10+ Most Destructive Pieces of Conservative Crap

[hyphenate]

I think we need to make our own list of "dangerous and harmful" books, don't you?

Let's start by listing all those we feel damages the intelligence quotient of the population by being either badly written, provoking dangerous acts, insipid and stupid, or simply rotten writing.

A few (please feel free to include your own gems to this list!):

Deliver Us From Evil by Sean "Moron" Hannity
Anything by Ann Coulter
Contract with America by some idiot named after a lizard
The Bible (very dangerous book, provoking jihads by Xtians)
My Pet Goat (suggested by someone who reminded us of how distracting it is)


These are off the top of my head, so feel free to fill the list!

[babylonsister]

1. Anything by O'Lielly. nt

[LynneSin]

2. The "Left Behind" series

I don't even think there is a rapture in the bible - it's this series that distorts the truth

[Aristus]

13. I always wanted to talk to a fundy about the "Left Behind" crap;

If the Bible is the absolute, irrefutable, undeniable truth, then won't the Apocalypse happen EXACTLY the way it's described in Revelation? The Beast with seven heads and ten crowns, the seven seals and all that? How can it happen the way the "LB" guys wrote it?

I wanna watch a fundy squirm trying to interpret something they insist is beyond interpretation.

And the bizarre thing is: I'm a Christian! But unlike the fundies, I believe Christianity is for personal salvation and a guide to loving and forgiving others. I don't have some desperate need to see God strike down people I don't like very much. I try to remember that God loves everyone as much as he loves me.

Fundies must hate that. B-)

[GirlinContempt]

3. Ayn Rand

any and all

[ghostsofgiants]

6. Seconded

Throw in anything Ann Coulter writes as well.

Edit: Haha, the OP beat me to it.

[Squeech]

29. No

We need to reclaim Rand. The bad guys in Atlas Shrugged all resemble George W. Bush-- incompetent children of plutocratic families, who failed upward to get to where they are today, dodging responsibility and wrapping themselves in the flag or the Bible when challenged. (And the biggest bad guy in The Fountainhead could pass for Andrew Sullivan.)

Rand is unquestionably flawed, in her adherence to an ideology that doesn't work in the real world. But she identified a particular sort of corruption that's all too common in the real world, and some of the reasons why that sort of corruption flourishes. And that's too valuable to consign to the dustbin of history. (Like Karl Marx, who pointed out problems with capitalism that are now widely acknowledged, even though his policy prescriptions had worse problems.)

[silvermachine]

33. You have fun reclaiming her...

...there precious little there of worth imho.

[GOPBasher]

35. I agree...

Even though they're great pieces of work, the philosophy she spreads is horrible.

[indepat]

4. PNAC, the Patriot Act, and every neocon Tax Act

[SmokingJacket]

5. Books aren't dangerous.

Stupid people are.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

10. Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner!

[rocktivity]

7. I love the "Lying Piece Of Crap" song on the Stephanie Miller show

It's so cheerful and peppy you almost don't realize what they're saying!

:rofl:
rockantion

[Taverner]

8. Mein Kampf by Adolf "Yuk Yuk" Hitler

Also "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand, "Slander" by Anntrhax Coutler and "Dare to Discipline" by James "Stickupass" Dobson.

[Dogmudgeon]

11. James "Stickupass" Dobson?

That's a good 'un!

I've been calling him James "Spanky" Dobson for some years now -- if you ever read Dare to Discipline, it will make perfect sense. But there's something about calling a grown man with a bad temper "Spanky" that deflates his enormous, cross-sized ego.

Plus it goes well with other (Hal) Roach Studios epithets: "Alfalfa" Robertson, "Stymie" Falwell, "Darla" Schlafly, "Moe" Horowitz, and "Curly" Falwell.

--p!

[McKenzie]

9. "Free to Choose" by Milton Friedman

the guru of afficiandos of the voodoo economics school. It emphasises the right of the individual to maximise their "utility". I wouldn't recognise my utility if it spoke directly to me. Yet another piece of trickery designed to con the gullible into believing that free market economics is all about "freedom" (sic) to choose yet more useless consumer products, including the handy dandy dial-a-matic sponge sharpener (apologies to Gilbert Shelton et al).

I laughed at your My Pet Goat comment; it was bloody funny.

regards

[hyphenate]

15. Thanks!

But someone else I know deserves the real praise for bringing it up! :toast:

[xmas74]

18. Friedman is a joke.

But many think that he's God (including one of my econ profs).
I never understood it.

[kick-ass-bob]

25. Some of my econ profs railed on Friedman.

Basically calling him a hack.
But then some others in the same dept were up Friedmans shorts.

[xmas74]

30. I live in a red state.

I don't know if that means anything but a few of them thought that he was god. I thought that he was a fraud. Of course, I was just an 18 yr old chick (let's stress the chick part-one of my profs thought that women shouldn't have an interest in econ. It's unnatural, according to him) who wasn't smart enough to form her own opinions on the subject. They thought that I needed to be told what to think instead of reading the material and forming my own opinion.
Friedman is one of the most dangerous people in the 20th and 21st century. His theories will ruin America yet.

[kick-ass-bob]

31. I was talking more about my graduate school professors.

There were some wild (as far as economists go) exchanges between those who liked him and those who did not. That was kind of funny to see. :D

Since you are obviously not a monetarist, are you more in line with Keynesian (which is not monetarist!!) or classical thoughts?

[flakey_foont]

12. Anything by Michael Savage

that wanker that wrote THE BELL CURVE
the Weekly Standard
the complete works of Ann Coulter
David Horowitz

[hyphenate]

14. A quick kick

:kick:

[Hardrada]

16. Up from Liberalism by William F. Buckley

None Dare Call it Treason- Phyllis Schlafly
Will- G. Gordon Liddy
books by "Babs" Bush

[hfojvt]

20. isn't "Dare" by John Stormer

or is that a pen name? Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations" seems to be a conservative bible, but Chomsky quotes it for great effect. Considering how conservatives Mormons are, I might add "The Book of Mormon" to the list, but since I have not read it I do not know if the conservatism comes from the book.

[Dogmudgeon]

24. Yes, "None Dare Call It Treason" by John Stormer

The book was a major best-seller in the early and middle 1960s, mainly because John Birchite businessmen, clergymen, and politically active military officers (particularly from the Air Force, for some reason) bought copies by the case and gave them out free for the improvement of the benighted populace.

My parents had at least a dozen copies; one or two of them were used as shims to keep a dresser drawer from tilting over, one was used to secure the telephone book my younger brother sat on at the dinner table, and at least two were used to keep a window air-conditioner stable.

And they still voted Democratic. :)

--p!

[SmileyBoy]

17. "Liberalism Is A Mental Disorder" by Michael Savage

:puke:-tastic.

[Hugin]

19. Anyone mention "Fox News" yet?

It's the Nuke Option of Destructive Pieces of Conservative Crap.

[DemGirl7]

21. I disagree, the Bible isn't dangerous...it's just some of the people

who read it are dangerous...saying the Bible is dangerous is just as bad as saying any other religious book or text is dangerous. Books don't kill, only people kill.

[Deep13]

28. depends which part you read

Much of it encourages some pretty savage behavior.

[jmowreader]

22. None of the above

The two most dangerous pieces of conservative crap ever written are The Way the World Works by Jude Wanniski and Supply Side Economics: Financial Decision-Making for the 80s by Arthur Laffer.

Arthur Laffer was the great financial guru who invented supply-side economics and the Laffer Curve (what George the Elder once correctly called voodoo economics until Saint Ronnie picked him up and shut him up); Wanniski is its greatest cheerleader.

Arthur Laffer is completely full of shit on the relationship between tax rates and tax revenues, and I can prove it. Says Laffer, there are two rates which produce the same revenue: a high one and a low one. Apparently, if tax rates are high people work less. Uh-uh. He also says that if the tax rate was 100 percent no one would work at all. Jesus, Arthur, haven't you ever heard of tax evasion?

Okay, kiddies, here's how the world really fucking works. Listen good.

People require money to live. People also require some taxed money to keep the IRS from coming after them. If the taxed money they earn provides them with a good living, they'll just do their taxed jobs and play softball or something in their off time.

If, for whatever reason, the taxed money does NOT provide a good living, they'll enter the Underground Economy. Everyone has some sort of a skill they can do in exchange for cash under the table. They'll continue to work at their taxed job but will also detail cars or knit afghans for beer money.

Now let's say we cut taxes. In fact, let's just chop 'em in half. Will this suddenly cause all the people who knit for beer to report their knitting income? Well, if you honestly think so you really need to quit smoking that shit.

And let's reciprocate by doubling them. This won't cause people to "work less," like Laffer claims; last I checked most of us need to work to eat. It will cause people to work at their taxed jobs less, so they can devote more time to their underground jobs.

[LeftyMom]

23. Babywise by Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo

a fine book on how to starve babies into submission so they'll be too afraid of you to cry before they're old enough to beat. Really, that's the basic idea.

Some fundie churches (and a few mainline ones) do parenting classes based on the even more whacked "Christian" (Jesus wept) verson, Preparation for Parenting. That just adds the twist that if the little wretches are too scared to qustion you, they'll never develop the habit of questioning, so they'll blindly obey god. So beating and starving your kids is your divine obligation as a "Christian" parent and to parent without the Ezzos method is a grave sin.

It makes Dare to Discipline (Dobson's child beating manual) and Bringing up Boys (his book on how to beat your sons so they won't be hooomoooseckshuallls) look as warm and fuzzy as AA Milne's Pooh books.

[DS1]

26. I don't think any book is dangerous

and to admit such is a sign of weakness and fear.

[Deep13]

27. "The Way Things Ought to Be"

started the whole avalanch of right-wing slander books masquerading as serious commentary.

[tjwash]

32. "The Redneck Manifesto"

A must read for all intolerant Rush and Hannity callers who love to complain about about how minorities are getting all the breaks in this country, and how white people are the most discriminated class in america. Written by Jim Goad, white supremist, and Bush supporter.

[ghostsofgiants]

34. You left out "douchebag"

These people with persecution complexes astound me.