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September 03, 2008

Human Beings: Why I Like Them

You'd imagine that political "professionals" could, when they're miked and sitting in a TV studio, refrain from saying things that would be highly embarrassing if the whole world heard them. When it comes to Peggy Noonan and Mike Murphy, you would be wrong. And of course you'd also be wrong when it comes to Jesse Jackson.

This is something I find genuinely winning about human beings: even when it's clearly in our best interests, we just CAN'T SHUT UP. Want to find out how the death squads of El Salvador worked? Go ask one of the generals who ran them for an interview, and he'll tell you about it with great pride and in excruciating detail. Want to know how the Bush administration put together their fraudulent case for war? Just wait a few years, go to a party with Karl Rove, and pretend to be interested. He won't be able to help himself.

We would be a much less likable species if we had any kind of self-control.

—Jonathan Schwarz

Posted at September 3, 2008 11:05 PM
Comments

2nd most entertaining: gwen ifill saying from the convention floor after the palin speech:

"the pent-up excitement here in this crowd just exploded all over the place"

i think that's close. i'm sorry but i was laughing so hard i couldn't get it down verbatim. hopefully, the transcript.…

Posted by: hapa at September 4, 2008 12:19 AM

Likable? This kinda makes me want to put everyone through obedience school.

Posted by: En Ming Hee at September 4, 2008 12:21 AM

They're destroying the country and the world. It's adorable.

Posted by: Carl at September 4, 2008 12:43 AM

They're destroying the country and the world. It's adorable.

Well, it's not the destroying things part that's adorable. It's the inability to act in their own best interests by not talking about it that I find appealing. Yes, they want to kill and maim, but they want even more TO BE HEARD.

Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at September 4, 2008 02:15 AM

but by talking about it - and being at least a bit inept - they are destroying the country and the world a little less quickly and completely than they otherwise could.

Posted by: bamboozlde at September 4, 2008 10:25 AM

What is so much more likeable about self-control? It seems to me that the most alienating and inhuman aspects of politicians, commenters, etc. is their ability to stay boringly "on message," and say nothing controversial.

It is always more enlightening and frankly likeable when the mask drops and they come up with something (relatively) scandalous.

Posted by: Seth at September 4, 2008 11:27 AM

What is so much more likeable about self-control?

Wait, are you responding to me? Because if so you may have read the last sentence too quickly. I was trying to say exactly the same thing you did.

Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at September 4, 2008 11:45 AM

Yer right. Sorry for the pleonasm.

Posted by: Seth at September 4, 2008 01:26 PM

And here is an explanation and an apology by Peggy Noonan!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122044753790594947.html?mod=todays_columnists

Posted by: Rupa Shah at September 4, 2008 02:31 PM

Human Beings: Why I Like Them
Really? I thought most of this blog was one long argument for human extinction.
I'd go further and say that our track record puts all simians in a bad light; if we go, we ought to take them with us so they can't move up and make the same kinds of mistakes we did - leave it to the cetaceans and the cephalopods to have a shot.

Posted by: Wareq at September 4, 2008 07:09 PM

Wareq - clearly you haven't been reading up on bononos. they are our hippie, peace-lovin', easygoin', matriarchal (with egalitarian tendencies), make-love-not-war'n frugivore simian siblings.

there's hope!

Posted by: bamboozlde at September 5, 2008 06:09 AM
Yes, they want to kill and maim, but they want even more TO BE HEARD.

We are social animals -- anything worth doing is worth sharing.

It takes some sort of derangement to remain privately self-satisfied when there's so much credit to be taken.

Well, it's not the destroying things part that's adorable.

Call it creative destruction. Or demand destruction. But the important thing is to make destruction a natural, and good thing that only some moron would oppose. I learned this from Tom Friedman.

Posted by: Labiche at September 5, 2008 06:55 AM