The Kimberlin people are at it again — using real world intimidation tactics to try to silence bloggers who presume to shine the light on their tax-exempt, celebrity-and-progressive-driven political (and highly politicized) gravy train. This time the target is Ali Akbar, National Bloggers Club President.
Now, I know Ace has called for a National Blogger’s Day of Silence on Friday, and I can appreciate the idea and its motivation. But on this I agree with datechguy: why not instead of going silent don’t we all gather together and pressure the NAACP, the Justice Department, and the major media outlets to answer questions about their indifference and silence over the intimidation of a black political activist by a gaggle of lily-white thugs being bankrolled by rich white Democrats?
After all, isn’t this a similar dynamic to other infamous civil rights battles here in the US — the kind that people like Holder and the NAACP and many progressives constantly refer to and pretend to have championed?
I thought Holder was all about helping “his people”?
— Or is what comes to count as “his people” less about color and more about the kind of plantation politics that tends to go along with a person’s color — with those of color who stray from the Democrat’s plantation no longer given cover and support, being as they are inauthentic and so undeserving of identity group protection?
And if that’s the case, doesn’t that lay truly bare the whole identity politics movement favored by the left for the politically-motivated and partisan progressive ruse it’s always been — one that has itself only been sustained by thuggish attempts to normalize the left’s rules of political correctness, to turn the idea of “tolerance” on its head so that what comes to count as legitimate speech is only that speech that has already been socially pre-vetted by the left’s very caring and tolerant thought police?
That is, doesn’t this whole saga provide those of us who champion free speech a golden opportunity to expose the tyrannical heart of progressivism, whose goal it is (as I’ve been writing about here for years) to deconstruct the very idea of free speech, refiguring free expression as expression first pre-approved by the left — with all other speech either “harassment” or “hate speech”? The brush strokes that color the left’s ideological worldview are showing. The “progressive” manipulation of speech and the institutionalization of their (necessarily authoritarian) linguistic assumptions are sitting naked before us here. All we need do, at long last, is point it out.
Going silent is certainly one potentially powerful method of protest. But I can’t help but think that this is precisely the kind of thing progressives and their thug henchmen bankrolled to intimidate and harass us, either through direct threats or through various iterations of lawfare, want to see happen.
So perhaps as an addendum to a day of blogger silence, we promote of day of blogger activism in which we vocally and en masse petition the Justice Department, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the NAACP, and all the various black activist groups and “civil rights” leaders (I’m looking at you, Al and Jesse) to open a serious investigation into the Kimberlin people and their tactics — and then we follow that up by pressuring the mainstream press and whatever investigative journalists may be left to follow up on it, as well as pestering our “conservative” media outlets to better cover the story.
But whatever we decide, I’m in.
If we don’t want to continue losing more slowly, now’s probably as good a time as any to stop simply counterpunching and start taking the fight to the leftists. Because the truth is, their tactics only work so long as we tacitly agree to play within their rule set.
Once we agree to ignore their paradigm, the whole facade crumbles — and what you’re left with are a bunch of twisted would-be tyrants who haven’t a chance in hell of controlling a free people who insist upon their own liberties.
****
related: Judge Vaughey, paraphrased: “Bow before Zod.”
Feel like getting on your knees? I sure as hell don’t.
On a related matter on another blog (Kimberlin was mentioned in the post, hence “related”) I may have mentioned that on occasions where I’ve had to defend myself I tend to save my breath for the activity. There is a time for using my words and a time for … not.
That’s my idea of “silent” response.
Screw “Let’s All Shut Up Day.” A day of action is in order. Silence is not action.
This Kimberlin freak still doesn’t understand the Streisand Effect, does he?
What? You don’t think Ace’s silence is a brave stance against people who want to silence us?!
The only peaceful way this will end is if Kimberlin and his Krew — along with Anonymous (who I will call “the 4chan Klan” from now on) — are thrown into prison and never released.
That would leave us with the Black Klan, the Eco Klan, and the Okkupy Klan, but at least one of the left’s dirty trick squads will be silent.
OK, I’ll make the mandatory Godwin reference: There were a lot of silent Germans in the 1930s.
Nah, RI Red, it’s not a Godwin reference. I submit that Kimberlin and Krew are part of the Sturm Abteilung of the modern Democrat party.
Yep, Crawford, my point exactly. Time for Die Volk to stand up to the S.A. “Libertad ueber Alles!”
It’s not a Godwin if the original thread really is about Nazis.
When you’re trying desperately to get your message out, and are met by stony silence from a media complex bound and determined to ignore you, going silent is the last thing you want to do. If you want your word carried far and wide, then make yourself impossible to ignore, not easier to ignore.
The intimidation of a black political activist and his family by a gaggle of lily-white thugs bankrolled by rich white Democrats” is a legitimate story. We need to keep hammering away until the networks have no choice but to cover it. Sit-ins are for physical demonstrations, where sympathetic pictures can help you. And as Lileks once observed, it doesn’t count as censorship when you put the duct tape over your mouth with your own hands.
Doesn’t some of the money Kimberlin has access to trace back to Soros?
Dem’s some big guns, but by gum, dem’s da guns we gots to twist into a knot, Bugs Bunny style.
If nothing else, we’ve got Beck and Breitbart on our side, and they know people who know people.
Game, Set, Match, McG. They are Nazis.
So, other than pounding the keyboards, what to do? How can you/we make the msm take notice?
Tides Foundation. So, yeah.
Red, I think they’ve already taken notice and are now in “Ignore it but don’t LOOK like we’re ignoring it” mode.
Or as I’ve learned to call it, “Tuesday.”
More than from Tides, I think. One of his other foundations as well. I think we should use the Tides link to tie him to Kerry, the Open Society (?) one to tie him to Soros, and, well, Babs gave directly…
How can you/we make the msm take notice?
Just keep talking about it. Mention it to cow-orkers. Mention it to the folks at your bus stop. Mention it to the guys at the VFW. If you know somebody at your local paper or TV station, so much the better. If your local paper happens to cover Montgomery County (*cough* WaPo *cough*), better still! If you have a sympathetic Congresscritter, ask them where they stand.
I mean, we’re talking about a convicted domestic terrorist, using threats and intimidation to get people fired from their jobs, and then turning around and claiming that he’s the victim, and getting a senile judge to go along with him! Then turns around and starts harassing a black political activist and his family. This isn’t even a political argument that might turn off half your friends — it’s a fucking Movie of the Week plot!
Just tell the story to four people. Ask why nobody’s defending a black activist who’s being harassed by a white convicted terrorist. Then do it again tomorrow. Before long, you have a few thousand people wondering aloud why it is that nobody is protecting the public from this convicted terrorist and the court system that helps him. A few thousand people asking uncomfortable questions is usually enough to prod the media into asking those same questions.
@Crawford–4chan is in on this? Weird.
Please remind me after we hit “Reset” and start all over again – Don’t cede the education system and the press to the leftists!
Yes, all, I think the only thing we can do is keep talking it up. Until McG’s silent response at the top of the thread.*
And if that html link doesn’t work, I’m going to, I’m going to . . . try again.
*
: does not equal =
Red, are you closing your tags? maybe your link is too long.
found it, leigh. dumbshit mistake.
I wonder if Patrick Henry had similar problems with his quill pens? Hard to rouse the rabble if you can’t get the message out.
I read that Patrick Henry invented the fountain pen to quell his quill problems.
In defense of Ace, I think his “day of silence” idea isn’t meant to impress them — who want us silent anyhow — or even our various elected officials (who don’t know we exist).
I think the idea is to rouse his legion of Morons into some degree of useful action. Rather than provide the standard diversion, where they can waste their entire day reading snarky opinions re. current events, he’s saying “you’re going to have to find something else to do on Friday, and oh, by the way, here’s a list of Congressmen you might want to call. You know, to help pass the time.”
At least, that’s how I read it.
“Maybe you don’t understand it, but I understand exactly what Ace is saying,” I said, puffing a Marlboro outside a Capitol Hill tavern. “It’s not that we’re not going to blog at all on Friday, but that we’re all going to put up one big post about this Kimberlin situation and nothing else.
“No election news, no policy stuff, no snarky jokes at the expense of the usual MSNBC douchebags — just one post about the way these left-wing monsters are attempting to silence us, and that’s it for the whole f–king day. Because, see, there’s some guys in Congress who owe us, big time, and Ace damned well knows it.
“You may not remember the ‘Crazed Ewok’ stuff Ace was posting about GOP challengers during the 2010 mid-terms, but I do. We’ve been carrying their water all this time, raising money for campaigns and pushing their message, and now when we need some help, those cowardly motherf–kers act like they never even heard of us? They’re going to sit up there in their offices and let us be gobbled up by these monsters and not say Word One about it? Oh, hell no.”
It was at that point that one of the young professionals said that maybe Darrell Issa could do something.
“What?!” I roared. “You don’t think Issa’s people know all about this crap? Oh, yeah, like maybe we can get a briefing on the Hill or a meeting with some staffers next week or whatever. F–k that! We need action. We need action now — not next week or next month — now! Today! Immediately!”
link
Why not put up 50 posts on Friday about it? Why not bug people to call a rep? Why not coax them to contact a civil rights leader/ group and ask where they stand on this? Why not record the response (or note the inevitable failure to respond)?
I guess I just don’t get the symbolism. As I told another blogger, it’s like announcing you’re going on a hunger strike. On Friday. Only.
But I’ll do whatever’s needed. If that’s what people decide is best, who am I to question it? After all, look how wrong I’ve been about everything else political, no?
And anyway, who’ll give a shit if I go silent? So why not?
where’s allen west? have they ask him about this situation? why not get him as their spokesman?
leigh, I heard on the radidio that any quill problems you have can be attributed to “low T”.
I also heard Levin saying on the radidio that we need to win all of the elections for the next generation.
I’ma go out on a limb here, but I actually think Jon Stewart might — might — give this a fair shake.
Now, let me finish…
My wife watches his show regularly. (At least she doesn’t mistake it for “news” and for me that’s enough for now.) Yes, he does lean heavily to the left regularly. (Every night is Seder night at the Leibowitzes?) But he does go after a Lefty person or even a Lefty cause on occasion, and he does seem to see through their more ridiculous hypocrisies. He might appreciate the news value of everyone ignoring a white man going after a black man’s family.
That would certainly get more eyeballs on this story.
[…] -Jeff Goldstein is worth quoting at length: Now, I know Ace has called for a National Blogger’s Day of Silence on Friday, and I can appreciate the idea and its motivation. But on this I agree with datechguy: why not instead of going silent don’t we all gather together and pressure the NAACP, the Justice Department, and the major media outlets to answer questions about their indifference and silence over the intimidation of a black political activist by a gaggle of lily-white thugs being bankrolled by rich white Democrats?After all, isn’t this a similar dynamic to other infamous civil rights battles here in the US — the kind that people like Holder and the NAACP and many progressives constantly refer to and pretend to have championed? […]
[…] 6: Camp of the Saints Pirate Cove, the Lonely Conservative, Evil Blogger Lady Protein Wisdom chime in and a memorandum thread builds. Share this:PrintRedditDiggStumbleUponEmailFacebook […]
[…] -Jeff Goldstein is worth quoting at length: […]