Sunday, February 1, 2015

Obama, Secret Muslim


281 Thank you for the clarification on the 'secret Muslim' Obama speech, Oregon Muse. Useful to know the whole context. I wouldn't know because I make a point of not listening. 
Prolonged hissing sibilants go poorly with tinnitus. 
Much like Bush's "mission accomplished" speech. The person bringing it up to mischaracterize the president, cartoonize the party under discussion, flatly does not know what they are talking about, by being unfamiliar with the speech. For they too cannot bear to listen to one. 
This provides a response whenever "mission accomplished" comes up, and it does come up. They say, "mission accomplished," you say, "the future must not belong to those who insult Islam." 
What? 
You're doing with "mission accomplished" what they're doing "must not insult Islam." Lying.
Obama, The Secret Muslim [OregonMuse] 

Oregon Muse relates the context of Obama's speech for the oft-repeated line, "The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam." But where was that?

This is where we guess. Since we do make a point of not listening to speeches and do make a point of relying on what we are told about them, if this were Jeopardy! I would rely on the photos accompanying the stories to guess the speech, I'd see familiar green marble background and know the UN. So, he said that along with a bunch of other vapid poo to our enemies in that sinkhole of the world, where people pull all kind of things out of their butts. It is a very ugly background. It looks like they got a box of marble tiles on sale from Home Depot. It could be checkerboard mirrors. You see that background and it actually hurts, and you think, "Man, this whole stage is a really bad idea. *vacant gap* In fact, so is the whole UN."

Am I right? Am I right? *click* Ugh. See?

If you were doing a flip that green tile would be the first thing you'd tear out.

But I am grateful for knowing the context.

The future must not belong to those who target Coptic Christians in Egypt – it must be claimed by those in Tahrir Square who chanted “Muslims, Christians, we are one.” The future must not belong to those who bully women – it must be shaped by girls who go to school, and those who stand for a world where our daughters can live their dreams just like our sons. The future must not belong to those corrupt few who steal a country’s resources – it must be won by the students and entrepreneurs; workers and business owners who seek a broader prosperity for all people. Those are the women and men that America stands with; theirs is the vision we will support. 
The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam. But to be credible, those who condemn that slander must also condemn the hate we see in the images of Jesus Christ that are desecrated, or churches that are destroyed, or the Holocaust that is denied.
In rhetoric that type of conduplicatio (repetition) is called anaphora (word or phrase repeated at the beginning), you hear it all the time. "You can wear this watch with a suit. You can wear this watch with Levis. You can wear this watch to church. You can wear this watch digging in the garden. You can wear this watch diving for oysters." Anaphora.  He goes on. And on, and on, and on, along this same line applying "the future must not belong to" formula.  He invites us to condemn incitement against Sufi Muslims and Shia pilgrims. See? Talking to our enemies in a pit (of deplorable design), pulling things out his butt. He evokes Gandhi. Obama said Americans embody what Ghandi said, and I am reminded again why I don' t listen.

He applies his 'future must not belong to ____' formula to Israelis and Palestinians. He applies the formula to Syria. He goes on exhaustingly. I scanned the rest, there is nothing that jumps out, there is noting interesting apparent, and I mean nothing. It is a dry arid speech given in a desert, a sunken desert of despairingly aggressively bad design. It is punishment to be there. Punishment to read. It is no wonder attendees so often escape by nodding off.

I am glad Oregon Muse pointed to this. I would not have known, and now I do. And I do characterize the two speech-related incidents as the same sort. When either one is brought up for its surface to characterize it means the person does not know what they are talking about because neither incident does any such thing.

I must have read a thousand times in posts and especially in comments, because it says so much, "What difference does it make?"

It makes no difference at all to the people who would vote for Hillary, and it means a complete characterization of Hillary Clinton for the people who wouldn't.

26 comments:

rcommal said...
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rcommal said...

Aww, honey. I won't vote for Hillary. (I never have voted for a Clinton.) For whom won't you vote, Chip?

rcommal said...

I also failed to vote for Obama (twice).

Moreover, I regret my vote (which, at that time, in that moment, I thought, for the first time, didn't matter, anyway) for Ross Perot, way back in the day. I thought I was making a point! So stupid. Had I been sharper, then, my vote ought to have gone toward the first Pres. Bush.

edutcher said...

The author of the original essay misses the point.

Choomie is not an observant Moslem. If he wants to go to church, he just looks in a mirror. He is, however, a cultural Moslem in the sense that he despises Western civilization (for that matter, what doesn't he despise?).

Since the line in question was used to support a lie (that Benghazi was provoked by an anti-Moslem video), it's reasonable to see the underlying sentiment as a subterfuge, as well.

rcommal said...

Just two times have I voted for a (ahem, I would say now, aw jeez, f'r c*'s sake, what was I thinkin'?) not-main party candidate for POTUS. Just shared one of those times and that I regret that specific one.

The other time was when I voted for John Anderson back in the first election in which I was eligible to vote at the presidential level. I don't regret that vote, on account of I was so very young then--

--and that, at the very least, I wasn't part of any herd, and I did, actually, try to do my best, at the time. I worked to try to consider everything! (LOL--at my own, so-young self.) I could see that Carter was a non-starter for me. And, at the time, I didn't understand Reagan (though that changed, soon enough, and make no mistake about that, either--even, though, it is true, that I never voted for him, either).

Chip Ahoy said...

I would never vote for a Clinton, nor a Bush.

Being forced to pick between two entitled candidates from two family political machines is unacceptable.

I do not view it as throwing my vote away because that is two votes that I am tossing, and I am not a member of these clubs. I WILL be voting for somebody who most likely wont win AND I am not voting for you. See how that's two votes in a binary world? It's yes and no at the same time.

Young as I was, I never understood Reagan.

Never.

I could never get over him being an actor. Never got over him acting with a monkey.

We deserve better than that. We deserve better than actors.

It's wrong.

Then the only thing I knew about him is what he presented on teevee and all that I saw of him through my coming and going, was him talking about the Panama Canal.

Well I'll tell you what, Buster, look at me. I wrote a research report on the Panama Canal in the Fifth grade (one of three Fifth grades, no I did not repeat, but the schools went schwing schwing schwing). And I delivered the report to the whole class, whom I did not know, and I said my "S's" as poorly as Barack Obama does today but a lot more endearingly like a lithp an abthurdly thilly thpeech dithorder, where everyone goes, "Ah Bleth."

So there was that therapy on top of all the madness of being in a foreign country, and I drew the flag of Panama and I drew their canal and their lakes and I showed why the whole thing doesn't just flood. So that makes me an expert. Of sorts. In my own view. And here is this guy banging on about how Panamanians cannot be trusted with an endeavor so important and we OWN that thing.

At near the time that the British returned Hong Kong without too much upset.

He seemed like a kook.

All old people seemed like kooks. They spoke a different language. I had no voting record at all and even then I was sick of Democrats VS Republicans. I didn't understand much of anything. And I recall a friend saying, "Well, you are throwing away your vote." Spoken as party activist and not as American patriot.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

Last night we finished watching The Sand Pebbles (1966), a surprisingly good movie.

There were "angry mob" scenes and there were more particularized depictions of common men with base motives.

Ugly. That stuff really gets me. I realize that kind of stuff is supposed to get you. That's why they put it in the movies. But it really gets me.

Politicians' speeches don't get me. Neither do everyday idiots mouthing bumper sticker platitudes on the internet. But for some people, that ugly stuff is like food.

Ugly food for ugly people.

Look for those ugly people in the ugly mob now headed your way. That's where they'll be.

rcommal said...

Outstanding, that, Chip: All of it, every bit.

Thank you!

rcommal said...

I did vote for George W 2x, because, respectively: 1) not-Clinton's-Gore and 2) we were just a coupla-so years from 9/11 and even if I were not a believer in stability and cautiousness and conservatism especially in time of war, in all of which in fact I am, OMFG we whatever the people got offered a particularly odious POS as the alternative candidate? Oh, please.

Dad Bones said...

Is Obama dangerously evil or a dangerous dumb ass? All presidents are unavoidably dangerous. As for Obama maybe he'll be playing golf with GWB some day, while Laura and Michelle are out shopping.

Good post, Chip Ahoy. Thanks.

Unknown said...

Even in context "The future does not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam" is a dumb thing to say.


I slander that jerk religion every day - so Obama thinks the future doesn't belong to me? Considering democrats want to destroy their real enemies - their ideological foes - (half or more of American) that would be accurate. Not that I count as an American citizen or anything.

bagoh20 said...
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bagoh20 said...

True enough about the Obama quote, but I don't care much what is said by politicians or most other people. Words are mostly used to avoid action, or to hide the failures of the actions taken. What matters is what one actually does, and that does not correlate well with most people's words about it, especially Obama, who can say the exact opposite about the same action on different days or for different audiences.

What a candidate did in his life before becoming President is what should inform your vote, and Obama's life before was distinctly disqualifying for an American President. Since being elected he naturally continued to be himself.

Now who among the next crop of candidates do you want to continue being himself in the most powerful job in the world?

What an amazing privilege it is for us to choose that person for that job. Nothing we do affects the world as much as that simple action. Millions of people will be freer or more oppressed, thrive or languish, and many thousands to even millions will live or die around the world based on our choices for them and ourselves. Such a responsibility should not be wasted by not voting, or using it as a nearly silent message to ourselves, or used vainly to show our open-mindedness, or some other trait we either have or don't despite our fashionable voting.

We have a responsibility, a very serious and dire one, and it's irreversible. The opportunities and challenges of the next four years will never be at hand again, even though their effects will live forever. Vote for the best person for the job who can win, period. Who will be best is almost certainly the one who has already been so in their life. Anything else is at best a long shot and at worst a personal failure at possibly the most important choice you make for the world.

I can't believe I'm even trusted to do it, but that is the privilege of living in a nation founded in rare genius, built by rare industrious people, and defended by the bravest of warriors. Don't waste it.

ricpic said...

Reagan had been an actor and that disqualified him? I don't get that at all. First, last and always what you're voting for in a president is character. Does he/she have it or not. That has next to nothing to do with the career path of the candidate. And character in a president is far more important than relative brilliance. Washington was a far greater president, probably our greatest, than the super-brilliant Madison and Washington was all about character, not intellect. Now if you disagreed with Reagan's positions that would be a perfectly legitimate reason not to have voted four him. Same if you had judged him lacking in character. But I don't get the actor thing as a disqualifier.

P.S. Plus, he had been governor of California. So lack of executive experience was not an issue.

Aridog said...

What Bagoh20 said above. I was all ready to fire off another epistle...but Bagoh20 said it for me. Thank you.

I always vote, in all elections, except when I was half a world away, and don't recall being offered absentee voting in those days. Anyway, I've made some mistakes in my votes, but I am responsible for those mistakes...never-the-less I will always vote.

Trooper York said...

Seriously. He is not so secret about being a Muslim.

Trooper York said...

"The Sand Pebbles" is an excellent and is quite instructive for the situation we are in today. Just as in the days of gunboat diplomacy we are trying to police savages. We need to load up our gunboats with he people who want to leave and let the rest stew in their own juices. Let Israel take off the gloves and let them settle Iran's hash before they get the bomb.

It is somebody's rice bowl. Just not ours.

Rabel said...
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Rabel said...

There is a larger point you may be missing in parsing Obama's wording and context:

September 25, 2012: The president of the United States said before the UN "The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam."

September 27, 2012: Nakoula Basseley Nakoula was arrested by federal authorities..

That's the reality. That's the context.

rcocean said...

I never vote for the lesser of 2 evils. And if the Republicans continue to nominate losers, who don't differ from the Democrats on any significant issue, I'll vote 3rd party.

I voted Perot in 92 and I'm glad I did. He was better than Bush or Clinton. And Billy Bob wasn't any worse than Bush I. In fact, the only reason we got a Republican congress in 1994 was because Bush Lost.

rcocean said...

I was a big Reagan fan. But I disagreed with him on the Panama Canal. I never understood why so many people got worked up about it, but then I never understood how Gerald Ford could say the Soviets didn't dominate Eastern Europe.

Unknown said...

Rabel @3:24.
That. This. You. Thanks.

Unknown said...

But remember,
Nakoula Basseley was a labeled a "shadowy character" by Team Obama-Hillary and the Obama/Hillary media.

He belonged in jail due to this classification. "shadowy character".

I'd classify the guy as "scapegoat."

edutcher said...

Trooper York said...

"The Sand Pebbles" is an excellent and is quite instructive for the situation we are in today. Just as in the days of gunboat diplomacy we are trying to police savages. We need to load up our gunboats with he people who want to leave and let the rest stew in their own juices. Let Israel take off the gloves and let them settle Iran's hash before they get the bomb.

It is somebody's rice bowl. Just not ours.


Never forget it was made by the same Hollyweird that hates "american sniper".

I' coming around to the idea that an American Empire (something "intellectuals" like Gore Vidal said we had back then) is the way to go.

Go in, take over (most of these places weren't in any way ready to be independent anyway) and let them know they will be treated fairly, but, if they get out of line, we won't waste any tears on them after we're done.

rcommal said...

FTR, I don't have automatic, from git-go, occupation issues (and never have I). For example, Reagan's occupation as an actor was not an issue, much less a defining issue, for me.

I also don't have automatic, from git-go, education issues. (I also couldn't have cared less, way back then, and nor do I now, where and how Reagan attended college: in fact, I considered that, then, normal and rather inspiring, as I still do now, to this day.)

Sharp eyes would see that I've not changed much, in those particular ways, over the years. I'm not all that much of an auto-respecter or auto non-respecter with regard to occupation and education, especially regarding the particulars.

rcommal said...

Why should any particular education automatically confer respect? Why should any particular occupation automatically confer respect? Why should either any particular education or any particular occupation automatically draw disrespect?

Distortions: Human nature loves 'em.