Archive for the ‘opinion/news’ Category

Ve haf vays of keeping you silent!

Posted: January 19, 2009 by datechguy in opinion/news
Tags: , , ,

We opined a couple of days ago about the hell and censorship and short sheeting of beds that the left suffered under the evil Bush-Hitler-Satan-Sauren et-al last week. You might remember this bit we quoted from the wall street journal:

As far as The Nation is concerned, just about every progressive bookstore, musician, theater troupe and mime is committed to fighting the stranglehold of censorship. Except, well, they don’t actually get censored

There was actually plenty of censorship going on during the Bush years, but not in America. I wrote about it often in the old HiWired blog before we went under. One example:

While the Net Neutrality debate continues in the USA, China shows the world how censorship is actually done:

On Monday authorities blocked the search engines of Sina.com and Sohu.com to try to upgrade their censorship capabilities, website staff said.

We all know how important upgrades are to a system.

She refused to specify what aspects of the search engine had been inspected. But on Tuesday Sina staff said the government was seeking to enhance the censorship capabilities to better preempt “unhealthy” content.

Yup; got to make sure those nasty words like Democracy and freedom are blocked properly…

…Back in the 80’s I had a co-worker whose family had been able to get out of the Soviet Union during the cold war. He had the gift of perspective that some lack.

Well we are still 15 hours away from the start of the Obama era and we are already seeing interesting stuff:

Exhibit A: Rap lyrics suddenly cleaned up can’t say boo to the CIA when it belongs to the one:

This politic bit of self-censorship is another, although I admit, I didn’t expect the agency that plays Snidely Whiplash in so many lefty fantasies to be absolved so soon. Then again, even by the standards of most Obama cultists, will.i.am’s always been unusually devout; if the avatar of Change asks you to suspend your criticism of the government in the interests of Hope, how do you tell him no

Not to worry commenter Scott explains all:

Has it occurred to anyone that will.i.am simply had the common sense to realize that under the circumstances, he needed to tone the song down? Or do people just assume he’s not that smart?

Posted By: Scott | January 19, 2009 at 04:59 PM

Right we all know how the left practiced decorum during the Bush years. Wasn’t there a disruption of a Rick Warren’s Martin Luther King Day Sermon just today?

Exhibit B Controversial items dropped from broadcasts and “speaker malfunctions“:

It turns out, Obama and his transition team didn’t want Robinson in the broadcast. His invocation was specifically referred to as part of the “pre-show” not included in the broadcast, which was again sold to HBO limiting the audience of it from the beginning.

That doesn’t even mention the fact that a large portion of the audience in attendance didn’t even hear the prayer because of a “speaker malfunction.” (From GetReligion.org contributer and Gannett reporter in Washington Mollie Ziegler: Friends who went down to the Lincoln Memorial reported that the microphone cut out just as Robinson began his prayer and only came back on as he said “Amen.”)

After all middle America that was fed pablum from the mainstream press is now paying attention. Can’t have them see his supporters saying the real stuff.

Exhibit C: Comedians can’t find anything funny about Obama:

Dan Gregor, the screenwriter, volunteered for the Obama campaign, working on phone banks with many comedians. “We felt, like, actual ownership of the political process in some way,” he said. “This felt like the right way to cap that off.”

That sounds awfully sincere. “It’s the death of comedy,” Mr. Gregor said. “We’ve entered the era of sincerity. That’s unfortunate because sincerity is pretty bland. But if it makes the world better, I’ll give up sarcasm.”

After all can’t bite the hand that they supported. Self censorship for political reasons. So much for the truth to power theory. After all they are too busy suddenly deciding that we are all Americans now and pledging to do all those good thing that they just couldn’t bring themselves to do with Bush in Office.

Andrew Breitbart answers them bluntly:

Remember this video: It is a instructive relic of the era of celebrity decadence and boutique anti-Republican activism under President Bush. It is a sickening display that they want fast and easy absolution for having comported themselves like ill-behaved children for eight difficult and war-torn years.

Good luck, President Obama. The rest of you can go to hell.

Exhibit D: The real thing officially announced by authorities:

Mason school officials said they are taking a proactive educational approach in advance of next week’s planned Inauguration Day activities.

“Inappropriate comments that may make other students, staff or families feel unwelcome or uncomfortable in school or on the bus will not be tolerated,” Superintendent Kevin Bright said in an e-mail sent to parents Monday, Jan. 12.

After all this is the one, not a conservative president or candidate. Was it only just 4 months ago that my son and I saw a school superintendent standing with students at a Palin appearance in NH as they screamed she was a bad mother because her daughter was unmarried and pregnant?

I suspect we will be seeing a lot of this stuff. And the media will entourage us conservatives to be quiet and go along.

Like Hell!

That’s likely why he lost

Posted: January 19, 2009 by datechguy in opinion/news
Tags: , ,

This post from Glenn Reynolds is a short but telling.:

MCCAIN ON OBAMA APPOINTMENTS: “Many of these appointments he would have made himself.”

One might say that this explains why so many conservatives stayed home. I didn’t.

However if one actually reads the article there is this very important point:

He added, “Obama does not want to be the guy who lost Iraq when it is close to being won.”

That is the thing that may redeem this presidency. It is inevitable that liberals would get power sooner or later as much as it was inevitable that the power of the purse would corrupt conservatives. That’s the nature of the world. The primary reason why I supported McCain was the war. The primary reason why I held a sign at a polling place in the bluest of blue states on Election Day was Sarah Palin as I support her positions considerably more than Sen McCain’s.

If the president elect prosecutes the war to victory then I will consider his presidency a success since that is the president’s primary job. There is always 2012 or 2016 for Mrs. Palin and social and economic issues but the war comes first, survival is trumps. That’s why this stuff was and is smoke. Despite the nonsense we have been hearing this week he has a tough act to follow.

Broken clock Watch Bob Herbert

Posted: January 19, 2009 by datechguy in opinion/news
Tags: ,

I don’t have a lot of use for Bob Herbert but this column on Zimbabwe is required reading:

Most of the world is ignoring the agony of Zimbabwe, a once prosperous and medically advanced nation in southern Africa that is suffering from political and economic turmoil — and the brutality of Mugabe’s long and tyrannical reign.

Zimbabwe mess is even worse since it was done by Zimbabwe’s dictator and his supporters with no opposition from African leaders who might have made a difference. Totally avoidable

It brings to mind this Wondermark Cartoon.

Well Obama will be president tomorrow so it will be ok. Right?

Update: Here is the Comic Proper used with permission and don’t forget to check out Wondermark twice a week available from our permalink:

Liberalism defined!

Liberalism defined!

Let it on the bus

Posted: January 19, 2009 by datechguy in catholic, opinion/news
Tags: , ,

Via Hotair it looks like the bus ads have spread to Italy, not:

The city was targeted because it is home to the head of the Italian Catholic Bishops Conference Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, an outspoken opponent of artificial insemination and gay marriage.

Cardinal Bagnasco was said to be ‘furious’ about the plans and had his assistants write to the bus company and the advertising firm in charge of the £13,000 campaign to express their opposition.

At the last minute the campaign was cancelled. A source said the cardinal was ‘delighted’.

I disagree with this move. Christianity is more than strong enough to compete in the marketplace of ideas. It has hundreds of centuries of experience in delivering its message and it has the added advantage of being true. As always speech should be answered by more speech. If the church with the power of Christ behind it can’t compete with this message then you need different people delivering that message.

As a purely free speech move lets cut to the chase:

The Bus company has a perfect right to accept these ads and take the cash.

The Cardinal has a perfect right to object to these ads loudly.

And the customers of the bus company have the perfect right to give or not give their business to them accordingly.

That’s how it should work. In my mind you can’t argue for Churches in Arabia and argue to repress this speech.