Big Lizards:Blog:Entry “More Stale Watchers... Will We Ever Sight Land?”

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January 14, 2008

More Stale Watchers... Will We Ever Sight Land?

Hatched by Dafydd

Someday, we shall overcome this evil curse of being behind in our Watchers. For I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal enmity against all forms of stale-Watcher tyranny over the mind of Man.

Council

I've always rather liked posts that take on the self-inflated and prick their balloons:

The Freddys Seven, by Soccer Dad.

Soccer Dad pops the automythological "relevance" of the "Reverend" Al Sharpton. 'Nuff said.

Here were our two votes in last week's Council category:

America Derangement Syndrome -- Or, Yes, You Can Call Them Unpatriotic, by Bookworm Room;

Politics Anonymous, by Right Wing Nut House.

In the first, Bookworm demonstrates that anti-Americanism is endemic in Europe and has always existed; it wasn't caused by having a "cowboy" in the White House... they always hate us. When the president is a Democrat, they're just politer about expressing their hatred. (But of course, anybody who watches the BBC car show Top Gear is quite familiar with this bizarre attitude; the main presenter, Jeremy Clarkson, nakedly loathes everything about the United States... and worse, he casually assumes that every decent person feels the same. I've never actually heard him refer to us as "the colonies," but I'm sure he thinks it -- in the most patronizing, infantalizing way.)

The second is a fun romp by the curmudgeonly Rick Moran through all the candidates... and it turns out he hates them all as even-handedly as European elites hate every aspect of America!

Nouncil

The winner was a post comprising a litany of myths about Israel and her neighbors:

Exploding Myths, by Treppenwitz.

I agree with the author, David Bogner, in each case; but I'm not sure what is unique enough about the post for it to win the vote this week. Still, it's nice to see these all in one place.

Rather, we voted for a couple that we thought quite different from the norm of Nouncil nominations:

The Wodehouse Primary, by The Debatable Land;

Ms. Hillary Does Pakistan, by Power Line.

The first recasts one of the principals in the primary pandemoneum -- Ms. Hillary -- as a couple of characters from the P.G. Wodehouse "Bertie Wooster" stories... both are women to which Berties has unintentionally and inexplicably become engaged at various times. Depending on Hillary Clinton's mood du jour, she can be the strident and mannish Honoria Glossop or the pseudo-intellectual Florence Craye. But never, ever the soppy and simpering Madeleine Bassett! (I personally think that at core, she's more like Bertie's Aunt Agatha -- the bad aunt who chews broken glass and bays at the moon.)

The second was our own nomination, a Power Line post in which Scott "Big Johnson" Trunk -- whoops, reverse those -- quotes Thomas Houlahan on the myriad things Hillary Clinton doesn't know about Pakistan... but thinks she does.

This is an example of what Don Rumsfeld would have called an "unknown unknown," where one not only doesn't know, one doesn't know that one doesn't know. This is the most dangerous kind of ignorance, and it's emblematic of today's Democratic Party. Another way to put it, generally attributed to Will Rogers (and quoted in widely varying forms), is: "It ain't what he don't know that scares me; it's what he knows that just ain't so."

How to find a Watcher for your very own

Just search here, and I'll bet one will pop up!

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, January 14, 2008, at the time of 2:56 PM

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Comments

The following hissed in response by: Towering Barbarian

I'm with you on Mrs. Clinton pretty much being Aunt Agatha! (Florence Craye, and to a lesser extent Honoria, actually seemed like chicks I wouldn't mind dating however wrong they might have seemed for Bertie). Lady Constance from the Blandings Castle stories would seem to be another role model for Mrs. CLinton in her ability to combine an officious outlook with uttermost fecklessness. ^_^;

The above hissed in response by: Towering Barbarian at January 14, 2008 3:34 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Towering Barbarian:

I must confess my inability to get into any Wodehouse series other than Wooster/Jeeves. I tried Blandings Castle, Psmith, and Mr. Mulliner... but no go; I only seem to like the Bertie Woosters, of which I think I've read them all. (Except the novel written in the 1970s, which I confess I couldn't finish; being 90, Wodehouse just didn't seem to have his heart in it.)

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh at January 14, 2008 4:25 PM