Make love when you can. It's good for you.It turns out that the sexy librarian is crazy and corrupt, which is entirely unshocking. Rural politics are like that. If anything, I find it endearing, as Alaska politics seem to me to closely resemble county politics in my own near, dear Appalachain borderlands. The fact that she apparently associated for a time with some Alaska secessionists attracts me to her even more, so charmingly quixotic is the mere notion that the US will voluntarily deprive itself of full possession of Seward's resource-rich, Russia-bordering folly.
-Kurt Vonnegut
The question of her daughter's pregnancy interests me. Liberals are of course quick to accuse her of a sort of hypocrisy. True, the more stringent one's public morals, the more likely one is to be exposed as a hypocrite. Democrats point to Gov. Palin's support for so-called abstinence education, and note with a shadenfreudenous glee were Palin's so-called pro-life position ratified as law, her 17-year-old daughter would not be choosing to keep her child, but obligated to keep it.
The liberal mindset is essentially managerial, and so he's wrapped up in metrics and outputs and benchmarking. Abstinence education doesn't work because the numbers don't bear it out. Restrictions on abortion have no effect on unwanted, unplanned pregnancies. Etc. Meanwhile, conservatives have the outlook of the marketing department, not the business unit. Their interest is in what the slogan says about the brand. The claims they make are perceptual, not factual. Does Crest really whiten better than Colgate? The ingredients are the same. Who cares? Their support for abstinence education, to take an example, isn't about convincing people to abstain from pre-marital sex. It's about what it says about the brand. For a party so wrapped up in American protestantism, they have a real Renaissance-Papist ability to view public morality as a realm distinct from private virtue.
18 comments:
maybe that's why no one knows what that fifth dentist problem is. He didn't agree so he was relegated to loony/quack, and pushed out of acceptable discourse. I wonder if there is blog somewhere with a bunch of disgruntled conspiracy minded dentists.
4 out of 5 Amuricans agree, this country KICKS ASS!
Yeah, the frenzy over Palin's daughter is pretty revolting. I understand what good fodder it is for discussion, and will indulge in that, but some of the liberal rage I've seen online is... disappointing if not necessarily surprising.
I don't mind liberal management, at least in terms of sex ed. I know that a lot of people can figure it out for themselves, but I figure that the more easily we can get teenagers to participate in relatively informed sexual activity, the better. An amoral, technocratic approach is ideal, then, I think, for getting the little bastards to stay disease-free and child-free (at least until they can be horrible parents in their 20s and 30s, as it's meant to be).
"The liberal mindset is essentially managerial, and so he's wrapped up in metrics and outputs and benchmarking...Restrictions on abortion have no effect on unwanted, unplanned pregnancies."
I think liberals are pretty principled on the question of "choice"--indeed, almost fanatically so. And that's partly because pro-choiceism offers them perhaps the only cogent reason to vote Democratic.
"I think liberals are pretty principled on the question of "choice"--indeed, almost fanatically so. And that's partly because pro-choiceism offers them perhaps the only cogent reason to vote Democratic."
No, it' s because the fuckers all think they're Neo and the Republicans are the Matrix. It has nothing to do with actual moral stances and everything to do with a desire to play the hero by taking on "the system" (by, ya know, buying into the system and turning it towards their own selfish ends).
I'm kind of in the same vote as the illustrious Dennis Perrin right now, the more I read about this shit the sicker I get of it. I'd rather watch hillbillies joust on BMXes than pay any more attention to this bullshit.
Oh, come now. Must the Democrats be wrong even on the few occasions when they manage to be right?
The lib reaction to Palin makes me want to smack my head against a rock. Maureen Dowd's column was physically sickening, and she wrote that BEFORE we found out the teen was knocked up.
(Not that Maureen Dowd columns aren't always sickening, but shit. Sexism is never sweeter than when it calls itself feminism, I guess.)
Well, Tristero has been doing his best at Hullabaloo to emphasize the need to look at things like the hurricane as a marketing opportunity for the Donk brand - after making all the requisite tut-tut noises about how terrible it is to have to descend to the opponent's level, but never you fear, we have the angels on our side, and it's only temporary, and the fate of the world hangs in the balance, so let the ends justify the means, and...wait...why is everybody laughing? What? What's so funny? I don't care what every other world-shaker has said before, my word is as good as gold! Where's a re-education camp when you need one?
Speaking of Digby's site, I think they exceeded their unintentional irony quota back on the 30th when dday said of the DNC, I shit you not:
"Despite attending the DNC convention, the presence of protesters wasn't all that prominent unless you knew where to look. The security presence was palpable, and there definitely were lots of anti-abortion activists in the streets, but overall you had to look for and find the more wide-scale protests that were expected."
Really? You had to look for protests? Maybe there was a reason for that.
Man, my reading list is getting shorter and shorter.
Heck...Palin was pro-independence. And, her party was a particularly loony Unibomber brand of independence. More reason to vote McInsane/Librarian 2008. Watch the empire implode of its own ridiculousness.
Had to flip a coin this morning wondering which IOZ would go with: Heads - there's real, live Anarchists in the Streets and (cover the chillun's ears) they've arrested Amy Goodman!, or, Tails - Destiny's Child Revealed.
Or, he could have driven it down the middle of the fairway and gone with Bob "Don't Rock the Boat" Herbert's latest advice column.
Mike
obligated to keep it
Come on, I saw Juno. She could give it to that girl from Alias. What's absolutely not allowed is any music from the Melvins or Stooges.
The funniest thing about the sex-ed controversy is that it appears to make no difference whether they put condoms on a banana or just get lectured about abstinence. It's almost as if kids don't care what adults have to say.
This managerial vs. marketing thing sounds like something you dreamed up in undergrad. Let it go. It's not that clever.
You don't think liberals are hung up on branding? Obama? What?
Jesus.
Watch the empire implode of its own ridiculousness.
If that was a possibility, wouldn't it have happened already?
I think the managerial vs. marketing thing is apt. it's not the first time it's been mentioned. see Henley or Sartwell.
The Republicans have that branding shit nailed, and I think that their core message resonates better with Americans. Dems are way more interested in the machinations and workings of The Machine, and how to manipulate it to make things "better." which is a horrible formulation. in fact, it's reason enough for me to stay away from their politics.
McCain's pick has made this entire thing far more entertaining, and far more interesting. and for some reason, I can't explain it, Dems make me want to vote Republican.
call me what you will.
McCain's pick has made this entire thing far more entertaining, and far more interesting. and for some reason, I can't explain it, Dems make me want to vote Republican.
Ha ha. I know what you mean. Until Sarah, the only possible excuse for voting Republican was the sheer obnoxiousness of the Dems. And since Sarah, that's ten times the reason it was before.
FREE AMY GOODMAN!!!
haha yep.
dunc at 8:15-true that. One can only hope, although "Beyond Thunderdome" would not be a pleasant place to live. Humongous is far more interesting than Joe Biden, though.
he liberal mindset is essentially managerial....
conservatives have the outlook of the marketing department,....
IOZ, I agree with a lot of the things that you write, but you're still missing a lot of your own folly that would make you a deeper thinker.
Yes, both sides are ridiculous, but you criticize them by their stereotype which really does no good. Everyone can point out the flaws in a caricature. Liberals and conservatives aren't like that. The only thing they're like are a million individuals all fighting to figure out what the best compromise is between all of their beliefs and their votes. Alternatively, they're just fighting to squash the other guy.
Either way, to paint with such broad strokes, well, it just prevents any sort of real insight. I call myself "liberal" but I'm not like a huge fan of the Dems and I don't agree with plenty of other liberals. In fact, on many things I prolly agree with you more than most others.
You need to stay away from words like "liberal" or "conservative." They describe millions of people and are therefor vague, nebulous, and ultimately useless.
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