Political Theatre category archive

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

. . . damned if you do.

President Barack Obama pulled off a master stroke last week. He deployed U.S. military force in support of an infant democracy that desperately needs our help. The result was a resounding success, a vivid illustration of how the United States can put its unchallenged power to positive ends.

He did it, once again, by sending in the SEALs, the U.S. Navy’s famous special forces. But this time they weren’t double-tapping a terrorist. Instead they seized a mysterious tanker that had skipped out of Libya with a shipment of oil that one of the country’s rogue militias was trying to sell on the open market. . . .

The reaction in Washington: a giant yawn. The reaction in Washington: a giant yawn. Deafening silence from Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who are always quick to demand U.S. military action in situations where it will usually make things worse. Fox News barely noticed.

That’s news inside the Beltway: If John McCain doesn’t mention it, it didn’t happen.

When the Virginia Republican Party’s governing body meets today in Richmond, many members for the first time could hear some unsettling news: Party finances are distressed.

No doubt some plutocrat will step in.

Listen all the way through. It starts slow, but it’s worth it.

Warning: Language.

Lawyers have a job to do. They fight for their clients. Good lawyers fight honestly and comply with their code of ethics.

Politicians have a job to do. It is to govern wisely, but too often they believe that it is to pander basely to the basest of their base.

You can decide whether this was governing or pandering. I vote for the latter.

Aside:

No, I don’t think that Mumia was unfairly prosecuted, nor do I think he is innocent of the crime with which he was convicted. I have noticed that the farther away from the facts and from Philadelphia one gets, the stronger the “Free Mumia” movement.

But to smear an honest lawyer (yes, there are such persons; in fact, I’ve known a few) for acting like an honest lawyer is despicable. And precedented.

Noz thinks Putin might be partly putting on a misdirection play.

At the least, he’s taking advantage of a true “look over there” moment.

NSA employees ask “Zelda.”

Below the fold because it might autoplay.

Read more »

Especially when it is a house made of straw.

. . . in North Carolina.

Aside:

I’m so old that I can remember when North Carolina was considered the leading light of the South.

It was, maybe, three or four years ago.

Via Juanita Jean.

What the Booman said.

Afterthought:

I have long thought that the concept of “performance art” is dumb.

If it is art, it can stand on its own. It does not need to be “performed.” If it needs to be “performed,” it’s not art, it’s chutzpah.

Also, “art installations” are crap. If it needs to be “installed,” it’s not art. It’s a washing machine.

It’s not the students.

It’s not the teachers.

It’s not even the administrators, though a lot of them are grifters who serve no useful purpose.

It’s wishful thinking and a ginormous misdirection play.

Our elite class has decided that they will not consider economic solutions to economic inequity. Instead, they will ask the educational system to solve what are, in large part, economic problems. Educational systems can help improve economic problems on the margins, but if the core problem is economic you need an economic solution. Elites will not consider economic solutions, so educators are given incoherent and unrealistic demands, and all else follows.

James Howard Kuntsler is not optimistic.

SO, NOW we are threatening to start World War III because Russia is trying to control the chaos in a failed state on its border – a state that our own government spooks provoked into failure?

Image via Jaunita Jean.

Shaun Mullen looks across the Delaware River to contemplate New Jersey. He does not find conducive to peaceful contemplation.

He starts with a question:

Say “Iowa” and you think of cornfields. Say “Texas” and you think of the Alamo. Say “Florida” and you think of Disney World. But say “New Jersey” and you think of . . . Oil refineries? Toll roads? The 1932 Lindbergh kidnapping? The Sopranos? And most recently Chris Christie, who has parlayed a career as a crime-busting U.S. attorney into a career as the most corrupt New Jersey governor in recent memory.

Do read the rest.

The father of the gunshine state’s “Stand Your Ground” law is moving into breakfast foods, pushing a bill to prevent schools from punishing kids who nibble their pop-tarts or other food items into the shape of guns.

My two or three long-time readers know that I think schools’ “zero-tolerance” rules are silly and stupid. They have resulted in the punishment of elementary school children for silly, harmless kid stuff that was malicious in neither intent nor result.

Those same readers know that I think “Stand Your Ground” is pernicious and vile. Underneath the high-fallutin’ rationale, it does nothing more than provide legal cover to Judge Lynch.

The Florida legislator is clearly grandstanding to the gun nut portion of his constiutency, but Frank Cerabino thinks some good might come from his effort:

But this might be the rare Florida gun bill that actually won’t create more harm to Floridians.

If this bill encourages school kids to imagine that Pop-Tarts function better as building materials for fake guns, rather than an acceptable breakfast food, it will be doing Florida’s kids a lot of good.

Florida has more than its share of child obesity . . . .