The Mask Slips
Today David Brooks gives us his rundown of Obama’s “address” to the Muslim world. I’m not going to discuss the speech because it has already been dissected to a great extent by some of the better writers like Chris Floyd and also for the mundane fact that I have neither listened to the speech nor read more than two paragraphs of it.
Reading through Brooks’ column it begins with some schmaltz about how great Chicago politicians are with some meaningless and syrupy sentimentality about the “Great Tension in Chicago” and how the Obama administration is at once idealistic, earnest and liberal while also clever, cautious and Machiavellian. This is high praise for a president who managed to create 2 million refugees during his first one hundred days in office, a new world’s record I imagine.
However that all may be the following statement lets slip that overgrown golly-gee Boy Scout demeanor Brooks likes to cultivate when he wrote...
“He was showing people in a region besotted with tiresome hysterics how to talk to one another with understanding and dignity.”
Whoops! I guess that one kind of got away from David. Yes indeed, a region “besotted” with tiresome hysterics. I mean why get hysterical when an American bomb just blew up your house along with everyone in it? Those dirty brown Arabs just have no understanding or dignity. And now the Great White Spirit from the White House has come to show them the way. Nice.
posted by Unknown @ 9:46 PM
10 comments
10 Comments:
Man I get tired of tiresome hysterics! I guess that's why they call them tiresome.
To my thinking Obama's Middle Eastern foray isn't about reaching out to people in the middle east but to Americans and Europeans who want to feel good about having a US president who reaches out to those tiresome, hysterical middle eastern types.
I'm reminded of Dubya's "compassionate conservatism" and the sundry gestures towards black voters-- the GOP knew they'd still get less than 10 percent of the black vote come election time, but they might soften resistance from middle-of-the-road white voters uncomfortable with voting republican because of their association with bigoted voters.
I think that's a good take on it, Jonathan. I'd agree there's definitely a component of that in Obama's handlers' strategies.
I'm more disturbed by the vulgar arrogance displayed by Obama when he lectured Arab/Muslim people. I mean that the general theme of his speech was a lecture, and he's not entitled to give one. He doesn't lead Arabs, he doesn't lead Muslims, so how does he have the right to give them a lecture on how to behave?
And then on top of that massive thematic problem, he offers the Golden Rule as a "lesson" for Arabs and Muslims. What the F*&# is that about?
To use a Biblical metaphor from Judeo-Christian "Old Testament" teachings -- the USA needs to cast the log from its own eye before it speaks of the speck in the eye of Islamic and Arabic people.
If Iraq treated the USA as the USA is now treating Iraq, there would be Hell. So how does the Golden Rule apply here?
It doesn't apply to Islam. It doesn't apply to Arabs. It applies to the USA.
This is the wonder of Goebbels -- always lecture your enemies about, and accuse your adversaries of, the very thing you are doing. Karl Rove knew this lesson and it was a cornerstone of the Bush/Cheney Admin. He's also given Obama's handlers lessons on this. He started advising them when it seemed Hillary may pull ahead.
This nation is run by lying thieves and murderers. They have no right to lecture anyone on anything.
-micah pyre
Jonathan,
To my thinking Obama's Middle Eastern foray isn't about reaching out to people in the middle east but to Americans and Europeans who want to feel good about having a US president who reaches out to those tiresome, hysterical middle eastern types.
Exactly. This is Obama’s big job, to polish the U.S. image while continuing with much of the Bush agenda. The people of the Middle East won’t be fooled for long as the bombs continue to rain down.
Micah,
That’s why I couldn’t read more than two paragraphs of the Obama speech. First my eyes crossed, the room started to cant 45 degrees and then the world seemed to turn inside out. I can take only so much concentrated hypocrisy at a time.
rob,
in these days of high-volume concentrated hypocrisy, it's really tough to stay focused on anything that is offered by the "news" media, or by our Federal Govt. That's basically why I quit blogging, I just got too angry and frustrated whenever I'd patiently analyze things.
I'm sure it would be even worse if I spent time reading in the lib-wool blogosphere, because that's where the hypocrisy is strongest. The sickening thing is that the hypocritical lib-wools and pwoggies actually think their hypocritical and inhumane position is SUPERIOR somehow.
who needs Syrup of Ipecac when you have such a noisome stench constantly emanating from Donkeyworld?
-micah pyre
I hear you Micah. I used to think “liberal” meant something, now I know better. The worst of it is when they go into Obama-Worship mode throwing undeserved laurels at him as if he has done anything significant, well other than order the murder of innocents abroad. If Bush did it, it was bad. If Obama does the same things as Bush it’s good.
I can understand your feelings regarding blogging. Dwelling on this madness can tend to be well, maddening. It’s definitely a good idea to have other interests for the sake of sanity. Actually I would love to see you post some more here if you ever feel the urge.
rob,
here's something I did this morning. see what you think.
http://pezcandy.blogspot.com/2009/06/not-one-in-arizona.html
further posts will identify me as Charles F. Oxtrot, not micah pyre. unlike Mr Pyre, Mr Oxtrot will be trying to avoid inflammatory statements.
--micah pyre
Micah,
Surely you know that when you reinvent yourself on th' internets you're not supposed to let people know that you're really senor X. ;^)
Micah,
I read your post and you write with a lot of passion which I think is a good thing. I think people like Rose contribute to the problem of our foreign policy by being obtuse. I recall on one show his guest criticized Condi Rice and Rose said something like “Oh, how can you say that about the beautiful Condi Rice!” I have never taken Charlie Rose very seriously since then. And that is an interesting bit of history regarding Joseph Goebbels. That is so true that the U.S. uses the same tactics.
Sarah,
Nice to hear from you and we are certainly honored here at our humble little blog. However I must tell you some of my moose friends aren’t too happy with you.
rob, when I was a kiddo my mother worked in the White House Press Office, under the Nixon and Ford Admins. what I saw back then made it impossible for me to ever think anything but lies and propaganda come from the mainstream press. when I was in college she had a job at State Dept where she basically ensured that all mainstream news media references to any US foreign policy were 100% consistent with the official State Dept version of things.
so I'm a little jaded at the start of my adult life, which I consider to be post-college, post-grad schooling. I leave college as a naive young Republican, go to law school and learn how American laws were made and how they're implemented and I became a pretty leftish person, no longer partisan, frustrated with the Democrats being apologists for a lot of ugliness in America. work for big insurance companies and other big corporate entities and see how their influence is wielded in society, I find myself forced to quit that work as I grew into a Marxist and couldn't stomach the hypocrisy of my beliefs betrayed by the nature of my income source.
that's 10 yrs ago now. and I've just got more jaded by the behavior of Clinton, Bush, Obama and their lackeys in the Congress and SCOTUS. it's horrible.
yeah I'm jaded.
Micah,
From the time we’re born we begin the indoctrination that we are subjected to throughout our childhood and on into adulthood. Culture is probably the most underrated power that exists. It permeates every aspect of our lives whether we notice it or not, and most don’t. And what it adds up to is that whatever culture we live in it creates our world view and sustains it through the news media, entertainment, and a constant rewriting of history and current events. So really when you think about it, it is a major achievement when anyone can see through the conditioning we experience and maybe it does make one jaded but perhaps it also makes you more aware which is a double edged knife to be sure. But when I listen to the Charlie Rose’s of the world who are held in complete thrall of the accepted narrative provided by our culture I’ll gladly take a little jadedness with what is hopefully a more realistic view of U.S. foreign policy.
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