Many folks have huge issues with profanity on this site. I’ve witnessed comments - some on my posts, some on others - that discredit a post purely based on some of the language used. In fact, on Daily Kos I contemplated titling my post “Sarah Palin is a filthy, lying bitch” with that exact title (did it here). I thought the title, and my description of why I made that kind of statement, are part of the discussion. Didn’t do it because of the PC nature of that site. I felt bad about having to make that choice. I think the post explained in fairly clear terms why I would call her that. Most seemed to “get” that.

Here’s my feeling about all this. Cursing has it’s place. It has a raw emotion to it. It can sometimes wake up a reader at the very point they need it to. It’s not always used for lack of a better vocabulary or unnecessary shock value. Sometimes that shock value is absolutely necessary. While I appreciate the argument that cursing devalues your message - and I understand that many people cannot get past it when reading a post (and, as a consequence, disregards your post), I still feel it is a similar discussion as the one’s people had when debating whether showing simulated sex in movies or extreme violence enhanced or detracted from certain movies. I think it depends completely on the subject and the message - and the openness one has in giving it consideration.

Profanity, at least in my case, can denote a certain trust or lack thereof. I’ve lived in New York and Los Angeles. People in New York curse more. I trust the folks in LA less. When someone tells me to go fuck myself, I know where I stand with them. When they say “have a nice day” and tell others to fuck me over, I’ll give that less credence.

Words. William F. Buckley used words like “dithyrambic” and “tergiversation” to describe the actions of other writers or those debating him. I always thought to myself he could gain more ground by saying something more gutteral, such as “You don’t have a fucking clue what you’re talking about.” It’s not that I didn’t understand him, or felt that he was not expressing himself truthfully - I just felt that his arguments could have benefitted now and again by a display of raw emotion that curse words provide. It’s okay if some members of the audience are offended. Maybe they should be.

It really comes down to Freedom and Truth - the freedom for a writer to say whatever it is he wants to say, be it loving, hateful, smart or stupid - and the truth to not pussy-foot around what it is he’s trying to say with language that cloaks it. While I may not agree with a typical hate-filled rant, I am reminded of the value of freedom of speech and how recently we’ve had people in office who didn’t attach the same value I did to it. When I see a writer curse, I don’t ask whether the word offends me but whether it’s “supposed” to offend me and if it fits the discussion. A poster named The Eyewitness Muse had a recent article titled “f*ck, f*ck, F*ck.” Many posted about their distaste of the title. I read the article and found it to be completely justified. It was about the emotion and frustration he was feeling in firing an employee. Should he have censored himself and titled it something like “Oh, Beans!”? Don’t think so. Others might disagree. Doesn’t mean they’re right.

Sometimes it’s necessary to curse. When I refer to George Bush and Dick Cheney as “pieces of shit” it is justified. They are murderers. Someone needs to get angry about that and say something that resonates. Words have power. Curse words, used skillfully (and sometimes not so skillfully), have extraordinary power.

John Boehner, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity are “scumbags.” Sarah Palin is “gutter trash”. Those who spew racism are “human garbage.” Michelle Bachmann is a “bitch” and Richard Shelby is a “prick.” Granted, some of these people give speeches and rants that might not use profanity (well, with the exception of Boehner), but their rhetoric is hurtful, divisive, ugly, and many times racist - hidden under the cloak of a smile and a few “kind” words.

Personally, I’d rather they tell me to go fuck myself. At least I’d know where I stand.

Verbal Paintball Dick Cheney, George W. Bush, profanity, rush limbaugh, Sean Hannity

Courtesy CSPAN

That drug-addicted, narrow-minded, lying, mean-spirited, treasonous head of the Republican party delivered his long-awaited speech at CPAC yesterday. For those who watched it, it marked the end of the Republican party of Bush and the beginning of the party of Rush. Just to be clear, both are laughable, rejected options.

In his usual spoiled sport way, Limbaugh blasted Obama for instilling “fear” in the American people:

“He wants people in fear, angst and crisis, fearing the worst each and every day, because that clears the decks for President Obama and his pals to come in with the answers, which are abject failures, historically shown and demonstrated. Doesn’t matter. They’ll have control of it when it’s all over. And that’s what they want,” Limbaugh said.

Once again, outright lies combined with revisionist history. It has been the Bush party that for eight years has done it’s very best to instill fear in the general public for easier manipulation of their agenda. While I agree that Obama has been a bit gloomy on a few occasions, it’s not a mantra like it is with the Republicans.

As always, Rush defies the path of partisanship for the path of obstructionism:

“They see these inequalities, these inequities that capitalism produces. How do they try to fix it? Do they try to elevate those at the bottom? No, they try to tear down the people at the top.”

And still seems to live in this alternative reality where we don’t know who they are and it’s the liberal media that has all the control:

“We conservatives have not done a good enough job of just laying out basically who we are, because we make the mistake of assuming that people know. What they know is largely incorrect, based on the way we’re portrayed in pop culture, in the drive-by media, by the Democrat party.”

Yeah, right. Continue with the childishness. Continue to show that you are not mature enough or selfless enough to actually want to work FOR the American people. Continue to show your callous self-centered side and we, the majority, will continue to see you for who you are: Indifferent assholes who care about no one but themselves and their failed ideas. Bring it on, losers.

Current News, Politics Barack Obama, conservatives, CPAC, liberal media, rush limbaugh

From the Guardian:

Congressional Democrats today waded into the spat between President Barack Obama and conservative radio personality and blow-hard Rush Limbaugh, calling for a petition “to express outrage at conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh for saying he wanted President Obama to ‘fail.’”

Democratic congressional campaign committee chairman Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said in a statement:

Rush Limbaugh’s reprehensible remark that he ‘hopes’ President Obama fails to meet the extraordinary economic challenges Americas face has no place in the public discourse.

Mr. Limbaugh’s comments politicize the economic struggle of millions of hard working Americans. With the unemployment rate over seven percent, today’s news that 62,000 more Americans filed for unemployment benefits last week, and millions of Americans struggling to keep their health care and homes, all Americans, regardless of their ideology, hope that President Obama succeeds in getting people back to work and turning our economy around.

Last week, Limbaugh said:

If I wanted Obama to succeed, I’d be happy the Republicans have laid down. I don’t want this to work. So I’m thinking of replying to this guy, say ‘okay, I’ll send you a response, but I don’t need 400 words, I need four: ‘I hope he fails’.

Once again, democrats fail to understand how to deal with a scumbag like this. Yes, scumbag. Rush Limbaugh has spent decades working large lies into small bits of truth and building a constituency of listeners who lap it up. Fortunately, his audience has diminished in the last year, but his ability to command the political stage has not - due in no small part to people who dignify his voice.

Public relations is very simple. Draw attention to your subject any way you can. If no one knows them, publicity needs to be molded carefully so bad first impressions do not stick. For those who are known - and trying to get noticed any way they can - good or bad publicity makes no difference. In fact, bad publicity can help to generate sympathy for said subject.

The best way for democrats and President Obama to get this fat drug-addled slob out of their hair is to either attack him directly (itemize his lies) or ignore him. Show him courtesy, and you’re his bitch.

Politics democrat weakness, neocons, republican lies, rush limbaugh