Why Are Glenn Beck and His Media Colleagues Walking Free While Minnesota’s ‘RNC 8′ Are Prosecuted for Terrorism?
Real Texans, natives from those parts of the state not dominated by the alligator-cowboy-boot luxury of the oil-pump Petrograds of Dallas or Houston, claim that, even in its death throes, a poisonous snake is still dangerous. Poke it with a stick and, with it’s a final ounce of waning spite, it will snap and try to kill as it writhes its last.
Such is the case with the fading right-wing media and their cohort in the Republican Party, their only hope for continued relevance encapsulated by the fervent wish that the increasingly popular President Obama fail miserably, and take the country down with him. These neocon elite know, even from their musings of history by the dim firelight in Plato’s cave, that a successful Obama spells the end, at least in their lifetimes, of the modern ‘free market’ corporatist-conservative movement blueprinted by Milton Freidman and his acolytes, and set into motion by Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and the two Bush presidencies, culminating in the Dubya-initiated disaster of our current economic crisis, the inevitable historically-repeated result of stealing from the poor to give to the rich.
But the Limbaughs and Becks, Hannitys and O’Reillys are also battling with each other for ratings from a dwindling, aging audience, causing them to engage in a war of words wherein they must out-do one another in issuing paranoia-laden proclamations in a voice of sullen outrage, bray archaic Cold War bombast or, in the case of Glenn Beck, display the tearful, fearful ramblings of a man losing his mind.
Not that any of them actually believe any of the guff they spread daily – they are mental itinerant workers who are well-paid for peddling a continually shifting ideology – when Bush said we are not at war with Islam, he was statesmanlike and diplomatic; when Obama does it, he’s surrendering to our Muslim enemies. When Bush ordered Shock and Awe bombings of Baghdad that killed innocent Iraqi teenagers, that’s understandable – the unfortunate ‘collateral damage’ of war; when Obama orders the three teenage pirates threatening the life of an American citizen shot, he’s killing kids. When Clinton was in office, seemingly his every movement, even firing staff in the White House Travel Office, was worthy of a special prosecutor; when Obama talks about holding those accountable who illegally ordered torture, he’s turning the country into a banana republic. And on it goes, an endless stream of swill offered up by the millionaire shills for the entertainment division of the Fox funhouse mirror of political propaganda, toiling in the fields planted by Edward Bernays, Joseph Goebbels, H.R. Haldeman and unsung laborers in behavioral psychology and mass marketing who devoted their professional lives to convincing the public to buy products they don’t need and adopt political ideas that empty their bank accounts and lower their wages, while tempering their minds to accept ever larger loads of pernicious claptrap that serves the profitable interests of the wealthy moguls who bankroll the whole anti-democratic, anti-Constitutional neoconservative operation.
Every day, in the safe confines of the radio or cable TV studio, these media evangelists of the New World Order wrestle with indomitably evil straw men, unleash torpedos of invective at liberal ghost blips on the radar, launch fusillades of bile at comic book enemies from the Eisenhower era, crucify those they detect as suspicious of Jesus’ divinity or conservative Republican provenance, and, most hilariously, mount fearsome attacks on the mythical Left-Wing Media, the corporate conglomerate parents of which are owned by wealthy capitalists who invest on Wall Street, seek further tax cuts for their upper-income bracket, deregulation for their companies, pay good money to lobby politicians, and, in many cases, own a piece of the outlet that broadcasts the daily doses of outrage and hate to the lower caste of ignorant, addled Proles seeking an easy leftist scapegoat for what has happened to their country in the wake of the misrule of the elite Republican right.
The ‘Who Said It’ Quiz for 2/22/2012
Match the quote with the right name or source. If you’re correct on all of them, give yourself a big pat on the back!
1. “Critics on the right worried that [the president] was a Communist, a socialist or the tool of a … conspiracy. Critics on the left complained his policies didn’t go far enough.”
To which president does the quote refer:
A. Barack Obama
B. Woodrow Wilson
C. Franklin D. Roosevelt
D. Harry S Truman
2. “The idea is that the state doesn’t have rights to limit individuals’ wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire.”
Who said it?
A. Newt Gingrich
B. Rick Santorum
C. Adolf Hitler
D. Benito Mussolini
3. “On religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God’s name on one’s behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both.”
A. John F. Kennedy
B. Barry Goldwater
C. Bill Clinton
D. Barack Obama
4. “The preservation of the family with many children is a matter of biological concept and national feeling. The family with many children must be preserved … because it is a highly valuable, indispensable part of the … nation. Valuable and indispensable not only because it alone guarantees the maintenance of the population in the future but because it is the strongest basis of national morality and national culture … The preservation of this family form is a necessity of national and cultural politics … it considers unborn life as sacrosanct. For the legalization of abortion is at variance with the function of the family, which is to produce children and would lead to the definite destruction of the family with many children.”
A. Ron Paul newsletter in the 1990s
B. Rick Santorum campaign press release in 2011
C. Family Research Council email in 2009
D. A Nazi newspaper in the 1930s
5. “Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties: 1. Those who fear and distrust the people, and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes. 2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them, cherish and consider them as the most honest and safe, although not [always] the most wise depository of the public interests.”
A. John F. Kennedy
B. Thomas Jefferson
C. Franklin D. Roosevelt
D. Dwight D. Eisenhower
6. “The liberal court found Him [Jesus] guilty of false offenses and sentenced Him to death, all because He changed the hearts and minds of men with an army of 12. His death reset the clock of time. Never before and not since has there ever been such a perfect conservative.”
A. Rick Santorum
B. Sarah Palin
C. Rick Perry
D. Herman Cain
7. “Stupid people are ruining America.”
A. Rick Santorum
B. Sarah Palin
C. Rick Perry
D. Herman Cain
Click on ‘Read the rest of this post’ for the answers…
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