Who exactly were the rich who, as the president said, were not “paying their fair share”? The rapper Jay-Z (net worth: nearly $500 million)? The actor Johnny Depp (2011 income: $50 million)? Neither seems to have heard the president’s earlier warning that “at a certain point you’ve made enough money.”From "Conservative Populism" by Victor Davis Hanson, December 18, 2012:
The truth is that everyone from the college president who gets his taxes paid by his university to Jay-Z is a beneficiary of Republican advocacies that he damns.From "The New Affirmative Action" by Victor Davis Hanson, March 14, 2013:
Will the children of multimillionaire Tiger Woods — or of Jay-Z and Beyoncé — qualify for special consideration on the theory that their racial pedigrees or statistical underrepresentation in some fields will make their lives more challenging than the lives of poor white children in rural Pennsylvania or second-generation Arab-Americans in Dearborn, Mich.?From "The War against the Young" by Victor Davis Hanson, April 9, 2013:
The administration seems aware of the potential paradoxes in this reverse “What’s the matter with Kansas?” syndrome of young people voting against their economic interests. Thus follows the constant courting of the hip and cool Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Lena Dunham, Occupy Wall Streeters, and others who blend pop culture, sex, youth, energy, and fad...From "Our Postmodern Angst," by Victor Davis Hanson, August 13, 2013:
Today, obesity, not malnutrition, is America’s epidemic. Our youth’s education is hindered by too many cell phones, not access to too few books. Misogynistic and obscene lyrics may have enriched Jay-Z, but they reflect the sort of values that lead millions to remain in poverty, rather than becoming disciplined cadres organizing for social justice.From "An American Satyricon," by Victor Davis Hanson, August 27, 2013:
Civil rights once meant an existential struggle between the oppressed and villains like Bull Connor with his dogs and fire hoses. Now Oprah is miffed over being treating rudely while eyeing a $38,000 purse in Switzerland... near-billionaire rapper Jay-Z warns that the have-nots may riot...From "Miley Cyrus and Ugly Sex" by Victor Davis Hanson, September 3, 2013:
Where is the elemental inspiration, the existential need to tap popular anguish and turn it into revolutionary artistic expression?From "Medieval Liberals" by Victor Davis Hanson, October 8, 2013:
If multimillionaire rapper Jay-Z performs at the White House, where is to be found the font of resistance? In short — resistance to what?
As recompense, [the Medieval Liberal] is not just liberal, but liberally hip and cool... in his 50s he listens to Jay-Z and Beyoncé as well as Springsteen and the Dead.From "Progressive Insurance" by Victor Davis Hanson, April 15, 2014:
Certainly racial venom is not a career ender for the fully insured. Jay-Z, a frequent White House guest, is not shy about wearing a Five-Percent Nation medallion, which reflects an ideology that considers whites inferior devils...From "The End of Affirmative Action" by Victor Davis Hanson, May 1, 2014:
Class divisions are mostly ignored in admissions and hiring criteria, but in today’s diverse society, they often pose greater obstacles than race. The children of one-percenters such as Beyoncé and Jay-Z will have doors opened to them that are not open to those in Pennsylvania who, according to President Obama, “cling to guns or religion.”From "Egalitarian Grandees" by Victor Davis Hanson, May 27, 2014:
Being liberal in the abstract also provides psychological penance for enjoying the good life in the concrete. A Johnny Depp or a Jay-Z is cool and therefore free to enjoy compensation based entirely on what the free market will bear.I feel bad for the kids, who have this instead of Biggie and Tupac.
UPDATE. In comments (always worth visiting! No trip to alicublog is complete without the comments!) D Johnston observes, "Everything [VDH] writes about politics is just a random assortment of talking points, creaky old bugaboos and Mark Steyn-brand simulated humor, all tied together with the pseudo-scholarly pablum of a bright but seriously self-obsessed high school senior." Johnston does us the further favor of identifying the paragraph subjects in Hanson's latest column: "Para 1 - Elizabeth Warren, Al Gore; Para 2 - Michelle Obama; Para 3 - 'Silicon Valley to Chevy Chase'; Para 4 - Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz; Para 5 - The Steyer brothers and 'the media'..."
You get the idea. The basic Hanson is that rich liberals are hypocrites because all liberals are supposed to live in rags and filth like their best friends The Poor -- I think that was in Herodotus -- and because they made their money in the arts and sciences they are morally inferior to people who made their money buying property with oil under it (whom Hanson takes care to associate with hard-bitten sons of toil, usually by adjacent description).
Also, Hanson's most recent column actually contains a reference to Pajama Boy. Is this what they mean when they call Hanson a classicist?
Ah, Victor, always the efficient wingnut. If you're going to memorize the name of a black guy, why not make it the shortest one you can find? Wouldn't want to waste an extra neuron or two on that.
ReplyDeleteThe burning question is whether VDH really has a special hard-on for Jay-Z, or if that's just the only nom de rap he can remember.
ReplyDeleteHey, he could have chosen RZA or GZA, which means You're The Real Racist!
ReplyDeleteWhy is Victor Davis Hanson so anti-wealth and anti-success!?!
ReplyDeleteI'll guess that Jay-Z is VDH's male placeholder whenever he needs to fill in the blank for "name a wealthy Black man who's at least vaguely sinister to older White folk." Tiger Woods certainly won't do--too many oldsters really like him.
ReplyDeleteHe probably remembers one or two others, but they're either dead or too obscure for his audience. He can't have his readers thinking "Snoopy Doggy-dog? WTF?"
ReplyDeleteToo much of his readership would assume it's a medical acronym, and head off to shop for prescriptions meds.
ReplyDeleteI've known I was a Real Racist since the nineties, when I decided to live in Prince George's County instead of slinking off to Montgomery. (DC area joke; don't feel bad if you missed it.)
I shouldn't be shocked, or pissed, but I am. God damn.
ReplyDeleteNear as I can figure, it's because it rhymes with "lay-zee". It's a mnemonic for when he's thinking "I need a darkie here".
ReplyDeleteJust Googled "Victor Davis Hanson + Jay-Z", and holy shit, you left quite a few out.
ReplyDeleteCome on, how many of Those People do you expect him to be aware of?
ReplyDeleteCall me when Jay-Z screws Native Americans out of their mineral rights or cuts corners on a no-bid, cost-plus contract, resulting in the deaths of Americans.
ReplyDeleteConservatives hate nothing more than an outspoken, self-made minority. No, Herman "I downsized a pizza chain at the behest of the board" Cain doesn't count.
Maybe it's all because of that goddamn "Hard Knock Life" ear worm.
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome!
As always, the distinction between being a rich guy who doesn't spend all his time bitching about paying taxes (and a good deal of his money buying politicians to lower them) and the rich fucks whose knobs VD Hanson is paid to polish is completely lost on him.
ReplyDeleteTrust me, the kids are not bothering with this shit.
ReplyDeleteHey, Dr. Dre is about to sell his company, Beats Electronics, to Apple for $3 billion. But as far as Victor David Hanson is concerned these guys are Niggaz 4 Life.
ReplyDeleteThese damned kids and their uppity hippity-hop.
ReplyDeleteThere's also the Obama Factor at play. I guarantee that if the President hadn't mentioned Jay-Z back in '08, VDH would have no clue who he was. Well, not that he knows who Jay-Z is now past "hippety-hop rapper, therefore scary."
ReplyDeleteNot specific to VDH, but I think Common was the Scary Hippety-Hop Rapper du jour for a while, thanks to that same guilt by association with the pretender reasoning.
ReplyDeleteA little poking around suggests that he has a similar fixation on Beyoncé Knowles, I suppose as the distaff Scary Black Celebrity. Now that one's really a puzzler. If you pretend really hard that it's 1992 and people are still afraid of rappers, Jay-Z makes sense. But fucking Beyoncé? I mean, I suppose she's a better candidate than Oprah Winfrey, but...oh, her too?
ReplyDeleteOh, he's a vanguard...I was recently in a meaningless FB convo about Donald Sterling and his overt racism. I was told in response to "why now, why race?" in regard to the shitbag Sterling, "well what about Jay Z. and his five percent medallion?"
ReplyDeleteBeing wise to the ways of the world, but admittedly ignorant of that particular racism against the white race, I managed to respond, sight unseen of Jay Z's awful, terrible racism, "What's preventing you from boycotting Jay Z?"
I hate this particular line of "reasoning" since it feels like a variation of the time some heroic conservative managed to shut a table of liberals the fuck up in the middle of a meal and convert them to the greater intellectual pursuit of conservative intellectualism -- but I was sincere. I don't give a flying fuck about Jay Z. He's a rich guy with an audience. If he did something awful and wrong, well, goddammit, nail the fucker. Donald Sterling is a disgrace to humanity. If the pendant Jay Z wore was in any way wrong, start a fucking petition! Call him out!
Instead, the FB "friend" said that I was equating him with a racist instead of calling a spade a spade, I guess.
For the record, I'm appalled by racism. If Jay Z is a racist fucker, I reject him and hope that everyone understands that! I don't really believe he is, especially in comparision to a billionaire who made his money as a slum lord, but milage may vary! Fight the power VDH! If not, I suggest to you and every one else who try to make awfully stupid connections between a rich rapper and racist white folk (or even just to inflame them), stop and try again.
They won't, of course, but then, they have no other point of reference than to defend themselves as to say that other assholes are as bad as they are, only we're too terrible to notice.
Which pretty much says it all.
If Victor can trigger a "that n****r's got how much?!?" stadium wave among his target audience, even without having a point or making a cohesive argument, the National Review is happy to cut him another cheque.
ReplyDeleteI'm sensing some repressed emotions on Hanson's part. Who wants to make some money writing VDH/Jay-Z Rule 34?
ReplyDeleteJust give the chainsaw back Jay Z and we'll say no more.
ReplyDeleteThe Five Percent Nation is calling out Jay-Z as a fraud for wearing that medallion.
ReplyDeleteAnd it's easy for you to reject Jay Z, because you've still got Jay C, Jay D, and twenty-one other Jays between you and him.
Slash-your-wrists fiction.
ReplyDeleteSo I know we're not actually talking about anything Hanson said, but I just paged through the last column on that list, and...holy shit. More than any other pundit, I fail to understand why anyone reads VDH. Everything he writes about politics is just a random assortment of talking points, creaky old bugaboos and Mark Steyn-brand simulated humor, all tied together with the pseudo-scholarly pablum of a bright but seriously self-obsessed high school senior. And it's all so random, like he can't stick to the topic at hand.
ReplyDeleteHere, I'll show you. I decided to write down the subject(s) of each of the sixteen paragraphs in his latest column. It's yet another "limousine liberals" pitch, so the subject is usually a "liberal" (as defined by him) that he considers a hypocrite for having money. Here's how it broke down:
Para 1 - Elizabeth Warren, Al Gore
Para 2 - Michelle Obama
Para 3 - "Silicon Valley to Chevy Chase"
Para 4 - Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz
Para 5 - The Steyer brothers and "the media"
Para 6 - Bill Gates, the Obamas
Para 7 - Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, John Kerry, Al Gore, universities
Para 8 - The thesis (yes, in paragraph eight)
Para 9 - The Steyer brothers and Al Gore yet again
Para 10 - Bill Gates, Warren Buffett
Para 11 - Hedge fund managers and financiers (well-known leftists all)
Para 12 - Pajama Boy (fuck you, Hanson)
Para 13 - Facebook, Google
Para 14 - No liberals, just a note on how awesome fracking is
Para 15 - Johnny Depp, Jay-Z
Para 16 - Conclusion
And when you're reading this, it's even more perplexing than this. Hanson can't go two sentences without losing the subject. The above is shot through with conservative urban legends (like the one about Warren claiming American Indian heritage to get affirmative action), shopworn reactionary saws about endangered species and Ivy League colleges (which all liberals attend, of course), and VDH signature complaints about "hipness." It's like he cracked open the right-blogosphere and poured the liquid into a blender.
Seriously, who the fuck reads this? Any teenager who watches the news every once in a while could do what VDH does, except the teenager would eventually get better at it.
Maybe VDH has him confused with the "you can call me Ray or you can call me Jay" guy.
ReplyDeleteWell, she's got a lot of money, and she undercuts racist notions of feminine beauty, so yeah, scary.
ReplyDeleteFuckity fuck fuck fuck, the Ray J. guy made a disco single. I'm a disco agnostic- some is good, most falls under "Sturgeon's Law"... with this being a prime example of the latter.
ReplyDeleteSounds like you need to back away from the internet for awhile J. Take a hike in the woods. Enjoy a sunset. Get laid. Life can be so much better than pointless FB conflicts.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised that such a distinguished and perceptive Scholar of Culture as VDH is still on about Johnny Depp. Doesn't he know that the Liberal Illuminati decided to dispose of Depp by making the Lone Ranger bomb? Our subliminal marching orders come from Jennifer Lawrence now.
ReplyDeleteVictor Davis Hanson is Mr. Dick.
ReplyDelete(Readers of David Copperfield will know what I mean; others will... well, you'll get the point just fine anyway.)
back in 1998 VDH was complaining that his academic colleagues are no
ReplyDeletebetter than computer programs, just churning out new permutations of a
few basic ideas.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tO1X6_AKKEo/UthBhDP0YeI/AAAAAAAAOYE/XAUg5McqF24/s1600/hanson.PNG
Needs moar 'establishment grandees'.
ReplyDeleteJay B ... Jay Z. I think you know EXACTLY which 5% medallion we're talking about.
ReplyDeleteIt's like madlibs, because he's mad at libs.
ReplyDeleteMy mental image of VDH:
ReplyDeletehttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-n3H6k5FdU70/Utg5hbAEs5I/AAAAAAAAOXw/9ofpcQdtj3I/s1600/hesiod.jpg
Googling "Victor Davis Hanson + grandee" is just depressing. I mean, the poverty of the guy's vocabulary.
ReplyDeleteLove-Hate. They regret that the rules didn't keep them all underfoot, but on the bright side, they can use the handful who escape as cover by pretending that even those people can succeed if they'd just quit whining, get off their lazy welfare-sucking asses and become "almost billionaires."
ReplyDeleteThe 5% nation of lumps in my oatmeal?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUF19MJWowM
How do you know he wasn't getting laid in the woods at sunset while having this Facebook discussion?
ReplyDeletePretty much. Needs a turtleneck sweater and a pipe.
ReplyDelete"No chainsaws were stolen in the making of this empire."
ReplyDeleteTiger Woods certainly won't do--too many oldsters really like him.
ReplyDeleteThe Gazoogle reveals that VDH has been ranting about Tiger Woods from 2007 to the present, as the beneficiary of some unspecified but resentment-inducing form of affirmative action, so his popularity is evidently no hindrance.
Slash-your-wrists-using-a-table-top-fan fiction.
ReplyDeleteFTFY
And remember that VDH is held up as a real power intellect because he write the occasional bit on history. Never mind that his history "scholarship" is about at the same level as this stuff.
ReplyDeleteI think the strangest part of the whole thing is that he ties in hedge-fund billionaires among the liberal elite who would be happy to pay a 50% marginal tax rate as long as they get to keep the other half. These are people who likened taxing their income as income at all to the Nazi invasion of Poland.
ReplyDelete[Snort.]
ReplyDeleteassume it's a medical acronym
ReplyDeleteBe choosy -- chew CHEW-Z!
Just speaking for myself, I'm not bothered at all by other people having billions of dollars. Let them jet-set their way around the world and eat expensive food and such. I don't care.
ReplyDeleteWhat freaks me out is when they buy politicians and organize "dark money" campaigns and finance propaganda. That's when I've got a problem with them.
I'm not jealous of their money; I'm jealous of their political influence. I think that ordinary working people like myself ought to have a little influence over the system too.
Is that too much to ask?
Apparently Woods is popular not because he is good at whacking a little white ball across areas of grass, but only because he combines those ball-whacking skills with visible membership of an ethnic minority, so you know, unfair advantage.
ReplyDeleteIs THAT what happened to The Lone Ranger?
ReplyDeleteAnd here I was thinking it bombed because it was such a lousy movie...
Sounds like easy money.
ReplyDeleteHe could have been!
ReplyDelete(by the way, that John Carpenter movie was great. Thanks for recommending it.)
Yeah, ol' Sturgeon had a point alright, and this song does prove it.
ReplyDeleteNot a bad bass line, though.
These days? Apparently so.
ReplyDeleteThat's dangerous ground for VDH: My mother-in-law is probably the quintessential example of his target audience, and she LURVES her some Tiger Woods golf watching.
ReplyDeleteAs for Jay-Z, mama wouldn't know him if he fixed a flat tire for her--he'd just be "a nice man who helped me." So I have to wonder if the rest of VDH's readership gets through more than a sentence or two of his stuff before throwing up their hands and deciding to find out what hilarious hijinks Garfield is up to today.
Nope, Hollywood political correctness. Same reason Song of the South got censored by the Obammunists.
ReplyDeleteWell I think we all know that Pajama Boy is the real racist.
ReplyDeleteHe's just mad because his book reviews continue to fail the Turing test.
ReplyDeleteWhy Johnny Depp? Because as a Hollywood star he's an unworthy successor to such paragons of American masculinity as Clark Gable, John Wayne and Gerard Butler.
ReplyDeleteCan Victor Davis Hanson make a single argument that doesn't reveal the shallow spite at the heart of his worldview? When he asks if the children of African American millionaires should recieve financial assistance and the help of programs like affirmative action to attend university when none of that is provided for less affluent white people, he is throwing a boomerang really hard. Because the answer isn't the one he's trying to lead his audience to which is something like "No that's unfair reverse racism!", the actual answer is "No, you dessicated old warmonger, it isn't right. Post secondary education at accredited learning institutions should be free to every citizen at taxpayers expense, because this is allegedly a civilized modern country."
ReplyDeleteThis is hot.
ReplyDeleteWITH A YETI.
ReplyDeleteJay-Z has ninety-nine problems, and VDH desperately wants to be one.
ReplyDeleteWhat really disgusts about this is how the influence they purchase gets used. It's not even for things as prosaic as "Give my brother-in-law the contract to rebuild that bridge over I-84." That kind of thing would at least help to spread the wealth while creating jobs AND doing something useful for society at large.
ReplyDeleteInstead, the influence purchased is used to 1.) push for lower or no taxes on investment income, 2.) push for repeal of the Estate Tax, 3.) push for repeal of any and all regulation or, failing that, setting up a system of regulatory capture to defang the agencies. In other words, the influence is used to simply amass more wealth in ways that are as destructive to the common good as possible.
Well, in fairness, Jay-Z does have all those suspicious links to the Illuminati. The Roc Nation head office is even on the list of potential Illuminati headquarters. So cut VDH some slack: If there's one thing he can't stand, it's secretive businessmen with extensive connections using their wealth and power to subvert democracy.
ReplyDeleteI've never understood why the worlds rich and powerful bankers, politicians, and entertainers would need a secret society to run the world, when they're quite obviously running the world openly. it seems like an awfully big waste of time and effort to go through just to wear silly robes and goofy hats.
ReplyDeleteNow we know how he does it. He has a big wheel with those names on it. He says, "Oh, yeah? Well what about ___?" and spins the wheel. Sure, it's "analogue." But when something works, you stick with it.
ReplyDeletethey are morally inferior to people who made their money buying property with oil under it
ReplyDeleteAgain, you're being unfair to VD. They're also morally inferior to people who inherited the money of those who bought property with oil under it.
BINGO!
ReplyDeleteLiving in France probably contributes to their hatred, too.
ReplyDeleteReal Americans prefer Can-D, lie-beral.
ReplyDeleteMost of Jay-Z's beats these days are made by distorting audio of old growth forest being senselessly destroyed. He claims it's the only thing that inspires him.
ReplyDeleteAnd before you ask, yes, it's critical that the destruction serve no purpose.
It's like reading one of those reports about some guy who wanted to impress his girlfriend by playing Russian Roulette with an automatic, or about a guy who had his girlfriend shoot him point-blank to test the porosity of his newfound flak jacket. You always arrive at the least surprising line in the whole thing: It's suspected that alcohol was involved.
ReplyDeleteI assume a similar line for the creation of any VDH column, since he always reminds me of the guy in Anybar, USA who whinges to no one in particular from within his own bottomless pool of ressentiment, lurching from one complaint to the next: "Al Gore! That fuck... [downs shot] and that fucking libtard rich fuck Johnny Depp anniz fucking pirate movies... [slug of beer chaser] Jay-Z....[wipes mouth, tries to light cigarette] fucking shit every last wunna them."
Just as you distilled his latest, pun intended.
when they're quite obviously running the world openly.
ReplyDeleteThe obvious ones aren't actually running the world. You think the true masters of the planet would throw such public tantrums over being treated with insufficient deference? Such apparent insecurity is precisely because they know they'll be the scapegoats if the tumbrels ever do start to roll.
it seems like an awfully big waste of time and effort to go through just to wear silly robes and goofy hats.
We're talking about the Illuminati, not the Stonecutters. The Illuminati regalia is actually quite stylish ... or, uh, so it is rumored. Besides, Abraxas must be honored in the traditional fashion, lest he grow wrathful ... or, uh, so it is rumored.
Are you kidding? Beyonce sang at Obama's second inauguration. That makes her at least an obersturmbannfuhrer of liberal fascism.
ReplyDeleteAlso, remember she ruined the Super Bowl by exposing her slutty slutty legs during what should have been the Up With People anniversary special.
I thought the whole point of Tiger Woods to people VDH's age and spittle flecked tendencies was that he owed his skill to the ruthless tutoring of his Thai father so he proved that any black person who allowed their essential worthlessness to be ameliorated by a doctrinaire asian father could pull themselves up by their own bootstraps? Tiger Woods who was famously so unblack that he coined the term Cablinasian for himself used to be one of the "good ones" who didn't make white people feel guilty.
ReplyDeleteI don't actually know who Jay-Z is. I know who Beyonce is but I couldn't name any of her songs. I'm that out of touch.
ReplyDeleteWhat's to stop him from boycotting Jay-Z?
ReplyDeleteYou can't boycott something you already don't consume, to start with.
Didn't she sing at the first inauguration, for the dance that President Obama and Michelle danced to first? It was "At Last"--I'm not sure it was here though. But it definitely seemed like the end times to wingnuts that Black Entertainers were going to be at the White House as other than a freak show. There was definitely (and is in the Jay Z stuff) real horror that the Black President knows Black people socially and invites them to our house. Where Kennedy and Jackie were celebrated for bringing glamor and youth to the white house Obama and Michelle are excoriated for bringing thugs. I wonder why that is?
ReplyDeleteYou are an optimist, aren't you.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure that if Jay Z's kids apply to Harvard the only person whose place they will be taking is some other AA kid whose parent can't pay full freight and legitimately needs the scholarship help to attend college. Far from stealing some white kid's scholarship Jay Z's kids will pay full tuition and probably be hit up for some serious dough to fund other people while Harvard double dips on the categories and "counts" them towards their diversity quota.
ReplyDeleteThat and he looks so good in heavy eye makeup he makes any number of people question their sexual orientation. Eye makeup on men = bad, I'm told.
ReplyDeleteI was reading Michael Lind's biography of the Bushs some years ago (or else I'm thinking of Kitty Kelly) and the description of how Bush had a job schmoozing farmers to get the oil leases under their farms was absolutely jaw dropping in its horror. You'd have to be an utterly shitty person to choose that as your principle form of work.
ReplyDeleteI was long out of college several times before I found out what a sweet deal a college student gets in western Europe (as long as you pass the entrance exams of course). If I were a just graduating-and-in-a-world-of-debt American, I suspect I'd have better access to that information and be seriously wondering WTF, this socialism stuff doesn't look half bad. The austerity VDH and his masters have rained down upon the newest members of Team Adulthood is what's going to get the tumbrels rolling.
ReplyDeleteIt's Tiger's mom who's Thai, actually.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that reminds me of one of Dave Chapelle's classic 'tweaking our racial tensions in a way that oh woops it turns out a lot of people didn't get' sketches - the Racial Draft.
ReplyDeleteThe basic premise is that all the races are coming together to take turns 'drafting' people of mixed or ambiguous race for their team. The black delegation picks Woods, and a grinning Chapelle comes on stage using the voice he normally reserved for playing white characters, to say something he's always wanted to say- 'forshizzle.'
Cut to the commentators informing us that Woods has just lost all his major sponsorships, but at least he has FUBU.
+1 it's a hard knock life
ReplyDeleteKeith Richards was definitely baaad in his kohl days.
ReplyDeleteAhh, the endless font of merriment and delusion that is Fred Hiatt's Bucket O' Bullshit. Today:
ReplyDeleteEditorial: The president binds America’s hands
Ignatius: Obama ignores crucial lessons
Will: Obamanomics is bad news for millennials
Lane: Kinsley’s critique of Greenwald is spot-on
Rubin: Ted Cruz shows adeptness at foreign policy
I'm reminded of the Buddhist traditions that believe in various metaphorical hells: the Diamond-Beak Hornet Hell or the Great Screaming Hell. Now add the Victor Davis Hanson Wanking Hell. Complain to the management and they'll move you into the front row.
ReplyDeletePBS had a documentary last year that followed the process of casting and staging that song for the most recent Broadway revival (it's adorable and so worth seeking out if your into that sort of thing, but I had it stuck in my head for days afterwards), and in one of his talking heads Charles Strouse is complaining about how they did it in the movie ("they're laughing and having pillow fights. What's hard-knock about that?") before segueing to "now that Jay-Z fellow, he got what I was going for."
ReplyDeleteI want to watch VDH watch that scene so very very much.
Exactly. The commons belongs to all of us, and we should all get some kind of say.
ReplyDeleteAnd yet, if I criticize the billionaires at all, some conservative always seems to accuse me of "just being jealous."
Uh, Tigers mother is Thai, it was his African-American father who taught him about golf. That makes it even worse, because everybody 'knows' that isn't possible.
ReplyDeleteIt's the fact that he's an African-American who succeeded at a sport traditionally associated with successful white males that gets Hansons rage up, IMHO.
They don't accuse you of being jealous--they accuse you of fomenting class warfare and advocating for the destruction of society. After all, saying something unkind about the Koch brothers is precisely equivalent to sending a trainload of Jews and Gypsies off to the gas chamber at Auschwitz.
ReplyDeleteif there's any one person our culture sorely needed in the last ten years, it was that guy.
ReplyDeleteBasically know this: Jay-Z is an incredibly talented rapper who they can't even apply the standard codespeak they have for rappers to, because for over a decade, barring a few incidents, his public image has been that of a hypercompetent businessman, and now hypercompetent business man with a loving wife and daughter. That's infuriating for them.
ReplyDeleteI always liked Charles Barkley's observation:
ReplyDelete"You know it's going to Hell when the best rapper out there is white and the best golfer is black"
Dear Mark Zuckerberg,
ReplyDeleteI never thought it would happen to me, but...
Additionally, the last time Jay-Z released anything remotely edgy (that wasn't along with Kanye) was approximately freaking 2004. Jay-Z in the year 2014 invests and attends basketball games. Real outrageous stuff.
ReplyDeleteGiven that they already have a stable of wingnuts to choose from, why even bother keeping Jenny Rubin around? Don't get me wrong- all of them are embarrassing, it's just that Rubin is *particularly* worse than the rest. Romney Rising!
ReplyDeleteThe Kochs are even worse, ripping off Native Americans who have oil under their lands.
ReplyDelete"it's just that Rubin is *particularly* worse than the rest"
ReplyDeleteThat's why they keep her.
"Small increases in the marginal tax rate" is one of those concepts, like "sexual consent" or "empirical evidence," that the right wing simply can't comprehend.
ReplyDeleteOr "hating success".
ReplyDeleteYeah, I've heard that.
ReplyDeleteAlso "you just want to punish people for being successful" comes up a lot... why would I want that?
Hanson spits it: 'I've got 99 problems and Jay-Z is every one.'
ReplyDeleteBlack golfers get to tee off 60 yards closer to the hole. Don't you know that.
ReplyDeleteMaybe VDH's objection to Tiger Woods is that he makes his living hitting something white around with a club.
ReplyDeleteNot the good kohl days then.
ReplyDeleteThat was my guess.
ReplyDeletePurposeless destruction, hmm. In his video with Kanye for "Otis", the two of them take saw and torch to a quarter-million dollar Maybach and turn into a Mad-Max-style hot rod. And the song itself is basically just both of them bragging about how much richer they are than you. This in a song that's ostensibly a tribute to, and samples from, Otis Redding. Go figure.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoEKWtgJQAU
But fucking Beyoncé?
ReplyDeleteAhem:
http://globalgrind.com/2014/02/25/beyonce-partition-full-video/
(Video too explicit for YouTube, requires sign in. This link is to a blog embed.)
I'll be in my bunk.
He has some non-European doohickeys in his bloodstream!
ReplyDeleteHey, it's not class warfare until you fight back.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking as a drunkard, i object to that slander.
ReplyDeleteThey couldn't hack it as bishops and cardinals, so this was the only Silly Robe and Goofy Hat route available to them.
ReplyDeleteI kinda get the idea VDH really wants Jay Z off'n his fuckin' lawn...
ReplyDeleteLane: Kinsley’s critique of Greenwald is spot-on
ReplyDeleteFurther proof of Meanie's 2nd law; "one man's indisputable logic is another man's impenetrable B. S."
Is it just me, or is our Plutocrats having difficulty adjusting to a digital new century in which all their previously secret, unseen machinations are now known to any ditch digger with an internet connection?
ReplyDeleteSee me, feel me, touch meeeeee...
ReplyDelete