SATURDAY, APRIL 26, 2014
Or at least, so they claim: By now, the point has been clearly established. Many major American pundits are brighter than Cliven Bundy.
In this morning’s New York Times, Gail Collins and Charles Blow establish the fact that they are brighter than Bundy. In her column, Collins lists the things we’ve learned “from the Crazy Rancher Guy saga.” In his own piece, Blow is able to recognize “the Mount Kilimanjaro-size amounts of ignorance packed into” two recent statements by the rancher guy.
In truth, it isn’t hard to be brighter than Bundy, who hails from the far perimeter of the outer reaches of the edge of the fringe. Still, pundits are staging a familiar type of festival in reaction to his recent racial pronouncements.
Here’s how this round-up works:
In this familiar old manifestation, observers find the most clueless person in a very large nation. They then spend the next several weeks (1) announcing that they are sharper than this person and (2) engaging in shaky acts of generalization, in which they say or suggest that everyone who isn’t Just Like Them is very much like the despised.
How many Americans are actually like Cliven Bundy? Like the nation’s pundits, we have no real idea. For ourselves, though, we will say this:
Bundy is one of our most clueless citizens—but he’s just an isolated rancher from somewhere past the boondocks. By way of contrast, Blow and Collins are major journalists based in New York, a large, influential city.
For that reason, we hold Collins and Blow to a different standard. And, in light of their advantages—because of their “privilege”—we aren’t sure that Collins and Blow are a whole lot brighter than Bundy.
For ourselves, we’ve been most struck by the Bundy-busting of (1) Chris Hayes and (2) Joan Walsh. We thought Hayes engaged in open play-acting on Friday night’s program. And we’d say that Friday’s post by Walsh helps answer an important question: How does it look when liberals get propagandized?
We’ll start to discuss these topics on Monday. In our view, it’s troubling to see players like Hayes and Walsh performing in the way they’ve done in the past few days.
Granted, Bundy is deeply clueless. But in this age of corporate media, how much more discerning are we, over here in our sad liberal tribe?
For Bob's (and everyone else's) edification :
ReplyDeletehttp://www.counterpunch.org/2014/04/25/rage-and-violence-on-the-western-range/
Thanks. It is truly sad watching us become more like them.
DeleteFeeling superior is important to many liberal readers of Dowd and Blow. My sister is a typical liberal. I once mentioned to her that Rush Limbaugh's listeners are better-informed than the average American. Now, there's no significance to this fact. If Limbaugh is wrong, he's wrong, regardless of who listens to him. Anyhow, it's only natural that people whose taste runs to political discussions would be better informed than people taste runs to music or sit-coms, or sports. No doubt fans of liberal media, such as the New York Times or NPR or the Daily Howler, are also better-informed than average.
ReplyDeleteAnyhow, even though it doesn't matter at all, my sister went ballistic at learning that Rush Limbaugh's listeners were relatively well-informed. Somehow it was important to her psychologically to believe that Limbaugh's listeners are ignorant boobs.
". . . my sister went ballistic at learning that Rush Limbaugh's listeners were relatively well-informed."
DeleteNo, David. I'm going to guess she went ballistic at you after listening to such right-wing nonsense, and most likely ordered you to leave her house.
And it had nothing to do with Limbaugh's listeners being "ignorant boobs." It's about having a ignorant boob for a brother and she finally got a belly full.
Limbaugh listeners are, on average, better informed than the average American. It is because they listen harder, for longer hours, and don't take time off for birthing no babies or doing housework when the Big Boy is broadcasting.
DeleteHow about a citation on that "fact" DinC? Please link us to the study that proves that, or are you just regurgitating another "fact" that Limbaugh drills into his mindless dittoheads on a daily basis?
DeleteLimbaugh may be smarter than DinC's sister, but he plays a moron on the radio, and misinforms his listeners for hours on end.
DeleteBerto
"In this familiar old manifestation, observers find the most clueless person in a very large nation. They then spend the next several weeks (1) announcing that they are sharper than this person and (2) engaging in shaky acts of generalization, in which they say or suggest that everyone who isn’t Just Like Them is very much like the despised."
ReplyDeleteJust for the record, Bundy was "found" by Sean Hannity and Fox News and rightwing radio hosts and bloggers, and most liberal discussion has focused on the later's embrace of Bundy, not on Bundy himself. A point bob conveniently overlooks.
Also overlooked: the extensive liberal coverage that does not make fun of Bundy. But as usual, bob chooses a few people, reads them as uncharitably as possible, and then generalizes about the liberal tribe of his fantasies. Like David in Cal, he generalizes on the basis of little.
mch
Amen to what Anonymous 4:09 said. This is an extraordinarily dishonest post by The Howler, as there was not a liberal soul seeking out the opinions of Bundy before Hannity turned him into a right wing hero. But in a veritable lab experiment of role reversal before our very eyes -- or would you call it classic projection? -- the script has to be served every day, doesn't it?
ReplyDeleteD in C
ReplyDelete" Rush Limbaugh's listeners were relatively well-informed. "
whats so surprising about that?
I myself would tune to Limbaugh, Hannity and Mark Levin - WHILE STUCK IN TRAFFIC, because liberal talk radio seems to be a non-starter in the USA. These guys are the equivalent of the gong show for liberals and other non-neanderthals during drive-time.
Now as to those who listen to Limbaugh AT HOME - curious minds want to know how many of them are terrified of black helicopters and hate "gummint" and froth at the mouth because "Obama is coming for their guns."
A better reaction of liberals to people like Bundy would be a discussion of the ideas that motivate them and their history, such as the article I linked to above, rather than to just call him a crazy racist (which he probably is). Also, Sean Hannity has promoted people from the farthest right in the past, though liberals have no memory or sense of history, so they won't discuss it:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.talk2action.org/story/2013/2/16/125118/337
hardindr, why do you assume that "liberals" don't attend to and discuss the ideas that motivate people like Bundy and their history? You'd actually have to cite a great deal more work by liberal-left journalists, bloggers, and so forth than does bob, who sticks to about the same five or six people (usually female or dark-skinned) who, he simply asserts, are exemplary, to justify the sweeping claims of which he is so fond. Don't the lawyers have an objection to counter this fallacy: argument based on facts not in evidence?
Deletemch
Give me an example.
DeleteOf this I'm certain: Bob will go on and on and on about "we liberals'" reaction to Bundy, long after "we {actual} liberals" have forgotten about him --- which will probably be by Tuesday. The "festival in reaction" will soon be almost entirely Bob's.
ReplyDeleteThe United States is a great, great country. The adding machine was invented here.
ReplyDeletePlus our health care is tops, if a bit pricey, and our black children have made enormous progress on standardized tests
Deletein ratty schools.
People with odd or extreme beliefs are not crazy in any clinical sense. Those who believe in alien abductions, spirit mediums or end of the world are as sane as anyone else. Delusional thought is not necessarily psychotic.
ReplyDeleteI see civilization collapsing. Most others don't. Neither they nor I are crazy. They are simply tribal. I am visionary.
DeleteAnd in this post, Somerby once again attempts (and fails miserably) at showing how much smarter and how much more morally superior he is than Charles Blow and Gail Collins, with Chris Hayes and Joan Walsh thrown in for good measure.
ReplyDelete"Bundy is one of our most clueless citizens—but he’s just an isolated rancher from somewhere past the boondocks."
"Bundy is one of our most clueless citizens—but he’s just an isolated rancher from somewhere past the boondocks."
No, Somerby. This is where you are clueless. And uneducated.
Bundy knew exactly what he was doing, and who he could call on to do it. His rhetoric from his first words to a fawning Fox News came straight out of the Posse Comitatus playbook. He knew how to raise a small army (reports say there were upwards of 2,000 camped on his ranch), and he knew who to call who would bring military-grade weapons.
Go look up some of these loons. They make the Weather Underground look like Mother Teresa's nuns. Start with Oath Keepers. Move on to Sheriff Richard Mack, the guy who wanted to use women as human shields, and his Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association.
While you are at it, look up Posse Comitatus and it's blood brother, the Christian Identity movement.
Yep, just a bunch of clueless, isolated loons out in the boondocks -- with guns. Lots of guns. Lots and lots of guns. And itchy trigger fingers attached to brains that aren't afraid to aim at federal law enforcement officers and cause a bloodbath.
So yes, by all means, as these isolated cranks assemble by the hundreds in the desert and prepare for battle, as Fox News and a string of Tea Party Republican policitians fall all over themselves to call them "patriots" and "freedom fighters," nobody else in the press should push back. They should just ignore the whole thing.
After all, if they do anything, anything at all, Bob Somerby might think they are just showing off how much smarter they are.
Well, I hope the mainstream press is a hell of a lot smarter than that. In fact, it's pretty much turning out that the American people are a hell of a lot smarter, too.
And a whole lot smarter than Bob Somerby.
Go back to defending Chris Christie and the bridge, Bob. Or go defend poor Gov. Ultrasound.
You only looked like an ass when you did that.
Amen. It's really quite remarkable the pretzels BOB twists himself into these days in order to find new reasons to sneer at Walsh, Blow, Maddow, Hayes, etc.
DeleteThat Somerby exemplifies the points he himself makes supports his ideas, not contradicts him. That would bother you if your goal were to dispute Somerby's ideas instead of attack him as a person. So why all the hate?
DeleteThere is something in between "ignoring" it and the hysterical reaction from the left. Not that a tribalist who needs Bundy to make him feel smarter-than has a clue about moderation.
DeleteLook, Somerby has reduced himself to defending a bunch of right-wing gun nuts who were prepared to kill federal officers.
DeleteAll because one of their buddies refuses to pay routine fees in his industry to graze his cattle on property that isn't his. And even at a federally subsidized discount price.
OK, I get it. Your a fan boy and Somerby is your hero. I guess I should rejoice that Somerby is just a clueless old crank with a blog stuck beyond the boondocks of the Internet, and he is down to very few idiotic fanboys who wouldn't know what to think if they check in every day.
And don't you just love it when the fanboys cry over "personal attacks" and have the gall to ask, "Why the hate?"
DeletePerfectly good questions that they never get around to asking their Hero, the Hypocrite. The "Let's Pretend I'm Liberal So I Can Regurgitate Right Wing Extremist Spin For My Remaining Fanboys Stupid Enough to Buy It" guy.
I don't pretend to know bob's motives, conscious or unconscious, but his arguments fit the profile of an "independent," namely, the sort who, quite understandably unhappy with the terms of our political discourse (and the way it is framed by most MSM journalists -- easy targets), finds refuge in "Can't we all just treat other guys' views with some respect?" and "I'm an independent thinker, unlike you other rubes" rather than actually trying to think through what is desirable and how, collectively, to get there from here, or recognizing the extraordinary power of the plutocrats (despite his harping on the salaries of a Maddow or Matthews) and their manipulation of latent racism in our society (despite his expressions of love for sweet young black children in Baltimore). Bob doesn't talk much about MLK's anger or hurt, much less his economic analysis (which, I think, is what got him murdered). I don't think I've ever read anything by him on Malcolm.
DeleteLife is unfair. Gore was treated badly, as had been Clinton and as would be Kerry (note that any of these was exactly a liberal exemplar by past norms). Some of us remember when Adlai Stevenson was treated unfairly, too. And our parents and grandparents and great grandparents could add to the list. If we're black and my age, our great grandparents may well have been slaves, even a few in northern states (where slavery hung on e.g. in NJ till after the CW, thanks to weird grand-fathering laws) -- in which case, the white liberal press is well known to be a very fair-weather friend.
Yeah, a little knowledge of history helps. Bundy is an easily identifiable product of our history. More to the point, so is Hannity. Sorry if the critics of a Bundy or Hannity are less than perfect. I hear tell that abolitionists weren't perfect, either. Even Lincoln wasn't, or so I've heard.
mch
Yes, Charles Blow and Joan Walsh are The Bad People, while Sean Hannity goes unexamined. That's just brilliant.
ReplyDeleteWhat's stopping you from doing so? Why is it only his responsibility?
DeleteJoseph did not say it was only Somerby's responsibility.
DeleteI think he meant to say Somerby's focus on any flaws of Blow and Walsh while ignoring Hannity was a disproportionate response.
There's no logic in that if that is what he intended to say. Blow and Walsh can't be criticized without some sort of proportionality? That doesn't make sense.
DeleteWhat's stopping you from doing so yourself?
ReplyDeleteI agree with Bob. Liberal columnists do us a disservice when they discuss anything other than the remarkable progress on test scores made by black kids under 13 and the looting of Americans by profiteers in health care. Everything else they write is designed to help the 1% divide us.
ReplyDeleteOMB (In Defense of BOB)
ReplyDeleteAnyone who suggests Harvard educated east coast self proclaimed blogger BOB is defending western rancher Clive Bundy should be ashamed.
Anyone who suggests that BOB misrepresents what each of the columnists BOB cites in this post should pat themself on the back.
As Anonymous 7:09 correctly points out, the one trying to demonstrate superiority here is BOB, and he disses Bundy's intelligence more than anyone he attacks in his post without even discussing either Bundy's views on race or the issues and events which brought him into notoriety.
Collins points out that what we have learned is that Bundy is a rancher whose livelihood is made possible by a federal subsidy. Blow attacks a notion expressed by far more mainstream figures than Bundy that slavery was a blessing for blacks. Hayes and Walsh focus on the conservative media figures who made Bundy a hero and then ran for cover, not Bundy.
We look forward to BOB trying to flesh out several posts on the substance of their work. We will enjoy reading his version of what they "seemed" to say, what their work "suggests" and what we might
"infer" from it.
Like Bundy, BOB is an old guy. He seems to get kookier with age. Like Bundy, his public positions seem to reek of hypocrisy. Because he is better educated and priveleged (Bundy's Dad ran cattle not burlesque dancers) many think BOB should be smarter than Bundy. We have suspected for quite a while he is not.
KZ
It's because he's old?
ReplyDeleteWho? Bundy or Somerby? They may be high school classmates.
DeleteBundy and Somerby are both younger than Sterling.
DeleteSomerby is one of our most clueless (not to mention condescending) citizens --- but he's just an isolated blogger from somewhere past the boondocks.
ReplyDeleteFortunately, we can read this blog without worrying about why those in the comments want to bash Somerby (or each other). But there is something truly ugly and odd about the animosity toward Somerby displayed here.
ReplyDeleteThere is indeed something odd and truly ugly about the animosity Somerby displays here.
DeleteNothing Somerby says justifies the extreme amount of animosity displayed by commenters here, day in and day out.
DeleteIt is just the tragic way liberal rubes have been taught to play.
DeleteI can't believe somedody stooped so low as to compare him to a pretzel.
Delete"We’ll start to discuss these topics on Monday" Somerby
ReplyDeleteTime for prognostications about upcoming posts.
Anyone see Dowd today? What are the odds she will be the lead on Monday? Think we'll hear about Dowd before Donald Sterling? If Olbermann weighs in on Sterling will we get a post about his past transgressions?
Bob will praise Sterling with faint damning. After all, some of Sterling's best players are black, and over the years, he has raised so many of them out of poverty from the philanthropy of his good heart.
DeleteThen he will blast Dowd for throwing around the "R" word, and claim she is the real cause of division and lingering discrimination.
Meanwhile, whatever Sterling or Bundy said, it pales in comparison to the millions Rachel Maddow stuffs in her pants every day.
Sterling's remarks to his girlfriend, no doubt publicized for reasons of her own (via a non-news gossip site like TMZ), say more about her attempts to hurt him than his attitudes toward anything. We are indeed in Big Brother times when personal remarks become public like that and nothing anyone says is private any more. You should all be worrying about that -- not the pathetic complaints of an old man betrayed by someone he cared about. People say unrepresentative things when emotionally upset.
DeleteThis is not a case exemplifying systemic racism that deserves pontification by pundits -- nor is it anything that the league should be involved in at all. Whether Somerby talks about this or not, the fact that so many others have gotten involved in this is ridiculous. We should all have turned the other way and given this man his privacy.
I couldn't agree more Anonymous at 12:40. He is, after all,
Deletea man who gives black people something to do other than sit around on their porches demonstrating slavery might have been better than government dependency.
I didn't say that. I said that when people are upset they say things they don't mean. I said that a domestic dispute doesn't belong on TMZ, much less on the President's agenda.
DeleteI do find it interesting that you think all "racists" are interchangeable and that Bundy's words can be put into Sterling's mouth as if these were not two different people, or even people at all.
Bob hasn't written much about Down lately. You can see from her comment section that people have caught on that she is clueless and insane. Bob was the first to point it out. Hopefully people will catch up and realize the same about Maddow and the rest of the millionaire charlatans that play you well meaning and otherwise smart people..
DeleteHate to use an extreme analogy, but maybe that's the only way to get a point across to a yahoo who would so casually and clumsily seek to downplay the words in that conversation.
DeleteIf Adolf were breaking up with Eva and she exposed his plans for the "Final Solution," well then, that would have said far more about her attempts to hurt him than about his attitudes toward Jewish people, wouldn't it?
Yeah. I'm sure you wrestled hard with your inner voice before ignoring it on this one.
Delete1:06 must not have heard the latest section of the Sterling tapes. He puts the food on his players tables, the roofs over their heads and gives them cars to drive.
DeletePlus he can trade them or sell them to another owner.
Maureen Dowd is a classic example of incestuous Beltway media group think. When Bob first pointed that out way back some 16 years ago, he had a point. By the 6,932nd time he said it, it lost a lot of its zing and became quite boring.
DeleteWhich is probably why you don't read much about her any more. Besides, Bob is too busy race-baiting for clicks and obsessing about Maddow's contract.
Just for the record, liberals in general were objecting to Dowd 16 years ago, not just bob somerby. Liberals have despised her since forever; only bob's non-liberal, or very young, readers would be unaware of that.
Deletemch
Blogger is guaranteed to defend Sterling ("us old white male farts have to stick together" ).
ReplyDeleteI don't mind Bob defending him. He can bring him home. He can feed him and fellate him. Just don't blog about it in public.
DeleteAnd who brought it up?
DeleteWho brought up what? The way Sterling was brought up?
DeleteI am sure if we rode with him in a car we could see his humanity. Especially if we had spent the night in his jail.
Somerby hasn't mentioned Sterling. This putting words and ideas into his mouth is ridiculous.
Delete"Somerby hasn't mentioned Sterling."
DeleteYet. He has become quite predictable. It is possible he'll say nothing because he is now on a quest to rehabilitate the reputation of poor, isolated Cliven Bundy from those savages on MSNBC.
But he will also see the great tie-in between Bundy and Sterling in the "scandal culture" that seeks to demonize both merely because their views on race are, in the words of one pundit, "beyond repugnant." (Remember who that was?)
On the Sunday last August that the whole "Rodeo Clown" thing went viral, I predicted on this very blog that Bob's only thoughts would be, "There go those damned liberals, throwing around the R-word again."
Sure enough . . .
TDH hasn't covered Sterling. If Salon says a tribal thing about him, I'm sure he will name names. Until then keep your immature troll specualtion private, just like the NY Times should have done with Bundy's private thoughts to his close family at the ranch campground podium.
DeleteOh, deary me. I've been called "immature" just because I think Somerby has become utterly predictable in his concern trolling.
DeleteI think I'll cry myself to sleep tonight.
I wasn't even talking about you. The Rodeo Clown, thing, though, that was an awful example of me-tooisms distorting a long recognized rodeo practice in bull ride distractions.
DeleteNo. The example was used to show how predictable Somerby has become in his knee-jerk reaction to every allegation of racism. To wit:
Delete"But what he (Bundy/Sterling) said isn't nearly as bad as what he/she (insert MSNBC/NYT target) said about what he said."
He'll discount, minimize and distort the racist remarks, and then when that doesn't work, he'll lie. And then he'll complain that the people reporting those remarks are destroying Western Civilization.
It's his schtick, and like a fading stand-up comic who wonders who the remaining few in his audience at the cheap strip mall comedy clubs are no longer laughing, it never quite dawns on him to get new material.
It is not just Blow. I don't understand how Somerby missed this glaring example of liberal self styled superiority from Stalin's favorite
ReplyDeleteonline mag.
http://www.salon.com/2012/10/12/ten_conservatives_who_have_praised_slavery/
Thank God or whatever higher power guides you that in this age of corporate media at least one among us is much more discerning than the truly clueless.
ReplyDeleteThe Republicans are already lapping liberal concern trolls wallowing in their festival of self proclaimed superiority on the Bundy front.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2014/04/25/the-insiders-ignore-the-bundy-sideshow-and-focus-on-the-issues/
Obama has now weighed in on the Sterling front. This is worse than his politicizing the witch hunt of poor George Zimmerman. Or at least just as bad.
ReplyDeleteWeeks of sanctimonius demands for a show trial from pseudo-liberals are coming.
Show trial, eh? The dude has been breaking the law for 20 yrs. Better Aryan Nation trolls, please.
DeleteOoops, wrong racist, never mind.
DeleteThis is the way Standard Misinformation spreads!
DeleteSterling has been sued by DoJ twice for housing discrimination. His testimony from the depositions are all over the internet this afternoon. The guy is stuck in the 60s. According to Sterling, blacks and Latinos are lazy and they smell bad. Women are best when they are silent and obedient. He's spent the last decade trying to rehabilitate his reputation by charitable donation. He's a creepy 1 percenter and deserves every bad thing that's about to happen to him.
DeleteS
Rich people don't give bunches of money to shore up their reputations. They don't care about reputation. They care about money -- so why do you think he gave those donations?
DeleteThe main points about the Bundy affair are not now stupid Bundy is but a) how many others were willing to support his rebellion with armed force; and b) how Fox News and some politicians and pundits supported him, contradicting their own statements in other matters. All these people, who really should know better, seem to think they have special privileges to disregard paying taxes, etc.
ReplyDeleteA lot of people will go to extremes, just like you did, to cover the fact that this is all a festival of progressives trying to prove they are smarter than a real dumb guy.
DeleteHave some original thoughts, please.
Exactly. And Bundy's expressions of racism gives all the right-wingers who supported his "cause" cover to run for the exits, as if they are just learning that he is "beyond repugnant."
DeleteAfter all, who could have known that a murderous anarchist could be a racist, too?
Lemme see, 2:36.
DeleteYou can only regurgitate Somerby's latest rant at his most ridiculous, and you are telling someone else to "have some original thoughts"?
BWAAAHAHAHA!
You play like a rube, 2:49. And how hateful to call this post a rant.
DeleteSterling's remarks were under-baked.
ReplyDeleteMinsinformation spreads like margarine regardless of how well baked the remarks. It greases the collapse of the culture and rube-like readers of major career pseudo-liberal pundits can't see it much less taste the difference with higher priced spreads.
DeleteHe's just some clueless, isolated NBA owner, living beyond the boondocks in LA.
DeleteIt's strange and interesting to see the mob take down someone. It happened to Bill Schrempf, a man I had worked with. Schrempf refused to let a clerk display an American flag at her desk, because it might offend non-American employees. This decision followed the multicultural philosophy, which prevailed at Stanford University when, he studied there. Unfortunately for Bill, this happened a few days after 9/11. In no time, he was getting national coverage as the bête noir. He was forced out of his job. See http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2001-10-09/business/0110080541_1_ncci-cfo-magazine-flag
ReplyDeleteToday, being caught saying something racist is considered a huge crime. Once a Bundy or a Sterling is publicly convicted, his reputation is shattered.
Extenuating circumstances no longer matter. Was he misquoted or quoted out of context? Did the media leave out some of what he said to make it sound worse? Do others say or think the same things? Were his statements really not that bad? None of these excuses matter. He's guilty in the public eye and the mob will have its vengeance.
So what were the extenuating circumstances? Was your comment really not that stupid? The mob will yawn.
DeleteSterlings girlfriend distributed a private plea to stop rubbing his nose in their breakup to TMZ.
Delete10:28, my point is, it doesn't matter whether there are extenuating circumstances. In the linked article, you can see that Schrempf offered some excuses. I don't know whether they were true or not. I kind of doubt them. But, whether or not his excuses were valid, he was forced out of his job. There was no real opportunity to convince the public that he hadn't done something awful. Once he received national publicity, his reputation could never recover.
DeleteLook at the Duke lacrosse team and George Zimmerman. They were publicly declared innocent or Not Guilty, but they will nevertheless be considered to be bad people forever by a large swath of the population.
"Look at the Duke lacrosse team and George Zimmerman. etc."
DeleteThis might make sense if liberals were mentioning Zimmerman and the lacrosse team incessantly. So the question should not be why these incidents are useful to liberals. The question why their mention is useful to conservatives.
I like Bundy and Sterling better than I like most of the torch carrying left these days. Screeches of "racism" after an old crank makes a remark are more offensive than the remarks, which in Bundy's case weren't racist.
ReplyDeleteNo. They were merely observations about the poor work habits of people without firm direction from overseers with whips.
DeleteNo they were observations about the poor work ethic of people whose culture has disintegrated as a result of a group of people who enjoy creating generations of government dependency because it lets them feel good about themselves.
Delete(A group largely comprised of privileged but stupid white Democrats)
DeleteAnon. @ 10:31-33 says some strange things, BOB fans but take heed.
DeleteBlack people have a poor work ethic, he charges. Their culture has disintegrated. They are multi-generational government dependents.
Heed the inner voice of the OTB. Do not call such comments racist. Otherwise the plutocrats will divide you and Anon @10:31-33 from your appointed fight against the looters.
Don't drop the R-bomb. If your leaders had not ignored how well black children in 4th and 6th grade are doing on tests, blacks would be doing better. The notion they are dependent or their culture has collapsed is underbaked, but their failure is your fault. Just for other reasons you would rather jump off the Eiffel Tower than discuss.
All glory to the OTB
KZ
Who knows what minor point bob will find to dispute in this Krugman column to distract from Krugman's argument. (Note to bob's right-wing and/or "independent" readers: Krugman is a classic liberal, not a leftist -- there is a difference; educate yourselves):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/28/opinion/krugman-high-plains-moochers.html?hp&rref=opinion&_r=0
The question I have long asked: why even bother with poor bob (who knows nothing of real leftism, btw, and little of real liberalism)? Because, both his earlier work, which was of some value, and because some of us sense real danger in his combination of "we liberals" (who "we," white man?), occasional (vanishingly!) good insight, and the readers/commenters he attracts. In the last category, not the obvious bigots, but the David in Cal's, who have no excuse (no, your sister-in-law is not an excuse) for failing to use your head and, say, yeah, I was wrong about that. In other words, that famously dwindling middle class.
mch
Why bother disputing actual statements made by poor bob when you can make up imaginary ones and dispute them instead?
DeleteMany pundits on both sides aren't that smart, so one expects flawed columns. Krugman is so smart that his flawed columns are a sad waste. Consider this sentence:
Delete[Bundy's] ranting has given conservatives an easy out, a way to dissociate themselves from his actions without facing up to the terrible wrong turn their movement has taken.
This might make sense if the Conservatives were the ones who are making Bundy's racist rant incessant news. However, it's the liberals who keep this story going (e.g., this very column of Krugman's.) So, the question shouldn't be why Bundy's rant is useful to conservatives. The question is why it's useful to liberals.
DAinCA,
DeleteWhen Krugman says that conservatives have taken a wrong turn, he isn't talking about their adopting Bundy's racist views; he's talking about their rebarbative views about government.
Sean Hannity's disgrace is in adopting the high-plains moocher as his hero and giving him a platform for his sedition. Krugman is saying that Bundy should be hung around Hannity's neck like the albatross that he is. Hannity can now disavow Bundy for his racism, hoping that people will forget that he loved him for his illegal, seditious, selfish, and potentially dangerous politics.