Honk If You’re Phony
Having already solved all the major issues of our day, the great thinkers at Town Hall have focused their powerful minds on the critical problem of…bumper stickers.
As a tasty little appetizer, full-time frowny face Bill Murchison makes it clear that certain people, especially sissy-Marys with frou-frou haircuts, should not call things bumper stickers that are not bumper stickers.
Above: free weenies for everybody!
The Democratic presidential candidates can’t stand Bush. All right — that’s their constitutional privilege.
Whew! And all this time, I’ve been worried that I might be liable for prosecution for not being able to stand the President. Turns out I’ve got me a constitutional privelege to drink this Haterade! Thanks, founding fathers!
The worst of the lot — as usual — was John Edwards. It comes, I imagine, from Edwards’ pre-political life as a trial lawyer willing to make any absurd argument in order to win.
Karl Rove? Not a trial lawyer. Also not trial lawyers: Lee Atwater, Roger Ailes.
What did the former senator say? He said, “What this global war on terror bumper sticker — political slogan, that’s all it is, it’s all it’s ever been — was intended to do was for George Bush to use it to justify everything he ever does.”
Look, that may all be true, but WAR IS NOT A BUMPER STICKER, mister! War is a very serious business to be fought with a determined look on one’s face, of the sort that can only be made by George W. Bush and possibly Fred Dalton Thompson. Certainly not someone with a $400 haircut.
Still, as a scathing condemnation of bumper stickers, or of things that are not bumper stickers, Bill’s piece is a bit lacking in certain qualities we’ve come to expect from the wingnut contingent: disproportianalism, hysteria, moral self-righteousness, and the ability to take a random personal experience and blow it up into a blanket condemnation of an entire political philosophy. for that, we’re going to have to hand it over to Dennis ‘My Son Has a Black Friend’ Prager.
Dennis is menaced by “BUCK FUSH” bumper stickers, which are everywhere — after all, he sees one “every day…usually more than one”. And while plenty of other commenters have noted how we shouldn’t take anything the left says seriously because they sometimes use dirty words, leave it to Dennis to dig a little deeper.
Apparently, some of our fellow Americans on the left find this message to be profound and witty. But it is not these individuals’ presence or absence of wit or profundity that interests me here — both are so obviously absent, no comments are necessary.
Except this one.
While the holiest among us might never utter an obscenity, most decent, even pious, individuals will use an occasional expletive in private under circumstances that can make its use morally, if not religiously, justifiable (as when using an expletive to describe some evil figure or after a heavy weight fell on one’s toe).
I was hoping the article would offer a spreadsheet detailing exactly when and where the private use of expletives would be morally justifiable (Dennis means ‘justified’, but let that pass). No luck, though, meaning I still don’t know if I’m allowed to yell “FUCK!” when Antonin Scalia runs over my foot with his Acura.
But higher civilization has always regarded the use of expletives in public (outside of, let us say, theatrical performances) as a form of assault on civilization. That is why as a broadcaster I am prohibited from saying seven selected words on the air. No one monitors my private conversations, but just about everyone, at least until the 1960s, understood that there was something very wrong in saying such words on the radio or putting them on billboards.
So, to recap: “higher” civilization, or at least “just about everyone”, has “always”, or at least “until the 1960s”, regarded the use of “selected” words in public, except for in “theatrical performances”, as an “assault on civilization”, or at least “very wrong”. Thanks for clearing that up, Den-Den!
That is why we have, as a society, crossed a line when people put expletives on bumper stickers (“S–t Happens,” “Buck Fush”) or use them in public in distinguished company — as in newspaper interviews or campaign fund-raisers.
Wait, hold on — are the people with “BUCK FUSH” stickers on their cars actually saying “Fuck Bush” in newspaper interviews about their cars? Are they handing them out as premiums at Obama rallies? I’m afraid Dennis’ deep intellectual probing has lost me here. Let’s get back on track.
So what does the increasing ubiquity of such stickers tell us? It says a lot about parts of the left.
For one thing, it tells us that leftist anger — make that hatred — of its opponents is probably the greatest politically inspired hatred in the country.
Certainly there were many on the right who hated former President Bill Clinton, and that hatred did at times reflect poorly on the right. But, to the best of my knowledge, no Clinton-hater ever put a “Cuck Flinton” bumper sticker on a car.
Why not? Why didn’t any conservatives who hated President Clinton do what some leftists who hate President Bush do and use expletives publicly? After all, “Cuck Flinton” is just as witty as “Buck Fush.” The answer is that parts of the left have little or no belief in the concept of “decency” as traditionally understood by Western civilization.
Whereas conservatives are just so decent and good, they would never dream of doing such a thing.
And that is why you almost never hear a conservative say “I am offended” when reacting to a liberal speaker or writer, but it is quite commonplace for a liberal to use those words in reacting to someone from the right.
Man, you said it, Dennis! If there’s one thing I know about conservatives, it’s that they’re rarely offended. (I actually asked the Great Gazoogle to help me out with this one, but five minutes after I entered “conservatives+offended”, he had to be taken in for emergency spinal surgery.)
I’ve known Murchison since I was about six years old, as I lived down the street from him and his kids in Dallas, and he’s an extraordinarily nice guy. He is, however, very, very wrong about a lot of things.
Regarding that last things about conservatives not being offended, just off the top of my head, I think there was an implied “I’m offended” by Guiliani at the last GOP debate in response to Ron Paul – and, as such, in response to the half or so of New Yorkers who would have agreed with Ron Paul and whose views Guiliani pretended not to have ever heard before.
Oh, and then there was the Mary Cheney thing in 2004. Crocodile tears all around.
It’s amazing, Mr. Leonard Pierce, that you’re still funny, let alone that you still have a functioning brain after you transcribed that bathroom vlog by the shrieking harpy a few months back.
As for bumper stickers, I saw a guy getting into a circa 1987 Ford Tempo the other day at a local mall and he had this one and a few other anti-poor people stickers proudly displayed on his bumper. Seeing as he was parked in the vicinity of a Prada and a Hermes store he was either driving the irony mobile as an act of performance art or he was a poor pathetic soul. I decided on the latter and began to feel sorry for him and his misdirected resentment but then realized he’s probably an LGF poster.
That reminds me, Lawnguylander, I forgot to transcribe Crazy Pammy’s latest videorrhea. I need to load up on Nembutals and get cracking on that.
Like this
Yup – conservatives sure are civil in public and among distingushed company.
Liberals+Cuss Words = Death of Western Society
Conservatives+Rampant Racism = Paragons of Decency
Well, shucks, couldn’t be more clearerer…
Dennis Praeger can go Cheney himself. What a major-league asshole. Big time.
More conservative “proof by anecdote” and the type of induction spread so thin even Rand would find it flimsy… Ironically enough, telling Den and his loyal ilk to fuck its collective mother is more and more becoming the only decent thing to do, partially due to excretions like this.
Your intermediate linkage there is important, because they show that for every example a proponent of an opinion can fish from the Intersea less simpleminded people can easily provide a counter.
This especially applies to the Israel-Palestine area, where people seem utterly incapable of seeing the swing of the pendulum – how both sides are stuck in a cause-effect hell that can only be resolved once those in power or those debating depoliticize the entire situation!
Our Judeo-Christian frontiermen among the medieval hairy savages is stealing land without legal repercussions? Well, women in Israel have more rights and Mohammed married a nine-year old girl, so there! Israeli civilians dying due to rockets from well-hidden theocratic maniacs? Well, this Israeli minister said something aggressive, so there!
Also, when are conservatives going to understand they do not have copyrights on civilization – especially when their kind of civilization leaves groups with power minority at the mercy of the privileged.
Oh, and I still do not know the spelling of privilege. Is mine correct?
Hang on a minute, aren’t the wingnuts all banging on about how Bush is a liberal and always has been. So why are they getting all upset about Buck Fush stickers?
.
Wonder if that first guy is kin to the John Bircher zillionaire that used to own the Dallas Cowboys
“Hang on a minute, aren’t the wingnuts all banging on about how Bush is a liberal and always has been. So why are they getting all upset about Buck Fush stickers?”
Because one conservative thought he could take his brain for a stroll and create a satisfying cosmology around the use of a cuss.
I for one see far graver implications in using masculine epithets for your “team” but feminizing your opponents or saying, in public, that you support the invasion of Iraq.
But cussing was really bad before and conservatives – who believe in the human spirit and adaptability when it suits their empty pro-capitalist spiel (rather than the sound arguments for capitalism that I gladly repeat) – apparently think this is due to some intrinsic facet of humanity, and that the use of expletives will cause people to vomit up their insides or turn is into value-ridden cynics who’d rather read VICE magazine rather then listen to Steyn or that “Atlas Will Shrug Any Day Now, You Have Been Warned”-maniac use some anecdote to advocate the use of thrusting our way through those damn Iranians and lock down the media while we do it.
The conservative “argument by anecdote,” or, as I like to call it, the “I knew this guy once” school of history.
While the holiest among us might never utter an obscenity, most decent, even pious, individuals will use an occasional expletive in private under circumstances that can make its use morally, if not religiously, justifiable (as when using an expletive to describe some evil figure or after a heavy weight fell on one’s toe).
Like Leonard, I’m intrigued by this comment. The suggestion seems to be, that if I were alone in a room and I said “fuck” for no reason, I’d be committing a sin. That’s some pretty hardcore morality.
I still don’t know if I’m allowed to yell “FUCK!� when Antonin Scalia runs over my foot with his Acura.
Do what Scalia did outside that church in Boston — use an obscene hand gesture instead.
“After all, ‘Cuck Flinton’ is just as witty as ‘Buck Fush.'”
Only to people who don’t understand even the simplest metrics of funny, since “our” slogan is an implied pun. “CF”, on the other hand, doesn’t reference anything but an ugly failure to get the point. Of course, ugly and not-getting-it seem to be the main hallmarks of conservative “humor”, so why should they waste their meagre allotment of brain cells attempting anything beyond weak imitation of others’ ideas?
I much prefer argument by metaphor to argument by anecdote. Much more entertaining!
“I still don’t know if I’m allowed to yell “FUCK!â€? when Antonin Scalia runs over my foot with his Acura.”
Don’t worry; you are constitutionally privileged to do so – but only if its his Acura.
I much prefer argument by metaphor to argument by anecdote.
And that’s understandable. But neither can even begin to compete with the right’s popular “argument by just making stuff up”…
mikey
So the list of things that indicate a clash of civilizations now officially includes (among other things) rude bumper stickers, the use of anything but Merry Christmas by anyone, a brown person buying a cell phone, Muslims praying at an Airport, the teaching of science in the classroom, Spanish on Major League Baseball uniforms, and the use of a purse as an accessory in a TV show aimed at toddlers. Is there anything done by any non-conservative that is not indicative of a clash of civilizations?
As “a broadcaster” he’s “prohibited from saying seven selected words on the air.”
No, you fucking cocksucking titlicking cunt chewing shit eating asshole who isn’t worth my motherfucking piss, you aren’t. Read up on obscenity law, you choad.
But higher civilization has always regarded the use of expletives in public (outside of, let us say, theatrical performances) as a form of assault on civilization.
Waitaminute. This from the guys who keep boohooing that liberals are elitists?
What’s that sound? Reminiscent of a fish on a dock, I’d say…
Actually, it’s not. Now, “Cluck Finton” would be pretty snappy…
Leave it to a winger to screw up something as simple as a spoonerism.
“So the list of things that indicate a clash of civilizations now officially includes (among other things) rude bumper stickers, the use of anything but Merry Christmas by anyone, a brown person buying a cell phone, Muslims praying at an Airport, the teaching of science in the classroom, Spanish on Major League Baseball uniforms, and the use of a purse as an accessory in a TV show aimed at toddlers. Is there anything done by any non-conservative that is not indicative of a clash of civilizations?”
You forgot boys with long hair and girls with short hair. Oh, and abortions. We’re gonna need less of those if we are to outbreed the hordes of Xerxes.
Please nobody tell Prager we’ve been visualizing whirled peas.
Prager has such good timing, that he publishes this opinion the day after a court rules that ‘obscenities’ on broadcast TV shouldn’t be fined, because the president and vice-president use them when talking to other politicians.
Puck Frager. Puck ’em all.
Prager closes today’s article by writing:
For more than a few people on the cultural left, public cursing is simply a form of self-expression, just as many on the left deemed graffiti to be. Indeed, public cursing may be defined as verbal graffiti, a defacement of the public square. But the people who believe in the sanctity of the public square are far more likely to be on the right. And that is why you will see and hear far more public profanity on the left than on the right..
Also appearing today, a NYT report on a ruling that a federal appeals court made in an FCC indecency case:
WASHINGTON, June 4 — If President Bush and Vice President Cheney can blurt out vulgar language, then the government cannot punish broadcast television stations for broadcasting the same words in similarly fleeting contexts.
A common garden rake left laying in Prager’s path suddenly says:
Sproing-THWAP!!! (spelling, Don Martin fans?)
oops! Sorry Barney.
And it was just this morning that President Bush taught me a new word. It turns out that “cooze” is an expletive rather than a term of endearment.
While the folks at Townhall are asking why the media doesn’t report the good news from Iraq, I have to ask why the media doesn’t report the noxious language being used by our leaders. For that matter, why aren’t the dainty folks at Townhall all over this story?
Also, where are all these bumper stickers mentioned above? I haven’t seen any.
Man are these people from another planet? Do they ever leave that little bubble? How out of it can you be? Do they really think swear words are going to destroy “Western Civilization”? Or maybe they’re just making shit up. Woops! Looks like I’m assaultin’ civilization again. Must be a closet “Islamo-commu-fascist-crat”.
are we allowed to double swear if we drop an evil figure on our toe?
An Acura? Really?
Okay, to get serious for a moment, no, this fucking war is not a fucking bumper sticker. It’s a goddamned mass grave with a headstone that reads like a war crimes hearing. However, and I’m going out on a limb here, Edwards probably understands that, while Mr Murchinson does most likely not, quite likely believing that war is just things exploding in a really neato way.
He cant see the diff between Cuck Flinton and Buck Fush. Thats hard to believe.
Im starting to suspect that some of the wingnuts aren’t being entirely honest in their writings. Sounds silly I know.
five minutes after I entered “conservatives+offended”
even just running that search on one wingnut website would crash your browser.
Hey, can we who aren’t on the left (or the right) have some of the blame for all this fucking anti-civilization talk going on. I mean goddammit, I want Bush to go fuck himself the same as “just about everyone else”.
higher civilization has always regarded the use of expletives in public (outside of, let us say, theatrical performances) as a form of assault on civilization
Does that include street theatre? Is civilisation under threat if a street mime lets rip with a few choice obscenities in sign language?
OK, “civilisation” and “mime” don’t really belong in the same sentence.
I think this video sums up Prager’s opinion on the fuck-word.
Clicky clicky
Whoa. Western Civilaztion is an awfully frail construct if a few swears can destroy it.
If that’s all it takes to bring it down, maybe it isn’t actually, you know, worth all that much.
…outside of, let us say, theatrical performances…
Which may never, ever reflect the experiences of mundane humanity.
So… he’s saying he’s NOT offended by indecent language? Oh, I must have misread what he wrote in the article about offensive language from the left.
Also: sucks for Dennis.
Now, instead of swearing those ‘seven’ words and scaring the kiddos, I yell ‘Bush Voter.’ No further obscenities necessary.
Btw, Jessica at Feministing will be on Colbert tonight. That oughta produce 1,000 more bumper snickers because the Neotards still can’t get over the wonder of tits.
Am I the only one who absolutely loves http://www.buckfush.com?
They have been helping me get through this Presidency for years now.
Jessica at Feministing will be on Colbert tonight
cool thanks for the heads up!
Would it be a sin to have a bumper sticker that says, I heart Play-doh and bacon?
I am seriously concerned that the West is lagging behind in the War on Catchy Slogans. We must take all necessary steps to close the Bumper-Sticker gap.
Cuck Flinton is stoooo-pid.
Cluck Finton is funny.
But the funniest all …
Pruck Fager …
and the forse he rode in on.
Ike Madams?
Histopher Chritchens?
Thred Fompson?
Judy Ruliani?
Billiam W. Fuckley?
For one thing, it tells us that leftist anger — make that hatred — of its opponents is probably the greatest politically inspired hatred in the country.
Yes, you’re right. The politics of the right-wingers have inspired great hatred in me. I hate you fucking stupid wingnut pieces of shit, because you are ruining my country.
Now go suck on mama’s titty, you sorry, pussy-ass crybaby.
these sentences are so profoundly poorly written it does more offense to the English language than a thousand Dick Cheney anecdotes could do to dennis douchebaglington’s arguments.
1. some lefties find something witty. but it’s got a modifier, “apparently”, for no apparent reason.
2. said lefties, whom Dennis has already stated find said message to be witty, possibly don’t find said message to be witty. or maybe they do. and maybe they don’t find them profound. or maybe they do. of course, though dennis cared, oh, i don’t know, A SENTENCE PRIOR, he doesn’t anymore. wait, because…
3. it’s so obvious that the statement in question is neither profound nor witty. so whether or not the left finds them so (a question left open by dennis’s three turns of the mind in but two measly sentences, quite a feat) is immaterial all of the sudden. because the whole thing isn’t worth commenting on. due to its obviousness. this from the man who just mangled the english language like krueger on a sleeping 16 year old object-of-derbyshire’s affection in order to undermine, or maybe negate, his own point.
yes, i’m a pedant, no doubt about it, but there are at least 15 regular commenters on this site in addition to 3 or 4 of the bloggers here who right with better language skills than a guy who is paid around america to opine in print. say what you will about george will or william f. buckley, at least those malignant turds can compose a sentence.
i hate dennis prager so very very much it makes me want to swear. egads. there, i said it.
Some of that Right Wing Stuff seems too extreme to be true. Especially all the Iraqi oil stuff.
http://www.cafepress.com/rightwingstuff/705150: This one is especially ironic. Not only is the line “religion of peace” from Bush, this also implies that Americanism isn’t a religion of peace.
Phone if you’re a Honky!
Judy Ruliani?
Billiam W. Fuckley?
True comedy gold, my friend. They need to be promulgated far and wide across the land.
>>”Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.”
Odd that that one is considered a “conservative” sticker on one of the sites linked to.
If only (poopy-doody poopie-doodie) my Tourette’s Syndrome (fuckity-fuck-fuck) could truly destroy (wee-wee pee-pee dog dump) Western “Civilization.” (Crap-piss-crap crap-piss-crap Ass! Bum! Titties! Lady lumps! Dumpy doo-doo!)
Or as they say at the Comics Curmudgeon: “Margo! Boxcar! Saturn!”
(Surprised I can even type what w/ all the Tourette’s spasms & what not.)
I don’t get that “This Iraqi Oil” sticker at all. That looks like a satirical leftwing sticker if anything. Not only does it admit that this entire clusterfuck was about oil and the military industrial complex in general, it celebrates it. Duh.
Another example of the hard right’s inability to think I guess.
Dean replaces Democrats’ gay leader
Christopher Curtis and Tom Musbach, PlanetOut Network
published Wednesday, May 3, 2006
Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean has abruptly changed leaders for the party’s LGBT outreach efforts, and the ousted man’s partner believes the shakeup was an act of political retaliation.
Dean this week fired gay outreach adviser Donald Hitchcock, whose partner, Paul Yandura, recently wrote a letter urging LGBT donors to rethink supporting Democrats until they get tougher on gay rights.
In a statement Wednesday afternoon, the DNC announced that the ex-Vermont governor had appointed Brian Bond, former head of the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, as executive director of the party’s Gay & Lesbian Leadership Council. The announcement did not mention Hitchcock, who had held the post for nearly a year.
DNC spokesman Damien LaVera refused to comment on Hitchcock, saying, “The governor decided we needed a change, so we hired a proven leader.”
Hitchcock declined to comment on the matter, telling the Washington Blade he may consult an attorney about his termination.
Yandura told the PlanetOut Network that Hitchcock was escorted from DNC headquarters Tuesday after refusing to resign. Yandura, who runs a progressive political consulting firm in Washington, D.C., believes the action was a result of an April 20 letter he sent to gay activists and donors.
“All progressives need to be asking how much has the DNC budgeted to counter the anti-gay ballot initiatives in the states. We also all need to know why the DNC and our Democratic leaders continue to allow the Republicans to use our families and friends as pawns to win elections,” Yandura wrote. “We need answers to these questions. Until we get them my advice is don’t give any more money to the Dems.”
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