A few years ago I had a run-in with Tom Nichols on twitter. I no longer recall the details, but he posted something that was obvious nonsense and I responded with a link to the facts. His instant response was to call me stupid and then block me. Needless to say that left me with a bad impression. It’s the sort of behavior you get from insecure drama queens, who worry that one day people will discover that they are complete phonies. That is, of course, the story with Tom Nichols, who has just posted this long hissy fit.
Unlike Senator Susan Collins, who took pages upon pages of text on national television to tell us something we already knew, I will cut right to the chase: I am out of the Republican Party.
I can only imagine how hard it was for him to write that while wiping the tears from his eyes. My goodness. Prepubescent girls have hardier constitutions. Given his hysterics over Trump the last three years, what took this guy so long to figure out he was no longer wanted? George Will got out early, making it clear he did not like the sorts of people who voted for the Republicans. Bill Kristol and the other freaks in the neocon clown car became open subversives. Self-professed genius Tom Nichols needed three years?
Small things sometimes matter, and Collins is among the smallest of things in the political world. And yet, she helped me finally accept what I had been denying. Her speech on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh convinced me that the Republican Party now exists for one reason, and one reason only: for the exercise of raw political power, and not for ends I would otherwise applaud or even support.
I have written on social media and elsewhere how I feel about Kavanaugh’s nomination. I initially viewed his nomination positively, as a standard GOP judicial appointment; then grew concerned about whether he should continue on as a nominee with the accusations against him; and finally, was appalled by his behavior in front of the Senate.
What self-professed super genius Tom Nichols is telling us is that his opinions are formed in the minds of others. When it looked like Trump had selected a Kennedy clone that would pass muster with the Democrats, self-professed super genius Tom Nichols was down with the nominee. Then the Left went crazy and self-professed super genius Tom Nichols realized Kavanaugh was a monster. When the Left attacked Kavanaugh for defending himself, self-professed super genius Tom Nichols agreed with them.
What a coincidence!
Self-professed super genius Tom Nichols is a fine example of the right-wing edgytarian that I described in this post. The short version is that he stakes out his positions just inside the line of what Lefty finds acceptable. That way he can pretend to be a conservative of some sort, but never get in any real trouble with Lefty. This type of feckless weasel has been a feature of Lefty chat shows for years. In order to maintain the act, these guys operate like a shadow, following the Left around, always aware of that line.
The remarkable thing about this tirade by self-professed super genius Tom Nichols is that it reveals he is not much of a super-genius. He’s shocked to learn that “the Republican Party now exists for one reason, and one reason only: for the exercise of raw political power.” This is guy who claims to be an expert on political science, but he is shocked to learn that politics goes on in political parties? The funny thing is there’s no reason to think this is a pose. He really is that dumb. He is surprised to learn politics is about politics.
There is the possibility that these so-called principled conservative have been smelling their own farts for so long they are delusional. Their endless chanting the last dozen years about principles may have created some strange form of Stockholm syndrome, where they have become emotionally attached to the excuses they were making for the disaster that was the Bush years. That’s something that does not get enough mention. These guys all became principled conservatives when their polices nearly destroyed the country.
The Republicans, however, have now eclipsed the Democrats as a threat to the rule of law and to the constitutional norms of American society. They have become all about winning. Winning means not losing, and so instead of acting like a co-equal branch of government responsible for advice and consent, congressional Republicans now act like a parliamentary party facing the constant threat of a vote of no confidence.
Self-professed super genius Tom Nichols is apparently unaware that the GOP, in fact no political party, is a co-equal branch of anything. That’s not their job. Only a complete ignoramus could think that a political party has some special duty to undermine the interests of its coalition. Democratic government is exactly the opposite of that. It is factions and coalitions jostling to get their way at the expense of others. That’s how it is supposed to work. That’s how it always works. How does he not know this?
Of course, the real issue for fake tough guys, like self-professed super genius Tom Nichols, is Trump is ripping the cover off their act. By actually fighting and winning, Trump is exposing fakers like self-professed super genius Tom Nichols. These guys were always a fraud. More important, this Kavanaugh incident has revealed the Left to be something other than wily opponents. They were outsmarted by the GOP and by Trump, which self-professed super genius Tom Nichols said was impossible.
The thing is, guys like Tom Nichols, who hilariously wrote a book lamenting the decline of expertise, were always favored by the Left because they were dumb. Sure, self-professed super genius Tom Nichols has a head for trivia. Just ask him. He stops people on the street everyday to tell them he is a five time jeopardy champ. Otherwise, he is just another hired man tasked with guarding the border between us and them. Maybe we get lucky and he and David French decide to go out like Thelma and Louise.
Damn that was fun to read!
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Off topic – There’s a possibility that I will have to travel to New York for business in a few weeks and I am thinking of taking an additional two weeks for sight seeing. Can anyone recommend some historic sites that are worth a visit. And no, please not the typical Washington Monument, Jefferson Memorial, etc. as I have seen those in the past.
My preference would be the lesser known historical areas, back road areas, small towns, etc. I understand many of early American settlements have been lost, but if anyone can provide a few locations it would be appreciated. Since I only have a few weeks, I’m considering an area withing the boundaries of New York City, Pittsburgh and Virginia Beach – if this is reasonable in two weeks time.
Many thanks.
Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts is the best preserved historical American settlement village I’ve seen.
https://www.osv.org/visit/
if you rent a car, there are many nice old towns in Western Massachusetts, southern Vermont and New Hampshire. The scenery will be very nice in the next few weeks too – if it ever stops raining.
My wife and I usually have dinner and book a room at the Wayside Inn around the holidays. It’s the oldest tavern and inn in the U.S.
http://www.wayside.org/
Other Karl, if you haven’t been to the Metropolitan museum of art (not modern art; that’s another museum) in NYC it’s pretty damn good. Personally, with two weeks at your disposal, I wouldn’t go to any of those places 🙂 Can you be more specific in what you are interested in: scenic beauty? historical landmarks (which tend to be anti climatic)? architecture?
Here’s a handy guide to each state: https://www.tickld.com/funny/1847690/the-50-states-of-america-if-they-were-actually-people-in-a-bar/
@ Drake & the other Karl – Gentlemen, thank you. My goal is more old historic sites and scenic beauty. I am not very interested in cities, more the little towns and villages. I understand there are a few Civil War sites but most are just fields and place markers. I suspect everything between NY and Washington D.C has been paved over and developed.
But if the region I indicated isn’t very interesting, then other areas known for their scenic value would be of interest, even old towns known for their aesthetic beauty would be nice too. As I am limited to just two weeks perhaps I should keep my travel radius smaller?
No, given two weeks you should open up your radius considerably. New England is famous for its Fall foliage — which is on my list of things/places to see.
If you want something that puts the French Riviera to shame, come out to Cali and see Carmel, Laguna Beach, etc. It’s in the mid 70’s (Fahrenheit) right now, and most of the fires are out 😛
But if you really want to see what Heaven is like, visit Hawaii
If you are interested in the Civil War, Gettysburg in Pennsylvania is well preserved and worth the visit. With a good guide, the battle lines and horrible casualties are very poignant.
OK, I was talking to an Indian engineer who had worked in DE recently, and he said a lot of young German engineers want to come to the US to work and live. Can you confirm or disprove this?
@ Karl – Hawaii looks nice, but we have Greece, Crete and Croatia which have some amazing beaches too.
I will make a point to look into New England. I have heard Vermont is very nice in the fall. Are any of the original colony sites still present? e.g. Jamestown, etc?
To your question on German engineers, there are some, yes. But it depends on which kind of engineering. With VW and BMW having established a presence in US, I know some mechanical and industrial engineers do get the opportunity to support those facilities.
But I believe like most IT engineers, there are more options in that field. I personally know several couples who have worked in the Bay Area, but only when their children were very young. They, like many Germans to work in the US, left before their children were school-age due to the problems with the US education systems.
Niagara Falls is a must see. Both sides if possible.
If Hawaii took a dump, it would look like Greece 🙂 Talk to your friends who have been there.
Karl,
The original Jamestown settlement is long gone. There is a recreation which is, er, non-echt.
I think that many old Virginia towns were built primarily of wood vice brick and the old buildings may not have survived. There is nice brickwork going back a few centuries in New England. Once when I was trying to avoid Interstate 95 traffic enroute to Cape Cod I drove through many small old towns in Rhode Island and Connecticut. I never knew they were there. Those small towns are economically depressed but still possess architectural charm. Gute Reise!
I have no idea who Nichols was, still don’t.
I disagreed with him over something so minor that I couldn’t tell you what it was. Instant block.
He’s a garden-variety asshole.
“I disagreed with him over something so minor that I couldn’t tell you what it was. Instant block.” I don’t think you’ve any idea how funny that is.
OT. I have never owned a gun and am going to buy one. Am leaning towards a 12 gauge. Any thoughts?
12 gauge is good. You should also get a small handgun for when things go bad and you’re away from home, or driven from your home. I just discovered that my particular county near Los Angeles is ok with giving concealed carry permits to regular people. I was floored. I’d just assumed that nowhere in California could you get a CCP unless you’re a movie star or security for a movie star. I’m freaking thrilled.
Have you shot much before? If not take the time to get some decent instruction and get comfortable with the recoil and running the gun effectively with different loads and scenarios.
Not much actually. Enough to be dangerous I guess. Did some skeet shooting once with a 12 gauge and was surprisingly pretty good at it. Thanks for the advice.
Basic .22 rifle (e.g. Marlin Model 60) is like your training gun. Cheap to practice with, easy/gentle to fire, easy to maintain, useful for squirrel & rabbit hunting. Then get a shotgun for home defense.
Complicated subject.
If you have people slight of build and not overly strong that you’d expect to be a shooter, consider downgrading the gauge. The traditional 12ga with 00 buck kicks hard and can hurt/injure a shooter if not trained and accustomed. 20ga with #4 buck perfectly acceptable for home defense IMO (and Ayoob’s).
Oh, and probably not much reason to look beyond Remington 870 or Mossberg 500, 18” barrel (shortest legal barrel).
Is not Nichols in violation of the Htch Act.
So let me get this straight: The Democrats are the party of ethics after orchestrating the ugliest unsubstantiated character assassination in modern US history?
As one wag on twitter observed, “Nichols is the vegan of experts, he can’t go 30 seconds without telling you that he is one.”
https://twitter.com/MaryFernandez/status/1049019542402289664
Zman: “Of course, the real issue for fake tough guys, like self-professed super genius Tom Nichols, is Trump is ripping the cover off their act. By actually fighting and winning, Trump is exposing fakers like self-professed super genius Tom Nichols.”
Caldwell via Z, from yesterday: “Americans of all political persuasions have woken up this week—some with exhilaration, some with despair—to the realization that…they are going to have to join the side they are on.”
Agree. Yes, there will be the fake Right defectors like Nichols, and mercenary line-straddlers. But post Kavanaugh, there will be Right-leaning intellectual heavyweights that will choose to “join the side they’re on” and stay Right.
And so they’ll have to take a harder Right tack on things. Somewhat from principle. But more out of competition, and that reliable vice, ego. Public intellectuals desire “new” things to say, to stay ahead of the pack and to maintain their brand as seers.
They can only afford to be boring for so long. Till a watershed moment occurs and they have to refresh. The supreme court circus via Trump, has given them the safe opening to start espousing “new” Dissident Right ideas. A very modified version for now.
Wishful thinking perhaps. But then Overton does move for a reason.
1. Not that I’ve done a ton of research on the matter, but prior to the Kavocaust, it sort of looked like Kav was an uninteresting “check each box that applies” Establishment squish.
1a. But he was Trump’s guy, for whatever reasons, and that was Trump’s strategy, so OK cool. And far better to have Trump’s guy in that vital seat than some Hitllary deathbot. We can cross our fingers and hope he won’t “evolve in office.”
2. But then came the Kavocaust, God love it. The mask just didn’t slip, it was ripped right off with the fury of a silent-movie villain. From that great psycho pre-Lovecraft horror classic “The King in Yellow”…
CAMILLA: It is midnight, Sir, and the masquerade is over. You should unmask.
STRANGER: I’m not wearing a mask.
3. Whatever else Kav is worth, he drew out a whirlwind of anti-white hatred and (((anti-White scheming))) of Biblical proportions. Even the normiest of normies couldn’t help seeing it, which in real terms means about 15 percent did. But that’s enough, it’s a start.
4. Doesn’t this Tom Nichols person have a tree-limb or a lamp-post he should be busy decorating?
One line of thinking is that Kavanaugh was one of a long, public list of “Trump qualified” candidates for the SC job, but that he was chosen because he worked with Ken Starr to prosecute the Clinton impeachment. Therefore Kava was nominated to trigger Hillary and the Hillary-bots. Looks like it worked, if true. Those liberal tears and shouts were election night redux.
Good comment. Thanks for the tip about “The King in Yellow.”
Gosh, however will the Republican party survive without Tom Nichols?
Pack it up, everyone, it’s all over! Go home! It was fun while it lasted, but without Tom Nichols, we have no team!
The epitaph for National Review: Death by a thousand cucks. Yeah I got nothin.’
oh, I wouldn’t say that. It was pretty good 🙂
works as Death By A 1000 Cunts too
Awesome. Severian 2 weeks ago on Rotten Chestnuts blog: “…and now we have to listen to her ask Kavanaugh what kind of tree he’d rape if he could rape a tree.”
Z-man, why do you assume malice when stupidity explains? Why do you think that Nichols is a fraud or Shapiro is a grifter? I have no evidence of their malice but stupidity is another story.
Did you not read this piece? It was said over and over that Nichols is a SUPER GENIUS. His own assertion but winning Jeopardy is proof, right?
you misspelled “observe” as “assume”
I changed my registration from Republican to Independent back when Papa “Read My Lips” Bush raised taxes. Gilens and Page reinforced the observation that it doesn’t matter which party gets the votes, the deck is stacked. When Obama left office he was murdering civilian women and children in seven nations with drone attacks. I sympathize with Tom Nichols, I don’t want to identify as a Republican either, or a Democrat.
Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page, “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens,” Perspectives on Politics , September 2014, Vol. 12/No. 3, Princeton University.
Heh heh. Nothing like a hearty belly laugh to help with lunchtime digestion. Good job Z.
Who’s he? Should I care? No. Conservative “magazines” are so dreadfully tedious I can’t even read them as a bedtime soporific. I wish the pussy hat crew would turn on his type and do a Kavanaugh attack on him to show him his place in their pecking order. He’s already a Leftist – look at the length of that screed – and the focus “…it’s all about me”!
Holy crap. You deserve some kind of award for the number of erudite insults you packed in this article. Great job.
Who the F**k is Tom Nichols and why should anyone pay attention to what he says?
Frankly, I never heard of the guy .
It had become totally clear that the opinions of the “experts” ( you know, experts; those that gave the USA the Spanish American War, WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, a couple of Iraq Wars, Afghanistan, a dozen of so “savage wars of peace” in Central America; the Great Depression, the great inflation of the 70s and early 80s; 9-11; the financial panic of 2008; and whom gave the USA real good allies around the world that hate our guts like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and most of Europe) are worthless.
They all come out of the woodwork AFTER some major event to explain to us idiots what/how it happened; yet the same experts were clueless about what was about to happen and even more clueless about the consequences of the strategies they propose and enact.
They are talking anuses.
The experts hate Trump because in talking common sense, basic stuff (like why the hell is the USA paying for the majority of the NATO budget or paying for the defense of
the Arab nations, or stating the obvious planned, orchestrated and Soros financed smear of Kavanaugh ) he is demonstrating the stupidity and naivete of the experts and worse, the totalitarian / repressive plans these experts are hoping to impose upon the citizenry.
Trump is totally upsetting the apple cart the “experts” have carefully constructed to shield their incompetence and their motives.
So the experts circle the wagons, seeking safe spaces with other members of the borg in the media, think-tanks, academia, Hollywood and the government bureaucracy.
The longer Trump is in office, the greater the vitriol and violence we will observe from the left; and none of it will be discouraged or criticized by any of the experts (because they approve of it).
Ideologues just believe; that is why they are dangerous and beyond reach of data, reasoning or reality.
It shouldn’t be possible for a professor at the Naval War College to be such a complete pussy. The damn Chinese are deploying a set of satellites that can track American subs down a third of a mile under water and he’s crying about us not believing victims. God help us if we ever have to fight another real war.
It baffles me, when I hear a faux-conservative pearl-clutcher lament the current state of the Trumpified Republican Party. The Republicans are only interested in winning at any cost? Umm, which movie have *you* been watching? There’s nothing Republicans love more than surrendering their “principles” in the name of virtue signaling. Grassroots voters have been dragging them, kicking and screaming, over the finish line for the past two years. And they’re upset at the “meanness” of the current Republican tone, apparently unaware that nothing happens in a vacuum. Conservatives have been getting clubbed like baby seals for the past two decades, and swinging back is deemed evidence that they’re street thugs. (Antifa? What’s that?)
Good start, Peter, but Conservatives have been getting clubbed only on *our* issues.
In exchange, Conservatism Inc. has done just fine on *their* issues, e.g. on Invade the World, Invite the World, and on handouts/ bailouts for Wall St.
For Conservatism Inc., a little virtue signalling is a quite small price to pay, to get an emasculated/ compliant white working class, a slew of juicy contracts from DoD, and 0% loans from the Fed.
Did/ does Antifa ever say jack, vs. Invade the World?
How can Invade the World not be seen as central to “fascism”?
Funny that.
I don’t disagree with you one iota. I simply used the term “conservative” as a shorthand. I haven’t considered Republicans to be conservative since Bush Jr started work on the panopticon. I was just trying to keep my post from reading like an Apple User Agreement.
People like Nichols are legion. Ben Shapiro is another one. They are posers and should just join the dem/communists and be honest about it. Some good news today. Nimrata Randhawa AKA: Niki Haley is said to be resigning from the U.N. Ambassador post. Now she can agitate for war with Russia some place else. Or go and make India great again.
Me thinks that Niki may have been revealed as the anonymous author of the NYT hit piece on Trump earlier this year.
oh man, you are so right! the duplicitous bitch.
I still believe it was a Times employee…perhaps even an intern.
Some philosophies point out “all things are empty of self” – and nothing is more empty of self than a dellusional ego, like Mr. Z’s buddy
I heard super genius Tom Nichols recently on Sam Harris’s podcast, and was not impressed. He reminded me of David Frum, another never-Trump “Republican” who is often trotted out on traditional media to speak for conservatives. The fact is, there is no one to the right of center-left on traditional media.
Would you say, Frum is a…Mongoloid? 😛
Perhaps there is greater meaning to the coming out of Fifth Columnists like Nichols. The Progressives have now lost the Supreme Court and, despite the propaganda in the push polls, the upcoming election is a toss up. If they don’t retake the House, Trump will have free reign to purge to Swamp and fully implement his agenda. It could be that what we are seeing is the existential desperation of the cornered rat. They are ranting and snarling now, but things could escalate rather quickly, so be careful out there.
The polls for the mid-terms are as predictive as the polls for the 2016 election. Which is to say they are completely compromised. Go with your gut; mine says Trump picks up +5 senate seats and 25+ house seats.
Oddly, I’ve been thinking the same thing all year and wondering why I haven’t seen it expressed elsewhere.
Hilarious take down, Sirrah! Never heard of the mug. If I run across the name henceforth, I shall always recall the awesome that is “self-professed super genius Tom Nichols’.
Collective term for his ilk: A Clutch of Cucks….
Most conservatives are honourable men,Z. That this guy is an idiot goes without saying – but one vulnerability we have as conservatives is our integrity. And Lefty has been shivving us with it for decades. It is an integral part of us to cut people slack, to make sure they get a fair shake, and have their say.
Lefty is no longer worthy of honourable consideration. Some people just can’t get that through their heads. They’ve changed, and we have to change to.
Yeah, Glen, Lefty is *no longer* worthy of honourable consideration, and, we should add, “likewise with never-Trump Righty”.
Zman quite nails it, when he says that these righties “have become emotionally attached to the excuses they were making, for the disaster that was the Bush years. That’s something that does not get *enough* mention”
When Lefties opposed Dubya’s BS Iraq war, they were arguably more honourable than “Righties” like McCain.
But, indeed, “they’ve changed, and we have to change too”.
They changed, *no later* than when they sought to cram BLM crank down our throats.
By that point, they’d become our existential foes.
The nature of a productive compromise is between two or more truths that are in tension. It is an art only ever achieved by honest and thoughtful men. To compromise truth with untruth only extends untruth. That is the engine of the left.
Glen;
Agreed: The entire Saul Alinsky playbook so beloved by Hillary et. al. from the ’60s actually depends on their victims/targets continuing to play by the rules while the Alinsky-ites supposedly run nimbly around their skirts in cleaver and deceptive ways. The Alinsky-ites implicit bet is that the PTB value order and the rule of law enough to allow their stuff to be gnawed at from the Left so long as the Left didn’t bite in too deeply.
IOW, the Alinsky-ites were, in fact, Left Edgytarians as defined by our able proprietor above and in the cited prior post. The Progs problem today is that the Left edge has just now moved entirely out of any sort of agreed constitutional, civ-nat type framework. Their position now is that once accused no male has any civil rights any more. So what to do_?
The choices now would appear to be to visibly and effectually suppress the shrieking cat-lady Progs, restoring the edge, or institute a new, extra constitutional framework agreeable to most citizens. Since the latter is highly unlikely, the former is essential, and very soon.
The thing to be avoided is a situation like that of Weimar Germany in the ’20s & early’30s. Specifically, under the Kaiser pre-WWI, the Left competed legally for power within the agreed framework of the time as the SPD (Socialist Party of Germany). Right as the Kaiser fell, the ultra left of the SPD, and the Communists (KPD – Communist Party of Germany) smelled power and saw their utopia right around the corner. So, acting under Trotsky’s orders, they threw off the mask and took it to the streets. The SPD had no choice but to call in the discredited military to suppress the attempted Communist coup by force.
Then, a year later, the military was suppressed by the victorious allies who simultaneously fatally compromised the SPD by making them sign the Treaty of Versailles. So no agreed framework was possible any more, creating a power vacuum. We all know what happened after that.
It also depends on fellow travelers inside the gates, sand bagging a proper response to the Allinskyites.
Glen, yep. We need to return to the understanding of our fathers. You pay back all debts in the currency you were given. They have set the rules, now learn to master the game—or perish. We learned this quickly in WWII while island hopping and engaging the Japanese. A few phony Jap surrenders and fake deaths taught the Marines to take no chances—and no prisoners!
@Compsci: “You pay back all debts in the currency you were given.”
I like that. Repay all debts in the currency received. An excellent motto.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=maHTo-4AW9Y
They keep believing the Left is going to hold that football.
Now that’s funny! 😛
I have a friend who’s a “conservative” and constantly talks about the need for both parties to compromise. He regularly shares his deep thoughts on Facebook with long effort-posts that essentially amount to pointing out that both the left and right are extreme and crazy, and why can’t people be reasonable and sane, like him, and work at compromising with the left.
He used the McCain funeral and the presence of both Dems and Repubs as a “lesson to learn how the two parties can get along.” I replied that the lesson to be learned is that all the politicians at the funeral are globalists and on the same team. The nationalists like Trump weren’t invited. I also regularly tell him the left has no ideas worthy of compromise and in fact, instead of working with them, they need to be crushed. He thinks I’m an extremist, and I think he’s a cuck. We also don’t get together for a beer much lately.
Well, ask him this .. “does having your cat lady friends over to hurl plates against the garage wall because Kavanaugh got on the court sound like people you can compromise with?”
It’s simply amazing that some think compromise is possible with lefties.
Compromise is possible if both sides have common goals and differ in how to get there.
The left only has common goals with folks like ANTIFA, BLM, By Any Means and the CPUSA.
Further, the left abhors the US Constitution ,representative democracy and capitalism and everything about the USA (that includes about 60% of the US population as well).
What possibly could anyone not understand about the left after watching Kavanaugh get tarred and feathered in the Stalinist show trial organized and conducted by the NKVD led democrat party?
Where is the common ground?
THERE IS NONE.
It’s winner take all folks.
Compromise—indeed. I hear that all the time. Especially with the anti-gun violence crowd. Seems the compromise is always to give up the right to keep and bear (which I already possess) for some latest utopian dream proposed by the left. Never been able to perceive what I get in this “compromise”. Good call Tyler.
Compromise has a good name for a reason. And I’m not trying to be Mr. Contrarian here. If the Republicans hadn’t compromised on “sensible gun laws”, like background checks and a 10 day wait, the anti-gun wave may have just busted our damn by now. I believe in guns, but I do think most of the sensible gun laws truly are sensible. Both politically and practically.
@Frip: ” I believe in guns, but I do think most of the sensible gun laws truly are sensible.”
Either this is satire, or you’re more clueless than I thought.
“Compromise” in our current politics means “capitulate to the proggies on something, and they will pretend they don’t despise you for a week or two”.
Kavanaugh, Bush 2, Romney, McCain, and all the other Hitlers were “compromise” choices, in their policy positions. What, exactly, did all of this compromising get us, other than the real-deal non-compromise in Trump (because it you are going to get labeled all Hitler anyway, may as well be NFG about being called it).
Dutch: “Compromise” in our current politics means “capitulate to the proggies on something, and they will pretend they don’t despise you for a week or two”. We’ve still got our guns, going on a lot longer than two weeks now. I’d like to think compromise had something to do with that.
California’s recent (last 25 years) history with respect to gun control legislation is something you need to devote time to study. When I grew up here, gun control laws were sensible and if you bought a gun legally you need only undergo the federally mandated background check and that was it. Since then, the state has slowly added one layer after another of restrictions and requirements for purchasing firearms. These have the cumulative effect of driving up the costs of purchasing firearms to the point that many here forego that right simply because they cannot afford the additional costs.
The undeniable fact is that in California the ONLY thing keeping the Democratically-controlled state legislature from outlawing civilian ownership of firearms outright is the willingness of pro-2A supporters to fight in court battles to stem the tide of onerous so-called “gun safety” legislation. With few, if any exceptions, the local news outlets report gun-related incidents (not even crimes, per se) on a regular basis at the top of the hour and always in the most lurid terms. That is part and parcel of the state directed propaganda campaign that garners uninformed voter support for ballot initiatives and/or statutes that keep increasing the restrictions on law-abiding citizens’ right to own firearms. Just this last year, new regulations and laws went into effect that make it impossible for one to go to a gun store and buy ammo without a Firearms Safety Certification card like the one you need to buy a firearm. FFLs are not allowed to let customers handle a box of ammo until after you’ve paid for it. And the current Democratic nominee for governor is openly stating there needs to be more restrictions on law-abiding citizens’ rights to obtain firearms under the same false flag of “gun safety.” And people outside California wonder why the people here act like docile sheep as the state turns into Mexifornia.
I can see “compromise” as “tactical retreat, to buy time”, IF the buying of time is used for executing plans, to reverse the strategic layout.
*Sometimes* compromise is the best of a bad set of options.
All too often, tho, Conservatism Inc. has gotten the grass roots to compromise our issues (esp. on immigration), for their profits, with no plan to the change the layout.
The miracle of Trump is mainly, a huge change in the layout of the battlefield, esp. regarding so much of the Left showing (*so* much more clearly) its basis, as being mostly about hatred of white males.
Wider knowledge of this basis makes it so much harder, for “moderate” Dems to duck seeing the vileness of this basis.
This Ford crap is one more step on that road.
Compromising with gun controllers: “Give us half your guns today. In a couple years we’ll compromise some more.”
Perhaps we should put forth that we are not against abortion; we merely believe there should be some common sense “compromise” (every year or so.) After all, which one is codified as “shall not be infringed”?
P.S. May I compliment all in one of the best, most thoughtful comments sections I have seen (anywhere) tonight?
It is by regular and consistent “compromise” that the left gets that 3-4 degree turn they need to end up with changing things 180 degrees while the common person hardly notices.
@Wolf Barney: “He thinks I’m an extremist, and I think he’s a cuck. We also don’t get together for a beer much lately.”
As they say, with ‘friends’ like that . . .
Drink your beer on your own – you’ll be better off.
Bwahahahaha!
https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8140/10227056515_8cb331b0c9.jpg
Identifying oneself as “on the Right” is just a career path, a business plan, for guys like this. It’s hard to get a foothold in the mainstream (Leftist) media, with all the competition and nepotism. But the Right is an underserved market, with a big audience that is very appreciative of any bones tossed its way. It has its own broadcast and publishing infrastructure that’ll get your name out there and your career rolling. And it has a few assigned seats among the mainstream outlets, so if you play your cards right (or rather, left) the latter will let you put on big-boy pants to romp in their playground.
The trouble is, once you break ranks with the Right’s audience, you’re out in the wilderness. You’re of no value any more to the Left, since they can’t use you to slap their opponents in the face anymore. And the barons of the Left jealously guard all their sinecures, and will not be handing those easy-street spots over to “former conservatives” when there are Leftists in good standing who need the work.
Maybe they should take a tip from the illegal aliens they love much, and promise to do the jobs ordinary Lefties won’t do, and do them for less?
For real sociopaths, starting out pretending to be a conservative is a good career move. E.g., Arianna Huffington, David Brock.
I have always seen Fox News as the grabbing of an underserved market; the exercising of a business opportunity. Nothing more.
That is indeed how Roger Ailes described it.
Dutch, that is cynical reductionism. Fox has helped in a great many ways. And I recall the joy back around ’97 when a conservative news network was announced. It really meant something. We had NOTHING but enemies on TV.
I stand by it. Not to say that Fox has not had incredible value to the right as a mouthpiece, and as a source of relative sanity in news reporting. But recognize that if the news winds blow differently, or the advertisers get doxxed away, or the ownership wakes up on the other side of the bed one day, it’s all “strictly business”. Fox is not a place to look at as a home for a version of right-ism, as Breitbart is. It is a product filling a market niche, in cold-blooded spreadsheet style. Fox is not a friend or an enemy, it is an entity that just happens to occupy a space that resonates for us.
@ Dutch: “Fox is not a place to look at as a home for a version of right-ism, as Breitbart is. It is a product filling a market niche, in cold-blooded spreadsheet style.”
Interesting and insightful comment re Fox, but calling Breitbart a “home” for the right is a bit . . . mind boggling. Since Bannon’s departure, one cannot even use the term Negro there without being banned, and the Israel=America posters fiercely police all other missives.
Breitbart may be a bit worthless as a version of the right these days, but it was started to fight the fight, not to fill a gap in the news product line.
…and by Andrew Breitbart, not Roger Ailes. Which one did at a young age and quite unexpectedly?
Ever notice the comment warning at https://www.americanthinker.com/
“We ask our readership to please flag anti-semitic and other vile comments.”
Only anti-semitic comments are specifically called out. All other “vile” comments are apparently of lesser import.
It’s a pretty clear “don’t criticize the Jews (or else)” statement.
Absolutely correct Dutch.
Have you noticed the turn away from the balanced coverage since Rupert booted Ailes and installed the sons?
You should stand by it, because it is objectively true. Murdoch is no conservative, he’s rich. Huge difference. Gatsby was on the money about their carelessness and destructiveness.
Exactly, agree, but it does serve its purpose nevertheless. I believe a lot of the alt right sites have this purpose too, to satisfy the market demand in a controlled opposition sort of way, as did national review in its day. But they are better than nothing!
“You’re of no value any more to the Left, since they can’t use you to slap their opponents in the face anymore.” Not quite true. Kevin Phillips created the original turncoat model in the 80s. For years he was quoted by lefties along the lines of “even conservatives like Kevin Phillips agree that liberals are great and conservatives are evil.”
That’s a great counter-example, DLS. Phillips created a brand for himself, no question. Norman Orstein is another one.
But it’s a pretty exclusive brand, isn’t it? Once established, there’s not a lot of room for others to muscle in on the territory. And it was so obvious that Phillips himself was only occupying that position with the permission of the Left; he was their abject, pathetic creature. A cuck avant la letter.
Good catch.
ChrisZ, well said. But I kinda disagree with the common notion on our side that says these traitors are eventually cast out by the Left and end up alone. This is a delicious thought for us. But Megan Kelly has been hosting a big NBC morning show for a long time now. There have been a few famous rejections, like, Kevin Williamson. But even then he’s not alone. Con.Inc took him back. As has been said, the Left needs these fake Rightists on their shows to feign the principle of being balanced. None of these guys ends up on the street, like we love to imagine. The political spectrum is wide. They find a new place.
Thanks for the reply, Frip. I enjoy your comments here. You’re right of course: these characters do find a place, even when they jump ship and lose. I guess my point was not that they find ruin, but rather stagnation. Assuming they joined the Right out of mere career ambition, those ambitions are never achieved in the mainstream. They get relegated to a niche or ghetto, or have to accept playing the role of former conservative forever. Meghyn Kelly gets a lucrative morning show, sure (and she’s a rare one); but is that what she was aiming for? And how long will she have it once she ceases to be a hottie? Williamson used to be the “conservative super-villain”; now he’s just a neutered house pet.
“They get relegated to a niche or ghetto.” Fair point.
“My aim, then, was to whip the rebels, to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses, and make them fear and dread us. Fear is the beginning of wisdom.”
Tommy doesn’t get that we’re playing Sherman’s game now and if you don’t have the stomach for it, get out of the way. On a more positive note, apparently one of our local Proggies hosted a “plate throwing” party to mourn Kavanaugh’s ascension to the court. I have pictures. Not exactly Bobby Lee’s seasoned regulars….
This could have been one long effort to feather his nest over at Libville in the hopes he’d be embraced.
How many people have made that successful leap once their usefulness to the left has been exhausted?
He’s truly a man without a home.
“Sorry, we’ve already got Max Boot and Jennifer Rubin.”
The GOP failed to do the right thing – surrendering on command, rolling over and showing the Dems their belly. He liked Kavanaugh right up until it would take courage and political will to continue.
Excellently put, Drake. Things like fortitude, courage, integrity, and perseverance seem foreign to all of these cucks. Lol, it’s not who we are…
Holy smoke! I just noticed that Tom Nichols is a US Navy War College guy. I wonder if he is a buddy of Thomas P. M. Barnett? Barnett is another Navy War College guy and is a rather brilliant globalist. Barnett’s TED talks are worth a look if you want to understand how these guys think.
And you wonder why the US Navy and their “officers” are in the state they are in today? There’s your answer- captain cuck, never having served aboard a warship at sea, was teaching the next generation of admirals the Gospel of NeoCon globalism and diversity.
The John McCain School of Naval Cuckoldry.
and airplane crashes.
And sinking aircraft carriers….perfect for the next war!
All we have to do is figure out how to get them assigned to the enemy’s aircraft carriers.
This from the Navy Times, celebrating the worlds first transgender bodybuilding contest, because ex-Navy members competed:
“…He also offered diet tips, shared his preshow rituals and helped Peter Moore of Oakland, California, apply fake tan, his hand running over the scars where Moore had his breasts removed when he transitioned to male two years ago…The evening was also special because Bennett’s wife of 31 years, Erica Grace, watched him compete for the first time since he transitioned and had surgery at 56. ‘She’s seeing me compete for the first time as a man. That’s pretty powerful. I had to do it. It means the world to me.'”
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2018/10/08/navy-petty-officer-wins-transgender-bodybuilding-contest/
There was a time not too long ago when no military publication would even dare touch such a revolting story as that.
It just shows how bad the rot is in the military. It’s real bad.
I thought Mattis would clean it up, but he’s ended up supporting women in combat MOS’s and trannies in the military.
You can change the direction of a culture only a few degrees at a time. Conservatives want to spin the ship 180 degrees all at once otherwise they give up, refusing to compromise their principles. Progressives are quite happy at changing the direction 3-4 degrees per election. After 2-3 generations you have your 180 turn.
Fuck you talkin’ ’bout. Conservatives merely yell stop.
Navy Times (like the other three service Times papers) aren’t “military”. They’re all owned by a private equity outfit.
Stars and Stripes is government published.
Shudder
It’s like some of these guys have been preparing their Dramatic Exit From The Right their whole career.
The phony anguish, the article in The Atlantic, the exquisite embrace of the Right People! Oh, to be queen of a sweetly rotting republic for a day!
He is a ridiculous person. I find it endlessly amusing that he decorates his CV with his performance on a game show.
Turn to page two of his CV, where he has his top 5 Scrabble scores.
“I’m Tom Nichols, five time Jeopardy champion, and two time Gong Show contestant.”
Who is this Tom Nichols person?
I never heard of him before. But that was quite an attack of the vapors that Z quoted.
and that’s why you are the master!
A duel sir! Challenge him to a blood sport version of Trivial Pursuit.
(If you had not mentioned him I never would have heard about him)
BTW Z-man, you’ve been on fire lately!
I think we need a special word just for these rancid little coming-out ceremonies of the cucks. I propose: the CUCK MITZVAH.
Genius.
Babe wins Internet, film at 11
Tom is not dumb. Obtuse, deluded, oblivious, etc. are the adjectives which come to mind. It takes a high verbal IQ to wind up one’s neurons into such a complex tangle that basic facts can be completely overlooked. Our task on the new right is to destroy all of the ‘isms that keep people from thinking clearly. People interact based upon incentives. The cyclical rise and fall of societies is caused be the operation of feedback loops (another term for incentive), in a manner similar to the oscillation of electrical or mechanical systems. All people are not created equal. There is no perfectly free market. Competition tends to produce equality. Ownership increases accountability. A huge problem for our elites today is excessive education. They have learned how to memorize complex theories and narratives without learning how to think analytically. A bit more kindergarten level logic is called for.
Would add “narrowness”, very deep and very narrow. Little ability to see outside their field but a cocksure belief that mastery of one is mastery of all.
That’s why I avoid fundamentalists.
Way back in the Pleistocene when I was a kid, you started your education in political science by reading Plato and Aristotle: first you read “Republic” and “Politics”, then Erasmus and Machiavelli and Swift, then you argued about it amongst yourselves for quite a while, and then maybe the grown ups would let you talk once in a blue moon.
As I got older I came to realize that a much better template for political thinking was the Greek tragedians and early Shakespeare (the Wars of the Roses flavor of Shakespeare). The real, messy, horrible craziness of human affairs. Orestes and Elektra have to try and figure out what to do about the brute fact that their own mother murdered their own father in revenge because he in turn had murdered their older sister. Am I remembering that right?
And don’t get me started on The Bacchae.
This is a very good and important point. I’m tired of the “STEM is everything” trope on the Right. As if healthy societies of the past were run by technocrats (say, isn’t that the Left’s ideal?) They were run by people with classical educations who had learned logic; not “mathematical logic” but rhetoric and argumentation. STEM faculty may be more “conservative” but actually they just stay out of politics because they know nothing about it. (And if they do jump in, they make as many foolish decisions as anyone else). Same with the Asians; they may be STEM mavens but they’re conformist who happily sign up with the ruling Progs for money and status. Two semesters of rhetoric or “informal logic” is all any student needs, whatever their major, to navigate society.
STEM graduates should be the best at applying Aristotle’s logic to society–Boolean algebra is logic. Unfortunately the social sciences are pseudo-scientific.
“The entire British Empire was built by young men who studied nothing but Greek, Latin, and plane geometry.” – PJ O’Rourke (oversimplifying a bit, as PJ has to keep his funny-man hat on, but the point is well taken.)
The STEM types are mostly (now) all pussies and soy boys; desperate for social recognition and affirmation. It really is surprising to me; or was when I first started noticing it about 10 years ago (in my own field).
I went back to the state U that I graduated from back in 1883. I was just about the only heritage American there. The student body seemed almost entirely Indian and Chinese.
“Death of a Cucksman” by Arthur Miller
Attention must be paid!
Arthur Miller would have nothing but contempt for present day cucks.
Considering who he married, I agree.
What the cucks don’t understand, is that they are now whipping boys and scape goats — to the left. And they are anathema to the right now, as well. Well played super genius, well played. Noticed that Fattie Goldberg is trying to inch his way back in off ledge. Aint gonna work Fattie, the internet is forever.
National Review fired all the writers who had anything interesting to say: Ann Coulter, John Derbyshire, Joseph Sobran. Am I missing anyone?
VDH is still around. Otherwise, no.
VDH signed that #NeverTrump screed. Never forget that.
And Southerners can’t stand him when he spouts off about the Civil War.
Karl, I beg to differ on VDH and NeverTrump. He was listed among the contributors to that “shrimposium,” but his contribution was not of a piece with the others (I think R.R. Reno of First Things was the other contributor who showed a measure of dissent from NR’s orthodoxy). For the remainder of the campaign, as NR’s marquee (and no-name) writers descended into sputtering madness over Trump’s progress, VDH charged out one column after another validating Trump’s policies and the resonance he was finding among voters, while offering up only perfunctory broadsides at his vulgarity and crassness.
I had a field day noting VDH’s subversion of the NRO narrative in the comments sections at the time. And of course my perception of Hanson’s support of Trump was vindicated by subsequent events. What amazed me was that most people did not realize that Hanson was an early articulator of the anti-immigration case in his book, “Mexifornia: A State of Becoming” (2003).
Was he, or was he not, a signatory (along with Thomas Sowell) of that infamous statement? Look it up and report back here.
As a matter of fact, after writing the above comment, I got curious and DID look up the NRO symposium, titled “Against Trump” (Feb. 2016). To my surprise, VDH was NOT one of the contributors. Sowell was. (As was R.R. Reno, but I was right about him offering a measured dissent.)
A week after “Against Trump” ran, Hanson addressed the Trump candidacy directly for the first time in an NRO piece, originally titled “Trump: Why do voters care’ (NRO subsequently changed that title). Here’s the comment I left at the time:
“Good to hear from VDH on this subject. He was conspicuous by his absence from last week’s shrimposium (indeed, his absence was one of the factors that diminished the credibility of that effort). The pro-forma lead paragraph notwithstanding [NB: VDH said Trump would not be his “preferred” candidate], Victor is pretty clear about the value of Trump in this election.”
I’ll leave it to you to suss out the links. But it looks like Hanson was never a NeverTrumper.
shit, you are right 🙁 I swear as god as my witness, I thought VDH was a NeverTrumper <= WKRP reference.
Thanks for checking. Damn my memory.
Aye, you are a good man, Karl.
Much props to you.
Karl, this reply really made me smile. Take care.
Someone admitted they were wrong on the internet. Let’s all have a moment of respectful silence.
Mark Steyn–another writer with interesting things to say.
John O’Sullivan, Peter Brimelow. Tangentially, Pat Buchanan.
A “Fired by National Review” anthology would be absolutely brilliant, both in content and as a troll.
Steyn.
Mark Steyn for repeating a decades old Dean Martin gay joke.
“How do you make a fruit cordial?”
“Be nice to him.”
And he wasn’t even presenting it as a joke, he was using it to demonstrate how unobjectionable and mainstream such expressions were such a short time ago. This was Dean Martin, for heaven sake, not Lenny Bruce.
They were always the left’s whipping boys – they love that. They get really angry when other “conservatives” actually fight back.
These guys need to remain acceptable to the progressive establishment for monetary reasons. They are either blank slates or subversives.
What I’d really like to know is the source of NR’s money. Goldberg gets paid a very pretty penny, and it sure isn’t coming from the readers, I’ll warrant.
Goldberg is the “Asness Chair in Applied Liberty” at the American Enterprise Institute.
That may be the main source of income.