It's being said more and more lately, but I'll say it again, right and left isn't the dividing line; it's supporters of freedom of speech and thought against the budding authoritarians.
Remember Brennan naming libertarians domestic terrorists and Russian agents along with Trump, his supporters and anybody who questioned the narrative? “Putin apologists”. This coming from a corrupt spook who was a registered member of the Communist Party, converted to Islam, a big time China aficionado, antisemite spied on Congress, Senate, journalists, imprisoned James Rosen and was a creator of the Gitmo torture program
Bret Weinstein had a terrific idea for a presidential ticket. One right of center candidate, one left of center, both sworn Patriots.
Years ago, two unlikely senators became very close allies. Thought very different in certain views, both were scrupulously honest, wanted the CIA, Fed abolished, withdrew from the divisive UN, end any further NATO buildup, secure the border, transparency, do not allow Communism a foothold in America and went to Reagan together, pleading that he take responsibility for Iran/Contra
One of them, deemed “ far right”, I still can’t figure out why, vocally called to end the War On Drugs, was pro-choice and very unhappy w/ Reagan’s “ Moral Majority” and Falwell’s presence in Reagan’s admin. He was responsible for rescuing persecuted Jews from the Soviet Union and wasn’t an anti-LGBT zealot. His son was gay.
Tha aforementioned Senator was none other than libertarian Barry Goldwater.
His friend across the aisle was Daniel Patrick Moynihan.An incredibly decent man with an exceptional understanding of the human condition. Both were unfairly smeared and stabbed in the back
Move-on.org sent me a message about giving money requiring masks and vaccine passports for being able to vote in the next election. It would assure Republicans would not vote. See how fast the Democrats will remove masks.
Move On.Org is an authoritarian propaganda tentacle of the globalist elite kleptotechnocratic WEF/UN/NATO/BlackRock/Vanguard/StatStreet NWO Elite psychopaths.I’m trying to wrap my head around the Faustus worship. Have said “ liberals” forgotten they were the ones who exposed Faustus torture, denying the usage of cheap, safe, effective repurposed drugs that would have saved the lives of 17,000 plus AIDS victims? The hysteria, homophobia and false information spread by Fauci,Collins,Gallo,Grady( Fauci’s wife w/Nazi connections), the “Medical Kidnapping” of minority orphans, foster children and disabled wards of state used as human guinea pigs for gruesome experimental AIDS vaccines and excruciating medical experiments. Many were disabled for life, scores died, it was covered up, later exposed and continues to this day. The Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Coverup, NC. Lab leaks, fake pandemics, risky research, scapegoating Dr. Steven Hatfill as the Anthrax Killer, using impoverished girls from a remite India village as HPV vaccine guinea pigs w/o the knowledge of India’s government. The girls were left crippled, infertile and many died. Ditto impoverished Africans told they were being vaccinated for smallpox, polio,measles,mumps,TB,
Patent theft, Pharma ties, ruined careers, animal torture. Dr Kary Mullis, PCR test inventor and thirty plus year memos of Fauci who suddenly dropped dead 2,months prior to announcing the Plandemic?
Meanwhile, Dr. Robert Malone, one of the original inventors of the mRNA technology, Dr. Harvey Risch, Dr. Jay Bhattacharaya,,Dr.John Ionnides,Drs Michael Levitt( , Kary Mullis,Luc Montagnier,(Nobel Pize winners) John Ionnides, McCollough,Hatfill,Lapado,Makary, Oz,Drew Pincus, Oskqui, the Chinese whistleblowers are all “ Finge Right Wing White Supremacists”? Most are liberal, several are not white, all are published in multiple top medical periodicals, several were consultants with the NIH, CDC.None are “ anti-vax flat earthers”. They are honorable professionals who take the Hippocratic Oath and Nuremberg Code as inviable doctrine
Because Demos can't get mail in voting, they want No mask, No vax, No vote. They want to perpetuate this nightmare. I think it is as useless attempt at getting money.
A picture is circulating widely today showing Governor Hochul and four other adults standing maskless behind five young children wearing heavy masks. She was announcing that her mask mandates were being extended! Many other Democrats have done this while saying masks are required.
Pseudo-Libertarianism (or better, call it Naive-Libertarianism) is the Trojan Horse Neoliberalism rode in on. The Koch Brothers are called libertarians--they are just fascists in reality. The same is true of the Blue Anon tech bros like Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt and all the rest. All of these people claim to be libertarians But they really mean: "Liberty for me not for thee." They are all essentially authoritarian.
Not trying to be intentionally argumentative, but what parts of the Reason program, exactly, are authoritarian? What positions do they take, specifically, that bug you?
How many times were we warned by great thinkers that this could happen in and to America ? Huxley,Bradbury,Serling,Orwell,Asimov, Welch, Goldwater, Moynihan, Solzhenitsyn,Hesse, Gandhi, Wiesenthal,Kubrick, Styron, Burgess,
I find Reason Magazine Libertarians to be some of the most authoritarian bootlickers on the planet. Then again, I throw up a little bit in my mouth whenever the Neocons at National Review start talking about how they are a "principled" bastion of conservatism and respecting the Constitution.
The difference between a libertarian and an anarchist is that the libertarian thinks that private property is an expression of liberty. And that's why I'm a barbarian.
Bingo. I'm an unreconstructed redneck from Louisiana and I feel far more sympicato with people like Matt T, Russell Brand and Green Greenwald than any of the tired Reaganite/neocon clowns on the so-called "right."
I hate to break it to you, but the neocons are on the authoritarian left now. The world has turned upside down... the "elites" don't care about anything except blind allegiance to whatever will make them more money.
LOL they neocons aren't interested in principles, just power. They will spew anything to get people to go along with them. They were NEVER reading Hayek.
Most of them were originally Marxists. Marxism, in practice, is pretty authoritarian -"dictatorship of the proletariat," really meaning of the Party, and so on.
Your first statement, which sounds so bizarre as to smack of satire, is in fact historically correct. At least as far as the originators of American neoconservatism as a philosophy.
In the second statement, "the proletariat" means "the working class." Which is not the way Soviet Russia, the nations of the Eastern bloc, the People's Republic of China and other Marxist Socialist regime is actually governed. They all adopted Leninism- political rule by "the vanguard" (sometimes ultimately just one person, as with North Korea) that purports to look out for the interests of the workers, the masses. To clarify what you meant by "really meaning the Party", i.e., the vanguard.
In this case, they used "straw man via false binary".
As if the only choices (in an invented, false dichotomy) were Hayek or Marx.
Nice of Matt to point out the clever-but-complete-bullshit techniques they use. Some of them, clever as they may be, are getting awfully tired, and people are widely aware of the bogus nature of the knee-jerk, intellectually vaporous accusations of "racist!" or "transphobe" or "you used a wrong word!! reeee!".
Oh, absolutely. It's their Trotsky DNA reasserting itself. The entire neocon project was gnostic -- "let's inaugurate an end of history utopia of American consumer culture at the point of the bayonet". I can understand why (for example) a manufacturer of military equipment would support that sort of thing, but why anyone ever thought it was "conservative" is completely beyond me.
But they can invariably count on Graham, McConnell, Cheney,,Boot,McCaul,Bolton,French, Jonah Goldberg, Steven Hayes to prop them up. Note the warmongers have no skin in the game. It’s not their kids who are being sent to their ruin.Otherwise they might think twice.This isn’t about Japan attacking Pearl Harbor ( which could have been avoided), the Nazis taking over the west, a nuclearized Soviet Union.. This is our saber rattling and encroachment.It’s also about our sellout to China, now a far more formidable superpower.
The unspoken irony is those cheering for war with Russia on both sides of the aisle are heavily vested in China.And now, Russia and China have partnered
Ah, Enoch. Wise enough to be taken up, like your namesake.
And you point out something valuable, and it needs to be shouted from the rooftops.
The Change which is occurring isn't just the much-ballyhooed phenomenon of lefties leaving the absurdities and meme-generating stupidity of the "Woke" camp, BUT YOU AND ME AND MILLIONS OF EX-RIGHT WINGERS WAKING UP AND FINDING THERE IS NO OTHER CAMP! THERE IS NO "RIGHT SIDE" IN THIS F'ING COUNTRY, not among the Dems, not among the Alt-right, not among the Republicans and not among the CRT/idpol/progressive/woke crowd of lunatics.
I've spent a lot of time being accused of "conservatism" and being a "right-winger" and blahdeblah, funny thing is, in my long life, no one, not one person who knew me, has EVER considered me a conservative. And I have ZERO expectation that the Republican Party will bravely fix the country...but we still have to throw the insane Dems out, because they, in cahoots w/ the MIC, the media, Big Pharma/Oil/Tech/etc. and the wild-eyed looneys of the Idpol Brigade, are trying to implement a police state with them permanently in charge. F. That. We need to throw them out and, and...break their cahoots!
So it's hardly a one-sided departure from the stupid Right/Left, Dem/Repub dichotomy that has lost all usefulness. LOT of ex-liberals and ex-conservatives out here in the real world, and for the sake of my children, and the country and everyone in it, I pray we can wake up and break the paradigm that threatens us.
I liked Goldwater far more than I did Reagan and not a partisan. Unfortunately our government is set up in a way that it’s all or nothing. I despise McConnell, Pelosi, Graham, Schumer, Cheney, Nadler, Schiff, Cornyn , the far left and the far right.
Essentially, if there are individuals on either side of the aisle that I do like, it doesn’t matter, because they are forced to fall in line with the party.In other words, there are no choices, nor is there any truth. Most of our “ elected officials” are clueless in global affairs. They’re uniformed or misinformed and create policies, make decisions based on perceived knowledge and double down on bad decisions.
Exactly what I have conclude. Fundamentally it's the authoritarian mentality against the anti-authoritarian mentality. Unfortunately, it's easier to organize the authoritarians.
Just to expand a bit on your insight of adding the vertical dimension, I tend to think that there is a geometric shape that contains all isms, wings, and nations, yet maintains the absolute power of just a few. This shape is, of course, the pyramid.
If we live, work, and think inside a pyramidal hierarchy—which we mostly all do—we may squabble among ourselves about political, economic, or religious differences, but we remain firmly in our place inside the lower strata of the pyramid. In this model of world-wide organization, it is not left vs right, authoritarian vs libertarian, or (most ridiculously) U.S. vs Russia that matters. It is all of us beneath the top vs those very, very few (rulers, oligarchs, archons, puppeteers, whatever you want to call them) in the vertex. The 99 percent vs the 1 percent estimate reflects this notion of embedded, rigged, and seemingly inescapable geometry of the world order.
I am thinking of "crowdsourcing" in the sense of "the wisdom of crowds" phenomenon in which groups of **independent** thinkers and analysts who combine or average their individual opinions are smarter than the sum of their parts.
Groupthink of course is the opposite effect of each crowd member following the others unthinkingly so that the whole is dumber than the sum of its parts.
But I see your point that one could "crowdsource" cancel culture as well. So maybe "crowdsourcing" isn't the ideal word I'm looking for.
Collectivism. The stuff of tyrannical manipulation. Our system has become a government neither for or by the people. It’s a duopolous Uniparty punctuated by polar extremes working against”We The People”.To survive as a nation,we deserve better than a choice between which we hate less.
There is no transparency, only edicts scripted behind closed doors. Each day I see laws adopted by states where the issues were not made public.Who are the people behind them? When I approach people from different walks of life, spanning the racial, cultural, economic and ideological spectrum, nobody can answer. They were never asked for input.
As per the trucker protests, I do support their cause, but question the venues accepting the donations.
Ditto the super pacs. If I’m donating to a specific political candidate, it’s because I’m supporting the candidate, not a community pot.Not Act Blue or Act Red, not a scam like CrowsSource who then decides to shift the funds elsewhere. Not to be used as a mechanism to shut down the cause I’m standing with.
So you'll be able to speak your mind in the back of the R250 NSA jumbo detainee bus on your way to the gulag. A shot fired for the 1st amendment, ex post facto.
The Liberal Borg Cube is TERRIFIED. The population is no longer acting like dogs in a Pavlovian experiment. People like Russell scare the World Economic Forum's Borg Cube because he's an actual liberal who believes in freedom of thought and free expression, in contrast to the terrible slogans and empty platitudes used by the Borgs to subvert any kind of nuanced discussion or honest conversations.
At this point, the oligarchy and their technocratic elite’s blindness has reached biblical proportion, almost guaranteeing that they have sown the seeds of their destruction (at least for now). Because they view human beings like beasts to be herded, controlled by threats of punishment and reward, pain and pleasure, the human response to tyranny, typified by the Canadian truckers, has come as a genuine surprise, so much so that the Canadian Prime minister was whisked away after declaring the Canadian Freedom Convoy a “fringe minority” only a few days earlier. As “fringes” become majorities and once unknown individuals become world-leaders, so “the last will be first and the first will be last.”
Yes hahahaha. They really are Borgs. It’s pretty funny. In Canada we have Trudeau, Chrystia Freeland (a very crafty and high-level borg with many portfolios), in the US Psaki, Jake Sullivan, all the Rhodes scholars populating Biden’s admin, and KAmala, they really have a Borg thing going on. It’s kind of funny. Once people see through the platitudes and their careful study of human behaviour, and see how they just can’t quite get it, it just goes to show, these are not smart people, they just have a playbook. They’re keying off behavioural science and such, but they have zero interest in truth, they couldn’t care less, they’re just trying to assimilate their enemies.
Thats’s pretty much it. They don’t have any real goals or purpose lol.
Fair enough. I guess I should qualify that. Their purpose is to preserve their power and enslave people. However, if we're getting metaphysical here, I don't think that's a purpose in life, it's the opposite. They are so out of touch with their humanity, their own creative abilities, so they just behave like Borgs reading from a script, doing what they see as necessary to destroy and assimilate their enemies.
I don't consider that an actual purpose, in human terms. As Augustine would put it, evil is not a some thing, it's the opposite, it's the absence of something, of that thing that makes one human and good. They just have none of it. Hence, their only talents are lying, subversion, and deception.
AND a goal they can see almost within their grasp...𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒. Locked-in rule by the self-anointed elite, an American version of the WEF/Davos global dream. This is why they are so desperate to pass that "Voting Rights" bill...no ID validation, non-citizens voting, oh they want it sooo bad.
And they have to have it before the mid-terms. If they can't pass it, I fully expect some kind of "emergency" to justify a push to "delay" the election.
That will be the signal for a real revolution, because they'll be in power, desperate, with no legitimate options.
The 18-wheeler hoedown being staged in Ottawa (and soon to debut in many major U.S. metropolitan statistical areas) is an astroturf campaign conceived and underwritten by the very same "oligarchy" and "technocratic elite" you so confidently deride. You know this, too, you devil you.
"Blindness?" The "beasts" have already been herded, Gosselin---and accordingly every eukaryote and prokaryote and everything else nailed down and not nailed down and upon which a price tag can be affixed is on the balance sheet of these lords and ladies, the result of a very arduous but focused 50-year cattle-drive executed by a field of thousands through stealth and public propaganda campaigns.
"Freedom of thought and free expression." "Terrible slogans." "The human response to tyranny." "Sown the seeds of their destruction." You're already sounding like the most prolix and followed agitator at Gulag #9. The "fringes" have always been the "majorities." They've also have lacked capital and power and we know what that will get you and what it won't get you---maybe a song written about you if you buy the right bag of peanuts in the right time zone from the right vendor...
But then you people have been unnecessarily cranky ever since Uncle Lyndon (Larouche) passed through and into the netherworld, no doubt simultaneously cultivating and irritating the leading ghouls and vampires of THAT realm. Always at the ready to summarize the "peanut gallery," always unable to bead the right fix.
Your response has a Borg-like quality to it. What direction do you want the discussion to go in with a comment like that? It seems like the only possible purpose a comment like that has is to obfuscate and divert. It's definitely not making much sense otherwise.
The truckers are astroturfed? And what, the Canadian government is just trying to restore order lool?
Again, you sound like a Borg. You've studied human behavior and tried to imitate it, but unfortunately for you, you didn't quite get it.
To anybody who has put in 15 minutes of research of who you are, who you work with, who your sponsors and paymasters are, who are well aware of the obviousness of their sympathies and network loyalties, my post makes perfect sense.
"What direction do you want the discussion to go in with a comment like that?"
Now that you have posed the question, anywhere away from your facile bullshit and 3rd-rate propaganda.
So far 78,792 people have donated to the FreedomConvoy2022. I did not know that there are so many people in the "oligarchy" and "technocratic elite"!
Also, the average donation is about $90. That certainly is BIG MONEY!
Thank you for correcting my ignorance.
Given the rate of donations, we should have 150,000 people by the end of the week in your categories, and the US government will decide that Social Security should be capped at $90 a month since that is real WEALTH!
That’s really not proof of some ‘revolt against the oligarchy’ by itself, though. Hillary had over half-a-million small donors that netted her over $105,000,000 in campaign funds, and she was “of the oligarchy.”
I said nothing about "donations." But then you know this. If I organize a car wash, fund it, and later set up a fund-raising mechanism in conjunction is both logical and, while linked, is a separate action. Come on, it's a common feature of the Authoritarian/Libertarian far-right grift. Now, I KNOW you know this...
If you had researched Gosselin as I have, this would make perfect sense. And you're one of the less obtuse commenters here---but obtuse you still are. And Canadian.
I vaguely remember seeing you post comments elsewhere that were somewhat to the point. Your comment here, on the other hand, reads like you snorted an 8-ball of coke and then tried to do an impression of a particularly pretentious freshman polisci major.
My comment was very much to the point. You simply are too far out of range of the real point to see it, let alone discern it. You need fresh coordinates. Everybody here does.
Emphasis on "particularly pretentious". Replete with obscure (of course) renaissance painting for an avatar. My guess is he might have gone Piero, if not for the expose about 5 years ago - too well known now, so up with Bartolomeo.
Then again, if he's claiming the surname, Lucrezia, perhaps he's just an Italian. I think that name would come from the latin word, lucrum, meaning wealth. This would add a funny context to his diatribe to Gosselin.
Don't be lazy. Lucrezia, and her place in history, is easily googled and researched. In the original Latin connotation Lucrezia meant "success," which was later translated into "wealth" in renaissance Italy. Always amusing to stumble across a mook who throws up the arms and cries "pretentious." At the risk of again sounding pretentious: go fuck yourself.
e. pierce then rises from his lounger and changes the channel or adjusts the volume---manually. Though the remote sits at arm’s length, certainly within his reach, on the end table, he prefers exercising the body via a perfunctory lunge, an ambulatory crawl, relishing the tactile sensation offered by the knobs and dials.
Collectively these are more than throwback gestures, acts of defiance (though they are these too); they are an abject repudiation of, and rebellion against, machines, gadgets, objects with numbers. It is a silent almost pagan-like protest. A vain attempt, perhaps, to counter the prevailing ethos of technopoly. pierce then wipes his nose and silently makes a note of this.
e. pierce a child of Cicero? Is pierce a registered democrat despite being, philosophically speaking, a republican? pierce is demonstrably indifferent to all oaths of homage, and keeps only jesters, dogs and falcons.
Explains a jester in pierce's employ: "He's a fairly easy audience. Sometimes I'll deliver a short monologue after work and before dinner. He often writes the material himself. He really enjoys hearing his own material performed. When he's a bit blue, usually late at night, I'll perform a Danse Macabre with a sort of ironic twist. Seems to boost his spirits somewhat. A brief respite from all the eugenic problems. All in all, nothing too fancy, he prefers the old forms..."
Most of the time. Occasionally it’s followed with” are great”.😜Unless coming from the MSM or the once Democrat Party, now the Cult Of Death. Once they crossed the line by openly wishing death upon anybody daring to differ with their mantra of misery, they showed their true selves, karma be damned.
Generally speaking I agree, but in this instance I think that it's more than suitable---it almost constitutes a polite gesture---to refer to the followers, supplicants and sycophants of Lyndon Larouche as "you people."
Justin Trudeau and his parents are ardent supporters of tyranny. Castro, Mao, Stalin… they couldn’t get enough. It is incredibly bizarre once very common knowledge. It’s now the common tents of the Democrat Party. You don’t hear much from the GOP, either. But Tucker cut right to the chase.The Bush Cartel was big into Mao, the Nazis and Fauci as well.. The Carter’s, Pelosi, Willie Brown, Jerry Brown,Guggenheims, Getty, Ford and Rockefeller Foundations were the largest sponsors of Jim Jones People’s Temple and helped make Jonestown in Guyana possible. It was promoted as a “ Utopian Socialist Multiracial Agragrarian Society”. They were forbidden from having children and if a pregnancy occurred, the mother was forced to abort. Are you seeing a pattern? BLM, Antifa, AOC, the far left, Fauci, Gates, Soros,Bloomberg, Schwab, Xi, the bizarre metastasis of Europe’s childless leaders, the encouragement of gay, lesbian, trans, pronoun obsessed ,CRT public school, military and inter-agency indoctrination. It has NOTHING to do with anti-racism or LGBT tolerance and awareness. It is about population control, the destruction of the nuclear family and diminishing reproduction. Most of my black and LGBTQ friends are well aware of aware of what’s driving the narrative. Many adore children, adopt or have children via surrogates and heterosexual friends they trust..The big push for transgenderism is sterility, not compassion. It is a travesty. Ditto the.mRNA vaccine technology’s dirty little secret.
Chimeric animal to animal creation and human/animal embryos now progressing to fetuses and hybrids. China has created primate pig cross species, humanized pigs, but the most awful is the insertion of primate brain tissue into human fetal tissue. The very real fear is if successful, it can cause a mutation where the human brain will be devoid of humanity, resulting in an easily controlled transhuman serfdom. Fauci is engaged in this ghoulish Faustian , Mengelian Island of Dr. Moreau
e. pierce is indisputably a Goldberg In Search of a McCann.
e. pierce states: In Buddhist practice, the first of the four noble truths maintains that life is suffering. Now, this may or may not be true---but. What we can say, with a fair amount of certainty, is that most Americans’ lives are from time to time marked by random moments of confusion and despair. Indeed, by e. pierce's reckoning, life for many Americans probably seems, to them, like nothing but confusion and despair.
e. pierce asks: Can we fix this? We don't know. Our exponentially increasing numbers of technological gadgets promise much distraction from real world problems and a brief holiday from the troubling goings-on in our own minds. This is nothing at which to sneeze. Or so says e. pierce.
e. pierce continues: The three negative emotions that afflict our society---attachment, aversion, ignorance---unpleasant subjects to be sure, but if we are to remain a great nation then we’re going to have to address these feelings. Now. Immediately. It will require great stores of humility, studied contemplation, and a willingness to roll up our sleeves and have at it.
What precisely is the source of our national anomie, this creeping malaise? asks e. pierce, earnestly. The price we pay for all the gadgets? Or is it a product of a long-festering disgust with potentates, foreign and domestic? Again, we don't know. What is needed today in America, e. pierce believes, is a fresh set of talking points, an altered rough draft of this great nation’s history...
e. pierce is a noted Mariner of the People. The Potomac river. e. pierce quietly seethes at the cigarette-boat crowd, and their cowboy-like maneuvering of these too-slick-by-half class of water craft, even though there's none to be found on the muddy doldrums of the Potomac where pierce negotiates the elements.
He quietly pooh-poohs, too, the summer yachtsmen and their aircraft-sized vessels (Nimitz class) with which they ply the waters.
Bur e. pierce's water craft of choice? Not a sailboat, typical of the nautically inclined, but a kon-tiki inspired balsa wood raft, as modest as a sloop can be. e. pierce's ignorance of sailing is nearly absolute---he is first and foremost most a loyal devotee of terra firma.
But pierce is nevertheless conversant with a smattering of the sailor's esoteric nomenclature: Egyptian Galley; top-gallent sail, trim, turnbuckle, gunkholing, whisker pole, scrimshaw, gabbywrinkle, Irish pennant, fiddle, scarfed, lazarette, etc.
The aesthetics of smoking. Is e. pierce a smoker? I'd wager not, but an entry in the pierce "smoker's journal" might read something like this:
"A filthy habit all in all, but: The unique timbre and pitch of the sound of the struck match. The reliable pleasure offered by a favored brand. The upward draft, dream-like, of the billowing blue vaporous smoke that gives off a not necessarily pleasant odor before it dissipates into the ether, real or mystical, whichever you prefer.
The repetitious hand-to-mouth gesture that is as eternal as fire itself. The extended exhalations leading to an all-too fleeting exaltation. The dizziness, the mild nausea..."
In the decline of our American railroads e. pierce can clearly see and hear the Ghosts of Walden. Once our railroads were the envy of the modern world. A monumentally complex web of private and public transportation networks that gave birth to the notion of unfettered mobility and a new sense of possibilities...in both time and space, e.pierce recalls.
e. pierce continues: Before the age of the automobile, when this type of personal mobility became the norm, American railroads aggressively promoted the great westward migration and elaborated a new notion of "freedom" to all Americans.
Our railroads created, and then by leaps and bounds extended, a new mode of highly efficient industrial delivery. American railroads served notice that here was a young, vibrant nation on the move, girding itself for the future, indeed flaunting its raw industrial might.
American railroads constituted a can-do spirit and the greatest building project since the construction of the great pyramids by the Egyptian Pharoahs. This is the sort of things that stays with e. pierce, as well it ought.
There are so many politically homeless people now it's like we're living in LA. They show they're not capable of objectivity by when they do this. It's a feeble minded person who when you provide facts and evidence their only retort is "racist", "transphobic", etc.
Yeah, well I used to be called a libertarian or social liberal/fiscal conservative. Called myself that and was referred to that way by my progressive writer friends. Now anyone who doesn't think exactly like they do who dares to question the left or make a health decision on their own is a "right wing white supremacist" and an "insurrectionist." And of COURSE, a racist. And must be demonized and cancelled, unfriended, and never published again. But I'd rather be called a "right winger" than a progressive fascist socialist CRT racist which is who they are now. Maybe we should start viewing that as a compliment. Here is an example I love. My husband's cousin is a progressive. He picked my address off his brother's email (where they were hounding us to get vaccinated) to which I responded with my reasons why I didn't want to do that. I had never talked to this guy before, but he told me I was not capable of critical thinking and should get vaccinated. I should "go with the science." We have been fighting now for several months. And he finally said, "you are opinionated aren't you, and very anti-science." I said, "YOU emailed me and told ME and told me I should get vaccinated. I did not email you and tell you NOT to get vaccinated. Because guess what, I MIGHT be wrong and don't want that responsibility for other people. But HOW DARE I think for myself and have an opinion for my OWN health and family that diverges from the propaganda science or what YOU think I should do. I'm opinionated? Opinionated my ass." I said. How dare I think for myself and make my own decisions on my health? Right? And of course that makes ME a fanatic. This is how they think. We should all follow consensus like sheep even when there is no long term testing, injuries and people are dying. And they don't WORK, possibly increase infectivity and do NOT stop transmission. This should have been rolled out for high risk people only and then been given with informed consent. They are making such a mess of this country. I haven't heard Russell Brand before, but obviously many many people who believe in freedom have differing views, but we have THAT in common. We believe in debate and freedom. And that is where the new dividing line resides. People I don't agree with on everything like Tulsi, (Matt), Bill Maher, Joe Rogan, and more are people I realize I share much more in common than any particular fiscal issue. Thanks, Matt, for carrying on with the cause.
The only people they hate more than the out-group are the ones who 'should' be inside the in-group. Rogan and Greenwald and Taibbi and Brand all fit into that category. (So does Larry Elder!)
Right-winger now means anyone who cares about personal freedoms, free speech, freedom of the press, equality of opportunity, belief in character over skin color, data and science and maybe worst of all, the US Constitution. Progressives (aka the Democrat party these days) realize they control the narrative in this country because they now own our schools, our media, our tech companies and the Democrat party. Because they do control the narrative, they now see the opportunity to tear down America and rebuild it into their fantasy world (see sitting congresswoman AOC condemn the free market and all it stands for). They’ve become emboldened with their ability to influence leaders (Biden, Pelosi, etc) who once were semi moderate to become essentially socialists trying to tear our country apart. Sad thing is, they are getting away with it. CRT, open borders, labeling of anyone right of Trotsky as a Trump loving insurrectionist, tearing down police and parents, trying to pass bills that demand the federal government take over our children starting at age 4-5, tearing down our borders, and demanding that we all capitulate to non science edicts that do nothing to save lives. We all need to wake up. They are emboldened by their increasing power.
The Democratic leadership are corporatists; they serve the wealthiest corporations. If they were socialists, they would have passed Medicare for All and laws to make higher education and housing more affordable by now. They wouldn't have shipped all those jobs overseas or south of the border for cheap labor. Words have meaning. They are not socialists.
Bingo. Except, in this "post-modern" world, seems like words do not have the same meaning as before, and sometimes they are in deed exactly the opposite. Slavery (walking masked in the park) is freedom, war (provoking Russia and China) is peace...
The Dems definitely serve corporate masters but please rethink things like Medicare for all. This pandemic has shown clearly that they would then use that to coerce behavior. Even pleasant sounding programs like Medicare for all will ultimately be used by the sociopaths that ultimately go to centers of power like moths to flame. It will be used to control and hurt anyone they don't like.
lol morons like you will never learn, yes no medicare for all, but lets continue to spend trillions on failed system. You are saying just because politicians are corrupt we can't have things that we need. You are an objective moron lady.
Meanwhile, those so called "moderates" (Biden, Pelosi, Obama, both Clintons, Schumer, Newsome, et al endlessly...) have fought the good fight to absolutely pillage this country and countless others for the All Mighty Stock Market gains.
Guarantee if you think Biden's a "centrist", you're over 50 years old and have a nice little investment account.
For what it's worth, I totally agree with you about how absolutely nuts the new Red Scare is...calling people Nazis and racists and transphobes over a legitimate difference of opinion is Authoritarianism at best, Fascism at worst.
With no moral compass….. Biden is a proud member of Old Boys Network… pretending to care about this country has been a 50 year long gig for this corporate empty suit now complete with scrambled eggs for brains.
The stench of Biden-family's and Democrats' corruption is simply unbearable. Opposing it are equally incompetent Trump and rabid anti-China GOP clowns.
Have you seen what those investment accounts have been doing for the last month or two? Probably explains his current approval ratings better than most things. Trump was doing better at his worst.
Funny how that works isn't it. I have never once asked anyone if they have been vaccinated for anything, yet I can't count the number of people who have asked me about my Covid vax status, including of all people, my employer. My employer demanded that every employee state their Covid vax status. And after swallowing that bitter pill for the sake of work place harmony and job security, I thought I was done.
But wait! There is more. Now my employer is requiring that all employees fill out a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion ("DEI) survey in which I must state my race, including subrace, i.e. if Caucasian, then is it Irish, English, German, etc. And after that first DEI survey is completed, my employer will be requiring a second DEI survey in which we will be forced to answer questions about our "feelings" about race, gender, marginalized groups, etc. The gall. What's next? Will my employer be asking us employees if we practice safe sex along with a list of all sex partners and their race, gender and social class? I can't see why not.
They just cannot leave us alone. Label it however they wish, but it comes down to the single factor that "they" are far, far more interested in me than I am interested in them.
Right. They stick their noses into your business with THEIR opinions and then claim you have no right to an opinion or a health decision--everything is their business now. God, that sounds awful at work. Are you going to do it??
I see no downside to this. To begin with, the accuracy of the traditional labels is approximately nil. Even the use of the word "race" is unacceptably noisy- both from the standpoint of population biology taxonomy, and,well, how is "race" both a noun and a verb, in English? That's some bullshit, right there. (I learned to read English really well, but I get the people who have problems with it. Between the recent outbreak of Race Obsession and the Olympics, even I'm getting confused at times.)
To hell with it. The next time I'm asked my race on a form, I'm gonna say "Angel." And if they don't hire me, they don't hire me. Go on, fool. Walk away from a deal like that. That's my attitude. Could have hired an Angel. But no-o...
I'd prefer "Celestial"- such a cool word- but since it's an archaic label for the Chinese, they can have first rights of refusal on that one. No reason to forbid "Black" people or anyone else from using the Angel label, that's open source all the way. It's a lot to live up to, I admit. I'm hoping we Angels are up for the challenge, and that we're allowed a few mulligans. So to speak. But if you think Angel is too poofy or whatever, I respect your masculine insecurity...name yourself whatever you feel like. Even if you don't think Angel is too poofy, for that matter. Anything you like. Call yourself a member of the Anything race. Or the Airthing race. The Crosscountry race. It's all up for grabs. Open thread.
Oh, how I could go on...the English language is silly putty in my hands. I might have made a tenure-track Postmodernist, but somehow I just could never quite get to do it.
The entire playbook of modern progressives consists of slapping a bad-sounding label (racist, transphobe, right wing, etc) on any person they don’t like and then attacking the label, with the goal of discrediting the person as a person rather than engaging with their ideas.
This is because they know their own shitty ideas cannot survive open debate, which is why they must silence any opposition.
But thanks in no small part to people like Matt, the bloom is off the rose and people everywhere smell their bullshit for what it is — the attempted and soon-to-be-failed cancellation of Joe Rogan is the canary in the coal mine.
Just as the madness of McCarthyism passed, so too will the madness of the Church of Wokery.
His statement where he just threw the whole pile of shame words at the truckers (“racist, sexist, transphobic white supremacists” or something of the kind) was hilarious, an obvious jump the shark moment.
It’s actually even better than I remembered, he threw the whole kitchen sink of shame words in there, including Islamaphobia for some reason — Substack won’t let me paste the link (or anything else) for some reason but it was a tweet by Trudeau at 3:47pm on Feb 1.
It is odd that he thought Islamaphobia might move the needle. Maybe there are some working class Canadian Muslims he thought he could keep away from the protests.
Miles - honest question. When you say "is not working" what facts do you see on the ground that support that statement? I'm asking because I know you're Canadian and a clear-thinker. I probably read the same stories and accounts that you read but I'd be interested in getting an insider's view of things.
Well, for starters, at least 1 member of Trudeau's own caucus has said he needs to do better than just calling the truckers racist and hoping that makes them go away
Also, Alberta and Quebec provincial governments have made concessions to the truckers, so it's not like politicians are presenting a united front against the protests.
Trudeau is also struggling with borderline mutinies when he tries to crack down on the protests. The cops are dragging their feet, and tow truck drivers have flat out refused to tow protester trucks.
That, and this is a high profile, ongoing international news story that is making him look like an asshole. Trudeau is becoming increasingly isolated both within Canada and on the world stage. Progressive media will never admit as much, but the truckers are winning this game of chicken and Trudeau is losing.
I hope so. But the people who should be defending speech, or speaking out against the perpetual auto da fes, most recently against Rogan, aren't. Think of the "news" or commentariat who, until two years ago, were relatively normal. Now they pile on. Alternate media is growing around them. I blame the MM for this.
You are right, the press hasn't been free for a long time. Nevertheless, Russiagate and the smarmy, skin crawling inducing, ubiquitous Schiff look like the good old days-- before authoritarianism,
censorship and blocking stories and people, Hitlerian deracination ("de-centering" sounds so much better), lawlessness, indoctrinating eight-year-olds, abolishing sexual differences, "persons who menstruate," pronouns, abolishing education and employment standards and capitalism, biological men on womens' swim teams, went mainstream, looting and street violence mere reparations -- we deserve it. Bopped on the head at 64th and fifth? You deserve it. Shoved in front of a subway car? No big deal, unless you are Bipoc.
This is massively destabilizing in a liberal democracy. Intersectionality/CRT was in the pipeline, in HR, education. There was ample and ignored warning.
That's why Trump was elected. Party media never acknowledged the provocation--he was a symptom. The entire, ideological suite burst into the open with the taped murder of Floyd George in all its horror. . Racism was the cudgel. Marcuse said that free speech
would have to be put aside - as if it ever returns -- to get the job done. Orwell said about two per cent run the show; another thirteen percent enforce. Eighty-five percent were viewed as too dull to organize. Parents of all stripes are beginning to organize. Bi- racial FAIR and other groups are providing legal advice, crucial before our courts are completely overtaken. CRT began in ivy league law schools. If this weren't the US I'd say we're sunk. But we've got to deal with mass sociopathology, which began with indoctrination of our kids. Town by town, time for the teachers unions, which never put kids first and whose radicalized leadership got us here, to go. Hire competent, independent instructors.
Vs. "Persons who menstruate"? Property, speech, and individual rights are oppression? Saferooms? De- centering? Russia groupthink, fixation. and censoring extenuating information/not owning up to glaring falsehoods was the calling card,the sign that, media-wise, something was terribly wrong. Then came the mother lode.
But this seems different. Losing elections in Virginia and elsewhere. Iosing viewers, doesn't matter. They double down. They gaslighted, lied, and attacked parents after Virginia. It's a revolution- the fanatics have everyone intimidated, a dismaying lack of courage, the virtue I most admire. I thought when Brian Williams retired, he'd name it, but he didn't. Not a single mainstream news person has said "enough," no Murrow moment, in more dire circumstances.
I saw a clip of his sign- off: "I love my country" and "I'm a volunteer fireman." I expected him to say something more, maybe in time. I choose not to hate him and continue to hope that he steps up. God, there's so much hate.
>slapping a bad-sounding label (racist, transphobe, right wing, etc) on any person they don’t like and then attacking the label, with the goal of discrediting the person as a person rather than engaging with their ideas.
Its the Red Scare all over again. And line the Red scare, once you're accused you're put on the defensive trying to disprove a negative.
True, but the neocons taught them everything they know; they’re just redeploying the neocon tactic of labeling anyone opposed to neocon wars as ‘anti-American’ and ‘ unpatriotic ‘, etc., etc.
Bari Weiss is right wing? Bahahaha.... I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but jeez there has been a lot of effort to go after this guy (Rogan) and I can't help but think maybe our government is behind it.
Rogan's story is the swinging pocket watch for the news cycle's hypnotism.
Just keep your eyes on the watch, and breathe... breathe... your body is relaxing as we bathe your brain in dopamine and you're getting sleepy... sleeeeeeeepy...
When I snap my finger, we will be in the middle of WWIII and you'll completely support this without any hesitation. Wouldn't want to be labelled an outsider, would you?
Except it's done over days, not on a cheesy stage for a few minutes. The messaging is coordinated, the media blasts it as asides to the Rogan story: reasons we should be fighting a ground war through proxy but with Russia. But hey, did you hear how much we at NewsCunt 9 hate Joe Rogan the horse-past anti-vacccccckser???
My leftist friends (?) are consumed with the Rogan saga instead of going to war with Russia. They have also cancelled Spotify. I heard Rogan is on You Tube though too. Make it make sense. I've even had one taking digs at me after posting a meme that only banning books is censorship. Strange times indeed. If Trump did what Biden is doing, there would be endless outrage.
If this article is any indication of where political discourse is heading in this country, we're in for a terribly rough ride. The interesting thing about it is the amount of acrimony, sanctimony, and moral high dudgeon being exercised over incidents of trivial import. To read this woman, you'd think that Joe Rogan is engaged in the same project as George Lincoln Rockwell's dial-a-Nazi recorded phone messages, back in the 1960s https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/08/joe-rogan-spotify-podcast-racism-language-slur/
"Joe Rogan and Spotify offer a masterclass in getting rich off the race card"
Yes, that's the actual headline. The insinuation being that millions of Rogan viewers had been drawn to his show by the chance that they might experience the thrill of hearing him dropping n-bombs every so often. I think there's a stronger case to be made that in this case the people really reaping a benefit from the "race card" are the Washington Post, and the article author. And that the only "masterclass" in session is Introduction to Clickbait.
An excerpt:
"...Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, in a now-deleted tweet, argued that Rogan couldn’t be racist because he interacts and works with Black people. Oh, please. You know who else interacted with and worked a lot with Black people? Slave masters...."
Joe Rogan's explicit apology was mentioned, although apparently for the author only falling on his sword would suffice as proof of his sincerity. Granted, Rogan didn't apologize for holding black people in bondage, because that was never anything that he did. He simply apologized for his use of that all-time Offensive Speech, the "n-word."*
As John Stewart once commented in 2004- a time when, in retrospect, divisive political hyperbole by the American pundit class of major media outlets had just gotten into second gear:
'Stop, stop, stop, stop hurting America.'
[* And there's so much dishonesty about this. Since the rise of hip-hop it's so often gotten to be used informally and familiarly among males, including in multiracial groups, there are certainly any number of examples of rap that are simply unquotable without employing the Forbidden Word multiple times in a single verse...meanwhile, what's happened to the once-FCC forbidden "seven words you can't say on television?" The prohibition is treated as a joke on talk shows, "bleep failure" is common, and it's simply no longer in effect as a restriction for television series or movies, on many channels. As any flame-throwing monologue by Beth Dutton on Yellowstone (which showed at 9pm Sunday nights on Paramount, in my region) will demonstrate beyond all doubt.
So for all practical purposes, there's only one Curse Word left- and only when it's used by people with an attributed status that somehow forbids them from ever using it- not even when quoting another speaker- because it's so offensive. Except when it's used by a member of the group that the horrid word traditionally describes, where its often used casually, practically interchangeable with the word "man." This, I would say, has created a situation unique in the history of linguistics: a word that originally carried implicit derogatory implications toward a discriminated class has now been embraced by that population, with stringent enforcement ordained against any use of the word at all, by any other group. A situation that implies that the meaning of the exact same word is to be processed differently by anyone who hears it, depending on the speaker...is this a system? At any rate, I'm not convinced that proprietary possession of the n-word is the victory for social justice that its enforcers appear to think that it is. Especially given the energy put forth in that effort. ]
There's big money doing shakedowns. Spotify is the latest casualty. I really feel pessimistic that anything is going to change for good at this point. All it takes is an accusation of being racist whether or not it's true, to destroy somebody. Even to say that you are voting for a Republican will cast you into the "racist deplorables".
Everyone just remains quiet for fear of losing their livelihoods. The elephant in the room is being ignored while a segment of the population is destroying society.
The omnipresent use of 'right wing' now is yet another example of the Decline and Fall of Language. Words mean whatever the woke corporate totalitarians (WCT) want them to mean. I wish they (the WCT) would all move to New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles, build a wall around themselves, and leave the rest of us the hell alone.
If you don't bow down to the narrative, you're right-wing. Sort of like how we were unpatriotic for going along with Iraq. Reality has nothing to do with it.
Yes. “State of emergency” seems to justify anything. And they’ve whipped us into enough fear they can manipulate us. Though maybe they’re the ones who are afraid.
Yes it is. We should all write our congressmen and senators and protest this. They can declare anything a state of emergency, and chip away at our freedoms.
I am looking at this from the bright side: during the height of Russiagate hoax I used to be branded "Putin-bot" and "Assadist" on various social media and comments sections (e.g. The Graun), now I graduated to distinguished ranks of "right wingers" :-)
"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." --- Came across this the other day, it's from the U.N.'s Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Matt's rundown on the generational change in journalism happened in a lot of professions. It's like the anti-union sentiment I hear from people that had their education paid for by their Teamster dad or mom. Never mind their parents saw a three fold increase in wages in 10 years that made it possible.
It's being said more and more lately, but I'll say it again, right and left isn't the dividing line; it's supporters of freedom of speech and thought against the budding authoritarians.
Libertarians vs. Authoritarians. Same as it ever was.
Remember Brennan naming libertarians domestic terrorists and Russian agents along with Trump, his supporters and anybody who questioned the narrative? “Putin apologists”. This coming from a corrupt spook who was a registered member of the Communist Party, converted to Islam, a big time China aficionado, antisemite spied on Congress, Senate, journalists, imprisoned James Rosen and was a creator of the Gitmo torture program
Hell, we Ron Paulers have been domestic terrorists since '08, IIRC. Something about "firm belief in the Constitution".
At this point, if you're not on a list, you're doing America wrong.
Bret Weinstein had a terrific idea for a presidential ticket. One right of center candidate, one left of center, both sworn Patriots.
Years ago, two unlikely senators became very close allies. Thought very different in certain views, both were scrupulously honest, wanted the CIA, Fed abolished, withdrew from the divisive UN, end any further NATO buildup, secure the border, transparency, do not allow Communism a foothold in America and went to Reagan together, pleading that he take responsibility for Iran/Contra
One of them, deemed “ far right”, I still can’t figure out why, vocally called to end the War On Drugs, was pro-choice and very unhappy w/ Reagan’s “ Moral Majority” and Falwell’s presence in Reagan’s admin. He was responsible for rescuing persecuted Jews from the Soviet Union and wasn’t an anti-LGBT zealot. His son was gay.
Tha aforementioned Senator was none other than libertarian Barry Goldwater.
His friend across the aisle was Daniel Patrick Moynihan.An incredibly decent man with an exceptional understanding of the human condition. Both were unfairly smeared and stabbed in the back
His
Sounds like someone looking for a job.
Move-on.org sent me a message about giving money requiring masks and vaccine passports for being able to vote in the next election. It would assure Republicans would not vote. See how fast the Democrats will remove masks.
Move On.Org is an authoritarian propaganda tentacle of the globalist elite kleptotechnocratic WEF/UN/NATO/BlackRock/Vanguard/StatStreet NWO Elite psychopaths.I’m trying to wrap my head around the Faustus worship. Have said “ liberals” forgotten they were the ones who exposed Faustus torture, denying the usage of cheap, safe, effective repurposed drugs that would have saved the lives of 17,000 plus AIDS victims? The hysteria, homophobia and false information spread by Fauci,Collins,Gallo,Grady( Fauci’s wife w/Nazi connections), the “Medical Kidnapping” of minority orphans, foster children and disabled wards of state used as human guinea pigs for gruesome experimental AIDS vaccines and excruciating medical experiments. Many were disabled for life, scores died, it was covered up, later exposed and continues to this day. The Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Coverup, NC. Lab leaks, fake pandemics, risky research, scapegoating Dr. Steven Hatfill as the Anthrax Killer, using impoverished girls from a remite India village as HPV vaccine guinea pigs w/o the knowledge of India’s government. The girls were left crippled, infertile and many died. Ditto impoverished Africans told they were being vaccinated for smallpox, polio,measles,mumps,TB,
Patent theft, Pharma ties, ruined careers, animal torture. Dr Kary Mullis, PCR test inventor and thirty plus year memos of Fauci who suddenly dropped dead 2,months prior to announcing the Plandemic?
Meanwhile, Dr. Robert Malone, one of the original inventors of the mRNA technology, Dr. Harvey Risch, Dr. Jay Bhattacharaya,,Dr.John Ionnides,Drs Michael Levitt( , Kary Mullis,Luc Montagnier,(Nobel Pize winners) John Ionnides, McCollough,Hatfill,Lapado,Makary, Oz,Drew Pincus, Oskqui, the Chinese whistleblowers are all “ Finge Right Wing White Supremacists”? Most are liberal, several are not white, all are published in multiple top medical periodicals, several were consultants with the NIH, CDC.None are “ anti-vax flat earthers”. They are honorable professionals who take the Hippocratic Oath and Nuremberg Code as inviable doctrine
Because Demos can't get mail in voting, they want No mask, No vax, No vote. They want to perpetuate this nightmare. I think it is as useless attempt at getting money.
A picture is circulating widely today showing Governor Hochul and four other adults standing maskless behind five young children wearing heavy masks. She was announcing that her mask mandates were being extended! Many other Democrats have done this while saying masks are required.
Are these people TRYING to look like pedophiles?
Talking Heads. (with nice hair) Same as they always were.
Lyric update needed: "I've changed my hair color, so many times now, don't know if it's pink, green, or blue"
Truly, this ain't no party.
Look where my hand was.
I saw them live few times back in early 80s. Good times.
Or in the case of Brian Stelter, no hair at all. But hey, he has a lovely complexion. Wonder how much time he spends every day on his skin regime.
Potato skin matters
Glad someone finally noted this. :-)
Pseudo-Libertarianism (or better, call it Naive-Libertarianism) is the Trojan Horse Neoliberalism rode in on. The Koch Brothers are called libertarians--they are just fascists in reality. The same is true of the Blue Anon tech bros like Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt and all the rest. All of these people claim to be libertarians But they really mean: "Liberty for me not for thee." They are all essentially authoritarian.
Reason 'libertarians' is what we call them. They're all for the freedom to do what helps them, but are violently against any other freedom.
Reason Libertarian actually sounds quite reasonable, can’t you numbskulls come up with a better naming system
Somebody doesn't understand the sarcastic quotes denoting that we are mocking the so-called libertarians who are instead authoritarians.
Not trying to be intentionally argumentative, but what parts of the Reason program, exactly, are authoritarian? What positions do they take, specifically, that bug you?
Perhaps crony libertarians is the correct term?
The authoritarians will throw you in the camps just the same.
If the entire world is a camp, they don't have to throw you in. They just have to keep you in.
Touche’!
How many times were we warned by great thinkers that this could happen in and to America ? Huxley,Bradbury,Serling,Orwell,Asimov, Welch, Goldwater, Moynihan, Solzhenitsyn,Hesse, Gandhi, Wiesenthal,Kubrick, Styron, Burgess,
Right, but surely it couldn't happen. And in America!
And the Titanic was unsinkable
Of course not. Just like “I’ll still love you in the morning” and the Twin Towers are still standing.
I'm not your mother or anything, but you might wanna join up with the libertarians then.
I find Reason Magazine Libertarians to be some of the most authoritarian bootlickers on the planet. Then again, I throw up a little bit in my mouth whenever the Neocons at National Review start talking about how they are a "principled" bastion of conservatism and respecting the Constitution.
The difference between a libertarian and an anarchist is that the libertarian thinks that private property is an expression of liberty. And that's why I'm a barbarian.
Bingo. I'm an unreconstructed redneck from Louisiana and I feel far more sympicato with people like Matt T, Russell Brand and Green Greenwald than any of the tired Reaganite/neocon clowns on the so-called "right."
I hate to break it to you, but the neocons are on the authoritarian left now. The world has turned upside down... the "elites" don't care about anything except blind allegiance to whatever will make them more money.
So the neocons are reading Marx now instead of Hayek? Interesting.
LOL they neocons aren't interested in principles, just power. They will spew anything to get people to go along with them. They were NEVER reading Hayek.
Well, they always were -- or Trotsky, at least.
Haha. That’s cute.
Everyone know Necons can’t read.
Most of them were originally Marxists. Marxism, in practice, is pretty authoritarian -"dictatorship of the proletariat," really meaning of the Party, and so on.
Your first statement, which sounds so bizarre as to smack of satire, is in fact historically correct. At least as far as the originators of American neoconservatism as a philosophy.
In the second statement, "the proletariat" means "the working class." Which is not the way Soviet Russia, the nations of the Eastern bloc, the People's Republic of China and other Marxist Socialist regime is actually governed. They all adopted Leninism- political rule by "the vanguard" (sometimes ultimately just one person, as with North Korea) that purports to look out for the interests of the workers, the masses. To clarify what you meant by "really meaning the Party", i.e., the vanguard.
In this case, they used "straw man via false binary".
As if the only choices (in an invented, false dichotomy) were Hayek or Marx.
Nice of Matt to point out the clever-but-complete-bullshit techniques they use. Some of them, clever as they may be, are getting awfully tired, and people are widely aware of the bogus nature of the knee-jerk, intellectually vaporous accusations of "racist!" or "transphobe" or "you used a wrong word!! reeee!".
Dave Portnoy called out one of the Meidas boy's wives for using the N-word. Beautiful.
Oh, absolutely. It's their Trotsky DNA reasserting itself. The entire neocon project was gnostic -- "let's inaugurate an end of history utopia of American consumer culture at the point of the bayonet". I can understand why (for example) a manufacturer of military equipment would support that sort of thing, but why anyone ever thought it was "conservative" is completely beyond me.
But they can invariably count on Graham, McConnell, Cheney,,Boot,McCaul,Bolton,French, Jonah Goldberg, Steven Hayes to prop them up. Note the warmongers have no skin in the game. It’s not their kids who are being sent to their ruin.Otherwise they might think twice.This isn’t about Japan attacking Pearl Harbor ( which could have been avoided), the Nazis taking over the west, a nuclearized Soviet Union.. This is our saber rattling and encroachment.It’s also about our sellout to China, now a far more formidable superpower.
The unspoken irony is those cheering for war with Russia on both sides of the aisle are heavily vested in China.And now, Russia and China have partnered
Ah, Enoch. Wise enough to be taken up, like your namesake.
And you point out something valuable, and it needs to be shouted from the rooftops.
The Change which is occurring isn't just the much-ballyhooed phenomenon of lefties leaving the absurdities and meme-generating stupidity of the "Woke" camp, BUT YOU AND ME AND MILLIONS OF EX-RIGHT WINGERS WAKING UP AND FINDING THERE IS NO OTHER CAMP! THERE IS NO "RIGHT SIDE" IN THIS F'ING COUNTRY, not among the Dems, not among the Alt-right, not among the Republicans and not among the CRT/idpol/progressive/woke crowd of lunatics.
I've spent a lot of time being accused of "conservatism" and being a "right-winger" and blahdeblah, funny thing is, in my long life, no one, not one person who knew me, has EVER considered me a conservative. And I have ZERO expectation that the Republican Party will bravely fix the country...but we still have to throw the insane Dems out, because they, in cahoots w/ the MIC, the media, Big Pharma/Oil/Tech/etc. and the wild-eyed looneys of the Idpol Brigade, are trying to implement a police state with them permanently in charge. F. That. We need to throw them out and, and...break their cahoots!
So it's hardly a one-sided departure from the stupid Right/Left, Dem/Repub dichotomy that has lost all usefulness. LOT of ex-liberals and ex-conservatives out here in the real world, and for the sake of my children, and the country and everyone in it, I pray we can wake up and break the paradigm that threatens us.
It’ll break itself. You just gotta figure out what to build outta the pieces.
I liked Goldwater far more than I did Reagan and not a partisan. Unfortunately our government is set up in a way that it’s all or nothing. I despise McConnell, Pelosi, Graham, Schumer, Cheney, Nadler, Schiff, Cornyn , the far left and the far right.
Essentially, if there are individuals on either side of the aisle that I do like, it doesn’t matter, because they are forced to fall in line with the party.In other words, there are no choices, nor is there any truth. Most of our “ elected officials” are clueless in global affairs. They’re uniformed or misinformed and create policies, make decisions based on perceived knowledge and double down on bad decisions.
Exactly what I have conclude. Fundamentally it's the authoritarian mentality against the anti-authoritarian mentality. Unfortunately, it's easier to organize the authoritarians.
Yup, good luck herding the cats...
You can try a bowl of milk. Now and then they will lick each other's fur. But that's as good as you're going to get in terms of cooperation.
Living through the hundred year war over the size of government made it easy to forget that freedom/authoritarianism is, in fact, the forever war.
Right vs left is a false axis. The truer axis is perpendicular to that, mathematically independent, and that is tyranny vs liberty.
Just to expand a bit on your insight of adding the vertical dimension, I tend to think that there is a geometric shape that contains all isms, wings, and nations, yet maintains the absolute power of just a few. This shape is, of course, the pyramid.
If we live, work, and think inside a pyramidal hierarchy—which we mostly all do—we may squabble among ourselves about political, economic, or religious differences, but we remain firmly in our place inside the lower strata of the pyramid. In this model of world-wide organization, it is not left vs right, authoritarian vs libertarian, or (most ridiculously) U.S. vs Russia that matters. It is all of us beneath the top vs those very, very few (rulers, oligarchs, archons, puppeteers, whatever you want to call them) in the vertex. The 99 percent vs the 1 percent estimate reflects this notion of embedded, rigged, and seemingly inescapable geometry of the world order.
And yet it is obvious that a lot of people support the pyramid. If they didn't, it wouldn't exist.
I agree with your geometry regarding power, but the Cartesian system I described is more appropriate for ideology / political views.
And the governments are all tyranny.
The purple empire has one party.
populists vs. elites - not necessarily a painless choice.
I think the current dichotomy is mostly a conflict between the groupthinkers vs. the crowdsourcers.
Please elaborate; I basically see cancel culture as crowdsourced authoritarianism.
I am thinking of "crowdsourcing" in the sense of "the wisdom of crowds" phenomenon in which groups of **independent** thinkers and analysts who combine or average their individual opinions are smarter than the sum of their parts.
Groupthink of course is the opposite effect of each crowd member following the others unthinkingly so that the whole is dumber than the sum of its parts.
But I see your point that one could "crowdsource" cancel culture as well. So maybe "crowdsourcing" isn't the ideal word I'm looking for.
Nah by your definitions (which I love) cancel culture is groupthinking authoritarianism.
It’s really the epitome of groupthink.
Collectivism. The stuff of tyrannical manipulation. Our system has become a government neither for or by the people. It’s a duopolous Uniparty punctuated by polar extremes working against”We The People”.To survive as a nation,we deserve better than a choice between which we hate less.
There is no transparency, only edicts scripted behind closed doors. Each day I see laws adopted by states where the issues were not made public.Who are the people behind them? When I approach people from different walks of life, spanning the racial, cultural, economic and ideological spectrum, nobody can answer. They were never asked for input.
As per the trucker protests, I do support their cause, but question the venues accepting the donations.
Ditto the super pacs. If I’m donating to a specific political candidate, it’s because I’m supporting the candidate, not a community pot.Not Act Blue or Act Red, not a scam like CrowsSource who then decides to shift the funds elsewhere. Not to be used as a mechanism to shut down the cause I’m standing with.
Mass Formation
Those terms are (and have always been) pseudonyms for "right-wing" and "left-wing".
Spot on!
So you'll be able to speak your mind in the back of the R250 NSA jumbo detainee bus on your way to the gulag. A shot fired for the 1st amendment, ex post facto.
That’s better than the alternative.
Stop screaming. Be more funny. Think laconically.
The Liberal Borg Cube is TERRIFIED. The population is no longer acting like dogs in a Pavlovian experiment. People like Russell scare the World Economic Forum's Borg Cube because he's an actual liberal who believes in freedom of thought and free expression, in contrast to the terrible slogans and empty platitudes used by the Borgs to subvert any kind of nuanced discussion or honest conversations.
At this point, the oligarchy and their technocratic elite’s blindness has reached biblical proportion, almost guaranteeing that they have sown the seeds of their destruction (at least for now). Because they view human beings like beasts to be herded, controlled by threats of punishment and reward, pain and pleasure, the human response to tyranny, typified by the Canadian truckers, has come as a genuine surprise, so much so that the Canadian Prime minister was whisked away after declaring the Canadian Freedom Convoy a “fringe minority” only a few days earlier. As “fringes” become majorities and once unknown individuals become world-leaders, so “the last will be first and the first will be last.”
“Liberal Borg Cube is TERRIFIED.” Love this. Great visual.
The BORG were my favorite nemesis in Star Trek. So certain in their "perfection." Perfect analogy.
Yes hahahaha. They really are Borgs. It’s pretty funny. In Canada we have Trudeau, Chrystia Freeland (a very crafty and high-level borg with many portfolios), in the US Psaki, Jake Sullivan, all the Rhodes scholars populating Biden’s admin, and KAmala, they really have a Borg thing going on. It’s kind of funny. Once people see through the platitudes and their careful study of human behaviour, and see how they just can’t quite get it, it just goes to show, these are not smart people, they just have a playbook. They’re keying off behavioural science and such, but they have zero interest in truth, they couldn’t care less, they’re just trying to assimilate their enemies.
Thats’s pretty much it. They don’t have any real goals or purpose lol.
Oh, they have real goals and purpose... obscene levels of wealth and power.
Fair enough. I guess I should qualify that. Their purpose is to preserve their power and enslave people. However, if we're getting metaphysical here, I don't think that's a purpose in life, it's the opposite. They are so out of touch with their humanity, their own creative abilities, so they just behave like Borgs reading from a script, doing what they see as necessary to destroy and assimilate their enemies.
I don't consider that an actual purpose, in human terms. As Augustine would put it, evil is not a some thing, it's the opposite, it's the absence of something, of that thing that makes one human and good. They just have none of it. Hence, their only talents are lying, subversion, and deception.
AND a goal they can see almost within their grasp...𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒. Locked-in rule by the self-anointed elite, an American version of the WEF/Davos global dream. This is why they are so desperate to pass that "Voting Rights" bill...no ID validation, non-citizens voting, oh they want it sooo bad.
And they have to have it before the mid-terms. If they can't pass it, I fully expect some kind of "emergency" to justify a push to "delay" the election.
That will be the signal for a real revolution, because they'll be in power, desperate, with no legitimate options.
Leftists Borg. Nothing liberal about this cabal.
The 18-wheeler hoedown being staged in Ottawa (and soon to debut in many major U.S. metropolitan statistical areas) is an astroturf campaign conceived and underwritten by the very same "oligarchy" and "technocratic elite" you so confidently deride. You know this, too, you devil you.
"Blindness?" The "beasts" have already been herded, Gosselin---and accordingly every eukaryote and prokaryote and everything else nailed down and not nailed down and upon which a price tag can be affixed is on the balance sheet of these lords and ladies, the result of a very arduous but focused 50-year cattle-drive executed by a field of thousands through stealth and public propaganda campaigns.
"Freedom of thought and free expression." "Terrible slogans." "The human response to tyranny." "Sown the seeds of their destruction." You're already sounding like the most prolix and followed agitator at Gulag #9. The "fringes" have always been the "majorities." They've also have lacked capital and power and we know what that will get you and what it won't get you---maybe a song written about you if you buy the right bag of peanuts in the right time zone from the right vendor...
But then you people have been unnecessarily cranky ever since Uncle Lyndon (Larouche) passed through and into the netherworld, no doubt simultaneously cultivating and irritating the leading ghouls and vampires of THAT realm. Always at the ready to summarize the "peanut gallery," always unable to bead the right fix.
Your response has a Borg-like quality to it. What direction do you want the discussion to go in with a comment like that? It seems like the only possible purpose a comment like that has is to obfuscate and divert. It's definitely not making much sense otherwise.
The truckers are astroturfed? And what, the Canadian government is just trying to restore order lool?
Again, you sound like a Borg. You've studied human behavior and tried to imitate it, but unfortunately for you, you didn't quite get it.
Nice try.
Like, like, like
To anybody who has put in 15 minutes of research of who you are, who you work with, who your sponsors and paymasters are, who are well aware of the obviousness of their sympathies and network loyalties, my post makes perfect sense.
"What direction do you want the discussion to go in with a comment like that?"
Now that you have posed the question, anywhere away from your facile bullshit and 3rd-rate propaganda.
Are you saying you don’t like my poetry?
You win best laugh of the night. This whole thread has me cracking up! Nicely done.
So far 78,792 people have donated to the FreedomConvoy2022. I did not know that there are so many people in the "oligarchy" and "technocratic elite"!
Also, the average donation is about $90. That certainly is BIG MONEY!
Thank you for correcting my ignorance.
Given the rate of donations, we should have 150,000 people by the end of the week in your categories, and the US government will decide that Social Security should be capped at $90 a month since that is real WEALTH!
That’s really not proof of some ‘revolt against the oligarchy’ by itself, though. Hillary had over half-a-million small donors that netted her over $105,000,000 in campaign funds, and she was “of the oligarchy.”
I said nothing about "donations." But then you know this. If I organize a car wash, fund it, and later set up a fund-raising mechanism in conjunction is both logical and, while linked, is a separate action. Come on, it's a common feature of the Authoritarian/Libertarian far-right grift. Now, I KNOW you know this...
Personally, I prefer arugula salad to word salad, but maybe that's just me.
If you had researched Gosselin as I have, this would make perfect sense. And you're one of the less obtuse commenters here---but obtuse you still are. And Canadian.
I vaguely remember seeing you post comments elsewhere that were somewhat to the point. Your comment here, on the other hand, reads like you snorted an 8-ball of coke and then tried to do an impression of a particularly pretentious freshman polisci major.
My comment was very much to the point. You simply are too far out of range of the real point to see it, let alone discern it. You need fresh coordinates. Everybody here does.
“If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself.” - Albert Einstein
Maybe try making the same point again, as you would to a young child...or a golden retriever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqTMMqRQQ9k&t=18s
Emphasis on "particularly pretentious". Replete with obscure (of course) renaissance painting for an avatar. My guess is he might have gone Piero, if not for the expose about 5 years ago - too well known now, so up with Bartolomeo.
Then again, if he's claiming the surname, Lucrezia, perhaps he's just an Italian. I think that name would come from the latin word, lucrum, meaning wealth. This would add a funny context to his diatribe to Gosselin.
Don't be lazy. Lucrezia, and her place in history, is easily googled and researched. In the original Latin connotation Lucrezia meant "success," which was later translated into "wealth" in renaissance Italy. Always amusing to stumble across a mook who throws up the arms and cries "pretentious." At the risk of again sounding pretentious: go fuck yourself.
e. pierce then rises from his lounger and changes the channel or adjusts the volume---manually. Though the remote sits at arm’s length, certainly within his reach, on the end table, he prefers exercising the body via a perfunctory lunge, an ambulatory crawl, relishing the tactile sensation offered by the knobs and dials.
Collectively these are more than throwback gestures, acts of defiance (though they are these too); they are an abject repudiation of, and rebellion against, machines, gadgets, objects with numbers. It is a silent almost pagan-like protest. A vain attempt, perhaps, to counter the prevailing ethos of technopoly. pierce then wipes his nose and silently makes a note of this.
e. pierce a child of Cicero? Is pierce a registered democrat despite being, philosophically speaking, a republican? pierce is demonstrably indifferent to all oaths of homage, and keeps only jesters, dogs and falcons.
Explains a jester in pierce's employ: "He's a fairly easy audience. Sometimes I'll deliver a short monologue after work and before dinner. He often writes the material himself. He really enjoys hearing his own material performed. When he's a bit blue, usually late at night, I'll perform a Danse Macabre with a sort of ironic twist. Seems to boost his spirits somewhat. A brief respite from all the eugenic problems. All in all, nothing too fancy, he prefers the old forms..."
How about a Waldorf one? From the Fawlty Towers :-)
Any time a sentence contains the words, "you people"... what follows is always hate.
Most of the time. Occasionally it’s followed with” are great”.😜Unless coming from the MSM or the once Democrat Party, now the Cult Of Death. Once they crossed the line by openly wishing death upon anybody daring to differ with their mantra of misery, they showed their true selves, karma be damned.
Generally speaking I agree, but in this instance I think that it's more than suitable---it almost constitutes a polite gesture---to refer to the followers, supplicants and sycophants of Lyndon Larouche as "you people."
Whatever makes you feel better about yourself…
You people are alright in my book.
;)
Justin Trudeau and his parents are ardent supporters of tyranny. Castro, Mao, Stalin… they couldn’t get enough. It is incredibly bizarre once very common knowledge. It’s now the common tents of the Democrat Party. You don’t hear much from the GOP, either. But Tucker cut right to the chase.The Bush Cartel was big into Mao, the Nazis and Fauci as well.. The Carter’s, Pelosi, Willie Brown, Jerry Brown,Guggenheims, Getty, Ford and Rockefeller Foundations were the largest sponsors of Jim Jones People’s Temple and helped make Jonestown in Guyana possible. It was promoted as a “ Utopian Socialist Multiracial Agragrarian Society”. They were forbidden from having children and if a pregnancy occurred, the mother was forced to abort. Are you seeing a pattern? BLM, Antifa, AOC, the far left, Fauci, Gates, Soros,Bloomberg, Schwab, Xi, the bizarre metastasis of Europe’s childless leaders, the encouragement of gay, lesbian, trans, pronoun obsessed ,CRT public school, military and inter-agency indoctrination. It has NOTHING to do with anti-racism or LGBT tolerance and awareness. It is about population control, the destruction of the nuclear family and diminishing reproduction. Most of my black and LGBTQ friends are well aware of aware of what’s driving the narrative. Many adore children, adopt or have children via surrogates and heterosexual friends they trust..The big push for transgenderism is sterility, not compassion. It is a travesty. Ditto the.mRNA vaccine technology’s dirty little secret.
Chimeric animal to animal creation and human/animal embryos now progressing to fetuses and hybrids. China has created primate pig cross species, humanized pigs, but the most awful is the insertion of primate brain tissue into human fetal tissue. The very real fear is if successful, it can cause a mutation where the human brain will be devoid of humanity, resulting in an easily controlled transhuman serfdom. Fauci is engaged in this ghoulish Faustian , Mengelian Island of Dr. Moreau
Welp, you and lucrezia certainly deserve each other.
I'm not into that sort of thing.
I could have said you and e.pierce deserve each other, but.....nobody deserves that.
e. pierce is indisputably a Goldberg In Search of a McCann.
e. pierce states: In Buddhist practice, the first of the four noble truths maintains that life is suffering. Now, this may or may not be true---but. What we can say, with a fair amount of certainty, is that most Americans’ lives are from time to time marked by random moments of confusion and despair. Indeed, by e. pierce's reckoning, life for many Americans probably seems, to them, like nothing but confusion and despair.
e. pierce asks: Can we fix this? We don't know. Our exponentially increasing numbers of technological gadgets promise much distraction from real world problems and a brief holiday from the troubling goings-on in our own minds. This is nothing at which to sneeze. Or so says e. pierce.
e. pierce continues: The three negative emotions that afflict our society---attachment, aversion, ignorance---unpleasant subjects to be sure, but if we are to remain a great nation then we’re going to have to address these feelings. Now. Immediately. It will require great stores of humility, studied contemplation, and a willingness to roll up our sleeves and have at it.
What precisely is the source of our national anomie, this creeping malaise? asks e. pierce, earnestly. The price we pay for all the gadgets? Or is it a product of a long-festering disgust with potentates, foreign and domestic? Again, we don't know. What is needed today in America, e. pierce believes, is a fresh set of talking points, an altered rough draft of this great nation’s history...
More Gail-force winds...
e. pierce is a noted Mariner of the People. The Potomac river. e. pierce quietly seethes at the cigarette-boat crowd, and their cowboy-like maneuvering of these too-slick-by-half class of water craft, even though there's none to be found on the muddy doldrums of the Potomac where pierce negotiates the elements.
He quietly pooh-poohs, too, the summer yachtsmen and their aircraft-sized vessels (Nimitz class) with which they ply the waters.
Bur e. pierce's water craft of choice? Not a sailboat, typical of the nautically inclined, but a kon-tiki inspired balsa wood raft, as modest as a sloop can be. e. pierce's ignorance of sailing is nearly absolute---he is first and foremost most a loyal devotee of terra firma.
But pierce is nevertheless conversant with a smattering of the sailor's esoteric nomenclature: Egyptian Galley; top-gallent sail, trim, turnbuckle, gunkholing, whisker pole, scrimshaw, gabbywrinkle, Irish pennant, fiddle, scarfed, lazarette, etc.
Sorry, your moron compass is broken. Your people are thataway, lost in the field eating each other’s shit.
Yep, it is times like this when I miss the 'block' option.
Buck up, buttercup.
Yet you read it. And I think you like it because you need it.
Ape cunt.
You just filch my NFT?
The aesthetics of smoking. Is e. pierce a smoker? I'd wager not, but an entry in the pierce "smoker's journal" might read something like this:
"A filthy habit all in all, but: The unique timbre and pitch of the sound of the struck match. The reliable pleasure offered by a favored brand. The upward draft, dream-like, of the billowing blue vaporous smoke that gives off a not necessarily pleasant odor before it dissipates into the ether, real or mystical, whichever you prefer.
The repetitious hand-to-mouth gesture that is as eternal as fire itself. The extended exhalations leading to an all-too fleeting exaltation. The dizziness, the mild nausea..."
I always find you.
In the decline of our American railroads e. pierce can clearly see and hear the Ghosts of Walden. Once our railroads were the envy of the modern world. A monumentally complex web of private and public transportation networks that gave birth to the notion of unfettered mobility and a new sense of possibilities...in both time and space, e.pierce recalls.
e. pierce continues: Before the age of the automobile, when this type of personal mobility became the norm, American railroads aggressively promoted the great westward migration and elaborated a new notion of "freedom" to all Americans.
Our railroads created, and then by leaps and bounds extended, a new mode of highly efficient industrial delivery. American railroads served notice that here was a young, vibrant nation on the move, girding itself for the future, indeed flaunting its raw industrial might.
American railroads constituted a can-do spirit and the greatest building project since the construction of the great pyramids by the Egyptian Pharoahs. This is the sort of things that stays with e. pierce, as well it ought.
There are so many politically homeless people now it's like we're living in LA. They show they're not capable of objectivity by when they do this. It's a feeble minded person who when you provide facts and evidence their only retort is "racist", "transphobic", etc.
"There are so many politically homeless people now it's like we're living in LA." Metophor win of the day, no question. :-)
As someone who lives in downtown L.A., I wholeheartedly agree. More and more people are becoming existentially unmoored.
Yes. Tribes imploding all over the place. The horror! The horror!
I love that. Such an opportunity.
Ironic. considering you were wishing death on me for a contrary opinion just a couple months ago. Pot, meet kettle.
Hey, don’t wish for the death of millions via nuclear fire and I won’t tell you to put a pistol in your mouth.
Still just words in any case, cupcake.
Nope, you're wrong.
But I'll happily laugh about that too, if it'll make you feel better.
Yeah, well I used to be called a libertarian or social liberal/fiscal conservative. Called myself that and was referred to that way by my progressive writer friends. Now anyone who doesn't think exactly like they do who dares to question the left or make a health decision on their own is a "right wing white supremacist" and an "insurrectionist." And of COURSE, a racist. And must be demonized and cancelled, unfriended, and never published again. But I'd rather be called a "right winger" than a progressive fascist socialist CRT racist which is who they are now. Maybe we should start viewing that as a compliment. Here is an example I love. My husband's cousin is a progressive. He picked my address off his brother's email (where they were hounding us to get vaccinated) to which I responded with my reasons why I didn't want to do that. I had never talked to this guy before, but he told me I was not capable of critical thinking and should get vaccinated. I should "go with the science." We have been fighting now for several months. And he finally said, "you are opinionated aren't you, and very anti-science." I said, "YOU emailed me and told ME and told me I should get vaccinated. I did not email you and tell you NOT to get vaccinated. Because guess what, I MIGHT be wrong and don't want that responsibility for other people. But HOW DARE I think for myself and have an opinion for my OWN health and family that diverges from the propaganda science or what YOU think I should do. I'm opinionated? Opinionated my ass." I said. How dare I think for myself and make my own decisions on my health? Right? And of course that makes ME a fanatic. This is how they think. We should all follow consensus like sheep even when there is no long term testing, injuries and people are dying. And they don't WORK, possibly increase infectivity and do NOT stop transmission. This should have been rolled out for high risk people only and then been given with informed consent. They are making such a mess of this country. I haven't heard Russell Brand before, but obviously many many people who believe in freedom have differing views, but we have THAT in common. We believe in debate and freedom. And that is where the new dividing line resides. People I don't agree with on everything like Tulsi, (Matt), Bill Maher, Joe Rogan, and more are people I realize I share much more in common than any particular fiscal issue. Thanks, Matt, for carrying on with the cause.
The only people they hate more than the out-group are the ones who 'should' be inside the in-group. Rogan and Greenwald and Taibbi and Brand all fit into that category. (So does Larry Elder!)
Apostasy has always been a far more heinous crime than mere heresy.
Beautifully put. One of the great human crimes— "How dare you not think like me?"
I was wrong about the meaning of "apostasy", so maybe this will help others:
Definition of apostasy
1: an act of refusing to continue to follow, obey, or recognize a religious faith
2: abandonment of a previous loyalty : DEFECTION
But Larry was "white supremacist" ;-))
If I remember correctly he was the black face of white supremacy.
Can definitely confirm that!
Right-winger now means anyone who cares about personal freedoms, free speech, freedom of the press, equality of opportunity, belief in character over skin color, data and science and maybe worst of all, the US Constitution. Progressives (aka the Democrat party these days) realize they control the narrative in this country because they now own our schools, our media, our tech companies and the Democrat party. Because they do control the narrative, they now see the opportunity to tear down America and rebuild it into their fantasy world (see sitting congresswoman AOC condemn the free market and all it stands for). They’ve become emboldened with their ability to influence leaders (Biden, Pelosi, etc) who once were semi moderate to become essentially socialists trying to tear our country apart. Sad thing is, they are getting away with it. CRT, open borders, labeling of anyone right of Trotsky as a Trump loving insurrectionist, tearing down police and parents, trying to pass bills that demand the federal government take over our children starting at age 4-5, tearing down our borders, and demanding that we all capitulate to non science edicts that do nothing to save lives. We all need to wake up. They are emboldened by their increasing power.
The Democratic leadership are corporatists; they serve the wealthiest corporations. If they were socialists, they would have passed Medicare for All and laws to make higher education and housing more affordable by now. They wouldn't have shipped all those jobs overseas or south of the border for cheap labor. Words have meaning. They are not socialists.
Bingo. Except, in this "post-modern" world, seems like words do not have the same meaning as before, and sometimes they are in deed exactly the opposite. Slavery (walking masked in the park) is freedom, war (provoking Russia and China) is peace...
The Dems definitely serve corporate masters but please rethink things like Medicare for all. This pandemic has shown clearly that they would then use that to coerce behavior. Even pleasant sounding programs like Medicare for all will ultimately be used by the sociopaths that ultimately go to centers of power like moths to flame. It will be used to control and hurt anyone they don't like.
lol morons like you will never learn, yes no medicare for all, but lets continue to spend trillions on failed system. You are saying just because politicians are corrupt we can't have things that we need. You are an objective moron lady.
Meanwhile, those so called "moderates" (Biden, Pelosi, Obama, both Clintons, Schumer, Newsome, et al endlessly...) have fought the good fight to absolutely pillage this country and countless others for the All Mighty Stock Market gains.
Guarantee if you think Biden's a "centrist", you're over 50 years old and have a nice little investment account.
For what it's worth, I totally agree with you about how absolutely nuts the new Red Scare is...calling people Nazis and racists and transphobes over a legitimate difference of opinion is Authoritarianism at best, Fascism at worst.
I am over 50 and have a nice little account and have seen Joe for too long to think he is anything but a corporate stooge with evil intentions.
With no moral compass….. Biden is a proud member of Old Boys Network… pretending to care about this country has been a 50 year long gig for this corporate empty suit now complete with scrambled eggs for brains.
The stench of Biden-family's and Democrats' corruption is simply unbearable. Opposing it are equally incompetent Trump and rabid anti-China GOP clowns.
You evidently think simplistically and hate everyone.
One day, hopefully, you will realize that we have only one party -- of 1% versus 99%.
Have you seen what those investment accounts have been doing for the last month or two? Probably explains his current approval ratings better than most things. Trump was doing better at his worst.
Funny how that works isn't it. I have never once asked anyone if they have been vaccinated for anything, yet I can't count the number of people who have asked me about my Covid vax status, including of all people, my employer. My employer demanded that every employee state their Covid vax status. And after swallowing that bitter pill for the sake of work place harmony and job security, I thought I was done.
But wait! There is more. Now my employer is requiring that all employees fill out a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion ("DEI) survey in which I must state my race, including subrace, i.e. if Caucasian, then is it Irish, English, German, etc. And after that first DEI survey is completed, my employer will be requiring a second DEI survey in which we will be forced to answer questions about our "feelings" about race, gender, marginalized groups, etc. The gall. What's next? Will my employer be asking us employees if we practice safe sex along with a list of all sex partners and their race, gender and social class? I can't see why not.
They just cannot leave us alone. Label it however they wish, but it comes down to the single factor that "they" are far, far more interested in me than I am interested in them.
Right. They stick their noses into your business with THEIR opinions and then claim you have no right to an opinion or a health decision--everything is their business now. God, that sounds awful at work. Are you going to do it??
Probably. Just trying to decide whether to fill it out as a Communist or a Nazi.
As a gringo that has worked in Mexico long enough to somewhat have become immersed, I’ve been going with “rednexican”
Communist, definitely.
Call a lawyer. Not kidding.
Unfortunately, I am a lawyer and my employer is a law firm. I think I need to call an Exorcist.
I thought you an accountant, with an ironic screen name
So am I. We don't do any of these things at my firm. Change firms. Go solo. Or stop complaining and understand you volunteer for the treatment.
Probably. I have never been so glad to be a sole proprietor. No surveys in my office, tg.
Then defend yourself or leave.
I think you should suggest to your employers that they consult with an Alienist.
I would think you could stand up to them and have options. Sue them.
Claim whatever race you want. They made the rules that you can identify how you want.
I see no downside to this. To begin with, the accuracy of the traditional labels is approximately nil. Even the use of the word "race" is unacceptably noisy- both from the standpoint of population biology taxonomy, and,well, how is "race" both a noun and a verb, in English? That's some bullshit, right there. (I learned to read English really well, but I get the people who have problems with it. Between the recent outbreak of Race Obsession and the Olympics, even I'm getting confused at times.)
To hell with it. The next time I'm asked my race on a form, I'm gonna say "Angel." And if they don't hire me, they don't hire me. Go on, fool. Walk away from a deal like that. That's my attitude. Could have hired an Angel. But no-o...
I'd prefer "Celestial"- such a cool word- but since it's an archaic label for the Chinese, they can have first rights of refusal on that one. No reason to forbid "Black" people or anyone else from using the Angel label, that's open source all the way. It's a lot to live up to, I admit. I'm hoping we Angels are up for the challenge, and that we're allowed a few mulligans. So to speak. But if you think Angel is too poofy or whatever, I respect your masculine insecurity...name yourself whatever you feel like. Even if you don't think Angel is too poofy, for that matter. Anything you like. Call yourself a member of the Anything race. Or the Airthing race. The Crosscountry race. It's all up for grabs. Open thread.
Oh, how I could go on...the English language is silly putty in my hands. I might have made a tenure-track Postmodernist, but somehow I just could never quite get to do it.
Who is your employer?
As for your last sentence---I sincerely doubt it.
The urge to silence those you disagree with exposes an 𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝘀 𝗼𝗽𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗲𝗴𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗼𝗿 𝗱𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗰𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗰 disposition.
There you go.
Welcome back to the middle-school mean girl world of cliques rife with "adults" who are emotional adolescents.
The entire playbook of modern progressives consists of slapping a bad-sounding label (racist, transphobe, right wing, etc) on any person they don’t like and then attacking the label, with the goal of discrediting the person as a person rather than engaging with their ideas.
This is because they know their own shitty ideas cannot survive open debate, which is why they must silence any opposition.
But thanks in no small part to people like Matt, the bloom is off the rose and people everywhere smell their bullshit for what it is — the attempted and soon-to-be-failed cancellation of Joe Rogan is the canary in the coal mine.
Just as the madness of McCarthyism passed, so too will the madness of the Church of Wokery.
You just perfectly described why Trudeau's strategy to deal with the trucker protests is not working at all.
His statement where he just threw the whole pile of shame words at the truckers (“racist, sexist, transphobic white supremacists” or something of the kind) was hilarious, an obvious jump the shark moment.
Oh man... this is rich.
Arthur Trudarelli.
Do have a link? Would love to read up. Tks.
It’s actually even better than I remembered, he threw the whole kitchen sink of shame words in there, including Islamaphobia for some reason — Substack won’t let me paste the link (or anything else) for some reason but it was a tweet by Trudeau at 3:47pm on Feb 1.
It is odd that he thought Islamaphobia might move the needle. Maybe there are some working class Canadian Muslims he thought he could keep away from the protests.
Miles - honest question. When you say "is not working" what facts do you see on the ground that support that statement? I'm asking because I know you're Canadian and a clear-thinker. I probably read the same stories and accounts that you read but I'd be interested in getting an insider's view of things.
Well, for starters, at least 1 member of Trudeau's own caucus has said he needs to do better than just calling the truckers racist and hoping that makes them go away
https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/liberal-mp-breaks-ranks-over-pandemic-policies-1.5772722
Also, Alberta and Quebec provincial governments have made concessions to the truckers, so it's not like politicians are presenting a united front against the protests.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10491549/Canada-provinces-ease-Covid-rules-trucker-protest-hardens.html
Trudeau is also struggling with borderline mutinies when he tries to crack down on the protests. The cops are dragging their feet, and tow truck drivers have flat out refused to tow protester trucks.
That, and this is a high profile, ongoing international news story that is making him look like an asshole. Trudeau is becoming increasingly isolated both within Canada and on the world stage. Progressive media will never admit as much, but the truckers are winning this game of chicken and Trudeau is losing.
Thanks for the reply. Appreciate it!
I hope so. But the people who should be defending speech, or speaking out against the perpetual auto da fes, most recently against Rogan, aren't. Think of the "news" or commentariat who, until two years ago, were relatively normal. Now they pile on. Alternate media is growing around them. I blame the MM for this.
List at least two who were relatively normal two years ago, please.
They weren't supporting a deranged ideology. Now they are. Plenty.
I'm sorry but the last 4 years of Russia!Russia!Russia! was, in fact, "deranged ideology"..
You are right, the press hasn't been free for a long time. Nevertheless, Russiagate and the smarmy, skin crawling inducing, ubiquitous Schiff look like the good old days-- before authoritarianism,
censorship and blocking stories and people, Hitlerian deracination ("de-centering" sounds so much better), lawlessness, indoctrinating eight-year-olds, abolishing sexual differences, "persons who menstruate," pronouns, abolishing education and employment standards and capitalism, biological men on womens' swim teams, went mainstream, looting and street violence mere reparations -- we deserve it. Bopped on the head at 64th and fifth? You deserve it. Shoved in front of a subway car? No big deal, unless you are Bipoc.
This is massively destabilizing in a liberal democracy. Intersectionality/CRT was in the pipeline, in HR, education. There was ample and ignored warning.
That's why Trump was elected. Party media never acknowledged the provocation--he was a symptom. The entire, ideological suite burst into the open with the taped murder of Floyd George in all its horror. . Racism was the cudgel. Marcuse said that free speech
would have to be put aside - as if it ever returns -- to get the job done. Orwell said about two per cent run the show; another thirteen percent enforce. Eighty-five percent were viewed as too dull to organize. Parents of all stripes are beginning to organize. Bi- racial FAIR and other groups are providing legal advice, crucial before our courts are completely overtaken. CRT began in ivy league law schools. If this weren't the US I'd say we're sunk. But we've got to deal with mass sociopathology, which began with indoctrination of our kids. Town by town, time for the teachers unions, which never put kids first and whose radicalized leadership got us here, to go. Hire competent, independent instructors.
Vs. "Persons who menstruate"? Property, speech, and individual rights are oppression? Saferooms? De- centering? Russia groupthink, fixation. and censoring extenuating information/not owning up to glaring falsehoods was the calling card,the sign that, media-wise, something was terribly wrong. Then came the mother lode.
People vote with their audience and with their dollars.
Thankfully money still fucking talks.
But this seems different. Losing elections in Virginia and elsewhere. Iosing viewers, doesn't matter. They double down. They gaslighted, lied, and attacked parents after Virginia. It's a revolution- the fanatics have everyone intimidated, a dismaying lack of courage, the virtue I most admire. I thought when Brian Williams retired, he'd name it, but he didn't. Not a single mainstream news person has said "enough," no Murrow moment, in more dire circumstances.
Brian Williams?
The same cunt who said he was guided by the beauty of cruise missiles???
Fuck that stuffed suit. Even if he slow jammed the news. Corporate shill
I saw a clip of his sign- off: "I love my country" and "I'm a volunteer fireman." I expected him to say something more, maybe in time. I choose not to hate him and continue to hope that he steps up. God, there's so much hate.
I am still not clear on whether Williams was expressing dismay over Jan. 6th and Trump, or the people in his own newsroom.
>slapping a bad-sounding label (racist, transphobe, right wing, etc) on any person they don’t like and then attacking the label, with the goal of discrediting the person as a person rather than engaging with their ideas.
Its the Red Scare all over again. And line the Red scare, once you're accused you're put on the defensive trying to disprove a negative.
I love this truthful post ending with a welcome note of optimism. Thank you.
True, but the neocons taught them everything they know; they’re just redeploying the neocon tactic of labeling anyone opposed to neocon wars as ‘anti-American’ and ‘ unpatriotic ‘, etc., etc.
My fondest wish.
The mainstream media aren’t left wing, they’re elites.
Or both.
Bari Weiss is right wing? Bahahaha.... I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but jeez there has been a lot of effort to go after this guy (Rogan) and I can't help but think maybe our government is behind it.
Rogan's story is the swinging pocket watch for the news cycle's hypnotism.
Just keep your eyes on the watch, and breathe... breathe... your body is relaxing as we bathe your brain in dopamine and you're getting sleepy... sleeeeeeeepy...
When I snap my finger, we will be in the middle of WWIII and you'll completely support this without any hesitation. Wouldn't want to be labelled an outsider, would you?
Except it's done over days, not on a cheesy stage for a few minutes. The messaging is coordinated, the media blasts it as asides to the Rogan story: reasons we should be fighting a ground war through proxy but with Russia. But hey, did you hear how much we at NewsCunt 9 hate Joe Rogan the horse-past anti-vacccccckser???
My leftist friends (?) are consumed with the Rogan saga instead of going to war with Russia. They have also cancelled Spotify. I heard Rogan is on You Tube though too. Make it make sense. I've even had one taking digs at me after posting a meme that only banning books is censorship. Strange times indeed. If Trump did what Biden is doing, there would be endless outrage.
I would put the question mark by the word "leftist" and hope you aren't losing actual friends (although that sometimes happens too)
NewsCunt 9. Nice! :-) Pithy phrasing on the board tonight. You guys have me howling!
Or those that stand to benefit.
If this article is any indication of where political discourse is heading in this country, we're in for a terribly rough ride. The interesting thing about it is the amount of acrimony, sanctimony, and moral high dudgeon being exercised over incidents of trivial import. To read this woman, you'd think that Joe Rogan is engaged in the same project as George Lincoln Rockwell's dial-a-Nazi recorded phone messages, back in the 1960s https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/08/joe-rogan-spotify-podcast-racism-language-slur/
"Joe Rogan and Spotify offer a masterclass in getting rich off the race card"
Yes, that's the actual headline. The insinuation being that millions of Rogan viewers had been drawn to his show by the chance that they might experience the thrill of hearing him dropping n-bombs every so often. I think there's a stronger case to be made that in this case the people really reaping a benefit from the "race card" are the Washington Post, and the article author. And that the only "masterclass" in session is Introduction to Clickbait.
An excerpt:
"...Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, in a now-deleted tweet, argued that Rogan couldn’t be racist because he interacts and works with Black people. Oh, please. You know who else interacted with and worked a lot with Black people? Slave masters...."
Joe Rogan's explicit apology was mentioned, although apparently for the author only falling on his sword would suffice as proof of his sincerity. Granted, Rogan didn't apologize for holding black people in bondage, because that was never anything that he did. He simply apologized for his use of that all-time Offensive Speech, the "n-word."*
As John Stewart once commented in 2004- a time when, in retrospect, divisive political hyperbole by the American pundit class of major media outlets had just gotten into second gear:
'Stop, stop, stop, stop hurting America.'
[* And there's so much dishonesty about this. Since the rise of hip-hop it's so often gotten to be used informally and familiarly among males, including in multiracial groups, there are certainly any number of examples of rap that are simply unquotable without employing the Forbidden Word multiple times in a single verse...meanwhile, what's happened to the once-FCC forbidden "seven words you can't say on television?" The prohibition is treated as a joke on talk shows, "bleep failure" is common, and it's simply no longer in effect as a restriction for television series or movies, on many channels. As any flame-throwing monologue by Beth Dutton on Yellowstone (which showed at 9pm Sunday nights on Paramount, in my region) will demonstrate beyond all doubt.
So for all practical purposes, there's only one Curse Word left- and only when it's used by people with an attributed status that somehow forbids them from ever using it- not even when quoting another speaker- because it's so offensive. Except when it's used by a member of the group that the horrid word traditionally describes, where its often used casually, practically interchangeable with the word "man." This, I would say, has created a situation unique in the history of linguistics: a word that originally carried implicit derogatory implications toward a discriminated class has now been embraced by that population, with stringent enforcement ordained against any use of the word at all, by any other group. A situation that implies that the meaning of the exact same word is to be processed differently by anyone who hears it, depending on the speaker...is this a system? At any rate, I'm not convinced that proprietary possession of the n-word is the victory for social justice that its enforcers appear to think that it is. Especially given the energy put forth in that effort. ]
There's big money doing shakedowns. Spotify is the latest casualty. I really feel pessimistic that anything is going to change for good at this point. All it takes is an accusation of being racist whether or not it's true, to destroy somebody. Even to say that you are voting for a Republican will cast you into the "racist deplorables".
Everyone just remains quiet for fear of losing their livelihoods. The elephant in the room is being ignored while a segment of the population is destroying society.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/blue-stack-strikes-back
Peppermint Patti all but admitted it at the WH podium earlier today. (or yesterday).
Suddenly watching House of Cards and Scandal no longer feels like fiction.
Bari Weiss is an outspoken racist who adores the "kill all Arabs" Nathan Sharansky and apartheid.
Your attempt to cancel Bari has been duly noted and logged for the record. 0.02 points to Gryffindor.
I pooped just now. Lick it. You want to.
Is that you, Bibi?
Progressive: “Everyone has the right to MY opinion!”
The omnipresent use of 'right wing' now is yet another example of the Decline and Fall of Language. Words mean whatever the woke corporate totalitarians (WCT) want them to mean. I wish they (the WCT) would all move to New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles, build a wall around themselves, and leave the rest of us the hell alone.
If you don't bow down to the narrative, you're right-wing. Sort of like how we were unpatriotic for going along with Iraq. Reality has nothing to do with it.
God, it really just woke me up when "Democrats" were so gung-ho on FUCKING TORTURE.
Probably the moment I saw Power and what people would accept in its name.
If everything is tribal, in-groups, affiliations and such without any critical thinking and moral criteria...well, fucking count me out.
Course that sets me up as a 3 name patsy...
#joke
Man, does that bring back memories. Being an anti-war small c conservative in 2003 was a very lonely place for me.
Hopefully you got on board the Ron Paul train in 08 and 12 :) Lots of fun there :)
Sure did, and it sure was! :-)
Libertarians are generally anti-war; "antiwar.com" was started by a Libertarian.
Democrats have a long history of imperialism and war mongering - eg, Viet Nam.
I guess if the shoe fits, fling it at them?
One of the greatest moments in my lifetime.
You know, it's almost like George Orwell was right...
as in right-wing, b/c I'm certain he'd be labelled that, too, in today's world.
"almost"...?
He was off by a few years, so "almost right" might be justified.
haha that made me laugh. Thanks!
👍👍
Censorship has gotten more ominous. Now a person can be considered a terrorist if they spread disinformation. Check out this bulletin from Homeland Security published yesterday. https://www.dhs.gov/ntas/advisory/national-terrorism-advisory-system-bulletin-february-07-2022
WTF have CNN and MSNBC been doing for the last five years besides spreading disinformation?
Via Clapper and Brennan? Are you saying they were LYING??? Get the smelling salts!!
You can say that again.
Hopefully DHS will tell us the “correct” information so that we can avoid these terrorists. Truly frightening.
Yes. “State of emergency” seems to justify anything. And they’ve whipped us into enough fear they can manipulate us. Though maybe they’re the ones who are afraid.
They sure as hell are afraid of Joe Rogan.
Isn’t that amazing? He simply listens to both sides. They are also very afraid of Drs Malone and McCullough too.
This is more concerning than almost anything else we see happening. It's under-the-radar control by the police state.
Yes it is. We should all write our congressmen and senators and protest this. They can declare anything a state of emergency, and chip away at our freedoms.
The list of who they consider "right wing" is more illuminating. more instructive, and more hilarious than anything else.
Rationality and open dialog, regardless of what is said is apparently "right wing" now? Isn't that supposed to be a liberal stance?
Many I dont know, but some are incredibly laughable.
Sam Harris? Brett and Eric Weinstein? Tulsi Gabbard? Heather Heying?
Apparently the ability to think for yourself and have your own opinion is now "right wing".
Bigot (definition): One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of anyone who differs.
Hilarious...
I am looking at this from the bright side: during the height of Russiagate hoax I used to be branded "Putin-bot" and "Assadist" on various social media and comments sections (e.g. The Graun), now I graduated to distinguished ranks of "right wingers" :-)
"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." --- Came across this the other day, it's from the U.N.'s Universal Declaration of Human Rights
...but some animals are more equal than others...
Here, off the top of my head, are just a few raving lunatic right-wingers that Joe has interviewed:
Cornel West, Ep. #1325;
Richard Dawkins, Ep. #1366;
Jon Stewart, Ep. #1498
Peter Boghossian, Ep. 1191
and some guy named Matt Taibbi, Ep. #1745
Lest we forget Dr. Carl Hart.
Yes, he's practically a Mormon.
Didn't he have Andrew Yang on?
He sure did...I used to think Andrew Yang was interesting, but he's shown his true colors. Andrew, you are dead to me.
Link? I don't read much news but I thought he was interesting as well after seeing him on Bill Maher.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/593158-andrew-yang-apologizes-for-tweeting-joe-rogan-isnt-racist-because-he-works
Matt's rundown on the generational change in journalism happened in a lot of professions. It's like the anti-union sentiment I hear from people that had their education paid for by their Teamster dad or mom. Never mind their parents saw a three fold increase in wages in 10 years that made it possible.