Archive for subtitles

Since I can't get anyone else interesting in tags, I'm confident you won't be interested in archiving subtitles either, but I'm going to give it a shot and you should feel free to help out. When you create a new subtitle, make an entry on the new page for "Subtitle Archive" (at the bottom of the column on the right), with the date you published the new subtitle. Optionally, add a link to the source.

Which candidates' parents are praying to "bring America back to her knees"?

From Joel Demos' parents:

We ask for your prayers that God will use Joel to advance HIS Kingdom and help bring America back to her knees! Joel has passed phase one of this venture with flying colors, gaining the favor and backing of key MN Republicans in a miraculous way in a very short time. Now, it is crucial that he pass through the second phase successfully, raising the large amount of money needed to launch his campaign in a very short time. Pray that the finance needed for this venture will miraculously come in from unexpected and solicited sources. Pray that the Word will be fulfilled, Matthew 10:18-20, throughout the remainder of this campaign to become Congressman Joel Demos from CD5 in Minnesota! ...
For the Kingdom and for America,
Alan and Valerie Demos

I'm not sure exactly what this means, but I'm betting that if Keith Ellison's parents publicly prayed that Allah "bring America back to her knees," Glenn Beck would be having a cow.

Here's the Matthew passage:

Matthew 10:18-20 (King James Version)

18And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles.

19But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.

20For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.

h/t quichmoraine

Joel Demos!

Canoeing with the Cree, Eric Sevareid

I just learned of the existence of Canoeing with the Cree, a book written by Eric Sevareid that looks interesting.

In 1930 two novice paddlers--Eric Sevareid and Walter C. Port--launched a secondhand 18-foot canvas canoe into the Minnesota River at Fort Snelling for an ambitious summer-long journey from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay. Without benefit of radio, motor, or good maps, the teenagers made their way over 2,250 miles of rivers, lakes, and difficult portages. Nearly four months later, after shooting hundreds of sets of rapids and surviving exceedingly bad conditions and even worse advice, the ragged, hungry adventurers arrived in York Factory on Hudson Bay--with winter freeze-up on their heels. First published in 1935, Canoeing with the Cree is Sevareid's classic account of this youthful odyssey. The newspaper stories that Sevareid wrote on this trip launched his distinguished journalism career, which included more than a decade as a television correspondent and commentator on the CBS Evening News. Now with a new foreword by Arctic explorer, Ann Bancroft.

I can't believe I didn't know about this book and its role in Sevareid's career.

WhatThe****ShouldIMakeForDinner

Want help thinking of something to make for dinner? Try this.

Click on the food name to get to a recipe for it. Or click on "I Don't F***ing Like That" or "I Don't F***ing Eat Meat" to change the suggestion.

I'm still shopping at Target and I still support same-sex marriage

There's a boycott going on in our area against Target for its contributions to MN Forward, a group that has backed Tom Emmer, the Republican candidate for Minnesota governor. Mr. Emmer is against gay marriage.

Of course, I love the idea that these political contributions have consequences to the businesses that make them, but this boycott against Target doesn't quite make sense to me. Here's the problem: I don't think very many people who've started buying their paper towels at Cub Foods instead have investigated Cub's political donations.

Cub is owned by SuperValu, Inc. Its political action committee has donated to a lot of Democrats, but it also has supported Republican candidates who are against gay marriage. One example, Joe Linus Barton:

Maybe the scale of Supervalu's donations (via a PAC) is small enough, compared to Target's contribution to MN Forward, that it's a different animal, but I daresay that lots of boycotters haven't considered whether their alternative paper-towel source is really better.

And, by the way, has anyone checked on political contributions of the manufacturer of those paper towels (and everything else)?

This is pretty simple

I have a few more thoughts about the D'Souza piece. It's not that I merely disagree with his conclusions, it's that I can clearly see that he's carrying the party's water at the expense of intellectual integrity.

It's completely, utterly, intellectually dishonest for D'Souza to write these opening sentences, without any acknowledgment whatsoever of the epically depressed economic conditions in which Obama's policy choices have been made:

Barack Obama is the most antibusiness president in a generation, perhaps in American history. Thanks to him the era of big government is back. Obama runs up taxpayer debt not in the billions but in the trillions. He has expanded the federal government's control over home mortgages, investment banking, health care, autos and energy. The Weekly Standard summarizes Obama's approach as omnipotence at home, impotence abroad.

The President's actions are so bizarre that they mystify his critics and supporters alike.

Those actions might be bizarre if they were done in the midst of an economy perking along. D'Souza surely knows this and yet chooses to omit mention of the economic conditions.

How about this:

The rich, Obama insists, aren't paying their "fair share." This by itself seems odd...

Oh yes, so very odd. It's almost as odd as our country's 1950's tax policy. Apparently, we've had Kenyan anti-colonial, socialist policy-makers fathered by Obama's dad in our past but just weren't aware of it.  (From dshort.com here.)

D'Souza actually wrote these sentences:

Obama railed on about "America's century-long addiction to fossil fuels." What does any of this have to do with the oil spill?

Yes indeed.  What ON EARTH could be a reason someone would reflect on fossil-fuel consumption in the midst of an oil spill.  I just can't figure that out either.  It surely must have something to do with one's (completely absent) father's view of colonialism, because there just is no other explanation for such a thing.

If you don't think D'Souza is playing a dangerous game of pushing buttons to cause Rethugs to salivate, then ask yourself this: What is the point of including the dollar figure in this sentence: "He supports a $100 million mosque scheduled to be built near the site where terrorists in the name of Islam brought down the World Trade Center."

The point, of course, is to repeatedly connect Obama's name to expenditures. Nevermind that this isn't government money being spent. Doesn't matter. It's a signal to generate the desired Pavlovian response: "Obama spends my hard-earned money. There he goes, spending another $100 million, this time on Muslims."

D'Souza uses the words "odd" and "bizarre" to characterize Obama's behavior. These are word choices calculated to fit the rightwing meme that Obama is a foreigner (and of course we all know foreigners are threatening to our well-being). Seriously, why else would D'Souza call it "odd" to discuss dependence on fossil-fuel at the site of an oil spill? Why else would he use the word "bizarre" to characterize stimulus spending that was voted on by Congress (none of whom shares Obama's father)?

As The Economist put it this way in reaching the conclusion that D'Souza is deranged:

There's no need to search for abstruse reasons why an extreme movement conservative like Dinesh D'Souza might oppose raising taxes on the rich or defend privilege in access to education. And it's not surprising that a centrist liberal like Barack Obama thinks people earning more than $250,000 per year ought to be paying more taxes. In fact, that conviction is shared by a majority of the American electorate. If Mr. D'Souza finds it bizarre, it's not Mr. Obama who's out of touch with America.

Incidentally, who isn't anti-colonialist? Is there a pro-colonial movement afoot in the Conservative party?