or Powell's or me• • •
"Mike and Jon, Jon and Mike—I've known them both for years, and, clearly, one of them is very funny. As for the other: truly one of the great hangers-on of our time."—Steve Bodow, head writer, The Daily Show
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"Who can really judge what's funny? If humor is a subjective medium, then can there be something that is really and truly hilarious? Me. This book."—Daniel Handler, author, Adverbs, and personal representative of Lemony Snicket
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"The good news: I thought Our Kampf was consistently hilarious. The bad news: I’m the guy who wrote Monkeybone."—Sam Hamm, screenwriter, Batman, Batman Returns, and Homecoming
August 12, 2014
Hillary Clinton and Ayman al-Zawahiri Compete in Violent Moron Mad Libs
What should you do when you’re a violent, moronic leader, but your “side” starts protesting your moronic violence? It’s easy: just start wondering out loud why your “side” is complaining about your moronic violence, rather than the moronic violence of the other “side.” And if at all possible, blame your “side”’s protests on religious bigotry. It works the same everywhere; each time the violent, moronic leader just has to change a few nouns and adjectives.
For instance, here’s Hillary Clinton using this rhetoric in a recent interview in the Atlantic, as she explains that people protesting against the Israeli attack on Gaza were motivated by anti-Semitism:
When I asked her about the intense international focus on Gaza, she was quick to identify anti-Semitism as an important motivating factor in criticism of Israel. “It is striking … that you have more than 170,000 people dead in Syria. … and yet we do see this enormous international reaction against Israel, and Israel’s right to defend itself, and the way Israel has to defend itself. This reaction is uncalled for and unfair.”She went on, “You can’t ever discount anti-Semitism, especially with what’s going on in Europe today. There are more demonstrations against Israel by an exponential amount than there are against Russia seizing part of Ukraine and shooting down a civilian airliner. So there’s something else at work here than what you see on TV.”
And here’s al Qaeda’s current leader Ayman al-Zawahiri using the exact same rhetoric in 'The Exoneration', his response to criticism of al Qaeda by prominent Islamist Sayyed Imam Al-Sharif, to suggest that Al-Sharif is motivated by bigotry against Muslims:
This is a question that we address to the brothers who use the term "terrorism" to describe what happened in America. I would like an answer to it. This is the question:When the United States fired missiles on the medicine factory in Sudan, destroying it over the heads of the employees and workers who were inside, what do you call this? What America did against the Sudanese factory, does it not constitute terrorism but what those men did against the American buildings is terrorism? Why did they condemn what happened in America but we heard no one condemn what America did to the Sudanese factory?
I see no difference between the two operations except that the money used to build the factory was Muslim money and the workers who died in the factory's rubble were Muslims while the money that was spent on the buildings that those hijackers destroyed was infidel money and the people who died in the explosion were infidels. Was this the difference that made some of our brothers call what happened in America terrorism? They did not condemn what happened in Sudan and do not call it terrorism. What about starving the Libyan people? What about the almost daily starving of the Iraqi people and the attacks on them? What about the sieges and attacks on the Muslim state of Afghanistan? What do you call all this? Is it or is it not terrorism?
There is one difference between these two violent morons, however: one will probably soon control a gigantic nuclear arsenal.
—Jon Schwarz
Posted at August 12, 2014 01:52 PMi tried to think of something insightful or funny, but this is all i've got:
q. how's hillary?
a. compared to what?
ha ha ha ha ha ha *giant explosion and screaming*
Posted by: Jon Schwarz at August 12, 2014 03:47 PMThere is one difference between these two violent morons, however: one will probably soon control a gigantic nuclear arsenal.
Zawahiri? I'm assuming that netroots nation will put a stop to the Clinton coronation.
Posted by: Happy Jack at August 12, 2014 05:33 PMBut we have to elect Hillary! First, she's a woman and we have to have a woman president. Second, she's a Democrat! You must want the Rethugs to win, and then the world will come to an end. It's you purity-obsessed leftists who are trying to ruin everything!
Posted by: Duncan at August 12, 2014 05:55 PMI didn't read the article, Did she mention all the people who protested the Iraq War that she voted for with no evidence that left hundreds of thousands dead?
Posted by: darrelplant at August 12, 2014 06:26 PMMore than the straightforward sexism of the conservative men, lefty Democrat-critical men's flirtations with and in many likely cases nose-dives into woman-hating in our campaigns to point out Clinton's imperialism and corporatism will be an interesting episode in U.S. politics.
Why act as if it's our jobs to point out the liberalism that Duncan refers to, when we can just let women do that? We're not part of their oppressed class. "Look at all those women who want a woman president without actually knowing anything about Clinton's fascism, how stupid are they??" really will be a tempting refrain in a society where women are already stereotyped as vain and uninformed.
Women in the left will probably object to "progressive" men taking it upon themselves to air condescension-bathed attributions women's support for Clinton to their emotional, irrational feminism, at which point these men will go absolutely ham. I doubt Jon will be one of these men but you can never know these things.
And that's not even to speak of the impending popularity of deep thought on "white women".
Posted by: man at August 12, 2014 06:28 PMAnd the winner for earliest accusation of sexism in the Hillary coronation goes to..."man", for his performance in "A Tiny Revolution comment at August 12, 2014 06:28 PM". Congratulations, "man"!
We should note that "man" has also been nominated in the most absurdly knee-jerk accusation of sexism category, but with two more years to go the competition there is sure to be fierce.
Posted by: John Caruso at August 12, 2014 09:16 PMDid she mention all the people who protested the Iraq War that she voted for with no evidence that left hundreds of thousands dead?
Not specifically, but she did mention that "Don't do stupid shit isn't an organizing principle." As she's a principled person, I'm gonna assume this means stupid shit is on the menu for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Posted by: Happy Jack at August 12, 2014 10:04 PMI'm always reminded of the comparison in Manufacturing Consent about worthy and unworthy victims in the US media. Then I think about the fact that US elites the probably don't care about Chomsky and Herman's conclusions in it. I think that's pretty impressive. It's like how they say Native Americans used every part of the buffalo.
Posted by: Lewis at August 12, 2014 10:37 PMJohn Caruso proves my point for me, thanks to John
Another emerging trend John almost demonstrates is/will be the liberal axiom stating that talking about the gendered aspects of various political spheres' reactions to Clinton's hypothetical presidential campaign must mean that one supports Clinton. We better assign a key combination to type out the string "I object to Clinton's politics with the burning passion of a thousand Greenwald tweets, but, " I guess.
Personally what I am the least ready for is the reemergence of "sexism" as a common locus word. I feel we were just starting to see cracks the reductionism of women's social position as merely a question of "how much sexism is going on in the US"/"how sexist are men generally" but the Clinton campaign will doubtlessly catalyze endless mainstream and male progressive media controversy over "is _____ sexist???", further distracting people from what actual feminists are saying (not that anyone is paying attention in the first place)
Posted by: man at August 13, 2014 04:05 AMGood lord, it's going to be a long two years.
(Just a thought, "man": maybe the best way to reduce "the reemergence of 'sexism' as a common locus word" is to avoid deploying it so readily yourself. You did toss in "woman-hating", though, so there's that.)
To keep this somewhat on topic, it's interesting to observe how often and how closely the use of the "sexism" charge mirrors the use of "anti-Semitism" by people like (ironically enough) Hillary Clinton. To point out just one way that applies here: that questioning it in any given instance is prima facie evidence that you're guilty of it yourself.
Is it possible, we can forget this racist, hypocrite a.k.a. HC??? Sorry but can not stand her....
Posted by: rupa at August 14, 2014 02:27 PM"I'm always reminded of the comparison in Manufacturing Consent about worthy and unworthy victims in the US media."
I never read it. Explain?
I finally got a computer that will load the comments here.
" To point out just one way that applies here: that questioning it in any given instance is prima facie evidence that you're guilty of it yourself."
Not actually what HRC was doing, so I can't imagine what you might be referring to.
Posted by: godoggo at August 15, 2014 09:04 PMWell, that last one was odd.
Posted by: godoggo at August 16, 2014 01:37 AM" To point out just one way that applies here: that questioning it in any given instance is prima facie evidence that you're guilty of it yourself."
"Not actually what HRC was doing, so I can't imagine what you might be referring to."
HRC implied that protests against violence in Gaza were motivated by anti-semitism.
But she didn't imply that people were anti-semitic for denying that somebody else was anti-semitic. Who did, I wonder?
Posted by: godoggo at August 17, 2014 08:02 PM
