Wonkette
Impossibly enough, this post isn’t about teabag protests but is about Ron Paul. That’s right, you guessed it, it is instead about whether Congress should distribute “letters of marque and reprisal” to stop pirates and stuff. This is one of those old-timey things that, to people in 1789, was a pretty clutch inclusion in the Constitution — kind of like assigning an accurate fractional electoral value to slaves. Ron Paul wants Congress to start using this power to send forth Privateers to the high seas. Back in the halcyon days of Mercantilism, the king or queen or dauphin would send private aristocratic warships out to sea to steal other countries’ ships and their booty, for Royal Profit. Sometimes those victimized countries would get so upset that they might retaliate with, say, A SPANISH ARMADA. This is all Ron Paul wants now, and that’s why he can’t have it. [TPM]
Privatizing the militaries worked out so AWESOME in Iraq so I can’t see why hiring Blackwater or Xe or the COBRA Navy to police the world’s water would be a problem? Right? Right? Right?
Where is Sir Francis Drake now that we really need him?
Forsooth! Join me brothers and sisters on my gallant privateer brigantine “St. Wonkette” and we will scour these churlish Mohammedian corsairs from the high seas. No knavish Ethiope will prevent the progress of our Glorious Republic’s sacred Commmerce! Hard tack, grog and an equal share for every dauntless lad and steady lass who takes to see with me!
Gallowglass: err, sea that is.
But seriously, the whole point of privateering was that you got to sell the captured ship and cargo afterwards. What’s the point here? The guys aren’t sailing around with holds full of pirate doubloons and ambergris. When you’re done you’ve got a dilapidated fishing trawler, a pile of broke-ass Soviet weapons and some rusty speedboats. Hooray for you.
Maybe he’ll get some charts printed on cardstock that he can use to explain this concept on the teevee, like a good old fashioned nutjob would do. (THAT’S RIGHT BITCHES THAT’S A ROSS PEROT REFERENCE, I JUST GOT ALL 1992 ON YOUR ASS)
Gallowglass: Unless it’s a freighter full of Russian tanks, in which case the privateer could have a good ol’ time starting a teabagging army.
Privateers in…Ranger bass boats?
Gallowglass:
That ship be tard free?
Fucking Acorn making us good merkins pay for the peglegs of the somali pirates so they don’t get thems feelins hurt.
Nobody expects the SPANISH ARMADA!!!!!!!!!!!!!11!!!1!!!!!
Our chief weapon is surprise, surprise and fear, fear and surprise. Our *two* weapons are fear and surprise, and a blimp. Our *three* weapons are fear and surprise and a blimp and an almost fanatical dedication to Ron Paul. Our *four*… No… Amongst our weapons… Amongst our weaponry are such elements as fear, sur- I’ll come in again.
ManchuCandidate: It would make life so much FUN, though! A Police State that kills the innocent. WHEEEE!!!!
Ron Paul. The name is so one syllable-ish and basic, it just rolls off an Anglo’s tongue. Rrrron Paullll.
Ron Paul wants to turn America into a giant Renaissance Festival. Got it.
Great — that thing with the Minutemen guarding our borders worked out so well, that giving more untrained, loosely organized yokels the authority to use weapons sounds like a brilliant idea.
Gallowglass: Not to mention that privateers had a tendency to become pirates themselves, usually by raiding allied or neutral shipping instead of playing by what few rules existed. So if it’s too easy to create terrorists — well, pirates are pretty much free.
President Beeblebrox: A hold full of iron horses, direct from the Tsar of Moscovy? With such riches at stake, the voyage is back on! How could men and women of fearless demeanor such as ourselves ignore the Good Doctor’s call to Arms? Reef the mainsails and let the jib fall o’er hull, my lads! Our grapeshot will scourge the decks and we’ll take her a prize!
Just crucify all of the Somalis and that should take care of everything.
Servo: There be but one tard on board, but he do be from far-off Alaska and we put him to work polishing the cannonballs.
This is the most awesome thing ever. I wholeheartedly endorse this. Let’s get those fat NRA fucks on the nearest tugboat and send their asses to somalia. Later douchebags!
None of this Olde Worlde naval shit. It’s just rum, sodomy, and the lash…
Which makes me fully support the idea of letting Paultards loose on the high seas! THE SPANISH PAULTARDA! No one will expect them. Or something.
They could get lost after a three hour tour, maybe.
Atheist Nun: ARMADATARDS!!
I see your Spanish Armada and raise you an English fleet.
BTW pirate boots teh sexy.
proudgrampa: Paultards are the pirate’s chum.
Uh, excuse me. But isn’t privateerin’ a method of “spreadin’ the wealth”?
Gallowglass:
Vigorously, me hopes.
Servo: Yes, but there was a privateer/pirate dude in Atlas Shrugged, so that makes it OK.
Servo: Oh aye, I make sure he do get them nice and shiny, and uses a brush to scrub between the- Arrr! I see what ye did there!
TGY: THE SPANISH PAULTARDA!lol… The term, it has been coined!
proudgrampa: Or, this.
I suspect they are getting real pirates with modern weaponry confused with Disney™©® pirates who drink rum and wink jauntily.
TGY: OMG. We are back to pirates! Arrrrgh!
A tot of rum and a pox-free harlot to the jolly jack tar who brings the scofflaw Ron ‘Tardbeard’ Paul in chains before the executor of the governor-general of the Americas, the Right Hon. Rahm ‘Nine-Fingers’ Emmanuel.
Has anyone coined the term “piratards” yet?
This would be perfect for the idiot militia in Stockton. Let’s put ‘em out to sea!
Gallowglass:
Any privateerin’ brig of the Republic is sure to be a coxswain-fest. “Arrr! Run ‘em bores good n’ hard, laddies!”
Gallowglass: Arr, but Ragnar, he were an ETHICAL pirate, only stealin’ from thar governments and givin’ to thar wealthy!
We should try to get Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin to privateer for us.
PomPom: Ross Perot! Remember when we all thought he was kinda crazy? Today, he looks like the very definition of sanity. Ah, progress!
President Beeblebrox: Yarr. And unlike the Somalis, he was also white, don’t be forgetting that part. It do be a very important distinction for the Lady Rand and her followers.
These losers actually served a purpose today: after seeing all these fat, white people on the tv, I decided to spend some extra time at the gym.
assistant/atlas:
Perot was pure, gut-busting comedy.
ALIVE!: Yup, Captain Aubrey would kick some ocean-going ass.
DC Hates Me: It also explains the whole gold thing.
I have the honour to report to the Wonkette Admiralty that the worthy raiding vessel CSS Teabag has sailed with the tide under the command of the Right Honorable Captain Ronald Paul to make safe the merchant sea lanes, protect huge American ships and introduce those devil Somalieniers to the blessings of Christianity.
Hell, why go that far? Just give the gunnuts(TM) a berth and grub and all the ammo they can use aboard merchant ships in the Indian Ocean heading for Suez..
Why is Ron Paul’s idea bad? They are attacking our ships, why don’t we send ships out to apprehend the pirates?
-billorders84
http://bill84121.blogspot.com
Obviously someone has been reading too many Patrick O’Brian novels.
Cape Clod: But is that even possible?
billorders84: Asking why a Ron Paul idea is bad is a self answering question…like why is water wet?
Apparently, the vast majority of you are well versed in the dull art of stupidity. I’m not sure whether you all had planned early in life to become mindlessly ignorant, but whatever you did, ignorance was the outcome. Get your facts straight. What Ron Paul advocated is allowing the ship owners to hire on-board security forces at the ship owners expense. A long standing tradition on un-armed merchant ships to remain un-armed is costing insurance companies a pretty penny. But the only “logical” conclusion is to begin taking measures to secure cargo vessels with private security hired and paid for by the shipping owners, not the American tax payers. Wake up, Nascar elite, it is you that are the “tards” in this scenario.