Blogblah!!! » Andrew Sullivan

October 10, 2009

laocoon — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 05:47:00 +0000

For some people, Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize will never be as good as the one Bush deserved after invading Iraq.
There was an incredible amount of commentary on the event in the punditocracy today. Look at Memorandum and be amazed. Josh Marshall gathered up the sleaziest and Andrew Sullivan looked for the most witty.
I Twittered a little bit about it, as you can read on the right hand column of my feed.
I had a personal reaction to news he won the prize: I felt like all of us had won it by turning our backs on the past four years of the neocons. It’s a big reason why I voted for him.
You had to know that his election with his proletarian background and Muslim name would make the world see us as more grown up and less like trigger happy cowboys. People who care about peace worldwide must have breathed a sigh of relief at his election. Think about it. He may not yet have ended the two wars he was handled, but he’s darn less likely to start any elective wars and that must seem like a blessing from Norway’s point of view.

cosmic hand of god

The congnitive dissonence of being a patriotic Republican who thinks America losing the Olympics is a good thing and an American president selected as Nobel Peace Laureate is a bad thing. My country, right or wrong. My country over party. Boom! Heads explode.
Watching little internet snippits of Fox commentators has amused the hell out of me.
But, I couldn’t help but notice that the putative grown ups in the GOP, the elected officials, kept it short and gracious.
And, last week, Bob Dole and Bill Frist endorsed Obamacare.
I think someone is starting to read the right polling.
I think the American people have lost their taste for abortion, gays and guns because they think war, the economy and health care is more important. I don’t think most of us have time to worry about the birthers and racist blather from the fringes.
I’m proud of us and I hope we do more and more to earn the honor, it’s a task that can’t be completed, as it should be.
Blogblah

P.S. I loved this from the Obama State Department. Don’t mess with Hillary.

10.09.09 — 6:37PM

Snarking It Up In Foggy Bottom
A State Department spokesperson, commenting on the Obama’s Nobel:

Certainly from our standpoint, this gives us a sense of momentum — when the United States has accolades tossed its way, rather than shoes.

Rimshot, please.

–David Kurtz

August 4, 2009

laocoon — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 15:18:42 +0000

THIS IS FROM ANDREW SULLIVAN’S BLOG,
TheAtlantic.com:

HP – invent from Tom and Matt on Vimeo.

June 13, 2009

laocoon — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 03:12:13 +0000

Blogblah

On the DOJ’s gay-hostile brief filed in a Defense of Marriage Act case, Andrew Sullivan and his readers/cohorts seem baffled. What was Obama Thinking? Is it a Bush-era holdover brief? Is he playing some game with eliminating “don’t ask, don’t tell”?
I want to suggest an alternative to those I’ve read. When I look at the brief and it’s very nearly absurdist anti-gay arguments, I’m thinking this is one big softball for some court to create a new 14th Amendment gay equality right.
I don’t deny that the arguments are offensive to many gay people, especially in their use of vivid language. However, as legal reasonng, they are a hoot and a knee slapper. Nevertheless, they also state the legislative record behind the statute, IIRC the Senate “debates.” Remember the now-gone GOP senators who voted for the beast?
Not even a conservative court would have an easy time accepting these arguments. At the least, these arguments will be judicially rejected in whatever decision comes from the Courts. In the case, I think this one is headed for the 9th Circuit, the most unpredictably left wing of those appeals courts. These arguments are tailor made to a response of “disparate treatment” under the 5th and 14th Amendments. A refusal of a right of marriage sounds also to me like one of the “badges” of slavery, which would be an interesting argument to make. (Cf. Lawrence, Loving)
Obama wouldn’t be the first president to hide behind the courts, oh so reluctantly as it will turn out.
Blogblah

May 31, 2009 updated at 3 p.m., 5 p.m., midnight

laocoon — Sun, 31 May 2009 15:15:02 +0000

(last update) THIS is very cool. Move your cursor! Thanks to Megan B!

The New York Times reports that a Wichita, KS, abortion doctor was shot and killed while attending his church Sunday morning.

(2d UPDATE) I found some “conservative” reactions to the above at Andrew Sullivan, and they are really shocking in their calloused view of this event, in my opinion.

Not long ago, Republicans were outraged at newly appointed Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano because her agency had released a threat assessment concerning extreme conservatives.

shut up, he explained

However, it seems to me that today’s news reinforces the idea that the right wing in America has gone over the edge. None of this seems to even speak to those survivalists/militia types that skulk around in the great northwest and along the Mexican border (plus, of course, our own local armed crazies along the Arkansas/OK border). The greater radicalization of the already armed extreme right seems rising and that is frightening in its prospects to me. G. Gordon Liddy (don’t even think about getting a link from me) saying on the radio he hoped no important court decisions were made when Justice Sotomayor’s menstrual cycle was near makes me ill with disgust. How can such vile gutterances (intentional made-up word) get into the mainstream of information? How can this be acceptable to decent people of ANY political stripe? God bless us, every one.

A FOLLOW-UP

I reported the comment mentioned in the last post to Politico and it’s been taken off the thread. However, this story appears in today’s online Salon, noting that a Pennsylvania newspaper had to drop and report to the Secret Service a classified ad that appears to invite the assassination of President Obama. You can be sure these right wing fuctards think torture is just fine and dandy. How did they ever become part of the civil discourse of our times? It’s disgusting, frighting, horrible and unacceptable.

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April 3, 2009

laocoon — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 21:47:18 +0000

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s … WHAT THE HELL?

I don’t know where Andrew Sullivan finds these things, but here’s Superman, India style: