Tuesday, March 28, 2006

If a Democrat did it, he'd be executed

I was talking to someone (I will begin to call this person "DT the Republican" from now on) on Sunday, and I mentioned that there seems to be the attitude in politics, especially from Republicans (but the Democrats do it also), of criticizing someone from the other party for doing something, then defending someone from his own party for doing the same thing.

If, say, Harry Reid, were to flip someone off after Sacrament Meeting, all the talking heads would be calling for his resignation. Republicans would be calling his Stake President to ask for disfellowship/excommunication hearings.

However, I bet none of the Republicans are doing the same for this guy:

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia startled reporters in Boston just minutes after attending a mass, by flipping a middle finger to his critics.

A Boston Herald reporter asked the 70-year-old conservative Roman Catholic if he faces much questioning over impartiality when it comes to issues separating church and state.

"You know what I say to those people?" Scalia replied, making the obscene gesture and explaining "That's Sicilian."

The 20-year veteran of the high court was caught making the gesture by a photographer with The Pilot, the Archdiocese of Boston's newspaper.

"Don't publish that," Scalia told the photographer, the Herald said.


I wish I were making it up.

-Bob

5 comments:

pramahaphil said...

Bob -- Have you ever played the game Rumor. The game where everyone sits in a circle and the first person whispers in the next persons ear, and so on untill at te end of the circle the original message has totally been messed up in translation.

The source of your link's source, said it was a hand gesture some might consider obscene. Your source said "The Boston Herald is reporting Scalia's movement as "an obscene gesture" and a "flick of the wrist." That still is unclear, it could have been the wrist-under-chin gesture mixed with the middle finger." You went all the way to it being the bird.

I'm just saying the story seems uncredilble now because your post has jumped beyond what the original story says. This from someone that new nothing about the story until opening your blog.

Bob said...

However, that just further emphasises my point. Republicans would let the story get so distorted, then that would be the new story.

-Bob

pramahaphil said...

Bob -- You and AmericaBLOG distorted the story. I went through the link you provided as your source (read AmericaBLOG's account) went to their source and all three accounts are different.

Who is letting the story get distorted?

pramahaphil said...

P.S. Have you seen the photo? I'd like to find it.

Anonymous said...

Bob, you're not making it up but you are getting it wrong. Here's the picture:

http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=133092

It looks to me as though Scalia did the flicking-the-fingers-under-the-chin gesture, which is definitely not the same thing as giving someone the bird. I wouldn't say that it is a nice gesture, but it isn't vulgar either; it's probably the most appropriate gesture to make to a bothersome photographer. Just as Scalia says, it is generally more of a dismissive gesture than an offensive one, though it still is somewhat rude. I don't blame Scalia for doing it; I can only imagine what lengths the photographer had to go to in order to draw such a response from a Justice of the Supreme Court.