The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Tenured, Yes. Radical, My Ass.

Posted on | December 29, 2012 | 11 Comments

“Weapons are my business. You name it and I know it: guns, bombs, gas, fire, knives and everything else. . . . .
“WHY ARE WE GROVELING? . . .
“Are we dupes? Do the Red Pansies want to destroy us? If not, why do they mock all we believe in?”
— “Raoul Duke” (Hunter S. Thompson), “The Police Chief: The Professional Voice of Law Enforcement,” Scanlan’s Monthly, June 1970, collected in The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time

You might think that anyone claiming to be “radical” would love guns with the quasi-religious fervor of Raoul Duke. After all, when the toiling masses rise up to overthrow the bourgeois imperialist oppressors, it might be handy for the revolutionary comrades to have a few weapons.

Quite the opposite attitude prevails, however, among the tame and toothless intelligentsia of our contemporary Left, whose only ambition is to secure a place for themselves within the bureaucracies of the status quo. Witness the “argument” of Claire B. Potter, Professor of History at The New School for Public Engagement, writing the “Tenured Radical” column at the Chronicle of Higher Education:

Conservative backers of the odious gun lobby are determined to divert our attention from the 27 dead in Newtown CT using familiar tactics: accuse someone else! Brilliant. This time the perp in question is an (unarmed) history professor, who has been accused of inciting violence against Bizarro NRA prez Wayne LaPierre (who presumably is armed to the teeth.)
Go here for the story of right wing media attacks on Erik Loomis, University of Rhode Island history proffie and fellow blogger at Lawyers, Guns and Money, as narrated by the gang at Crooked Timber blog. Loomis’s weapon of choice was his Twitter account, through which he tweeted his desire to have LaPierre’s “head on a stick” after the Newtown school massacre.
As we all know, however, the blog is mightier than the Bushmaster. CT‘s efforts helped to galvanize a letter-writing protest campaign to the URI administration, who was cowering in the corner and had seemed willing to throw Loomis (who, according to this rightwing blogger, tweeted variations of the word “f**k” a lot, but the last time I looked that was also protected speech unless you shout “f**k” in a crowded bed) under the bus.

All of which is wonderfully snide, but is merely an evasion of the question: Who is to blame for the Newtown massacre?

Who is trying “to divert our attention” from the actual culprit, namely the Creepy Little Weirdo who clearly should have been locked away at the kook farm long ago? It wasn’t Wayne LaPierre and “the odious gun lobby” who pulled the trigger, was it?

It was the ACLU, not the NRA, which insisted on de-institutionalizing the mentally ill. So why — other than their purely partisan desire to play “Pin the Tail on the Right-Wing Bad Guy” — is the Left now claiming that the Newtown massacre is a story about gun control, and that any other discussion is deliberately off-topic?

Never mind the specific issue at hand, however: In what sense is Professor Potter “radical” vis-a-vis the Obama Age? Where is there in her attitude anything revolutionary? Her “specialties are feminism, political history and cultural criticism,” and she directs us to a curriculum vitae that includes these titles:

What kind of weak-kneed intellectual drivel is this, Professor? Where do we see here any call for Revolutionary Action by the Toiling Masses?

“Death to the Fascist Insect That Preys Upon the Life of the People!” — that, my friends, is genuine radicalism, not a bunch of timid academic maundering in Women’s Review of Books.

When the revolution comes, these establishmentarian poseurs will be dealt with in summary fashion. They’ll be lucky if the Dictatorship of the Proletariat even bothers to give them “show trials” before they are taught that political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.

 

Category: Education

FMJRA 2.0: Heavy Metal

Posted on | December 29, 2012 | 1 Comment

— compiled by Wombat-socho

The Vocabulary of Professor Erik Loomis: ‘Motherf–ing F–kheads F–king F–k’

FMJRA 2.0: Relay Breakdown

Put Stakes In The Hearts Of Fanny Mae And Freddy Mac

Newsroom Management Training Video

‘How Dare You Let Your Mental Illness Disturb My Gun-Control Narrative?’

Too Sexy for Iowa

Rule 5 Sunday: Live From Luray

President First Person Singular and His Radical Cult of Antisocial Admirers

How Romney Lost America

Arguably Sacrilegious Genesis Parody

Memo From the National Affairs Desk: Chains Rattling, and Who’s That Ghost?

A Holiday Tradition Continues

The Obama Age: ‘That ’70s Show’

Peace, Love and Murder: Green Radicals Target Brandon Darby on ‘Hit List’

Christmas Greetings From A Leader

NBC: Nothing But Criminals

The Bloody Mess at FreedomWorks

Greedy Corporate Swine at Starbucks Cleverly Market Altruistic Image

Scofflaw David Gregory Busted by Bloggers, MIA From ‘Meet the Press’

Sociopathic Monsters: ‘Heroic Hatred’

The Problem With Piers Morgan Is That Americans Don’t Hate Him Enough

The Winners Write the History Books

The Truth and Its Enemies

Ironic Headline of the Day

Further Tales of ‘Heroic Hatred’: Down the Rabbit Hole With Neal Rauhauser

Needed: HR 824–House Select Committee On Benghazi

Muslims Now Using Lawfare to Threaten ‘Zionist’ Bloggers in Canada

Objectively Worse: Democrats to Blame for the Hyper-Partisanship They Decry

Everybody Hates Piers Morgan

AFRICA IN CRISIS: U.S. Abandons Embassy, France Won’t Intervene

Ohio College Student Gets Restraining Order Against Her ‘Stalker’ Parents

Top linkers this week:

  1. Lonely Conservative (9)
  2. (tie) Ed Driscoll and Daley Gator (5)

Honorable mention to Rick’s Rants, which would have made the list last week but was waylaid by the flu.

Thanks to everyone for their linkagery! Deadline for the first FMJRA of 2013 will be Friday, January 4.

 

Category: FMJRA Award

Credit Where Credit Is Due: Breitbart, Beck and the Dana Loesch Lawsuit

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 60 Comments

Back in the Day: Andrew Breitbart was a guest on Glenn Beck’s Fox News show

In April 2011, Matthew Boyle of the Daily Caller reported that Glenn Beck had been accused of using bloggers’ content without attribution:

Mandy Nagy, a conservative blogger known online as Liberty Chick, spent untold hours last fall creating a chart that tracks left-wing billionaire George Soros’s influence over media organizations, only to see it appear, in its exact form and without any attribution, on Beck’s famous chalkboard. “We were laughing that he went to all the trouble of [recreating] the visual on the blackboard,” Nagy said, not sounding entirely amused.
John Sexton, who blogs at VerumSerum.com, has provided Beck with material several times, and has sometimes received credit for it. But in several other cases, Sexton says, “he’s used our stuff without any hat tip at all. I don’t understand that.” According to Sexton, in one instance even famously liberal CBS News credited VerumSerum.com for content it used, while Beck, who lifted the same material, did not.
Pamela Geller of AtlasShrugs.com recalls watching Beck use a story she wrote about campaign contributions the Obama campaign received from donors in Gaza. Many other publications referred to the story, Geller says, but only Beck refused to give her credit for it.
“I went through thousands of pages of FEC documents and it was an enormous task to uncover the campaign contributions from Gaza, a Hamas-controlled area, to President Obama,” Geller says. “It’s in my book and it wasn’t a secret that I wrote the story. I don’t know how to describe such outrageous and proud thievery. I like his work, but he’s a thief.”

You can read the whole thing. Let’s be clear that Glenn Beck is certainly not the only broadcaster or journalist who has been accused of failing to give adequate credit to the work of others, and bloggers especially get used to being shortchanged by the big shots.

That April 2011 article, however, was sort of an Empire Strikes Back episode in what became a widespread backlash against Beck after he had a falling-out with Andrew Breitbart. And this is relevant now because, as I reported Christmas Eve, “people are telling me that it was Glenn Beck who wanted to hire Dana Loesch away from Breitbart.com,” and Dana has filed a federal lawsuit against Breitbart.com.

Let’s be clear (a) there’s a whole lot of backstory to this, which may never be entirely known, and (b) I cannot verify that there were actually any negotiations between Dana and Beck — it’s just what “people are telling me.” Obviously the plaintiff in a lawsuit can’t talk about it, and nobody at either Breitbart.com or Beck’s operation has said a word about it. Then again, I haven’t gotten any angry e-mails denying it, so . . .

In order to understand why Breitbart.com might take especial umbrage at the idea of Dana Loesch leaving to join Glenn Beck’s rival New Media operation, it helps to listen to a podcast interview Andrew Breitbart recorded in December 2011 with Stephen K. Bannon.

Because Bannon is now executive chairman of Breitbart.com, this is a very important interview. Becca J. Lower and Danielle Saul have provided a full transcript, which I briefly excerpt here:

Breitbart: [T]here are a lot of Beck supporters. In the past, Beck has made a lot of mistakes and his supporters come out and try to defend him, because Beck is a coward and will not defend himself when he makes a mistake or lies about a person or steals content —
Bannon: Hold on, I want to go back over this: you’re saying that Glenn Beck’s a coward, Glenn Beck’s a liar, and you’re saying that Glenn Beck steals material from people?
Breitbart: Oh yes, and this is well-documented. And whenever he does it, he never answers to the charges. He’s a coward. He won’t have me on the radio show, he won’t have himself [and] me on GBTV, refused to have me on Fox when he threw me under the bus. During the Sherrod thing, I asked to be on TV or radio to explain why he had it wrong. Months later, we found out why he wouldn’t have me on is because he lied to his audience on television that he didn’t do the Sherrod story. . . . In order to rectify the situation, he went on TV and tried to pretend like he was above the fray and told O’Reilly, to his face, a lie . . .
He also has historically been found to take countless bloggers’ content, to turn it into book gold, to turn it into chalkboard gold . . .He will not answer to the charges, and his minions online like to defend him. . . .

You can — and certainly should — read the whole thing.

 

PREVIOUSLY:

 


Category: Andrew Breitbart, Dana Loesch, Glenn Beck, Journalism

Ohio College Student Gets Restraining Order Against Her ‘Stalker’ Parents

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 33 Comments

The “helicopter parent” syndrome carried to an absurd extreme:

A 21-year-old theatre student has obtained a civil stalking restraining order against her parents after convincing a judge that they attempt to control all aspects of her daily life.
Aubrey Ireland is a gifted theatre major at the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, often winning major roles in her school’s musicals. . . . Earlier this month, Common Pleas Court Judge Jody Luebbers ruled in her favor, ordering that her parents must stay at least 500 feet from their only child until September 2013.
“They basically thought that [because] they were paying for my college tuition and living expenses that they could tell me what to do, who to hang out with … basically control all of my daily life,” Ireland told ABC News.

The Golden Rule: He who has the gold, makes the rules.

The dean’s list student’s complaints against her parents began when she realized they’d installed monitoring software on her computer and her phone. They paid unannounced visits, traveling 600 miles from their home in Kansas, to meet with Aubrey’s department head.
They also accused their daughter of promiscuity, doing drugs, and having mental issues to the point where they were considering going to court to order that she get treatment.

“We’re so proud of our slutty dopehead psycho daughter!”

“My mom has always been very overly involved,” Ireland said. “I would have to get on Skype all the time to show them that I was in my dorm room, or there were nights I had to leave my Skype on all night and my mom would watch me basically sleep.”
She claims her parents, David and Julie Ireland, have been diagnosed with co-dependency disorder. Her parents, however, say their daughter is just a good actor, and is lying. They said she is “an only child who has been catered to all her life.”

OK, and whose fault is that? I mean, you invest your entire biological destiny in exactly one child, it sort of naturally follows that you’re going to “cater” to her, so she becomes a spoiled brat who grows up to be a slutty dopehead psycho . . .

Because Aubrey has cut all ties with them in a very public way, they now want a refund of the $66,000 they’ve already paid toward her education.
“We’re not bothering her,” Julie Ireland said. “We’re not a problem.”

Sure, you’re not a problem, Mrs. Ireland. Your daughter just got a restraining order against you, so either (a) you’re a paranoid control freak or (b) you’re right, she’s a slutty dopehead psycho.

Neither alternative is especially flattering to you, Mrs. Ireland.

Good luck getting your $66,000 back.

Category: Education

Professional GOP Swindlers

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 12 Comments

It seems that David Dewhurst’s campaign manager broke Rule One of the Republican Party Operative Handbook: “Don’t get caught.”

AUSTIN — Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst’s campaign manager is under criminal scrutiny, suspected of stealing at least $600,000 — and possibly more than $1 million — from the Republican’s political accounts over the past several years.
Kenneth “Buddy” Barfield, a longtime GOP consultant who most recently managed Dewhurst’s failed run for the U.S. Senate, has been accused of falsifying documents to the Texas Ethics Commission that overstated the cash in Dewhurst’s state campaign committee by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Barfield, who also directed Dewhurst’s re-election campaign for lieutenant governor in 2010, did not return calls to his cellphone Thursday.
The original reports, examined by The Dallas Morning News, allegedly allowed Barfield to conceal huge sums of money taken from the David Dewhurst Committee since 2008 until Dewhurst associates discovered the improprieties this month.
After Dewhurst and his top aides confronted him, Barfield offered to repay the money — but was unable to do so, one campaign official said. Officials then alerted the Travis County district attorney’s office on Dec. 20, asked for an investigation and submitted revised reports to the ethics commission.

(Via Memeorandum.) Meanwhile, Gary Jackson is steamed about reports that aides to Mitt Romney trashed Sarah Palin’s reputation from 2008 onward in order to pave the way for the Romney 2012 campaign — despite the fact that Mitt himself didn’t really want to run again.

It is difficult to maintain any hope of winning with a party run by people whose sole interest in politics is, “What’s in it for me?”

Category: Corruption, Election 2012, Republicans, Scandal

AFRICA IN CRISIS: U.S. Abandons Embassy, France Won’t Intervene

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 24 Comments

The U.S. State Department has evacuated its embassy staff from the Central African Republic, as armed rebels threaten the capital of Bangui:

President François Bozizé of the Central African Republic has appealed for French and US help to stop rebel forces that threaten to overrun the country’s capital. The US has evacuated its embassy and the United Nations is also pulling out its staff.
The United States evacuated its embassy in the Central African Republic as the nation’s embattled leader appealed for French and US help after rebels seized large swathes of the mineral-rich country. . . .
The rebel coalition known as Seleka — which means “alliance” in the country’s Sango language — has seized four regional capitals, including a diamond mining hub, since its fighters took up arms on December 10. . . .
Central African Republic, with a population of about 4.5 million, has seen frequent coups and mutinies since independence from France in 1960. It ranks 179 out of 187 on the UN development index.

Becca Lower points out that the only place you can find the latest breaking news on this escalating catastrophe is . . . Ace of Spades HQ.

So don’t expect any reporting about the crisis in Bangui from CBS, MSNBC or CNN, because they’re all racist, that’s why.

UPDATE: Twitchy was reporting this story yesterday and notes:

ABC’s State Department correspondent Dana Hughes has been all over this story on Twitter, so she’s definitely a feed to watch as the situation progresses.

The last time the U.S. abandoned an embassy? Syria.

Because you’re probably wondering: No, I don’t know if these “rebels” are radical Islamists. Only about 10% of the C.A.R.’s population is Muslim, so it seems unlikely that any kind of al-Qaeda-backed extremist coup could be successful there. On the other hand, one of the country’s neighbors to the northeast is Sudan, an Islamist regime that might have its own motives to secretly support the Seleka rebels.

UPDATE II: Patrick Fort of AFP reports:

BANGUI, Central African Republic — Government soldiers in the Central African Republic battled to re-capture a rebel-held city Friday, a military official said, despite regional efforts to seek a peaceful end to the growing crisis.
The military official said the fighting in Bambari, which rebels from the Seleka coalition seized Sunday, was “especially violent”, and a humanitarian source said witnesses some 60 kilometres (35 miles) away could hear detonations and heavy weapons fire for several hours.

One of the commenters dismisses C.A.R. as one of those insignificant post-colonial “lines on a map” kinds of countries, and this may be entirely true. On the other hand, you never know when one of these minor dominoes might tip over and start some trouble that is more than local. A “failed state” outcome, for example, such as transpired in Somalia in the 1990s, might provide harbor to terrorists. It’s worth nothing, by the way, that the U.S. has a small contingent of troops stationed in C.A.R. to help hunt down the fugitive terrorist leader Joseph Kony.

UPDATE III: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Those “smart diplomacy” punchlines just write themselves, don’t they?

 


Category: Central African Republic

Everybody Hates Piers Morgan

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 27 Comments

The petition to deport Piers Morgan is now nearing 90,000 signatures — which is what I’d call “a good start” — and this groundswell of antipathy to being lectured by a smarmy Brit on CNN has now reached America’s youth, including Michael Butler at The High School Conservative:

Piers Morgan “has a case of the sads” over the deportion petition, tweeting things such as “Ironic U.S. gun rights campaign to deport me for ‘attacking 2nd amendment rights’ – is my opinion not protected under 1st amendment rights?” One witty twitter user responded with “You ignore the Constitution, why shouldn’t they?” For those of you wondering if we really can deport Piers Morgan for being stupid, we can. James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal explains, “Your opinion is protected, your presence in the U.S. is not. See Kleindienst v. Mandel (1972).” . . .
There is also a response petition from British citizens which reads, “We got rid of him once and why should we have to suffer again. The Americans wanted him so they should put up with him. We washed our hands of him a long time ago.”

The Brits don’t want him back and everybody in America hates him. Maybe we should send Piers Morgan to France — or even worse, Canada!

It doesn’t matter, as long as we #DeportPiersMorgan.

Category: CNN, Foreigners, Great Britain, Media Bias

‘A Lucrative But Risky Decision’

Posted on | December 28, 2012 | 9 Comments

That’s what the New York Times calls it when teenagers get good jobs:

The New York Times seems concerned that teens in the fracking belt of eastern Montana are opting to work in the new oil-field economy right after high school rather than going straight on to college. A front-page story warns: Taking a job is “a lucrative but risky decision for any 18-year-old to make, one that could foreclose on his future if the frenzied pace of oil and gas drilling from here to North Dakota to Texas falters and work dries up.”
Let’s see. Where is a teenager more likely to learn the basic and transferable virtue of showing up every day and on time, not to mention how to get along with a boss and fit into an organization — as a communications and binge-drinking double major at Missoula State University, or as a mechanic fixing broken rig equipment?

(Hat-tip: Instapundit.) My own children — including my 23-year-old daughter, who graduated summa cum laude and is now in her second year of teaching elementary school — have worked their way through college. Speaking of “basic and transferable” virtues, one of my 20-year-old twin sons will report for Army basic training in a couple of weeks, a work experience that will qualify him for higher education benefits, as well as killing terrorists. (Because he hates terrorists.)

Category: Education, Media Bias
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