The Other McCain

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

Old, Odd Fuddy-Duddys And Anyone Else Who Digs Liberty: Hie Thee To The East Lawn At High Noon On 24 March

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 15 Comments

by Smitty

Title alludes to Daily Pundit’s alternative suggestion for naming this blog. I like ‘The McCain Mutiny’, but once you’ve been indexed by Google, you don’t want to go making changes.

By the same token, once you’ve been annexed by the Progressive Borg, for something like ObamaCare, it gets very hard to undo. Which makes this:

The Road to Repeal Rally will take place on the East Lawn of the Capitol, right across the street (1st St NE) from the Supreme Court Building. The rally will begin at 12pm noon and will conclude at 2pm. Speakers and Coalition Partners to be announced soon.

. . .of paramount importance.

Let’s bring it, and in quantity. One can reasonably expect #OccupyResoluteDesk’s little henchmen to make mischief and mockery of law-abiding exercise of the 1st Amendment. But, more to the point, anyone who can needs to ensure that, irrespective of the outcome, they did the most they could to save the republic.

Road to Repeal

Wolverines!!!

Update: linked by That Mr. G. Guy.

Update II: Welcome, INSTAPUNDIT readers!

Category: Tea Party

We Forgive You, Foster Friess

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 31 Comments

Ali Akbar, Foster Friess and Robert Stacy McCain at CPAC 2012

The joke about aspirin as a contraceptive — just hold it between your knees, ladies — was probably first told by Phyllis Diller on “The Tonight Show” back when Jack Paar was still hosting. Those of us old enough to remember it were surprised when it became “controversial” this week.

How does a decades-old gag become “controversial”? When it is re-told by a GOP billionaire who supports Rick Santorum for president.

Welcome to the Age of Political Correctness: Foster Friess has felt the need to apologize for telling that old joke.

Should conservatives denounce, disavow and “distance” ourselves from Mr. Friess? Not at all. We are quite proud to be associated with such a courageous and patriotic Christian gentleman. In fact, we have created a Special Patriotic Tribute to Foster Friess, and hope that everyone will click the link to see it. IYKWIMAITYD.

Category: Foster Friess, Rick Santorum

Our Tolerant Liberal Overlords (Unexpectedly!) Mock Dancing Lesbian

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 11 Comments

She insists on being known as “A Conservative Lesbian, Cynthia Yockey,” because that gets her to the top of any alphabetically ordered blogroll, at least until I change the name of this blog to “AAA Homophobic Sexist Patriarchal Theocratic Right-Wing Swine.” But I digress . . .

A video of Cynthia dancing to a rap song by Steven Crowder and Chris Loesch at CPAC went viral, which earned her mockery at Wonkette and at Mediaite, where Frances Martel wrote, “There is also an elder white lady grooving that is either hilarious or tragic” before subsequently updating to acknowledge that the “elder white lady” was in fact Cynthia, who is (a) merely 58 and (b) what would otherwise be regarded by liberals as a Sacred Victim of Unjust Discrimination.

Cynthia has taken notice of this, and there are a couple more things I’d like to point out:

  1. Would Mediate ever describe Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, or any number of other liberal Baby Boomers as “elder”?
  2. Why is the sexual preference of conservatives only noted when they are caught in “hypocrisy,” or outed by liberals, or openly gay and criticizing the GOP as homophobic?

Seriously: There are lots and lots of gay people who vote Republican and support conservative policies and never complain about discrimination or get caught in scandals, but you’d have no idea of this if all you knew was what you read in the liberal media.

For example, there were thousands of lesbians at CPAC. How do I know this? Well, there were many women attending the conference who did not fling themselves in lovestruck desperation at me, and so therefore . . .

Well, need I say it? I think not.

Anyway, Cynthia Yockey is good people and you should go hit her tip jar immediately, because when I flew back from Florida and no one else could get to the airport to pick me up, Cynthia was “AAA Ride Home From the Airport.” Some have entertained angels unaware.

Category: CPAC, Cynthia Yockey

The New Media Proletariat

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 43 Comments

It is rather a painful thing to acknowledge that Joy McCann is onto something when she remarks about the advent of a two-tiered blogging hierarchy. And it is even more painful to see my friend Jerry Wilson’s expressions of resentment toward Ed Morrissey about this.

In all honesty, despite what anyone may suspect from certain previous writings here (ahem), I recognize Ed as one of the great selfless souls of conservative New Media.

The growth of blogging, including the ascent of certain sites and individuals to pre-eminence within the ecology of the blogosphere, has fundamentally transformed the online environment. People who were still in high school when Bill Quick named the blogosophere (more than a decade ago) now wield more influence and throw more traffic than does Bill Quick himself. Those who have toiled long years as bloggers obviously have reason to resent the upstarts, who may not recognize how they stand on the shoulders of giants. By the same token, newcomers to the ‘sphere understandably resent the difficulty of carving out a readership in an environment where a certain hierarchy has seemingly become already set in stone.

Is some sort of revolutionary movement necessary to unleash the strength and satisfy the ambitions of the New Media Proletariat? Is the existing online hierarchy an engine of systemic injustice?

I think not.

The world is not fair, nor is there ever likely to be any system in human experience that operates as a pure meritocracy. There will always be those whose hard work is ill-compensated and unrecognized, just as there will inevitably be others who benefit extravagantly from what appears to others as undeserved good fortune.

Sic semper hoc.

What is true in the rest of the world and throughout human history is, alas, true in the online world: Life is not fair.

Yet nobody’s participation in this field is compulsory. I could quit this blog tomorrow and go drive a forklift, and probably make more money doing that than I’ve earned in the past year. There is no one in the blogosphere holding a gun to my head, no one with the authority to issue me any commands that I am obliged to obey. My participation is entirely voluntary, as is true of everyone who decides to create a blog and try to make themselves heard above the incessant online din.

Do I have advantages others do not? Indeed I do, and I exploit every one of these advantages to the fullest extent I can.

Do others in online media have advantages over me? Of course, and they will certainly employ those advantages to obtain for themselves the greatest possible personal benefit. It would be foolish for anyone to expect them to do less.

Nevertheless, it remains true that no blog is an island. There is no site with such a decisive advantage of readership or resources that it can neglect the need to grow and expand, to keep pace with the evolution of the online information system. Even within the seemingly rock-solid “Establishment” hierarchy of the blogosphere, there are still opportunities for those who are willing to embrace the challenges, to think of themselves not as oppressed toilers, but as innovative entrepreneurs.

Hear me, my virtual comrades!

You are not being oppressed by the Blogospheric Bourgeoisie.

There is no “Man” holding you down, no Tsar or imperial bureaucracy impeding your advancement. If you are not being linked, if your e-mails go unanswered, if you are banned or attacked or excluded, let those setbacks inspire you to still greater efforts, to new ideas and new enterprises.

If you feel yourself chained to your laptop, the chains that enslave you are forged by your own mind. You can quit tomorrow, walk away for as long as it suits your fancy, and begin again anew whenever, wherever and however you decide.

You may never be “equal,” my comrades, but never doubt that you are always equally free. And perhaps, indeed, the lowly and neglected among us have far greater liberty than do those who, by merit or mere luck, have succeeded in obtaining an income on which they are dependent, so that they are compelled daily to strive for new successes, to crank out the content like so many factory workers manning an industrial assembly line.

Comrades! I beseech you: Consider for yourself what value you add to whatever cause it is you seek to advance, and ask whether the success of that cause is an end greater than your own personal benefit. Your labors and your sufferings — real or imagined — can only be justified by one or the other, and it doesn’t matter which it is.

If it is your goal to be a New Media professional, you should seek the maximum compensation for your skill. If it is your goal to be a volunteer activist online, you have no measure of your success other than the advancement of whatever cause you embrace. It is certainly true that the larger your readership, the greater your impact either way. Yet it is incumbent upon you to expand your own readership, rather than to think of others as obligated to share their readership with you.

A blogospheric Welfare State can no more be the goal of online friends of liberty than would we wish an Internet dictatorship that would allot online traffic according to some egalitarian formula. Blogospheric free enterprise may not produce “social justice” in the virtual environment, but whatever it produces — for good or for ill — a capitalistic New Media will triumph over any other online equivalent of a planned economy that “experts” could invent or imagine.

Comrades of the New Media Proletariat: YOU ARE FREE!
Go forth and prove yourselves worthy of your freedom.

.





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Category: Blogging, Ed Morrissey, Goldfish & Clowns, Little Miss Attila

Is Ian Masters Looking For A Job In, I Don’t Know, Say, Tennessee?

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 1 Comment

by Smitty

Valley of the Shadow points out Ian Masters, an LA radio personality of some note, who really seems to dig him some anti-Semitism. Read all of Joe Fein’s debunking of a sad situation in LA.  It brings to mind Charlotte Bergmann, whom I saw cruise through the blogger lounge at CPAC, but had no time to hail. These Lefty radio personalities seem to have problems with raaaaacism. Do they get that in their broadcasting school?

It used to seem strange and paradoxical that the Left, purporting to be all about fairness and decency, stand revealed as the least fair and decent upon serious analysis. But that seems to be their point: there is no ‘serious analysis’ on a societal scale. It’s really all about power, isn’t it? Especially if you have no moral center to explain why this is a violation of Matt 4:8-10.

And, speaking of those who apparently lack a moral center, Sean Penn continues to pal around with anti-Semites and those who hate America. Gotta love Sean’s approach to free speech: his is consistant in his mis-application thereof.

Category: California, Tennessee, Valley of the Shadow

‘A Poor Impression Of The Insular, Cliquish Culture Of Their Discipline’

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 4 Comments

by Smitty

An interesting article at Slate reprints an article from a decade ago about a non-professional philosopher who wrote a serious philosophical tract and then, retaining anonymity, paid philosophers to engage on it in scholarly journals. James Ryerson then goes on a hunt to unmask this anonymous thinker, with anti-climactic results, emphasis mine:

After all, the philosophers I had spoken with had assumed from the very beginning that “Coming to Understanding” was the work of an amateur. Not only did the draft itself suggest an amateur’s hand, but the whole elaborate production of the institute was a bright, shining neon advertisement for the fact that this was not a professional philosopher working through professional channels.
No, quite obviously it was the money that had convinced the reviewers to write their reviews. If anything, the institute’s anonymity had only made reviewers reluctant to participate. So I wrote Sanders back, suggesting that if his primary goal was, as he stated, to attract reviewers, then he should rest assured that my article would only broaden the range of philosophers who might be interested in contributing to his project.
His reply was revealing, for his message had changed. He explained that he no longer expected that he could genuinely interest the sort of professional academics who read Lingua Franca. Despite his deep admiration for the work of trained philosophers, he had come to form a poor impression of the insular, cliquish culture of their discipline. “I have found professional philosophers to be a proud, demanding bunch who protect their terrain with great contempt for outsiders,” he wrote. “My past attempts to publish my work did not get beyond the first contact stage because I had ‘no standing in the academy.'”

The whole article is interesting, if you’re keen on metaphysical topics. The bolded organizational behavior point is one that crops up every time you have a non-trivial number of people involved in an effort. Two of my favorite sayings in life:

  • People don’t scale.
  • Everything is easy when you know how to do it.

When you have more than, say, a half dozen people working together on a non-trivial effort, a standard normal distribution pops up, as leaders drift toward the management tail on the right, and the bums drift toward the left tail and check in with the #Occupy movement.

Staffing comes and goes in the left and middle, but the more people hang around, learn, and become skilled, the more to the right they drift, and the same sort of bitchy philosophers club alluded to in the article will form. Inevitably.

Will the conservative blogosphere suffer from this ‘malady’? It already does, or never will, depending upon your perspective. The barriers to entry are exceedingly low, the turnover is quite high, and technology tends to lob bolders at the keep of your coveted readership.

Aside: I absolutely meant no reference whatsoever to Mrs. Burri in this post. I was trying to crack a contextual joke, which was probably better left alone. I don’t really think he took it personally, but in such matters, I will always flog the horse well past dead.

via Stephen R. C. Hicks

Category: Culture, Education

GOP Debate, Arguably, Still Going Strong

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 11 Comments

by Smitty

I met young Ben Shapiro at the blogger awards event Friday morning at CPAC. Crowder was making a running joke on the topic of condoms and a social conservative Presidential candidate. After two or three tries that fell flat, I looked at Shapiro and said “He’s going to keep inflating that joke until it pops.”

Is the last pre-Super Tuesday GOP debate on 01 March in some way similar to a Steven Crowder condom joke? I contend that the topic of the debate informs the question. Sample debate topics for which total collapse of the debate itself is appropriate:

  • The economy.
  • Every good thing President Obama ever did.
  • U.S. credibility in Southwest Asia.
  • The Constitutional basis for Progressivism.
  • What the Left knows about free market capitalism.
  • Courageous bureaucratic acts.

So, no hint as to what the candidates were to have discussed at the onset of March Madness. However, given the relative lack of substantive policy debate in the preceding events, it’s hard to argue that a collapse on 01 March is any worse than what came before.

In fact, it is arguably more honest that that candidates not bother wasting our time, again, rather than stand there for 1-2 hours saying nothing to each other in the most caustic political terms available.

Good news, bad news: who can say?

Category: Debates, GOP, humor

LIVE AT FIVE – 02.17.12

Posted on | February 17, 2012 | 5 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
One Killed, One Wounded As ICE Agents Open Fire On Each Other

LAPD seals off the area near the Long Beach Federal Building

ICE agent wounds supervisor, killed by another agent; FBI investigating

President Obama’s Big-Money Day In San Francisco
Four-fundraiser day light on policy, big on boodle

U.S. Attempting To Craft Sanctions That Will Only Hurt Iran
Mission impossible?



POLITICS
NJ Assembly Passes Gay Marriage Bill

NJ State Senator Reed Gusciora

Christie says he’ll veto measure; votes not there for override

Newt Gingrich Putting California In Play?

Mardi Gras Fattening Business All Along The Gulf Coast, Not Just New Orleans

Iowa Lawsuit Tests “Implicit Bias” Theory




Rhode Island School Forced To Remove 50-Year-Old Prayer Banner

Weed Smuggler Intercepted By F-16s After Straying Into Obama’s Air Space

Poll:  Brown Leads Warren By 9% In Mass. Senate Race

Ron Paul Brings Revolution To SeaTac

Pat Buchanan Out At MSNBC



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Oil Rises For Third Day On Outlook For U.S. Economy, Greek Aid
U.S. Stocks, Gold Seen Rising
Germany Seeks To Avoid Two-Step Vote On Greek Aid
NYSE, CME Kick Off Race For London Metals Exchange
USPS Plans Call For $0.50 Stamp, Slower Deliveries
Record Profits But Mixed Success At Government Motors
Audit Finds Extensive Flaws In Foreclosures
Consumer Agency Wants Oversight Of Collectors, Credit Bureaus
Jobless Claims Hit Lowest Level Since 2008
Inside Apple-Bothering Proview’s Crumbling Factory
Amazon’s Kindle Fire Eats Into iPad’s Market Share
Motorola Droid 4: An Office In Your Pocket?
Apple Wins “Slide-To-Unlock” Patent Ruling Against Motorola
Google Tricked Safari Browser In Order To Track Users Despite Privacy Settings



SPORTS
Hall Of Fame Catcher Gary Carter Dies, 57

The Kid and his fellow Mets celebrating their win in the '86 World Series

1954-2012, RIP; struck down by brain cancer

Duke Rallies To Beat Wolfpack, 78-73

Your Daily Fix Of Linsanity

Blackhawks Stun Rangers 4-2 To End 9-Game Slide

TrailBlazers Self-Destruct In 74-71 Loss To Clippers

#20 Florida State Edges Virginia Tech 48-47

Flyers Roar Back To Ice Sabres, 7-2

Celtics Can’t Hold It Together, Fall To Chicago 89-80

Amid Media Swarm, Danica Says She Prefers “Pretty” To “Sexy”

Nyets’ Skid Hits 8

Kiwis Lead South Africa In 20/20, 148 (4 out) to 147 (6 out)

Nationals Baseball Begins Again: Pitchers And Catchers Report Sunday



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Janet Jackson In Preliminary Talks To Join “X Factor”

Janet Jackson

Dodges question from Anderson Cooper

Kevin Costner To Speak At Whitney Houston’s Funeral?

Chris Brown’s Shocking New Pickup Line

Jessica Simpson Bringing High Fashion To “The Biggest Loser”

Jason Bateman, It’s A Girl!

The CW Finds Its Beauty: Kristin Kreuk To Star In “Beauty & The Beast” Pilot

Blake Lively Shuns Her #1 Fan

Heidi Klum Still Wearing Wedding Ring; Seal Isn’t

Jennifer Aniston, Dennis Quaid In “Switch” Talks

Taylor Swift: “I’m Good At Being Single”



FOREIGNERS
Pressure Growing On German President To Resign
Times Correspondent Dies Of Asthma In Syria
UN General Assembly Passes Resolution On Syria As Slaughter Continues
Thai Police Seek Two More Suspects In Bomb Attacks
Kosovo Serbs Vote Against Albanian Rule
Boko Haram Jail Break: 93 Inmates At Large
Cameron To Sign Nuke Power Pact With Sarkozy



BLOGS & STUFF
Big Government: Last Pre-Super Tuesday Debate Collapses
Ed Morrissey: Santorum Leads Romney In Ohio, 42-24
Gateway Pundit: Dems Call On Christian-Hater Barry Lynn To Represnt Them In Religious Hearing, Then Storm Out
Heritage Foundation: Liberals Scramble To Avoid Talking About The Constitution
Pat Buchanan: Blacklisted But Not Beaten
Israel Matzav: Gallup – Israel’s Approval Rating Rises To 71%
Rush Limbaugh: Christie Defends Whitney Houston Decision
The Lonely Conservative: Another Scary Chart, And Tim Geithner Is Making Our Case For Us
Weasel Zippers: NBA Star Vince Carter Hosting Obama Fundraiser Over All-Star Weekend
Powerline: Slouching Toward Tehran
National Review: Ron Paul’s Delegate Advantage
Megan McArdle: Leaked Heartland Institute Docs – Is One A Fake?
Valley Of The Shadow: Hate Speech On LA Radio
WyBlog: Newark Finally Evicts Occupods – To Make Way For Whitney Houston’s Funeral

Category: Live at Five
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