Category Archives: Etiquette

Your Republican Reptile In Action

Ethics, Etiquette, Individual Rights, Internet, Private Property, Republicans, Ron Paul, The State

Fredrick Ray Hartman, a DC-based statist Republican, in the employ of the government, had petitioned me for Facebook Friendship (not the other way around).

On getting notice of my Facebook Policy, he writes furiously:

“don’t send people [note the royal plural] a copy of facebook policies again…you are being deleted…..i was your friend ditto… removing you from my friends list…..i tried to friend you from another wall and you had the gull [sic] to respond with a facebook policy note….you don’t know your friends i guess…..good luck”

Your Republican politician (or aspiring overlord) in action.

And OMG! What will I do without these Republican faithful “pals” of mine, of whom I have none, as they deserted me on September 19, 2002, when I wrote this op-ed for the Globe & Mail, one of Canada’s national newspapers.

Let me remind Hartman and his ilk (statist, power-hungry Republicans, whom we libertarians disavow) that he was the one to petition me for Facebook Friendship, not the other way around. This statist and I (a long-time paleolibertarian) have nothing in common.

This conduct is a taste of what you should expect from your reptilian Republican in office, should you demand that he comply with YOUR rules, enacted on your turf, or property.

This is the chance of all like-minded Republicans on this Wall to join Fredrick Ray Hartman; Unfriend me please.

Ron Paul for president.

Next Time, Reporter Neil Munro Should Throw a Shoe

Bush, Etiquette, IMMIGRATION, Iraq, Pop-Culture, Republicans, The State

When in 2009, a brave Baghdadi journalist lobbed a loafer at a similar object (President Genghis Bush), I commended him for his bravery against “a bully.”

Less boldly—and even gingerly—Larry Elder has written “In Defense of the Rose Garden ‘Heckler.'”

Why?

I wasn’t aware that anyone needed defending for speaking truth to power, in America. I was wrong. We Americans may not have the venerated tradition of a hardworking royal family, but we accord an inordinate and undeserving respect to our parasitical political royalty.

Writes Elder:

Last week, a “right-wing activist” (according to Michael Eric Dyson, guest-hosting for Ed Schultz on MSNBC) interrupted President Barack Obama as he explained his executive order that bars deportation for at least 800,000 illegal aliens who came to America – “brought to this country by their parents” – before the age of 16.
As Obama stood in the White House Rose Garden and outlined the plan, Neil Munro, a reporter with a conservative website, shouted, “Why do you favor foreigners over American workers?” Based on his colleagues’ reaction, one would have thought he’d thrown a shoe at the president. Reporters and pundits called him unprofessional, rude and even racist for interrupting Obama.

Speaking of shoe tossing; When that stellar fellow threw his “Bye-Bye Bush shoes,” the Istanbul-based Baydan Shoe Company was inundated with orders for the black leather loafers. From “Take this, Mr. President, For Ramos and Compean”:

In what will go down as the high-water mark of his career, journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi lobbed a loafer at Bush for invading his country, during the president’s last official trip to that country. Iraqis, tens of thousands of whom were killed and millions displaced, have every reason to throw boots, baklava, and even bombs at Bush. But they’ve come along way. Shoe tossing is much better than bomb throwing. … in times of terrorism and economic downturn, the brave journalist who booted a violent bully, and the entrepreneurial shoe merchant who built a brand around this barmy comedy—these [were] good news stories.

It’s sad to say, but if Neil Munro tried to launch a line of loafers thus, in the USA today, he’d been shot on the spot. Were he protesting a Republican, Larry Elder would have probably approved of the murder.

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On a personal note, the pressure of this effort over months has had some unexpected consequences. (I heard it said that in the US there are two types of engineers: overworked or unemployed. A tough economy would indeed force increases in productivity: fewer and fewer workers are doing more and more of work.) The upshot: My husband has come down with pneumonia. I will be taking some time to look after him (and hoping to remain uninfected).

THE WND COLUMN, “Return to Reason,” will resume next week. RT will be featuring a golden oldie. Make sure you Click to Like, Share and Tweet it.

Noblesse Oblige Is Back

Democracy, Ethics, Etiquette, Europe, Family, History, Private Property

Stripped of their property by the political class (at the behest of the masses), landed aristocracy is making a comeback to a desperate Europe, in the role private property has always encouraged: duty and custodianship, in contrast to pillage politics (which is what the political class does).

Noblesse oblige means to “act with honor, kindliness, generosity,” as the privileges of high birth dictates.

At Taki’s (via Lew Rockwell.com):

With the exception of Greece, which with Anglo-American help had avoided its sister countries’ red servitude, the populations of the formerly Marxist region welcomed back their former monarchs (or their heirs) with open arms—going so far as to reverse the theft of much of their former property. The Balkan royals began once again to play supporting roles in their homelands’ public life. Simeon II of Bulgaria was perhaps the most successful. Acting as the focus of a grassroots political movement, he was elected prime minister in 2001.
…So steeped have we become in the politics of envy that the government robbing a rich man—better still, an ex-reigning sovereign—will bring joy to many. This is why the decades-old reduction of Britain’s landed aristocracy from a political force to a band of desperate folk trying (and often failing) to hold onto what is left of their inheritance begets either a smile or a yawn. If Simeon is to continue to play a useful role in his country’s life, he will need to seek justice—paradoxically enough—from the European Court of Human Rights. It is ironic that this is happening under Boyko Borisov’s scandal-ridden prime ministry. The contrast between monarch and politico could not be starker. …

MORE.

‘Flesh-Eating, Zombie Apocalypse’

Ethics, Etiquette, Media, Morality, Pop-Culture, Psychology & Pop-Psychology, The West, The Zeitgeist

The plethora of piss-poor, potty mouthed writers, who’ve attempted unsuccessfully to satirize contemporary cannibalism in the West, attest to what Thomas Fleming diagnoses as,

…partly the fault of a very sick popular culture that dotes on the perverse movies of George Romero, Anne Rice’s novelistic gushings over vampires, and the teen-exploitation books, movies, and TV shows in which ghouls, werewolves, and vampires are basically not bad creatures who just need a little understanding. We are teaching ourselves not just to celebrate evil but to elevate it. Good people trying to muddle through in a difficult world are boring: Evil is way cool.

Of course, I would not use the word “exploitation” to describe the maladies afflicting the Millennials, who’ve been allowed by errant adults to turn feral.

Millennials are a generation of youngsters that reveres only itself for no good reason. They have been unleashed on America by progressive families and educators (Democrat and Republican alike) who’ve deified their off-putting offspring and charges, and instilled in them a sense of self-worth disproportionate to their actual worth.

One can disagree with Dr. Fleming on this or the other point or perspective. But his erudite, highly intelligent and cultured perspective in “Eating People is Wrong”—whereby he eviscerates the smarmy “Amateur philosophers and pop culture critics,” who rushed “to ascend their cracker barrels and deliver their explanations for the hysteria”—strikes the right tone, avoiding stupid spoofs on the one hand, or platonic theorizing on the other.