Glenn Greenwald Jokes about President Obama Raping a Nun

[TiberiusB]

156. Sorry, but you are just making things up here

Glenn Greenwald has never praised Ron Paul, he HAS pointed out the disturbing fact that some of Paul's positions on issues such as war and civil liberties are significantly to the left of all the other candidates, including Obama. Any "praise" has been focused on Ron Paul's opposition to certain long standing government policies, and has not been aimed at the man himself or any of his proposed solutions to those issues.

http://www.salon.com/2012/01/05/democratic_party_priorities/singleton/

He never joked about rape. In fact, it was just the opposite. If you look at the screen capture of the actual Twitter conversation, he flatly states that he was using rape to illustrate how extreme some of Obama's most ardent supporters can be.



His opinion about Citizen's United isn't nearly so simplistic as you attempt to make it.

http://www.salon.com/2010/01/22/citizens_united/

As far as the "rape" discussion goes, I think his decision to piggyback on another Twitter user's comment, in what was a crude jibe aimed at a particular Obama supporter, was a mistake. He allowed the discussion to be hijacked and lost control of the argument. It was especially stupid given that he was debating with women at the time, so he should have expected that allowing rape into the conversation in such a fashion would cause a sh*tstorm.

By the time most of us reach adulthood, it is almost certain that we know at least one person who was the victim of a violent sexual crime. This personalizes discussions of rape for most people in a way that abstract discussions about children killed half a world away in unmanned drone strikes can never match. So long as the bloody costs of conflict don't touch the lives of the majority of voters, most will continue to value their economic well being over the blood and treasure expended in pursuit of empire. This is why Obama can joke about using unmanned drones to kill the Jonas bothers and effectively get away with it, but Glenn Greenwald cannot argue that even rape is not a "bridge to far" for a particularly zealous group of Obama supporters. It's not that rape isn't a deeply serious issue, or that the impersonal summary execution of children, even if accidental ...repeatedly "accidental"... is not arguably worse, it is that one falls within the bounds of human experience for many Americans and one does not. Whether it was intended or not, this has been made painfully apparent by the attempts to paint Glenn Greenwald as insensitive to women and "doubling down" on rape jokes. That he was discussing the degree to which the President has accrued vastly expanded, and clearly destructive, powers is completely lost, as was his obvious contention that even something as heinous as rape would be excused by those most in thrall to this President.

So, while it is almost incomprehensible that we live in a country that is virtually unmoved by the unlawful murder of thousands, many of whom are infants and school children, but that is driven into an uncontrollable rage over the mention of rape in a heated Twitter debate, that is where we are.

Welcome to the Internet.