sisu

A poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior

A great gentleman has gone to meet his maker. An empty place in our hearts. RIP #GreyphusTheMagnificent #GreyphusTheTerrible. #Gravitas #BestPurrboxEver. #Earnest. #DesktopCompanionAnimalParExcellence pic.twitter.com/AzPrIvt856

— Sissy Willis (@SissyWillis) February 1, 2019

"A revival of tribalism in thinking and politics"

"Many people bitterly resent it when members of the other group hold power," notes former liberal mugged by reality Roger L. Simon:

Members of the knowledge class tend to think that Republican leaders are simple-minded, uncultured morons. Members of the business class tend to think that Democratic leaders are decadent elitists. In other words, along with the policy and cultural differences that divide the groups, there are disagreements on these crucial questions: Which talents should we admire most? Which path to wisdom is right? Which sort of person deserves the highest status?

That's the kind of stuff that really gets people riled up . . . with their overwhelming cultural and financial power, these elite groups do frame the choices the rest of the country must face. If not for the civil war within the educated class, this country would be far less polarized.

We are reminded of Australian Scholar Keith Windschuttle's argument in The Killing of History, where he "tackles head-on the pernicious but widely held ideas that objective truth is an illusion and that history is nothing more than a fancy kind of literature," as Roger Kimball wrote in his Wall Street Journal review in August of 1996, plucked from our snail file this very day:

The focus of his attack is the cult of so-called "theory" -- that poisonous combination of radical skepticism, left-wing politics and deliberate obscurantism that has overtaken the study of the humanities everywhere.

Indeed, he shows that this form of intellectual incontinence now affects many disciplines outside the humanities.

We noticed the phenomenon with horror in the air-headed discourse of some of the faculty members at the Harvard Design School (known in our day as the GSD) during our otherwise luminescent studies there in the late nineties.

Most academic writing these days is deliberately obscure and jargon-laden.  A follower of Jacques Derrida, the father of deconstruction, put it quite baldly when he dismissed another critic's work because of his "unproblematic prose and the clarity of his presentation, which are the conceptual tools of conservatism."

An anti-Western bias is a common if not quite universal feature of the attack on objective, empirically verifiable truth that Mr. Windschuttle documents.  This breeds the consummate irony that by jettisoning one European perspective -- theory-mad academic radicals merely wind up with another entrenched European perspective: cultural relativism.

It is around such issues that the arcane theories of Derrida, Foucault and other academic radicals collide with the real world.  For the cultural relativism that stands behind the attack on history is part and parcel of what Mr. Windschuttle calls "a revival of tribalism in thinking and politics" . . . and it is in this sense that the postmodern academics who busy themselves denying the possibility of objectivity and truth are complicit in political as well as intellectual barbarism.

Written five years before 9/11, how these words resonate in our day.

Note: This post was published late July of 2007. We accessed it years later on September 11 of 2018 to make a grammatical correction but were unable to republish with original date. Frustrated.

Present at the re-creation

Twitter buddy Pete602 caught old-style pols Rep. Adam Schiff and Sen. Diane Feinstein in the social-media headlights of a newly empowered electorate this morning:

If Schiff and Feinstein want to see "Russian bots" they can look out the window.
We are their "bots" and we have torches and pitchforks.#tcot #pjnet #p2 pic.twitter.com/sixFOhgNBh

— pete602 (@petefrt) January 24, 2018

Like Peter Finch's Howard Beale, we are "mad as hell," but unlike Beale's passive television audience who "do whatever the tube tells you," we deplorables can see behind the curtain and don't have to let fake-news pols get away with their tendentious false narratives any more. Case in point, the power of the twitter hashtag to spread the word. Jim Hoft at GatewayPundit explains:

BOOM! Twitter DESTROYS Adam Schiff and Sen. Feinstein: Internal Analysis Finds NO RUSSIAN BOTS Behind #ReleaseTheMemo.

Last week, the House Intelligence Committee quietly voted to make available to fellow House members “a memo documenting abuse of the FISA program,” reports Fox News’s Chad Pergram.

As TGP’s Cristina Laila reported previously — News of the FISA memo spread like wildfire on social media. Trump supporters pushed a #ReleaseTheMemo campaign after GOP Reps came forward demanding the document be released to the American public.

We were part of that Reynoldsian grassroots Army of Davids that tweeted early and often in the last few days using the #ReleaseTheMemo hashtag and inundated Schiff’s office with phone calls confirming we are not Russian bots.

Desperate Democrats like Adam Schiff (above) trotted out their shopworn Russia, Russia, Russia narrative to try to hold back the cascade of truth spilling out over the damn of official lies.

Then came the Democrats' lame attempt to stem the tide:

On Tuesday, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) urged Twitter and Facebook to conduct a thorough forensic examination into the #ReleaseTheMemo campaign as ‘potentially an ongoing attack by Kremlin-linked social media actors’ also referred to as “Russian bots.”  

But we weren't buying, and neither was Twitter itself: 

Even The Leftist Daily Beasty Boys Concede: "Twitter’s internal analysis has thus far found that authentic American accounts, and not Russian imposters or automated bots, are driving #ReleaseTheMemo" https://t.co/d1HDWsAQD4

— Andrew Bostom (@andrewbostom) January 24, 2018

Thanks to the power of social media, You CAN fight City Hall.

Update: Too delicious not to note:

Russian bots might be behind controversial #ReleaseTheMemo campaign, Democrats say https://t.co/soqCdt1gyN pic.twitter.com/oSR7jSnKX4

— Newsweek (@Newsweek) January 24, 2018

One person's assimilation is another's appropriation

"Indigenous leaders from across the world requested that the UN outlaw cultural appropriation." Elizabeth Warren aka Fauxcahontas was unavailable for comment.

"Mosaicist vs assimilationist: On the multiculti side, there were smug, self-congratulatory sermons scolding melting-pot types like ourselves for xenophobic/racist views we do not hold," we blogged back in February of 2014, quoting a holier-than-thou Daily Beast opinionator:

At this point, we shouldn’t be shocked by the intolerance of some towards immigrants and other cultures. 

As our Shakesperaean actress sis always says, nothing changes but the date. In the wake of the latest iterations of the national "debate," we've narrowed the question down to fewer than 140 characters:

One person's #Assimilation is another's #Appropriation. Discuss

— Sissy Willis (@SissyWillis) June 17, 2017

That appropriation bit is but the latest iteration of the Gramscian March through the institutions, and Sara Hoyt has been on the case forever. This from her November 2015 "Prepare to be Assimilated":

Humans are tribal, and living in a multi-ethnic society doesn’t make you less tribal. This is why people keep looking for racists under their bed, because you know, it’s baked in.

And from just the other day:

The problem is the left has bought into Marxism and its pseudo-scientific lies. And the system despite many past failures to predict anything, purports to predict our emergence into a paradisaical “perfect communist state”. Everything, from leftist “science” to leftist “art” (that is to say the establishment versions of those, since our establishment is solid left) is designed to hasten the coming of that ah, eschatological result. According to Marxist/leftist/progressive exegesis, of course.

Because their minds were not trained in flexibility and they’re something of a cult, they are having a nervous breakdown.

In cults, this usually ends up in koolaid. In nations, too, when a paradigm (yes, sorry, but it’s the right word) breaks in a way perceived as sudden.

As we blogged back in February of 2005 in our post "Bloggers are 'cracking, popping, drilling and peeling their victims open":

The leftist utopian dream was doomed from the start because it denied the economic logic of nature and human nature. The long-repressed voices of opposition in a free society, now ringing loud and clear through talk radio, cable TV and -- of course -- the blogosphere, will force the left to rethink its arguments or go extinct.

"A young ballsy girl in pigtails showed why the cowards of ISIS will never win"

Dear @ArianaGrande,
I'm sorry.
Love Piers. https://t.co/BNRQgXhmj6 pic.twitter.com/A3Hkr88mXx

— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 5, 2017

"Last night you showed true grit and also why the cowards of ISIS will never win," writes British TV provocateur Piers Morgan in an open letter to U.S. pop star Ariana Grande, who laughed in the face of the Jihadi losers who had terrorized fans outside her original Manchester concert two weeks ago:

Last night I felt a surging sense of pride watching the bigger, better show than the one two weeks ago…

Then I chuckled to myself at the thought of how utterly enraged those pitiful ISIS douchebags must feel to see that their efforts to destroy our way of life, and force us to cower away in hiding, have been so roundly thwarted by a young ballsy girl in pigtails.

"My grandmother used to speak of the ‘Blitz Spirit’ whenever we spoke about her experiences during World War II when she was a young teenage girl," Morgan recalled:

The official dictionary definition is ‘stoicism and determination in a difficult or dangerous situation, especially as displayed by a group of people.’

You displayed that exact same spirit last night.

The inspirational 21st-Century "Blitz Spirit" of Ariana Grande and her mostly young, mostly female fans at the #OneLoveManchester benefit concert last night in the face of a mysogynous, totalitarian death cult called to mind Glenn Reynolds' provocative proposition that Elvis Presley was "The King of Anti-Fascism."

.@instapundit: "After Elvis, commercial culture of rock & roll simply occupied mindspace that totalitarians need" https://t.co/ZnqcOseXXD

— Sissy Willis (@SissyWillis) June 5, 2017

"Hitler used the tools provided by the new technology," Reynolds – AKA Instapundit – wrote back in August of 2002":

But Elvis owned them: radio, television, movies, it didn't matter: he conquered them all. And the changes that he brought about helped to topple totalitarian regimes, and make new ones less likely, for he left behind a changed culture that short-circuited the mechanisms that Hitler had used to secure power - and the mechanisms that other regimes used to maintain it.

Since Elvis, the bonding-and-catharsis element of mass media has expanded to outdo anything that any politician can deliver. We describe an especially popular politician today as looking "like a rock star," rather than the other way around, after all.

After Elvis, the commercial culture of rock and roll simply occupied the mindspace that totalitarians need, and it out-competed them.

The same holds wherever people try to tyrannize the minds of men and women. It's no wonder that the Taliban opposed dancing and Western music, and no wonder that the increasingly desperate mullahs of Iran are flogging people for dancing at birthday parties. They can't compete with the King and his descendants. And they know it.

. @ArianaGrande delivered a message of hope to thousands of fans during her #OneLoveManchester concert. https://t.co/wA1FNPzvY8 pic.twitter.com/pOLPDELMBK

— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 5, 2017

Ariana Grande. A Vera Lynn for our time?

Pigs — and fracking — are a girl's best friend

"European ingenuity! Can't get access 2 a gun b/c of strict laws, buy yourself an attack pig.

"Trump in Saudi tells me something: We lost the argument. But who rewired Trump?" tweets anti-cultural-jihad warrior Diana West this afternoon. We're with her fundamental argument re President Trump's apparent dhimmitudinous cave to the usual "Islam is a religion of peace" meme. BUT, as we tweeted her, acknowledging her case but with a larger view:

Don't know who "rewired Trump," agree re #dhimmitude, BUT. #Fracking means oil won't be enuf for KSA —> Cultural changes w new generation.

Unforeseen westernizing results in KSA economy & culture will counter #CulturalJihad in western nations

The link goes to Peter Bergen's must-read "The real reason Saudis rolled out the reddest of red carpets":

When oil wealth seemed an endless spigot of gold, the absolute Saudi monarchy created, somewhat paradoxically, a quasi-socialist state: an astonishing 90% of Saudis work for the government and have long enjoyed subsidies for water, electricity and gas. Health care and education are free.

 

But in late 2015 the IMF warned that, given falling oil prices, the Saudi government could run out of financial reserves in five years if it kept up its present rate of spending.

 

With oil prices holding steady at around $50 a barrel, the Saudi government is now cutting government salaries and reducing subsidies. Trump's visit -- and deals -- therefore create a critical opportunity in the private sector for Saudis who can no longer exclusively depend on the government.

 

The Saudi government calls it "Vision 2030." The aim is to privatize the education, health care, agriculture, mining and defense sectors and to sell off Saudi Aramco, perhaps the wealthiest company in the world.

Adam Smith is smiling.

Update:

“Just a circle of people talking to themselves who have no f***ing idea what’s going on”*

"In some profound way, the election made clear, the national media just doesn’t get the nation it purportedly covers," writes a somewhat bemused Jack Shafer at Politico in "The Media Bubble Is Worse Than You Think."

The “media bubble” trope might feel overused. But it's real. And it's more extreme than you might realize https://t.co/ucAus0IM4Z pic.twitter.com/9qqxpe3z2E

— POLITICO (@politico) April 25, 2017

Shafer should have asked us. We've been on the media navel-gazing case for decades. He attributes his "surprising" discovery to "the data on where journalists work and how fast it's changing":

The results read like a revelation. The national media really does work in a bubble, something that wasn’t true as recently as 2008. Concentrated heavily along the coasts, the bubble is both geographic and political.

"Wasn't true as recently as 2008"? You're off by decades, sir. Ed Morrissey at Hot Air explains:

This might shock everyone who lives inside that bubble, but not anyone on the outside. Conservatives have long accused the media of living in a bubble, and Jack Shafer writes today at Politico that they were right — even if the bubble might not be exactly what they thought. In fact, there may be more than one bubble, one ideological and the other geographic, and the impact of both together may make it worse than people — even conservatives — imagine. However, Shafer’s analysis has its own limitations, and misses a key point…

He’s correct in that limited sense, but he’s got the root cause wrong, or at best incomplete. The trend toward cultural narrowness and ideological blinkering started long before the Internet shook up the news business, and in some ways the Internet’s impact was a reaction to bias in newsrooms. At least they agree on one core outcome: America’s media exists in a series of self-reinforcing bubbles, and it’s getting worse.

As we tweeted Ed:

@EdMorrissey Terrific analysis, Ed. Blogged about it myself for years & "snail blogged" before that: Soylent green https://t.co/0jssGvrZIt pic.twitter.com/qyPLtu8nEK

— Sissy Willis (@SissyWillis) April 25, 2017

 We were delighted with his reply: "Excellent. Just added it as an update":

Sissy Willis has further thoughts on the timeline … or rather had further thoughts. In 2004. And used a 1990 critique from Insight magazine to make the point.

*NOTE: Author of the quote in our title is the fiery presidential strategist and former executive chair of Breitbart News, Steve Bannon, quoted by Shafer in his Politico piece:

“The media bubble is the ultimate symbol of what’s wrong with this country. It’s just a circle of people talking to themselves who have no f***ing idea what’s going on.”

Haven't we been saying that forever? Self-awareness is not their strong suit. As we quoted William Staneski in our 2010 post "Marc Ambinder and the epistemic echoes of his mind":

This is the way cultural Marxism is taking over our world in its inexorable Gramscian march.

"One thing people don’t quite get is that she is a living, breathing folk hero for millions of people around the country”

"Horrified critics of the president are often surprised to find that, in person, it’s very difficult to dislike Conway," writes Olivia Nuzzi in "Kellyanne Conway Is a Star: Not your star, perhaps. But that’s the point," New York Magazine's cover feature on the lady of the hour. A fair and informative headline and subhead, unlike Molly Ball's (see below). (Martin Shoeller photograph)

"Will the truth ever catch up with Trump's most skilled spin artist?" asks the snarky subheader of Molly Ball's "Kellyanne's Alternative Universe" in the April 2017 issue of The Atlantic. We got wind of the well crafted albeit tendentious profile of the Counselor to the President of the United States from Redstate's Jay Caruso, who seemed quite smitten:

Great piece by @mollyesque on @KellyannePolls in The Atlantic https://t.co/g5P4k7JGy5

— Jay Caruso (@JayCaruso) March 18, 2017

Reading between the lines, our own take was not so enthusiastic:

How 'bout this, @mollyesque @TheAtlantic: "Will the truth ever catch up w @HillaryClinton?" Or how 'bout same re @BarackObama? Just askin'…

— Sissy Willis (@SissyWillis) March 18, 2017

Can you say #FakeNews?

Hallmark Movies foretold Trump Nation

We know this in our soul.

That thing they call "everyday Americans" LOVE the HallmarkChannel movies. Especially women. Beautiful parents who love their kids and their country. Heroine always ends up winning her man. Corny & romantic. What's not to like?

Never thought of ourselves that way as we won the Exeter Day School spelling bee back in 1955 (?). Never thought of it when we got through the gates at Harvard Design School in the 90's. Thought we were pretty darned smart, fergossake. But all the while we knew there was something wicked wrong with the liberal/progressive mindset. Utopian vs. Tragic View of human nature. Coupla twitter hashtags sum things up: #gramscianmarch #virtuesignaling

Has Typepad jumped the shark?

From our March 3, 2009 post "Tiny performs Meowzart": Tiny inhabits the role of Queen of the Night singing "Der Hölle Rache" in Meowzart's The Magic Twig (German Die Zaubersweig). Listen here.

Just checking to see if Typepad is as clueless as the latest note from a "helper" suggests:

"Additionally, it looks like your account is suspended. You will need to update your billing information before you can make an edit to your posts or other content"

HUH? Has Typepad been hacked? Also, did you know that the word "Typepad" is routinely spell-checked to "Typed" within your own program?