[Politics_Observer]

George Carlin was one brilliant fellow. I always loved and still do love listening to George Carlin:

[BigSteve]

Carlin was brilliant.

I had the good fortune of seeing him perform several times, and it always astounded me at how the guy could walk onto the stage with a microphone and go at light speed for two hours, never missing a beat and never hesitating.

The only other person who comes close, for me, was Robin Williams...

[Patrickov]

I always find it amazing when people use past or present atrocities to dismiss a target that we actually should head for.

I do not care how the rights come from. If it is something desirable then we should strive to achieve.

It is OK to admit being unable to achieve the goal but to dismiss the idea itself is a big sour-grape expression.

[Politics_Observer]

@Patrickov

Art is truth and comedy is art. The job of the artist is to tell the truth. Now, you have to be careful about telling the truth. A lot of people don't like to hear it or it will make them mad. But the comedian can get away with telling the truth to most people because he makes them laugh while he does it. Carlin is just telling it like it is.

[Patrickov]

@Patrickov

Art is truth and comedy is art. The job of the artist is to tell the truth. Now, you have to be careful about telling the truth. A lot of people don't like to hear it or it will make them mad. But the comedian can get away with telling the truth to most people because he makes them laugh while he does it. Carlin is just telling it like it is.

I probably was irritated because some of the video contains interpretations of truth that I found irrelevant to the principles he tries to ridicule.

In a slightly more specific note, the presentation is based on an assumption that the Government should care about us. May I suggest that neither the Government nor the people should make a fuss on how each other actually think, and just get the job done (for the Government: Administration; for the people: Check and balance) properly.

[Pants-of-dog]

If Carlin is making the point that rights are not objective and can be taken away by the government, then he is correct.

But the next question would then be: where do rights come from? And the answer is that they come from our hard work to force the government and others to recognise the rights that we demand.

So, the deeper message is that if we wish to continue having rights, we must continue fighting for them.

[Rancid]

@Patrickov

Art is truth and comedy is art. The job of the artist is to tell the truth. Now, you have to be careful about telling the truth. A lot of people don't like to hear it or it will make them mad. But the comedian can get away with telling the truth to most people because he makes them laugh while he does it. Carlin is just telling it like it is.

This is true.

The Court Jester in feudal times was a VERY important person for this reason.

I wonder if Potemkin has any insight on the impact and incluence of court jesters. He strikes me as the kind of person that would know this kind of nerdy shit.

[Politics_Observer]

@Rancid

This is true.

The Court Jester in feudal times was a VERY important person for this reason.

I wonder if Potemkin has any insight on the impact and incluence of court jesters. He strikes me as the kind of person that would know this kind of nerdy shit.

Yeah I bet he would! At least based on some of the posts I have seen from him.

[Verv]

I believe that the foundres of the US, at least the bulk of them, actually truly did believe in the rights that they enshrined and that they would not have been upset with the regular people ready to defend to the death their right to free speech, assembly, etc.

The problem is that every revolution eventually becomes the establishment, and establishments breed establishment culture and establishment ideas. The ideals are forgotten and what is thought about regularly is the political edifice itself, not the ground that it was built on.

This is why, to this day, talking politics to most people means discussing scandals, the impeachment proceedings, etc., and rarely does it mean discussign political philosophy. In a roundabout way, that is exactly why your rights are under threat: the average person doesn't care about your abstract rights, but they stand with Borat in limiting your free speech under the guise of it being a 'threat' to them because they understand punching their political opponents but not political philosophies.

[Politics_Observer]

@Verv

Think of it this way Verv. Republicans don't care about the constitution or the country. So, after they finish helping Trump consolidate his position as dictator of the US and our republic ceases to exist, you will then see that we just have temporary privileges and not rights (maybe Trump and the republicans will fail in this endeavor to consolidate Trump as dictator of the US, I don't know). You see, Carlin was right all along. We got our independence and our Bill of Rights because the founders wanted to right some wrongs during their time, but we also got them because we had France's help. And without the help of France, we wouldn't have won our independence from the British and have our current Bill of Rights, or Bill of Temporary Privileges to be more accurate.

We didn't win our independence simply because a bunch of rednecks grabbed their muskets and fought and defeated the Brits all by themselves with no help from anybody. France's help, money and support was crucial and we couldn't have won our independence without their help. France helped us so much to win the American Revolutionary War as a matter of fact, that it bankrupted them; which in turn helped to lead to the French Revolution and the demise of the french monarchy.

A lot of people here in the states think that the American Revolution was largely won by a bunch of rednecks grabbing muskets and taking up arms against the Brits. That's not exactly true nor historically accurate. We won primarily because of french help and their was no way we could have won without french help unless another foreign power stepped in to bank roll our revolution as well as send additional help or advisors and their navy to combat the British naval blockade.

Regardless, every country that has a Bill of Rights, can have those Bill of Rights discarded at any time by their governments and that has happened in many places, including here in the US. Their is not much you can do about it. You can sue, but during that period of time when your rights have been discarded by your government, it's not likely that suing will do any good realistically speaking.

[Verv]

Let me say that I truly believe that there are both Republicans & Democrats, sometimes even at the highest levels, that fully believe in their ideals. No one here would accuse me of being a bleeding heart liberal, but I do think that Pres. Carter is an example of an ideological leftist who really made it to the top of his part and the top of the US government.

I would comment on some ideologically loyal Republicans, but Democrats and leftists are far less circumspect. I won't derail this thread by saying something good about a conservative and then having people freak out.

....

Yeah, the French helped us.

But the fact that some people are self-interested does not mean that the vision for the Republic was selfish. The fact that there are people acting in bad faith or who are ambivalent does not mean that the whole system is actually designed to be that.

I think most people who are even apolitical or self-interested will have moments where they are loyal to ideologies and who would say that they believe that the framework for their country is more important than their five million dollars...

But IDK.

Here's a hot take: maybe we are suckers when we are overly ideological and we have to operate more in terms of reality to be able to get anything done or accomplished.

[Rich]

If Carlin is making the point that rights are not objective and can be taken away by the government, then he is correct.

But the next question would then be: where do rights come from? And the answer is that they come from our hard work to force the government and others to recognise the rights that we demand.

So, the deeper message is that if we wish to continue having rights, we must continue fighting for them.

So how much ammunition have you used up then say in the last ten years in all this fighting? Really all this nonsense about fighting for rights. Haiti is actually an example, and an admirable one of people fighting and even willing to commit genocide to secure their rights. However this is actually rare, for non government forces to overthrow a government, without major help from another government. In the American war of independence, it was France, Spain and the Netherlands that did the heavy lifting. Even in the case of the 1917 Russian Revolution, it was the German Army that broke the ability of the Russian State to govern.

Or take women's right to vote. Why did British, American and German women get the vote so much earlier than France and Switzerland? Was it because they were full of fearsome feminist warriors? Time to give up this pathetic fantasy world.

[Pants-of-dog]

How does that contradict what I said?