NO, I'M NOT GOING TO ACT "NICE."

Lawyers Guns and Money responds to an establishment lament that former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice decided not to speak at a college graduation in the face of protests, courtesy of Eschaton:

Don’t Want A Torture Facilitator to Get $35K for a Bad Speech? Why Are You A Bigot?

So, Rice played a major role in a war fought on false pretenses that cost hundreds of thousands of lives and 2 trillion dept-financed dollars. Her administration also arbitrarily tortured people. No major figure involved with this has faced the slightest punishment. And not only am I supposed to be upset that she decided not to give a commencement address for a large pile of money after some protest, but I’m supposed to believe that people who protested are comparable to climate troofers? Are you shitting me?

More here.

This REALLY reminds me of the attitude displayed by the establishment media back when Stephen Colbert made laughingstocks out of them at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner back in 2006.  Clearly, the press was outraged because Colbert called them out for the utterly lousy job they had been doing covering the Bush administration's countless failures, but the way they spun it, you'd never know.  I mean, of course they couldn't attack him for what actually pissed them off because that would open up the door, you know, to talking about how pathetic they are.  Instead, they came up with something else entirely.  For the mainstream media, Colbert's sin was talking about issues (gasp!) at what was supposed to be a decidedly genteel, professional, and friendly affair.

But what the fuck kind of rule is that?  A lot of people were dead at that point, with still more to come, because of Bush's horrifically failed presidency.  Never mind the fact that pretending everything is just dandy when it's far from it is the opposite of journalism.  That's bad enough.  But expecting a freaking comedian to follow your stupid nihilistic rules of decorum because you're all "professionals" is just too much.  I mean, it's beyond too much.  It's insulting and patronizing.  And evil.

In a democracy, when something horrible is happening, it is every citizen's RESPONSIBILITY to condemn it as loudly and as often as possible until democracy's machinery gets to work ending the horror.  Failing to do so makes you a part of the problem, an enabler of the horror.  Your "professionalism," your expensive suit, your big paycheck, your social status, all that shit's meaningless when all you do is hang out smoking cigars and drinking brandy in the study with your Ivy League pals.  Screw you.  Stephen Colbert is one hundred times the American any of you are.

For god's sake, you people are JOURNALISTS!!!  What good are you?

This New York Times editorial lament that Condoleezza Rice decided not to deal with people potentially protesting her war criminal status at the graduation ceremony where she was slated to speak is essentially the same thing.  I mean, why isn't Mr. Elite Journalist out there protesting her himself?  Is he afraid his Gucci suit might get sweaty?  Why didn't he write instead an angry essay condemning her role in the debacle that was the Bush administration?  Why isn't he in solidarity with the protesters?

Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable, indeed.  Disgusting.  And to think, people believe the NYT is liberal.  Go figure.


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