OK, here’s what we’ve got: the Rand Corporation, in conjunction with the saucer people, under the supervision of the reverse vampires, are forcing our parents to go to bed early in a fiendish plot to eliminate the meal of dinner.
We’re through the looking glass here, people…
And that little boy grew up to be Glenn Beck.
Who’s Afraid of Obama the Secret Muslim?
There’s been a bit of consternation today about a Pew Research Center poll that found that 18 per cent of Americans say they have a Muslim for President. Strangely, only 11 per cent thought Obama was a Muslim when Pew last asked the question in 2009 and the proportion who say they don’t know what their President’s religion is has increased from 34 to 43 per cent.
This is the sort of result that might seem gravely troubling for both Barack Obama and the United States; in the case of the former because it could harm his chances of being re-elected, and in the case of the latter because it seems to demonstrate that nearly in one in every five of its citizens believes a moronic conspiracy theory. But though I don’t doubt the numbers, I have my doubts that this result is particularly meaningful.
I’ve included Yes, Prime Minister’s Humphrey Appleby explaining the vagaries of opinion polling to Bernard Woolley above not to suggest Pew has been involved in such shenanigans, but to caution about what we do with the information polls give us. I’m quite fond of polling, but for it to be useful we need to remember how to use the data it gives us, and work out whether it’s important or not.
I suspect this data is not particularly important…
“Key Independents berate “fool” Barnaby Joyce,” AAP, 22 August, 2010
This is hilarious, even though where Bob Katter especially is concerned it’s a severe case of pots, kettles, and accusations of blackness.
(Proof? From the same article:
[Katter] told the ABC the trio got “on very well together, we work very closely together, we have similar backgrounds and we’ve simply agreed that we’ll walk in a room, close the door and not be taken advantage of by all you cunning media people”.
He’d be PM right now if it weren’t for a bunch of meddling kids.)
My primary concern in all this is ensuring that Tony Abbott not become Prime Minister, but handing more power to Rob Oakeshott, Windsor and Katter is a steep price to pay. You don’t need to be Bob Brown to be entirely unimpressed at the vast gap between the National Party’s representation in parliament and their meagre slice of the popular vote, and handing even more power to rural conservatives will only create more ill-advised policies directing disproportionate levels of taxpayer resources to a sliver of the population that neither needs nor deserves it.
Mining magnate and government critic Clive Palmer has questioned the role of Governor-General Quentin Bryce in determining whether Julia Gillard or Tony Abbott is allowed to form a government.
Ms Bryce’s daughter Chloe Bryce is married to ALP powerbroker Bill Shorten, who was instrumental in Ms Gillard toppling Kevin Rudd for the prime ministership.
”We need to make sure that the Governor-General is totally impartial,” Mr Palmer told The Age. ”If the Governor-General finds she can’t be impartial, she should stand down and they should get someone else to fulfil that role.”
“Governor-General must be impartial,” Sydney Morning Herald, 23 August, 2010
After the debacle earlier this year in Tasmania, we are faced once again with a constitutional requirement that the delegate of a foreign monarch resolve an Australian political problem. The idea that the Governor General is a mere figurehead is fanciful; she is the direct intrusion of the British Crown into Australian self-government. Add this to the reasons why the system is broke and must be fixed.
A gross flight of fancy imagining two members of the Danish royal family taking over Australian government. The Danish Royal family is seen positively in Australia because one of its princes married Mary Donaldson, a Tasmanian, and the public reacted with squeals of Someday my prince will come! and Australian princess and WEDDINGS! ROYAL WEDDINGS! which all ignores that monarchies are foul, bankrupt institutions wherever they might be found. There is nothing to celebrate about an Australian getting involved in that business, and as much as we might loathe the representatives and senators we send to Canberra, each and every one is superior to Donaldson, by mere dint of gaining his or her position via democratic election.
I want to make this clear: Monarchies are never legitimate institutions. The British crown, like the Danish crown, is instituted because of centuries of subjugation of people purported to be inferior to the royal family. The British Queen holds her position through the continued perpetration of a moral wrong on people all over the world.
Getting ready to put on the Handling Stuff Like A Grownup Suit.
“Nice” people do not consider themselves so magnificently superior to everyone else that they insist people remain seated in their presence, particular when their only claim to wielding such authority lies in their birth. Anyone receiving such advice should consider themselves honor-bound to defy it.
Jasen Comstock: Why Mehlman is (NOT) important
(via filigree)
Yeah, I said basically the same thing at the USSC blog today. As lastbutnotleast points out, Mehlman could help with fundraising, but this isn’t going to do much more to shift conservative opinion than the last well-connected Republican interested in campaigning for gay rights.
Today, I got a statement for my emergency appendectomy and two-day hospital stay. I now know firsthand that this post is not bullshit.
I have never, ever been more thankful for health insurance. But, honestly, I’m beyond heartbroken thinking about those who are not as fortunate.
Reblogging so non-Americans can see exactly why health care reform was necessary this year. (Americans who are already unconvinced won’t be swayed; it’s hard to be shocked by something your society considers normal.)
Dan McGinty, The Great McGinty (1940)
Apparently this is “the best political movie ever.” I haven’t seen it, but the clips on YouTube look OK. But that speech there? That’s some Scarface shit, freal.
Follow the brilliant career of Jonathan Bradley, noted iconoclast, libertine, and man of letters. When he's not blogging here, he blogs at The United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, Australia. Jonathan is the editor of American Review magazine's daily Blog Book section and a daily editor at the Singles Jukebox.
e-mail: saturdayclubproductions [at] gmail.com
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