Whether the use of Traffic's The Low Spark of High-heeled Boys as the soundtrack was deliberate or not, I don't know, but I think we're seeing another Karl Rove sucker-punch unfold
I honestly have no idea what he's talking about, my best guess is that he's saying that Karl Rove is impugning the masculinity of which ever Democrats are in the commercial, but a) he seems to say this as if it's a good thing, b) does that song really suggest that, besides the title? and c) how much of an influence, even subliminal, is the song going to have?
NB: I haven't watched the advertisement, perhaps the song is amazingly prominent
All I can say is, thank goodness the majority of Americans didn't tell a pollster that they thought Canada was responsible for 9/11. The Democrats would sure have a lot of blood on their hands then.
It's confusing. I can't quite tell whether Sylvia is using Glennuendo to imply that Clinton is responsible for making Saddam look scarier than he really was (that would be a very predictable new line of attack), or if she is saying that Saddam was so universally agreed upon as scary, Bush must be exonerated for assuming the worst?
Would it be futile to remark that maybe part of the reason Democrats were talking about Saddam's WMD in the 90s was that then, before Clinton's effective containment policy had taken effect, he had WMD? And then to tie down everyone who thinks that this mean Bush was always and 4eva justified in thinking Saddam had WMD, so Hans Blix can piss all over their faces?
This strikes me as meriting a response analagous to an Yglesias post from last year pointing out that many instantiations of the "flip/flopper" meme literally ignore the existence of change over time. It was is if all events are simultaneous.
Is Neil's (a) like this: It's all Clinton's fault, because he primed you for the misleading stories that I would go on to tell? Stop me before I lie again!
well, that would be one way to spin (a), but I think in practice, it's going to be more like 'Clinton started exaggerating Iraq's capabilities, our mistake was trusting his intelligence.' This is going to be a fairly effective argument because it is exactly the same argument that Democrats are making against Bush now. It will likely thus be distilled into a 'he said-she said' shouting match which, the media referees will determine, is unresolvable by objective facts.
I think the point is to relieve Bush of responsibility for what people believe: people already thought that Saddam was involved, so we can't say that "Bush led Americans to believe" it. Of course, it's still a stupid point, but I think that's what's being said.
Not exactly, though. It's not as if Bush merely let everyone believe what they wanted to about Iraq. There was an active media campaign in which, at a bare minimum, Bush recycled every "lie" that Clinton had already told us.
So, I think Neil's got it right. "Our only mistake was listening to a Democrat" etc.
Of course, "people" believe all manner of patently insane things, so this won't, in the long run, hold much water. Nobody with even a passing understanding of Middle Eastern politics thought that Saddam was in cahoots with AQ, aside from the demonstrably insane (eg, Mylroie and Ledeen).
Somehow, I don't think misdirection is going to help Bush this time out, as "people" have decided he's dishonest, unethical, and untrustworthy.
Ah, the line between getting you to believe something false and allowing you to continue believing something false as evidence of its falsity comes in (under conditions in which it's much more important to have true beliefs about the matter at hand).
At some point, the Democratic Party is going to have to disown Clinton entirely, together with this Third Way nonsense that gets us nothing but supposed "nuance."
Even if they didn't win any elections, I'd be really grateful if at least once in my life I could vote for an unabashedly class-warfare oriented candidate (by which I mean one who is waging class warfare from the lower class, unlike every other politician in the world).
Thanks, ogged. I remember hearing that Eliade might have sexed up the "waiting for death" part, or that his sources did. But it makes such a good story.
When searched closely, one can find something in Spencer and Gillen, 1927 to support nearly every word of the text Eliade has presented, but the text is nonetheless almost completely concocted. Most certainly there is nothing in Spencer and Gillen to support the principal Eliade sought to illustrate and establish by using this text, that is, that "the center" is equivalent with "the religious."
And now I debunk myself: the Storytracking page shows that, while the tribe did just flop down and die, such flopping down and dying does not support Eliade's thesis.
Doesn't the Storytracking page show that it was part of the ancestral myth that the tribe flopped down and died?
I refuse to recheck it, since I have Important Work to do preparing slides on the effectiveness of ethical compliance programs (actually it may be important).
But that's the whole point—their belief didn't necessarily propel their mass expiration:
E 37 tired and sad lay down to die from S & G 76, however, Eliade holds that the tiredness and sadness of the ancestors was the reason they did not plant the pole, whereas S & G have it that they did not paint themselves, i.e., prepare themselves for ritual performance. In S & G they do not plant the pole because it is inferior to some of the poles of others. There is no necessary connection between the tjilpa ancestor's deaths and the pole in S & G, though Eliade's construal makes it essential.
Very poetical, though. Also:
Doesn't the Storytracking page show that it was part of the ancestral myth that the tribe flopped down and died?
Yes, I think so. My bad. Actually no, I blame Eliade's penis.
Below it is presented as published in his The Sacred and the Profane (New York: Harper & Row, 1959). It is notable that in this presentation, he understands the occasion of the broken pole and the death of those present as occurring in the ethnographic present, that is, as an event Spencer and Gillen actually witnessed.
I went to WaPo Sept. 13 poll, and found that the question was not asked. You are wrong. That connection came later, after Chaney, Bush et al continuously put Sadam and 9/11 in the same sentence.
Clinton tied Saddam to 9/11 before 9/11 happened? Sweet.
Posted by JP | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:08 AM
Whether the use of Traffic's The Low Spark of High-heeled Boys as the soundtrack was deliberate or not, I don't know, but I think we're seeing another Karl Rove sucker-punch unfold
I honestly have no idea what he's talking about, my best guess is that he's saying that Karl Rove is impugning the masculinity of which ever Democrats are in the commercial, but a) he seems to say this as if it's a good thing, b) does that song really suggest that, besides the title? and c) how much of an influence, even subliminal, is the song going to have?
NB: I haven't watched the advertisement, perhaps the song is amazingly prominent
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:12 AM
Clinton: my sexual adventures have allowed me to transcend time itself; I can see all of eternity at an instant. PS Hillary in 08.
Posted by FL | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:13 AM
All I can say is, thank goodness the majority of Americans didn't tell a pollster that they thought Canada was responsible for 9/11. The Democrats would sure have a lot of blood on their hands then.
Posted by neil | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:13 AM
It's confusing. I can't quite tell whether Sylvia is using Glennuendo to imply that Clinton is responsible for making Saddam look scarier than he really was (that would be a very predictable new line of attack), or if she is saying that Saddam was so universally agreed upon as scary, Bush must be exonerated for assuming the worst?
Posted by neil | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:20 AM
Clinton's time-traveling penis strikes again.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:28 AM
Neil: I think it's 'a'.
Would it be futile to remark that maybe part of the reason Democrats were talking about Saddam's WMD in the 90s was that then, before Clinton's effective containment policy had taken effect, he had WMD? And then to tie down everyone who thinks that this mean Bush was always and 4eva justified in thinking Saddam had WMD, so Hans Blix can piss all over their faces?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:31 AM
Stehpinkeln, obviously.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:32 AM
It's nit clear to me that Sitzpinkelners are good. I don't see a clear good/bad here.
Posted by bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:34 AM
No relation to Operation: Golden Shower.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:35 AM
Well, I think Stehpinkeln is called for in this case--you need to keep your distance because wingnuts bite.
The Editors (scroll to "Andorra") speak for me on WMDs.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:37 AM
This strikes me as meriting a response analagous to an Yglesias post from last year pointing out that many instantiations of the "flip/flopper" meme literally ignore the existence of change over time. It was is if all events are simultaneous.
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:44 AM
In Republican ideology, each moment the world is created anew -- by those damn liberals.
Posted by Adam Kotsko | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:46 AM
It was is if all events are simultaneous.
Too good not to point out.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:49 AM
"is" s/b "as"
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:49 AM
Is Neil's (a) like this: It's all Clinton's fault, because he primed you for the misleading stories that I would go on to tell? Stop me before I lie again!
Posted by FL | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:49 AM
All comments are simultaneous!
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:50 AM
13, 16-- Apparently the liberals have much more power than I had previously imagined.
Posted by Matt F | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:51 AM
[redacted]
Posted by [redacted] | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 8:55 AM
Clinton's penis is the Liberal axis mundi, and without it we will wander about aimlessly for a time and finally lie down on the ground and wait for death to overtake us.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:00 AM
You may never start.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:00 AM
Yeah, Glenn seems to be openly admitting that Bush lied. But we should have expected it! Clinton set him up!
Posted by Sam K | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:01 AM
well, that would be one way to spin (a), but I think in practice, it's going to be more like 'Clinton started exaggerating Iraq's capabilities, our mistake was trusting his intelligence.' This is going to be a fairly effective argument because it is exactly the same argument that Democrats are making against Bush now. It will likely thus be distilled into a 'he said-she said' shouting match which, the media referees will determine, is unresolvable by objective facts.
Posted by neil | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:05 AM
Is Jim Henley's argument any better?
Posted by Andy Vance | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:05 AM
I think the point is to relieve Bush of responsibility for what people believe: people already thought that Saddam was involved, so we can't say that "Bush led Americans to believe" it. Of course, it's still a stupid point, but I think that's what's being said.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:05 AM
Re: 25
Not exactly, though. It's not as if Bush merely let everyone believe what they wanted to about Iraq. There was an active media campaign in which, at a bare minimum, Bush recycled every "lie" that Clinton had already told us.
So, I think Neil's got it right. "Our only mistake was listening to a Democrat" etc.
Posted by Sam K | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:09 AM
people already thought that Saddam was involved
Of course, "people" believe all manner of patently insane things, so this won't, in the long run, hold much water. Nobody with even a passing understanding of Middle Eastern politics thought that Saddam was in cahoots with AQ, aside from the demonstrably insane (eg, Mylroie and Ledeen).
Somehow, I don't think misdirection is going to help Bush this time out, as "people" have decided he's dishonest, unethical, and untrustworthy.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:12 AM
Ah, the line between getting you to believe something false and allowing you to continue believing something false as evidence of its falsity comes in (under conditions in which it's much more important to have true beliefs about the matter at hand).
Posted by FL | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:13 AM
You have to admit, it's been a great administration for people interested in fine distinctions.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:18 AM
20: SB, that's a great link. The entire tribe is in consternation.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:19 AM
At some point, the Democratic Party is going to have to disown Clinton entirely, together with this Third Way nonsense that gets us nothing but supposed "nuance."
Even if they didn't win any elections, I'd be really grateful if at least once in my life I could vote for an unabashedly class-warfare oriented candidate (by which I mean one who is waging class warfare from the lower class, unlike every other politician in the world).
Posted by Adam Kotsko | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:33 AM
Adam, many countries allow naturalized citizens to vote.
Posted by neil | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:40 AM
Thanks, ogged. I remember hearing that Eliade might have sexed up the "waiting for death" part, or that his sources did. But it makes such a good story.
Yup, it was Eliade:
I bow before such superior debunking power.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:48 AM
And now I debunk myself: the Storytracking page shows that, while the tribe did just flop down and die, such flopping down and dying does not support Eliade's thesis.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:51 AM
But I don't care about Eliade's thesis: the flopping down and dying is the poetical part. Now that's belief!
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:56 AM
Doesn't the Storytracking page show that it was part of the ancestral myth that the tribe flopped down and died?
I refuse to recheck it, since I have Important Work to do preparing slides on the effectiveness of ethical compliance programs (actually it may be important).
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:58 AM
the Democratic Party is going to have to disown Clinton entirely
No, just the notion that we can't ever have disagreed with him about anything.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 9:59 AM
But that's the whole point—their belief didn't necessarily propel their mass expiration:
Very poetical, though. Also:
Doesn't the Storytracking page show that it was part of the ancestral myth that the tribe flopped down and died?
Yes, I think so. My bad. Actually no, I blame Eliade's penis.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 10:04 AM
How is "Mircea Eliade" pronounced, btw? I've always pronounced it "MIR-chay EELY-odda," but I've also always feared I'm probably wrong.
Posted by Paul | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 10:31 AM
What do you know, someone asked that very question on Google Answers.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 10:36 AM
Thx, Standpipe!
Posted by Paul | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 10:39 AM
At first glance, I read that as Eliade's Numbskulla.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 11-15-05 11:55 AM
I went to WaPo Sept. 13 poll, and found that the question was not asked. You are wrong. That connection came later, after Chaney, Bush et al continuously put Sadam and 9/11 in the same sentence.
Posted by Vicki | Link to this comment | 11-18-05 3:30 PM