Hey, there! Log in / Register
No automatic weaponry without representation?
Support Universal Hub
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
Comments
If that thin heard of
If that thin heard of dittoheads constitutes a "revolution" than what would you call the Hemp Fest? A D-Day invasion? I dont get these self styled patriots, elections arent good enough for you anymore? It doesnt take a paranoid mind to make the link between these people and that kid who shot the cops in Pittsburg, keep feeding em enough fear and outrage and sooner or later some will start popping off.
First of all...
First of all, it's sad and unworthy of you to be unable or unwilling to bear the thought of an anti-bailout, anti-trillion-dollar-spending tax protest without venting weird partisan paranoid rantings about dittoheads and cop-killers.
Secondly, on your comparison to Hemp Fest - many people who attended Tea Parties do support marijuana legalization, and freedom in general. It sounds like you'd be surprised to know that many firearms-positive libertarian types support drug legalization initiatives as well.
Thirdly, there were thousands of people at these protests across the country:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/04/0233...
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2009/04/st-louis...
http://www.ksat.com/news/19190512/detail.html
http://thewhitedsepulchre.blogspot.com/2009/04/tea...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomholz/3446127312/in...
....etc
Keep the nutjobs away from the cameras
and it won't be a problem. But I'm sure that is probably as hard at these small scale protests for the right as it is for the left to keep the keffiya-wearing nutjobs from dominating any given environmental small-issue protest around here, because the crazies are unemployed and outnumber the people who just want a specific change in both cases.
All the same, this is a pathetic turnout given the media promotion by Faux News and the national, coordinated event nature of the whole thing. Spectacular fail by any objective measure of a "major" protest. Had Faux not been involved, the turnout magnitude would have been more impressive - but this was heavily promoted and these crowd sizes are all you got??? Think about how many people showed up to protest the commonwealth not giving Boston any stimulus for the schools for comparison. You're doin it wrong.
The protests in '03 in NYC and around the world wern't promoted by specific media outlets for hours on end, but they were on a Sunday morning. I think you can see a huge difference between people filling 40 blocks of three major avenues of Manhattan, people clogging the streets of LA and SFO, and this. Three million in Rome. A million in London. Go ahead - spin away. Your numbers aren't impressive.
Location, Location, Location
This is Boston, Massachusetts. You can't expect the same sort of conservative/republican/libertarian/non-liberal turnout as in a city in a red state. The only place you could have reasonably expected an even smaller turnout might have been Berkeley.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Why do you have to excessively personalize / politicize?
Hi SwirlyGrrl,
As always, why do you have to excessively personalize / politicize everything?
For example, your calling Fox news "Faux" news just makes you sound like a teenager.
To your point of media involvement in defining and generating protests:
How does your view of the 4/15 Tea Parties compare to your view of the average ANSWER rally, which are filled with Mao and Che-defending out-and-out communists, 9/11 truthers, and tons of other whack jobs? How does it compare to Cindy Sheehan, who was the subject of unending media coverage by the NYT side of the aisle? She only gathered a handful of protesters with her, was demonstrably a nut, and was vastly outnumbered by mothers of deceased service people on the other side who had a much harder time getting their message out.
A lot of people believe that the tone and obvious bias taken by firms like CNN and NYT in cases like this is partly responsible for the death of their industry, and for the existence of an entity like Fox News, which never could have become the mirror-image of CNN bias if the latter had not been so egregious in the first place.
http://pajamasmedia.com/eddriscoll/2009/04/15/lega...
Well it would be one thing
Well it would be one thing if there was a coherent plausible alternative being presented, all I saw was new paint on the old libertarian nonsense. You hate Obama cause he's a Kenyan Socialist/Fascist/Muslim whatever, great, you think that the rich pay too much taxes, gotcha - so whats your plan to fix things? And by plan I mean something that stands half a chance of working in the current political/economic climate, not some warmed over Ayn Rand. We've got serious problems to tackle, dressing up as a naked Obama baby just speaks to the level of tea party crowd.
Great you had some talk radio fan rallies, so what, I've seen Zombie flashmobs with a bigger turn-out. You lost an election, you dont have to like it but spare me the silent majority, save our country crap, the true majority is wishing Obama well. All I see is a couple dozen pudgy white folks in their Old Navy finest farting around on the common, you can spin it another way but the pics dont lie.
Glad to see it's not just lefties
Apparently it's not just the liberal rallies which are afflicted by the all-causes-go-together disease. We used to grumble that you couldn't have a rally against the Patriot Act without someone in the back trying to round up signatures on a pot-legalization petition. Now it looks like conservatives can't have an anti-tax rally without the automatic-weapons nuts showing up.
(Sure, there are interrelationships between the issues, but if you see the two issues as linked by "First they're coming for our money, then they're coming for our guns," then you're a whacko conspiracy-theorist.)
At least two of the protesters got the joke with the name
Bizzow talked to a couple of them on a Red Line platform at Park Street after the event was over.
They got the joke
They just didn't get the part where the Bailout, as it were, isn't taxation without representation!
In other words ... representatives that we elected are doing these things! they don't seem to understand that they are still represented even when they disagree with what congress decides!
I'm surprised that they don't claim that they have no representation because their rump regional party is in disarray and isn't in power right now ... okay ... what next, a Roman Hruska "mediocre are entitled to representation too" fan club?
Not that I agree with them, but...
...there's an obvious argument that they don't consider the elected representatives to actually be representing their interests.
Tough
If you don't get that you don't get a representative of your personal interests all the time and every time, you don't deserve to vote.
I have been livid over various things our senators have done over the years, and wish that Kennedy had retired long ago. But I don't whine that I don't get a personal perfect senator - I write them a letter, and sometimes it has made them think twice. That's the system our founders fought for - not a concierge for every citizen!
One fundamental problem we have
as a country is that we're so diametrically opposed on so many issues. We can't even agree on whether the Constitution is a good thing. We spend most of our time fighting, some have exploited that conflict, and we have gotten into some perverse compromises. So, it's easy for some large group to believe that they're not actually represented.
There are other fundamental problems, but right now I'm just playing devil's advocate on the question of whether a group can arguably claim not to have representation.
Confusing tyranny with losing
Stewart had a few funny lines about this. The Republicans are confusing tyranny with losing. "See, now you’re in the minority. It’s supposed to taste like a shit taco."
Obama Derangement Syndrome is pretty funny to watch, if intermittently scary.
Not That I Disagree With Your Sentiments...
... but would you have said the same to black people in Selma or Montgomery during the 1960's? To anyone gay, outside of a state sanctioning gay marriage? To women prior to the 19th amendment?
Sometimes people truly are not represented.
I'm not thick enough to believe that we who desire less taxation have NO representation, but is there truly a problem with protesting in an effort to get a bit more?
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Civil Rights and Sore Losers
In all of those situations, people were being deprived of rights they supposedly had or were demanding equal treatment. Women were disenfranchised, and blacks in the South were prevented from voting by various ploys like "literacy tests" using chinese newspapers.
Whining about losing is not the same as demanding one's civil rights. These people were not prevented from voting, they are not prevented from forming parties, they can write as many letters to their representatives as they like and even ask for a meeting, they are not prevented from running for office, and they can move somewhere where their worldview is a majority worldview that their rep shares.You don't get to have a representative for every political party or idea. Not getting your way is not the same as being oppressed.
Then Your Reply To Women, Blacks And/Or Gays...
... who feel that there should be more women, blacks, and/or gays in places of representation would be "No, you're wrong. You get what the majority voted for. Sit down and shut up."
Glad to see we're on the same page on this one, Swirly :-)
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Another Reply
"Yes, you're right. There should be. So go out and organize, network, compromise, and get out the vote, and someday there will be."
Parroting the Puppet here
Sit down and shut up? I wouldn't go that far. As the saying goes: don't agonize, organize! Who you get as your representative is based on who the majority votes for, but that doesn't mean that you are oppressed if you don't like that person - and that you can't cultivate a correspondence with somebody you don't like and have your voice heard.
I've never been one to think that having women and minorities in positions of power necesarily changes anything anyway. Having people in power who work make things better for all people is what changes things. The RNC is headed by a black man now ... but it is still the RNC. This fallacy is also a big reason why I found Therese Murray's "shiny man" rant so very offensive, and ultimately rejected Hillary as the best presidential candidate.
I honestly don't have an issue with people coming out to demonstrate - they have every right to peaceably assemble. I do think the way they were "organized" to appear by using a massive amount of media time, and how they don't agree on why they are out there and some don't even seem to understand some minimally basic things about participatory democracy and tax policy is a fair game as a source of amusement.
We Actually ARE On The Same Page!
I was being facetious before, of course. I didn't know how you felt concerning minority/female representation, so I took a shot in the dark and blew off my foot. My bad for assuming, since we all know what happens when we assume.
Yes, definitely fair game as a source of amusement.
I think I've taken some of the commentary a bit too personally and I shouldn't be that thin-skinned. I know everybody here - well, almost everybody outside of Pierce - likes me.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Yes, That's Another Way Of Putting It
Much nicer than mine, too, I'll admit :-)
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
The problem
The problem is that either:
A) You were represented during 8 years of Bush, or
B) You were not represented during 8 years of Bush
If A, then you had your chance and you fucked it up. Someone else's chance now. It's only been weeks and you're having tantrums already? Get over it.
If B, then where were these protests during the last 8 years, while the national debt was doubled - and all we have to show for it is a bunch of dead people and blown up shit in Iraq and a ruined economy?
The fact that these protests only come out now, targeting Obama for proposing to do the same thing that Bush just did (double the national debt) shows that it's just opportunistic bullshit rather than principled opposition.
At least Obama has a good reason for it - he didn't inherit a booming economy and a surplus, like Bush did, but the worst economic disaster since the Depression. I don't think a repeat of the Depression is in anyone's interests. Preventing one is exactly the kind of thing we have a government for.
It's kind of hilarious you can put on the "black people in Alabama" trope, considering how much of the Obama Derangement Syndrome has racism at its roots. I'm sure there are some cerebral libertarians out there teabagging, but there are probably just as many out there mainly because they hate blacks.
Assumption
"I'm sure there are some cerebral libertarians out there teabagging, but there are probably just as many out there mainly because they hate blacks."
I assume you mean protesters in general at this gathering, not libertarians in particular? And, specifically, not me?
As to the other part of your answer, I was protesting. I did a few of the anti-war things. I was at other anti-tax gatherings. I have always tried to distance myself from "opportunistic bullshit", instead focusing on principled causes. If you are implying otherwise, to me personally, then I am personally insulted. Surely you didn't mean it that way.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
You assume correctly
I did not intend to imply in any fashion that you, Suldog, are racist or participate in opportunistic bullshit. Nor did I intend to paint all libertarians with that broad brush. I apologize if I didn't speak clearly enough and gave that impression. There's a great range of libertarians out there, all the way from misguided or impractical on the one end to Rand-obsessed nutcases on the other, with the same sprinklings of prejudices and atavisms as any other group.
The teabaggers, on the other hand... as you mention, you weren't one of them. I'm sure there's a handful of well-meaning, intelligent, unbiased people there. But I doubt it's more than a handful.
These are largely the dregs of humanity that can be motivated to hatred through an extended media campaign. They're dumb, they're gullible, they're enraged. They're suckers doing Mellon Scaife's dirty work. The fact there are so few should be reassuring to us all.
Thanks
Thought it should be made clear, for both our sakes.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Yes, but
Sure they aren't represented by people who think like them. In fact, they probably didn't even vote for these people. But guess what? That's why there were only a few hundred people out of a city of a million on the Common yesterday! Not enough of them, more of the rest of us. Welcome to Democracy 101.
It's time to pay the piper for the absolute CRAP that they've been supporting for the past decade. If they don't want to be taxed or they don't want their tax money going to bailouts and what-not, then they shouldn't have supported the people who led us into the brick wall at 113 mph in the first place.
Not All Of Us Supported Them
I didn't vote for Bush. I've never voted for a Republican, to the best of my recollection, at any time during the past 25 years. Frankly, most of the people I've voted for have not been elected. That's democracy, and I'm OK with that, but don't tar me and others like me with the same brush you use to tar the republican dickheads who used government for their own personal wealth-gathering.
I'm a Libertarian, and so were many you disparage. Yes, our economic policies would match some of the R agenda, but not all of it, not by any stretch of the imagination.
In other words, your first paragraph I have no problem with. That's the system. Your second paragraph, when taken with the first, is illogical. If we only have a few hundred, then we elected NOBODY, as you so eloquently stated in your first paragraph, so you have no right to blame us for the failures.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
You have a rosier view of
You have a rosier view of libertarians, probably because you have more experience with them.
Your average American's run-in with a libertarian illustrates why, precisely, the word "Paultard" has entered the Internet lexicon.
Paultard
Fascinating. I had never heard the term before. It seems I should have, considering how many hits the term brings up.
Well, as I've said before in fewer words, my biggest reason for becoming uninvolved in libertarian political strategizing, campaigning, fundraising, etc., was my increasing disbelief at their naivete concerning realpolitik. Taken as a whole, I find them tremendously astute when it comes to the nuts-and-bolts of economic theory, as well as having a comprehensive grasp of American history and the documents associated with same, but they are, for the most part, socially retarded. They alienate when there is no need to do so and when alliances could just as easily be forged via a bit of diplomacy.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
'tard
Kind of funny how people who have cognitive deficits that they cannot help get turned into an insult for people who exhibit shaky reasoning and/or signs of mental illness.
teh funny
"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. "
-Kung Fu Monkey
Ayn Rand
Around the age of 21, I read a collection of her essays. Even then, I could spot her making a show of priding herself on meticulous logical argument... punctuated by huge flying leaps of assumption on crucial points.
At the time, I thought she was a vile, hypocritical person. I've since mellowed out and taken a more relativist perspective on it.
I think most people read Atlas Shrugged in high school and are indifferent, or if it takes, then they usually grow out of it when they get to college and are introduced to more ideas.
I think Rand tends to stick with people who are not exposed to other thinkers, who are reacting strongly to a collectivist society (like some 1st or 2nd generation immigrants from certain Asian countries), or who feel that "lesser" people are keeping them down. That third category includes people of above-average and below-average intellect, for very different reasons.
I'll Give You Teh Funny
I'm the only libertarian I know who has never read "Atlas Shrugged." That may explain some things.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Good: Some actual tea throwing in the harbor
I mean, really, this is Boston and all.
However, North End Nudists Unite (and yes, with a name like that, they get the "teabagging" jokes), was not impressed:
Crowd size?
WFXT and HQ ought to get their stories together. 'FXT is reporting this morning that "a few hundred" were on the Common. Cody Willard was reporting "1500 to 2000" yesterday in this video although it is tough to tell due to the camera angle they chose to use.
http://mediamatters.org/countyfair/200904150024
Even if it was 1,000
Even 1,000 people or a cumulative 2,000 is a pathetic turnout given the quantity of airtime that a large network has spent promoting this jumble of "issues" masquerading as a cause.
Think about it.
A couple weeks ago, I happened across a late-lunch-hour protest by Amnesty International in the little plaza in front of Borders. Guy with megaphone, plaza packed with chanting people, didn't last long but it was probably a couple of hundred showing up for a tightly organized and focused event that didn't require network news coverage or network news promotion.
They didn't even have giant puppets or a die in. Doin it wrong!
Any sane people there?
As an early-go-to-bedder, pretty much the only thing I saw about this last night was Jim Armstrong's Fox 22 story (this one-- the video, not the AP text). It was remarkably consistent: everyone shown in the story looked crazy, ignorant, or both. Were there really no reasonable people there?
There were, I know several
There were, I know several people who attended and they were sane and reasonable people.
It's just the nuts scream louder and have the stupid flags.
Effin hilarious
Thanks for posting that. That video is really funny. Is that really Fox News? Is that reporter a ringer or something? You'd think the network that promoted this would try to make the teabaggers look a little better than that. Maybe that was the best he could do with a stunningly ignorant bunch of folks (Yeah, why don't we "lower" taxes back to Reagan-era rates...), but he seemed pretty disgusted really.
An editor at the Metro has a
An editor at the Metro has a sense of humor; their coverage of this event had a little blurb at the page number about Obama's tax plan, and namely the cuts contained therein.
Also, their front page photo featured a sign saying "Public servents, not public rulers".
If only the "Get a Brain Morans" guy had shown up.