There is only one major issue in this campaign: Get Angry About Words!

[hiaasenrocks]

And that issue is:

Who can be more offended and demand the most apologies.

A large part of our population has lost the ability to laugh, or at least to shrug something off and get on with their lives. No, can't do that. Must be OFFENDED. Must write angry emails and message board posts calling for someone to be fired because they did something offensive.

Yeah, that's it. If we can just silence people with whom we disagree (or people who say/create something that we don't "get") then everything will be just fine.

And if we ever find ourselves going a day or two without someone saying something offensive, we'll look, VERY HARD, for something that offends us.

Oil? Important, yes, but that issue is nothing compared to an offensive word!
Health care? We'll get to that, maybe, but first we must be very angry about a drawing!
War? Pshhht. That's nothing compared to a few words uttered by some peripheral campaign surrogate.
Constitutional rights? Fine, sure, we can talk about that but first we have to write our angry emails because someone said a word I don't like!

We must force apologies! We don't care if they are sincere or not. Just give us an apology! That will make us FEEL better and then we can act like we care about those other issues that actually have some impact on the lives of actual people.

(I might not be good at satire, but the above was meant in that fashion, for all the speech-police folks out there. Thank you. Have a nice night.)

[writes3000]

1. Given how John Kerry was swiftboated, I'm glad Dems are speaking UP...

Free speech works both ways.

The New Yorker can print the magazine and people can scream their heads off about it.

Last election, Kerry and the Dems didn't take the Swift Boaters seriously until it was way too late.

Seems to me like we're learned our lesson.

PS - This controversy hasn't hurt the mag at all.

[NattPang]

2. No apologies required. Just even even handedness.

[World Citizen]

3. whatta ya, stupid?

I see three sentences right off the bat that have no subject. How can you talk about words when you can't even use them? (reaching around to pat myself on the back and feeling very superior while avidly hoping that everyone else will see my superiority also)


The amount of pettiness and quick judgement that I have seen here in my short stay is very surprising.