Atrios:
Getting Scarier
SoCal:
WESTWOOD -- A man accused of making threats against the White House led officers on a wild freeway chase that ended in a standoff outside the Federal Building.
MD:
The Secret Service is investigating a man who authorities said held a sign reading "Death to Obama" outside a town hall meeting on health-care reform in western Maryland.
The sign also read, "Death to Michelle and her two stupid kids," referring to the first name of President Barack Obama's wife, said Washington County Sheriff's Capt. Peter Lazich.
Dangerous and also super classy.
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But I'm sure that swastika outside that congressperson's office was a fake.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Not Interested in Governing
That, I think, is the basic mind-set behind the townhalls, the worldview promulgated by hate radio, Faux TV, and the various astroturf freedomworks groups for the last ten years and beyond. It manifested itself, of course, in a variety of ways during the W presidency, Katrina and the occupation of Iraq being only the most disasterous examples.
The only legitimate use of government for this crowd consists almost exclusively of starting wars and harranging liberals, academics, uncoverted Hollywood actors, immigrants, secularists, and other perceived unpersons. Beyond that, there just simply isn't any interest in addressing the realities of the modern world.
Ezra Klein's column gets at this somewhat, as well.
The only legitimate use of government for this crowd consists almost exclusively of starting wars and harranging liberals, academics, uncoverted Hollywood actors, immigrants, secularists, and other perceived unpersons. Beyond that, there just simply isn't any interest in addressing the realities of the modern world.
Ezra Klein's column gets at this somewhat, as well.
What Matt Yglesias Said
Big Media Matt:
...Watching McCaskill on TV what I mostly thought of was that I don’t understand why members of congress are holding these town halls. There’s been so much focus on the spectacle of the whole thing that nobody’s really stepped back and explained what the purpose of these events are other than to give us pundits something to chat about. Obviously this is not a good way of acquiring statistically valid information about your constituents’ opinions. And it doesn’t seem like a mode of endeavor likely to increase the popularity of the politician holding the town hall. The upside is extremely limited, and you’re mostly just exposing yourself to the chance that something could go wrong.
I know this is a relatively older post, and with the townhalls that horse is already out of the barn or whatever.
Anyway, this has been another edition of What Matt Yglesias Said.
...Watching McCaskill on TV what I mostly thought of was that I don’t understand why members of congress are holding these town halls. There’s been so much focus on the spectacle of the whole thing that nobody’s really stepped back and explained what the purpose of these events are other than to give us pundits something to chat about. Obviously this is not a good way of acquiring statistically valid information about your constituents’ opinions. And it doesn’t seem like a mode of endeavor likely to increase the popularity of the politician holding the town hall. The upside is extremely limited, and you’re mostly just exposing yourself to the chance that something could go wrong.
I know this is a relatively older post, and with the townhalls that horse is already out of the barn or whatever.
Anyway, this has been another edition of What Matt Yglesias Said.
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