It goes without saying that fear is what makes life worth living for people on the right.
In fact, if the right has any kind of practical dictum at all, it's that "we have nothing to enjoy but our wonderful fears. "
This brings us to the fear du jour--fear of radical Islam--the idea, even the conviction, that radical muslims will be taking over the United States and introduce sharia law, make everybody convert to Islam, force everybody pray five times a day, and make "our women" wear burkas whenever they left the house.
The pervasive fear of radical Islam seems to derive from some statements that Osama bin Laden has made about destroying the West and forcing everyone to convert.
There seems to be an operant conditioning principle at work here: Osama speaks, conservatives fear.
Not that it takes the right much to be "afraid, very afraid" anyway.
Glenn Greenwald printed a stunning example of this kind of fear in his Salon blog yesterday. I'll quote at length.
Glenn -- just read your post about how we're all over-reacting to Islamic fundamentalism. How refreshing! I had no idea that our fears were so ill-founded. There I was, all set to actually believe the rhetoric of Al Qaeda and Iran and the countless video tapes of suicide bombers, not to mention the actual language of the Quran. In fact, I'd even begun to believe this poll, which says that quite a few American Muslims think that there is justification or strapping a bomb to yourself and walking into a mall . . . But who needs polls when I have Glenn Greenwald! Thank heavens we have you to balance all this with an argument that can basically be summed up as, "well none of these people who mocked Islam have been killed, so you all need to relax, OK?"
I picture this moment, Glenn, and it brings me a little chuckle. It's you, begging some terrorist for your life, pointing out all the wonderful things you wrote that undermined America's resolve to fight against Islamic terrorism. "Look," you say, pulling articles out of your pockets with shaking hands, "I have served you! Clearly this means that I deserve to be spared!" I won't tell you how it ends, Glenn.
I imagine this scenario brought Greenwald's correspondent more than a little pleasure. This person's imagined "terrorist" sounds more like a dominatrix than anything else as he holds a knife to Greenwald and makes him beg "to be spared" before slitting his throat. This kind of terrorism porn even has a connection to reality because it's fairly close to what happened to Danny Pearl when he was murdered in Pakistan.
When conservatives conjure up the "Coming Muslim Take-Over of America," they essentially envision terrorists holding a knife to the throat of all Americans and making us do their will. For some reason, they find this to be a really fascinating and exciting vision of their future.
But it's essentially a dominatrix-style pornography in which conservatives enjoy the thought of themselves and their fellow Americans being punished by our terrorist doms. We've been such bad boys and girls not to have supported the Bush administration.
Maybe this is why Ann Coulter is so popular on the right.
The next time you see a conservative, ask them if they're part of the "Dominatrix Right."
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I will comment on the topic in another message.
It seems that some folks think I plagerize some of my material here. I do not but now I from time-to-time I will use someone else's words.
I might use my very own words (as I always did) AND, sometimes I really will cut and paste an entire statement with which I agree. Let's just see if you can make out the difference between my stuff and someone else's. I'm not a student anymore you see so plagerism is irrelevant.
So, for the Todd-haters out there (apparently every other person who comments on this BLOG,)Let's test those wits of yours. Is it Todd, or is it someone better than. Happy hunting.
Caric - This meme of Republicans being scared, the whole bedwetting meme, is tired. It is old. It is worn. Even projecting your own BDSM fantasies into the meme cannot make it interesting, or even topical.
Maybe you ought to get to know some Republicans, rather than using that one in your head as the model for all.
But, I guess a PhD frees you from things like facts, and lets you babble in the meta-.
Caric - I just figured it out. You are just trying too hard. Every week, trying to come up with a new name to call people. Weenies. Smearkreig. Dominatrix. Actually, it says more about you that those you level your words at. You are like that kid in high school, begging for attention, trying just a little bit to hard to fit in, and never quite achieving it.
todd mayo - We do not think you plagarize. We just think you have no original thoughts. Copying entire articles into a comments thread is not debate, it is overkill. Learn to link. Have real thoughts.
For better or worse, Republicans keep giving it new life. One of the things that Greenwald is good at is digging up this quotes on this inane "fear of a Muslim takeover" theme. But the quote Greenwald had from his e-mail was too precious to pass up.
Btw I caught an Ann Coulter interview with Dennis Miller today. Miller's a fuck up. He didn't know Coulter's book was out today, didn't know any themes from the book, and just asked her about stuff from Godless.
Coulter must have been pissed. I give her fair credit for being extremely smart and competent. It must have been annoying to see that Miller and his staff were such slackers.
Another thing was her pessimism about the Republicans. She's not completely sure that she's going to vote for one of the "idiot Republicans" and she made the point that they're really in trouble if she's having doubts.
I'm fine with the way Todd does things.
"Dominatrix right." Priceless.
The right does feed on fear much like a vampire feeding on blood.
Putting all this fear, uncertainty and doubt in the minds of Americans. Making exaggerated claims of impending doom and disaster for all Americans if we do not follow the plan RIGHT NOW!!
Using lies and unsubstantiated claims of immediate threat to life and limb. Why? To further enrich huge corporations, specifically, oil companies.
This situation puts reminds me of the Orwellian classic, 1984.
George Orwell describes the society in 1984 thus:
"A Party member...is supposed to live in a continuous frenzy of hatred of foreign enemies and internal traitors, triumph over victories, and self-abasement before the power and wisdom of the Party. The discontents produced by his bare, unsatisfying life are deliberately turned outwards and dissipated by such devices as the Two Minutes Hate, and the speculations which might possibly induce a sceptical or rebellious attitude are killed in advance by his early acquired inner discipline...called, in Newspeak, crimestop. Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought. It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments if they are inimical to Ingsoc, and of being bored or repelled by any train of thought which is capable of leading in a heretical direction. Crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity."
It is amazing that Orwell could have precisely described today's right-wing nightmare world sixty years ago. But the right-wing was not much different when he wrote the book than they are now.
Scary.
Thank you Ric. I may not try might little experiment after all. JD explained what he meant. I don't quite agree but at least I do not stand accused of stealing words from people.
My thanks again.
ric, project much?
That last bit was me. I neglected to put my name on it.
The idea of Orwellian thought crimes being leveled at the Republicans is the absolute most comical idea I have seen today, no small feat given Caric calling the Right Dominatrix. Where are the origins of hate crimes, free speech zones, thought codes, etc. in modern society? One need look no further that the modern LEFT.
To the point of the post, Professor, I think the Right had been searching for something since the Berlin Wall. They so adored the Russians for giving us all something to fear, for enforcing conformity, for giving us an "other." I remember being a college student during that time and being excited and hearing my former heroes on the Right telling us it was all an illusion; they are just really tricky; there are secret military build ups, etc.
The Islamic "threat" is just the same thing. If you listen to the credit a Sean Hannity, a Collins, or even a JD gives these buffoons, you'd think the Umma landing craft were bobbing off the Long Island shoals. The jihadist is "crafting", "cunning", alien, he takes negotiation as weakness, he is implacable, he is subversive, his friends are in the media, he is fighting "the long struggle", he wants to dominate the world, he is monolithic...
It's all the same stuff you heard about the Soviets. We're supposed to think a bunch of morons who couldn't hold onto Afghanistan, who haven't wielded military power on par with the West since the Turks were chased away from Vienna in the 17th century are a threat to us!
I always remember the words of the Osama: poke the giant in the eye and watch him swat the village. They gain so much power from us because people like Pablo, Goldstein, Roger Ailes, that silly little man from Little Green Footballs, David Addington, and Michelle Malkin are terrified of any "other." They now have Al Queda and allies in Afghanistan, the Sudan, Iraq, and Pakistan. Before they controlled part of Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan.
If the Bush administration could receive a "Most Valuable Player" from foreign entities, the only question is who would give the biggest trophy: Iran for making them a regional power or Al Queda for "expanding markets around the World"?
I'll exempt JD from this, because after reading his comments on PW from last night, he's more interested in making gay slurs at folks than conversing about the terrorist hanging on Gray Road in Carmel.
tim - If you are so interested in where I live, just ask. It is no secret. I do live near Gray Road, but not on it, and not in Carmel.
Was 9/11 just some fantasy for you folks?
I picked one of two road I know (I was too lazy to type 116th Street) and I wasn't fishing; I was mocking.
9/11....the reason we went into Afghanistan and defeated a bunch of guys on horseback, whose major contribution to military science was a machine gun welded to a Toyota pick-up?
I remember 9/11. I remember we could have actually killed or captured the folks responsible for it, except the President himself botched Tora Bora.
When you think of 9/11 do you become scared of all Muslims. Pablo's in the pub linking a bunch of Thai separatists and their murder of Buddhist teachers to some sort of global jihad. These half-educated kooks, who have been fighting the Thai govt on and off for decades, are now some arm of a global jihad network!
Say what you will, but most righties are little babies about Islam.
For the party of nuance , you do not seem to utilize it often. There are miles of grey area between ignoring the threat of the jihadis, and cowering under our beds.
You mean, sort of what I was saying above? Go visit Darleen's website, go watch Hannity declare there's madrassah opening in NYC, go watch every Rightie from important ones to Protein Wisdom ones gets apoplectic about the idea of the President of Iran (a country that did not attack on 9/11) visiting Ground Zero to lay a wreath. What's wrong with that? He's Muslim and he's the enemy of the week!
When you can explain why every Rightie in America is as scared of every Muslim as much as they are afraid of Mexican illegal aliens, then you will know which side is evincing a lack of nuance
I do not care what Hannity says. He is not running for office, nor is Darleen.
He is not the enemy of the week. Iran is an enemy period, as long as the mullahs are in charge. Since this particular mouthpiece also happened to participate in the kidnapping and imprisonment of Americans in the embassy, I think he classifies as an enemny. Since they are providing arms to those who fight us, they are an enemny. Since they sponsor terrorism, via the likes of Hezbollah, they are our enemy.
He had every right to speak, and Columbia had every right to invite him. That does not make what they did right, only within their rights. His particular type of crazy should not be given a megaphone on our soil. Why should he be given the opportunity to thumb our noses and be given a PR shot at Ground Zero? Why?
EVERY rightie is not afraid. Just in your head.
If you aren't afraid, why do you feel it necessary to so relentlessly trumpet your conservative credentials? You seem terribly worried that someone will doubt your devotion to the right.
Trust me, we get it. One reply to Ric's posts is sufficient. I'm only doing more this day because I am not very busy.
What conservative credentials am I trumpeting? You need to go back to 5th grade and brush up on your reading comprehension.
What conservative credentials am I trumpeting? You need to go back to 5th grade and brush up on your reading comprehension.
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