Since its Friday afternoon, let’s take a break to enjoy some sly humor, via have a Ben Sargent and Pat Oliphant.
Gee, I wonder why the Bancroft family is reluctant to accept the bid, or why the reporter’s union has voted against it?
Murdoch WSJ
May 4, 2007 2:30pm by Barry Ritholtz
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Friday Night Jazz: Artie Shaw
I’m looking forward to the WSJ Page 3 girl!
So, if by going from completely left leaning, to down the middle is your idea of a bad thing, I guess I wouldn’t sell either.
Jdamon, what do you mean? I think the girl in the top picture is leaning to the right!
Small Investor Chronicles™
Good catch: The girl is leaning to her right, possibly in a vain attempt to balance those formidable forward turrets, but that’s actually to the reader’s left. Ooohh, double message, double message.
I don’t think it matters who owns the damn thing. I stopped reading the Journal years ago.
Sundae Strike
Hello, everyone, Bess and Muffie here (and Equity Private in spirit). You might have noticed there was a drop off in posts today. Many of you may have questions about it. Unfortunately, we’ve been advised by counsel not to talk…
>> So, if by going from completely left leaning, to down the middle is your idea of a bad thing, I guess I wouldn’t sell either.
Jdamon, depends on what one’s vision of truth is, don’t it? If one thinks the truth leads to left-wing ideas, then that’s what a paper should be. Some of us believe you have to follow truth no matter where it leads, because knowing the truth facilitates conceiving the best plans.
If one thinks the truth supports right-wing ideas, then shifting from the left to the middle would be a good thing. So, apparently, you think that would be a good thing.
I didn’t used to call myself a librul. I was [wuns] [a] [con]servative. But, I:
– In summer 2001, suspected there was something “not right” about Bush’s emotional and mental fitness for the most important job on earth.
– In 2003, noticed a rush-to-judgment on WMD and the presence of other motivating factors.
– Concluded there was not going to be any WMD.
– Predicted the invasion (“operation”) would succeed but the occupation (“patient”) would fail.
That was before the war began. Afterwards, I:
– Doubted the insurgency was in its last throes.
– Expected the war not to pay for itself.
– Declare the war “lost” by any reasonable metric of “success”.
Turns out that more libruls and libertarians agree(d) with these views. At the same time, everyone who continues supporting the GOP has been misled and, thus, wrong on the above items. But, in the GOP now-minority view, folks like me and the newspapers I read aren’t to be commended for having been correct, truthful, and prescient. Rather, they should be chastised for their “bias”; for not being more “objective” and “independent”.
I am more frightened, shocked, disturbed, and angered by the present-day large-government/deficit-spending “right-wing” than I am of foreign armies, because the only way to ruin this country is for us to ruin ourselves through insensibility.
So, for now, I will maintain my “strong convictions loosely held” about political matters of the day. The Right is Retarded and should withdraw from “public service” until they rediscover their sense of shame, common sense, and fiscal and moral responsibility.
Too, too funny. Where can I get a link to send them out?
Well said “u former con”.
Its difficult to listen to this Bill Moyers Journal, documenting the obvious lies that were being reported as a “strong and compelling case” for going to war.
Good thing that Knight-Ridder didn’t have any clout in Wash, NYC or LA.
“The smoking gun, that could come, in the form of a mushroom cloud.” GWB
Yup, we can’t wait.
Sounds ridiculous now, don’t it?
You leftish folks are really starting to harsh my mellow. I haven’t listened to Artie yet tonight. I have Al DiMeola on. Maybe I’ll try Artie later. But I really don’t get the funnies. They have Rupert’s new WSJ calling you anti-American and treasonous. Isn’t that just true? Plain as the day. Obvious. Not funny. You think the baby-killers in Iraq (AKA al-Queda in Iraq) are just resisting American aggression there. Don’t you. You know you do. Isn’t that anti-American and treasonous? They say that the best humor has an element of truth at its core. So maybe you think it’s funny because it’s so true. Maybe the low-life Mr. Murdoch has you nailed, Barry.
Maybe you want those misogynist, homophobic barbarians to show W who’s the boss. You couldn’t — twice.
And you’re going to lose again in ’08.
OK. I listened to Artie Shaw. A thousand times better than Al. And it was beautiful. I thank you for the link. It was out of this world.
But why do you support the head-choppers? They blow up hundreds of people every week. Innocent people. Children.
But you hate W so much that you can look past their dead eyes. They would happily kill you, me, and my little ones.
Yet Barry, you reserve your special hate for George.
Strange. Strange. Strange.
Reading all these comments is really fun, but I just found another dad-gummed commie under my bed and I have to go show him where the bear went through the buckwheat.
badhaikuguy – I remember 1967 like it was yesterday, too, Dude.
U wouldn’t have had that commie under u’re bed, guy, if we’d a finished the job in Vietnam. Looks like those dominoes are starting to fall. Pilgrim.
tjofpa – “Looks like those dominoes are starting to fall.”
The millions who died in SE Asia after the left abandoned them are nothing to you? Just faceless dominoes. Have a good time at the mall.
They are just like those in Darfur, Somalia, Iraq, Indonesia, Souuthern Thailand, ad infinitum.
They may not have a moral claim on our lives. But that doesn’t mean you can pretend that they don’t exist.
That Oliphant cartoon isn’t much different than the WSJ’s editorial page has been for years.
Hard to take the rest of the paper seriously when it’s attached to such blatant editorial hackery.
Kyle – That’s a very persuasive argument. I’m really impressed.
No argument.
Just cynical fantasy. With attitude. Cooler than Artie. Ain’t we.
But why do you support the head-choppers? They blow up hundreds of people every week. Innocent people. Children.
No one in America supports the head-choppers. I’m sure you don’t actually believe that anyone does. So what did you really mean to say? I can answer that: what you meant is that withdrawing from Iraq (for example) would be a terrible thing for America and Iraq, and would only benefit the terrorists. That might be a starting point for a discussion.
Imagine what would happen if half the country ever came to truly believe, as Fox seems to want to convince them (I actually don’t know because I don’t watch), that the other half supports Al Qaeda. I imagine witchhunts, fascism, civil war, total chaos would result. I think that really would be terrible for America, don’t you?
>> But why do you support the head-choppers?
Putting aside the humor in you asking a “why do you beat your wife?” question, the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend, Mark. And certainly not in this case. That’s one reason I’m against this blunt, bloody foreign policy. It radicalizes Muslims. In other words, whereas we had 2 radicals to worry about, now we have 20. In other words, we create more enemies than we kill. (It’s worse than that, because the new enemies were originally no more of a threat than Patrick Swayze’s character before the Red Dawn. In other words, we’re (1) making normal people into militants and (2) then discovering we have to kill them, too.) Don’t believe me? Ask Rumsfeld, who in at least one moment of clarity asked himself a rhetorical question “is it the case that the more we do, the further and further we fall behind?”
And now “they” no longer have to “attack us here”, because they can attack us on their home turf, where we spend much more men and material.
Finally, Bush has now convinced the rest of the world that the only way to avoid being capriciously attacked and occupied is to *obtain* nukes.
*This* is progress??
So, since he’s creating more and more of them and then giving them both motive and opportunity to chop heads, why don’t you ask Bush your wife-beater question: why does Bush support the head choppers? Why do Republicans support al Qaeda?
But, you wouldn’t right? Let me guess why not: because you believe Bush’s heart is in the right place. That his goals are noble. Well, surprise, surprise: *I* believe his goals are noble, too. Yes, I do. But, that’s not the point though, because good intentions alone don’t cut it. Not with situations this complex. Have you not heard that the road to hell is paved with good intentions? Have you not heard, soldier, that discretion is the better part of valor?
It’s been said that problems cannot be solved at the level of awareness that created them. When the GOP realizes that the truth of a statement like “The GOP reaction to 911 has caused more damage than Osama himself”, then maybe it will prove itself competent to lead again. But, so far, I have seen no contrition or embarrassment on the right over the hundreds of thousands of people they killed. Their “awareness” is stuck in 2003.
As for what to do now, bring Shinseki back. Draft all Republican sons and daughters. They made this bed and deserve to sleep in it. They should not turn their backs now on the poor not-yet-radicalized people of Iraq. No, not a good solution? Well, short of that or enlisting enough international support, a quick pullout may or may not be worse than staying there without enough troops to do the job. It might lead to less bloodshed, because the warring factions can meet and hammer out agreements between them without the complication of having to *also* negotiate with foreign occupiers. It’s easier to make deals between 3 parties than between 4 parties, especially where the other 3 hate the 4th (and even ask the 4th to leave).
No, no good solutions? No clear answers? You see, this is why you need to avoid quagmires in the first place. Once you’re in one, all subsequent decisions are salvage operations.
Low life Murdock? Who called him that? How about media diversity and home ownership. And cause a cartoon was posted – hate for GWB?
Baby killers paragraph? What if the USA had a landing by a foreign government telling us that GWB was a dictator type? What would Americans be doing? I would hope defending against the invaiders only. In a 1000 years from now I wonder who would be killing who in the chaos.
I guess I’m to young for the bear in the buckwheat? I probably don’t need it explained. I started high school in ’73 and excused from ROTC since Vietnam was shutting down. Joined the Army anyway to shoot that picture that would turn stomachs, it doesn’t exist and never will.
Did we fail to stop something in Vietnam? Did we show China what? Vietnam ushered in The Wall coming down? Russia failed to control mideast? USA failing to control mideast?
The times of my life. I wonder when countries and it’s people get back to governing themselves? And only conceive children if a peaceful and fruitful land would support them – or not at all.
Christian missionaries preach with gentle words not swords.
Politics aside, I don’t understand how most of these deals can get approval from an economic perspective.
News corp owns hundreds of media channels in print, tv, websites, etc, how can such a buyout get regularoty approval? The same with the ABN/Barclays deal, I mean seriously, there are so few big banks in europe already and a merger between two of them draws no criticism or competition worries?
That’s stranger than all the partisan conspiracies…
New addition Atlas Shrugged rewritten by WSJ: Who is Leo Strauss?
New addition Atlas Shrugged rewritten by WSJ: Who is Leo Strauss?
Those are some very reasonable and civil responses. I don’t have the time to reply to all of them in detail this morning, but The Big Picture is that the left (not all of you fine leftish folks as individuals) made a choice to tear down our flawed (but only) president, instead of working with him to defeat the awful enemy. All sorts of terrible calumny was poured on him, and the leftish leadership failed to coalesce around any alternative strategy — I guess because they didn’t agree about the nature of the problem. They’d rather see Bush fail than America succeed. It’s all the easier to assume this pose for those who believe that the American right is evil.
Mark —
Your comments are full of convenient amnesia — Right after 9/11, Bush’s approval rating was 90%. He had nearly the entire country, and most of the world behind him.
Instead of focusing on terror, he abused the public trust to politicize the country. Karl Rove made sure of that. He then took his focus off of Terror, failed to follow thru in Afghanistan, or with the Taliban or Al-Quada. He next entered an unecessary war of choice against an adversary who had neither WMD nor links to terror. Your comments ignore that reality.
As to the entire Bush presidency, if he went back in time, and could redo everything with the benefit of hindsight, how many decisions do you think he would keep the same?
He would reverse himself on nearly every decision.
Of all the Presidents of the past 100 years, he has demonstrated the poorest judgement of the lot, surrounding himself with incompetent but loyal associates, making one bad decision after another.
Is that what is worth your blind loyalty? I voted for Reagan twice, For Bush I (once) I voted for Ford, I voted for Nixon (Only once). I’m one of the few proud Republicans who can say this guy never got my vote . . .
Scott,
It’s not a question of forgetting past mistakes “convenient amnesia”. Let’s limit the discussion to right now. The left leadership in Congress is trying to surrender to the head choppers right now — there will be terrible consequences if they succeed.
Bush is not above criticism, but he’s not the enemy.
They have Rupert’s new WSJ calling you anti-American and treasonous. Isn’t that just true? Plain as the day.
Just to explain this one to you: no. Only crazy people think that disagreeing with the right is anti-American and treasonous. They’re a very vocal minority, because the web tends to amplify things. But no. Dissent isn’t treason. It’s actually the greatest of all American traditions.
The millions who died in SE Asia after the left abandoned them are nothing to you? hUH?
iT Seems To bE SOMETHING wORSE THAN A cASE OF AMNESiA.
Well, Right now Vietnam is a trading partner and an ally; and the sooner we let Iraq alone, the sooner we’ll be able to say the same about them.
Damn! I found another Lefty trollin round the net here. This darn country must be full of ’em now.
William leF.ty Buckley Jr.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MWZjMDBlZDg2MDlmMDM4MmE1MGFmNjlkOTE5OWVkOTc=
“What can a “surge,” of the kind we are now relying upon, do to cope with endemic disease? The parallel even comes to mind of the eventual collapse of Prohibition, because there wasn’t any way the government could neutralize the appetite for alcohol, or the resourcefulness of the freeman in acquiring it”
>> But why do you support the head-choppers?
hmmh… Saddam was a secular leader, and women could drive, go to university, hold professional jobs.
We overthrew him and now they can’t. We are currently propping up a government whose electoral base is the ‘head-choppers’, and is thoroughly infiltrated by the them to the highest levels.
Likewise, under the Soviets, Afghani women didn’t wear burkhas. We armed and supported mujahideen ‘headchoppers’ like Bin Laden, and then they did.
So who has done the most for the ‘headchoppers?’
Not to say I support the Taliban and Saddam, but simply that you’ll have to forgive your compatriots if we don’t defer to the superior wisdom of Bush and the neo-cons.
So who has done the most for the ‘headchoppers?’
^clearly the retro-libs, let’s see, against Guantanomo, against wire taps, against racial profiling (none of the 9/11 hijackers, cole bombers, African embassy bombers, UK subway bombers, khobar tower bombers were white as i recall) but at least theyre focusing on the real threat to civilization, global warming. at the current rate Mars is warming, it won’t be inhabitable for all the goatlovers and weekend hippies that are soon to be exiled there-
Posted by: tjofpa | May 5, 2007 11:13:04 AM
“Well, Right now Vietnam is a trading partner and an ally; and the sooner we let Iraq alone, the sooner we’ll be able to say the same about them.”
Let me get this straight. You say that the millions who died in SE Asia did not die in vain, because Vietnam is now a trading partner [and an ally!]? So now we should risk millions more dying on the off chance that everything will work itself out in the GWOT if we just surrender to them?
“He would reverse himself on nearly every decision.”
Shrub?
You really think so?
Let me get this straight. You say that the millions who died in SE Asia did not die in vain, because Vietnam is now a trading partner [and an ally!]? So now we should risk millions more dying on the off chance that everything will work itself out in the GWOT if we just surrender to them?
That is the real question–what will happen if we leave? One important factoid that I am missing is how many of those SE Asian millions died before we left and how many after–anyone know? And then, whether the comparison holds with Iraq anyway, with so many violent types coming into the country from its neighbors, as well as the followers of Saddam who went into hiding after “mission accomplished”. There really could be a terrible civil war, with Iran for one trying to set up a puppet state.
Still I also worry that ordinary people in that part of the world don’t really understand why our troops are there–or to put it another way, if they think we are there for the wrong reasons (oil) they may turn out to be right. Either way they may indeed take up arms just to get us out, causing all sorts of trouble in the process–revenge is an important part of the cultures over there, and once a revenge cycle gets started, it doesn’t stop. That says we ought to take the troops out, because as long as they are there the trouble won’t die down.
So it seems to me this is a terribly complicated problem, and I am torn over what is the right choice. In any case I don’t think we should be trying to solve it by ourselves, especially since it just seems to be getting worse all the time.
We get it… you have to trash the Constitution to defend it, just like you have to donate countries to the ‘headchoppers’, ditch your global allies, and stir everyone against us to make us more ‘secure’.
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
Nice try, MacFly.
I think we (USA)(associated governments) should pullback to the Iraq boarders, guard against incoming illegal alien border crossers, provide aid to folks that choose to encamp around us and let Iraq become the state it will become.
Maybe the life on Gliese 581c could catapult a meteor at the Mideast. Just a little one, a heavenly message everyone could rally around.