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November 16, 2004

Drama Queens: Snivelling High School Punks Want to Call for Bush's Death at Talent Show

It was between this or banging on pots while chanting "Please Pay Attention to Me!!!!":

DENVER (Reuters) - A Colorado high school talent show turned into a political hot potato after some parents said a trio of students planned to use a Bob Dylan song to say they wished for the death of President Bush, officials said on Friday.
...

Even if there was a misunderstanding over whether the students -- some of whom called themselves the "Talibanned" -- meant to wish harm to the president, they learned how offended people can get.

...

The problem started after rumors circulated that a trio of students planned a poetry reading at the talent show using lyrics from the Bob Dylan anti-war song "Masters of War." But some parents got the impression that the students wanted to alter the words to say they wanted to see the president dead while a slide on a curtain displayed Bush's picture.

Ummm, where's the possible misunderstanding?

Usually Secret Service agents, responsible for keeping the president safe, do not visit high schools to check on threats to the president.

Shut up, really?!

"We're very sensitive about First Amendment rights," [the principal] added.

And the Secret Service is very sensitive about incitement to murder the President. They're real bears on the issue. Indeed, one could say that it's sort of their job.

"It's a tempest in a teapot. "It apparently began with a misunderstanding of a parent who was told about a rehearsal," Denver attorney and local talk show host Craig Silverman said.

Ah. There's the m-word again-- "misunderstanding."

Whenever people like this get into trouble, they claim that 1) it was a misunderstanding or 2) that they were being "ironic," or just "doing a character," like Ice-T and other thugs claim when they urge people to kill cops.

It's ironic except it's that sort of ironic where you really mean it, and plainly state so. Kind of like Spinal Tap irony-- "I think the message of our music is love your fellow man.'" "I mean, we don't literally say that." "We don't literally mean it." "But I think it should be obvious to anyone who listens."

Boulder, Colorado, has long been known as a bastion of liberalism and is often referred to by locals as "the Republic of Boulder."

Ummm, I've never been there, but usually they say "the People's Republic of ___________." I'd bet real money that that's what it is.

So is this reporter just a doofus, or what? Maybe there was a "misunderstanding" about Boulder's nickname.

Last week, Boulder high School students staged an overnight sleep-in at the school to protest Bush's re-election.

These people really have got to get over the sixties. I mean, these dopey lefties in training weren't even born then. Heck, these snot-nosed little twacks were just barely born in the eighties.

Thanks to GregS, who is now the Ace of Spades HQ Official Finder of Cool Crap to Blog.

posted by Ace at 03:04 PM

Comments

You know, had we tried an "overnight sleep-in" at my small-town Red State high school, the principal would have driven up, given us all detention hall for three months, and told us to go home. And we would have gone. Unless we had vandalized school property in order to express ourselves, in which case we would been summarily expelled. And if we sassed back about it, we would have gotten paddled by one of the football coaches.

This is not even that long ago. They were great about speaking power to truth in my school.

Posted by: See-Dubya on November 16, 2004 03:10 PM

I worked in Boulder, CO for three months. It is a very liberal place. I don't really understand the ignorance of some people. How is it possible that they would want to see Bush not reelected? He is doing his best to keep this country safe.

If Kerry had been elected and we were attacked again, they would still blame Bush. This is how incomprehensibly stupid these people are.

Posted by: Joseph McLaughlin on November 16, 2004 03:29 PM

You're right about it being the People's Republic. My friend is the president of the Young Republicans on that campus and the organizition has all of 78 participants. Whenever they have a meating in any sort of public area they get harrassed. My friend also ran for the state senate seat for that district and she managed to get 22% of the vote, that completely astounded me.

Posted by: Brass on November 16, 2004 03:30 PM

Who's this other GregS and what he doing with my name? I demand a recount!!

oh well, at least he isn't a leftie moon bat.

Posted by: GregS on November 16, 2004 03:34 PM

The reporter? Obviously not completed basic training (whatever they do to them) in the trenches:

It's spelled "Principal." Principles is another subject altogether.

And with that, I'll shag my pedantic ass outtie.

Posted by: Margi on November 16, 2004 03:45 PM

Well from my experience working at for a public school district, the Secret Service does show up to check up on students. We had one nut email a threat to the White House website and the next day the Spooks were crawling all over the place.

Posted by: Iblis on November 16, 2004 03:47 PM

Margi,

Ooops. That was my error, not his.

Posted by: ace on November 16, 2004 03:59 PM

I always do that unless I'm careful about it.

Posted by: ace on November 16, 2004 04:03 PM

This story mentions that a couple teachers jammed with the band and that one in particular, Jim Vacca, encourages all kinds of revolutionary behavior.

The Oregon Commentator is having a Best "Open Letter to Jim Vacca" contest.

...increasing militarism through No Child Left Behind... heh..

Posted by: Nathan on November 16, 2004 04:04 PM

I read another blog (I know gasp), from a guy who goes to college in Boulder and he has commented frequently about how crazy the people are. He got yelled at at a red light by a lady because he had a "fight terrorism" license plate. (He was in DC when the plane hit the Pentagon.) His story was mentioned on National Review.

Anyway here is his blog, if anyone would like to see some post by a (fairly conservative) guy who is in the middle of the People's Republic of Boulder.

http://www.conjecturer.com/dailycon/

Posted by: BlueDevils on November 16, 2004 04:48 PM

Boulder is a far-out lefty place. I remember after the 2000 election, Neal Boortz listed three or four places in the country people should avoid, including Boulder. His criterion for the list? Double digit support for Nader. If over ten percent of the population supported Nader you knew it was a bad place.

Posted by: Dale on November 16, 2004 05:07 PM

My question would be, how many people here honestly believe these HS students thought of this "sleep-in" idea all on their own ??? Likely. I had a teacher in HS that was a through and through liberal and she didn't like Reagan, much as some don't like Bush. Thinking back it's pretty clear that a sizeable portion of her classes was indoctrinated by her liberal viewpoint.

I mean I'm all for teaching kids about politics and the merits of BOTH parties and ideologies, but is it really helpful to have these kids indoctrinated so far to the left that they go along with the idea of a "sleep-in" to protest Bush being re-elected ? Isn't the ideal of the democratic process and the Constitutional election of a president something you celebrate in principle in school ?!??!

No, none of the students was around in the 60's, but you can be damn sure the TEACHERS were, and boy they are sure loving their 60's hippy revival. Pathetic, really.

Posted by: Sherard on November 17, 2004 01:37 PM

poker me up

Posted by: poker me up on December 29, 2004 02:41 PM

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Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
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Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
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Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
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The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
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I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

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