Wonkette
A feature in yesterday’s Washington Post Food section very liberally suggests, with a garish math graphic as its weapon, that Americans should use Thanksgiving as an opporunity to learn about eating “green” and reducing one’s carbon footprint. Behold, the language of the new Obama-style post-socialism: “A holiday all about seasonal food presents a real opportunity to eat sustainably. But making the right choices is more complicated than you think. Should you buy local or organic? Or is what you eat — and how much — more important?” This would be an insanely mockable newspaper item if not for the fact that it’s so boring to read. Just look at the graphic! It’s all, “blah blah blah 92% blah fowl e=C0_2 Al Gore blah fart.” Fortunately, the National Review read it and has published a lengthy response, about the War on Thanksgiving.
The writer of this NR piece, a certain James S. Robbins, “is the author of Last in Their Class: Custer, Picket and the Goats of West Point. If anyone can see a War on Thanksgiving comin’ hither, it is this author of a book about some ol’ warlord cadets having had sex with goats, in college:
Thanksgiving is a time to celebrate abundance, and to give thanks for the labor, the good fortune, and the blessings of God that make it possible. But increasingly we are being told that it is a time to observe limits. The front page of Sunday’s Washington Post Food section tells us that Thanksgiving offers “a real opportunity to eat sustainably.” Other articles in the section promote the sustainability theme. But the whole point of the holiday is to do that which is unsustainable. The pageantry of the day doesn’t suggest limits. How many weekday mornings can we sustain motorized floats, marching bands, clowns, the Harajuku Girls, and gigantic helium-filled balloons parading down Broadway?
And who, exactly, would deny James S. Robbins the opportunity to watch the Harajuku Girls in his basement, in his underwear? Why the Indians of course! (Or, to be politically correct, the “Mexicans.”)
The hard-core anti-Thanksgiving movement has traditionally been centered around the Native American cause, whence came the term “Thanks-taking.” Animal-rights and vegan groups have traditionally criticized the annual “Turkey genocide.” Now the themes of the ecology movement is creeping into the festivities. They don’t want to see the holiday abolished, just layered with new meaning. Thanksgiving, they assert, is a time for both gratitude and responsibility. “The more you eat,” the Post cautions, “the larger your carbon footprint.” And the larger your waistline, but that cogent argument hasn’t proved a deterrent either.
Robbins rants against several different cultures, interest groups and political disciplines for several more paragraphs to make a very important point: that James S. Robbins, personally, will eat whatever the fuck he wants on Thanksgiving, Indian backlash or not. Uh, go for it dude!…??
Thanksgiving Unlimited [National Review]
Greener, Step by Step [WP]
“Eating green?” Fine. I’ll make my Aunt Gertrude’s lime jello marshmallow cottage cheese surprise.
A celebration of the comin’ together of teh injun folk and the cracker, only so the cracker could keep the man down for glorious 400 years. That’s change we can believe in.
STUFF YOUR FUCKING FACES NATIONAL REVIEW PEOPLE. Get fat so you die younger.
I had no idea that the pilgrims had such cheesy mustaches. I am ashamed to be an American.
oh damn, i’m afraid my planned war on april fool’s day is going to have some enemies once the right wing gets a hold of it.
i mean, it is the one holiday that celebrates their birth, isn’t it?
Are those supposed to be pilgrims or witches?
THanksgiving is the true American holiday. One day a year we all feel the need to acquire more than we’ll ever need in celebration of ourselves. God bless us, everyone.
I’m just angry at those Godless liberals always trying to take the Christ out of Thankschristgiving.
This is a PRESSING ISSUE! This would have won McCain the election, if only he had had the balls to stand up to the media elites and tell it like it is, past the turkey-hugging filter. We don’t need to “sustain” the “natural world” which will only be burned up in the imminent Second Coming anyway.
Barack Obama palls around with sweet potatoes.
this is a beautiful thanksgiving message:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7_MYrVzU-Y
I knew this was coming. I’m waiting for the conservative blowback on the liberal outrage around the Palin turkey slaughter. My better half believes that that was a Rovian style set up to get the chattering classes riled up so the Palinistas could come out swinging at anti-American, anti-livestock, pinko, vegetarian, liberal, urban dwellers out of touch with real American values.
The Pilgrims are clearly offering the Natives a neatly folded pile of smallpox blankets.
You know what they say about people with large carbon feet, don’t you?
Anyway, an the National Review get a fucking life, right after the Washington Post gets one? Thx.
And the Pilgrims both seem to have Frito Bandito mustaches. Or am I projecting?
shortsshortsshorts: oh COME ON, please take it easy on the “wishing other people would die” comments, unless directed at me.
Checked his book on Amazon. From the Back Cover: ”
James Robbins’ Last in Their Class provides a fascinating look at Generals George Armstrong Custer, George Pickett, and other West Point under achievers who outside the academy found both successful and notorious careers. While Robbins laments the modern demise of the meritocratic system of stigmatizing students for low achievement, he also explores why and how the same audacity, individualism, and even occasional insubordination that earned a cadet low marks at school often later proved indispensable for officers in the real world on the battlefield. A much needed and timely investigation about the nature of military leadership.
Victor Davis Hanson, Senior Fellow, the Hoover Institution, author A War Like No Other.”
lol, this jackass wrote an apology for Pickett and Custer, two of the dumbest motherfuckers ever to come out of West Point, and had to get VD Hanson to write a blurb.
Why should anybody, even the dipshits at the National Review, take him seriously about anything?
Jim Newell: Alright, alright. In all honestly I want them to live forever, but don’t tell these other librul swine that.
Oh noes! Are those smallpox laced blankets the Pilgrims are about to give the Indians? No wait: that was much later. Amherst College had something to do with it.
(grumblegrubmle) …dowhateverthefuckiwant,hippie… GET OFF MY LAWN! What children…
We, at least, know Kathryn Jean Lopez agrees with his eat anything/everything point of view over there at the National Review.
It must be very strange to be professionally angry all the time for no particular reason. These people puzzle me.
4tehlulz:
I can sort of see his point, being a class goat myself (bottom 1/3 of the class, huzzah!)
However, neither Custer nor Pickett are associated with military success.
Seriously, I bought local apples at the local co-op to make the pie only I am transporting it 300 miles. This guy gets paid for writing this crap? I could write crap for half-price.
What’s this about eating green? Like, green turkey? Like, left over from St. Patrick’s day with food coloring?
Jim Newell: I feel bad now, ’cause that’s the premise of a joke I was about to make about my own family. But you are right, though - I don’t wish for their death - just the death of my familial obligations over the holidays. So thank you, Jim, for ruining my snark - die already, motherfukka.
Traditional foods like Wonder Bread aren’t good for me? So, hippie, you’re saying my Momma didn’t love me? Put up yer dukes, feggitt!
Those pilgrims didn’t have Green Cards, Work Visas or immigration papers. Why isn’t the National Review and Lou Dobbs demanding deportation of illegal pilgrim immigrants? I refuse to celebrate Thanksgiving until we secure our borders to keep the pilgrims out.
The graphic represents the real hidden origin of Thanksgiving when the Village People were invited to the Annual Wiccan Frito Fest and bartered dead birds and a basket of turds for stacks of luxurious bath sheets…I think.
The Indians should have let those puritan douchebags starve to death. If they had any idea what heinous things they’d do in Ireland and North America I’m sure they would have eaten them instead of turkey.
This is a strategic blunder take will our eye off the ball. We need to commit more secular San Francisco valued Hollywood liberals to the true front on the War on Wingnuts, the War on Christmas.
It’s a goat eat goat world out there.
US out of North America!
This is just the culninary version of Gay Marriage. He can’t just ignore the fact that some poor schmuck wants to eat Tofurkey so he has to freak out about it instead because he’s afraid of things that are different then what he thinks they should be.
I would not be surprised to find out that secretly enjoys eating a mix of curry, Indian chickpeas, lentils and rice with his gay lover.
I will be eatin injun flesh on Thursday. Sustain that, Al Gore!
“The more you eat,” the Post cautions, “the larger your carbon footprint.”
When used in a sentence: “George Armstrong Custer ate too much turkey jerky, and the fumes of his large carbon footprint let the Native Americans know exactly where he was!”
I think that this is a vast left winged conspiricy that is akin to distracting a kitten with a ball of yarn. by tossing a few pieces of red meat their way, the right wing nuts get caught up on a completely meaningless issue instead of actually participating in this…well, world as it exist.
want to keep Hannity, O Reilly, and the other clowns at FOX away from Obama so he actually get some work done? find a few mayors who agree to block Christmas trees at Town Hall and the nuts will lather themselves into a frenzy for weeks, forgeting all about Obama.
You know that you are on the right track when you see that pasty blowhard Bill Donahue from the Catholic League wondering how Christians can endure the vile bigotry that keeps them in caves
The War on Christmas keeps the lunatics busy for months, it is nothing short of brilliance to have them take the bait on Turkey Day. Following the Republican Party these days seems like repetitive mouse observation
I know it’s fun to be a National Review anger bear, but since most of the traditional Thanksgiving dishes are native to North America, isn’t it the perfect occasion to eat locally grown food?
Nah, let’s just go on a crazy rant that can be summed up as “Conservatives shouldn’t conserve resources, and neither should you!”
Driving home for Thanksgiving a few years ago I hit an entire flock of turkeys with my car. On accident. It was awful. I think they survived though because they were pretty big and none of them actually went under my car. It was more like they bounced off of it. I’m not really sure what this has to do with the post. Moving on….
What is this… this “National Review” of which you speak?
I shall gorge myself on Ralph Nader’s Lebanese garlic hummus and watch my carbon footprint skyrocket!
sanantonerose: I say we should all start the Thanksgiving meal by handing out colorful symbolic smallpox blankets, recognizing the feats of our ancestors in wiping out the Indians, thus enabling the food gorging and meaningless consumerism that Thanksgiving and Black Friday embody…
I for one welcome the war on Thanksgiving and the damn killer parade.
One year it was so fucked up I had to eat at three homes or else. And, I still had to cook a whole turkey because the other places “totally can’t cook a damn turkey right, Mom.”
Best year was lobster in a restaurant. Hell, goat is delicious and it will keep your guest list short almost as short as going vegan and having no TV.
TGY: Is “Unsafe at Any Speed” hummus made with free-range tahini? Net-caught garbanzos?
Only the twatwaffles at the National Review could offer up the opinion that “Thanksgiving is a time to celebrate abundance, and to give thanks for the labor, the good fortune, and the blessings of God that make it possible” as we head into the next Great Depression and the economy is sloughing off jobs like Congress is shedding Republicans.
Regardless of whatever the Puritards did to the indigenous ones, I still plan on stuffing my face because there’s no telling where the next meal is going to come from.
But if it’s a war on holidays you want, I suggest we start gunning for Easter. Easter is for bitches and the monstrous bunny is goin’ down.
Mangodash: They’re football fans. Indians are smart enough not to go shirtless in November.
Once, the Pilgrims came to ‘merica. Being fundamentalist wackos, they had no practical skills (like growing food or hunting, or collecting berries). All they could do was read the bible and condemn “the Indians”, who were the gays of the time. Since the Pilgrims had no food, the Indians gave them a bunch of food to last through the winter. The pilgrims ate it all in one day, because they were well on their way to becoming the fat Americans of today. Then, having eaten all their food for the winter, they all starved. And now we have a holiday to celebrate being a nation of fat genocidal fundamentalists!
…as God is my witness I thought turkeys could fly.
There’s only one man I consult with for Thanksgiving culinary advice. The one and only John Madden.
(I would post the video, but all I can find on youtube is Frank Fucking Caliendo. Arrrgh.)
It’s a Thanksgivng miracle!
Christ, I fucking hate this holiday.
Oh, c’mon, it’s just some made-up, ebil gubmint holiday anyway! It’s not like Muslim Jesus did something notable on the last Thursday in November! Does this mean that, around a century from now, the ring-wing reactionary conservatives will get bent out of shape over some evil librul newspaper losing the “true meaning” of MLK Day, which we’ve obviously been celebrating since the Revolution?
It’d be nice if they’d get bent out of shape about something older and more fundamental to the Union than some made-up federal holiday, like the Fifth Amendment.
Seeing as we’re fatter, poorer, and have worse asthma than ever, I really don’t see why tamping down on Thanksgiving is such a bad idea. Maybe we should treat it like every other holiday: Just increase the alcohol consumption and call it good.
kimbongil:
Can we start a War on New Year’s?
Well, clearly the Military Goats book was meant as a means to deconstruct/reconstruct McFaily’s West Point experience in the aftermath of his successfully candidacy… book sales plummeting, why should not old duds be mad…? Now writing by the word, what could be more entertaining to the right than why liberals fucked up Thanksgiving…? And the fail goes on, yadayadabe…
ManchuCandidate: Robbins, like may Republicans, believe that the best governance and the best military command is, by definition, the least competent. It’s a fundamental tenant of conservatism.
sanantonerose: Are we related? Because CorkPopper’s mom serves that every year, on individual plates on top of a leaf of iceberg. It’s called (completely without irony) “congealed salad”.
Let’s start a “War on Bill O’Reilly’s Birthday”. I don’t know when it is but since he’s such a fucking martyr anyway, he must think he’s Christ-like and so a war on his birthday would be perfect.
kimbongil: I am with you on this plan.
We need to scrounge up a picture of Oberman stuffing sweet potato pie in his pie-hole. That will set them off but good.
James S. Robbins, author of Last in Their Class: Custer, Picket and the Goats of West Point
I’ve never heard of this guy. Shouldn’t he have been a McCain campaign surrogate?
Is this all part of the goat vs. moose bloodletting?
dano: WKRP reference FTW!
Theodorick Of York: I like your re-envisioning of this historic event.
This is just one in a series of assaults on God’s favorite celebration of gluttony. This one time a liberal told me that Thanksgiving was a good time to donate food to the homeless. They had the GALL to suggest politely that part of being thankful for what we have is that we should share it with those who are less fortunate. BUT THE WHOLE POINT OF THANKSGIVING IS TO EAT EVERYTHING IN EXISTENZ! What are we supposed to be thankful for if we don’t consume it? Why are the liberals FORCING us to consider sustainability and charity?
What happened to good old fashioned fasting? People used to starve themselves to feel more thankful to God for His Gifts. Damn kids.
I think the only real question is will Frank Purdue be tried at the Turkey Hague for his Turkey Genocide during the War on Thanksgiving. What about Sarah Palin? That press conference was practically a Turkey Jihadist video.
http://thesebastards.blogspot.com/
Ted Perino: We’ll presume it’s garbanzos grown in ..uh..humus.
CorkPopper: We are quite possibly related. I come from East Texas stock. And when I stock, I mean literally.
Organic whipped cream whips up much better
than your regular ultra pasteurized.
1. organic
2. pasteurized
3. ultrapasteurized
4. cool whip
5. the can stuff
sanantonerose: You’re projecting. Those are Fraunch soldiermen disguised as the parking cones. http://www.neilinnes.org/galleri/hg1.jpg
James Robins: “Human activity accounts for a fraction — ten percent or less — of global carbon-dioxide emissions.”
Quel dickwad.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Mauna_Loa_Carbon_Dioxide.png
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Global_Carbon_Emission_by_Type_to_Y2004.png
All praise greed, gluttony and the engine of our economy Baal, I mean conspicuous consumption.
A casual NeoCon Thankingsgiving: http://www.irvinehousingblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/quo-vadis.jpg
My Thanksgiving: http://images.salon.com/media/col/shre/1999/07/30/consumption/consumption.gif
I’m so glad my wife & I started a tradition several years ago whereby we each tell our own parents that we’re going to the other’s parents’ for thanksgiving. That way we have a nice 4-day weekend to ourselves w/o screaming kids & pissed off parents on a stupid, made-up holiday where righteous assholes on TV break their arms patting themselves on the back for feeding homeless people ONE DAY out of the 365 total in one year. And not only that, but turn on the NFL game & watch them fellate each other over one or more players who also feed poor people for ONE DAY. Do they not understand that these people actually need to eat EVERY DAY? The fucking righteousness & hypocrisy make me glad we usually close all the curtains, take mind-erasing drugs & run naked around the house for 48 hours before passing out. It’s worth not being able to make eye contact with each other for the next several days, wondering if that really happened or was something we dreamed.
<>
Oh yes, THAT term! Is that from whence that term came? That ubitquitous term that always pops up during NFL commercials, shows up in my e-mail, gets carved into my face by scary black people. Just the other day, I was complaining that everything was all “Thanks-taking this and Thanks-taking that” Now I know who to blame. Mr. Robbins, I am now “giving thanks” to you! Haw haw!
hobospacejungle: Amen.
gaaah! why is green-smallpox-blanket pilgrim just a floating torso?
shortsshortsshorts: on the opposite side of the coin, the easiest way to completely reduce your carbon footprint, is just make yourself waste away into carbon. But even then, one would fail because of the carbon left over. Yup, we’re screwed.
kimbongil: excellent observation, what should we get them to obsess over next and how do we get them focused on not being focused?
Flag Burnin’ seems too easy a way to distract them. There must be something better.
The method of communication needs to be JoetheForum or Rebuildtheparty. I haven’t checked out the comments on the SarahPalinPAC yet
S.Luggo: I asked Robbins where he gets the fact that humans are tenth of CO2, and he gave me a discovery channel link http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/11/17/soil-carbon-dioxide.html
Best part is that it’s not people, it’s the earth itself that is doing the CO2. See end of second paragraph.
hansdog: Evidently, Neocon rentboy James S. Robbins, wanker supreme, breezed over the link in the Discovery article’s first paragraph :
http://www.howstuffworks.com/global-warming.htm
“Global warming is a significant increase in the Earth’s climatic temperature over a relatively short period of time as a result of the activities of humans.”
So much for Robbins’ intellectual honesty.
JMO, of course.
Nothing’s deterring K-Lo from expanding HER fucking waistline, no sir!
sanantonerose: Worse, a Walmart tacky, day-glo green which clashes violently with Native American gords and buffalo hides. I mean really, how shall we ever apologize? - WWD
“But the whole point of the holiday is to do that which is unsustainable. The pageantry of the day doesn’t suggest limits.”
Because of course, the American people are known for their self-restraint and temperance the other 364 days a year.
A couple of observations.
Firstly, if I were one of the folks at the WaPo, I’d be really careful about taking an anti-turkey dinner stand- The Witch of Wasilla is watching. She’s got turkey cones, (at least one) smiling assassin, shootin’ irons, and who knows what else… and I have a feeling she’s the type who’d keep a shit list.
Secondly, I couldn’t help but note the general tenor of Mr Robbins’ article, especially his fond reference to “gigantic helium-filled balloons”. Could it be we have a closet Ron Paul supporter here, recalling the glory of the R(love)ution Blimpatroid, and all those funsters in colonial dress? Is she still cranky that Ron Paul remained flat?
We have never needed Stan Freburg more. (”You put our national bird in the oven?”)