The Man Who Brought Obamacare Back to the Supreme Court

Competitive Enterprise Institute's Lawson Bader on King v. Burwell

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The Man Who Brought Obamacare Back to the Supreme Court

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"The real reason we're doing this has nothing to do with Obamacare, that's just the vehicle," explains Lawson Bader, president of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), the organization behind the latest Supreme Court challenge to President Obama's signature health care law.  "For us the real issue is, does a federal agency have the authority and the power to essential reinterpret and rewrite a law passed by legislature."

The case, King v. Burwell, hinges on whether the IRS violated the law by granting tax credits to states that opted to join the federal health care exchange rather than create their own state-based system. 

Bader sat down with Reason TV's Nick Gillespie to discuss King v. Burwell, how Obamacare could "implode" if the court agrees with CEI's interpretation of the law, and his prediction on how the justices will rule.

About 5.5 minutes. 

Produced by Alex Manning and Nick Gillespie. Camera by Paul Detrick and Alex Manning.

Scroll down for downloadable versions of this video, and subscribe to Reason TV's YouTube channel for daily content like this.

Comments

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I suspect that this will be the article where the paid trolls and wreckers show up.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

^#1 right there.. I mean you're still getting your Koch cheque (check) biweekly right?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

WTF is a cheque?

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

Rufus knows....

[Dweebston]

I want to say it's a writ issued by the... chancellor of the exchequer? I don't recall anything about the civics of monopoly money counties.

[Dark Lord of the Cis]

You mean Bo's gonna shit all over the thread and suck Nazgul cock?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Yes and yes.

[Sevo]

Pl?ya Manhattan.|3.26.15 @ 5:10PM|#
"I suspect that this will be the article where the paid trolls and wreckers show up."

Not sure, but this is the article featuring the ritual 'down-sitting'. I think this is the journalistic equivalent of the Yogish 'downward dog'.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

3 days later, and I stand by my comment.

[Warrren]

Not much action.

[Mr. Meeseeks]

Hi! I'm a paid troll! Look at me!

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Go on...

[Faceless Commenter]

Who's your employer? I could use some extra dough.

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

Chris Elliot is going to take down Obamacare at the Supreme Court?

[Winston]

Just like Cabin Boy?

[Vulgar Madman]

Get a life!

[EDG reppin' LBC]

I'm a male model. Not a male prostitute!

[F. Stupidity, Jr.]

+1 Handsome companion

[matthennry]

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http://www.Jobsyelp.com

[Puddin' Stick]

That's one type of paid troll.

[bassjoe]

So we're essentially patting the CEI on the back for successfully plaintiff-shopping? Great.

CEI came up with a legal/philosophical argument against Obamacare, found compatible plaintiffs to paste it on and now the plaintiffs are less important than footnote #15 in an amici brief. Why exactly is this a good thing? If anything, it merely shows that this is nothing more than political dispute masking itself as a judicial proceeding.

[kV]

No, this kind of "plaintiff shopping" is unfortunately what's required under ridiculous standing rules that limit everyone's ability to challenge the lawfullness of government actions.

[PapayaSF]

+1

[VG Zaytsev]

Yep. It's actually a demonstration of the worthlessness of the court system and that it has become Kabuki theater.

[Sevo]

bassjoe|3.26.15 @ 6:36PM|#
..."Why exactly is this a good thing?"...

"Standing", that's why. Like it or not, you can't just show up and say that law sucks and I want to sue.

[Libertarius]

All you libertarians and right-wingers need to just plug back in to the leftoid matrix, all you have to do is remember your gubbermint skool and collectivist university brainwashing (but it might help to start watching Communism Central as well). Then you will see that the state can do whatever it wants, because it is the will of the leftoids, and we will achieve collectivist utopia eleventy!!!ll

[frankr]

the court found a way to find the ACA Constitutional the first time around and my thought at the time was that the ohbama administration, pretty much owning the FBI, had a file on Justice Roberts and let him know they had it. Mr. Roberts sided with the liberals on the court at the last minute and gave us ohbamacare!

hoover had dirt on EVERYBODY and used those files to drive an agenda and I have no reason to believe that those files still exist and are used, especially by this lawless President!

so, I look for the court to find for Burwell.

[VG Zaytsev]

The adoption of one of Robert's kids was legally questionable.

That's the leverage they have on him, threatening to take the kid away and send his wife to prison.

[Harun]

Srsly?

[F. Stupidity, Jr.]

OT: Bad enough Duke is winning in their regional final, but all the Duke-sucking by the CBS broadcast team is making me homicidal.

I don't root for college teams. I root against them. And if the championship game is Duke v. Kentucky, I might just vomit my intestines out.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

"Duke is winning"

...and water is wet.

What's your point?

[F. Stupidity, Jr.]

I'm an avowed Duke hater. That's my point.

[C. Anacreon]

Too bad about Gonzaga, the Final Four would have been a lot more interesting had they made it.

[Sevo]

So do the have a Terrific Two?

[Warrren]

Coach K has a sad.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

So Reason knows how to reuse and recycle, but what about the "reduce" part?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Abortion, ISIS two biggest concerns of conservatives

Among the issues asked about in the poll, the biggest litmus tests for Republicans are candidates' positions on ISIS - which Republicans overwhelmingly see as a major threat to the U.S. - and abortion. Sixty-one percent of Republicans would not consider voting for a candidate who disagrees with them on dealing with ISIS, and half (51 percent) would not vote for someone with a different position on abortion.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/po.....YHF4eb9d17

[Notorious G.K.C.]

I guess that's just too bad for the pro-abortion candidates in the Republican primary!

And the article seemed a tad vague on what the respondents wanted done with ISIS, and how or whether it clashes with the positions of the candidates.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Interesting conservative priorities. That is all.

[VG Zaytsev]

What are the dims top two priorities, smash whitey & smash the rich?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Get high and not work?

Why would I know?

[VG Zaytsev]

Isn't it in the talking points that receive daily?

[C. Anacreon]

Kidding aside, I've often wondered if there is something similar that exists like that.

Reason being, over the course of a few days in our local paper, there will be several Leftish letters-to-the-editor that all seem to have been written from the same outline, with identical analogies, and each including a side point which appears unlikely that random average people interested in writing a letter would have all have come up with on their own simultaneously.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

In case your weekend is going too well, here is a cheery piece from Michael Weiss on the current clusterfuck in Iraq.

"A few days ago, Khaled al-Obaidi, Iraq's minister of defense, went to Tikrit, but the militias wouldn't allow him to enter. He had to stay in Samarra."

All of which makes risible U.S. officials' continued emphasis that there is no direct American coordination with Iran or its proxies. Gen. James Terry, the U.S. commander of the coalition, claims that the "ongoing Iraqi and coalition air strikes are setting the conditions for offensive action to be conducted by Iraqi forces currently surrounding Tikrit. Iraqi security forces supported by the coalition will continue to gain territory."

One of the authors personally witnessed in Baghdad how the IRGC targets make their way into the U.S. targeting queue. Shiite militia commanders pass Quds Force-selected targets to Badr-affiliated Iraqi Security Force commanders on the ground (many of whom are, in fact, agents of the militias), who then pass them on as legitimate targets to Iraq's Defense Ministry representatives in the Joint Operations Centers where U.S. advisors then put those targets into a queue for aerial sorties.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

So we're fighting alongside Iran now, and using their intelligence to help select targets?

The sooner we find something to replace oil, the better - then those Mideasterners can export goats and antiquities if they want.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

"Pass me the intelligence report, you bearded nutcases."

"Here you go, Great Satan poopy-pants infidel."

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

Yeah - that's been pretty obvious for awhile. Our foreign policy is an utter mess. We're supporting Iranian Shiite militias in Iraq against ISIS, we're supporting Iranian objectives in Syria against ISIS and we're fighting against Iranian militias in Yemen alongside the Saudis.

So we're helping Iranian proxies in two countries and fighting them in a third. Brilliant.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Not to mention Obama's desperation for Iran to rescue his credibility in Iraq is leading to a total diplomatic meltdown as well.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

The War Nerd has a good article on the Yemen issue.

He mentions a Saudi Shiite uprising I didn't even know happened:

In 2000, the Shia of Najran got sick of being told by their Saudi Provincial Governor (a Saudi princeling, naturally) that they were rafidii ("nay-sayers") and takfiri ("apostates"). The Najrani grabbed their guns, scared off the Saudi national police and drove Prince Mishaal into hiding in the Najran Holiday Inn. You can still see the Holiday Inn; it's as good as a Gettysburg monument to the locals, though the bullet holes have, unfortunately, been covered over.

That unknown rebellion ended with massive Saudi secret-police reprisals?more holes in the desert than a Joe Pesci golf tour. Once they'd killed off the ringleaders, the Saudi authorities went back to slower, less bloody methods.

It's astonishing at how good Saudi Arabia is at covering up their atrocities. People don't talk about Saudi Arabia with the same disgust as they talk about other police states, but the Saudis are actually worse than most other authoritarian countries. The fact that you don't hear about it shows how grimly effective they are.

[Heroic Mulatto]

I realize Brecher writes for fucking Pando, but it still rankles to read his hissy fit about the fall of communist "I Fucking Love Science" South Yemen*. Because they would have brought an enlightened age of sweetness and light; it is inconceivable that South Yemen would have become the shithole, say, Ethiopia became under the Derg.

*South Yemen, in reality, was East Yemen.....I never got that.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

It's the War Nerd - he's very interesting when discussing the facts of combat, particularly wars you've never heard of, but his proclamations on American domestic policy are always retarded diatribes filled with unsourced opinions he can't be bothered to provide evidence for and his preferred economic policy is slightly to the left of Trotsky.

[Agammamon]

Which most likely greatly contributes to his primary job being teaching English in the Middle East.

[mauricegirodias]

The fuck? Nothing wrong with teaching English for a year or two if you made bad college decisions, ahem, but... why not go some place where you can get laid?

I.E., Korea, Taiwan, China, Japan...

[VG Zaytsev]

It's astonishing at how good Saudi Arabia is at covering up their atrocities.

Meh, what's a few thousand dead Shi'a compared to $50 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation?

[PapayaSF]

Hey, Hillary said those emails are private!

[Palin's Buttplug]

How is it different than 1980-2009? We armed Saddam. We armed Iran. We armed Al-Qaeda. We armed Egypt. We armed - well who didn't we arm?

Is it because we have a Kenyan Muslin President now?

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

It's not different and it was just as retarded then. It's weird that my post didn't mention Obama, but of course you had to bring him up.

Of course, now that he's in the conversation, how do you feel about the Saudis not telling us they were going to start bombing in Yemen because they think we're leaking information to the Iranians as part of our nuclear talks?

Another example of 'smart diplomacy?'

[Palin's Buttplug]

So the Saudi's are not besties with Obama? Good. Fuck them. Maybe they Jeb will hold the King's hand in 2017 and make him feel all better.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

I realize you're a sockpuppet that doesn't actually believe any of the things you say, but I have difficulty seeing how Obama genuflecting before President Rouhani is in any way better than obediently jumping at the command of King Salman.

[Palin's Buttplug]

I'm no sock. I am a radical social liberal, secularist, and capitalist. Think about it. I can't be GOP and Dems are barely any better but they don't suck at social issues quite as much as the GOP.

I know - I don't express the proper fealty to Team Red.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Is it because we have a Kenyan Muslin President now?"

Is that like the plot to Mannequin?

...Because that movie sucked.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Tea Party spelling. An old joke - just Google Tea Party + misspelled signs. Some funny shit.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

...But that movie did suck.

[De Oppresso Liber]

OT: Salon article, The planet won't notice you recycle, and your vote doesn't count. Spoiler alert: it's not nearly as rational as the title reads.

[Heroic Mulatto]

No one wants the crowding-out bias to dominate. It's something to avoid and overcome. If you catch yourself recycling that paper cup and thinking you've solved global warming for the day, think again. If you catch yourself buying those voluntary carbon offsets for the cross-country flight, feeling better about flying, and as a result doing more of it, that's not quite in the spirit of the exercise either. "The hotel changes my towels only when I throw them on the floor and the airline lets me spend $20 extra to offset my carbon pollution? Eco-vacation, here I come!"

None of that is all that far-fetched, even for the most committed of environmentalists. You can't do it all. Plenty of environmentalists who recycle, refuse meat, don't drive, and generally try to do it all the green way still commit various other, often more significant carbon sins. Flying is a prime example.

Not only are they through with pretending this whole thing isn't just religious asceticism, but they've gotten to the point where they're talking about peccata carbonaria venialia versus peccata carbonaria mortalia.

Unbelievable!

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Flying is a prime example.

I thought you could still buy indulgences carbon credits for that sort of thing..

[Heroic Mulatto]

Dies ir?, dies illa
Solvet s?clum in favilla,
Teste Gore cum NASA.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Quantus tremor est futurus
Quando Gaia est venturus
Cuncta stricte discussurus

Translation:

Captain Planet, he's our hero,
Gonna take pollution down to zero!

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Late Night Links? :

Peak Snowflake?

Austrian Infighting (irrelevant to the outside world, but doctrinal dispute to our libertarian bubble)

[Heroic Mulatto]

And that's the essence of my concern about that bumper sticker. It's not only a gratuitous disparagement of neighbors and community members, but it is also the kind of nasty sentiment that ensures that our federal government won't ever be better than it is right now. Whether you're a big- or limited-government person, it seems self-defeating to be a snarling, attacking voice. If that chorus grows loud enough to dissuade our best and brightest from going to work for Uncle Sam, then the false sentiment that bumper sticker espouses will be true. And then we'll be truly broke.

Really, you self-righteous bitch? Which is "louder," a fucking bumper sticker or the bully-pulpit of a Washington Post op-ed complaining about the bumper sticker?

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Streisand Effect, FTW.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Hmm second thought, not quite the SE. What is it when you try to suppress something but only end up making it worse? Gamergate effect, maybe?

[Heroic Mulatto]

I believe the term for penning a stentorian jeremiad titled "Badmouthing your neighbors" in which one bemoans badmouthing neighbors by badmouthing a neighbor is "chutzpah".

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

Especially funny since the bumper didn't even insult government workers, it insulted the way government works generally.

It would be like writing an anti-drug war bumper sticker and having your neighbor get angry because their kid is a random paper pusher for the DEA.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Well, of course. You're threatening their kid's livelihood.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

This is an interesting thought - are we not allowed to criticize any government policy which employs anyone?

I think we should set up some sort of government think tank to consider the issue.

[Heroic Mulatto]

You think these little apparatchiks wouldn't legislate lese-majeste as a crime if they thought they could get away with it?

[C. Anacreon]

You can't insult them because they work really hard and mean well, so shame on you. And all government employees work overtime at their own expense just to make sure you loser taxpayers get a fair shake.

When are you going to appreciate us government workers, dammit?

[Gozer the Gozerian]

...the bumper didn't even insult government workers, it insulted the way government works generally.

I try not to comment on my own links, but this was actually my first thought.

[C. Anacreon]

I think even the WaPo knew how ridiculous this rant was, and that's why they ran it next to the photo of the goofy Capitol tour guide (a great example of our best and brightest working for the government.)

[PapayaSF]

+1 for "stentorian jeremiad."

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

She was Streisanded in the comments.

[straffinrun]

Ha. Nice.

[VG Zaytsev]

If that chorus grows loud enough to dissuade our best and brightest from going to work for Uncle Sam, then the false sentiment that bumper sticker espouses will be true.

Yep, the only problem is not enough Top Men? in gubmint.

[straffinrun]

The attitude about government workers matters. Recently, we learned that millennials aren't interested in working for the government and that morale among federal employees is at its lowest in 11 years.

I need a bigger bumper to fit that on a sticker.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

Those poor darlings! Their 'morale' is low?

How low do you think the morale of private sector workers is when there's been virtually no wage growth for 6 years.

But no - it's only the federal workers we must worry about since some pigs are more equal than pigs who haven't taken a civil service exam.

[straffinrun]

Raise my morale or else. I like the guy's bumper sticker. Another variation could be Govt, If ain't fixed, break it

[Heroic Mulatto]

I think you're being too cavalier about this poor woman's situation. Think about it. During her daily postprandial constitutionals, she has to suffer the indignity of walking by a house with a porch. Can you believe it? A porch with tacky painted Adirondack chairs and a pickup truck in the driveway! Why I bet he just sits there on that porch, strumming his banjo, like the ignorant hillbilly he is. And I bet he plays something racist on his banjo, like "Dixie", just as she walks by with her family. And could you imagine the noises his family makes? I bet there is like 20 of them running around in overalls, all hyped-up on Mountain Dew. By Obama above, I don't know how this woman doesn't pull a Lubitz and crash the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights into Chesapeake Bay! It's like that bumper sticker rapes her and her family everyday just by being there!

[straffinrun]

I bet She has a bumper sticker, though. Wapo out of fairness will carry the neighbor's response to it next week.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

I bet She has a bumper sticker, though.

"Coexist"?

[lap83]

"I bet She has a bumper sticker, though." Maybe not.. She sounds like a classic limousine liberal. Like HM was suggesting the pickup and adirondack chairs were details to get the reader to empathize with her hatred of the subject of her rant, not to add rich literary detail.

However, she probably nods her approval whenever she sees someone with a coexist sticker. The world is there to be molded to her preferences.

[Brochettaward]

Funniest reply I've read around here in quite a while.

[mauricegirodias]

I like the two jobs we must feel are so important and necessary. She's working for the DoE, an agency whose Title IX enforcements are at the heart of so many phony campus rape allegations, he's at VA, an agency that's been killing our returning soldiers through shoddy care and lying about it. And we have to take their feelings into consideration.

Self-awareness much?

[Gozer the Gozerian]

...some pigs are more equal than pigs who haven't taken a civil service exam.

It's Cleveland's fault! Patronage NOW!

[Carl ?s the level]

From the comments:

Thank you for this article. My Daddy brought me to believe that I was, as we all are, the government. We vote or should and create the laws by voting.

A VW Bug is great when there are only two of you but when you've got 8 - you need a wagon. Same with any governing body!

Huh?

[Warrren]

The infighting is between freebankers who have history on their side and 100% gold reservists that insist that their theory that has very little historical or contemporary evidence is the only valid way to produce currency.

The 100%ers do not understand and hate the private production of paper currency. They think anything less than 100% backing of the currency by gold is fraudulent. It's a huge blindspot for people that are normally pro free-market.

[straffinrun]

As long as people are free to choose currencies and are aware of the capital reserves the bank holds, I don't see how you could object to paper currency. Seems to me it's the "fiat" not so much the "currency". But I'm hungover like a big dog.

[Agammamon]

The infighting is between freebankers who have history on their side . . .

Seems to be entirely because the 'freebankers' insist that their way is soooooo good that you shouldn't even be allowed to try the other.

[Warrren]

You have that exactly backwards. Listen to the Rothbardians go on about fraud and tell me what side is the one calling for suppression.

Freebankers know that the business model that the 100%ers support will not gain much market share but if by some weird historical fluke it does, great! Thus the idea that it needs suppression never occurs.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Again, I try not to respond to my own links -- even indirectly -- but that business model is alive and well: They're called "safety deposit boxes."

(Naturally, I'm kidding, and you know that I'm on your side here, Warrren.)

[Agammamon]

Listen to the US government attack and shut down alternate currencies - tell me who's *actually* suppressing?

[MJGreen]

Whether you're a big- or limited-government person, it seems self-defeating to be a snarling, attacking voice.

No, it's not, if you're a limited-government person.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Large, shrill woman screams at 18-month-old kid's dad.

18-month-old kid, not capable of understanding what's going on, begins to cry out of fear.

Large, shrill woman accuses the child of being "racist".

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

That bitch also showed up late.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

When did she scream at the dad?

[Heroic Mulatto]

When she is relating the story of how she met the kid's dad earlier, you think she wasn't hectoring him then too?

[Gozer the Gozerian]

...Continued, courtesy of our Late Night Link? Limit?

If Progs understood this, they wouldn't be (Progs).

No matter how you spin the Piketty, that three-letter word is the answer.

[straffinrun]

Theft has five letters.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

+2

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Orszag was one of my econ professors at Berkeley. My god, how far he has fallen.

[Sevo]

"Stiglitz also argues for imposing a land value tax, to directly address this source of increasing wealth inequality. Economists have long favored such a tax, because it does little or nothing to distort incentives: Since land is roughly fixed in supply, there's little one can do to escape a land tax. Indeed, from the perspective of economic efficiency, a land value tax scores higher than even a value-added tax, which is typically seen as the most efficient form of taxation."

Fuck Stiglitz with Piketty's dick.
This is a wealth tax, driven in many cases by government policies. So Yellin keeps interest cheap, money runs to real estate and then some agency taxes the increase.
Don't see how that can go wrong...

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

Stiglitz also argues for imposing a land value tax, to directly address this source of increasing wealth inequality. Economists have long favored such a tax, because it does little or nothing to distort incentives: Since land is roughly fixed in supply, there's little one can do to escape a land tax. Indeed, from the perspective of economic efficiency, a land value tax scores higher than even a value-added tax, which is typically seen as the most efficient form of taxation.

Re. Tarded.

You know what you can do to escape a land tax? Not buy land there. You know what happens if people with the means don't buy land there? Your tax base and your productivity both collapse because the wealthy will refuse to live in areas with these land taxes.

Unless you can create a global land tax (which would be impossible without some sort of totalitarian global government) there are obviously things you can do to escape a land tax, and only a moron could fail to see this.

[Sevo]

And I'll bet you LOVED this comment:
"Economists have long favored such a tax, because it does little or nothing to distort incentives:"
Nope, no perverse incentives there! Not at ALL!

[PapayaSF]

OT, and months old: "'Everything is problematic': My journey into the centre of a dark political world, and how I escaped" by Aurora Dagny. It's by a gay radical leftist who realized how poisoned that mindset is, and how bad it was for her. She's still a leftist, but a much more tolerant enlightened one.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

The aftermath was wonderful. A world that seemed grey and hopeless filled with colour. I can't convey to you how bleak my worldview was. An activist friend once said to me, with complete sincerity, "Everything is problematic."

You don't say.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

"Everything is problematic."

May the ghost of A. J. Ayer haunt their asses -- they deserve each other.

[PapayaSF]

+1

[MJGreen]

I still can't believe "Everything is Problematic" didn't win the Oscar for Best Song.

[Swiss Servator... Switzy!]

*narrows gaze*

[MJGreen]

Yay! This is an honor!

[lap83]

"She's still a leftist, but a much more tolerant enlightened one."

Doesn't that seem to be the journey of many leftists once they get older and wiser? To me it's one of life's mysteries that anyone can be so hoodwinked by it in the first place, but I've started to think that a lot of it is just personality. I've always been a person who kind of lives on the sidelines, so the insanity of activists is obvious to me. But people who have a tendency to be more passionate seem to fall for it more, even if they're relatively intelligent.They have to get out of their environment to see how messed up it is.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

McGovern, George.

[PapayaSF]

McGovern had an intense real-world wake-up call when he tried to run a small business and discovered that taxes and regulations created difficulties that he'd never imagined. The woman in this piece encountered things that were less on the practical and economic side, and more purely ideological.

Related.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

I'm not sure they're as different as you assert...

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Meanwhile, in Biden's world:
http://www.salon.com/2015/03/2.....tect_them/

[Gozer the Gozerian]

That should just link to Monkeybone.

[VG Zaytsev]

Holy shit.

[Agammamon]

I don't find this to be outrageous. Somewhat alarmist sure, but . . .

1. How many pogroms have the jews endured? Even in 'enlightened' countries that suddenly turned.

2. Do *any* of us here, the actual libertarians, trust our government to always look out for and protect our rights? Or do we demand the right to arm ourselves, *heavily* if desired, 'just in case'?

[Gozer the Gozerian]

So Biden should really be plugging JPFO?

[Agammamon]

No, but pointing out that governments, even the US', can go bad in a horrible way and that you should always have an exit is probably the most honest and insightful thing the man has said in his entire life that wasn't 'I go make poopy now'.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Now I'm terribly confused. Do you mean to say that things might go south (hell, positively Road Warrior), not just in the United States, but everywhere except Israel?

[Brochettaward]

I think it's just that even if things go bad in Israel, you won't be killed for just being a Jew. Maybe for other things.

At least as long as they keep the Arab horde out, that is.

[Agammamon]

No, no - that's not what I'm fucking saying at all.

I'm saying that shit can go south *anywhere* and having escape routes available is a good thing. Don't assume that *any* government will always be benevolent and plan accordingly.

If it all goes south, everywhere, at once - then you're simply screwed.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Then why is an escape route to Israel the issue?

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

This awesome parody of Wes Anderson movies is so fucking problematic.

There's a problem, however. Anderson's style is inaccessibly white. His movies cater to white nostalgia about self-absorbed aristocrats. While I do not find him to be an explicitly racist director, I sometimes wonder why I don't. He indulges in non-stop colonial nostalgia, from the wall-paper to the entire premise of The Darjeeling Limited. He employs racist language to elicit shocked guffaws from the audience, making his character 'flawed' in the way that your grandfather is 'flawed,'?incorrigible, yet loveable anyway. But are they lovable? This friction makes his perennial father-son conflicts poignant, yet the racist language is never really addressed, or treated like a flaw worth resolving. Anderson cast an indeterminately ethnic actor as Zero in The Grand Budapest Hotel, playing a refuge from the Middle East, yet most of Zero's lines are spoken in narration when he's an older man? a role played by a white, Jewish actor. Anderson would white-wash perhaps the noblest part of the X-Men?its commitment to diversity, and its stories about civil rights, hate-crimes, prejudice, and genocide.

PROBLEMATIC

[Heroic Mulatto]

Anderson cast an indeterminately ethnic actor as Zero in The Grand Budapest Hotel, playing a refuge from the Middle East, yet most of Zero's lines are spoken in narration when he's an older man? a role played by a white, Jewish actor

Wait, Semites aren't from the Middle East now?

Kailyn Kent must subscribe to the Jews are alien, shape-shifting, space lizards origin theory.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Wait... I thought they were magical shape-shifting Jews!

[Dweebston]

Predictable tone-deaf bitchiness from yet another dweeby cultural martinet-wannabe is just frosting on cake that was Wes Anderson-themed X-Men.

[PapayaSF]

Indeed. OMG, a white artist creates art with white characters! How positively retro, if not hateful.

[MJGreen]

Anderson cast an indeterminately ethnic actor as Zero

That bastard! Why can't he just cast a normal ethnic actor. Like a black-black one, or one of them Chinamen.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

R.I.P., Anthony Quinn.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Wait, the guy who did those boring old-woman movies is doing the X Men?

[PapayaSF]

A great Twitter account. He may have my vote for 2016.

[Gozer the Gozerian]

Think he it can edge out Morgan Freeman?