Having said that, it's time once again to plumb the depths of liberal idiocy of my local newspaper and display the glittering jewels of colossal ignorance that rest on that seabed. This first one comes from Abel Tomlinson. Abel actually ran for state Senator a couple of years ago on the Green Party ticket.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette must evolve. The paper is failing on the two most important fronts: news information and wise opinion.
Virtually every opinion columnist is writing with partisan blinders. Can we at least have one conscious columnist with clear enough vision to see that both parties are corrupted and owned by corporate election financiers, especially Wall Street? Can we have one columnist who not only understands this, but consistently discusses solutions for draining the stagnant slime from the putrefied cesspool that is Washington, D.C.? Perhaps more importantly, the newspaper is failing to document the revolution for deep democracy ongoing nationwide, even in the backwoods of Arkansas. Apparently, the revolution will not be televised, or printed, in our state.
Recently North Little Rock joined Fayetteville and Eureka Springs in passing resolutions to support the Move to Amend movement, but there was not a whisper in this paper. About 300 cities and seven states have now passed these resolutions for a 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Quite simply, the amendment would abolish the Supreme Court doctrines of corporate personhood and that money equals speech. This would not only undo Citizens United, which said corporate “persons” can spend unlimited sums in our campaigns, but might eliminate the army of paid corporate lobbyists in D.C. and much, much more. Democracy is still possible, especially if the Democrat-Gazette learns to smell.
Gosh, it’s a complete surprise that Abel didn’t win state office, isn’t it? I have to admit, part of the reason I wanted to post this letter is so that I can post this picture of Abel.
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| Doesn't this face just scream Senator? |
This is an unedited jailhouse photo of Abel. Abel (and remember, I am not making any of this up) decided to start his own religion, in which his followers used “magic” mushrooms (wink wink, nudge nudge) to get closer to God. Apparently, Abel tried to get physically closer to God on his way to trial by not only partaking of his religion’s basic tenets, but by also climbing a tree. Unfortunately burdened by his clothes, he decided to lighten himself a little bit so that he could bask in God’s glorious light. The police had to eventually physically pull him out of the tree after he fell partially out of it.
Granted, this letter doesn’t have the obvious mouth-frothing lunacy of other letters that we’ll see, but it does serve the purpose of learning the lesson of knowing what you are talking about before spouting off.
The problem with Abel’s position is that the Citizens United case did not, in any way, establish the doctrine of corporate personhood. That doctrine had already been established in the case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad in 1886. Don’t believe me? How about Chief Justice Morrison Waite, who stated flatly:
The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does. [emphasis mine]
Still not convinced? How about from Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of Law, which summarizes a number of important cases in the back of the book. This decision is summarized thusly:
“[D]efined corporations as ’persons’ who are entitled to the same equal protection rights as individuals. While falling short of conferring citizen status on corporate entities, the Court nevertheless declared that such entities are constitutionally guaranteed the right to liberty, property, and due process of the law and for legal purposes may be regarded as persons.”
Oops.
If you think about it, common sense tells us that corporations must be considered as a person. Otherwise, there would be no way to tax them. Why should one class of people have a different tax rate than others?
They would also be exempt from constitutional burdens, such as slavery and property. Anyone could create a business and deny any of its workers any kind of constitutional protections.
Corporate personhood also prevents the government from performing unreasonable searches or seizing property by reason of eminent domain.
The question that I’ve never seen answered is, “Why do liberals, who say that they have fought for free speech for everyone, not want free speech for businesses?”
This next letter is from Caryl Feck of Bella Vista, and contains one of the greatest laugh-out-loud lines I’ve come across in quite a while.
I am a political junkie and listen to all the television stations and all their opinions that they like to try to convince us are fact.
Now that the conventions are over, my biggest concern is that with all the money that is behind Mitt Romney, who I believe is a just man, it will be the downfall to a true election. We have no way of knowing where all the money is coming from. It can be foreign money that will make a puppet out of the candidate if elected. Then where will our freedom be?
Are we better off now than we were four years ago? As a nation I have to say a loud “yes” because now when we end our pledge of allegiance with “and justice for all,” we can say it with more truth than ever before.
I am an independent voter, but given these two important thoughts, it looks as if I have made my choice. But, I will listen to the debates with an open mind. I hope you all will, too.
No, I’m not making this up.
So, because somebody can now say “and justice for all” and mean it, that means we are better off now than we were four years ago? What if they don’t mean it when they say “…and justice for all”? What if someone from a hundred years ago who fully supported slavery recited that part? Does that mean that we were better off one hundred years ago than we are now?
One wonders how Caryl was able to make it through the Pledge of Allegiance in years past. One can only imagine the psychic trauma that happened to Ms. Feck whenever she was forced to perform the Pledge. How she must have had to choke out the words “…and justice for all”. What a horrible existence.
This next letter is from one of my favorite letter writers, Richard “Sniveling Dick” Snively of Fayetteville.
Comparing Mitt Romney to President Barack Obama, it seems one believes the glass is half empty and the other believes it is half full.
Romney is a man who collects $20-plus million every year from profit on his $250 million fortune and pays a lower income-tax rate than many earning $50,000 or less. He seems to be out of touch with our working class and their income stagnation.
Of course he is a self-made one per-center who made his wealth all by himself. Never mind his father’s seed money and influence, as well as the many government services he uses. No man is an island.
Romney complains how bad our economic condition is and blames it on Obama, who inherited most of it. Is Romney politically trustworthy, with his flip-flopping, truth-stretching negativism, taking nearly everything Obama says out of context?
Obama was right. Most of the private sector is doing well economically, especially the one per-centers. Ninety percent of our citizens have jobs. I understand that those who are out of work are struggling, but those with jobs are living a standard that is probably better than what most of the world’s people have.
I believe if it were not for some of our greedy, unpatriotic corporations sending jobs overseas, our unemployment rate would be much lower. Whirlpool’s outsourcing is an example. Wal-Mart’s slogan, save money, live better, is hollow to those without earned income. It is difficult to find and purchase goods manufactured in the U.S.A.
There are so many face-palmingly stupid statements here, that it would fill this entire page debunking all of them. I could write an entire essay on the concept of “no man is an island” idiocy alone. (If no man truly is an island, why the concern about the one-percenters, then? Sniveling Dick snivels about the one percenters, then turns around and states that the private sector is doing well, . Huh?) What I want to focus on is Sniveling Dick’s question, is Romney politically trustworthy?
That’s a question that doesn’t have an easy “yes/no” answer. Romney can certainly be criticized for his previous flip-flops that he has committed in the nomination campaign and even stretching back to his stint as governor of the state of Massachusetts. There’s a lot about his campaign promises that make me uneasy. Comparing him to the opposition and saying, “Well, he’s better than Obama”, doesn’t make that uneasiness go away or even justify voting for Romney.
I think that the answer lies in the concept that Romney’s campaign can be thought of as being a new entity. I think Romney realizes that he is not going to be President without the full support of conservatives, even against such a weak candidate as Obama. With the addition of Paul Ryan and a number of various other things that I’ve observed from the campaign, it seems that Romney is taking conservatism seriously. So I feel rather good about voting for him, but I’m still going to keep an eye on him.
This next letter is from Jim Rawlins of Bigelow.
It took me a while, but I finally figured out what the slogan “We want our country back” means. It seems to mean that those who say it want the country to go back to the way it was before Barack Obama became president. Well, here are a few of the changes that have happened in those nearly four years. Federal, state and local governments are smaller, with fewer employees. Domestic gas and oil production is at an historically high rate. About 92 percent of Americans are working, and employment numbers have gone up every month for the last 30 months. The stock market is higher now than at any time in the past five years.
The rich have grown richer. Taxes were lowered for the middle class. GM, Ford and Chrysler, on life support four years ago, are alive, strong and thriving today.
Thousands of people now have health insurance which cannot be revoked if they get sick. And even Mitt Romney wants to keep the good parts of Obamacare.
The U.S. war in Iraq has ended. Osama bin Laden is dead. We now have a president who thinks before he acts and does not act out of paranoia as George W. Bush did or out of rage as Mitt Romney proposes.
Now I’m trying to figure out why anyone would want our country to go back to those conditions.
Wow! I sure wish I lived in the America Jim lives in. Unfortunately, I’m stuck here in this one.
This next letter is from J. W. Dillree of Hot Springs Village.
It is alarmingly clear to me how radical the Republican Party has become.
For example, the statement Mitt Romney made at a political money raising event that he thinks 47 percent of U.S. citizens are not responsible people and that he is writing them off as just victims who will vote for the president no matter what. This is very revealing as to the disdain apparently felt by many in the GOP toward those who are living on Social Security and who depend on Medicare, as well as those who are not fortunate to have been born to wealth and privilege.
A Republican congressman from Florida, in defense of Romney on Fox News, quoted Alexis de Tocqueville, essentially saying that a democracy like the U.S. is destined to become a dictatorship because the people will always vote to enrich themselves from the treasury and thus bankrupt the country.
So, given that several Republican-dominated state legislatures across the country have recently voted to institute very discriminatory voter-ID laws that will make it very difficult, if not impossible, for many of the “47 percent” to cast a ballot, are we to understand that the “party of Lincoln” sees democracy as a dangerous institution that needs to be ended?
I didn’t know that carrying an ID was discriminatory. How J.W. came to the conclusion that the G.O.P. wants to end democracy will probably remain an unsolvable mystery.
The next letter is from Elizabeth K. Harris of Evening Shade, which is notable for being the name of a sitcom with Burt Reynolds in it.
I can climb past the Richie Rich stuff and the prayer undies and golden-plates stuff, but what I’m still waiting for is for Mitt Romney to openly disavow, disinherit and discredit the shrieking fantasists out there in radio land.
Until I hear the man say that folks similar to or actually named Rusty, Michael, Glenn or Rushbo are verging on sedition and are inciting their listeners to commit (fill in the violent crime of your choice here) and should be shunned-until that happy day, I’m voting the strict vegetarian ticket this year.
If Romney, by his tacit acceptance through his silence, needs the votes of the tinfoil-hat brigadiers that badly, well, he’s not smart enough to be my president.
’Nuf sed?
Yes, Ms. Harris (and you just know that Ms. Harris pronounces that “Miz“, as in “Miz-erable old cow), you’ve said quite enough. I wonder, though, Ms. Harris, if you hold President Obama to those same standards. I don’t seem to recall Obama denouncing any of the shrill voices on the left. As a matter of fact, I seem to recall Obama accepting monetary donations from the likes of Bill Maher, Steven Colbert, Jon Stewart, Malik Shabazz, Reverend Wright, and quite a few others of that ilk.
Must be an oversight. Yes, I’m sure that’s what it is.
This next letter is from Robert Hymer of Little Rock
In clear dialectical terms, President Barack Obama has survived the onslaught of the Republican party leadership. Please recall the public announcements. The only policy left at the beginning of Obama’s first term: Do anything to make Obama fail; to hell with the business of the United States.
With that truth in mind, Obama steered the country clear of a second depression, struggled with unemployment over 8 percent, wound down two wars, sent bombers to Libya, ordered the death of Osama bin Laden, rewrote banking rules and pushed through the largest new entitlement program since 1965.
Conversely, Willard Mitt Romney disposed of 47 percent of the American people in fundraising among his peers, some very rich people with the country’s population reaching pi times 100 million on August 14. How many citizens does that constitute?
As I write this, our current population is 314,162,406. So, 47 percent would be 147,656,331. In that case, Romney would need 90 percentplus of what’s left to win the election, which is rationally impossible.
Gee, I don’t know, Robert. I don’t seem to recall Democrats in 2000 saying that they were going to work together with President Bush to get his agenda done. Maybe you could remind me of when that happened?
Another one of my favorites, Al “Nut” Case of Enola, is next.
All those who do not perceive religion as a major stumbling block to world peace have not been paying attention. One needs only to scan the pages of any daily newspaper to view the carnage created by Islamic fanaticism and the persistent violation of international law by the state of Israel.
A vast majority of fundamentalists, both Christian and Jewish, have remained silent about the inhumane policies being carried out by Israel, and are often directly complicit in their implementation. Even our politicians act like trained poodles jumping through the hoop held by Israel’s powerful lobby when it concerns our Middle East policy.
The fundamentalists who accept Israel as their religion feel compelled to defend it from all criticism. They are driven by religious conviction, embracing a towering myth hatched in the minds of Bronze Age semi-barbaric tribesmen. The influence those fundamentalists hold over our national and foreign policies is of great concern, as power and ignorance are a dangerous combination.
In every religion there is a lunatic fringe who take its myths way too seriously. They interpret their holy books as it suits them, and, feeling their barbaric urges, think heaven is on the line, and in their hysteria, proceed to create hell on Earth.
The world is burdened by a variety of faiths, all holding each other in infinite contempt, making rational discourse impossible. Religion is a detriment to civilization and the greatest threat to mankind’s continued existence.
Before you ask, yes, this letter is typical of what Nutcase Al usually writes. On the one hand, there is the hatred and loathing that Nutcase Al brings toward any religion not his own. This, of course, prevents “rational discourse” from taking place among the people of the world.
Then, there is assertion that power and ignorance (other people’s ignorance, of course; never Nutcase Al’s own) are a dangerous combination. A few lines later, we have Nutcase Al saying that religion is the greatest threat to mankind’s continued existence. So, apparently, religion is the biggest threat, followed closely by the combination of power and ignorance. Greed, jealousy, fear, competition - none of these have anything on religion or powerance (power and ignorance). The great philosophers were all wrong; Nutcase Al has identified the true enemies of all mankind.
And finally, a letter to the editor from my old pal, Gene Lyons of Houston. Gene used to have a weekly column in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, but was let go a year or two ago to make room for the returning John Brummett. While Brummett is a little bit more sane than Gene (which, admittedly, isn’t that much of a bar to jump over), the liberal codswallop is spread out 4 times a week instead of just once.
I got so tired of Gene’s weekly incessant lying, that I just took to fisking it every week. There’s only so many times that you can swat at the annoying
Recently, Paul Greenberg denounced the BBC for rejecting the idea of erecting a statue of George Orwell in front of its headquarters on the grounds that the esteemed author was “too left-wing.”
According to Greenberg, the author of Homage to Catalonia, Animal Farm and 1984 exhibited a “Tory sensibility” that apparently BBC bureaucrats were too dull to recognize.
Sorry, but this is nonsense. Satire like 1984 is inherently ambiguous. However, to the end of his life Orwell resisted being lionized by conservatives.
Shortly before his death in 1949, Orwell wrote to an official of the United Auto Workers here in the United States about this exact issue:
“My recent novel [1984] is not intended as an attack on socialism or the British Labor Party (of which I am a supporter),” he insisted, “but as a show-up of the perversions to which a centralized economy is liable and which have already been partly realized in Communism and fascism . . . The scene of the book is laid in Britain in order to emphasize that the English speaking races are not innately better than anyone else, and that totalitarianism, if not fought against, could triumph anywhere.”
It’s never clear if Greenberg’s attempts to recruit Orwell into the Republican Party are the result of ignorance or wishful thinking.
That they are historically inaccurate, however, is beyond dispute.
I would fisk this myself, but I found a quote that works just as well as anything that I could put up, so I’ll use it instead.
From Conservapedia:
The book is, at its heart, a condemnation of the ultra-liberal menace that arose in Europe at his time. The fictional Oceanic dictatorship is the logical extreme of the liberal attitude towards government Orwell saw creeping in around him, both at home and abroad. The breakdown and perversion of home and family ties, the eradication of religion to make room for secular cult worship, the manipulation of language and history to suit the agenda of the day, and the use of deliberate economic strangulation in order to ensure compliance in the population were all tactics that Orwell predicted would come into play should an ultra-liberal government arise. One need only examine the regimes of Stalin and Kim Jong Il to see examples of Orwell-type dictatorships; atheism and state-worship forcibly substituted for religion, the deliberate starvation of all but the most elite members of society, even Orwell's nightmarish vision of sons spying on their parents for the state came true in the Soviet Union, and still persists in North Korea. Thus he uses the book to attack the intrusiveness and arrogance of big government.
Hmm, breakdown of home and family ties? The eradication of religion being replaced by secular cult worship? The manipulation of language and history to suit an agenda? The deliberate economic strangulation of the population? Gosh, that doesn’t sound familiar at all.
Well, that's more than enough for this time. See you next time.
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Good to see you around, KK
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