Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If you are still talking about Maher's show, agree completely, and he is the worst of them.

Shoshana Zuboff’s Surveillance Capitalism is a devastating take on Google. Worth reading.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

The shows where he’d have Andrew Sullivan, Rushdie, and Hitchens on were his best moments. Rushdie is a fantastic guest. Sullivan still performs well, also.

He had Charles Blow on a few weeks ago and there were numerous testy exchanges. That was somewhat insightful, because Blow explained a definition of social justice warrior I’d not heard before.

If you’re famous and you’ve done a big book, you do Maher. And he does a solid job of actually researching the books.

His interview with Bannon was also great. He can’t stand the guy, but he held it together and hit Bannon with a polite but strong cross examination.

Maher reminds of the old days, when people engaged rather than shouted over or refused to entertain the positions of their opponents. The days before deplatforming, call out mobs, or someone asserting the opponent had no right to speak because he or she didn’t come from a certain background.

And of course I love his refusal to kowtow to either side’s sanctimonious positions. He rips the crybabies and virtue signalers on the right and left. Is he revealing some amazing new insight? No. But he’s tacking toward the middle and calling out the children and bullshitters on both sides. He’s this rare thing we see little of in political debates anymore: A rational person with common sense.

My god, Sebbie showed an interest in Rushdie*, someone who is not an old white dude. Amazing. Sebbie, what have you read by him?

* Even Blow gets a mention.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

My god, Sebbie showed an interest in Rushdie*, someone who is not an old white dude. Amazing. Sebbie, what have you read by him?

* Even Blow gets a mention.

You select your books by opening the dust jacket to check the photo?

None but some of Joseph Anton. I commented on Rushdie as a guest. I’ve read about as much by Sullivan, as well.

Rushdie, if one is to judge from public statements, close friendship with Hitchens, and non-fiction, appears to be of a sort who would find you quite frivolous and contrived. An object of brief amusement, but not to be dwelled upon for more than a moment.*

____
* The irony is noted. I plead guilty to being a small man at times. But I’m trying to be bigger - to reach “the Hankness” where one is permanently elevated beyond the petty.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

You select your books by opening the dust jacket to check the photo?

None but some of Joseph Anton. I commented on Rushdie as a guest. I’ve read about as much by Sullivan, as well.

Rushdie, if one is to judge from public statements, close friendship with Hitchens, and non-fiction, appears to be of a sort who would find you quite frivolous and contrived. An object of brief amusement, but not to be dwelled upon for more than a moment.*

____
* The irony is noted. I plead guilty to being a small man at times. But I’m trying to be bigger - to reach “the Hankness” where one is permanently elevated beyond the petty.

You should read some of his books, dig deeper into his thinking. Maybe after we discuss something like Midnight's Children or Satanic Verses, the two most popular works by him, I'll consider whether your opinion on what he might think is worth any consideration.

[LessinSF]

No comment on how there does not appear - yet - any new conservative bloc with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh? So far, they have often been in conflict.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

No comment on how there does not appear - yet - any new conservative bloc with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh? So far, they have often been in conflict.

Blocs have always been overstated - easier for simple minds if it's a team sport. I think the most notable development this term, however, has been Clarence Thomas going ultra-right without significant criticism from any of the federalist society or libertarian sorts who like to pontificate about the court or from any of the conservative members of the court itself. If you are fond of bloc analysis, I'd say look for the emergence of a third block of the radical right, and don't be surprised if that bloc has a fundamentalist vibe to it (oddly, a Catholic fundamentalist vibe). So there will be an increasing number of decisions where Thomas together with Alito or Kavanaugh or one or two others goes uber-right, the majority kind of shrugs and ignores them, and maybe one or two of the liberals point out that they're total lunatics challenging the very fundamentals of representative constitutional democracy.

And, of course, the court continues to engage in truly crappy historical analysis. But that is neither new nor particularly partisan, even if Alito and Thomas deserve particular awards this year, Alito for Bradensburg and Thomas for the Indiana case. Someone in Bradensburg should have done a "concur but for the moronic view of history" opinion.

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Blocs have always been overstated - easier for simple minds if it's a team sport. I think the most notable development this term, however, has been Clarence Thomas going ultra-right without significant criticism from any of the federalist society or libertarian sorts who like to pontificate about the court or from any of the conservative members of the court itself. If you are fond of bloc analysis, I'd say look for the emergence of a third block of the radical right, and don't be surprised if that bloc has a fundamentalist vibe to it (oddly, a Catholic fundamentalist vibe). So there will be an increasing number of decisions where Thomas together with Alito or Kavanaugh or one or two others goes uber-right, the majority kind of shrugs and ignores them, and maybe one or two of the liberals point out that they're total lunatics challenging the very fundamentals of representative constitutional democracy.

And, of course, the court continues to engage in truly crappy historical analysis. But that is neither new nor particularly partisan, even if Alito and Thomas deserve particular awards this year, Alito for Bradensburg and Thomas for the Indiana case. Someone in Bradensburg should have done a "concur but for the moronic view of history" opinion.

I actually see what may be a three-justice pragmatist bloc with Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Breyer. Thomas is an absurdity, and Alito simply scary.

As for Bladensburg (correct spelling), it is the next step in the death throes of Lemon, which Scalia colorfully described as:

Like some ghoul in a late-night horror movie that repeatedly sits up in its grave and shuffles abroad, after being repeatedly killed and buried, Lemon stalks our Establishment Clause jurisprudence once again, frightening the little children and school attorneys of Center Moriches Union Free School District. Its most recent burial, only last Term, was, to be sure, not fully six feet under: Our decision in Lee v. Weisman conspicuously avoided using the supposed test but also declined the invitation to repudiate it. Over the years, however, no fewer than five of the currently sitting Justices have, in their own opinions, personally driven pencils through the creature’s heart (the author of today’s opinion repeatedly), and a sixth has joined an opinion doing so. The secret of the Lemon test’s survival, I think, is that it is so easy to kill. It is there to scare us (and our audience) when we wish it to do so, but we can command it to return to the tomb at will. Such a docile and useful monster is worth keeping around, at least in a somnolent state; one never knows when one might need him.

Lamb’s Chapel v. Center Moriches Union Free School District, 508 U.S. 384, 398–99 (1993).

I am a rabid First Amendment adherent and an often outspoken atheist, but reason is winning out over theism, and the odd cross on a hill is less important or symbolic than it used to be.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

I actually see what may be a three-justice pragmatist bloc with Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Breyer. Thomas is an absurdity, and Alito simply scary.

As for Bladensburg (correct spelling), it is the next step in the death throes of Lemon, which Scalia colorfully described as:


I am a rabid First Amendment adherent and an often outspoken atheist, but reason is winning out over theism, and the odd cross on a hill is less important or symbolic than it used to be.

I don't disagree with the outcome in Bladensburg, that isn't my beef.

But the historical discussion in there of what the cross means is totally bizarre, and on par with Thomas' scree about eugenics. Crosses at the time were emblematic of a resurgent, New Testament based theology - you see few crosses in 18th & 19th century graveyards, where old testament symbols dominate - and there is lots of history about why the US military adopted medals with crosses at almost exactly the same time that cross went up (the court cites these medals, things like the distinguished cross, as evidence of "secularization" of the cross as if they were longstanding examples not tied to the very historical events they're discussing). The poem cited by them as the use of the cross in the secular is specifically using the cross to symbolize death and resurrection. Just as the justices get wrong what the resurgence of religion in the WWI period meant and how it is memorialized, they often get wrong how irreligious and even anti-religious the founders were, because they have this fiction of the country as a static religiously based culture. They miss the importance of the fact that military graves, by design, didn't carry religious images in the 19th century, and that graves even adopted classical and mythological designs instead of religious designs, and the artistic vision of a field of crosses was new and very aggressively religious (and still is). The whole idea of secularizing religious history to make it acceptable is a total cop-out and abuse of history. The irony is that it is in the context of an historical memorial whose very goal was to preserve the history. I don't think this stuff was needed to get to their conclusion, but the way they fill their opinions with what are really myths is pretty frightening for a body trying to figure out things like "original intent". By way, the athiests who brought this case really ought to want to preserve the history of religion in America, with all its warts, as well.

And that's where it is going to come back to bite us all, in turning some of these myths into accepted history. It's all like preserving Jefferson's home with care but not preserving the horror of the slave's quarters.

But, set aside my pet peeve. Why do you think Kavanaugh would be in a moderate block? He sided with liberals on the Buddhist case, but that fits in with an approach that is broadly protective of religion, and I'm kind of surprised it didn't get more support from conservatives. His other cases of being in the middle so far seem more procedural than substantive, unless I'm missing some (and I may be).

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

I've been watching Maher's show for years, due to a spouse that likes him for some reason or another he can't articulate very well. I don't really find him all that interesting or insightful, but he can have a point every now and then.

I've given up on him. The stuff that makes sense is fewer and farther between. I find it astounding that he can talk about how the right is completely resistant to facts and experts when it comes to something like climate change and then talk about how we poison ourselves and we shouldn't have to be subjected to vaccines (for example) in the next fucking breath. He's far too convinced of his own brilliance. And he's mistaken.

TM

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

I've given up on him. The stuff that makes sense is fewer and farther between. I find it astounding that he can talk about how the right is completely resistant to facts and experts when it comes to something like climate change and then talk about how we poison ourselves and we shouldn't have to be subjected to vaccines (for example) in the next fucking breath. He's far too convinced of his own brilliance. And he's mistaken.

TM

I get annoyed that he doesn't let anyone contradict his worldview. Someone says something smart that he doesn't like, and he shuts down the conversation. And he's terrible with women.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

And he's terrible with women.

As lots of women who have worked with him but won't any more will tell you if you listen.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

I get annoyed that he doesn't let anyone contradict his worldview. Someone says something smart that he doesn't like, and he shuts down the conversation. And he's terrible with women.

Watching Congresswoman Porter pull his gonads through his urethra and stuff them up his anus was the most entertaining bit I've seen on his show. I bet she can hog-tie a porker in under ten seconds at the county fair.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

I get annoyed that he doesn't let anyone contradict his worldview. Someone says something smart that he doesn't like, and he shuts down the conversation. And he's terrible with women.

I find him perfect in this regard in three areas:

1. Religion. It’s dangerous nonsense.

2. Climate change denial. See #1.

3. Free speech. You’re offended? Well then you’re not that bright. To register offense is to apply to the referee. Now, of course, if you play the refs well, good strategy on you. But the offended Maher skewers aren’t playing anyone. They’re dangerous and frivolous, much like climate change deniers. Or the religious. Maher has a consistency to him in this regard.

On the issue of vaccines, however, if TM is right and Maher believes they cause autism or any other adverse effect, Maher is full of shit. But full of shit on 5% of what a TV personality says is a quite enviable level of gravitas these days.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Watching Congresswoman Porter pull his gonads through his urethra and stuff them up his anus was the most entertaining bit I've seen on his show. I bet she can hog-tie a porker in under ten seconds at the county fair.

She was very funny, and this is a warped recollection. I’m not sure what you’re going for here, but I’m willing to guess anyone with HBO GO (everyone) would be perplexed, or perhaps unsurprised, by your take on that episode.

She was excellent, and she forced him to work, as does Dan Savage (another great guest) and Sullivan.

Maher’s greatest guest of all is John Waters. I need not explain why. He’s a national treasure (a compliment which would compel him to feign gagging).

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

She was very funny, and this is a warped recollection. I’m not sure what you’re going for here, but I’m willing to guess anyone with HBO GO (everyone) would be perplexed, or perhaps unsurprised, by your take on that episode.

She was excellent, and she forced him to work, as does Dan Savage (another great guest) and Sullivan.

Maher’s greatest guest of all is John Waters. I need not explain why. He’s a national treasure (a compliment which would compel him to feign gagging).

Look, dude, frankly, it's just been TMI on you and Maher. I mean, whatever turns you on, I don't want to chill your kink, but you don't need to broadcast. Because, for most of us, ewwwwwwwwww.