espresso stout so I’m obviously biased, but I think they’re pretty good if they’re subtle.
Some local information I am not privy to.
Anyone who has been there will likely have seen guys boinking on the beach. So it’s not like anyone was keeping it secret, y’know?
You could always pay him back where he lives, tigris.
~
Notable for making you pee 50% sooner than you would from drinking beer or coffee alone.
yes…
but I think they’re pretty good if they’re subtle.
yes…
Where is the Pepsi Max stout?
Last time I was a that State Park was 20+ years ago, and there was nobody there… The weather wasn’t very nice (IIRC) so perhaps not ideal beach-boinking weather.
Where is the Pepsi Max stout?
Waiting for your magic touch to bring it about, obviously.
. Did you ever get around to braising anything in Rasputin Imperial Stout?
My usual stores* don’t carry it. On the rare occasion I go to the big Freddies or somewhere I always fucking forget to pick it up. I SHALL REMEMBER SOON
*Fred Meyer Burlingame, cause it’s so close. New Seasons in Sellwood. Winco for staples and canned goods. Cash and Carry (restaurant supply place) for some meats (those that don’t come in case lots – frozen duck $2.15 /lb right now, I snagged three the other day). I sometimes hit the Zupan’s on Macadam when I just want to be frivolous spendthrift.
My usual stores*
again…thanx for reminding me once again that i live in a shithole…
Where is the Pepsi Max stout?
Not to mention the Mountain Dew IPA.
I assume even now an enterprising home brewer is devising Yoo-Hoo Doppelbock.
Well, they are. The modern state of Israel was created as a “sorry about that genocide” gift to one set of Europeans by another set of Europeans. Few of the Europeans involved seemed to give a flying fuck about the people who were already living there.
This.
There was a picture making the rounds on Facebook last week of a protest where one woman held up a sign that said “I AM A PALESTINIAN. I WAS BORN IN JERUSALEM. PALESTINE IS MY HOMELAND, BUT I CANNOT RETURN THERE.” Next to her, another woman, with a sign of her own. “I AM AN AMERICAN JEW. I WAS BORN IN U.S.A. ISRAEL IS NOT MY HOMELAND, BUT I CAN ‘RETURN’ THERE.”
The entire conflict in a nutshell. Fuck if I’m going to use nice, soothing words to describe a system that gives more rights to people born on the other side of the world than to the people who’ve actually lived there all their lives based on nothing other than racial ancestry.
note: the car was totalled…
this story just lend credence to my fear that i will be squished while driving by oversized loads…
yoo-hooing the doppelbock…
Driving by the oversized load.
Still better than Bud’s latest thing.
Agreed entirely. There was a “chocolate milk stout” on tap across the street and the staff was raving about it. It’s the kind of beer (combination chocolate stout and “milk stout” — brewed with added milk sugars) that was worth trying. Once. After that you never need to try it again. Super chocolatey and milky — like drinking a thinner alcoholic chocolate milk. No thanks.
A little hint of chocolate? A smidge of additional lingering sweetness? Fine. The underlying beer needs to be able to stand on its own merits, and then be improved by the addition of something else.
If I wanted to drink a glass of chocolate I’ll make a glass of hot chocolate.
“Cockthrower” has a simple, homey feel to it.
The defensive fortification would be known as the cockblocker.
Jennifer “Bili” Rubin
Thank you, sir, for enhancing my vocabulary today – even if indirectly. I have added stercobilic to the list of words I must somehow work into conversation.
Is stercobilin the reason people who think their shit don’t stink are wrong?
While I’m sure you could (and someone probably already has) work kola nuts into a stout, I’m a little skeptical about the brewing of the MDIPA. I mean, where would you even find dew nuts? In the mountains obviously, but which mountains?
Hanging from the back of pickup trucks, mostly.
Fortunately Max can be found in most places and it takes only a little bit of trickery to lure him into the vats.
I mean, where would you even find dew nuts?
I suspect the ‘mountain’ moniker is misleading, given the ubiquity of the swamp variety of nut.
well, once again, due to your links, your wit and your silliness, i have managed to get precious little work done today…so, i’m off…to finally see les mis with the daughter…yay!!!
Relevant.
Oh, those wacky Hindus!
Not relevant, you meanies.
I cannut believe you resisted the temptation to say “Oh, those nutty Hindus!”
Oh, by the Lords of Kobol, people fighting the Arab-Israeli conflict over here. Snark blog needs more funneh —
…the extended dance remix of the imaginary friend story.
Bingo! Well-done, sir!
Not relevant, you meanies.
Oh, right. Because if there’s one problem the right suffers, it’s that they’ve increasingly been silenced over the past 30 years.
OMFG it’s projection rolled up into a strawman, clothed in IOKIYAR and propped up with hyperbole.
A. EVERYONE IS AGAINST YOU!!
B. FIGHT BACK AGAINST EVERYONE!!!
C. BUY MY NEXT BOOK WHICH WILL EXPLAIN WHY EVERYONE IS STILL AGAINST YOU AND WHAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT!!!!
Oh Jeebus Coprophilic Christ.
Because teaching symbolism is exactly the same as brainwashing a new generation of socialists.
Yes please. Every two income household will just flip to a single income so Junior doesn’t get no indoctrination at the public school.
Mine would say “E pluribus unum.”
A white cross on blue with “In God We Truss” in one corner and a rattle snake coiled around the base with a cartoon speech bubble: “Don’t tread on me!”
The comments over there are a truly festive affair of fear and hate. Wow.
My wife has seriously been considering getting out of teaching because of these types of people. It’s a hard thankless job anyway, but to have a third of the country think you’re some sort of evil socialist mind control agent because you won’t teach that Jeebus rode around on a dinosaur is becoming a bit much.
I mean, where would you even find dew nuts?
Follow a police car, they’ll eventually lead you to a dew nuts place.
a truly festive affair of fear and hate
Aye, a wingnut pelican drinking party if I ever saw one. I took the rarely-done extra effort of whitelisting the site on Ghostery and temporarily allowing a bazillion scripts under NoScript just to witness it.
One brave ‘Mary’ asks “Do we know if they also included other system’s symbols? Does anyone here… know what the WHOLE lesson plan was? Do you know if there was equal or more time given to our system of government? Don’t we want our children to understand the other systems, even if we don’t want them to adhere to them?.”
And in reply, she receives only the implication that she’s drunken the socialist kool-aid. (Either that or invited to commit suicide…)
Every other comment is along the lines of “OMFG the libs are taking over, the sky is falling and they need to be deported to California now before our childrens is edumacated,” which is the general gist of the entire EAGnews site in the first place, so no wonder they’re eagerly chuffing down each others’ regurgitated paranoia.
Their editor and publisher, Kyle Olson, is as typical as they come in these regressive educator circles:
Really? Clownhall? Go figure.
Now, off to revoke all those permissions and de-whitelist that cesspool…
Sects and drugs and rock-n-roll…
OBS, try the chocolate porter at Block 15 next time they have it. Not sweet and the chocolate is subtle.
Follow a police car
Har! Verily, I wonder at thee and at the slyness and deftness of thy wit!
Jesus Christ, people were worried about communiss indoctrinashun back when I was a tot. It’s just that without the internets you couldn’t see the loons assembled in all their glory.
Beer, braising and catapoultry, sorry I missed out. Wish I could contribute but just can’t seem to pullet off.
Super chocolatey and milky — like drinking a thinner alcoholic chocolate milk. No thanks.
Agreed. The chocolate stout milkshake at McMenamins however is delightful. On the rare occasion I go to McMenamins I’m highly likely to order one along with a burger and tots.
[…] taking this opportunity to mention that HTML Mencken, my favorite of all the Sadlynauts, is back in furious action at Sadly, […]
Where will you go if America collapses?
And so on.
Good to have you back, HTML.
@DAS: “assisted the Arab powers that be in creating a perminant “refugee problem” that could be used as a cudgel against Israel”
Ah yes, the nefarious scheming otherwise known as “recognizing there were PEOPLE living in the territory before and insisting they might have some sort of rights”.
Where will you go if America collapses?
Wouldn’t the Libertarian paradise of Somalia be the obvious choice?
Israel can act like what it claims to be or it can fuck off and so can people who habitually excuse its crimes because of tribalist loyalty.
Strongly agree.
Israel can act like what it claims to be or it can fuck off and so can people who habitually excuse its crimes because of tribalist loyalty.
And with this.
Where will you go if America collapses?
Wow, cesspool of crazy in the comments.
Where will you go if America collapses?
Wow, cesspool of crazy in the comments.
I’m not going in there. My chem/bio suit is still at the cleaners.
Sorry for the double-up. I failed to copy the comment I intended to agree with, forgot that I had the earlier comment in my Copy machine, and well…you know…
I blame Hilter.
Chris nails it.
What the fuck did I just read?
Yes, you do that. Please buy a one way ticket and convert all of your remaining assets to big bars of gold.
Is there a way to make these morans think America is on the verge of collapse so they’ll scurry off to safety? And then we can shout “Psyche!” and close the borders.
Where will you go if America collapses?
Why doesn’t he go to Sweden? He could have the spare bedroom in my castle, because this jerkoff is ever going anywhere like I’m the King of Sweden.
More fun from Jenghazi:
1) The schaden freudes itself.
2) You’ll find Rubin’s picture in the dictionary next to “special-interest hardliner”.
~
THIS is the copy-paste I meant to make earlier. Major props to Ibn Thundra for bringing Sabra and Shatila into the conversation.
Then the obvious choice is Switzerland.
After all, the Swiss are so generous about handing out citizenship to new arrivals.
And even though most Swiss households have machine guns
And flying cars. Don’t forget the flying cars.
I love that he only mentions the hassles of living places where people speak that funny furrin talk is when he gets to South America.
Yes, because your ass will be surrounded by fluent speakers of English in Estonia.
this jerkoff is ever going anywhere like I’m the King of Sweden.
We’re relatives! The Frau Doktorin’s mother was quite gaga for a few years before she died, and each time we visited her in the Twilight Home she insisted on calling me Prince, firmly convinced that I was a minor member of the Danish royal family. Either that, or she thought I was an alsatian.
Then we would take her out into the grounds, and she and the Frau Doktorin would chat while they threw sticks for me.
your ass will be surrounded by fluent speakers of English in Estonia
Estonia? Good luck with those language lessons!
Where “basic knowledge” is a term of art meaning “rigorous standard designed to disqualify native Russian speakers”.
Feck, even Finns think Estonian is a bugger of a
Finnish dialectlanguage.Shakezula said,
February 5, 2013 at 5:24
What the fuck did I just read?
So if America goes under, I recommend going Down Under.
Yes, you do that. Please buy a one way ticket and convert all of your remaining assets to big bars of gold.
Nooooooo! Pleasepleasepleaseplease, don’t let these weeny-dicked crazy-eyed knuckle-draggers come down here – tell them we’ve suddenly become all liberal and shit.
Actually, after my initial hyperventilation, they probably would think we’re all liberal and shit. After all, we’ve got fairly strict gun laws, we have sensible welfare for those who need help, and most folks down here don’t think the earth is flat (and all the other quaint beliefs like that).
And, and (drum roll) we’ve got a sensible public health insurance system. That would just finish them off.
Please buy a one way ticket and convert all of your remaining assets to big bars of gold.
Just Alison will correct me if I am wrong (in a completely non-mocking way), but I think that the mouth-breathers have to show a return ticket before they’re allowed into Downunderia… so you’re not going to get rid of them that easily.
You will have to stick with Plan A — lure them onto the rockets with talk of the blanket trees and ham bushes and soap roots waiting for them at the Venus colony.
Smut is entirely correct, and I’d add that not only would they have to show a return ticket, they’d need to be followed constantly by at least 3 footy players until they got back on the plane.
And Smut’s Plan A is admirable, if strangely reminiscent of The Marching Morons…
Mmmm, ham bushes…
they’d need to be followed constantly by at least 3 footy players until they got back on the plane.
Carn the Doggies!!!
Oh please please please please PLEASE our Sadly(Over)Lords, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE you must write posts on this:
Conservative media figures are giving the thumbs down to Fox News analyst Karl Rove’s new effort to police the Republican Party against the influence of the Tea Party.
(h/t Atrios)
The response from conservative media figures has been almost uniformly negative, with many citing American Crossroads’ poor performance in the 2012 election and President Obama’s election after years of Rove’s work in the Bush White House as evidence against him.
And who, pray tell WHO, are these blinding lights of modern conservative thought?
W. James Antle III pointed out in The Daily Caller … Ben Shapiro of Breitbart.com … Michelle Malkin … Daniel Horowitz … Rick Moran, writing at American Thinker … WorldNetDaily …
But who is The Big Kahuna in their effort to stop evil genius Rove? Drumroll please — wait for it! —
Newly signed Fox analyst Eric Erickson…
Let’s get started on that last one, shall we?
“Newly-appointed public health official, Typhoid Mary…”
“Newly-confirmed Bureau of Indian Affairs expert, Lt. Gen. Custer (Ret.)…”
“Just starting work today, the new Secretary of Education, Jesse Helms…”
Somewhere (possibly in a pillow fort) there are people who don’t see a problem with that.
More fun from Jenghazi:
I’m goin’ with Kettle Korn for this one.
If I run out, I’ve got some Cracker Jack in the basement.
Then the obvious choice is Switzerland. That nation’s long-run fiscal outlook is relatively favorable because of modest-sized government and a very good spending control mechanism.
It’s funny that they would think that the Swiss would welcome a bunch of sub-literate religious nutters in the first place. The Swiss went through some serious religious conflicts during the Reformation and Counter-Reformation… no way would they tolerate a bunch of evangelical, end-timer outsiders to the CH.
I’m goin’ with Kettle Korn for this one.
If I run out, I’ve got some Cracker Jack in the basement.
At this point, it might be worth your while to buy a kettle.
[…] Likud It Or Not, Syria Had To Be Blown Up […]
I suspect Brave Sir Robin Runs Away When America Collapses believes immigration requirements only apply to terrorist-hued people.
And it is fun to imagine one of these assholes getting himself in a peck of trouble at customs in Estonia. Or even Australia.
“What? I can’t understand you! I. Am. An. Am-er-i-can. I wantee move to your country tooty sweet. Damn it, why can’t you people speak English!?”