← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Angler
Thread ID: 19494 | Posts: 7 | Started: 2005-08-08
2005-08-08 09:30 | User Profile
Someone at LibertyForum posted this story:
[url]http://www.dailytexanonline.com/media/paper410/news/2005/08/04/TopStories/Conservative.Group.Commends.Bush-965863.shtml[/url]
Roads were shut down Wednesday and residents living in nearby apartments between Dooley and Ruth Wall Roads were warned not to look out of their windows Wednesday. School busses from Grapevine-Colleyville ISD formed a perimeter around the site where President George W. Bush was scheduled to land. No one was going to get a glance of the president on his way to the Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center.
On his way for summer vacation on his Crawford ranch, the president stopped at the American Legislative Exchange Council's 32nd annual meeting. The conservative organization of 2,400 members, mostly legislators, recognized the president with their highest honor, the Thomas Jefferson Freedom Award. The last recipient of the award was former President George H. W. Bush.
Texas Speaker Tom Craddick, R-Midland, introduced the president and thanked ALEC for upholding the conservative principles in the country and believing in Jeffersonian principles of peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations.
Could anything possibly be more sickeningly ironic? People are ordered not to even look out the windows of their own homes at the Great and Infallible Defender of Freedom! I can't believe that didn't push those people to the breaking point. That is arrogant tyranny of the worst possible sort.
As for that award, giving it to Bush is a sick joke. Thomas Jefferson would have knocked out Bush's teeth if he'd ever had the chance to meet him.
2005-08-08 11:31 | User Profile
Your story came from a college newspaper, Angler. :rolleyes:
"Feh. So goofy. Reagan landed at Purdue U. airport in '86. We were told to leave the building before he showed up but I had a pile of work to do, so I just stayed put. Watched (disinterestedly) as Air Force One landed, limos came round, blah blah blah. When I left at the end of the day (and had to hike a mile down the road to my car) , his motorcade drove by so slowly and so close that I could have knocked on the window. But I didn't want to encourage him
I still have my sight. My eyes were not gouged out as a result of this indiscretion. Though I have a tendency to get queasy if the name Reagan is mentioned now. Connection?"
"The first paragraph of this article is the news trade's equivalent of a bait and switch -- it sells the story with a detail and then changes subjects, never following up the initial detail with an explanation.
It violates the Chekhov's rifle rule: "One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it."
"The first paragraph of this article is the news trade's equivalent of a bait and switch -- it sells the story with a detail and then changes subjects, never following up the initial detail with an explanation."
Yes, it annoyed me too. Specially because the FPP also ended with a suggestive "Why?". I was certain the article would explain the looking at the window detail, but the writer never bothered." Me: "It's pretty standard for the secret service to make sure windows are closed along a motorcade route."
dash_slot: "Er, you realise that from a non-US perspective, that doesn't make it better, right?"
I wasn't defending the practice. I was just pointing out that the story wasn't reporting anything unusual, at least as I understand the way presidential security works. Also, my guess is that the directive was not so much "don't look at the president" as "keep your windows closed," which are related but very different instructions. The Secret Service took a beating after the JFK assassination for not paying attention to open windows on a motorcade route, so I expect they are pretty sensitive -- perhaps oversensitive -- about this kind of thing."
"If some Secret Service asshole told me I can't look out my window because the W was passing by I would tell him to go ahead and arrest me now. . And they probably would.
Actually the SS counter-snipers would probably think seriously about shooting you. Although they'd probably only shoot you if you opened the window, not just looked. It's a needless distraction to have a bunch of people looking out their windows, lots of movement, etc.
I don't know how the SS spokesman phrased it. I'd like to hear a "please" and an explaination why.
Bush isn't King Hardecanute. We're not paying Danegeld. You don't have to bow to him. Doesn't mean I don't think he's an asshole, but it's a reasonable precaution to ask for. I wouldn't agree with any sort of enforcement of it though."
[url]http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/44060[/url]
2005-08-08 15:22 | User Profile
Angler,
I saw the same story minus the part about looking out windows. With Bush, I can well imagine this being case, see how this has been done elsewhere. Someone indeed has a sense of black humor to give an authoritarian like Bush this award.
2005-08-09 00:28 | User Profile
Just compare between the treatment of the common folk by the "leader of the free world" and the "evilest tyrant that ever lived".
Whenever you watch The Hitler Channel you see Adolph walking through crowds of people who are trying to touch him, shaking hands with kids, ect.
And as to giving Shrub The Jefferson Award, These "faux conservatives" are just showing the whole world that they are dumber than a box of rocks.
We sure have come a long ways in 60 years have we not?
2005-08-09 00:58 | User Profile
[QUOTE] Whenever you watch The Hitler Channel you see Adolph walking through crowds of people who are trying to touch him, shaking hands with kids, ect.[/QUOTE] Yep, BK, they don't make leaders like they used to. He rode through Prague in March, 1939 without an escort. That took nerve, when you consider the mood the Czechs were in.
2005-08-09 03:01 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Gabrielle]Your story came from a college newspaper, Angler. :rolleyes:[/QUOTE]Yeah? So what?
2005-08-09 16:41 | User Profile
[QUOTE]Defining the Powers of the Government Jefferson believed in a "wise and frugal Government", which shall restrain men from injuring one another" but which otherwise left them free to regulate their own affairs. In an effort to minimize the influence of the central government, he reduced the number of government employees, slashed Army enlistments, and cut the national debt. [/QUOTE]
Yeah. Sounds a lot like Bushie don't it. Whoever the clowns were that gave the award, they never read Jefferson's writings.
[URL=http://www.americanpresident.org/history/thomasjefferson/]http://www.americanpresident.org/history/thomasjefferson/[/URL]