Damn It, I'm Sorry: I Got No Money (So I Must Be Right)

The Crack Emcee, Tuesday, October 8, 2013:

"I can't tell these people anything - this delusion is fixed - better to let it run it's course:

They'll burn out like a fever,..."

Salon's Joan Walsh, Tuesday, October 15, 2013:

GOP’s deadly fever: Has their fantasy bubble finally popped?

Race Is In Our Face But We're Talking About Shutdown (Betrayal Is Crime - But Let's Talk About Sinatra's I.Q.)

There's some interesting writing being done over the shutdown - none of it by our usual suspects which, once again, makes me wonder why they're so great (yes, Glenn Reynolds, I'm talking to you) - but mostly by people I'm known to really disagree with, like Salon's Joan Walsh, who's waded in on a subject I was discussing with a reader just last night:

  How did I write a piece about the modern GOP’s use of race and racism without talking about Rand (and Ron) Paul? What is the matter with me?

I have covered Paul’s many disappointing moments on racial issues over the years, from telling Rachel Maddow he couldn’t support the Civil Rights Act provisions that applied to private businesses back in 2010, and to his dishonest weaseling over his white neo-Confederate staffer Jack Hunter, aka Southern Avenger, to his own slurs against Abraham Lincoln drawn straight from the canon of neo-Confederacy. I can’t believe I left Rand Paul out of the piece. I apologize for the omission.

Journalists everywhere should "apologize for the omission" because I see Rand and Ron waaay too often - actually influencing American policy and the national dialogue - with absolutely no mention of what they've been part of. 

It's a snow job, perpetrated on my non-racist white reader and I, that lets the Paul's drive us to distrust and distraction in their dark fetid alleyways of the mind, we two big-hearted guys had no reason to go down. (Mitt Romney's racist space opera belief system should've been enough to disqualify him for political consideration, but that discussion was deemed off-limits by the Right as well - the real Freedom of Speech Wingers - and then, with my mouth, they wonder why they make me uncomfortable,...)

Let's get back to Walsh, talking about the cover a racist who goes by "Searcy" on Salon, but who may be named "Sixty Grit" elsewhere, lays down before firing:

If every right-wing racist nut job who claimed to have an adopted black child, or a black in-law – his son’s wife, or sister’s husband, whatever – then every single black person in America would have a right-wing racist nut job for a parent or an in-law. I can’t speak for black people, but I don’t think that’s actually true.

Nope. Since I was raised by slaves (inside joke) I don't think that's possible. Walsh continues:

I was clear,..that not all Republicans are racist, not even most. The problem is that too many are sadly addicted to the politics of racial resentment that’s powered the party since the ’60s. They can’t quit it. They don’t have the spine to tell the truth to the racist fringe. They’re too busy cashing their checks, and deferring to them at town hall meetings lest one of the wingnuts primaries them. House Speaker John Boehner has let roughly 30 wingnut Tea Partyers from overwhelmingly white districts shut down the government. He’s complicit in their racially driven obstructionism, even if he isn’t racist himself. He ought to shut them down.

Right here, I have to say, the number of things the Left, and Right, think John Boehner is capable of doing in this illogical hotbox the Right has created for him is amazing. I really feel for the guy, because I'm sure he feels alone and under the gun, when it's the dumbshit troublemakers on "our side" who ought to know better (yes, Glenn, I'm talking to you again) but keep Boehner - and the rest of us - in this no-win situation. 

Turn on them and, I'm sure, we could work our way out of this. 

Weird thought:

Glenn Reynolds could be lifting entire communities out of poverty but, instead, he's wasting our time with - quick look at Instapundit - I shit you not:

  OCTOBER 4, 2013
AT AMAZON, save 30% or more on Radar Detectors.
Also, Outlet Deals Galore: Clearance, Markdown, and Overstock Deals.
And, today only: 66% Off Die Hard and Planet of the Apes Blu-ray Collections.

It's incredible. BTW, Ann and Meade ended yesterday with an Amazon pitch, too, because - Jesus - you know how hard-up those two are for money. I mean, it's Wisconsin, folks, come on. 

They've got it rough, and need the money, or else how can Ann get online and brag the next time she's practically the first in line for a new expensive Apple product? 

(Priorities, people.)

See, the problem isn't as Megan McArdle sees it, with the rest of us imagining whites "get together on an evening to discuss how much better their lives would be if they could only manage to immiserate vast numbers of their fellow citizens," but as it is:

They just sit and watch it happen, never once suggesting there's anything wrong with that picture, as seen by someone who isn't an extremely well-paid college professor who - no doubt - got there by bogusly complaining about how difficult it is being an American white woman with every advantage under the sun.

Which isn't racism but just (as my tags regularly say) "stupidity" based on their bizarre frame of reference. (Though it is a bit like being a slave, trying to negotiate your freedom with your owner, who just stares, uncomprehendingly, because he doesn't understand you're a human being and not an animal.) 

For instance, Ann quoted Mia Farrow's admittance of betrayal to Woody Allen yesterday, but what did Ann focus on, along with most of the media? Frank Sinatra! Not the lies Mia Farrow's spread to all of us and the damage those lies have caused Woody Allen (and the rest of us by falling for her fib), but how high Frank Sinatra's I.Q. may have been compared to his kid.

From an ethical standpoint, alone, it's just weird.

They don't see the poor - of any color - or anything else of importance.

As I wrote yesterday - to let you see the difference in perspective and concerns - when a football game can instantly be bequeathed $230,000, or NPR can collect thousands in an hour, while we know people will die in the streets this winter (and I may be one of them) this nation is FUCKED UP. 

And this is while whites rule the roost (don't make me show you the racial map again). We wouldn't have a black president unless whites decided it was time for them to "try" it, never even considering those of us, forced to watch and wait, while rich whites make up their precious minds whether or not they're "ready" to get over melanin in someone's skin. 

They're simply clueless:

While most of us are happy to take the credit when things go well, few of us are willing to take the blame when things go awry.

Now scientists have figured out why. Rather than trying to hide our shame or embarrassment, experts found we are simply less aware when our actions result in a negative outcome.

Our brains take longer to associate our actions with a bad result, according to the study, and our perception of such events are more remote. The research may explain why we often feel it hard to take the blame for our actions.

‘Our result suggests that people may really experience less responsibility for negative than for positive outcomes,’ said lead researcher professor Patrick Haggard of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London.

Things did "go awry":

And, White folks, I think we've got your number,...

 

You Can Believe What You Want To Believe

Well now, let's not mince words:

"The doctor at the centre of the MMR vaccine controversy has been struck off after being accused of ‘callously disregarding’ vulnerable children.

Andrew Wakefield, 53, whose research claimed there was a link between autism and the measles, mumps and rubella jab, was yesterday branded dishonest, misleading and irresponsible by the General Medical Council.

He has been banned from practising in Britain after being found guilty of more than 30 charges of serious professional misconduct.

In the longest, most expensive hearing in its 148-year history, the GMC accused the doctor of ‘bringing the medical profession into disrepute’.

The five-strong panel, which began its investigation in July 2007, concluded Dr Wakefield had behaved unethically and ‘abused his position of trust as a medical practitioner’."

So much for the "science" holding up Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey.

Or rather, Jenny McCarthy.

I forgot she and Jim broke up.

It just got too crazy.

Awww, so sad.

That also means NewAgers, like Suzanne Somers and Oprah Winfrey, take another hit in Ye Ol' Credibility Dept. as well.

Whoda thunk it, huh?

And let's not forget when Chiropractic was put through it's paces:

"A respected science writer yesterday won his gruelling libel battle over the right to criticise what he calls 'bogus' science.

The British Chiropractic Association has dropped its defamation case against Dr Simon Singh  -  who has spent £200,000 fighting the legal action and says he has been put through 'two years of hell'.

Campaigners hailed it as a victory for freedom of speech."

Which was right around the same time homeopathy, appropriately enough, was laughed out of it's own hearing:

"It's hard to say which is more ridiculous: the sight of a grown man speaking this nonsense, or the fact that after 200 years homeopaths apparenly haven't bothered to 'fully investigate' how much shaking is required for their remedies to work. And yet, bizarrely, these people expect to be taken seriously.

In this they have failed spectacularly. The select committee report has brutally inflicted the 21st, 20th and 19th centuries on this 18th century magic ritual, and under inspection it has fallen apart."

Meanwhile, Salon.com's Joan Walsh is, kinda sorta, sorry she said something, kinda sorta, saying:

"I'm coming to regret using the term 'racist' about the Tea Party."

Say it ain't so! And I'm finding it's becoming easier and easier to find other women are, finally, standing up and screaming:

"Why!? Why!? This is your fault! Take responsibility, you crazy woman! Why!?"

That was totally unheard of just a few years ago. But you really can't beat this great quote from our friends at Greenpeace:

"Legitimacy has shifted to the side of the climate skeptics, and that is a big, big problem."

Yea, yea, "big problem".

Tell me, my cultish compadre - do you get the feeling something's been lost?

"Italian police reportedly unearthed hidden dossiers on 'enemies' during a raid on Church of Scientology offices in Turin.

The files, apparently discovered behind locked doors in a basement office, allegedly contained personal information on judges, police officers and journalists identified as hostile to the Church.

Details on former Church members who have turned against Scientology were also reportedly recovered from handwritten files and computer records seized following a nine-hour search of the premises."

Like people might be putting your cons together, and maybe catching on?

"Jim Jones was a power player in Bay Area politics and thereby a player in national Democratic Party politics. Local politicians and activists benefited from the slave labor that he could provide on little notice to people political rallies and hand out campaign literature. In gratitude, Moscone appointed him chairman of San Francisco’s housing authority and Willie Brown likened Jones, a man who would eventually kill more African-Americans than any Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard, to Martin Luther King, Jr. First lady Rosalyn Carter and her husband’s running mate, Walter Mondale, both met with the cult leader. Jones even appropriated the title of Huey Newton’s book, Revolutionary Suicide, to describe the extermination of his flock (which included several of Newton’s relatives). Once Jonestown’s residents had performed this 'revolutionary suicide,' the wills left behind bequeathed all to the Soviet Union."

You know, seeing the world as it is?

"He was the original guru pop star. Made famous by the Beatles in the 1960s, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was the godfather of the Transcendental Meditation movement, known as TM. He inspired such acolytes as author Deepak Chopra and filmmaker David Lynch, and remained TM’s figurehead until his death in 2008 at the age of 94. The Maharishi was once dubbed 'the giggling guru.' But now it appears he may have been giggling all the way to the bank. David Wants to Fly, a new documentary shown last week at Toronto’s Hot Docs festival, offers compelling evidence that the Maharishi’s empire of enlightenment is more devoted to shaking down its followers and amassing wealth than transcending the material world."

Some are certainly starting to talking like it:

"Even though the Constitution does not include the words 'separation of church and state,' liberals have long treated that concept as a hallowed fundamental doctrine of constitutional law. But no more. With the recent introduction of new Senate cap and trade legislation, ultraliberal supporters Barbara Boxer, John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama and others have now completely abandoned that doctrine in their quest to establish global warming dogma as the official, established religion of the United States."

But is anybody else paying attention out there?

I mean, really, this is HUGE:

I'm reversing the trajectory of the planet - with my mind!

Some Nice Words To Wake Up To In January

"Joan Walsh of Salon and Joe Klein of Time debate the Democrats' troubles."

You, too, can start your day out right by listening to these much-admired crackpots here (I just heard Joan actually ask Joe, above, how liberals can be "feared" - suggestion: lay off the granola and soymilk,...and, oh yea, "no bed-wetting".)

And Now That That's Over, What's For Dinner?

Joan "I was wrong" Walsh went on Bill O'Reilly recently and then blogged the experience. You'll guffaw as she repeatedly reveals her paranoia by pre-emptively accusing the program of dishonest editing that never comes. You'll marvel as events surrounding the abortion debate has her driven to wonder "Is there really a God?" You'll be amazed as this really-mixed-up woman begins by saying "I'm not terrible" on TV when the whole post is one long breakdown of her "terrible" showing:

Sadly, Bill cut me off and derided that comparison as stupid, and went back to asking me his one apparent question: if late-term fetuses deserved any protection. I hemmed and hawed -- I hate that I did that, but as I said, though I'm ardently pro-choice, I'm Irish Catholic, and I was raised to think abortion was wrong -- but in the end, I support the law as it is. My overriding principle is that I believe this very tough choice can only belong to women. It might have been then he said, 'You have blood on your hands!' Not sure; we'll watch the video.

Shortly after that he started badgering me about whether I'd call Dr. Tiller a hero, and I strangely bobbed and weaved until reality beckoned, and I said, 'Yes, he's a hero!' Well, it was over then. He had what he wanted. His audience could see what I was (you fill in the blanks there). I believe he repeated that I have blood on my hands, but I'm not sure. I might have said he has blood on his hands. It wasn't pretty."

And, finally, you'll wonder how a Joan Walsh can be this confused and still be running anything involved in American politics or journalism. We don't know about you but it's enough to, also, make us wonder if that "very tough choice" just might not need a little of the ol' informed male input after all,....

Not The Kind Of "Salon" She's Used To

Pay Attention, People: The Cult Is Cracking

Democrats traumatized by the surreal losses in 2000 and 2004 feel like it's déjà vu all over again, with the sudden surge of John McCain and Sarah Palin in the polls. It's like a bad dream: Even the Obama fundraising juggernaut is stumbling, according to the New York Times, missing its internal targets and having to push harder for cash. Meanwhile, white women have flocked to the ticket with the white female vice president; according to the most recent ABC News poll, Barack Obama had an 8-point lead among white women voters last week; now he's trailing McCain by 12, a 20-point swing in one week.

...Watching Obama's press conference Tuesday morning, I found myself thinking the Democrat needs some sleep -- and maybe a speech coach. I know, that sounds ridiculous given what a great orator he is. But in these short sessions with reporters, and even sometimes on the stump, he's strangely rambling and indirect. There are too many "ums" and "you knows" and long preambles. Asked a question about Palin stealing his thunder with her star power and biography, his answer began:

"You know, uh uh, I guess, uh uh, one of the benefits of running a 19-month race, we've been through twists and turns." He went on and on with that preamble, and I found myself tuning out the rest of his answer.

-- Joan Walsh, one of the most liberal of liberal talking heads, finally noticing what the rest of us have seen all along, in Salon.com.

You Sat Elitist, I say ALOTist,...

I've seen a lot of dumb excuses for Barack Obama's regrettable remarks about "bitter" Pennsylvania voters who "cling" to God, guns and narrow-mindedness in the last few days. But maybe the dumbest are the ones that blame my city, San Francisco.

-- Salon.com's Joan Walsh - in total denial, as usual - and stupidly attacking out-of-town newspapers for saying San Francisco is out of touch with America

In Obama's answer, one could hear that he is wise to the precious Bay Area Liberal lament: Oh why, oh why, isn't the rest of America as enlightened as we are?

And: If only the rest of America were better educated, then folks would turn in their hunting rifles and head for the sushi bar, sneer at devout evangelical Christians and happily hire immigrant gardeners - just like we do.

It cannot be an accident that Obama spoke as he did in an area where many two-college-degree Democrats think that, because everyone they know thinks as they do, that all the smart people must be liberals. It does not occur to them that they are cocooned in their own like-minded world, just as guys who go duck-hunting and women who cook for the church bake sale might do. They dutifully nod when Obama talks about small-town voters who express "antipathy to people who aren't like them" - and they don't even realize they are doing just that.

Then they congratulate themselves for being so broad-minded.

-- Local San Francisco columnist, Debra J. Saunders, accurately defining why San Francisco is out of touch with America, in the San Francisco Chronicle

Black, White, And (Not Very Well) Red All Over

"I think most white politicians do not understand that the race pride we all have trumps everything else."

- Willie L. Brown, Jr., former San Francisco mayor and longtime speaker of the California assembly - defending being racist - as reported by the Washington Post

"To intimate that you may face a challenge for what you believe in, I just think that's over the top. I think my citizens pretty much understand that I am a person who stands up for what I believe in. I'm not saying that if I run again somebody won't hold that against me. That's politics. My thing is: Bring it on!"

- Trenton, New Jersey Mayor, Doug Palmer, on the effort to "pester, intimidate, question our blackness" for his support of Hillary Clinton (also in the WP)

"If the party wanted the superdelegates to merely ratify the voters' choice, the party wouldn't have superdelegates in the first place."

- Joan Walsh (making sense for once) on Slate.com