The Other McCain

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

The Media’s Weird Silence on Soros

Posted on | November 30, 2012 | 10 Comments

The Free Beacon’s Matthew Continetti observes how little attention was paid to the recent meeting of the Democracy Alliance, a left-wing fundraising network backed by billionaire George Soros:

More likely the media simply ignore data that complicate their preferred narrative. When it comes to the fraught relationship between money and politics, that narrative is as follows: Money in politics is corrupting only because rich businessmen trade campaign donations to Republicans for low taxes and fewer environmental regulations.

Continetti points out a little-noted development:

Earlier this year the Democracy Alliance scraped away groups that were not affixed like barnacles to the hull of the Democratic Party and left alone the groups that were.

Continetti links to a February article by HuffPo’s Ryan Grim:

Among those who support the creation of a progressive infrastructure, there is heavy debate over whether to fund organizations closely aligned with the Democratic Party or those that operating outside it and pressuring it to move in a more progressive direction.
The groups dropped by the Democracy Alliance tend to be those that work outside the party’s structure. Groups with closer ties to the party, such as the Center for American Progress and Media Matters, retained their status with the Democracy Alliance as favored organizations.
The decision to drop certain groups was delivered to those affected last week. Among the ones axed are Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Foundation, James Rucker’s Citizen Engagement Lab, Melanie Sloan’s Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (known as CREW), Third Way, the Center for Progressive Leadership, the Advancement Project, Democracia, Free Press and Simon Rosenberg’s NDN, according to sources with knowledge of the situation. Groups working on issues relating directly to people of color appear to be the most dramatically affected.

Why so little attention? It may have to do with how left-wingers gain access to this sweet, sweet subsidy of “non-partisan” philanthropy:

While the Democracy Alliance does not give directly to progressive groups, it pulls together a network of donors to attend two annual conferences. Groups on a select list are given access to those donors and a chance to make presentations on behalf of their organization. . . .
The Democracy Alliance maintains a low profile by forbidding recipients from talking publicly about the organization.

The first rule of Soros money is, nobody talks about Soros money. And it seems the the New York Times, the Washington Post and other major news organizations are playing by the rules.

Category: Uncategorized

The Fiscal Cliff Rub

Posted on | November 30, 2012 | 11 Comments

by Smitty

 

 

I, for one, don’t waste time when it comes to eating my vegetables or taking the hit when I’ve really jacked it up. I realize the whole notion of responsibility is passé in the era of “You didn’t do that”, even when you did do that.

I’m sick of the Sword of Damocles. I figure that, cynically, the Commies figure we’ll nuckle under and beg them to make the Bad Republicans stop hammering us. No’ so fast. I’m fully prepared to sail off the cliff and take the landing, provided that we learn from the experience and set about actual, contra-Progressive reform.

Redistribute power, not wealth.

Category: Uncategorized

LIVE AT FIVE: 11.30.12

Posted on | November 30, 2012 | 6 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
Obama’s Unbalanced Approach: All Tax Hikes, Zero Spending Cuts

President Obama

Doesn’t understand that he can’t have his revenue enhancement pudding until he eats his spending cuts meat


UN General Assembly Votes Non-Member State Status For Palestine
Haaretz blames the JooooosIsraeli FM Lieberman

Egyptian Islamists Fast-Track Draft Constitution
Enshrines Sharia law as basis for legislation; protests scheduled for later today



POLITICS
Bush The Elder Hospitalized, Expected To Recover

Former President G.H.W. Bush and wife Barbara

In stable condition with bronchitis, should be out in 72 hours
Related: The hate begins

“Plugs” Biden Pays Visit To D.C.’s First Costco

Strauss-Kahn Allegedly Cuts Deal With Hotel Maid

Senate Amendment Revives Military’s Biofuel Plans

Wikileaker Claims He Considered Suicide In Custody

Arizona Governor Sued Over Licenses For Illegals Whose Deportation Was Deferred

Michigan Eyes Right-To-Work Measure

Bloomberg, Cuomo Detail Aid For Owners Of Storm-Damaged Property



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Oil Up Sharply On US Budget Optimism, Continued Middle East Tension: NYMEX $88.07, Brent $110.76
Asian Shares Higher, Capped By US Fiscal Worries
Zynga Shares Fall As Facebook Terms Change
Japan’s Consumer Prices Unchanged As Abe Calls For More Easing
Blue Chips Dip Into Red After Boehner Comments
$haky Start Boxes In Retailers
New York Fast Food Workers Rally For $15 Wage
Conservationists, Interior Department Drive Oyster Farm Out Of Business



SPORTS
Drew Brees Throws Five Interceptions As Saints Fall To Falcons 23-13

Falcons QB Matt Ryan throws under pressure

Atlanta jumps out to early lead and never looks back

Allen, Heat Top Short-Handed Spurs 105-100

Rutgers, Louisville Give Muddled Big East Muddled Finish

Mediation Fails To Solve NHL Lockout

Notre Dame Beats #8 Kentucky 64-50

Mariano Rivera Agrees To $10M Contract With Yankees

Catcher Russell Martin Leaves Yankees, Signs With Pirates

Nationals Acquire Denard Span From Twins For Prospect Alex Meyer



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Lindsay Lohan Arrested For Fighting In NYC Bar

Lindsay Lohan

Allegedly punched woman in face over boy band member

Halle Berry Allegedly Selling “Fight House”

Jessica Simpson Wants To Get Hitched Before Second Baby Arrives


Kanye West Wants His Unspeakable Fiancee To Quit Reality TV

Michael Jackson’s Father Joe Suffers Stroke

Katy Perry Feels Fat Without Spanx



FOREIGNERS
British Inquiry Report Calls For Press Watchdog
Assad Regime Shuts Down Cell Phones, Internet In Syria
Violent Raid Breaks Up Burma Copper Mine Protest
US Moves Toward Recognizing Syria’s Opposition
New PRC Law Authorizes Search, Expulsion Of Foreign Ships
Halappanavar Family To Take Case To European Court
Chaos Feared As Congolese Rebels Prepare To Leave Goma



BLOGS & STUFF
Power Line: Obama To GOP – My Offer Is This, Nothing
Lonely Conservative: How Can Any Fiscal Cliff Deal Be Balanced Without Spending Cuts?
Weekly Standard Blog: McConnell “Burst Into Laughter” As Geithner Outlined Obama’s Plan
Larry Kudlow: Herbert Hoover Obama?
Daily Caller: Gingrich Recommends GOP Stop Negotiating With Obama
The Lid: Reports Of Mahmoud Abbas’ Moderation Are Like An Old Joke
Wall Street Journal: What Kind Of Palestinian State?
Weasel Zippers: US Birth Rate Plunges To Lowest Since 1920
Rush Limbaugh: Just Walk Away, Republicans
Allahpundit: Boehner Says No Progress On Fiscal Cliff Talks In Last Two Weeks
Gretawire: Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Believe Legalization Is The Answer To The Drug War
Conservatives4Palin: Man Of The People Barack Obama To Take 20-Day, $4 Million Vacation At Taxpayer Expense
Jammie Wearing Fools: Former ACORN Honcho Wants To Unionize NYC Fast Food Workers
Protein Wisdom: What Is Obama So Afraid Of?

Category: Live at Five

Auto-Marginalization: @BrooksBayne Decides to Jew-Bait (!) Aaron Walker

Posted on | November 30, 2012 | 39 Comments

Did I ever mention that I was friends with the late Sam Francis? That I have shaken hands with Pat Buchanan and once interviewed the late Joe Sobran? I’m bringing this up — doing “guilt-by-association” against myself, as it were — to make the point that I’ve hung out with Thought Criminals of the Dreadnaught class, the kind of right-wing extremists your nice Republican mother warned you about.

Having been smeared as a “hater” myself and having seen good people suffer from intra-conservative factional infighting, I am loath to support purges of people on the basis of cheap attacks from the Left or flimsy accusations of ideological impurity.

Ask Pamela Geller who stood up for her when Charles Johnson accused her of abetting “Euro-fascism.”

So now we confront the problem of Brooks Bayne.

Exactly who he is, or thinks he is, or has convinced other people that he is, Brooks Bayne has recently decided to auto-marginalize himself. It’s a hell of thing to say about somebody that I’d rather link a Firedoglake article about them than to link anything they ever wrote.

The Entire Internet Hates Brooks Bayne’s Guts

That was in March, when Bayne decided to go off on a weird tangent about Sandra Fluke’s boyfriend being Jewish and the scion of a family who subscribed to “the typical Jewish variant of socialism.” Marc Tracy offers an examination of Bayne’s rant at Tablet Magazine.

Just to demonstrate that one can speak of “the typical Jewish variant of socialism” without being a Jew-hater, I would direct you to David Horowitz’s memoir Radical Son, in which he ponders how and why his Jewish parents became members of the Communist Party U.S.A., and thus idolators in the totalitarian personality cult of a mass murderer named Josef Stalin. Horowitz recognized the cultural roots of this and discussed it in the context of tikkun olam. As I wrote in February 2011:

Tikkun olam is a rabbinical concept that might properly be translated as “for the public good,” but which in the modern era has been politicized by many on the Left, so that it is indistinguishable in their interpretation from “social justice.” Most famously, Michael Lerner — a 1960s anti-war radical who once led an SDS splinter group called the Seattle Liberation Front — named his magazine Tikkun.

“Social justice” is, as Hayek said, a mirage. Whatever you call it, and whatever compels you to pursue it, chasing the mirage of social justice will eventually bring about disillusionment, if you are intelligent and honest with yourself. It would be good if more Jewish conservatives spoke bluntly about this, just as it would be good if more Catholic conservatives spoke bluntly about how various “social justice” teachings of their church empower Welfare State liberalism that is ultimately hostile to faith and morality. For that matter, most Protestant churches could use a stern lecture or two about this perverse and nonsensical misinterpretation of Christian teaching.

As Ludwig von Mises observed nearly a century ago, “Christian Socialism is nonetheless socialism.” But I digress . . .

Brooks Bayne rather reminds me of another enthusiastic political parvenu, Glenn Beck, in that during his famed chalkboard lectures, Beck was often teaching his viewers facts that he himself had just learned. Not that there was anything wrong with that — Beck’s genuine excitment as he traced the historical background of current politics was quite infectious — but there is always a danger that such student-teachers will let themselves be sidetracked into well-known dead-ends that more experienced teachers might have warned them about.

The origins of the Federal Reserve system are indeed a frightful mess, but if you start ranting too excitedly about Jekyll Island and “international bankers,” you’ll sound like a kook — and might actually become one. More than a few well-meaning folks have started down that path and ended up on the paranoid fringe, barking madly about the Bildebergers, the Bavarian Illuminati and the New World Order.

It is in such light that we must evaluate Brooks Bayne and the suspicious whiff of anti-Semitism that surrounds him. I don’t want to be hasty. It takes more than a few sharp jabs at “neocons” to arouse my suspicion in this regard; many of my good friends are paleoconservatives, traditionalists or libertarians who have their own legitimate complaints against neconservatives. Such an éminence gris as Russell Kirk once infamously quipped that it seemed some neocons “mistook Tel Aviv for the capital of the United States.” Unless we’re willing to airbrush Kirk from the conservative pantheon, then, we can’t be haphazardly purging people on the basis of random remarks.

Nevertheless, Brooks Bayne keeps tallying up marks against himself, and has managed to alienate so many conservatives that it’s difficult to find anyone willing to defend him anymore. And this brings me to the incident that inspired this long rumination: After a U.S. District Court judge dismissed Aaron Walker’s federal lawsuit against Brett Kimberlin — I blogged about that decision, and the PDF of the judge’s ruling is here — Brooks Bayne made a comment at his own blog mocking the plaintiff as “Walkerwitz.”

WALKERWITZ?

What the hell is this? Never mind why Bayne, who endlessly celebrates himself as a True Conservative, would take sides with Brett Kimberlin. Why would Bayne make this bizarre anti-Semitic jest about Walker, a conservative Presbyterian from Texas? Maybe because Brooks got this idea (as he has seems to have gotten so many other falsehoods) from the pro-Kimberlin “Breitbart Unmasked” site.

More than two months ago, Aaron Walker explained how “Breitbart Unmasked” began harassing him in March on Twitter with claims that records at Yale Law School showed Walker as being Jewish.

This was preposterous. And where did “Breitbart Unmasked” get that silly idea? From an anti-Semitic site whose idiot author evidently decided anyone with the first name “Aaron” must be Jewish.

So, a falsehood makes its way from a Jew-hating site to a pro-Kimberlin Twitter account and now, it seems, to Brooks Bayne, “True Conservative.”

Anyone care to defend Bayne in this? Anyone? Bueller?

UPDATE: Phillip McGuire on Twitter informs me that Bayne has been throwing this “Walkerwitz” idiocy at Aaron Walker for weeks now, and Google confirms this as true, raising the question: Why were none of Bayne’s fanboys troubled by this? And why do mainstream conservatives think they can safely ignore people like Brooks Bayne?

On the one hand, he may be an irrelevant distraction. On the other hand, he seems to have made himself the center of gravity of a minor galaxy of “True Conservative” posturing, so that when he starts Jew-baiting a Presbyterian, maybe we ought to take time to warn people about this dangerous fool.

UPDATE II: Back in September, Ladd Ehlinger Jr. subjected Bayne to a memorable satirical beatdown.

 


Category: Aaron Worthing, The Kimberlin Files

Benghazi => ‘High On A Mountaintop’

Posted on | November 29, 2012 | 18 Comments

by Smitty

I’ve been waiting to see this video. Stevens, Smith, Doherty and Woods did their part. Cassone has done his. Now, you know what to do for your part: make this viral. All over twitter, blogs, and inboxes.

“Who gave the order to let his son die?” indeed. I think we need to get what we know to be the truth out there, and have #OccupyResoluteDesk stand tall. He’s really adept at hiding behind Susan Rice’s skirts, admittedly.

Update: thanks, Instapundit, and thank you again, Cassone!

Category: Barack Obama, Chris Cassone

World’s Youngest Blogger: I May Have To Get Medieval On Boehner

Posted on | November 29, 2012 | 15 Comments


Were these United States not begun as a tax revolt? Was taxation without representation not a cause célèbre ~250 years ago? Are Congresses on about not binding future Congresses?

So what’s the big deal here? Why is it blatantly obvious to someone in their second year of life that binding future generations with a ridiculous tax burden is so fundamentally un-American as to hearken back to that crappy Parliament the Founders kicked to the curb a couple centuries back?

Would those Founders do anything other than order the Colonials to fix bayonets, if they were confronted with the wretched hive of scum and villainy that this Congress has become?

It’s time to realize that the country has come full circle. Just get over the fact that, yes, Woodrow Wilson sowed to the wind, and, a century on, it’s time to reap the whirlwind. You’re not winning within the status quo. The GOP needs to quit trying to fight for the helm and go sound the collision alarm. This Progressive course has been our undoing. All hands brace for shock.

After the collision with the Fiscal Cliff  I’m going to track down Speaker Boehner and flog him with my pacifier.

Update: linked at Jackie Wellfonder.
Also, dad’s on this ‘Twidder’ thing. Can someone help me understand why this is funny?

Category: John Boehner, World's Youngest Blogger

Boehlert’s Nemesis @BethanyBowra Now Takes Sandra Fluke to the Woodshed; UPDATE: Pwnage Complete After Boehlert Blocks Bowra on Twitter

Posted on | November 29, 2012 | 9 Comments

Bethany Bowra is a 16-year-old high school student who has already achieved remarkable success. And by “remarkable success,” of course I mean, she got denounced on Twitter by Eric Boehlert.

Of all the obnoxious bozos on the Left who hated Andrew Breitbart, none hated him more than Eric Boehlert, so it’s sort of like a Pulitzer Prize for conservatives to be denounced by Boehlert, especially when you’re just a 16-year-old high school student.

Rather than resting on her laurels, however, Bowra has moved forward to take on Sandra Fluke and the baby-hating feminist Left:

Yes, I said it:  Today’s feminists, whether directly or indirectly, are actively advocating the murder of unborn baby girls.

You go, girl.

UPDATE: After Bowra saw the post, she Tweeted thanks and I replied:

Badass lefty “intellectual” Eric Boehlert blocks a 16-year-old girl?

It’s hard to imagine how his humiliation could be more complete.

 

 

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Category: Abortion, Feminism

Speaker Of The House Shocked That President Who Likely Left Two Heros High And Dry In Benghazi Proves Incapable Of Keeping Phone Call Secret

Posted on | November 29, 2012 | 29 Comments

by Smitty

For crying out loud in the dark, Boehner:

Republicans believe the administration leaked details of the 30-minute Wednesday night phone call to Politico, which is causing them to question whether they can trust the White House to keep details private, a sentiment that has caused progress in the negotiations over the “fiscal cliff” to stall.

Trusting Obama to do anything other than throw you under the bus is like dropping off your children at the Jeffrey Dahmer Day Care Center. What if, and I fantasize, you just punted and started offering a no-kidding reform platform that stabilizes the fisc and returns liberty to Americans?

Of course it’s not going to get through Chokepoint Harry in the other chamber, much less get signed into law by #OccupyResoluteDesk, but your purported base would SURE LIKE TO SEE YOU DO MORE THAN COWER FOR ONCE!

Category: Uncategorized
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