"The conservative president in the piece holds that people are each out to make a living, and the best way for government to facilitate that is to stay out of the way, as the inevitable abuses and failures of this system (free-market economics) are less than those of government intervention."
He was doomed as a liberal when he became capable of understanding and accurately expressing the conservative viewpoint.
Funny, those were the paragraphs of the article that jumped out at me too.
His comments in the introduction about NPR ("National Palestinian Radio") were amusing as well. I've always called it "National Propaganda Radio" myself.
Hey, we are talking about this on my blog as well. I was going to send you the link. Here is what I wrote in comments on Mamet's piece...
It is a good article. Here's my problem...I find myself with, what I call, Heston-O'Donnell syndrome. I have this rare disease and it is defined thusly: I love Charlton Heston. How can you not? "It's a madhouse!" "Soylent Green are people!!!" "Damn dirty apes!!" are classics. His politics, however, are absurd and terribly short sighted.
Rosie O'Donnell, on the other hand, is a loud mouthed fat cunt. I quite literally can't stand her voice, which drives me to want to slay puppies. Yet, she is completely correct in her criticisms of Bush Co.
When it comes points each of these people bring up, I find myself so personally biased, in favor of Heston and against O'Donnell, that my clarity is lost. I can no longer be objective. Now I must change the name of the syndrome to Heston-O'Donnell-Mamet syndrome because I adore Mamet so much personally that I would believe anything he says.
So, more than likely, I disagree with what he says but in the final analysis I must recuse myself from further comment because David Mamet is, in my opinion, the finest playwright of the last 30 years. And he is from Chicago!!
Gee Mark, that's the most I've agreed with you of just about any post you've written. You are 1/2 right on Heston, 1/2 right on O'Donnell, and totally correct on your objectivity. ;-)
"Yet, she is completely correct in her criticisms of Bush Co."
Especially that part about how fire has never melted steel before as proof of Bush's 9/11 inside job. The bronze and iron ages are an even bigger myth than the moon landing (which Bush also faked for... um... reasons!)
Mine was a conservation commission hearing. After all the rigamarole, it came down to the property could never be a wetland because the terrain and soil types are all wrong. That is "never" as in impossible even if you could flood it and grow sawgrass in it. Never.
So, as we're picking up the maps and papers, some assh*le in the back pipes up they should have a finding anyway because "we need to keep control of these people".
This is in a small town in the hills of western MA - normally less insane than most...
"Especially that part about how fire has never melted steel before as proof of Bush's 9/11 inside job."
I was speaking of her overall assessment of Bush....incompetent, single minded to a fault, lacking compassion on a multitude of levels...etc..
I would disagree with her that 9-11 was an inside job and Bush was behind it. Clearly, Bush had no idea what was going on the morning of 9-11. The fact that he sat there for seven minutes and did nothing proves to me that he was way out of his element. I do think that Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz knew something was coming and made plans to use the attacks to their advantage.
The real question is...did they have like minded people in place that purposefully looked the other way to help facilitate the attacks? Did they use the "big government" excuse as a cover to a)blame the whole thing on incompetence and b)open the door for more privatization?
"Did they use the "big government" excuse as a cover to a)blame the whole thing on incompetence and b)open the door for more privatization?"
This would make perfect sense except for the fact that they expanded government after 9-11 and folded the formerly private airport security into the federal government. Bush and Cheney may be a lot of things, but one thing they aren't is supporters of limited government.
I'll make a better argument for your side. Bush and Cheney have made the security requirements much more extensive to get a government job. You basically have to go through the steps to get a Secret clearance in order to get even the most mundane federal job. A lot of people will not put up with this, so this will limit the number of federal employees. This will force the size of government to shrink.
Now, do I think that Bush and Cheney are thinking through this result of their security policies. Of course not. We need no Machiavellian conspiracy theories to understand Bush and his administration. It really is simple. Bush is obsessed with security because he thinks it will prevent another incident like 9-11. It is really that simple.
...more than likely, I disagree with what he says but in the final analysis I must recuse myself from further comment....
You know, upon further consideration, I find this revealing and fascinating.
You can't ask Markadelphia exactly what he disagrees with Mamet about, because he's "recused himself from further comment."
This seems strikingly like the equivalent of putting one's fingers in one's ears and chanting "I can't HEAR YOU!"
I'm really curious!
What was it about his essay that blew your mental fuses, Mark? Could it have been this?
"I took the liberal view for many decades, but I believe I have changed my mind."
AIEEEEEE!!! (The sound of Markadelphia's brain spraining itself in its mad effort to spring away from apostasy.)
Or could it have been this?
"I wondered, how could I have spent decades thinking that I thought everything was always wrong at the same time that I thought I thought that people were basically good at heart? Which was it?"
Huminahuminahumnia.... Mental vaporlock.
Perhaps he got to here:
"I'd observed that lust, greed, envy, sloth, and their pals are giving the world a good run for its money, but that nonetheless, people in general seem to get from day to day; and that we in the United States get from day to day under rather wonderful and privileged circumstances—that we are not and never have been the villains that some of the world and some of our citizens make us out to be, but that we are a confection of normal (greedy, lustful, duplicitous, corrupt, inspired—in short, human) individuals living under a spectacularly effective compact called the Constitution, and lucky to get it."
(Please, God, make it stop!)
Somehow I don't think he made past there before the mental shutters slammed down. Hard. :lol:
Kevin, I enjoyed the piece by Mamet. I even agreed with some of it. There are plenty of things I don't like about liberals and he illustrated some of them. I just can't think critically about his piece, though, because of how much I adore his writings and there are things in there to criticize. He is nothing short of stellar, Sexual Perversity in Chicago being my favorite play of his and one I re-read quite often.
So, it's not mental vaporlock. I just think you should try to think critically about all things and I can't do it with him. I don't have the heart.
Note:
All avatars and any images or other media embedded in comments were hosted on the JS-Kit website and have been lost;
references to haloscan comments have been partially automatically remapped, but accuracy is not guaranteed and corrections are solicited.
If you notice any problems with this page or wish to have your home page link updated, please contact John Hardin <jhardin@impsec.org>
JS-Kit/Echo comments for article at http://smallestminority.blogspot.com/2008/03/quote-of-day_12.html (18 comments)
Tentative mapping of comments to original article, corrections solicited.
"The conservative president in the piece holds that people are each out to make a living, and the best way for government to facilitate that is to stay out of the way, as the inevitable abuses and failures of this system (free-market economics) are less than those of government intervention."
He was doomed as a liberal when he became capable of understanding and accurately expressing the conservative viewpoint.
I find it eternally humorous that the first comment on the article calls David a racist.
Funny, those were the paragraphs of the article that jumped out at me too.
His comments in the introduction about NPR ("National Palestinian Radio") were amusing as well. I've always called it "National Propaganda Radio" myself.
I always preferred "People's Republic Radio". (Said in my biggest, brassiest, baritoniest Socialist-Realism voice. Try it, it's fun!)
Off topic: Is Mr. Delphia on vacation? I never thought I'd say this, but now that he hasn't posted for a couple of weeks, I miss him...:-(
Hey, we are talking about this on my blog as well. I was going to send you the link. Here is what I wrote in comments on Mamet's piece...
It is a good article. Here's my problem...I find myself with, what I call, Heston-O'Donnell syndrome. I have this rare disease and it is defined thusly: I love Charlton Heston. How can you not? "It's a madhouse!" "Soylent Green are people!!!" "Damn dirty apes!!" are classics. His politics, however, are absurd and terribly short sighted.
Rosie O'Donnell, on the other hand, is a loud mouthed fat cunt. I quite literally can't stand her voice, which drives me to want to slay puppies. Yet, she is completely correct in her criticisms of Bush Co.
When it comes points each of these people bring up, I find myself so personally biased, in favor of Heston and against O'Donnell, that my clarity is lost. I can no longer be objective. Now I must change the name of the syndrome to Heston-O'Donnell-Mamet syndrome because I adore Mamet so much personally that I would believe anything he says.
So, more than likely, I disagree with what he says but in the final analysis I must recuse myself from further comment because David Mamet is, in my opinion, the finest playwright of the last 30 years. And he is from Chicago!!
I have no objectivity.....
Gee Mark, that's the most I've agreed with you of just about any post you've written. You are 1/2 right on Heston, 1/2 right on O'Donnell, and totally correct on your objectivity. ;-)
I thought the immediacy of the rabid counter-attack in comments was quite revealing.
[*cough*] O'Donnel?? [*cough*] You actually use her as...*?* A(ny) sort of...referential...?
Ok I'm, done here, next stop American Idol.
"Yet, she is completely correct in her criticisms of Bush Co."
Especially that part about how fire has never melted steel before as proof of Bush's 9/11 inside job. The bronze and iron ages are an even bigger myth than the moon landing (which Bush also faked for... um... reasons!)
I've always been under the impression that the fire didn't have to melt the steel in the WTC...it just had to weaken the steel.
Apparently this exceeds Rosie O's understanding.
Mine was a conservation commission hearing. After all the rigamarole, it came down to the property could never be a wetland because the terrain and soil types are all wrong. That is "never" as in impossible even if you could flood it and grow sawgrass in it. Never.
So, as we're picking up the maps and papers, some assh*le in the back pipes up they should have a finding anyway because "we need to keep control of these people".
This is in a small town in the hills of western MA - normally less insane than most...
P.
"Especially that part about how fire has never melted steel before as proof of Bush's 9/11 inside job."
I was speaking of her overall assessment of Bush....incompetent, single minded to a fault, lacking compassion on a multitude of levels...etc..
I would disagree with her that 9-11 was an inside job and Bush was behind it. Clearly, Bush had no idea what was going on the morning of 9-11. The fact that he sat there for seven minutes and did nothing proves to me that he was way out of his element. I do think that Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz knew something was coming and made plans to use the attacks to their advantage.
The real question is...did they have like minded people in place that purposefully looked the other way to help facilitate the attacks? Did they use the "big government" excuse as a cover to a)blame the whole thing on incompetence and b)open the door for more privatization?
"Did they use the "big government" excuse as a cover to a)blame the whole thing on incompetence and b)open the door for more privatization?"
This would make perfect sense except for the fact that they expanded government after 9-11 and folded the formerly private airport security into the federal government. Bush and Cheney may be a lot of things, but one thing they aren't is supporters of limited government.
I'll make a better argument for your side. Bush and Cheney have made the security requirements much more extensive to get a government job. You basically have to go through the steps to get a Secret clearance in order to get even the most mundane federal job. A lot of people will not put up with this, so this will limit the number of federal employees. This will force the size of government to shrink.
Now, do I think that Bush and Cheney are thinking through this result of their security policies. Of course not. We need no Machiavellian conspiracy theories to understand Bush and his administration. It really is simple. Bush is obsessed with security because he thinks it will prevent another incident like 9-11. It is really that simple.
"Yet, she is completely correct in her criticisms of Bush Co."
"I would disagree with her that 9-11 was an inside job and Bush was behind it."
I wish I could attach you to my car so it could turn around that quickly.
...more than likely, I disagree with what he says but in the final analysis I must recuse myself from further comment....
You know, upon further consideration, I find this revealing and fascinating.
You can't ask Markadelphia exactly what he disagrees with Mamet about, because he's "recused himself from further comment."
This seems strikingly like the equivalent of putting one's fingers in one's ears and chanting "I can't HEAR YOU!"
I'm really curious!
What was it about his essay that blew your mental fuses, Mark? Could it have been this?
"I took the liberal view for many decades, but I believe I have changed my mind."
AIEEEEEE!!! (The sound of Markadelphia's brain spraining itself in its mad effort to spring away from apostasy.)
Or could it have been this?
"I wondered, how could I have spent decades thinking that I thought everything was always wrong at the same time that I thought I thought that people were basically good at heart? Which was it?"
Huminahuminahumnia.... Mental vaporlock.
Perhaps he got to here:
"I'd observed that lust, greed, envy, sloth, and their pals are giving the world a good run for its money, but that nonetheless, people in general seem to get from day to day; and that we in the United States get from day to day under rather wonderful and privileged circumstances—that we are not and never have been the villains that some of the world and some of our citizens make us out to be, but that we are a confection of normal (greedy, lustful, duplicitous, corrupt, inspired—in short, human) individuals living under a spectacularly effective compact called the Constitution, and lucky to get it."
(Please, God, make it stop!)
Somehow I don't think he made past there before the mental shutters slammed down. Hard. :lol:
Kevin, I enjoyed the piece by Mamet. I even agreed with some of it. There are plenty of things I don't like about liberals and he illustrated some of them. I just can't think critically about his piece, though, because of how much I adore his writings and there are things in there to criticize. He is nothing short of stellar, Sexual Perversity in Chicago being my favorite play of his and one I re-read quite often.
So, it's not mental vaporlock. I just think you should try to think critically about all things and I can't do it with him. I don't have the heart.
Note: All avatars and any images or other media embedded in comments were hosted on the JS-Kit website and have been lost; references to haloscan comments have been partially automatically remapped, but accuracy is not guaranteed and corrections are solicited.
If you notice any problems with this page or wish to have your home page link updated, please contact John Hardin <jhardin@impsec.org>