Vacation
I'm going on vacation with the whole fam damily, but I want everyone here to keep arguing. Don't mind me being gone. I'll be back Tuesday and there better be some really good comments on this site or you all will have a lot of explaining to do.
You think I'm joking, huh?
Please vote on my new feedback survey. I'm bummed because for some reason the sixth selection didn't show up which is "Shut up, Pauli, we're sick of you" or something like that. This selection doesn't make much sense because no one was forced to come here. But I've learned that many a wandering traveler has wound up here only to be greatly offended by something emanating from this humble cottage off an obscure exit ramp on the information highway. Maybe it's the fried zucchini with garlic?
Also -- no one has remarked on my Simpsonesque portrait, not even my wife. What do I have to do to get attention around here?
Oh, yeah, that's the "Vacation" album cover, in case you forgot.
UPDATE: Oh there's that 6th selection. Fire away, Gridley.
I hope you have a good vacation Pauli. You deserve it! Please visit my blog at www.scrappycons.com and we will continue talking about what ever we need to.
ReplyDeleteHere's my argument.
ReplyDeleteIs it me, or is Mr. Dreher's "I can't believe they're taking my brother-in-law away from his family to send to Iraq for a doomed mission," stuff a little hard to take after his belligerent support for the invasion of Iraq, and implication that anyone who opposed it, especially Catholic bishops and the Holy Father, were moral weenies who weren't willing to do the manly stuff it takes to survive in the world.
I know, I know, he's taken all that stuff back, stuff like advocating that Catholics turn their back to the podium when prayers were peace were offered, and asking us to disobey JPII's request that we dedicate our Ash Wednesday fast to the cause of peace.
Maybe it took being hit close to home to bring the realities into focus, but did Mr. Dreher not realize when he was so voiferously advocating the invasion and villifying those opposed that going to war would probably mean taking daddies away from their kids? That war actually has a real cost, which is why so many of us wanted to be damn sure it was worthwhile? That Just War theory should be applied rigorously rather than elasticized to fit what you want to do?
As I have said, I suspect that embarassment that he was so wrong and the bishops -- the people he had been constantly running down and considering worse than useless, the bishops! -- were so right, played no small role is his turn to Orthodoxy.
John McG: Amen! Preach it, brother!
ReplyDeleteDiane
P.S. I can't believe Rod Dreher advised turning one's back to the podium (ambo? whatever?) during prayers for peace. What snotty, prideful, arrogant, nervy hubris!
ReplyDeleteHe seems to be downright obsequious toward his current OCA bishops...that's what's really crazy. By all accounts, they're as corrupt as the worst RC bishops put together and cubed. Yet Rod Dreher would never dream of turning his back on "Vladyka," I'll warrant.
Diane
The permalink is broken. Here's a working link. You can scroll down.
ReplyDeleteHe backed off from that idea afgter K-Lo and others nored that it wasn't such a hot idea, but the venom toward anyone who thought "peace" is a good thing is evident.
I'm beginning to think the pro-war anti-surge Dreher/Sullivan position is the least tenable at all. They were all gung ho to get us into this mess, and now they're not willing to clean it up.
It also track public opinion.
"it also tracks public opinion."
ReplyDeleteYes. I think it's been amply demonstrated that dreher is more interested in having a following than intellectual consistency.
For me, it is less the opposition to the Surge than the way that it's being argued. Rod will write that his initial support was rooted in emotion and thus untrustworthy in hindsight, but he seems completely incapable of grasping the emotionalism in his current position.
ReplyDeleteAnd as an annointed crunchy conservative, Rod will blast our culture for its impatience, but he wants us to retreat from Iraq and admit defeat because it's too long and too hard and because we've taken casualties, as if any military endeavor doesn't involve the regrettable but necessary loss of life.
And now, he writes, "I wonder what will be the 'immense overhaul of language' that will result from the Iraq War. Already I think it will be impossible (thank God) for any American politician to use words like 'democracy' and 'freedom' with reference to American military intervention overseas."
Thank God that American military intervention will no longer be used in promotion of the cause of freedom?
It's beyond bizarre, it's positively perverse.
It's beyond bizarre, it's positively perverse.
ReplyDeleteIt's unhinged, too. And it's evil.
Diane
I love this guy...
ReplyDeleteLet me put the question to the room: How do you think the Iraq War experience will change the American language?
"Redeploy" has already become a euphemism for "retreat"
"I support the troops" now is code for "I don't support the mission"
"Meatgrinder" now refers to four-year campaigns with under 10% of the Allied casualty total of one Western Front battle (Passchendaele), with consequent adjustment in western resolve levels.
Posted by: The Man From K Street | August 2, 2007 3:39 PM
As horrible as it is to access the web when you're on vacation, what I'm doing is worse because I'm in a cottage we are renting in a neighborhood and, finding someone's unsecured WiFi connection, I'm borrowing a weeeee bit o' bandwidth. But I'll give it back when I'm done.
ReplyDeleteWhat JohnMcG reports is interesting to me tho' not surprising. I didn't have a problem with our going to war with Iraq and I didn't have a problem with the Pope and Bishops opposing it either. After all, the Pope is an ambassador of the peace of Christ. I don't really want a Pope saying "Yayyyy, war." I don't say "Yay, war," either any more than I rejoice to see a perp getting slammed upside a cop car. There's just some crap that has to be done in this broken world.
So I've never had issues with a prayer for peace. Of course we want peace and an end to fighting! It would seem that a good soldier is a man who fights in a war because he must and prays the hardest for peace. There is no apparent contradiction, not to the religious soldier or to me either.
The reason I say it is not surprising is that Rod has what I would call a "spirit of protest" about everything in general. He reacts very immediately and very violently to events with very little real thought. I think that partly explains why most of the crunchy commenters/followers are not the sharpest knives in the drawer. And THIN-SKINNED, do ya think? Several folks take EVERYTHING personally over there.
Getting mad enough to "protest" about something said during the Prayers of the Faithful is a good example of taking things too personally. I wouldn't even call it a bash if Rod poked fun at those prayers the way we used to, e.g., "For the poor sister down at the end of the hall whom no one talks to, let us pray to the Lord." But that's not Rod's style, he prefers anger. Gosh, how many times has he quoted "Heck of a job, Brownie!" He's still not over that.
K Street Man rules.
Let's invite the Man from K Street over here. He's too good to be enjoyed in small doses. I want my Man from K Street Fix!!
ReplyDeleteDiane
But that's not Rod's style, he prefers anger. Gosh, how many times has he quoted "Heck of a job, Brownie!" He's still not over that.
ReplyDeleteSo the lesson for the rest of us is, "Don't be like Rod," right? Don't prefer anger, don't not get over another's failing.
It's not that dreher "prefers anger", it's that he's a hypocrite. btw, No one here "prefers" anger. we "prefer" to point out hypocrisy when we see it. You'll have to work harder to persuade me there is a "failing" in that.
ReplyDeleteTom, I think I've demonstrated a preference, not for anger, but for rationality: I would prefer to reason with people with whom I disagree. But that preference is not an option with a guy like Rod Dreher, who today writes that Bush is no Churchill because Bush "has never offered anything but baseless optimism, such that today, it is impossible to believe him when he says we're turning things around in Iraq."
ReplyDeleteThe assertion is an easily refutable lie.
Let's go back to the address Bush gave when the war in Iraq first began:
"A campaign on the harsh terrain of a nation as large as California could be longer and more difficult than some predict. And helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and free country will require our sustained commitment."
Or we can look to the speech announcing the end of major combat operations, when Bush conceded, "We [still] have difficult work to do in Iraq," and acknowledged that the transition to a democratic regime would take time.
I'll grant that Bush is nowhere near as eloquent as Churchill was, but it's simply untrue to suggest that Bush has offered nothing but an unblinking optimism that refuses to acknowledge the costs of war.
(Could he have emphasized these costs more? Sure, but let's not forget the political environment in which these speeches were given: Democrats and liberals in the media were even then invoking Vietnam the first chance they got. Hysterical pundits like Rod -- who has called one of the least bloody wars in history a "meat grinder" -- are one good reason why a sober discussion of foreign policy is so difficult today.)
This lie is similar to the smear that conservatives didn't criticze Bush before late 2005: it's easily refutable, as a matter of the public record. With the smear of mainstream conservatives, Rod was explictly, repeatedly shown evidence that contradicted his ridiculous claim and never showed even the slightest willingness to deal with inconvenient facts.
I would say that anger is a wholly appropriate (and perhaps the only appropriate) response to the writings of a pathological liar such as Rod Dreher.
and beyond that ...
ReplyDeleteanger per se can be perfectly Christian, as is obvious upon even the most cursory reading of the New Testament. Jesus was not bland (thankfully), even if some of His followers were. Indeed, I would argue the idea that anger is non-Christian is a calumny propagated by secularists.
The purpose of righteous anger is to sustain the one who is angry in his efforts to right the wrong at which he is angry.
ReplyDeleteIt's clear from Scripture (as well as from human experience) that, if someone can sustain himself in his efforts to right a wrong without being angry, then he ought not be angry.
It seems to me that the easier it is to refute a false claim, the less reason there is to be angry about it. Sure, there'll be that flare of irascibility, stronger or weaker depending on temperament and history, but anger should only be used as fuel when the rational will might otherwise flag.
If he's done nothing else over the last five years, I'd say Rod has amply illustrated to problem with approaching an issue -- be it religion, politics, or the work of a journalist -- with habitual anger. Hence the lesson: don't prefer anger.
And I pointed out this lesson, not to suggest anyone here does prefer anger, but because I prefer to think that the discussions here are (and must be) ultimately about something more important, and more fitting, than Rod Dreher's personal failings.
Tom: It has nothing to do with Rod Dreher's personal failings. It has everything to do with his deleterious influece on those few foolish souls who still hang out at his blog or peruse his DMN screeds.
ReplyDeleteRecently, one comboxer related how Rod Dreher's relentless anti-Catholic rants had deeply influenced him. Rod had this guy convinced that every other priest was a pedophile. Utterly discouraged, the guy was on the point of quitting the Catholic Church. Then his wife took a job at a retirement home for RC priests. The guy tried to discourage the wife from taking the job, arguing that she was about to expose herself to Evil Incarnate. Well, she took it anyway--and discovered that the elderly priests at this home were some of the saintliest, holiest, most wonderful Catholic Christians she had ever met. She felt truly blessed by their example of heartfelt devotion and fraternal charity. For this guy, her experience really put Rod's jaundiced, slanderous rants into perspective.
But how many of the gullible folks influenced by Rod Dreher have this opportunity to see the record set straight? Bottom line: Rod Dreher causes scandal. As long as he continues to unfairly bash my Church--exhibiting a glaring double standard in the process--I'm going to continue to provide as much of a counterbalance as I can, God being my helper. I'm not going to sit back and let falsehoods and smears go unchallenged. Not when it's against the Holy Catholic Church founded by Christ Himself.
Just think of us as a micro online version of he Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. :)
Diane
Tom:
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that the easier it is to refute a false claim, the less reason there is to be angry about it. Sure, there'll be that flare of irascibility, stronger or weaker depending on temperament and history, but anger should only be used as fuel when the rational will might otherwise flag.
The issue also hinges A) on the person making the claim and B) on the nature of the claim.
First, Rod's a journalist: he went to college for four years to get a little diploma saying that he knows how to be a journalist. The standard for a journalist getting basic facts right should certainly not be lower than it is for others, and it should probably be higher. He's supposed to report on things as they are, not assert that things are as he wishes they were -- asserting that, for instance, both the Administration and mainstream conservatives are less moral than they and we really are, all to justify his narrative and the need for an alternative to mainstream conservatism. He's displaying the behavior of a propagandist, which is not only contrary to acting like a journalist, it undermines journalism.
Second, Rod's not merely wrongly writing that Birmingham's the capital of Alabama: the nature of his false claims is derogatory, to slander the character of other conservatives. He does not lie in the other direction, that is, to give conservatives the benefit of the doubt. Even if it's easy to refute the false claim by proving that one's wife is faithful and has been with you throughout a lengthy vacation, that doesn't diminish the anger that ought to result from someone accusing her of being adulterous. Likewise, even if it's easy to refute his claims by showing what conservatives actually wrote and what Bush actually said, it is -- and ought to be -- infuriating that he consistently accuses Bush of being much worse than he is and us of being less principled than we are.
The very premise of his book is that mainstream conservatives are greedy, godless, materialistic, and hedonistic. Them's are fighting words that he has never retracted, that he has in fact expanded upon -- mainstream conservatives are apparently homophobes for agreeing with him on the issue of marriage -- and steadfastly refuses to justify.
Like with Catholicism, Rod Dreher frequently offers unfair and often vicious criticism of conservatism, and he refuses to engage with those he demeans. I believe it's absolutely correct that anger doesn't help one reason with him: in fact I have ample proof that reasoning with Rod is impossible. I also don't think anger helps showing others where he's wrong, but I still think it's a very justifiable reaction to much of what he's written.
But not everything he writes provokes me to be angry. Yesterday he wrote (again) about how he was angry when he supported the war, and how he was angry when he supported bombing Arab capitals if we were ever hit with nuclear terrorism. He wrote, "I hope I have learned in the past few years how anger can cause one to self-destruct, and make unwise decisions. Hard lesson to learn. Hope I've learned it."
Read anything he's written about George W. Bush in the last half year or more and tell me he's learned it. It doesn't anger me, it amazes me, the disconnect between the lessons he's supposedly learned from being a Catholic and supporting the war and his actual behavior now -- namely, church-hopping to Eastern Orthodoxy and emoting his way to supporting surrender.
(What his current position is on a response to NUCLEAR TERRORISM remains unclear, which is itself equally dumbfounding. As much as Rod Dreher seems to understand the threat the face from jihad, he cannot seem capable of forming a rational response to that threat, blinded as he is in his hatred of Bush, his attempts to overcompensate for his emotional support of our liberating Iraq, his attempts to project that emotionalism onto all supporters of Iraq, and the need to scream that the sky is falling in order to justify his blabbering about Chicken Little--I mean, Benedict.)
Alongside his unwillingness to defend his claims and wrestle with intellectual opposition, this disconnect, conscious or not, deliberate or not, betrays a character flaw that cannot possibly be masked by his writing: even Christopher Hitchens can mask his irrationality on the subject of religion, and, affected as his style may be, Dreher is no Hitchens when it comes to the written word. This flaw will be ignored by leftists who find him to be a useful idiot, willing to promote himself as a former Reagan conservative (ha!) who's seen the error of his ways; it will be ignored by paleoconservative pundits who are often equally flawed and who see in Rod a "good cop" to the fire-and-brimstone "bad cops" of Larison and Stegall; it might not be caught by socially conservative Whole Foods patrons who don't independently know that Rod's assertions are fales; but it has not and will not pass muster with mainstream conservatives who can (and I believe will) effectively repudiate Rod's intellectually thin writing.
That last observation is why I'm not too worried about what harm Dreher can cause in the long term, but those first few observations are why his hypocrisy and incoherence should still be documented.
Amen, Bubba. Eloquently put, as always.
ReplyDeleteDiane
"It doesn't anger me, it amazes me, the disconnect between the lessons he's supposedly learned from being a Catholic and supporting the war and his actual behavior now --"
ReplyDeleteI'm with you Bubba. For me it has been more about fascination, not anger (though i was really angry about his making 9/11 into the Ballad Of Dreher). and that's saying something, because i have a low boredom threshold.
for some reason the catholic bashing doesn't anger me anymore, though it probably should.
Yeah, Kathleen, the Catholic-bashing is beginning to sound just...pathetic.
ReplyDeleteDiane
BTW, I simply hafta correct an awkward sentence from my previous pots, as follows:
ReplyDeleteThis guy [a comboxer at Rod's] found that his wife's positive experience [at a clergy retirement home] really put into perspective Rod's jaundiced, slanderous rants vs. Catholic priests.
Well, since I was the one who mentioned anger first I should point out that regardless of the justifications available for anger about this or that, during the "Prayers of the Faithful" (PotF) is probably a bad time to cultivate or display anger, even the righteous brand.
ReplyDeleteBut I find incredible humor in the PotF. They probably have some benefit helping people with no prayer-life and A.D.D. to focus on something general which is worth praying about, but the content is often what I would classify under "sound-bite sermonette". Specifically, here's one I just heard in Canada, read by a 70-year-old woman who, if she wasn't a school-librarian, she should have been one: "That our elected politicians would work TIRELESSLY for a fair distribution of wealth in society, let us pray to the Lord." Achieving world peace would seem to be a warm-up act to actually seeing "politicians working tirelessly", but God never said we couldn't pray for miracles.
Achieving world peace would seem to be a warm-up act to actually seeing "politicians working tirelessly", but God never said we couldn't pray for miracles.
ReplyDeleterotflmao :)
diane
Would it be wrong to pray that, while politicians are working tirelessly to redistribute wealth, our guns be well maintained and fully loaded for such an eventuality, that our aim is as true as their intentions are misguided?
ReplyDeleteIn keeping with Bubba's comment on Journalism read the following. It is also on the blog www.scrappycons.com
ReplyDeleteThe New Republic's Baghdad Diarist Recants
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2007/08/beauchamp_recants.asp
In a example of what happens when Magazine or Newspaper Editors only spellcheck articles instead of fully vetting them; Scott Beauchamp the New Republic's Baghdad Diarist, admitted he made up all of the stories that he wrote for the New Republic.
"THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned from a military source close to the investigation that Pvt. Scott Thomas Beauchamp--author of the much-disputed "Shock Troops" article in the New Republic's July 23 issue as well as two previous "Baghdad Diarist" columns--signed a sworn statement admitting that all three articles he published in the New Republic were exaggerations and falsehoods--fabrications containing only "a smidgen of truth."
Where is the outrage over this? Because a magazine hated the war so much they let any schmuck write the most God-awful things about the people who serve this country with only "a smidgen of truth." Would Walter Cronkite, Andy Rooney or Ernie Pyle do this? Of course not! Whatever you think of their political views they went to the story and did their own leg work. That is why their days as War Correspondents are models we should demand from the MSM. What do you think? Email me or post your comments to my blog.