An important characteristic of a mature adult is the ability to take constructive criticism from others and turn it into a vehicle for self-betterment. Another sign of maturity is the ability to admit when one is wrong or has made mistakes, and the willingness to rectify them.
These are universally admired characteristics which speak to a common decency in those who possess them. To lack these features in one’s personality constitutes a glaring deficiency that will no doubt be unpleasantly noticeable to those who must interact with that person. Americans can be a forgiving bunch, willing to overlook minor or mild transgressions if only the perpetrator will make the necessary ritual mea culpa and look sincere while he allocutes. In some cases he may even be praised for his humility in the face of the giant mess of his own creation. After all, “Everyone makes mistakes.”
The fallibility of humans is a fundamental and unavoidable fixture of the species. Everyone is aware of this gloomy reality which is actually the very foundation of most religions, including Christianity. But in the United States, the public is completely unwilling to apply this simple idea to itself, or more specifically, the government for which the public is largely responsible. In other words, individual Americans are expected to apologize when they do harm to another or admit to being an ass on occasion. But Americans believe that Americans are virtually beyond reproach as a collectivity. I am thinking in particular of the reaction in the U.S. to Barack Obama’s overseas speeches last year in which he said America had been “arrogant” and “dismissive” of its allies in international affairs—surely an understatement of the first order. Controversy shortly ensued. World Net Daily declared, “Obama apologizes for America.” Mitt Romney decried Obama’s “Apology Tour.” RedState.com returned the critique, saying it was Obama who had been arrogant and dismissive. Of course, the president did not actually apologize for anything, but in this age of America fetishism and feigned outrage by armchair patriots, Obama’s comments constituted an affront to all red-blooded, flag-waving Americans.
How is it that a nation can laud the willingness of individuals to admit wrongdoing, while at the same time hopelessly lack the ability to admit to its flaws as a collective entity (as embodied by the government of the United States in its relations with others)? I have tried my damnedest to reconcile these realities but I find myself wholly incapable of performing the necessary mental contortions for this task. Most Americans do not suffer from personality disorders, but solicit an American’s opinion on the Motherland and you are likely to observe a slew of symptoms associated with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (IV), the criteria for NPD are fulfilled when a person exhibits five or more of the following symptoms:
1. has a grandiose sense of self-importance
“American is the beacon of freedom for the world.”
2. is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
“America is the greatest country on earth.”
3. believes that he or she is “special” and can only be understood by, or should associate with, people (or institutions) who are also “special” or of high status.
“America is an exceptional nation.”
4. requires excessive admiration
“Love it or leave it!”
5. has a sense of entitlement
“God bless America.”
6. is interpersonally exploitative
“Europe owes us because we bailed them out in World War II.”
7. lacks empathy
“Fucking illegals! Fucking welfare bums!”
8. is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her
“People immigrate to America because we are the land of the free.”
9. shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
See all of the above
As you can see, the United States public suffers from severe NPD. Who among us would entertain the company of someone who possessed even just a few of the above characteristics, let alone all nine? Yet collectively, the American people are a giant asshole. Yes we are. Take it away, Lewis:
Awesome news out of Ohio. The regionally-famous “Touchdown Jesus” statue off I-75 was struck by lighting and got its shit ruined. Let’s see the Jesus freaks try to explain away this one.
“Israel has the right to defend itself against rock-throwing Palestinian punks using any means necessary.” - Some douchebag American pundit.
The American response to Israel’s deadly commando raid on the “freedom flotilla” in international waters has been predictably uniform. Words of approbation can be found everywhere from the business press, to Fox News and MSNBC, to Congress, and to the American public in general. Although none of this is surprising, the blind allegiance that many Americans pledge to Israel never ceases to amaze me. No government—including America’s own—receives as many apologias as Israel’s from Americans.
Of course, the United States has a pretty effective propaganda system for precluding and stifling substantive debate on critical issues. Foreign policy debates generally focus on whether a policy is “worth it” from a cost-benefit perspective. Questions regarding the rightness of the policy are rendered unnecessary by the media’s unsaid assumption that whatever we do is right from a moral standpoint. News broadcasts and opinion pieces reflect this practice. During the run up to the Iraq war, Americans who were not so enthusiastic about waging an unjust and foolish war were the targets of derisive attacks in the media. The Neoconservative bastion Fox News set the tone for the war coverage, with its partisan pundits launching into fascistic tirades against the anti-war Left, calling them “un-American” and “traitors.” Bill O’Reilly declared that while he respected the people’s right to free speech, once the war started he expected everyone “to shut up” and fall in line. On O’Reilly’s own network, token liberal Alan Colmes did just that.
A similar scene plays out with respect to Israeli actions in the international arena, but the spectrum of debate is even narrower than discussions on U.S. foreign policy. Last week’s flotilla raid provides an instructive example. The flotilla was carrying humanitarian aid with the stated objective of defying the Israeli-Egyptian naval blockade of Gaza. As most Americans do not know, the blockade has been condemned throughout the world, by the United Nations, by human rights groups, by the European Union, and scores of others for contributing to a humanitarian crisis in which nearly three-quarters of Gazans live on less than $1 a day. As the Jewish international jurist Richard Goldstone said in the famed Goldstone Report on Israel’s 2008-2009 siege on Gaza,
“Israeli acts that deprive Palestinians in the Gaza Strip of their means of subsistence, employment, housing and water, that deny their freedom of movement and their right to leave and enter their own country, that limit their rights to access a court of law and an effective remedy, could lead a competent court to find that the crime of persecution, a crime against humanity, has been committed.”
Goldstone’s report was overwhelming condemned by the U.S. Congress, owing to our elected officials’ compulsive need to support Israel always no matter what.
Take Senator Scott Brown (R – Massachusetts). This guy’s been in Washington for just a few months and already he’s got the standard position on Israel down pat. Here are some selected remarks from Brown’s speech to dinner sponsored by the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as quoted by the Boston Globe:
“I don’t need polling or political strategists to help define a nuanced stance on Israel,” Brown said, according to a copy of his prepared remarks. “We are engaged in a worldwide struggle against radical, violent jihad. It is the defining issue of our time. Our best friends and the strongest allies in this fight are in the State of Israel.”
“Let’s remember—Israel is our ally. Israel is a democracy,” Brown added. “Hamas is a terrorist group with clear and genuine intentions of destroying Israel’s way of life.”
[…]
“[T]he story of Israel made a distinct impression on me at a young age.”
[…]
“Their ability to maintain their identity and culture against enormous obstacles mirrors America’s own struggle for independence.”
[…]
“Now I know I am still the new guy on the block, with a little more than 100 days in the Senate under my belt, but I have placed U.S.—Israeli security as one of the most significant and highest priorities on my agenda.
[…]
“A safe, secure Israel, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the United States and its allies is essential to the continued liberty of our nations,” Brown said. “Our fates have never been more intertwined. May God continue to bless Israel and the United States of America.”
What a pandering jackoff. Israeli security is one of your highest priorities, Senator Brown? Great. That’s what we need. Another U.S. Senator who puts Israel ahead of America. I think Joe Lieberman is doing enough of that for the other 99 Senators combined, so you don’t have to worry too much about it.
Brown also stated that the U.S. should commit itself to “unwavering support” of Israel. Vice President Joe Biden made similar comments when he visited Israel a couple of months ago, despite the fact that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu totally showed him up when the government announced the construction of 1,600 settlement units in disputed East Jerusalem while he was there.
Excuse me, but what the fuck? Why should the U.S. promise any country its unwavering support? The truth is “unwavering support” is code for “Do whatever you want.” That’s what “unwavering support” means, and this is why the U.S. can never act as a serious impartial arbiter of the Israel-Palestine conflict: because the referee has big money one on of the teams. Sure, presidents going back decades have said all kinds of wonderful things about the Palestinian right to self-determination, but they don’t mean it because they give Israel the nudge-nudge, wink-wink treatment: “What’s that? You’re adding even more illegal settlements? Well, we don’t like it, but here’s more military aid anyway. And we will definitely not let the U.N. Security Council pass any resolutions condemning you.” The whole thing is a charade and a farce.
The American media is happy to adopt the framework established by the American and Israel governments, which translates into blind support for Israel among the general population. What was the framework of debate in the press after the Israeli raid on the humanitarian convoy? Was there discussion about the legality of Israel’s attack on unarmed vessels in international waters? No. Was there discussion about the legality and human consequences of Israel’s blockade of Gaza? No. Was there discussion about how Gaza is a de facto Bantustan where poverty and malnourishment are rampant? No.
The central question that concerned the American media was whether or not the activists on the ship on which nine people were killed attacked the Israeli soldiers or not. Thankfully, the Israeli government released its own edited footage of the raid that appeared to show some of the activists resisting the commandos who were dropping in on their ship from helicopters in international waters. Footage shot by journalists and activists aboard the ships was confiscated by Israel and therefore unavailable for media review, but this did not prevent the predictable conclusions from being drawn. Perhaps if Somali pirates shot footage of their hijackings in the Indian Ocean, we would see similar scenes in which crews attempt to fend off the unwelcome intruders.
Interestingly, this all comes in the run up to the 43rd anniversary of Israeli attack on the USS Liberty. During the Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors, on June 8th 1967 a U.S. intelligence gathering ship was the target of an Israeli onslaught for about 90 minutes in broad daylight with the American flag flying high in international waters. Furthermore, the Israelis flew at least eight reconnaissance flights overhead and never once asked the ship to identify itself over radio before the attack. Thirty-four people were killed, with 171 wounded. Crewmen on the Liberty maintain to this day that the attack was deliberate due to the nature of the attack. Former CIA officer Ray McGovern agrees, suggesting the attack was carried out to prevent the Liberty from intercepting Israel communications revealing that it wanted to seize the Golan Heights from Syria, which it did the next day. If the information were obtained and reported back to Washington, the Johnson administration likely would have attempted to put the kibosh on the plan.
Or what about Israel spying on the U.S.? Spying on a friend is no way to treat an “unwavering” ally. Several times the Israel government and even AIPAC have been caught actively engaged in espionage activities against America:
I’m so glad Scott Brown and the rest of the U.S. Congress—both Republicans and Democrats—regard Israel as a staunch ally. At least one of the sides in this “special relationship” thinks so.
I will leave you with this exchange from MSNBC between host (and disgraced former New York governor) Eltiot Spitzer and journalist Glenn Greenwald. While I think the word 'destroy' is used far too often to describe such debates, Greenwald totally wrecks Spitzer's shit. Good stuff. Too bad Greenwald will never be invited back to talk about this subject.
Perhaps the biggest unanswered question of all was how Hurley stayed so goddamn fat on a deserted island.
Five years ago, I decided to take a chance. I was in a monogamous relationship that I had no interest in ending, but felt like I needed something more. I had my eyes on a few things, but I decided not to jump the gun too quick. I really wanted to find something perfect. A form of entertainment that would take me to the edge and back for an hour or so at least once a week.
Don’t get me wrong, Iloved24. Still do to this day. I just wanted another show to watch on a Tuesday or Wednesday. What? What did you think I was talking about? Chicks? Pfffffff.
I never thought anything else on television could come close to toppling24as Greatest Show Ever, until I took that chance. In the middle of it’s second season, I jumped headfirst into what will be remembered as the single most captivating and confusing television program in history. I’m talking aboutLOST.
I remember the first episode I ever watched. It was a pointless, bore that I watched in my friend’s bedroom while everyone else drank and watched the Sox game in the living room. The one when Rose and Bernard, the show’s first (yes, there would be more!) interracial couple meet and fall in love and Rose gets cancer. The two never really mattered in the true plot and direction of the show, but somehow managed to become every hardcoreLOSTfan’s Favorites They Never Remember. The ones that other people randomly bring up and your first reactions is, “Oh yeah, I like them too.” But you’d never open up a dialogue about the show with them. It wasn’t a very good introduction to the show, but somehow enticed me to keep tuning in every week.
It was mostly the composition of the show that intrigued me. It took me a couple weeks to realize that every episode is centered around a particular character on The Island. (I think anyone writing about this show should capitalize The Island because it’s just as much of a character as anyone). It would show flashbacks of that character’s past that ultimately led to their presence on Oceanic Flight 815 from Sydney, Australia to LAX in Los Angeles. A flight that crash-landed on a strange island. Island, sorry.
Now this sounds like your run-of-the-mill Survivor bullshit, but this is no Survivor island. Rose’s cancer? Gone. Quadriplegic John Locke? Wakes up on the beach wiggling his toes. There is strange monster-like activity in the jungle. There are polar bears in the jungle! There are aboriginal people dubbed “The Others” (See! That one’s always capitalized!) The writers continued to introduce new characters and work them into the rotation of flashback or flash-forward episodes. We got to see the pasts and futures of heroes and villains alike and see them succeed or fail and die and interact with each other in ways other television shows simply could not do.LOSTbrought character development to the forefront and kept their audiences guessing with the secrets of The Island.
Why does The Island heal people, but allow pregnant women to die? What is the deal with the Dharma Initiative? Week after week, it felt like more questions arose with no answers on the horizon. But it worked. Every week, I couldn’t wait to watch the next episode. When the season finale ended, I cursed the fact that I had to wait 6 or 7 more months before I got another new one. We wanted the information! What the fuck is going on?!? Who the hell was that guy? DAMMIT!! All us viewers wanted were answers. We just never realized that the answers would mean the end of the show.
This past final season cemented the show as the greatest live-action drama ever. The mythology of The Island was revealed through flashbacks from what could possibly be centuries ago. A present-day battle of good and evil erupted on The Island between our remaining surviving castaways and the evil presence on The Island. All the while, we had what was universally called “flash-sideways.” We saw all our catalysts back in Los Angeles where they belonged, carrying out their previously-assumed lives, as if the crash never happened. Or so it seemed at first.
What we were seeing was the culmination of six years of devotion not only by me, but millions of fans. The writers had the monumental difficult task of tying a bow on the most polarizing and mystifying show in history, and they did it masterfully. I’ve seen lots of other reactions claiming that the finale sucked, that it made the last six years a waste, and left too many questions unanswered. My response to that? Go Fuck Yourself. The ending was perfect. Yes it was corny, and predictable (the whole Man In White vs. Man In Black was a dead giveaway), but that’s what you wanted! You wanted to figure some shit out! You did, it was Good vs. Evil and the sideways flashes were of a Purgatory and they all go to Heaven and it had religious connotations. Are you pissed because they didn’t explain the mythology? Who gives a shit? The whole basis of the show was to keep you guessing and wondering what was going on, why wouldn’t they continue that after the conclusion of the story? Some of this stuff is gonna bug me for years. But all that is going to do is make me buy all the DVDs and watch the whole series all over again. And again. Which brings me to my final point.
There is no effing way the last 6 years (5 for me because I jumped in late, but illegally downloaded season 1 before season 3 started) could be considered a waste. All of us would do it again and hope another show hooks us like this one did. Like I said, I had24on Mondays. If there was a shittyLOSTepisode one week, Jack Bauer could usually step it up. But at least 90% of the time, I was completely enthralled with Jack and Sawyer and Kate and Charlie and Ben Linus et al. I could not get enough. Many other people couldn’t either, and they watched this past week like I did. And maybe it got a little dusty in the room. Not because it was a sad ending, or a happy ending, but because itwasthe ending. It had better be the end. No movies, please. For the love of Hurley, no movies. Let it be guys. It was a masterpiece, and nothing on television will ever touch it. I feel like I’ve lost a part of my family.
I hear that quantum physicists are doing wonderful things in the field of string theory these days. One hypothesis that has gained momentum over the last several years is that there exist parallel universes alongside our own on other planes of reality. If this is the case, and scientists ever find what they believe to be a wormhole leading to these unknown places, allow me to volunteer to be the world’s first inter-universe traveler. My reasoning is simple: I do not want to live in a universe where Glenn Beck makes $32 million a year doing whatever it is that he does.
Over the last thirty years or so, conservative thought in the United States has undergone a remarkable devolution. Whereas the conservatives of the 1950s, sixties, and seventies were ably and articulately represented by the likes of William F. Buckley, Barry Goldwater, and others, today’s right wing relies on the ostentatious Beck and the forever self-aggrandizing Sarah Palin to champion modern conservative values. Palin’s style differs from Beck in that her rhetoric is heavily platitudinous—even for a modern conservative. Palin manages to give lengthy speeches about politics without saying anything. Beck’s shtick on the other hand is fueled by personal mania combined with a gross misinterpretation of American and world history. As bad as Palin is, as a speaker and rhetorician she will never be as dangerous as Glenn Beck is.
Take this line from Beck speaking on his radio show last week. He was criticizing remarks by Simon Greer, who is head of the Jewish Funds for Justice (whatever that is) for saying,
“The government is you, me, and 300 million whom we share with our nation. Government is one way which we care for our neighbors, and tradition tells me to care for my neighbor as I care for myself. Here's what we do for each other as Americans: We grow food, we create jobs, we build homes, pave roads, teach our children, care for our grandparents, secure our neighborhoods. Government makes our country function. To put God first is to put humankind first. To put humankind first is to put the common good first.”
To you or me, this may seem like a pretty uncontroversial statement. But thank god we have Glenn Beck to set us straight. He tells us:
“This leads to death camps. A Jew, of all people, should know that. This is exactly the kind of talk that led to the death camps in Germany. Put humankind and the common good first.”
Beck went on to say that this Greer’s line of thinking leads to death camps because old or disabled would be regarded as harming the common good and therefore they would have to be “liquidated.”
To me, this is one of the clearest examples we have of Glenn Beck engaged in an active psychological projection, which is the denial of one’s own unconscious characteristics or inclinations by outwardly accusing others of having those same attributes. Sane people who are not fascistically inclined regard “common good” as an ideal to be striven for. Conservatives and liberals alike laud this goal, although they have different ideas on how to get there. Beck, however, attacks the very notion itself because he says this will inevitably involve rounding up certain undesirable elements of the population and exterminating them. “Death camps,” as he said. But how in the world do you get from phrases like “common good” and “put humankind first” to the Nazi-esque extermination of people? You don’t. Only Beck does. Many conservative commentators have at some point played the Nazi card over the last year and a half, but Beck invokes them regularly to ascribe Hitlerian characteristics to a wide variety of political phenomena and ideas—from the work of community organizations such as ACORN or Americorps to “social justice,” Beck sees Bormann-type boogeymen everywhere. It could be that he’s doing it just for show and to rile people up, but on the few occasions I have watched this piece of work operate, I get the feeling that he genuinely believes what he’s saying.
Ironically, Beck has accused liberalism/progressivism of being a cancer that embodies fascist philosophies. On the Right, it is becoming increasingly popular to describe the fascism of Hitler and Mussolini as being rooted in progressivism. (See Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism”) But as any schoolchild knows, fascism is an inherently conservative and reactionary doctrine. Fascism is not about putting humankind first as Beck seems to think, but about putting the nation-state first, whose glory depends on the social cohesion of the general population which is preferably comprised of a single uniform ethnicity. Every fascist state in history has invariably invoked the superiority of the people of that state to all outside groups. Sound familiar? How many times have we heard Beck and other conservatives espouse the tired mantra that America is an “exceptional” nation with a special place in world history? All the time. It’s their m.o. Criticize U.S. foreign policy in front of them and see what happens. Just recall the Bush years. Anyone who wasn’t 100% on board the war train for Iraq was deemed a terrorist sympathizer or at the very least a pussy by Beck, Hannity, et al. These men decry the purported rise of “big government” under the current president, but remember that no matter how much authority the Bush administration usurped for the federal government, they were behind it all the way. The decision by the Obama administration that conservatives have approved the most of is his decision to escalate the war in Afghanistan. A close second is his sending 1,500 troops to the border to keep out Mexicans from a territory that less than 200 years ago belonged to Mexico. That illegal immigration has come to the forefront of the political landscape at a time when the American economy is in the doldrums and American workers are getting the red-headed stepchild treatment speaks volumes about the political culture. It says that Americans—like the Weimar Germans before them—are looking for a scapegoat, a reason for why their livelihoods are fucked.
As you already know, Facebook has disabled the Inebriated Discourse pages (Friend and Fan) for whatever reason. As you can see below, the line Facebook is giving is that the name of the page is different from my actual name. But how is this different from any number of pages out there including, "Can this pickle get more fans than Nickelback?" I guess if your page has actual thought-provoking and occasionally provocative content on it, then that is not acceptable according to Facebook. As the recent privacy controversy has clearly demonstrated, Mark Zuckerburg seems more interested in information gathering on his clientele than anything else. Fucking asshole. Anyway, here is my most recent correspondence with these fuckers in which they simply reiterate their bullshit in their previous email. For the background on this, go here.
Hi,
In an effort to maintain a culture of authenticity on the site, Facebook requires users to provide their real first and last names. Impersonating anyone or anything is prohibited, and fake accounts are a violation of our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.
Your account has been suspended because we have received reports that your account could be in violation of our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. If you believe you were disabled by mistake, please reply to this email with a scanned image or digital picture of a government-issued ID (e.g., driver's license, passport, etc.) and make sure the following information is clear:
- Full name - Date of birth - Photo
Please black out any personal information that is not needed to verify your identity (e.g., social security number). Rest assured that we will permanently delete your ID from our servers once we have used it to verify the authenticity of your account.
Note that writing in and submitting your ID multiple times will not result in a faster response. Once you submit your initial request, it is placed in a queue and responded to accordingly. We appreciate your patience and apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
Thanks for contacting Facebook,
Zoe User Operations Analyst Facebook
My reply:
Provide my real name? Why? So Zuckerberg can pimp out my info to every half-baked yuppie marketer?
