Two quick quotes for your brain!

[elfs]

Obama is a Marxist Muslim Arab Jesus Black White Terrorist Technocrat Racist Do-Gooder Liberal FDR Stalin Hilter Commie Fascist Gay Womanizing Naive Cynical Insider Noob Boring Radical Unaccomplished Elite Slick Gaffe-Prone Pedophile Pedophile-Seducing Liberation Theology Atheist Etc. & Anti-Etc. with a bunch of scary friends from - wait for it! - the Nineteen Hundred And Sixties.

Panic in the Streets of Wingnuttia

"Wading for a few minutes through the sewage of popular right-wing Web sites reminds me uncannily of the time I've spent having political discussions in certain living rooms and coffee shops in Baghdad."

Wild fantasies presented as obvious truth, patterns seen by those few with the courage and wisdom to see, amused pity for anyone weak-minded enough to be skeptical, logic that turns counter-evidence into evidence and every random piece of information into a worldwide conspiracy. Above all, the seething resentment, the mix of arrogance and impotent rage that burns at the heart of the paranoid style in politics.

George Packer concludes, "It will only get worse if Obama wins."

Call center employees walk off job rather than read McCain campaign script

Apparently, the McCain script delivered to a call center in Indiana, where robo-calls are illegal, was so foul that somewhere between 30 and 40 workers walked off the job and gave up a day's pay rather than read the script

McCain: We Must Stop Coddling Criminals!

Radley Balko brings us a snippet of a McCain speech in which he promises to get 'tough on crime.' We're already too tough on crime; we have too many laws, many for victimless crimes and irrelvancies. 1 out of every 100 Americans is currently behind bars, and your tax dollars go to keep the prison-industrial complex alive and sucking the money out of your pocket.

The Tennessee Republican Party blows a great opportunity.

Steve Bennen bites his thumb at the Tennessee Republican Party, which started off well:

Hate is not a political party, policy statement, agenda or ideology -- it is a pure evil that no place in civil society.

Y'know, if he'd left it at that, it could have been perfect. The TRP would have done what was necessary to distance itself from the skinheads who fantasized about killing minorities and eventually Obama. But then the spokesman added,

Whether it is neo-Nazi skinheads plotting a racist shooting spree targeting Sen. Obama, or West Hollywood liberals hanging Gov. Sarah Palin in effigy and calling it 'art,' or unknown anarchists tossing bricks through the windows of a county Republican headquarters in Murfreesboro, Americans of all political views should be outraged.

And that really lessens the impact, because while the press is concentrating on a conspiracy to commit mass murder, it really reads like the TRP is saying "Look, over here, we've been victimized too!" The press will ignore this as whining and concentrate on, you know, conspiracy to commit mass murder.

I have no doubt that vandalism is a crime and should be prosecuted. Hanging Sarah Palin in effigy on your own property is offensive, and the correct response is outrage and more speech. I don't think the TRP's press release is "breathtaking," as Bennen does; I just think it's an instinctual playing of the equivalency game.

The Guardian Digests Widows of Eastwick

Alexandra hesitantly accepted the opportunity for another Lonely Planet roundup, interspersed with a pointless hex on a bat and endless chat about snoring, cock, incontinence, pussy, cock, death, ass and cock that was totally unconnected to the preoccupations of a male writer in his late-70s.

That'll leave a mark.

Flickr developers on designing for the iPhone

The developers of Flickr bring us a short article outlining what they learned about developing applications for the iPhone, including optimization techniques and CSS hacks.

Really cool CSS footers

Just because I like to keep my hand in the design stuff.

Comments

[solarbird]

I'm wondering whether we'll see "Impeach Obama" bumper-stickers before he even takes office, as we did with President Clinton.

(No lie. Kentucky, December 1992.)

[shunra.livejournal.com]

That hanging-in-effigy of Palin is despicable.

[areitu.livejournal.com]

I liked this comment from the TRP story--

According to teh Editors, 88 represents their IQs and 14 is the age at which they marry their sisters. Posted by: Jennifer on October 28, 2008 at 8:58 AM | PERMALINK (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_10/015400.php#1404996)

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Well, yes it is. It is also, fortunately, legal.

[shunra.livejournal.com]

If it were illegal, I wouldn't feel like I have to point that it's despicable, one could merely rely on the authorities to take care of the matter.

More speech: Palin's candidacy is terrifying. I wish her health, prosperity within the law, and maximal distance from power.

[blaisepascal]

May the Lord bless and keep the tzar...far away from here.

[shunra.livejournal.com]

Or in other words: "may her prosperity and that of my beloved country not compose a zero-sum game".

[theerik.livejournal.com]

On the main hand, I'm delighted to see you reading Steve Benen, who I've appreciated since I discovered him 3 years ago as one of the best bloggers on either side of the fence. In my experience, he very rarely just quotes or links unless he has something significant to say (barring his single daily links-only post), he's excellent about keeping continuing events in reasonable historical context (and linking it), and he generally keeps his partisan rants out of the body of his analysis (though that's slipped a little as the election approaches).

On the other hand, his name is spelled "Benen", not "Bennen". :-)

[fallenpegasus]

I was going to email the iPhone one to you, but I figured you had probably already seen it.

to quote Obi-wan Kenobi

[(Anonymous)]

"The Force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded"

America needs better education, not just to be competitive, but to elevate public discourse.