Wed 18 Nov 2009
Please, Have Mercy
Posted by Brian Moore under bad things
[8] Comments
I don’t think I will ever be happy until I can claim that I haven’t heard about Sarah Palin for a full year. I dislike her so much that I don’t even like reading articles (or sites, Mr. Sullivan!) that reference her, even if it’s only to mercilessly criticize her, because it’s so mind-numbingly boring and pointless.
Yes, yes, I’m very aware of many things that are bad — such as Palin, or being hit in the head with a tire iron. I do not need to read any more treatises on either topic. Besides, there are vastly more amusing and interesting people named Palin.
For some reason this reminded me of this:
http://xkcd.com/154/
Yeah, that fits pretty well. Hopefully she remains unemployed, so we never encounter such a “situation.”
“ I dislike her so much”
Seriously, that seems messed up. As a point of contrast, I think Obama is a disaster and a borderline socialist, but I don’t dislike him so much. The degree of hate Palin gets (and, let us remember, Bush and Reagan in his day) is not called “derangement syndrome” for nothing. He’ll, I think Barney Frank is personally largely to blame for the current disaster and possible end of the US (we are in some very serious trouble), but personally despising the man just does not compute. There is something seriously weird in the Palin hatred, and maybe since you seem to take part, maybe you can explain what is going on in your head.
I will say that I think Kerry is a real asshole, because of his skiing comment about the secret service agent. But it’s not that big a deal to me.
Yeah, I feel like I should’ve phrased that better, because one of the things I also dislike the is the reflexive attacks she inspires. I don’t dislike her personally, and it was incorrect of me to say so. I dislike her politics, and I dislike the conversation that goes on around her. I just… don’t want to hear about her. I don’t want to hear criticism, praise, objective reporting or anything else.
To be more precise I suppose do have “palin-media derangement” — the immense and perhaps irrational dislike of the entire topic, and of people who talk about it constantly. Which, often, is herself.
When I hear about Palin, I just want to change the topic because it just bores or revolts me. In the same way that talk show pundits do — I don’t care if I’m even agreeing with what they’re saying, I just don’t like the whole construct.
So, what movies have you seen recently?
To support the change in topic – I just checked the Rotten T. Top Box Office to refresh my memory and the top movies I actually saw come in at 26 and 27: Inglourious Basterds and Informant. Liked both. The next one is at 39: the latest Harry Potter one. Liked it, as expected – a reliable series. Latest movie I saw chronologically was a repeat viewing and Netflix DVD, UP. Liked it both times. I saw it in 3D in the theater – I’ve seen a lot of movies in 3D in the theater lately but when I think back my memory of the movies doesn’t seem to include that they were in 3D. I wonder if it’s a waste of the extra 4 bucks. But I’ll still keep doing it.
Hurray! I’m still not sure if I liked Basterds. Thumbs up for killing lots of nazis, though, can’t go wrong there.
I was pretty impressed by the last Harry Potter movie, I think it was probably my favorite movie of the series. There were 1 or 2 I didn’t like very much, but unfortunately I don’t remember which, since they kind of all blur together now.
UP was amazing. I seem to remember seeing it in 3D too, but yeah, I’m just not sure it adds a ton to my enjoyment. It seems to be in the category of special effects in general: they are nice when attached to a good movie, but don’t really help a bad movie be any better.
I too don’t want to hear more about her, but you have to admit she has an awesome first name.
Definitely! I like her last name too, since I like Michael Palin. That may be the extent of it, though.