This editorial on Time's website is written by Michael Kinsley, who even Baghdad Bob could take lessons from. I have decided that he must be a moonbat . Who doesn't feel he has any stake in this war. Some people will never figure it out, and this guy seems to be one of them. He doesn't understand what it means that MoveOn.pimp ran this ad before Petraeus spoke, and that Hillary's phrasing was essentially calling General Petraeus a liar. Hillary's motivations are almost purely political or you would think she (and all the other liberals who side with her) would be pleased to see things are going well and that a lot of folks have a chance to live a life far better than they "enjoyed" before. These are the same folks who repeatedly cry "Don't question my patriotism!" Apparently that only applies if you are a true liberal as defined by MoveOn.sugardaddy. This guy also seems to think being disingenuous in politics is perfectly acceptable even if people's lives and everyone's futures hang in the balance. As far as I am concerned if you can't play fair given these stakes, you are hopelessly lost. Read on if you wish just so you know what is (or isn't) going on in his liberal mind. Don't have anything breakable too near.Goodness gracious. oh, my paws and whiskers. Some of the meanest, most ornery hombres around are suddenly feeling faint. Notorious tough guys are swooning with the vapors. The biggest beasts in the barnyard are all aflutter over something they read in the New York Times. It's that ad from MoveOn.org — the one that calls General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. forces in Iraq, general betray us. All across the radio spectrum, right-wing shock jocks are themselves shocked. How could anybody say such a thing? It's horrifying. It's outrageous. It's disgraceful. It's just beyond the pale ... It's ... oh, my heavens ... say, is it a bit stuffy in here? ... I think I'm going to ... Could I have a glass of ... oh, dear [thud].
I recall them being pi$$ed off, I don't recall the fainting. But I've seen all sorts of stories involving crying and victimized innocent children made up by liberals and put on the internet for others who are like-minded who would even lick that crud up off the back of my balls if they found it there.
Welcome to the wonderful world of umbrage, the new language of American politics. You would not have thought that the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly would be so sensitive. Sticks and stones and so on. Yet they all seem to have taken one look at that ad and fainted dead away. And when they came round, they demanded — as if with one voice (or at least as if with one list of talking points) — that every Democratic presidential candidate must "condemn" this shocking, shocking document.
Why don't you go into some depth about why they find it shocking and why even liberals shy away from it?
The ad is pretty tough, and the pun on the general's name is pretty witless. You could argue that since the verb betray and the noun traitor have the same root, the ad is accusing the head of American forces in Iraq of treason. The ad can also be interpreted — more plausibly if you consider the rest of the text — merely as questioning the general's honesty, not his patriotism. But whatever your interpretation of the ad, all the gasping for air and waving of scented handkerchiefs among the war's most enthusiastic supporters is pretty comical.
PUN? WITLESS? Interesting choice of words there, Michael. Trying to minimize something, are we? The likes of you are the ones who madly arm-wave those "scented handkerchiefs" around in these situations. Also interesting to note that you don't see how Petraeus cannot be meaningfully patriotic if he were falsely testifying. Oh, I almost forgot (not) that you are liberal and have a problem with cause/effect and logical connections. Especially when trying to make a situation that reveals some ugly truths go away.
It's all phony, of course. The war's backers are obviously delighted to have this ad from which they can make an issue. They wouldn't trade it for a week in Anbar province (a formerly troubled area of Iraq that is now, thanks to us, an Eden of peace and tranquillity where barely a car bomb disturbs the perfumed silence — or so they say). These days, mock outrage is used by every side of every dispute. It's fair enough to criticize something your opponent said while secretly thanking your lucky stars that he said it. The fuss over this MoveOn.org ad is something else: it is the result of a desperate scavenging for umbrage material. When so many people are clamoring for a chance to swoon that they each have to take a number and when the landscape is so littered with folks lying prostrate and pretending to be dead that it starts to look like the end of a Civil War battle re-enactment, this isn't spontaneous mass outrage. This is choreography.
Like Hillary's pre-scripted comments or MoveOn.pimp's ad that ran before Petraeus testified? Well, I guess you would be a better judge than I. In any case, even without the ad your cause was dead and buried. Nobody was "desperately looking for umbrage material" except maybe for Hillary. Besides, your idiotic pimp-masters are the ones that vomited that one up, not "true liberals", right? So why are you so defensive?
The constant calls for political candidates to prove their bona fides by condemning or denouncing something somebody else said or to renounce a person's support or to return her tainted money are a tiresome new tic in American politics. They're turning politics into a game of "Mother, May I?" Did you say "Here is my plan for health-care reform"? Uh-oh, you were supposed to say "I condemn MoveOn.org's comments on General Petraeus, and here is my plan for health-care reform."
Why don't you want to pick a side, Mr. Public Figure? I want to know what I am voting for.
All this drawing of uncrossable lines and issuing of fatuous fatwas is supposed to be a bad habit of the left. When right-wingers are attacking this habit rather than practicing it, they call it political correctness. The problem with political correctness is that it turns discussions of substance into arguments over etiquette. The last thing that supporters of the war want to talk about at this point is the war. They'd far rather talk about this insult to General Petraeus. It just isn't done in polite society, it seems, to criticize a general in the middle of a war. (Although, when else?)
We don't need to talk about the war as much as we need to talk about the defeatist liberal mindset. That says a lot.
The Republican front runner, Rudy Giuliani, is another tough guy who has seized the opportunity to reveal his easily bruised soft side. He is running TV commercials saying Hillary Clinton "stood by silently" while MoveOn.org ran its despicable ad. Another way of saying this would be that she had nothing to do with the ad. But Rudy accuses her of "joining with" MoveOn.org and "attacking" General Petraeus, although the only evidence he can muster for this accusation is a clip from Clinton telling the general at a hearing that his reports of progress in the war "really require the willing suspension of disbelief." For this, Giuliani demands an "apology," not just to the general but to all American troops in Iraq. He accuses her of "turning her back" on America's brave soldiers "just when our troops need all our support to finish the job."
Easily bruised? You're backing down from a guy who's "easily bruised"? Hmm.
When we try to untangle this web of accusation and innuendo, Giuliani appears to be suggesting that it is unacceptable for a Senator to express skepticism about anything said by a general in uniform. If he believes that, he does not understand democracy. I am shocked by this. In fact, if Giuliani doesn't apologize, and if the other Republican candidates don't condemn this commercial, I think I'm going to faint.
There is no web of accusations, you would just like there to be one so you could hide in it. There is no innuendo except in your liberal mind. What was said was perfectly clear. As are the resulting actions/inactions/avoidances/disingenuities. There is total disarray in the Democratic party right now whether you like it or not. It is related to disagreements on how to cover up the massive party-wide hypocrisy that has been exposed to even the politically blind. Rather than try to fix the problem you try to minimize and redefine it.