|
Post by spoon on Jul 10, 2017 22:16:30 GMT -5
I don't recall if there was actually a moment when Scott and Jean were explicitly established as being a couple in the pre-reprint era. Maybe it was implied toward the end of the run. The closest we get to a confirmation that they're at last an item, is Uncanny X-Men #48, when the team has temporarily split up. Scott and Jean have decided to stay together, and there's a whole page on which Arnold Drake lets both of them fight off potential suitors. It's incidentally also the first issue Drake scripted by himself, so I guess he was eager to get rid off the "will they or won't they" stuff as well, and get some resolution. Jean is seen telling some other girls "You're poaching on MY reserve" and Scott refers to himself as Jean's "boyfriend". Ah, yes, Jean the model and Scott the disc jockey. And Jean gets hit on by her boss.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 11:34:16 GMT -5
Hadn't thought about that, but I think you're right. He did seem much more capable of handling Falcon than he did Vulture. Maybe...how long Toomes had been the Vulture vs how long Sam was Falcon was the difference? Maybe Sam was holding back? Spider-Man also fought many others in the course of the Civil War battle (Winter Soldier, Cap, Giant-Man) and seemed pretty skilled throughout. In Homecoming, Spidey had difficulty with the thugs robbing the ATM. After he knew they had high tech weapons, he still got caught two or three more times.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 11:26:25 GMT -5
The helmet is about severity, not causation, so I think it makes perfect sense for the media to mention lack of a helmet when a drunk cyclist is hurt. One of my problems with bicyclists or motorcyclists not wearing helmets, is the impact on a driver who is involved in a collision. If someone dies or is brain damaged, because they weren't wearing a helmet, it's little solace to the motorist to say it's not your fault. They have to deal with being involved in a fatal crash. And someone who is all about personality when they want to go without a helmet may change their tune after an accident. Failing to wear a helmet is not a bar to a lawsuit after an accident. Failure to wear a helmet could come into play when assessing damages, but there is work to be done to get there. So I don't see this as merely a "personal consequences" situation, because failure to wear a helmet to impose consequences on other people. So many of my buttons pushed, Spoon! The majority of severe head traumas are caused by car accidents and simple falls, so all your valid arguments apply to car drivers and pedestrians more than to cyclists. Yet I see no media saying "the car driver was not wearing a helmet" when there is an accident. Failure to wear a helmet imposes consequences on other people when a cyclist has an accident and hits their head, I agree. This also applies to anything that makes any given situation worse when something bad happens. Should we legislate on every aspect of our lives to reach a point where nothing bad eve happens? It's not possible. Here's an example: people who are overweight and out of shape endure much worse health problems when they get older, suffering disproportionately from diabetes and heart problems. These health problems have consequences on other people too, from doctors who have a harder time treating their patients to family members who have to take care of their loved ones, to parents who feel guilt because they really should have forced Timmy to put down the playstation and become a health nut. Should we consider laws that impose limits on our weight, and force people to run regularly? I really don't think so, but it must be pointed out that a lot more people are overweight that fall on their head while riding a bike, and so such a law would actually make more sense than a mandatory helmet law. We would save way more lives that way, because hundreds of thousands of people die each year due to problems associated with their being overweight, while merely a few dozens die for not having worn a bicycle helmet. And I'm not even addressing the fact that cogarettes are still legal, despite being proven agents of mass destruction. The obsession with bike helmets is a distraction, as far as I'm concerned. The numbers of times a cyclist actually falls on their head is very low, and that number would be close to zero if bike accidents were made more infrequent by having cyclist respect traffic laws, having them use a headlight at night (as is mandatory, but rarely observed) and by having infrastructure better suited to the proper sharing of the road between bikes and motor vehicles, as is often the case in Europe. I wish the media were quicker to point out that a cyclist was riding at night withoutna headlight than that he wasn't wearing a helmet, especially when he was hit by a truck (in which case the helmet isn't going to be much help). I wouldn't be surprised if there are more head injuries from walking or driving than biking in absolute terms, because people (at least in North America) spend a lot more time in those activities. But I'm really skeptical that walking causes more head injuries relative to time in similar situations. I'd need to see the stats to buy that. There are also probably lots of elderly people with great falling risks who are simply too ill to bike. Also, I don't think the slippery slope you suggest is really isn't very slippery at all. Requiring that a person maintain a certain weight is a much, much, much greater imposition on a person's autonomy than requiring them to wear a bike helmet. Your weight involves the very state of your body. A helmet is just something you put on. Your weight is condition you must maintain every moment of your life. A bike helmet is just connected to a specific activity. Controlling one's weight can be a tricky thing due to metabolism and how many factors go into it. Wearing a helmet is a straightforward decision. Furthermore, the toll one arrest in being killed by a motorist because you didn't wear a bike helmet seems a lot more direct, immediate, and dramatic than a doctor treating a patient who refuses to maintain a healthy weight. Health protections shouldn't be an all or nothing thing, and there's a big gap between these two "somethings." And as far as cars go, we have other elements in place to very directly mitigate the problem. Seat belts mitigate a big part of the head injury danger.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 11:10:02 GMT -5
Claremont and Byrne were apparently impatient for something to happen, too. In Uncanny X-Men #138 (one of my favorite issues), they retcon in a scene where Jean and Scott finally reveal their feelings. When I re-read my X-Mens few years ago, I was shocked by how long it took for them to do anything, and how little of a romantic relationship they actually had prior to the "All New, All Different" era. They mostly just pined away for each other in thought balloons, issue after issue. I don't recall if there was actually a moment when Scott and Jean were explicitly established as being a couple in the pre-reprint era. Maybe it was implied toward the end of the run.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 8:59:39 GMT -5
X-Men #32 'Beware the Juggernaut, my son!' Thomas/Roth/Tartaglione It's Bobby's 18th Birthday, and the gang are celebrbating at Coffee A-Go-Go, courtesy of Zelda, who has a Bebop band and Bernard the Poet as entertainment. Warren brings Candy Southern to meet everyone, and Scott actually dances with Jean! The party ends when a biker gang busts into the coffee shop, and the X-Men use some powers on the sly to chase them off. Back at the mansion, the Professor goes to the secret basement door to reveal... the Juggernaut! He says it's his duty as his step brother to fix him. It fails, and his machine blows up, but Juggy is not only all better, but has mental powers, too! He leaves in search of the X-Men. Back in town, Bobby is on cloud nine after a birthday kiss (he's always been gay my butt)... Warren gets shot down by Candy, and Scott and Jean spend some quality time. They return to a dark mansion, and get into uniform.. Cerebro goes off, but it's sensing them, not the bad guys... they quickly find Juggernaut, and the fight is on! Juggernaut wins fairly easily, but then a voice tells him to go to Europe to joing Factor Three, since it was they that freed him. He says no, then goes anway, leaving the X-Men before he finishes them off. The team finds Xavier alive.. barely. To be Continued! Blah... never a good sign when you job the stars of the book out, and the bad guy just ignores them to do something else! They did that a lot in the beginning, but this was the first time in a while, and it's still bad. Story: C- History: B (major villain, part of ongoing Factor Three story) Notes: - I guess this is during the time when they mandated single issue stories, as Stan (or Roy) apologies on the title page for this being a 2 parter. - 'Disko' Is that some early alternate spelling I'm not aware of, or are the Marvel guys that out of touch? - Speaking of out of touch, all our heroes are still wearing suits at the party, even though it's a beatnik coffee shop. I guess Stan just thought that what good guys do. - Scott and Jean dance! Buy still angst about each other while doing it.. just let this two kids be happy already! They talk later is vague tones, but they're getting there! Claremont and Byrne were apparently impatient for something to happen, too. In Uncanny X-Men #138 (one of my favorite issues), they retcon in a scene where Jean and Scott finally reveal their feelings.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 8:31:16 GMT -5
I think I made a clear case for what it did right and, besides that, I still found it visually appealing and saw potential in the characters. Days of Future Past was a far better film, but it didn't give us an X-Men team. This one did. Putting aside your comparing this film to that one, are you saying Last Stand isn't as bad as XO: Wolverine?? I absolutely agree that the quality dipped. Maybe it's Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn not being attached to this one, wheres they were a major part of the writing for First Class and Days of Future Past. But I wonder if your (and, really, most people's) utter contempt for the film stems from that disappointment more than from a fair analysis of the film in its own right. I'd still rather watch Apocalypse than any of the pre-First Class films. Last Stand is my #3 worst X-Men film, but I find it a head taller than this one. It had lots of great story points and character moments, but failed to make a cohesive whole out of them. Superhero movies live or die on their characters and character arcs. And that's where this one died. Storm's story alone is enough to condemn this film. EDIT to add: I missed your last comment. I think X-Men and X-Men 2 are great films, and X-Men 2 is one of the best superhero films ever. X-Men 2 is at least a 4.5 star film. This is at most a 2 star. X-Men 3 is a pretty poor film, but I rewatched both recently enough to be confident that Apocalypse is worse. EDIT again: I checked my film logs. I last watched X2 about a year ago and gave it 5 stars. I think that was too high. I previously watched it about a year before that and gave it 4. 5 stars. That seems about right. I gave X-Men 4.5 stars when I watched it last year about the same time and 4 stars when I previously watched it back in 2014. I go back and forth between the two ratings. It's all about how many points I want to dock it for the Statue of Liberty sequence. I gave 2 stars to both Apocalypse and Last Stand. I watched both together last March specifically to compare them and decide which was worse. Apocalypse was a drop-off from Days of Future Past, but I liked it. Apocalypse was just too overstuffed to give various characters proper focus. It needed less action in exchange for more character moments with the new students. I wish the deleted scenes from the DVD had made their way into the finished film. I can't watched Last Stand to compare it to Apocalypse, because I'm not that much of a masochist.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 8:27:33 GMT -5
But seriously, I really liked the casting for Jean, Scott, and Xavier, and Rogue was fine. James Marsden did absolutely nothing with the role beyond throw shade at Wolverine, Anna Paquin just wasn't Roque (though that's the fault of casting and writing, not of the actor herself), and I truly don't think Famke Janssen can act. Patrick Stewart was good enough, but I think he got the role more for being bald and professor-like than for being Professor Xavier-like. I did love Ian McKellan as Magneto. Yes, Anna Paquin's portrayal has little to do with the comic book character. All the vitality was sapped out of her. A big part of her character is the contrast between outward bravado and inward vulnerability. They just dumped the bravado part. But I agree that it seems like a writing problem. Paquin can't act out what isn't in the script. The irony for me regarding Patrick Stewart a Professor X is that if Stewart had just acting like Jean-Luc Picard it would have been closer to Prof. X he portrayed in the original trilogy. Xavier can be a demanding teacher at times. But Stewart just played him as a sweet, nice guy. Ian McKellan gives the closest performance to his comic book counterpart in the original trilogy.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 8, 2017 7:49:14 GMT -5
I am completely fed up with the Bicycle Helmet Crusaders. Each time a cyclist is injured, news report insist on pointing out that "the person was not wearing a helmet", even when it has nothing whatsoever to do with the incident. A cyclist going the wrong way, at night, without a light, gets hit by a truck? "No helmet". A cyclist, drunk as a sailor, falls off a bridge? "No helmet". A cyclist fails to do their Stop and ends up as a fender decoration? "No helmet". That @&$# helmet, which is at most a nice complementary safety feature, has become the only socially acceptable discussion point when it comes to bike safety. Never mind obeying traffic laws, never mind being seen at night, never mind getting drivers and cyclist to learn how to share the road. It's all about the helmet, and our cowardly politicians are only too happy to vote more and more laws forcing people to wear them, even if research after research shows that such laws have no net effect on safety. It is pure laziness on the part of news reporters to keep harping on that point, and it is counterproductive: because as long as we focus on that @&$# helmet, we won't be talking about important safety issues. This obsession with new coercive measures meant to replace common sense is turning me into a cranky survivalist type. Now we're even talking about laws against kids below 14 crossing the street alone, because "studies" suggest that they're not as careful as grown-ups when doing so. Oh, for crying out loud! What's next? Mandatory testing to check if we are all wearing sunscreen before going out? Mandatory buoyancy vests when we leave our house just in case we fall in a swimming pool or a river? Mandatory parachutes in case we fall off a cliff? When does it end? There! I said it. The helmet is about severity, not causation, so I think it makes perfect sense for the media to mention lack of a helmet when a drunk cyclist is hurt. One of my problems with bicyclists or motorcyclists not wearing helmets, is the impact on a driver who is involved in a collision. If someone dies or is brain damaged, because they weren't wearing a helmet, it's little solace to the motorist to say it's not your fault. They have to deal with being involved in a fatal crash. And someone who is all about personality when they want to go without a helmet may change their tune after an accident. Failing to wear a helmet is not a bar to a lawsuit after an accident. Failure to wear a helmet could come into play when assessing damages, but there is work to be done to get there. So I don't see this as merely a "personal consequences" situation, because failure to wear a helmet to impose consequences on other people.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 7, 2017 19:01:44 GMT -5
I'm pretty excited and looking for a forum where people can discuss this film openly. I expect to see it a second time today. I'm curious on your thoughts about the inclusion of Iron Man on "helping" Spider-Man with his suit, etc. Do you feel it enhanced the story or put a damper on it somewhat (which is what I felt)?
I feel the inclusion of Iron Man takes something away from Peter. Instead of relying on his own genius, intellect & will he now has a high tech "fairy" godfather backing him up.
I dislike the emphasis on the suit for the same reasons you did. Spider-Man has a cool, diverse set of abilities, so it diminishes them somewhat by putting so much focus on the costume. But I didn't mind it as much as thought I would based on the trailers. It served storytelling purposes, so there are pros to go with the cons. But speaking of Spidey's powers, his spider sense was noticeably absent. In fact, it had to be absent for several plot points to work. For instance, I can't see Peter overlooking Ned in his room if he had spider sense. I liked the movie a lot. It was clever, funny, action-packed, well-constructed, heart-felt, etc. They messed with the canon a bit, but I think the changes worked well. I don't mind them so much, since we've had opportunities to see more traditional portrayals of Aunt May, MJ, etc. on screen already. I think Sony/Marvel may have created a fake spoiler to take movie-goers by surprise. I heard that Michelle's last name was revealed in some materials to be Toomes. I never saw it coming when the Vulture turned out to be Liz's father, because I thought he was going to be Michelle's dad. Michael Keaton was great. I think his portrayal and the fact that Peter rescued him were helpful in explaining why he wouldn't reveal Spider-Man's identity. Civil War hinted that Tony and Pepper were on the outs. I felt bad about that, so I was glad to see Gwyneth Paltrow back as Pepper. One glaring inconsistency was the portrayal of Spider-Man's skills in Civil War compared to Homecoming. Spidey had skills to hold his own against various Avengers in Civil War. But I guess the storyline of Homecoming required Spidey to be less adept at this point.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 3, 2017 21:19:15 GMT -5
I googled Brittany Pettibone and Virtue of the West, since this content was cut and pasted without a link. Turns out that she's a white supremacist and that's basically the point of her podcast. She has a partner named Tara McCarthy who is of a similar ideological bent. Their logo is a Spartan helmet, so I'm guessing they are advocates of violence as long as they have the numbers to win the fight. I don't know what incident this cutting and pasting is about, but her credibility is zero. You mean this BS "Rational Wiki" summary? rationalwiki.org/wiki/Brittany_PettiboneShe's a Trump supporter and nationalist. I've never heard her say anything racist or anti-semitic like this claims. And what's so hard to believe about what she says? This sort of crap goes on at essentially every rally that ANTIFA shows up at. Go to youtube and watch some of the videos of these degenerates. No, I mean google anything. Her YouTube channel is filled with several videos with various alt-right, white supremacists, etc. I encourage everyone who wants to know to google Brittany Pettibone themselves. Don't take my word for it. I've already condemned violence at Berkeley to try to silence speakers. But any article that cites Pettibone as a "free speech advocate" is suspect. We don't need to need to be normalizing racism, religious bigotry, etc. We don't need to be go backward to the 17th century or 15th century or whenever and re-litigate whether people who tick different demographic boxes than us are human beings with rights and dignity. This alt-right stuff is at the margins because it that disgustingly backward. Let's not mainstream it.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jul 3, 2017 15:46:07 GMT -5
Yup And now New Jersey Homeland Security has officially declared ANTIFA a terrorist organization. Hopefully more places follow suit and start throwing these pricks in jail. Everyone should have the right to free speech. Left, right or center. " “We were surrounded the entire time. It was crazy. Antifa tried to rush us a few times, but the police held them back,” Brittany Pettibone, a free speech advocate, author, and co-host of the Virtue of the West podcast told Big League Politics.
We asked Pettibone if she was concerned for her safety, particularly when attempting to exit the plaza.“I attended the rally alone, so yes, I was concerned for my safety the entire time. The Antifa were bold enough to challenge the police a few times. I met two guys who were punched in the face by Antifa and another who punched an Antifa in the face in self-defense and the Antifa’s tooth got knocked out and stuck in his hand,” Pettibone told BLP. “I was given a police escort from the rally, so I made it out safe. The Antifa are getting even more radical. Wouldn’t be surprised if someone gets killed one of these days.”Pettibone added that while she expected this rally to be big, it was by far the largest she had been to — which includes the Battle for Berkeley.
Tim Treadstone, better known as ‘Baked Alaska’, had received violent threats and was placed on a “bigot list” that was posted around town and sent to hotels and other establishments urging people not to service them prior to Saturday’s event.
Treadstone told Big League Politics that during the rally people were throwing balloons filled with feces and urine, eggs, and bloody tampons." ~ from the bigleaguepolitics page. I googled Brittany Pettibone and Virtue of the West, since this content was cut and pasted without a link. Turns out that she's a white supremacist and that's basically the point of her podcast. She has a partner named Tara McCarthy who is of a similar ideological bent. Their logo is a Spartan helmet, so I'm guessing they are advocates of violence as long as they have the numbers to win the fight. I don't know what incident this cutting and pasting is about, but her credibility is zero.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jun 25, 2017 10:06:32 GMT -5
I finished reading the Iron Man Epic Collection TPB The Enemy Within, which reprints Iron Man #158-177 and Annual #9. I don't think I'd read any of the individual issues in the TPB before. It covers the beginning of the Obadiah Stane storyline. Jim Rhodes takes over as Iron Man around the middle of the TPB. I'd only read an issue or two of his stint as Iron Man, so it was new to me. The TPB ends with the storyline still ongoing. Stane is still running Stark's old company. Rhodes is still Iron Man. As the hero, Rhodes obviously gets a lot of pages, but at this point it seems like Stark's struggle with alcoholism still gets more character development moments than Rhodes does. One of the first comic book runs I ever followed was when John Stewart replaced Hal Jordan as Green Lantern. My perception is that GL run having a greater focus on Stewart as an individual than this run had on the personal aspects of Rhodes. I always felt like Rhodey got more development as Tony's pilot/best friend/sidekick than as a superhero. I feel like alot of his 'camera' time was spent worrying about living up to Tony when he was in the suit. or worrying about people figuring outhe's a different guy, etc. IIRC, the Stane arc goes to issue 200. Yes, when Rhodey as Iron Man, a lot of his character moments are in the armor thinking about those things. There's at least one issue in this TPB in which he only appears in the armor. I hope that doesn't come across as too critical, because Denny O'Neil certainly made an innovative move. He replaced a major hero and with an African-American in the early 1980s. Plus, it was a move that work really well within the title with Tony's history of alcoholism and with Rhodey as an established character.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jun 24, 2017 16:26:04 GMT -5
Mmmmh... According to this, the suit against Ms. Sanders, who was president of Burlington College at the time, is based on her possible distortion of donor levels on a loan application. The loan was not to pay for her lavish lifestyle or anything, but to allow the expansion of the college. Well, well, well. That doesn't mean the suit is baseless, and if there were really malversations the normal legal repercussions should ensue. However, this doesn't strike me as being as scandalous as a president firing the man investigating the possible collusion between his campaign and the Russian government. (And once again, I remain convinced that if such collusion did take place, it was very small potatoes... on the level of the Russians merely leaking information at opportune moments... nothing that the US government itself wouldn't do to influence another country's election. But if there is no "there" there, why is Trump so adamant about shooting down the investigation? It only makes him look bad). I don't believe Bernie Sanders is a saint. I just believe that out of all the candidates in the primaries, he was by far the candidate I viewed as the best choice. He had actual ideas to help the American people in general, and not only his small coterie of billionaire friends or interest groups; he cared about the environment, he cared about providing health care to everyone, that sort of thing... The kind of thing I'd expect a president to care about. And the man appointed to investigate Trump (Mueller) is known to be very close friends with James Comey. You don't find that to be a tad bit suspicious? I agree that Trump should tone down his rhetoric on stuff like Twitter, but he's faced the most opposition during his first 5 months in office of any President I can recall. From both the MSM as a whole and argent opposers on both the left and right. And it seems like it stems from two things mostly, him being caught making a crude joke about women 12 years ago and trying to institute a temporary, 4 month travel ban on countries that Obama himself listed in a proposed temporary ban during his administration. Trump simply tried to act upon it. Mueller and Comey are not close friends. Trump described them as "very close friends" and you parrot it. Trump says, "Jump." You say, "How high?" abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/mueller-comey-close-trump-suggest-48251561 They have never been to each other homes. They've worked at high levels in the FBI. Hillary Clinton and Mitch McConnell were in the Senate together. Maybe Hillary and McConnell are very close friends. People are opposed to Trump for numerous reason. If you divided the things he's done among 5 different people, each would have enough misdeeds to outrage. You've been in the discussions long enough to know that. You're just ignoring that. And Obama didn't propose a temporary ban on travel from those countries. That's just an objectively false claim, which you should retract. www.snopes.com/trump-immigration-order-obama/ Rather, he added those countries to a list from a bill, passed by Congress, that removed people from the visa waiver program (VWP). He wasn't a banning people from those countries, just requiring them to apply for and get a visa. There are lots of countries around the world where the average person has to get a visa before traveling to the U.S.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jun 24, 2017 13:35:07 GMT -5
I finished reading the Iron Man Epic Collection TPB The Enemy Within, which reprints Iron Man #158-177 and Annual #9. I don't think I'd read any of the individual issues in the TPB before. It covers the beginning of the Obadiah Stane storyline. Jim Rhodes takes over as Iron Man around the middle of the TPB. I'd only read an issue or two of his stint as Iron Man, so it was new to me. The TPB ends with the storyline still ongoing. Stane is still running Stark's old company. Rhodes is still Iron Man.
As the hero, Rhodes obviously gets a lot of pages, but at this point it seems like Stark's struggle with alcoholism still gets more character development moments than Rhodes does. One of the first comic book runs I ever followed was when John Stewart replaced Hal Jordan as Green Lantern. My perception is that GL run having a greater focus on Stewart as an individual than this run had on the personal aspects of Rhodes.
|
|
|
Post by spoon on Jun 24, 2017 12:38:01 GMT -5
The First Amendment includes freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and the right to petition the government regarding their grievances because those rights are at the heart of a healthy democracy. You don't seem to have much regard for the Enlightenment values our country was founded upon, but people aren't supposed to shut up until the next election. Speaking up and complaining when things are going wrong with the government is about as American as you can get. And as everyone else has pointed out, you're perception of how Republicans reacted during the Obama Administration bears no connection with reality. I think I read thousands, probably even tens of thousands, of racist comments about Barack and Michelle Obama in the comments to news articles at Yahoo! during the Obama Administration. I mean that literally. I'd go to political article after political article and see dozens of racist comments per article directed at Obama. And they'd usually be from many different users. Posters would use the "n word" but do things like replace the "g"s with "q" or insert spaces in the middle of the word to get around censors. During the Obama Administration, large numbers of people suddenly started argument that imagery regarding as anti-black racism, like depicting Obama as an ape, wasn't racism. People accused Obama of plotting to kill Americans at Benghazi. Trump accused Obama of killing a Hawaiian official. People accused Obama of turning FEMA trailers into concentration camps to kill political opponents. People accused Obama of creating a Nazi-like paramilitary force. Large swaths of Republicans in opinion polls repeatedly espoused views, with no legitimate evidence, that Obama lied about his place of birth and religion. People accused Obama (not jokingly) of being the Anti-Christ. A miniseries about the Bible (produced by Mark Burnett of Apprentice fame) cast a Satan who looked remarkably like Obama. People accused Obama of being a terrorist mole trying to destroy America (without the loads of reasons to be suspicious like in the Trump/Russia situation, with confirmed contacts). People said that Obama was going to seize power after his term in office expired. In reality, he bent over backward not to undermine a political opponent seeking to succeed him, although he had reason to think Trump was tainted. The Republican strategy of attacking the Affordable Care Act was marshaling the personal hatred of their rank-and-file members have for Obama. The GOP made up the name Obamacare to make the fight about personal animosity, not policy. Should I go on . . . ? Yeah, I'm a big believer in free speech...so why do liberals show up in droves at places like Berkeley and burn sh*t outside and assault people while trying to shutdown an Anne Coulter or Milo speech? Snoop Dogg shoots Trump in a rap video, Kathy Griffin holds up a severed bloody head of Trump in a mock ISIS shoot, and Johnny Depp makes jokes about his assassination (celebs who reach millions of people, all you guys have given me are a handful of cases of random nutters and douchebags)....and the left calls that "free speech". But invite a journalist or media analyst with conservative views to speak at your university...and the left calls that "hate speech". Are you an advocate of free speech though. Your grievances that I replied to were things like marches, wearing pink hats, and wearing "Love Trumps Hate" shirts. You don't seem to be opposed just to violence or jokes about violence. You seem to believe that an election ends all debate when the candidate you like wins. There's several gigantic problems with that philosophy. As noted, debate is supposed to go on between elections. It should go on, especially because this administration is historically dishonest and incompetent. It's necessary to communicate the popular will to politicians because Trump lost the popular vote, elected officials have pushed voter suppression, and politicians are trying to impose unpopular policies. And Trump himself had decided to hold a perpetual campaign. He's already formed his 2020 campaign entity and hold campaign-style rallies. I condemn violence at Berkeley. It's wrong Liberals aren't a monolith. Those huge protests regarding women's rights, the environment, Trump's tax returns, etc. were non-violent. But of course, you point to two incidents that occurred in the same place and likely had big overlap in participants. The has been violence at Trump's own campaign events against protesters. Trump himself has cheered on that violence. Trump has suggested supporters use violence. He has used as advisors people who have advocated political violence. For example, just the other day, at a bill signing, Trump invited Al Baldasaro, a campaign advisor and state legislator who advocated shooting Hillary Clinton. I condemn the violence on the fringe of the Left. I don't recall you condemning the violence that's at heart of the administration you support. I'm not a fan of Kathy Griffin or Johnny Depp. Their jokes about assassination aren't helpful to the discourse. But Trump and large numbers of his supporters are hypocritical on this issue. They take enormous pleasure in incivility and violent rhetoric when it's directed against their enemies.
|
|