Cristiano

This is brilliant:

Arizona Debate: Conservative Chickens Come Home to Roost | Matt Taibbi | Rolling Stone

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detrius

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Cristiano

I have never seen such a succinct, dead on analysis of modern American conservatism before. It's really incredible.

Wrong Weatherwax

Taibbi certainly has an excellent way of framing his arguments and articles. I'm fond of this one not just because he captured the general picture, its like he captured the prevailing storm of paranoia and hatred that bursts from our media outlets when it comes to these chuckleheads.

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Cindy Claveau

Underneath his clarity of words was something else, though - he was outlining the undercurrent of American culture post-1945. By that, I specifically mean the growing clash between change and traditionalism.

This is where true conservatism struggles. Prior to the post-war era, conservatism could champion traditional values and time-honored attitudes because things just didn't change that much.

But in this age of the internet and head-spinning social change that world view is in deep trouble. This is the era of "move with it or get run over", and the supreme irony is that the Republicans are running over themselves.

There seems to be this firm conviction that the upheavals of the Arab Spring were unique, one-off events. But to believe that is to ignore the context. While the conservatives mock and ridicule the "Occupiers" here in the States and their own last-gasp knee-jerk Tea Party movement sent a bunch of clueless whackjobs to Congress, the tide of cultural change is still rolling. It's still gaining momentum. Every new generation swells the tide. I'm becoming convinced that we are witnessing the death throes of the Republican Party - killed by its own myopic bigotry and resistance to change.

It's not too late for the GOP to remodel itself, but they're going to have to give up this notion that genuflecting to their own far-right religious nutjobs will ever get the White House back for them.

People are more informed than ever and to the tyrant and the bigot, information is their mortal enemy.

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Beebo Brink

Thank you, this is the best polictical article I've read in ages.

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Tess Whitcroft

Some related stories from all over...

Did Jeb Bush Actually Say That? | Swampland | TIME.com

When Jeb Bush and Pat Buchanan think you've gone too far...



Tess

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Circle Widdershins

Oh I want to party with these guys:



This article really gives some great insight into the degradation of the Republican party ideals.

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Cristiano We need to make 'endless celestial sex' into a thing.

Mr. B

The debates certainly have been a traveling carnival show, and the author definitely makes some valid points, such as:
“It's as if all of the American public's bad habits and perverse obsessions are all coming back to haunt Republican voters in this race: The lack of attention span, the constant demand for instant gratification, the abject hunger for negativity, the utter lack of backbone or constancy (we change our loyalties at the drop of a hat, all it takes is a clever TV ad): these things are all major factors in the spiraling Republican disaster.” (emphasis added)

And I can see where some would feel validated by the article:
“The finger-pointing game is a fun one to play, but it’s a little like drugs – you have to keep taking bigger and bigger doses in order to get the same high. So it starts with a bunch of these people huddling together and saying to themselves, "We’re the real good Americans; our problems are caused by all those other people out there who don’t share our values."
[Refer to the OP subject article itself and this very sub-forum for evidence that type of phenomenon isn’t limited to “conservatives”.]

Interesting that the author says conservatives have been calling liberals “terrorists” and forgets that some of the highest elected officials in the country (and possibly the second highest) have apparently actually called elected Republicans and the elected Tea Party members “terrorists”.

The author (disingenuously I think) uses a Ron Paul quote to validate at least a portion of his opinions; (from the OP article)
“Paul also recalled that after World War II, 10 million soldiers came home and prospered without any kind of government aid at all – all they needed was a massive cut to the federal budget, and those soldiers just surfed on the resultant wave of economic progress.
"You know what the government did? They cut the budget by 60 percent," he said. "And everybody went back to work again, you didn't need any special programs."
Right – it wasn’t like they needed a G.I. Bill or anything. After all, people were different back then: They didn’t want or need welfare, or a health care program, or any of those things. At least, that’s not the way Paul remembered it.”

Contrasted to what was apparently actually said the author seems to have with-held more than a small bit of important information here (from the debate):
“KING: Let's stay on the economy and let's stay on the South Carolina experience all you gentlemen have had.

As you know, and as this audience reflects, this is a state incredibly proud of its military tradition and incredibly proud of its veterans. Many of those veterans who have served post-9/11, served honorably in Iraq and Afghanistan, are coming back to a terrible economy. Right now, the unemployment rate for post-9/11 veterans aged 18 to 24 is at 22 percent.

Congressman Paul, to you first, sir. Should the federal government be specifically targeting that part, our veterans coming back, saying the unemployment rate is so high among that sub group, that the federal government should offer tax incentives to employers or take other steps to help them to incentivize the economy to help them get jobs? (emphasis added)

PAUL: To some degree, but you really want to make the environment -- the economy healthy for everybody and not designate special places. But to help them out to come back is probably necessary on some occasions now.

But we have to think about how serious our problems are here, because we face something much, much greater. After World War II, we had 10 million came home all at once. But what did we do then? There were some of the liberals back then that said, oh, we have to have more work programs and do this and that. And they thought they would have to do everything conceivable for those 10 million. They never got around to it because they came home so quickly.

And you know what the government did? They cut the budget by 60 percent.

They cut taxes by 30 percent. By that time, the debt had been liquidated. And everybody went back to work again, you didn't need any special programs.

So…

(APPLAUSE)

But the one thing, talking about concern about the -- the military and the veterans, I'm very proud that, you know, I get twice as many donations from the military, active military people, then all the rest put together.

(APPLAUSE)

So I am very concerned about them. I think where the real problem is, is we can create a healthy economic environment if we did the right things. Where the veterans really deserve help, both as a physician and as a congressman, is the people who come back and aren't doing well health-wise. They need a lot more help.

We have an epidemic now of suicide of our military coming back. So they need a lot of medical help. And I think they come up shortchanged. They come up shortchanged after Vietnam war, Persian Gulf war, and even now. They don't get care from the Veterans Administration.” (end of debate quote)

IMO, it is pretty clear that Paul was still responding to the question on new Federal created employment incentives for veterans when he mentioned “special programs”. The GI Bill after WWII did not (as far as I can determine) include employment incentives as the question posited – if true it would appear that Paul was factually accurate that special employment incentives were not needed to get people back to work.

If we apply the same standard for truth that the “Left” hold FOX News to, I think the authors misuse of the aforementioned Ron Paul quote would be at the top of the WORST EVER LIES list.

When I started to read this portion of the article I thought he must have shifted gears and was talking about a “Clinton – Obama” debate:
“There was only one possible answer, and we're seeing it playing out in this race: At themselves! And I don’t mean they pointed the finger "at themselves" in the psychologically healthy, self-examining, self-doubting sort of way. Instead, I mean they pointed "at themselves" in the sense of, "There are traitors in our ranks. They must be ferreted out and destroyed!" But then he refers to that being where the Republican party is today – so it isn’t clear if he is ignorant of history or trying to say the Republicans took a long time to get to the same place the Democrat Party was years ago?

Great use of the “Left’s” Code words and Dog Whistles in the article too (I think he only missed referencing Rush by name.)

(Interesting article overall – agree it is well written and indeed has some elements of truth. Thanks for sharing it)

Sushiva

Dr Paul seems to forget that what really happened was GI Joe came home and took Rosie the Riveters job.

Wrong Weatherwax

And what about Paul's statement? Perhaps not a lie but certainly selective presentation of the facts. The reasons the all of those shrank isn't a ribald tale of Paul's Bed Time Stories, rather it was a focus on the reality of the situation. War spending was no longer necessary, the budget was no longer an issue, and even 10% inflation during the war years was really nothing more than a hiccup because employment levels were sitting at around 2% with annualized growth up around 30%.

Post-war, cutting massive war expenditures was offset though by a very different environment than we are seeing now. Suddenly no one was buying war bonds anymore, no one was rationing, and suddenly there was this huge demand spike that drove greater demand to be sought than there were workers providing supply. People bought cars and a huge shift to the suburbs took place driving an increasing housing market.

So the economic recovery and slow shrinking of the debt didn't take place in the vacuum of budgetary policy, rather it relied on a huge boom from the returning vets and the home front who no longer had to scrimp, save, and work twenty hour days, and the shift of one population of home front workers being replaced by the vets who took up their old jobs.

Unfortunately, the pill of austerity that Paul seems to be trying to sell us here isn't going to create the same kind of effects that happened then.

Mr. B

Certainly many factors were involved that Paul did not go into and could be viewed as selective presentation. Although I imagine that in the context of a debate, while answering a question, there is hardly time for a complete history lesson (even if he in fact knows all the details).

Agree that there isn't any quick painless fix for our ills.

Perphides

Yeah, it's pretty insulting that the GOP is out there discussing competing visions and ideas for the future of their party.

I guess not every primary campaign can be as classy, erudite, and viscerally compelling as the competing themes in the 2008 Democrat campaign; "You're a racist!" "No, I'm not.. you're a sexist!"

Cindy Claveau

If that's what they were doing, they might not be the laughing stock of the moderates and liberals in this country. But their version of "competing visions and ideas" is some religious, homophobic, anti-science theocracy where over 10% of US citizens don't even have basic rights, non-Christians threaten "American values", and they deny the same science that 98% of scentists accept (Evolution and Climate Change) as provably valid.

They've proven themselves clueless and irrelevant. If they came up with one good idea to actually improve this country and the plight of our citizens, maybe they'd be worth listening to. Maybe they'd actually win the White House this November using something other than smoke, mirrors and fear mongering.

But I don't see that happening no matter how hard YOU wish it were true.

All the Dems have to do in 2012 is point out that "We're not the ones with clown noses".

DoctorZen

"[The Republican candidate] wants the government to have complete and total control over your uterus."

That alone should be enough to sicken anyone that has one. Hell, I don't have one and that sickens me.

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Cristiano

* wild applause *

Ishina

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Cindy Claveau

OMG he's clapping with his LEFT hand!

infiniview Merit

[IMG][/IMG]

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Kanomi Pikajuna

Taibbi's seminal article about the Vampire Squid corrupting all political and judicial processes is far more profound and disturbing in its implications than this piece, particularly once you suss out that both parties are puppets of the financial oligarchy and absolutely divorced from morality, reality, or accountability.

The only thing being debated between Obama, Romney, Gingrich and Santorum is how much money they will surrender to the banking cartel and how much blood and treasure they will shove into the war machine and the police state.

Nothing else matters, certainly not whatever bits of divide-and-conquer showcase morality the media dredges up to pretend there is any difference between these thieves.

Casey Pelous

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Perphides

An entertaining, if wildly inaccurate, analysis. It's hysterical (literally) to suggest that anyone has said anything about establishing a theocracy. And while there are arguments to be had concerning highly debatable science like climate change and Victorian fantasies like evolution, they have no place in guiding government actions.

As far as winning in 2012... I think that a win with Romney as the standard bearer for the GOP is a Pyrrhic victory at best.

Personally, it would very likely benefit me in several ways if Obama were to be re-elected.

Tengu Yamabushi

I'll just leave this here...

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Tess Whitcroft

THE most ignorant arrogant man in America speaks out...

Rick Santorum: JFK’s 1960 Speech Made Me Want to Throw Up - ABC News

Well Rick Santorum makes me want to throw up.

Tess

Free Xue

Of course, he's throwing up over a complete misreading of JFK's speech. Typical.

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