Combat! - Page 212 of 406 - A blog by Dan Brooks

Zimmerman’s friend says something weird

By Dan Brooks in Fighting July 3, 2013 4 Comments

My brother forwarded me this article from Headline News’s obsessive coverage of the George Zimmerman trial, in which Zimmerman’s friend Mark Osterman explains how he convinced Zimmerman to buy a gun. Quote:

He asked whether he should or shouldn’t—to start with—and I recommended that he should. Anybody who’s a non-convicted felon should carry a firearm. The police aren’t always there.

Dear friends: when I am on trial for murder, please do not describe me as a “non-convicted felon.” Also, great advice on the gun thing, Mark.

Citing Christianity, PA rep stops gay colleague from addressing House

By Dan Brooks in Epistemology July 2, 2013 3 Comments

Pennsylvania Rep. Daryl Metcalfe (R–Cranberry)

Last week, during the end of Pennsylvania’s legislative session, Rep. Brian Sims (D–Philadelphia) took the floor to speak about the Supreme Court’s DOMA ruling. Under PA house rules, legislators can speak about uncontroversial issues at the end of the session by unanimous consent. Sims, who is gay, had his mic cut a few seconds into his remarks, owing to the objections of Rep. Daryl Metcalfe. Indignant Democrats subsequently took the floor to speak about DOMA themselves, only to have their mics cut, too. It was a mess. In defending his maneuver, Metcalfe told Pittsburgh’s KDPA:

His talking about that on the House floor would have been an open rebellion against Almighty God and God’s word, against God’s law. And as a Christian, if I would have sat there and been silent, it would have violated my conscience because of my beliefs as a Christian.

Exegesis after the jump.

Dept. of Irony: GOP paints Clinton, Dems as old

By Dan Brooks in Department of Irony? July 1, 2013 2 Comments

Hillary Clinton, recently upgraded to “old” from “bitch”

“In some ways,” Rand Paul says in this article from the Times, “the older Democrats have become more staid and status-quo-like than some of us Republicans.” Thus begins the most tenuous political strategy in recent memory: Republicans’ plan to characterize Democrats as the party of the old. Former Romney strategist Stuart Stevens told reporters last month that electing a Democrat in 2016 would be like going back in time. And Mitch McConnell described the likely Democratic field as like an episode of The Golden Girls, presumably in that he masturbates to it.

Friday links! Baffling responses edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links June 28, 2013 2 Comments

Supporters of gay marriage deploy a well-intended sign that even quotation marks cannot save.

The verdicts are in, and once again half of the country absolutely cannot compass the reasoned values of the other half. You would think that, in the socially liberal America of 2013, gay marriage would be a simple issue. It’s not as if gay people wanted to marry straight people. This question of what liberties the US government will afford is the rare controversy in which the rights of one side overlap not at all on the rights of the other. They don’t even have to eat at the same lunch counter. Yet bigots across the country are scandalized that the Supreme Court has denied them the right to curtail the rights of others. Today is Friday, and some people cannot leave well enough alone. Won’t you condemn them smugly with me?

On keeping Missoula weird

By Dan Brooks in Uncategorized June 27, 2013 1 Comment

My usual Thursday gauntlet has been compressed even further by a visit from my mother, who arrives at the only-just godly hour of 10am. It is a disappointing son who makes his mother take a cab from the airport, a rickety middle-aged man who skips his precious Thursday yoga, and a broke freelance writer who misses deadline. All this is to say that there is not much Combat! blog today. Fortunately, Thursday also brings the publication of yet another screed in the Independent, this one about keeping Missoula weird. It’s not just a bumper sticker or a self-satisfied identity formation; it’s a way of life, and I ironically oppose it because I am an ironic curmudgeon. If any arts feature ever turns the good people of this city against me, this will be the one. Read it now before the townsfolk debone me with pitchforks. We’ll be back tomorrow with Friday links.