This is a selection of good reactions to the death of Margaret Thatcher. There are some real nasty reactions surfacing out there, I will expose them in a seperate post.
In 1990, when Mrs. Thatcher was evicted from office by her ingrate party’s act of matricide, the difference she’d made was such that in all the political panel discussions on TV that evening no producer thought to invite any union leaders. No one knew their names anymore.
Margaret Thatcher, almost alone, refused to accept the inevitability of decline. She was determined to turn the country around, and she succeeded. Inflation fell, strikes stopped, the latent enterprise of a free people was awakened. Having lagged behind for a generation, we outgrew every European country in the 1980s except Spain (which was bouncing back from an even lower place). As revenues flowed in, taxes were cut and debt was repaid, while public spending – contrary to almost universal belief – rose.
History will enshrine Margaret Thatcher as a transformational leader who helped defeat communism, promote freedom, and bring hope to the oppressed. Her penetrating words and compelling vision will last for generations. Read more »
It is easy to close oneself off inside a conservative echo chamber. And right-leaning outlets like Fox News and Rush Limbaugh’s show are far more intellectually closed than CNN or public radio. If you’re a rank-and-file conservative, you’re probably ready to acknowledge that ideologically friendly media didn’t accurately inform you about Election 2012. Some pundits engaged in wishful thing; others feigned confidence in hopes that it would be a self-fulfilling prophecy; still others decided it was smart to keep telling right-leaning audiences what they wanted to hear.
But guess what?
You haven’t just been misinformed about the horse race. Since the very beginning of the election cycle, conservative media has been failing you. With a few exceptions, they haven’t tried to rigorously tell you the truth, or even to bring you intellectually honest opinion. What they’ve done instead helps to explain why the right failed to triumph in a very winnable election.
Why do you keep putting up with it?
Conservatives were at a disadvantage because Romney supporters like Jennifer Rubin and Hugh Hewitt saw it as their duty to spin constantly for their favored candidate rather than being frank about his strengths and weaknesses. What conservative Washington Post readers got, when they traded in Dave Weigel for Rubin, was a lot more hackery and a lot less informed about the presidential election.
Conservatives were at an information disadvantage because so many right-leaning outlets wasted time on stories the rest of America dismissed as nonsense. WorldNetDaily brought you birtherism. Forbes brought you Kenyan anti-colonialism. National Review obsessed about an imaginary rejection of American exceptionalism, misrepresenting an Obama quote in the process, and Andy McCarthy was interviewed widely about his theory that Obama, aka the Drone Warrior in Chief, allied himself with our Islamist enemies in a “Grand Jihad” against America. Seriously?
Conservatives were at a disadvantage because their information elites pandered in the most cynical, self-defeating ways, treating would-be candidates like Sarah Palin and Herman Cain as if they were plausible presidents rather than national jokes who’d lose worse than George McGovern.
Mitt Romeny is standing for President of the United States. That position is often described as leader of the free world, but his efforts in london suggest he might just be a tool. Not only is he tone deaf, but he said some silly things and did dumb things like on take questions from pommy reporters.
One of those pommy reporters hashtagged it #romneyshambles:
Serious dismay in Whitehall at Romney debut. ‘Worse than Sarah Palin.’ ‘Total car crash’. Two of the kinder verdicts #romneyshambles
— James Chapman (Mail) (@jameschappers) July 26, 2012
“It’s hard to know just how well it will turn out. There are a few things that were disconcerting,” he told NBC’s Brian Williams. “The stories about the private security firm not having enough people, the supposed strike of the immigration and customs officials, that obviously is not something which is encouraging.” The British press was unamused. The Telegraph’s website screamed: “Olympics: David Cameron rejects Mitt Romney’s suggestion Britain is not ready,” while The Times of London headlined the story “PM rebuffs Romney over readiness for Olympics.”
Cameron himself told reporters: “This is a time of some economic difficulty for the UK, but look at what we are capable of achieving as a nation even at a difficult economic time,” he said. “I think we will show the whole world not just that we come together as a United Kingdom but also we’re extremely good at welcoming people from across the world.”
Clearly, the same can’t be said for Romney.
“I will obviously make those points to Mitt Romney,” Cameron added. “I look forward to meeting him.”
I bet. Way to keep that “special relationship” special, Mitt.
I’ve called Romney “gaffe-tastic” before, but I found myself shocked by his tone-deaf, condescending remarks in London. I mean, we expect it in this country. Romney’s Olympics gaffe made me think about when, campaigning in Pittsburgh, the candidate insulted a local bakery by disdaining its baked goods. “I’m not sure about these cookies. They don’t look like you made them,” Romney said to the woman next to him. “No, no. They came from the local 7/11 bakery, or whatever.” In fact they came from the local Bethel Bakery, whose owner later told MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell he was offended by Romney’s remarks.
Sarah Palin has today announced she won’t run for the US presidency.
The former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential nominee in 2008 has been sending signals that she would not run and she confirmed it in a letter sent to supporters, saying “my family comes first”.
“After much prayer and serious consideration, I have decided that I will not be seeking the 2012 GOP nomination for president of the United States,” she said.
Remember in the aftermath of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting many left wing journalists and bloggers blamed Sarah Palin for the actions on moron because she had put out a brochure that purportedly had targets on it. Never-mind that Democrats has similarly published “target” brochures.
The online first-person shooter game called Tea Party Zombies Must Die, gives players the chance move around a decaying Fox Newsstudio, killing zombie versions of presidential candidate, Michele Bachmann, star of the Tea Party movement Sarah Palin, speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and right-wing broadcaster Glenn Beck using an array of weapons.
Other undead creatures players may encounter include likenesses of the former Senator for Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum and Fox News host Bill O’Reilly.
They can also target a series of generic characters, of which the descriptively-named “Expresses racist views anonymously on the internet modern klan zombie” and “Factory-made blonde Fox News Barbie who has never had a problem in her life zombie”.
The game, which was created by StarvingEyes Advergaming who make games for online viral campaigns, has attracted criticism from some conservatives.
But why hasn’t it attracted the same outrage fromt he left that Sarah Palin’s campaign brochure did?
Brent Bozell, president of Media Research Center, a right-wing media analysis organisation, said: “The liberal media have been preaching for years that conservatives are the ones who invoke violent imagery and rhetoric. Yet in the space of two days, the radical, pro-Obama left calls us ‘son-of-a-bitches’ and says they want to ‘take us out.’ And they follow that with a hideously violent game where they do just that – depicting ways of shooting prominent conservatives, presidential candidates and journalists. The news media would be in an uproar if violence had been incited against liberals. Their silence disgusts me.”
Their silence disgusts me too. Let’s see if Martyn Bradbury will publish a vitriolic laden post about the left-wing nutters who made this game or will he just explain it all away as “just a funny game”.
I’m picking he will just remain silent and continue his mad rantings about the latest baby recipes he found in John Key’s wheelie bin.
Many leftists employ a standard debating tactic wherein they assure you of their Republican credentials . . . just before they start into some inane diatribe about how crazy Republicans are “these days.” It’s rare to go a week without reading about some allegedly “lifelong Republican” who has had it with the dishonesty of conservatives nowadays, and found himself siding with Barack Obama and the Democrats because, by God, common sense demands it! Usually investigation reveals that the “lifelong Republican” is anything but — and yet, the tactic persists.
The trick is as old as the Greeks — it’s a part of ethos, one of Aristotle’s modes of persuasion. The idea is to show you are a disinterested party. The speaker’s declaration that he is neutral — or better yet, one who is naturally inclined to believe the other side — allows the speaker to portray himself as simply swept away by the compelling force of his own arguments. Why, I didn’t start out to be a Democrat! I am naturally one who leans Republican! It’s how I was raised! But I just can’t help but notice how extreme and radical those Republicans are nowadays!
Remember the outrage over an old brochure of Sarah Palin’s and her comments about not retreating, but reloading? Remember our own left-wing hate speech blogs like The Standard and like Bomber at Tumeke saying that the right-wing are hateful and use violence to get their message across? Remember all that? Take a look at this catalogue of left-wing and union thuggery from Wisconsin. I wonder when we will hear about this in the MSM with all the vitriol about hate-speech and inciting killings coming from the left….I won’t hold my breath.
What you’re going to read below is a startling compilation of what can only be described as thuggery. These examples are occurrences that have taken place only since the beginning of the month and do not include the equally disturbing incidents we’re hearing about outside of Wisconsin. Keep in mind, it’s more likely than not that I missed a few things.
March 17th, 2011: Threats against WI blogger and Madison Law Professor Ann Althouse:
WE WILL FUCK YOU UP. We will throw our baseballs in your lawn, you cranky old pieces of shit, and then we will come get them back. What are you gonna do? Shoot us? Get Wausau Tea Patriots to form an ad hoc militia on your front lawn? That would be fucking HILAROUS to us. You could get to know the assholes on your side in real fucking life instead of sponging off the civil society we provide for you every single day you draw breath.
The office of Sen. Dan Kapanke (R-La Crosse) said the senator has been subjected to damage of personal property and has received threatening statements in the wake of mass protests in recent weeks over Gov. Scott Walker’s budget-repair bill.
Kapanke have been unavailable, but an aide to Kapanke says that windows on Kapanke’s car were broken in Madison and the senator’s wife found nails strewn on the driveway of their home.
According to Rose Smyrski of Kapanke’s staff:
Nails were scattered on his driveway twice last week. The incidents were reported to the La Crosse Police Department.
Also, Kapanke’s’s windshield was damaged on March 9 after the Senate voted on the budget-repair bill.
A couple of weeks ago Judith Collins faced attacks from the left wing about her comments regarding looters. Just as a reminder to what she actually said it was:
Police Minister Judith Collins said the actions of looters was akin to “people who rob the dead”.
She expected to see the judiciary throw the book at looters.
“I hope they go to jail for a long time – with a cellmate.”
Left-leaning blogs howled in outrage, claiming that the Minister of Police and Minister of Corrections was advocating jailhouse rape. Here’s a selection from the cyber-buffet:
Dim-Post – She really shouldn’t encourage individual citizens to rape each other.
The Hand-Mirror – And now she’s telling us that, for her, abuse and violence between inmates is a feature of double-bunking, not a bug. She is not explicit, but we live in a culture where threats of rape in prison are common enough that she doesn’t need to finish the thought by telling us that the cellmate is large and called Bubba. By signalling that she thinks looters should be subject to rape and violence from their cell mates, she has acknowledged that her policy of introducing cellmates is responsible for increased rape and violence.
No Right Turn – Does the Minister of Police believe looters should be raped in prison?
CapitalismBad – Tree pretty – So when the Police Minister implies that looters should be raped, the ideas she’s promoting about prison are appalling, but they don’t just affect prisoners.
Judith Collins of course made no such claims. She simply asked that the judiciary send looter to jail for a long time.
I also truly hope Judith Collins regrets her statement made in the wake of looting incidents. She was playing to the crowd of course, and I don’t think was refering directly to Arie, but it was not the calm words of leader in our community.
So far the only left winger to have anything to say about the matter is No Right Turn, and to his credit he has come out swinging against Phil Goff. For the record Phil Goff has said he was joking, but it is clear from the tone and context of the whole interview that he was far from joking. Even if he was joking, just how appalling is it that he was using a family tragedy to “joke” about what should be done to looters.
Just to clear things up before lefty trolls say “but you adovated the gut-shooting of looters too”, I am not the leader of the opposition wanting to be Prime Minister. I am not telling jokes either, about the circumstances, Phil is, he says he was. Further, I am in support of his comments, especially about “shackling them to shovels”.
The point I want to get across is that Phil Goff said something much worse than anything Judith Collins suggested and he thinks he has pretty much got off scot-free. Meanwhile the very people who castigated Judith Collins for her comments have remained silent, with the sole exception of No Right Turn.
The hypocrisy of the left wing is astounding. These are also the same people who accused Sarah Palin of killing people because she had crosshairs on a map. If Sarah Palin is guilty of killing people because of crosshairs on a map then the defense of anyone shooting a looter in Christchurch is that Phil Goff told them to do it.
I am still waiting for Grant Robertson to question whether Phil’s words were “the calm words of a leader in our community”, or will he just stick to the defense of “Phil was only joking”?
The fact remains, Phil Goff advocated for the summary execution of looters or at the very least them being shackled to shovels for 18 hours a day. I wonder of the media will scrutinize Phil Goff in the same way they go after Judith Collins. My bet is that they won’t.
