Friday, April 17, 2009

Dear Ross Douthat

Hey, Boy Genius, have you ever done any actual reporting in your life? Or are you Harvard guys too good to do anything except sneer?
[The Tea Party] have all of the weaknesses of the anti-war marches: Their message is intertwined with a sense of disenfranchisement and all kinds of inchoate cultural resentments, they've brought various wacky extremists out of the woodwork (you know, like Glenn Beck), and just as George W. Bush benefited from having opposition to his policies identified with peacenik marchers in Berkeley and Ann Arbor, so Barack Obama probably benefits from having the opposition (such as it is) associated with a bunch of Fox News fans marching through the streets on Tax Day, parroting talk radio tropes and shouting about socialism. Obama is a very popular President, at the moment, his unpopularity among Republicans notwithstanding, and it's awfully hard to see the Tea Parties doing much to change that reality in the short run; if anything, they're far more likely to reconfirm the majority in its opinion that American conservatism is increasingly wacky, echo-chamberish, and out-of-touch.
Politics as an abstract concept formed by reading Talking Points Memo may be sufficiently prestigious for you, Mr. Working Class Hero, but if you weren't gunning the turn-only lane on Valleydale Road in Hoover in a desperate haste to reach Wednesday's rally with Rick and Bubba, Lee Davis and Tim James, don't tell me what the Tea Party movement is about, OK?

You and David Brooks make such a perfect couple. Perfectly useless, that is. Go surf some more 'barely legal' porn. and stop pretending to know anything about actual politics.

Lent's over, douchebag, and it's punk-smacking season.

UPDATE: Linked by Cynthia Yockey, who stepped up to help fill the gap by punk-smacking Douthat while I was bound by my Lenten vow.

10 comments:

  1. Lent's over, douchebag, and it's punk-smacking season.Oh, oh. Pesach's over, too. Can I play?

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  2. Finally!! I don't even observe Lent, and yet I feel like I did having to wait for some bashing of that snarky little no-accomplishment porn-loving elitist beltway twit around here ... phew. I won't say the release here was as good as that which Ross gets while surfing "BarelyLegalBarnyardAction.com" for one of his ostensibly objective "studies" designed on the surface to bolster his streetcred with social conservatives, but it's still good to see it return to this space.

    Next year, Stacy, you cannot give up Ross bashing or Brooks fisking for lent, ok?

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  3. The best wat to smack these punks down is to make the next one soon and make it bigger than the previous one. I hear July 4th is starting to sound good?

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  4. Hey, if you ever get the goods on Ross in a photograph, use it as part of your smackdown. Michelle gives a brilliant demonstration here while smacking down the prissy denim-hater George Will:

    http://michellemalkin.com/2009/04/17/friday-fun-conservative-rebels-in-blue-jeans/

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  5. Damn.
    I gotta say, I really feel for my buds at RSM. I was there when you guys began to get the word out about your Tea Bagging Party, so I know that it did begin in a grassroots manner.But alas, the whole thing was hijacked by Fox News and the profiteers, I mean capitalists, who know how to rake a sucker when they see one.
    I support the right to protest, but your experiment turned out to be a thinly veiled Anti-Obama rally disguised as an anti-tax crusade with people insisting they are being taxed to death under Bush era tax codes. Make sense? Not really but it doesn't matter. It was a great opportunity for Fox to ride the bandwagon and capitalize on what you all worked so hard for.
    What still gets me is how much of this turned out to be a marketing gimmick intended to co-opt the Obama grassroots movement, which still shows that you guys truly don't understand what happened last November. It's quite asinine to attempt to replicate something that was truly organic. I think of Glenn Beck last night telling his wackjob viewers to record their Tea Party experiences in their journals because of the "historical" nature of the protests.Historical? Really?
    A protest with no clear-cut message? I think not.
    I applaud the attempt but alas the result was lackluster.
    And that is what Douthat , I feel was referring to. It's the result of what was a well intended exercise in free speech.A valid point on your behalf was turned into a ratings bonanza by the very media outlet who in the end will support the status quo that has helped to put us where we are. What should have been a day of bipartisan discontent became a joke by way of the clowns on the ground and those behind the hype machine.
    There was more effort put into convincing people that this was an authentic grassroots movement because " grassroots" has become the latest catch phrase. There was more emphasis put on trying to portray this as a bipartisan uprising than in sending a clear message devoid of the silly rhetoric you guys love so much. There has to come a time when you will all realize that the language problem on your side is at the core of your overall problem.
    Language wrapped in revolutionary speak that lacks any logic whatsoever is a non starter. i know you won't think so, but then again you probably thought invading Iraq was a great idea.
    And language that puts forth insinuations of possible secession, well, makes you guys look like assholes.
    But hey! What does any of this matter? After all Sean Hannity feels inspired now! I'm glad to see that all your sweat and toil went to so worthy a cause.
    For my part it was sheer entertainment watching all the costumes that served to highlight the contrived nature of the event.Not to mention those snazzy signs! Truly inspiring to see so many Americans gathering and protesting on the behalf of the upper crust Republicans. Manufactured dissent is so beautiful....

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  6. Why are these precious east coast pseudo-cons turning their ire on Glenn Beck now? Has Rush bashing run its course? That George Costanza lookalike David Frum was bad mouthing Beck on his New Minority site the other day as well. I’m not a Beck fanatic myself but he’s always sounded pretty reasonable to me and I would suspect that a lot of people that don’t spend all their time with pinkie extended sipping lattes in an Upper West Side Starbucks feel the same.

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  7. Y4E:

    Paragraph breaks are our friend.

    I mean, I'd probably skip over your drivel anyway, but at least I'd consider reading what you wrote if it didn't give me a migraine headache.

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  8. ya you faux shilling corporate mark chicken hawks it aint grass roots unless soros bought and paid for it

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  9. Did you see my Ross Douthat post and get my trackbacks today?

    Also, thanks for the "Full Metal Jacket" Award today!

    Cynthia

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  10. "a thinly veiled Anti-Obama rally"

    Quick, pass me my smelling salts! Unveiled Opposition to the President? Who has ever heard of such a thing? I´m telling you, this Republic is going straight to hell!

    Now excuse me while I´m off to practise my goosestepping.

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