Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
Speech Disguised as a Question
Helen Thomas is asking questions. Helen Thomas is asking questions. Helen Thomas is asking questions. She’s not giving a speech. Keep saying it to yourself, maybe it will become true.
Q The President has publicly acknowledged that we went to war under false information, mistaken information. Why does he insist on staying there if we were there falsely, and continue to kill Iraqis?
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, maybe you missed some of his recent speeches and his remarks, but the President said it was the right decision to remove Saddam Hussein and his regime from power —
Q And a right decision to move in and to tell the people, the American people, that it was all a mistake, and stay there?
MR. McCLELLAN: I don’t think he said that. He said that Saddam Hussein was a destabilizing force in a dangerous region of the world —
Q That isn’t true. We had a choke-hold on him.
MR. McCLELLAN: It is true. He was a threat. And the threat has been removed.
Q We had sanctions, we had satellites, we were bombing.
MR. McCLELLAN: Let’s talk about why it’s so important, what we’re working to accomplish in Iraq —
Q I want to know why we’re still there killing people, when we went in by mistake.
MR. McCLELLAN: We are liberating people and freeing people to live in a democracy. And why we’re still there —
Q Do you think we’re spreading democracy when you spy and put out disinformation and do all the things that — secret prisons, and torture?
MR. McCLELLAN: I reject your characterizations wholly. I reject your characterizations wholly. The United States is helping to advance freedom in a dangerous region of the world.
Q — recognize this kind of —
MR. McCLELLAN: For too long we thought we had stability by ignoring freedom in the Middle East. Well, we showed — we saw on September 11th —
Q — 30,000 plus?
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Helen, we can have a debate, or you can let me respond to your questions. I think this is an important subject for the American people to talk about. By advancing freedom and democracy in the Middle East we’re helping to protect our own security. It’s a dangerous region —
Q By killing people in their own country?
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I reject that. We’re liberating and freeing people and we’re targeting the enemy. We’re killing the terrorists and we’re going after the Saddam loyalists.
Q The President said 30,000, more or less.
MR. McCLELLAN: And you know who is responsible for most of that? It’s the terrorists and the Saddam loyalists who want to turn back to the past.
Q We didn’t kill anybody there?
MR. McCLELLAN: Our military goes out of the way to minimize civilian casualties. They target the enemy —
Q You admit they kill?
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, we’ve got a lot of technology that we can use to target the enemy without going after — without collateral damage of civilians. And that’s what our military does.
Q Are you kidding?
MR. McCLELLAN: Oh, I’m going to stand up for our military. Our military goes out of the way to protect civilians. In fact —
Q Fallujah, we didn’t kill any civilians?
MR. McCLELLAN: We freed some 25 million people in Iraq that were living under a brutal regime.
There are millions of people in our country who think Helen Thomas belongs in that press box, doing exactly what she’s doing.
Now read back over that exchange again. Sure, there are things that Helen Thomas said, which are concluded by the question-mark. Can’t everyone agree that, in context, this is nothing more than a ceremonial inkblot? She’s not there to acquire information. She has an opinion. Perhaps she formed it herself. Perhaps she’s communicating it on behalf of someone else. Perhaps she formed it independently, and she was chosen because someone else liked the opinion. Whatever. She’s got an opinion, and her job is to promulgate it by talking over people.
Is anyone really willing to stand up, give their name, and assert “that isn’t true, we had a choke-hold on Saddam Hussein” is a fact and not an opinion?
What does this say about her supporters?
What does it say about them, that they think the job of a reporter is to form an opinion and then beat it into people?
What does it say about their own opinion, that they’re so ready and willing to let Helen Thomas come along and displace it with her own because they think that’s her job?
What does it say about the quality of their judgment?
Why are those people allowed to cast votes that count every bit as much as mine? Yeah, yeah, American values, whatever. That’s rhetoric. These are people who don’t think for themselves. I want to know how it is they can vote, and how in the world we can survive it. But most of all, I want to know how we’re supposed to understand what our government is doing, when a reporter who’s supposed to be asking probing questions of the leaders who run that government — the one most consistently applauded for doing so — isn’t doing it. She’s just being a hostile little bitch.
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