From the April 17 Weekly Standard “Scrapbook”:
Concerned that Americans might be engaged in anti-Muslim stereotyping, “Dateline NBC” producers had an unusual brainstorm: Let’s stereotype Americans! More specifically, the class of Americans that enjoys stock car racing.
As we learned last week from Michelle Malkin’s blog, NBC sent an undercover camera crew to NASCAR’s April 2 DIRECTV 500 at the Martinsville Speedway in southern Virginia. NBC confirmed to an AP reporter that it had sent “Muslim-looking men” to the race “along with a camera crew to film fans’ reactions.” Apparently those mouth-breathing NASCAR fans (as “Dateline” imagines them) didn’t take the bait. They “walked around and no one bothered them,” NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston told the AP. Malkin got a few emails from readers who attended the race. “Woody B.” wrote that he had noticed the NBC plants: “They never seemed to be going anywhere in particular. To the credit of NASCAR fans, I never did see someone do so much as a double take at their presence.” Another reader, “Jerry W.,” offered a useful tip to NBC: Try going to the Texas Motor Speedway. “The Texas track is much larger, with grandstand seating for over 140,000 and sufficient room in the infield for, by the track’s estimate, 53,000 more people. The track promises to be, if not completely sold out by race day, at least extremely close to it. Much easier to find someone willing to react ‘suitably’ for Dateline with that size crowd, plus the added ‘bonus’ of finding such behavior in the president’s home state.”
But our favorite piece of advice came from “Chris S.”: “My wife and I attended last weekend’s NASCAR race in Martinsville, and had a wonderful time. But if NBC wants to guarantee they get a negative reaction to their ‘plant,’ all they need to do is put him in a Jeff Gordon T-shirt. The Dale Earnhardt Jr. fans will be sure to give him a rough time! His fans are definitely the most vocal of them all.”
What many progressive activists and self-righteous liberal empaths don’t seem to understand—and this has reached almost pandemic proportions among the “reality-based community” —is that the vast majority of those who vote differently from them are not xenophobic Pat Buchanan / David Duke acolytes. In fact, many of us, as a matter of principle, are far less concerned with race and ethnicity than are our “progressive” betters, who continue to keep race in play as a political hotbutton issue by constantly focusing on it, and by trying to gin up controversy and tension between competing racial groups. In short, they help perpetuate that which they claim to abhor.
For my part, I’ve written a number of posts about my disgust with the race industry (with “race” used in its traditional post-1930s sense)—and I include among those both racial essentialists who apply genetics to social policy in a way that attempts to use race as somehow indicative of potential and performance, and social construction theoriests, who use “race” in a similar fashion, though they fail to recognize their own implicit adherence to the essentialism they claim to be fighting (oftentimes by promoting social engineering programs that further problematize the ideal of a society that is legally colorblind). Because it is my considered opinion that until we stop foregrounding race as a social “problem,” we as a country will not be able to get beyond its superficial divisions.
Many conservatives / classical liberals—who, like me, were one-time self-described Democrats—would be perfectly willing to support, to some degree or other, affirmative action programs based on something like economic disadvantage, which is far more substantial than the color of one’s skin as an indicator of need. In fact, our concern is that the conflation of skin color with need is quite artificial, and that the proper aim “diversity”—which in its current incarnation is anti-individualistic and both anathema to the principles of classical liberalism and Constitutionally dubious—is a diversity of ideas, not the feel-good photo spreads in university marketing brochures that mimic Benetton ads.
I bring all this up as a way to address the following, written by Orcinus’ David Neiwert, and found in the comments at JustOneMinute:
The main mechanism for converting mainstream conservatives into right-wing extremists and white nationalists is a process I call transmission: extremist ideas and principles are repackaged for mainstream consumption, stripped of overt racism and hatefulness and presented as ordinary politics. As these ideas advance, they create an open environment for the gradual adoption of the core of bigotry that animates them.
Note, first, that Neiwert begins with the assumption that there exists some goal that “mainstream conservatives” become “right-wing extremists and white nationalists”—and that those adepts of the Aryan Resurgence doing the molding and brainwashing behind the scenes are cleverly stripping away all the “overt racism and hatefulness” so as to make their message more acceptable for mixed company.
But Neiwert is having none of it. He knows that all this stripping of hatefulness and overt racism is nothing more than a coded reassertion of that very same hatefulness and racism, only it has been “repackaged” this time for the mouth-breathing, NASCAR masses who have been conditioned by progressives and social activists with pure hearts to resist their inner racist bigotry.
Which, if you ask me, is an ostensibly bigoted assumption on par with the paranoid fantasy Neiwert harbors that close to half of the US population—specifically, those who don’t follow the policy prescriptions he advocates for—are unreconstructed racists, though many of them need help re-discovering their inner hate.
Continues Neiwert:
This strategy was first enunciated by Patrick Buchanan back in 1989, in a nationally syndicated column that expressed a level of kinship with David Duke, who at that point was building momentum in a bid to win the Louisiana governorship. Buchanan thought the GOP overreacted to Duke and his Nazi “costume” by denouncing him; he urged:
Take a hard look at Duke’s portfolio of winning issues and expropriate those not in conflict with GOP principles, [such as] reverse discrimination against white folks.
It was a simple formula: Look at the issues that attract white supremacist votes, strip out the racism (or anything inimical to good public relations for the GOP) and present them to the public as fresh, “cutting edge” ideas. In the process, you’ll attract a lot of middle-class white voters who harbor unspoken racial resentments.
Where to begin? Neiwert has decided that any policy supported by white supremacists is de facto a racist policy. But this is nonsense: there are bound to be many policies white supremacists and nativists support for reasons others of us may find repugnant. But that doesn’t make the policy itself bad—it only suggests that certain reasons for supporting the policy are distasteful and wrongheaded. And in fact, as I point out in one of my essays on race, the only real difference between those modern progressive racial theorists who promote the social construction of race as a way to keep race a politically controversial issue and, say, the KKK, is that the latter doesn’t contort itself trying to justify its position: they believe in racial essentialism, and do so overtly. The social constructivists, on the other hand, are “animated” by an essentialism that THEY have “stripped” of its racist trappings in order to make it more palatable to mainstream progressives and liberal democrats. Utlimately, however, both groups wish to use that essentialism to promote a social policy of their liking.
And so for Neiwert to argue, as he is obliquely arguing here, that, because both white supremacists and classical liberals / conservatives agree that race-based social policy is wrong, the policy is therefore inherently (though secretly) racist, is both an absurd contortion of logic and a paranoid fantasy in which only people like he are able to see through this gambit and prevent Buchananite conservatives from tricking “mainstream conservatives” into reestablishing a society based around white supremacy—which is something they either unconsciously (or unspokenly, in the worst cases) long for.
And how heroic is that! Fight the POWERS, Dave!
In addition to the stunning hubris and incoherence of such an argument, here are two other things Neiwert is guilty of: first, it would be hard these days to find conservatives who have become more marginalized by the current conservative movement than Duke and Buchanan (whose sympathies of late seem to fall in line with the anti-war and isolationist principles of many on the left; see also, Raimondo, Justin, and compare some of his writings to those of Cindy Sheehan); second, stripping out the racism from, say, slavery, isn’t likely to convince “mainstream conservatives” to accept it as an acceptable policy initiative. Which, while I’m using an obviously hyperbolic example, is meant only to suggest that Neiwert’s belief in Buchanan’s thesis is as crazy as Buchanan’s thesis itself.
In short, “the process” Neiwert calls “transmission” is a chimera—but it is one that has been pushed since the Goldwater days by many leftist academics, who believe a good deal of conservative policy is simply white nationalism written in “code.” Whereas were Mr Neiwert to give the Constitution a quick once over, he’d see that we don’t need code where we have the founding principles of classical liberalism on our side.
I suspect, though, that Neiwert was not at all suprised that the NASCAR crowd didn’t turn on the Brown Other, as “Dateline” seemed to hope they would. After all, these closet racists must have been able to smell the setup, and they have been conditioned to keep their hatred and bigotry hidden from the eyes of those who are constantly on the lookout for the inherent racism of non-progressive whites.
Which, of course, does not bespeak any racism on the part of the seekers like Mr Neiwert. No sir! Because any complaint that whites are being singled out as racists, we’ve been told, is in fact proof that David Duke’s “reverse racism” lie has taken hold—stripped of its white supremacist embroidery—and that Neiwert and his ilk were correct in their assumptions all along!
BECAUSE OF THE HYPOCRISY CONVENIENCE!
****
update: see Rick Moran’s extensive critique of Neiwert’s piece, which I discovered while trying to find a link for the original (not provided in the comments at Tom Maguire’s place, alas), here. An excerpt:
Neiwert’s thesis – that right wing “movement†bloggers are “transmitting†the very same themes and ideas that fascists and racists espouse only dressed up in mainstream intellectual couture – is an old one, as ancient as similar lines of attack followed by the left against William Buckley, Barry Goldwater, and the bête noire of liberals Ronald Reagan. The assault is based on false assumptions, setting up straw men, towering intellectual conceits, and a moral absolutism with respect to one’s own privileged frame of reference regarding issues of race, class, and politics.
It should be noted that Mr. Neiwert has done more than most to expose the dark underbelly of the extreme right, writing extensively on the Neo-Nazi and White Supremacist movements in the Northwest. His book, Death on the Fourth of July was well received and praised for its penetrating look at hate groups and hate crimes.
That said, Mr. Neiwert should be ashamed of himself. By trying to connect right wing bloggers and the positions they advocate on the issues, however tangentially, to the haters, the Hitler lovers, the cross burners, and the racial purists, he demonstrates an arrogance commonplace on the left where it has become de rigueur to simply mouth the words “racist†and “fascist†in order to cut off debate on the issues and destroy any moral authority to which their opponents might aspire.
Not to mention, he engages in the kind of thematic overreach usually reserved for the likes of Alec Baldwin, Sean Penn, and Dennis Kucinich—one that blinds him to his own delusions, bigotry, and hatred.
****
update 2: Incidentally, I’ve had this kind of discussion before, with that famed legend of the leftosphere, Hesiod. Which, Neiwert has certainly penned himself into some august intellectual company, I must say…
What a pile of fallacy. It’s there, trust me, but you can’t tell because they hide it. It’s like those pesky extraterrestrial Jew aliens in black helicopters trying to ease up that corner of your tinfoil hat so they can soak your brain with mind-control rays. If you could detect them you wouldn’t need ME to tell you they were there, now would you?
That, and Dave apparently has forgotten that Buchanan’s long since been roundly rejected by the Republican party. Oops, that’s part of the grand scheme to keep people from knowing they’re part of this party of racists.
Let’s see if I have this reasoning down. The more that I ignore race and embrace racial diversity, the more racist I am. That is, if I support a policy that is against racial quotas or set asides. I assume if I support gender equality yet have a pro-life stance (which I do not, by the way), I would be a misogynist.
If I support pre board screenings for those more likely to be terrorists (young Middle East males) over white grandmothers (allocation of resources) then I must be racist.
If I support enforcement of immigration laws, while supporting legal immigration, I am racist toward Hispanics.
Do I have that right?
According to Dave, if I support any conservative policies, I am disguising my racism.
What a tool!
Wouldn’t you love to be a fly on the wall at the NBC auditions for Arab plants:
“Okay whose first? Good morning Habduhl. No, I’m sorry. You’re just not what we’re looking for. Marcia will show you out.
BRIAN!!!! Did I not tell you that I wanted big noses, beards and oily, swarthy skin? And did I not ask you to put the ugh in ugly? Now go find me some Aye-rabs or find yourself another job!”
We’re evil. The sooner we accept this, the better. That’s all there is. Our betters have told us so. Why bother disputing it?
On the other hand, there was a comment in Just One Minute by “BumperStickerist” that I found to be very useful:
It really does work.
It sounds like NBC’s idea is to see if americans would stereotype themselves.
We are all dumber for having read that.
~ feeling 7-up, I’m feeling 7-up! ~ …
Y’know, I’m laughing already!
~ feeling 7-up, I’m feeling 7-up! ~
Robert (“I’ve seen a lot of white niggers in my time”) Byrd and friends were unavailable for comment…
And you’d really like Neiwert’s work on the contemporary, Dolchstosslegende. Not to mention the whole bit about eliminationism.
On the flip side this sort of thing does show just how dead the “progressive†political philosophy (if it can be said to be a philosophy) is as a viable movement. They don’t even bother to forthrightly express their agenda to the public anymore. It’s all just a bunch of sleazy political tactics and rhetorical ploys.
How can anyone interpret liberal views on race as being anything other than a benevolent attitude towards groups they obviously see as genetically inferior?
Talk about “code†words, the left’s need to segment society into subgroups based on everything but character and ability, coupled with their need to “help†each of these “disadvantaged†groups, trumpets a crystal clear self image on their part as being “advantaged†by nature in some way.
Liberals tend to view people like Condi Rice as aberrations that they somehow helped to climb to (near) their level, however who is now ungrateful and confused as to who she should thank.
If the left truly accepted people of all races as equals, what would be the point of 90% of the liberal agenda?
Buchanan doesn’t seem to be offering a formula nor describing any process. He’s simply making an observation which one may or may not take issue with. To characterize it as some sort of conspiracy based on an observation that rolled out of Buchanan’s pen is really an outright lie. Of course, Buchanan may have gone on to do so, but the, he’s Pat Buchanan. Oddly enough, Niewart doesn’t provide a link. Just the sentence suggesting that the reader “Take a look”.
If this is what he’s going to base his “rising white supremacy” theories on, I’ve got a theory where liberals intend to gas anyone right of Dennis Kucinich, and it’s got Neiwart’s name all over it. Just let me find a dozen of his words to use for a springboard, and we’re off.
And this in a country where the Aryan World Congress draws a whopping 75 losers to a tent in freaking Idaho, half of which are likely the spawn of the other half. Oh yeah, white power is
en fuegoON FIRE, BABY! just 17 short years later.Has anyone seen the entire Buchanan piece?
Pablo: 1
Mr. Goldstein: 3
Niewart: 0
Actus: Everybody loses 5 points, Actus 12
If it weren’t for bogeymen and strawmen, the Left would have no men at all.
Ah,
Now I understand how NBC News plans to become relavant to more Americans. By stereotyping and pissing off the segment of the population that watch and attend the fastest growing spectator sport in the country. Brilliant. Just brilliant.
You just can’t make this crap up can you?
Hey pablo, get it right. It wasn’t just any place in Idaho, it was in Athol, Idaho.
The 75 losers is just a feint, no doubt: to make the genuinely racist extreme of this country look weaker than it actually is. These guys are probably just the borderline insane, expendable lunatic-squared fringe.
And wouldn’t it be neat if this racist core were all part of some ancient, ritualistic organization like the Masons? I mean, who is not aware of the Masons out there, pulling strings, even to the point of designing the shape of Washington DC to imprint Masonic/racist ritual on the minds of the unsuspecting? And using Templar gold to finance their nefarious ends! I smell a screenplay, here.
Seen the fnords yet?
Me? When reading Angry Lefty rants I just say to myself over and over, “athol.”
Try it!
Leaving what? An affinity for godawful heavy metal, shaved heads and tattoos? That is going to be the new GOP platform?
This from the branch of politics where ‘freedom of speech’ has been used to stifle exactly that?
Projection, if you’re feeling charitable.
Conservatives reject the likes of Duke and Buchanan – it’s pretty clear their influence is about nil. However, liberals embrace and hold up pariahs like Cindy Sheehan, Jessie “Hymietown” Jackson, and Grand Kleagle Byrd. The hypocrisy is nauseating really.
The best take-away I got from Moran’s post was this:
I have spent a substantial amount of time on blogs like Balloon Juice and Crooks & Liars, trying to engage commenters there in topics like race, immigration, abortion, and with few exceptions I am responded to with the simple-minded labels the Left finds so much comfort in.
Complex issues, detailed analysis, and considerate responses by and large are beyond these folks. They would much rather distill complexities into comfy epithets that they casually hurl at anyone they consider anathema to their cherished, yet fragile, “beliefs”.
To be fair, there’s a great many liberals that don’t do those things. Be careful not to fall into that trap, yourself. Certainly there are several hastening to defend this POV, but it’s probably all due to the conservatives=evil transmission.
So you could think of Niewert’s piece as a sort of Dolchstosslegende. Genius, actually, to achieve that level of irony.
Dolchstoßlegende, even.
Yeah. It’s pretty cheap to smear those with whom one disagrees as racist.
Calling critics of Israeli policies anti-Semites, however, is totally fair game.
Beg pardon, but “muslim” is an ethnicity, not a race. You can’t say “racist”, must say “ethnicist”. It just doesn’t have the same sting.
And hispanics are non-white caucs, so they are technically of the same race white caucasions are.
Just exactly what does racist mean anymore?
I’m thinking that liberals have a formula of their own: Look at the issues that attract Communists, strip out the …
Wait, they don’t strip anything out! Go figure.
Actually, it’s neither. It’s a word used to describe adherents to a particular religion.
Uh, Josh. Ethnicity can be used to refer to a religious group.
Just exactly what does racist mean anymore?
It seems that the working definition is: A person with which I disagree.
Good question. It’s meaning has incrementally changed to be so broad as to be rendered meaningless. Like Holocaust, Nazi, and dare I say…..rape.
Hmmmmm…..David Duke supports Cindy Sheehan, so Neiwert just put paid to that campaign, you betcha!
Say, is this another form of dissent crushing? Disapproval by proxy, maybe?
Brian, I feel violated by your redefinition of rape.
Hmmm.
Good name for an album.
Technically true, as religion is sometimes a component of ethnicity. But it’s innacurate to refer to Muslims as an ethnic group.
Heh. I’m sure an apology from me is beyond your acceptance. Shall I simply resign my position as a human being, or volunteer at NOW until I have been sufficiently re-programmed?
No it’s not.
Good name for a band. My candidate: Slurp the Meniscus. I’m thirsty.
Dare, indeed. The understanding of rape has changed in the past century. I wish I had my evidence book handy to quote some nice 19th century cases.
Just as it’s inaccurate to characterize members of the KKK as racist?
My security word screwed my dazzling brilliant rejoinder the likes of which hath never been uttered and shall never be repeated.
The cliff notes: you must wear a scarlet ‘R’, Republican or not, for the mockery and condemnation of Progressive* orthodox true believers. My God forgive you, Womyn shall not (nor shall effeminate men).
*A Heretical branch of Protestantism in the old style Calvinist militantism
The left/progressive community have always been unsurpassed masters at projecting their bigotries and phobias onto the ‘other.’
Actually, it’s a far more acurate glimpse into the feverswamp of their mentality than it is anything else.
runninrebel wins.
It is important here that Dateline tried to choose people who “looked” Muslim. That Muslim is a religion is not the point. They were clearly looking for evidence of “racism” as it is commonly understood.
For my own part, I don’t believe in race in its common use taxonomy, as my linked posts make clear.
Finally, Josh’s link about my “smearing” someone as a racist with whom I disagree—which points to a post that references a former Grand Kleagle of the Klan—seems a bit confused about the meaning of the word “smear.”
So, has the Dateline segment aired yet? I’m really curious about how they ended up portraying the unexpected behavior of the fans.
RACIST!!!!
Very good Paul! “Tonight on Dateline…NASCAR Fans who don’t react in a racist or bigoted manner toward apparent Muslims.”
Show about 5 different false starts, a bunch of aimless wandering with no harrassment, then cut to the anchor – who is sitting there with a slack-jawed look.
Emmy material!
No shit, B Moe. That’s why I noted that shared religion is one component ethnicity, but it’s inaccurate to make ethnicity synonymous with religion. Are all Catholics the same ethnicity?
You’re right. Calling someone a racist for views they held 60 years ago and have repeatedly repudiated and apologized for isn’t really a smear. This, from this post, is a much better example:
Josh,
Ethnicity is a very fluid term. An individual can “belong” to several ethnicities including one that contains many components. That doesn’t mean there is not a muslim ethnicity or that it is inaccurate to speak of one.
As for Jeff’s “smear” I can only tell you that sarcasm is often expressed in ironical statements and let you figure it out from there.
It is more accurate to speak of Muslims as adherents to a religion rather than an ethnic group.
I understood Jeff’s sarcasm just fine. He was caricaturing those who disagree with him on the gravity of the threat from Iran as racists who think Persian Brown People need not to taken seriously.
So you’re just being an ass then?
And a demagogue as well?
Wooosh!
Uh huh. Except many commenters here (Actus, Doc Vic, Carl Goss?) and others have argued, on this very site, that they know better what Iran has in mind for its nuclear weapons than do the Iranians themselves. This suggests, to me at least, that said commenters believe they are in a better position to articulate what the Iranians really mean than are the Iranians leaders themselves.
You see, the Iranians threatening to wipe Israel off the map are not REALLY evil—just misunderstood and not particularly articulate about the way they go about expressing themselves. Sometimes they speak out of turn and need the help of Doc Vic, et al, to de-“code” them for the slack-jawed racist riff raff who believe the worst of these oppressed Others.
As for Byrd, I don’t believe his apologies. It wasn’t that long ago, after all, that he used the phrase “white niggers” on FOXNews.
Sorry. But one does not so easily shed the Kleagle hood, I’m afraid—particularly when one cannot even resist using “nigger” in public.
Or on national television for that matter.
Still, Josh’s defense of a a former kaln kleagle and the president of Iran,a man who has claimed that the state of Isreal, which just happens to be filled with Hebrews, should be destroyed, is very stirring…in a redneck, barbeque and allligator shoes kind of way. Hell, maybe Josh and the folks at the RNC have more in common than he thinks. Maybe he and Mister Karl and Mister Ken and Mister George should all take a seat on the front porch and share a mint julep or two. Gracious sakes, who knows what all they all might have to talk about and all.
Because everone is talking about what hte Iranians actually know themselves.
Its like kicking off a presidential campaign in Philadelphia, MS, declaring, “I believe in states rights.” Its not even code. Its plain old grandstanding to an audience.
Lord have mercy, Mister Josh, when y’all go over to the RNC y’all should take Mr. Actus with you. He’ll fit right in.
And it follows, of course, that this belief stems from their racism against Persian Brown People. Just so we get it right: calling conservatives racists because even though their sentiments aren’t racist on their face, you just know they’re racists, the fuckers: bad. Doing it to liberals: a-ok. Cuz I don’t think Pablo, runninrebel, or corvan quite understand the argument here and they might need it to be spelled out a little more clearly.
Josh, neither is arab a race.
Let me explain the difference to you with a crude example.
In Dafur, an ethnic grouping of BLACK muslims is being genocided by an ethnic grouping of WHITE muslims, ‘cause, biologically speaking, race trumps ethnicity.
So the janjaweed are racists, not ethnicists.
Caucasoid NASCAR fans cannot be racist to arab appearing muslims, because they are in the SAME race.
Josh, I guess you didn’t notice Actus’s comment. He said exactly what Jeff said he said. Are you telling me he’s not defending a racist regime. Are you telling me that Robert Byrd didn’t toss the n-word all over national television? Are you telling me you weren’t defending Mr. Byrd and the President of Iran? Are you telling me that no one is allowed to notice that the Iranina regime is a little on the shall we say, prejudiced side? And do me a favor when you answer my questions try to do it out of one side of your mouth.
No, Josh. You see, I was being ironic. And ironically, what I was being ironic about was the very sincere and earnest dissertation on the secret hidden racism that is always ascribed to the right. I thought it would be funny if I turned the very same rhetoric on them. Funny and ironic.
Really. If you’d start reading the posts for what they are—not for how you can add something contrary—you’d do a lot better on this site.
Instead, you come off looking like one of those tone-deaf idiots who always thinks he’s pulled off a gotcha moment, only to have others point out that the joke has been on him all along.
Your twisting yourself into rhetorical knots Josh, which means it’s probably a good idea to put it down for a bit.
For my money the refusal to believe that Iran means what it says has less to do with racism and more to do with the idea that the hated reichwingers believe the threats. The left, seemingly, has come to identify itself wholly as how it is NOT the right, and with sadly predictable results.
Do you believe Iran when they say that they will destroy Israel with nuclear fire Josh? If not, why not?
I would describe the “liberal” belief about the Other as being paternalistic. It may be racialist to some degree but I don’t have a need to use buzzwords like Josh does.
And BTW, Josh, your analogy doesn’t work since we aren’t looking to de-code the words “liberals” use; we are taking their actual words at face value and satirizing them.
That is the acthole in a nutshell. What that putrid, pubescent, pimply porker could possibly see in visiting this site is beyond me. The writing skills of a dyslexic parapelegic and the comprehension of a single cell organism combined with fits of hubris results in turd droppings all over every thread.
So, let the turds drop. Just step around them and go on.
I like to come here to read the latest from FIRE. I’m eagerly awaiting their arrival at all institutions of learning in this country.
Actually I think Defense guy has it about right. Still the left’s tendency to use condescending, paternalistic language towards anyone who isn’t a WASP, then cry racism at all those who point that tendency out is odd. Even more odd is their-bug eyed castigation of people of color who happen to disagree with them on political matters (Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell, etc. etc.) Josh, instead of casting any light on this strange behaviour has shown up and cried racism, at Jeff and anyone else who happens to wander into his path. Fortuantely it’s easier to make fun of him thant just point out what a jerk he is being.
Lord you’re dumb. I have no evidence that anyone here is a racist and I’ve never made that accusation. Jeff objected to Neiwert’s argument that, even though there’s no evidence indicating that mainstream Republicans are racists, they nonetheless are because they favor the same policies that genuine racists do. I agree with Jeff that this is a bad argument and an unfounded accusation. But I then pointed out that Jeff sometimes does the same thing, when he characterizes opposition to various “classical liberal” ideas vis a vis the middle east as somehow premised on a racist view of Arabs and Persians. It’s pretty fucking simple, hardly a “rhetorical knot,” and I lack the patience to keep explaining it to someone too stupid or ideologically blinkered to understand it.
But I then pointed out that Jeff sometimes does the same thing, when he characterizes opposition to various “classical liberal†ideas vis a vis the middle east as somehow premised on a racist view of Arabs and Persians.
Josh, you ignorant slut. Jeff’s characterizations are based on actual statements not the telepathic power to read minds and decipher hidden meanings in text. Your examples have already been shot down. Try again.
Of course, that might just be true.
Are liberals and conservatives equally likely to embrace the disreputable, extremist position that the racist concentration camps we set up during WWII were proper and justified?
Are there liberal websites like LGF, the vast majority of whose posters actually applaud the burning of Muslim schools?
Fact 1: Most Republicans are NOT vile racists.
Fact 2: If all the vile racists in the US refused to vote, the Republican party would suffer.
Same deal as those who HATE homosexuals–they aren’t a majority of your guys’ party, but man oh man you’re in trouble if they stay home this November.
Fact 3: if all the non-vile racists who are sanctioned by polite society were to stay home—the social constructionists who populate current non-genetic racial theory, those who defend identity politics and unconstitutional race-based affirmative action, the “leaders” of the race industry—the Dems would be in trouble.
And last I checked, many blacks (traditionally Dem voters) and Catholics (traditionally Dem voters) are dubious about same-sex marriage. Which I see you’ve conflated with HATE-ing gays, but that’s to be expected, I guess…
Which actual statements? BTW, I think you missed Jeff’s statement that he’s not actually ascribing those views, he’s just doing some rhetorical judo on the race-baiters.
Uh huh. Look, more double-layered irony:
No attempt there to associate people with Nazis. Just turnin’ Buchanan’s constant accusations of Nazism back on him.
This sentence needs another clause. That aside, are the non-vile racists sanctioned by polite society racists, or is this more irony?
Huh?
Bullshit. How many black racists vote? How many vote Republican? How many vote Democrat?
Aryans aren’t voting for George Bush. Have you seen his Seretaries of State?
The “huh?” comment goes to your previous post.
And the non-vile racists sanctioned by polite society don’t think of themselves as being racists. They just happen to support policies that are “racist” is the sense that they promote the interests of certain select races over others.
The irony is only that they are blinkered to their own objective racism—defined as “discrimination or prejudice based on race.”
No code or mind-reading needed. It just is.
Josh, I see you’ve managed not to read Geek, Esq.’s posts either, that’s half the trick isn’t it? Knowing when to close your eyes.
So what’s all that Jeff Gannon chatter, and what’s this juvenile foolishness of trying to associate Jeff with the term man*shake? Is that embracing homosexuality?
I wish I was a Republican so I could tell you to go fuck yourself, Josh.
Well, the frontrunner for your party’s nomination has stated that Jerry “The fags and feminists caused 911” Falwell isn’t an agent of intolerance.
To his credit, Rudy Giuliani refuses to suck up to Falwell and his fellow Orcs. Which means that he has no shot at the Republican presidential nomination.
Perhaps some code breaking is needed, Jeff. I’m sure a number of our friends from the left will be rummaging around the floor in search of their eyeballs after reading my suggestion that there are black racists.
That’s just not how it’s supposed to work. And yet, it just is.
“if all the vile racists in the US refused to vote, the Republican party would suffer”.
Oh, really?
I guess no democrat can be a racist, is that it?
Now, before you answer, I would invite you to consider the Sharpton/Mckinney/Farrakhan/Jackson/Byrd mob.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say there were one or two vile racists in there.
And if it follows that no democrat wins national office without 90% support from the followers of these vile racists, then who is harmed more by said racists sitting on their hands?
Or are you really going to try to convince anyone that these are not racists?
The white man is the devil,as the “late” Malcolm X used to say.
So Josh what’s it going to be? Are you actually going to put your principles where your mouth is and take Geek, Esq. on? Or are you just going to call me names? This is a test, btw let’s see how you fare.
First, it’s not my party. I’ve voted Republican once.
Second, my opinion of McCain is easy enough to find. I’d vote for him only if I had to hold my nose to do it as a way of keeping a left-liberal out of the White House. And in fact, I criticized him for his sucking up to Falwell on my radio show last week.
I disagree with Guilianni on certain issues, but I trust in his sincerity. I’m not convinced that McCain is anything more than an egomaniac. And McCain-Feingold is horrific legislation, as is his “anti-torture” legislation.
I see Geek,Esq is back to his usual cheap slanders.
Um, everyone knows that, for example, black cops can racial profile too.
Yes, there are black racists, and many of them come out and say that they hate whitey. And where is the rebuke of “Calypso Louie” and his wonderful collection of anti-semitic Nation of Islam goons?
I can’t hear it from the Democratic side of the fence.
Because it isn’t happening. So don’t start the “only whites can be racist” BS, because it is BS. Really.
Don’t worry, Robin. Josh is going to swoop in soon and take care of Geek. He’s been looking hard for just that sort of thing all day.
Josh at 3:02 pm (since I’m skipping comments to answer this direct)
Holding Israel to an different standard, and to one by which they can never be the “good guys” is the epitome of antisemitism.
Anything you want to confess to here?
BTW… the problem of actus, Josh, Niewart.. or leftists in general when dealing with non-leftists is one where they have substituted “social justice” for “personal morality.” While regular folk (like NASCAR brethren) can think of “the other” individual as a good egg regardless of disagreeing with social/political values, the leftists hold those that disagree with them as morally berift, therefore lessor or evil beings.
Thus when a “Palestinian” goes into to a Tel Aviv marketplace and blows up men women and children, it doesn’t really horrify the Left. They expect such “tragic” “lamentable” action because ISRAEL as a whole is “socially injust” therefore any horror visited against even its smallest, youngest member is to be “expected”.
“If all the vile racists in the US refused to vote, the Republican party would suffer.”
That’s what Blue State Dems like to tell themselves so they can sleep at night. The actual vile racists are still, as ever, largely yellow-dog democrats and proud of it. They might kick the dog, but they do it because they hate the boss.
Did someone from teh “reality based” left just call me an Orc?
(Actus, I am not really Jerry.)
Wouldn’t that be so nice if he commented here? Wonder if we would get any identity politics based on who is going to hell and who isn’t.
You don’t want to know after your “baby jesus butt plug” comment.
They truely believe a large segment of the population are racist hicks, and not actually just decent people. You can feel that inflated, smug sense of moral superiority.
Darleen at 11:30 PM:
“BTW… the problem of actus, Josh, Niewart.. or leftists in general when dealing with non-leftists is one where they have substituted “social justice†for “personal morality.†While regular folk (like NASCAR brethren) can think of “the other†individual as a good egg regardless of disagreeing with social/political values, the leftists hold those that disagree with them as morally berift, therefore lessor or evil beings.”
Roger, that.
Not only that, but the leftists hold those whom they purport to ‘help’ as inferior and incapable of helping themselves.
Because they’re objectively pro-saddam.
To revisit the “does the Iranian president mean it when he says Israel should be wiped off the map” issue: I just took an informal poll of my wife (an Amherst College/Harvard Law-educated liberal) on that very question. My framing of the question was, should one base one’s foreign policy towards Iran on that statement if you are Israel or the US?
Her response was, “It’s a different kind of rhetoric over there [in the Middle East].” To some extent, I have only to think of We Love the Iraqi Information Minister to agree somewhat. On the other hand, that’s easy for me to say as an American, thousands of miles away. Doesn’t Israel have to assume the threat is real?
Considering they have been under assault since their inception, I think it is beyond an assumption.
[…] assumptions about the three hundred million people who share this nation with you, hmm? I mean, it’s like you work for NBC or something. Posted by JohnAnnArbor @ 11:27 pm | Trackback Share […]