An Open Letter To Steven Crowder About Abortion And Rhetoric

Anti-Abortion Terrorist Scott Roeder

Dear Stevie C

I read your recent post on PatriotUpdate.com that ostensibly dealt with the Gosnell case, and I have to say that I’m a bit perturbed at the rhetoric that you chose when expressing your expectedly ridiculous opinions on abortion. To be brief dude: if want to join a war feel free to sign up for it yourself.

In case you are missing the subtly of that last sentence let me be a bit clearer. Unlike you I have lived in a place that has suffered from an act of domestic terrorism. I grew up in Birmingham Alabama in the 1990’s. It was a period in which some of your friends in Operation Rescue blockaded access to clinics and threatened doctors and patients on a pretty regular basis. This era of violent discontent eventually culminated in Eric Robert Rudolph blowing up a clinic down the street from my house and on the same block as the YMCA where my elementary-school aged friends and I went for aftercare.

I tell you this story Steven out of an entirely hopeless desire to make you recognize that the language that you are employing in trying to score some sweet click bait from your fellow wingnuts is beyond dangerous. For example:

(A)s you peel the layers of obfuscation from the atrocity that is the modern abortion holocaust, you will find a battle between two groups of people with very, very different values. Those people are either Lifeists or Abortionists.

…

Terms like “pro-choice” sound benign. Leftists designed them that way. Who could possibly be against choice?  Whether it’s “reproductive rights” or pizza toppings, “choice” sounds like a really good thing. But for this term to hold any real meaning, one would have to assume first that its adversaries are anti-choice, and that “choice” has anything to do with legitimizing murder.
….

People often think of “Idolatry” as an Old Testament act, requiring one to bow down to a Golden calf or Ram’s head. The people involved with today’s abortion holocaust are still doing it.  They’re idolizing themselves.
….

RIP to all of the babies, who were merely victims of “choice.”

 

For decades now people on the far right wing have been slowly pushing the boundaries of acceptable hate speech with regards to people who choose to exercise their constitutionally protected right to have an abortion. Each generation of pro-life extremists (not satisfied with simply calling these women sluts or murderers) has increased the level of “justified” hatred and violence through literal calls to arm that are virtually indistinguishable from this awful piece of shit that you have published. Ironically while the Randal Terrys and Flip Benhams  inspire the James Kopps and Eric Robert Rudolphs of the world, the latter group of folks never faces jail time themselves, protected by the broad sanctuary of the First Amendment.

But of course I’m not saying anything that you do not already know.

In writing something like this you are consciously entering a level of internet trolling that goes beyond simply being outrageous or attention-seeking. You want to be taken seriously and know that you can do so by inspiring a movement where people are held accountable for making “proper” choices or condemned in a biblical fashion for being “glorified hitmen”. If someone picks up a gun and shoots a doctor or two you’ll say that it was a regrettable loss, but nothing compared to the loss of the babies to the abortion industry. It’s a familiar circle of awfulness, and one that guarantees someone like yourself a considerable degree of street cred in the forced birther sect.

So here’s the deal Steven. If you want to be a big man who dolls out justice against the wicked in order to defend the innocent, step away from the keyboard and join the fight. Google “Army of God” and become the handsome face and articulate persona for those crazy fuckers. Start plotting your Second Amendment remedy to this problem that you are so concerned with. If you think that equating medical procedures and reproductive freedom with the systematic murder of 12 million people is appropriate, than do something concrete to stop it.

Do it for the babies Steven. Grab a gun and make a list.

Or shut the fuck up and mind your own goddamned business.

-Stefan

Joe Walsh, Now Unemployed, Continues To Be An Awful Piece Of Shit

“Goddamn my kids and their need for food and stuff”

One of the joys from the 2012 election included the forced retirement of a some of the more repugnant members of the incredibly horrible House of Representatives. Gone were the likes of Alan West, Todd Akin, and this blog’s favorite son of Illinois, Screamin’ Joe Walsh. However while stripping those fine gentlemen of their political power was a throughly good thing for America, it seems as if there are actually some negative repercussions to sending those assholes out to pasture.

In the case of Joe Walsh, being booted out of office after one term surprisingly did not provoke him into carefully reevaluating his beliefs and approach towards life. No instead Walsh (much like the constituents who elected him), seems to have somehow come to the understanding that he was not ENOUGH of an asshole when speaking to the public:

 

That’s some quality trolling their ‘hoss. Sadly for Walsh however is that Santorum took the last paying job at World Net Daily, leaving the former Congressman without a source of funds to pay his ex-wife the six figures he owes her in Child Support. Yup it seems like the man who frequently accused the President of “bankrupting the country” is having a bit of a cash flow problem:

“Joe’s employment has been terminated through no voluntary act of his own and he is without sufficient income or assets with which to continue to pay his support obligation,” the filing states. “Due to substantial change of circumstances, Joe requests that his child support obligation be terminated based on his present income and circumstances.”

“At one point, the filing asks to amend his payments to be equal to 20 percent of his income — which presumably is 20 percent of zero.”

Now not to get all “law-student-cum-blogger” on you, but (unfortunately) I’ve worked in the field of Child Support Law and I can confidently say that the “I’m broke” defense is usually a failing strategy for the Non-Custodial Parent. Furthermore given Walsh’s well documented history of avoiding paying his kids as well as the court hearings demanding that he pay support, it’s a bit surprising that he isn’t being found in contempt right now. To paraphrase Chris Rock, if Ex-Representative Joe Walsh was Joe Walsh the Ex-Con, his unemployment would be regarded as a voluntary refusal to pay and he would be in jail alongside the other deadbeat dads until he forked over a payment or two.

When I worked in a Child Support office in Tennessee we were frequently told to remind the deadbeat parents with expensive smart phones that their legal and moral obligation to their children held precedence over their data plan. For the sake of Joe Walsh’s kids as well as what is left of his reputation as a public figure after those tweets last week, perhaps it is time for the court to impound his iPhone.

The War On Terror Is A Bipartisan Fuck Up (Oh And I Was Wrong About Drones)

“SAY HELLO TO THE NEW BOSS”

I have not written much over the past few weeks for a variety of reasons. School work has picked up and the news has centered mostly on the various ways in which both parties are seeking to use “teh deficit” to continue decades long tradition of transferring our collective wealth into the hands of the 1%. Furthermore cataloging the various stupid shit that conservative pundits and activists say and pretending that the existence of such insanity will prompt a change within the GOP is also a waste of my time. However something did strike me about the argument here in leftblogistan over the nomination of John Brennan for CIA chief. It’s a familiar sense that the hippies have this one right yet again, and that those of us who fancy ourselves politically astute might want to start and listen to them before it is too late.

It has been almost 10 years exactly since the previous President decided to stake his place in history by engaging in our most pointless war on a series of lies that the media had breathlessly repeated for the previous year. I was a teenager at the time and was frankly amazed at the universal failure of virtually ever major institution that I as a citizen expected to act as a check against the narrative. Sadly despite the rather obvious progression that lead to this complete disaster we as a society seemingly learned little from the experience, as evidenced by the current intransigent nature of our discussion concerning National Security.

Democratic voters responded to the Bush Administrations draconian fervor to destroy the world by falling way to the left of their elected counterparts. While powerhouse politicians like John Kerry, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton allowed their judgement to be swayed entirely by idiotic village thinking concerning the imminent threat of Sadamm Hussein (i.e. they saw what happened to Max Cleland in 2002), voters were uniting around a virulently anti-war ideal. Howard Dean almost became the nominee for President in 2004 and Barack Obama’s entire career was provoked by being one of the few establishment voices against the conflict. Nevertheless here we are in 2013, talking about the legal potential for an American citizen to be killed within this country based on the mere belief that the individual provided material support to the nebulous enemy of terrorism.

Something has gone seriously wrong, and it is unfortunately our (meaning progressives) fault.

In a similar vein to those dull Democrats who actively seek out the “A” rating from the NRA for its political gain, the “Hawk” Democrat has in the last forty years become a standard part of our party. Their existence persists no matter how such beliefs run counter to the overarching philosophy of our voters, partly because of the media’s obsession with authoritarianism, but mainly because of the nature of the defense industry. Liberals like Sherrod Brown or even my own Congressman here in Long Beach know that the Defense Industry is one of the few domestic manufacturing employers left in the country, and Boeing/Lockheed/Northrup/etc have astutely spread out their offices and plants throughout the country regardless of whether the district was blue or red. The result predictably is the creation of a perpetual war machine that (like any other capitalist venture) demands growth in order to survive.

Regarding the drone issue specifically Liberals as a group have engaged in a series of circular arguments concerning the nuances of the policy itself (where the strikes should take place, the legal steps that must occur in order for due process to be fulfilled, etc). Those of us who see the drones as necessary evils of the post 9/11 era look at the Glenn Greenwald’s of the world as at best politically naive or at worst tools of the reflexive right-wing (who as a group obviously love to see a discordant opposing side). I too engaged in the difficult defense of the policy, especially around the time of the election when I saw such debates as counter productive towards the goal of preventing a Romney/Ryan White House from having access to the kill list. However now I see the error of my ways and wish to step back into sanity.

To put it succinctly:  drones are a problem, but they are just a microcosm of the immense insanity that we have cultivated over the past generations.

Fortuitously while the conformation hearings for Brennan were going on I happened to be watching a few documentaries on the news media and their coverage of the War in Iraq (as well as a few on the War on Terror in a general). These works mainly consisted of interviews that I had either seen before or I had seen their subjects speak at other points after 9/11, but the context in which I saw them now allowed me to recognize my own faulty conception of the world that we live in now. Back in 2006 or 2007 I would have seen someone like John Brennan, Robert Gates, or Richard Armitage as lackeys of the Bush Administration and consciously dismissed virtually everything that they said as being consistent with the dominant culture of employing lies for the greater good of inflicting malice on the rest of the world. Now that those same people (or their analogous counterparts) are working with my guy or appear on the liberal MSNBC, I take them seriously and at least accept their justifications as being based on actual facts.

This phenomenon is a serious issue for liberals, and it needs to be corrected before it is too late.

Make no mistake, John Brennan is a terrible person and his policies and worldview are despicable no matter what Obama says about him. Brennan is yet another member of the extensive club of sociopaths in suits that have plagued Washington since the Cold War began (think Robert McNamara, Kissinger, and other killers who perfected the efficiency and corporatization of our foreign policy). Virtually every military or foreign policy decision that we as a country have made since World War II has been shaped by a culture of armchair warrior fanatics, whether it is Rumsefld and Cheney on the right or Diane Feinstein and Joe Lieberman on the left. Despite the fact that doves have been correct in their predictions concerning every single military intervention that the US has undertook, they remain a mocked minority throughout the political establishment.

As liberals we have a duty (especially since the other side obviously isn’t big on the whole self-reflection thing) to examine our own responsibility for the perpetuation of this incredibly awful set of policies. Let’s use the same jaundiced eye towards our own guy concerning war that we gave Bush (a task that should be rather easy given the repeating cast of characters). When we are being told that extra-judicial killings are being performed with the highest respect for the law, imagine that the person telling us that just happens to be Liz Cheney. The “imminent” threat of terrorism existed on 9/10/2001 and disappeared as of 9/13 of that same year- yet for some reason we keep on killing people.

Beyond the fact that this policy is counterproductive (and more than likely based on the same pile of lies and fear that we dismissed when it was presented in Bush wrapping paper) is that there is diminishing political value of such wariness. In the past thirty years only a handful of elections have been decided due to what was happening on the foreign policy front, but for some reason Democrats still feel reluctant to embrace the sensical idealism of supporting international human rights and peace as electable values. The Republicans will probably recognize the shift in a few years, as the Lindsey Grahams and John McCain’s of the world are pushed aside for the traditional Rand Paul styled isolationism (foreigners, in the GOP lizard brain, are to be either bombed or ignored dependning on the direction of the breeze that day). Furthermore it makes little sense to constantly defend the bloated defense budget while “compromising” on necessary entitlements that traditional Democratic voters actually like.

The truth of the matter is one that we as a society will always refuse to admit. The nature of the enemy in this never ending War on Terror is that it is impossible to destroy it. Terrorism is a chronic condition within a free and democratic society, and the best that we can hope to avoid it is to either do our best to address its systemic causes (i.e. stop supporting the assholes in the House of Saud and the Likud Party) and to punish those responsible in the same manner that we would any other crime (actual judicial due process versus the facilitating martyrdom of the extremists). However Americans do not like to confront their own mortality, and for some reason are convinced that they will die a preventable violent death rather than the much more likely preventable “natural” death related to their increasing poverty. As a result both sides of the political divide will continue to patronize to their base that they know the best way to kill our way into safety, regardless of the actual facts of the matter.

Larry Kramer’s Opinion On Ed Koch Is The Only One That Matters

You know why I love the gay rights movement? They don’t forget and they never forgive:

“What is this evil man up to as he approaches his death? Is he trying to make up to us? National Medals of Freedom from the White House! Would these provide a big enough enema to clean out his rotten insides? We must never forget that this man was an active participant in helping us to die, in murdering us. Call it what you will, that is what Edward Koch was, a murderer of his very own people. There is no way to avoid knowing that now. The facts have long since been there staring us in the face. If we don’t see them, then we are as complicit as he.”

Larry Kramer

Needless to say the Times failing to mention the role that Koch (a notorious closet case) played in prolonging the public health crisis in New York City was pretty goddamn disgusting. Luckily the activists from that time are masters in using their influence to force people into doing the right thing.

“Never Again” as a concept only works when you are relentless in pursuing your ideological enemies to the grave. Shame is a powerful tool (and sometimes the only one available for some people) when dealing with monsters.

“Conservative Ideology” Is Nothing But A Fancy Term For Sadism

Tennessee State Senator Stacey Campfield wants to make being gay the functional equivalent to having lice for children in public schools

I’ve mentioned few times before my favorite recent Chris Rock observation concerning modern politics, but it bears repeating once again:

“Kids always act up the most before they go to sleep. And when I see the Tea Party and all this stuff, it actually feels like racism’s almost over. Because this is the last—this is the act up before the sleep. They’re going crazy. They’re insane. You want to get rid of them—and the next thing you know, they’re fucking knocked out. And that’s what’s going on in the country right now.”

I look to that passage frequently as a way of taking solace in the news, especially when (to paraphrase Charlie Pierce), the Methlabs of Democracy known as our state governments begin to cook up their newest batch of blue crystal crazy. Despite how it might appear at times on this blog, I do try my best to keep the big picture and more or less ignore the more blatant acts of trolling that dark red legislatures puke up from time to time. However this one out of my old home of Tennessee piqued my interest:

Tennessee’s so-called ‘Don’t Say Gay‘ bill died with theadjournment of the state assembly last year. But now the measure is back — with new, harsher requirements.

The bill, SB 234, still bars Tennessee teachers from discussing any facet of “non-heterosexual” sexuality with children in grades K-8. But the newest iterationalso includes a provision requiring teachers or counselors to inform the parents of some students who identify themselves as LGBT.

The exact political viability of measures like this is irrelevant. This law could pass, or it could again be effectively lobbied out of existence due to the attention it is receiving from the internet, but it would be a mistake to view this as a serious attempt by the bills author to change the law or even to strengthen his own base of support. This law and it’s equally insane headline-grabbing counterparts in other states are a not-so-subtle threats to the progressive community in this country. We should start to conceptualize these “ideas” not as acts of trolling, but as serious acts of violence.

The “we’re under siege” mentality of the white Christian conservative is, and always has been, the most dangerous and uncontrollable force in American politics. Whenever the unbridled rage of the white working class and poor receives direct encouragement from established conservative power centers (like the church or big business), the rest of us who do not see this democracy as a mere pretext for continuing White Christian supremacy face real tangible violence. Today’s daily assault of insanity from the Red States are no different.

Sadly too many of us, particularly moderates who falsely believe that these people can be reasoned with (or that the insanity is a bipartisan phenomenon) simply do not understand the reactionary mind. This is an area in which I have some personal experience, having done two tours of duty living in the deep south as a liberal. The self-identified christian conservative of today does not intend to negotiate with people they see as having achieved power in an illegitimate manner or even as innately sub-human. They intend to accumulate as much influence as they possibly can, and utilize that authority in order to exact revenge on those they perceive to be a threat to their way of life.

The sadistic methods of using the law as a punitive device against minority groups has become a trend in recent years as the Bush era of confident conservatism gave way to it’s current iteration of extraordinary paranoia. Whether it’s using policy to place children who are perceived to be gay in Tennessee at risk of serious injury at the hands of their family or the ritualistic humiliation of people receiving state aid during this time of economic hardship, the “ideas” of Conservatives have continually been centered around a concerted effort to effectively extort non-crazy people into taking the “middle ground” of just eliminating the facilities and resources that are supposed to serve the public. Policymakers in these communities do not care how much people suffer as a result of these laws and regulations, because inflicting harm is the entire point of what they are doing.

However this is not just about policy.

Despite whatever idiotic and ahistorical thesis that Ben Shapiro tries to justify with his usual word vomit of angry prose, the fact of the matter is that the right wing in the country has and will continue to be the home to hardcore domestic terrorists and their allies. The strength and number of hate groups always correlates with times when conservatives are out of power, and the current hysterical pro-gun rhetoric from the NRA has long abandoned any pretense of defending any other position than outright violent sedition against political movements with which they disagree. These are not folks to be reasoned with, and left of center politicians have a real threat of violence over their heads that their counterparts are more then conscious of when negotiating policy measures (the Tea Party summer of 2009 with people showing up to public forums with assault rifles being a prime example of this).

We could easily dismiss whatever novel and creative way to make life miserable for people that they despise as simply stupid, or remember that they are effectively becoming less and less democratically influential after each election. However this attitude of passive ignorance to the problem that these people pose is at least premature, and at worst is an act of appeasement. The Bill O’Reilly’s of the world know that their time of unchallenged influence is going to end soon, and instead of accepting that fact (or evolving) they have instead chosen to burn down this experiment in self-government. They have facilitated their own apocalypse, and they fully intend to carry it out with the most collateral damage possible.

These are not trolls, idiots, flat-earters, or any other derisive analogy that you have heard (or that I have undoubtedly repeated). These folks in elected and appointed positions of power throughout Red State America are fanatics, pure and simple. We should regard them with disdain and seek (as Paul Ryan warned his own supporters) to delegitimize them at every point. They, through legislation and administrative policy, have signaled that they intend to target anyone who opposes them with a level of violence that should be unacceptable in any society, much less one that supposedly prides itself on representing the truest form of democracy and respect for human rights. It is time to speed up the end of their influence through exposing the depravity of their ideals.