Posted by Damozel | "Credible Evidence." In The Philadelphia Inquirer, there is an opinion piece by Robert Wexler (D-Fla), Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis), all members of the Judiciary Committee, in which they argue that there is now credible evidence on which Dick Cheney may be impeached.
A couple of weeks ago, three members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee started trying to publish a column urging that their committee begin impeachment hearings against Vice President Dick Cheney. Several major newspapers turned them down. So, the congress members posted their op-ed online at http://www.wexlerwantshearings.comthe Philadelphia Inquirer. where it quickly gathered over 100,000 signatures (and counting) in support. Newspapers were forced to cover the growing push for impeachment, and an appropriate newspaper finally agreed to put the op-ed into print: a paper from the city where the Constitution was written, (Democrats.com)
Notable Op-Eds. The New York Times has published a list of its most notable op-eds for 2007, among which is the piece by former critics of the war, Pollack and O'Hanlon, A War We Just Might Win. Remember that piece? I remember that piece. I feel the same way about it now as I did then: that in the context of Iraq, the word "win" has become meaningless. With the lives, money, and time invested in Iraq, how would a win look; how would we know it if we saw it? I suspect that for many Americans the significance of a win is in inverse proportion to the investment required to achieve it.
Sometimes it's hard not to conclude that liberals really are smarter. Glenn Reynolds thinks liberals are in a "tizzy" over the Goldberg book, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning. I know I'm in a tizzy---of helpless laughter. The title alone is what used to be called a "laugh riot." "Goldberg has a lot to say about the "progressive" roots of both socialism and fascism and the way they're reflected in contemporary politics." (Instapundit) I'm sure he does.
And I could make an equal and opposite analogy to conservatism as it has evolved under the influence of the religious right. The question isn't whether one is "left" or "right," but whether one is prepared to shove one's personal beliefs down someone else's throat on the theory that if it's for that someone else's own good, the end justifies the means.
Today's conservative pundits, past masters of Orwellian turns of phrase, have certainly latched onto the word "fascist." First we got "Islamofascist," a phrase that makes no sense, and now "liberal fascist," ditto. Those guys slay me. They are like the kids who went out for debate team, with their love for fake rhetoric and of shit-stirring for its own sake. Pick out your buzz words, deliver them in ringing tones to a group of credulous morons with anger management issues, and you'll not only have yourself a lynch mob in no time, you'll convince yourself that your made-up arguments are true. Which, come to think of it, sounds almost like...like fascism.
Fortunately, I don't have to deal with Glenn Reynolds or Jonas Goldberg.
Sadly, No! is on the case with "It’s like the blind leading the really, really blind."
1.) When someone who complains about people throwing the term “fascists” around too freely then turns around and writes an entire book explicitly comparing his political foes to fascists, he should have less than zero credibility in anything he says.
2.) Giving out free food isn’t fascism. Look, Jonah, I’ve done some research into the matter and have determined that giving out free food is one of the least fascist things a government can do. Call this hyperbole if you will, but if the very worst thing the Nazis had ever done was to give people free food, they’d have probably gone down as the greatest government in history.
3.) I find it sickening to see you cast yourself as a champion of “individual rights,” even as you’ve actively cheered the Bush administration’s expansion of executive power, its advocacy of torture and its insubordination of both domestic and international law....
40-Year-Old Virgin describing a woman’s breast as a bag of sand.
And who could forget Jon Swift's "Jonah Goldberg's Shining (Liberal Fascism with LOL Cats)?" (My personal favorite is the "Dialektical Kittehs.") Though ultimately Goldberg was able to complete his without Swift's help, I would submit to you that Swift preempted the field.
Comments