House of Eratosthenes

…[T]he decline of the antiwar movement can be attributed, in part, to the fact that Democrats have stopped using the peace movement as a platform for anti-Bush sentiment. In other words, at its peak, the ranks of the antiwar movement were swelled by partisans. Once Obama won the presidency, and other issues emerged, the movement shrank when Democrats stopped showing up. The remaining protesters were more likely to be non-partisan or third party, and these non-Democrats were more likely to disapprove of Obama’s management of Iraq and Afghanistan. When Democrats gained power, the movement converged on a core of peace activists who were not strongly identified with the Democratic party.

This is just completely damning, especially if you bought into the notion that voting for Obama was all about a principled opposition to war. This is precisely why we spell “democrat” with a small d, even in our headlines. We don’t respect them, because they don’t respect anything. Every single agenda their party has, is exactly like this — they are fair-weather friends of whatever it is. They’re fiscal hawks until such time as they get elected and don’t need that support anymore, they’re peace doves until they don’t need that, they’re all for making sure every vote is counted provided they’re the kind of votes they happen to like.

They buy votes. I suppose both major parties are guilty of this to some degree, but the democrats have made a constant practice out of it. Here…here’s some money…now, just completely sidestep the whole question of whether my ideas are any good or not, because they’re important to the people I really represent. Just think about the money and the benefits. Can you get along with those. No, you can’t? Then the conversation is over. And you’re to think of me as a wonderful friend because I gave you this money and these benefits, as if I pulled them out of my own billfold…even though you know and I know, that that’s not what I did.

That, too, is but a means to an end. That, also, cannot be reliably envisioned as their ultimate goal. Ninety-nine percent of what they do is in service of something else — and the one percent that’s left, is the something-else. Day and night they work like the dickens to avoid talking about what that is.

We’ll discuss that further, later. It isn’t opposition to war. That question need not be pondered, ever again.

Update: More obfuscation, this time it’s parody. But this is the sort of parody that creates a serious challenge for he who parodies. It’s getting difficult to stay out ahead of this stuff.

Democrats Introduce 12,000-Page Bill to Solve Problems Caused by Previously-Passed 2,500-Page Bill

As objective evaluations of the recently-passed health care law have become available, it’s becoming increasingly clear the law will not lower the costs of health care insurance, some 14 million people will lose their employer coverage, patients will spend tens of billions of dollars on new fees and excise taxes on drugs and medical devices, and 23 million people will remain uninsured.

In response to those concerns, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced she was introducing a 12,000 page bill to help solve the problems created by the previously-passed 2,500 page bill.

“The American people can have faith that these additional 12,000 pages comprehensively address the previous 2,500 pages that were intended to comprehensively address needed changes to our health care system,” said Speaker Pelosi.

This sort of touches on the issue of what’s going on with the post previous, and it also recalls some of my bitching and belly-aching back here.

We are living in a prolonged period within the history of our government, in which problems are routinely being solved through measures nearly identical to what created the problems in the first place.

It’s getting to the point where nobody who’s watching what’s going on, possessing some measure of recollection of recent history, has any reason to think anything is ever going to be any different. Nobody’s expecting a real change of motion. So we all must be expecting consistent results, or else among those who truly expect things to work out differently there must exist a condition of true insanity.

I can’t really blame the democrat party for pretending to support an antiwar movement they never really supported. If this was my constituency, I’d be using a whole fistful of phony gimmicks too. Some of these politicians have been serving for a very long time, and I think this must warp your view of life after awhile wouldn’t it? When your job is to just put on a big show for people who are easily fooled, and then you go back the next day and do it again? And you’re always working the same primal instincts…so unlike the stand-up comedian, you’d never have to change your act.

For some reason, I cannot help but recall a quote I read many years (which is why I do not guarantee its total accuracy today) ago:
“The best argument against democracy is a five minute talk with the average voter.”
- Catmoves | 04/27/2010 @ 11:53
And you’re to think of me as a wonderful friend because I gave you this money and these benefits, as if I pulled them out of my own billfold…even though you know and I know, that that’s not what I did.

‘From a libertarian perspective, your generosity is reflected in what you do with your own money, not in what you do with other people’s money. If I give a lot of money to charity, then I am generous. If you give a smaller fraction of your money to charity, then you are less generous. But if you want to tax me in order to give my money to charity, that does not make you generous.’ — Arnold Kling

Lifted from dyspepsiageneration’s commonplace book. An excellent source of your daily requirement of awesome quotes.
- philmon | 04/27/2010 @ 18:18
Way ahead of you, except that I had no idea there were so many non-Democrats in the antiwar movement to begin with. I suppose that now I see the data, it does make sense that many of them are Green or members of some other group that’s dissatisfied with the Dems because they’re seen as not left-wing enough. (I used to know a guy who left the Democrats for precisely this reason; I told him that for my part, I was disgruntled with the Republicans because *they* were not far enough to the right for my taste.)

When the protests began in earnest in 2002 and dragged on for the next four years or so, I did wonder, “Where the hell were all these people back in the 90’s, when Clinton was bombing a defenseless Balkan country from 30,000 feet and pouring troops into a place they have no business being?” I noted with some interest that all the peaceniks suddenly lost interest once Gulf War I had come to a close. Suddenly, with another Iraq War looming, they were scrambling out of the woodwork.

And in like fashion, they’re quiet again, even though Obama just sent 30,000 troops to Afghanistan and we’re not yet out of Iraq. Hmmm. Feminists standing by Bill Clinton instead of Paula Jones, anyone?

Damn left-wing hypocrites.
- cylarz | 04/28/2010 @ 00:02

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democrats Dump the Antiwar MovementTuesday, April 27th, 2010

democrats Dump the Antiwar Movement
Tuesday, April 27th, 2010