Game over.
The competition for world’s most cretinously immoral blogger is officially at an end. Over on the HuffPo (why am I not surprised), one Russell Shaw takes on – purely as a mental exercise, you see – the weighty task of wondering whether or not another terrorist attack on the US homeland would or would not be of net benefit to American society. That benefit, payable in “n” number of American lives lost, would redound to Mr. Shaw’s preferred political party, and thence to the rests of us, the lumpen red state masses otherwise too ignorantly self-absorbed in NASCAR to make the same kinds of choices Mr. Shaw and his friends would like for us.
One presumes that “n” is actually “n minus anyone Mr. Shaw himself cares about.” After all, there are so many other people in the country that one doesn’t know.
Among the many benefits that such a terrorist-initiated – hey, politics does make strange bedfellow – regime change would engender, are: Another Roe v Wade-friendly Supreme Court justice or two, increased gun control, universal health care, cleaner air standards, mass transit and an augmented minimum wage. And for this classically scattershot liberal wish list to come to fruition this time – we didn’t quite get ’round to it during the Clinton years – all that would be necessary is that a few thousand perhaps, hopefully no more than that, 100,000 at the highest, American citizens would have to die horribly. As a down payment, like. Past performance does not ensure future returns, though, so: Caveat moritur.
Going to make an omlette? Gotta break a few eggs. The ends justify the means, and all that.
I don’t see anywhere within there a recommendation on how we’d stop the next terrorist attack after that one though. Presumably if Bush wasn’t president they wouldn’t hate us anymore.
So, not just cretinous and immoral, but blind as well – can’t see past his own prejudices to see into his self-interest. If people like Mr. Shaw can’t see why such a post is offensive not just to those of us on the opposite side of the politcal spectrum from him, but also one expects from broad swathes within his own party, then he’ll continually wonder why the rest of us will just never see it his way.
What a prick.
(H/T to Dusty over at Big John’s for the link. Here’s more on the same subject.)
Such language, sir.
I suggest, on the basis of our mutual assessment, that a study group be formed forthwith to invent a brand-new, suitable adjective. None of the set I’ve got seems sufficient.
Perhaps a pleasing acronym symbolizing a conjunction of everyone’s favorites.
These people are starting to sound a lot like the damn Nazi’s…and scaring me more than a little bit. Time to buy some more ammo…
On an mistaken impulse, I returned to the HuffPo post and browsed the first page of comments; I think some of those folks, if not quite up to the author’s qualifications, might very well place or show.
Just now, it started playing in my mind:
“As someday it may happen that a victim must be found, I’ve got a little list – I’ve got a little list…”
No, not me. Never.
“Incredible courage” again?
Michelle McNally must think he’s “brave”.
After all, its the thought that counts.
I guess I’m going to be bucking the trend. To me this isn’t much different from arguing that Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were justified because they ended the war and saved lives, or that bombing Iran before they develop nuclear weapons would be acceptable.
The only difference I see between his arguments and mine is that I don’t think his will work. That just makes him stupid, not evil. Even when you factor in the number of lives lost he’s criminally stupid, not cretinous.
The most telling thing about this is that despite all the high-minded talk of empathy and feeling for the little people they’re no different than I am. Nobody who endorses this, even tacitly, can EVER claim to be a better human being than I. Deep down we’re all the same, bloodthirsty little monkeys willing to kill to get what we want.
Welcome to the seedy underbelly of the human condition, Mr. Shaw.
I have to say I’m leaning more toward MMDeuce’s position on this.
Cassandra also wrote about this. Grim in particular (who wrote the provocative “On Killing Children” post over at Blackfive) has some thought provoking comments on her post.
I have to disagree MMDeuce: this specimen is evil AND stupid.
He wants to use another attack for political gain, so our betters can impose their utopia on us ungrateful proles. Any bets that he and his ilk would screech like scalded monkeys if the “Rethuglicans” pointed out how the left has hamstrung our efforts at every opportunity?
I FEAR that it will take another, worse attack for us to get serious. Since one of my children will be living in NYC, my moral calculus is a bit different than Mr. Shaw’s.
Please read the analysis at this site:http://www.caerdroia.org/blog/archives/2006/08/shaws_but_prove.html
This has to be the very best reasoning as to why Shaw’s means to an end to further his own idea of what our political future should be is: “Evil is as Evil does” at it’s worst.
I just thought it was dull. I clicked, read, eyes wandered, lost interest and never reached the end.
It is hard to be a good bomb-thrower if you are dull.
The cat doesn’t off get my tonugue. This time it has. But I am glad it waited until after I posted a comment over there.
Now I don’t have anything to say. Except for this – if I try to take a large step back, I am amazed at the amount of anger inside me at the moment, almost like I am shaking internally. That just reading his words makes me wish I could find his throat.
Michelle, I’m with you. I’m “almost” without words to describe my feelings on this. I like the idea from “socialism_is_error” – a new acronym needs to be found to satisfy how we feel about people like this, and their thoughts. And speaking as someone who has already lost a loved one on 9/11, I loathe and completely detest people who use these losses for political gain. These were PEOPLE – with families. They aren’t pawns.
I have some rather imaginative thoughts on how to DEAL with Mr. Shaw – but they shall remain only thoughts, as I don’t want Lex to ban me for life.
I see they didn’t post my comments over there. Hey, its not like I actually told him what I thought he was, just what I thought of his thoughts. Oh well, assuming I’m banned over there, I won’t lose too much sleep over it.
But whats with this, most (all?) of the comments are followed by the words “Flag: [abusive]“?
As one who was on the receiving end of one of the 9/11 attacks, I have little patience with such as Messr. Shaw and his convenient moral relativism. Away sir, to the shadows with the other sub-humans and vermin you so richly deserve to keep company with…
-SJS
SJS – I’d agree except I think you are insulting the vermin by banishing this *&^%$ to them. Unless you mean terrorists, at which point I’d be happy to see him with a knife to his throat with a couple of jihadists making him convert. See how much he thinks we have to “gain” from another attack when he’s on the receiving end, all personal.
Perhaps we can all buy NASCAR tickets for Mr Shaw. Have him wear his comment on a sandwich board at the pre-race kegger.
After the pre race impromptu soccer clinic, he can let us know if he feels our pain.
Just another P.O.S. They’re everwhere in this e-world. Another miserable, weak, and powerless loser attempting to push his moonbat agenda.
To be honest I am less shook up by this bozo’s b.s., than I am by Ol’beady eyes and that Hizbollah Mullah(hey- that sounds like a new dancestep…)
B2
I can’t seem to get past that whole “net benefit” part….
I just keep goin’ back up to that ittle bitty phrase.
MMDeuce:
I think what is most apt here is a rating of the credibility of the theoreticals.
Feel free to dispute it, but I think that in the case of the atomic bombing, the credibility of the projected alternative in loss of life, property damage, etc. was indisputable. We had fought this enemy for some years, and thus had direct observation of his strength of will and overall philosophy of war; in fact, the appalling casualty rates on Okinawa constituted an immediate, objective example of what we could expect in invasion of the “home” islands.
Contrast this with a credibility test of Mr. Shaw’s theoretics, which I believe can best be done by similarly examining the most immediate, objective examples of the type. What to examine and why?
Well, what we are looking at is a series of predictions of disaster, based on policy choices; this, I say is why the following are suitable candidates:
1. The clear errors in predicting the effects of the welfare reform legislation,
2. the clear errors in predicting the casualty rates in the first Gulf War and
3. the clear errors in predicting the casualty rates in the deposing of the Taliban.
Once again, feel free to choose your own.
In these cases, the Left predicted disaster in the most hyperbolic language. We’re not talking about street partisans; this was from the political leadership, academia and think-tanks: the Left’s best and brightest. Not only were they wrong, they were spectacularly wrong, off by no less than several orders of magnitude. This, for me, destroys their credibility in general and Mr. Shaw’s in particular. For his propositions, unless he can come up with (at the very least) a sound chain of logic from premises which I can accept as true, I’ll prefer the lessons of history.
I call what this man has written legitimately evil, since it envisions evil as a tool. It’s not hard to see the next step in such calculation.
dc: That’s just the thing – the NASCAR crowd would roll their eyes at this guy, but I’d wager that he’d be in no more physical peril there than you or I would be. Just look at the journos who tried to incite them at a NASCAR event a few months ago by parading about in some ‘Islamic’ getup, only to be met with the resounding lack of a story.
The ivory tower crowd loves to look down their noses at the ‘Rednecks’, but the vast majority of them are decent people just trying to go about living their lives the best they can. Having grown up in the South, I know these people. A sizeable percentage of them are fiercely individualistic, yes, but individualism to them means that not only will they not put up with you making up their minds for them, but they also won’t try to make up your mind for you. They know that means that not everyone will agree with them – and just as impartantly, that’s OK. It takes all kinds, as they say.
It seems to me that it’s the intellectual crowd that’s most likely to respond to difference of opinion with hatred and vitriol. As for Billy Ray? He’d probably listen to Mr. Shaw with a mixture of amusement and horror, tell him that maybe his Pappy shoulda taken him out behind the woodshed a time or two when he was a youngin’ (“mighta done you some good, Sir”), and then proceeded to go cheer on Ricky Bobby, with nary a backward glance. No screeching OpEds in the NYT, no calls for censure, no painted plackards and kitschy chants, no protest marches.
As for me, I know which crowd I prefer to hang out with – and which better reflects traditional American values.
I’m just sayin…
“…the Left?
“…the Left’s best and brightest…” Isn’t that an oxymoron???
“…Not only were they wrong, they were spectacularly wrong…” Of course they were, they just don’t get it and they never will.
They are intelligent enough, just lacking in correct thinking. Using even flawless logic from utopian premise(s) doesn’t “get it”, as you say.
Inevitably, their achemes require brute-force statism; they persist, in spite of the endless stream of objective failures of such systems.
I recently commented in Wal-Mart, redux, in reply to B2, Nose, et al., including the fact that I have spent a career nose-to-nose with the results of such nonsense. Speculation is not required.
Scott:
…Unless you turn him loose in the Talladega infield, Saturday night and the back of the sandwich board said “and Junior is Gay” *That* would surely elicit a response
- SJS
socialism_is_error, I pretty much agree with what you said. Except that I think you and I see socialism differently. You see it as evil, I see it as wrong. Therefore you see anyone who advocates socialism as evil, while I see them as stupid. In this case, given the cost he requires for a dubious outcome I would go so far as saying that Mr. Shaw is criminally stupid, but he’s no more evil than I am.
My biggest point was that a great many (but by no means all) of the responses to this from the right took the tone of “How evil this man is for advocating the deaths of Americans to further his stated aims of saving lives” when those selfsame people would eagerly advocate (as I do) that Iran should be bombed, potentially killing thousands, in order to save lives.
The only reasons I could see for this discrepancy is either some people favor Americans more than other people or they just weren’t aware of the hypocrisy. Hanlon’s razor and my esteem for those who post here dictate I assume the latter.
MMDeuce, I think we differ in minutiae: I will attempt to clarify.
My nom-de-blog signals my general philosophy, but can be subject to misinterpretation. I believe socialism is wrong (error), not evil, as you do; however, I recognize the great evil that has been done in its service. I trust that makes my basic position clear; a full explanation would be too long.
As to an evaluation of Mr. Shaw, you can only be referring to my final paragraph:
I call what this man has written legitimately evil, since it envisions evil as a tool. It?
MMDeuce, I think we differ in minutiae: I will attempt to clarify.
My nom-de-blog signals my general philosophy, but can be subject to misinterpretation. I believe socialism is wrong (error), not evil, as you do; however, I recognize the great evil that has been done in its service. I trust that makes my basic position clear; a full explanation would be too long.
As to an evaluation of Mr. Shaw, you can only be referring to my final paragraph:
I call what this man has written legitimately evil, since it envisions evil as a tool. It’s not hard to see the next step in such calculation.
This does not call Mr. Shaw evil, for I believe that someone not intrinsically evil can, nonetheless, produce evil through ill-considered thought. That was what I was trying to express in the first sentence; he was playing around with the notion of possible benefits of evil. In fact, he somewhat recognizes the danger himself:
“I am not proud of myself for even considering the notion that another terror attack that costs even one American life could ever be considered anything else but evil and hurtful.”
My second sentence attempts to indicate (too obliquely, perhaps) the terrible slippery slope situation inherent in such dalliance. Just how easily might someone willing to play with such thinking be susceptible to a triggering event that would cause a wish for such a thing? And beyond.
If you accept this, I think we are clear. Your own assessment of Mr. Shaw’s fallacies includes a recognition of my contention that his cause-and-effect claims are “dubious”, the point of the bulk of my comment.
Regards, sir.
SIE
Housekeeping: To whom it may concern:
When I entered the blogosphere last summer, Bill Roggio’s crowd at the fourth rail took one look at my nom-de-blog and, in the interests of brevity, christened me SIE. I have been remiss in not introducing this ere now, particularly as I myself am a two-finger typist.
Apologies,
SIE
SJS:
Yeah, I’ll have to give you that… =)