TRY THIS SIMPLE TEST. "[The Ole Perfesser's] blog is compulsively readable because it's not predictable and it's not partisan." -- Althouse.
This comical fiction about Perfesser Reynolds is apparently hard to kill, but as we have in the past and for the benefit of our younger readers, we will open the current page of Instapundit and analyze the contents of the postings (this morning’s only -- I don’t have all day or an iron stomach):
11:26 am: Liberals are asking Bush to intervene in Darfur just so they can attack him for doing so.
11:18 am: Science fiction nerd stuff.
11:15 am: Idiosyncratic French defamation trial result spurs common Perfesser trope suggesting that liberals hate free speech.
11:11 am: Shitty digital snapshot.
10:15 am: Perfesser’s wife sends trolls to alicublog because liberals hate free speech.
10:11 am: Liberals also hate homosexuals.
9:59 am: Being a law perfesser is easy and fun.
9:49 am: Taxes R Bad.
9:22 am: Incredibly shitty video clip.
8:52 am: OpinionJournal thinks torture bill is a twofer -- allows torture, slaps tyrannical liberal judges. Perfesser thinks it’s just a onefer.
8:44 am: Oooh, army mens! When can we invade?
8:34 am: Liberals hate free speech.
8:25 am:: Pharma-nerd “If I take enough pills with weird number-letter combination names I can live forever" bullshit.
8:20 am: The only real problem with our invasion of Iraq is that we haven’t invaded Iran too.
8:05 am: Ha ha! Democrats will lose. Ha ha!
7:58 am: Liberals hate homosexuals, privacy.
7:51 am: Clinton likes torture, so liberals are hypocrites.
This test works with any page of Instapunditry, even those that include the semi-regular Fourth Amendment and gay marriage defenses that are his sole fig-leaves.
I used to think that Althouse, the Perfesser, and other conservatives denied their orientation because they were ashamed of it, but time has proven that they are strangers to shame. My current operating analysis is that they're attempting to normalize wing-nuttery -- that is, if a popular writer can be identified as "not partisan" though 95% of what he professes is right-wing boilerplate, folks who are new in town may take that to mean that ordinary, untainted-by-politics people are supposed to believe exactly what right-wing political operatives believe.
It's nice work if you can get it, and you can get it if you lie.
UPDATE. Links fixed. I hate how Word for the (blech) PC manages text almost as much as I hate free speech, homosexuality, and America.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
YOU CAN'T TALK TO ME THAT WAY! Dr. Mrs. Ole Perfesser is sending trolls to alicublog and elsewhere. Their mission:
My great temptation is to tell Dr. Mrs. to take the bone out of her nose and call me back, but I will patiently explain things to her and whatever minions may be stopping by:
alicublog is not a teahouse, nor a group hug, nor a simulation of a League of Women Voters debate. It is a place for me to spout off and for such as wish to join me to do so. I have never banned anyone, though one troll, after irritating me with his anti-Mets comments, has pre-emptively banned himself ("You're threat of censorship has won"); but I reserve the right to do so, just as conservative bloggers who have comments features (which of course leaves out the Ole Perfesser hisself) do all the time. Really, anyone is welcome to come over, at least at first, even tards and mouth-breathers.
I hate to break it to the Doctor and her friends, but there's really no foolproof way to keep from being "ridiculed," here or anywhere else in the world. Though they could reduce their risk of being ridiculed by not being so fucking ridiculous.
Post comments around on various lefty blogs such as FireDogLake, The Daily Kos or Alicublog. These comments should disagree with the view of the host or view of the blog or diary; for example, state that you support Israel at the Daily Kos, wonder if feminists who are against sexual harrassment should support Bill Clinton at FireDogLake, and/or politely stand up for colleagues at Alicublog who you feel have been treated unfairly just because they disagree with the views of the host. Now, check back to evaluate scores for these paragons of openness for their ideas, actions and feelings. If your comments have been troll-scored by the Kossacks, deleted by Jane Hamsher, or ridiculed by whoever runs the Alicublog, give an openness score of zero. Negative bonus points if you are called a douche, told to stay in your place so as not to "assail your betters," or have a racial slur thrown your way. [emphasis mine]That's right -- if someone comes to my own site and challenges me, I'm not supposed to make fun of them or I'm a fascist.
My great temptation is to tell Dr. Mrs. to take the bone out of her nose and call me back, but I will patiently explain things to her and whatever minions may be stopping by:
alicublog is not a teahouse, nor a group hug, nor a simulation of a League of Women Voters debate. It is a place for me to spout off and for such as wish to join me to do so. I have never banned anyone, though one troll, after irritating me with his anti-Mets comments, has pre-emptively banned himself ("You're threat of censorship has won"); but I reserve the right to do so, just as conservative bloggers who have comments features (which of course leaves out the Ole Perfesser hisself) do all the time. Really, anyone is welcome to come over, at least at first, even tards and mouth-breathers.
I hate to break it to the Doctor and her friends, but there's really no foolproof way to keep from being "ridiculed," here or anywhere else in the world. Though they could reduce their risk of being ridiculed by not being so fucking ridiculous.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
WHEW. Tomorrow will be a nail-biter with Jeff Suppan pitching on good rest. If we win, the MVP is Rick Peterson. Met pitching entered the series in tatters and got to Game 7. Now Oliver Perez, who a few weeks ago was nobody on his way to nowhere with a 6.55 ERA, has a chance to win his second NLCS game. They came into the Series favored, but tomorrow they'll have to play like inspired underdogs. This is of course a Mets equity. To quote the motto, and William Holden in The Wild Bunch, let's go.
PLENTY OF THIS AROUND THESE DAYS: Another conservative explains that liberals hate homosexuals because some of them are telling non-homosexuals that conservative homosexuals are homosexuals.
The joy is all in the comments, with mentions of "that group of people who profess to be 'liberals'" (as opposed to the real liberals, who will all vote for conservative candidates) and the genius phrase "Faux Liberal Left," which I guess means that, as the real liberals will all be voting for conservatives, and the liberals won't vote for liberals because they're not really liberals (no word as to who we are voting for -- Satan, I guess), nobody will vote for the liberals, and America will be saved. After all, as J. Peden remarks, "Apart from Dhimmis and Parasites, it's in no one's interest to vote Democrat."
Seeing what "real" and "Lieberman" liberals are like, you have to wonder how we ever passed the New Deal.
UPDATE. John Cole breaks it down. We all Deeply Regret the Politics of Personal Destruction, &tc. But if you think Republicans are the party of clean politics, you have a very bad gas leak and you should call 911 before you pass out.
The joy is all in the comments, with mentions of "that group of people who profess to be 'liberals'" (as opposed to the real liberals, who will all vote for conservative candidates) and the genius phrase "Faux Liberal Left," which I guess means that, as the real liberals will all be voting for conservatives, and the liberals won't vote for liberals because they're not really liberals (no word as to who we are voting for -- Satan, I guess), nobody will vote for the liberals, and America will be saved. After all, as J. Peden remarks, "Apart from Dhimmis and Parasites, it's in no one's interest to vote Democrat."
Seeing what "real" and "Lieberman" liberals are like, you have to wonder how we ever passed the New Deal.
UPDATE. John Cole breaks it down. We all Deeply Regret the Politics of Personal Destruction, &tc. But if you think Republicans are the party of clean politics, you have a very bad gas leak and you should call 911 before you pass out.
GO-BAGS FOR CO-BAGS. Maybe you have known someone who, after he or she read The Late, Great Planet Earth or The Population Bomb, or saw An Inconvenient Truth, went nuts and started digging a fallout/pollution/global warming/zombie shelter in the backyard. I certainly haven't, thank God, nor had I even heard of such a thing before the Ole Perfesser's column about what he perceives from his suburban panopticon as a wave of "lefty apocalypticism":
All this is of course projection of the most pathetic sort, as The Perfesser is himself kind of a freak about preparedness:
Christ Jesus, what a dork. What a bunch of dorks, as Army Man Preparedness games seem to be a right-wing blogger affliction. Check out this guy --
Where once people on the right were worried about the shock troops of the socialist New World Order or the breakup of America into racial enclaves, now it seems like it's mostly lefties worrying about self-reliance in the face of collapsing unsustainable technology, and the dangers of suburban extinction in the face of high oil prices. As with some of the righty books from the 1990s, there's a curious push-pull here: Though these are warnings of catastrophes to come, there's a sense that to some extent those catastrophes involve society getting what it deserves for its sinful ways, perhaps coupled with an opportunity for purification in the wake of the crisis -- with the virtuously prepared having the upper hand, of course.I don't know where these commie survivalist camps are located, but if they have Free Love, I'm in!
All this is of course projection of the most pathetic sort, as The Perfesser is himself kind of a freak about preparedness:
I've got this emergency radio and it seems to be pretty good...Etc. The Perfesser has even envisioned a day when ordinary citizens will take over the chores of Homeland Security:
Personally, I also keep a copy of my old Boy Scout Handbook in my kit...
Yes, I took an advanced first aid course years ago -- it was more like bush medicine, really...
No plausible government program could prepare us adequately for the kind of unlikely cataclysm [some stupid scifi potboiler he likes] employs -- but, in fact, if we should ever find ourselves needing people who can construct a lorica segmentata we've got them...
...here's a family survival kit for $50 and it's pretty good. Most poor people in America can afford food (that's why so many poor people are fat)...
Aside from reporting any potential terrorists you might run across at strip clubs, you can maintain situational awareness, especially in public places like airports, shopping malls, and so on. Jeff Cooper's book, Principles of Personal Defense, contains a number of games and mental exercises designed to promote that sort of awareness......presumably including that 3-D chess Spock and Kirk used to play.
Christ Jesus, what a dork. What a bunch of dorks, as Army Man Preparedness games seem to be a right-wing blogger affliction. Check out this guy --
After Tom died, his widow -- a woman he loved and married in his final weeks -- was going through various things and came to his car. He hadn't used it for some months. When she began to clean it out she noticed first that the front seats had been rigged so that they could flatten backwards. Then she noticed that the back seat had been rigged so it would pop out easily enabling you to crawl into the trunk. Opening the trunk she found blankets, a number of military issue MREs, containers of water, a folding shovel, a long crow bar, two hundred feet of rope with knots tied in it every two feet, and three small but powerful hydraulic jacks......and the genitals of his victims in the freezer. Oh, and look who pops up in comments:
I have a Go-Sack, a Go-Bag, and a Go-Box. The Sack is in the closet, and contains requisites necessary for a trip from here to there, God forbid. The Box is in the garage, and can be thrown in the car in a second; it has food, electronics, fire, cooking tools, wind-up radios, pointy things, all that Coleman crap you can buy at Target. The Bag has all the digitized histories. Worst comes to worst: one, two, three, and we're off.Yes, it ends just like that -- old Jimbo Lileks musta got them "twinges" in the middle of his sentence. But from time to time he elaborates at the Bleat:
I often feel foolish for having these things, let alone updating them from time to time. Until I read entries like yours. And the comments! I'll add a notebook and a book to the Box.
Tomorrow. Or one of the days that follow. Hell, next week. What's the ru
Me, I have three bins, and they have everything required for a two-day trip to Fargo by back roads, should the worst case scenario arise and the tripods burst from the ground. Why Fargo? You ask. Because my family has a gas station, that’s why, and it’s loaded with food and fuel. They have a generator the size of a VW bus and underground tanks full of petroleum. No, I’m sorry, you can’t come. There’s not enough Coleman™ shower-in-a-pouch personal wipes for everyone. Get off the running board! Honey, close your eyes.I don't see how the Perfesser failed to notice that we lie-berals all cluster in big coastal cities so that, comes the apocalypse, we can all die quickly, and be spared the ensuing road company production of Lord of the Flies in which, after a moment of cheerful solidarity over the death of the Left, conservative bloggers become crazed by pixel deprivation and express their Will to Power-Strips by jousting with Coleman™ lanterns and loricas segmentata.
Then I made an open-faced peanut butter sandwich.
THE DEPAHTED. Well, that was bracing. Scorsese got a hell of a good script and directed the shit out of it. This is not a bloated obsessional gig like the last couple -- it's a lean mean one, with a crackerjack cast and Ballhaus and Schoonmaker and Shore on deck. You can feel the pleasure of the material in every artist's hand.
Since Scorsese left the old neighborhood, film-wise, his strength in milieu details has become more obvious and admirable to me. I always expected him to catch Little Italy and the Lower East Side -- indeed recognized them in his movies -- but he also showed a similarly obsessive feel for the plug hats, blind tigers, and all-sorts barrels of Gangs of New York, and for the airplane hangars, nightclubs, and richie haunts of The Aviator. Boston gang- and cop-life are equally well-limned here: smoking old moms with oxygen tubes, Southie hood bars and candy stores (even when actually filmed in my own neighborhood), and claustrophobic command centers all have the flavorful stink of life, as does Scorsese's direction of dialogue in those supercharged environments, especially in the tart cursing banter of Alec Baldwin and Marky Mark. They may or may not be true, but they feel just right.
As for the tale, we have two undercover men -- one for the mob, one for the cops -- pursuing parallel missions through the mean streets. What it all amounts to is open to debate. Something attracted Scorsese to the Hong Kong resolution of this Mexican standoff -- tribal blood being thicker than divergent streams of moral water, and all that. Dignam's character is the most interesting element (not to say he's the most interesting character) -- from his harsh reactions to both protagonists, we get the feeling that he has the bone-deepest feeling for the real game, and his resolution confirms it (abetted by a glimpse of a rat scuttling across our view of a gold dome). Is that it, then? All intrigue is equal, and all are punishèd?
There can be no debate on the playing. Nicholson does less Jacking off than usual, which does not muffle his dazzle; what a fine, human villain he makes. Everyone else gets top marks, even Vera Farmiga, if only for struggling gamely through another functionary Scorsese female lead role. We may measure the gap between The Departed and the very highest screen art in the distance between Valli's screen cross at the end of The Third Man and Farmiga's here. But it's still close enough to merit the price of admission.
Since Scorsese left the old neighborhood, film-wise, his strength in milieu details has become more obvious and admirable to me. I always expected him to catch Little Italy and the Lower East Side -- indeed recognized them in his movies -- but he also showed a similarly obsessive feel for the plug hats, blind tigers, and all-sorts barrels of Gangs of New York, and for the airplane hangars, nightclubs, and richie haunts of The Aviator. Boston gang- and cop-life are equally well-limned here: smoking old moms with oxygen tubes, Southie hood bars and candy stores (even when actually filmed in my own neighborhood), and claustrophobic command centers all have the flavorful stink of life, as does Scorsese's direction of dialogue in those supercharged environments, especially in the tart cursing banter of Alec Baldwin and Marky Mark. They may or may not be true, but they feel just right.
As for the tale, we have two undercover men -- one for the mob, one for the cops -- pursuing parallel missions through the mean streets. What it all amounts to is open to debate. Something attracted Scorsese to the Hong Kong resolution of this Mexican standoff -- tribal blood being thicker than divergent streams of moral water, and all that. Dignam's character is the most interesting element (not to say he's the most interesting character) -- from his harsh reactions to both protagonists, we get the feeling that he has the bone-deepest feeling for the real game, and his resolution confirms it (abetted by a glimpse of a rat scuttling across our view of a gold dome). Is that it, then? All intrigue is equal, and all are punishèd?
There can be no debate on the playing. Nicholson does less Jacking off than usual, which does not muffle his dazzle; what a fine, human villain he makes. Everyone else gets top marks, even Vera Farmiga, if only for struggling gamely through another functionary Scorsese female lead role. We may measure the gap between The Departed and the very highest screen art in the distance between Valli's screen cross at the end of The Third Man and Farmiga's here. But it's still close enough to merit the price of admission.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
SOMEHOW I ALWAYS KNEW: "Personally, I agree with Donald Trump: Handshaking is unsanitary, and we should replace it with something else... Next time, I'm taking a big pump-bottle of Purell."
A germ phobia, synesthesia ("falling rain 'looks' like polkadots...Electric guitars look like multicolored spaghetti.."), and a strong desire to become an immortal robot lawyer... yeah, I'd say he suits his constituency right down to the ground.
A germ phobia, synesthesia ("falling rain 'looks' like polkadots...Electric guitars look like multicolored spaghetti.."), and a strong desire to become an immortal robot lawyer... yeah, I'd say he suits his constituency right down to the ground.
NOT A FUN DATE. I think we'll be looking in on S. T. Karnick a lot. Best known for his National Review gig of scanning TV shows for Jesus-friendly content, he also maintains a blog showcasing his fist-shaking and finger-wagging skills. Here we get Karnick's ravings against an advertising slogan:
I'm always surprised when I see pictures of these people and they appear older than 12.
Even so, the notion that one can run wild without any consequences to the state of one's mind and soul is truly repulsive. Casting aside your morality for a few days may seem to be just a temporary matter of "blowing off a little steam," but that's just a convenient excuse: human beings are not steam engines.Also, "Winston Tastes Good Like a Cigarette Should" promotes bad grammar, and "Does She or Doesn't She?" totally caused the sexual revolution.
To think that one can indulge in extramarital affairs, long hours of gambling, or binge drinking and not expect to carry home some reinforcement of the urges that brought the person to Vegas in the first place is incredibly naive and truly stupid.
And note the words used in the ad: what happens in Vegas. These things simply "happen" in Vegas, you see. You're not responsible for your choices; they simply happen. So of course there should be no consequences—it wouldn't be fair for you to be punished for something that simply "happened" to you.
What a wretched message to send to people.
I'm always surprised when I see pictures of these people and they appear older than 12.
SEE YOU IN GITMO. Scrolling through the logs, I find that my site was recently visted from wdcsun27.usdoj.gov and tias-gw2.treas.gov. I also found a similar usage pattern here, which suggests that I am on some government nut watch list.
My questions are:
1.) Does this kind of thing ever happen to you? and
2.) Which one of you ratted me out?
My questions are:
1.) Does this kind of thing ever happen to you? and
2.) Which one of you ratted me out?
Monday, October 16, 2006
BULLSHIT LIBERTARIANS REDUX. Jennifer Roback Morse is best known to us as the B-list sex scold responsible for bon mots such as these:
Would you classify Roback as your garden variety Jesus freak? Well, guess again!
To be fair, when Morse brought out her anti-gay-marriage, anti-contraception, anti-fornication libertarianism, "Much to my disappointment, my libertarian and economist friends seemed uninterested." (Later, when, "much to my surprise," Roback "spent the next five years talking to social conservatives," she was amazed at how much she -- a libertarian, remember! -- got on with the Christers. "I appreciated the fact that they’d talk to me." As well she should have.)
This isn't so much a dig at true libertarians -- if there are any -- as a further demonstration that the most common use of libertarianism is as a cloaking device for right-wing nuts.
The Left hates sex. Do not be deluded by the fact that the Left is hyper-active about sexual activity. Far too many on the Left are profoundly uncomfortable by any evidence of sex differences between men and women...It's hard to pick a favorite out of so rich a trove, but a sure contender would be, "The feminist movement introduced an unbelievable amount of tension into the relationships between men and women." She also hates Plan B and, weirdly, artificial insemination.
And make no mistake about it: men do sometimes go over the line and become obsessively jealous, even dangerously jealous. But, one thing is for sure. A woman knows that she matters to a guy who gets jealous...
For many people in modern America ...sex is a recreational activity, and a consumer good... the sexual partner has become an object that satisfies [one] more or less well.
Some heterosexuals believe they are entitled to unlimited sexual activity without pregnancy... Some homosexuals, particularly the professional activists, find it incomprehensible that sexual activity could be anybody's business but the two parties involved. So these activists can make common cause with heterosexuals who hold these views.
Would you classify Roback as your garden variety Jesus freak? Well, guess again!
I suppose some people now consider me a social conservative, even though I never intended to be any such thing. I still consider myself a minimum-government libertarian, who has thought through the implications of the family for the size of government. I have come to the conclusion that you simply can’t have a minimum government without a robust institution of marriage.They sure aren't making libertarians the way they used to -- if they ever did.
To be fair, when Morse brought out her anti-gay-marriage, anti-contraception, anti-fornication libertarianism, "Much to my disappointment, my libertarian and economist friends seemed uninterested." (Later, when, "much to my surprise," Roback "spent the next five years talking to social conservatives," she was amazed at how much she -- a libertarian, remember! -- got on with the Christers. "I appreciated the fact that they’d talk to me." As well she should have.)
This isn't so much a dig at true libertarians -- if there are any -- as a further demonstration that the most common use of libertarianism is as a cloaking device for right-wing nuts.
NO EXPERIENCE REQUIRED. Some days this gig is easy. All I really have to do is show you a post by a noted buffoon...
But I do anyway, because I'm an asshole.
More: Gay Troop Leaders Can Take Teenagers Camping, But Gay Republican Congressmen Can't: The Democrats and MSM are determined to root the boy-lovin', disease-spreadin' faggits out of the Republican Party....and, if you have a better than 8th grade reading level (60% of my readers do!), you will see immediately what is stupid about it. I don't even have to think up a joke line like "His sense of irony reached full flower when he told his Mom 'Yes, Hitler' at age 10." Or make any observations about how he sure talks a lot about gayness for a he-man right-wing chest-beater. Or double back with something like, "But of course I would say that, because my liberal secret & counterintuitive hatred of gays means that I cannot accept the bitter truth that this he-man right-wing chest-beater is totally OUT and PROUD."
Thank God we have a party willling to fight the Pink Menace.
But I do anyway, because I'm an asshole.
Sunday, October 15, 2006
SEVEN RUNS IS NOT ENOUGH. Another slugfest, this time going our way, thank God, but I am still worried. Fox ran a ten-second clip of the '86 Mets tonight, and it reminded me that our boys back then were observably on speed -- whether metabolized via "the high hard one" previously mentioned by commenter Reginald, or by adrenal surges owing to alcohol or nicotine withdrawal (as when Keith was barred from smoking in the vommies), we can't be sure. But those Mets were juiced, and juice is what's needed in the post-season.
Despite tonight's offensive Wachet Auf, our present crew looked almost as fat 'n' happy in the dugout as they looked fat 'n' unhappy the night before. Hell, before the runs started raining, they seemed positively glum. You may read that as professionalism and confidence, but I see it as lack of drugs. The reflexive awakening of muscle memory alone can explain tonight's laugher. Tom Glavine pitches tomorrow on three days rest; keep laughing. Or recognize that winning teams can make mistakes just as easily as losing teams, and this series can turn on a dime -- or a dime bag.
St. Lou is a cowtown, but surely the Mets' team doctor has underworld connections somewhere in the Midwest. Let's go into the tie-breaker, not just psyched, but psychotic. Most of our muscled players won't even feel a jab in the ass. Some might not disdain to inhale a pharmaceutical "antihistamine." LET'S BLOW, METS!
All credit to the adequate Mr. Perez (thankyouGod, thankyouGod), the hot bats, and Jose Reyes for that little sleight-of-hand in the third -- the umps didn't like it but the rest of us were tickled to death.
Despite tonight's offensive Wachet Auf, our present crew looked almost as fat 'n' happy in the dugout as they looked fat 'n' unhappy the night before. Hell, before the runs started raining, they seemed positively glum. You may read that as professionalism and confidence, but I see it as lack of drugs. The reflexive awakening of muscle memory alone can explain tonight's laugher. Tom Glavine pitches tomorrow on three days rest; keep laughing. Or recognize that winning teams can make mistakes just as easily as losing teams, and this series can turn on a dime -- or a dime bag.
St. Lou is a cowtown, but surely the Mets' team doctor has underworld connections somewhere in the Midwest. Let's go into the tie-breaker, not just psyched, but psychotic. Most of our muscled players won't even feel a jab in the ass. Some might not disdain to inhale a pharmaceutical "antihistamine." LET'S BLOW, METS!
All credit to the adequate Mr. Perez (thankyouGod, thankyouGod), the hot bats, and Jose Reyes for that little sleight-of-hand in the third -- the umps didn't like it but the rest of us were tickled to death.
THE FEDERALIST. Finally finished Chernow's Alexander Hamilton. 700+ pages is a lot of time to spend with anyone, and if Chernow is exhaustive he can also be exhausting, as can his subject.
Little Al was a dynamo, and his energy and intellect clearly awestrike his biographer, who gives us lots of stuff like "Eliza Hamilton remembered the sleepless night when her husband gave immortal expression to a durable piece of constitutional law." The bulk and scope of Hamilton's achievements -- auto-didact, indefatigable pamphleteer, Revolutionary War hero, political activist and intriguer, legal pioneer, most of The Federalist, Bank of New York, Bank of the United States, and oh yeah, the framework for American financial policy which largely persists to this day -- are lilies that hardly need such gilding.
But Chernow slobbers over these. Perhaps in consequence, whenever Hamilton goes clearly off the rails -- the Reynolds affair, the Miranda escapade, "The Public Conduct and Character of John Adams, Esq." etc -- Chernow professes astonishment. How could the greatest man in the world make such stupid mistakes? It seems never to have occurred to him -- or he chooses, out of infatuation, not to admit -- that Hamilton was something like a mad genius. His was such a roaring cascade of ideas that some were bound to be indiscriminate, sometimes even insane, and, as even Chernow acknowledges, Hamilton was not one to back off. That's what got him killed.
So enamored is Chernow that he feels it necessary to heap abuse on all who opposed Hamilton: Jefferson ("Dr. Pangloss... Hamilton wasn't the only one who suspected him of cowardice"), Madison ("lacked the charismatic sparkle that made the brashly confident Hamilton a natural leader" -- yet was President for two terms, hm), Monroe ("a plodding speaker and a middling intellect"), and most of all Burr, who is painted as a "supremely cynical" voluptuary, which paint is given a whole Hamilton-posthumous chapter of infernally black lacquer ("William Plumer wasn't the only person who gagged at Burr's incongruous presence in the Senate... this aging roue sampled opium and seduced willing noblewomen and chambermaids with a fine impartiality." Chambermaids! Such very Republican égalité, wot?). Readers not under a spell similar to Chernow's may regard Hamilton's fatal "affair of honor" with Burr -- and Hamilton's persistence, even unto his death agonies, in framing the fault with Burr -- as Wilde regarded the death of Little Nell. And if we have read Vidal -- who gets a slighting mention here -- we may be forgiven for yet feeling that debauched old Aaron played it well and fairly, and was within his rights.
Still, Alexander Hamilton is a good read. Chernow scraped every source and makes it tell. In the heretofore murky matter of Hamiliton's younger days, this book makes it possible to imagine that skinny, intense boy, fired by intellectual passion and ambition, feverishly working in the counting house, reading borrowed books, and cajoling propertied men (the beginning of a lifelong habit) to get out of his poverty, illegitimacy, and nearly savage environment, and into history. Chernow famously visited the ancient prison where Hamilton's mother had been detained, and this seems to have galvanized his sense of mission. We are made to feel both Hamilton's restless energy and his survivor guilt ("What a world of scarred emotion and secret grief Alexander Hamilton bore with him on the boat to Boston") so strongly that it comes back to us all through the book in what breathing spaces Chernow's worshipfulness allows. And it is bracing to see a Founder's reversals as well as his triumphs -- to see Hamilton pelted with stones as well as with garlands -- and humanizing to see him flirt with Angelica Church, suck up to George Washington, and negotiate wary truces with Burr.
I wish, in the vastness of the book, he had allowed us larger portions of Hamilton's prose. I sometimes imagine that Hamilton is the model that makes modern political writers of whatever stripe think they can touch glory by waxing eloquent about the Defense of Marriage Act and other tediosities. But George Fucking Will can scribble through ten lifetimes before he gets close to what Hamilton achieved. Perhaps because of his early deprivations, Hamilton learned to yoke words to ideas right out of the box -- he drafted well in his head, and his mania propelled his reasoning and his eloquence with equal vigor. That explains his follies as well as his masterpieces.
I thank Chernow most heartily for the favor of lingering long over the gloriously incivil newspaper and pamphlet wars of the post-Revolutionary period. The accusations of treason, Jacobinism, atheism, "Angloman"-ism, monarchism, and Caesarism -- like the Journals-Affiche of Revolutionary France, an inspiration to bloggers everywhere. Come, let us slander! The example of our Founders demands it.
Little Al was a dynamo, and his energy and intellect clearly awestrike his biographer, who gives us lots of stuff like "Eliza Hamilton remembered the sleepless night when her husband gave immortal expression to a durable piece of constitutional law." The bulk and scope of Hamilton's achievements -- auto-didact, indefatigable pamphleteer, Revolutionary War hero, political activist and intriguer, legal pioneer, most of The Federalist, Bank of New York, Bank of the United States, and oh yeah, the framework for American financial policy which largely persists to this day -- are lilies that hardly need such gilding.
But Chernow slobbers over these. Perhaps in consequence, whenever Hamilton goes clearly off the rails -- the Reynolds affair, the Miranda escapade, "The Public Conduct and Character of John Adams, Esq." etc -- Chernow professes astonishment. How could the greatest man in the world make such stupid mistakes? It seems never to have occurred to him -- or he chooses, out of infatuation, not to admit -- that Hamilton was something like a mad genius. His was such a roaring cascade of ideas that some were bound to be indiscriminate, sometimes even insane, and, as even Chernow acknowledges, Hamilton was not one to back off. That's what got him killed.
So enamored is Chernow that he feels it necessary to heap abuse on all who opposed Hamilton: Jefferson ("Dr. Pangloss... Hamilton wasn't the only one who suspected him of cowardice"), Madison ("lacked the charismatic sparkle that made the brashly confident Hamilton a natural leader" -- yet was President for two terms, hm), Monroe ("a plodding speaker and a middling intellect"), and most of all Burr, who is painted as a "supremely cynical" voluptuary, which paint is given a whole Hamilton-posthumous chapter of infernally black lacquer ("William Plumer wasn't the only person who gagged at Burr's incongruous presence in the Senate... this aging roue sampled opium and seduced willing noblewomen and chambermaids with a fine impartiality." Chambermaids! Such very Republican égalité, wot?). Readers not under a spell similar to Chernow's may regard Hamilton's fatal "affair of honor" with Burr -- and Hamilton's persistence, even unto his death agonies, in framing the fault with Burr -- as Wilde regarded the death of Little Nell. And if we have read Vidal -- who gets a slighting mention here -- we may be forgiven for yet feeling that debauched old Aaron played it well and fairly, and was within his rights.
Still, Alexander Hamilton is a good read. Chernow scraped every source and makes it tell. In the heretofore murky matter of Hamiliton's younger days, this book makes it possible to imagine that skinny, intense boy, fired by intellectual passion and ambition, feverishly working in the counting house, reading borrowed books, and cajoling propertied men (the beginning of a lifelong habit) to get out of his poverty, illegitimacy, and nearly savage environment, and into history. Chernow famously visited the ancient prison where Hamilton's mother had been detained, and this seems to have galvanized his sense of mission. We are made to feel both Hamilton's restless energy and his survivor guilt ("What a world of scarred emotion and secret grief Alexander Hamilton bore with him on the boat to Boston") so strongly that it comes back to us all through the book in what breathing spaces Chernow's worshipfulness allows. And it is bracing to see a Founder's reversals as well as his triumphs -- to see Hamilton pelted with stones as well as with garlands -- and humanizing to see him flirt with Angelica Church, suck up to George Washington, and negotiate wary truces with Burr.
I wish, in the vastness of the book, he had allowed us larger portions of Hamilton's prose. I sometimes imagine that Hamilton is the model that makes modern political writers of whatever stripe think they can touch glory by waxing eloquent about the Defense of Marriage Act and other tediosities. But George Fucking Will can scribble through ten lifetimes before he gets close to what Hamilton achieved. Perhaps because of his early deprivations, Hamilton learned to yoke words to ideas right out of the box -- he drafted well in his head, and his mania propelled his reasoning and his eloquence with equal vigor. That explains his follies as well as his masterpieces.
I thank Chernow most heartily for the favor of lingering long over the gloriously incivil newspaper and pamphlet wars of the post-Revolutionary period. The accusations of treason, Jacobinism, atheism, "Angloman"-ism, monarchism, and Caesarism -- like the Journals-Affiche of Revolutionary France, an inspiration to bloggers everywhere. Come, let us slander! The example of our Founders demands it.
CLUBHOUSE. On a cold night in 1977 Peter Doherty and some others took me on my first trip to CBGB. It was a weekday and the show was ill-attended (we took one of the tables up front; they had waitress service). The Erasers and the Feelies played. The first wave of CBs stars had already graduated, though some of them would pop in occasionally. The current headliners were supposed to be part of some Second Wave (they were both wonderful bands, by the way). The talk at our table was scenester in the extreme, so I mostly kept my mouth shut. I had just seen the Talking Heads and the Ramones for the first time, and knew I had some catching up to do. I got the impression that the dank, stale-beer smell was part of the curriculum.
It made sense that the nexus of New York punk rock was such a ratty joint. A greybeard such as I have become will taunt the kids today for their backwards-looking rock gambits, but the old punk scene was full of magpies mining la boue for lost gems, and sometimes turds. This was said to be a rebuke to what was considered the smooth and stupefied state of the lively arts of the time. It was also a form of passive aggression: one could expect outsiders to be uncomfortable. I have a hunch you won't like it here, the potato chips are soggy, they water the beer, etc.
I became a habitue, saw many splendid shows (Ramones, Dead Boys, X-Ray Spex, B-52s) and a lot of lame ones. Eventually I hauled myself up on that stage and played some splendid/lame shows myself. I got accustomed to the smell, the smashed toilet, and the pleasurable clubhouse atmosphere that you get just by showing up and doing a little work. Nostalgie de la boue? No, it was happening right now! I always had a hand to shake or a back to pat or a face reading clearly, "Oh, this guy again" when I walked in the door.
All those hours spent loading in and loading out and drinking and hearing, or yelling, "You rock" or "You suck." Long after I stopped playing regularly, I considered it part of my life, until the day came when I realized I could count the time that had passed since I darkened Hilly's door in years, and if I walked through again it would be as a stranger.
Last autumn I was called back for the great final wave of CBs benefits. I commandeered a corner of a garishly-lit "dressing room" and practiced my parts while the act on the other side of the graffiti-scarred plywood boomed and blasted. I kept a close eye on my equipment. I tried to time it right so I would get back from the bar with a beer before the set started. I taped my set-list to the wall. I wondered what it sounded like out front. I clammed on a change. I struck a heroic pose. I heard people clapping.
That was my farewell to CBGB: running my tired old muscles through the old routine and seeing how ill it suited me, as a lapsed Catholic might take in a Mass and find himself surprised how hollow it all is when you've lost your faith. But it wasn't all bad. Whatever my level of disengagement, it was still a show, and shows are always good, whether they Rock or Suck. And CB's was holding the door open, though the closing bell was insistently ringing. A friend in Seattle wrote me the other day:
The final services are tonight. The furnishings are being hauled to Vegas, I hear, perhaps to become part of this -- not an outrage, just macabre, like the varnished corpse of Elmer McCurdy hanging in a carnival's haunted house.
You won't catch me grieving, quite. Ah! as the heart grows older/It will come to such sights colder. It's another me I would be mourning, and I retain a lively interest in the present one. My sympathies are with those who have one less place to play but, as my Seattle friend and '68 Elvis knew, if you're looking for trouble, you will eventually come to the right place. Hilly's unique rental deal kept overhead low for a long time, so it will be hard to find something like that in New York now. Maybe New York isn't it. But somewhere it is. Somewhere there's always a clubhouse.
It made sense that the nexus of New York punk rock was such a ratty joint. A greybeard such as I have become will taunt the kids today for their backwards-looking rock gambits, but the old punk scene was full of magpies mining la boue for lost gems, and sometimes turds. This was said to be a rebuke to what was considered the smooth and stupefied state of the lively arts of the time. It was also a form of passive aggression: one could expect outsiders to be uncomfortable. I have a hunch you won't like it here, the potato chips are soggy, they water the beer, etc.
I became a habitue, saw many splendid shows (Ramones, Dead Boys, X-Ray Spex, B-52s) and a lot of lame ones. Eventually I hauled myself up on that stage and played some splendid/lame shows myself. I got accustomed to the smell, the smashed toilet, and the pleasurable clubhouse atmosphere that you get just by showing up and doing a little work. Nostalgie de la boue? No, it was happening right now! I always had a hand to shake or a back to pat or a face reading clearly, "Oh, this guy again" when I walked in the door.
All those hours spent loading in and loading out and drinking and hearing, or yelling, "You rock" or "You suck." Long after I stopped playing regularly, I considered it part of my life, until the day came when I realized I could count the time that had passed since I darkened Hilly's door in years, and if I walked through again it would be as a stranger.
Last autumn I was called back for the great final wave of CBs benefits. I commandeered a corner of a garishly-lit "dressing room" and practiced my parts while the act on the other side of the graffiti-scarred plywood boomed and blasted. I kept a close eye on my equipment. I tried to time it right so I would get back from the bar with a beer before the set started. I taped my set-list to the wall. I wondered what it sounded like out front. I clammed on a change. I struck a heroic pose. I heard people clapping.
That was my farewell to CBGB: running my tired old muscles through the old routine and seeing how ill it suited me, as a lapsed Catholic might take in a Mass and find himself surprised how hollow it all is when you've lost your faith. But it wasn't all bad. Whatever my level of disengagement, it was still a show, and shows are always good, whether they Rock or Suck. And CB's was holding the door open, though the closing bell was insistently ringing. A friend in Seattle wrote me the other day:
Anyway, I have two shows this weekend, and I just loaded in to the second scummy punk bar and am waiting to play as I write this. The odd thing is, and the reason I'm bending your ear, is that it seems that in the Northwest at least, the Eighties Punk Rock Experience has been faithfully recreated. Sometimes I feel like I'm running around in a theme park of my twenties, only I'm not on drugs this time around. It's eerie, but really fun.So faith abides in some great souls.
The final services are tonight. The furnishings are being hauled to Vegas, I hear, perhaps to become part of this -- not an outrage, just macabre, like the varnished corpse of Elmer McCurdy hanging in a carnival's haunted house.
You won't catch me grieving, quite. Ah! as the heart grows older/It will come to such sights colder. It's another me I would be mourning, and I retain a lively interest in the present one. My sympathies are with those who have one less place to play but, as my Seattle friend and '68 Elvis knew, if you're looking for trouble, you will eventually come to the right place. Hilly's unique rental deal kept overhead low for a long time, so it will be hard to find something like that in New York now. Maybe New York isn't it. But somewhere it is. Somewhere there's always a clubhouse.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
SHIT. The Trachsel fiasco appeared to cut the heart right out of the team, which isn't a good sign. The Mets can count on adversity in this series, so they better find some snap-back fast. Maybe Tug McGraw can haunt them. Kudos to Suppan and a great fielding Cards team.
FUCK. It is ominous to lose a slugfest to the Cards with three straight coming up in St. Lou. Crap from Wagner is shocking but we can dismiss it as an anomaly -- starter John Maine has always been a wildcard at best and if we get to six games we can't be overconfident about him. Our Mutts are capable of batting explosions, but so are their opponents. It'll be a tough run. I'd pray, if my faith weren't utterly shattered by Rod Dreher's conversion to the Orthodox Church. Dreher was the last prominent imbecile Catholic ring-kissing blogger I could believe in, and though we all should have known that he would succumb to the first sect that waved a sweeter pot of incense and crunchier plate of mashed yeast at him, his apostasy yet wobbles the fundaments. What's next? A Republican pullout from Iraq? Shea it ain't so!
Friday, October 13, 2006
A MIRACLE HAS OCCURRED! The Ole Perfesser has posted about a corrupt Republican without adding that the Democrats are just as bad!
Maybe he was just distracted by a passing Jetta, or a piece of string. Or perhaps he was overanxious to talk about breasts (and, less approvingly, the creatures to whom they are attached).
What's next? Roger L. Simon talking about a movie that he's actually seen?
Maybe he was just distracted by a passing Jetta, or a piece of string. Or perhaps he was overanxious to talk about breasts (and, less approvingly, the creatures to whom they are attached).
What's next? Roger L. Simon talking about a movie that he's actually seen?
CRAZY JESUS LADY TAKES A DIVE! CJL's in rare form today, giving us all the proof we should need that liberals hate free speech:
By the same formula, Republicans are one-quarter boy-crazy middle-aged men, and the other three-quarters Denny Hastert's midsection.
Also, the Lady tells us, liberals and Democrats lack "grace," and "What also seems missing is the courage to ask a question. Conservatives these days are asking themselves very many questions..." Oh, I bet they are! Like "How much of this government money can I stuff into the trunk of my car before the voters turn me out?" and "Is now the time to start screaming about fags getting married, or should I wait until the week before the election?" and "If they caught Foley, does that mean they can catch me, or the guy that sold me this cocaine, or the prostitute that is currently sucking my dick?"
All that's left is to try and figure the Crazy Jesus Lady's real angle here -- for she is only mad north-northwest, and when the wind is southerly she can tell a hack from a handjob. While "Drunk/behind deadline" is a temptingly obvious choice, it is possible that she knew from the start how thin her argument was, and presented it in all its pathetic insufficiency to achieve not a political but a social effect.
The other OpinionJournal writers are every bit as bad as Noonan -- but not nearly as famous, Reagan-associated, or grandly declamatory in style. She may think that they think that they are not good enough for her. What else explains the nervous glances and evasive half-smiles that greet her when she wheels her shopping cart into their offices? Why else do they never accept her invitations to vespers?
And she has been so lonely since Reagan died and Dan Rather stopped sending her even the restraining orders. Well, she's not some bra-burning feminazi -- if a crappy tautology will do more than a lower neckline on her strait-jacket to make her seem more approachable, she can do that.
Oddly enough, in the very same OJ edition Daniel Henninger bitches out YouTube for making his favorite right-wing politicans look like feebs and assholes. (He also lets us know that he uses YouTube to look at jazz, not junk like you people watch.) I've seen Henninger on TV, and he looks and acts like a depressed undertaker after a shot of sodium pentathol.
The Crazy Jesus Lady and the Gloomy Culture Crank! A match made in heaven!
UPDATE. I have to add that while I believe the Minutemen certainly deserve all the contempt they get, I also think they should have been permitted to speak without the bum-rush.
I say this knowing that Noonan and every other conservative will continue to talk as if Democrats all advocate censorship, but what the hell. Maybe a few of them can read.
- A couple dozen rowdies interrupted a showing at Columbia of Ku Klux Klan: Special Mexican Unit thereby depriving evil godless New Yorkers of their chance to learn the truth about those exotic Spanish people, even though Jesus was outside handing out flyers;
- A Columbine Dad told millions of CBS viewers that abortion made Jesus kill the Amish, but a couple of bloggers didn't agree, which is retroactive censorship of both Columbine Dad and Jesus;
- Barbra Streisand told a heckler to shut up. The heckler's name was Jesus Christ.
- Rosie O'Donnell is fat, whereas Jesus looks fetchingly slim on the cross.
By the same formula, Republicans are one-quarter boy-crazy middle-aged men, and the other three-quarters Denny Hastert's midsection.
Also, the Lady tells us, liberals and Democrats lack "grace," and "What also seems missing is the courage to ask a question. Conservatives these days are asking themselves very many questions..." Oh, I bet they are! Like "How much of this government money can I stuff into the trunk of my car before the voters turn me out?" and "Is now the time to start screaming about fags getting married, or should I wait until the week before the election?" and "If they caught Foley, does that mean they can catch me, or the guy that sold me this cocaine, or the prostitute that is currently sucking my dick?"
All that's left is to try and figure the Crazy Jesus Lady's real angle here -- for she is only mad north-northwest, and when the wind is southerly she can tell a hack from a handjob. While "Drunk/behind deadline" is a temptingly obvious choice, it is possible that she knew from the start how thin her argument was, and presented it in all its pathetic insufficiency to achieve not a political but a social effect.
The other OpinionJournal writers are every bit as bad as Noonan -- but not nearly as famous, Reagan-associated, or grandly declamatory in style. She may think that they think that they are not good enough for her. What else explains the nervous glances and evasive half-smiles that greet her when she wheels her shopping cart into their offices? Why else do they never accept her invitations to vespers?
And she has been so lonely since Reagan died and Dan Rather stopped sending her even the restraining orders. Well, she's not some bra-burning feminazi -- if a crappy tautology will do more than a lower neckline on her strait-jacket to make her seem more approachable, she can do that.
Oddly enough, in the very same OJ edition Daniel Henninger bitches out YouTube for making his favorite right-wing politicans look like feebs and assholes. (He also lets us know that he uses YouTube to look at jazz, not junk like you people watch.) I've seen Henninger on TV, and he looks and acts like a depressed undertaker after a shot of sodium pentathol.
The Crazy Jesus Lady and the Gloomy Culture Crank! A match made in heaven!
UPDATE. I have to add that while I believe the Minutemen certainly deserve all the contempt they get, I also think they should have been permitted to speak without the bum-rush.
I say this knowing that Noonan and every other conservative will continue to talk as if Democrats all advocate censorship, but what the hell. Maybe a few of them can read.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
FIELDERS: CHOICE. Jeff Weaver and Tom Glavine were great tonight. So were both bullpens. But it was gloves what won it. Carlos Beltran doubling Pujols off first from the outfield took the juice out of St. Lou early, and Adny or Endy or Inky or whatever-it-is Chavez' sno-cone catch in the fifth kept the tarp nailed down tight. The infield was impermeable. Even Willie Randolph, who looks in all interviews now like he's being grilled by cops, spoke up for the defense in the post-game. Beltran's homer was a rare moment of batter confidence, and all we needed.
Fox 5 coverage from the Shea parking lot tonight made we wish badly I could be out there. Mets fans are spectacularly stoopid. They don't have the confidence of Yankees rooters, and their enthusiasm is more retarded and untelegenic. To paraphrase Robert Ryan in The Wild Bunch: They're mooks, and I wish to God I was with them. (Sign of the night: CARDINALS TASTE LIKE CHICKEN.)
I'm beginning to love Tom Glavine. I hated him, of course, when he was Brave and affectlessly whipping our asses year after year. But at the butt-end of his career, waiting on win number 300, Glavine was The Professional, blandly blotting out rallies and walking off the field like he had just cut a man's throat in an alley and didn't want anyone to look at him. He's a nice counterweight to drama queens like Wright and Reyes.
I'm still nervous. We really have only three starters, and sooner or later the middle relief is going to resemble a five-car pileup on the BQE. And if we get to the Series, I suspect the Tigers will be as strong and supple as their namesakes. But I'm happy to have the opportunity to fret.
Fox 5 coverage from the Shea parking lot tonight made we wish badly I could be out there. Mets fans are spectacularly stoopid. They don't have the confidence of Yankees rooters, and their enthusiasm is more retarded and untelegenic. To paraphrase Robert Ryan in The Wild Bunch: They're mooks, and I wish to God I was with them. (Sign of the night: CARDINALS TASTE LIKE CHICKEN.)
I'm beginning to love Tom Glavine. I hated him, of course, when he was Brave and affectlessly whipping our asses year after year. But at the butt-end of his career, waiting on win number 300, Glavine was The Professional, blandly blotting out rallies and walking off the field like he had just cut a man's throat in an alley and didn't want anyone to look at him. He's a nice counterweight to drama queens like Wright and Reyes.
I'm still nervous. We really have only three starters, and sooner or later the middle relief is going to resemble a five-car pileup on the BQE. And if we get to the Series, I suspect the Tigers will be as strong and supple as their namesakes. But I'm happy to have the opportunity to fret.
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