Tuesday Tally Comes Skulking in Late

Most Important Political Influences Edition

Well here they are:

-Alan Alda

-Rob Reiner

-Rush Limbaugh

-PJ O'Rourke

-Matt Drudge

-Mark Steyn

-Andrew Breitbart (PBUH)

Twenty five years ago William Stroock was a Conservative Democrat looking forward to Bill Clinton's inauguration. Now he was never a lefty. He favored all kinds of government action at home but also wanted a strong military. He supported the Gulf War, he  hated communism, two things that will get you primaried in today's Democrat party. In fact, in his famous 1993 English 101 Essay, 'The 1992 Presidential Campaign, a panoramic view of a myriad of divergent choices' he specifically stated, 'If it comes down to Bush and some schmuck Democrat, I'm voting for Bush'.

A few years ago in the faculty lounge a very leftwing colleague of mine who now runs something called the Hunterdon County Anti-Racism Coalition asked, upon hearing this asked, 'So what happened.'

'Well,' I replied as I adjusted my tie, 'I guess I fell in with the wrong crowd.'

In a way that's true. Because in the spring of 1993 I was hanging out with a guy who would later be my post college roommate and wedding usher, and he listened to Rush Limbaugh while we played Madden on his Sega. My buddy is now a lobbyist, btw. My most important take away from Rush was to be a happy warrior. Have fun. I always did so teaching, ok not with those little bastard Orthodox Yeshiva students.

While Limbaugh was it important, that summer I's already read what was for me a landmark book: Give War a Chance by PJ O'Rourke. Here was an irreverent baby boomer making fun of the world's crisis, retelling his own time in the Balto-Cong in 1970 and poking holes in a lot of the things I took for granted. He slammed We Are the World (its a Gen X thing, guys) and showed how it was pointless and dangerous and above all, stupid:

We are the world [solipsism], we are the children [average age forty].
We are the ones to make a brighter day [unproven], so let’s start giving [logical inference supplied without argument].
There’s a choice we’re making, so let’s start giving [true as far as it goes].
We’re saving our own lives [absurd].
It’s true we’ll make a better day [see line 2 above],
Just you and me [statistically unlikely].
That’s three palpable untruths, two dubious assertions, and nine uses of a first person pro-noun, not a single reference to trouble and anybody in it and no facts. The verse contains, literally, neither rhyme nor reason. And these musical riots of philanthropy address themselves to the wrong problems.

Going back even further, I'd say yuuge influences were Alana Alda and Rob Reiner (meathead).  I Every night of my childhood they were on channel 5 at 7 and 7:30, I mean every goddamn night. I just got sick of listening to them bad mouth American. I never need to see All in the Family again, but I really need to go back and give MASH a binge watch.

Moving on to manhood we come to Matt Drudge. He broke the Lewinsky story, of course and showed just how corrupt the media was, simply through his editorial choices. Simple really,and going strong. A real news man in the old style.

Mark Steyn. Like everyone else in America I hadn't heard of him till after 9/11. There's really no point in my trying to pick a few examples those interested should just go to his website or CRTV where he has new show. I've most importantly followed and participated in his crusade against the Canadian Human Rights Commission and now the climate fraudster Dr. Michael Mann. Free speech at any price.

Finally there's Andrew Breitbart, He began as Drudge's partner in crime and branched out or exploded out, anyway. I knew Breitbart was important after the California Prop-8 initiative when he challenged the screaming homosexuals to 'Protest a Mosque'. I was hooked. He knew me, though he never met me, and I sure knew him. I wept openly the day he died and am getting a little teary just writing this. I know he would love the way I found out, via Drudge. I can still see the screen now.

Breitbart taught me that enemy was the institutional left. He taught me how to fight it. He taught me the media is scum. He's no doubt  looking down from heavens with a giant smile. and an extended middle finger. 

Your Nation Sucks, and its Your Fault

Famed economist and Nobel laureate Robert Shiller proposes the abolition of 'nation privilege':

The next revolution will not abolish the consequences of place of birth, but the privileges of nationhood will be tempered. While the rise in anti-immigrant sentiment around the world seems to point in the opposite direction, the sense of injustice will be amplified as communications continue to grow. Ultimately, recognition of wrong will wreak big changes.
For now, this recognition faces strong competition from patriotic impulses, rooted in a social contract among nationals who have paid taxes over the years or performed military service to build or defend what they saw as exclusively theirs. Allowing unlimited immigration would seem to violate this contract.
But the most important steps to address birthplace injustice probably will not target immigration. Instead, they will focus on fostering economic freedom.

There's  lot of economic gobbledygook too, something about factor-price-equalization or some such. It ain't called the dismal science for nothing, folks.

Haven't we been doing this for 20 years or so? I mean, I remember meeting a lot of Iranians in on-line chat rooms, this was back in the late 90's.

Let's move on to this nefarious notion that some nations are bad through no fault of their citizens. In his excellent work, Eat the Rich, PJ O'Rourke (PBUH) tried to answer that question. Cuba and Sweden are both socialist. Why is Cuba a crap-hole and why is Sweden a paradise? O'Rourke figured it all came down to the rule of law.

Mark Steyn noticed that most of the nice places in the world used to have a Union Jack flying over them. The U.S., Canada, New Zealand, Australia. Of course the last three still do. Herr Shiller no doubt believes this is the result of some sort of privilege; no doubt of the white variety. But what, then, about Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaya, India? The only privilege here is that of having once been run by mild-mannered, competent and utterly incorruptible British colonial ministers.

India is an ethno-linguistic hodgepodge that ought to be as conflict riven as your typical African crap-hole, like say, Nigeria.  But its not because since the late 19th century it had been run by a British trained civil service. The Indian National Congress actually began as a trade organization in 1885. Gandhi was a lawyer, after all. The British thought so highly of the Indian governing class they trained that they used them to run the far-flung reaches of the empire. Most British colonies had an Indian run civil service.

Of course, African psycho-leaders in places like Uganda and Kenya upon independence fired the Indians, confiscated their property and exiled them. Black spaces for black people, of course. Hey, look at Detroit!