[@crawdad:] Its not even provocation. It's pure hate-for hillary. Hate that overwhelms every decent and humane instinct, every intelligent thought, and every creative expression that Paglia has ever had. Paglia has become a Perfect Republican--her heart is so filled with hate that she has become an irrational raving scumbag.Comment by Salonista sabatia on "I was wrong about Donald Trump: Camille Paglia on the GOP front-runner’s refreshing candor (and his impetuousness, too)." By Camille Paglia, Salon, 3/10/16.And I say this as a Bernie voter(NH!), donor, and volunteer.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
Feeling the Bern over at Salon.
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
Delusions, Their Defenders, And Their Promoters
Delusions are often functional. A mother's opinions about her children's beauty, intelligence, goodness, et cetera ad nauseam, keep her from drowning them at birth. – Robert A. Heinlein
The above is a thought of striking insight. Many persons labor under some delusion – and in many cases, the delusion is what makes the holder’s life worth living. Dale Carnegie mentions a typical, and typically fascinating case in How To Win Friends and Influence People:
Why do these people go insane?
I recently put that question to the head physician of one of our most important hospitals for the insane. This doctor, who has received the highest honors and the most coveted awards for his knowledge of insanity, told me frankly that he didn't know why people went insane. Nobody knows for sure. But he did say that many people who go insane find in insanity a feeling of importance that they were unable to achieve in the world of reality. Then he told me this story:
"I have a patient right now whose marriage proved to be a tragedy. She wanted love, sexual gratification, children, and social prestige; but life blasted all her hopes. Her husband didn't love her. He refused even to eat with her, and forced her to serve his meals in his room upstairs. She had no children, no social standing. She went insane; and, in her imagination, she divorced her husband and resumed her maiden name. She now believes she has married into the English aristocracy, and she insists on being called Lady Smith.
"And as for children, she imagines now that she has a new child every night. Each time I call on her she says:
'Doctor, I had a baby last night.'"
Life once wrecked all her dream ships on the sharp rocks of reality; but in the sunny, fantastic isles of insanity, all her barkentines race into port with canvas billowing and with winds singing through the masts.
Tragic? Oh, I don't know. Her physician said to me:
"If I could stretch out my hand and restore her sanity, I wouldn't do it. She's much happier as she is."
The unfortunate woman in the above found the reality to which she was subjected impossible to endure. She went insane – i.e., she adopted a set of comforting delusions and invested herself totally in them – to shield her from that unendurable reality. The physician who described her case above exhibited a degree of humanity and sympathy that goes well beyond the norm. I could only wish that everyone might think, feel, and act as he did.
That woman’s delusions were her way of surviving the shipwreck of her life. Only God knows why her life turned out the way it did, but both we and God can easily see why “Lady Smith” abandoned reality for a far preferable fantasy world. In comparable circumstances, you or I might well do the same.
Do you know anyone whose delusions are the cushions he inserts between himself and an intolerable reality? Given that most of us believe ourselves to be better persons than we really are – brighter; stronger; faster; handsomer; more moral or ethical; better drivers – I estimate the probability to be about 100%.
Delusions of the sort “Lady Smith” exhibited don’t necessarily impose a burden on others. (I said necessarily. Remember that part.) However, there are species of behavior, arising from personally held delusions, that can burden others, especially given the abominable state of our law in this year of Our Lord 2016.
The critical cleavage arises when the deluded one includes among his delusions that he has a right to dictate your opinions and behavior to conform to his delusion. When the contretemps rises to the level of enforcement, there can be the most terrible of consequences.
Consider the following brief video snippet, culled from the movie Hitman. Please watch it; it’s less than a minute long.
When Agent 47 says “That’s not a woman,” does he immediately leap from his seat to upbraid “her” about inappropriate clothing choices? He does not. Does he do so later? Again, he does not. He has no interest in imposing his opinions on the creature. Apparently neither does the restaurant...and it’s all for the best. “Her” delusion of womanhood might well be what keeps “her” from being a danger to others.
Yesterday, in the comments section to this piece, I had an exchange with a certain Amy Tapie, an official of the Gender Identity Center of Colorado. That’s apparently a gathering of “trans” people: its members were born into one sex but have chosen to live as the other.
I want nothing from such persons but to be left alone. I consider them deluded. However, I concede that their delusion might be functional. At any rate, it’s not my place to interfere with them. Problems arise when such persons demand a certain level of conformity from us: specifically, to ratify and approve of their delusion.
For Smith to demand that others’ see the world (or any part thereof) as Smith requires is the start of a road to Hell – a short one. Nor does it matter at all how many Smiths league together to demand it.
I could go on about this for a great many words more, but I’ll spare you. In summary: It’s best for those of us who see the world a little differently not to try to impose our opinions of it on others – whether or not we’re in the majority. The delusions of others might be more important than we know. Indeed, our delusions about our strength, speed, agility, intelligence, appearance, and sexual prowess might be all that keeps us from unpacking the Barrett .50, grabbing an unopened package of Oreo Double-Stufs, and climbing the nearest clock tower. Nor ought we to take too great an umbrage at minorities that exhibit delusions we find laughable. We cannot know which of them has a Barrett .50 and an unopened package of Double-Stufs.
As usual, it’s attempts by the use of the law to compel such agreements and ratifications that really cause trouble. In the degenerated state of law in our time, such attempts are distressingly frequent, often aided and abetted by media thugs (e.g., Memories Pizza). That’s the vilest sort of coercion. It must be resisted a outrance. If freedom does not include the freedom of thought – the right to see the world as we please and make our decisions thereby – what could it possibly mean?
Have a nice day.
Tuesday, March 8, 2016
Quickies: The Leader Of The Free World
...it appears has had enough of the mistreatment he’s received from Barack Hussein Obama:
Washington (CNN)The White House said Monday it was "surprised" to learn through press reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had declined an invitation to meet President Barack Obama later this month in Washington.An aide to Obama said that Netanyahu's office had requested a sit-down between the two leaders on March 17 or 18, and that the White House responded two weeks ago offering March 18 as a meeting date. That's just ahead of Obama's planned trip to Cuba.
"We were looking forward to hosting the bilateral meeting, and we were surprised to first learn via media reports that the Prime Minister, rather than accept our invitation, opted to cancel his visit," said National Security Council spokesman Ned Price. "Reports that we were not able to accommodate the Prime Minister's schedule are false."
This might be unexpected even by conservatives who smarted for Netanyahu when Obama left him to wait in a White House anteroom while the Obamas had dinner. Israel does benefit greatly from access to American arms and foreign aid. Nevertheless, it’s refreshing to see someone of stature smash back Obama’s service of contempt. Perhaps the next Administration will treat Israel and its prime minister with more respect.
I admit to borrowing the title of this post from Bill Whittle. It seemed both ironic and appropriate. Here’s the video at issue:
Do Feminists Have A Point?
Perhaps more precisely, do feminists have an agenda?
It’s not a question one can answer with perfect certainty. However, there are signs and portents one must regard with due seriousness:
- David Gelernter notes that feminist dogma now trumps combat effectiveness.
- The mighty Ace of Spades notes that female privilege now outranks the ordinary rules of politeness.
- Ann Althouse notes that feminist “rape culture” notions obviate the use of the word “no.”
- Stephen Green notes feminist transformation of ordinary behavior to a threat.
- Twitchy notes that Bruce “Caitlyn” Jenner is being reviled for being a Republican.
These outcroppings of feminist activism and its consequences don’t all point in exactly the same direction. However, among their common effects is one that suggests fundamental significance: they all reduce men to second-class status:
- Combat is the emblematic male undertaking.
- The alternative to politeness in discourse was once pistols at dawn.
- Male interest in a woman is “politically incorrect” and might be “triggering.”
- Boys and young men were once expected to carry knives and to learn their many uses.
- Even a hero(ine) of the “trans” migration is disallowed any divergence from feminist gospel.
These are just the bits I could cull from my 4:30 AM news sweep. If I were to keep at it once I’m more awake, I’m sure I could find others – and I’m just as sure they’d be consistent with the ones above.
The stronger, more innovative, generally more capable sex – that’s the male sex, just in case you were in any doubt – has always behaved in certain ways, preferred certain activities, and predominated in certain trades. Men have also been the conceivers and codifiers of all the laws and social customs that have historically protected women from male predators. Women have benefited from that aspect of the division of labor far more than they’ve ever admitted, whether publicly or to one another.
Now and then, individual women have succeeded in rising to male levels of accomplishment and prestige. They’re noteworthy for being exceptions to the pattern of their sex. They don’t disprove anything about the larger pattern of men as the driving forces of economic and social progress, or as the defenders of civilized society.
The arrant nonsense about women having been “oppressed” by that pattern is refuted merely by noting that even today, with the law and a huge social current in their favor, women continue in their old pattern:
- Very few women become warriors, or seek out dangerous or physically exhausting trades;
- Very few women become significant inventors, innovators, or serious scholars;
- Very few women rise to the pinnacles of business success;
- Very few women aspire to political elevation.
All those male bastions remain so, despite the tailwind that law and social trends provide in women’s favor. Inasmuch as there are criminal penalties for just about anything one might do to discourage a young woman from entering the military, the dangerous trades, the sciences, the technologies, venture capitalism, or national politics, the only conclusion a rational man could draw is that they’re just not interested.
And really, why should they be, as long as there are plenty of men to do all that painful, wearying, grotty stuff?
The last sentence in the previous segment should serve as a reminder, and a warning. Women would be well advised to ponder it seriously.
Any trend in law or prevailing thought that undermines men’s protective, supportive attitudes toward women will have its worst effects on women. It cannot be said more plainly...or too often. Moreover, women are learning this in the most direct of ways, from the hyper-patriarchal Muslim invaders of Europe.
Though feminists seek to “have the cake” – male protectiveness, enterprise, and productivity – while “eating it too” – legal and social privileges for women at men’s expense – they’ll soon find themselves in the far less enviable condition of paying for cakes that others will eat. Already there are important trends that point in directions millions of women are lamenting, such as the “marriage strike.”
Ironically, both feminist activism and the reactions against it are driven by an emotion: resentment. Women are being encouraged to resent men’s predominance in the traditionally male endeavors and fields. When feminists succeed in marshaling law, custom, or important institutions (e.g., the media and universities) behind their agenda, men affected by those things resent it sufficiently to cluster unto themselves, excluding women by personal decisions women cannot countervail. With one another, we have no need to concern ourselves with what goes on “outside.” Our resentments cease to trouble us. We can relax.
The pity of this is that smart, sensible women – women who appreciate men and don’t regard femininity or the traditional division of labor between the sexes as “oppressive” – are as affected by the results as their feminist counterparts. Once again, the laws of reality prove indifferent to anyone’s preferences or opinions.
If there’s an achievable goal in feminist activism, it can only be the only sort of dominance feminists can possibly obtain and hold for a while: dominance over women.
Some of this is easy to spot. Much feminist cant is directed at controlling the opinions and decisions of non-activist women. Insults such as those hurled at Sarah Palin, Carly Fiorina, Joni Ernst, and Marsha Blackburn – “they’re not real women” – have no chance of affecting their overt targets. They’re made to constrain the opinions and behavior of women generally: to “keep ‘em toeing the party line.” And to some extent, they’re effective. For how long? No one can say...especially as men’s reactions to the perverse incentives feminism has produced will play a part as well.
If I were a woman, I’d resent such attempts at mind control more greatly than any comment about my appearance from a man...but then, I am a man. And all propaganda to the contrary notwithstanding, that’s a difference that matters.
How did it begin? With power-hungry feminists, of course. With the hijacking of the admirable drive for equality of the sexes before the law. It got its initial foothold with the emergence of motels, reliable contraception employed by the woman, and the gradual destigmatization of adultery, divorce, and the production of illegitimate children. It seeped further into our culture in seemingly innocuous ways, for example through fiction about men’s marginalization of women and men as an “evolutionary dead end.” It strutted publicly with “equal employment opportunity” laws and the use of quotas to bend employers to feminist demands. It reigns supreme in contemporary hysteria over “microaggressions” and “trigger warnings,” and the nonexistent “rape culture.”
All of those things are still with us. Yet others are with us as well. Mankind – Oops! Sorry! I meant to type “huperoffspringkind” – is a single house, more so than any nation. It will not long stand divided against itself. As with so many other things: We shall see.
Monday, March 7, 2016
Quickies: The Way Things Improve
There’s a rather well known book nominally aimed at younger readers, The Way Things Work, that provides a pretty good explanation of the principles and mechanisms behind many important devices. Quite a lot of budding engineers first get their curiosities tickled by this volume.
It came to mind this morning after I viewed the video embedded here: a humorous “endorsement” of the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. I showed it to my wife, who immediately reminded me of an episode involving a friend of ours who immigrated here from Russia in 1991. She’d asked me to recommend a cooling pad for her laptop, so I pointed her to Amazon and the many such devices available there. Her response was an absolute classic:
“Fran, I come from a socialist country. I can’t be given a choice!”
She meant it, too.
Many immigrants to the U.S. from the old Soviet Union were baffled, even appalled, by the array of choices offered in our supermarkets, among such things as bread, coffee, and toilet paper. They couldn’t cope with the choice problem. It paralyzed them; they needed assistance from an American inured to such things. Fortunately, over time even a former Russian becomes accustomed to it, though the acclimatization interval varies among them.
As with varieties of bread and coffee, so also with everything else available in American stores. The Amazon phenomenon – these days, how likely is it that one who uses the word “amazon” in conversation is referring to the semi-mythical warrior-women? – has multiplied those choices as never before. Vendors who would have quailed at the many details and difficulties involved in running a retail operation now let Amazon handle most of the grubby bits. The result has been an explosion in product variety no one twenty-five years ago could have imagined.
My friend is a highly capable engineer. She would learn almost nothing from The Way Things Work. Indeed, she could probably find all the errors in it. But were you to ask her, “How do things improve?” she’d have to take her time over it...and might venture a few less relevant guesses before she arrived at competition as a possibility.
In a socialist, and therefore noncompetitive, context, things improve slowly if at all. Choice pressures don’t function there. The multivariate comparisons among alternatives, where the prospective purchaser balances price, features, quality, durability, and so forth against one another simply don’t occur. You buy the State’s bread or you go without. You buy the State’s coffee or you drink tea...the State’s tea. You buy the State’s toilet paper or you...well, perhaps we shouldn’t go there.
Every so often it’s good to remind ourselves – especially those of us subject to the stresses of employment in a competitive field – that competition is the most important of all the forces that improves things: that makes them better, cheaper, and more copiously available. It even improves us somewhat. Those of us that don’t go totally, gothically mad at having to learn a new programming language every three months, at least.
Quickies: The End Is Near
Or is it here already?
New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito has long refused to pledge even ceremonial allegiance to the American flag. No surprise, then, that she displays no respect for American citizenship, either.Mark-Viverito wants to grant voting rights to non-citizens — including, perhaps, illegal immigrants — in all municipal elections....
“I believe that in a democracy, everybody should participate, and I don’t see how you call something a democracy when you don’t give everybody that opportunity to participate,” said Queens Councilman Daniel Dromm, Mark-Viverito’s point-person for non-citizen voting.
What do you think, Gentle Reader? Has Miss Mark-Viverito ever read the Constitution of the United States? If she has, do you think she regards herself, a public official, as subordinate to the Constitution’s dictates? It is the Supreme Law of the Land, after all.
It’s highly doubtful that Mark-Viverito grasps the distinction between a democracy, which the United States is not, and a republic, which it is. But then, to expect that degree of comprehension – much less acceptance – from a New York City politico has been unreasonable since John V. Lindsay at least.
How on Earth do such persons attain elected office? Do the voters know that little about them, or do they know but not care?
Immigration without assimilation probably explains most of it. What stands unexplained – and is desperately in need of an explanation – is what’s keeping patriotic New Yorkers from dangling Mark-Viverito’s twitching corpse from a convenient lamppost. A shortage of rope, perhaps? Or is it that Andrew Cuomo must be first?
We will come here until Europe is black.
H/t: Honest Thinking.
It hard to link to specific articles on this site but search for the "Sukant Chandan" entry on 3/5/16. There he quotes from a 2011 Monthly Review article by an Indian immigrant to the United Kingdom who wrote:
We have won, historically, the right to come here, in the 50s and the 60s and the 70s, when the West wanted, literally, us to do their dirty work here and they wanted us out. But we fought for our right to stay here, against the government and against the Far Right and racist organizations and movements. So, we've won our right to stay here. We're here to stay, permanently. That right has been won. Now, I think, the final challenge is for us to completely take over the West. . . .Westerners who think they are importing foreigners to clean their bed pans and contribute to their bankrupt social welfare schemes (but who will remain docile and accepting of this degrading policy) had best think that through one more time. You thought you were getting meek, grateful servants but you're importing your new masters.
Judge Jeanine says all that needs to be said about Romney and Republicans.
Cliff notes version: we are sick and tired of crony capitalism, the lies, the games, and entitled losers. Donald Trump terrifies you. Don't even think about a brokered convention. You suck.
God bless this amazing woman.
H/t: Market Ticker.
Sunday, March 6, 2016
Quickies: Catholics Who Should Know Better
I’ve been recently, deeply disturbed by the fusillades being exchanged between two groups of vocal Catholics. These groups may be roughly, imperfectly described in several ways:
- Remnant versus Patheos;
- pro-Pope Francis versus anti-Pope Francis;
- anti-Vatican II versus pro-Vatican II;
- Tridentine versus Novus Ordo.
These groups have exhibited highly unappealing behavior toward one another – certainly behavior inappropriate for a Catholic – and show no indications of regretting it.
I shan’t endorse or condemn either group’s positions on Church teaching or policy, as in my incomplete knowledge of them I’d probably do unintended violence to someone’s sincere beliefs. But I do deplore the slanging-match that’s in progress.
As one with a deep interest in the health and future of the Church, of Catholicism, and of Christianity generally, I exhort both communities to turn up the gain on their consciences, review their own contributions to these shameful exchanges, without any “Well, they started it” nonsense, repent of all such unseemliness, and retreat from it permanently. Remember, ladies and gentlemen, that your crossfire is out in the open where others can see it – and that whether it’s justified or not, persons outside the Church will find their attitudes toward it and us to be influenced thereby.
Glory be to God, people! Behave like adults! Isn’t it bad enough that the Baptists keep accusing us of worshipping the Blessed Virgin? (“The cult of Mary,” my bleeding Irish-American ass!)
Quickies: The Future Of “Social Justice” Activism
...is on ludicrous display in this incident:
Libertarian commentator Lauren Southern was assaulted and reportedly “covered in piss” by activists in the streets of Vancouver, in a new low for the regressive left. Her crime? Saying there are “only two genders.”The incident took place Friday evening in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, during an “anti-fascist” protest against a visiting libertarian speaker.
Southern, accompanied by her Rebel Media cameraman and a team from PressForTruth.ca, met protesters on the street and engaged them in a spirited debate about feminist anti-rape culture crusades and gender identities. Southern’s insistence that there are only two genders annoyed the left-wing activists, who accused her of being “hateful” and “transphobic.”
The encounter, which was recorded by Press For Truth and can be watched below, concluded when a protester sneaked up behind Southern and, shockingly, poured a bottle of liquid, which Southern later said she believed was urine, over the libertarian commentator. A scuffle quickly broke out as two men attempted to restrain the protester, who was nonetheless able to flee the scene.
If anything would more vividly reveal the utter vacuity of the SJW “community,” I can’t think what it might be. These people can’t argue for their positions. That renders them unable to tolerate a difference of opinion. Their impulse is to silence such dissenters, by whatever means are expedient. The use of excrement is typical of the mindset.
What’s heartening is that Miss Southern was unfazed by the assault and continued as she had begun. Let’s hope her example inspires much more such staunch, carry-on-regardless conduct among libertarian and conservative activists. There’s no better counter for SJW activists’ puerility and intellectual defaults. They must be reduced to a self-parodying farce. The mature, coolly rational conduct of the Right will present an irresistibly preferable alternative.
Quickies: “Hidden Law”
Ponder the following from Andrew McCarthy:
For a number of years in the mid-aughts, we debated the merits vel non of waterboarding. I defended the legality of this interrogation method — in the restrained practice of the CIA, not as cruelly administered historically — mostly based on a strict interpretation of the federal torture statute. It was not an endorsement of the tactic in any particular case. The opposition’s point was well taken that the existence of a legal justification (which they did not concede) would not necessarily make the use of waterboarding good policy. We volleyed ticking-bomb scenarios and slippery slopes back and forth.As a lawyer, I instinctively believed we should be able to write rules clarifying the extremely rare circumstances in which aggressive tactics could be used. Critics forcefully countered that the very writing of rules was an authorization that would be stretched to cover non-dire circumstances. Jonah Goldberg reminded us about the “hidden law,” which as applied here, counsels forbidding across the board that which should be forbidden in almost all situations, in the belief that if a dire emergency did arise, good people would act outside the law, do what had to be done, and hope that others would understand and forgive.
[Emphasis added by FWP]
In Goldberg’s argument for “hidden law,” which McCarthy, an unusually ethical lawyer, cites humbly and without qualification, lies the starkest, truest wisdom: There are times and cases when we simply have to trust to the judgment of good people.
In The Machinery of Freedom, David Friedman poses a probing test case:
A madman is about to open fire on a crowd; if he does so, numerous innocent people will die. The only way to prevent him is to shoot him with a rifle that is within reach of several members of the crowd. The rifle is on the private property of its legitimate owner. He is a well known misanthrope who has publicly stated on numerous occasions that he is opposed to letting anyone use his rifle without his permission, even if it would save hundreds of lives.
What sane man would refrain from seizing the gun and acting as necessary? Would he have any reason to fear being indicted and tried for theft? What jury on Earth would convict him?
What McCarthy and Goldberg termed “hidden law” might better be called reality.
If you make the criminal code sanguinary, juries will fail to convict. If the law is too mild, private vengeance comes in. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Compensation”
Saturday, March 5, 2016
Competence And Commitment: A Personal Reflection
This earlier piece has stimulated some memories, not all of which are pleasant ones...but which I feel I should recount even so. In part, that’s because the subject – competence – is important, but in equal measure it’s because I want my Gentle Readers to know the relevant stuff about the guy who writes these sententious, often contentious pieces.
First, a brief vignette from the early Nineties. It was December, the day before our Christmas break, an interval of paid holidays that spanned Christmas and New Year’s Day. My employer was wise enough to realize that nothing much gets done over that period, and preferred to close its buildings rather than pay to keep them pointlessly open. Most of us looked forward to that interval...most of the time.
I was straining to find a problem in one of the most difficult pieces of work I’d ever undertaken. Without going into gory detail, let it suffice to say that no one else in the company was equal to the task. As our story begins, I wasn’t sure that I was, either.
Closing time was approaching, and there was little work and general jubilation. I wasn’t part of that. The problem I was focused on occupied the whole of my attention. It became obvious as time passed that I wouldn’t crack it that day. Unhappily but resolutely, about half an hour before we were all supposed to vamoose, I informed my supervisor that I’d need building access over the Christmas break.
He was stunned. He called his supervisor, who was equally stunned. That worthy called Security to arrange to have the building kept heated, lighted, and guarded – yes, it was a defense contractor – and the Security people were stunned...and very unhappy, as that meant that one of them would have to be there with me. They called my supervisor to quarrel with my request.
My supervisor put his phone aside and asked me, very gently, whether it was really necessary for me to continue through the break.
“I have to,” I said. “If I don’t crack this now, I’ll lose the thread. That might mean missing the deadline.”
“Can’t you leave yourself notes?” he pleaded. “Security wants this place cold and dark by five.”
I just stared at him. He wilted, picked up the phone, and told Security in his don’t-test-me voice that there was no option, it was vital that I be there the following day. (I have a very effective stare.)
All’s well that ends well. I was able to crack the problem the next day before noon, thus sending an only slightly disgruntled Security officer back to his family and freeing us both to enjoy the rest of the break.
Yes, I was competent enough to solve the problem, but more important yet, I was committed to solving it, in time and within budget. Everyone else in my chain of command would have let the matter slide – missed deadlines in defense contracting are more common than the ones met – but I wouldn’t have it. I’d committed myself, which put my reputation for always being on time on the line. I was determined to make it come Hell or high water.
This second, less pleasant memory comes from just a few years ago.
A program developed a few years prior to my involvement with it had gained favor with projects other than the one for which it had originally been developed. My supervisor asked me to see if it could be adapted for more general uses than its original, narrow focus. I agreed to do so. Unfortunately and most unwisely, he took that as a commitment to making it so, and told those other projects to expect a version for their use Real Soon Now.
The program under discussion:
- Was in a language I didn’t know;
- Required a toolchain I’d never used;
- Used third-party libraries I didn’t know;
- Was undocumented and completely uncommented;
- And all the original developers had left the company.
I couldn’t even get the BLEEP!ing thing to run, much less begin to probe its structure and what bound it so tightly to its original focus. After a few weeks’ struggle, I went back to my superior and reported my inability to get anywhere with it. He was stunned – and well he might be, as I’d never before admitted to defeat by anything. Then he proceeded to stun me:
“You have to make it work,” he said. “[Another project] is expecting it by the end of March.”
I restrained my temper by a very narrow margin. “I didn’t commit to solving this for you,” I said. “I said I would look at it. I have, and I can’t get anywhere with it. There’s just too much I don’t know.”
“Well,” he said, “what do you need?”
“Someone who knows the language and the toolchain, at least,” I said.
“I don’t have anybody I can give you,” he replied. (He had sixty software engineers reporting to him at that time, yet I was sure that was true. We were very tightly scheduled.)
I summoned my reserves of resolve, which were rather low at the time, and said, “Then I can’t commit to this. You’ll have to tell [the other project] that it’s a research problem.”
(“A research problem” is what we call any ball-of-yarn undertaking where we have no idea whether it can be done, much less how soon or for what budget.)
I felt bad about saying that. For one thing, I was the company’s top software guy, and I’d never failed at anything before that. For another, the desirability of the endeavor was very high; we could milk a lot of revenue from it. And for a third, I genuinely liked my supervisor and hated to tell him no.
But I couldn’t commit to a project with a fixed delivery date when I was so completely incompetent in so many of the required areas of knowledge.
Once again, it ended well. My reputation was sufficient to move the immovable: my supervisor “shook the tree,” found in another department someone familiar with the language and toolchain who could assist me, and together we cracked the mysteries of the program and found ways to generalize it sufficiently. However, the larger point here is what matters. Knowing that I wasn’t competent to solve the problem alone forced me to withhold any commitment to it. My chain of command, realizing that I was only reporting the facts of the matter, acquiesced to my needs.
It’s impossible to squeeze blood from a stone. If you can’t, you can’t, and there’s no honest, responsible way to avert the admission. You have to be willing to say “I can’t,” and / or “I need help,” and stand your ground. Yes, it’s about appropriate humility, but not entirely so. It’s part and parcel of your personal integrity: your commitment to the truth.
For there are higher and lower commitments in life, and the acceptance of that fact is essential to anyone who puts himself at the service of others. You must be ready to recognize and bow to a higher commitment even at the cost of admitting to the limits of your competence. If you’ve never been there before, it can be an occasion for personal embarrassment.
In a commercial context, the highest of all commitments is to an old maxim of conduct: “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” But truth, including the truth about oneself, matters just as much in any other interaction with other people. You must never, ever never, ever say “I can and will” if there’s an appreciable chance that you can’t or won’t.
The admission of one’s limitations is essential to the concept of competence. Yet far too many persons in far too many walks of life are unwilling to do so. It’s too great a blow to their “self-esteem.”
“Vanity. Definitely my favorite sin.” – Al Pacino, as Satan, in The Devil’s Advocate.
Quickies: The War On Competence
Yes, another war – and this time, one you’ll have trouble believing.
Both [my] boys — in retrospect — went to school knowing how to read. (We didn’t know how well the younger read, but well enough to fetch me my book as in “I left my book somewhere, it’s Death on the Nile. Go find” and bring me the right one in a household carpeted and littered with books. The older, we first spotted he could read before his brother was born, when he was not quite yet 3. And he was reading middle grade books, then. By six when he entered school we often discussed Roman history or Heinlein juveniles over breakfast.A few weeks into the school year, I noticed something odd. I’d gotten used to the convenience of having him fetch my book, but suddenly books brought back just had a couple of letters in the title in common. Or when we were somewhere like a museum I’d notice him “guessing” comparable became compared, say. Also, he stopped reading as much and went into comics.
I finally lost it and asked him if he’d been hit on the head and forgot how to read. “We’re not supposed to read. We’re supposed to look at the word and guess.”
[Emphasis added by FWP.]
Horrifying, eh? This perversion of reading education wasn’t news to me. What caught my attention was young Robert Hoyt’s characterization of the “method” being foisted upon him. Consider the rationale Sarah suggests a bit further on, and shudder:
A friend told me the purpose of this was to have all the kids start at the same level...
But wait: there’s more! Sarah goes into considerable detail on the retreat from education as it was successfully practiced before contemporary educational fads took hold. She extends her survey to the accelerating penetration of other fields by incompetents. Such incompetents, should they reach positions of authority, often “protect” themselves by hiring people even less competent than they.
Competence is being treated as a form of discrimination. Given the notorious incompetence of contemporary “educators,” many of whom are demonstrably as ignorant about the fields they “teach” as any of their students, perhaps this should come as no surprise.
Please read the whole thing, and add to it this equally important piece by Dystopic. Ponder the likely course of a society in which insistence on “equality” forbids consideration of actual ability, and make-believe is allowed to substitute for competence in the name of “self-esteem.”
Friday, March 4, 2016
Eureka!
Great God Almighty, enough about the campaign already! There’s too much being said about it by too many people, and ultimately none of it will matter. The country is going to Hell in a handbasket, everyone knows it, we’re all hunkering down in our various ways and trying to wait out the rest of the electoral charade without losing our BLEEP!ing minds. It’s high time we looked at some other pressing problem – something we might have a Chinaman’s chance of solving, or at least ameliorating – so we can regain a sense of accomplishment, however little.
For instance, is anyone out there seriously addressing the scoring drought in the National Hockey League, other than myself and the C.S.O.?
(crickets chirping)
I thought as much. Well, what’s a Certified Galactic Intellect for, if not to tackle the tough ones?
The National Hockey League reached its zenith of popularity during the 1980s, when Wayne Gretzky, Marcel Dionne, and Mike Bossy were tearing holes in goal nets from coast to coast. Then came the neutral zone trap, and the enlargement of goalies’ pads, and the enlargement of goalies, and the ever-increasing reluctance of referees to call penalties on players two to three times their size who are wearing protective equipment, are armed with sticks, and have had their moral codes surgically removed. Scoring went into a slump from which it has not recovered, despite the league’s many rule changes meant to address the problem. With the scoring went the attention of the public, which found the game about as interesting as soccer (which you’ll notice still hasn’t caught on despite several decades and billions of dollars of promotional efforts).
The economics of the game are becoming critical. Franchise owners are now caught in the same sort of revenues-versus-costs squeeze that ruined the baseball season a few years back. Unless they can find a way to bring back popular attention to the game, it’s likely to go back to the status in which it languished in the Fifties and Sixties, when a local television station might televise a game if it couldn’t sell the time slot for “paid programming.”
But to bring back the fans, the league must bring back the scoring. Few persons outside our correctional institutions take much interest in the sight of huge, heavily padded men crashing into one another pointlessly for an hour. It’s not like NFL football, where things actually happen. There’s fighting, true, but it makes waltzing bears look graceful by comparison.
I may have arrived at a workable approach. Consider the rink itself, which defines the outer perimeter of the game:
The players skate back and forth in a free-flowing sort of opposition where playmaking is nebulous, puck possession is always tentative, and a well-coached team can usually collapse on its goal in time to prevent an adverse score. Most games end with fewer than four goals scored in toto. Nothing much happens unless someone catches a stick blade across the chops. Keeping your attention on the contest is difficult even for a major enthusiast.
I toyed with the notion of changing the shape of the rink, but all the really interesting changes seemed likely to depress scoring still further while increasing the chance of serious injuries. Can’t have that. What we want is an alteration that would make scoring more likely, albeit without giving the players a case for demanding hazardous duty pay.
And on this fine March morning in the Year of Our Lord 2016, I believe I have found it:
What are those strange little oblongs I’ve added to the rink, you ask? What do you think they are, doofus? Have you never played pinball? They’re flippers. Two per defensive zone, to be operated by the attacking team. Thus, if the New York Rangers were playing the Montreal Canadiens – Original Six matchups are still the best – the flippers in New York’s defensive zone would be operated by Canadiens players, while those in Montreal’s defensive zone would be operated by Rangers players. To keep the rink from getting unduly crowded, the flipper operators would be off the skating surface.
Think of the possibilities! Each team would have a kind of numerical superiority in the other team’s end. Moreover, the fixed position of the flippers would greatly improve the chances for real playmaking. And two of the players each team refrains from dressing to skate would have something to do.
There are details yet to be worked out. How long and how high should the flippers be? How quickly should they respond to a command from the operator, and should they endure a few seconds of “dormancy” after being used? Should they slide along the ice surface? I favor it, but a small gap, such that inaccurate passing to the flipper would be ineffective, might be interesting as well.
Rule changes would be required, of course. It would be illegal to send one’s “healthy scratches” (or more ardent fans) to “check” an opponent’s flipper operators. “Flipping” an opposing player would be penalized by five minutes’ loss of use of the offending flipper. And of course, putting spikes or blades on a flipper would be right out.
(What about “flipping” a referee, you ask?)
I expect the introduction of flippers as delineated here would soon double scoring, as teams and players learned to work them into their playing patterns. Perhaps we could try it out for a season or two. What do you think, hockey fans?
French perfidy.
Much stronger language is needed to describe the rottenness of the French government. This particular official, Emmanuel Macron, is a disgrace, as are his superior(s) and colleagues who approved his statement. And it was approved. Such a threat to do major damage to Britain would not have been made on his own initiative:
"France Blackmails Britain: Stay in EU or We’ll Flood You with Migrants." Reuters, 3/3/16.If Britain votes to leave the European Union in a June referendum, France will allow migrants to move to Britain by ending border controls and roll out a red carpet for bankers fleeing London, French Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron said.
H/t: Gates of Vienna.
Playing with fire.
I never thought I'd say it, but here's a giant helping of good sense from Nancy Pelosi on the issue of superdelegates:
There are warning lights flashing in many unexpected quarters that indicate the electorate is energized precisely over the issue of having their legitimate concerns being contemptuously ignored. Any attempt to continue with practices that have fueled this deep-seated anger will not be well received.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday amplified her criticism of the Democrats' presidential primary system, saying the states' pledged delegates — and not the superdelegates — should decide the winner.Who are these "superdelegates" to cast votes equal to votes cast by delegates elected by thousands of voter? I could make an argument in favor of the superdelegate mechanism from general republican principles. The electoral college was set up to be a second last line of defense against a truly horrible choice by the people. The indirect election of senators was a mechanism that also diluted the effect of popular thinking or passion (and should be brought back). Lincoln Steffens made a convincing case for a superior delivery of services to city dwellers by patronage politicians over politicians arising out of various good government reform movements."I'm not a believer in the sway of superdelegates deciding who is going to be the nominee," Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol. "I think we have a democratic process where people vote on both sides of the aisle … and that that should determine who the nominee is."
* * * *
The comments arrive as some Republicans, wary of putting the surging Donald Trump at the top of the GOP ballot in November, are floating the idea of staging a brokered convention in an effort to topple the controversial party front-runner.
Pelosi declined to predict how a Trump nomination might affect the Democrats chances at the polls in November — "Let the Republicans nominate who they nominate, and they we'll have that debate then" — but she also warned that the Republicans would face a political tempest if they sought to toy with the primary results.
"If somebody has the majority of the delegates from the votes of the people, I think that you change that to your peril," she said. "Whatever party you are."[1]
Be that as it may, it would be unwise for leaders of any party to proceed as though these are normal times.
Either party is playing with fire if they think that delegates at their convention can snatch victory from the candidate who worked hard to earn delegates by competing in the primary process. "Too clever by half" would be the operative dictum and any candidate nominated by virtue of supermajority manipulation will instantly be utterly illegitimate in the eyes of the nation.
Notes
[1] "Pelosi pans superdelegate system." By Mike Lillis, The Hill, 3/3/16.
Thursday, March 3, 2016
Quickies: You’re Not Just Being Watched
At least, present trends continuing, pretty soon you won’t be:
Connecticut — Police are now voicing their concerns about domestic drone use — specifically, they want the option to be able to employ weaponized drones in the future, should the need arise.As if police brutality and aggression weren’t already an epidemic in the United States, police departments in Connecticut oppose a bill to outlaw the weaponization of drones. The bill also address unmanned aerial vehicles fitted with cameras, and their potential to violate the privacy rights of individuals. But law enforcement departments in the state appear far more concerned with being deprived of the possibility of arming them with weapons, rather than cameras.
This isn’t wild-eyed conspiracy-mongering blather. Fox 61 in Hartford, Connecticut has reported on it.
Connecticut is the state that went “anti-gun” crazy after the Sandy Hook atrocity. The very same state that’s straining to yank the guns away from private, law abiding citizens wants the privilege of flying armed police drones. Ponder that for a moment.
Anyone out there saying “It can’t happen here?” You might be surprised:
In 2015, North Dakota passed a law granting police the right to arm drones with “less than lethal” weaponry. Quietly slipping under the radar of the public and the media, the bill as originally written by its sponsor, Representative Rick Becker, banned all weapons on police drones — until a powerful police lobby had its way with the original draft.“Bruce Burkett of the North Dakota Peace Officer’s Association was allowed by the state house committee to amend HB 1328 and limit the prohibition only to lethal weapons. ‘Less than lethal’ weapons like rubber bullets, pepper spray, tear gas, sound cannons, and Tasers are therefore permitted on police drones,” Justin Glawe reported for The Daily Beast in August.
But let’s go back to the first quoted snippet. Focus on that phrase “should the need arise.” Who defines the “need?” Who will sit in determination of whether the “need” has arisen? What criteria for qualifying the “need” are to be written into the law?
Imagine having a loud fight with your spouse. Nearly every married couple has one, now and then. Imagine that you've left a window open. Imagine that a busybody neighbor hears it and calls it in to the local precinct...and imagine that when you storm out your front door, intending nothing more violent than sitting in your car, a drone – oh, to be sure, armed with nothing “lethal,” merely rubber bullets, a Taser, and tear gas – draws a crosshairs over you and lets you have it. For arguing with your wife.
It needn’t even come to that. The drone might be equipped with a loudspeaker. It might merely blast out 120 decibels of “Lie face down on the ground!” You know, so the whole neighborhood can hear what a scumbag you are.
Are the police your friends, Gentle Reader? Are you sure of that?
Quickies: Governments And Gold
Where there is government, there is repression, suppression, and oppression. Governments particularly hate privacy, especially financial privacy:
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presented the government’s gold plan as part of the annual federal budget. Saying that gold import taxes will remain unchanged this year – dashing hopes for a cut.In fact, Jaitley actually announced an increase in taxes on gold sales. Saying that the government will add a sales tax of 1 percent to all gold jewelry sold in India.
Such a sales tax had been scrapped by the government four years ago. But is now being revived by officials with the stated aim of reducing gold consumption.
And that wasn’t the end of increased taxation on bullion. With Minister Jaitley also saying he will raise taxes on imports of dore gold bars – to 8.75 percent, from a former 8 percent.
The “underground” portion of India’s economy is very large. Its “currency” of choice has long been gold, usually in the form of “jewelry:” unadorned gold circlets. Such circlets are worn by Indian women, on the forearms. When such a woman approaches certain categories of merchants, she endeavors to display her circlets without explicitly drawing attention to them, to evoke some off-the-books bargaining. Many entirely private, untaxed transactions are struck through this mechanism. The Indian government has been aware of it for some time, which is why it strives to curb the practice through import and sales taxes on gold.
Now if only we could get Americans to adopt this device...and keep the government blind to it.
Quickies: Another One Falls To The PC Headsmen
In academia, it’s not enough just to be a left-liberal. Apparently, unless you kowtow to the racialists and victimists in precisely the proper fashion, that won’t save you:
Andrea Quenette, an assistant communications professor, was chased out of her own classroom—not because she was a bad teacher, but because her students said she wasn’t agreeing with them quickly enough.For months, Quenette has been under investigation by the University of Kansas. She is currently on academic leave. Her students’ refusal to return to class left her no other choice but to take the semester off.
I can’t do this story justice with further excerpts. Please read it all.
What do you think, Gentle Reader? In this day and age when shit and fuck are considered commonplace terms of discourse, should nigger be absolutely unspeakable? Bear in mind that racialist blacks use it freely, along with ofay, honky, and other racial epithets directed toward whites.
Perhaps it’s all about “keeping up with the Joneses.” The feminists have claimed cunt for their exclusive use, and the homosexuals now claim property rights over queer and faggot. How would American Negroes gain inclusion in the victimist parade without a couple of copyrighted terms of their own?
(This diatribe – especially the mini-dialogue embedded therein – seems more relevant with every passing day.)
Quickies: Cart And Horse
First, one of Bill Whittle’s very best video presentations:
Now, a question:
I think the answer is no, and I want to know which characteristic – Democrat rule or massive black influx – is the cause of the other.
(A public-service message from the Web’s favorite racist.)
Angela's disdain.
Merkel's reaction to being handed the flag is instantaneous. Her nation's flag must leave her hands no matter what. Her expression right at the end of the video is unambiguous. A rebuke. "You shouldn't have done that to me."
We have proof of the same disdain in Obama for national symbols. What can one conclude from the fact that the leaders of two major Western nations show no attachment to their respective peoples? This is astonishing.
Pearls of expression.
Much of the reaction [against Trump's statement about Muslim immigration] was somewhat Islamophilic: America needed larger numbers of Muslim immigrants to help win hearts and minds versus ISIS. An immigration pause would alienate them. As evidence, the Times highlighted a story of Trump luxury brand items being removed from the shelves in rich Arab Gulf states.Winning the hearts and minds of the people is a concept born during the Vietnam era. It was referred to then as "WHAM."But no one has yet measured how the prospect of an immigrant visa, or lack of it, weighs compared to other policies through which the United States makes an impression on the Muslim world. For instance, one way in which the U.S states “who we are” to Arab and Muslim audiences is by killing a lot of Muslims.[1]
Notes
[1] "Trump and the Riot of the Elites." By Scott McConnell, The American Conservative, 12/15/15.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
A Headful Of Metaphors
That’s what comes of spending an entire day staring at a blank screen while berating yourself for being unable to finish your tenth BLEEP!ing novel.
One of the more contentious phrases of the past seven years, American exceptionalism, is once more in circulation:
The listeners of this commentary are among some of the most intelligent in the country.
Not as intelligent as the Gentle Readers of Liberty’s Torch, Todd ol’ buddy.
So it’s not my business to tell you who to vote for today.
Well, that’s a relief. Everyone else seems to think it’s his business.
But I do want to tell you what this election is about.
No, you don’t. You want to tell us what this election is about to you.
Read the rest if you care to do so. It’s short and pretty much what you’d expect. The part I cited here is what got my glands chugging.
What’s this election about to you, Gentle Reader? If you take any interest in it, that is?
The typical American voter is narrowly focused. There are a small number of issues – not infrequently, only one – that matter to him. He votes according to the candidates’ positions on those issues. He’s relatively unconcerned with anything beyond them.
One of the reasons our electoral processes have become so acrimonious is that narrow focus. When the federal government is involved in everything – hundreds if not thousands of discrete activities – it becomes rare for voters to assess candidates in a holistic fashion. They’ll make their selections according to their personal priorities. Political strategists know this, which is why it’s so hard to get the typical candidate to focus on anything other than the handful of issues his handlers have selected for his headliners.
Donald Trump has selected those issues that he thinks will lead with the majority of voters. Ted Cruz has articulated a set of principles and has pledged to stay true to them. Which of these candidates is currently doing better in the delegate chase?
Doesn’t seem all that closely related to American exceptionalism, does it?
In commenting on “democracy,” Lysander Spooner – one of my personal heroes – wrote that “A man is no less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years.” Given that the federal government has burst its Constitutional bonds, that’s not a bad assessment of our electoral predicament. However, it was truer in Spooner’s day than it is today.
Mark Steyn wrote in After America that the emergence of the “permanent government” – i.e., the millions of federal bureaucrats who can’t be fired or otherwise disciplined by the 540 elected federal officials – has reduced the Republican Party’s periods in federal ascendancy to “keeping the seat warm” for the Democrats. He had a good point: Leviathan continues to grow and to oppress regardless of who occupies the Oval Office or Capitol Hill. For instance, federal payrolls grew 13% during the Reagan Administration. (Yes, it does grow faster under Democrat administrations.)
We no longer choose “masters,” in Spooner’s formulation. Rather, we select figureheads: persons in whom we can repose our hopes – which are usually dashed completely – and whom we can blame for the disappointments that follow.
“Opinions change with age; otherwise what is age for?” – James Blish, The Triumph of Time
My opinions have certainly changed over the years. In part that’s because I’ve studied different things as time as passed: first, mathematics and physics; later on, war, economics, and moral theory; most recently, human motivations and how they bear on social, economic, and political dynamics. All those subjects are relevant to the state of our nation, and that of Mankind generally. However, the earlier lessons bear less powerfully on our political decisions, and the words and deeds of “our” governments, than the later set.
We who live in Time are fated to pursue goals: things we want but don’t yet have, and threatening possibilities we hope to avert. Because we are fallible, and not much given to reflect on what would really be best for us, we fail far more often than we succeed. Because we are various, and variously motivated and gifted, contention among us is inevitable. Satisfaction for one often means disappointment for another.
Perfection is denied us as individuals, and therefore as societies. We know this about ourselves. Yet our tendency to think with our wishes instead of our reason – to invent pretty fantasies to take the place of dismal realities – leads us to hope that political heroes will save us from ourselves.
I wrote of such a hero. He’s as imaginary as all my other characters. Were he to exist, and to gain the office of president, the hopes attached to him would be prodigious...as would the tragedies attendant upon his downfall. That’s part of why the completion of Statesman is frustrating me so greatly.
Political heroes will not save us. They cannot: they’re as flawed, as fallible, and as subject to temptation as any private citizen. To expect deliverance by their hands is to bet on an impossibility. The larger the bet, the greater will be the anguish in the aftermath.
Why should we have expected anything else? Politics of any form is the institutionalization not of our best aspirations but our worst: the desire for power with which to make the world over into some preferred shape. But that sort of power is purely destructive. To create a paradise through destruction is not possible even to the angels...and if I may be blunt, there are no angels in politics.
We – flawed, fallible, temptable men – are the problem we yearn, vainly yet eternally, to solve.
Have a nice day.
Life in the insane asylum.
Europe and America create massive incentives for foreigners to come to their lands and then act like it's the biggest mystery on the planet why they do. There are refugees! Angela hat uns gesagt!
Once our countries are flooded with foreigners, our governments concoct astonishingly mendacious doctrines such as "multiculturalism" and "diversity" and criminally prosecute citizens who point out the ugly truths about being inundated by unassimilable foreigners -- the Orwellian offense of "crime speak." Actual crimes committed by foreigners on a massive scale – creating conditions of utter lawlessness where the police are overwhelmed – are hidden by the governments. Where the police do act, it is as toads and Muslim lickspittles.
A complete breakdown in order and civil society has taken place in the space of two years and an alien presence encouraged to take root which in earlier times would only have come about because of a catastrophic failure of the armies of the nations.
[1] "Europe’s Slow-Motion Refugee Debacle." By Pepe Escobar, Strategic Culture Foundation, 3/2/16 (emphasis added).
 |
A slow-motion invasion engineered by the governments is furiously denied by officials.
Traitors prosper and patriots are marginalized and live in fear of their lives or safety because of government paramilitary thugs. Or foreigners.
What we are witnessing is the deliberate betrayal of white culture. Out and out treason.
Below, Pepe Escobar captures a crucial aspect of this attack by succinctly stating the obvious about the effects of Western war, war, and more war and the dishonesty of Europe's leaders about its effects:
Meanwhile, there’s no concerted EU refugee policy to be seen. Not even a balancing act between humanitarian concerns and «deterrence», altruism and realpolitik. No EU political «leader» will confront the responsibility of NATO’s wars (with petrodollar GCC «support») crafting the whole crisis. The absolute majority of refugees are Syrians, Afghans and Africans who depart the continent via NATO-destroyed Libya.NotesPolls consistently show that a majority of EU citizens don’t want to «welcome» refugees anymore. As Belgium-based Jean Bricmont, author of Humanitarian Imperialism has correctly stressed, EU citizens who «were never consulted on the issue of refugees and who are constantly asked to make sacrifices because ‘there is no money’ understandably do not accept this moral discourse» anymore.
Bricmont is among the very few in Europe to connect the dots: «The same people who encouraged ‘humanitarian’ interventions and ‘support’ for armed insurrections abroad, that have led to perpetual wars, generating a constant flow of refugees, are now demanding that the population of our countries ‘welcome the refugees’. They first generate chaos there, then they applaud chaos here».[1]
[1] "Europe’s Slow-Motion Refugee Debacle." By Pepe Escobar, Strategic Culture Foundation, 3/2/16 (emphasis added).
H/t: Russia Insider.
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Quickies: Words Fail Me Dept.
I frequently get email to the effect that I’m a terrible person: racist, sexist, homophobic, Islamophobic...in the words of a dear friend, these correspondents call me “everything but white.” My reply, if I bother to issue one, is “Yes, I’m all that and worse. So what?”
I often wonder whether my critics, who usually reserve their names to themselves, have ever met real racists, sexists, etc.: i.e., the type who don’t merely harbor a preference for their own race, sex, creed, or what have you, but who actively seek to inflict damage on those of other tribes. Then along comes an article such as this one:
Three University at Albany students who claimed they were victims of a racial attack on a bus last month have been charged with assault as prosecutors said they were actually the aggressors.Alexis Briggs, Ariel Agudio and Asha Burwell, all 20 years old, appeared at Albany City Criminal Court today for their arraignment.
All three have pleaded non-guilty to charges of assault in the third degree, CNN reported. Burwell and Agudio have also pleaded not guilty to falsely reporting the incident.
They claimed they were attacked on a Capital District Transportation Authority bus on January 30, but prosecutors say they actually assaulted a 19-year-old woman early that Saturday.
'The evidence indicates they were actually the aggressors in the physical altercation, and that they continued to assault the victim despite the efforts of several passengers to stop them,' police said in a statement.
In addition to the charges of assault and false reporting, Agudio faces counts of attempted assault, harassment and criminal mischief, CNN reported.
Are you at all surprised to learn that the women charged above are all Negroes? That is to say, black? Or if you prefer the current jargon, African-American?
When was the last time you read about a white person making a fallacious accusation like the above? The Scottsboro case, perhaps?
I’m a white male heterosexual Christian who prefers to be surrounded by other white heterosexual Christians. I’m also a political conservative, albeit with distinct libertarian leanings, who prefers the society and conversation of other political conservatives. I consider American left-liberals to be seriously misguided. I consider anyone who mouths the “multicultural” gospel to be dangerously deluded; I avoid such persons if at all possible.
I apologize to no one for any of it. Stories such as the one cited here are the reason.
Campaign Musings 2016
The news isn’t terribly inspiring this morning. That was to be expected: it’s mostly about the presidential campaign, which is about as uninspiring as a visit to the dentist. Nevertheless, if that’s what people are thinking and talking about, I suppose it will do for a topic on the first of March in this Year of Our Lord 2016.
Presidential campaigns have been fraught with angry contentions for as long as I’ve paid attention to them. The trend has been perceptibly downward to ever lower levels of civility, and has been accelerating in recent years. The contestants in the current one seem to have cast aside all restraints, all bounds, and all considerations of how to get along after the thing is over.
That frightens me – not because I much care about relations between power-mongers and their hangers-on, but because in our time, the behavioral standards displayed by celebrities invariably “trickle down” to the general population. Politicians are merely celebrities without appreciable talent.
A few years back, Vice President Dan Quayle noted that Candice Bergen’s “Murphy Brown” character, by becoming an unwed mother, was setting an example for many of her fans that she could afford to indulge but they could not. It immediately made him Public Enemy #1 in the entertainment world. You’d have thought he’d called for Bergen to be exposed in stocks like a Twentieth Century Hester Prynne. Yet he’d only pointed out a truth that no one could refute.
So it is also with disregard for politeness and courteous conduct among politicians. I once had a character say that:
“Politeness is like the grease in a bearing, or the oil in an engine. So is dressing neatly and conservatively. These things make it possible for people to work together without constant friction. We can concentrate on our work instead of our dealings with one another.”
That character was speaking of an office environment, in which persons who might not like one another all that much are nevertheless compelled to share a roof, a copier, and a coffee maker for eight to ten hours five days a week. Yet his observation applies with undiminished force to general relations among us.
Anger appears to be the dominant force in the current campaign, both on the Democrat and the Republican sides.
It’s not hard to grasp. The Obama regime, raised to power largely by the votes of young people, Negroes, and Hispanics – at the very least, Obama wouldn’t have become “The Won” without them – has impoverished those constituencies more effectively than any previous administration. Simultaneously it’s inflamed all manner of racial, ethnic, and sectarian tensions to the boiling point. Thus, many who otherwise would have automatically ticked their primary ballots for Hillary Clinton are flocking to Senator Bernard Sanders, an outright socialist of absolutely no achievements, simply to “flip the bird” at the outgoing regime.
No one who’s paid the least attention to the political news can be unaware of the rise of “outsider” candidate Donald Trump: who once said openly that he considered himself “more of a Democrat,” who’s in favor of government mandated, government funded universal medical insurance, who’s openly pro-abortion, pro-same sex marriage, pro-eminent domain – as long as it will line his pockets – and pro-gun control. Even on illegal immigration, his trademark issue, Trump’s record of statements and behavior cast doubt on the sincerity of his furious proclamations. His appeal to the electorate is entirely founded on anger at the Republican Party and its failure to use its Congressional majorities as its candidates promised.
Unleavened by cool, sober consideration of where our self-interest really lies, anger at the powers that be could easily give us a Mussolini. Either Sanders or Trump would fill the bill.
Concerning the general election that will take place on November 2, all that we have is speculation. Despite her maculate past, her current legal jeopardy, her lack of personal appeal, and her ties to Obama’s policies, Hillary Clinton would be a formidable candidate. No one on the GOP side of the contest would be guaranteed to defeat her.
If we imagine a Clinton / Trump finale, the outcome of the election would be likely to depend on factors other than their policy prescriptions. As noted above, Trump can hardly stand on his record. The political machine behind Clinton is famed for its penchant and its facility for throwing mud. However, Clinton has enough skeletons in her closet to equip all the teaching hospitals in New York, and Trump has shown no aversion to slinging mud himself.
The final determinant of that contest could well be which candidate has more funds with which to slander the other. While American voters have often voted defensively – i.e., against the more disliked of the major-party candidates – in this case we’d be compelled to hold our noses regardless of which lever we choose to pull.
Owing to public anger and overall dissatisfaction with the American political class, talk of third parties is in the air once more. It’s a bit more overt on the Republican side, owing to the open clash between the conservative “base” and the GOP’s “Establishment / donor” class. However, it should not be discounted among typical Democrat voters, as the unexpected strength of the Sanders campaign has shown us.
Third parties are typically unimportant at the polls. When they do matter, it’s usually as whipping boys. I’ve lost count of the times when a defeated Republican has blamed his loss on the Libertarian candidate for “stealing” votes that would have put him over the top.
Where third parties have traditionally mattered is in delineating those issues about which people feel strongly enough to donate their time, effort, and money to a “guaranteed loser.” For example, in New York the Conservative and Right-to-Life parties persist, and maintain surprisingly effective fundraising efforts, owing to the flaccidity of Northeastern Republicans, who’d qualify as Democrats virtually anywhere outside New England and the Mid-Atlantic sectors. Socialist and populist minor parties tend to flourish in “rust belt” states, and other states where “blue collar” working-class voters are numerous. Toward the end of a campaign, the major party candidates will do whatever they can within the blue laws to persuade the allegiants of minor parties to refrain from “wasting your vote” and “back a winner” instead.
While the minor parties are unlikely to influence the outcome of the presidential contest, it’s wise to keep an eye on the “down ticket” races, both at the federal and state levels. There, a mere trickle of votes can be enough to throw an election. Candidates for legislative seats thus have more incentive to pursue minor-party voters...and they’ll often make important statements and commitments in the attempt.
Stay tuned.
Allah the merciful, the compassionate.
The following is from a Sputnik article about a young Yazidi woman in northern Iraq. Her experiences after ISIS took over her village have been described in a book by a German author.
[1] "Hit, Attacked, Raped by Men High on Drugs,' 18-Year- old on Daesh captivity." Sputnik, 2/28/16 (links omitted).
Notes“Muslim Kurds, Arabs and Yezidis were like a big family for me before all of this,” she wrote, according to Deutsche Welle. “It was only after the terrorists seized power that our neighbors suddenly no longer wanted to even eat with us…. Workers, teachers and doctors — all of our Arab neighbors seemed to have joined the [Islamic State].”The terrorists captured thousands of people from the Yazidi minority group that are believed to be infidels according to their religion. Yazidi females were taken as “wives” and sex slaves forcibly by Daesh [ISIS] fighters.A 60-year-old militant and nine others impregnated Shirin and her last “husband” helped her to flee to Germany.[1]
[1] "Hit, Attacked, Raped by Men High on Drugs,' 18-Year- old on Daesh captivity." Sputnik, 2/28/16 (links omitted).
On Trump and repudiating David Duke.
Megyn Kelly on "The Kelly File" tonight (transcript not yet available) was in full cry to derail Donald Trump's candidacy for his appearing not to repudiate David Duke for statements he had made encouraging whites not to vote for a candidate other than Trump.
I'll let Mr. Trump defend himself on this point but, for a little perspective on the source of some politicians' support -- and what support politicians have rendered to whom -- let's take this stroll down memory lane:
- "[In March 2007,] as Senator Obama, the current President of the United States marched with the New Black Panther Party in the streets of Selma, Alabama. – "Reminder as Ferguson Tension Grows: Obama Marched With The Black Panthers." By Katie Pavlich, Town Hall, 12/3/14.
- "Earlier this year [2014], President Obama nominated cop-killer advocate Debo Adegbile to head up the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice." – "Reminder as Ferguson Tension Grows: Obama Marched With The Black Panthers." By Katie Pavlich, Town Hall, 12/3/14.
- Hillary Rodham was "personally involved in the defense of several Black Panthers" by attending their trials as a law student and arranging for shifts of students "to monitor court proceedings." – "Hillary Rodham Clinton." Discover the Networks.
- "Hillary Clinton criticized Barack Obama at Tuesday night's debate for not directly rejecting the support of Louis Farrakhan." – "Clinton hits Obama over Farrakhan." By CNN, 2/27/08.
- "Two officials from a group designated by the Justice Department as an unindicted co-conspirator in a plot to fund the terrorist group Hamas will attend President Obama’s State of the Union address Tuesday as guests of Democratic lawmakers." – "Democrats invite jihad-linked CAIR to State of the Union." By Art Moore, World Net Daily, 1/12/16.
- "Sen. Bernie Sanders, fresh off a win in New Hampshire – and a very near win in Iowa – has taken to a restaurant in New York City for a sit-down with activist Al Sharpton, a Wednesday morning meeting aimed at broadening the self-declared socialist’s standing among black voters." – "Sanders hunkers down with Al Sharpton." By Cheryl Chumley, World Net Daily, 2/10/16.
- "Angela Davis, a political activist, author, professor and 'radical African-American educator' who was once regarded as a terrorist and danger to the nation by former President Richard Nixon, in part for her early communist beliefs, said during an interview about her new book that she favors Sen. Bernie Sanders in the presidential race because of his more radical views." – "Sanders wins nod from noted communist leader." By Cheryl Chumley, World Net Daily, 2/26/16.
- "All that [problems with interviewer and journal in which interview with former DIA director Michael Flynn appears] is noted, but if this transcript is accurate, former DIA director Michael Flynn is confirming that the Obama Administration knowingly decided to support al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria, and directly enabled the rise of the Islamic State. And given the Obama Administration’s general stance toward the global jihad and Islamic supremacism, what would be unbelievable about that?
"In a sane political atmosphere, this would be enough to bring down the Obama presidency. Instead, it will get little notice and no action whatsoever." – "Former DIA director: Obama White House made 'willful decision' to support al-Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood in Syria." By Pamela Geller, Atlas Shrugs, 8/8/15.
- "The Canadian company selling Uranium One to the Russians donated $2.35 million to the Clinton Foundation. And Russians tied to the deal gave Bill Clinton $500,000 for a Moscow speech." -- "The Clintons' Other, Truly Bodacious Mine Boondoggle." By Jack Cashill, American Thinker, 4/27/15.
- "While questions regarding the U.S. Democratic Party's fund-raising activities first arose over a Los Angeles Times article published on September 21, 1996,[1] China's alleged role in the affair first gained public attention when Bob Woodward and Brian Duffy of The Washington Post published a story stating that a United States Department of Justice investigation into the fund-raising activities had uncovered evidence that agents of China sought to direct contributions from foreign sources to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) before the 1996 presidential campaign." – "1996 United States campaign finance controversy." Wikipedia (links omitted).
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