He always seems to have the right take on things.
James O'Brien on the Tory MPs celebrating the end of freedom of movement: "How does a country end up imposing economic sanctions on itself and celebrating the abolition of freedoms enjoyed by its own citizens?"@mrjamesob | #Brexit pic.twitter.com/ZN8F3bbcV1
— LBC (@LBC) July 1, 2020
Both the US & UK are afflicted with these awful people who punch themselves in the face to make the liberals cry. I don’t get it, but that’s what’s poisoning our politics right now.
(just for a bit of context – the following is of course just imo …
O’Brien is, um, probably the best of a very shitty lot on the talk radio channel LBC; they gave a platform to Nigel Farage for years before he went too far even for them, and they still give a platform to Nick Ferrari and Jacob Rees Mogg. But being the best out of that lot is not much to be proud of :-s
O’Brien is indeed good on some topics – as in the example shown, where he’s quite right – but on many others he’s a bit of a bro to put it mildly. YMMV, and I’m sure other commenters who know more about him than I do will have something to say)
This -and the previous thread- are connected to how reactionary news giants dominate the media, spewing desinformation and “manufacturing consent” to borrow a term from Chomsky.
The Brits act like eejits because they are fed propaganda daily from the gutter press. This is how BoJo daily can contradict his earlier statements without his voters noticing. In USA, you have Fox news and similar abominations.
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blockquote>Both the US & UK are afflicted with these awful people who punch themselves in the face to make the liberals cry. I don’t get it…
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Having been on that side of the spectrum in my misspent youth, I kinda do. The Right sees the Left as perpetual hypocrites riding high upon a moral high horse, smugly lording over anyone who doesn’t measure up to their impossible-to-meet standards. Anything that takes the Left down a peg or inconveniences them is entirely justified and is SOOOOOO satisfying, even when it affects us–and it usually doesn’t or doesn’t in way that we acknowledge.
It’s stupid, but since humans are stupid, it works more often than not.
“Owing the libs” is really a pathetic way to organize a political movement. It worked in 2016, but it’s not a long term survival strategy. Really, it was a one time boost that got them both houses and the white house so they could pack the courts. That’s the long term strategy. Trump is desperately hoping lightening will strike twice. Can “owning the libs” get him 2020? I don’t think so. Not that alone at least. Not ruling out an October surprise.
The latest rumor is, Trump wants to get a third Supreme Court Judge, to save his campaign. Supposedly, (pardon my used of weasel words), he wants Clarence Thomas to retire so he can replace him with an even more conservative Justice. Trump is so openly racist he gives David Duke a run for his money and he wants a black Justice to retire just to boost his campaign. That whole scenario is so crazy it would make a bad script for a good/bad future cult classic movie. And yet it’s completely plausible in 2020.
Ray @4
More conservative than Scalia’s sock-puppet?
Can’t say I’ve heard the 3rd Justice rumour — albeit removing brain to insert a hair furian negative vaccum and see it from his perspective of “me! Me!! ME!!!” does make it seem plausible — but it has been reported in the Grauniad, Al Jazeera (English), and presumably elsewhere hair furor’s “October surprise” could be the announcement of a Covid-19 vaccine. This is hair furor, there wouldn’t have to be one, nor one that has passed safety &tc tests, nor even one which meets the FDA’s recently-announced guidelines(? requirements?), just make a lot of noise and take credit for it whilst lying about everything
else. The recent purchase of the world’s entire supply of Remdesivir and the bragging / boasting that is now happening hints this concern of a vaccine surprise isn’t that far-fetched.@2:”The Brits act like eejits because they are fed propaganda daily from the gutter press.”
No, they act like eedjits because they believe the propaganda from the press. Because they want to, because the underlying theme of the wjhole thing- Brexshit, statues matter, asylum seekers crisis, charge heroes for working for the NHS- is pure racism. Back to the 50s when we were all white, they think.
@#4, Ray Ceeya:
Dunno where you are, but I’ve been seeing that since the mid 1990s. Right-wing political theory has basically ceased to exist completely in public. Everything is framed as “how to make liberals mad” now. And, of course, they don’t really even mean “the left”, they mean “Democrats”, which is not at all the same thing. Clinton and Obama specialized in giving the Republicans half of what they wanted and then letting them get the rest by throwing tantrums, but they continue to be demonized by Republicans as though they had somehow stonewalled at every turn. There is no longer any discussion of what the goals are and how to get there, Republican policy has become purely reactionary in the literal sense. The people at the top have goals, and choose which issues to push, but there is no longer any discourse at all.
The sad thing is that a very large chunk of the Democratic Party is basically doing the same, and it’s the part which is in control. That’s why we’re supposed to pretend that it will somehow be a step forward if we replace Trump with the Democrat who is more responsible than any other person in the party, and even manages to be more responsible than some Republicans, for the problems we’re facing. No sane person, starting from scratch, would consider Joe Biden to be a repudiation of Trump policy; it’s only if you buy into elections-as-team-sport that he has any appeal at all.
that is a statement from which meaning has fled leaving only venom and spittle
uncle frogy
@#9, unclefrogy:
Leaving aside the fact that he was Obama’s VP, essentially every point in Biden’s history suggests that he is more aligned with Trumpism than against it. He was pro-segregation, he spent decades agitating against abortion, he was considered by Republicans to be more authoritarian than Ronald Reagan or the first Bush (and the Biden Crime Bill came out of that), he helped make it easier for the rich to squeeze the poor with his bankruptcy bill in 2005 (while his son got a cushy job with MBNA apparently in exchange for his support), he supported all the dumb wars and police-state moves of the Bush era (Iraq, the PATRIOT Act, the creation of ICE and DHS), he was a proponent of SOPA/PIPA/Protect IP, he got caught stealing the work of a black woman and had to drop out of a previous presidential race, while VP he made a statement about how ICE separating immigrant kids from their parents was necessary, the whole selling point of his campaign right at the start was how well he “works” with Republicans, he himself says he “likes Republicans too much” and mulled in public the idea of naming one as his VP, etc. etc. etc.
Really and truly, if I gave you the list of stuff Biden has done in his time and didn’t tell you the name or the party affiliation, you would conclude that he was a Republican. Not the person you would choose to try and roll back the Trump administration at all, given a wider choice. It is flabbergasting that the party has chosen to unite behind him.
what policy does agent orange advocate other then his own personal advantage and fortune? As far as I can see everything is a show, a pose. You think he manages things? The only work he does is watch the TV make some pronouncements the work is done by his staff of bootlickers, incompetents and crooks.
The population has been fed fear for decades, the population the voters chose the safe feeling of Uncle Joe. There were others with very similar ideas and policy stances but voters picked Joe. Was it a poor choice? it was not what I would have wished. Biden will follow the crowd he has always been some what of a panderer go along with the majority type politician. It was one of the things that allowed him to get long with Obama who is also tends to be a consensus type of person and not a crusader for some ideals or causes other then the rule of law and basic democratic ideals.
That is something that can not be said about agent orange who is at heart a criminal amoral narcissist
to equate them is a gross exaggeration at least or just a design to depress votes as being futile
uncle frogy
@3
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blockquote>The Right sees the Left as perpetual hypocrites riding high upon a moral high horse, smugly lording over anyone who doesn’t measure up to their impossible-to-meet standards.
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Ah, so.. Its really just a political/secular form of, “Of course we are as corrupt as you, and can’t live up to ideals, but we have Jesus to forgive us!”, or, another version of what was linked to on the other thread, “Conservation of Worship” – they think we are replacing their “superior” form of “sins” and “morality”, with an inferior form, which no one can, as you say, hope to live up to… Makes a sick sort of sense, from their perspective, I guess.
@11 unclefrogy
“… voters picked Joe.”
No they didn’t. They supported literally everyone other than him, right up until the moment that his opponents started telling their supporters, “We are dropping out. Support the clown the PARTY want instead.” If they had all staid in the race, or the so called race had, like in some countries, been only a few months, not a year long slog into madness and stupidity, the “winner” would have almost certainly NOT been Biden. He only won via betrayal by other candidates of the person who, if they had given more of a damn about their ideals than their party, of candidates that where better options. I sure as hell didn’t want him, and no one has “voted” him into office yet. His position as the “choice” is purely about what polls said, and the decisions of others to hand him the win.
Just for a brief moment, try to imagine the resulting shift in who polled as supporting who, if even one, or two, of the other candidates had said, “I am dropping out, and my endorsement goes to anyone else“. Do you really, truly, think the general public, who have been crying for change for almost a decade, would have decided to ignore that, and join up with Biden? The very idea is.. depressing. Its also absurd, since no one that supported any of the other candidates, and then jumped to Biden, as far as I can tell, where going to vote for any of those other candidates because they thought Biden was a better supporter of women, or gay rights, or ANYTHING. But, the person they where going to vote for said, “Trust me. This idiot will give you the same thing we would.” Except.. as has been pointed out above, he doesn’t even freaking believe in any of the things anyone else promised they would do, if they got elected.
What sort of insane world do you image we live in that thousands of supporters of any of those other candidates, who where going to vote for them because of the issues they believed in, just all, collectively, up and decided, “Yeah, no. We collectively represent 80% of the entire liberal electorate, but whelp, none of the stuff we thought we cared about we suddenly woke up this morning wanting, so.. sure, lets throw all our support behind the jerk that never believed in any of the things we did! No – the only way that happens is if “most” of the people in each group have no freaking clue that he is the worst possible candidate, and simply go along with the statement, made by the person they did previously support, that, “Yep, this guy thinks just like we do, and you should now support him.”
This is itself depressing, and horrible, but.. most of the freaking public hasn’t bothered to look at his past history, only his mealy mouth waffling since he because the “chosen one” of the party.
“freaking public” is the right word to use. the public is freaking out and has been for some time now. having been lied to and misled for generations keeping the actual processes of politics and the economy obscured with jargon and platitudes and faith making it hard to understand.
The insecurity of it all and the utter failure is plainly visible. and repeatedly occurring.
even the moderates could not decide who was the best one to run. Not one of the candidates had a clear majority at all so all the moderates folded in favor of one of the old guard then biology put an end to the normal campaign season and fear of a divisive political battle leaving only a weakened candidate to face agent orange and right-wing fascist party leaves us here. Still freaking out and marching in the street.
remember the guy running is not “The Leader” he is just the guy in the front. That is how democracy works.
uncle frogy
uncle frogy