What is conservatism’s problem with race?  Why does everything done in the name of the conservative movement (and by proxy, the Republican Party) fail to appeal to a majority of self-conscious minorities? 

1-     America was born into slavery.  It’s our original sin, and may be the nation’s undoing as its legacy seems to engender the permanent alienation of minorities from traditional American culture.  To the racially conscious, every defense of American tradition, no matter how thoughtful or tolerant, smells like a defense of slavery, Jim Crow, and segregation.  From a certain standpoint, it doesn’t matter than Americans died to abolish slavery.  What matters is that the founders didn’t do it in the first place, which makes appeals to their collective wisdom sound like excuses for slavery. 

2-     Conservatives must reach out to minorities, especially the black community.  No matter how vain it may seem (progressives rarely deny themselves the opportunity to portray their opponents as racists—see Rand Paul) the rift between the political right and the black community is cultural, which means it will almost certainly change slowly, if it’s to change for the better.  Only through familiarity with a sober conservative understanding of tradition, unblemished by progressive malevolence, will minorities learn to be comfortable with conservative ideals.  Only until blacks are completely comfortable with the paradoxical reverence of American heritage coupled with the acknowledgement and justified rejection of our worst traditions, will that change.  Whether or not it’s fair, America’s political atmosphere is such that the burden of proof is on conservatives to demonstrate we’re not racist.  At the very least, this means engaging with minority communities, accepting invitations to NAACP events, and empathizing with the African American experience (even if it doesn’t entail sympathizing with it).  We should start today, but not expect results for generations.

3-     While conservatives are right to reject the assumptions that drive political correctness, a healthy disregard for leftist mores is different than dumb, blunt name-calling.  Every time Ann Coulter uses the term “Raghead” to denounce Islamic extremists, or someone like former Republican Senator George Allen says “Macaca,” it only fuels the false perception that right-wingers are pining for a pure, white America.  Conservatives should be the last people willing to play with racial slurs, if only because of the first two reasons I listed above.  When the assumption is that we’re racist, we can’t get away with the same things the left can.  Case in point, then-Democratic Senator Joe Biden’s comment about Indian-Americans: “”In Delaware, the largest growth of population is Indian-Americans, moving from India. You cannot go to a 7/11 or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. I’m not joking.”  Rightly or wrongly, progressives are given the benefit of the doubt by Americans when they say stupid things that involve race.  This is not the case with conservatives, and it won’t change if we simply disregard it. 

4-     We were dead wrong in the civil rights era, specifically, on voting rights.  

When Americans were arguing about voting rights in the mid-twentieth century, classical conservatives, correctly trying to preserve moral nuance on the subject, simply weren’t libertarian enough.  In the 1959 book Up From Liberalism, Willaim F. Buckley argued that the federal government shouldn’t guarantee African-Americans voting rights.  His reasoning isn’t racist, in fact, it rejects the fundamental tenant of racism, inherent racial superiority—“There are no scientific grounds for assuming congenital Negro disabilities.”  So why did he oppose it?  Further reading is required. 

For Buckley, the salient question about voting rights was whether or not the “claims of civilization” took precedence over those of universal suffrage.  Intellectual conservatives have always been aware of democracy’s excesses, particularly mob rule.  Thus, the denial of voting rights wasn’t seen as a big deal.  “Being able to vote is no more to have realized freedom than being able to read is to have realized wisdom,” wrote Buckley.   Yet this ignored the plain truth that African Americans, being American citizens, should be accorded the right to govern themselves through democratic elections.  The proposed solution of voting qualification tests is flawed along the same lines.  We shouldn’t deny legal citizens the right to vote based on whether or not they understand the foundations of American culture.  It would be impractical and potentially abused—what would happen if the test is written by progressive activists who interpret everything as a matter of exploitation?  Moreover, to be ruled by a government against your will is simply a less enthusiastic form of slavery.  

More than anything else, being wrong about the right to vote has brought into question the conservative stance on every issue from affirmative action to reparations, and made it more difficult to present these cases as the African American community, along with much of the rest of our country, only sees that a generation of conservatives opposed black interests, not a nuanced, comprehensive picture of conservatives who have supported legal equality and have wholeheartedly condemned racial prejudice as readily as any other Americans, but have rejected more extreme claims such as proportional representation.  This legacy follows us today, and gives a false air of authority to the claims that conservatism is a racist ideology, when in fact, such beliefs are irrevocably misinformed. 

Tags: civil rights, race
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I’ll admit it; I used to be one of those conservatives who never thought immigration was a big deal.  That’s partly because of my libertarian background.  Libertarians, while more tolerant of social conservatism than progressives, nevertheless have no philosophical framework for understanding the classical conservative reverence for things such as cultural capital and transcendent morality.  Thus, my social conservatism developed far more slowly than my lifelong disgust towards the left’s corny morality tales and over the top emotionalism, an aversion most libertarians share.  Another reason for this is that the two most often cited reasons for opposing illegal immigration, high crime and a stressed economy, don’t resonate with me as much as they probably should. 

Start with the argument that illegal immigration is bad for the economy.  Illegal immigration is estimated to cost the state of New York (which is only thousands of miles from Mexico) between 4.5 and 5.1 billion dollars a year.  This limits the amount of money educators have to spend on competitive teachers and computers, among other things.  This is a serious charge, but it’s also a drop in the bucket compared to what this century’s first two American Presidents have spent in the name of progress. 

Some conservatives go as far to equate the practice of exploiting illegal residents for cheap labor with slavery (It doesn’t help that both slave-owners and supporters of illegal immigration have argued that their preferred employment practices are integral to the economy).  But aside from its illegality, the prospect of human beings being paid less than minimum wage doesn’t bother me if all parties agree to it in good faith. 

Then there’s illegal immigration’s contribution to crime.  Imported gangs such as MS-13 intimidate American citizens not only along the border, but in faraway lands such as Omaha and New Jersey.  The ongoing inner-city drug problem progressive activists cynically (and enthusiastically) blame on racism is largely fueled by illegal aliens smuggling drugs into the country.  A seemingly endless number of brutal crimes would almost certainly not have occurred if the United States enforced its immigration laws.   Even taking into account the plain fact that most illegal immigrants are clearly not violent thugs, the growing population of illegal aliens who happen to be criminals has made some of America’s biggest cities much more dangerous than they already were. 

While it would be irresponsible to ignore the economic and criminal consequences of illegal immigration, neither extends a shadow over America as long as the one cast by its cultural impact.  My stance on immigration is shamelessly derivative of Samuel Huntington’s: The most important question about immigration isn’t whether or not foreigners are importing themselves to America, but whether or not they’re assimilating. 

As much as I tend to stress otherwise, liberals and conservatives, by virtue of their American heritage, have more in common than their predictably hyperbolic “outrage” suggests.  The vast majority of all Americans place ideals such as free speech, freedom from political coercion, and rule of law on a pedestal.  In general, Americans wholeheartedly respect their libertarian constitution, which unites them despite their doctrinal pissing matches.  While conservatives are generally more exuberant in their nationalism, liberals also readily proclaim that they love America and support the troops. 

For the most part, this cultural heritage has held America together despite crises such as the Great Depression, the 60’s Revolution, and 9/11.  It’s telling that both Democrats and Republicans quote George Orwell’s 1984, a narrative obsessed with the dangers of an overbearing state, as if it were the Bible.  Undermining the Constitution is an offense on both sides of the aisle, even as it’s vulnerable to eccentric interpretation.  As long as the American people care to uphold our deepest traditions, American politicians have no choice but to submit to our most valuable ideals.  Even President Barack Obama has said “I am a strong believer in capitalism,” and expresses at least token consideration for gun rights. 

Yet we forget that while our nation’s constitutional principles are self-evidently wonderful to us, the rest of the world doesn’t necessarily see it that way.  Despite the fact that the United States has granted its citizens unmatched economic prosperity (past-tense at the moment), the freest political culture (ask Canadians about free speech), and status which was the envy of the globe throughout the majority of the 20^th century, only twenty of the world’s nations are federal republics like America, and many, such as Venezuela, have little regard for liberty.  Because America is a federal republic, where the duty of governance is split between the national government and local governments, our national government is capable of deferring to local traditions.  Thus, cultures as diverse as San Francisco’s and Texas’s can both legitimately claim to be authentically American.  In addition, because our constitution emphasizes negative rights, the stuff the government’s not allowed to do, these communities can co-exist without worrying that one will impose its sensibilities on the other through law (although this is becoming more difficult as the nation becomes more interconnected—As I am writing this, protestors in Los Angeles are marching against a law restricted to Arizona).  It’s difficult to argue against a free society which allows for this much cultural diversity while still maintaining unity.

Quite a peachy scenario, don’t you think?  Now imagine that literally millions of people with no intimate connection to American culture flooded some of our largest communities, effectively re-shaping large segments of the United States in a starkly different image.  That’s what happens with Illegal immigration, which waters down American culture through the massive influx of a population ignorant of it.  Not because American traditions cannot coexist with Latino, Hispanic, or any other peaceful heritage, but because American culture cannot sustain itself without deliberate assimilation of incoming residents.      

Even though illegal immigrants presumably come to America of their own volition, conservatives are handicapped when it comes to relating to unassimilated immigrants because unassimilated immigrants have little incentive to change their distant relationship to the United States.   Beyond what it takes to smuggle one’s self into the country and find work, anyone can live here without coming to appreciate this country at all.  See: Sean Penn.  There are entire communities along the border where even comprehension of English, the primary language used to communicate our values, isn’t required to fit in.  This is why legal immigration is so important.  It encourages assimilation while illegal immigration circumvents it. 

Without assimilation, the civil liberties which allow the blue and red states to coexist would slowly dissolve, because the Constitution is only a piece of paper, and needs popular support in order to have any authority.  Without assimilation, the rights we take for granted, such as freedom of expression, will come under attack by those who pledge loyalty to ideals contrary to American tradition.  Pro-illegal immigration groups have long claimed that the immigration debate is fueling a rise in hate crimes.  If so, then the pragmatic solution would be to censor colorful opponents of illegal immigration, right? 

It’s not as if illegal aliens pour over our borders with the intention of undermining this country’s well-being, but national identity isn’t something one absorbs via osmosis.  If that was the case, surveys demonstrating that our schoolchildren don’t know when the Civil War occurred wouldn’t pop up every few years.  Cultures are fragile.  For a culture to survive, the majority of the people within them must be truly educated about it.  Insisting that immigrants enter our country legally isn’t to condemn them, but an attempt to protect the way of life immigrants are seeking when they come to America. 

It isn’t unreasonable to ask immigrants to assimilate.  Assimilation doesn’t mean “denying” one’s heritage anymore than me learning Spanish would be an affront to my patriotism.  No one who immigrates to America is being asked to abandon his family’s values and switch to a diet exclusively based on cows and potatoes.  All assimilation means is to recognize America’s cultural heritage and pledge to respect, and not undermine, America’s best traditions.   This unspoken contract is what allows atheists to live besides Catholics, libertarians to break bread with feminists, and me to get along with most of my friends. 

The path to citizenship, as much of a painful, bureaucratic process it is, at least demands that prospective citizens pass a simple test about American history and government to be granted their citizenship.  It’s no accident that the citizenship process requires applicants to take an oath of allegiance to the United States, which includes supporting and defending the Constitution.  For Christ’s sake, we hold our legal immigrants to higher standards than we hold ourselves! 

America’s unique political traditions are not instinctual; if they were, conservatives wouldn’t have to work so hard to defend them.  Tolerance for freedom, especially if it doesn’t obviously contribute to the public good, is not a natural phenomenon.  Primitive societies are notoriously intolerant and bound to communitarian principles.  When it comes to wealth, the human economic impulse tends towards envy and class warfare; the opposite of constructive capitalism.  Truly freedom loving people are raised, not born.  If that wasn’t the case, then opening our borders to unmitigated migration wouldn’t have such a profound effect on our political culture. 

America isn’t special because it reflects humanity’s base desires, including ethnic chauvinism.  America isn’t special because of our commitment to civil rights, which is absolutely commendable, but not unique in the western world.  America is special because it preserves liberty from the government as well as the fickle mob it often represents.  As the percentage of Americas who understand this shrinks, the likelihood that America will lose this unique feature increases.  I suspect more supporters of illegal immigration know this than will admit it. 

Tags: culture, illegal immigration
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I know it’s the popular thing to advocate, but I’ve hated the idea of college football playoffs since the first day I heard it.  Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I like the bowl game system; it’s the most interesting post-season format in sports, and it gives non-championship teams a chance to end the season on a high note.  The bowl games also help preserve the flavor of a league whose 119-team talent pool is much more diluted than the professional National Football League’s. 

I can understand the appeal of a playoff format.  Obviously the BCS hasn’t always placed the two best teams in college football’s championship game (In one of my few bright spots writing for The Daily Iowan, I wrote that the BCS is like a government program—invented with good intentions, it fails time and time again, but never goes away).  In 2001 the BCS sent a Nebraska Cornhuskers team which didn’t even win its conference championship (it was embarrassed by the University of Colorado in the Big 12 title game, 62-36) to the national championship only to be smacked around in by the Miami Hurricanes, 37-14.  That’s what happens when computers get in the way of humanity’s common sense.   One reason people don’t run the economy though a silicon processor is that it would be impossible to write a program which correctly weighed the countless tangible variables that dictate the proper allocation of goods and services, and then took capricious human nature into account, so what makes college football fans trust HAL 9000’s ability to decide whether or not USC’s a better team than Florida? 

But this doesn’t mean a single-elimination playoff is necessary.  A playoff system would take the meaning out of college football’s regular season, where just one loss can sink a team’s national title hopes (a sixteen team-playoff could make three or even four losses non-threatening if a team’s schedule is brutal enough).  Without the safety net of a low-seeded playoff berth, just about every game is a must-win match for college football’s title contenders.  Even a top-eight playoff scenario would suck the urgency from important games.  In 2006, Michigan and Ohio State, the top two teams in the nation at the time, played a thrilling 42-39 game (food for thought:  Would they have played as hard if the game wouldn’t have knocked either team out of playoff contention)?  Alas, the Fuckeyes won, ending Michigan’s national title hopes.  In an eight-team playoff system, the game would have only been a formality.  Both teams had performed so well that there was virtually no chance losing the game would have knocked the loser out of the title hunt; in fact, Michigan entered the bowl week that season ranked #3 in the BCS as well as both major polls.  If college football had a playoff system in place, one of the greatest games in the rivalry’s history would have been reduced to a warm-up for the post-season. 

The same thing occurred when then #1 Alabama hosted #4 Florida in the 2008 Southeastern Conference title game.  Florida won an intense matchup, 31-20, dropping the Crimson Tide to #4 in the final polls.  In a playoff system, the only drama surrounding the game would have concerned whether or not Florida would lose so bad they would fall out of playoff contention. 

I know the playoffs will give a comforting finality to the college football season, but the simple selection of the top eight teams will be as arbitrary as any pair of polls, especially when it comes to deciding the seventh and eighth-ranked teams.  Should a 12-1 team from a weak conference be invited over a 9-3 SEC team?  What about a team that played a tough schedule and lost three close games versus another 11-1 squad that defeated creampuffs all season, but was blown out the one time they played a ranked opponent?   There are 119 teams in college football’s most prolific division, but only twelve or so games in the regular season, which means that schedule strength will vastly differ.   A team with an 11-1 record may be worse than a team with a 6-5 one because all the former racked up victories against much weaker opponents.    Don’t pretend there wouldn’t be any controversy with a playoff system.  After the 2008 regular season, 12-0 Boise State, ranked #9 in the BCS behind a group which included only one other unbeaten team (Utah) would have been left out of a top-eight playoff selection.  

Most of all, I don’t want the NCAA to be like the NFL.  College football should be distinct from pro football, not just a watered-down developmental league with essentially the same playoff format.  The bowl game system helps sustain the atmosphere of college football, because almost every game indeed matters when it comes to the national championship.  Which sounds more exciting, the Orange Bowl, or round two of the playoffs at a neutral site?  I would rather have a little controversy every so often over deciding the national champion than change the makeup of the entire game, which is what a mechanical playoff format would do to college football.  Just think: How many people list regular-season NFL games when asked to name the greatest games ever? 

The only real problem with the bowl system before the BCS was that no matter what the circumstances were, the Big Ten and Pac Ten conferences had agreed to send their champions to the Rose bowl, even if it created a mess like it did in 1994 by pitting the unbeaten #2 team in the country (Penn State) not against the other unbeaten team (#1 Nebraska) but against a 9-3 champion in a weak year for the Pac Ten (the Oregon Ducks).  The Rose Bowl’s exclusive rights to the Big Ten and Pac Ten champions prevented some great de facto title games.  Because of the contract, the dominant Washington Huskies and Miami Hurricanes split the national title in 1991, because they had to play lesser, non-unbeaten teams instead of each other in their respective bowls.   The same goes for the 1997 Michigan Wolverines and Nebraska Cornhuskers. 

A playoff system would only let unthinking fans pretend all of sport’s arbitrary factors can be accounted for.  Even then, does anyone really believe the best team always wins in single-elimination tournaments?  Were the NFL’s 1998 Atlanta Falcons a better representative for their NFC in the Super Bowl than the 1998 Minnesota Vikings?  In college basketball, the 1985 Georgetown Hoyas would have beaten the 1985 Villanova Wildcats, which upset them in a single-game championship, nine out of ten games if given the chance.  Can one even truly say the 2007 New York Giants were a better team than the then undefeated New England Patriots, even though they squeaked by the Patriots in the Super Bowl?  In college football’s Division I-A right now, every game a team plays is part of the resume for the championship game.  In all other sports, the most important part of the season always comes at the end.  In NCAA football, every game can potentially end a team’s quest for glory. 

As long as there is an intelligent, flexible system for deciding which two teams deserve to play in the championship (sometimes it’ll be close, and there will be arguments over who deserved to be invited—get over it) college football should avoid a playoff system at all costs. 

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Selected quotes from Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn’s Leftism Revisited   

Americans (or Britishers) are basically conservative.  Being evolutionary rather than revolutionary they like familiar things and ideas in bigger and better editions, but they are easily horrified or disgusted by the essentially new, the different or unexpected.  (xvii)

Whoever praises a collective unit in which he participates (a nation, a race, a class, a party) also praises himself.  (4)

In the last two hundred years the exploitation of envy—its mobilization among the masses—coupled with the denigration of individuals, but more frequently of classes, races, nations, or religious communities, has been the key to political success…all leftist “isms” harp on this theme; i.e., on the privilege of groups, which are the objects of envy and, at the same time, deemed inferior in an intellectual or moral respect…they ought to adjust, become identical with “the people,” renounce their privileges, conform. (6)

Since we do not know who among us is nearer to God, we should treat each other as equals.  This, however, is merely procedural.  (10)

A certain equality of treatment is necessary in a free society.  Only by treating people equally can one discover who is superior to whom. (12)

Egalitarianism, as already intimated, cannot make much progress without the use of force: perfect equality is only possible in total slavery.  (13)

Since equality is the dynamic element in democracy, and liberty lies at the base of true liberalism, the two political concepts are equally exclusive.  (14)

In every nation, the lower half of the social pyramid (if the expression is permitted) is by far the biggest half, which means that the people of quality can always be outvoted.  (17)

The repression of 49 percent of the people by 51 percent, or of 1 percent by 99 percent, is most regrettable, but it is not undemocratic. (18-19)

Tolerance is a real virtue because it entails self-control and an ascetic attitude. (19)

…This brings about such errors as calling the confiscation of a newspaper “undemocratic.”  If the majority of the people approve of it, such an act is highly democratic, but assuredly not liberal. (21)

In Germany after World War I, the National Socialists, most unfortunately, were seated on the far right because to simple-minded people nationalists were rightists, if not conservatives… (24)

…Extremes never meet.  Extreme cold and extreme heat, extreme distance and extreme nearness, extreme strength and extreme weakness, extreme speed and extreme slowness never meet. They do not become identical or even alike. (25)

The Catholic faith is not conservative.  It is, rather, like a tree, rooted to the same spot but changing in shape, shedding old leaves and branches, adding new ones.  (41)

…The foundations of the American republic are aristocratic and Whiggish with an antimonarchic slant.  (50)

One ought not to forget that the term “democratic” appears neither in the Declaration of Independence nor in the Constitution.  Nor does the word “republic”; the Constitution merely insists that the member states of the Union have a “republican” form of government. (51)

In a letter to John Taylor (John) Adams insisted that democracy would inevitably evolve into oligarchy and oligarchy into despotism, a notion he shared with Plato and Aristotle. (52)

“who is secure in all of his basic needs?  Who has work, spiritual care, medical care, housing , food, occasional entertainment, free clothing, free burial, free everything?”  The answer might be, “monks and nuns,” but the standard reply is “prisoners.” (88)

Marx nurtured a real hatred for the Jews, in whom he saw the very embodiment of bourgeois capitalism. (110) 

The farmer was and remains the stumbling block to socialist experiments everywhere.  Since he raises his own food and tends to live in his own house, he is less “controllable” than say, the urban dweller. (117)

Just as the “Reddest” areas of Germany changed from red to brown to back to red, so it occurred in Italy.  The Romagna, very red today, was very fascist in the 1920s and 1930s. (143)

In practice Hitler certainly subscribed to Mussolini’s “Tutto nello stato, niente al fuori dello stato, nulla contro lo stato” (”Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state). (144)

“German socialism does not differ from Marxism in its critique of capitalism nor in its concept of class struggle.” (147)

The patriot, on the other hand, is not contentious.  Just as an intelligent man would never try to argue that his parents were the “best in the world” so the patriot considers his attachment to his country a matter of loyalty. (199)

There is no better way to generate hatred than by forcing a person to sign a confession of guilt which he is sacredly convinced is untrue. (218)

In a democracy, the manifold efforts—the talks, intrigues and chats, the incessant rubbing of shoulders—necessary to attain a leading position consume so much time and energy that the factual knowledge absolutely essential for statesmanship (as opposed to the qualifications of a mere politician) is seldom acquired.  (262)

The typical leftist is a dreamer without honor, and that is a troubling combination. (291) 

Since democratism is strongly ideological, the West has a tendency to “democratize” every conceivable domain of life—education, families, drama, stores, circuses, banks, hospitals.  (310)

The alternative to authority is coercion. (333)

National Socialism was most certainly not a conspiracy; it was a mass movement, operating in broad daylight and filled with people who sacrificed time, money, their very lives for a wicked and stupid cause.  But democracy could not admit to any of this. (334)

People are rarely diabolic or bent enthusiastically on evil.  As a rule, they are only weak; they cannot resist temptation and thus give way to their evil drives.  (339)

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Just logged in the site for the first time in two months.  More than 12,000 comments were waiting for me.  11,999 were spam.

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Mackinnonese: What Conservatives Would Sound Like If They Wrote Like Feminists. 

The spookiest thing I’ve ever read is Catherine MacKinnon’s opening to Only Words (1987), her articulate anti-pornography polemic.  MacKinnon is both a Marxist and a feminist, so it makes sense that her rhetoric displays an eerie fixation on victimhood, an obsessive regression reminiscent of the psychological horror conveyed in a classic episode of the Twilight Zone. 

The opening paragraphs to the short book form an intense, poetic narrative, a spotlight into the feminist id.  They’re marked by overly dramatic language, occasional vulgarity (as MacKinnon is known to use) and disturbing sexual imagery (Which is why I’m not dragging ModCon down with this post).  I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to post this, but since I don’t care about being timely anymore, here it is.  The first pages of Only Words, if only they were written by a conservative.  If this doesn’t creep liberals out, they’re not paying attention. 

Imagine that since the start of the 20th century, your most formative traumas, your daily suffering and the intimidation you live with, are unspeakable—improper for serious discussion.  You grow up with your peers complaining how insensitive your sincerity is, so an authority figure can punish you using a creative interpretation of tolerance.  When you are older, dickless comedians will scour all of your recorded statements for opportunities to embarrass you.  Despite the heartfelt vitriol on their end, they’ll insist that you not take them seriously. 

You can’t really tell anyone.  When you try to speak of these things, you’re told that they didn’t happen; you imagined it; your fathers did it to their fathers for years.  Textbooks say this.  No textbooks will recall what happened to you.  Laws say this.  No law imagines what is happening to you, the way it is happening.  You live your whole life wondering why a silent echo follows both your most feverish screams and your most articulate pleas. 

In this century-plus of silence, pictures of you are made while these things are being done.  Every time the pressure of being hated breaks you, making your arguments inchoate, you hear the journalists scribbling and the populists giggling.  You always know that your lowest, if still human moments are out there somewhere.  Sold, or traded, or passed around a classroom, or archived in a newsroom.  In them, your basest and most vulnerable moments are made immortal.  Someone, anyone, could see you this way.  What they felt as they watched you and used your worst moments to define you and your friends is being done again and lived again and felt again through pictures.  Your violation becomes a deep well to draw their arousal from.  Your unraveling becomes their pleasure.  Watching you is how they get off; with their pictures they can watch you and get off any time. 

Slowly, then suddenly, hope emerges; maybe they’ll treat you as a human being—maybe you will be believed.  You find a guarded way of bringing it up; maybe, just maybe, the pictures of you are perhaps slander?  You find that the pictures, far from recording the way you’ve been betrayed, are fuel, “proof” of your hatred and idiocy.  Those who see you being violated only experience their own pleasure.  They do not feel your pain as pain any more than those who recorded you being hurt felt it.  The pictures, surrounded by a shining halo of false insight and false revolution—false because they’re not intellectual and certainly not unfamiliar—have become the authority on your role in the debate.  They are called the record of your experience, a sign for ideology, your ideology itself.  In a very real way, they have made your beliefs be what they are imagined to be by those who use you and their images of you interchangeably. 

In this way, their images are not so different from the videos and transcripts which came before—but your use for the camera gives the images a special credibility, a deep verisimilitude, an even stronger claim to truth, to being incontrovertibly about you.  They happened to you; there they are.  You can’t hide it, hide from it, or modify it.  Because you are needed for these images, the providers of them will prod and antagonize you just to get new documentation of their imagination of you. 

Finally, somehow, you meet other conservatives.  Their teachers, friends, and co-workers also saw the images, liked them, beat off to them, and tried to bait your friends into acting out those images live.  “Bush is an idiot” the predators would screech over and over, less an expression of what they believe than a way to preserve distance between us and them.  They burn your flags, dip your crosses in urine, and insult the contributions of your intellectuals—just waiting for you to lapse and prove that you are what the images say you are.  It is only proper for them to look at your conservatism through a paranoid prism—our preachers say “a salt ministry,” and they hear “assault ministry.”  The same defensiveness that was forced on you is forced on your friends; the same silent civility you found necessary just to interact with them has also been adopted by your friends.  There is, you find, a whole industry producing and selling darkly romantic images of you and your friends.  They call it a necessity, acting as if they’re oblivious to your unpopularity, which they’ve worked very hard to cultivate.

When any of your friends tries to tell what is happening, they are told it didn’t happen; they imagined it; they’re acting out of class interests.  Your unwillingness to define people according to their race becomes racism.  The recordings prove it.  See, he’s not ashamed of being against reparations.  Besides, they say, why focus on the images, which are only symptoms of your irrationality?  Even if you are being wronged, what’s keeping you from defending yourself?  It’s not as if you’ll be shouted down by self-righteous students, be ridiculed by passive-aggressive entertainers, or be forced to abandon your livelihood.  The images themselves do nothing, they’re just free speech—you taking offense means nothing.  Go make your own images, just as long as it doesn’t offend them. 

Putting to one side what this progression from isolation to cultural repression does to your sense of reality, personal security, and place within a community, not to mention faith in humanity, consider what it does to one’s relation to expression:  to language, speech, the world of thought and communication.  You learn that language does not belong to you, that you cannot use it to say what you know; knowledge cannot be what you’ve learned.  Information is not made out of your experiences; it can’t be if your conclusions are radically different from theirs.  You learn that talking about what has happened to you does not count as dialogue, but as “hate-mongering.”  You learn that your reality is postmodern—defined by entertainment media, totally exposed but invisible, screaming yet inaudible, never disproven but eternally “indefensible.”  You learn that debate is not an opportunity for you to be heard, but a forum for them to belittle and talk down to you. 

Your relationship to politics is like shouting at a movie.  “Don’t follow the axe-murder outside!” you scream.  The audience acts as though nothing has been said; they keep their eyes fixed towards the front while many feel disturbed and embarrassed for you.  The action on screen continues as if nothing has occurred.  As the echo of your voice dies in your ears, you feel ashamed about saying anything.  Soon even you being to wonder if your experience is legitimate; it has no effect on the world surrounding you. 

This is the right-wing version of life imitating art: your life is the left’s text.  To survive, you learn shame and how to cover it with rhetorical concessions; you learn meekness, how to make inefficacy seductive, and the habit of only opening up in like-minded circles.  You learn how to betray your ideals and substitute others when you cannot stand being put down anymore.  You develop a self who is ingratiating (ignoring their ingratitude) obsequious (ignoring their thirst for power) imitative (ignoring their unwillingness to empathize) and reluctantly passive (ignoring their proud hectoring)—in short, you learn how to express conservatism. 

Tags: Mackinnonese
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Hi, Mom!  I bet you’ve noticed I’m not updating my blog very often.  Well, after a little more than a month of blogging, I’ve decided that it’s not for me.  This doesn’t mean I’m giving up The Sword and the Olive Branch.  I thought of the name first, and it’s too good to let go and risk letting some insecure douchebag turn it into another left-wing circle jerk.  Besides, I’ll still have something to post every lunar eclipse (and I’ll still be cross-posting those occasional items on Modern Conservative until further notice). 

I underestimated how much work it takes to be a good blogger.  I expected to hit the ground running, my writing meshing seamlessly with my blogging.  Instead, it takes me hours to post three short paragraphs and cross-post it on Modern Conservative.  In fact, here’s a synopsis of every weekday of my first month of blogging. 

1.  Wake up at 5:15 a.m. (sometimes 5:30) to go to work at 6:00. 

2. Work.  Spend lunch catching up on the news.  Hopefully find something worth writing about. 

3.  Leave work between 3:00 p.m. and 4:00ish.  Eat a snack.  Talk to my girlfriend. 

4.  If I found something worth writing about during lunch, I’ll research it.  Half the time I’ll find out whatever I thought may have been interesting really wasn’t, and I will have to resort to step five.

5.  If I didn’t find something interesting during lunch, or gave up on what I first had in mind, I’ll go over to Feministing to see if they have any unintentionally funny material.  I’ve been waiting for an overwrought, poetic narrative, ala Andrea Dworkin, to pop up (I have a perfect response ready for it whenever it happens) but to their credit, the chicks at feministing are less melodramatic than their older, second-wave sisters.  If I don’t find anything there, I’ll troll the internet (for longer than I’m willing to admit here) looking for something relevant to write about. 

6.  I will eventually either write a short piece about current events, or I’ll finish off something I’ve had simmering in the mental crock-pot for a few days.  This takes hours, for I’m not an efficient writer. 

7.  I will look for typos and edit my post (No, this isn’t redundant to me). 

8.  I will look for typos and edit my post, again. 

9.  I will tell my girlfriend why I’m not asleep yet.  Half-asleep, she will kindly help me look for typos and edit my post. 

10.  I will post on my website first.

11.  I will look for typos one last time before I have to correct them on two websites. 

12.  Satisfied, I will post the same thing at Modern Conservative.

13.  I will find a typo. 

14.  Fuck!

15.  I will correct the typos. 

16.  Finally, I tentatively shut down the computer while several things are still spinning in my head (did I catch all the grammatical mistakes?  Is it formatted correctly?  Are all the links the same color?)

17.  I will go to sleep somewhere between midnight and 3:00 a.m., only to wake up before 6:00 a.m. to start the entire process again. 

 If it isn’t evident, the effort I put into blogging isn’t worth the reward.  This isn’t a bitter “I’m not getting any traffic, so give me pity” post.  While I’m sure it would be slightly more difficult to cut my losses if I had more readers, the time I put into my little on-line diary isn’t worth the time it takes away from everything else.  Besides, I’m conservative, so I take victimhood too seriously to cynically use it as a tool for eliciting sympathy from others. 

I’m still going to occasionally contribute something online, and I’m still going to read blogs and keep a close eye on my favorite blogs, especially my air family.  Although from now on, I’m going to show a complete disregard for blogging etiquette.  Since I didn’t get it in the first place, this won’t take any effort.  Oh, and if I haven’t answered your e-mail yet, it’s because I haven’t looked at my website’s inbox since February.  Sooner or later I’ll find the sheet of paper with my e-mail password on it.  Probably later, when I feel like deleting 84,000 messages asking me if I want to approve spam.  

To be honest, I am upbeat.  I think my short blogging career (I am using this in the glibbest sense) has caused me to move on to something more my style.  Somewhere in between my junior year and my John Belushi (second senior) year of college, I realized that all I truly want is to get a master’s degree and some teaching credentials so I can become a professor at a small college.  The more I reflect on my experience blogging, the more I think that if I’m willing to get four hours of sleep a night for no tangible benefit, I can work just as hard for a college degree that will pay off in the long run.  So what not just apply again, and actually go to the school after I’m admitted?

The idea of teaching the little I know, combined with learning every day on the job, is something of a dream to me.  Sure, I’ll have to deal with self-righteous twenty-year olds, but that’s what the shotgun is for (just kidding).  I want to grow intellectually every day for the rest of my life; one of the best opportunities to do that would presumably be in an academic institution (at least one that isn’t beholden to political activism). 

As for my own ideals, I can make more of difference leaving a strong, enduring impression on a few people rather than a passing impression on many.  I want to do my small, individual part to change education, one the left’s pillars, from the inside (you have no idea how much the intellectually fraudulent “teaching for social justice” school of thought disgusts me).  I want to become the conservative professor on campus, although I think I can be much more than a mere political being.  But enough daydreaming; now it’s just a matter of doing it. 

Bonus!  Things I won’t miss about blogging. 

1.  700 spam e-mails every two weeks. 

2.  WordPress doing weird things to my post when I type my draft online. 

3.  Microsoft word doing even weirder things to my post when I type it offline. 

4.  Me doing the weirdest things to my post as I’m trying to fix whatever Microsoft or WordPress did to it in the first place! 

5.  Staying up until 1:00 a.m., thinking of something thoughtful to say about on breaking news I don’t care a whole lot about.  I’m interested in politics, but I’m not a political junkie.  I’m much more interested in the doctrinal disputes between schools of thought than house bill 8T.48B.  Besides, if you pay attention long enough, current events tend to be less compelling remakes of past events. 

6.  Posting something at 3:00 a.m., and finding a typo at noon.

See you this summer!  Or fall!  Or 2011! 

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Actually, I would have returned this afternoon, but my morning flight was cancelled due to the six inches of snow that blanketed Washington D.C. overnight. 

My first impressions of the nation’s capital:

1. It’s a commercial shrine to President Obama.  From Walgreens to the airport to street vendors, the capital is drowning in Obama merchandise.  One restaurant had a full-size cardboard cutout of the President standing behind its front window.  I wouldn’t be surprised if police printed tickets on Obama-themed paper. 

2. No one smiles.  It could be because they have to live in D.C., where people worship fallible men in lieu of God.  It could be because they’re all into politics; political junkies are generally insufferable.  The ones that don’t talk way too much have more defense mechanisms that the White House.  And it could be because most of them are liberal.  Liberals are threatened by too many things (ex: talk radio, deregulation, being associated with uncouth rednecks) to be anything but neurotic. 

3. It’s prettier than I thought it would be, and far less dangerous.  Perhaps because I spent all of my time in northwestern D.C., the city looked nice.  The streets are wide, the buildings are up kept, and the touristy stuff, such as the Supreme Court, truly inspires a sense of majesty.  I expected the city to be a real-life version of Grand Theft Auto, but the architecture and the uptight yet civil populace pleasantly surprised me. 

More on CPAC in a bit…

Tags: CPAC, Washington D.C.
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I’m off to D.C. tomorrow for CPAC.  I’m not bringing a laptop, so this means no more Afghan Whig for the rest of the week (I’m neither Afghani nor a whig, but that’s a different story).  Expect something from All American Mike to fill the gaps.  Let me know if he craps all over Rushbo or the religious right, so I can put the smack down on him when I get back. 

Take care,

-Afghan Whig

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So I leave this Wednesday for D.C.  I’ll be seeing CPAC for the first time.  Because of mitigating circumstances (girlfriend) I’ll miss most if not all the first day.  No Biggie.  My priorities at CPAC are thus:

1- See Mitt Romney speak. 

2-Check out the vendors.

3-Mingle.  Hope to pick some good brains. 

Yes.  I’d rather look at t-shirts than socialize.  I hope to pick up a couple of obscure books as well. 

My best friend, All American Mike, will be blogging in my place until Tuesday.  I don’t feel like packing my GF’s laptop, and I don’t want to be gouged by my motel to use their business center, so I likely won’t be pooping out any posts after tomorrow night. 

I’m going to start packing in earnest tomorrow.  Tonight, I’m focusing on more immediate concerns, such as eating the food in my kitchen which will spoil if I leave it here over the weekend.  The menu for the next two days is half a steak, one hamburger, half a chicken patty, some aging heart attack fries from KFC, a burger king patty/hockey puck, lettuce, and a cucumber, with chocolate milk and grapefruit juice to wash it down.  It’s not going to increase my carbon footprint because they’re all leftovers, but I don’t feel bad because I know I’ll make up for it eating out every night for five days.   Think globally, act with your stomach. 

Later,

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So it’s already been a month at The Sword and the Olive Branch.  What have I learned 1/12th of the way through my rookie season? 

1) Microsoft Word does funny things to html.  I didn’t want to believe it at first, because I like Word.  I know where all the options are; it looks nice, and I love the Calibri font.  That doesn’t stop Word, upon being transferred to my blog, from making some

       paragraphs look like this.Or closing the gaps in between some sentences.  Or inserting strange line breaks (I can’t even recreate this one at the moment).  Word doesn’t even convert well to open office.  So reluctantly, I’m saving my drafts online, which is a little discomforting.   I’m a creature of habit, and I feel more secure when my drafts are safely and securely stored exclusively on my PC. 

2) The way I’m blogging right now, I give myself no time for contemplation.  This is the most serious threat to “Afghan Whig,” as it’s affected my judgment and made my new hobby feel like a second job.  Without time to read books, absorb the news, and polish my writing, the quality of my work will deteriorate (in some ways it already has).  My first month of blogging followed the same economic logic as social security:  I was spending way more knowledge than I was taking in.

This is causing me real stress.  If it ever gets to the point where I’m blogging more than I’m learning, I’ll cut my losses and dedicate my website to music I like (p.s.  Does anyone within earshot know where I can find videos from Slayer’s “Diabolus in Musica”)?

As a result, The Sword and the Olive Branch is going to take a more personal tone.  Contrary to what I learned in school, my best writing comes when I’m not crafting my message towards a certain audience.  When I worry how my readers are going to react, I find myself pulling my punches and trying to be too clever.  It kills my personal voice, which is really all I have to offer.  Bloggers come a dime a dozen, but there’s only one of me.  That’s going to show in the upcoming months. 

Expect to see more short posts, more interesting links and images, and more unpolished immediate reactions.  When it comes to my editorials and essays, I’m going to start deffering to quality over quantity.  Also, I can go for weeks and not find anything in the news that interests me.  So I’m going to post on more topics which may not be timely (as in leading the headlines) but are relevant anyway.  For example, I have something on illegal immigration coming very soon (possibly tonight). 

In addition, I have no time to work on the nuts and bolts of html and the technical points of online publishing (I use this term in the loosest sense).   For the most part, I’m winging the actual blogging process; I’m still an internet newbie.  For example, I’ve examined every line of my style sheet, looking for the section that makes my links default to green.  I can’t find it.  I think the code was split in four pieces and scattered to the four corners of the internet.  It’s gotten to the point that someday I’m going to print out my style sheet, shred the fucking thing, and burn the shredded pile out of frustration.  Sooner or later I need to actually read the HTML books I bought in December. 

3) I’m not a social butterfly.   I already knew that, but blogging in a vast community of people I’ll never meet has reminded me just to what extent.  I almost skipped buying tickets to CPAC for the first time this year because the thought of being stuck in conference rooms full of opinionated strangers sounds slightly less fun than shaving with a cheese grater.  But Mitt Romney’s speaking, and my girlfriend has always wanted to see D.C., so I’ll be there (All American Mike will take over the site if terrorists take control of one of my cross-country flights). 

I despise networking; twittering’s a chore (although I did have fun live-tweeting the Oscars); I don’t generally like leaving random comments on anonymous blogs, and I hate promoting myself.  I’d rather my work speak for itself.  Since that’s not going to get me any traffic when I’m competing with thousands of like-minded peers, I’m going to save up to hire an agent to do all the cyberspace glad-handing.  For my free blog.  With no advertising.  Perhaps I need to think this one through. 

4) For a conservative, I’m terrible at adhering to convention.  I’m still learning blogging etiquette, and I think I’ve inadvertently alienated some people with my approach to blogging.  I’m still not sure what “Hat-tip” means, but it looks pretty ridiculous when I see “Hat tip: Hot Air via Conservative Grapevine via cracked.com.”  What if I find, via Yahoo!, a silly video everyone has linked to?  Will people believe I didn’t get it from the thousands of bloggers who got there first?   When I get time, I’m going to hunt for the internet version of the Chicago Manual of Style. 

5) Finally, I know The Sword and the Olive Branch needs some work, especially concerning continuity and appearance.  Expect a re-vamp later this year after I figure out exactly what I want in a custom-built wordpress theme. 

Later!

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I just found this while researching something for tomorrow’s late afternoon (probably midnight Saturday) post.  It’s old (from 2003), but a goodie:

The Onion: Women Now Empowered By Everything A Woman Does.

An excerpt:

“As recently as 15 years ago, a woman could only feel empowered by advancing in a male-dominated work world, asserting her own sexual wants and needs, or pushing for a stronger voice in politics. Today, a woman can empower herself through actions as seemingly inconsequential as driving her children to soccer practice or watching the Oxygen network.”

 

Cross-posted at

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 The biggest reason populist conservatives are so unpopular.

 (I’m determined to get through this one without using the “L” word).

George W. Bush and Sarah Palin are the most despised elected Republicans in recent memory.  Even though his Presidency is over, George Bush’s most extreme opponents are fantasizing about trying his administration for war crimes.  Sarah Palin is still kicked around in certain circles and falsely portrayed as the reason the disloyal, uncertain, and uninspiring presidential candidate John McCain lost the 2008 election.  

It’s plain to everyone that there exists a core group of Americans who sneer down at conservatives simply for the sin of being right of center, but Bush, Palin, and the populist conservatives just like them are hated with a vigor that would be more appropriately directed at someone who suffocates infants in the maternity ward.  Anyone strolling through the internet last fall would have found it difficult not to trip over mean-spirited hecklers purposefully spreading malicious rumors such as the lie that Sarah Palin didn’t know Africa was a continent.  There are many reasons for this, but the biggest one is that both of these Republicans are too normal.   Neither Bush nor Palin seem to make any effort to portray themselves as part of some insufferably articulate, tea-tootling ruling class. 

The historian Robert Greene shares a story in The 48 Laws of Power about the last King of France, Louis-Philippe.  He came to power during the 1830 July Revolution after Charles X was forced to go into exile to avoid being murdered by revolutionary zeal.  Louis-Philippe carried himself not like a king, but like the French middle class.  He constantly downplayed his status, treating guests in his palace as if they were in his position.  In addition, he wasn’t a friend of the nobility.  He didn’t speak their language or adopt their symbols.  He called himself the “King of the French” as opposed to the traditional title “King of France.” 

Eventually Louis-Philippe’s everyman act wore on the French, who started to look down on him.  It got to the point where the powerful banker James Rothschild publically berated the King for being late.  After riots broke out over electoral reform, the “King of the French” rewarded the rioter’s violent behavior by firing his prime minister and appointing a replacement with more revolutionary sensibilities.  Predictably, this emboldened the mob, and eventually they surrounded his palace.  In the tradition of French leaders confronted by political extremism, Louis-Philippe tucked in his tail and fled to England, leaving the country to fend for itself.  It turns out that even people clamoring for equality at all costs don’t want a ruler just like them. 

Flash forward to Bush and Palin now.  As a result of their plain-spoken manner, liberals like to pretend that George and Sarah are so dumb it embarrasses America.  This is simply poor man’s elitism.  Both Republicans were popular governors, far more successful on a state level than a national one.  After governing the lone star state, George Bush was elected twice as President of the United States, which took a lot of guile, especially considering that he was re-elected after starting an immensely unpopular war.  Even the stingiest parent would be proud of their child if he or she grew up to become president.  Surely being the son of another former President helped Bush achieve what he has, but no all rich children are smart enough to make the most out of their privilege.  Has anyone who doesn’t own a police scanner heard of Al Gore III? 

As for Palin, she led a complex proposal that ensured that when 35 trillion feet of cubic gas under Alaska’s North Slope comes to market, it would allow for competition and growth, have clear and objective measures of progress, and preserve Alaska’s sovereignty.  She then ensured that the proposal would get voted on.  And if that doesn’t convince you, even the Democratic feminist and former editor in chief of Ms. Magazine, Elaine Lafferty, concedes that Palin is “very smart,” and feminists don’t concede anything to the right.  Yet even though it can probably be demonstrated that Bush and Palin are more happy and successful than most of the population, their opponents are still able to portray them as barely one step up from Joy Behar. 

Of course Bush and Palin aren’t fantastically stupid, but they’re portrayed as such because they’re too much like the Americans we see every day.  More than even real tyranny, the mere appearance of commonality is something people don’t want in a leader.  People like to imagine they’re being led by the best and the brightest.  We don’t want to know that our presidents, governors, and judges are just like us, only more educated and driven.  We feel safer pretending that our elected officials aren’t capable of making the same dumb mistakes we make.  Politicians aren’t supposed to have ideological biases or speak like regular folk, because no likes to deferring to their equal. 

This is why being articulate is so important in politics.  The largest blow to Sarah Palin’s image hit home when the media exposed her lack of aristocracy, for the privileged class is trained to have a least talking points ready for all situations.  As for G.W., his speech flubs are proof that our politicians are human, which is why they’re called “Bushisms” and obsessed over by the mediocre masses.   How can the government be responsible for our well-being when our leaders are no better than we are? 

Bush and Palin’s penchant for regular, unpolished communication not only sounds dumb to some people, but it seems inauthentic.  Again, the presumption that politicians are better than everyone else is the culprit.  When political figures make obvious attempts the act like someone they’re not, let’s say they pop out of tanks even though it’s obvious they’re not military types, it gives the impression that they have no self-respect.  Instead of selling you their ideas in their language, they pretend to be in tune with people they share little to nothing in common with.   So when Sarah Palin speaks in plain English, as opposed to iambic pentameter, it seems as if she doesn’t respect her position.  George Bush’s casual approach to the speechmaking (he’s often glib and tends to speak in platitudes) made him look un-presidential.  They both ignore when I now humbly deem the first rule of democracy: no one wants to give power to someone they can’t pretend is better than he or she is. 

In addition to that, no one likes being talked down to.  If a politician starts adopting your southern accent when they never had one before, their appeal to regional ties is so obvious they may as well be using baby talk.  “HOW Y’ALL DOING?  I SURE HATE THEM RICH PEOPLE.”  Thus, Bush and Palin’s plain language risks offending people because it seems condescending.  Regular Americans don’t know politicians well enough to trust that their common lingo is sincere.  Ironically, this pretty much guarantees that a working-class person will never be elected by the working class.  No one believes Barack Obama is representative of his constituency, unless they’re only counting professors who make six figures.

The lessons conservatives can learn from misguided populism are many.  One, don’t act as if you’re a lower class than you really are, it’s condescending and smacks of insincerity.  People don’t mind if you’re true to yourself and your own culture, as long as you demonstrate a respect for their values.  Two, don’t be inarticulate, it convinces people you’re dumb even if all the remaining evidence suggests otherwise.  To have any chance of winning the Republican Presidential nomination in 2012, Sarah Palin will have work hard to convince Americans she’s not the dope her opponents gleefully portray her as.  The most important part of that will be learning how to act like part of the ruling class.  I’m no advocate for shallowness, but when it comes to persuading the masses, appearances may actually be everything—who a politician is isn’t nearly as important to his success as who the people think he is.  Three, if you ever become King of France, don’t preclude Elvis’s look. 

Cross-posted at Modern Conservative

Tags: Bush, communication, palin
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It’s almost 2:00 in the morning (California time) and all I can say about Obama’s stimulus is that it’s overly concerned with expensive social programs, spending money America doesn’t have on things Americans don’t need. I’m only the 4,875,697th person to say it, so I’m not going to belabor the point.

Expect a guest editorial later this week from All American Mike. Just like what he wrote in college, it’s really good and one week late.

I’m trying to find a fresh way to illustrate the fundamental flaws in the feminist viewpoint (which is relevant today: feminism has always reflected liberalism’s base instincts), because I’ve beaten the “they’re litigious/emotive/self-centered” thread to death. I think I’m on the cusp of something good, but it’s a little experimental. Perfect for a Friday cross-post.

I’m also building up a category tenativley titled “The Socialist Papers.” Expect the first mortar to launch next week.

To both my readers: Is CPAC worth the money?

Back to the economy: What kind of silly shit is going on in liberal’s heads that makes them argue that the proposed stimulus bill isn’t large enough? IT”S OVER 900 BILLION DOLLARS! (that’s what you get when I’m tired. I write in stream of consciousness and I curse).

As America is coming apart over an outrageously expensive bill, it’s good to keep in mind that all of this could have been avoided. Here’s the best, short explanation of the recession’s roots I’ve ever come across.

I’ve gotta be at work by 6:00 a.m., so see you tomorrow!

Tags: Tired
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Hi, my name is Afghan Whig; my friends call me Tony.  For some reason, I’ve been invited to cross-blog my posts right here at The Sword and the Olive Branch on Modern Conservative.  From what I can tell, I’m now playing a small, small part in perhaps the most ambitious conservative project I’ve come across.  Thanks for the opportunity.  

Like a certain type of offender who must go door to door when he moves into a new neighborhood, I have to disclose a few things up front. 

Firstly, I’m a bit of a polemicist.   I have my Ann Coulter moments (the latest being that last analogy) and I’m going to have more.  As long as it’s tactical and habitual, outrageousness is a useful tool.  This doesn’t mean I’m going to lose myself in a profanity-laced, Amanda Marcotte-like rant, but I’m going to be colorful. 

Secondly, I don’t think I’m center-right, the way Modern Conservative views itself; I think I’m at least two standard deviations to the right of G.W. Bush.  I don’t know what that means in this community, so let me say I’m not a Bircher; I like having good faith debates with moderates and even liberals, and I’m not drawn to silly fantasies about Barack Obama’s birth certificate.  I’m as conservative as anyone I know, but that doesn’t make me unapproachable or insane.  But don’t take me at my word.  Let me demonstrate it in my future posts. 

Thirdly, I’m new at this blogging thing.  I really just started last week, and I still can’t find the spot on my style sheet which makes my links on The Sword and the Olive Branch default to a way too subtle shade of green.   Oh, and my grammar’s terrible. In fact, I better hurry up and post as much as I can at ModCon Central before Chris notices that. 

Finally, it’s been brought to my attention that 2600-word posts on things such as the meaning of the word “liberalism” aren’t normal.  Apparently the blogging style is short and sweet.  I’m not going to stop posting essays (I love writing them; they’re a large reason I started blogging) but for the sake of my readers, I’ll keep them from running loose.

Other than that, I think I’ll make a good neighbor. 

Talk to you later,

-Afghan Whig

Cross-posted at ModernConservative.com

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Of course conservatives should be able to criticize one another. 

I got my first two complaints the other day.  Surprisingly they were both written by self-identified conservatives (I need to start leaving my URL on progressive blogs).  It turns out they were rubbed the wrong way by my list of annoying conservative subgroups, specifically the part about “intellectual elitists.”  Apparently not everyone sees the humor in lines such as: “It’s nice to see that Ann Coulter is getting airtime LISP! but better specimens SLURP! of conservative thought LISP! could be chosen.”  Politely but tersely, I was accused of arguing that any conservative who criticizes another right-winger is being disloyal.  I was also chided for ignoring the value of education.  I think it’s clear that I wasn’t doing either of those things, but since I was contacted in good faith, I should handle these comments in good faith.   

Getting right to the point, my entire post was a critique of a broad array of conservatives, so it wouldn’t make sense for me to lambaste right-wingers for being critical of their own.  I don’t mind that some conservatives share legitimate concerns about Ann Coulter.   I myself am no fan of her tendency to be glib rather than forthcoming in her interviews, and her occasional schoolyard taunts, such as “raghead” and “faggot,” are irritating.   But I don’t criticize her the way conservative elitists do, by (1) assuming intellectual superiority, and (2) using language crafted to appeal to Coulter’s liberal opponents (EX: calling her “hateful” when she’s merely being crude).  These two tendencies are what I have in mind when I mock intellectual elitists, not mere criticism.

While I don’t doubt the value of higher education (I try to bury my nose in a book every day) I strongly disapprove of conservatism’s elitist strain, which seems to be related to the status education bestows a person.  I’ve actually read a line much like the “better specimens of conservative thought” comment I typed above.  There was an air of condescending self-promotion to it that stuck with me.  Why did the writer need to qualify his statement by taking a cheap shot at his subject?  Telling a conservative they can be a better thinker is something a mentor should do in a classroom or in private, not something an arrogant peer should do in a public forum.  Treating your conservative peers as if they were younger siblings betrays a lack of respect and dignity which deserves to be lampooned at the very least. 

A recent example of this is an opinion piece by Mickey Edwards, a former Republican congressman.  Here he criticizes the Republican Party’s conflation of small government with limited government, all the while making the case the Ronald Reagan wouldn’t belong in today’s GOP.  So far, so good.  But then he calls today’s Republicans “Anti-intellectual,” and cites Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, George W. Bush, and Karl Rove of not representing a conservative party, but rather one bent on the “narrow pursuit of power.”  While a good argument can be made that Bush isn’t all that conservative and Rove may be more conniving than normal, Newt-Gingrich is a right-wing egghead.  He’s neither anti-intellectual nor disloyal to conservative principles.  Mr. Edwards has tips his hand with Gingrich’s inclusion; it shows that he’s not taking aim at anti-intellectualism, but unpopular conservatives.  This is what I mean by intellectual elitism.  His article is conservative, smart, but fundamentally disloyal.  He could have easily made his point without tossing these five figures under the bus, but he didn’t.  In fact, he followed that by parroting the jejune cliché that today’s conservatives have turned to the politics of exclusion and division.  I wonder if he was paying attention when Reagan joked about bombing the Soviet Union.   

I wholly embrace the idea that conservatives should criticize each other.  Without internal criticism, we’d be vulnerable to groupthink.  Even worse, if we don’t evaluate our own arguments, liberals will do it for us, and they’re far less likely to treat them fairly.  But we can do this without looking down on our peers or borrowing the left’s cheap rhetoric.  The fact this isn’t self-evident is troubling. 

Tags: ann coulter, loyalty, mickey edwards
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Doesn’t it seem odd that people vote on everything?  Whenever polite suburbanites come to an impasse, say they’re having trouble deciding where to drink this weekend, they take a vote.  We’ve taken the concept of direct democracy, which we don’t even use in our electoral process, and applied it to our private lives.  Americans vote on where our company outings are being held, which self-absorbed citizen celebrity should leave the reality show set, and where everyone in the sorority should travel for spring break.  

This bugs me because most decisions are just too personal or important to be left in the hands of strictly popular rule.  Direct democracy is only fair in a generic sense, and is often unjust.  I won’t be the first to point out that the repression of 40% of the population by 60% of the population is tyrannical, but not undemocratic.  It would be democratic but repressive if Americans somehow voted to regulate political speech through the fairness doctrine.  It would be fair in a sense, but also fairly senseless to hold a vote on which strategy our generals should use in the Middle East.  It would just be stupid for families with several children to vote on decisions parents should be making unilaterally, such as division of chores and matters of discipline. 

Direct democracy isn’t essential to liberty.  In fact, it potentially undermines our God-given rights as they’re outlined in the Constitution.  Especially in densely populated areas, where intellectual trends can sweep up large numbers of people at once, Americans don’t always understand or even respect the rationale behind freedom of speech, property rights, or checks and balances.  The choice to vote on every decision that may remotely affect your life isn’t nearly as liberating as the ability to elect a representative who can be trusted with your best interests.  Taking some power out of the hands of the fickle “people” is essential to that. 

The Electoral College is a perfect reflection of this.  On one hand, it respects the right of law-abiding citizens to have a say in which presidential candidate their state’s electoral votes go for.  But the United State’s winner take all electoral system undermines direct democracy by keeping a narrow handful of densely populated cities from imposing their unmitigated rule on the rest of the country.  Without the electoral system, prospective presidential candidates would have no incentive to campaign anywhere outside of America’s biggest cities, which in turn would effectively disenfranchise everyone who lives in rural areas. 

Obviously it’s important for American citizens to be able to vote for their political representatives.  Without the ability to vote bad politicians out of office, we would have no agency outside of violence or coercion.  But most decisions don’t affect the general public in such a way that everyone should be invited to chime in about it.  While a lot of valuable insight can be gleaned from digesting a variety of opinions, the best decisions usually aren’t made by committee, but by wise individuals relying on the insights of those around them (as well as from history).  If I’m ever in intensive care, I would rather place my well-being in one doctor’s hands, as opposed to the vote of all the doctors, nurses, janitors, secretaries, and whoever else wants to have a say. 

Remember the argument that Iraq wasn’t “ready for democracy?” (You never hear about that one anymore).  It’s underlying admission is that everyone’s collective opinion isn’t always the most intelligent one.  Case in point: Hugo Chavez has twice been elected President of Venezuela. 

The truth is some situations just aren’t made for democracy, no matter how civilized a population is.  Imagine that you and several friends were having trouble deciding where to eat dinner.  One solution you could try is voting on it.  The results: Your friend Jerry wants to eat at Burger Palace, but that’s not cosmopolitan enough for Markos, who votes for P.F. Chang’s. 
Amanda wants to eat at Buca Da Bepo, but Michelle’s allergic to garlic, and wants to eat at Mexican Hut anyway.  “Don’t they use garlic in their salsa?” you ask, prompting Michelle to say “shut up.”  You and Eva suggest Chili’s, which makes you happy since 33 percent is a plurality in this case.   But Amanda really doesn’t want to eat there, so you and your friends start over.

“We can go to Old People Buffet, they have food that everyone likes” Eva says.  “Yeah, but it sucks worse than Halliburton,” Markos retorts.  “Why don’t we just order pizza?”  Jerry says, inviting a chorus of opinions such as, “As long as there isn’t any pepperoni.”  “I only eat pepperoni.”  “You have the pallet of a five-year old.”  “I don’t like Papa John’s, their sauce is too sweet.”  “What are you talking about?  They’re the best in town!  What do you like, Pizza Slut?”  “All of sudden we’re eating pizza?  I want to get out of here.”  All of this is prolonged by bouts of uncomfortable silence where no one can think of anything to say.  After deliberating for fifteen agonizing minutes, everyone ends up compromising on a place no one is really happy about. 

This is what direct democracy is like.  Any thoughtful insight would be drowned out by the mass’s petty objections and irrelevant musings.   Out of fairness, everyone will be forced to jump through hoops to overcompensate for a small percentage’s special needs (garlic allergies), even though they’re all adults and can take care of themselves.  If they’re lucky, the lowest common dominator will prevail, and everyone involved will be minimally satisfied.  

Now imagine taking a more direct, less democratic approach to where to eat dinner.  Playing the role of the alpha dog, you suggest that everyone should go to Happy Tokyo Surprise.  Someone says “no.”  “O.K., how about Mickey’s?” You quickly suggest.   Everyone more or less agrees and you’re out the door in minutes.  Whether two or ten things are suggested, this method works as long as the decisions whether or not to go are made quickly, without earful deliberation. 

But wait a minute!  In the latter example, not everyone was given five minutes to state their case, along with a two-minute counter-rebuttal.  You don’t even ask Michelle about her allergies! 

It’s true that not everyone’s voice is heard in the latter system, but it’s not as if they can’t assert themselves.  Anyway, it’s okay.

It’s just f**king dinner. 

Tags: dinner, direct democracy
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About

This is my website, theswordandtheolivebranch.com.  It will be updated once every weekday with my opinions dedicated to current events, reviews of movies that have been out of theatre for years, and occasionally sports.  But more than anything, it’s dedicated to the renewal of conservative philosophy.  Yes, it’s another @##% conservative blog.  But I swear it’s different. 

All of my liberal friends (for better or worse, most of them are liberal) tell me I’m not like most conservatives they meet.  It’s not because I’m a fair-weather Republican who throws the religious right under the bus every time I’m at a party—I have more dignity than that.  It’s because I know exactly what I believe and why I believe it, even as I’m learning more every day.  I can explain why I’m pro-life or against illegal immigration to liberals without losing my temper or appealing to a moral order they simply don’t agree with, respect, or even understand. 

See, the argument that “conservative” equals “common sense” doesn’t cut it.  For conservatism to survive the coming millennial generation, right-wingers must understand exactly where their ideals came from and be able to explain to all open-minded Americans what conservatism actually is.  For starters, it’s not infantile clinging to vestiges of a golden past.  Anyone who knows anything about history knows 99% of it isn’t worth re-living, and .5 of the remaining 1% would still be a nightmare for spoiled westerners.  Caste systems and communes aren’t exactly ideal environments for human development.  But I’m getting ahead of myself. 

Because even Republicans aren’t exactly conservative right now, I’m going to blog with a constant eye on reinforcing conservative values.  This doesn’t mean I’m going to hector liberals about being “godless” or “unpatriotic.”  What it means is that I’m going to be myself and focus on explaining why I believe the American right is rare and valuable, especially in contrast to the countless utilitarian, statist, and populist movements that pollute history.  The last thing I want is to appeal to fear or prejudice.  In fact, one of my greatest motivations is to frustrate such appeals.  A good rule of thumb is to watch what people are being the most emotional and unyielding about, and err the other way.  Even the most righteous cause can be warped by extremism.    

I’ve titled my page The Sword and the Olive Branch because these are the most important tools any conservative needs to get along in America.  It’s hard to predict if someone you’ve just met is going to deal with you in good faith.  Some of the most hardcore liberals I know are surprisingly open to honest debate, while some of the most polite liberals I’ve met are insufferably closed-minded.    Since it’s tough to tell who’s who, the best way to approach everyone at first is to hold out an olive branch-risk their condemnation by being frank, but not belligerent.  Consequently, my posts will employ a lot of hemming and hawing and ostensibly redundant declarations such as “not all liberals are unpatriotic.”  Trust me, they’re not redundant to people who’ve spent their entire life being taught that conservatism is simply an apology for exploitation and bigotry. 

Yet due to the plain fact that not everyone will feel obligated to reciprocate that good faith, conservatives must also be ready to wield a sword when needed.  Explaining my lukewarm opposition to gay marriage to someone who’s only interested in portraying my words as “homophobic” would be casting pearls before swine.  Thusly I’m going to hack at some weeds every so often.  It sometimes pays to be provocative like Ann Coulter rather than stately like Brit Hume.  On the same token, this isn’t going to be a right-wing version of Pandagon— I also have more dignity than that.

I guess I should describe myself somewhere in here.  My name is Tony.  I was born on the ass end of generation X, grew up in Michigan (hence the blind devotion to Detroit sports—even the Lions), lived briefly in Florida, colleged in Iowa, and now I live in Southern California, where it often takes half a hour to drive eight blocks (as long as my car hasn’t been stolen).   

On the right-wing spectrum, I’m self-consciously fusionist.  I truly believe that conservatism is fundamentally the reconciliation of traditional morality and libertarianism, held together by an aversion to the far left.  My favorite news magazines are Reason and National Review.  Reading these alternately is like growing up with Ayn Rand and William F. Buckley as divorced parents.  I’m starting to worry my dual consciousness has taken me to ridiculous extremes:  I’m a Baptist who fervently supports Mitt Romney and cites South Park to explain political theory. 

If you’re charitable enough to peruse my blog, you’re going to be assailed with references to great conservative thinkers such as Russell Kirk and Ludwig Von Mises.  If you’re already familiar with how these men differ, this may not be the blog for you, because I’ll be covering old ground and frankly I’m still digesting the Austrian trade cycle theory.  But then again if someone forced a fifth of Jim Beam down my throat while another stood across the room and shot me with tranquilizers, I could still write a 30-page extemporaneous essay on the short history of American conservatism.  I work very hard to understand something before I write about it, so The Sword and the Olive Branch is going to be more thoughtful and interesting than a dilettante’s inchoate rants. 

Most importantly, I’ll be having fun.  I’m going to try and be least a little responsible and remain academically detached, but if you like top five lists about the most annoying things environmentalists do, or would like to witness a conversation I overheard between Mitt “Beaver” Romney and Al Gore-bot, then stick around.   I’m going to have several days of play.  Besides, I know that you haven’t read anything like I’m going to write down here.  At the very least, I’m a novelty. 

Take care,

-Afghan Whig

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The Sword and the Olive Branch will be launching on January 20th, 2009, President Obama’s inauguration.  It will be a self-indulgent forum for my opinions on politics, sometimes sports, and movies that were released five years ago.  So far it sounds fantastic, right?  I’ll be the first person to ever whine about politics on the internet! 

Seriously, I hope to God this isn’t another run of the mill political blog.  There’s only a few hundred thousand of those.  Maybe I should do something else with this space like sell my deceased relative’s things.  I wonder if it’s too late to start www.mydeadgrandmaskitchenware.com?  Or maybe I should do a porn blog; those seem to get a lot of traffic.  Should I dedicate this website to Virgin Steele?  They’re one of the best metal bands on earth, and no one seems to have heard of them (for those who are interested, start with their hardest album, Invictus). 

Nah, those are too much work.  I’d much rather pretend my opinion on current events is interesting enough to create and sustain an audience.  Besides, commerce is hard; have you seen the economy lately? 

Hey commentators, try to guess whether this will be a conservative blog, a liberal blog, or “other.”  Of course that’s assuming this thing actually gets off the ground.

Examples: 

(1) I think it’s going to be a conservative blog, because he listens to metal.  Liberals are pu**ies (what, I can’t say pu**ies?) who listen things like Sara Bareilles and the rest of the Grey’s Anatomy soundtrack. 

(2) I think it’s going to be liberal because this guy’s funny, and conservatives don’t have a sense of humor.  On top of that, they’re too dumb to know who Sara Bareilles is. 

(3) I don’t care, so I’m going to guess “other.” 

Until Januray 20th, take care, 

-Afghan Whig

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