• I am a homo. That is a good thing. I am a liberal. That is a good thing.
    Everyone is godless. I belong to the minority that has figured this out.

Partial Listing of Bush Regime Policies Obama Has Continued Or Expanded

Get the Facts on Obama's Wealthcare Plan for the HMOs and Health Insurers

About Me, Me, Me!

I am the epitome of evil to the Religious Right....OK, so is at least 60% of the U.S. population.

Followers!

"Google Bombs"

Blog Archive!

Labels!

Laughing at John Podhoretz

Posted by libhom Sunday, August 03, 2008

In case you haven't heard of him, John Podhoretz is a wingnut who works for the fascist propaganda rag, Commentary. His latest bit of silliness is to try to start a pissing contest with Time Magazine's Joe Klein, a conservative commentator who just isn't willing to be crazy enough to satisfy the neocons. (Note: "neocon" is really just a euphemism for "fascist.")

Podhoretz is one for wild flurries of rhetoric as was the case recently on his blog:

It is the view of Time magazine’s leading political columnist, and a former friendly acquaintance of mine, that bloggers on this site are more dangerous and threatening to the future of the world than Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Our intention in highlighting the words spoken by Iran’s president, he says, is to scare his parents in Florida and thereby achieve our vicious foreign policy aims. And he does not wish to accuse us of dual loyalty, but, darn it, he just can’t help himself, as he does it three times.

Klein defends himself from this nuttiness here.

However, connoisseurs of unintentional humor can have a field day with what Pohhoretz says without Klein's help. Pohhoretz's rant certainly is an overly dramatic reading of what Klein actually says. You would think that Klein is out to get Israel, something the extreme right always claims when anyone, including Jewish people like Klein, question the dangerous and foolish policies of the far right government in that country.

The underlying assumption is really funny too. We all are supposed to be obligated to believe that the policies of the right in Israel must be flawless. Never mind the fact that the right's policies here in the US have been ruinous for our country.

Pohhoretz's dramatic passage also is silly because it insists that Ahmadinejad is a threat "to the future of the world," a claim that sounds like it is out of a bad 50s scifi movie. In the real world, Ahmadinejad is not much of a threat to anyone for the simple reason that he isn't in charge of Iran. The Supreme Leader, not the President calls the shots in that country.

Just because we have a powerful president here in the US does not mean we should assume things work that way everywhere. In most countries, presidents are largely figureheads. In Iran, presidents have some administrative powers, especially on domestic issues. However, the notion that an Iranian president would have the power to decide whether or not that country goes to war is laughable.

How can a magazine like Commentary hope to be taken seriously by anyone but dittoheads when their writers show such incredible ignorance on the most important foreign policy issues of the day? You have to wonder what's next. Will they claim that Andorra has weapons of mass destruction, and we need to start bombing immediately?

The only thing about this that isn't funny is that the writers at Commentary have had some access to the Bush regime because their rhetoric provides a cover for the corporate interests and Christian religious extremism that drives the Mideast policy of the crooks who illegally occupy the executive branch.

 

2 comments

  1. Lew Scannon Says:
  2. The neocons claims against Iran are based on a misinterpretation of a statement Ahmadnijehad made. iran has every right to enrich uranium at it's current rate, and our attempts to punish them are a violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty both the US and Iran have signed. The IAEA has found no evidence that Iran is doing anything except building a power plant, and yet the calls from Israel and neocons keep coming for the US to violate international law, attack a sovereign nation (something the US wouldn't do with Pakistan, even to catch Bin Laden) and kill millions of Iranians who don't like their government either.
    I wonder how many children Podhoretz has in the military?

     
  3. landsker Says:
  4. Hello again, and after reading the link to Podhretz`s take on Israel.
    It seems that the focus of debate is shifting away from the bomb, bomb, bomb, the "Moslems and Terrorists", Jewish pundits have been knocked onto the back foot, to defend Israel and the relationship, if any (?) between Israel and the actions of the U.S. military in the Middle East.
    As for America having a strong president, surely he is just the mouthpiece for the monied classes, rather like our own little puppets, Blairs/Browns etc.
    Religion-based wars are usually also about power, territory and resources, no coincidence then, that the current mother of wars is being fought above the world`s biggest oilfields.

     

Search!



Facebook Fan Box!


More Links!





blogarama - the blog directory