Centerfield

All your open threads is belong to us!

I have a hard time not agreeing with the sweeping generalization, being a memeber of the public so prone to sweeping generalization. Of course, I agree strongly with it despite my lack of knowledge on the subject, being a member of the public so prone to strong uninformed opinions. I'm not being entirely sarcastic here. I think it applies to a significant percentage of people. "Pragmatist" or "elitist", "planet" or "dwarf planet"? I am what I am.

The political gallop to the November finish line is heating up and the race is certain to tighten. Get ready folks, we’ve just rounded the final turn and we’re now headed into the homestretch and that horse making a big push on the Democrats’ right flank is none other than the GOP’s Secretariat, Karl Rove. With his legal troubles apparently behind him, Rove seems to be focused like a laser on once again wearing the floral blanket. In his most recent public appearance in Ohio, Rove reiterated the talking points of the strategy upon which the GOP intends to run.

Mr. Rove, a White House adviser and the architect of Mr. Bush’s winning presidential campaigns, peppered Democrats on taxes and national security, invoked the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and called the Iraq war “the heart of the battle” in a global war against “Islamic fascists.”

The 20-minute speech echoed Mr. Bush’s 2004 campaign themes. He said Mr. Bush would not abandon the war and said of terrorists to the audience: “Who thinks if we come home, that they’re not going to follow us?”

The important thing to note in the 2006 strategy is a minor, though significant, shift in the GOP framing…a technique that has been the hallmark of their success. This week the President gave a candid answer to an oft asked question…on a topic that has been the source of repeated Democratic criticism. He was asked what Iraq had to do with 9/11 and he quickly replied, “Nothing”…but then went on to explain that he believes the lesson of 9/11 was that we must take threats seriously before they materialize.

Herein is the shift. Republicans realize that the conflation of Iraq and 9/11 is no longer the viable tool that it was during the 2002 and 2004 elections. In a classic counterintuitive Rovian shift, they have taken the Democratic strategy for 2006 and incorporated it into the GOP’s new framing. When Bush uttered “Nothing”, the revised strategy was revealed. Simply stated, the new GOP strategy is to incorporate the Democratic message into their revised rhetoric. This isn’t the first time that the Bush administration has co-opted the message of the opposition when it became apparent that they were perilously close to a position of checkmate.

Not only do they now want Democrats to make voters consider leaving Iraq, they will take it a step further and insist that voters consider the potential consequences and risks…once again invoking the power of terrorism in order to create voter doubt…all the while framing the Democrats as the object of that doubt. The goal is to make the doubt about leaving Iraq (the terror threat) greater than the dissatisfaction about the conduct of the war. Forcing voters to move beyond the GOP’s past poor performance is essential and can be achieved by refocusing voters on other more ominous potentialities.

Read the full article here:

www.thoughttheater.com

Doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. Isn't that the right question to ask about withdrawal, "will we be better off in the long run?"

The risk of course is that Bush's opponents will tack that new "nothing" snippet by Bush to other past snippets and make it look like he's been talking out of both sides of his mouth or has no clue, or both. Noit saying that'd be fair, but that this might make it even a little easier.

I gotta say that the Rove Evil Genius theme always makes me chuckle nowadays. It's almost like the democrats have adopted the same perspective as the Red Sox Fans towards the Yankees, that they are always waiting for the other shoe to fall, that the Yankees will always find an unfair way to sway things at the end, that defeat will always be snatched from the jaws of victory.

Liberals invoking Karl Rove to rally the troops reminds me of Red Sox fans randomly chanting "Yankees Suck" even when it's not a Yankees game. As a red sox fan myself, I find this whole attitude embarassing. So I wonder if any democrats find the Rove obsession embarassing.

Not any more than Republicans find the "Hillary is Evil" trope embarrassing.

Yeah, first I find out Pluto isn't a planet but a planetary object, then I find out Goofy isn't a mouse, but a dog. What next, cruel world? ;-)

I think Goofy was originally some sort of equine animal, most likely an ass, maybe a mule or a horse. I swear I remember seeing him in one of those really old, fuzzy, black and white cartoons pulling a cart. They already have a dog in Pluto. I know there are some characters of the same species, but usually they are relatives or significant others of different ages or genders arising as off-shoots of some other character. It's not like Goofy is Pluto's gay boyfriend or his father or son. They would just be two unrelated dogs who happen to be main characters in the same cartoon.

LOL! That's a good analysis, WHQ. Wikipedia lists him as a dog, though. He started out as "Dippy Dawg". (as a counterpart to Krazy Kat, I suppose) then changed to "Goofy Goof". Besides, at the end of Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Goofy has a little cameo where he calls himself a dog.

No, I'm not sure why Goofy the dog wears clothes and acts human, yet Pluto the dog does not. Maybe Disney had a cartoon Dr. Moreau working behind the scenes. Or at least, a Dr. Hibbert. ;-)

Hell, I hate to date myself (as that's still illegal in our state, I believe...) but I remember as a little rug rat when he and Mel Brooks first came out with Get Smart, and I used to beg my folks to let me stay up and watch it. Thus began a life-long (platonic) love affair with both Brooks and Henry....

How many folks know that Henry wrote or co-wrote the screenplays for some of the better films of the era? Like Catch-22 and The Graduate?

We already know that Goofy's not gay (or at least not entirely). Haven't you heard the old joke about Mickey explaining his divorce court petition to the judge? "No, your honor, I didn't say she was crazy, I said she was..."

Yes, Buck was (and is) vastly underappreciated. He was the one of the few who really got SNL up and going, too.

BTW, did you mean this divorce?

My first cousin twice removed (i.e., my grandfather's fisrt cousin) was one of the original 9 animators for Walt Disney (Oliver Johnston, if you want to look him up). I went to visit him once years ago, and he taught me to draw Goofy and Pluto and Mickey. So I can assure you, straight from a guy who would know better than anybody but Walt himself, that Goofy was a variety of dog, not horse.

Oh no, I meant the Mickey/Minnie divorce, of course! :-)

For those who still don't get it, the punch line of the old joke I left hangin' can be found in the lower left corner of this 1967 underground poster from Krassner's Realist magazine.(Somewhat not safe for work...)

Pat,

Cool! I once wanted to be a Disney animator, then I found out Disney's views on women, and there went that option. I'll have to look up your relative sometime. Thanks!

Tully,

Thanks for the update-and the warning. I can just picture my boss (a big Pooh fan) looking over my shoulder, saying "Oh, that's so cute...WHAT???!!"

I'm afraid the poster came out before I was born; the only version I knew involved Minnie's handwriting and Goofy's...uh...precious bodily fluids.;-)

In my time, Disney's lawyers became far fiercer than they were back in the sixties. I remember when the big D threatened to sue Mizzou because one of their tiger mascots looked a little too much like Shere Khan in The Jungle Book. Not a good idea to tick off the House of Mouse.

Meanwhile, this smut does it for me.

Oh, yeah. Beast knew what he was doing when he showed Beauty his library.

the only version I knew involved Minnie's handwriting and Goofy's...uh...precious bodily fluids.;-)

Oh, they tell THAT one about everybody! I first heard it as a LadyBird/Humphrey joke. It got a revival with the advent of DNA testing. The Disney folks ignored Krassner's publication of the Disney-porn poster, but strapped on the six-guns when someone started selling a colored commercial version. The first they thought could stay under the radar, as satire in a low-circulation political rag, but blatant commercial exploitation put them on the warpath, and they got it banned and the printer prosecuted for copyright violations.

Hey, that's my kind of smut too! All that leather.... ;-)