Friday, March 27, 2009

Blast from the past (November 5, 1999) Congress Passes Wide Ranging Bill Easing Bank Laws. Money quote:
''I think we will look back in 10 years' time and say we should not have done this but we did because we forgot the lessons of the past, and that that which is true in the 1930's is true in 2010,'' said Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota.
Shouldn't Byron L. Dorgan get a prize or something? Not only for his foresight, but as compensation for the fact that he had to go through life with the name Byron L. Dorgan. And for having to live in North Dakota.

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Yesterday I accidentally read the editorial pages of the Taipei Times. I'm not supposed to do that- if I'm going to read any local editorials, it should be the China Post. Problem is that every time I read the China Post, my English gets more badder. Anyway, the Times had an editorial from J. Michael Cole, about the Guo Guan-ying (郭冠英) kerfuffle, and in it he said this:
Despite what the Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration has said, this isn’t free speech. Free speech ends at the shore of hatred and has additional limits when it is a government official doing the writing.
But I thought that what Ma said was already pretty wonky:
Ma said that although he respected freedom of speech, the right was not absolute.

“If someone incites ethnic confrontation and harms people’s feelings, such a freedom cannot be tolerated and must be condemned,” he said. “Nobody can hide under the umbrella of freedom of speech and engage in improper acts or instigate ethnic conflict.”
Free speech ends at the shore of hatred? Inciting ethnic confrontation (and don't forget harming peoples' feelings!) cannot be tolerated? If that's how they're gonna roll, I'm gonna... I'm gonna... complain about it on my BLOG! Oh yeah. That'll show 'em. Besides, it's not really inciting ethnic confrontation to candidly discuss the multiple failings of the wanton and perfidious Irish. Our culture is under constant attack from the Potato-Eating Shillelagh-Huggers, and if proud partisans like me are silenced, next thing you know we'll all be drinking beer with alcohol in it and churning out really good literature.

Free speech includes racist nonsense and offensive ideas. Old Guo shouldn't have been writing on the job, but his sin is in dicking around on the job and making the government look stupid, not writing stuff that hurt people's feelings.

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Fox News, I love you so much.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Once again, you rail against the Irish (properly) but forgot to call them Fenians. When you rant against the Irish, its required to use the word Fenian at least once. Next, I suppose you will order a gin and tonic with ice in it.

Red A

Anonymous said...

Certainly one of the best posts about Kuo and his...whatever.
Beside, the Irish part is hilarious.
Beer with alcohol?
:-)

Chaon said...

I am unaccustomed to drinking beer that has either a) Flavor, or b) alcohol content greater than 1%