Rotwang Ruminates
That's entertainment. I've got to start recording Glenn Beck. That dude is special.
Is our bankers learning. The mortgage guys I talk to all urge me to hurry up and refinance before the value of my house sinks further. That way I can borrow more.
Tough crowd. Nobody can empty a room like that Iranian dude. They should use him for fire drills.
Even the IMF. Things have come to a sorry state when the former chief economist of the I-M-Effin-F is denouncing the capitalist class.
Hail to the cheese. Newt Gingrich will be the next president of the United States. IN HIS DREAMS.
Relax and enjoy it. Of course the use of torture is inhumane and even worse, it doesn't even work. But expecting prosecutions for torture is like expecting the Gov to abolish the CIA, or expecting Donald Trump to fire himself.
I see dead people. Consumer tech advice: if you're going to buy a webcam, spend more than $29.95.
Black swan dooky. I'm tired of Nassim Nicholas Taleb. He isn't as brilliant as he thinks he is. He may be a quant jock, but he talks about an idealized laissez-faire capitalism as if he's never read a history book. Dude, this is the way the system works. This IS the system. The bubble bursting was not some unforeseeable event. It's happened many times. Lots of people foresee it. They just don't foresee the timing.
You little demon. Fun to watch Opie put the shiv into that hump William Donohue, all the while playing the fair-haired innocent. "I made Splash!" Tom Hanks and a mermaid!!
Maybe they read the Summers memo. I don't care that the pirates got their heads blown off, but if garbage and nuclear crud is being dumped in the ocean off Somalia, somebody should look into it.
Why not him. I hope Norm Coleman can be countersued for damages when this is all over.
"The Lobby." It's not a lobby. It's an intelligence operation, nor is it limited to information gathering. Didn't you know that?
Wile E. Coyote strikes again. Obama is a political genius. When the R's criticize him for shaking hands with Hugo Chavez, he can say he also shook hands with the Mexican president's dog.
Codswallop.
Rotwang, tell me, why is it you are actively discouraging people from their civic duty?
Lots of ho-hum garden variety malfeasance, sure, I have low expectations. I'm jaded.
But not this. Torture is never acceptable. If you and Obama want to pardon these criminals for ruining the lives of both the tortured and the torturers, fine.
They must be brought to justice first, before you can do so.
I'm so sorry you find these heinous acts tiresome. Perhaps you'd feel differently if you thought it could happen to you? Well, now it can. If you don't stand up against it now, don't expect anyone to stand up for you.
April 20, 2009 9:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's not that I find torture tiresome. I find capitalism tiresome. Sorry, I can't maintain a fever pitch of outrage 24-7. People who do get burned out. Maybe I am jaded. I think I'm realistic. Remember the Church Committee? We've seen this movie before.
As for misfortune not befalling me, you have no idea. You don't know where I've been.
I'm not burned out. I'm trying to do good deeds and have a few laughs.
April 20, 2009 10:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
I didn't say anything about misfortune, and I'm sorry if you've had some. It doesn't take outrage, Rotwang. Just a clear and levelheaded persistence.
The kind the founding fathers had during the War of Independence. I think it's a pretty long established tradition, and not too difficult to keep. If Washington could coolheadedly order captured prisoners to be treated... "with humanity, and let them have no reason to Complain of our Copying the brutal example of the British Army in their treatment of our unfortunate brethren…. Provide everything necessary for them on the road."
Can we do and expect so much less? Why? I don't understand this attitude at all. I don't understand a one of ya.
April 20, 2009 10:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Made my night to read "codswallop", hearing that stinker swat the Rot upside the head.
Apropos this topic, the tendency of brown skinned folks to treat our boys roughly seems to correlate with our initial tendency to treat them poorly. We waterboard Filipinos, Japanese waterboard us, we waterboard KSM.
April 20, 2009 10:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Race to the bottom. Whoo hoo.
April 20, 2009 10:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Too many Americans are unaware of the Filipino-American War.
April 21, 2009 11:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
To think denizens of the Café can change the world if we get outraged enough day in and day out is expecting too much. I like the way he puts things and I don’t think he cheapens the message at all. I think he heightens it. A daily torrent of outrage and despair can have a negative effect: it can actually demoralize you. And that's what they want: to demoralize you and make you feel helpless.
April 21, 2009 12:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
But Rotwang, we have not seen this movie before. The Church Committee worked in a time before Congress completely lost it's moral compass. There were lots of WWII vets in the Congress in those days. Those fellas really did oppose torture and really understood the difference between our great country and the rotten, murderous dictators they fought in the war and that they continued to oppose during the Cold War. Contrast that to today where we have a morally indifferent Democrat in the White House and a Democratic majority in Congress afraid of it's own shadow along with a rabid, wild-eyed immoral Republican Party willing to go to any lengths to prove to the world they are really fascists. Very different movie in my view.
April 20, 2009 10:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The Church Committee worked in a time before Congress completely lost it's moral compass."
BLLSHT
The only ones with a moral compass were the members of the
The Citizens Committee to Investigate the FBI.
The US has always committed and supported torture, and terrorism as well. And the CIA is a criminal enterprise, but by law it's only allowed to commit those crimes in foreign jurisdictions. That is in fact its mandate.
April 21, 2009 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
That's incorrect.
The upshot of the Church Committee was to make illegal most of the activities it investigated, if not all of them. I still have my original copy of the Church Committee Report and if you take a look, it will become readily apparent to you that there was, in fact, a far more acceptable moral compass in use at that time than their is today.
April 21, 2009 3:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
So things have gotten worse.
You'll get no argument from me on that.
April 22, 2009 12:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Agree with you, well written and definitely a good laugh. You could add that expecting torture prosecutions would also be like expecting:
(1)Bush to turn himself in at the Hague.
(2)Republicans agreeing to a tax increase to pay for the Iraq war.
(3)The US will stop sending billions in military aid to Pakistan while they bury alive teenage women for picking their husbands.
(4)The NRA to support a federal tracking database of gun sales to reduce gun violence here or in Mexico.
(5)Cheney not to disarm his wingnut supporters when they come to hear his speeches.
April 20, 2009 10:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
What an amusing little Tory you are. I bet you woulda slug them A-Rabs up by their little toes and enjoyed their discomfort while you drank elitist wine and engaged in (weak) witty (dumb) reparteé. Oh, tee hee Aren't you clever
I guess it goes to show some of you really do live in the gutter.
April 20, 2009 10:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Name calling isn't going to get torture prosecutions.
At least Obama has stopped the torture, stopped the renditions, is closing Gitmo prison camp and is planning to remove the troops from Iraq.
Maybe you think Bush should not turn himself in at the Hague, maybe you voted for him Bwatfat?
April 20, 2009 11:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, I calls them like I sees 'em.
You are a Tory, in 1776, you would have been an apologist for King George.
It took a little passion, and moral turpitude to stand against torture then. Just as it does now.
April 21, 2009 7:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
And I thought that you were just some precocious teen sitting in one of those charter schools cutting and pasting punch lines from grown-up blogs. You’re very witty and perceptive. But don’t mess with farm animals. Remember the answer to “Why did the blogger cross the road?”
Because he saw the chicken had a laptop.
April 21, 2009 7:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, I can't maintain a fever pitch of outrage 24-7. C. A. Rotwang
Suck it up, Rotwang!
April 20, 2009 11:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well to get my obligatory cannabis reference in...you know today was 4/20, right? Fire it up...
Anywho...
Burnt out? Can't maintain a fever pitch 24/7? Screw that noise...Ellen is right, suck it up Doc. No time to quit now...the monster is growing more powerful. Now more than ever it is time to fight...
April 20, 2009 11:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
“So let us not give up in doing what is fine, for in due season we shall reap if we do not tire out.” (Gal. 6:9)
We know the objective of the enemy, is to tire us out
It seems we are no longer focused on crooked bankers, and are now focused on Torture.
Guess what? Some of us really can walk and chew gum at the same time.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
The cause is just. It is when we give up they will have won.
One of us is going to have to push the Self-destruct button.
April 21, 2009 6:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
I thought people would whack you over the noggin for your reference to the reality of the "The Lobby." Nobody has so far. Interesting.
April 21, 2009 6:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
The first rule of Teh Lobby is, you don't talk about Teh Lobby
The second rule is, if anybody else talks about Teh Lobby, you call 'em an antisemite.
The third rule is, you call Jane Harman and have a good laugh about how you're getting one over on the rest of the world.
April 21, 2009 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, Dave. Me be dum fuk. I'm not an anti-Semite, truly. I was just wonderin' was all.
April 21, 2009 5:45 PM | Reply | Permalink