Froma Harrop And Procul Harum: Both Progressive Rock, But Only One A Band

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 34 Comments

Head over to Dan Collin’s place and watch it, since the embed isn’t playing nicely for us. The tone-deafness (if you will) reaches nearly creepy levels.

rdbrewer at AoSHQ has some quoteworthy analysis:

I’m left with questions. 1) Did she not know this was John Oliver from The Daily Show, and was she not aware of the kinds of things that typically happen during Daily Show interviews? 2) Was this a case of intentional hypocrisy on her part for rhetorical gain? Or was she acting out of complete ignorance?
. . .
In fact, she double-downed again, *accusing the Tea Partiers of having difficulty recognizing irony. Oliver clarified, to paraphrase, “You mean, even where there’s almost a dictionary definition of it right in front of them, they don’t get it?” Her response, “Absolutely.”
Well, I can understand where she’s coming from. The possibility her positions were absurdly mutually exclusive must never have occurred to her. After all, high-minded, super-intelligent people never make mistakes.

On is reminded of Nancy Pelosi, when called on the carpet over ObamaCare’s Constitutionality: “Are you serious? Are you serious?” I actually have a dear friend, X, who is of the Froma/Nancy mold. The last time I spoke to her, her new emotional flail was sexual abuse of children. The problem is real and serious, and I do not sink to minimize it.

What creeps me out about X or a Froma is the matter-of-fact, calmly fanatic certainty with which they will tell you that Tea Partiers are terrorists and the U.S. is turing into a cauldron of sadistic carnal abuse. I told X words to the effect: “It would be interesting to see how you show statistically that humanity is any more depraved now than ever.”

This is the same kind of unquestioning regurgitation that fuels global warming hysteria. I want to agree with rdbrewer at AoSHQ that these are rational people having us on. The alternative that they are soulless zombies in masquerading as humans is terrible. Also, what would you do differently if they were? Ultimately, I move closer to the opinion that people on the Left are not playing with a full deck. To answer my own question then, I’m saying I’m minimizing the amount of time I waste playing cards with these creeps. The more important task is to remove them from positions of power.

Update: linked at Legal Insurrection.

Update II: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Here, enjoy a Beckett reference.

Category: Progressivism

Comments

34 Responses to “Froma Harrop And Procul Harum: Both Progressive Rock, But Only One A Band”

richard mcenroe
January 13th, 2012 @ 7:56 pm

They are not soulless zombies. They are not being ironic. They are hothouse flowers carefully raised to be exactly as they are.

That stench is deliberate.
smitty
January 13th, 2012 @ 8:01 pm

I don’t suspect her of such skill as an actress.
Adjoran
January 13th, 2012 @ 8:07 pm

Froma is one of the better examples of why it is absolutely impossible to have a rational discussion with leftists. It’s like communicating with someone from another planet, there is no common frame of reference. Yet THEY consider themselves the “reality-based” ones!

O/T: Federal judge tells Perry, Newt, Santorum, and Huntsman: “You are right, these rules suck, but you had months to complain and waited until you couldn’t make it as so many others have, and then whine about the rules. Tough luck. Now get your crybaby asses out of my courtroom before I have you all locked up for contempt of common sense.”

{Those may not be the exact words}.
» “Tea Party” in Fromanize is spelled “t-e-r-r-o-r-i-s-t” - Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion
January 13th, 2012 @ 8:55 pm

[…] from Small Dead Animals and The Other McCain, […]
ThePaganTemple
January 13th, 2012 @ 9:26 pm

And Perry’s talking about he might consider filing an appeal. I don’t know if he’s serious but I kind of hope he does just so it will drain him of some of whatever money he has left. Just another example of the incompetence of that campaign. All the others who failed to meet the deadline probably didn’t think at the time it was worth all the effort required. But Perry had plenty of money, and time.
melanerpes
January 14th, 2012 @ 12:17 am

Self reference is tricky for a lot of folks. Fromma needs to try to understand Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem. That would bend her mind into a Möbius strip.
Bob Belvedere
January 14th, 2012 @ 12:30 am

You cannot reason with Leftists anytime, anywhere. Adj is right: there’s ‘no common frame of reference’.

Also…
It is time we on the Right realize that there is no reasoning with the Left, that they will not listen.

Their minds are closed and bolted shut to any arguments because they believe they have found THE ANSWER, the Way. The Progressives believe they are the only Enlightened Ones and that we are, at best, misguided idiots, and, at worst, dangerous and insane lunatics. This is what they believe. Don’t kid yourself that they view us as anything but fools or thought criminals. Just think of the ways they describe us and our ideas…go ahead, think…I’ll wait…well? In their depraved way of thinking, the Left believes that the Right is evil.

Therefore, there’s no point in EVER arguing with them about anything.

The time has come for us to refuse to deal with them in any reasonable way. To engage them in any conversation is to give them and their ideas legitimacy, to announce that their fantastical thinking is normal – it is not. Created in the sterile laboratories of their minds, the ideas and schemes of the Left are unrealistic, unworkable, and unsuited to human beings living in Reality. Therefore, we are only wasting our time in arguing with them. They are zealots, fanatics who cannot be persuaded with Right Reason. We must forego trying to argue with them and go on and do what it takes to restore and then maintain our freedoms and liberties. Perhaps, just perhaps, by the example we set, a few of the loons will recover their mental health sufficiently to see the light and fight against their crippling [and dangerous to others] retardation.
Lars
January 14th, 2012 @ 10:25 am

There’s no question it’s flaming hypocrisy for Harrop to lead the Civility Project, but the people in the conservasphere whose heads are exploding over the Daily Show sketch are letting themselves get played. Everything on TV is fake to some extent, including the news. Anyone who thinks John Oliver was doing a straight-up interview with Harrop and that the two of them weren’t doing multiple takes as they followed a pre-written script is really, really gullible. Three things to consider:
1) The Daily Show is a *fake* news show that is performed by comedians, according to a script written by comedians.
2) This hypocrisy meme developed the instant Harrop published her piece last summer. When she agreed to do a comedy sketch about it five months later, she was completely clued in to what was going on. She’s a poor actor, but she *was* acting, nonetheless.
3) Oliver’s responses during the “interview” would be brilliant if they actually were spontaneous. But they weren’t (see #1). They were thought out and written down ahead of time, and he’s not actually a genius.The kind of very belated over-reaction you’re seeing from the most outraged conservatives is probably part of what The Daily Show was shooting for here. Maybe the main part of the joke, since this is such an old subject. This was thoroughly talked out more than five months ago, and if you missed it then, the joke is on you now.
Anonymous
January 14th, 2012 @ 9:40 pm

“It isn’t that Liberals are ignorant. It’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.”
Montjoie
January 15th, 2012 @ 8:26 pm

I watched it and assumed throughout that she knew what was going on and was in on the joke. I could not bring myself the believe she didn’t see what he was doing. I still have trouble grasping that.
Swen
January 15th, 2012 @ 8:33 pm

and what? Make her totally one-dimentional?
Anonymous
January 15th, 2012 @ 8:51 pm

My wife is born Canadian (now a US Army doc), and I have to put up with some of the same disconnect when talking with her Canadian friends. One is a musician who makes almost all of his money playing songs by US songwriters in US venues, to US audiences, but somehow believes that US citizens are basically evil. Got in a discussion with another who said of ALL US servicemen, “They are animals, disgusting!” when discussing the pissgate video. Then he went on to state that the Taliban weren’t involved in 9-11. When I pointed out the logistical and geographical support given to Osama by the Taliban, he said that it probably wasn’t THOSE PARTICULAR Taliban. He didn’t see the idiocy of grouping all US servicemen with four Marines, while separating three dead Taliban with their greater group. When I pointed this out, he simply snorted. Good intelligent retort.
The Left is full of intellectual midgets.
William Peak
January 15th, 2012 @ 9:04 pm

From her article, “Name-calling is not foreign to respectable commentary”. I think she was completely sincere.

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/editorials/2011/08/18/hurt-feelings-can-be-a-consequence-of-strong-arguments.html
Mike_ste
January 15th, 2012 @ 9:08 pm

Lars – I agree that this was a performance, but I don’t think that changes anything, really. Of course Froma was “in on it” – nobody could be so daft as to not be. Still, there is something creepy about her willingness to joke about this. Is she admitting that she is a pathetic hypocrite? That would appear to be what you mean by your last sentence. If the joke is now on outraged conservatives, Froma must be laughing because they failed to get the real joke, which is that she was conceding the point. But if she is conceding the point, where does that leave her? An admitted hack. So I don’t think that was the point. Perhaps, to go along with your idea, the joke is that 5 months later the Daily Show can stir up the hornet’s nest again, though you seem to imply that those who are overreacting now missed the premier event. Which is implying that Froma gets her kicks out of riling up right-wingers. But then that would suggest that she doesn’t get that she is a hypocrite. Either way, she’s screwed.
What say you?
Dave H.
January 15th, 2012 @ 9:26 pm

Harrop was clearly in on the joke. The only mystery is why she is prepared to humiliate herself this way.
Anonymous
January 15th, 2012 @ 9:55 pm

There’s a key passage in there, where she discusses editorial writing as a form of entertainment. True colors show: it’s her version of Stewart’s own “clown nose on, clown nose off” line of dementia. And in their own moral sense, they consider themselves to be unassailable on this point. “It’s all entertainment.” If you don’t enjoy it, you’re not NYC material.

Hard to avoid the image of the small yapping dog who continually nips at the big, strong one — his name is Ralph, if you’re a Warner Bros fan. Whenever big Ralph gets peeved enough to turn and growl, the little one is suddenly just kidding, just kidding. The Fromas of this world owe their continued employment, good health, status and existence to being able to put over the “just kidding” defense at the critical moment. Once in a while one of them blows it, and Splat.
Bill Gryan
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:01 pm

I don’t know much about this Fromunda Harrumph person, but the fact of the matter is that she talks about “civility” with a
straight face, and then calls her opponents “terrorists” with the same straight
face. She is making a fool out of herself. I can’t believe she would do
this intentionally, so I don’t see how she was “in” on the joke.

Sure, she knows it’s part of a comedy show, but I believe she is accurately expressing her opinions, however self-contradictory they might be.
Denian
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:07 pm

I don’t understand mostl of the discussions here. She’s evil. Most liberals are. It’s a function of having no moral code but power.
Sclark
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:11 pm

Correct. Either way, both she and her project: If the Civility Project was intended to be serious, it no longer is; if not then it’s rendered banal.
ptl
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:14 pm

The village idiot does not realize that she’ the idiot. Funny.
Only proves that you can’t be intelligent and a Leftist.
Nemo
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:35 pm

Procol Harum, not “Procul.” (Sorry for the nitpick, but they are one of my rave faves.)
smitty
January 15th, 2012 @ 10:43 pm

You’re so right, and I’m the real rock here. Duh. But it’s in the URL, so I eat this one going forward.
Miriam
January 15th, 2012 @ 11:02 pm

haha – I was scrolling through the comments before posting the same thing – you’re not the only nitpicker here, but you caught it first. I was going to say ‘What are all the boomers coming to?!’
David R. Graham
January 15th, 2012 @ 11:34 pm

Roger that!
Some People Can’t See Irony — Even When There’s a Shining Example of it Right in Front of Them | TeeJaw Blog
January 16th, 2012 @ 12:43 am

[…] From The Other McCain: The tone-deafness …reaches …creepy levels. This is the same kind of unquestioning […]
Breezaway
January 16th, 2012 @ 4:15 am

I think that the most important thing is that someone should please advise us just how one gets a name like Froma Harrop.
Edward
January 16th, 2012 @ 6:50 am

What should scare the crap out of you is that this kind of person is the first to leap in and volunteer for staffing the SS, the NKVD or become the Political Commissar of a district. That is scary.
Bsmith
January 16th, 2012 @ 7:49 am

What is the real economic terrorist? The Tea Party or the federal-industrial complex that spends too much, borrows too much regulates too much and uses all of it powers to enrich Washington DC and its camp followers (like Ms. Harrop and the public employee unions) while impoverishing the rest of the country.
JPL17
January 16th, 2012 @ 9:15 am

“Here, enjoy a Beckett reference.”

Ha! I forgot that Thomas Becket’s last name only has a single “t” in it, and therefore thought the link would take us to the dramatic, “Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?” (or maybe “Will no one rid us of this meddlesome President?”). Instead we get nihilist despair…. To which I reply, don’t despair yet! A lot can happen in 10 months….
Timdaddy
January 16th, 2012 @ 9:30 am

Your wife needs new friends.
smitty
January 16th, 2012 @ 9:32 am

No, I meant Samuel Beckett.
Patrick Carroll
January 16th, 2012 @ 11:24 am

Meh. What a piker. For true comity and amity, go to Iowahawk: http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2007/03/lets_tone_it_do.html
John Sipher
January 16th, 2012 @ 11:38 am

You know how we conservatives make fun of liberals for not having a sense of humor and failing to get the joke for what it is? This time the joke’s on us.
http://www.fromaharrop.com/?p=1330
Stewart
January 18th, 2012 @ 4:09 am

She’s evil. But Procul Harum is very very good and needs to do a U.S. tour again one of these days soon.