Iraq in a wingnutshell: "Hey, dickhead..."

Ace O' Spades to Juan Cole:

Hey, dickhead?  What more "reasoning" do you need than this?

[Graphic in the original.]

Ace was berating Juan Cole for refusing to retract his post about the troop food shortage memo on the say-so of Little Green Footballs.

Little did Ace know that he had provided the epigraph for the whole Iraq war.

Comments

[cfrost]

Yechh. I'd write something about the food shortage memo/wingnut hysteria thing, but after visiting Mr. Ace O' Spades' blog, I think I'd better quickly check for ticks.

[mudkitty]

The deprivation thing plays into the heroic iconography of war.

[Tyler DiPietro]

The wingnut wrongosphere has always been a conglomeration of self-parodying, semi-literate zealots. But now they've basically descended into full blown crankery and denialism, with all the requisite conspiracism, cherry-picking and perpetually moving goalposts.

Unfurtunately, our president seems to be leading them every step of the way into the black hole of stupid.

[Trystero]

A little help for those of us who just woke up? What exactly is going on?

I followed the AOS link. Yech, gee, thanks.... Obviously that was no help.

[chowderhead]

Yes - the right wing today is completely out of touch with reality - this is what passes for argument now. Josh Marshall at TPM says "We're so far deep into this mess that sometimes I believe we're past the point of argument" - seems true.

[Cass]

Excuse me, but what is that eagle doing to our flag?

[DJA]

Trystero,

Here you go.

[Whispers]

Spot on.

Reasons? We don't need no stinkin' reasons!

[Jill Bains]

"The deprivation thing plays into the heroic iconography of war."

-(mudkitty)

So true, and very well said.

An iconography that can only be smashed to the point it can no longer be nonsensically spun by fascist, militarized media.

Liberals should not be so challenged to let this beneficent food shortage play into their iconographic, and tired critique of Republican war 'incompetence.' All that does is belie support for the war itself, while only attacking the technics of how the war is run,letting the latter absolve the former.

Democrats are so absurdly and transparently fearful of fascist criticism that they do not support 'the troops,' that they go so out of their way with macho posturing that they actually become pro war by mimicking the Republicans. The whole contest of who supports 'the troops' more is only a race to the bottom, and a harbinger of more Iraqi type wars.

And as the truth be told, following the implacable rules of Empire, a Democratic presidency has no intentions whatsoever of ever leaving Iraq to the Iraqi's. The indissoluble American military bases, are just that- permanent; corporate control of the oil resources are similarly endurable as is the hideous 'Green Zone.'

The iconography of empire can only have the force of permanence.

It is not a question of American's deciding to leave Iraq via negotiation, which is oxymoronic, it is totally about Americans being driven out of Iraq by force:There is the point at which real thinking should begin.

Such a defeat for America, as in Vietnam, can only be seen as victory for humanity, but most importantly, for America itself.

America needs to rejoin the human race. A total defeat in Iraq is but the first step. All else is piss in the wind.

"The sun will not overstep his measures; if he were to do so, the Erinyes, handmaids of justice, would seek him out."

(Heraclitus, Fragment #122,Phillip Wheelwright translation.)

[greensmile]

After this weekends exchange over at Pandagon, touched off by Amanda's take down of another AoS spew-fest, I am begining to wonder if Ace is real or a parody, a mock-conservative calculated, a la Liberal Larry, to make is own purported side look asinine. Seriously...he is so sick and dimwitted that whatever cause emerges from his keyboard arrives with a bad smell and a host of ready-made detractions. With friends like Ace...

The only reason I don't read Juan Cole more often is how extremely depressing reality has gotten to be.

[Davis]

Every time I follow a link to a right wing site, I'm reminded of Kevin Spacey's notebook in Se7en.

[Jill Bains]

Everyone around here always speaks about "Amanda" as if one should know who she. Is she the high priestess, the Hydra, an ogress in a right wing cult, demanding worship, constant tribute, and fear?

Who is Amanda?

Seriously, I am in the dark.

Insider stuff is no good, and ill mannered. She should be referenced and identified properly for the benefit of those not in the know.

"Advertising becomes art and nothing else. just as Goebbels-with foresight-combines them: l'art pour l'art, advertising for its own sake, a pure representation of social power."

-(Max Horkheimer, Theodor W. Adorno, Dialectic of Enlightenment-"The Culture Industry-Enlightenment as Mass Deception.)

[j swift]

Yep, the Commander Guy and his Happy Cheerleading Minions have taken patriotism to a new level. He can not in good conscience ask that any civilians make any sacrifices. So in addition to fighting and dying in the W's Big Adventure, they will also be starving in our places.

Keep your chins up servicemen and servicewomen. I am sure that now that W has his 100B he will Halliburton right back in there with the Pizza and Burgers.

[greensmile]

apologies Jill B. I refer to Amanda Marcotte, the alpha blogger of Pandagon. I should neither assume every body knows what I know [cause god know I don't know half of what they know] nor should I carry on as if I were a personal acquaintance of Ms. Marcotte, which I am definitely not.

and that Marcotte with a trademark registration to most of us.

[greensmile]

apologies Jill B. I refer to Amanda Marcotte, the alpha blogger of Pandagon. I should neither assume every body knows what I know [cause god know I don't know half of what they know] nor should I carry on as if I were a personal acquaintance of Ms. Marcotte, which I am definitely not.

and that Marcotte with a trademark registration to most of us.

[greensmile]

oops. [actually I don't even know why that duplicated...it made me do a captcha ...it really looked like a single shot.]

[Julian Elson]

Why do you hate America?

[Jill Bains]

greensmile,

Thank you for your candor and sincerity. I did not mean for you to feel I was picking on you alone. I never pick on anybody or lay in the weeds playing 'hit man.' I hate that stuff as I hate intimidation or blogosphere thuggery.

This "Amanda" thing goes on nearly everywhere. I'm glad you picked up on my concern.Keep up the interesting postings.

joy and fun,

J.B.

[Kevin Hayden]

Jill, in many ways - well beyond Amanda - you're right. bloggers use names or insider references all the time ('teh gay', for example) that assume everyone who's anyone understands the reference.

As a longtime blogging junkie, it's just as frustrating when you skip a day or didn't read a 'must-read' blog like Eschaton, and miss the original guffaw. Which distracts from the message.

As to the hoopla that Ace helped create about the authentic fake memo, I find it helpful to think of most rightist bloggers as thirteen year olds. I really think, based on their logic, that many are.

[me]

That's just a /slightly/ Freudian image, no? Pointy thrusting thing emerging from crumpled crinkliness between two legs. What an odd choice of substitute. Then again, perhaps not for a wingnut.

[Jill Bains]

The creation of 'celebrity' bloggers should not be enabled when possible. I suppose this wish is impossible, even with the best of intentions. Celebrity seems to an automatized by-product of American life, just as fascism is of American political life. Although it is my belief that fascism is not merely a 'by-product,' but the dominant modality whether liminal or submerged.

I posted for a long time on Digby's Hullabaloo and I don't recall seeing any of this "Amanda" stuff about Digby or Tristero, although some participants did name dropping about 'Amanda.' Some posters may have used the full name 'Amanda Marcotte,' I just don't recall. My curiosity finally got the better of me. The air of insider 'cattiness' was starting to be irksome, and as a woman, we don't need anymore of that.

This phenomena has been compounded and strangely ironical for me after checking out the Pandagon blog, which claims to be ostensibly 'feminist.'

Finally, the not so secret phenomena is the barely concealed male erotic attraction to female 'cattiness' whether assumed or other- deliberate stylistic artifice -or an ancient mode of being. The atavistic sources of female 'cattiness' as a source of power, hence eroticism, is functional of I know not what.

'Amanda' has become a barely unconscious sexualized projection for both men and women by celebritization.This is no good. I think what Roland Barthes said about America is apropos here:

"In America, sex is everywhere but in sex." -(Roland Barthes)

Yes. Sex is all in war. Reign of fascism.

[B-Money]

Sieg Heil!! Sieg Heil!! Sieg Heil!!

Just doing my fascist duty, since I am an American, and by Jill Bains' reasoning, guilty of being a fascist. As are all of you Americans who post here! All hail the empire! Sieg Heil!!

[Dave]

Funny but didn't we read a good part of that post on another post of yours JB? B-money that was funny, but, leave the cut and paste queen alone.

[Jill Bains]

B-Money tries to be a thug. A gangsta without a gang. An intimidator already frothing apoplectically wrapped in a dervish of impotence. You couldn't raise a bead of sweat on my brow.

How many more of the empire's minions died on your memorial day. 10? 100? Did you include the Iraqi war dead in your honorarium? I did. And that is all that I included. But you knew that. Aw shucks!

Dave-

You are correct. Your diligent reading of my posts has detected what most people call a 'style.' I posted for a long time with Hulabaloo and basically struck the same note 2000 different ways. I learned that from studying Balinese Gamelan music and drumming from the Ivory coast. two of the most highly developed peoples on the planet. It is called variations on a theme. It is endless.

You've already been taken down.

You are so obsessed with me you study the nuances of my work and minutiae where it would almost qualify as a textual exegesis. Laying in the weeds trying to be a blogospheric assassin, out for revenge!Obsession is so unbecoming.

You've already been taken down.

You just don't know it.

The train of humiliation is a long one. Best to vacate early.

Did you say prayers for the Iraqi and Afghani civilians and children killed by our high tech super-duper Airforce on your Memorial day?

Well we did. In hopes of their vindication.

But oh I forgot! You've already been put to pasture with your chatterbox sidekick and hysteric B-Money.

You were probably the two who got caught on Hullabaloo trying to hack me by posting as Jill Bains! I must have really hurt your and your troops feelings for you to sink so low. But you can't hack me. My style is inimitable.

I won't forget the salt lick for you and your cows pasturing in that field.

[Marc]

Shorter AoS: "America....FUCK YEAH!" (I prefer the power-ballad mix, myself)