Then there's the latest available baloney from the Evil Eye network. I'd like to comment on A. Looney, the clown who pops up toward the end of the Giant Stopwatch (as in Stop Watching?) show. He used to be funny, at least sometimes, though he could also be annoying. (Beavis and Butthead took him on once: "Why do they call it taking a dump? I mean, you're not taking anything...") Now he's blown it with his wanton hostility toward some peoples' faith--because of a contoversial film he hasn't even seen. Well, I'd say it's time to put him out to pasture; he's become a liability to his employer. I haven't seen the film either and don't intend to evaluate it. But I've seen enough of the insulting Mr. Looney to decide he's not worth viewing. (Update: For a nice response to the guy, go to dumbcelebs.com and scroll about halfway down the page. [OK, to the 2/23/04 entry.])
The P-Cock network, on its often-good SNL, similarly insulted the unfashionably-conservative cinematographer and his take on Christianity with a cartoon crudely mocking both and essentially depicting him as a Jew-baiter. (Real animosity directed against Jews tends to flourish on the Left, where the mainstream media won't cover it.)
Back to See BS: The other day its prime propaganda program found fault with the US President for making fun of himself, displaying photos of himself in the Oval Office, apparently searching, while voicing lines about seeking the notorious missing WMD. The Evil Eye agitprop chief pompously questioned the President's taste in jokes, ostensibly because of the danger our military faces--then produced someone from a military family who, predictably, objected to W's eforts at humor. Bad taste?! Look to your own glass house, you moral morons! And don't tell us your coverage isn't biased.
Thursday, April 01, 2004
From Big Ideas we descend a bit, back to the old Lake Traverse Travesty, this community's journal of record. In January Yours Truly actually appeared on the front page of a Sunday edition, though in the picture's background, partly obscured and not IDd in the accompanying caption--just as well, I thought. What most stood out was my forehead; I hadn't realized it was so prominent, though maybe this shouldn't have surprised.
A few weeks later the Sunday Travesty featured a guest editorial by an area Catholic priest. Having previously in these pages gone after a local Lutheran lefty, I'm just as inclined to find fault with the words of Another Leading Denomination's preacher when they seem to go politically astray. I still have the time for this, so here goes:
Father M's point of departure is the ongoing flap over the Pledge of Allegiance. Rather than argue over the "under God" clause, he admits to trouble with the "liberty and justice for all" part. OK, I'll confess right now I was never a big fan of the Pledge, which first appeared in a late-19th-century publication. The reference to the Deity amounts to a mid-20th century afterthought, while the liberty/justice wording suggests the achievement of some perfect society, which I don't think anyone would insist already exists, though it might well describe our ideals.
Unfortunately the padre elaborates with a list of reasons why he thinks "we do not, as a nation, believe in 'liberty and justice for all'." (He apparently counts failure to attain them as evidence of our not desiring these objects.) First is the claim that one in five US children is born into poverty. Offhand I don't know the official statistics, but I can say that "poverty" in this country may compare favorably with the way most people live in much of the world! And it's largely preventable anyway; the primary cause here is single motherhood. Moreover, government reckoning, as I recall, doesn't include transfer payments as income.
Next comes this hackneyed complaint: "The gap between the rich and the poor is still increasing." No figures to back it up--and they'd probably be suspect anyway, as this assertion commonly seems made to mislead. Once again, these terms are relative!
"Over 43 million people in the United States cannot afford health insurance." I'm not positive about the details myself, but this type of argument has been explained as misleading. "These people do not receive equal health care." Equal to what? And how do liberty and justice translate into health insurance? Liberty and equality are to some extent mutually exclusive--not an original thought--and we can't have it both ways.
Father M goes on to lament the inadequacy of efforts to help "millions of homeless in our land." Notwithstanding the probability that their numbers are routinely exaggerated, there is a matter of liberty here: Too much for the mentally ill and drug-ridden, whom certain courts, in their superior wisdom, have mandated not be confined.
"Racism," he says, "is deeply rooted and widespread throughout our nation." So when was this not the case? A man of the cloth should hardly marvel at the human capacity for nastiness. Racism, Padre, is deeply rooted and widespread throughout the world!
Subsequently he whines about tax and program cutting, demonstrating his ignorance of political economics and prompting me to overwrite "BULL$#|+!" when I first read it. Then it's the old saw about women not earning equal pay for equal work. How does he know (particularly in his profession)?
"Workers," he charges, "are exploited by corporations and private businesses through minimum wages." What the purgatory? I thought required minimum wages were supposed to help workers--though some economists think they actually harm segments, notably youth. His possibly-confused wording called forth this penciled note: "Mere leftist SCREED & DRIVEL!"--which is what it looks like.
I'll give him half a point when he objects to executing underage and mentally deficient criminals, To my limited knowledge, this practice isn't widespread. One can easily name places, however, where the young and stupid are encouraged to blow themselves up while killing others (often children) who merely belong to a hated ethnicity--or ordered to fight their elders' deadly battles more conventionally.
Father M follows up with a series of lame, rather vague accusations about police brutality, pollution, "corrupt" elections and a foreign policy dominated by (the horror!) self-interest--which has (gasp!) failed to solve the world's problems--plus "Unbridled market economy" (where?!) which "exploits the Third and Fourth World." I scrawled across these paragraphs "BULL$#|+ LEFTISM"; the poor padre is clearly out of his depth.
But he's not done showing his ignorance. Before making his single valid point, that abortion snuffs out millions, he accuses some of us of maintaining luxurious lifestyles, depriving many of necessities. Folks, it just doesn't work that way. I labeled the page here "IDIOT BLATHER." He then wraps up his bogus indictment with the point that we allegedly waste so much in resources and lives on wars not approved by "most churches and theologians"--as if the Founders had set up such a constitutional check.
Lamenting the phony picture of our country he's painted, the padre refers to Matt. 25:31-45. I disagree with his understanding, but that's a religious subject beyond the scope of my criticism. In the end, he flounders in some kind of wishful collectivist thinking, suggesting that we could somehow achieve some kind of ideal social justice if we just weren't such naughty hypocrites. Concepts such as individual responsibility for the consequences of one's actions (instead of blaming society--or, as he seems to prefer, all of us) complicate matters. Ultimately he proposes adding the word "equality" to the Pledge, claiming it appeared in the original version but was deleted for racist reasons. I'm not sure how much of a canard this is, but--as noted above--an excess of equality is not something most of us would accept. It's also been said that, in contrast to the United States, if you want equality at the expense of liberty, there's Europe.
One more thing about the Pledge: While I don't really like it myself, the fact that a single dyspeptic atheist, without standing to sue, can dishonestly bring it before the Supreme Court (where, according to the saw about self-representation, he has a fool for a client), strikes me as pathetic. Move to Europe, dummy!
A few weeks later the Sunday Travesty featured a guest editorial by an area Catholic priest. Having previously in these pages gone after a local Lutheran lefty, I'm just as inclined to find fault with the words of Another Leading Denomination's preacher when they seem to go politically astray. I still have the time for this, so here goes:
Father M's point of departure is the ongoing flap over the Pledge of Allegiance. Rather than argue over the "under God" clause, he admits to trouble with the "liberty and justice for all" part. OK, I'll confess right now I was never a big fan of the Pledge, which first appeared in a late-19th-century publication. The reference to the Deity amounts to a mid-20th century afterthought, while the liberty/justice wording suggests the achievement of some perfect society, which I don't think anyone would insist already exists, though it might well describe our ideals.
Unfortunately the padre elaborates with a list of reasons why he thinks "we do not, as a nation, believe in 'liberty and justice for all'." (He apparently counts failure to attain them as evidence of our not desiring these objects.) First is the claim that one in five US children is born into poverty. Offhand I don't know the official statistics, but I can say that "poverty" in this country may compare favorably with the way most people live in much of the world! And it's largely preventable anyway; the primary cause here is single motherhood. Moreover, government reckoning, as I recall, doesn't include transfer payments as income.
Next comes this hackneyed complaint: "The gap between the rich and the poor is still increasing." No figures to back it up--and they'd probably be suspect anyway, as this assertion commonly seems made to mislead. Once again, these terms are relative!
"Over 43 million people in the United States cannot afford health insurance." I'm not positive about the details myself, but this type of argument has been explained as misleading. "These people do not receive equal health care." Equal to what? And how do liberty and justice translate into health insurance? Liberty and equality are to some extent mutually exclusive--not an original thought--and we can't have it both ways.
Father M goes on to lament the inadequacy of efforts to help "millions of homeless in our land." Notwithstanding the probability that their numbers are routinely exaggerated, there is a matter of liberty here: Too much for the mentally ill and drug-ridden, whom certain courts, in their superior wisdom, have mandated not be confined.
"Racism," he says, "is deeply rooted and widespread throughout our nation." So when was this not the case? A man of the cloth should hardly marvel at the human capacity for nastiness. Racism, Padre, is deeply rooted and widespread throughout the world!
Subsequently he whines about tax and program cutting, demonstrating his ignorance of political economics and prompting me to overwrite "BULL$#|+!" when I first read it. Then it's the old saw about women not earning equal pay for equal work. How does he know (particularly in his profession)?
"Workers," he charges, "are exploited by corporations and private businesses through minimum wages." What the purgatory? I thought required minimum wages were supposed to help workers--though some economists think they actually harm segments, notably youth. His possibly-confused wording called forth this penciled note: "Mere leftist SCREED & DRIVEL!"--which is what it looks like.
I'll give him half a point when he objects to executing underage and mentally deficient criminals, To my limited knowledge, this practice isn't widespread. One can easily name places, however, where the young and stupid are encouraged to blow themselves up while killing others (often children) who merely belong to a hated ethnicity--or ordered to fight their elders' deadly battles more conventionally.
Father M follows up with a series of lame, rather vague accusations about police brutality, pollution, "corrupt" elections and a foreign policy dominated by (the horror!) self-interest--which has (gasp!) failed to solve the world's problems--plus "Unbridled market economy" (where?!) which "exploits the Third and Fourth World." I scrawled across these paragraphs "BULL$#|+ LEFTISM"; the poor padre is clearly out of his depth.
But he's not done showing his ignorance. Before making his single valid point, that abortion snuffs out millions, he accuses some of us of maintaining luxurious lifestyles, depriving many of necessities. Folks, it just doesn't work that way. I labeled the page here "IDIOT BLATHER." He then wraps up his bogus indictment with the point that we allegedly waste so much in resources and lives on wars not approved by "most churches and theologians"--as if the Founders had set up such a constitutional check.
Lamenting the phony picture of our country he's painted, the padre refers to Matt. 25:31-45. I disagree with his understanding, but that's a religious subject beyond the scope of my criticism. In the end, he flounders in some kind of wishful collectivist thinking, suggesting that we could somehow achieve some kind of ideal social justice if we just weren't such naughty hypocrites. Concepts such as individual responsibility for the consequences of one's actions (instead of blaming society--or, as he seems to prefer, all of us) complicate matters. Ultimately he proposes adding the word "equality" to the Pledge, claiming it appeared in the original version but was deleted for racist reasons. I'm not sure how much of a canard this is, but--as noted above--an excess of equality is not something most of us would accept. It's also been said that, in contrast to the United States, if you want equality at the expense of liberty, there's Europe.
One more thing about the Pledge: While I don't really like it myself, the fact that a single dyspeptic atheist, without standing to sue, can dishonestly bring it before the Supreme Court (where, according to the saw about self-representation, he has a fool for a client), strikes me as pathetic. Move to Europe, dummy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)