One writer actually 'gets' what's happening about the MoveOn ads.

[sinkingfeeling]

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1663424,00.html?cnn=yes


How Dare You By MICHAEL KINSLEY

<snip> Goodness gracious. oh, my paws and whiskers. Some of the meanest, most ornery hombres around are suddenly feeling faint. Notorious tough guys are swooning with the vapors. The biggest beasts in the barnyard are all aflutter over something they read in the New York Times. It's that ad from MoveOn.org — the one that calls General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. forces in Iraq, general betray us. All across the radio spectrum, right-wing shock jocks are themselves shocked. How could anybody say such a thing? It's horrifying. It's outrageous. It's disgraceful. It's just beyond the pale ... It's ... oh, my heavens ... say, is it a bit stuffy in here? ... I think I'm going to ... Could I have a glass of ... oh, dear .

It's all phony, of course. The war's backers are obviously delighted to have this ad from which they can make an issue. They wouldn't trade it for a week in Anbar province (a formerly troubled area of Iraq that is now, thanks to us, an Eden of peace and tranquillity where barely a car bomb disturbs the perfumed silence — or so they say). These days, mock outrage is used by every side of every dispute. It's fair enough to criticize something your opponent said while secretly thanking your lucky stars that he said it. The fuss over this MoveOn.org ad is something else: it is the result of a desperate scavenging for umbrage material. When so many people are clamoring for a chance to swoon that they each have to take a number and when the landscape is so littered with folks lying prostrate and pretending to be dead that it starts to look like the end of a Civil War battle re-enactment, this isn't spontaneous mass outrage. This is choreography.

All this drawing of uncrossable lines and issuing of fatuous fatwas is supposed to be a bad habit of the left. When right-wingers are attacking this habit rather than practicing it, they call it political correctness. The problem with political correctness is that it turns discussions of substance into arguments over etiquette. The last thing that supporters of the war want to talk about at this point is the war. They'd far rather talk about this insult to General Petraeus. It just isn't done in polite society, it seems, to criticize a general in the middle of a war. (Although, when else?) <snip>

Great read! And rather short!

[SteppingRazor]

1. What makes me nearly pass out cold is that Michael Kinsley wrote this. n/t

[redqueen]

3. Eh... he's done good work before...

it's just scattered in between wide swaths of shittiness. ;)

[SteppingRazor]

6. True enough.

I think I just tend to remember the bad and forget the good. But you're right. The man's on the right side of history. He's just annoyingly dismissive and cynical sometimes.

[redqueen]

2. Hah... not polite to criticize them... but A-OK for bushler to fire them

for not toeing the party line?

[PDJane]

4. wonderful read! I love it!

Thanks much for posting this....

[Eric J in MN]

5. Good point about Giuliani.

"Giuliani appears to be suggesting that it is unacceptable for a Senator to express skepticism about anything said by a general in uniform. If he believes that, he does not understand democracy."

[Karenina]

7. The cross-dressing dude thinks he's Churchill!

What else do you need to know? :shrug: