Political Theatre category archive

At Asia Times, Pepe Escobar takes a look at what keeps the 101st Fighting Keyboard Brigade turned on. War is for them what guns are for gun nuts: their viagra.

There is, however, a crucial difference. Gun nuts actually shoot guns, often when they shouldn’t.

The Fighting 101st doesn’t actually fight wars; it just likes to watch.

The early 21st century is addicted to war porn, a prime spectator sport consumed by global couch and digital potatoes. War porn took the limelight on the evening of September 11, 2001, when the George W Bush administration launched the “war on terror” – which was interpreted by many of its practitioners as a subtle legitimization of United States state terror against, predominantly, Muslims.

This was also a war OF terror – as in a manifestation of state terror pitting urban high-tech might against basically rural, low-tech cunning. The US did not exercise this monopoly; Beijing practiced it in Xinjiang, its far west, and Russia practiced it in Chechnya.

Like porn, war porn cannot exist without being based on a lie – a crude representation. But unlike porn, war porn is the real thing; unlike crude, cheap snuff movies, people in war porn actually die – in droves.

Read the rest.

The Commander Guy muses on the Republican War on Knowledge. A nugget:

Putting it a little more politely, I believe that opposition to science stems from a populist reaction to the fact that it takes over educated eggheads using hard to understand skills sets to run the Country post 19th century.

Read the rest.

They have their own political party.

Daniel Ruth considers Newt the Gingrinch’s campaign:

Once upon a time and a wife or two ago, Gingrich was a big shot, the second most politically powerful figure in the nation. Now he’s been reduced to the campaign trail equivalent of a strip mall photo booth.

When you stare into a mirror and see St. Thomas Aquinas, Winston Churchill and Mount Rushmore staring back, it’s not easy to accept that the body politic has rejected you.

So Newt Gingrich, the Norma Desmond of the stump, continues to annoy people. He knows the moment he officially ends the campaign his moment in the limelight, no matter how dim and flickering, is over for good.

In one short paragraph, the Booman cuts to the quick:

No one has suggested that Trayvon Martin was doing anything wrong. And he’s dead. Can a black boy be killed with impunity in this country?

The Sanford, Florida, authorities seemed to want the answer to that question to be, “Yes.”

Still improving slowly:

Initial jobless claims fell 5,000 in the week ended March 24 to 359,000, the lowest since April 2008, the Labor Department reported today in Washington. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg News survey called for 350,000 claims. With the report, the government data also contain revisions dating back to 2007.

(snip)

The four-week moving average, a less-volatile measure than the weekly figures, fell to 365,000 last week from 368,500.

The number of people continuing to receive jobless benefits dropped by 41,000 in the week ended March 17 to 3.34 million.

Not to me. I don’t get noticed enough.

But Chauncey Devega got a gem, a literate and articulate attempt to justify bigotry by changing the subject. It’s a good example of how persons paper over hate with smooth-sounding rationales.

Aside:

Be sure also to read Devega’s column in the New York Daily News.

A different perspective:

Via PoliticalProf.

Via Raw Story.

Dick Polman does a quick roundup. One of the items:

Newt Gingrich, who’s destined for more humiliation this weekend in Louisiana, said on TV this morning: “People walk up to me every day and beg me to stay in the race.” They must’ve all appeared in his bathroom mirror while he was shaving.

Follow the link for the rest.

John Cole on a recent racist picture:

It’s really just absolutely killing them (you know who “them” is–ed.) that Obama is black. They’ve all completely lost their minds in incoherent rage, and they are so filled with repressed hostility that every now and then they lose track of the plot and something like this slips out.

Via Balloon Juice.

“Fear still sells.”

At the Chicago Tribune, David Martin documents the Republican candidates attempts to out-right each other. A nugget from the narrative:

Newt Gingrich: If you want conservative, I’m your man. I’m against all those things Santorum’s against plus a few more, including divorce. After all, I’ve already been divorced twice and I think that’s more than enough.

Santorum: Unlike phony conservatives, I am willing to take a tough stand on the issues of the day. That means no sex outside marriage and, even within marriage, no sex unless for the purpose of procreation.

Romney: OK, I’ll go you one better. No sex, period. Top that.

Gingrich: Fine by me. No sex. No immigration. No reproduction of any kind. We’ve got enough Americans already.

Read the rest.

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

Via PoliticalProf.