Category Archives: Neoconservatism

UPDATE VI: Eunuchs at NRO Sack John Derbyshire (Cognitive Consonance)

Business, Canada, Free Speech, Intellectualism, Neoconservatism, Political Correctness, Race, Racism, Reason

Writes Facebook friend Aditya Vivek Barot:

Ms Mercer:

Mr. John Derbyshire, the man whose blurb appears on your book, has been unceremoniously sacked by the eunuchs at NRO.

What an apt appellation for that castrate, Rich Lowry.

Adds Peter Brimelow of VDARE.COM:

“[T]o appease a Left-wing lynch mob, John Derbyshire has just been fired from the new, Politically Correct National Review—despite (or perhaps because of) his unmatched brilliance there, to say nothing of his cancer and his years of loyal service.”

National Review has been PC—and worse, boring—for as long as I can remember.

John, who, as Aditya mentioned, had endorsed my book without flinching, was fired by the intellectual pygmies of NRO, for a tract titled “The Talk: Nonblack Version,“ published at Taki’s Magazine.


UPDATE I: NRO did at least employ John for a long time. They have never considered my work and have never replied to submissions.

UPDATE II: When you read Amy Davidson’s inane histrionic piffle, published in an elite magazine, you realize that ousting John for his views is more about enforcing mediocrity than enforcing conformity.

Americans cannot abide enormous talent, unless it is in a mindless or uncontroversial field such as sport or hard science. You have to be mediocre in writing and thinking and echo one of two party lines. I lived in Canada (I’m a Canadian) where my stuff appeared in the national press, no less. That could never happen in the US.

UPDATE III: Richard Spencer: “… it’s hard to mistake the trajectory of official ‘Conservatism’ as anything other than a gradual degeneration and dumbing-down. NR has gone from James Burnham and Russell Kirk to Kathryn Jean Lopez and various man-children spouting human-rights doctrines. … the mainstream Right [is] much stupider…more defined by the Goldbergs, Ponnurus, Lowrys, and Lopezes of the world…and more obviously a racket and dead-end. …”

UPDATE IV (April 10): In reply to the Facebook thread. Aditya, AMM, and others: To me, the Derb issue is never about whether you agree or disagree with his article, as Richard Spencer does (on FB, I quoted a slice of Spencer’s piece with which I agree). This perennial Soviet-style purging is never about “agreement,” to me. I do not know why people think that if you want to see a lot of well-written, wickedly witty, controversial writing in print (pixels or paper), as I do—you necessarily endorse all of it.

NONSENSE.

During the Iraq war, when the likes of Paul Craig Roberts, myself and other non-Beltway libertarians and paleos were writing up a storm against Bush’s barbarity–and being ousted and banished for it—Roberts noted that readers wanted to see a mirror of their opinions in his writing. This is so true. Readers judge me not in terms of style, thinking; quality of writing, a challenge to consensus, etc., but in accordance with how much I reflect their opinions; do they agree with me.

Cognitive consonance is what writing in the Age of the idiot is all about.

The narrowing of the American mind is not the fault of corporations; its The People’s fault, for heaven’s sake. Corporations would not survive if they ceased to cater to The People, who are tyrants in their own right. This leftist argument misconstrues the direction of the dumbing of America.

I am on record as saying that I am not comfortable with the racialist right’s tack. (To quote: “I think I reflect Western man’s disdain for race as an organizing principle, and for broad generalizations. Good luck with organizing modern westerners around race. I prefer to beat back the state so that individuals regain freedom of association, dominion over property, the absolute right of self-defense; the right to hire, fire, and, generally, associate at will. That’s the route to freedom.”)

But I simply love—and think it is necessary to a free society—to see all well-expressed, eloquent opinion and argument in print, at the pleasure of that print’s owners.

Of course, self-interest plays a role in wanting to see Derb and his work prevail. Derb is one of many canaries in this minefield of our own making.

UPDATE V: Maureen O’Connor of Gawker.com has actually done the job of a journalist in interviewing Derb. I hope he gets a book deal or makes a ton of money out of this shameful episode in the annals of NR.

UPDATE VI: “The first pessimists were the Old Testament prophets.” I love the Prophets, Jeremiah being my favorite. John Derbyshire on The B.S. of A. with Brian Sack (Full)

UPDATED: Putin Saves Us From Ourselves

Foreign Policy, Ilana Mercer, libertarianism, Middle East, Neoconservatism, Ron Paul, Russia, The West, War

“Putin Saves Us From Ourselves” is my new column (front page on RT, the column was buried at the bottom of WND’s second page, where two-day-old columns go to die, so is unlikely to edify the few who might have been amenable to edification). Here’s an excerpt:

“He vetoed a draft United Nations Security Council resolution calling on President Bashar Assad to step down. Such a resolution, he argued, would serve as a ruse for the US to do a Libya in Syria.

He made the case that the “Syrian crisis would be better resolved by Syrians themselves,” and that the West should confine itself to brokering a ceasefire in that country, and encouraging dialogue between the feuding factions.

And, “Six months ago,” by the Daily Star’s telling, he “vetoed an earlier draft resolution threatening Damascus with sanctions.”

He is Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president elect. And he has done nothing that Ron Paul, president of America’s libertarians, would not have done: work to avert another ill-conceived, idiotic American intervention in a country in which it has no business, advocate for a peaceful resolution to the conflict, and oppose economic sanctions, which always and everywhere do more damage than good.

A just course of action is a just course of action irrespective of the actor.

The Sino-Russian alliance has been promoting the idea of an accord, involving “all the Syrians, the government and all opposition groups,” or so the Washington Post framed their side. NATO (nee the US) was champing at the bit to take the battle for Syria away from the Syrians and put it where they believe it belongs: the US military and its proxies.

Now, out of the blue, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is pretending that the United States and its Arab and European allies have always supported such a civilized solution in Syria, and were merely waiting on the Russians to get with the peace program. This is the same woman who came close to squatting on Gadhafi’s corpse, in honor of her country’s custom of peeing on its dead enemies.

Yes, one minute the Obama Administration and its UN and Arab-League lickspittles had been itching to oust Assad. The next, the same coalition was dusting Kofi Annan off and dispatching him, as a UN envoy, to mediate a resolution to Syria’s civil war.

What’s going on here? …

The complete column is “Putin Saves Us From Ourselves.”

If you’d like to feature this column in or on your publication (paper pr pixels), contact ilana@ilanamercer.com.

Support this writer’s work by clicking to “Recommend,” “Tweet” and “Share” the “Paleolibertarian Column” on RT and “Return To Reason” on WND.

UPDATE: So true, Stephen Hayes. This is why I keep at my readers to post their responses to what they read here far and wide; post them to where my columns are featured, at RT (a new audience), and WND (which buried this column on the second page, where 2-day-old columns are posted), on Amazon (where is your Cannibal review, Stephen?), and other forums. Here on BAB, you are preaching to the converted.

UPDATED: No Surprise: Left-Libertarianism Prevails Among The Young

Affirmative Action, Education, Elections, IMMIGRATION, libertarianism, Multiculturalism, Neoconservatism, Political Philosophy, Private Property, States' Rights

I’ve long since contended that establishment-endorsed libertarianism, touted on the Fox News and Business channels, is a left-libertarianism. Like neoconservatism, this “Libertarianism Lite” equates liberty with abstract propositions that—against all evidence, historic and other— purport to work when applied to every individual, Afghani, Israeli and Iraqi, provided he or she gets the proper (invariably American) instruction.

A libertarianism that refuses to recognize “Liberty’s Civilizational Dimension,” sadly, prevails among the young (leftism is, after all, second nature to youth).

Writes VDARE’s James Kirkpatrick:

Students for Liberty, forthrightly supports exterminating the American identity. It defends capitalism precisely on the grounds that it undermines conservatism and traditional values. Its campus coordinators enthusiastically champion the usual “civil rights” causes and are particularly obsessed with championing gay groups. They invite immigrants like Reason Magazine columnist Shikha Dalmia (email her) to punish us for letting her come here by lecturing their mostly white audiences on why their ideology requires more immigrants.
Needless to say, Students For Liberty avoids Politically Incorrect causes that may technically fall under the cause of “liberty.” A column posted on its website about an affirmative action bake sale by the College Republicans says the real root of racism is “statism.” [Don’t Just Bake, Strike the Root!, by James Padilioni, Jr., September 27, 2011] There’s even a defense of critical race theory, and needless to say, no mention of official multiculturalism and its reliance on state support. [The Law Perverted: A Libertarian Approach to Black History Month, February 1, 2012 by James Padilioni, Jr.]
Movements that supposedly champion the radical libertarian economist Murray Rothbard might want to look at what he actually said on the subject.

Note that, as a paleolibertarian, I do not give a tinker’s toss about gay marriage. It is NOT a libertarian issue (other than to stress that “whatever is not specified as a power of the federal government and is not prohibited to the states, is reserved to the states or the people“). However, it is incongruous to profess libertarianism, while supporting affirmative action, anti-private property Civil-Rights laws, and public education extended to all trespassers—these are policies that violate private property, which is the cornerstone of libertarianism.

MORE.

UPDATED: In reply to HBK on Facebook: The stand most libertarians take is that libertarianism is neither Right not Left; we are all supposed to uphold the non-aggression axiom (although left-libertarians, aka the Beltway think-tank type, were more likely to evince full-throated enthusiasm for Bush’s war than the Rightists; I came out against that war on Set. 19, 2002, and never again heard from Neal Boortz, who used to link to my stuff prior). There is something to the eschewing of Left and Right, but in my opinion, it is, for the most, a cop-out. Beltway lefties were also quite hostile to Ron Paul at the inception. Since the nation’s memory is non-existent, they now love him—talking about him gets them on TV.

Meanwhile, In ‘Liberated’ Libya

Democracy, Foreign Policy, Neoconservatism, War

Meanwhile, in “Liberated” Libya
Nebojsa Malic

As part of its great white-knighting enterprise to charm the jihadists of every color an hue, the Empire launched a “kinetic military action” last spring to “liberate” Libya from its own government. That evil little war is now being invoked to justify a similar endeavor in Syria.

But was Libya really liberated? Depends on your definition of liberty. If it involves keeping dark-skinned folk in cages and torturing them, then yes. Establishing Sharia law? Check. Desecrating Christian cemeteries, a la Kosovo (another one of Empire’s “liberation” projects)? Ditto.

Last week, the “free and democratic” Libyans vandalized a number of gravestones of both Allied and Axis troops who died during the North African campaign of WW2. The campaign, pitting Italian and German (Afrika Korps) troops against the British and Commonwealth forces, had swept back and forth across today’s Libya between 1940 and 1942, with some of the fiercest fighting around Tobruk and Benghazi. The cemeteries survived Libyan independence and Col. Gadhafi’s reign, but not the NATO-installed “transitional” government.

Now, it is entirely possible that the “government” in Tripoli has nothing to do with this, and that it was the handiwork of local, Benghazi jihadists, noted veterans of the Iraqi insurgency. But that is precisely the constituency – for lack of a better word – which the Empire sought to “protect” by intervening. And now there is word that Cyrenaica (the area in question) is seeking “autonomy” from Tripoli.

Back in March 2011, as the “kinetic military action” became imminent, Justin Raimondo noted that Libya was a construct – three disparate provinces with different tribal composition. First under Ottoman rule (1551-1911), then under Italy (1911-1941), the regions were put together into the independent Kingdom of Libya (1951-1969) by the British. Colonel Gadhafi overthrew the monarchy in 1969, and ruled Libya until last year. And now the country is – predictably – coming apart.

Kosovo offers some clues about what might happen next. It, too, was a “humanitarian” intervention on behalf of a terrorist “liberation army,” with the goal of “regime change” (replacing Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic with someone more to Empire’s taste – i.e. the October 5 crowd and their current incarnation). The deliberate and systematic destruction of Serbian Orthodox churches and cemeteries began almost immediately, along with the murder and expulsion of ethnic Serbs, Roma, Turks and other “unwanted” communities. The UN and NATO occupation authorities did nothing to stop this persecution, which peaked in March 2004 with a 3-day pogrom. Not only was no one involved punished, the Albanians were rewarded in 2008 with US and EU recognition of their illegal declaration of independence (sure, the ICJ said it wasn’t illegal, but only after torturing the facts).

The Empire now insists on inviolability of “Kosovo” borders, seeking to suppress the remaining Serbs who refuse to accept “independence”. Yet carving out Kosovo clearly violated Serbia’s borders, which the Empire had no trouble with. Chances are it will seek to suppress the “autonomy” in Cyrenaica, then – unless the separatists there are the actual clients of Empire, in which case the “transitional council” might be thrown under the bus.

In other words, there really are no principles involved; just power. For all the media prattle about saving innocent civilians and helping democracy and freedom, “humanitarian” interventions – be they “kinetic military actions” involving bombers or ground troops or “regime change” operations involving astroturf revolutionaries – are never actually humanitarian. They do, however, involve murder, destruction, terrorism, organized crime, butchery, and plenty of lies. Such are the fruits by which we ought to know them.

My good friend Nebojsa Malic has been the Balkans columnist for Antiwar.com since 2000, and blogs at grayfalcon.blogspot.com. We are always thrilled when Nebojsa finds the time to pen an exclusive editorial for Barely A Blog. (Click on “BAB’s A List” for Nebojsa’s articles archive.)