Deep Thoughts From The Guardian

Will the Republicans ban sex in 2010 [sic]? Why did those “government-hating,” “market-worshipping” Republicans “sacrifice all the workers and retirees”? Why mustn’t we despise our corrupt, corporatist governments? Read The Guardian and find out!

Well, OK, just read one article from that august publication: Glenn Greenwald’s analysis of the Republicans’ greatest difficulty in campaigning against Obama. Much of it is off-topic for this site, but here’s a relevant snippet:

It is in the realm of foreign policy, terrorism and civil liberties where Republicans encounter an insurmountable roadblock. A staple of GOP politics has long been to accuse Democratic presidents of coddling America’s enemies (both real and imagined), being afraid to use violence, and subordinating US security to international bodies and leftwing conceptions of civil liberties.

But how can a GOP candidate invoke this time-tested caricature when Obama has embraced the vast bulk of George Bush’s terrorism policies; waged a war against government whistleblowers as part of a campaign of obsessive secrecy; led efforts to overturn a global ban on cluster bombs; extinguished the lives not only of accused terrorists but of huge numbers of innocent civilians with cluster bombs and drones in Muslim countries; engineered a covert war against Iran; tried to extend the Iraq war; ignored Congress and the constitution to prosecute an unauthorised war in Libya; adopted the defining Bush/Cheney policy of indefinite detention without trial for accused terrorists; and even claimed and exercised the power to assassinate US citizens far from any battlefield and without due process?

Reflecting this difficulty for the GOP field is the fact that former Bush officials, including Dick Cheney, have taken to lavishing Obama with public praise for continuing his predecessor’s once-controversial terrorism polices. In the last GOP foreign policy debate, the leading candidates found themselves issuing recommendations on the most contentious foreign policy question (Iran) that perfectly tracked what Obama is already doing, while issuing ringing endorsements of the president when asked about one of his most controversial civil liberties assaults (the due-process-free assassination of the American-Yemeni cleric Anwar Awlaki). Indeed, when it comes to the foreign policy and civil liberties values Democrats spent the Bush years claiming to defend, the only candidate in either party now touting them is the libertarian Ron Paul, who vehemently condemns Obama’s policies of drone killings without oversight, covert wars, whistleblower persecutions, and civil liberties assaults in the name of terrorism.

10 thoughts on “Deep Thoughts From The Guardian”

  1. The Republican apparatchiki, e.g. the approved candidates, continue nonetheless to mouth this increasingly moronic line. For example, when asked about Ron Paul, Rick Santorum had this to say:

    "A second term with Barack Obama I'm not sure will look that different from a Ron Paul administration," he said, when it comes to foreign policy …

    Yeah, because we all know that Obama the Peace Laureate is going to end the wars, evacuate the military bases, bring the troops home and shrink the military down to the size necessary only for territorial defence.

    We all KNOW that, right?

    Riiiiiiiight.

    1. It would seem that the anti-war message of Ron Paul is not what people want to talk about. Nor the anti-drug war message. Nor the pro-civil-rights message. Nor the pro-property-rights message.

      They want to talk about the '64 civil rights act!

  2. Yes Republicans are going to ban sex and that's what we should worry about. Never mind worrying about anything real like the increasingly real loss of civil liberties. Let's worry about entirely fictional sex bans. You know what else I hear? Republicans also plan to ban breathing! Do you like filling your lungs? Then vote Democratic!

    The guardian really needs to fire some of these writers, you know just to give them something real to worry about, like how to get a job in a great recession economy when the only skill you have to sell is being a talentless hack.

  3. "The president could have rescued the O-Ding junkie by injecting him a with a double dose of heroin. Not doing so was a failure of epic proportions."

    Why.jpg retarded left-wing Keynesian talk

  4. Unlike Austrian quackery, Keynesianism has worked, despite the emotional outbursts that Keynesianism seems to provoke amongst the "there must be lots of deep poverty to punish the wicked, bad, lazy, stupid people" crew, you know, the ones that speak of the evil of "free lunches". Austrianism has this strange desire to punish people for alleged overindulgence though the people punished are usually very different from those who benefited from the so-called overindulgence under their grand scheme. By the way, heroin is a sedative, not a stimulant. If you want to get your drugs right use mention cocaine or amphetamines.

    1. "unlike Austrian quackery, Keynesianism has worked"
      Care to provide an example? Or is this just a wet dream? Perhaps if you keep saying it over and over again, it may become true. Just like denying gravity, oh wait, no.
      And what's wrong with allowing insolvent, incompetent institutions (BofA, Citi, etc) to fail? I mean, instead of punishing the few well run institutions with billion dollar regulations, that is.
      And what's this all about with the emotional outbursts? Getting a little desperate, I see. Don't worry, uncle Ben has already set the stage for the next Keynesian bubble. All is well, it 's only paper money, it's not like there's any real value here.

    2. Here's more quackery: live within your means, in both micro and macro economic terms, and you will not get into financial trouble.
      Cicero, Benj Franklin, Mr Micawber, et al.

  5. Mr. Barganier, I feel that your message is undermined by your tone. The beginning of your article represents CIF America, a collection of opinion pieces, as representative of the Guardian, and your sarcasm attempts to discredit the publication. Your tone codifies my response to Greenwald's quote. For example, I read the phrase "off-topic" as “tangental,” for the ongoing, enfeedbling characterization of the Guardian's “deep thoughts” encourages me to. However, the phrase is benign, yet I find myself lamenting the tone instead of reflecting on the message. Have I gravely misunderstood you? Does it matter? Your post is a single reference; eveything else is filler. I want to engage with your ideas regardless of my political conformity or reading preferences, so I encourage you to make your point and connections without the bluster and problematic charicatures.

    2. It's humor, dude. You could have just said you didn't find it funny. It has occurred to me that I may not be as witty as my mama says I am.

      As for The Guardian, like most publications, it's a mixed bag. I felt that the threesome in the screen grab illustrated a point raised by the Greenwald piece: that most Democrats and Republicans are so similar to one another that partisans have to exaggerate (if not invent) slight differences.

  6. Sachs is the ultimate double-downer – some random policy not working? Do it more! That is literally his prescription for everything.

  7. Well,.. I guess it could be worse. It could be Dorothy Rabinowitz from the 'Wall Street Journal' editorial board hinting that Ron Paul may need to be swiftly ‘dealt with’ via a drone strike on his home in Texas—while, at the same time, her colleges squeal with hysterical glee in agreement.

  8. Remember one of Obama's campaign speeches in which he said "If the next president cannot turn the economy around in three years he does NOT deserve to be re-elected" ? And yes, he and Michelle still laugh hysterically, to the point of tears, whenever they look at the Nobel Peace Prize ; or even if the Prize is mentioned…..

  9. The most ardent of Ron Paul’s followers think the US government is too big when it has more people than the secret number Ron Paul has written on his magic anti-alien hemp underpants.

  10. @jrs, "The guardian really needs to fire some of these writers, you know just to give them something real to worry about, like how to get a job in a great recession economy when the only skill you have to sell is being a talentless hack."
    Very intelligent commentary! I agreed that its better to do so than to look foolish about it.

    Michelle
    My blog : isolant mince 

  11. Yeah, because we all know that Obama the Peace Laureate is going to end the wars, evacuate the military bases, bring the troops home and shrink the military down to the size necessary only for territorial defence.

  12. W licz?cym w przybli?eniu 1000 witryn planie regulacji znalaz?y si? te? schedy, jakie naturalnie modernizuj? wizy do usa rozpocz?cia a? do VWP, i? mog?aby do niego wkroczy? Polska. – Pierw powinni?my wzmocni? przepis, konserwowa? ?ciany natomiast ustanawia? szyk strze?enia towarzystwa wizy do usa wje?d?aj?cych równie? wyruszaj?cych spo?ród Stany zjednoczone, natomiast wówczas odt?d przes?dza? si? na amnesti? – rozpatruje Camarota.

    Zameldowany na mocy ponadpartyjn? wspólnot? senatorów wst?pny projekt statuty imigracyjnej pozosta? w maju przyswajany wizy do usa gigantyczn? grosem zda? przez senack? komisj? przejawu sprawiedliwo?ci. Nie egzystowa?o nie pr?dzej opatentowa? ani dobitki do zapisów o VWP. Na forum sko?czonego Senatu wzorzec trafi najbezpieczniej o tyle o ile 10 czerwca.

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