Friday, June 16, 2006

The Onion stinks

The right has repeated ad infinitum the outrageous canard that liberal bloggers supported Zarqawi. Now the Onion, in a parody ad concerning the Yearly Kos convention, joins in. Supposedly, the Kossacks held an "Abu Musab al-Zarqawi memorial service."

Yes, I know that the Onion folks are in the satire business. But satire is supposed to have a definable target. What, exactly, is it that they are satirizing?

It's time for the right-wing propagandists -- and for the Onion -- to put up or shut up. Name one liberal blogger that supported Zarqawi. Sure, you can name quite a few who thought that Z-man was an overblown fake; that's pretty much my own take on the matter. But I dare any critic of the left to name a single liberal writer who took the Zarqawi legend at face value and who proclaimed that Zarqawi was a good man doing fine things.

If the propagandists can't come up with a single citation, then they reveal themselves -- once again -- to be liars. The Onion has swag for sale. Unless they can come up with a cite, don't buy their crap.

(By the way, the Onion's segment in The Aristocrats is suprisingly unfunny. But I urge you to see the movie anyways. Carlin kills.)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I used to adore The Onion, but it's been sucking pretty badly for a number of years now, ever since Jason...whatever his last name is moved to NYC, got intimidated by life in Gotham and lost the funny. And editorial/creative control, I guess. I think it really began to go down hill after '04, around the same time Jon Stewart sold out and The Daily Show started to eat it. Which is pretty sad.

How many more funny/integrity bones will the Bush Administration shred? At this point, I'm even a bit worried about Carlin's.

Anonymous said...

As Tom Lehrer explained thirty some years ago when he stopped doing his biting verse, satire is no longer possible in America. It can't get far enough distance from the truth to be discernibly different.

Unless, of course, you make up a false truth, like the Onion has done.

Anonymous said...

I never did think the onion was funny. Like SNL of the past, oh, 20 years, they stretch too far and when you have to pummel a point, in or out of satire, it's just not that clever. Lehrer was right then and even more so now. Try reading a press release from the State Dept. or any speech by Bush. onion can't compare to that.