Hugh Hewitt, on the Miers debates:
The echo-chamber effect that plagued the Michael Moore Democrats last year may now be at work among conservative intellectuals who think they are seeing a rising [in discontent over the Miers nomination], when in fact they are witnessing the equivalent of a cyber faculty meeting meltdown over a tenure decision, on steroids.
And
There is no large scale revolt in the base, although there is a lot of noise from commentators. The somewhat desperate looking attempt to get a new “grassroots” campaign going tells me that no established and powerful group is willing to take the interenet lead.
Translation: Hugh’s side is WINNING!
Sorry, but I don’t need a grass roots movement to justify or validate my principles. In fact, should Hugh be correct—and the anti-Miers “elites” are simply engaged in a mutual circle jerk of anti-Miers elitism —that doesn’t change one bit the righteousness of their position. Not one bit.
In fact, something about Hugh’s latest column put me in mind of this bit, from Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket:
Pogue Colonel: Marine, what is that button on your body armor?
Private Joker: A peace symbol, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Where’d you get it?
Private Joker: I don’t remember, sir.
Pogue Colonel: What is that you’ve got written on your helmet?
Private Joker: “Born to Kill”, sir.
Pogue Colonel: You write “Born to Kill” on your helmet and you wear a peace button. What’s that supposed to be, some kind of sick joke?
Private Joker: No, sir.
Pogue Colonel: You’d better get your head and your ass wired together, or I will take a giant shit on you.
Private Joker: Yes, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Now answer my question or you’ll be standing tall before the man.
Private Joker: I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir.
Pogue Colonel: The what?
Private Joker: The duality of man. The Jungian thing, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Whose side are you on, son?
Private Joker: Our side, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Don’t you love your country?
Private Joker: Yes, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Then how about getting with the program? Why don’t you jump on the team and come on in for the big win?
Private Joker: Yes, sir.
Pogue Colonel: Son, all I’ve ever asked of my marines is that they obey my orders as they would the word of God. We are here to help the Vietnamese, because inside every gook there is an American trying to get out. It’s a hardball world, son. We’ve gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over.
Private Joker: Aye-aye, sir.
So, where do you stand, privates? On board for the big win? Or are you a bunch of anti-establishment hippie-like discontents?
****
update: Jonathan Adler at Bench Memos points to this poll—which is clearly a mirage.
Keep moving. Nothing to see here.
I’m going to go with anti-establishment hippie-like discontent, if only because it sounds like it would be more fun.
Hell, I like you. You can come over to my house and f*ck my sister.
IT’S BECAUSE OF THE … DUALITY!
I accept my own duality.
OOOH RAHHHHH!!!!!!!!
Count me in the big game Gunny!!!!!
Actually, I’m onboard for the big win. This might mean that I read your blog as a statement on the duality of man. If, you know, I understood “duality.”
I dunno, if I go with the hippie option, do I have to make huge paper- mache puppets?
As long as there is free love in a consequence-free environment, well, heck, then I’m with the hippies.
The problem, Jeff, is that Pogue Colonel happened to be right in that movie* and Private Joker happened to be – not wrong, per se, but definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time doing the wrong thing for all of the wrong reasons. Not that Kubrick intended to subvert his whole damn movie with that graphic demonstration of the difference between the volunteer and the draftee, but, well, he did.
My larger point? (Shrug) Beats me: I’m just this guy in the rear with the gear.
Moe
*Which is to say, the colonel that we only get to see through Kubrick’s funhouse mirror.
That’s not a problem for me, Moe, because the Colonel and Private Joker were after two different things. Which is part of my point.
I don’t know where I’m standing, but if someone takes a giant shit on me there will be hell to pay.
Is this like the choice between the Good Package and the Big Gun?
Fair enough, Jeff.
So if I don’t go along with Hugh will he pop out my eyballs and skull f**k me?
Just want to know if I should put on some safety goggles.
Me, I’m just wearing a pledge pin.
And as far as which team, I’m holding out for the best offer. And Miers ain’t it.
“Is that a pledge pin on your uniform?” he said in his best Neidermyer voice.
News Flash for Hughie!
It’s not just the “interenet” lead, it’s any lead. Have you taken a look at what is going on in DC these days? Your boys are lookin’ pretty rudderless dude.
Gosh, I agree with Hugh on this one.
I noticed a blind rush to opine on Miers when scant was known about her – usually on the basis that she wasn’t this or that blogger’s best choice – and this led to an accelerating cycle of character deprecation – not just of hers, but of our successful President’s, too.
There’s been some coagulation of conservative blog circles into “echo-chambers” lately. Conservatives talking to conservatives in reinforcing loops are just as likely to conjecture and pose as are Kos-kids and Deaniacs fed on NYT editorials.
An aside: I was of mixed emotions when Glenn Reynolds and others formed the Pajamamedia. It represented the formation of a much-needed independant news-gathering conglomerate, but one that risks engaging in advertising, message and link-collusion: the symptom of an audience-specific, advertisement-dependant, echo-chamber.
-Steve
I’m for giving Travis a Glock and telling him Ted Kennedy is sleeping with Jodie Foster.
I’m not for everything – just those things I think are right.
I’m not against everything – just those things I think are wrong.
That probably makes me part of the echo chamber.
Shrug.
tw: through. I’m through with Hugh.
I loved that movie, and if Jeff doesn’t include it in his list when he gets to 1987, I shall sneer at him like certain embarrassingly reactionary rightwing blogs sneer at homosexuals and minorities of all stripes.
But to answer your question, no, I don’t think it’s like that.
Hey friend, no matter the argument as an American I’m on your side. I don’t read Hugh myself so I claim no repetition of his talking points. I read NRO but am taking a break reason being, their immediate reaction to the nomination was sucking me inside the beltway’s intellectual vacumn. These days, my faith in the DC Beltway is far less than my trust in Bush and I admit most of my decisions are based on my own instincts not just intellectualized reasoning. Personally, I felt instantly bombarded into simply accepting everyone’s reasons for why Miers was the wrong choice because it wasn’t their choice while never having an opportunity to give respect to her defense. Interestingly, when I compare the reaction to the Robert’s nomination, I read a great deal of reasoned grumblings of his no-paper trail history yet he blew me away during the hearings. We elected the President to make the decision, the nominee should be given an opportunity to present their case in why he made that choice.
That said, at this point I have personally conceded the Meirs nomination is over, aborted and out. Too much bad blood, no need to beat one another to death. Hugh is not helping the situation by attacking within, snobbery is ugly on everyone’s face.
And what exempts Hewitt and the Miers supporters/Bush sycophants from being an echo-chamber?
BECAUSE OF THE HYPOCRISY!!
Seriously, after Hugh’s post that was dissected here yesterday, it really is BECAUSE OF THE HYPOCRISY: Hugh’s.
TW: board. “That boy needs to be hit with a board between the eyes.”
It’s a good thing too, ‘cause that would be, y’know, elitist or something … or whatever logical pretzel ol’ Hugh’s twisting into next. Did you actually read all those paragraphs of mental masturbation he put up as a post today, Jeff?
Such a fortunate confluence of events; Hugh’s become unreadable just as I’ve lost any interest in what he has to say.
Crap, Joe, I had to read through 26 comments to find that you’d taken my only thought on the matter. Hewitt is an intellectually inconsistent partisan hack, and if he was a Democrat we’d just point and laugh.
It’s a hardball world, son. We’ve gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over.
Pretty hard to argue with that one.
TW “heavy, as in Colonel got all heavy and harshed everyone’s mellow.
Hah! Not like you haven’t done that to me before, too, Matt!
I give up on Miers since my oppinion doesn’t count in Hewitt-world anyway. In fact it doesn’t count twice since I don’t sit around getting a chub about overturning Roe and I’m not a real conservative anyway.
I’m only one of those increasingly disgruntled, centrist-libertarian types that has been essential to keeping Hugh’s precious Party in power for the last decade. So he’s looked around and somehow come to the conclusion that centrists like Steve Green, Ann Althouse, and Glenn Reynolds have tripped over themselves piling into a conservative echo chamber?
Hmmmm.
@ susan
May I ask a question then?
If the “beltway” pundits hadn’t made a fuss and simply accepted Miers unquestioningly *and* Miers then turned out to be little more than a younger and more liberal O’Connor, wouldn’t you be angry with these very same “beltway” pundits?
Because IMHO that’s the other side of the coin. A bit of a damned if you do and a damned if you don’t sort of deal.
Congrats on using pogue correctly.
Think we could find some way of forcing politicians to read something besides the menu at their local bistro? Suggested:
“Baboons don’t read Nietzsche!”
“Yes, they do. They just don’t understand it.”
— A Fish Called Wanda
Jeff, I’m with you. I had to swallow my rising gorge and send a constituent e-mail to both my scoundrely Senators requesting they gong her nomination. Bah.
Oh, and Hugh…deep breath, pal. Read what you have been posting lately and contrast it with some of your work from last year. Embarrassed yet?
Whether we are hippies or are in for the big win matters not a whit to Hewitt. He had John Fund from NRO on today for two segments, and Fund totally destroyed Hewitt – Hewitt’s basic response to the transcripts of the Miers speeches was basically to declare that up was down, right was left, and who are ya gonna believe, me your your lyin’ eyes?
Right about now, Hewitt probably wishes he had the power of the anti-Miers echo chamber on his side, because his pro-Miers echo chamber is quickly becoming an echo thimble.
But it’s a thimble full of people who really know who is qualified and what ConLaw is all about. Just ask Hugh. He teaches it. He’ll tell ya.
If the solution by does not present itself by inspection, I recommend the little blue pill.