Friday, June 19, 2009

Pete Hoekstra - hero of the revolution

Believe it or not, very few Americans voted for Barak Obama. The 9 million or so difference between the count for McPalin and Obama was the result of election tampering by ACORN. This notion seems to be part of the ever-changing catechism of the Republican faithful because I've been hearing it over and over again and so it's not all that surprising that congressman Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) would feel encouraged to tell us that the internet activity and the massive street protests since the Iranian election was
" similar to what we did in House last year when Republicans were shut down in the House."
He said, referring to last August when the Speaker adjourned the House before an energy vote. Jon Stewart joked last night about the parallels being eerie: "Not parallels, the perpendiculars” but to a party that has tried to compare the governments we've cobbled together in Iraq and Afghanistan to the formation of our own government, the humor will be written off as liberal meanness or deflected by some tale of an unfair joke about the Palins or Joe the Plumber. No, once again they're posing as victims of a corrupt system and a stolen election.

I can imagine the groans of his staff, who quickly told us what Hoekstra would have said if Hoekstra had been as smart as they are:
"The two situations do share the similarity of government leadership attempting to limit debate and deliberation, and the ability of new technologies to bypass their efforts and allow for direct communication. That’s the only point that he was trying to make."
No it wasn't and of course his party had been doing just that for 8 years. The reaction was swift, according to CNN, and one counter-twitter responded with:
"Except the Democrats didn't come after you with clubs and guns, did they?"
No, they did it with the ballot box and will all allowances made for poetic license, the perpendiculars are striking.

4 comments:

  1. Being from Michigan, I cringe any time our crazy elected officials say crazy things. How amazingly disrespectful of him.

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  2. How Republican of him. But you know I really do understand what people who have lost everything are going through. I lost a quarter in a Coke machine back in the 60's.

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  3. For an analogy or an accusation to achieve its rhetorical aim, there has to be at least SOME integrity to it. Some of the charges I've heard from the right at least since last year have sounded almost Dadaist in their contempt for logic or even sanity. At present they're just playing tabloid politics -- whoever says the most ridiculous, insane thing possible about Barack Obama or his policies gets the most attention.

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  4. Lovely comparison particularly since Dada had much to do with WW I and insane nationalism and other things that seem to obtain today -- only this time it seems to be a protest against honesty and sanity.

    Perhaps we should revive it. If I had the software and the ability, I'd love to do a video of John McCain singing his "Bomb Iran" song against a backdrop of people out in the street trying to restore democracy.

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