Category Archives: Pop-Culture

UPDATED: In Defense Of Jacko’s Doctor

Drug War, Individual Rights, Justice, Law, libertarianism, Pop-Culture, Regulation

The following is from “In Defense Of Jacko’s Doctor,” now on WND.COM:

What a difference a few years can make. In July of 2005, cable TV’s crusaders wanted that frail stick figure, Michael Jackson, locked away forever. Jackson was a danger to ‘our’ children, they insisted. Had not his accuser said so? The ‘kid’ in question was a five-foot-seven, hirsute, habitual liar and shoplifter, who was following in the tradition of a family of transients and tramps.

Today, the same characters on the networks are having a whale of a time at the prospect of jail time for Dr. Conrad Murray. Murray was convicted of the involuntary manslaughter of Mr. Jackson. The pop sensation died of a fatal dose of the anesthetic propofol. It had been administered in the singer’s bedroom on June 25, 2009.

Dr. Murray, who had been out on bail, was promptly declared a dangerous offender by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor. ‘This is a crime where the end result was the death of a human being. That factor demands rather dramatically that the public should be protected,’ said Pastor.

What a difference a day makes. Before the verdict, Murray was out and about among the public, during which time he did not put anyone under.

Jackson, whom I defended when the prosecutor known as ‘Mad Dog’ (Thomas) Sneddon picked up the star’s scent and gave chase, charging him with child sexual abuse—was a deeply disturbed, body dysmorphic, drug-addicted man. Nevertheless, he was an adult, not a child. His decisions were his to make. And Michael Jackson had hired Murray to feed narcotics directly into his bloodstream. …

With a steady stream of ‘milk of amnesia,’ Mr. Jackson should have expected an unsteady practitioner. …”

The complete column, “In Defense Of Jacko’s Doctor,” is now on WND.COM. Read it. “Like” it!

My book, “Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa,” is available from Amazon. (Don’t forget those reviews; they help.)

A Kindle copy is also on sale.

Barnes and Noble is always well-stocked and ships within 24 hours.

Still better, shipping is free and prompt if you purchase Into the Cannibal’s Pot from The Publisher. Inquire about an Xmas special on bulk buys.

UPDATE (Nov. 11): Robert, there’s the reason I do not watch any show where a 100 pound woman with implants and cleavage bests all men in some of the traditionally toughest male roles there are. I advise men against watching these shows, and taking firm control of the remote. It goes without saying, I lost your thread, but, no need to xplain. [Grin.] Oh, good, manly programs: The Unit, Flashpoint, and Special Ops training on the Military channel. These give you an indication of what’s really involved in a manly work, and why we should not emasculate men.

UPDATED: Slimy Sex Trail Leads to Chicago

Aesthetics, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Morality, Politics, Pop-Culture, Propaganda, Racism, Republicans, Sex

Ann Coulter provides some good shoe-leather reporting, absent from US mainstream media, as she tracks the slimy trail of Herman Cain’s accusers back to … Chicago. And, if you want the exact GPS (Global Positioning System) coordinates, the breadcrumbs lead straight to “David Axelrod’s apartment building at 505 North Lake Shore Drive,” where “Cain’s latest accuser, Sharon Bialekhe” resided.

What does it say about the workplace that someone who looks and sounds as Bialekhe does has held respectable position’s in various industries? And she’s only 50; so ugly and lined despite all the obvious plastic panel beating her face has endured. In answer to the question of how to stay young, I always reply: When you get to your late 40s, what’s inside begins to manifest on the outside. You can’t hide ugly insides.

UPDATE: The Real Rush has it that the media’s extra-hideous attack on Cain is because, “Herman [is] Cain more of a threat than the other GOP contenders: He could win. So, neither the Obama administration, the Democrat National Committee, nor the liberal GOP leadership wants him to secure the Republican nomination. Blacks would vote for him. The guilted white fools who voted for Obama would vote for him. Conservatives would vote for him. Evangelical Christians would vote for him. Is there anyone left?

Sure there is. But you get the picture: With Cain versus Obama, it’s Cain in a landslide.”

MORE.

Steve Jobs & The Paramountcy Of Privacy

Business, Capitalism, Celebrity, Conservatism, Ethics, Human Accomplishment, Media, Morality, Pop-Culture, Technology, The Zeitgeist

THE PARAMOUNTCY OF PRIVACY. I’m not particularly familiar or enamored of the new gadgets, although I fully appreciate their contribution to humans and to humanity. I tend to stick with CDs (for the best in sound), books for reading, and the Internet and email for communicating.

Still, as a capitalist and a communicator, I admired Steve Jobs greatly. I particularly liked the precision and sophistication with which he used language. I appreciated the amalgamation of drama and simplicity in the Job’s message. Jobs was never a blabber mouth.

But most of all, I identified with Steve Jobs’ acute sense of privacy. He was a very private man.

For one of the most recognizable men on earth, Steve Jobs was quite elusive. To me, that is paramount—and the very essence of greatness. Privacy is what made Jobs a conservative persona. The fact that Jobs knew the importance of boundaries between what a person shared with the world and what he kept to himself gave him the bearing of a champion. Only a private man, in my view, can strive to true greatness.

When Jobs died I was wrapping up a WND column about yet another repulsive character that is about to join the pantheon of American exhibitionists—liars, cheats, whores (not the good kind), and worse—who’ve shared (or will share) a couch with that vulgarizer, Oprah. What a study in contrasts!

In Ayn Rand’s magnificent words, “civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy.” The heroic and creative inner struggle is what brings out the best in man. I repeat myself, I know: My heroes are in the Greek tradition: silent, stoic, principled yet private. That is what I saw in Steve Jobs.

Steve Jobs (1955–2011)

America, Business, Capitalism, Celebrity, Ethics, Human Accomplishment, Morality, Pop-Culture, Technology

Ryan McMaken at Mises.org eulogizes Steve Jobs:

Steve Jobs, one of the most important entrepreneurs and innovators of both the 20th and 21st centuries, has died. Will he receive the sort of veneration reserved to politicians when they die? That’s unlikely, although Steve Jobs typically did more good for humanity every day before lunch time than any politician has ever done in his whole life.
Jobs should be considered a great American icon in the same way that Michelangelo is associated with Italy or Mozart with Austria.
When foreigners walk into “American-themed” gift shops in America, they should be greeted with commemorative plates bearing Jobs’s face.
Unfortunately, that is unlikely to happen since we have to honor great humanitarians like nuker-in-chief Harry Truman instead.
And of course, Jobs did great things for all humans, and not just Americans.

Rest in Peace, Steve Jobs.

APPLE–Remembering Steve Jobs: “… Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built…”

Playboy before “The Girls Next Door”. Via LewRockwell.com, here is the definitive Playboy interview with Steven Jobs.