The Watering Hole; Friday December 11 2015; “Ecrasez l’Infame”

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“Écrasez l’infame.”
(Voltaire)

Sometimes I run across stuff that makes me mad. Like this, for example:

And here are a half-dozen-plus-two of similar ilk, each and all of which express nonsense that apparently is, this day, acceptable to both the political (Republican) and religious (Christer) realms as well as to the innumerable ‘bastions’ of radical right wing punditry.

Trump’s Anti-Muslim Campaign Is Helping Fuel White Supremacist Recruitment

Brigitte Gabriel: ‘Trump Is General Patton Reincarnated’

Pamela Geller Hails Trump, Warns A ‘Large Conspiracy’ Is Bringing Down Civilization

Pat Robertson Defends Donald Trump’s Muslim Immigration Ban

Jim Simpson: Immigrants Will ‘Destroy The Culture,’ Usher In ‘Despotic Governments’

Jeff Sessions Defends Trump On Muslim Ban, Says It’s ‘Appropriate To Begin To Discuss This’

Bachmann: ‘Donald Trump Is Right’ On Muslim Immigration Ban

Tony Perkins: ‘Only 16 Percent Of Islam Is A Religion’ So Immigration Ban Not A ‘Religious Test On Muslims’

I admit it. I’m at a loss to understand why such a pile of nonsensical vitriolic gibberish is so widely broadcast; I’m even less able to comprehend the obvious mentality lack that apparently motivates not only those who spout it, but also those who listen and pay attention to it. As the New York Times has recently reported,

Americans are more fearful about the likelihood of another terrorist attack than at any other time since the weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, a gnawing sense of dread that has helped lift Donald J. Trump to a new high among Republican primary voters, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

In the aftermath of attacks by Islamic extremists in Paris and in San Bernardino, Calif., a plurality of the public views the threat of terrorism as the top issue facing the country. . . .

I’ll say it straight: I do not like, at all, what’s happening in and to this country, courtesy the influences of our home-grown haters, bigots, and fear-mongers (aka Republicans/Conservatives). The bottom line is a simple one; there is something terribly wrong with a country in which so many of its people are so easily and readily afflicted — for infamous political purposes ONLY — with irrational fear and the hate-filled consequences thereof. Even worse, however, are those many voices that continuously shout their fear-inducing epithets that serve no purpose other than to feed the infamy of their spurious motive.

Voltaire said it best: Écrasez l’infame. Crush the infamous. I agree. Where do we start?

OPEN THREAD

 

61 thoughts on “The Watering Hole; Friday December 11 2015; “Ecrasez l’Infame””

  3. On April 5, 1968. the day after MLK’s assassination, Bobby Kennedy spoke in Cleveland. He said, in part:

    “. . . When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies that he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your home, or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and to be mastered.

    “We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, alien men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in a common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

    “Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

    “We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children’s future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

    “Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in this land of ours. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

    “But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment that they can.

    “Surely, this bond of common faith, surely this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.”

    A glance around the country today suggests that some things never change. How sad that is.

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  4. Guess who agrees with Trump on banning Muslims? I’ll spare the drivel. How her twitter name looks:

    Sarah Palin
    Former Alaska governor (?)· December 9 at 12:21pm ·

    ?, indeed.

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  8. Frank Luntz Did A Focus Group With Trump Supporters And It Was Hideous

    This Frank Luntz focus group of self-proclaimed Trump supporters is disgusting, and it’s mostly disgusting because these people have been completely indoctrinated by right wing radio and online media like Breitbart News.

    None in the group wanted to find themselves on the side of the mainstream media — or of President Obama. When Luntz asked participants to sum him up in a word or phrase, “socialist” and “Jimmy Carter” tumbled forth until one man raised the ante.

    “I wouldn’t urinate on him if he was on fire,” he said.

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    • I know these people. They are willingly ignorant and no matter how gently you may suggest that perhaps some of their truths might be wrong, they will turn the same vile hate upon you.

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      • We have lots of them here, too. They hate Obama with undying and unalterable passion, and they love Donald because he spews the hate they love to hear. I’m not in their company except maybe in a blue moon, but if you ever read about me having been chained up and dragged behind a pickup, you’ll know I happened to wind up in their midst for five, maybe four, minutes.

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    • In the Conservative Reality, Ronald Reagan was the epitome of Good. So, naturally, in their binary way of thinking, the man he defeated, Jimmy Carter must represent the epitome of Evil. Therefore it is not possible for Carter to have done anything Good (like pardon the Vietnam draft dodgers so they cold come home again to their conservative families), nor Reagan anything Evil (even if he did pardon even more illegal immigrants than Carter did draft dodgers.) So to them, calling someone “Jimmy Carter” is a vile insult. It makes no difference at all that it is a senseless, or ill-founded insult. It’s how their minds “work” (assuming that is the proper term.)

      And since we always seem to have a hard time agreeing on reality, it’s impossible to discuss anything with them. And even though someone with an IQ in the three-digit range can see that we base our opinions (as much as possible) on factual reality, they are convinced that we are the ones living in a fantasy world, with the fantasy being that we think the world can be made to be a better place.

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  9. Curious little statistic in Nate Silver’s analysis on the Trump demographic – and again note the huge skew in attention from the ‘librul media’ towards Trump.

    “…(the media) has distorted perceptions about Trump’s true level of support, which Silver has estimated as 6 percent to 8 percent of the electorate — or roughly “the same share of people who think the Apollo moon landings were faked,”

    …. hmm what are you trying to say Nate? 🙂

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    • The first line nails it: “Yes, Les, we get it: Trampling democracy and inciting violence is really, really good for business!”

      Just like endlessly repeated stories that inspire fear of “terrorism” — gun manufacturers and sales outlets love it.

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    • The god damned Repugnants.
      (am scheduled to start chemotherapy the day after Christmas. The shutdown will stop my Social Security which will affect the start of therapy)
      I detest the GOP.

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  14. If only there was a pill for that. This is disgraceful and shameful. Infants and children should NOT be taking these drugs. Big Pharma’s advertising campaigns make us believe that there is a pill that cures or controls every illness and every behavior, even in infants. Don’t even ask me how I feel about this.

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  16. The word is slowly leaking out, but so far remains a long way from making it as far as to the nightly news.

    Trump’s ‘Muslim Policy’ Conjures Up Demons From Fascism’s History

    Watching Donald Trump on television Monday urging that Muslims be banned from entering the United States was like listening to Hitler on the radio in the early 1930s.

    As was the case with Hitler, Trump appeals to a substantial number of angry people who cheer his call for making outcasts of members of a particular religion. At first scorned by decent people, as was Hitler, the presidential candidate now is enlisting a growing number of angry and scared Americans by promoting hatred of a religion and an ethnic group. That’s what Hitler did in regard to the Jews.

    With Trump gaining strength, he may be on a path to the Republican presidential nomination and, if things continue to go his way, the presidency. Then, say farewell to our democracy. The bleak prophesies of novelists Sinclair Lewis and Philip Roth about a fascist America could come true.

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  17. This just in from Batshit Shoebat:

    Theodore Shoebat Wants ‘An American Inquisition,’ Hails The Trail Of Tears

    Anti-LGBT activist Theodore Shoebat posted a new video yesterday praising Donald Trump’s plan to ban all Muslims from entering the country, approvingly comparing him to Andrew Jackson, whom he hailed as “the greatest president in American history” for oppressing, dislocating and killing thousands of Native Americans because “the heathen needed to be punished.”

    Trump’s plan to ban all Muslims is the epitome of “American values,” Shoebat explained, just as was Jackson’s treatment of the Native Americans.

    “Any Indian that expressed any sort of anti-American sentiment, he killed them,” Shoebat rejoiced. “He had no tolerance for evil and wicked people. He got rid of them and he purged the society of these pagan heathens and he did an American Inquisition and that’s what we need now … Homosexuality? Death penalty. Blasphemy? Should be punished. Pagans coming in to your land? Kill the pagans, defeat them, convert the to Christianity.”

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  18. Ted Cruz Raises Money For Radical Gun Group To Fight Obama’s ‘Left-Wing Hatred Of Your Liberty’

    Ted Cruz sent a fundraising email on behalf of the radical gun group Gun Owners of America yesterday, boasting that he was “honored to work with GOA” to stop gun legislation after the Sandy Hook massacre and declaring that President Obama’s gun control efforts “have nothing to do with keeping Americans safe, and everything to do with his left-wing hatred of your liberty and your rights under the Constitution.”

    Reply ↓

    • The last time I checked; not a single gun has been confiscated by the federal government from anyone who didn’t do something against the law to lose said gun. I keep making the exact same statement on every thread I find about this subject. Here it is…

      “I want our lawmakers to discuss ways to make it harder for criminals and psychopaths to legally buy firearms and ammunition.”

      I even have it written on a Post-it Note next to my computer in case I forget how I worded it before. I am invariably met, even on “lefty blogs” that don’t tolerate stupid trolls, with “GUN GRABBER!” “SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED!” and the ever-popular, “WHEN GUNS ARE OUTLAWED ONLY OUTLAWS WILL HAVE GUNS!”.

      The Cruzer provides a perfect example of what we are up against. He would cut off his own nuts before sitting down to discuss gun laws and the rest of the GOoPers are every bit is bad. Alas. I don’t ever see that conversation taking place so our only hope is to vote out enough GOoPers so that the Dems, who are nowhere near as strong on the subject as I would like, can eventually act unilaterally.

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      • The bottom line is that Republican PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES — not just demented screwballs like Larry Pratt and Wayne LaPierre — are fanning the flames with sole intent to increase political unrest in an already tense climate. Why isn’t doing that a crime? When does the word ‘sedition’ wind up on the table?

        I have become, these days, increasingly unsure that this country has a viable future that’s reflective of the better days in its past. Creeping fascism is not, apparently, something that inspires hope in those who actually give a shit.

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  19. Here’s an update on my neighbor Prckerhead Pete. Pete’s latest business venture of selling shrimp and crabs seems to be working out. Pete came by to have me look up the nearest Comcast office so he could arrange for TV and phone service. Two types of customers have created the need for a phone line: Corporate customers wanting to pay with a credit card and people who want to buy with their food stamp money. I rode with him to the office in Palatka, Florida. After he paid a past due balance and a deposit for the equipment he asked me to hook it up for him! The representative from the bank that will handle his transactions comes next Tuesday with his card swipe keypad.

    Now that he has TV, I reminded him that people who watch Fox know less about current events that people who do not watch any TV news. I also use one of his favorite expressions, “Its a proven fact,” when informing him that people who watch Bill O’Reilly and agree with him are racist!

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  21. Norman Lear: Trump ‘Has Become The Middle Finger Of Their Right Hand’

    “Donald Trump is a fool and an asshole,” Lear told The Daily Beast this week. “I don’t think people are backing him as much as he has become the middle finger of their right hand.

    “And it’s their way of saying to the establishment, ‘This is the kind of leadership you’re giving us? Take this!’” he adds. “It’s a ‘fuck you’ to the establishment. It isn’t a heartfelt belief in this guy.”

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