among the highlights: posts # 1, 14, 21, 25, 32 (the smoking gun, in my mind)
“That’s not satire, that’s an attempt at persuasive writing.”
#1, 14, 21, 25, 32.
Posted on 10/15/2009 11:22:59 AM PDT by swarthyguy
I'm all for Liberty but I'd sacrifice some rights for a tough love leader and a law against Big Gulps.
......And people love a good dictator — or at least get over their hatred of one pretty quickly — provided that the dictator doesn't put up too many pictures of himself. We instinctively object to new forms of paternalism, but we also quickly accept them:
......President Obama should probably get a little bit dictatorial up in here. He's the only person in the U.S. unaware that we elected him dictator, giving him both houses of Congress and the major television networks whenever he wants them.
.....In fact, we need a dictator to do all kinds of things. I want a law making .....
(Excerpt) Read more at time.com ...
I too, like the posted Stein, long for the good old days under Joe Stalin, with those exciting boom times of the 5-Year Plans! The bonding between citizens that went on with 5 families to a room, the shared sanitary facilities for the whole block, even those midnight knocks on the door, taking counter-revolutionaries to the camps in Siberia.
Boy, that was living! Every one knew what was what! Who was who! Mom, giving me her half-potato, even after I turned her in for sneaking into a church! Fast, effective, free healthcare for all, so advanced that mothers returned to mining work the afternoon after giving birth in the morning. Patriotic dads, back to work on the same machine tools that maimed them only hours before!
No need to ask yourself, "Golly, why can't we have a strong and effective, patriotic government like that?" Yes, Comrades, we can! Si se puede!
Not a day goes by that I don't thank our lucky stars that our POTUS and former British Subject, President for Life Barack Hussein Obama II, is rapidly setting up just such a government for me and you.
read the whole thing and weep......
So this is how liberty dies; not with John Wayne swinging his musket in the ruins of the Alamo, but with a faggish whimper of smug approval.
Satire is just so, well, Twentieth Century, dontchathink?
This is the beginning of Hayeks steps on the road to serfdom.
To wit: The people tire of all the arguing and failure, and begin to long for a strong man who can just force things to go the right way.
This will indeed happen eventually.
Hayek was right.
Stein is being tongue in cheek in a very cheeky way. It’s hyperbole with a touch of humorous twist, but it absolutely exposes his desire for the government(the dear leader)to exert more control over citizens...or should I say subjects.
Stein thinks disguising his dictatorial vision by cloaking it in exaggeration and flippancy works. Not for me.
“Satire is just so, well, Twentieth Century, dontchathink?”
Allay, allay, relent, I pray thee! Lawrence wrote BAAAD satire with EEEVIL intent... maybe. I don’t choose to take offence unless it’s clearly intended. (Then I run away.)
Liberalism is arrogance writ large.
Stein has worked for Time magazine, the LA Times and is now back with Time magazine. He is a liberal. I do not think what he wrote is satire. It’s outrageous and repugnant thinking cloaked in hyperbole. There must be a literary desciptive, but I don’t know what that would be.
At first I thought this was satire. Then about midway through, I realized it wasn’t. Joel Stein really wants an Obama dictatorship.
Wow, just wow!
No matter what the author's intention, the sad thing is a lot of readers will be oblivious to any sarcasm but will still agree with everything he's written.
I wonder how many people expressing outrage over this article have their own laundry list of consensual private activity they'd like to crack down on.
I thought it was satire at first, too. Started waffling about midway through. The following paragraph at the end clinched it for me that Stein was serious:
“But also because instead of an actual dictator, I think what we need is to recognize that social mores require government nudges like the ones Bloomberg creates and Obama adviser Cass Sunstein advocates. We live in a connected age in which our liberties bump against one another. I know this is all easy to say since I’m not a smoker, a soda drinker or a columnist whom politicians listen to. But in an age of overwhelming choice, some dictatorial direction would help. Plus, then Obama wouldn’t have to be on TV so much.”
Why, Because if it was satire, Stein would have either gone WAY over the top here to drive the satirical point home or would have blown up his own premise. Instead, he did a mild back-off to what is apparently the actual point, with a little humor thrown in to make it more palatable. That’s not satire, that’s an attempt at persuasive writing.
Yeah, I’ve been kind of (cough) hammered on my attempt to be “kind”. The jury’s vote seems to be eleven to one, so I’ll think about it for a few years, and *probably* admit that I *may* have been *slightly* mistaken. SOB! You’re all MEAN!
LOL, didn’t mean to be mean. Mean is saved for trolls! It’s all love (in a freeper way, of course) here!
Well said. Of course, dictatorships, esp leftist ones, never stay benevolent for long. They just bring death and suffering. Too bad leftdolts just can’t seem to learn that lesson until it is far too late...
Yikes! Cannot imagine showing it around here — blood pressure would be rising in Oklahomans.
I am not holding my breath for it to come out from those times. Bet he had the Bush Derangement Syndrome of the DemocRATs.
Satire or not? ...softening up the ground?
among the highlights: posts 1, 14, 21. 25, 32 (the smoking gun, in my mind)
“That’s not satire, that’s an attempt at persuasive writing.”
among the highlights: posts # 1, 14, 21, 25, 32 (the smoking gun, in my mind)
“That’s not satire, that’s an attempt at persuasive writing.”
#1, 14, 21, 25, 32.
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