Bringing the Military-Industrial Complex Home

Posted on August 29, 2021 by leslie

The Last Stand, by William Barnes Wollen, 1898, credit Wikipedia

Bringing the Military-Industrial
Complex Home

 by Ilana Mercer

With the American media as master of ceremonies, pundits and politicians—all partners in the neocon-neoliberal joint venture in Afghanistan—are barking mad over the images coming out of the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, and the reality these optics portend. Naturally, media “reporting” from Afghanistan is nothing but unremitting sentimental gush, aimed at creating a state of heightened emotions. “The children; the children; the translators; the translators. Americans held hostage behind enemy lines. ‘Teach the Taliban a lesson, Corn Pop,’” demanded a “macho” personality at Fox News. The same litany runs on a continuous loop.

Forbes reporters dissolved into puddles of tears at the sight of U.S. Air Force pilots bringing in plane loads of young, strong, military-aged men, unfreighted by women and children. On August 20, about 5,700 people had been flown out of Kabul. Only 169 were American. “Make no mistake,” slobbered Forbes, “lifting six times more people than an aircraft is designed to seat is a heroic achievement of logistics, skill and sheer grit.” I for see a medal of commendation for the pilot, who commandeered a U.S. Air Force C-17 to airlift 800 Afghani passengers from Kabul to Qatar. Continue reading →

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Biden Decamps from Afghan Hellhole

Posted on August 22, 2021 by leslie

C17s support Afghanistan drawdown, 2021, credit Wikipedia

Biden Decamps from Afghan Hellhole

by Ilana Mercer, August 19, 2021

Yes, we know it was chaos, but then again there was no good way to leave that dusty “shithole,” as the much-missed Donald Trump would have put it. Joe Biden was right in his “Remarks on Afghanistan“: “… if Afghanistan is unable to mount any real resistance to the Taliban now, there is no chance that one year — one more year, five more years, or 20 more years of U.S. military boots on the ground would’ve made any difference.” Tempting as it is for right-thinking conservatives and paleolibertarians, in particular, to use the inevitable collapse of the charade in Afghanistan against Biden—honesty demands that we avoid it.

TV Republicans, no doubt, will join the shrill CNN and MSNBC females and their houseboys, who love nothing more than to export the American Nanny State, in bashing Biden for his decisive withdrawal. The president said, “I stand squarely behind my decision. After 20 years, I’ve learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw U.S. forces.” Falling into the Republican line of partisan, tit-for-tat retorts is wrong. The man made the right choice—as opposed to Barack Obama’s. Indeed, Afghanistan was a war Obama had embraced . Continue reading →

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Verdi’s Luisa Miller

Posted on August 18, 2021 by leslie

Guiseppe Verdi by Giovanni Boldini, credit Wikipedia

Verdi’s Luisa Miller

Glyndebourne, Saturday 7th August 2021, reviewed by David Truslove

Glyndebourne is in full swing this summer after reopening its doors in May with Káťa Kabanová. Since then, there’s been Il turca in Italia and Così fan tutte. Luisa Miller, Verdi’s middle period opera first performed in Naples in 1849, is currently receiving its debut at this Sussex venue. Linking all four stage works is the conflict between love and duty. Glyndebourne’s Artistic Director Stephen Langridge suggests that the “institution of marriage often represents the duty aspect, an opposing force to unruly anarchic romantic love”. This antagonism is at the heart of Luisa Miller.

Based loosely on Friedrich Schiller’s tragedy Kabale und Liebe (Conspiracy and Love), Luisa Miller is rich in human detail and powerful emotions, but it also focuses on class conflict and the corruption of power. Indeed, Verdi’s work closely follows the Year of Revolution (1848) and a period of bitterly resented despotism of King Ferdinand II. Power struggles emerge in Luisa Miller when Rodolfo, the son of the tyrannical Count Walter, challenges his father’s plans for him to marry the duchess Frederica. But Rodolfo is in love with the young country girl Luisa, the daughter of Miller, an old soldier who is one of the Count’s tenants. Abduction, blackmail and betrayal ensue and when the truth is finally disclosed the two lovers drink from a poisoned cup (Luisa unwittingly) and Rodolfo kills Count Walter’s henchman, the scheming Wurm. Continue reading →

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Financial Terrorism and Social Excommunication, part 2

Posted on August 16, 2021 by leslie

Clarence Thomas, credit Wikipedia

Financial Terrorism and Social Excommunication, part 2

Ilana Mercer, on Justice Thomas’ Solution 

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is a meddlesome, shakedown operation, in the mold of the Southern Poverty Law Center, that has taken it upon itself to decide who lives and who dies socially and financially. The ADL deems people like Pat Buchanan and Tucker Carlson  to be mired in white supremacism. PAYPAL HOLDINGS, Inc, is an indispensable, American, global corporation, without whose services, financially transacting online is difficult. The company is worth $16.929 billion. The ADL and PayPal have conspired to ferret out “bigotry and extremism” from the financial industry, by which they mean ban thought crimes.

“Racism—systemic or other—remains nothing but thought crime: impolite and impolitic thoughts, spoken, written or preached. Thought crimes are nobody’s business in free societies.” In response to this particular collusion against thought crimes, Fox News personality Tucker Carlson stays chipper. But this is not sufficient a solution from so powerful a persona as Mr. Carlson. Continue reading →

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Letter to the Editor, Bell Curve Reverberations

Posted on August 15, 2021 by leslie

Letter to the Editor, Bell Curve Reverberations

Sir,

I write in response to the review of Charles Murray’s Two Truths about Race, published in the TLS on August 6. The reviewer, Patricia J Williams, is a lawyer and a supporter of Critical Race Theory. She is the author of Giving A Damn: Racism, Romance, and Gone with the Wind. Eminently qualified, then, to address the history of eugenics, social Darwinism and race differences in IQ!

According to Professor Williams, Stephen Jay Gould’s The Mismeasure of Man is “the most well-known refutation” of Murray and Herrnstein’s The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life. But how can a book, to wit, The Mismeasure of Man, first published in 1981, be a refutation of a book, The Bell Curve, that was only published in 1994?*

When is IQ evidence acceptable, when not? Williams celebrates the “Flynn effect”, which is supposedly reducing racial gaps in IQ. But she also contends that IQ tests are “culturally specific”, i.e. when they inconveniently reveal ongoing race differences in cognitive ability.

As an exponent of Critical Race Theory (CRT), Professor Williams considers the US a bastion of white supremacy and “a majority white nation in which most crimes are committed by whites”. Your indomitable columnist Ilana Mercer is correct. CRT equals anti-white racism.

Ritortus

*Editorial note; in ‘Curveball’, New Yorker, November 1994, Gould retrospectively reviewed The Bell Curve. 

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The Epistle to the Romans, Part IV

Posted on August 13, 2021 by leslie

Saint Paul, Rembrandt van Rijn, credit Wikipedia

The Epistle to the Romans, Part IV

by Darrell Sutton

Literacy in the ancient Greco-Roman Republic was more widespread than in some other civilizations. Oxyrhynchus papyri-texts are extant and confirm that assertion. Depending on the writings one studied, the culture of Rome seemed refined. It was deemed by themselves to be superior to the values in other nations. Rome’s readers were aware of the sciences and philosophies in surrounding territories. A well-read people, they learned old myths, memorized legends and travelogues written by wanderers to faraway lands. Agricultural details also frequently appear in Latin through various forms of literature. And comments about Roman gods and goddesses in antiquity show up regularly in Latin poems and in prose texts. Cicero and other educated Romans could express themselves proficiently in both Latin and Greek.

Paul was an urbane and sagacious scholar. Mastery of his letter to the Christians in Rome is vital for apprehending the intricate systems of his thought and for grasping those principal doctrines pioneered by him and declared throughout the Aegean and Mediterranean provinces. In Late Antiquity, differences of opinion regarding ‘grace’ often incited disagreement. The East-West Schism of 1054 is well known. Afterwards, and during the [Counter] “Reformation” centuries, sometimes violent confrontations occurred in the battle to control how basic beliefs about this letter were to be understood within Protestant and Catholic factions. Continue reading →

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Financial Terrorism and Social Excommunication, part one

Posted on August 8, 2021 by leslie

Trump and DeSantis, credit Wikipedia

Financial Terrorism and Social Excommunication, part one 

Ilana Mercer, on Big Tech tyranny

Republican solutions to Big Tech tyranny do not begin to address financial de-platforming, the cancellation of citizen dissidents en masse, including the infringement of the right to partake in the public square and make a living. In their weak case against Deep Tech (“Deep” to denote enmeshment with The State), Republicans are still defending only some speech on the “merits,” rather than all speech, no matter how meritless.

In a sense, the statist anti-trust bills, targeting especially Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google and currently being pushed by lawmakers are worse than useless. The anti-trust impetus is misguided as it conflates corporate size with anti-competitive practices: the larger, the more monopolistic. However, reducing the size of an entity–a corporation–doesn’t necessarily alter its nature.When a malignant cell divides, it doesn’t grow less potent. To the contrary, it innervates and enervates more spheres. Likewise breaking up Big Tech. Smaller malignancies metastasize and kill just as well.

The habitual failure of the representatives sent by “Deplorables” to D.C. to prevent cancellation en masse–the Orwellian nightmare–cannot be understated. On the line is dissidents’ ability to speak, publish, partake in society; sell our cultural products, and transact financially over the country’s major online economic and social arteries. Continue reading →

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All the Fun of the Fair

Posted on August 2, 2021 by leslie

Appleby Horse Fair, credit Wikipedia

All the Fun of the Fair

by Bill Hartley

‘Joint Working’ is a concept that is prevalent throughout government and the civil service. The idea is that where responsibilities lie in close proximity, an inter departmental committee might better manage these. This can work but it requires strong leadership and those assigned to the committee need to be sufficiently senior, otherwise their role may extend no further than voicing enthusiasm and a promise to report back.

Interestingly, this approach can be found at work far from central government. The county of Cumbria has a committee which rejoices in the grandiose title of Multi Agency Strategic Planning Group. Note the word ‘strategic’, a hostage to fortune if ever there was one. The group is so well known in the local press that there is no need for the full title. Everyone understands what MASPG stands for and the group has been hard at work on behalf of the citizens of a small town in the county. From an outsider’s perspective the main strategic challenge in Cumbria might be thought to be inconsiderate car parking in the Lake District. However, there is an annual event which has drawn the attention of this multi-agency group, even though some locals consider it largely a police matter.

Appleby lies just off the A66 and is famous for its annual horse fair. Each year, in June, some 10,000 members of the Gypsy and Traveller Community descend on the town to buy and sell horses and to socialise. Last year, due to COVID restrictions, the fair was cancelled. Some Gypsies and Travellers took exception to this and turned up anyway. The strategic planners in MASPG therefore had plenty of warning ahead of this year, when once again the fair had to be cancelled. Continue reading →

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America, Man Up!

Posted on July 31, 2021 by leslie

Adam Kinzinger, credit Wikipedia

America, Man Up!

by Ilana Mercer

Emasculated America has been on display in all her undignified inauthenticity, in the crybabies of Congress and in the loud and proud quitting at the 2020 Olympics. In Menstrual America, medals go to congressmen and cops who wail the loudest when recounting their professional failings on Jan. 6, 2021. And props are given not to athletes who “bring it”, despite the jitters; but to those who crumble and quit, and then crow about the authenticity of it all.

Feminised America’s rich and famous belong to a fraternity of foolish, showy killjoys. They take the knee anywhere and everywhere, to show the world how gynocentrically great they are. Speaker Pelosi, of course, is nothing like that; the woman is made of steel. For political effect, though, she lugs around all kinds of crybabies. One such Pelosi poodle is Adam Kinzinger. The Republican from Illinois is serving on the January 6th Select Committee, at the behest of the speaker.

On Day One of this Democratic happening, Kinzinger denounced Republicans’ attempts to compare the Jan. 6 melee to violence during last summer’s race riots: “I condemn those riots and the destruction of property that resulted,” Kinzinger whimpered. “But not once did I ever feel that the future of self-governance was threatened like I did on Jan. 6. There is a difference between breaking the law and rejecting the rule of law. Between a crime, even grave crimes, and a coup.” Continue reading →

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Society, Poisoned by Imageries

Posted on July 29, 2021 by leslie

The Dark Knight, credit Wikipedia

Society, Poisoned by Imageries

by Mark Wegierski

Late modern societies – especially America and Canada – have become increasingly subjected to dark and disorienting imageries, notably in the various subgenres of the fantastic. Among the most prominent and absorbing of these subgenres are fantasy role-playing games (RPG’s) such as Dungeons and Dragons, launched in 1974. D & D arose from a convergence of interest in historical board gaming, medieval miniatures gaming, and the huge popularity of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings in the 1960s.

As Dungeons and Dragons became increasingly prominent in the 1980s, some concerns arose about the allegedly occult nature of the game, fuelled by a number of highly publicized cases of teenage suicides. Indeed, there was a made-for-television movie, Mazes and Monsters, which explored the most prominent of these suicides. However, in relation to what was to follow in the 1990s and later, the mostly Tolkienian role-playing background or world prevalent among gamers in the early 1980s, had been reserved indeed.

D & D, as it is probably most commonly experienced today, is far removed from the charming, graceful Tolkienian mythos, while also lacking the Nietzschean textures of, for example, Robert E. Howard’s Conan vision. It is often suggested that D & D often amounts to the personalized power-fantasies (tinged with sexual elements) of frustrated and often highly intelligent adolescent North American males. Moreover, D & D typically conforms to the vision of open-ended progress, amorphousness, florid lifestyles, and wish-fulfillment fantasies, which have increasingly come to characterize the late-modern world. Continue reading →

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