WHAT?! I CAN'T BUY FULL AUTO!?

Hilarious.

More material documenting combox Nazism at The "American" "Conservative"

Speaking of comments not being approved over at The "American" "Conservative", a blogger named Thomas O. Meehan has posted numerous examples over at his site Odysseus on the Rocks of his comments not being approved by Rod Dreher and others. Mr. Meehan is an interesting example to me because I think he's much closer to Amconmag's way of thinking on certain foreign policy issues than I am. But, like us, he is utterly perplexed at how they can continue to advertise themselves as being conservative after displaying so much Obama-love and espousing so many liberal views. He writes this:

I was going to post something later on the President's faux impromptu speech to the White House press corps. And then I noticed an almost giddy puff piece in TAC by some kid they recently hired named Jonathan Coppage. Let me say that this is just the latest signal from TAC that they no longer wish to be considered Conservative in any way beyond their masthead. Along with Coppage's love letter to our mulatto messiah, there was a piece by Goldman attacking the 2nd amendment, a piece by Jacobs in the same vane and a really shameful piece by Millman whining about Human Bio-Diversity. So It's official, TAC is now a sham. It has devolved into a spineless exercise, a hermaphrodite among the journals. It is neither really conservative or left. It is a talking shop for those worshiping at the plastic shrine of the goddess NICE.

[Nota bene, I try not to use the term mulatto even as an adjective, but Kurt used it as a noun, so it probably can't be racist.]

Meehan's entire post is worth reading. I don't know if they published this comment, he doesn't say. Someone else can do that research if they wish. While you're at it, find out if Amconmag has any openly gay traditional religious conservative bloggers yet. They're due for a token of that important conservative voting bloc.

The way I discovered Thomas Meehan was through a snarky comment of his that was published on Jeremy Beer's review of The Little Way of Ruthie Leming. It's a short comment which I would be proud of writing, subtle but deadly:

This is a very timely and necessary review given Dreher’s extreme reluctance to publicize or advance himself in any way.

Isn't that good? See, that's the trick you need to use if you want a chance at getting a comment approved. He begins with perceived flattery: "This is a very timely and necessary review", but then he packs the business end of his argument in the subordinate clause. It's the Trojan Horse model, and it worked in this case.

Here's another interesting post from about a year ago about comment approval over at Amconmag.

A comment of mine was "excised" by Wick Allison over at the American Conservative last week. Excised is his term for his culling of comments that violate his criteria for respectability. An informed source tells me that Allison is the censor for all comments, without reference to the wishes of the writers. Curious that, considering they pay people to write but don't trust them to manage their own comments. Well, at least they're honest about it.

This is another step in the devolution of TAC from it's nationalist/traditionalist beginnings to something lesser and disappointing. TAC has come to suffer from a form of multiple personality disorder. It still publishes Pat Buchanan's and Jim Pinkerton's articles but it also publishes the work of Kelly Vlahos, resident harridan at the left wing Antiwar.com. Rod Dreher is on board writing from deepest, darkest Louisiana representing the childish crunchy-cons while Daniel Larison does a grand job deconstructing Republican talking points in the manner of a dissertation defense. He also does a very creditable job as agent of the vast pan-slavic mind view. That is, the Russian government ought to pay him. I'm not suggesting that they do, but that's how good he is at advancing the let's not be beastly toward the bear meme. Lately, to further extend the big tent into a three ring circus, TAC brought on people like Noah Millman who at least make no pretense at being a conservative.

He claims he has a source for Wick Allison being the main comment censor, and I don't doubt this claim. It rings true because this level of micromanagement is so odd that I can imagine any eye-witness to it would be willing to relate his strange experience. I have the experience of Wick Allison personally returning emails which was a little bit surprising to me.

The thing that is hard to remember in the aftermath of having a comment deleted is that you most likely scored a point. This is because you're irritated that it wasn't published. That means that you have to go and start your own blog—or go to someone else's who shares your opinion—and relate it there where it won't be excised. But here's the thing: this is the mainstream conservative experience in modern America. The mainstream media—which is dyed-in-the-skin liberal to leftist—used to practically control all the information that got out there, and they still control it to a great degree. Then we had the talk radio revolution—spearheaded by Rush Limbaugh, Fox news and the conservative pundits and blogger on the internet. Sites like Washington Examiner provide the counter-balance to WaPo even though they scrapped their print edition. Think of how the liberal mainstream media have tried desperately to censor so many huge stories. Any good news from Iraq back in the Bush years, anything bad about Islam, the Kermit Gosnell case, the dirt on Trayvon and his whacked gang connections, the Benghazi cover-up, etc., etc. But they can't always readily do this, thanks to alternative conservative media.

So the really pathetic thing about Amconmag is that they're doing what the drive-by media does on a tiny little scale. They really aren't much bigger in popularity than someone like R. S. McCain, and they are dwarfed by NRO and Hotair.com (source = alexa.com). By using a fine-tooth comb on comments with which they don't agree, they are just forcing people like Thomas O. Meehan to drop his subscription and to join the chorus of other conservatives in the rest of the world who doubt there's anything very conservative or even American about the "American" "Conservative". And they'll never engage us naysayers directly since they wouldn't want to give us hits, or maybe because their noses are at such a steep angle that they can barely even see us.

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(Update: I added Meehan's middle initial after finding out he shares a name with a famous comedy screenwriter.)

So who's being "Binary"?

I was surfing around looking at anti-Sirico stuff after reading this jab by The Grumpy Mailman Blog when I came across this recent review by Elias Crim over at the American (cough) Conservative (cough, cough). Excerpt:

Culturally speaking, Fr. Sirico gradually became an adherent of the Reagan revolution, a movement that seemed to find its vindication in 1989, only to ossify intellectually in the years following. Even without an Evil Empire, the Reaganites seemed only able to think in a binary fashion: capitalism vs. socialism (or anything else). Even as supply-side economics became a matter of Republican institutional dogma, the historical record showed a growing government and increasing income inequality. Reagan’s vision of widespread employee ownership went unfulfilled, and for most members of the American middle class, the unintended consequence of economically neoliberal policies was a road to serfdom that by 2008 felt more like a superhighway. Wage slavery, with no path to ownership, or welfare: take your pick.

The author asserts that Reaganites are being "binary" when they point out that you either have some sort system based on economic freedom (like capitalism) or some sort of system based on central control (like socialism). But he goes on to state that Reaganism leads to either "Wage slavery, with no path to ownership, or welfare: take your pick." That sounds thoroughly binary to me, although I prefer to use the term false dichotomy to describe this particular fallacious view of reality. Sorry, but I'm not a "wage slave", whatever that is precisely, and I'm not on welfare, thank you very much. I left my job as an IT Professional (not a slave) and started an incorporated consultancy.

Furthermore, I have many friends who are neither slaves nor freeloaders. Sure, I know people who dislike their job. But most of them are able to change employers--and often do--and the ones who can't are most often constrained by external factors, not by whip-cracking capitalist villains in larger offices.

Finally, I'm not sure whether or not Mr. Crim considers those who pay him to write copy as his "slave-masters", but I'm pretty sure he is not a welfare case. The tag at the end of his review states that he "is at work on a new web zine to be called Solidarity Hall." I have to say that makes him sound very much like someone taking advantage of the freedom we have in our country to be an entrepreneur.

So his own existence itself is evidence against his own assertion, ironically. The more these people attempt to promote an imaginary Third Way, the more they just become dogmatists touting their own contrarian ideology.

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Cruel and Unusual? Or Right and Just?

We report. 

A woman who was caught on camera passing a Cleveland school bus on the sidewalk, while the bus was loading and unloading kids, was ordered by a judge to stand at the intersection and wear an "idiot" sign.

Shena Hardin, 32, appeared in Cleveland Municipal court Monday after being cited for driving along the sidewalk to avoid a school bus.

The judge sentenced Hardin to pay $250 in court costs and suspended her license for 30 days and more.

Hardin must also stand at the intersection of E. 38th Street and Payne Avenue wearing a sign next Tuesday and Wednesday that says "Only an idiot drives on the sidewalk to avoid a school bus." She has been ordered to wear the sign from 7:45 a.m. to 8:45 a.m. both days.

You decide.

Note that this was not a one-time occurrence. Amazing.

Reaction of a Sensible Georgetown Woman

Read the whole thing here. Excerpt:

Sandra, I hope you take to heart our school’s motto of “Cura Personalis” — care of the whole person. You are so much more than your reproductive organs. Please, have some self-respect and take responsibility for your choices instead of having to beg the government for help. The government should not be able to force a religious institution — like the one we attend — to pay for the things they don’t believe in. That is pretty clear in the first amendment. But since you missed the ten commandments I can’t expect you to read the Bill of Rights either.

I believe in Georgetown. I love this school. And I know that we are so, so much better than what Sandra Fluke would make us out to be.

Nothing to add to that.