NRO's The Corner: Rolling Bile, Spit, and Gnash Thread

for some reason the thing that bugs me the most is how all these people use this I Am A Thoughtful Scholar language ("proceed from the assumption", "pivots upon", "normative", "hence") while haphazardly comparing huge complex systems with no actual data and no attention at all to any factors whatsoever except THEY'VE GOT SQUINTY EYES THERE AND BIG LIPS HERE, HENCE THE NORMATIVE PIVOT PROCEEDS FROM THE ASSUMPTION. like there's youtube commenters who just yell good ol racist slurs and then there's NRO commenters who think that they're sophisticated analysts.

so otm i want to cry

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/262162/people-want-know-contd-john-derbyshire

complete with a Richard Lynn citation about "national IQ"

In what way am I a Bad Person? I work hard, pay my taxes, and observe the speed limits. I am loyal to my friends and faithful to my wife. I nurture my children and try to guide them to good citizenship. I strive to practice good manners and consideration when dealing with strangers. I do not covet my neighbor’s ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is my neighbor’s. In what respect am I a Bad Person? This is not a rhetorical question.

Thus does science prove that John Derbyshire is a Good Person.

repressed ass coveter

oh my god derbyshire is so dumb

My favorite commenter in the Derbyshire post:

03/15/11 11:51

Let's give some credit to General MacArthur's reorganization of Japan and its psyche.

i wouldn't say that Derbyshire is dumb so much as he is Colonel Blimp given human form

chrisrock.gif SCUSE ME DUMBSHIT, YOU DON'T GET A VICTORY LAP FOR DOING WHAT YOU'RE 'SUPPOSED TO'. /unlock caps

In what way am I a Bad Person? I work hard, pay my taxes, and observe the speed limits. I am loyal to my friends and faithful to my wife. I nurture my children and try to guide them to good citizenship. I strive to practice good manners and consideration when dealing with strangers. I do not covet my neighbor’s ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is my neighbor’s. In what respect am I a Bad Person? This is not a rhetorical question.

"I have good manners. I say thank you and goodbye, and when I see dead things laying around I bury them."

(Can't remember where I got that from, but it's the first thing I thought of when I read the thing in italics.)

currently linked to from cnn.com front page: http://caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/15/why-is-there-no-looting-in-japan/?hpt=T1

interesting to compare the comments when opened as an editorial on a more homogenous 'news' forum

maybe I'm dumb but why would this no-looting-in-japan question even occur to anyone in the face of such devastation and human suffering?

sure it's the internet and all but I read NRO these days and wonder what the hell is wrong w/these people. besides the obvious...

I think the immediate parallel people are trying to draw is to Katrina, and the subtler suggestion in some of these comment threads is "they aren't looting in Japan because they're not black"

i'm going with- they're not looting because wealth is more evenly distributed in Japan

i mean there are probably actual cultural differences between america and japan or between louisiana and fukushima prefecture or whatever that might be useful in "answering" this "question", if indeed there is "no looting" and if you're ready to control for all kinds of other non-human-related differences between the situations, and if you're actually interested, but NRO is neither.

^^^this

(because that would involve actual rigorous careful curious sociology, which doesn't feel nearly as good as making permanently vague references to "the destructive tendencies inherent in sub-Saharan culture" and how they were brought disastrously to the american surface following "the cultural collapse of the 60s")

In what way am I a Bad Person? I work hard, pay my taxes, and observe the speed limits.

wait, i thought the last two of these were bad things to do according to NRO

This afternoon our local AM conservative station's guest host brought up ("Just a thought here -- here me out...") the "differences" between the Japanese response to natural disasters and "ours." He was tactful enough to not go beyond this generalization and allow his callers to articulate the subtle racism. "The Japanese are so clean and ordered; they're taught this stuff since they were kids," swore one caller, a self-identified "lifelong resident of Tampa, Florida."

I wonder if conservative talk radio receives faxes and emails every morning with that day's talking points. I swear these things are coordinated.

dude i wouldn't doubt it

It's like this lifelong resident of Tampa, Florida got his impressions of Japan from Ozu films.

btw one of the big relevant-to-looting differences between katrina and the tsunami is that japan has actual emergency services that actually respond to a national crisis instead of dithering for three days

or however long it was that everyone was drowning and wondering where the helicopters were

clearly we need our own Yakuza.

btw one of the big relevant-to-looting differences between katrina and the tsunami is that japan has actual emergency services that actually respond to a national crisis instead of dithering for three days

It's that Oriental efficiency again.

if only we'd "brought" more of them here

Like we did this man:

http://heatherpickerell.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/mr-yunioshi.jpg

Happy Birthday

March 22, 2011 9:38 A.M.

By Shannen Coffin

Let us all take a moment from trying to decipher the United States’ current foreign policy to wish the Corner’s room mother, Kathryn Jean Lopez (or as my kids call her “Auntie Miss K-Lo”), a joyous anniversary of her birth. She celebrates her 25th birthday again today.

Display name variations in 3 . . . 2 . . .

“Auntie Miss K-Lo”

okay what the fuck

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/262662/london-journal-part-i-jay-nordlinger?page=2

Nordlinger interrupts his own reminiscences of a dead friend for some prime right-wing resentment

The bit about the honours system favouring Marxists is parallel-universe crazy. "Can’t the country give honors to people who like Britain more than they do Stalin?" Yes, like all the time.

Liz Taylor

March 23, 2011 10:09 A.M.

By Mona Charen

She may have gained a few too many pounds in her later years. And she may have said some silly things. But there are two things worth remembering about Liz Taylor — she was, in the beauty department, a bird of paradise. Second, though she endured a great deal of ridicule for her — was it eight marriages — she explained that she just couldn’t bring herself to have “affairs.” If she was romantically involved with someone, it had “to lead to the altar.” Seems quaint today. She will now enjoy the company of the angels — the only creatures that can match her for looks.

"she mightve been fat, but at least she wasnt a slut"

Mona "Mommy, What's Jet Magazine?" Charen.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/263159/human-right-suspend-reality-mark-steyn

Ill-bred proles ruin Mark Steyn's "normally agreeable corner of Mayfair"

http://www.nationalreview.com/right-field

what the world needed

From the Mark Steyn thread:

Rusty_Shackleford

03/29/11 19:38

What I find even more ironic than anarchists protesting in favor of bigger government is that anarchy has an "official" symbol...

Killer point, Rusty.

Love the new cover!

http://www.nationalreview.com/planet-gore

Never_Outraged
03/31/11 18:39
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Actually, every one of those children will be killed by the adherents of leftist American Churches (ELCA, Episcopal, I am talking to YOU) who have adopted the American gay-marriage agenda instead of supporting starving children in other nations.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/263767/re-lindsey-graham-and-first-amendment-mark-steyn

Steyn readers love the First Amendment, calling for genocide

I like the quote about falling camels and knives. Islamaphile!

"The Romans once elected a horse to their senate, thereby outdoing the voters of South Carolina, who only sent us half a horse."

One of the funniest things I've ever heard -- my first true LOL! I just got reprimanded by a co-worker. Try explaining to someone in Seattle why that's so funny.

i mean i follow but that's probably because i'm in portland

I thought he was making an enumclaw joke.

Jonah shows his tolerance.

"a writer of Goldberg's talent"

this must be a troll

I agree with the general sentiment, but must disagree on at least one detail. I don't consider the Koran to be holy. I'd be very surprised if Jonah did either, really.

I suspect that referring to it as such was just a PC reflex from spending too little time outside governing class enclaves. I expect a writer of Goldberg's talent to use words correctly and say what he means. Unless he's going to also start referring to things like "The holy city of Charleston South Carolina, (or Kyoto, or Cologne, or Independence, Missouri)" habitually, then he needs to get his thoughts clear on paper and say something like "a book that many consider holy."

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/263852/canadian-slut-walk-jonah-goldberg
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/263856/re-canadian-slut-walk-kathryn-jean-lopez
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/263866/walk-slut-my-daughter-daniel-foster

can't decide which is worse, Goldberg's frat boy hooting or Steyn inevitably showing up to blame feminism for the Cultural Decline of the West

You don't get to be anti-PC and then use the phrase "cultural confidence."

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/264799/speaking-truth-power-michael-walsh

Obama is a secret Spartacist or something