Sarah and Barack, peas in everyone's pod

What is the single, common(est) denominator between Sarah Palin and Hussein Obama? In a comment to the VFR entry, The Freepers on Laura Wood on Sarah Palin, frequent commenter Clark Coleman explains his recent epiphany of sorts about Sarah Palin,

It suddenly occurred to me when reading this blog entry that Sarah Palin is the conservative version of Barack Obama. Many of us (even Obama himself) noted that Obama was a blank canvas on which his followers could project their political hopes. Why? Not because of his political experience or capabilities or clearly stated policy positions, but because of his personal life story. E.g., Obama is going to be a post-racial unifier. What was there in his past to indicate such a thing? Nothing. In fact, just the opposite. But his followers had hopes, you see. Ditto for numerous other policy areas where people had hopes not based on his statements or past actions.

Sarah Palin is a dyed in the wool conservative who will lead the GOP out of the mushy moderate wilderness. How do we know this? By reading her pronouncements on immigration, feminism, etc.? Obviously not. Rather, it is because of her personal life story. She is a small town girl, one of us flyover-country types, who identifies with us and not the Beltway elite. We can project all our conservative hopes on her. Because of her personal qualities, she is a conservative political blank canvas, ready for us to paint to our liking, just as Obama was for white liberals.

LA replies to Clark Coleman:

I think this is an important, basic insight into the Palin phenomenon..

Further, your analysis also explains the left's overwrought reaction to her. Earlier today I was saying to a friend, "Why do people love her so much, and why do people hate her so much? Neither makes sense." In fact, as your comment makes me realize, the left loathes and fears her for the same illusory reason that the right loves and adores her: both sides imagine her to be some super conservative. Both sides are taking her biography, her symbology, as representing something real about her politics.

The right and the left are having this huge, bloody battle over Sarah Palin in Plato's Cave, fighting over illusory images.

In a short follow-on entry directing readers to comments in the discussion, LA boils it down even further:

Clark Coleman has a good explanation of why so many conservatives believe—without any evidence or record to back up the belief—that Sarah Palin is a great conservative. She is the conservative version of Barack Obama, a blank screen on which people project their hopes. I add that liberals hate her for the same reason that conservatives love her. (emphasis mine)

It's a good point and it ought to be stated with as much simplicity as often as opportunity arises. Liberals hate Sarah Palin for the exact same reason that conservatives love her, and without what?, without any evidence or record to back up the belief about her that they both hold in common.

Not to toot my own horn (I wouldn't do that! ;-)), but I said as much very early on in one of several short exchanges between Auster and I in the Great Palin Debate of 2008:

TM to LA:

Here's the subject line of an email I received yesterday from Dr. Dobson's CitizenLink newsletter:

Dr. Dobson: McCain's choice of Palin: "Outstanding."

Outstanding?

I don't get the immediate display of enthusiasm among "conservatives" for this choice. Not only does she not have a political record to speak of, but nobody really knows anything of substance about her. Is it that they were just so dismayed and disgruntled by their nominee that McCain's choice of a pro-life, pro-gun, anti-homosexual rights (female) running mate far exceeded all their expectations?

It seems like President Bush's phrase "the soft bigotry of low expectations" could be easily customized to fit this situation.

LA replied:

It's not true that she does not have a political record to speak of, and that nobody really knows anything of substance about her. The issue is whether she has the background to be president, not whether she has a political record to speak of.

TM replied:

Okay, she has a political record that consists of her time as governor of Alaska, and as mayor of the city of Wasilla (population: ten thousand).

You're right about what the issue is. And in my opinion she definitely does not have the background to be president. But who does in this race?

By the way, I never did, that I recall anyway, follow up on my statement in the exchange where I said that Bush's phrase could be easily customized to fit this situation, so allow me to do so here. We may call it, if you like, "The false conservatism of high expectations."

As has been said so many times before, modern Americans are so utterly steeped in liberalism that very often they don't know that they're liberals; that their words and actions are almost altogether liberal. Which is probably a good partial explanation for why study after study has shown that most Americans identify themselves as more conservative than liberal. And yet. But then again, I don't put too much stock in the results of most "studies" anyhow. So the point, at least as far as I'm concerned, is probably a moot one. Which begs the question, why'd I raise it in the first place? :-)

End of initial entry.

**********

I should like to add that we now know quite a bit more about Sarah Palin, her politics, her family life and so on, than we did during the initial stages of the Great Sarah Palin Debate conducted between August and September of 2008. Indeed, the debate itself revealed, or helped to reveal, or put in proper perspective, a lot about Sarah Palin that was not formerly known or understood by the average American, conservative and liberal alike. It's one of the things I most appreciate about VFR, and why I read and participate in the discussions there on a daily basis.

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The bow, what does it mean?

Here we have Obama again debasing the presidency, and the United States by extension, with what is apparently going to be standard procedure for this rogue whenever he meets with a foreign Monarch, dictator, whatever. But what does it all mean?

See Auster's article, Obama marks the path for future West/non-West relations here, where several readers, including yours truly, offer their perspectives, and/or theories. Sorry y'all, I'm generally not a big conspiracy theorist, but I just don't trust this dude and those that advise him at all. I think they're all criminals, and accordingly think and act like criminals. Of course they're way better at it than your average, low-level petty criminal scum. But of course this makes them worse and more dangerous than your average criminal scum.

Also, and as a side note, I take serious exception to Daniel H.'s comment stating "I didn't think that he [Obama] could go lower than Bush but he has." I've seen some form of that statement made around the blogosphere numerous times over the last several months, and every time it just gets under my crawl. What did they think Obama was? Why in the name of heaven did they believe that Obama, with the boatload of baggage he carried to the presidency, was going to be somehow better than Bush, who, whatever your differences with his policies, is at least an American born-and-raised? It just kills me when people say stuff like that. I personally had a lot of issues with Bush while he was president, namely his constant reiteration that Islam is a religion of peace, his right-liberalism/neoconservatism, his fiscal policies, NCLB, the Patriot Act, etc., just off the top of my head. I mean, the list is long and distinguished. But to say or imply that you somehow thought that Obama couldn't possibly be any worse is just, well ... ridiculous.

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A spate of new Non-Islam Theories of Islamic Extremism about to be unleashed

Technically this new wave of a well established means of explaining away the Islamic cause of Islamic extremism has already been unleashed. But it will take us some time to quantify and delineate between the various (new) theories in written form. In the meantime, let's review the characteristics common to the existing and documented Non-Islam Theories of Islamic Extremism per Lawrence Auster:

LA writes:

Islam in its concrete particulars is too alien and threatening to liberal Westerners for them to acknowledge its existence as it really is. So they keep putting Islam into this or that Western-centric conceptual box in order to make Islam seem familiar and assimilable. But because these non-Islam theories of Islamic extremism are all false or inadequate, new theories, or new variations on old theories, must keep being invented. The never-ending compulsion of Western intellectuals to explain uniquely Islamic beliefs and institutions in non-Islamic terms expresses the very essence of liberalism, which is to deny the existence of human differences that really matter.

The prerequisites:

(1) Denial by liberal Westerners that Islam is what it is in its concrete particulars. Resulting in,

(2) a propensity amongst leading Western writers and thinkers to place Islam, or a particular instance of Islamic violence or terrorism (such as Hasan's recent jihad on Ft. Hood), inside a sort of walled-in Western-centric conceptual framework in an attempt to explain it in terms other than the unacceptable, disallowed framework of Islam being the cause of Islamic extremism.

(3) But since every single Western-centric theory of Islamic extremism, or any combination thereof has proved, thus far, to be inadequate or utterly false, and since admitting the actual truth about Islam as the source of Islamic extremism would at once destroy the leading and dominant principles of modern liberal society, which itself is unacceptable, therefore,

(4) such individuals engage themselves in a continual and frantic search for, and discovery of, new Western-centric conceptualizations of Islam by which to explain, in acceptable (i.e., liberal) terms, the propensity of its adherents towards acts of violence.

Hence we see with this latest Islamic attack on Ft. Hood -- an attack committed by an individual who doesn't fit the current Western-centric profile formerly established in the preceding Non-Islam explanations for Islamic extremism, i.e., he wasn't poor or marginalized, he wasn't uneducated, etc. -- the introduction of a spate of new Non-Islam Theories of Islamic Extremism unleashed in verbal form. Of which the preceding blog entry contains but one.

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Where the rubber meets the road on "equality"

In a new entry today at VFR, Lawrence Auster gets down to it in two paragraphs:

Lawrence Auster writes:

Everyone wants to be superior

Contemporary America says it believes in the equality of all groups and cultures, but in reality none of those groups or cultures believes in equality. Each group wants to be superior and dominant. Blacks don’t want to be equal, they want to be superior and dominant. Homosexuals don’t want to be equal, they want to be superior and dominant. Hispanics don’t want to be equal, they want to be superior and dominant. Muslims don’t want to be equal, they want to be superior and dominant. Feminist women don’t want to be equal, they want to be superior and dominant. The only group today that doesn’t want to be superior and dominant, the only group that sincerely believes in the equality of all groups, is the historic Anglo-European majority population and culture of the United States.

The non-liberal truth is that in any given society, one group or culture must be dominant and set the tone and standards for the rest. There is thus no substitute for making the decision as to which group or culture will be dominant, or, by continuing to bleat about the wonders of equality, passively letting that decision be made for us by others. Liberalism has no answer to this problem, because its only answer to all problems is to call for more equality. I therefore propose that the traditional, Anglo-European majority culture of this country, shorn of its suicidal liberal belief in the equality of all groups and cultures, be the dominant culture.

Mr. Auster's entry reminds me of several related entries, both recent and not-so-recent, archived at this blog. As to the latter, there was the entry dealing with the Congressional Republicans' ecstasy at now being in the minority. As to the former, there was the entry where we concluded that school segregation was the answer to the dilemma of having whites-favorable rules applying to non-white school students.

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How to distinguish a real racist from a ...

...I mean a ... umm, what I mean is a ... a non-real racist?

Lawrence Auster subitted a comment at FrontPage Magazine criticizing David Horowitz's vision of America:

Horowitz:

White European-American culture is a culture that the citizens of this nation can take enormous pride in, precisely because its principles, revolutionary in their conception and unique in their provenance, provide for the inclusion of cultures that are non-white and non-Christian (and which are not so tolerant in their lands of origin).

Auster:

David Horowitz writes:

“White European-American culture is a culture that the citizens of this nation can take enormous pride in, precisely because its principles, revolutionary in their conception and unique in their provenance, provide for the inclusion of cultures that are non-white and non-Christian (and which are not so tolerant in their lands of origin).”

So, according to Horowitz, white European-American culture is good, and the main reason it is good is that it includes non-white and non-Christian cultures. The greatest thing about white European-American culture is that it allows itself to be progressively changed into a melange of nonwhite, non-European, non-Christian cultures and peoples.

Now think about the fact that Horowitz’s vision—assertively pro-America, with the defining thing about America being the fact that it includes ever greater numbers of non-white and non-Western peoples and their cultures—presents itself as the “conservative” vision today, as distinct from the leftist, anti-American vision which Horowitz opposes.

Think of the choice between left and “right” that Horowitz offers us.

On one side, the anti-American left, which openly declares its intention to end white Christian America, by changing America into a nonwhite, non-Christian country.

On the other side, the pro-American “right,” which openly declares its intention to end white Christian America, by changing America into a nonwhite, non-Christian country.

Someone named Jack Hampton instantly smelled a rat, umm, I mean a rar (Real [American] Racist) upon reading Auster's comments:

Jack Hampton:

Why do I smell a real racist.

ROTFL!!!

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Great shadows

"It takes a tall man to cast a great shadow!" Well, isn't that the conventional wisdom? Of course. Unless we're talking about the setting of the sun:

I saw a wonderful quote in response to this utter farce earlier today:

"When small men cast long shadows, you know the sun is setting." Lao Tzu

By the way, have y'all ever noticed that all athletes, playing at night under artificial lighting, always cast long shadows?

Artificial lighting -- hmmm.

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Breaking News: Missing link(s) found!

So someone went to digging and they uncovered a slave in the woodpile. Among other things. Will wonders never cease!

As one of the commenters at Lucianne.com (#68 I think) points out, put as much effort into discovering Obama-the-husband's roots and you've got yourself a real human interest story -- How America's first alien-in-chief overcame all the odds stacked against his ancestry, leaping tall buildings, mighty natural obstacles and unassailable eligibility requirements in a single bound. (H/T: VFR)

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Little Green Footballs -- I'm kicking one right about now

You know, I don't think I've ever made a single reference to ... well, that site, well, since this site has been in existence. Ta Da! But, you see, that site has been, among conservative bloggers, some kind of epitome for conservative thinking expressed in writing, though I cannot possibly imagine why.

Allow me to put Chuckie-cheezie-Johnson in his place: You're worse than a menace, sir; you're a conservative-poser (I.e., a deranged leftist) by everyone's estimation. Good riddance to you you piece of garbage.

No apologies, no appeals to his higher ... whatever ... just, you know, what it is.

P.S., Chuckie (here comes one of those appeals I swore off of earlier), can I get a 'little green football' with your signature on it? Not that I really want one, but I'm purty sure I could sell it, at this point, for at least a couple hundred bucks in any event, which would certainly help me out financially, umm, dude.

By the way, please don't designate my site as one deserving of your ultimate (inernet) disapproval. Oh, you bastard! But can I get a charles johnson signed lttle green football for my efforts nonetheless? No? Ain't that a peach!

Tell ya what, Chuckie, why don't you and I have a meeting of sorts down here in conservative-central?-- you could express your idiotic understanding of conservatism and I could kick your ass for your efforts. How about that? No? Thought not you leftist piece of dung. Can I get a rain check?

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How Oklahoma saved the Union -- not

Hey, look, I don't particularly appreciate digs on Oklahoma citizens (affectionately known internally as "Okies") by outsiders. In point of fact, ask one of my local (migrant, misinformed) neighbors about all that (we had a little -- potentially major, though it didn't turn out that way in the end -- disagreement on that recently), anymore than I appreciate digs on my country by outsiders. On the other hand, as an Okie, I feel imminently qualified to, and particularly justified in, criticizing my own state. All others need not apply.

And here we see the tried and true stupidity of democratic ficklness once more set in stone. But, of course, I'm not arguing against the legitimacy of democratic government on a local level, I'm simply agreeing with the ancients that democratic government can be the worst possible of all forms of government. And when you have a stupid people stupidity will ultimately rule the day.

Isn't democracy just wonderful!?

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So you DO know who your children are meeting on MySpace

Auster has posted at VFR a follow-up entry on the quadruple "horrorcore" related murder in VA that I wrote about here the other day. Included in the VFR entry is an AP article which helpfully fills in some of the gaps left in the case by previous reports.

Let me simply say that I sit here, having just read the AP story a few moments ago, and I'm quite literally stunned, STUNNED by what I've just read. I've known of some pretty horrible parents in my day, but Emma Niederbrock's parent-figures take the damn cake. Unbelievable!

Mood: Disgusted, Outraged!

(Note: In the other entry I mistakenly wrote that Emma Niederbrock's father was a Baptist minister. He was, in fact, a Presbyterian minister, which I've changed the entry to reflect.)

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Got 'Game?'

I haven't read all of the articles collected under this entry, not to mention the outside articles linked up under certain titles, and I didn't really involve myself in the debate at all, though I thought it was interesting, albeit disturbing in certain respects. I did send Auster a couple of emails on the subject, however, one in which I seconded his description of the 'Gamers' as "these kids", saying that I thought that description pretty well summed it all up and going on to explain how a real dominant male (something these man-children (male adolescents trapped in a man's body) have apparently never actually been exposed to) such as my dad (among certain other dominant males I've had in my life) would have handled me as a young man had I ever expressed to him the low view of women which seems to be the basis of the gamers' approach to, well, "manhood." Which, and as I explained to Auster, after my dad quite literally hit me so hard that I would have had to unzip to spit, he would have gone on to remind me of all the female loved ones in my life.

To refer to women in general in such offensive, degrading, and dare I say unmanly terms as the gamers use is to refer to my grandmothers, my mother, my sisters, my aunts, my female cousins ... my own wife and daughters in such terms. My dad's way of handling it is the way a real man handles that class of ungovernable punks of which we speak. Let them hope they never meet up with one and mistakenly choose to share their view of women with him. In the first place, they wouldn't know how to recognize a real dominant male, because, as I said, they've unfortunately never been exposed to one. Thus, they don't know when to speak and when to shut up; when to 'let their yeas be yea, and their neas be nea.' But in any event I suspect that about 98% of them, give or take, are just full of sh*t to start with. You can make lemonaide out of a lemon, but you can't make a real man out of an arrested (male) adolescent.

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Rifqa Bary

Yes, I know about the case and I support the ongoing efforts to protect this young girl from her father who has apparently threatened to murder her, in accordance with Islamic law (and as has been done before in America), because she is an apostate. But protecting Rifqa from her father, noble as the cause is, does nothing to protect the West from the influence of Islam, which is altogether bad. Let us recall that the whole purpose of CAIR is to empower Muslims in America. As I've pointed out any number of times before, empowering Muslims in America equals disempowering non-Muslims. Because, you see, the whole is exactly equal to the sum of its parts. Let Muslims be empowered in their own homelands. There ain't enough room for us and them on the same continent.

Auster writes about the Rifqa Bary case in this VFR entry, from which I extract the following important passage:

While every effort must be made to protect Rifqa, I cannot refrain from pointing out that as long as the main emotional energies of anti-jihad activists such as Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller go to protecting individual Muslims who are threatened by other Muslims, they are scooping water with a thimble while the sea is pouring through the dikes. The main emphasis of the anti-jihad movement must not be on protecting individuals who are threatened by Islam in the West, but on removing Islam from the West, by stopping and reversing the immigration of Muslims into the West. If your main concern is to protect our society from Islam, then your main agenda must be to stop and reverse the growth of Islam in our society. If your main concern is to protect individuals from Islam, then you will ignore that larger picture and allow our society to continue to be Islamized, and the individuals you want to protect will be lost in any case, along with all the rest of us.

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Will the real Hussein O. please stand up!

Question: Had Hussein O. just come out during his campaign last year and told everyone in explicit terms what he is in actuality, would the electorate have rejected him? I'm guessing no. (Keep in mind that Bill Clinton's marital infidelity and dirty-dealing, not to mention his poor management of the state of Arkansas as Governor were well known prior to his elecion to the presidency, in spite of what the liars that voted for him say to the contrary.)

But apparently some Hussein voters are now getting cold feet, as demonstrated in this New York Daily News column by Michael Goodwin (H/T: VFR), titled (of all things) "Health care debate confirms this is not the Barack Obama we elected."

Can you believe that?! What kind of idiots are these people?! And isn't democracy just a wonderful thing! Here's what the title of the column ought to read:

Health care debate confirms this IS, without the slightest doubt remaining, the Hussein Obama we elected.

But the original title doesn't let us down. No; the article goes on to further demonstrate how completely oblivious and idiotic some people really are. To wit:

Where have you gone, Barack Obama? Where is the sunny-side-up young man who promised to inspire and unite an unhappy nation?

Gone into the partisan sinkhole of Washington, that's where. Like some novice swimmer too confident of his own ability, Obama is suddenly finding himself in water over his head. [TM: Dear God!]

His flailing, including a foul habit of demonizing dissent, is not pretty. And that brief foray into e-mail tracking of critics showed a win-at-any-cost side.

Where is the appealing man we elected? Where is that Barack Obama?

Let's find him quick because the whole nation is paying the price for this impostor's irrational exuberance. Or hubris.

Say what?! You must be (expletive withheld for PG viewers) kidding me! This guy can't possibly be serious!

The column unfortunately continues:

Writing in The New York Times, he guaranteed everything for everyone: "If you don't have health insurance, you will finally have quality, affordable options once we pass reform. If you have health insurance, we will make sure that no insurance company or government bureaucrat gets between you and the care you need.

"If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan."

Those claims would be credible if they were a multiple-choice question, where only one is true. To say they can all happen at once is a crock, and the country knows it.

Heck, throw in a free puppy for everybody, too.

Ha, ha. As to that last line, I have a better one which I lifted from a favorite movie of mine:

Why don't you just score the winning touchdown for Notre Dame while you're at it.

But anyway, the author finishes out the article in fine style, keeping with his main theme throughout -- you know, our superhero is bound to emerge again real soon:

If he's the man we thought he was, he'll now choose to make peace, before the country concludes he's the mistake.

"The man we thought he was." Let that sink in real deep, y'all. You live in the midst of a bunch of absolute morons. These people have real responsibilities, they drive on your highways, they enter into marriage contracts and then break them on a whim, they actually make critical decisions on a daily basis. And they vote in your elections. If they're the moral paragons that they pass themselves off to be, then they'll voluntarily recuse themselves from participation in the next election as demonstrably unqualified ... before the country decides that the liberal principles of absolute equality and non-discriminationism are a mistake.

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Why do the Sarah-haters hate Sarah?

There's a pretty good discussion on the topic at VFR in which several posters posit their own theories on what is the source of this irrational visceral hatred of someone as real and genuine, and non-threatening (personality wise) as Sarah Palin.

So, what do you think? Why do the Sarah-haters hate her so much?

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What is "racism?"

(Hat tip: VFR)

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Is Mitt Romney disqualified from the presidency?

Yes! In the same way that Hussein Obama (a Muslim, a closet-Muslim, a non-Muslim with sympathies for, and intimate ties with, Islamism; it matters not generally, but in this instance it matters particularly.) is disqualified.

We had this discussion way back when. M. Mason and I tended to agree on the substance of Romney's faith, and the implications thereof. And now Mr. Mason invokes the Christian Research Institute. Yet another of our common interests. Hmm.

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Vindication

Regarding the preceding blog entry, I wrote to Mr. Auster this morning:

What a great article (or discussion) Tyrannical Atheism has turned out to be! Excuse me while I bask in being vindicated citing that particular VFR article as my prime example of why VFR is the premier Trad-con site. ;-)

Outstanding work! Thank you.

Perhaps it is simply a matter of, as they say, beauty being in the eye of the beholder. There is certainly an element of truth in that statement, and I don't deny it. But I saw this coming early on with Tyrannical Atheism, partly because I'm familiar with the quality of readership at VFR, partly because it's (that is, Tyrannical Atheism) a subject of intense interest for yours truly.

As has been said before, "extreme individualism is as dangerous to liberty as any form of collectivism." See Mr. Auster's reply to a reader whose answer to the collectivism he sees in our society is the aforementioned extreme individualism. The reader supposes he wishes for a society that, well, isn't a society; a society that has no identity, no purpose, no nothing but a universal recognition and following of extreme individualism. He supposes this only because he's never lived in such a ruthlessly individualistic society.

As I've suggested before, why don't we build these extremists a city somewhere off in the mountains, self-contained, self-'governed', completely independent of our society and check in on them from time to time to see how they're coming along in their 'development' away from the extremes of extreme individualism and all that that implies. Make it so number one.

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View From the Right (VFR) -- Home of Traditionalist-Conservative Apologetics

I've written, since the inception of this blog, any number of favorable items about Lawrence Auster's VFR. I've also written several items critical of VFR. But I make no bones about the fact that I've written many more of the former than of the latter.

I don't comment as much at VFR as I used to, but it doesn't mean that I have some problem with Auster or his site. Nor does it mean that I neglect keeping up with VFR articles as they're posted. As you all know, there are a number of factors which govern whether we make a contribution to a site or not; opportunity, time, whether one is knowledgable enough (or, possesses humility enough to admit it) on a given subject to speak intelligently on that subject, etc., these are all factors which govern when and how, and to what extent one makes (or doesn't make) such contributions.

Mr. Auster often delves into subjects that are, quite frankly, beyond my personal ability to add anything of any real significance. In such cases, though I often find the articles interesting, informative, and intriguing (the three-I's?), I'm really not able to add anything comment-wise, so I just keep my proverbial trap shut like a good little reader. ;-) But here's the point...

I've often said of VFR (and Lawrence Auster), that it is, in my opinion, the Premier Trad-Con site on the internet, notwithstanding the naysayers, the critics, the Auster-skeptics and detractors (Yes, I'm aware of them and their arguments -- some of them have apparently made it their life's purpose to refute virtually anything and everything Auster has to say on any subject).

I maintain today that VFR is the Premier Trad-con site. And here is a good (singular) example of why I say so.

Update: I've been informed that the second link goes to VFR's main page, instead of to the VFR article I intended. I've tried to correct this, twice, but to no avail, so, the title of the article, posted May 22, 2009, 10:40pm, is: Tyrannical Atheism. Scroll down the main page to access the article. At present it is the fourth article listed.

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Randians vs. Trad-cons

At VFR we read, once again (**rolls eyes**), the "articulation" of the simplistic view among men which states that reason alone is to be our guide in everything, at all times, and under the inexaustible minutia of conditions and circumstances which we as human beings experience. My God!, what kind of kool-aid are these people drinking? Do they pay any attention to the goings-on around them?

Here is my comment to the VFR entry:

Terry Morris writes:

Humorous on one hand, sad and dangerous on the other, that Andrew Dalton has put his full faith in his own ability to reason properly and correctly, when all of human experience (as well as his own experience whether he cares to acknowledge it or not) hath shown that mankind is particularly disposed to reason incorrectly, as the faculty of reason without cultivation, without experience, and without revelation, is a miserable guide which often errs from ignorance, and more often from the impulse of passion.

His own words are his own undoing. To claim someone has rejected reason altogether on the basis that that person rejects the pitifully ignorant, sophomoric notion that reason alone is to be our sole and exclusive guide, and thus to count him a savage, is to reveal oneself as completely detached from genuine reason, not to mention humility. But as long as he's managed to convince himself, I guess that's all that matters as far as the poor soul is concerned.

LA replies to me:

I like your paraphrase of Mr. Jefferson.

Ah, we have a glimmer! It is satifying indeed to see that Mr. Auster recognized my paraphrase of Mr. Jefferson. But so far as he's concerned I would expect no less. Any Trad-con worth his salt would immediately identify the first part of my paraphrase as originating with Mr. Jefferson and the DoI. BUT...

...how many among you can identify the original source from whence the second part of my combination paraphrase emanates? Just yell it out when you know! ;-)

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The problem with non-discrimination as the ruling principle for any society --

--Civilizational Suicide.

Excerpted below are a few paragraphs selected almost at random from Lawrence Auster's excellent speech -- A Real Islam Policy for a Real America -- given at the Preserving Western Civilization Conference, February 8, 2009 in Baltimore, Maryland (The full text of the speech is here.):

The key to this liberal ideology is the belief in tolerance or non-discrimination as the ruling principle of society, the principle to which all other principles must yield. We see this belief at work in every area of modern life. The principle of non-discrimination must, if followed consistently, destroy every human society and institution. A society that cannot discriminate between itself and other societies will go out of existence, just as an elm tree that cannot discriminate between itself and a linden tree must go out of existence. To be, we must be able to say that we are us, which means that we are different from others. If we are not allowed to distinguish between ourselves and Muslims, if we must open ourselves to everyone and everything in the world that is different from us, and if the more different and threatening the Other is, the more we must open ourselves to it, then we go out of existence.

[...]

The dilemma suggests the solution. What is now unthinkable, must become thinkable; what is now unsayable, must become sayable; and ultimately it must replace non-discrimination as the ruling belief in society. I know that this sounds crazy, utterly impossible. But fifty or a hundred years ago it would have seemed crazy, utterly impossible, that today's liberalism with its suicidal ideology would have replaced the traditional attitudes that were then prevalent. If society could change that radically in one direction, toward suicidal liberalism, it can change back again. It's not impossible.

[...]

What I'm saying here is nothing fancy or metaphysical, it's something that all people know by common sense. We live within these two dimensions--the better and the worse, the more like and the less like--in everything we do.

That is, we did live within them, until modern liberalism came along and said that it's wrong to discriminate between higher and lower, it's wrong to discriminate between better and worse, it's wrong to discriminate between like and unlike.

[...]

The equality principle of modern liberalism says that unassimilable immigrants must be permitted to flood our society, changing its very nature. It prohibits normal authority such as the authority of parents and teachers over children. It banished the very idea of a morality that men ought to follow. And even God is banished if he's a God who has any claims on us.

This is the ubiquitous yet unacknowledged horror of modern liberalism, that it takes the ordinary, differentiated nature of the world, which all human beings have always recognized, and makes it impossible for people to discuss it, because under liberalism anyone who notes these distinctions and says that they matter has done an evil thing and must be banished from society, or at least be barred from a mainstream career.

This liberalism is the most radical and destructive ideology that has ever been, and yet it is not questioned. Communism and big government liberalism were challenged and fought in the past. But the ideology of non-discrimination, which came about after World War II, has never been resisted--it has never even been identified, even though it is everywhere. What is needed, if the West is to survive, is a pro-Western civilization movement that criticizes, resists, and reverses this totalistic liberal belief system that controls our world. ...

I just became aware that Auster has posted a permanent link to the speech in the sidebar of VFR only an hour or so ago while visiting the site and trying to catch up a bit. It's good to see the speech posted at VFR in its entirety. And perhaps we might think of adding it to the Lawrence Auster on Islam page in the near future.

Speaking of which, if you happen to be new to Webster's and you've not yet become familiar with the articles and pages I have permanent links posted to in the sidebars of the blog for ease of accessibility, if you will look under the heading On Islam in the left sidebar there is a permanent link to the page in question which we created over a year ago.

If you are familiar with the page but haven't been there in a while, you will notice during your next visit that the page has undergone something of a facelift in recent months. This was not my idea, nor am I particularly satisfied with the looks of the page by comparison with the original. But I do give some latitude to the individual who handles the technical aspects of putting these kinds of things together for me. And on that latter note, I have some other ideas for additional pages to add to the blog (not related to Islam) hosted by my own website in the relatively near future that I'll be sharing with you. Stay tuned.

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