Even a broken clock hits it out of the park twice a day. Right?
[T]hey have settled on a basic, stupid, unserious, unpersuasive, jackass political message: Only little pussy-fairies are afraid of terrorists and terrorism; real tough strong he-men types, like us on the left, laugh at it as a big joke. Don’t you want to join the super-tough guys who laugh in the face of mass-murder? (As long as it’s mass-murder killing other people, of course.) So join us, and laugh at terror, be one of the Real Tough Guys with the Cocks of Burnished Blued Steel, and just put your silly-ass concerns about terrorism away. Let’s focus on what really matters — universal health care and the fundamental restructuring of the economy into something more socialistic — and let us not be distracted by the childish antics of some Muslim head-cases who are, after all, just “acting up” in a particularly aggressive fashion.
Oh, and of course: Let us also be so bad-ass and Rambo-licious as to shower terrorists with kindness and good treatment, because, you know, if you’re really a super nail-spitting fire-breathing Hard Case like us, you never let a bit of righteous fury interfere with your civility and dedication to social justice.
Endlessly repeated, endlessly repeated. It’s all so stupid. But apparently some blogger — or someone — struck up on this idea in around 2006 (around then — that’s when I seem to remember it popping up) and the idea caught on like wildfire.
They really think that with a little “re-branding” they can solve their perennial Terrorist Gap problem.
By the way, Douchebags, not every problem in our lives can be fixed by “re-branding;” get this, some problems are actually real-world physical-reality problems and require real-world physical-reality solutions. A cute and counterintuitive marketing campaign is not, in fact, enough to stop terrorism, the same as it’s not enough to cure AIDS, and it’s not enough to cure cancer, and it’s not enough to re-start the economy.
Yes. And when you call them on this, they bob and weave back into the “oh, but we’re smarter than those who fight terrorism by actually . . . fighting it.”
Read the whole thing. I did, and it may be the first time, with all due respect, that I’ve read every single word of a long Ace post.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Wow. A stopped clock is right twice a day? Talk about cutting a guy while ostentatiously complementing him. Why so down on ace? Is it the potty-mouth thing?
Actually, I was making a joke, by conflating two expressions.
I respect Ace, but I enjoy squabbling with him too much to give it up: I call him on it when I think he’s oversimplifying, and he calls me on it when he thinks I’m being too sentimental.
He’s a big boy; he can handle my snark.
“I enjoy squabbling with him too much to give it up”
Heh. Now that I read your response, that made me remember something I *think* you wrote about him. It had to do with intentionalism, via the Goldstein / Patterico kerfluffle.
(roughly paraphrased) ‘I said ace, you can’t read my mind. He said I don’t have to, I can read your words.’
Anyway, best wishes for the new year, and enjoy a couple of good squabbles with ace. May I suggest a good natured blog fight?