Category: media and media people

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media and media people

The Eristic of Ann

If conservative Eris-wannabe and apple-​thrower Ann Coulter wants to understand why those of us working for truly limited government sometimes have trouble voting GOP down the line, she might consider her beloved party’s history.

The Republican Party started out as the Big Government party, combining the abolitionist/​anti-​slavery cause with the “internal improvement” Whig Party remnant. That is, the party started out half right, half big government.

Further, Republican Teddy Roosevelt introduced Progressivism into national politics in a big way.

No wonder the Grand Old Party has been so bad about limiting government. It was the party that unleashed unlimited government in the first place. Institutional inertia set in. Some Republicans remain progressives at heart — though nowadays, thankfully, a tad more cautious in their progressivism.

George W. Bush’s many big-​gov measures were no abberation.

Heedless of this history, Coulter called limited government folks who vote the Libertarian ticket “idiots,” ending her latest column with a dare: “If you are considering voting for the Libertarian candidate in any Senate election, please send me your name and address so I can track you down and drown you.”

Over at Reason, Ron Bailey provided Google instructions for Ann to get to his house. He’s voting for Robert Sarvis, the Libertarian candidate in Virginia.

I have trouble calling science writer Bailey an idiot for his vote preference. Sarvis is a lot better than his incumbent Republican competitor, Ed Gillespie — whom Sarvis aptly dubbed a “blank check for George W. Bush.”

Maybe Coulter should threaten to “drown” Big Gov GOPers for a change.

Or stop the death threats altogether and help find better Republican candidates.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ideological culture media and media people

Goodbye, Kittens and Puppies

The global warming won’t kill us; we’ll be done in by the suffocating silliness of overheated alarmist “science.”

I’m provoked to this proposition by the advent of Harvard Prof Naomi Oreskes’s new book The Collapse of Western Civilization, in which she and Erik Conway “report,” from the vantage point of 400 years hence, that all Australians have gone gurgling into the climate-​change whirlpool.

Also all kittens and puppies. Their extinction “occurred” in 2023:

The loss of pet cats and dogs garnered particular attention among wealthy Westerners, but what was anomalous in 2023 soon became the new normal. A shadow of ignorance and denial had fallen over people who considered themselves children of the Enlightenment.

I know what you’re saying. You’re saying, “Oh Paul! Science fiction writers project all kinds of wild dystopian scenarios. You can’t treat these as serious attempts at evidence-​based, logic-​based, purely plausible extrapolation! We don’t think time travel is plausible. Does that mean we shouldn’t read H.G. Wells? Come on!”

Yes but … it’s not me claiming that Oreskes’s claims are “all based on solid science.” She’s claiming this. She’s the one averring that the universal demise of cuddly pets is grounded in “scientific projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.”

Hmm. Hold on. Perhaps Oreskes is indeed conceding that her tale is mere groundless fantasy, if the politicized mulch that is the IPCC’s annual report is what she considers unassailable support for her ludicrous scenario-spinning.

I stand corrected, Dear Reader.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment media and media people

Absence of Talk

Yesterday morning, Paul Waldman of the Washington Post wondered why libertarians and limited government conservatives weren’t all over the Ferguson riot suppression, and the police shooting that sparked the whole fracas. He recognized that Reason magazine’s website has covered it, but, he noted, “the politicians and conservative media figures who claim to be the most fervent advocates of individual freedom and to care the most about misuse of government power have been silent.”

One might be tempted to conclude they believe that when somebody’s grandson has to pay taxes on their inheritance, it’s a horrifying injustice that demands redress, but when somebody else’s grandson gets shot walking down the street, that’s just how things go sometimes.

Or maybe one should yield, instead, to the temptation to wait and see what they say when they say it. Rep. Justin Amash tweeted about it later in the day. But Waldman got his licks and innuendo in first.

The whole thing smacks of bad government to me — deadly misgovernment — but I can understand why many folks might want to reserve judgment.

Weighing on the wait-​and-​comment-​later side of this particular debate, it is worth acknowledging that the information so far has been awfully confusing. Especially since the Ferguson government has been cracking down on reporting and video recording, as well as being not very forthcoming about the initial shooting or the autopsy.*

The 24-​hour news cycle is bad enough. The 24-​hour commentary/​reaction cycle is doubly daunting. Forgive me if I don’t have anything profound to say yet. I’m sure, when the facts become clearer, at least I will make my thoughts known.

Isn’t it too early to make comments about comments not made?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* Those are good reasons to be protesting in Ferguson. There are no good reasons for looting Ferguson businesses.

Categories
media and media people Second Amendment rights

Rapid-​Response Counterfire

If somebody tries to polemically gun down your rights, button your flak jacket and shoot back.

It may take years — say, if you’re John Locke answering Robert Filmer.

Sometimes you’ve got only seconds.

You’re on a gab show being watched by millions. Somebody says something unwise, illogical and destructive — but possibly persuasive to a certain percentage of viewers. Unless you reply, instantly, with something wise, logical and constructive, you lose your chance.

If it’s dueling YouTube videos, maybe it takes a couple of days to blast the enemy and win a viewership the size of a small city.

The offending “celluloid” I have in mind is a Bloomberg-​funded skit that opens with the caption “Warning: this video depicts scenes of domestic violence.” An armed ex-​boyfriend breaks into a woman’s home and threatens to take their kid. The woman calls the police — minutes away when seconds count. The video implies that the way to “stop gun violence against women” is to get rabid-​ex-​boyfriend-​empowering guns off the streets.

Two days later, Liberty PA had posted a parody-​rebuttal. This time, the prospective victim flourishes a shotgun to scare off the ex. Opening caption: “Warning: this video depicts scenes of self-​defense.” Closing caption: “Stop gun control against women.”

Bull’s‑eye.

The video-​rebuttal didn’t cost much more to make than the quick wit and time of a few alacritous participants. Within a couple days — credit partly yours, O modern technological infrastructure! — it had garnered 72,000 hits.

On Fox’s Red Eye and elsewhere the inanity of the original propaganda piece was pointed out. But it was the Liberty PA video response that really brought the point home.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ideological culture individual achievement media and media people national politics & policies responsibility

Mercy as a Calling

The cause of immigration reform hit a huge speed bump in recent weeks, with the arrival at the border of thousands upon thousands of children from war-​torn Central America.

War-​torn? Yes. Gangs — micro-​governments in the olden style — fed by drug money have turned the Latin American states to our south into war zones, alas not too dissimilar to the gang warfare that beset some of our great American cities.

Only worse.

No wonder the people in those countries are scared, and desperate. “Coyotes” are taking advantage of U.S. politicians’ inability to secure the border, or even cook up a coherent immigration policy, and charge large amounts of money to transport children to “safety” in the U.S.

Where they are gathered and detained.

In the midst of all the partisan bickering — a legitimate clash of ideologies, really — stands one hero: Glenn Beck. While President Obama avoids the border crisis as if avoidance solves problems, radio/​TV/​Internet sensation Beck is taking his trucks and buses and volunteers directly to the area Obama avoids, the detention centers and surrounding cities and churches.

He’s taking food, clothing, and comforts for the children.

Last night on The O’Reilly Factor he explained  that governments are instituted to provide justice. He laments the lack of justice on  immigration coming from Washington. But the business of the people — of caring Americans — is not primarily justice.

It’s mercy, Beck says. He’s raised millions, and he’s personally taking aid to where it’s needed.

Heroic. And very neighborly.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
media and media people national politics & policies

Border Problems, Solutions?

Bill Maher began the panel segment of his latest Real Time with Bill Maher episode taking on the “children at the border” problem. He identified the underlying cause: drug cartels.

His solution? Legalize all psychoactive drugs, particularly cocaine.

Wait a minute. The best response to a border crisis is to legalize drugs?

Seems orthogonal to the issue. “Out of left field.”

Which is not to say I don’t support legalizing drugs. But I try not to bring it up every discussion. Could Maher have drugs a tad too much on his brain?

Be that as it may or may not, for the facts I then turned to … Cato Institute.

Only to have the good folks at Cato back up Maher’s assertions.

On July 8, Ted Galen Carpenter, a Cato senior fellow, pinpointed the growth in drug cartels’ power in Central America as central to the whole issue. The drug cartels are “driving vulnerable populations northward to the United States to enhance their own profits.”

But the whole picture is more complicated.

A month earlier, Alex Nowrasteh, Cato’s immigration policy analyst, focused on two American border policies that “likely” and “unintentionally” incentivized “some of the migration and the smugglers that carry many of the migrants,” leading to the current debacle of thousands of unaccompanied minors now being housed — in poor conditions — in detainee centers.

True to form, Nowrasteh notes that “some American politicians who blame American law for the surge actually voted for that American law in the past.”

Which is more horrifying: The idea that politicians make things worse? Or that comedians make more sense than our elected representatives?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.