DI Column: Hillary Hating 101
by Jon Monteith • Apr 9th, 2007 at 12:02 am • 8 comments
I’m sure with this pack of womanizing clowns (that’s just unnecessary provocation and I heart many of you), the follow-up to this one will be interesting.
I included LGBT because I’m sure people like Billy think Hillary’s a lesbian for not walking barefoot around her kitchen all day.
Comment by tet on 9 April 2007 at 7:04 am:
I try to be completely fair in my criticisms of Hillary. You are absolutely right about her being as ambitious and power-hungry as the rest of the field.
This means that she, like everyone else out there who is running, is basically evil in that are seeking to use government to change the country in the direction that they think it should go.
That’s diametrically opposed to my opinion, of course, which is that politicians need to get out of the fucking way and let the country go in the direction it wants to.
Hillary holds a special danger because of her experience, however. She has already been close enough to the seat of power in the Executive Branch that she knows exactly what buttons to push in order to get the results that she wants.
In addition, the Bush administration has seen to it that the Executive Branch has near dictatorial powers under their interpretations of the Patriot Act. Her political enemies could, conceivably, just disappear or be mysteriously linked to terrorism.
The previous Clinton administration (and I believe that it was a co-Presidency) demonstrated that it had no real restraint on its ambitions. Nothing has changed since the 90s in their personalities, as far as I can tell.
I could count on Obama or McCain or Guiliani or Romney screwing things up and being inefficient, since there’d be a learning curve after their election while she could jump in being evil from day one. With Hillary in office, I am afraid of how good at getting her way she could be, especially with a Democratically-controlled Congress. I am pretty sure that we’d have no freedom left by the end of her regime and that we’d long for the carefree days of Bush 2. (A horrific thought in itself)
Tom
Comment by Brandon on 9 April 2007 at 2:32 pm:
“This means that she, like everyone else out there who is running, is basically evil in that are seeking to use government to change the country in the direction that they think it should go”
Tom, you always say things like this without really qualifying them. What pray tell do you mean by “be evil?” Do you simply mean using the apparatus of the state to effect their goals? Do you mean they’re somehow nefarious and diabolical worshippers of satan, set, whatever? Are you saying the very use of government power is inherently wrong somehow?
Comment by tet on 9 April 2007 at 2:53 pm:
Yes, Brandon, I say that the use of governmental power above and beyond the minimum required to allow society’s members to have life, liberty and the ability to pursue happiness is inherently wrong. I don’t think I can get any clearer than that.
You keep asking that question and I keep replying to it the same way. This repetition gets somewhat tiresome. I mean, seriously, last time I explained it (in the Geraldo/O’Reilly article), you said that you knew what my beliefs were….
Now, to answer the other two, I object to the use of government to pursue virtually any personal agenda or belief in how the world should be. I favor dismantling the present government to the extent outlined in my previous paragraph and would look forward to living in whatever civilization ensued even if it didn’t necessarily meet my deepest desires as to what was proper. I have absolutely no interest in passing any legislation or coercing any person, organization or government body to align itself with my beliefs.
As far as the question concerning Satan or Set, there is no need for the perpetrators within government to worship any of the above. Humanity’s tendency towards corruption by power renders the involvement of such evil entities irrelevant and unnecessary.
I mean, really, Brandon, is your day so boring that you really desired to hear me rave about this again just to reduce the ennui?
Tom
Comment by Brandon on 10 April 2007 at 6:54 pm:
Yes, yes it is. That and using a loaded term like “evil” is useless without qualifying what about a particular action is so terrible. You use “evil” a bit freely, so I like to understand what particularly is bad about whatever it is you’re calling evil. And yeah I’m bored
Comment by Jon on 10 April 2007 at 10:06 pm:
I’m bored, too. Here’s hoping Kittencon (and Josh’s return) will lift my spirits this weekend. I’m moist at the thought of it.
Comment by tet on 11 April 2007 at 7:59 am:
Ok, now that I have described why political candidates for President (or Congress) are evil as a general rule, I hope that you bookmark this or something so I don’t have to repeat myself again.
Jon, I’m excited about you coming over, too. It should be a lower-key kittencon than in years past because we scheduled it (without checking the UofI calendar) on the same weekend as Mom’s Day and the motels are full, precluding some of our usual out-of-towners from attending easily.
None the less, there should still be a good mix of grad students, academics, gamers, hippies, weirdos, cats and my family–just no one from Halifax, Tasmania or 6th Fleet HQ this year.
Looking forward to seeing you.
Oh, want to toss in a plug. Now that Christianity is declining over most of the “civilized” world, one of the ills that it and the seapower of the British Empire destroyed is returning to the planet.
Beatrice Fernando, an ex-slave, is going to be speaking tomorrow night at Loomis Lab–7pm.
27 million slaves currently in the world, damn. Slavery, torture–the barbarians are not only at our gates, someone let them inside.
Tom
Comment by Brandon on 11 April 2007 at 10:17 am:
Tom Christianity and slavery peacefully coexisted for oh 1800 years or so. Slavery never really went away, we just didn’t talk about it.
Comment by tet on 11 April 2007 at 11:47 am:
Brandon, it was the combination of modern Christianity (influenced by the Enlightenment) and British Sea Power that virtually eliminated it (along with things like suttee).
You’re making the tacit assertion that “things were never much better concerning x then they are now.” This is simply not true. There was a period of about 150 years where slavery was commonly accepted as being “impractical” as well as immoral. The former came from British (later joined by Yankee) cannons, the latter from modern Christianity.
When someone dismisses the slow slide of things like human rights, freedom and progress into the ashcan of history as the continuation of things in the past, it diminishes the real progress that we had made fighting such wrongs.
Or are you going to question my implication that slavery is “evil” to attempt to distract people from my point?
Tom