Monday, January 17, 2011

Exit Michael Steele... Enter Reince Priebus

Here he is ladies and gentlemen!


OK... haha... but really - it's not that far a stretch:



And the secret word of the day? 'Blood libel' of course!!

12 comments:

Ryan said...

Ha, funny post. It will be interesting to see if the GOP is able to be wagged by its tea party tail, or if it will be more of the same.

Sarah Palin needs better press advisors. She is being used beautifully by opposition. I had never heard of the phrase "Blood Libel" before either, and I'm a little unsure why "Jews" think they are justified being sensitive about it? What a waste of time.

For once, I agree with John Stewart, who said, as every rational American should be pointing out, we don't need to use the actions of an obviously crazy man as a justification for a law (or laws) that will affect us all.

Ban the visual use of cross-hairs? Make it illegal to come within 1000 feet of a federal official with a weapon? How do these people keep getting elected.......

I'm also more than a little irked that this is such a big deal in the press, when women are killed every night in some major inner city, and we don't have politicians rushing around dealing with it... not that they could.

Ryan said...

To answer my own question about the nature of the GOP probably remaining the same despite a face change:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/11/entitlement_cuts

Ooofta....

Ryan said...

Sorry, can't believe there is such difficulty posting links here:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/
democracyinamerica/2010/11/
entitlement_cuts

or maybe this will work:

[link]http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/11/entitlement_cuts[link]

Unknown said...

Ryan, I totally agree with your "irked" sentiment about the response to the Arizona shootings. I believe we probably don't see eye to eye on overall gun rights, but I am in total agreement that changes in laws in response to one crazy man is reactionary at best, and disastrous at it's worst.

I don't recall too well, but I took a class in undergrad way back when entitled "The History of Antisemitism." Awesome class, and incredible instructor. One major topic discussed at some point during that semester was the Blood Libel Legend. It is quite significant from an historical standpoint, and speaks directly to a very real and damaging history of antisemitism. That said, it makes no sense to me that Jewish representatives would be offended either. Just sounds like more overreacting, more eagerness to be defensive and pissed off, and just looking for a reason to be wrongfully victimized. We see this everywhere, in every genre. Hell, listen to any NY Jet fan or player this week for an example.

The problem is that invariably there ARE people being persecuted or attacked wrongfully, and they ARE victims. In this particular example, muddying up the waters with bickering about concerns of republican blame, contentious politics, and now inadvertent antisemitism does nothing. Nothing for me, and nothing for the country.

There truly are some victims in this tragedy. People who lost their lives, the families and friends of those people, the family of the sickened perpetrator, and many more. And as Ryan said, there are victims every day and every night in other locations that we don't hear about.

So I think Jews certainly have the right to be sensitive to the Blood Libel Legend as a whole, but I don't see much need for sensitivity to Palin's misappropriation of the term.

As an aside, I heard a rumor that the shooter may have been left-handed. As an extremely defensive southpaw, I will personally lead a public response to this information if it is made public. F all you rightys!

Ryan said...

Geno, agreed. Of course we're not eye to eye on these issues, because you're always wearing your ice skates and are like 6 inches taller than me.

Your points are well taken. I remember looking up Blood Libel after this hoo ha came out and thought it was really weird. I am not a historical expert at all but wonder how seriously that kind of rumor or phrase was ever taken. And even if it was as sensitive as the "N" word is today, does anyone think Sarah Palin was actually being anti-semetic? Worst case, she was just being ignorant, although it's not clear that she or anyone else would be expected to know the roots of that phrase (which easily could be independently constructed creatively to describe a different context).

The point to me is that the average Jew probably doesn't give two hoots about what comes out of Sarah Palin's mouth. I think much of the fear, paranoia and over reaction you speak of is not coming from the average (Jewish) person but is coming from some special interest groups.

Don't believe the hype!

Hopefully this will become an election issue. If Democrats can't solve the "crazy guy" issue, then Republicans will be given that chance. I'm so thankful that our national politicians are tackling the tough issues that affect us all so much.

Speaking of the "N" word, did you know that Huck Finn is being re-published in an edited form, removing the words "nigger" and "injun" from it?

irk irk irk.....

Roller said...

I think Sara Palin has worked hard to establish enough 'stupid cred' that we can believe she was ignorant of the phrase's roots and is not an anti-semite.

Thank you both for turning my post with a picture of Pee-Wee Herman into a real discussion.

Rye, you'd think that our browsers would be smart enough to detect a url and present it as a link by now, but to post a link in the comments you have to use good ole' fashioned HTML.

Here's a quick refresher on the anchor tag if you've forgotten.

Ryan said...

Thanks, Rollo. Maybe if I practice, I'll remember:

Try number one


Try Number Two

Unknown said...

Way to go, Ryan. Now you've pissed off a substantial percentage of owls with your "two hoots" comment.

Just keep the bald eagle out of it if you know what's good for you.

Ryan said...

Gene, stop being such a hawk.

Kevin said...

I thought the blood libel thing was strange as well. I agree with youz that it's odd to think someone owns that phrase (and it's therefore somehow offensive if another person borrows the phrase). Something that hasn't been mentioned here though, is that I don't think it's a very intuitive phrase to start with, which makes me wonder who thought of it in the first place (on Palin's team).

G. Smith said...

I think the hoopla about the blood libel comment and the relative lack of hoopla about the new version of Huck Finn that replaces "nigger" with "slave" are two examples of how screwed up our media is.

In the first example, I have to agree with folks here, I think much of what Palin does is out of ignorance - and she tries to play it off. Sort of like I do when I trip over invisible objects when I'm a little drunk. It was an unfortunate reference - but not a big deal. She is no more or less an idiot or poor choice for a leader because of it.

On the other hand, I'd argue that the popularity of this new version of Huck Finn offers an opportunity for a much more accurate and interesting analysis of us as a country. But for some reason that's a much lower headline.

Ryan, I thought Larry Wilmore from the daily show had a pretty good start at that analysis:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-january-11-2011/mark-twain-controversy

Rollo - I appreciated the brief visual blog post. Images say alot, I'm going to miss these:

http://gawker.com/5424477/gop-chairman-michael-steele-gets-jiggy-with-his-interns/gallery/

Ryan said...

Funny stuff.

G, those pictures remind me that Michael Steele will land on his feet. He will probably end up going back on tour with Digital Underground, showcasing the Humpty Dance, as he was when the GOP scooped him up to begin with.