Do you think this kind of nonsense, given their shrinking demographic, can really last more than one or two more cycles?

Why is it that the laws against terrorism can’t be applied to these people?  Is it that they’re not Muslimy enough?

Ben—Is this really something unique to that demographic? or just a consequence of getting older? I am not sure that the olds who replace them might be just as reluctant to succumb to a changing society and face their generations unending march to oblivion.

Ben—Is this really something unique to that demographic?

Yes. If you look at the numbers, this started when the current teabaggers were in their 20s. They’re still fighting the 1960s. This is also a given since this demographic is the whitest (or more accurately for what I’m describing the least non-white) so of course it will have the most wingnuts.

There’s a fetish right now for blaming this crazy level of right wing populist fury on the economy.

Thank you for proposing an alternate theory…I’ve been getting tired of a lot of the liberal bloggers I admire putting forward the idea that the less money white people have, the more bigoted they must be.  (Obama did it, too, with his “clinging to guns and religion” comments.)  That argument (1) excuses white bigotry as a natural consequence of economic hardship, (2) reinforces a “white trash” stereotype that poor white people are all bigots, and (3) pretends there is not a huge number of pretty well-off white bigots out there, like the Koch brothers or Rupert Murdoch or James O’Keefe.  (And as to (3)—hello?  Rich white men have a massive vested interest in preserving a system that favors rich white men, and are likely to have a lot more of a financial interest in perpetuating bigotry.)

Which why it was so important to bust up Acorn: whose voter registration success made it a target.

I’m 60 and I lived through Watergate and those people cheering when we got gassed in anti-war marches. Then as now, “they” combined the white, monied elite and the racist proles they ginned up for elections, so the elite could pass tax cuts for themselves and make fortunes on oil, Wall Street and whatever death dealing materials needed in the latest war they ginned up the proles to support.

The dirty tricks and voter suppression have also been going on for at least 40 years, all too successfully.

I’ve got stories, behind the scenes, but not in the mood to tell ‘em now.

Since this Democratic Congress and administration have done their damndest to hand the country back to them.

Right, ryang. They’re most middle and upper middle class. Poor white people actually vote for Democrats more than people think, especially outside of the South.

Oh and back in the 1960s we had a wonderful economy, fueled by decades of Democratic leadership: the Republicans began winning when they were able to begin monopolizing the bigot vote, despite a solid middle-class and booming economy.

I’m wondering myself if this isn’t just a culmination of the kind of violence that has always existed on the right: anyone who’s an Ob-Gyn at a Women’s Health Clinic can tell you that they’ve been under the gun & in the crosshairs of the anti-abortion reign of violence for at least the last 25 years.  The Feds have never taken the violence of the Randall Terry-types seriously, even when bombs were going off & people were being killed, so why should they start now?

I know how horribly negative the above sounds, but all too often the authorities in the US turn a blind eye to right-wing violence.  If they’re not participating in it themselves.

Who knows?  Now that law enforcement officers are getting gunned down by these “Sovereign Citizen” types, they’ll start taking right-wing violence seriously.

judy—

I really think that if it wasn’t for Vietnam Johnson would have been re-elected in 1968, despite the bigot vote. Hell Humphrey almost won anyway!

The economy started tanking the instant the Supreme Court threw it to GWB. I remember the DOW and NASDAQ started sinking and the dot com bubble burst shortly after and California’s entire treasury was vacuumed into Enron’s pockets due to energy deregulation. And if you bring it up with them, right-wingers will say they protested Bush’s spending while he was in office, but none of them were freaking out like they are now.
Also telling is what spending cuts they want to make. It’s always stuff that helps the little people, particularly women and minorites; Food stamps, welfare, school lunch programs, medicare, VA benefits… Never corporate welfare or defense spending.

Do you think this kind of nonsense, given their shrinking demographic, can really last more than one or two more cycles?
Comment #1: Ben D

I don’t know. I’m skeptical. They teach it to their kids. I’ve heard 20-somethings that talk like Archie Bunker.

@Ben D.:  Of course, if you’re a middle or upper class white person who’s a bigot (Rupert Murdoch, any given republican politician), you’re just being shrewd.

Snobographer, I just look at who they vote for. And they vote for Democrats when they vote. Someone posted a link here (forget who) that said Obama still has an 85% approval rating among 18-35 year olds.

Obama’s approval rating overall is on par with Reagan’s at the same point in his presidency.

Drop that fact and watch tea party brains explode.  Then they’ll promptly deny that fact as being “liberal”, “biased”, “lame”, and “skewed”.

But Nixon promised “Peace with Honor”: an impossible lie, of course.

But he also ran on dog whistle racism, so he got the bigot vote, the Republican vote, and those pissed at Democrats who hadn’t ended the war.

With dirty tricks all along the way—I was working in Government with some elite Republicans above me back around Watergate, and they knew all about the dirty tricks and employed several I saw even after Watergate.

One of which I, a drop-out college student, foiled royally on the international news: but that’s a story for another day.

The 18-35 may be Obama supporters still, but in the mid-terms will they show? Also: peel some back who will go Libertarian, or Green (including for Greens currently bankrolled by Republicans in PA and AZ.)

Nixon deliberately turned former Dixiecrats into Republicans, the southern bigots traditionally Democratic until Johnson signed the Civil Rights act.

And the Republicans have been mining that well for 40 years since.

”...the Republicans began winning when they were able to begin monopolizing the bigot vote, despite a solid middle-class and booming economy.”

...the booming economy that sank right after Nixon was elected, and has continued to provide no economic benefit for those outside the Privileged Few… 

...and that stagnation of wages, plus extreme deficits caused by tax cuts for the Privileged Few, makes for a continually sick economy for most people.

...which the Reichwing has been able to unfairly blame on the Left and Democrats.  Which ensures continued Republican electoral success… 

...which then fuels more economic failure, which is again blamed on Democrats, which ensures continued Republican electoral success, ad infinitum…

Then they’ll promptly deny that fact as being “liberal”, “biased”, “lame”, and “skewed”.

Or start barking about Jimmy Carter. A guy who left office 30 years ago, and they scream at us when we talk about Bush!

And I still say the reason they hate Carter is because he was a better Christian (in the best sense of the term) than politician on the right has ever been.

Yes, MikeEss, you’re right.

But the blame doesn’t only go to Democrats: the Brown People get an inordinate amount of blame as well. (But doncha know, the Democrats are giving Your Money to the Brown People.)

Taxes have been slashed for the rich over and over during those last 40 years, jobs and manufacturing sent overseas, the middle class destroyed, and the elite have been happy to set those below fighting over whatever scraps they throw down.

can we say “brownshirts” boys and girls? i knew that you could.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/10/27/914006/-The-other-Republican-Partymeaner,-richer,-and-anonymous

Why is it that the laws against terrorism can’t be applied to these people?  Is it that they’re not Muslimy enough?

They don’t do it because they don’t want to do it.  They’re not beholden to any laws and principles that the right wing politicians and agencies regularly discard, they could easily do the same thing if they wanted.  They don’t do it because they have no intention of ever doing it.  Remember when we were talking about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell?  About how Obama is fighting to keep it on the books?  They don’t do these things out a sense of trust in the rule of law, they do it because they are not your friends.  They do it because they do not represent you.

The government is not our friend.  The police are not our friends.  The law is not our friend.  The government is on the side of the people who scream about destroying the government.  The people who want “smaller government”-those are the people who already control the government.

We learned a long time ago that the police were not our friends.  Why would we expect the people in charge of the police to be any different?

“can we say “brownshirts” boys and girls? i knew that you could.”

Weren’t the Squadristi / Black Shirts just as nasty as the S.A.? 

Why do the Italians — who invented and named Fascism, who put it into practice while Young Mr. Hitler was still trying to figure out what he wanted to do after the Great War, and then while writing and then selling copies of Mein Kampf, who already had in Mussolini what Hitler would only become later — why do they get dinked on their contributions to Fascism in favor of our obsession with the Nazis?

Sure, I’ll grant that the Germans took Fascism to the next level, but to diminish the pioneering spirit and the importance of many of the great/sick ideas of the Italian fascists, well, it’s just not fair.  They deserve as much blame for Fascism as the Germans…

“The people who want “smaller government”-those are the people who already control the government.”

...and made it as large as it is for their own benefit, while blaming the whole thing on greedy colored people and oldsters.  Quite a racket…

And while I think bad times are increasing tension, my feeling is the economy doesn’t have as much to do with this as people think.

I agree. If you look at some of the groups who are really hit by unemployment and/or poverty (POC, young people, etc.) they aren’t the ones screaming (literally for) bloody murder. It’s the well-off and/or comfortably retired white people who are flipping the fuck out right now.

Bagelsan. Do they think they have the most to lose?  I think that’s part of it. Money, status, privilege.

Do they think they have the most to lose?  I think that’s part of it.

From the poor economy, you mean, or the changing America? I think the ‘baggers/etc. definitely have the most status and privilege to lose due to the latter. I agree with many others on here that that is exactly why they are shitting themselves. I don’t know about the money loss though—I’m not sure that all that many of them have very endangered finances due to the economy (at least, not more than anyone else in the country.)

What they have to lose is the future kinda.  As in the Future, they attack those things that they don’t want it to be about.  Many do think of it in 60’s terms.  Underneath it all and fueling the anger is that they can’t stop it, and not only can’t stop it but are seeing it “in their lifetimes”, which I’m guessing they mostly did not expect.

It’s the well-off and/or comfortably retired white people who are flipping the fuck out right now.

Teabaggers are solidly middle class.  They have a median household income of $50,000 (and it’s likely that most of those households are dual income), and 15 percent of them have college degrees, which tracks almost exactly with the American population at large.

This recession has hit the middle class very hard.  Men, in particular, have lost jobs and haven’t found new ones, and middle aged workers are finding it nearly impossible to find work.  This recession is going to leave many people permanently unemployed, and I’m certain most of them are middle aged, middle class, and relatively well educated.  Younger, poorer, less educated, low skilled workers ultimately don’t find it that hard to find work since they have such low expectations, since they can fill a much larger variety of jobs (anything that pays shit wages with no benefits), and since employers are more willing to hire them (because they’ll put up with more shit).  But someone who has a college degree and is used to making $40k a year isn’t going to settle for a low wage or entry level job.

I’m only 30, and I know it would be harder to find work now than it was the last time I was unemployed six years ago.  When I was 24, I was still starting out and could take any entry level job.  Now I have specific skills and high expectations for pay and benefits.  Taking any job would be a significant step down for me, and I don’t even have to worry about supporting a family.

I think Amanda is seriously underestimating how much impact the economy is having on this.  At a minimum, this economy is creating a much larger pool of useful idiots with a lot of time on their hands.

At a minimum, this economy is creating a much larger pool of useful idiots with a lot of time on their hands.

But they should have become our useful idiots, not theirs.

JulieMcCloud @28, Bagelsan @29, ewellone @30: I really think that calling this a “loss of status” doesn’t quite capture what the deal is for these people.  Calling it a “loss of privilege” is more or less accurate if you interpret “privilege” in the technical sense it has in the term “White privilege,” but I still think it falls short, because it doesn’t frame the issue as I think it should be framed: they’re fundamentally opposed to policies that improve brown people’s lives.

When you look at it from a strict economic perspective, these folks have everything to gain from policies they oppose, like healthcare reform.  As Amanda has said many times (and I fully second), this isn’t about them losing anything in absolute terms; it’s about a more fictive “loss” that they would incur if those brown folks became better off than they are now, and close the economic gap.

You know that Rally to Restore Sanity that Stewart and Colbert are throwing? Some cheesehead on Fox is saying union members will be forcibly bused in at gunpoint.
http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201010270014

It just seemed relevant to this discussion.

this isn’t about them losing anything in absolute terms; it’s about a more fictive “loss” that they would incur if those brown folks became better off than they are now, and close the economic gap.

Oh sure, agreed. When I say “loss of status” I basically mean the loss of their “nyah nyah I’m better than those damn [insert ethnic group/other minority]” status. Rationally these people have everything to gain—rising tide floating all boats, etc—except that they want to be the only ones above the surface. The status they prize is the pride of “better than” more than any kind of objective well-being.

Is my take on it, basically.

When I was 24, I was still starting out and could take any entry level job.

What entry level jobs? All your 30-year-old peers are competing for those jobs with the 20-somethings, now. Not to mention, having your first job be particularly low-paying or crappy can set you back financially for ages—entering the workforce during a recession has long term effects on income.

This isn’t to get into a poorer-than-thou argument, or anything; I’m just pointing out that a 22-year-old’s desperation, low standards, lack of experience, and employer-abuse-ability aren’t really beneficial when she’s trying to start a career or land her first “real” job…

keshmeshi, you are younger than many of us here and like many have already said, we’ve seen this story play out over and over again.  The economy has been collapsing ever since the last or middle portion of the sixties when manufacturing was no longer protected in this country.  Imported steel flooded the market and killed the steel industry, import cars hit an unprepared and overly pampered auto industry and killed that as well. 

In the east the millyards had began shutting down since the 20’s and the south just moped along as usual, never really recovering from the antebellum culture and reeling in division and identity crises after the civil rights act passed.

Dirty hippies smoking pot all the time and talking about revolution and communism, negroes running around with new ideas in their heads, demanding better jobs, rioting in the ghettos, women folks divorcing men, refusing to get married, acting like uppity dikes, getting educations and demanding jobs that aren’t theirs.

People were confused and at the same time they were losing their jobs left and right, plants were shrinking and closing, downtowns across the country began to get swallowed up by mass corporate franchises and the mall disease, everyone had a color television no matter how poor they were. 

Nixon effectively took the anger about losing their jobs and stagnant wages, inflation and the rest and pointed the angry masses at those damn hippies, negroes and promiscuous sluts who were taking everyone’s hard earned money! That’s where the economy is going!

Reagan then took that same ire and turned up the volume, called it a “revolution” and it hasn’t stopped since.  The majority of the Democratic party operatives (almost all white then)  have done little to stop it since they’ve benefited from Ronnie’s policies just like every wealthy person has.  While the poor get poorer, they feel more left out and angrier and are told over and over again to look at the Godless, the unwashed, the unclean, the undocumented—- the undeserving who are not like THEM.

Like another said here, and so it goes around and around until finally enough common people have decided they’ve had it and realize that the noise machine is telling them lies.  I don’t know when that will happen. History says that those people have to suffer a lot more than they are now.

“The status they prize is the pride of “better than” more than any kind of objective well-being.”

THIS!  This is key.  For example, people who have the opportunity to fly first class generally have three responses:
1.) It would be better for me if everyone could be comfortable. (Progressive)
2.)  The fact that there are people back in coach makes me enjoy this more, but I understand that this makes me an asshole, and I really know that I shouldn’t try to construct society to allow me to enjoy this dirty pleasure.  But the temptation… (‘Independent’)
3.)  The fact that there are people back in coach makes me enjoy this more, and they are fucking losers who deserve their discomfort. (Conservative)

Amanda, although what happened was a brutal assault and should always be referred to as such, “curb stomping” is isn’t. (Look it up.) I say this not from a lack of outrage, but from a fear that your opponents will focus on this and thus get an easy way out from what is otherwise a watertight example of their moral privation.

On the other hand, never mind. You could have them dead to rights and they’d still manufacture excuse after excuse.

“Clinton won—-twice—-because Ross Perot split the wingnut vote.”

I think it’s kind of misleading to say Perot split the wingnut/conservative vote.  I think Clinton would have still won on his own merit without Perot.  Perot had some other positions, but his main issue was anti-free trade which upset a lot of liberals and is still upsetting them.  In fact if anything, because Clinton supported free trade, he probably lost support in the elections and would have won by larger margins if he opposed free trade.

#35: I’d be willing to bet that the majority of the staffers and other workers at those clinics are women, too. The Repubs and conservatives have a tendency to think of themselves as men and everybody else as women—-or womanish.

@32 - Yeah, they should have. We have to stop focusing just on the evil right-wingers and their seductively deceptive frames, and start coming up with some positive framing of our own.

@38 - As an employer, I gotta tell you, you’re wrong. Not that I go around looking for young-and-dumb so that I can put them in the Exploitationatron, but desperation, low standards, etc. reduce the cost of a hire. Low-cost hires do have an advantage over high-cost hires at the beginning of their respective careers. I’ve gotta hire a warm body to hold a sign, do you think I’m looking for a college graduate with a commitment to progressive values? No, I look for the girl who will show up for work but who also has no extra skills or aptitudes that I have to pay extra for.

You may say, yeah, but it’s a minimum-wage sign-holding job, it’s not a career. True - but of my four assistant managers, two of them started off holding signs. It’s a stepping stone, and the first one to the stone often has an advantage.

I remember polls from 1992 that showed Perot taking votes about equally from Bush and Clinton.  I think he would have won anyway.

Why is it that the laws against terrorism can’t be applied to these people?

They are, in the cases where actual acts of terrorism are committed.  Not always, but in some cases, yeah.

I think a lot of these people feel justified using violence not only because they are the only true “Americans” they also believe they have god on their side.

Libertarian, you can pretend that Valle put Rand Paul on the curb and stomped him with her Doc Martens all you want, but that don’t make it so.

Other than a paper cut, there is no danger in a piece of paper that justifies the use of the word “attacked”.

OTOH, putting a woman on the ground and then stomping her shoulder and head is pretty much a textbook attack.

Does being a “libertarian” result from being lobotomized in high school?...

@Alkaloid,

So, what, your assistant managers have cracked the $8 per hour mark? W00t!

You are so full of it. Exploitatron indeed. (Although, I will be stealing that word - very descriptive, well played, sir.) You are no different than McDonalds, who sells that same bullshit line at hiring. “Well, show up and work hard, and maybe, if you are one of the destined, you may make manager, with bennies, and maybe, if you dream big… Hamburger U.” (Followed by “oooohs” and golf claps).

A fast food manager in St. Paul makes approx $13-14 per hour, before any employee contibutions to insurance or any other benefits, much less retirement. It is a DEAD-END. So don’t spout this bullshit about “I am happy to hire anyone with the drive that comes from having nothing to lose, and with me, they just might make it after all! Ohohoho, god, I love me!”

@John Rove

The justified violence angle - There were remembrance articles for the Kent State shootings. When I was in HS in the 80’s, these were taught as one of the things that turned the American public against the war. I was not aware that at the time, it certainly did not turn the populace of Ohio, though - the governor cheered and the people approved, often with that same phraseology.

Bush v. Gore was terrible law, is terrible law, and in my view shouldn’t have happened for a variety of reasons including that the Supreme Court shouldn’t be constitutionalizing state election law and that Florida election law should have been better.  BUT, Bush won Florida.  Yes, Gore won the national popular vote, but several analyses of the vote in Florida after the election all showed Bush as the eventual winner in a full recount.

A fast food manager in St. Paul makes approx $13-14 per hour,

Considering the rent on a place in St. Paul, MN, that’s not bad.

We are in an era where it’s no longer a professional path to work in the mail room to “get your foot in the door,” unfortunately—the guys in the mail room are staying in the mail room. The administrative assistants are staying as administrative assistants. But keshmeshi’s point still stands: when you are young and have no experience, doing something keeps your rent paid, gives you some savings and, most importantly, puts something on your resume so you have something to show for yourself while you find a better job. In this economy, a lot of young people don’t even have that.

WTF is wrong with you, Libertarian?

Valle is on the ground, in a fetal position, when Profitt stomps her cervical region giving her a concussion and spraining her shoulder.  He only stops b/c someone calls him off b/c of the camera.

There is no excuse for his violence.  None.  Valle was restrained.  More than that, Proffit knew who she was—a MoveOn protestor.  He knew she wasn’t a threat.  He just didnt’ think she should be allowed to express her disapproval of Rand Paul.

The police did nothing b/c, strangely enough, they respected her first amendment right to dissent.  So since they couldn’t get someone else to get rid of her, they decided to take her out themselves.

Seriously, fuck you.  There is NO EXCUSE for Profitt’s actions on that tape.  It should be universally condemned regardless of your political ideals.

Unless you really do hate freedoms.  Is it just projection?

Seriously.  I’m still wtf-ing over here.

Valle and Hill being asked to apologize?  Does reality even matter to half the population anymore?

Libertarian is foamy because this happened to his Jesus-stand-in, Rand Paul, the great white hope of the Libertarian Party. Rewrite the story with Valle as a libertarian and, day, Peter DeFazio as the politician being protested and a bunch of Earth First! types as the curb-stompers, and he’d be shitting himself in his eagerness to demand that DeFazio get on his knees and apologize and that the curb-stompers be executed.

This doesn’t just go back to 2000, or 1972, or even 1928.  Dennis over at John Cole’s place had a beautiful post up last night, showing how it goes back at least to 1865.  And yes, they are going to lose the demographic struggle, but that will only make the violence and intimidation worse.  Whites in the Reconstruction-era South were often outnumbered by blacks in their counties and districts, and that’s why they resorted to violence in the first place.  So this demographic challenge isn’t new to the white racist bloc, and they have nearly a century and a half of experience dealing with it.

Just as 9/11 allowed airlines to implement policies they’d been wanting to put in place for years, the economy has allowed wingnuts to come out and say all the things they’ve been muttering behind closed doors for years.

Most of the teabaggers I’ve encountered are philosophically motivated by, “I’ve got mine, and screw everybody else.” Well, that and racism.

Also, I know I’m Godwinning myself by even mentioning it, but it’s really hard to discuss this topic without thinking of Weimar Germany.

Ben D., I’m not so sure if American poltics would overall be that different withoutt the Vietnam. Much of Republican success has more to do with the reaction against Civil Rights and other purely domestic concerns of the 1960s than Vietnam War. Liberals might be in a slightly stronger position without Vietnam since the internal splits would have been much less but with Civil Rights comes white reaction and Republican power.

  Ross Perot’s effects on the 1992 and 1996 elections are over-emphasized just like TR’s independent run in 1912 is over-emphasized. Many historians know believe that Wilson’s victory would have been bigger without TR.

ttintagel @60:  I know what you mean, although for me, nerd that I am, it’s dystopian science fiction that I keep thinking about.  In my head there’s a near-constant awareness that this could all serve as the “backstory” for a novel about a fascist America in 2050.

Libertarian, did you not read the post? The whole point was that Tea Party types have been using confrontational methods for the past year and a half, but when the same methods (actually much tamer methods) are used against them they either get violent or bring in the police.

Also, I know I’m Godwinning myself by even mentioning it, but it’s really hard to discuss this topic without thinking of Weimar Germany.

When right-wing thugs are engaging in politically motivated assaults, and when “reasonable conservatives” (hi Libertarian!) are making excuses for it, it’s not a bad thing to point out the similarities. I think BlacBloc noted that Godwin’s Law it was more descriptive than proscriptive one.

@Comment #61: Lee on 10/28 at 09:48 AM

Ben D., I’m not so sure if American poltics would overall be that different withoutt the Vietnam. Much of Republican success has more to do with the reaction against Civil Rights and other purely domestic concerns of the 1960s than Vietnam War.

Lee I think I see where you’re coming from. During the Vietnam era, the war may not have been on the wider public’s mind much. Just as today many Americans seem almost unaware that we are occupying Iraq and Afghanistan. The wars were and are not discussed in our politics much.

I think you’re missing something important though, which is that wars tend to come home whether we notice it or not. The fact that we are/were killing Taliban/Baathists/Vietnamese is never truly forgotten. I think there is a rhyme between the state assassination of Fred Hampton and the Phoenix Program which neutralized so many NLF in Vietnam.

Also, when you have American soldiers occupying a country for a long time, never knowing who is a freind or an enemy, never truly secure, the soldiers naturally get paranoid. And when they come home they are gonna bring some of that feeling into the wider culture. I really think it affects the rest of us.

As an employer, I gotta tell you, you’re wrong. Not that I go around looking for young-and-dumb so that I can put them in the Exploitationatron, but <strike>desperation, low standards, etc. reduce the cost of a hire.</strike> I am. Low-cost hires do have an advantage over high-cost hires <strike>at the beginning of their respective careers</strike> so that I can put them in the Exploitationatron.

Fixed that for you.

I’ve gotta hire a warm body to hold a sign, do you think I’m looking for a college graduate with a commitment to progressive values? No, I look for the girl who will show up for work but who also has no extra skills or aptitudes that I have to pay extra for.

Because the two are mutually exclusive.

You may say, yeah, but it’s a minimum-wage sign-holding job, it’s not a career. True - but of my four assistant managers, two of them started off holding signs. It’s a stepping stone, and the first one to the stone often has an advantage.

Comment #45: Alkaloid

See!?  I’m so high-minded and benevolent!  I give them boot straps to tie to their Why-Are-You-Whining-I-Gave-You-Boot-Straps-Who-Cares-That-You-Have-No-Boots!!!
Please pat me on the back more!  Why can’t a privileged white man get more appreciation!?!?!

The National Socialists were mostly middle class. So is Al-Quaida (and the other Islamo’fascist’ groups). The upper middle class is the traditional stronghold of fascism. Fascism is about preserving privilege. The truly rich don’t need much preserving, because outside of times where socialists and other ne’erdowells are very powerful, nothing seriously threatens their privilege (that’s why the elite rich gave support to the Nazis when the Reds were at the peak of their power, but didn’t bother with them prior). But being middle class is a precarious position.

Like Amanda I think preserving privilege is what motivates them, not the economy. It’s just that the economy is bad enough in certain times that it becomes a threat to privilege, just like in times of plenty the calls of the lower classes to share in the prosperity through welfare programs is seen as a threat. The privileged who are drawn to fascism would prefer a crumbling economy in which they remain on top of the masses even if they drop in absolute quality of life than a prosperous one in which they remain on the same level of prosperity but their lessers get to their level as well.

Yes, she attacked Rand Paul with a piece of cardboard. That totally makes sense.

Libertarian, I’m curious about something…

In your world, the one that bears little resemblance to the one the rest of us occupy, what color is the sky?  Is life there carbon-based or silicon-based?  Do common words like “attack” simply have a completely opposite meaning to the one they have here?...

Well, cynickal, I could close down. Then I wouldn’t be oppressing anybody, and economically-illiterate “progressives” who have forgotten the fact that social welfare comes from people’s labor and from nowhere else could feel all special and warm that Alan the signholder will now be free to take that job as a computer programmer at Oracle. Because that’s the option I’m keeping from him, you know. Fucktard.

Yes, the two ARE mutually exclusive. College graduates aren’t interested in sign-holding jobs (usually, God help us if the economy keeps spiraling down). Occasionally I have hired people who were overqualified for a position; it rarely works out, because they don’t have a skill set and attitude that matches the job, and because they’re taking the job only until something in their actual career field opens up. I hire college graduates to do the books and run the computers. I hire high school dropouts to hold signs. Sometimes the latter group is able to move up the skill ladder; we work with them because we are loyal to our people. I guess the world would be better off if people just stopped engaging in economic work until everything is perfect and there are no dropouts who need jobs, but of course, everyone involved would fucking starve in the meantime.

I wasn’t asking for back-pats. I was telling someone who doesn’t understand how hiring works, how hiring works. If you are starting out, your willingness to do so on easier terms than other people, regardless of the source of that willingness, does help you to get a foot in the door.

@Comment #71: Alkaloid on 10/28 at 12:08 PM

Yes, the two ARE mutually exclusive. College graduates aren’t interested in sign-holding jobs (usually, God help us if the economy keeps spiraling down). Occasionally I have hired people who were overqualified for a position; it rarely works out, because they don’t have a skill set and attitude that matches the job, and because they’re taking the job only until something in their actual career field opens up. I hire college graduates to do the books and run the computers. I hire high school dropouts to hold signs. Sometimes the latter group is able to move up the skill ladder; we work with them because we are loyal to our people.

Oh, wait, you mean you have to deal with people in the real world? Well that changes everything!

The National Socialists were mostly middle class. So is Al-Quaida (and the other Islamo’fascist’ groups). The upper middle class is the traditional stronghold of fascism.

Very true. However, in the early stages they invariably employ ignorant working class folks as street brawlers and bullies. This serves the dual purpose of intimidating political enemies with the threat of violence, and creating an overall chaotic political atmosphere for which the only “answer” are law-and-order fascists.

Once the fascists take power, the Know-Nothing thugs are usually purged and the now state-sanctioned violence is handed over to more educated and cultured psychopaths drawn from the middle class.

There are differences, of course. As others have noted, the Republicans engaging in S.A. tactics are a bit long in the tooth. And unlike Weimar, there’s nothing comparable to the KPD’s left-wing thugs and the forces of American “Reaction,” to use the term from the Horst-Wessel-Lied, are even more hapless than Germany’s mainstream conservative and liberal parties.

The brownshirt mentality, however, clearly lives on in a significant portion of Rand Paul’s supporters.

Libertarian, she was attacked by a man on the Rand Paul payroll, a campaign which has recruited from the ranks of violent fanatics who think America has been taken over in a leftist coup. Republican actinides of this sort were also celebrating violence and torture at Abu Ghraib.  They got excited about an opportunity to beat up a liberal because that is their idea of a good time And somehing the felt was justified in order to take America back from Obama. And Rand Paul was too much of a coward to condemn it because he depends on those people. These are people who have problems with moral reasoning and have been whipped into violent fanaticism by the republican party for many years, fostering a culture of violence. Not sure why you want to defend these thugs, Rand Paul, or Republicans in general. You’re sounding a lot like a 9/11 truther.

Come to think of it I forgot that Rand Paul is actually a walking animatronic blow-up sex doll. Of course this means that the slightest puncture in his plastic skin could be deadly. Or if Valle grabbed the controls, that could be bad too.

So is Al-Quaida (and the other Islamo’fascist’ groups). The upper middle class is the traditional stronghold of fascism. Fascism is about preserving privilege.

Let’s not use that moronic neoCon term. Islamist ideology also contains heavily RWA elements and also exploits young male ignorami, but move away from the anti-semitism and the goal of restoring the caliphate (hilariously seen as an “anti-imperialist” project), and it turns out that their middle-class leadership gives even less thought to the practical long-term implications of their taking power than Mussolini did.

Alkaloid, do you let your sign-holders have time off for band practice, too? How nice of you!

Alkaloid, you could use that army of strawmen you built to hold your sign.

But I’m glad that my pointing out the flaws in your economic exploitation of a terrible situation allows you to read my resume, educational background and experience in the American corporate environment.

I suppose if all of us had your unique ability to spin your privileges into taken for granted “facts” that really have more to do with philosophy than actual possible real work outcomes then we’d have the Galtian paradise that Captains of Industry all enjoy.

Sadly, your lecture on “how things work” has more to do with keeping people in their place.  Otherwise you’d have enough real world experience to know that America is the most stratified and stagnant mobility between classes of any industrialized country *including* Japan.

But feel free to make up more about who I am and what I’ve experienced.  I’ll add it to my LinkedIn like Christine O’Donnell

Yes, the two ARE mutually exclusive. College graduates aren’t interested in sign-holding jobs (usually, God help us if the economy keeps spiraling down). Occasionally I have hired people who were overqualified for a position; it rarely works out, because they don’t have a skill set and attitude that matches the job, and because they’re taking the job only until something in their actual career field opens up. I hire college graduates to do the books and run the computers. I hire high school dropouts to hold signs. Sometimes the latter group is able to move up the skill ladder; we work with them because we are loyal to our people. I guess the world would be better off if people just stopped engaging in economic work until everything is perfect and there are no dropouts who need jobs, but of course, everyone involved would fucking starve in the meantime.

I wasn’t asking for back-pats. I was telling someone who doesn’t understand how hiring works, how hiring works. If you are starting out, your willingness to do so on easier terms than other people, regardless of the source of that willingness, does help you to get a foot in the door.

Comment #71: Alkaloid

Well, which is it?  Do they not have the skill set to hold a sign or is the training to hold a sign so involved and difficult that it consumes too much of your valuable time deciding if the guy in the mailroom is sub-assistant to the manager’s administrative assistant?

I mean, because those high school drop out learn to hold a sign at such a faster rate than a college educated liberal.

@Comment #79: cynickal on 10/28 at 12:50 PM

Well, which is it?  Do they not have the skill set to hold a sign or is the training to hold a sign so involved and difficult that it consumes too much of your valuable time deciding if the guy in the mailroom is sub-assistant to the manager’s administrative assistant?

Neither. They have the skill set and they require no training. But they still do a lousy job because they feel the job is beneath them, or are honestly just bored as hell doing it. This is hiring in the real world.

judybrowni (comment 15)  Please tell us, pleease pleeease!  Older and Mr Older really really want to hear about it!

Graccus: there are fascist ideologies leading some Islamist organisations. The reason the NeoCons’ use of the term took off so well was that there was a grain of truth to it. The problem of the term is in its over broadness, in that it is applied to all Islamist organisations, some of which are not fascist in nature because they are theocratic and pre-modern. Fascism, in spite of its tense relationship with icons of modernity like the Enlightnment, liberalism and so forth, is conflicted in its opposition to modernism and seeks to keep what it considers the good (improved efficiency, factory discipline) without the bad (the effeminate comfort that modern productivity allows, which they consider decadent).

All your 30-year-old peers are competing for those jobs with the 20-somethings, now. Not to mention, having your first job be particularly low-paying or crappy can set you back financially for ages—entering the workforce during a recession has long term effects on income.

And my 30-something peers aren’t getting those jobs, the 20-somethings are.  That’s my point.  However hard it is to get a job, any job right now, it’s not nearly as difficult as looking for a good-paying job with a specific skill set, which is what middle aged unemployed people are trying to do right now (and have to do because employers aren’t hiring them for lesser jobs), and why *they*, not the youngsters, are the ones facing permanent unemployment.

Graccus: there are fascist ideologies leading some Islamist organisations. The reason the NeoCons’ use of the term took off so well was that there was a grain of truth to it.

Of course, NeoCons mainly use the term to create the specter of a vast Islamist army poised to conquer the US in an instant(as if Bin Laden has the 6th SS Panzer at his command), in order to justify whatever aggression NeoCons deem necessary to fulfill their dream of American Empire.  If you can convince people of that, it’s easy to level charges of treason and ‘not wanting to protect our country’ at anyone who questions military action of any kind.

The fact that Alkloid finds it more economical to hire a person to hold a sign instead of, I don’t know, using a rack or frame to hold it up makes me fear more for the world we live in than anything else.

This is “Why do we need telephones? We have plenty of messenger boys!” territory. When you can find a person so desperate that they’ll do something so boring, degrading, and (as far as I can tell) unnecessary, labour basically has zero value. And that sucks.

And no, I wouldn’t hold up your damn sign, Alkaloid. That is not a job that requires the attention of a human being. High school dropouts have more to contribute than that.

Comment #82: BlackBloc on 10/28 at 02:19 PM

Best explanation of the term “Islamofascism” I’ve heard. But it’s still been ruined by association thanks to the Cheney/Shrub administration.

the goal of restoring the caliphate (hilariously seen as an “anti-imperialist” project)

Yup. Islamists aren’t anti-imperialism. They’re anti-western imperialism. Ex. after the Bali bombings, one of the stated reasons for that attack was the Australian backing of the independence of East Timor from Indonesia. Or the Taliban, which was a Pakistani client state when in power.

Graccus: there are fascist ideologies leading some Islamist organisations.

The Muslim Brotherhood comes closest to a fascist strain of Islamist ideology, but it’s a bit less fantasy-based than Al Qaeda’s flavour. As noted above, all militant Islamists draw heavily from the playbook of fascist practise (as opposed to ideology).

The term “Islamofascist,” though, is empty propaganda—a neologism coined by neoCons for the purposes Sour Kraut describes at #84. Anyone who uses it in earnest immediately loses credibility.

When you can find a person so desperate that they’ll do something so boring, degrading, and (as far as I can tell) unnecessary, labour basically has zero value. And that sucks.

Welcome to all of human history. Labor has basically zero value. And some people would rather eat/pay tuition/ keep the lights on than hold out for an ideologically pure and fulfilling job that doesn’t exist.

[is now thinking of spending her impending unemployment standing on the highway with a sign reading, “Will Hold Signs for Money”]

Lots of jobs suck, are boring, and/or do not use all of your intellectual potential. Not everyone gets to be an astronaut. However, what we strive for in the modern age to do is ensure that even if you don’t have the most simulating job in the world, after 8 hours, it’s over and you can enjoy time with your friends and family and pursue things that are more interesting to you.

I don’t consider using a term that is appropriate in a given situation is a bad idea because of the way others misuse the term, as long as you make it clear (as I did) that you are using it to describe the phenomena in question and not misapplying it like the neocons are doing. If we refuse to call a cat a cat, then when someone will say that a dog is a cat they can simply point to the other times we refused to call a cat a cat and say ‘see, this must mean this dog is a cat, and they’re just too scared to say it’.

Welcome to all of human history. Labor has basically zero value.

Another person wakes up from the American Dream and realizes he or she lives in Socialist Reality.

Hey now. I woke up at LEAST seven years ago.

hat we strive for in the modern age to do is ensure that even if you don’t have the most simulating job in the world, after 8 hours, it’s over and you can enjoy time with your friends and family and pursue things that are more interesting to you.

That goal won’t be achieved by further reducing the number of available paid jobs, which is what KristinMH was suggesting (replace signholding humans with signholding…signholders)

This is “Why do we need telephones? We have plenty of messenger boys!” territory.

Anyone know what happened to the unemployed messenger boys, btw? I’m legitimately curious. Because I’m kind of their 21st century equivalent.

If we refuse to call a cat a cat, then when someone will say that a dog is a cat they can simply point to the other times we refused to call a cat a cat and say ‘see, this must mean this dog is a cat, and they’re just too scared to say it’.

I prefer to call Islamists with fascist tendencies (as opposed to monarchist tendencies or theocratic tendencies) “The Muslim Brotherhood” (I’m sure there are other orgs that match that description). If someone’s going to complain because I’m trying for nuance and accuracy, I’ll take them just as seriously as I would someone who insists that a tomato is a vegetable.

The term “Islamofascist,” in its brief 20-year life, was debased from the beginning.

How about “Theocratic Fascism”? or “Theofascism”?

“How about “Theocratic Fascism”? or “Theofascism”?”

...no, ‘cause weak-minded liberals might say that it could be applied to our own Christianists.

Since Christianity is everything that is good and proper about religion, while Islam naturally represents everything bad and improper, failing to emphasize the term is intended as an attack on Islam is a big no-no…

How about “Theocratic Fascism”? or “Theofascism”?

“Islamists” is a good and academically respected umbrella term, conveying an authoritarian (but not necessarily fascist) ideology based in and justified by the Koran and, more accurately, the Hadiths. It allows for actual Islamic fascists like the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic monarchists like Al Qaeda, and theocratic Muslims like the mullahs of Iran. Looks like there’s even an “International Pan Islamic Communist Party of Proletarian Islam” who are fans of Saddam Hussein.

Which reminds me of one of the pitfalls of the term “Islamofascist,” which was applied to Saddam and the Ba’ath Party despite the fact that Islam was not central to their particular authoritarian ideology.

...no, ‘cause weak-minded liberals might say that it could be applied to our own Christianists.

There you go. The term “Christianists” (or “Xtianists,” out of respect to J.C.) works just as well as “Islamists”—you have your Xtian Libertarians (authoritarians in practise), your Xtian fascists, probably some Xtian monarchists over in Europe, etc.

Gracchus—

Saddam Hussein was a just plain old vanilla Fascist. He only used Islam when it suited him, meanwhile he drank whiskey, smoked cigars, discouraged women from wearing the veil and so on.

“Saddam Hussein was a just plain old vanilla Fascist. He only used Islam when it suited him, meanwhile he drank whiskey, smoked cigars, discouraged women from wearing the veil and so on.”

...so what you’re saying, Ben D., is that Saddam Hussein would have made a great Republican, if he swapped perfunctory involvement with Islam for perfunctory involvement with Christianity…?

Rand Paul was too much of a coward to condemn it because he depends on those people.

Yep.  He won’t return the $2000 Profitt donated to him either, even though it’s a pittance.  Cuz he’s disavowed him and his ilk, ya know, wink wink.  Such a shame he has to be PC for the lamestream media.

Libertarian, you are fucked up.  But let’s pretend that instead of trying to get a picture of Rand with the sign, she actually wanted to smack him with it and give him a paper cut.

How does that justify Proffit stomping on her head and giving her a concussion?  She was down on the ground in a fetal position.  Not struggling.  Not threatening.  Just on the ground getting groped.

Profitt walks over and calmly stomps her head.  He only stops b/c someone warns him off b/c of the camera.

Please, Libertarian, explain why poor Mr. Proffit deserves an apology for behaving like a thug in what we previously would have called an unamerican fashion.  And why poor Rand “both sides are passionate”, “oh well, if there’s going to be a hissy fit I’ll condemn violence”  and “I fired the guy b/c I had to but I won’t give up his donation so that the racists know I’m still their guy” Paul deserves an apology from anyone.

There’s no justification, asshole.  None.  Americans have First Amendment rights to dissent at political rallies.  You can’t stomp people’s heads just b/c you disagree with them.

Well Mike, I’ve always maintained that if Dick Cheney had been born in Baghdad or Damascus in 1941 instead of Nebraska that he would have ended up a dictator for life rather than a term-limited Vice President.

Libertarians are protofascists and the tea party is a fascist organization. Libertarians advocate for unlimited corporate power. Hitler utilized Rohm to do the initial beatings and were later exterminated because they were too big for their britches. You can see old nazi films where Rohm was displayed as equal to Hitler.

You may say, yeah, but it’s a minimum-wage sign-holding job, it’s not a career. True - but of my four assistant managers, two of them started off holding signs.

That’s exactly what I’m saying. And if a college grad 32-year-old wouldn’t even piss on those complete non-starter jobs if they were on fire, because they know they’re a waste of time, why would a college grad 22-year-old? Are we supposed to be dumb enough to take jobs that don’t advance our careers when no one else will take them? And is this supposed to be an advantage to us in some way?

But yeah, I’m sure I’ll tell my friends—the physics major, the english major, the comp sci/anthropology major, etc.—that hey, buck up, this recession will set your careers back years, but at least if you pretend to be high school drop-outs you can get $8 holding a sign each day. (But only if you pretend that fast food is where you see yourself in 10 years.) Using your education, seeking intellectual stimulation, and paying back student loans are for suckers!

I would imagine zoning laws and other municipal regulations make putting up a sign cost-prohibitive for most businesses, especially if the signs are only needed for a short period of time.  And most of the human sign holders I’ve seen were advertising short-lived things, like special events or condo auctions.

Holding a sign on the side of the road is extremely low on the degrading scale.  I’d rather do that for minimum wage than change soiled sheets in a nursing home.

I find it strange that we’re simultaneously condemning employers that can’t do much better than offer very menial jobs, yet the same commenters would likely take issue with the idea that we should really shut off the spigot of low-skill immigration in our country, which provides an ample available supply for this kind of menial work, acting as a subsidy for employers who want to specialize in that kind of thing.

One of the reasons that sign-holding jobs even exist is because there are so many people available to stand around holding a sign. Sure it’s better than nothing, but why is the alternative nothing? (well, in this case the economy sucks).

But yeah, I’m sure I’ll tell my friends—the physics major, the english major, the comp sci/anthropology major

Well, other than the comp sci. guy, I would tell them to not, under any circumstances, get a Ph.D. in their fields.

Desperation and (metaphorical) hunger is beneficial, but it has to be combined with a certain amount of street-wisdom. It’s what they used to call “paying your dues.”

comp sci. guy

They’re all women, actually.

So they’re gonna be earning less in their lifetimes already anyways. Yay. :p

Yes, we could put up signholders in one place, but the zoning and municipal rules comment was spot on. Basically at least in this town if you don’t own the property you’re not putting a sign on it. Also, are the people who want me to do that under the impression that this will do something positive for the kids who usually start in this kind of job? I quite agree, as a society we should be thinking about signholders, not about preparing our children for signholding. But I’m not a society, I’m a guy with a couple restaurants. My choice is “give signholding job to low-skill people” or “do not have signs”.

“Immediately convert America into a just social-democratic paradise, share comradeship and joy with my fellow proles” is not one of my available options. Though it would be nice.

Bagelsan, you are quite right that my jobs are not a great first step for your anthropology grad student friends. So what? The jobs that would be great first steps for them, would not be good first steps for Bob the Friendly Dropout. He’s a good kid and always shows up for his shift, but he hasn’t done a whole lot of studying Frazer. (Or whoever the anthro kids study these days, it’s been a while.) We have a huge array of talent in this country; I’m not going to feel bad for not pretending Bob the Dropout and Bagelsan the Collegian are the same people. I’ll give Bob the best job I can find for him and if he wants to do more with his life and career going forward I’m glad to be a part of it.

Desperation and (metaphorical) hunger is beneficial, but it has to be combined with a certain amount of street-wisdom. It’s what they used to call “paying your dues.”

It used to be called “paying your dues” because of the expectation that, if you paid your dues, you would eventually reap a reward on that payment in the form of better career prospects and advancement. That model is largely dead in the US.

Other than survival, there is no reason for overqualified people to take unskilled/low-skilled work, because it doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in the eyes of white collar employers. That being said, sometimes a person wants to leave their house every once in a while and feel useful to society, even though it may be a farce.

Indeed, had Al Gore been in office on September 11, 2001 they would not have rallied to his side.

I had hoped that President Obama would end 4 wars:  Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam, and the Civil War.

Tyro—the problem isn’t low-skill immigration, it’s the creation of a slave class which is immune to US labor law due to their illegal status.

Wages aren’t the problem.  Wages are never the problem.  Organizing is the problem.

Organize.  When the bosses cut your wages, organize.  When they increase your hours, organize.  When they threaten to destroy your town just to chisel a nickel out of you, organize.

@Woody: to end the Civil War, we first have to fight it, and that means squarely facing the fact that conservatives hate this country and the people in it.