In a time of chimpanzees, I was a penguin.
The religious right is motivated by the suspicion that someone, somewhere,
is having fun -- and that this must be stopped.
For some definition of Free(tm). Maybe Josef Stalin's.
And thanks to a suggestion in a comment below:
-- Badtux the Snarky Penguin
Free(tm) is a trademark of USA Inc. and may not be used without attribution. Violators will be taken to a hole in a farm field and shot and used for fertilizer.
Ground rules: Comments that consist solely of insults, fact-free talking points, are off-topic, or simply spam the same argument over and over will be deleted. The penguin is the only one allowed to be an ass here. All viewpoints, however, are welcomed, even if I disagree vehemently with you.
WARNING: You are entitled to create your own arguments, but you are NOT entitled to create your own facts. If you spew scientific denialism, or insist that the sky is purple, or otherwise insist that your made-up universe of pink unicorns and cotton candy trees is "real", well -- expect the banhammer.
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Freedom, well, I walk my own paths and am not a slave to any of that monkey bullshit out there.
ReplyDeleteThey made the system, not me, I just use it to my advantage. And in the long run it really doesn't make much difference who the next preznut is.
Good or bad none of it is going to have much of an effect on me. Good times, bad times, whatever, I just flow through them.
Wow, Tux, that Alternet article... Whew! I have friends here who, over the years, have wanted to travel to the U.S. and asked my opinion about it. I've told them "The landscape of the country is beautiful, and the food is cheap. See it for the surroundings. But be prepared for hostility from the people, and you might find getting into the country a bit like getting into the USSR."
ReplyDeleteI haven't heard any negative feedback from the few who have actually gone. (Now that I review in my mind, though, I can only think of one or two who actually made the trip. Aussies are prodigious travelers, but they tend to go to Bali, Thailand, Europe or the home countries of their ancestors.) And the people thinking of going are generally light-skinned Aussies or Filipinos, so they wouldn't face the automatic sneering "fuck-you" reception that someone with a Syrian connection would.
One of the more left-wing older nurses from my ward has been on a trip that was taking her to New York. I'll be curious about her impressions, and she won't hesitate to tell me. As you say, it has become the Soviet States of America.
I don't have huge hopes for a corporatist like Obama. But maybe he'll end the climate of fear. It's pitiful how the U.S. has become this nation of terrified bullies. "We know you hate us, and you all want to kill us, so we're going to abuse you in hopes of scaring you away." The debt-load of bad karma the U.S. is building up may very well exceed the $10 trillion national debt when it comes to Cosmic Payback time.