American Power And Ugly Babies

Now before anyone says anything stupid or reactionary, no: This is obviously not "a grotesque ridicule of Down Syndrome". It's merely and only a grotesque, some might even say ghoulish, ridicule of my conservative counterpart and community college poli-sci prof Donald Douglas of American Power. Perhaps others might even go so far as to characterize the little guy above as an "ugly baby" but not me, and I've gained quite a bit of notoriety for uttering my famously hypocritical statement, "There's nothing worse than an ugly baby."

Speaking of which, it seems that Don is also coincidentally talking about ugly babies in his aptly named post "Talking About Ugly Babies":

I got a longer e-mail from a reader on the debate thread at yesterday's post, "Democratic Epic Moral Fail!" This portion is the second, concluding half of the e-mail:

A commenter named ex DLB posits: "To be perfectly fair, Eddie Burke was probably just as ugly as a baby. Sorry if that upsets anyone." And JBW replies: "There's nothing worse than an ugly baby, ex DLB."

Okay ... dance around this as much as you like, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist, nor an intellectual genius to understand that Trig Palin is the baby being discussed here. It's just another of the 'nudge, nudge' comments made by these quasi intellectual, heartless, individuals whose words are used to cause as much pain as possible. No wonder the Greek root of the word "sarcasm" means "to tear the flesh." Dr. Douglas, you are right in calling them out on this, and exposing them for what they are. Their treatment of Governor Palin and her innocent children aren't their only targets, obviously. How sad when one's purpose in life is nothing more than to tear down another's reputation, and to harm them, emotionally. If this is representative of the Democratic majority, then we, as a nation, are in big, big trouble.

I sent the reader the link to another post, where "ex DLB" adds, "And Don, you were probably an ugly baby, too."

James "Barebacker" Webb is an inveterate hypocrite, as I've noted previously. And the leftists just can't get away from calling neoconservatives ugly babies! Man that is rich!

This commenter is obviously neither a rocket scientist nor an intellectual genius but more importantly they're also dead wrong. As I've stated more times than I can count in several different forums since this whole brouhaha started, I have a little sister with Down Syndrome. I love her with all my heart and would never insult her or anyone else with similar disabilities by calling them ugly. I'd say the fact that Don's reader just assumes that I'm referring to a Down's child rather than a tubby conservative talk radio host, even within the context of obviously discussing said host, says much more about their own inherent prejudices than those they're trying to impart onto me.

But wait, there's more. It seems that Don also fashions himself as some kind of pudgy, neoconservative Clint Eastwood in his ominously titled post "'You Better Watch Your Back'":

Here's the first thing out of James "Barebacker" Webb's mouth when responding to reader Rusty Walker at my post, "Democratic Values! Left-Wing Alaska Operative 'Ghoulshops' Trig Palin!".

Rusty, you look younger than 63 in your picture.

James brags at the post that "I am well into my second bottle of wine..."

That's some bottled courage for you. Well, folks know what happens to young cocky suckers like James Webb. Recall Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino, "Get off my lawn." Chinese Kid: "You better watch your back"...

This is how James Webb operates. Just an ass, totally.

He then bafflingly supplements the above lines with an embedded Youtube trailer for the aforementioned movie dubbed over in Spanish. Why Spanish, you ask? While it certainly defeats the supposed purpose of complimenting the lines he'd just quoted it could be a subtle nod to the social commentary expressed in the film about the innate prejudices pertaining to race and culture that we as Americans all share as an integrated melting-pot society and our ability to overcome those prejudices through mutual respect and understanding. My opinion? Don just posts shit on his site without watching it first.

Even more baffling is Don's specific mention of my comment regarding Rusty's age in a post excoriating me. I was giving the guy a compliment: he looks pretty good for someone who's 63 years old. Fortunately Rusty is not a knee-jerk reactionary when it comes to interacting with people of different political leanings than his own and he took it as such. In fact, I'd like to post the entirety of our short exchange concerning my previous post because I feel that it exemplifies the respectful discussion of ideas I was looking for when I first went to Don's site so many months ago:

Rusty Walker said...

JBW, Okay, all due respect to my good friend Donald, I agree, I’ll give you this, it looks like Eddie Burke. And I’ll give it to him that he even thinks this is clever – I used to be a Provost a college that teaches Animation/Photoshop. So I know the ghoulish visuals students can come up with.

So, maybe he thinks this is funny. It isn’t. But, you, as a person who has a downs syndrome child in the family - I find it hard to believe that you don't think this is over the top. When Letterman went too far, he eventually apologized. It took a while, but I found that redeeming. Were the Republicans to Photoshop Obama and Michele in such a way the left would rightly be outraged (I highly disagreed with the cover issue with the Obama’s as what looked to me as Taliban, as I remember).

People sometimes put it out there in this culture looking for the cheap laugh. But, don't you think, even as a cynical-libertarian socialist, that this is a morbid path to go down, if you are trying to influence?

Or, maybe at the advanced age of 63 I am losing my sense of humor.

JBW said...

Rusty, you look younger than 63 in your picture. Please excuse the brevity of my reply as I am well into my second bottle of wine and am going to fall asleep soon.

While most on the right have seen this as a photoshop of a Down's baby, I have seen it as a photoshop of a woman holding a baby. Blue Oasis' point (whether you agree with it or not) was to portray Eddie Burke as a child in the arms of Sarah Palin. I wrote at my site, the physical or mental condition of the baby in the photo is irrelevant, the photoshop only used the relatively anonymous body of the child to portray Burke in a humorous light.

As someone with a Down's child as a beloved sibling, I see nothing wrong with this adaptation that would not be wrong with the same done with a baby of regular mental faculties. Now, whether you believe that it is right to use the beheaded infant body of a political opponent in a fundraiser graphic is a valid point, but don't tell me that you think that the intention here was to smear or make fun of a mentally-handicapped child.

Don and his sycophants are taking advantage of the fact that Trig is so handicapped to try and demonize Blue Oasis for their opposing political views. I've read your comments here before and I respect what you have to say. All I ask on this point is that you view the incident without the "poor retard" blinders I see on so many in our society.

Rusty Walker said...

Thank you for the compliment of “looking younger than 63” (the photo was taken this year). I have worked out all my life, so I take some pride in that, I suppose.

I understand the points made.

Civilized, rational discussion; a rarity at American Power, to be sure. And obviously I wasn't bragging about how much wine I had been drinking, I was just covering my ass in case I wrote something stupid while drunk at two in the morning. But I guess that's how I operate. Just an ass, totally. Don, please include another humorous photoshop in your next attack on me to compliment the one above, I worked really hard on it. Cheers.

[Update: Unbeknownst to me at the time of this posting, Don has already put up another post condemning someone else for photoshopping the above picture. I fully expect to be similarly condemned and suitably vilified shortly.]