vdare--2020-09-30--DERB's SEPTEMBER DIARY: A Nation Gone Crazy ? (No, pre-Revolutionary Russia); Into Manhatttan; Jeet?

DERB's SEPTEMBER DIARY: A Nation Gone Crazy ? (No, pre-Revolutionary Russia); Into Manhatttan; Jeet? [10 ITEMS]

Alternate pop-culture worlds .
The Derbs ' weekly Netflix rentals this month included two not-bad movies — better than our recent average .
Once Upon a Time In Hollywood , reviewed by our Steve Sailer at TakiMag was the better of the two .
I did n't enjoy it as much as Steve did ; but then , I do n't know anything like as much as Steve does about 1960s California , Hollywood , and movies .
I agree with the numerous reviewers who complained about the movie being too long , and I naturally frowned at the disrespect @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kept my attention , though .
I stayed awake all through , which is by no means — by no means — always the case with me and movies .
The acting is at a high professional standard , and the plot line was clever .
That plot line left me reflecting that two of the three 2019 movies I have seen had alternate-history plots ; and the history being altered in both cases was pop-culture history .
The other of the two was Yesterday , which I reported on in my April @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
Alternate-history stories are of course nothing new .
As I noted in April , I 've been reading them for almost as long as I 've been reading .
For the most part , though , their worlds are ones in which some large historical event turned out differently .
The allies losing WW2 has been the most thoroughly worked-over alternate world : The Sound of his Horn by `` Sarban , '' Philip K. Dick 's The Man in the High Castle , Robert Harris ' Fatherland , … How many @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been more adventurous .
Robert Silverberg wrote a rather good novel in which the Ottoman Empire took over all of Europe in the 14th century — Shakespeare 's plays were written in Turkish — and held it until the 1900s .
Kingsley Amis gave us Russian Hide & Seek , in which the USSR has occupied the British Isles .
( Inspiring me to a similar but much shorter effort . )
A favorite of mine , although only at short-story length , was Poul Anderson 's `` Eutopia , '' which flips @ @ @ @ @ @ @ like as many as David Gerrold 's novel The Man Who Folded Himself .
And then of course there is Harry Turtledove … Yeah , I know , I 've read way too much sci-fi .
Placing the historical switch in the realm of pop culture — of pop music in the case of Yesterday , Hollywood in Once Upon a Time — is new to me , although I may just be out of date here .
I 've been striving to think of similar plot lines .
• The young Fred @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to train him as a dancer .
His physical genius instead found an outlet in martial arts , of which he became a world-famous popularizer .
At the climax of the movie an elderly but still-agile Fred ( b .
1899 ) takes on Bruce Lee ( b .
1940 ) … OK , maybe I 'm just getting back at Tarantino for the Bruce Lee caricature .
• Mario Puzo ca n't get any movie producers interested in making The Godfather as written , so he starts over , pitching it now @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 'm not really getting anywhere with this , am I ?
If any readers have suggestions , I 'll put them in my next email round-up .
If any suggestion ends up as a movie , though , I want a cut of the movie rights .
Mister Jones .
I mentioned having seen two not-bad movies this month .
Number Two was Mr. Jones , based on Welsh journalist Gareth Jones ' 1933 foray into Stalin 's USSR .
Jones ' mother , around 1900 , had lived in Ukraine as tutor @ @ @ @ @ @ @ John Hughes , who had founded the iron-working city of Donetsk — actually named Hughesovka until the Revolution .
That connection inspired Jones , against all the rules , to go take a look at how Ukraine was faring in 1933 .
It was , of course , in the throes of a dreadful famine .
It 's a story worth telling , and the movie 's not badly done .
Main negatives : if you do n't know the outlines of the story in advance , it 's not clear who 's @ @ @ @ @ @ @ so I had to keep pausing the thing to explain ) ; the scenes of Jones trekking through deserted snow-bound villages could have been cut by half ; and the producers were a bit heavy-handed with atmosphere , which , like so many things in life , is best attained if not striven too hard for .
There were some good character sketches , though .
Peter Sarsgaard was a fine repulsive Walter Duranty , the New York Times reporter who shilled for Stalin and got a Pulitzer Prize for it ( never @ @ @ @ @ @ @ see a screen portrayal of George Orwell , too , although the mustache does n't look quite right .
We also get a glimpse of Malcolm Muggeridge , the only movie portrayal of the old gadfly that I know of .
It 's the merest glimpse , the bittiest of bit parts : no speaking lines , just a background figure in a crowded-party scene , the left one of the two people face-on here .
( The other I think is Ralph Barnes . )
Is Muggeridge still read ?
He was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wealth of experience , an impressive list of personal acquaintances , and a great fund of memorable anecdotes ( although I suspect he made a lot of them up ) .
Whatever : I thank actor Michael O'Donnell for giving us a Muggeridge .
I hope his career takes an upturn .
Mr. Jones is his only screen credit on IMDb.com , and they do n't even have a publicity still of him .
I have no personal access to movie producers , but if Michael is ever at a loose end on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be glad to buy him a drink .
Into Manhattan .
This month saw my first trip into Manhattan since the coronavirus scare came up .
From news reports of people fleeing the city I was vaguely expecting to see tumbleweed blowing down Broadway and prairie dogs prowling the sidewalks .
In fact , on a walk along Second Avenue from 53rd Street to 75th , things looked surprisingly normal .
Stores were open , restaurant sidewalk tables were well-occupied , there were pedestrians and cyclists a-plenty .
A lot of the people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to 20 percent—and seemed unselfconscious about it .
I witnessed no incidents of mask rage .
The main difference from normal times was underground .
There were actually empty seats in rush-hour subway carriages .
On the other side of that coin , vehicular traffic was even worse than usual , which I would not have thought possible .
The Manhattan quip `` Shall we walk , or do we have time to take a cab ? ''
is several years old to my certain knowledge , but it has never been more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a reassuring normality : one more for the file folder headed `` London in flames ! ''
Tyrants with a writing problem .
I once somehow got the idea that it would be cool to be able to boast of having read a book by Stalin .
I accordingly bought a copy of the Short Course .
That was of course a blunder : Stalin is unreadable .
Then a few weeks ago I spotted a reference to Daniel Kalder 's 2019 book Dictator Literature , which surveys the written ( or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Lenin to President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov of Turkmenistan .
The thought occurred : If I ca n't read Stalin 's book , I can at least read about it .
So I bought Dictator Literature .
Incredibly , Kalder has read them all : the literary productions of every crank despot and mass murderer of the past hundred years .
( Although I 'd guess he resorted to some skim-reading with the thirteen volumes—seven thousand pages !
—of Albanian dictator Enver Hoxha 's memoirs . )
Even more incredibly , he has kept his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is not all turgid theorizing and bombastic self-justification .
Mao Tse-tung famously wrote poetry .
So did the young Stalin : We are offered an example .
Kalder gives sensible , often witty judgments on it all .
He thinks , for example , that Ho Chi Minh was a better poet than Mao : Kalder may not know that in the context of classical-style Chinese verse , which is what Ho was writing , that last line is a weary cliché , as if an English-language poet were to mention the sweet @ @ @ @ @ @ @ knew that and was being ingenious somehow .
The line between cliché and allusion is not always clear , certainly not in translated verse .
And as mediocre as Mao 's and Ho 's poetry may have been — and again with all due allowance for qualities lost in translation — Stalin 's was probably worse : Some of these tyrants of the past century wrote novels as well as poems .
Kalder actually contrasts Mussolini 's 1910 effort in this genre , The Cardinal 's Mistress , with Stalin 's Short Course @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for money , when Mussolini was a penniless journalist .
If you want novels written by tyrants when actually tyrannizing , there are Generalissomo Francisco Franco 's 1942 Raza ( `` The plot is simple and not wholly incompetent '' — Kalder ) and the four novels Saddam Hussein published in the early 2000s ( `` The books were so personal , so important to Hussein that he worked on them right up to the end of his rule . ''
) And yes , President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov of Turkmenistan has entered the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ novel , The Bird of Happiness , at an event in the city of Dashoguz in October 2013 . ''
I ca n't find any evidence of an English translation , but perhaps some poor hack in the Turkmen capital is at work on one .
Writing , said the Roman , is neither an art nor a science but an illness .
( The Irish playwright Brendan Behan described himself as `` a drinker with a writing problem . ''
) Dictators are not immune .
I salute Daniel Kalder for his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a mountain of drivel , and for having presented his thoughts about it with insight and wit .
I hereby nominate him for the Presidential Medal of Freedom .
Fiction reading of the month .
As well as being a producer of literature , Stalin was also a consumer of it .
One author he liked a lot , and to whom he showed quite un-Stalinish favor , was Mikhail Sholokhov ( 1905-1984 ) .
And yes , that link is to Sholokhov 's page on the Nobel Prize website .
He was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Sholokhov is mainly known for his epic novel And Quiet Flows the Don , which was published piecemeal from 1928 to 1940 .
It 's about the Cossacks , a south-Russian ethny of much-disputed origins , but speaking Russian and adhering to the Orthodox Church .
They lived mainly on the steppe lands north of the Black Sea .
Sholokhov was not himself a Cossack , but he grew up among Cossacks and immersed in their culture .
The novel covers the years 1912-18 in four parts : `` Peace , '' @ @ @ @ @ @ @ '' and `` Civil War . ''
Sholokhov the man gets mixed reviews , mostly but never entirely negative .
I knew about And Quiet Flows the Don from way back .
In my misbegotten youth I hung out with lefties sympathetic to the USSR .
When Sholokhov got his Nobel in '65 they were all swooning over the book .
I bought a copy and started to read it , but bailed out after a couple of chapters .
Fast forward to Summer 2020 .
Mrs Derbyshire listens to Chinese-language audio novels @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
I have been unable to fathom her criteria for selecting which novels to listen to , but she casts her net wide .
Last month she was enthusing to me about her current selection , which had the Chinese title 靜靜的頓河 ( Jìng-jìng-de Dùn Hé ) — `` The Quiet Dùn River . ''
At first I vaguely supposed that this was something out of Chinese literature — they 've been writing novels for several centuries — but when she described a couple of episodes from the book I guessed it must @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and to make up for my youthful sloth , I borrowed a copy of And Quiet Flows the Don from our town library and read it right through with no effort .
Not bad : though not worth a Nobel , and Sholokhov did n't write much else of note .
Yet more evidence , as if more were needed , that the non-science Nobels are , and have always been , to some degree political .
The book 's main defect is the great multiplicity of characters , made harder to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ naming system .
Forename , patronymic , surname : Sholokhov sometimes uses one , sometimes two , and sometimes all three to identify a person , not always consistently for the same person .
My library copy ( Pub .
Alfred A. Knopf , 1941 , tr .
Stephen Garry ) includes a three-page `` Key to Principal Characters , '' but it 's not much help .
Whatever : In the book of my life , that 's one thing fewer I 've left unfinished .
A nation gone crazy .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ almost entirely in the Ukrainian and South-Russian hinterland , far from metropolitan centers .
None of his characters could really be described as belonging to the urban intelligentsia .
I shall therefore forgive him for not having provided coverage of the sheer craziness of politics in pre-revolutionary Russia , some of which bears a disturbing resemblance to our own current Cultural Revolution .
Professor Gary Saul Morson has a first-class article about that side of things in the October issue of First Things .
Prof. Morson 's piece should be compulsory reading for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the U.S.A. My only quibble with Prof. Morson—a very small one , perhaps stirred by having just mentioned Malcolm Muggeridge in an earlier segment — is that he should have put in at least a passing mention of Muggeridge 's 1966 essay `` The Great Liberal Death-Wish . ''
Put that piece together with Prof. Morson 's , you have a nice set .
Daniel Kalder in Dictator Literature gives us some glimpses of the general lunacy of Russia in that time .
It was n't restricted to the political intelligentsia .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ had never heard of the Skopts .
Here 's Kalder , writing about Lenin .
Basil 's birthday .
Basil , the Hound of the Derbyshires , was one year old on September 23rd .
We celebrated the event in proper style : cake , candle , presents , song , silly hats , party balloon .
Mrs Derbyshire wanted me to tie the party balloon to Basil 's collar when I took him for his daily walk .
Me : `` Honey , I 'm just as willing as the next guy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ front of the neighbors ; but there 's a line to be drawn , and that 's on the other side of it . ''
Caumsett .
Yet another escape from lockdown : The Sunday after Labor Day I went for a bike ride in Caumsett State Park , for the first time in months .
More normality ; in fact the park was as crowded as I 've ever seen it .
Mask compliance was even more casual than in Manhattan : I think more than a quarter of the park-goers were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two and a half miles .
My habit , which I want to resume , has been to ride four times round , alternating clockwise and counter-clockwise .
That 's a neat ten miles .
It also makes for easy calculation of average speed .
If I do a circuit in 10 minutes , I 've averaged 15 mph , the park speed limit ; if in 15 minutes , I 've averaged 10 mph .
Easy to remember .
My times on this outing were not very good .
Not one of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Some of that was just me being out of condition , but most of it was the number of people walking and cycling .
I had to keep slowing down for them — especially the little ones on kiddie bikes , who have not yet mastered lane discipline .
Still it was lovely to be in the park , among so many fellow citizens none of whom was shrieking political slogans or trying to make money .
My state is shamefully ill-governed , but even among madness and commotion there are bright clearings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , New York .
Jeet ?
I see that a scholar at Stony Brook University has published a book about the spoken dialect of New York city , title You Talkin ' to Me ?
The September 19th issue of The Economist ran a column about it , column title `` Cawfee Break . ''
I 'd buy a copy of the book and read it but that ( a ) my pile of bought-but-not-yet-read books is way too high and ( b ) I already have a good stock of knowledge on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by living several years in and near the city and working alongside all its classes , from dishwashers to investment bankers .
Arriving in New York first from England at age 28 , it took a while for my ears to get adjusted .
`` Earl , '' I realised eventually , is not a title of nobility , there being none such in this republic , but a generic term for lubricants .
Fat Alice is not an overweight local female celebrity but a sum of money , instantiated in a paper @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ? ''
is a polite enquiry as to whether you have recently taken in nourishment , to which the proper negative response is : `` No , jew ? ''
And so on .
It was n't just the phonetics I had to get used to but the attitude .
Almost the first words spoken to me in the city were , `` HEY , JACKASS ! ''
after I just-perceptibly brushed against someone as we both simultaneously traversed a wide doorway in opposite directions .
If I had written that Stony Brook @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been my choice of title : Hey , Jackass !
Now , after a half-century of social churning and levelling , there is n't so much raw New Yorkish spoken ; and living as I do many miles outside the city boundaries , I do n't hear much of what there is .
When I do hear it , I savor it .
In late September I went to a nearby electronics store to buy a new router .
I 'm a landline/Ethernet guy myself , but the two smartphone addicts I share @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they kept losing their wi-fi connections .
My router was years old and obviously failing in its powers , so I went to the store and asked to see some late-model domestic routers with potent wi-fi .
The floor sales rep I engaged with was knowledgeable and helpful .
His speech , however , was one of the outer-borough sub-dialects of New Yorkish — Trumpish , more or less .
He pulled down a top-of-the-line model , extolled all its many virtues and capabilities , then concluded his sales pitch by leaning towards @ @ @ @ @ @ @ item in its box , and declaring triumphantly : `` I tell ya , dis ting eats an ' shits ! ''
Dis ting cost more than I 'd budgeted for , but he 'd pressed a key button in my psyche .
How could I resist ?
I bought it .
It works fine , so far without leaving any unpleasant messes behind .
Math Corner .
The Derb Award for best math journalism of the month goes to Laura Ball , writing at the Nautilus webzine .
Her topic is mathematical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the Calabi-Yau manifold has a walk-on part in my algebra book , page 317 .
Oh , it 's a brainteaser you 're wanting , is it ?
Here 's one from the 2019 Putnam Competition .
( The 2020 Putnam , originally scheduled for February this year , was canceled on account of the damn fool virus . )
It 's harder than it looks , but you can solve it with just basic arithmetic .

Alternate pop-culture worlds. The Derbs' weekly Netflix rentals this month included two not-bad movies—better than our recent average.
Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, reviewed by our Steve Sailer at TakiMag was the better of the two.
I didn't enjoy it as much as Steve did; but then, I don't know anything like as much as Steve does about 1960s California, Hollywood, and movies. I agree with the numerous reviewers who complained about the movie being too long, and I naturally frowned at the disrespect shown to Bruce Lee.
The movie kept my attention, though. I stayed awake all through, which is by no means—by no means—always the case with me and movies. The acting is at a high professional standard, and the plot line was clever.
That plot line left me reflecting that two of the three 2019 movies I have seen had alternate-history plots; and the history being altered in both cases was pop-culture history. The other of the two was Yesterday, which I reported on in my April Diary. Is there a trend forming?
Alternate-history stories are of course nothing new. As I noted in April, I've been reading them for almost as long as I've been reading. For the most part, though, their worlds are ones in which some large historical event turned out differently. The allies losing WW2 has been the most thoroughly worked-over alternate world: The Sound of his Horn by "Sarban," Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, Robert Harris' Fatherland, … How many have there been?
Other writers have been more adventurous. Robert Silverberg wrote a rather good novel in which the Ottoman Empire took over all of Europe in the 14th century—Shakespeare's plays were written in Turkish—and held it until the 1900s. Kingsley Amis gave us Russian Hide & Seek, in which the USSR has occupied the British Isles. (Inspiring me to a similar but much shorter effort.)
A favorite of mine, although only at short-story length, was Poul Anderson's "Eutopia," which flips through several alternate worlds, although nothing like as many as David Gerrold's novel The Man Who Folded Himself. And then of course there is Harry Turtledove … Yeah, I know, I've read way too much sci-fi.
Placing the historical switch in the realm of pop culture—of pop music in the case of Yesterday, Hollywood in Once Upon a Time—is new to me, although I may just be out of date here. I've been striving to think of similar plot lines.
The young Fred Astaire successfully resisted his mother's efforts to train him as a dancer. His physical genius instead found an outlet in martial arts, of which he became a world-famous popularizer. At the climax of the movie an elderly but still-agile Fred (b. 1899) takes on Bruce Lee (b. 1940) … OK, maybe I'm just getting back at Tarantino for the Bruce Lee caricature.
Mario Puzo can't get any movie producers interested in making The Godfather as written, so he starts over, pitching it now as a musical …
No, I'm not really getting anywhere with this, am I? If any readers have suggestions, I'll put them in my next email round-up. If any suggestion ends up as a movie, though, I want a cut of the movie rights.
[Permalink]
Mister Jones. I mentioned having seen two not-bad movies this month. Number Two was Mr. Jones, based on Welsh journalist Gareth Jones' 1933 foray into Stalin's USSR.
Jones' mother, around 1900, had lived in Ukraine as tutor to the grandchildren of Welsh industrial entrepreneur John Hughes, who had founded the iron-working city of Donetsk—actually named Hughesovka until the Revolution. That connection inspired Jones, against all the rules, to go take a look at how Ukraine was faring in 1933. It was, of course, in the throes of a dreadful famine.
It's a story worth telling, and the movie's not badly done. Main negatives: if you don't know the outlines of the story in advance, it's not clear who's who (Mrs Derb didn't, so I had to keep pausing the thing to explain); the scenes of Jones trekking through deserted snow-bound villages could have been cut by half; and the producers were a bit heavy-handed with atmosphere, which, like so many things in life, is best attained if not striven too hard for.
There were some good character sketches, though. Peter Sarsgaard was a fine repulsive Walter Duranty, the New York Times reporter who shilled for Stalin and got a Pulitzer Prize for it (never revoked). It was nice to see a screen portrayal of George Orwell, too, although the mustache doesn't look quite right.
We also get a glimpse of Malcolm Muggeridge, the only movie portrayal of the old gadfly that I know of. It's the merest glimpse, the bittiest of bit parts: no speaking lines, just a background figure in a crowded-party scene, the left one of the two people face-on here. (The other I think is Ralph Barnes.)
Is Muggeridge still read? He was clever and funny. He had a wealth of experience, an impressive list of personal acquaintances, and a great fund of memorable anecdotes (although I suspect he made a lot of them up).
Whatever: I thank actor Michael O'Donnell for giving us a Muggeridge. I hope his career takes an upturn. Mr. Jones is his only screen credit on IMDb.com, and they don't even have a publicity still of him. I have no personal access to movie producers, but if Michael is ever at a loose end on Long Island North Shore, I'd be glad to buy him a drink.
[Permalink]
Into Manhattan. This month saw my first trip into Manhattan since the coronavirus scare came up.
From news reports of people fleeing the city I was vaguely expecting to see tumbleweed blowing down Broadway and prairie dogs prowling the sidewalks. In fact, on a walk along Second Avenue from 53rd Street to 75th, things looked surprisingly normal. Stores were open, restaurant sidewalk tables were well-occupied, there were pedestrians and cyclists a-plenty.
A lot of the people I saw were mask-less—I'd estimate 15 to 20 percent—and seemed unselfconscious about it. I witnessed no incidents of mask rage.
The main difference from normal times was underground. There were actually empty seats in rush-hour subway carriages.
On the other side of that coin, vehicular traffic was even worse than usual, which I would not have thought possible. The Manhattan quip "Shall we walk, or do we have time to take a cab?" is several years old to my certain knowledge, but it has never been more apt.
All in all, though, a reassuring normality: one more for the file folder headed "London in flames!"
[Permalink]
Tyrants with a writing problem. I once somehow got the idea that it would be cool to be able to boast of having read a book by Stalin. I accordingly bought a copy of the Short Course. That was of course a blunder: Stalin is unreadable.
Then a few weeks ago I spotted a reference to Daniel Kalder's 2019 book Dictator Literature, which surveys the written (or ghost-written) works of numerous despots from Lenin to President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov of Turkmenistan. The thought occurred: If I can't read Stalin's book, I can at least read about it. So I bought Dictator Literature.
Incredibly, Kalder has read them all: the literary productions of every crank despot and mass murderer of the past hundred years. (Although I'd guess he resorted to some skim-reading with the thirteen volumes—seven thousand pages!—of Albanian dictator Enver Hoxha's memoirs.) Even more incredibly, he has kept his sanity.
The literary output of dictators is not all turgid theorizing and bombastic self-justification. Mao Tse-tung famously wrote poetry. So did the young Stalin: We are offered an example. Kalder gives sensible, often witty judgments on it all. He thinks, for example, that Ho Chi Minh was a better poet than Mao:
Mao never wrote anything as simple and affecting as Ho's "Goodbye to a Tooth":
You are hard and proud, my friend,
Not soft and long like the tongue:
Together we have shared all kinds of bitterness and sweetness,
But now you must go west while I go east.
Kalder may not know that in the context of classical-style Chinese verse, which is what Ho was writing, that last line is a weary cliché, as if an English-language poet were to mention the sweet sorrow of parting. Perhaps Ho himself knew that and was being ingenious somehow. The line between cliché and allusion is not always clear, certainly not in translated verse.
And as mediocre as Mao's and Ho's poetry may have been—and again with all due allowance for qualities lost in translation—Stalin's was probably worse:
High in the clouds a lark
Was singing a chirruping hymn
While the joyful nightingale
With a gentle voice was saying —
"Be full of blossom, oh lovely land …"
Some of these tyrants of the past century wrote novels as well as poems. Kalder actually contrasts Mussolini's 1910 effort in this genre, The Cardinal's Mistress, with Stalin's Short Course:
[The novel] shows that Mussolini, although a Marxist [yes, really: Marxist, fascist, po-tay-to, po-tah-to — JD] , could allow for the significance of the inner, subjective world in human action. Now, admittedly, these inner worlds are attached to two-dimensional fictional characters, but at least they have desires and hatreds — in stark contrast to the proper nouns who serve as the protagonists of Stalin's Short Course. Mussolini's fictional people, motivated almost entirely by superstition, greed, lust, and hatred, have more substance that Stalin's "real" people.
The Cardinal's Mistress was written for money, when Mussolini was a penniless journalist. If you want novels written by tyrants when actually tyrannizing, there are Generalissomo Francisco Franco's 1942 Raza ("The plot is simple and not wholly incompetent"—Kalder) and the four novels Saddam Hussein published in the early 2000s ("The books were so personal, so important to Hussein that he worked on them right up to the end of his rule.")
And yes, President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov of Turkmenistan has entered the fiction lists, "launching his debut novel, The Bird of Happiness, at an event in the city of Dashoguz in October 2013." I can't find any evidence of an English translation, but perhaps some poor hack in the Turkmen capital is at work on one.
Writing, said the Roman, is neither an art nor a science but an illness. (The Irish playwright Brendan Behan described himself as "a drinker with a writing problem.") Dictators are not immune.
I salute Daniel Kalder for his superhuman perseverance in having read through such a mountain of drivel, and for having presented his thoughts about it with insight and wit. I hereby nominate him for the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
[Permalink]
Fiction reading of the month. As well as being a producer of literature, Stalin was also a consumer of it. One author he liked a lot, and to whom he showed quite un-Stalinish favor, was Mikhail Sholokhov (1905-1984). And yes, that link is to Sholokhov's page on the Nobel Prize website. He was awarded the Nobel for literature in 1965.
Sholokhov is mainly known for his epic novel And Quiet Flows the Don, which was published piecemeal from 1928 to 1940. It's about the Cossacks, a south-Russian ethny of much-disputed origins, but speaking Russian and adhering to the Orthodox Church. They lived mainly on the steppe lands north of the Black Sea.
Sholokhov was not himself a Cossack, but he grew up among Cossacks and immersed in their culture. The novel covers the years 1912-18 in four parts: "Peace," "War," "Revolution," and "Civil War."
Sholokhov the man gets mixed reviews, mostly but never entirely negative.
He was a regime mouthpiece, but he had been other things too … In publicly advocating for the release of men wrongfully imprisoned during the Great Terror, Sholokhov exhibited extraordinary bravery when others — almost everyone, in fact — was overwhelmed by fear; ultimately, however, he would lose his conscience in the stupor of vodka and vanity. [Peter Finn in the Washington Post, January 31st 2019, reviewing Brian Boeck's biography of Sholokhov.]
I knew about And Quiet Flows the Don from way back. In my misbegotten youth I hung out with lefties sympathetic to the USSR. When Sholokhov got his Nobel in '65 they were all swooning over the book. I bought a copy and started to read it, but bailed out after a couple of chapters.
Fast forward to Summer 2020. Mrs Derbyshire listens to Chinese-language audio novels when working round the house and garden. I have been unable to fathom her criteria for selecting which novels to listen to, but she casts her net wide.
Last month she was enthusing to me about her current selection, which had the Chinese title 靜靜的頓河 (Jìng-jìng-de Dùn Hé)—"The Quiet Dùn River." At first I vaguely supposed that this was something out of Chinese literature—they've been writing novels for several centuries—but when she described a couple of episodes from the book I guessed it must be Sholokhov's.
For conjugal solidarity, and to make up for my youthful sloth, I borrowed a copy of And Quiet Flows the Don from our town library and read it right through with no effort. Not bad: though not worth a Nobel, and Sholokhov didn't write much else of note. Yet more evidence, as if more were needed, that the non-science Nobels are, and have always been, to some degree political.
The book's main defect is the great multiplicity of characters, made harder to keep track of because of the Russian naming system. Forename, patronymic, surname: Sholokhov sometimes uses one, sometimes two, and sometimes all three to identify a person, not always consistently for the same person. My library copy (Pub. Alfred A. Knopf, 1941, tr. Stephen Garry) includes a three-page "Key to Principal Characters," but it's not much help.
Whatever: in the book of my life, that's one thing fewer I've left unfinished.
[Permalink]
A nation gone crazy. The action of Sholokhov's novel takes place almost entirely in the Ukrainian and South-Russian hinterland, far from metropolitan centers. None of his characters could really be described as belonging to the urban intelligentsia.
I shall therefore forgive him for not having provided coverage of the sheer craziness of politics in pre-revolutionary Russia, some of which bears a disturbing resemblance to our own current Cultural Revolution.
Professor Gary Saul Morson has a first-class article about that side of things in the October issue of First Things. Prof. Morson's piece should be compulsory reading for anyone troubled by today's intellectual climate in the U.S.A.
Not just lawyers, teachers, doctors, and engineers, but even industrialists and bank directors raised money for the terrorists [i.e. of pre-revolutionary Russia]. Doing so signaled advanced opinion and good manners. [Suicide of the Liberals by Gary Saul Morson; First Things, October 2020.]
Uh-huh.
My only quibble with Prof. Morson—a very small one, perhaps stirred by having just mentioned Malcolm Muggeridge in an earlier segment—is that he should have put in at least a passing mention of Muggeridge's 1966 essay "The Great Liberal Death-Wish." Put that piece together with Prof. Morson's, you have a nice set.
Daniel Kalder in Dictator Literature gives us some glimpses of the general lunacy of Russia in that time. It wasn't restricted to the political intelligentsia. For example: Until reading Kalder I had never heard of the Skopts. Here's Kalder, writing about Lenin.
To put things in perspective, consider that in 1907 [Lenin's] Social-Democratic Party had a membership of around 150,000. The Skopts, a millenarian sect who believed that salvation would come once they had managed to castrate 144,000 people, had around 100,000 members during the same period. Even at its peak, then, Marxism was not that much more popular than crushing men's testicles between hot plates, a method of castration favored by the sect.
Ouch!
[Permalink]
Basil's birthday. Basil, the Hound of the Derbyshires, was one year old on September 23rd. We celebrated the event in proper style: cake, candle, presents, song, silly hats, party balloon.
Mrs. Derbyshire wanted me to tie the party balloon to Basil's collar when I took him for his daily walk. Me: "Honey, I'm just as willing as the next guy to make an idiot of myself in front of the neighbors; but there's a line to be drawn, and that's on the other side of it."
[Permalink]
Caumsett. Yet another escape from lockdown: The Sunday after Labor Day I went for a bike ride in Caumsett State Park, for the first time in months.
More normality; in fact the park was as crowded as I've ever seen it. Mask compliance was even more casual than in Manhattan: I think more than a quarter of the park-goers were maskless.
Once round the park is two and a half miles.
My habit, which I want to resume, has been to ride four times round, alternating clockwise and counter-clockwise. That's a neat ten miles. It also makes for easy calculation of average speed. If I do a circuit in 10 minutes, I've averaged 15 mph, the park speed limit; if in 15 minutes, I've averaged 10 mph. Easy to remember.
My times on this outing were not very good. Not one of my four circuits broke 15 minutes. Some of that was just me being out of condition, but most of it was the number of people walking and cycling. I had to keep slowing down for them—especially the little ones on kiddie bikes, who have not yet mastered lane discipline.
Still it was lovely to be in the park, among so many fellow citizens none of whom was shrieking political slogans or trying to make money. My state is shamefully ill-governed, but even among madness and commotion there are bright clearings of sanity and peace. Thank you, New York.
[Permalink]
Jeet? I see that a scholar at Stony Brook University has published a book about the spoken dialect of New York city, title You Talkin' to Me? The September 19th issue of The Economist ran a column about it, column title "Cawfee Break."
I'd buy a copy of the book and read it but that (a) my pile of bought-but-not-yet-read books is way too high and (b) I already have a good stock of knowledge on the subject. I acquired that stock by living several years in and near the city and working alongside all its classes, from dishwashers to investment bankers.
Arriving in New York first from England at age 28, it took a while for my ears to get adjusted. "Earl," I realised eventually, is not a title of nobility, there being none such in this republic, but a generic term for lubricants. Fat Alice is not an overweight local female celebrity but a sum of money, instantiated in a paper bill called a fin. "Jeet?" is a polite enquiry as to whether you have recently taken in nourishment, to which the proper negative response is: "No, jew?" And so on.
It wasn't just the phonetics I had to get used to but the attitude. Almost the first words spoken to me in the city were, "HEY, JACKASS!" after I just-perceptibly brushed against someone as we both simultaneously traversed a wide doorway in opposite directions. If I had written that Stony Brook scholar's book, that would have been my choice of title: Hey, Jackass!
Now, after a half-century of social churning and levelling, there isn't so much raw New Yorkish spoken; and living as I do many miles outside the city boundaries, I don't hear much of what there is. When I do hear it, I savor it.
In late September I went to a nearby electronics store to buy a new router. I'm a landline/Ethernet guy myself, but the two smartphone addicts I share my house with had been whining that they kept losing their wi-fi connections. My router was years old and obviously failing in its powers, so I went to the store and asked to see some late-model domestic routers with potent wi-fi.
The floor sales rep I engaged with was knowledgeable and helpful. His speech, however, was one of the outer-borough sub-dialects of New Yorkish—Trumpish, more or less. He pulled down a top-of-the-line model, extolled all its many virtues and capabilities, then concluded his sales pitch by leaning towards me, jabbing a finger at the item in its box, and declaring triumphantly: "I tell ya, dis ting eats an' shits!"
Dis ting cost more than I'd budgeted for, but he'd pressed a key button in my psyche. How could I resist? I bought it. It works fine, so far without leaving any unpleasant messes behind.
[Permalink]
Math Corner. The Derb Award for best math journalism of the month goes to Laura Ball, writing at the Nautilus webzine. Her topic is mathematical onomastics.
Any student of modern math must know what it feels like to drown in a well of telescoping terminology.
For a high-profile example, let's take the Calabi-Yau manifold, made famous by string theory.
A Calabi-Yau manifold is a compact, complex Kähler manifold with a trivial first Chern class. Before you could even guess what that definition might mean, you would need to find another source to define a Kähler manifold:
A Kähler manifold is a Hermitian manifold for which the Hermitian form is closed. After which you would need a third source to define a Hermitian manifold:
A Hermitian manifold is the complex analogue of the Riemannian manifold … And you're down the rabbit hole. [Why Mathematicians Should Stop Naming Things After Each Other by Laura Ball; Nautilus, September 2nd 2020.
I cannot forbear noting that the Calabi-Yau manifold has a walk-on part in my algebra book, page 317.
Oh, it's a brainteaser you're wanting, is it? Here's one from the 2019 Putnam Competition. (The 2020 Putnam, originally scheduled for February this year, was canceled on account of the damn fool virus.)
Problem: Determine all possible values of the expression
A³ + B³ + C³ − 3ABC where A, B, and C are non-negative integers.
It's harder than it looks, but you can solve it with just basic arithmetic.
[Permalink]


vdare--2020-10-01--Patrick J. Buchanan: It's Late For Trump, But There's Still Time

In their first debate , the president of the United States , challenged by the former vice president , performed poorly—even by his own estimation .
If memory serves , an instant poll showed that the American people , by 47-43 , thought Walter Mondale had bested Ronald Reagan in the Louisville debate where the president made such gaffes as citing the high cost of the military 's `` food and wardrobe . ''
By week 's end , reflecting the press commentary , 80 % of the country was of the view that Mondale had crushed Reagan .
Democrats @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Slugger . ''
Among Republicans , there was real alarm .
Had The Gipper `` lost it '' ?
The president blamed his staff for stuffing him like a pelican with facts that he spent much of the debate trying to regurgitate .
This set the scene for the second debate in Kansas City where Henry Trewhitt of the Baltimore Sun put to Reagan the question raised by the first debate : Came then the kicker .
`` I might add , Mr. Trewhitt ... that it was Seneca , or was it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was not for the elders correcting the mistakes of the young , there would be no state . '
'' `` Fritz '' Mondale joined in the laughter .
The cloud that had hung over Reagan 's campaign since Louisville lifted .
And we all knew it , even a media that wanted to see Reaganism repudiated .
Rereading Reagan 's reply of 36 years ago , one can see that it was not spontaneous , but a product of preparation .
And the old actor knew how to deliver the lines .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Reagan , weeks later , would sweep 49 states , losing only Mondale 's Minnesota .
Which brings us to that less courtly affair of Tuesday last .
It was a debacle , and , more crucially for Trump , a major lost opportunity .
His objective going in was to leave 90 minutes later with several goals achieved .
First , show , by contrast with the Joe Biden on stage beside him , that he was the stronger , superior leader to handle the pandemic and economic crises of 2020 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ since the Memorial Day death of George Floyd .
Second , to let the country see itself that Biden was too weak—and too captive to the Bernie-AOC-BLM-antifa radicals—to deal with the crisis created by the criminal elements that have ravaged the cities of Portland , Seattle and Minneapolis .
Trump 's need was to show that while he may have lost the Mr. Nice Guy competition of 2020 , in the situation we are in now , the nation needs a strong leader—not a good buddy .
What happened on that stage in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the name-calling and the yelling became the story of the debate , the `` worst in presidential history , '' a `` dumpster fire '' in which Trump , Biden and moderator Chris Wallace were all complicit , with Trump fingered as the instigator .
Millions of Americans likely walked away saying , `` What a mess ! ''
More difficult to imagine is that undecided or Trump-leaning voters would have come away saying , `` That 's the leader we 've been looking for . ''
Trump has two debates left @ @ @ @ @ @ @ achieve in Cleveland .
He and his campaign need to tie Biden to the repellent elements of the Democratic Party and their radical agenda on remaking an America that the extreme left visibly detests , or to force Biden to repudiate those elements .
Trump 's rallies continue to reflect the energy , enthusiasm and affection of his followers .
But in four years , the rallies have not changed the math .
For Trump to rise into competitive range , Biden must fall , and Trump must appear the necessary and only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not that fond of him .
Trump 's assignment in the next two debates : Link Biden to the people—and their agenda—in his coalition whom the national majority detests .
Make Joe repudiate both .
And let Biden 's performance expose his own inadequacies .
The presidency hinges upon whether Trump can succeed in this .
And the next two presidential debates will likely give us the answer .
Patrick J. Buchanan needs no introduction to VDARE.COM readers ; his books State of Emergency : The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Will America Survive to 2025 ?
are available from Amazon.com .
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of “ The Greatest Comeback : How Richard Nixon Rose From Defeat to Create the New Majority .
His latest book , published May , 2018 , is “ Nixon ’ s White House Wars : The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.
” See Peter Brimelow ’ s review : “ Wheel And Fight ” —Pat Buchanan ’ s Nixon Book Provides Road Map For Trump .

In their first debate, the president of the United States, challenged by the former vice president, performed poorly—even by his own estimation.
If memory serves, an instant poll showed that the American people, by 47-43, thought Walter Mondale had bested Ronald Reagan in the Louisville debate where the president made such gaffes as citing the high cost of the military's "food and wardrobe."
By week's end, reflecting the press commentary, 80% of the country was of the view that Mondale had crushed Reagan.
Democrats were cheering Mondale as "The Louisville Slugger."
Among Republicans, there was real alarm. Had The Gipper "lost it"?
The president blamed his staff for stuffing him like a pelican with facts that he spent much of the debate trying to regurgitate. This set the scene for the second debate in Kansas City where Henry Trewhitt of the Baltimore Sun put to Reagan the question raised by the first debate:
"Mr. President, I want to raise an issue that I think has been lurking out there for two or three weeks and cast it specifically in national security terms. You already are the oldest president in history. And some of your staff say you were tired after your most recent encounter with Mr. Mondale. I recall yet that President Kennedy had to go for days on end with very little sleep during the Cuban missile crisis. Is there any doubt in your mind that you would be able to function in such circumstances?"
Reagan stepped into the pitch:
"Not at all, Mr. Trewhitt, and I want you to know that also I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth, and inexperience."
Came then the kicker. "I might add, Mr. Trewhitt ... that it was Seneca, or was it Cicero ... that said, 'If it was not for the elders correcting the mistakes of the young, there would be no state.'"
"Fritz" Mondale joined in the laughter. The cloud that had hung over Reagan's campaign since Louisville lifted. And we all knew it, even a media that wanted to see Reaganism repudiated.
Rereading Reagan's reply of 36 years ago, one can see that it was not spontaneous, but a product of preparation. And the old actor knew how to deliver the lines. The age issue instantly vanished, and Reagan, weeks later, would sweep 49 states, losing only Mondale's Minnesota.
Which brings us to that less courtly affair of Tuesday last.
It was a debacle, and, more crucially for Trump, a major lost opportunity. His objective going in was to leave 90 minutes later with several goals achieved.
First, show, by contrast with the Joe Biden on stage beside him, that he was the stronger, superior leader to handle the pandemic and economic crises of 2020, and the racial crisis that has erupted since the Memorial Day death of George Floyd.
Second, to let the country see itself that Biden was too weak—and too captive to the Bernie-AOC-BLM-antifa radicals—to deal with the crisis created by the criminal elements that have ravaged the cities of Portland, Seattle and Minneapolis.
Trump's need was to show that while he may have lost the Mr. Nice Guy competition of 2020, in the situation we are in now, the nation needs a strong leader—not a good buddy.
What happened on that stage in Cleveland?
The insults, the interruptions, the name-calling and the yelling became the story of the debate, the "worst in presidential history," a "dumpster fire" in which Trump, Biden and moderator Chris Wallace were all complicit, with Trump fingered as the instigator.
Millions of Americans likely walked away saying, "What a mess!" More difficult to imagine is that undecided or Trump-leaning voters would have come away saying, "That's the leader we've been looking for."
Trump has two debates left to achieve the goals he failed to achieve in Cleveland.
He and his campaign need to tie Biden to the repellent elements of the Democratic Party and their radical agenda on remaking an America that the extreme left visibly detests, or to force Biden to repudiate those elements.
Trump's rallies continue to reflect the energy, enthusiasm and affection of his followers. But in four years, the rallies have not changed the math.
For Trump to rise into competitive range, Biden must fall, and Trump must appear the necessary and only alternative, even to folks who are not that fond of him.
Trump's assignment in the next two debates: Link Biden to the people—and their agenda—in his coalition whom the national majority detests. Make Joe repudiate both. And let Biden's performance expose his own inadequacies.
The presidency hinges upon whether Trump can succeed in this. And the next two presidential debates will likely give us the answer.
COPYRIGHT 2020 CREATORS.COM
Patrick J. Buchanan needs no introduction to VDARE.COM readers; his books State of Emergency: The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America, and Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025? are available from Amazon.com. Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of “The Greatest Comeback: How Richard Nixon Rose From Defeat to Create the New Majority.
His latest book, published May, 2018, is “Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.”
See Peter Brimelow’s review: “Wheel And Fight”—Pat Buchanan’s Nixon Book Provides Road Map For Trump.


vdare--2020-10-01--Trump Announces Major Cuts To Refugee Admission While Facebook CENSORS His Campaign Ads On Immigrati

Trump Announces Major Cuts To Refugee Admission While Facebook CENSORS His Campaign Ads On Immigration

Previously : Trump Keeps Refugee Promise—Why Are Lankford Nine Whining ?
The Trump administration announced Wednesday it would reduce America ’ s refugee intake to the lowest number in history .
Just a few minutes before the congressional deadline to announce the refugee caps for the fiscal year 2021 , the administration declared it would accept no more than 15,000 refugees .
That is a 16.5 % decrease over last fiscal year ’ s previous cap record of 18,000 refugees .
The U.S. accepted 10,800 refugees before freezing admissions in response to the coronavirus outbreak [ Trump plans to slash @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , by Julie Watson and Matthew Lee , Associated Press , September 30 , 2020 ] .
Trump ’ s caps are significantly lower than Barack Obama ’ s high of 85,000 refugee admissions and planned 115,000 admissions for 2017 .
This news is once again a sign that Trump is delivering on some of his immigration promises and is a real victory for the historic American nation .
But Big Tech doesn ’ t want the American people to hear this good news , nor know about the dangers of Joe Biden @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Facebook announced it took down Trump campaign ads that warned about Biden ’ s plans to accept refugees from dangerous parts of the world .
The ads claimed Biden would increase refugee intake from Syria , Somalia and Yemen by 700 percent .
“ We rejected these ads because we don ’ t allow claims that people ’ s physical safety , health , or survival is threatened by people on the basis of their national origin or immigration status , ” Facebook spokesperson Andy Stone said in a statement explaining why the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump ads on refugees and Covid-19 , by Jo Ling Kent and David Ingram , NBC News , September 30 , 2020 ] .
Biden wants to raise the maximum refugee cap to a staggering 125,000 admissions per year .
While Big Tech attempts to stifle this powerful message , Trump is delivering it to his massive rally crowds .
“ Biden will turn Minnesota into a refugee camp , and he said that — overwhelming public resources , overcrowding schools and inundating hospitals .
You know that .
It ’ s already @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what they ’ ve done to your state , ” the president said at a Minnesota rally this week [ Trump plans to slash refugee admissions to US to record low , by Julie Watson and Matthew Lee , Associated Press , September 30 , 2020 ] .
Trump knows Middle America wants control of its borders and less immigration .
On the refugee front , he ’ s keeping his promise .

washingtonwatcherii@protonmail.com (Washington  Watcher II)

Previously: Trump Keeps Refugee Promise—Why Are Lankford Nine Whining?
The Trump administration announced Wednesday it would reduce America’s refugee intake to the lowest number in history.
Just a few minutes before the congressional deadline to announce the refugee caps for the fiscal year 2021, the administration declared it would accept no more than 15,000 refugees. That is a 16.5% decrease over last fiscal year’s previous cap record of 18,000 refugees. The U.S. accepted 10,800 refugees before freezing admissions in response to the coronavirus outbreak [Trump plans to slash refugee admissions to US to record low, by Julie Watson and Matthew Lee, Associated Press, September 30, 2020]. Trump’s caps are significantly lower than Barack Obama’s high of 85,000 refugee admissions and planned 115,000 admissions for 2017.
This news is once again a sign that Trump is delivering on some of his immigration promises and is a real victory for the historic American nation. But Big Tech doesn’t want the American people to hear this good news, or know about the dangers of Joe Biden’s refugee policies
This week, Facebook announced it took down Trump campaign ads that warned about Biden’s plans to accept refugees from dangerous parts of the world. The ads claimed Biden would increase refugee intake from Syria, Somalia and Yemen by 700 percent. “We rejected these ads because we don’t allow claims that people’s physical safety, health, or survival is threatened by people on the basis of their national origin or immigration status,” Facebook spokesperson Andy Stone said in a statement explaining why the company banned the ads [Facebook removes Trump ads on refugees and Covid-19, by Jo Ling Kent and David Ingram, NBC News, September 30, 2020].
Biden wants to raise the maximum refugee cap to a staggering 125,000 admissions per year.
While Big Tech attempts to stifle this powerful message, Trump is delivering it to his massive rally crowds. “Biden will turn Minnesota into a refugee camp, and he said that — overwhelming public resources, overcrowding schools and inundating hospitals. You know that. It’s already there. It’s a disgrace what they’ve done to your state,” the president said at a Minnesota rally this week [Trump plans to slash refugee admissions to US to record low, by Julie Watson and Matthew Lee, Associated Press, September 30, 2020].
Trump knows Middle America wants control of its borders and less immigration. On the refugee front, he’s keeping his promise.


vdare--2020-10-01--Media Smears The Proud Boys As ‘White Supremacists’—And Republicans Believe Them!

The media is in an apoplectic frenzy over President Trump ’ s refusal to condemn the Proud Boys .
Journalists call the pro-Trump group violent white supremacists who pose a far greater danger than Antifa .
And the worst part of all : Republican politicians agree with the lying press .
The media image of the Proud Boys is not based in reality .
The Proud Boys , despite their white supremacist reputation , are explicitly multiracial .
An assortment of group pictures easily demonstrates .
The group ’ s leader , Enrique Tarrio , is Afro-Cuban .
The Daily @ @ @ @ @ @ @ level of diversity two years , yet the outlet still concluded the Proud Boys are white supremacist [ Why Young Men of Color Are Joining White-Supremacist Groups , by Arun Gupta , The Daily Beast , September 4 , 2018 ] .
In typical fashion , Republican on Capitol Hill believe the media ’ s smears about the Proud Boys .
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott demanded Trump explicitly condemn the Proud Boys .
South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham said the “ Proud Boys is a racist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans Scold Trump on White Supremacy , Fearing a Drag on the Party , by Alexander Burns , Jonathan Martin and Maggie Haberman , The New York Times , September 30 , 2020 ] Trump ’ s own aides condemned the group .
Trump campaign national press secretary Hogan Gidley called the Proud Boys “ a reprehensible group ” and insisted the President condemned them .
It ’ s another depressing sign that Trump is much better than the party he leads .

The media is in an apoplectic frenzy over President Trump’s refusal to condemn the Proud Boys. Journalists call the pro-Trump group violent white supremacists who pose a far greater danger than Antifa. And the worst part of all: Republican politicians agree with the lying press.
NBC’s @oneunderscore__: "White supremacist groups” like the Proud Boys — not Antifa — are the ones creating "organized violence“ and “domestic terror” pic.twitter.com/N9wPgkDqCi — Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) September 30, 2020
The media image of the Proud Boys is not based in reality. The Proud Boys, despite their white supremacist reputation, are explicitly multiracial. An assortment of group pictures easily demonstrates. The group’s leader, Enrique Tarrio, is Afro-Cuban. The Daily Beast noticed the group’s surprising level of diversity two years ago, yet the outlet still concluded the Proud Boys are white supremacist [Why Young Men of Color Are Joining White-Supremacist Groups, by Arun Gupta, The Daily Beast, September 4, 2018].
This is one of the Proud Boys, with his black wife and half-black kids, who was arrested for defending himself against Antifa a while ago in NYC. Yet Joe Biden and the media keeps calling them a "white supremacist" group. pic.twitter.com/NpKM32H2qL — Mark Dice (@MarkDice) September 30, 2020
The Proud Boys even waited to do a group photo after the fights. They were hyped the fuck up after that. Flashing their white power hand symbol before marching towards a downtown train. pic.twitter.com/JP6jiM8Yud — Shay Horse (@HuntedHorse) October 13, 2018
Fact check for the media: You can think Proud Boys are a lot of things but white supremacists isn’t one of them, their leader Enrique is afro-Cuban. pic.twitter.com/IbE7XHvunh — Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) September 30, 2020
In typical fashion, Republican on Capitol Hill believe the media’s smears about the Proud Boys. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott demanded Trump explicitly condemn the Proud Boys. South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham said the “Proud Boys is a racist organization antithetical to American ideals” [Republicans Scold Trump on White Supremacy, Fearing a Drag on the Party, by Alexander Burns, Jonathan Martin and Maggie Haberman, The New York Times, September 30, 2020].
Trump’s own aides condemned the group. Trump campaign national press secretary Hogan Gidley called the Proud Boys “a reprehensible group” and insisted the President condemned them.
National Press Secretary for the Trump campaign Hogan Gidley on Wednesday tried to clean up Pres. Trump's call for the Proud Boys to 'stand by' during Tuesday's debates, saying that the remark was actually telling the hate group to "get out of the way." pic.twitter.com/EZOQpsnuOC — TPM Livewire (@TPMLiveWire) September 30, 2020
An anonymous White House adviser simply told CNN: F*** the Proud Boys.”
Trump adviser on Trump’s proud boys comments last night: “F*** the proud boys. There I said it. Not that hard.” — Jim Acosta (@Acosta) September 30, 2020
It’s another depressing sign that Trump is much better than the party he leads.


vdare--2020-10-01--NYT: Open Borders Spread the Pandemic

NYT: Open Borders Spread the Pandemic

Here ’ s another example of the New York Times ’ occasional Better Late Than Never honest reporting .
From the New York Times news section : Ski , Party , Seed a Pandemic : The Travel Rules that Let COVID-19 Take Flight The World Health Organization said open borders would help fight disease .
Experts , and a global treaty , emphatically agreed .
But the scientific evidence was never behind them .
ISCHGL , Austria — They came from across the world to ski in the most famous resorts of the Austrian alps .
Jacob Homiller and his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ States .
Jane Witt , a retired lecturer , arrived from London for a family reunion .
Annette Garten , the youth director at a tennis club in Hamburg , was celebrating her birthday with her husband and two grown children .
They knew in late February and early March that the coronavirus was spreading in nearby northern Italy , and across the other border in Germany , but no one was alarmed .
Austrian officials downplayed concerns as tourists crowded into cable cars by day , and après-ski bars at night .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” said Ms. Garten .
Then they all went home , unwittingly taking the virus with them .
Infected in Ischgl ( pronounced “ ISH-gul ” ) or in surrounding villages , thousands of skiers carried the coronavirus to more than 40 countries on five continents .
Many of Iceland ’ s first known cases were traced to Ischgl .
In March , nearly half the cases in Norway were linked to Austrian ski holidays .
Nine months into an outbreak that has killed a million people worldwide , Ischgl is where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ possible by cheap airfares and open borders , collided with a pandemic .
For decades , as trade and travel drew the world closer , public health policy , enshrined by treaty , encouraged global mass tourism by calling for open borders , even during outbreaks .
Foreign travel is wonderful , but it ’ s more of a luxury .
Shutting down foreign travel is a lot cheaper way to fight a pandemic early than locking down a population late .
When the coronavirus emerged in China in January , the World @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its advice : Do not restrict travel .
But what is now clear is that the policy was about politics and economics more than public health .
Public health records , scores of scientific studies and interviews with more than two dozen experts show the policy of unobstructed travel was never based on hard science .
It was a political decision , recast as health advice , which emerged after a plague outbreak in India in the 1990s .
By the time Covid-19 surfaced , it had become an article of faith .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ religion of global health : Travel and trade restrictions are bad , ” said Lawrence O. Gostin , a professor of global health law at Georgetown University who helped write the global rules known as the International Health Regulations .
“ I ’ m one of the congregants.
” Two of the articles of faith of the public health elite up through last winter were : Quarantines don ’ t work and masks don ’ t work .
Covid-19 has shattered that faith .
Before the pandemic , a few studies had demonstrated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not stop , the spread of SARS , pandemic flu and Ebola .
Most , however , were based on mathematical models .
No one had collected real-world data .
The effect of travel restrictions on the spread of the latest coronavirus is still not understood .
“ Anyone who is truthful is going to tell you it ’ s a big fat ‘ We don ’ t know , ’ ” said Prof. Keiji Fukuda , a former senior World Health Organization official who teaches at the University of Hong Kong .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ world seeks a way back to normalcy .
For months , national leaders have invoked travel restrictions that vary in strictness and are often contradictory .
Some shut their borders and simultaneously imposed domestic lockdowns , others required tests and quarantines .
Many regularly revised their lists of risky destinations , sometimes responding tit for tat when their citizens were denied entry .
The restrictions have humbled powerful nations like the United States , whose citizens are no longer welcome across most of the world .
Even so , President Trump has called @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we made so far ” and attacked the W.H.O.
’ s early advice on borders as “ disastrous.
” Still , it is too soon to know , based on data and hard science , how much travel restrictions help , and if they do , which restrictions help most .
Experts who had defended open borders at the start of the pandemic now say countries should use judicious travel measures .
The W.H.O .
now calls for a gradual reopening in which each country weighs its own risks .
My impression is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over the U.S. in fighting the Coronavirus is it still has intracontinental national borders to shut down in case of emergency .
The U.S. in contrast is one giant country , with metropolitan areas such as New York , Philadelphia , Washington , Cincinnati , Chicago , St. Louis , and Kansas City sprawling across more than one state .

Here’s another example of the New York Times’ occasional Better Late Than Never honest reporting. From the New York Times news section:
Ski, Party, Seed a Pandemic: The Travel Rules that Let COVID-19 Take Flight By Selam Gebrekidan, Katrin Bennhold, Matt Apuzzo and David D. Kirkpatrick
Sept. 30, 2020 The World Health Organization said open borders would help fight disease. Experts, and a global treaty, emphatically agreed. But the scientific evidence was never behind them. ISCHGL, Austria — They came from across the world to ski in the most famous resorts of the Austrian alps. Jacob Homiller and his college friends flew in from the United States. Jane Witt, a retired lecturer, arrived from London for a family reunion. Annette Garten, the youth director at a tennis club in Hamburg, was celebrating her birthday with her husband and two grown children. They knew in late February and early March that the coronavirus was spreading in nearby northern Italy, and across the other border in Germany, but no one was alarmed. Austrian officials downplayed concerns as tourists crowded into cable cars by day, and après-ski bars at night. “The whole world meets in Ischgl,” said Ms. Garten. Then they all went home, unwittingly taking the virus with them. Infected in Ischgl (pronounced “ISH-gul”) or in surrounding villages, thousands of skiers carried the coronavirus to more than 40 countries on five continents. Many of Iceland’s first known cases were traced to Ischgl. In March, nearly half the cases in Norway were linked to Austrian ski holidays. Nine months into an outbreak that has killed a million people worldwide, Ischgl is where the era of global tourism, made possible by cheap airfares and open borders, collided with a pandemic. For decades, as trade and travel drew the world closer, public health policy, enshrined by treaty, encouraged global mass tourism by calling for open borders, even during outbreaks.
Foreign travel is wonderful, but it’s more of a luxury. Shutting down foreign travel is a lot cheaper way to fight a pandemic early than locking down a population late.
When the coronavirus emerged in China in January, the World Health Organization didn’t flinch in its advice: Do not restrict travel. But what is now clear is that the policy was about politics and economics more than public health. Public health records, scores of scientific studies and interviews with more than two dozen experts show the policy of unobstructed travel was never based on hard science. It was a political decision, recast as health advice, which emerged after a plague outbreak in India in the 1990s. By the time Covid-19 surfaced, it had become an article of faith. “It’s part of the religion of global health: Travel and trade restrictions are bad,” said Lawrence O. Gostin, a professor of global health law at Georgetown University who helped write the global rules known as the International Health Regulations. “I’m one of the congregants.”
Two of the articles of faith of the public health elite up through last winter were: quarantines don’t work and masks don’t work.
Covid-19 has shattered that faith. Before the pandemic, a few studies had demonstrated that travel restrictions delayed, but did not stop, the spread of SARS, pandemic flu and Ebola. Most, however, were based on mathematical models. No one had collected real-world data. The effect of travel restrictions on the spread of the latest coronavirus is still not understood. “Anyone who is truthful is going to tell you it’s a big fat ‘We don’t know,’” said Prof. Keiji Fukuda, a former senior World Health Organization official who teaches at the University of Hong Kong. Not knowing is especially vexing as the world seeks a way back to normalcy. For months, national leaders have invoked travel restrictions that vary in strictness and are often contradictory. Some shut their borders and simultaneously imposed domestic lockdowns, others required tests and quarantines. Many regularly revised their lists of risky destinations, sometimes responding tit for tat when their citizens were denied entry. The restrictions have humbled powerful nations like the United States, whose citizens are no longer welcome across most of the world. Even so, President Trump has called his travel restrictions “the biggest decision we made so far” and attacked the W.H.O.’s early advice on borders as “disastrous.” Still, it is too soon to know, based on data and hard science, how much travel restrictions help, and if they do, which restrictions help most. Experts who had defended open borders at the start of the pandemic now say countries should use judicious travel measures. The W.H.O. now calls for a gradual reopening in which each country weighs its own risks.
My impression is that a big advantage Europe has had over the U.S. in fighting the Coronavirus is it still has intracontinental national borders to shut down in case of emergency. The U.S. in contrast is one giant country, with metropolitan areas such as New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Cincinnati, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City sprawling across more than one state.
[Comment at Unz.com]


vdare--2020-10-01--The Proud Boys and Fashion

The Proud Boys and Fashion

Please enable JavaScript .
Without JavaScript some features of the site will not be accessible .

Can't load tweet https://twitter.com/PALE_Primate/status/1310743802915807235?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1310743802915807235%7Ctwgr%5Eshare_3&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.unz.com%2Fisteve%2Fthe-proud-boys-and-fashion%2F: Sorry, you are not authorized to see this status.
They should wear Nike Colin Kaepernick gear.
Now that I think about it, they could shake down big brands by threatening to wear their clothes.
https://t.co/Yi7P9FlPtR — North Sea Poverty Law Center (@casijndegraaff) October 1, 2020
[Comment at Unz.com]


vdare--2020-10-01--NYT: White Leftist Anarchists Are Organizing Riots, Much Like Bill Barr Says

Earlier : NYT : Remember What We Told You About the Peaceful Protests ?
Well , Never Mind ...
Periodically , the New York Times publishes work by their staffers that detonate much of the assumptions built up by hundreds of other NYT pieces , such as the ( belated but welcome ) reporting over the summer on all the devastation caused by the riots .
Here ’ s an important piece from the New York Times opinion page about Antifa ( without ever using the term “ Antifa ” ) : “ Insurrectionary anarchists ” have been protesting for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ leaders wish they would go home .
By Farah Stockman Ms. Stockman is a member of the editorial board .
On the last Sunday in May , Jeremy Lee Quinn , a furloughed photographer in Santa Monica , Calif. , was snapping photos of suburban moms kneeling at a Black Lives Matter protest when a friend alerted him to a more dramatic subject : looting at a shoe store about a mile away .
He arrived to find young people pouring out of the store , shoeboxes under their arms .
But there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ A group of men , dressed entirely in black , milled around nearby , like supervisors .
One wore a creepy rubber Halloween mask .
The next day , Mr. Quinn took pictures of another store being looted .
Again , he noticed something strange .
A white man , clad in black , had broken the window with a crowbar , but walked away without taking a thing .
Mr. Quinn began studying footage of looting from around the country and saw the same black outfits and , in some cases , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ go to a protest dressed like that himself , to figure out what was really going on .
He expected to find white supremacists who wanted to help re-elect President Trump by stoking fear of Black people .
What he discovered instead were true believers in “ insurrectionary anarchism.
” To better understand them , Mr. Quinn , a 40-something theater student who worked at Univision until the pandemic , has spent the past four months marching with “ black bloc ” anarchists in half a dozen cities across the country , chronicling @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Report .
He says he respects the idealistic goal of a hierarchy-free society that anarchists embrace , but grew increasingly uncomfortable with the tactics used by some anarchists , which he feared would set off a backlash that could help get President Trump re-elected .
In Portland , Ore. , he marched with people who shot fireworks at the federal court building .
In Washington , he marched with protesters who harassed diners .
Mr. Quinn discovered a thorny truth about the mayhem that unfolded in the wake of the police killing of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Minneapolis .
It wasn ’ t mayhem at all .
While talking heads on television routinely described it as a spontaneous eruption of anger at racial injustice , it was strategically planned , facilitated and advertised on social media by anarchists who believed that their actions advanced the cause of racial justice .
In some cities , they were a fringe element , quickly expelled by peaceful organizers .
But in Washington , Portland and Seattle they have attracted a “ cultlike energy , ” Mr. Quinn told me .
Don ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ word for it .
Take the word of the anarchists themselves , who lay out the strategy in Crimethinc , an anarchist publication : Black-clad figures break windows , set fires , vandalize police cars , then melt back into the crowd of peaceful protesters .
When the police respond by brutalizing innocent demonstrators with tear gas , rubber bullets and rough arrests , the public ’ s disdain for law enforcement grows .
It ’ s Asymmetric Warfare 101 .
An anarchist podcast called “ The Ex-Worker ” explains that while some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by Mohandas Gandhi , others advocate using crimes like arson and shoplifting to wear down the capitalist system .
According to “ The Ex-Worker , ” the term “ insurrectionary anarchist ” dates back at least to the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath , when opponents of the fascist leader Francisco Franco took “ direct action ” against his regime , including assassinating policemen and robbing banks .
If that is not enough to convince you that there ’ s a method to the madness , check out the new report by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , online mobilization of violence that was planned , coordinated ( in real time ) and celebrated by explicitly violent anarcho-socialist networks that rode on the coattails of peaceful protest , ” according to its co-author Pamela Paresky .
She said some anarchist social media accounts had grown 300-fold since May , to hundreds of thousands of followers .
“ The ability to continue to spread and to eventually bring more violence , including a violent insurgency , relies on the ability to hide in plain sight — to be confused with legitimate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ public to minimize the threat , ” Dr. Paresky told me .
Her report will almost certainly catch the attention of conservative media and William Barr ’ s Department of Justice , which recently declared New York , Portland and Seattle “ anarchist jurisdictions , ” a widely mocked designation accompanied by the threat of withholding federal funds .
There ’ s an even thornier truth that few people seem to want to talk about : Anarchy got results .
… And yet , I had to admit that the scale of destruction @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a way that peaceful protests hadn ’ t .
How many articles would I have written about a peaceful march ?
How many months would Mr. Quinn have spent investigating suburban moms kneeling ?
That ’ s on us .
While I feared that the looting and arson would derail the urgent demands for racial justice and bring condemnation , I was wrong , at least in the short term .
Support for Black Lives Matter soared .
Corporations opened their wallets .
It was as if the nation rallied behind peaceful Black @ @ @ @ @ @ @ like whites who flocked to the Rev .
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. after they got a glimpse of Malcolm X .
But as the protests continue , support has flagged .
The percentage of people who say they support the Black Lives Matter movement has dropped from 67 percent in June to 55 percent , according to a recent Pew poll .
“ Insurrectionary anarchy ” brings diminishing returns , especially as anarchists complicate life for those working within the system to halt police violence .
… In Seattle , Andrè Taylor @ @ @ @ @ @ @ brother to police violence in 2016 , helped change state law that made it nearly impossible to prosecute officers for killing civilians .
But he has been branded a “ pig cop ” by young anarchists because his nonprofit organization receives funds from the city , and because he cooperates with the police .

Earlier: NYT: Remember What We Told You About the Peaceful Protests? Well, Never Mind ...
Periodically, the New York Times publishes work by their staffers that detonate much of the assumptions built up by hundreds of other NYT pieces, such as the (belated but welcome) reporting over the summer on all the devastation caused by the riots.
Here’s an important piece from the New York Times opinion page about Antifa (without ever using the term “Antifa”):
The Truth About Today’s Anarchists
“Insurrectionary anarchists” have been protesting for racial justice all summer. Some Black leaders wish they would go home.
By Farah Stockman
Ms. Stockman is a member of the editorial board.
Sept. 30, 2020
On the last Sunday in May, Jeremy Lee Quinn, a furloughed photographer in Santa Monica, Calif., was snapping photos of suburban moms kneeling at a Black Lives Matter protest when a friend alerted him to a more dramatic subject: looting at a shoe store about a mile away.
He arrived to find young people pouring out of the store, shoeboxes under their arms. But there was something odd about the scene. A group of men, dressed entirely in black, milled around nearby, like supervisors. One wore a creepy rubber Halloween mask.
The next day, Mr. Quinn took pictures of another store being looted. Again, he noticed something strange. A white man, clad in black, had broken the window with a crowbar, but walked away without taking a thing.
Mr. Quinn began studying footage of looting from around the country and saw the same black outfits and, in some cases, the same masks. He decided to go to a protest dressed like that himself, to figure out what was really going on. He expected to find white supremacists who wanted to help re-elect President Trump by stoking fear of Black people. What he discovered instead were true believers in “insurrectionary anarchism.”
To better understand them, Mr. Quinn, a 40-something theater student who worked at Univision until the pandemic, has spent the past four months marching with “black bloc” anarchists in half a dozen cities across the country, chronicling the experience on his website, Public Report.
He says he respects the idealistic goal of a hierarchy-free society that anarchists embrace, but grew increasingly uncomfortable with the tactics used by some anarchists, which he feared would set off a backlash that could help get President Trump re-elected. In Portland, Ore., he marched with people who shot fireworks at the federal court building. In Washington, he marched with protesters who harassed diners.
Mr. Quinn discovered a thorny truth about the mayhem that unfolded in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man in Minneapolis. It wasn’t mayhem at all.
While talking heads on television routinely described it as a spontaneous eruption of anger at racial injustice, it was strategically planned, facilitated and advertised on social media by anarchists who believed that their actions advanced the cause of racial justice. In some cities, they were a fringe element, quickly expelled by peaceful organizers. But in Washington, Portland and Seattle they have attracted a “cultlike energy,” Mr. Quinn told me.
Don’t take just Mr. Quinn’s word for it. Take the word of the anarchists themselves, who lay out the strategy in Crimethinc, an anarchist publication: Black-clad figures break windows, set fires, vandalize police cars, then melt back into the crowd of peaceful protesters. When the police respond by brutalizing innocent demonstrators with tear gas, rubber bullets and rough arrests, the public’s disdain for law enforcement grows. It’s Asymmetric Warfare 101.
An anarchist podcast called “The Ex-Worker” explains that while some anarchists believe in pacifist civil disobedience inspired by Mohandas Gandhi, others advocate using crimes like arson and shoplifting to wear down the capitalist system. According to “The Ex-Worker,” the term “insurrectionary anarchist” dates back at least to the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath, when opponents of the fascist leader Francisco Franco took “direct action” against his regime, including assassinating policemen and robbing banks.
If that is not enough to convince you that there’s a method to the madness, check out the new report by Rutgers researchers that documents the “systematic, online mobilization of violence that was planned, coordinated (in real time) and celebrated by explicitly violent anarcho-socialist networks that rode on the coattails of peaceful protest,” according to its co-author Pamela Paresky. She said some anarchist social media accounts had grown 300-fold since May, to hundreds of thousands of followers.
“The ability to continue to spread and to eventually bring more violence, including a violent insurgency, relies on the ability to hide in plain sight — to be confused with legitimate protests, and for media and the public to minimize the threat,” Dr. Paresky told me.
Her report will almost certainly catch the attention of conservative media and William Barr’s Department of Justice, which recently declared New York, Portland and Seattle “anarchist jurisdictions,” a widely mocked designation accompanied by the threat of withholding federal funds.
There’s an even thornier truth that few people seem to want to talk about: Anarchy got results. …
And yet, I had to admit that the scale of destruction caught the media’s attention in a way that peaceful protests hadn’t. How many articles would I have written about a peaceful march? How many months would Mr. Quinn have spent investigating suburban moms kneeling? That’s on us.
While I feared that the looting and arson would derail the urgent demands for racial justice and bring condemnation, I was wrong, at least in the short term. Support for Black Lives Matter soared. Corporations opened their wallets. It was as if the nation rallied behind peaceful Black organizers after it saw the alternative, like whites who flocked to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. after they got a glimpse of Malcolm X.
But as the protests continue, support has flagged.
The percentage of people who say they support the Black Lives Matter movement has dropped from 67 percent in June to 55 percent, according to a recent Pew poll.
“Insurrectionary anarchy” brings diminishing returns, especially as anarchists complicate life for those working within the system to halt police violence. …
In Seattle, Andrè Taylor, a Black man who lost his brother to police violence in 2016, helped change state law that made it nearly impossible to prosecute officers for killing civilians. But he has been branded a “pig cop” by young anarchists because his nonprofit organization receives funds from the city, and because he cooperates with the police.


vdare--2020-09-30--ABC: Reparations For Mexican-Americans

ABC: Reparations For Mexican-Americans

Soon , the New York Times will be running op-eds by young women named Kim about how they deserve reparations @ @ @ @ @ ( such as their golf pro at the country club ) asked them , “ @ @ @ @ @ ” By the way , the phrase “ reparations for Mexicans ” doesn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ .
The fifth-highest ranking version of this is our own Whiskey ’ s comment on @ @ @ @ @ The demands will get higher and higher as the candidates bid up for Black support @ @ @ @ @ .
Special reparations for Mexicans too .
The Establishment ’ s slogan should be “ @ @ @ @ @ .
”

TUNE IN: What reparations may look like for Mexican-Americans, detailing what they feel America owes them. #TurningPointABC pic.twitter.com/pZpuIA3cUi — Nightline (@Nightline) September 30, 2020
Soon, the New York Times will be running op-eds by young women named Kim about how they deserve reparations for the times white people (such as their golf pro at the country club) asked them, “Where are you from?”
By the way, the phrase “reparations for Mexicans” doesn’t come up much on Google. The fifth-highest ranking version of this is our own Whiskey’s comment on Feb. 22, 2019:
The demands will get higher and higher as the candidates bid up for Black support, and likely Mexican support. Special reparations for Mexicans too.
The Establishment’s slogan should be “Making Whiskey Into a Prophet.”
[Comment at Unz.com]


vdare--2020-09-30--Ann Coulter On The Proud Boys: "America’s Last Line Of Defense Against The Left’s Fascistic Antifa S

Ann Coulter On The Proud Boys: "America’s Last Line Of Defense Against The Left’s Fascistic Antifa Storm Troopers"

After four months of looting , arson , window breaking , vandalism , intimidation , physical assaults , stabbings and shootings by Black Lives Matter and antifa , the first thing on the media ’ s mind is … getting Trump to condemn “ white supremacists ” !
It would be as if , on the morning after Pearl Harbor , the League of Nations demanded that FDR condemn American aggression in the Pacific .
Why on earth was Trump being badgered by both debate moderator Chris Wallace and Democratic nominee Joe Biden to denounce “ white supremacy ” ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ asked to condemn the nonstop violence by antifa that actually has been consuming the country for more than 100 nights now ?
Wallace to Trump : “ Are you willing tonight to condemn white supremacists and militia groups ?
” Trump ( perfectly accurately ) : “ Sure .
I ’ m willing to do that .
But I would say almost everything I ’ m seeing is coming from the left wing , not the right wing.
” The media ’ s position on the murderous BLM and antifa riots has gone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ peaceful protests !
to The rioters are white supremacist Trump supporters !
Who thinks white supremacists are a major force in America ?
There haven ’ t been any two people in 50 years who ’ ve gotten together and said , “ Aren ’ t whites way better ?
Shouldn ’ t we rule over other people ?
” “ White supremacy ” is a bogus concept invented on college campuses .
There are white men who do horrible things , just as there are Asian men and black men who do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t represent any kind of kind of organized movement .
You know what ’ s an organized movement ?
Antifa—Rose City Antifa , Antifa Seven Hills , Antifa Sacramento , Atlanta “ Antifascists ” and so on .
They ’ re organized well enough that hundreds , sometimes thousands , of antifa members always know exactly when and where to show up , and what weapons to bring .
Then they turn around and celebrate the destruction they ’ ve wrought ( unpunished by Democratic mayors and liberal district attorneys ) .
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , out beyond the coastal cities , there ’ s a scary world of pickup trucks being driven by men with long-barreled guns trying to re-enact “ Roots.
” ( And they shop at Walmart ! )
When Trump tried to bring up Pearl Harbor—i.e.
, the actual violence , as opposed to liberal imaginary violence—Wallace cited Kenosha .
REMINDER : After two nights of looting and arson by “ peaceful protesters ” in Kenosha in response to the police shooting of a knife-wielding black man resisting arrest , a group of men @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Our Lives and Property ” did just that .
One of the men , Kyle Rittenhouse , shot three antifa as they were attacking him , killing two , in a clear case of self-defense .
That ’ s Wallace ’ s big example of right-wing violence : an armed citizen defending himself .
The left wants antifa to rule our cities , with no pushback from uppity Americans .
Trump ’ s more addled debate partner , Joe Biden , threw in the Proud Boys—without correction by Wallace , whose entire career @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for NBC .
Burning down police precincts , knocking statues off their pedestals , smashing windows , looting and vandalizing stores , stopping cars and demanding the drivers pledge allegiance to BLM , banging drums outside of politicians houses late into the night—was it the Proud Boys doing any of that ?
Why are we talking about the Proud Boys at all ?
How about asking the Sierra Club to renounce violence ?
Forget about the last 100 days of mind-boggling left-wing violence , let ’ s open it up to all of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ big crime ?
Is there a single instance of the Proud Boy staging an unprovoked attack on anyone — ever ?
The absolute worst thing you could say about the Proud Boys is : Too macho !
They fight back .
Fine , join the Democratic Party if testosterone isn ’ t your thing .
The nation ’ s leading anti-American and anti-Christian hate group , the Southern Poverty Law Center , calls them “ white supremacists , ” meaning , “ anyone we don ’ t like and can ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hate outfit hates ?
Dennis Prager .
The Alliance for Catholic Tradition .
Christian Ministries .
The National Prayer Network .
The claim is especially delusional in the case of the Proud Boys , who have black members , Asian members and Latino members .
The Los Angeles branch of the Proud Boys is about half Mexican .
One of the founders is married to a black woman , with whom he has a biracial child .
The entire point of the Proud Boys is for men to be masculine and defend the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It has nothing whatsoever to do with “ white supremacy.
” But , again , liberals call anyone they don ’ t like and can ’ t refute “ white supremacists.
” You know why the media and Democrats hate the Proud Boys ?
Because they are America ’ s last line of defense against the left ’ s fascistic antifa storm troopers .
Often , they are the only ones protecting us when the police are outnumbered or have been ordered to stand down by Democratic mayors and police chiefs .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ was trying to convey with his typically garbled : “ Proud Boys , stand back and stand by , but I ’ ll tell you what … somebody ’ s got to do something about antifa and the left because this is not a right-wing problem.
” ( If I ’ m wrong , then two men with Secret Service protection are throwing the rest of us to the wolves and I ’ m sitting this election out . )
The Proud Boys should sue Biden and Wallace for defamation .
The universities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ supremacist ” into the worst thing any human can be—worse than “ murderer , ” “ drug dealer ” or “ child molester.
” To falsely accuse an organization of being “ white supremacist ” ought to be considered defamation per se .
If you want to destroy something , is there a better way to do it than labeling it “ white supremacist ” ?
In Portland , there have been mind-bogglingly destructive antifa riots every night for more than 100 days now .
Last weekend , the Proud Boys staged a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Oregon finally declared a “ state of emergency.
” ( It was a lovely gathering with no arson or looting . )
This is the position of the media and the Democratic Party : Antifa must be allowed to run riot without interference from anyone .
We ’ ve liberated antifa from district attorneys and mayors and now we ’ ll liberate them from individual Americans .
Therefore , anyone who defends the innocent from psychotic left-wing violence will be cursed as a “ white supremacist.
” Ann Coulter is the author of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Her book , ¡Adios America !
The Left ’ s Plan To Turn Our Country Into A Third World Hell Hole , was released on June 1 , 2015 .
Her latest book , Resistance Is Futile !
: How the Trump-Hating Left Lost Its Collective Mind , was released on August 21 , 2018 .

Earlier By Ann Coulter: Trump Wins "Disavowal" Game, Then Super Tuesday
After four months of looting, arson, window breaking, vandalism, intimidation, physical assaults, stabbings and shootings by Black Lives Matter and antifa, the first thing on the media’s mind is … getting Trump to condemn “white supremacists”!
It would be as if, on the morning after Pearl Harbor, the League of Nations demanded that FDR condemn American aggression in the Pacific.
Why on earth was Trump being badgered by both debate moderator Chris Wallace and Democratic nominee Joe Biden to denounce “white supremacy”? And why wasn’t Biden ever asked to condemn the nonstop violence by antifa that actually has been consuming the country for more than 100 nights now?
Wallace to Trump: “Are you willing tonight to condemn white supremacists and militia groups?”
Trump (perfectly accurately): “Sure. I’m willing to do that. But I would say almost everything I’m seeing is coming from the left wing, not the right wing.”
The media’s position on the murderous BLM and antifa riots has gone from What riots? They’re peaceful protests! to The rioters are white supremacist Trump supporters!
Who thinks white supremacists are a major force in America? There haven’t been any two people in 50 years who’ve gotten together and said, “Aren’t whites way better? Shouldn’t we rule over other people?”
“White supremacy” is a bogus concept invented on college campuses. There are white men who do horrible things, just as there are Asian men and black men who do horrible things. But they don’t represent any kind of kind of organized movement.
You know what’s an organized movement? Antifa—Rose City Antifa, Antifa Seven Hills, Antifa Sacramento, Atlanta “Antifascists” and so on. They’re organized well enough that hundreds, sometimes thousands, of antifa members always know exactly when and where to show up, and what weapons to bring. Then they turn around and celebrate the destruction they’ve wrought (unpunished by Democratic mayors and liberal district attorneys).
But in Chris Wallace’s demon-haunted imagination, out beyond the coastal cities, there’s a scary world of pickup trucks being driven by men with long-barreled guns trying to re-enact “Roots.” (And they shop at Walmart!)
When Trump tried to bring up Pearl Harbor—i.e., the actual violence, as opposed to liberal imaginary violence—Wallace cited Kenosha.
REMINDER: After two nights of looting and arson by “peaceful protesters” in Kenosha in response to the police shooting of a knife-wielding black man resisting arrest, a group of men calling themselves “Armed Citizens to Protect Our Lives and Property” did just that. One of the men, Kyle Rittenhouse, shot three antifa as they were attacking him, killing two, in a clear case of self-defense.
That’s Wallace’s big example of right-wing violence: an armed citizen defending himself. The left wants antifa to rule our cities, with no pushback from uppity Americans.
Trump’s more addled debate partner, Joe Biden, threw in the Proud Boys—without correction by Wallace, whose entire career at Fox has been an audition tape for NBC.
Burning down police precincts, knocking statues off their pedestals, smashing windows, looting and vandalizing stores, stopping cars and demanding the drivers pledge allegiance to BLM, banging drums outside of politicians' houses late into the night—was it the Proud Boys doing any of that?
Why are we talking about the Proud Boys at all? How about asking the Sierra Club to renounce violence?
Forget about the last 100 days of mind-boggling left-wing violence, let’s open it up to all of history! What is the Proud Boys’ big crime? Is there a single instance of the Proud Boy staging an unprovoked attack on anyone—ever?
The absolute worst thing you could say about the Proud Boys is: Too macho! They fight back. Fine, join the Democratic Party if testosterone isn’t your thing.
The nation’s leading anti-American and anti-Christian hate group, the Southern Poverty Law Center, calls them “white supremacists,” meaning, “anyone we don’t like and can’t refute.” You know who else this hate outfit hates? Dennis Prager. The Alliance for Catholic Tradition. Christian Ministries. The National Prayer Network.
The claim is especially delusional in the case of the Proud Boys, who have black members, Asian members and Latino members. The Los Angeles branch of the Proud Boys is about half Mexican. One of the founders is married to a black woman, with whom he has a biracial child.
The entire point of the Proud Boys is for men to be masculine and defend the innocent, something like the Guardian Angels. It has nothing whatsoever to do with “white supremacy.” But, again, liberals call anyone they don’t like and can’t refute “white supremacists.”
You know why the media and Democrats hate the Proud Boys? Because they are America’s last line of defense against the left’s fascistic antifa storm troopers. Often, they are the only ones protecting us when the police are outnumbered or have been ordered to stand down by Democratic mayors and police chiefs.
I believe that’s what Trump was trying to convey with his typically garbled: “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by, but I’ll tell you what … somebody’s got to do something about antifa and the left because this is not a right-wing problem.” (If I’m wrong, then two men with Secret Service protection are throwing the rest of us to the wolves and I’m sitting this election out.)
The Proud Boys should sue Biden and Wallace for defamation.
The universities and media have successfully turned “white supremacist” into the worst thing any human can be—worse than “murderer,” “drug dealer” or “child molester.” To falsely accuse an organization of being “white supremacist” ought to be considered defamation per se. If you want to destroy something, is there a better way to do it than labeling it “white supremacist”?
In Portland, there have been mind-bogglingly destructive antifa riots every night for more than 100 days now. Last weekend, the Proud Boys staged a rally in Portland—and the lunatic governor of Oregon finally declared a “state of emergency.” (It was a lovely gathering with no arson or looting.)
This is the position of the media and the Democratic Party: Antifa must be allowed to run riot without interference from anyone. We’ve liberated antifa from district attorneys and mayors and now we’ll liberate them from individual Americans. Therefore, anyone who defends the innocent from psychotic left-wing violence will be cursed as a “white supremacist.”
COPYRIGHT 2020 ANN COULTER
DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION
Ann Coulter is the author of THIRTEEN New York Times bestsellers—collect them here.
Her book, ¡Adios America! The Left’s Plan To Turn Our Country Into A Third World Hell Hole, was released on June 1, 2015.
Her latest book, Resistance Is Futile!: How the Trump-Hating Left Lost Its Collective Mind, was released on August 21, 2018.