The BBC History Magazine published a list yesterday of the 10 Worst Britons as selected by a group of historians and, in response, blogger Alexandra von Maltzan issued "A Challenge to the Blogosphere" asking bloggers to compile their list of the Ten Worst Americans, and she asked me by e-mail to contribute my list.
As is the virtue and the vice of the blogosphere, virtually everyone she asked was able to survey 250 years of history, single out all of the villains, and post their list within a few hours. Lagging embarrassingly behind, and being further shamed in my inexcusable delay by e-mails from Alexandra gently though firmly reminding of my dereliction, I turned in my time of need to my illustrious commenter Hypatia for assistance, who then e-mailed me several suggestions.
The following list is an aggregation of Hypatia’s choices and mine. I disagree with some of Hypatia’s selections and Hypatia disagrees with some of mine, but the list simply combines our choices. I know that’s not the bravest method but desperate times call for desperate measures. After all, it’s been almost 20 hours since I was asked for my list, which, in blogosphere time, equates to a few years. So I am very late with this.
If there are some selections here whose inclusion is driving you to a blind rage, you should assume those were the ones contributed by Hypatia. In no particular order:
(1) Harry Ansliger - America’s first "drug czar," courageous warrior against marijuana, and almost certainly deserving of the title, "the Father of the War on Drugs"
(2) John Yoo - The authoritarian theoretician, enabler and justifier of the current government excesses and lawlessness to which we are being subjected, as well as the ones still to come/be revealed
(3) Ted Hall - Manhattan Project spy who passed on more secrets to Josef Stalin than better-known traitors Ethel & Julius Rosenberg and/or Alger Hiss
(4) Joseph McCarthy - One of the founding theoreticians of the still popular world-view that individual liberty is incompatible with America’s security
(5) Richard Perle - As corrupt as he is dishonest, his neoconserative, Israel-above-all poison infects every component of America’s foreign policy
(6) "Rev." Lou Sheldon - Has devoted literally decades of his life to waging noble war against the homosexual agenda. On the bright side, he has helped tens and tens of gay men pretend that they have converted.
(7) Harry Blackmun - With a single, intellectually flimsy judicial opinion, did more than anyone else to inflame and render irresolvable America’s paralyzing and internally destructive culture war
(8) Pat Robertson/Jerry Falwell/James Dobson - Destroyers of modern, limited-government conservatism whose vision of America provides an instructive illustration of what Thomas Jefferson’s America would look like . . . if his worst nightmares came true.
(9) Rush Limbaugh - pumping intellectually dishonest, nakedly hypocritical, supremely partisan, bottom-scraping trash into the minds of 20 million enraptured followers every day for the last 20 years. Has done more to degrade the national political dialogue than any other person in the last several decades.
(10) The Commenters at Little Green Footballs - a truly unique brew of genocidal fantasies, raging fascist impulses, genuine collective mental imbalance, and towering stupidity who, on a daily basis, industriously convert even innocuous news articles into a pretext for their repetitive, ritualistic orgies where they primally beat their chests, single out the Culprits of the Day, and then gleefully advocate their violent, gruesome deaths.
Here are a few more:
ReplyDelete-Aldrich Ames
-Karl Rove
-Lee Harvey Oswald
-George Wallace
-John Muhammad (sniper)
-Glenn Reynolds
TrackBack by All Things Beautiful 'A Challenge To The Blogosphere: 'The Ten Worst Americans' List':
ReplyDeleteAs a post Christmas/Hannukah Challenge, I invited the Blogosphere to name 'The Ten Worst Americans'....Glenn Greenwald has just posted his. Glenn is a brilliant blogger and although our opinions more often than not differ, I have a great deal of respect for his sound reasoning, ahem .....most of the time (I reserve my judgment on the inclusion of the LGF commenters on the above list! LOL)."
#10) :D
ReplyDeleteMichael Moore should be added to this list.
ReplyDeletehis crapy movie backfired which in my humble opinion is a good thing.
Richard Perle would not make any list of bad Americans that was solely mine. Harry Anslinger would merit multiple slots. The comments section at LGF is thoroughly vile.
ReplyDeleteBut about Limbaugh, I have mixed feelings. When he blew on the scene in the mid-80s, I was utterly delighted. At the time, it could accurately be said that the MSM was horribly biased toward the left, and there was no Fox News or Internet to serve as balance and corrective. Limbaugh was about it, and he often was extremely funny.
Since then, however, I've learned it is indeed true that one should be careful what one wishes for. Sean Hannity, John Gibson and Bill O'Reilly are revolting, and it bothers me enormously that they hold such sway. Limbaugh now too often adds to their sickening brew, and I am no longer amused.
Karl Rove - he has destroyed our electoral system.
ReplyDeleteCheney would be on my list too, but if it was a choice between the two I'd pick Rove first because Cheney wouldn't be where he is without Rove's sleazy campaign tactics.
One commenter here, who thinks Michael Moore should be on the 25-worst list, demonstrates that the ongoing character assassination techniques with the help of which these people retain whatever popular support they still have, do work on ordinary Americans.
Michael Moore! His film Fahrenheit 9/11 WON best film at the Cannes Film Festival. And at the same time he had a book on the best-seller list for ages. The guy is incredibly prolific. And, in my opinion, honest and true. He stands up for working class Americans. Was he attacked on his facts? No. They waved their hands and attacked him as a far leftist, just like McCarthy.
And why did they not challenge him on the facts? Because it is a documentary, and Moore used competent fact-checkers. Bush incontrovertibly did stand before an audience of supporters and say: "What an impressive crowd: the haves, and the have-mores. Some people call you the elite, I call you my base." And so forth.
But such scenes were threatening to the powers-that-be. What if people took them to heart? So they took their usual playbook. They killed the messenger. They waved their hands in the air like Joe McCarthy, and attacked Moore as a far-out unpatriotic leftie.
And when mild-mannered Richard Clarke, who was hired by Bush as a counter-terrorism expert, as he had been hired before by presidents of both parties, wrote a book exposing this administration as having ignored all his pleas to do something (at least to give him a high-level hearing, at least to convene meetings) to try to prevent an attack on this country, warnings of which were flying fast and hard: what did they do? They attacked Clarke's integrity, of course.
I have no way of proving Rove was behind these two particular examples, but he has set the example. Surely he WAS behind the personal attacks on John Kerry and his war record, and behind the vicious attack on Senator Max Cleland's patriotism.
So, in my view Rove belongs on the 10 worst Americans list. And Michael Moore belongs on the heroes list.
And, by the way, Harry Blackmun? Are you kidding? One might not like the decision in Roe v. Wade, and one might not like the way he wrote it, but he came by it HONESTLY, this is a difference of OPINION. (I think the only way to get anywhere on the abortion debate is for both sides to stop vilifying, and to acknowledge the others' sincerity.)
Blackmun was hardly evil! Indeed, he gradually moved away from some of the conservative views Eisenhower chose him for, presumably because he had an open mind, which is what we want in judges.
In any case, if you want to go after judges for bad decisions, Bush v. Gore was a far worse one: clearly had the two parties been reversed, had the recount been going Bush's way and had Gore asked to have it stopped (hard to imagine he would have, but let's try) that decision would have been different. In their edict stopping the weekend counting, those judges didn't even give lip service to Gore's interest. That's basic: you consider both sides, when you're a judge. At least you pretend to! They didn't even pretend.
It was corrupt: a few of them had fish to fry in that contest and should have recused themselves. Blackmun's decision was not corrupt. Nonetheless I wouldn't put Scalia, Rehnquist, Thomas, O'Connor and/or Kennedy on my ten worst Americans list! C'mon. I think in concocting this list together with someone of such radically different views, you might have retained some vetoes, Glenn.
(I'm not saying Rove isn't clever. Aristotle's first rule of rhetoric was that you have to establish sympathy with your audience, or your logic won't matter. "I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him." As the orator, you must first get the audience on your side. Rove and his pals know that if they can make Americans dislike Moore, or Clarke, they won't get a hearing.)
(But Lex Luthor was clever too.)
LOL I'm one of those raging, genocidal fascist commentators on LGF. I'm an atheist who supports gay marriage and is opposed to teaching "intelligent design" in public schools. Furthermore, I joined LGF while I was still a Democrat who had supported Howard Dean's campaign for the nomination and even had my Dean t-shirt signed by Mr. Yeeaaarrgghhh himself.
ReplyDeleteWhat I expected to find on LGF was a bunch of narrow-minded far-right-wing bluster. What I found instead was a moderate host, plenty of intelligence, common sense, a diverse membership, and FACTS about Islamic fascism, left-wing perfidy, and mainstream media bias that opened my eyes in a big way.
Do people on LGF advocate genocide? No, they advocate killing those who have openly declared that they want to kill us. They are opposed to appeasement of Islamic fascists and terrorists, because as history as shown, appeasement does not work.
If Charles Johnson, LGF, and his lizardoid minions are "raging genocidal fascists," then so were Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt. LGF is simply a diverse group of people who recognize that Islamic fascism poses an existential threat to liberal democracy and civilization and therefore must be confronted and defeated.
What I expected to find on LGF was a bunch of narrow-minded far-right-wing bluster. What I found instead was a moderate host, plenty of intelligence, common sense, a diverse membership, and FACTS about Islamic fascism, left-wing perfidy, and mainstream media bias that opened my eyes in a big way.
ReplyDeleteI was praying to God that nobody would come by and say something like this, because I knew when someone did, I would have to go wade through the vile sewers known as the LGF Comment section in order to find some illustrative samplings.
I picked one thread randomly -- one -- from a couple of days ago, on British journalist Robert Fisk. It has everything which virtually every LGF thread has -- death wishes for political enemies, demented obsessions with people getting their heads chopped off, and juvenile imbeciles competing with each other over who can spew the ugliest and most repulsive ad hominems.
And oh . . . the whole world is against Israel . . . everyone and everything is unfair to Israel . . . and anyone who doesn't want the entire world devoted the glorious project of slaughtering Muslims should have their head chopped off - slowly - al Qaida.
Here is the "plenty of intelligence" and "common sense" for which LGF'ers are so renowned:
I'll be happy to, right before I kick the chair out from under his feet and watch that bitch dance at the end of a rope.
____________
(in response) Hell, why make it quick? There are certainly plenty of ways to make him suffer for hours or even days before he joins the choir invisible.
_______
Really, how many head chopping snuff videos must we bear witness to? My G_d, this man is an ahole! When everything is said and done, I pray to G_d that these morons end up in hell.
_________
I think some of these people just did too many drugs early in life (maybe still doing them).
This snake does Goebbels proud.
_______
A dream for me to visualize them locked up for the duration, and this time the duration will last until every one of them are dust.
_________
Why couldn't the Islamos have beheaded him when they had the chance? Oh I know, it wouldn't have made much of a difference.
_______
Happy 3rd night of Chanukah!
May Robert Fisk and those who think like him die in horrible and agonizing ways - and quickly, I might add.
____________
I truly do not think this guy will understand what this is all about until he is kneeling on the ground with his hands tied behind him as some Islamic nut job terrorist prepares to kill him. Even then though, one of his last fleeting thoughts would likely be to blame Bush.
____________
OK, I take it back - there is one stock comment missing here: pleas to drop nuclear bombs on various Muslim countries. Then again, I couldn't stomach to make it through to the end, so maybe that was one of the finales.
I think your list got blown out of the water. It only opened the door for the mentally retarded left to vent their frustrations with life. No plans, no ideas, no life beyond trying to undo what good someone else has done. It's sad to see the minority party of the country go completely off the edge of reality.
ReplyDeleteI was praying to God that nobody would come by and say something like this, because I knew when someone did, I would have to -
ReplyDeleteMr. Greenwald, if you're going to eat cookies in bed, you going to have to sleep with the crumbs!
Then again, I couldn't stomach to make it through to the end, so maybe that was one of the finales.
ReplyDeleteAre you ok? Glenn, no one should have to do that.
I had to stop reading LGF comments because doing so exacerbated my tendency toward depression and a dark view of humanity. It is a very popular site, and Charles Johnson a reasonably bright and interesting guy; seeing who he attracts, and what he permits, is soul-sickening.
The only antidote I know of is the Hallmark Channel.
QVC also works.
ReplyDeleteI see now that this is all your fault, Solomon - obviously in a mischief-making mood this morning, you pasted my gentle and playful description of the LGF denizens in one of the threads over there, causing others to do the same in a couple other LGF threads, thus sending them here in droves.
ReplyDeleteI will be monitoring your blog for a nice plum to paste over at Daily Kos, with your return address, and will exact my vengence when they swarm over to your place to make their displeasure known.
I post from time to time on LGF- way less than I used to, but hey, the years go by.
ReplyDeleteEvery time I see LGF's commenters all lumped together and then called a collective name or otherwise denigrated en masse, I just grit my teeth and move on. Folks who post there (if one pays attention over time) are anything but the homogenized Nazi horde they are so frequently labeled by the uninformed. There are far more wise commenters than bomb-throwers, but sometimes it is a bomb-thrower that has that particular insight that makes a thread worth reading.
Then there are the polemicists. Some write the way they do to get the attention of the reader and then communicate a point through hyperbole and overstatement. Some write simply to shock, but regular LGF readers generally know who has a point and who doesn't.
Another large group of commenters, in my belief, are the frightened. The Islamofascists, who do not play by no stinkin' rules, get to be violent in real life. Most would not hesitate to kill you or me if given a chance. I hear a lot of violentspeak on LGF as the same sort of thing people do when they talk loud in the dark, where there be monsters. It's the only way they can compete (or at least sound like they are competing) with the bad guys. Can one blame them?
So call names, Mr. Self-Important First Amendment Lawyer (I practice law myself, but not at such rarified levels- I get people divorced, help them adopt their kids, write their wills, form their businesses and resolve their disputes). With regard to LGF and those who comment there, you know not of which you speak.
D. Edgren
What a lame list. Noone before 1950, no mention of the Supreme Court who created the Dred Scott decision that caused the Civil War, no mention of Benedict Arnold *at all*, no mention of Nathan Bedford Forest, whose genius as a cavalry officer prolonged the civil war, and whose vileness as an individual caused him to create the Klan. By your reasoning, Hitler might have been bad, but it was that awful Colonel Klink that was the *real* bad guy.
ReplyDeleteOh, and don't you mean Harry Anslinger? If you followed LGF regularly, you would know that PIMF (Preview Is My Friend).
ReplyDeleteSeriously, Mr. Greenwald, wouldn't 15 minutes of thinking about the question generated at least 10 "Americans" (Noriega and Pinochet, not saying they'd qualify, are Americans- aren't your intended targets in fact intended to be citizens of the United States?) who are far worse sorts than anyone you have mentioned? Or did you simply farm the question out to the new associate at your firm?
D. Edgren
John Wayne Gacey?
ReplyDeleteJay Gould?
Roger Maris?
(just kidding about the last one...)
D. Edgren
Dear Glenn,
ReplyDeleteIt's me again, the anonymous poster who forced you to dredge up those hideous examples of LGF "raging genocidal fascist" statements. Hey, I probably have a few myself in there, and I don't apologize for them. You can search for my comments: I'm tigger2005.
Glenn, you just don't get it; LGFers are saying these things about murderers, killers, barbarians, the spiritual soulmates of those who planned and executed 9/11 and countless other vicious terror attacks since at least 1968, deliberately targeting unarmed men, women, and children just going about their daily lives. People who think chopping off heads with dull knives makes great entertainment.
Other comments are directed at people LGFers rightfully perceive as traitors, who deliberately undermine our national security, provide aid and comfort (moral and even legal and material support) to the enemy, give away national security secrets, present biased "news" reports under the guise of objectivity, make excuses for suicide bombing and other forms of terrorism, morally equate, say, an accidental U.S. bombing of civilians with deliberate targeting of schoolchildren, and so on. We despise these people because they are DANGEROUS. Their words and actions impair and sabotage our nation's efforts to combat our declared enemies and prevent another, possibly even more catastrophic attack on American soil.
No, Glenn, you don't get it. You don't get that if al-Quaeda had had a nuclear weapon on 9/11, long before we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, they would have used it. You don't get that Islamofascists want to destroy the U.S. and the West not for what we do, but for what we are. They don't like liberal democracy. They don't like freedom for women. They don't like infidels being equal to Muslims. They don't like music. They don't like nude statues. They don't like secularism.
You need to understand, Glenn, that I'm an independent and critical thinker and that at the time I joined LGF, I was highly critical of George W. Bush, John Ashcroft, et. al. and had been voting straight Democrat for at least 8 years. I'm an atheist who posted regularly on Internet Infidels. I'd visited conservative sites and was not "converted." I was highly skeptical of LGF and went in biased against it.
It was in THAT context that I became convinced that Charles Johnson had it right. Maybe you should take the time to actually READ what he posts. After a while, the evidence of media bias, leftist treason and defeatism, and Islamofascist imperialist intentions becomes impossible to deny.
Dr. Edgren: The Harry Anslinger nomination was mine. And I'm not an associate in Mr. Greenwald's firm, tho I have practiced law, and even done a divorce or two.
ReplyDeleteMy criteria for inclusion on the list is the extent and nature of the harm done to the United States, hence I also nominated the Communist atomic spy, Ted Hall. Mr. Anslinger bequeathed to us a huge expansion of federal control over a matter previously left to the several states, namely, what people may take into their own bodies. Because of him, drug prosecutions corrupt law enforcement -- as many cops have admitted and even written about -- and millions of Americans have had their lives destroyed by being sentenced to PRISON for non-violent crimes involving the use or sale of substances the govt does not like. (I'm still waiting for someone to show me the enumerated power authorizing Congress to prohibit drugs.) In light of these despicable facts, I don't think a typo in a hyper-link is so very awful.
Seriously, Mr. Greenwald, wouldn't 15 minutes of thinking about the question generated at least 10 "Americans"
ReplyDeleteI made clear that I didn't think this was a particularly serious exercise - asking to name the 10 "worst" Americans without defining "worst" - and asking that the list be generated in 5 hours - isn't very conducive to producing scholarly examinations. And it's hardly surprising that most people creating such a list focused on contemporaries.
Having said that, I think all of your suggestions suck, and had I thought of them beforehand, I wouldn't have put any them on the list.
As nasty as serial killers might be, their impact is extremely limited. John Wayne Gacy? That's your idea of some insightful selection? He's nothing more than a 20-minute segment on some sensationalistic criminal freak show of the type which Bill O'Reilly used to host. The imapact of someone like Gacy compared to, say, someone who has been brainwashing 20 million followers for 20 years (Rush Limbaugh) or the person who laid the theoretical foundation for lawless detention of American citizens and state-sanctioned torture is, well, non-existent.
If you're going to try to ridicule my choices - and I'm not saying they aren't susceptible to it - at least have some decent alternatives. The ones that have been mentioned as proof that my list was lame have been either irrelevant goons or obvious, trite choices (Benedict Arnold - gee, what a great contribution I would have made to this exercise had my list been a carbon copy of everyone else's).
To the anonymous ex-supporter of Howard Dean turned LGF fan - You began by disputing my characterization of what takes place in the comment section of LGF, but have now shifted to defending and justifying that behavior.
ReplyDeleteMy knowledge of the LGF comment section comes from reading it over some period of time. The sheer ugliness and deranged rage over there captured my attention for awhile, until its repetitiveness just made it boring. I'm not describing it based on what others have said - it's based on my own extensive exposure to it.
If you think that calling on a daily basis for the torture and death of people with whom you disagree politically constitutes enlightening and riveting dialogue, then you've found the right home. If you think not just Osama bin Laden and al Qaida members, but also people like Robert Fisk, Cindy Sheehan, James Wolcott, and Howard Dean deserve to have their heads sawed off on video or should hang by a rope until their necks snap, then I can understand why you consider the LGF Comment section so enlightening.
But you're not disputing anything I said about what takes place over there. You're simply justifying it. There are bewteen 150 and 800 comments for each post, and naturally there are some decent and reasonable ones. But the overall tenor is one of primal rage and childish hatred. But if you think those emotions are appropriate because your political enemies (not just terrorists, but domestic "liberals") are so depraved and dangerous that they merit those reactions, then I understand why you like it over there.
To all those here to defend LGF comments section, I used to read there, and occasionally commented -- under a different handle. For the reasons set forth in this thread, I eventually stopped.(I greatly, greatly enjoyed Charles' role in Rathergate.)
ReplyDeleteIt was about a year ago, and it happened as I found myself writing a reply to some thoroughly ignorant claims that Islam -- not Al Qaeda or Islamo-fascists -- is a "false religion." Holding as I do a BA in religious studies, I know how sociologists approach religion as a definitional matter, and so am well aware how totally absurd that claim about Islam is. (Not that such a level of education is necessary for any well-read person to dismiss such notions abvout a faith that has been around for some 1400 years.)
But as I was writing, I realized that in a sewer of blood-thirsty invective, no calm explanation from me would make a bit of difference. So I didn't complete my comment, and have been back only when following a link from elsewhere.
Glenn,
ReplyDeleteI never "denied" that people at LGF make angry statements. What you can't seem to figure out is that blowing off steam at merciless killers of innocent men, women, and children, as well as those who wittingly or unwittingly aid and abet them, is quite different from actually going out and committing hideous acts of murder and torture, as Islamofascists do practically every single day.
We are in the midst of a life and death struggle for the survival of liberal democracy and Western civilization. The revelation of the NSA wiretapping program alone could have devastating consequences for MILLIONS of Americans.
But I guess you have your finger on what's REALLY important and what REALLY deserves condemnation. It's those posters on LGF who vent their anger and frustration at those who are actively seeking or aiding our destruction.
If you're going to try to ridicule my choices - and I'm not saying they aren't susceptible to it - at least have some decent alternatives.
ReplyDeleteMr. Greenwald, why? Why in the world would I bother, with so many productive and(or) interesting things to do (bother the former and the latter to include, btb, checking in at LGF from time to time and, admittedly, engaging in a dialogue with you and others on your blog), to spend a minute trying to come up with the "worst" Americans? Sounds like engaging in the sort of self-loathing that has become liberalism's raison d'etre these days.
I'd rather spend time thinking of the 10 best Americans (citizens of the United States, whatever). Seems way more positive a use of my time. The members of any infantry platoon currently serving in Iraq would fill a list- there are plently of other great Americans- more than enough to go around.
You've apparently spent a goodly portion of your professional life defending the Constitution. I assume you would characterize your actions in its defense as "passionate" ones (I have yet to meet a lawyer who deals with Constitutional issues who would admit that "it's just a day job") Why not stand up for your country if you care so much about it? Why stand with those who engage in pointless (except to themselves and their ilk) spitting exercises.
Just so you know, I don't seek out the worst of the dark side. I don't delight when Ted Kennedy's name appears on a "10 Most Loutish Members of Congress" list; I just weep for my country that he's elected there in the first place. I do believe that what happened at Abu Ghraib was wrong, but I believe even more that the military will deal with the situation and move on. Those who won't either are "stuck on stupid" or, most likely, have an agenda that I would use for toilet paper if it fell into my hands.
I'll check out, as long as I'm here, the rest of your blog- unless, that is, you would prefer that your threads remain unsullied by a person you would deem one of your "10 worst Americans."
D. Edgren
D Edgren declares: Sounds like engaging in the sort of self-loathing that has become liberalism's raison d'etre these days.
ReplyDeleteI'd rather spend time thinking of the 10 best Americans (citizens of the United States, whatever).
Did you actually read Glenn's original post? He was invited by a conservative blogger to participate in a multiple blog activity of folks compiling a "worst Americans" list. He agreed, but didn't take it all that seriously, especially given that she who invited him wanted results immediately.
We exchanged a few emails, I contributed some names and Glenn had some of his own, and hence Glenn's list. It was the product of very little time, and was more or less just for fun. Jeez. Lighten up!
BTW, as you look around, do see Glenn's post about the obnoxious phenomenon of European anti-Americanism vis-a-vis the Tookie Williams execution. You might thereby gain a better sense of his ideological posture.
Hypatia:
ReplyDeleteNone of that makes it any better.
Sorry.
D. Edgren
Oh my. We seem to have a genocide of one.
ReplyDeleteBooga booga!
Grow up, Glenn.
D. Edgren piously intones: None of that makes it any better.
ReplyDeleteSorry.
Well, are you going to take your scrupulosity over to such sites as Captain's Quarters, or LGFer Atlas Shrugs, both of whom are among the many bloggers that compiled "worst Americans" lists? Really, do they not need to understand that they are engaging in a fundamentally liberal enterprise of self-loathing, that you, for one, cannot forgive?
Hypatia:
ReplyDelete(btw, love the pretentious nic, so Library of Alexandria+feminist n' all)
Look, you are simply seeking to obfuscate the point- that being that none of those other bloggers, of whatever persuasion, found it necessary to take a chickensh-t swipe at LGF commenters. 10 worst Americans...remember?
I comment there, ergo, he's talking about me. I am most assuredly not one of the 10 worst Americans. I don't know anyone who posts on threads at LGF who fits that description, either. Tongue-in-cheek? Words matter. More like head-up-butt.
D. Edgren
A lot of entertainment in this comments section.
ReplyDeleteI really got some belly laughs out of the long winded evil Karl Rove diatribe, as though it took an evil genius to make a boring, self-admitted war criminal, incompetent lying gigolo who lives off of other women's money and his own treason all his life look like a complete loser.
If it wasn't for the in kind contributions of $20,000,000.00 by the MSM to this war criminal and treasonous idiot's campaign he would have been lucky to carry Massachusetts.
Like it was Rove's idea for this treasonous, I threw away my medals; no wait they were somebody else's medals; no wait I didn't have time to go home and get my medals but I meant to throw my medals away; I voted for funding the troops before I voted against funding the troops; I meet with foreign leaders without leaving the country by sitting next to them at starbucks; 4 months of boat driving and 3 purple hearts with absolutely NO, NONE, time off duty for recovery from my scratches.....
to base his entire campaign on those 4 months of boat driving and expect everyone to forget his 30 years of treason and pimping of rich white women for money.
LOL,
Now that's entertainment.
Gary
D. Edgren, you are moving the goalposts; initially you dissed Glenn for spend[ing] a minute trying to come up with the "worst" Americans? Sounds like engaging in the sort of self-loathing that has become liberalism's raison d'etre these days.
ReplyDeleteI'd rather spend time thinking of the 10 best Americans (citizens of the United States, whatever). Seems way more positive a use of my time.
Well? Are you going to chastize all the conservative bloggers for so wasting their time, and engaging in a species of liberal self-loathing?
And about my handle, I just admire her spunk. I'm really not much of a feminist, except in a Christina Hoff Sommers or Cathy Young sort of way. After all, I also put Harry Blackmun, author of the intellectual excrement known as Roe v. Wade, on Glenn's list.
Finally, I agree with Glenn about the comments section at LGF. Altho that was not my suggestion, at least not directly. I have, however, previously informed him how much I came to dislike that venue.
Oh and the old Michael Moore is a great film maker the French love him crap, that was pretty damn funny as well.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Michael Moore is the soul of the democratic party, that's why they got booted out of office in 1994, and its why they won't make the standard gains for an out of power party in an off year election in 2006.
As for his movie that was so completely deceptive full of lies and false impressions it was completely debunked by several writers and two movies.
And as for his credibility, he invests the money he makes off of you demented suckers that fall for his schtick in HALLIBURTON stock among other large corporations.
LOL,
Gary
RE: Little Green Footballs
ReplyDeleteJames Wolcott, one of the most insightful and hilarious court jesters in the Kingdom of Popular Culture, handily dealt with the comments crew from LGF in yesterday’s posting:
http://jameswolcott.com/archives/
2005/12/headhunters.php
I suspect that many readers of this blog are already familiar with him. But if you aren’t, take a look. The subjects are serious, but he never fails to provide some tickle with his amazing verbal gems, which plant visual imagery that I’d sometimes sooner forget but instead return to repeatedly. And I laugh again, as if reading them for the first time. He’s the perfect antivenin for the toxins of the time, including those spewed by the LGFers.
Sue:
ReplyDeleteNo, no...you have it all backwards.
The comments crew from LGF, some`of the most insightful and knowledgeable anti-idiotarians in all of Blogdom, handily dealt with James Wolcott, a tired and fatuous old ex-Baltimorean, two year college-dropout, poseur and drag queen in todays posting:
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=18708_Pro_Journo_Venomfest#comments
Who 'ya gonna believe, you or yer lyin' eyes.
D. Edgren
Your right D. Edgren, they are quite entertaining over here!
ReplyDelete/LFG-er Stuck in california
Hey 'anonymous from LGF', what was your handle at Internet Infidels?
ReplyDeleteAh, Glenn, forgive me! It's a full day later and I'm still laughing my head off every time I read your LGF comment! Yes, you have me pegged correctly; I wanted such mirth to be shared! I encouraged people to view it light-heartedly!
ReplyDeleteI hope you are a very good litigator, because you seem be missing a magnificent career as a writer and humorist!
As for the Daily Kos threat: you're welcome to try, but it hasn't worked in the past. Very few people read my blog. (Sniff, sob, bwahhh! - or should I "primally beat my chest"?)
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteN Shinji: I adore Camille Paglia. The woman understands and *celebrates* that -- gasp! -- sex happens. People even meet in the...workplace!!!
ReplyDeleteI totally turned off to mainstream feminism watching Anita Hill perform her martyr's act. Even if Clarence Thomas had done everything she said, so the eff what?
Funny how quiet the feminist sector got when Bill Clinton was depicting all the women he bedded (or, uh, got otherwise creative with) as lying, neurotic sluts. Clarence Thomas should have been strung up, but Bill was just Jim Dandy.
Blech.
Glenn-san, perhaps you can parse this argument for me--the logic truly escapes me.
ReplyDeleteIs it arguing that there are no LGFers in DC or NYC? Or that the president should ignore what happened in those cities because he didn't carry them?
I think the argument goes something like this:
In the places in the U.S. where the odds of an al-Qaida attack are less than a meteor crash - say, on farms in Kansas or rural South Carolina or the plains of North Dakota - majorities there have been whipped into a paralyzing paranoia where they live in deathly fear of a Muslim terrorist attack and consequently want to give all power to the Government - and sacrifice every other national goal - so that George Bush will save them from the people of whom they are so petrified.
By contrast, majorities of people who live in the places actually most likely to be attacked - including those places which have already been attacked -- do not have their lives dominated by fear and worry over terrorist attacks and see that threat rationally, i.e., as one of many problems which need to be addressed but which does not merit panic and living on one's knees begging the Daddy Government to save them.
Does that clarify things for you?
They believe that fighting back is dangerous, and will lead to retaliation. They believe that terrorists can be reasoned with, and if that doesn't work, bribery might.
ReplyDeleteOh, is that what they believe? Do such individuals have any representatives anywhere in government or in the media, because I have never heard a single person - not one - opine that terrorists can be reasoned with or that we shouldn't fight against terrorists because that will made them angry.
Presumably, they have such representatives - are you under the impression that, say, Hillary Clinton or Charles Schumer believe that? Can you point to a single person of even a small level of prominence who has expressed that view?
Presumably, they have such representatives - are you under the impression that, say, Hillary Clinton or Charles Schumer believe that? Can you point to a single person of even a small level of prominence who has expressed that view?
ReplyDeleteIn my view, you are asking that poster the wrong question; her point was a demographic one, not one about what any prominent Dem has said. I don't know where she is from, but I'm a member of a small, politically oriented email list that contains three people from Oakland, CA. Her desription fits them to a T.
Before casting one of these moonbats into my killfilter, I tried to explain that adherents of wahhabi Islam cannot be reasoned with. Her answer was to send me Middle Eastern recipes and invite me to dine with some Muslims.
Such morons form a significant part of the Democratic base.
Senator Patty Murray:
ReplyDeleteThat is not even remotely what Mary claimed "left-leaning people" believe. Murray's statement is a statement of fact about bin Laden's charitable activities in the Arab world which was offered as one explanation for why he is popular there and we are not. Hamas does the same thing. I know this statement was supposed to be eternal proof that Patty Murray is an al Qaida-loving traitor, but it's a totally innocuous statement offering an explanation as to why bin Laden is not hated. He provides material support to people and - whether he does it to manipulate public opinion or for some other reason - it's simply a fact that he does it.
And it's hardly unique to bin Laden. I live most of the time in Brazil. The slums of the city are controlled by murderous, primitive drug dealers who put bullets into people's heads for the smallest rule infractions. But the people in their slums love them because they pay for the residents' medical operations and keep their neighboorhoods burglary-free. People care about their immediate material well-being and will show allegiance to whoever provdies it.
To recognize that FACT hardly implies any love for the drug dealers, and more than Murray's statement implies some desire to "appease" al Qaida.
In my view, you are asking that poster the wrong question; her point was a demographic one, not one about what any prominent Dem has said. I don't know where she is from, but I'm a member of a small, politically oriented email list that contains three people from Oakland, CA. Her desription fits them to a T.
And people over at LGF routinely advocate dropping nuclear bombs on Middle Eastern countries and express plainly racist views about Arabs. So I guess it's fair to say now that "right-leaning" people are genoicidal maniacs who want to slaughter millions of Muslims in order to stop terrorism. After all, some people in a Comments section/e-mail list said that.
And people over at LGF routinely advocate dropping nuclear bombs on Middle Eastern countries and express plainly racist views about Arabs. So I guess it's fair to say now that "right-leaning" people are genoicidal maniacs who want to slaughter millions of Muslims in order to stop terrorism. After all, some people in a Comments section/e-mail list said that.
ReplyDeleteIt would be fair to say that, about some right-leaning people. The comments at LGF support that this is so. It is equally true that some leftist cohorts are deluded multiculturalists who think all we need to do is really understand the Muslims, and all will be well. Oakland, CA is totally captured by multi-culti insanity, and hence all 3 people from that city on my little list spew this crap. The intellectual pathology that is multiculturalims is not confined to Oakland, however. So, the commenter's point is accurate, in that there are some demographic areas (university towns being high on the list) where the attitude she describes would be, if not predominant, at least not unusual.
I'm not sure if there are any geographic areas that would see concentrations of people who think as the LGF commenters do, but I'm open to the possibility.
Senator Murray was saying that we should not fight the terrorists we should build roads. That is appeasing.
ReplyDeletePatty Murray voted FOR the resolution authorizing the use of MILITARY FORCE in Afghanistan and against those responsible for the 9/11 attacks.
She didn't vote for building roads or giving bribes to the terrorists. She voted to use miltiary force against them.
So did every other Democrat in the Senate. Don't you see how dishonest it is so say that someone who voted to WAGE WAR on terrorists is opposed to "fighting terrorists"?
If you want to critique someone's political views, you should feel free to do so, but it's really not appropriate to first distort them and then describe them inaccurately in order to do so.
Hi
ReplyDeleteDon't bother wading through the LGF comments, I've saved you the trouble:
the LGF Quiz
Don't bother wading through the LGF comments, I've saved you the trouble:
ReplyDeleteVery well done - I got an 85. And I bookmarked it for use the next time there is a little dispute about the nature of the LGF comment section.
I got 92 percent. Never read the LGF site before, but I noticed that while the words the Little Green Footballers choose are uncannily similar to those of the Late German Fascists, the bloggers' tone tends to be less sort of authorative. Has more of a dare-doubledare quality.
ReplyDeleteMany times the choice of pronouns gives it away.
Something has gone wildly wrong in the American education system.
As an aside, I'd still like to see some of the Kos or DU comments listed here for comparison purposes. I try to avoid those sites, but from the few times I've gone to them, LGFers are tame by comparison.
ReplyDeleteCould you give me an example of a type of comment which could render "tame" calls for one's political opponents to have their heads sawed off slowly or have their necks snapped with rope - or pleas that nuclear bombs be dropped on muslim countries in order to kill all the vermin there?
What type of comments would make those comments look tame?
ReplyDeleteWith all due respect, when was the last time you looked?
Not sure, but I think it was when another site I read linked to some uproariously funny photos Charles had of women cops in Tehran rappelling buildings for a training exercise -- suspended on ropes while covered head to toe in black burkhas, with AK-47s strapped on themselves.
Utterly hysterical.
As to Kos or DU. I've only read at the latter maybe three times, and Kos maybe a dozen. In both style and substance the comments there are far from my cup of tea, but I don't recall the sheer bloodthirstiness that pervades the comments at LGF.
I like my political discourse civil and calm, tho I can occasionally be pointed and even bitchy. (Some folks, after all, beg for it.) LGF is far too saturated with mindless nastiness and calls to kill virtually all Arab people.
In my view, you are asking that poster the wrong question; her point was a demographic one, not one about what any prominent Dem has said. I don't know where she is from, but I'm a member of a small, politically oriented email list that contains three people from Oakland, CA. Her desription fits them to a T.
ReplyDeleteThis is my first post on any site anywhere. The thing that I really love about the "America Love it or Leave it" crowd from Rush Limbaugh on down is that they work really hard to find three extreemists and then lump every person who doesn't agree with them into the same bucket. And then whine that we don't understand them. I wish I were more articulate, but it angers me that these people continue to get away with it. My grandfather lost a lung in the Argon Forest, My father served on a DDE in the Pacific in World War 2, I served my time in Vietnam and my son is in the infantry in the Oregon Guard, getting ready to go back to Iraq for the second time. Yet I regularly have these people who never served a day tell me what a coward I am because I am not a mindless "Ditto Head".
Boy did I start in one direction and run off in another or what? I think I've said enough. Outrage isn't exclusive to the right wing.
Just as American as I am writes:
ReplyDeleteThis is my first post on any site anywhere. The thing that I really love about the "America Love it or Leave it" crowd from Rush Limbaugh on down is that they work really hard to find three extreemists and then lump every person who doesn't agree with them into the same bucket.
Welcome to the blogosphere.
With all due respect, it is you who are lumping me in with Limbaugh, and imnplying that I've done something I just did not do. I was responding to Glenn, who was doubting that there are any geographic areas where the population prattles about just wanting to understand the terrorists. I think Oakland is such an area, and said why.
But I do not attribute those people's views to everyone who disagrees with me. Glenn disagrees with me about Bush's foreign policy, and I am very certain he has no interest in singing We Are the World with terrorists at a potluck.
But I do not want to be associated with the filth that overwhelms the comments section at LGF.
ReplyDeleteJeez, Hypatia- you're starting to sound like one-note Tommy....
Back right around the time Charles instituted registration in the summer of 2004, I wrote one of those comments that sooner or later everyone who becomes a regular on a 'blog posts- the "you've screwed this up and I'm outta here" sort of thing. The kind from which one learns the lesson "post in haste...regret at leisure."
My beef was that, by requiring registration, Charles would eliminate the "Crazy Eddie" element (see The Mote in God's Eye) that made LGF comment threads, at times, glow with an incendiary brilliance that rivaled the best of Hunter Thompson's late 60s-into the 70s gonzo period (not the faux post-Lono Hunter, in other words). I muttered about "echo chambers" and how LGF would degenerate into an "airhugs and airheads" chat-room. I feel, in the light of 20-20 hindsight, like that kinda-sorta happened, but with nowhere near the catastrophic consequences I had railed on about. I still visit LGF about every day and post once a week or so. I feel I'm in the company of many friends when I'm there.
The "echo chamber" stuff is a concern. A few folks get going along the lines of:
>Comment 1: Kill them.
>Comment 2: Yeah, kill them all.
>Comment 3: Hell yeah! Kill them all twice.
but that sort of thing, these days, tends to be a few posters, many times writing with deliberate excess, who just get on a roll. Truth be told, I've made such comments when I thought there was a point to be made. Sometimes posts get graphic about what people say that they would want as an outcome, but is that any different than Al Franken or a Kos commenter saying that someone is a "big fat white racist asshole" or that our president is "Chimpy Bushitler?" This may not be the sort of dignified public discourse that we would always see our own selves engaging in, but it has a way of getting the point across."
There's folks on LGF who want to "nuke" Muslims. So? There's Muslims (my guess is a lot of Muslims, likely far surpassing a majority) who want to nuke us, or at best wouldn't mind seeing it happen at someone else's hands. I served with the Army in Europe when the strategy was "Defend Europe against the Warsaw Pact to the last German." I don't see "Nuke Mecca" as a response to some future Islamic WMD attack on this country as being a whole lot different.
The vast majority of posts on LGF are just folks greeting their online friends (I still cringe at the airhugs), chatting about the weather, food, what strikes one at the moment as funny, or sad, or odd, or outrageous. There is anger there, and people feel safe expressing it the same way that folks at a bar with the usual crowd will speak or act in ways they never would at, say, a dinner party where one is just another invited guest. People feel safe at LGF letting what they are thinking hang out, even to the point where the pale begins to appear in the rear-view mirror.
Like I said yesterday, these are not folks who are among the "10 worst Americans (the Israelis, French and Japanese, among others, who post on LGF regularly must be snickering behind their hands at Mr. Greenwald's parochialism)." The two of you have revealed yourselves as incredibly petty and small by your inability, like the chihuahua lifted up to eye level with the chewed-up slipper, to be able to let go long after it should have been apparent that a mistake was made.
An apology is owed. Do I think one will be forthcoming?
Not a chance.
D. Edgren
ReplyDeleteMy beef was that, by requiring registration, Charles would eliminate the "Crazy Eddie" element (see The Mote in God's Eye
Oh go blow. Jerry Pournelle is all on Glenn's side. He and Glenn are wrong, but not anti-American. Christ, get a grip on the liturature.
litErature
ReplyDeleteOkay, Hypatia...I'll indulge you. You've got 15 minutes from now to tell me the significance of Crazy Eddie in TMIGE. No fair using the Internet- your answer should demonstrate a basic understanding of the book gained by actually reading it
ReplyDeleteOh, you get an extra point if you throw in the name of the co-author.
D. Edgren
Time's up, babe. I'll send you a copy. It'll broaden your horizons.
ReplyDeleteD. Edgren
I read LGF regularly for the links in the comments section to articles that do not get play in the MSM - there is a lot there and they are valuable.
ReplyDeleteA fair number of the "nuke 'em comments come from supporters of Israel who are painfully aware that a substantial number of Muslims are very serious in their intent to destroy Israel, not just politically, but militarily, and who believe that there is no chance of peace with those Muslims. FWIW, I think we have passed the point of no return myself and it is now just a matter of time until the balloon goes up, but there is not yet a casus belli sufficient to trigger all out war. It is human nature that people living with the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads want to see action instead of waiting for it to fall.
Now, who's paranoid?
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on illustrating in one short comment how unserious Administration supporters are when it comes to fighting "terrorism" and how manipulative and dishonest the use of that word has become.
The vast majority of deaths and attacks in that list are in Iraq and Afghanistan, which happen to be war zones. Even George Bush acknowledges that all but a tiny number of the people we are fighting in Iraq are NOT terrorists, but are simply nationalists fighting against our occupation (and the current government of Iraq believes the same thing - that the vast majority of attacks on that list are not terrorism but legitimate acts of war against an occupying power).
The Administration and its followers love to call anyone they don't like "terrorists" and every act against America, including our military, "terrorism," when those words are completely inaccurate when used that way.
Yeah, there are people who are shooting at our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. That's what tends to happen when you militarily occupy another country. To try to equate those acts with terrorist attacks on our soil which deliberately target civilians is dishonesty and fear-mongering of the worst sort. And the fact that you have to count acts which are plainly not terrorism in order to get a still quite unimpressive number shows just how exaggerated these fears are.
D. Edgren: Crazy Eddie, as I recall, is when the Moties go nuts. I read The Mote in God's Eye and the sequel -- albeit quite some time ago -- because I am a sci-fi nut. (Some posting here know me and are in a position to know this is true, since I have given them sci-fi novels and gone on endlessly about my love of various sci-fi authors.) Pournelle frequently collaborates w/ Larry Niven. I loved Footfall and Lucifer's Hammer.
ReplyDeleteJerry Pournelle is a conservative who is adamantly opposed to the war in Iraq. Instapundit links to Pournelle's web site on occasion; if you google and find it, you will see what I mean.
I have tried to post to LGF, but I kept getting banned within two posts. I switched accounts and IP addresses to post again, but I still got banned. Once I was banned within a minute of my first post. Their moderators are as rabid as their commenters.
ReplyDeleteAt first I thought is was kind of odd. Generally I was politely disagreeing with commenters and going out of my way to cite my facts, so I didn't think I would do anything to get banned. But I sorted out what was going on, they really don't like people who don't agree with them especially when they cite their facts.
Falwell, Dobson, Robertson, worst Americans? This was unfathomable to me until I reread your #1 choice. What exactly are you spiking your marijuana stash with - pscilocybin?
ReplyDeleteanon at 3:51 writes: Also, for example, it is very Crazy Eddie of me to try to convince Glenn Greenwald that leftists should not try to attack Bush where he is strong, like on Iraq and nat'l defense, but where he is weak--ESCR, ID in schools, illegal immigration, spending.
ReplyDeleteJust FYI, somewhere in his earliest posting, Glenn did take a swipe at the Bush Admin on science issues, and I believe he referenced both ESCR and ID. I know he has dedicated a whole post to the immigration issue, and I'm not enirely in agreement with his position, since I am ambivalent on the issue and there are certain arguments about immigration that I find morally unacceptable. But I agree he would do well to lay off unrelenting attacks on Bush foreign policy -- which is indeed very Crazy Eddie of me to even suggest. :)
Anon at 6:17 spews: This was unfathomable to me until I reread your #1 choice. What exactly are you spiking your marijuana stash with - pscilocybin?
For the second time -- the Harry Anslinger nomination was mine,, tho I have every reason to believe Glenn agrees that the man was an abomination. Obviously, anyone who thinks Anslinger's having waged a huge PR campaign before the press and Congress to lie about cannabis and other drugs, to in one decade depict users as terrifyingly insane, murderous Mexicans, and in the next to declare pot is a Communist plot to turn us into a nation of pacifists, and to do all of this to secure and retain a prison-industrial system that locks up citizens and destroys lives all for deciding they and not the state have the right to decide what to put into their own bodies...why, it is evident that a person could object to all that only because they are high themselves. I'm sure I'd think more clearly if I would only consume sufficient quantities of a legal drug, like vodka.
No doubt I would then also love Falwell and Robertson. Yet another good reason to be sober.
I'm a little surprised to see a lawyer referring to Clinton as a sexual harasser and perjurer. That's kind of sloppy, isn't it? Just for the record: he was tried for sexual harassment and exonerated. He was impeached for perjury but was not convicted by the Republican Senate which heard the case.
ReplyDeleteJudge Susan Webber Wright, you will recall, dismissed the Paula Jones case, as WITHOUT MERIT. She agreed with Clinton that Jones had failed to produce evidence of harassment or workplace discrimination.
Canadian Encyclopedia:
...Wright did not rule on whether the incident that Jones alleged ever took place. Instead, the judge said that even if what Jones claimed happened really did happen, it did not amount to sexual harassment. "Although the governor's alleged conduct, if true, may certainly be characterized as boorish and offensive," she wrote, "even a most charitable reading of the record in this case fails to reveal a basis for a claim of criminal sexual assault." Key to Wright's ruling was the fact that by Jones's own account, Clinton asked for sex only once and backed off when she refused.
From the Wikipedia entry on Paula Jones:
a David Brock story in American Spectator told a lurid account, popularly referred to as Troopergate, about an Arkansas employee named "Paula" offering to be Clinton's girlfriend. Jones filed a sexual harassment suit against Clinton in May 1994. Long after the resultant scandal subsided, Brock publicly apologized to Clinton in an article in Esquire in April 1998, in which he claimed that all of the details in his original article in American Spectator were simply made up as part of Richard Mellon Scaife's anti-Clinton Arkansas Project.
Here's a fairly thorough discussion of the perjury issue:
Clinton himself said later that the government didn't need to spend $70 million to find out if he was a sinner, he could have told us that himself. I, personally, was more angry at the people hounding him selectively, where they had not hounded his predecessors - including his immediate predecessor - for similar behavior that would undoubtedly have looked equally disgusting if the details were printed for the world to slobber over. Throughout the history of the human race, the chiefs and kings and even presidents have tended to have more women around them. For those alpha males who resist temptation in the interests of stable monogamy, more power to them. For me the line is crossed when people do things to other people against their will - that was never proven against Clinton. And it was not for lack of trying.
So many glass houses, so many stones...
(Hypatia, I'm wondering where you did stand on Thomas' confirmation? And Schwarzenneger's bid for governor? And oh, I didn't mean the above comment about glass houses to apply to you. It's my impression that generally you think for yourself; that's why I was a bit surprised by the words you chose here.)
Two things.
ReplyDelete1. I think any list of "Worst Americans' has to include James Buchanan, who actively pushed for the Supreme Court decision on the Fugitive Slave Act which guaranteed the Civil War, and seemed happy in its inevitability. By a strange coincidence, a century later, the chief advocate of political strategies designed to break up the United State was Pat Buchanan, who at least deserves a Dishoroable Mention.
2. You've got an amazing amount of commant spam which you really should clean up. Comment spam harms the net.