806 Comments
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Todd Davis's avatar

Best response to bad speech is more speech

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dorothy slater's avatar

A gentleman I had just met, opened up our conversation with what I knew was going to be an anti Trump rant. I explained to him that I was put off by the fact that without knowing me for even 5 minutes he assumed that I was as anti-trump as he, and we could go on from there. When I told him that I didn't share his feelings, he said to me well, then what are we going to talk about?. I answered, no comment.

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Apollo's Lyre's avatar

This is terrifying, but totally relatable. It perfectly epitomizes how people's brains have been melted by years of Two Minutes Hate on endless loop: they really do not have any idea what else to talk about!

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Bill Jarett's avatar

Shorter attention spans are a feature not a bug of the modern media.

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Don's avatar

Bill that is an OUTSTANDING observation - and terrifying

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Susan e's avatar

Any news station any time if day, Somehow someway they always bring Trump into the conversation. I really don’t know what they would do if he wasn’t around to talk about.

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Tom Larson's avatar

Zappa saw this coming! "I'm the Slime", about sums it up.

We used to call them "Boob Tubes" because the Cathode Ray Tubes were actually shaped like a boob! The contemporary usage would refer to the viewers actually being turned into "BOOBS"!

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James P's avatar

That may have been an alternative meaning but "boob" also means a stupid person. I'm pretty sure that was the intent of "boob tube" when the phrase was commonly used - including by my Baptist mother! - in the 50s and 60s

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Tom Larson's avatar

I'm actually a former TV tech. At the dawn of the CRT, was the boob shape. And it took on a new and more publicly palatable meaning almost instantly.

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F Onderwaal's avatar

I guess one has to be of a certain age to remember that Jeremy Boob was the Nowhere Man in the Beatles movie Yellow Submarine...

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Janet's avatar

Blast from the past! Boob tubes. Lol.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

The original meaning of "boob tube" was sex is best sold visually.

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Lysander Spoonbread's avatar

cold showers for the lot of you...

- regards, The Church Lady

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Good advice, my Lady. After cold showers, I am more civilized: I call them decolletages, and they look just as good...

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Janet's avatar

Some people use Trump as metaphor all day long for everything in their lives. I know someone like that.

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Beeswax's avatar

Only one? Lucky you.

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LaVerne Karras's avatar

But that applies to both sides of that argument in particular but many others as well, there is ideology on both sides and both sides KNOW they are right.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Thus, democracy.

The *usual* rub is avoiding the tyranny of the majority, but our individual rights protected by a *right-leaning* (i.e. strictly-Constitution-following) SCOTUS does a good job stopping this.

But today, one party has figured out how to win *without* a majority, by capturing private sector actors (media, universities, finance, c-suites) to censor and fool the ignorant peeps grown fat, happy, and complacent with the success of Capitalism (another word for the Classical Liberalism of the West in general, and especially of the founding documents, appropriately amended to include *all* citizens of course some 150 years ago).

Coupled with Democrat Party capture of what should certainly be non-partisan Federal security entities, as well as most adminstrative entities (think Strzok, but these apparatchiks are almost too many to list, and the most dangerous are certainly still anonymous) *and* a number of wealthy oligarchs, this equals...

A Fascist State.

The U.S. Federal State has been taken over by Fascist-minded Democrats. Goaded beautifully by the neo-twin-slaying (and un-capturable) DJT, they have had to reveal themselves and double down, effectively conducting a declaration of war on the People and their precious freedoms.

*Only* massive voting for an un-diluted opposition party (that's the Republicans, folks) will avoid an eventual 1984 outcome, and the death of all that we libertarians hold dear.

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LaVerne Karras's avatar

Trump is uncapturable? I don't think so, his foreign policies were not significantly different than any other, while he didn't start any _major_ wars, he din't stop the covert crap that the US does and he made a bigger mess in the Middle East by moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, the war in Yemen continued, he almost started a war with Iran, and instead of a war with Russia, he wanted a war with China, the difference is just _who_ he was captured by, as I pointed out, when Ideology takes over, objectivity is lost. Besides, have you ever seen a millionaire/billionaire that couldn't be bought, they _never_ have enough money!

As for voting for the altruistic Republicans, _most_ of them are voting _with_ Biden on his war in Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza, as far as the establishment Republicans go, they are no different than the Democrats, they are just generally more forthright in their attacks on the average person, they don't beat around the bush about being enablers of the wealth transfer to the 1% by reducing their taxes even more.

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Spiderbaby's avatar

"If the Democrats cared about getting your vote they’d be trying hard to earn it. They’re not trying because they don’t care.

"The unelected empire managers who actually run the US power structure also don’t care who wins the election. They know they’ll still get their murder and militarism and capitalism and imperialism no matter who gets sworn in next year, whether it’s Biden or Trump or Harris or someone else. Nobody with any real power cares about your vote.

"And that’s the real issue. That’s the real point that keeps getting missed here. The problem is not that the wrong people keep getting elected, it’s that the elections don’t matter and voters don’t have a say. It’s that humanity is dominated by a murderous globe-spanning power structure loosely centralized around Washington whose actual movements and behavior have effectively zero responsiveness to the will of the electorate.

"You’re never going to be able to vote your way out of this mess, and you’re never going to be able to not-vote your way out of this mess, because the power of your vote has been undermined to a value of zero. That doesn’t mean there’s no way out of this mess, it just means there’s no way to get out of this mess using the fake plastic diversion toy they handed you to shut you up and trick you into thinking you have a say." - Caitlin Johnstone

https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/nobody-with-real-power-cares-if-you

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

I could not disagree more.

Imso, DJT has shown that he is *not* a Statist, nor an oligarch, nor ever will be.

And today the two parties are night and day. Democrats are destroying the wealth-creating private sector, and aggrandizing the public. They are acting like Fascists in all but name, including their woke base.

Woke is just the latest word for social Fascism (I am aware that is not its original meaning).

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PassingThru's avatar

Therein lies that problem. No principles or moral fortitude. The hate has shattered their soul, leaving a shell full of propaganda.

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BeadleBlog's avatar

Remember the pictures of the screaming apes mobbing black students as they walked into schools during desegregation? This epitomizes the type of brain prone to TDS.

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michael888's avatar

What's really sad is that science and medicine were so politicized during Covid, that what turned out to be better ideas and approaches were censored. Physicians and scientists who spoke out were vilified, some lost their jobs. Many of the over a million Covid deaths could have been prevented just by open dialogue.

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Steve Dietrich's avatar

A major part of the problem was that pretty much everyone knew it was extremely probable that it came from the Wuhan Lab where we knew they were performing Gain of Function research under conditions similar to that of a dentist lab. The back channel emails from Faucci's group show that A) they thought it probable that it came from bioweapon research and B) displayed characteristics of an engineered virus and C) they were not allowed to consider the lab as the source.

Goes back to the foundational truth - he who controls the assumptions controls the analysis

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Cranky Frankie's avatar

The journalistic community enabled that denial-of-Wuhan lie. And the Medill and Columbia journalists keep wondering why the news reporting business is dying...

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Steve Dietrich's avatar

Absolutely , but also it came from the top and it was protecting the left so the press did not want to look very deeply. What was surprising was how freely those writing the dismissals talked in their back channel coms that they knew they were "just following orders" not the facts. Although I disagree with a lot of his ideas RFK jr just nailed it in his writing on covid from its origins to the vaccine corruption to masks and closing schools .

The coverup of Hunter Biden's laptop and the vast array of crimes he conveniently documented on his computer were stuffed into the closet by the press to protect Joe Biden and the greater problem, the army of influence peddling lawyers, fixers and spinners and their partners in crime in various government departments and agencies.

This is a sample of the corruption. Louie Freeh, Hunter and gang are working to assist a client, JP Morgan, get $2.4 Billion out the back door of the Treasury with help from a an array of elected and appointed officials. Even better there would be no visibility of the event.

https://bidenlaptopemails.com/biden-emails/email.php?id=20100307-152935_23691

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Excellent, and thank you.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Yep, but "foundational" only to the wayward Left today.

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Thomas Heath's avatar

Can't have crisis capitalism without a crisis, manufactured or otherwise. Ahem....global boiling catastrophe emergency. lol

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Bill Jarett's avatar

Everyone loves a good "IMF Riot".

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Bill Jarett's avatar

"Trust fund"... All these World Governance institutions were started after WW2 with our gold we "gifted" to them. Time to get it back with 80 years interest.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

You mean crony-capitalism, the opposite of classical Capitalism.

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Apr 1, 2024
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michael888's avatar

Dream on! The Government and State Media are desperately trying to push the Orange Man Bad theme (true, but worse than the more dangerous Establishment?) and of course abortion access (which I favor, along with voluntary, non-mandated vaccinations).

It's a good thing that, like Obama, Biden once again broke his campaign promise: "I would send immediately to the desk of the United States Congress, when I'm elected president -- if I'm elected president, a codification of Roe v. Wade amended by Casey, because I think it is a woman's right to choose." transcripts.cnn.com/show/se/date/2020-03-15/segment/03 Of course Biden did nothing with control of the House and Senate (why waste the Democrats' best campaign promise? Even Trump, when a Democrat, supported Roe vs Wade), and Obama, when called out on the same campaign promise, said it wasn't high priority. Except as a continual campaign promise.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

But could it possibly be that even you, who see the truth about the Dem police state gambit, have bought Dem lies about "Orange Man Bad"?

OMB is TDS.

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Janet's avatar

My only grandchild was steered into this hell. The monsters do quite a job on the parents.

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MH's avatar

It's sooo true. Living in an Uber liberal city, as I do, people assume ALL the time that you're automatically going to agree w their political views without question. Makes me nuts.

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Queen Lolligag's avatar

Their heads are little echo chambers

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

If you lived in coastal California, you get used to it.

Sometimes I can avoid it by wearing my Trump hat...

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dorothy slater's avatar

That comment I wrote is only one of many I have every week. The sad thing is, that most of my dear educated loving long time friends and I can't find anything to talk about anymore because all they want to talk about is how much they hate trump. I now drop out of many conversations and just have another cup of coffee as they go at it. I even had a Canadian Living down in expat Mexico where I live whose jaw literally dropped when I told her that I rather liked Trump. The hatred has even spread to canada. She rarely spoke to me after that encounter. But Life Goes On. And thank god, I found this site.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Thank you, dorothy. It makes me happy you have found your community. If you have time, check out the stack Screaming into the Void by SimulationCommander. There are many libertarian-minded newsletters.

When the peeps around me start assuming I'm woke too, I stay very friendly, but not silent either. Someone's got to wake them up!

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william teetzel's avatar

I do the same here in deep red sw colorado. Except I dress up in rainbow leotards. I try to get used to it, but it’s a challenge.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Ha!

I don't think we *should* get used to it, william. That strikes me as giving in.

But...I don't usually wear my hat here in Marin County for two reasons.

1) I want these local wokesters to think they don't need to vote, and

2) I always feel like I have to be some kind of ambassador, instead of my usual curmudgeonly self!

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Amusings's avatar

Wow! Marin!! Hats off to you...no pun intended.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

It's not so bad, really. I think part of it is human nature. Once about 60% of the population goes one way politically, both sides tend to give that substantial majority much more weight in describing the people of a region/state.

But one out of three Bay area resident voted Republican.

And when I *do* wear my Trump hat (black, with big white lettering, easily seen within 50 feet!), while most look askance, I do get quiet signs of support.

I think this time around especially, final numbers count, so it is important for all blue-state people-of-the-right to vote, even if in losing effort.

I hope that is a Trump hat you're tipping, but a sincere thanks in any case!

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Bill Jarett's avatar

Richard Simmons, is that you? Lol.

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Lysander Spoonbread's avatar

I've always wondered about wearing a MAGA hat in a Whole Foods

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

The feeling is one of not just total isolation, but of all eyes on you like you are a joke or not even human. No one talks to you (except the occasional and quiet thumbs-up). I doubt most could take it. We are social animals, and TDS is *so* dis-heartening.

But...Woke Foods has my parmesano reggiano, and I can take it. ;-)

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Janet's avatar

Ha. When I quit talking about liberal politics or any politics with my rabid liberal sister back in my “weaning off democrats during the Obama days”, she said I was now “boring”.

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Amusings's avatar

The assumption you thought like him is a phenomena I still don't get, especially given the 50/50 split in the population. Basic statistics would tell you that a 1 in 2 chance is you're talking to the 'other' side. There are so many things to talk about besides politics.

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Jonny's avatar

Perhaps that was a missed opportunity, it sounded like an invitation to conversation. We need more speech, not less. Friendly dissent, perhaps? It's become a vanished artform.

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Jeff Keener's avatar

...or better speech.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

We can't decide which is better until we see them...

That's the point of erasing the middle man (the censor).

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Running Burning Man's avatar

Better is in the ear of the beholder!

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Susan Steffner's avatar

....and mind and heart....

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

It's the eye of the beholder I'm worried about.

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Robert Brusca's avatar

spoken like a real running burning man! What are you hiding? Come out come out whoever you are!! ID yourself!

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TruthCanHurt23's avatar

Or more speech by Matt.

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Jeff Keener's avatar

That's always welcome.

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Greg Connolly's avatar

Huh? Best detail that call sir. What is better?

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

What I love about Racket News comments is the broad stretch of perspectives, and while there are a fair amount of pointed comments, it's nothing like other places. Like The Free Press, for instance, where even the whiff of criticism of Israel's government will have you called antisemite and Jew-hater by at least 4-6 people.

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Mel's avatar

Yep, I can’t even look at Citizen’s Free Press anymore. And I won’t. Just because of this very issue. It’s sickening. I always respond with, “I happen to admire and adore Aaron and Gabor Mate, Max Blumenthal, Medea Benjamin, Norman Finkelstein, Russell Dobular, Keaton Weiss and Glen Greenwald to name just a few of the fine Jewish people with intact moral compasses.” Then I end by telling the person who called me a “Jew-hater” - “so you are FULL of ****.”

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John Stuckey's avatar

My reply is that my first teachers about Zionism were folks with numbers tattooed on their arms.

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Mel's avatar

Yeah, there’s no cornering the market on genocide…

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Keith's avatar

Just a question. how many governments that are democracies you've criticized other than Israel? If you have more than one I hope you started with our own "democracy".

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Lately? Ours, Canada's, China's, Russia's, the UK's, Germany's, and the EU's in general when it comes to censorship. There are a lot more I haven't heard or written about much lately, like Saudi Arabia and India.

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Jeff Keener's avatar

But, you've never been banned from commenting on the Free Press, have you?

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

No, but I have had a couple freeze-outs, as some other commenters have related as well. Then again, I pay them $80 to read, so they probably like that.

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MG's avatar

Oh come on. I love the comment section on The Free Press. I've seen people disagree with you (Iike me) but I've never seen you called a Jew hater, much less by 4-6 people. Maybe if you celebrate rape and terrorism you would get that, but you're not in that category.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Antisemite didn't surprise me, though it did disappoint me. It's a quick, reflexive response given by people who otherwise seem logical. Those were the 4-6. I was called a Jew-hater once, and was asked if I was a Jew-Hater once. Those are the extremists, and I pay them no mind. I would probably be able to remember the specific commenters if I scrolled through a random TFP.

You're right, I don't support rape or terrorism. But neither do I support what is happening to Gaza, much less our providing the guns and bombs to do it.

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Lynne Morris's avatar

What do you see as the/a solution in Gaza?

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Marcia Donaldson's avatar

Spot on.

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Savi_heretic33's avatar

Probably because they are.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Thanks for proving my point.

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Darren G Whitney's avatar

British accent?

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Jeff Keener's avatar

More persuasive.

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Todd Davis's avatar

Who’s to say what’s better? How about we let the marketplace of ideas function?

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Tom Larson's avatar

There's also the option to IGNORE speech and not lend foolish, flippant, or impulsive comments any credibility by bringing them to a public forum, thereby validating them. Stupid shit doesn't even deserve the validation of a response.

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Tom Schwoegler's avatar

Clear, concise, no bullshit. Why would you go anywhere else?

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Don Reed's avatar

"Some writers are concerned about what the presence of certain kinds of commenters says about them."

These "writers" should get the hell out of the writing business and enter into beauty pageants.

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Don Reed's avatar

Our local Idiot of The Year is the NJ Governor's wife, Tammy Murphy, who somehow thought that there were phalanxes of voters in HoHoKus just dying to see her replace Mendacious Menendez as a U.S. Senator. That delusion perished in the sunlight of reality.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Sweet sunshine!

Freedom's disinfectant.

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Don Reed's avatar

04/01/24: With a hefty hockey-assist point from the knowledge that when Covid Murphy bankrupted (and murdered) thousands with his Cuomoian (NYS gov) business lockdowns/from-hospital-to-nursing home dumps, he and Tammy also thought it a good idea to get a good night's sleep or two at their villa in Italy (bought with Murphy's accrued investment-banking Goldman Sachs lucre). Instant disapproval. And we remembered.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Yes, the wealthy Left are out of touch with reality.

I sure enjoyed the irony when Menendez publicly defended his crony-capitalism by threatening his fellow anti-Capitalist Democrat politicians with exposing (and thus ending) their own.

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Erin J. Morgart's avatar

Oh, HELL NO to entering THAT world! I’d never go back to it! Women are the WORST, most territorial backstabbing drama characters of anyone out there! And YES, I can write this without remorse because I’ve lived it!!!

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Don Reed's avatar

And here's a blast from the NBC-Pravda past:

A comment posted on Mark Steyn's website...

"Paul G. • Mar 18, 2020 at 22:18

"Everyone here ought to stop by the NBC site for a proper scolding by Richard Engel about the ignorance of the bigoted term "Chinese virus,"... delivered from his [impeccable] moral pinnacle previously occupied by Brian Williams, Matt Lauer and most recently, Chris Matthews."

And mine:

DR: I personally remember the days when you could be fired from NBC for moral turpitude.

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Don Reed's avatar

04/03/24: Then you must be immensely enjoying the public spectacle of the five exclusively female NBC-Pravda "News" 30 Rock execs shrieking and tearing each other's hair out trying to avoid being fingered as one of The Women (hello, Claire Booth Luce!) Who Hired Ronna McDaniel.

[Which is all very strange in itself since their boss, Señor Conde --- "The Revenge of Telemundo" --- had publically taken sole responsibility for the McDaniel Hired-Fired Dumpster Inferno. Maybe if they had watched, you know, the "news," they would have known this before launching their hussy-diabolical diatribes.]

Worthy successors indeed to Fili-Krushel and Deborah Turness, the one-time Big NBC-Pravda execs in charge when Lyin' Brian William's fables were exposed.

F-K in the aftermath landed in a cushy, empty executive Comcast office before returning to the beaten-path as an Upper East Side nosh-commando.

FCD ("Forever Cool" Debby) was rewarded with the biggest media job in the UK, BBC-Pravda "News."

(Honorable mention goes to the putz who in January 2019 had to spend $160,000,000 to get rid of his prize hire, Megan Kelly. His name escapes me for the moment. Another H.M. is Third-Sex-Specimen Noah Oppenheim, long gone.)

Nothing changes.

Actually, that's not true. The male goons were replaced by the FemDolts.

Granted, identical results. Money corrupts impartially, emphatically, completely.

And tonight, The Rockies beat the Cubs in Chicago.

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Apr 1, 2024
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Don Reed's avatar

Good to hear, always! And she can't go wrong with "Mind The Gaffe, The Penguin Guide to Common Errors in English," by Larry Trask [1944-2004]; Penguin Group (2002 paperback).

The title is misleading; it sounds like a "scold" book (a grammar "specialty," which is why no one wants anything to do with it). MTG isn't like that at all. Mr. Trask's robust and resilient sense of humor will win over readers of all ages.

Above all, buy the English edition; AVOID the American edition!

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HeftyMatty's avatar

And amazing flourishes of humor, too.

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Kelly Green's avatar

If you like to talk about scissoring you might. Condemning a comment and then issuing this a couple days later is tidily apologetic but not exactly "no bullshit"

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Steve Baldwin's avatar

Love it. That’s why I subscribe.

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Yuri Bezmenov's avatar

This is the way. Ever notice that the more a leftist writer bleats on about fascism, the more they censor? Check out the Trump Derangement Substack March Madness Censorious Sixteen: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/christofascist-leftist-cult-religion

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Mike Stone's avatar

Why are you posting a comment about MSNBC (or, as someone called it, NBC's crazy sister they keep locked in the attic.)

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Kirk Anderson's avatar

If they had actual leftists there, I might watch.

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Thomas Heath's avatar

Very true. Check out Due Dissidence on YT if you haven't already.

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Nowhere Man's avatar

COURAGE!

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Erin J. Morgart's avatar

You ROCK, @yuri!!! I DO believe that you are the reincarnated version of Yuri 1.0. I’m Resubscribing to you! Word I love now: samizdat. Thanks to you! Sposeba!

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Don Reed's avatar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrXoCb4ORio (starts at 08:35). 04/03/24: Unfortunately, since Mark Dice somehow didn't provide indexes to any of his/the four books that I once owned, you CAN'T find the pages pertinent to the original Yuri in "The War on Conservatives."

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Sam McGowan's avatar

That's the best rules to have.

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James Levesque's avatar

This is the BEST comment section on the web. The IQ level of your audience is off the chart. It gives me hope for our hurting humanity. It is also the best kind of rabbit-hole ;-)

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Scuba Cat's avatar

"Off the chart" always makes me think that we need better charts.

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Josh Wilson's avatar

I'll give 110% making a better chart!

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Scuba Cat's avatar

😂

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Or at least bigger ones.

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feldspar's avatar

Indeed!

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Mar 31, 2024
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Brad M's avatar

Why does it have to be measured by left or right? Are we only pigeon holes to be filled? There are intelligent and interesting posts from all sides of the spectrum.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

True. I do see fewer "Orange Man Bad!" and "all Democrats are fascists/communists" (well, which is it?) here, which typically signifies a my tribe vs. your tribe perspective found so many other places.

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rtj's avatar

We have had some dyed in the wool Dem cheerleaders here, but they seem to get scared off when the party line is not swallowed here. Or just assume that we're all right wing Trumpsters and unsalvagable.

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Mar 31, 2024
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rtj's avatar

Sorry, my bad. I was replying to Builttoill's comment.

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madaboutmd's avatar

I think that's because Matt is a straight shooter. The Free Press, for example, when it was Common Sense, was much more a straight shooter than it is now. So it's not surprising to see reactions to factual, interesting content vs a whole lot of slant. You get much more thoughtful, insightful and educated comments when one is presented with the facts.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Fascism and Communism, both being forms of Authoritarian Socialism, share the LEFT endpoint.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

It's funny, because the last big power of each really didn't get along, and even had a war about it.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

That's because in the end, there can be only one Authoritarian Socialist in charge.

If you will do some research, you will find this is the historical rule.

And it isn't funny at all.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

Because to the left lies more of today's Democrat Fascism (a form of Statism), and to the right lies the freedom of Classical Liberalism, not to mention *limited* gov't.

But I don't believe bk was refering to the political spectrum...

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Mar 31, 2024
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william teetzel's avatar

Funny

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Rick Merlotti's avatar

Left side of chart = Axis of Morons. Which is a good description for the NATO-centered Borgish Empire.

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Bill Jarett's avatar

Why does that matter so long as we are all THINKING? "Conservative" speech naturally gravitates to the internet because it is suppressed everywhere else. So long as one is not a sophist, has an honest argument I will LISTEN and maybe LEARN something. I might even be convinced to change my position.

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Apr 1, 2024Edited
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Bill Jarett's avatar

Ha! Yes I can see that now. I must be on the lower end of the bell curve.

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mule_ear's avatar

I hate 'LOL' but I actually did laugh out loud

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Mar 31, 2024
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Jala's avatar

I do not think IQ means much. Highly overrated these days

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J David Krauser's avatar

If it did not represent something significant the Left would not be working so industriously to banish its use.

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Timothy Andrew Staples/pop122's avatar

But wisdom is.

Only a unified opposition party can defeat the entrenched/embedded Statist party.

Vote policy, not personality.

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Mar 31, 2024
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william teetzel's avatar

Especially in the last few comments

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HV_Commissioning's avatar

I saw an email notification pop up from Matt about rules for comments and really wondered how he could have any given his continued fight for free speech.

I was pleased when I actually read the message. :)

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bestuvall's avatar

yup I was frightened there for a second. a nano second

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

For a half-second I thought we wouldn't be allowed to say son of bitch, fuckton, and assclown anymore. Then I remembered who this writer is.

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bestuvall's avatar

lol. all Tourette's people. sign off. one of the best scenes ever. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xb8OZP_4sUs...

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

I just pissed myself. How did I miss that episode?

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Bradley Lacke's avatar

I have to imagine that was the intention. Great writers take you on a journey.

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Ellen's avatar

I wasn't. Not here. I assumed he'd say something to the effect that there were no rules, and I was right.

However, Substack may overrule him here and there.

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KathyC's avatar

Haha, perfect answer Matt!

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Sheldon H.'s avatar

Matt’s got an IDGAF attitude lately, and I like it.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

I think that attitude is about 20 years old, but you're right, it has amped up since some dipshits in Congress called him a so-called journalist.

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CBL's avatar

We all need to cultivate a DGAF attitude.

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Bill Jarett's avatar

Absolutely! The essence of the American spirit is to stand up and be able to look any man in the eye and tell him to "Go Fuck Yourself". We have lost the rebel spirit that made this country special, nakedly proven by covid.

I post under my own name because I'm an American and will not be cowed by authority. Don't like what I have to say? GO FUCK YOURSELF- my opinions are worth what you pay for them. FREE SPEECH!!!

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Apr 1, 2024
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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

And dumbass totalitarians at that. A bunch of stooges who were handed their notes on the way into the hearing, having no idea what the issue is all about. The so-called Rep from the Virgin Islands and her nonsense, then it's handed to Allred for some real stupidity, then Wasserman-Schultz grabs the baton for the home stretch, fantasizing that if her hero Hillary were there, she would simply vanquish these heretics!

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Mar 31, 2024
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Sandy Milne's avatar

Even better is DILIGAF. When someone tries to point out your "error", you can reply DILIGAF.

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ocjackel's avatar

I for one welcome our new insect overlords.

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David Burse's avatar

+1 for appropriately channeling Kent Brockman

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Rfhirsch's avatar

The comments on this post are really a problem for me.

I want to like all of them, but do not have time to do so.

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Susan Steffner's avatar

Whoopie ! No rules ! I feel like a defiant teenager.....

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Go for it, Susan. Stay out late, rip off multiple MF's per day, consume much weed, and continue to join us here.

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Ellen's avatar

I'm getting much too old for the first two, but I've got the third and fourth covered. And it's fun.

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Susan Steffner's avatar

Done !...in the previous Century.....

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Me too, but the weed is much better now.

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Ellen's avatar

Ain't it the truth!

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J David Krauser's avatar

Those were the days!

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Susan Steffner's avatar

....and these are the Dark nights...or Dark Knights ?

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Ellen's avatar

In the dark nights, we need Dark Knights.

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Harry Broertjes's avatar

I'm with Matt. Substacker Freddie deBoer had an extremely long discourse on commenting today that might have prompted Matt's note —"The Only Way to Continue to Host Comments Here at All is to Get Ruthless." deBoer promised weeklong all the way up to lifetime commenting bans on offensive commenters. https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/the-only-way-to-continue-to-host?publication_id=295937&utm_campaign=email-post-title&r=2jvk2&utm_medium=email

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Scuba Cat's avatar

That's because he's a weenie.

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Harrison Bergeron's avatar

You know, that is a highly underutilized pejorative. I've been defaulting to foul language for way too long. I'm going back to good words like "weenie" for maximum effectiveness!

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Ellen's avatar

LOL. Peter De Vries had a female-centered novel, Sauce For the Goose. There's a memory her high-school english teacher has of her back when. He'd asked the class what poetry was for; someone offered, "to shock the bourgeosie?"

Then the teacher asked how one would do that, and got ,"Um, four letter words?"

So he pressed, what four letter words would actually shock the bourgeorsie - our heroine piped up with, "How about 'fain,' and 'dost?"

He knew this was the brat he'd been hoping to have in the class.

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druzus's avatar

I'm particular to "dweeb"

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nedweenie's avatar

He totally is. I should know. ;)

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Running Burning Man's avatar

He’s done v that before. That is a reason I dropped his posts.

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Literally Mussolini's avatar

So is it a fair conclusion that Matt's post was prompted by deBoer's?

Matt's brevity seems like a mic drop.

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Lisa N.'s avatar

Thanks for sharing the link to Freddie’s rant about his comments section. It makes me appreciate Matt’s 1 minute read even more. Seems like Freddie needs to lose his nose for a while. Or forever.

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Sweatpants's avatar

I’m a big Freddie fan, but he has such disdain for his audience

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Megan Baker's avatar

De Boer will instantly ban you if you suggest that maybe, just maybe, psychiatric drugs sometimes have negative side effects, like--oh, I don't know--suicide and violence. He's utterly intolerant of dissent from his pet views and he acts like a middle schooler if you have the gall to express any. Call me nitpicky but that strikes me as a terrible quality for a writer working in a public space. He's certainly the opposite of Matt in that regard, and it's not a trivial thing.

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Anti-Hip's avatar

"The only arbiter of when these lines are crossed is me. This is my shop and I run it how I want."

Yup. He's begging for people to mess with him, and so of course they will (and already do, under his radar, compounding his paranoia). This attitude doesn't result in the best commentary, and it may backfire spectacularly some day.

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miles.mcstylez's avatar

Calvinball content moderation - just like pre-Musk Twitter.

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David Burse's avatar

He has super thin skin. He correctly observes the kids ought not self diagnose themselves by watching TikTok videos, except of course that they are not their sex, which cannot be questioned. Then there's his Hamas rape denial. Oh well...

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Megan Baker's avatar

I agree with him on quite a few of his views but I can't abide banning people for disagreeing. On the issue of psychiatric drugs he behaves like he's on Big Pharma's payroll.

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Mike Zillion's avatar

I don't always agree with Freddie, but his talent for pissing off the kinds of self-important people I loathe is unparalleled and for that, I appreciate him

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Jim M's avatar

Not for nothin', up till now, never heard of him. I hit the link posted below, and looked at his latest or whatever...

MAN DOES HE LOVE HIS KEYBOARD! I gave up when I realized that this one post was more than 4K words.

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That TERF Owl's avatar

Reading his posts gave me a newfound appreciation for editors.

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Sweatpants's avatar

Agreed. He’s a helluva writer.

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Megan Baker's avatar

That's right. Just ask him!

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Ellen's avatar

Thanks for the chuckle.

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Just an observer's avatar

Agree, but some of his ideas are preposterous, and he doesn’t discuss any POVs that he doesn’t share.

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Mar 31, 2024
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Anti-Hip's avatar

Don't you understand? Modern "Leftists" know the uncontestable "truth". Naturally, FdB's self-esteem is sufficient for him to "know it when I see it" with an unimpeachable finality. (As for positive and normative, um... what's that?)

Among other things, this means that if, in some polity, an election candidate (such as, oh, Saddam Hussein) wins 100%, that democracy must so perfect that "the will of the people" has been fully revealed, and all the "erroneous" beliefs have been completely destroyed by a thorough "education". Three cheers for the Democratic Republic of America!

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Tickled to Death's avatar

Freddie?

Bartholomew, March, or _____ and the Dreamers?

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Scuba Cat's avatar

I deleted my paid subscription from deBoer a few months ago due to his seeming support for totalitarianism as long as it was leftist totalitarianism, but the the headline of the one he dropped this morning made me unsubscribe entirely. Then I saw this post from Matt and it cheered me up. (That and the brunch drinks.)

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David Burse's avatar

#Metoo

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JR's avatar

He is a better writer than he is a public intellectual. All of his ideas have been tried already and failed repeatedly. So we go off to search for Real Socialism (TM). After a while, it's just gets repetitive. YMMV.

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miles.mcstylez's avatar

Apparently his new book boils down to "real identity politics have never been tried" according to Quillette

https://quillette.com/2024/03/28/rescuing-identity-politics/

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JR's avatar

Socialism is based on No True Scotsman logical fallacy. Any argument based on the logical fallacy becomes unfalsifiable. His pro-Palestinian stance was the last straw for me. I can read "Israel is bad, m'kay" pieces in Nation or TNR for free.

I'm going to read the review.

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Michel Angelo's avatar

just realize that when reading quillette, you are basically reading reason-lite magazine. they def. have their bias and blinders on in various ways. (like listening to tim pool, well not that bad but you get it)

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The Upright Man.'s avatar

Freddy is an intellectual coward. He takes positions, but will not defend them. He subscribes to a ideology that has been proven to be a failure, and yet clings to it, even as he reaps the benefits of the antithesis of that ideology.

A socialist who owns a house in the suburbs. Need I say more.

(he does have an excellent comment section, far above what he writes. i am not surprised he wants to tame it, indeed, is frightened of it.)

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DPFlorida's avatar

I know more about his complaints about Substack than about him or his positions on anything. Does he want people to read him or hate him? Or both?

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Running Burning Man's avatar

He’s bipolar so likely both.

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Clever Pseudonym's avatar

lololol

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Lucy's avatar

That’s not fair (or nice).

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Ellen's avatar

It's a fact (asserted by De Boer). May not be nice, but fair, yes.

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Apr 1, 2024
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Ellen's avatar

My late husband was - slightly - bipolar. That can tend to people really, truly not hearing themselves "right now."

However, it doesn't tend to lend confidence in their general observation powers or mental clarity. Perhaps De Boer should write fiction instead of social commentary.

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Michael's avatar

Freddie uses his mental illness as the basis for his constant claiming to know more about mental illness than anyone who disagrees with him about mental illness.

He pretends to have "taken responsibility" for his spurious online rape charges against someone who disagreed with him but has written thousands of words establishing that mental illness makes people do bad things and that it is important to understand that about mental illness. In other words, his mental illness "made" him do bad things.

He talks about the side effects of his meds, the power of his illness to influence his perspective and his behavior, and then broadens his experience to the point where it becomes "what mental illness and psychiatric drugs ACTUALLY are."

Sounds like a mental illness to me. But don't say it in Freddie's hearing, cuz he's a Marxist.

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Subcomandante Mark's avatar

The guy is publicly on board with an ideology that has created more oppression, suffering and death than any in world history. That is everything you need to know about him.

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SV's avatar

I mean if you’re one of those people that takes every opportunity to bitch about trans people maybe you should just shut the fuck up?

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JR's avatar

But then he writes long diatribes assuring us that he is one of the Good Ones, a good Ally who is totally down with adult men showering with pre-teen girls. And everyone who disagrees is a reactionary who should shut the fuck up.

I unsubscribed because what I thought I was getting was something different than typical woke bullshit. What I ended up getting was exactly the same woke bullshit, only written up better. I can get that for free anywhere.

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SV's avatar

yeah see you’re one of those people that ought to shut the fuck up

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JR's avatar

Straight to ad hominem. How boring. Can't you at least try to say something original?

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Michael's avatar

I think you'll find "STFU" and a Kill All Terfs T-shirt is pretty much the extent of what to expect from ol' SV.

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SV's avatar

I don’t remember asking you a god damn thing billboard boy

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JR's avatar

Really? I consider myself a TERF and a militant one at that.

The Internet delivers again. Never change, anonymous Internet boards.

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SV's avatar

why be original when I can be consistent? you’re the kind of person I was referring to in my first comment. also rich asking me to be original when you’re fearmongering about bathrooms like a NC state senator from half a decade ago

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JR's avatar

I agree. What's the point of you even trying to be original? A man's got to know his limitations, and you know yours. So kudos.

Just like Freddie, I see you too think that disregarding welfare of women to appease some dudes is really awesome and everybody who is not aboard the latest thing should shut the fuck up. I think you probably get off on the idea of frightening women but have no balls to live out your fantasy. So you live it through others. Naughty naughty.

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miles.mcstylez's avatar

This particular blowup had nothing to do with trans. I would know lol

https://substack.com/@milesmcstylez/note/c-52637691?utm_source=activity_item

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Slaw's avatar

Maybe you should try getting an argument.

If people want to bitch about trans people they can. It's a free country.

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feldspar's avatar

Disdainful? Fred? Duh-Boor? It's probably just a case of self-loathing that stems from the fact that nobody has any idea what he's talking about at any given column inch, including himself. He is, after all, a self-proclaimed Marxist whose ideas suggest a lonely CPA going through a mid-life crisis and who is actually a closet libertarian.

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Old Breed's avatar

You’re going to treat me like a grownup and act like one yourself? I’d pay $5/month to see that.

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Russo Radio's avatar

Fucking Bravo 👏 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓🆓❤️

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Kathleen McCook's avatar

See my comment above.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

What comment? I didn't see one.

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Jim M's avatar

This is the 2nd or 3rd time you posted 'see my comment'. I read it. You asked for less profanity and got slammed or something? OK...

What's your point? I'm genuinely curious.

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Kathleen McCook's avatar

My point is that if I got hurt and went away that would be on me, not the fact that the comment section is obstreperous.

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Lawyers Guns & Money's avatar

Fuckin'-A-right

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