If you missed me and PJ on Al Jazeera, you can watch it on YouTube.
Ted Rall & PJ O’Rourke on Al Jazeera English
Ted Rall
http://rall.comTed Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication and WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a contributor to Centerclip and co-host of "The Final Countdown" talk show on Radio Sputnik. He is a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "2024: Revisited."
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10 Comments.
Ah, Ted, you described the Democrats as a “Center-left” party. That’s nuts! The Democrats in their present incarnation are a hard-right party, and the Republicans are the “drooling racist stupid peasant Attila-the-Hun rape-and-pillage” party.
Also, you’re so mild! P.J. O’Rourke spouts lies and bullshit and your response is . . . well, you don’t call him on any of it — and I know you disagree.
And you don’t take up enough time! P.J. gets to ramble and fill up time with his crap, and you fill in the edges. Is this because you know you will be cut off, or will never be invited again (or both) if you express your bolder sentiments?
Hairhead: For purposes of this video, P. J. was the famous humourist. Mr. Rall was the token counterbalance. Most of the airtime was given to P. J., the Harvard grad, with a 40 year history of biting right-wing satire, while Mr. Rall is a cartoonist few have heard of. I only discovered Mr. Rall because he had a very brief run with the NYT, and I liked him better than the better-known NYT cartoonists, and followed him to gocomics after his banishment from the NYT.
Note that P. J. and Mr. Rall both agree that if voting could make a difference, it would be illegal. It can’t, so it isn’t.
Ted is definitely wrong on one count: the inception of the Tea Party (now being aggressively co-opted by neocons and mainstream Repugs) was in the Ron Paul campaign, and not as a reaction to the election of a black president. Heck, the very term “tea party” was coined during Paul’s campaign.
Hairhead, what specific lies did P.J. tell? If anything, I caught Ted laughing at a couple of his improv jokes. This is Al-Jazeera, not CNN, there’s no reason to be paranoid.
I think Ted makes an excellent point about how the noise that comes from the teabaggers has drowned out the legitimate points of the left. I really think that Democrats losing a few seats to these fascist wackos will hopefully be the catalyst that brings about real change from the liberal wing of the Democratic Party in 2012 and beyond. I really don’t see much hope from Obama unless he decides to grow a pair of balls to combat these people.
PJ commits my favorite fallacy at 20:00;
“The one party system is good because it assures that a position close to the center is always well represented”
0) there is no center.
1) if there were a center, it would be no more correct than any thing else just because it’s the center
2) The “center” in the US would be the right in comparable countries
3) THE TRUTH IS USUALLY CLOSER TO ONE VIEWPOINT THAN THE OTHER
Angelo, I agree that P.J. is talking out of his elbow when he defends the “mainstream”, but you’re also wrong about point 2). Ohbummer is not to the right of Berlusconi, or Sarkozy, and I don’t recall there ever being (in my lifetime, at least) a U.S. presidential candidate to the right of Le Pen.
Buceph,
You misread point 2. Though, to be charitable, I don’t think it was a particularly interesting point. I’m only stating the obvious (ie. Obama’s policies would be policies of a party on the right almost anywhere worth considering.) Your reading of it (ie. Obama is to the right of every leader in Europe) is more interesting. So I’ll just continue the conversation by addressing that reading:
The ultimate embodiment of what I consider ‘right’, are policies which facilitate concentration of wealth. On that measure alone, Obama wins by a landslide. He is indistinguishable from Reagan, when it comes to being the bankers’ bitch. I realize that when I am talking to Austrian economics enthusiasts, that Reagan and Obama may be considered ‘left’ Rather that ‘right’. So, you and I should probably stop using those designations with eachother.
That leaves us with redistributive policies, versus a more hands off approach to policy advocacy. you Probably wouldn’t say that Sarkozy wishes to roll back Frances healthcare to a point where it looks like Obama’s plan.
Angelo,
You stated words to that effect, if I recall right, “Obama would be stoned as a far rightist in most of Europe”, a few threads ago (I think last week). That just ain’t so: like P.J. points out the political spectrum in the US is a lot narrower than in Europe. ‘Right’ and ‘left’ are ill-defined, for sure, everywhere, but let me say this much: no matter how much you guys twist it, the Tea Party is not the American version of the hardcore nationalist, chauvinist Front National, Lega Nord, Vlaams Belang etc.
That said, I concur: we should leave this old-fashioned, 19th century terminology behind and use straight vocabulary to describe their politics. To me Reagan, Obama, Sarkozy are all terminal statists, though Sarko is a little less of a warmonger than his American counterparts. He is not too fond of civil liberties, though, as the the anti-hijab thing demonstrates.
Suffice it to say, you Probably wouldn’t say that Sarkozy wishes to roll back France’s health-care system to a point where it looks like Obama’s plan.
Glad we are ditching ‘right’ and ‘left’ designations. Completely meaningless and muddied with irrelevant cultural implications.
All we have to do to come to a point of agreement on the norm of the policy spectrum in the US versus anywhere is look at the Heritage Foundation / Wall Street Journal Economic Freedom Index. Our policy norm is far more corporate-friendly and less socialist than any of those Western European countries you or I would gladly choose to reside in over any-town USA (might as well face it). Obama, being the most representative politician of the wretched norm in this country I can think of, is surely no exception.
The Berliners I observed cheering for Obama in 2008 surely had no idea what they were cheering for.
I don’t know why you oppose “corporate friendly” and “socialistic”, Angelo. France manages to be strongly both, with the goverment occasionally acting as PR agency for Dassault or Allstom. Piece of information for you: did you know that, unlike its American counterparts, these companies are not penalized by French law if they bribe foreign officials overseas? Talk about “deregulation”!
You have the tainted vision of an enamored tourist. I visited many places in Western Europe and, as alluring as clean German sidewalks and as delicious Italian food might be, I wouldn’t trade New York City for any of those places.