Category Archives: Pop-Culture

Update # IV: Exporting Women To Make Benefit Glorious Nation of USA

Ann Coulter, Capitalism, China, Democracy, Family, Feminism, Free Markets, Gender, Intelligence, Pop-Culture

It transpires that Chinese leader Mao Zedong once proposed to export 10 million Chinese women to the United States:
In a long conversation that stretched way past midnight at Mao’s residence on February 17, 1973, the cigar-chomping Chinese leader referred to the dismal trade between the two countries, saying China was a “very poor country” and “what we have in excess is women.
Smart man. I think that’s one idea we ought to adopt. Think about it.
Or take a trip around Costco. You’ll see what I’m speaking about. I’ve become an expert at racing my cart through that fabulous store, weaving between walls of stupid female flesh. Only women can cause traffic jams with supermarket trolleys. It’s something to behold.
Give it some thought. If we exported women, politics would begin to move to the right again. Oprah would go out of business slowly. You’d hear less of that staccato tart tone:
“And he was like, ‘come here’; and I was like, ‘No’; and he was like, ‘You’re amazing’; and I was like, ‘I know.’”
What would you do to hear less of that voice and mannerisms?
Greg Gutfeld described the sound emitted from Lauren Caitlin Upton, of the Miss Teen USA fame, as having “that profoundly irritating voice that combines the worst of Southern California with South Carolina—a hybrid that squeezes out anything smart from both places, leaving only a ditz-filled diaper.”
Yes, sans so many dames, it would become possible to rehabilitate English as our official language. Think less small-minded pettiness and jealousy (how I’ve suffered personally from that aspect of the female character). The possibilities are endless.
Women who come to this site are excluded, of course. Ilana’s ladies are fabulous.
I said once that I’d give up my vote if that would guarantee that all women were denied the vote.
Are there any other benefits, incidental to the export of women, that you can think of?
If the Idiocracy should stumble upon this post, then chill, please; it’s called satire, humor, reductio ad absurdum (and a bit of wishful thinking).
Update # I (Feb. 14): To the perplexed: Good satire is always based on a kernel of truth; ask Ali G., or Borat. Just because Ann Coulter would agree with this post, doesn’t mean it’s wrong. That’s woman logic.
Ann Coulter is right about very many things; it’s a shame she rarely writes about the things she’s right about. That’s the secret to success: keep the masses euphoric and moronic. (This last and the tart talk have gone to our “Quotables.” Check them out sometime.)
Update # II: See my related bimbos-instead-of-bombs suggestion in the next post, “Ayaan Hirsi Ali: America’s Shame.”
Update # III: Fewer females means there will be fewer “Skanks in the Sky,” and not as many men weighed down by “cranky kids” and a “papoose strapped to a sunken chest.”

Update # IV: Barbara, who has just started her own blog (I’m allowing it, provided she doesn’t neglect us), comments on the shrews that sully my favorite store, Costco.
On approaching a display, let’s say the tomatoes, and out of courtesy to other shoppers—not wanting to impede access—I’ll park the cart out of the way, and then approach the produce. Not the CCs (Costco Cows). They straddle the length of the counter with their carts and creepy kids and block anyone from approaching. Because brain size is inversely proportional to sense of importance, they might make time for a quick call on the cell as other more demure ladies wait to take tomatoes.
Trader Joe bitches are way worse; they imagine they’re the crème de la crème (of what? Provincial America?) Pity the patron who wants only to grab some zucchini and flee, but must circumnavigate a Trader Joe Mom mid-lesson—in other words laboring to make the zucchini purchase a “learning experience” for her malevolent little mutants. The only thing these beasts manage to teach their brats is that they, like their ugly moms, are the center of the universe. Screw the rest.
When I used to take my now grown-up baby shopping, I always found time to teach her courtesy. You don’t run through the place; you give way to older people—when you’re 3, that’s practically everyone—apologize if you bump into someone, pick up what you made them drop; don’t scream. Tantrums never occurred.
My saving grace at Costco: I shop only on the outskirts of the store. I go there for the best produce, poultry and fish you can get. The behemoths of Costco do not buy produce, or fresh fish and meat. How do I know? Standing in the queue to pay, I’ve noticed that the women have nothing but boxes in their carts. Piles of boxes packed with, it would seem, synthetic, preservative-laden, ready made food (frozen pizza, etc.) Women are poisoning America with more than just stupidity. Not one item of fresh food stuff for the brood and the bread winner.
I was once asked by a sullen, if rather pretty, slim lady—a rarity there—what I do with all the berries I buy. I said: “eat them.” She asked: “how.” I was going to say, “With my mouth,” and point, but had a change of heart. It looked like I might be able to do some good. And she was interested.
“Every morning,” I told her, “I go through the time-consuming exercise of making a mega fruit salad for me and the Ungrateful Other (who also gets his morning coffee in bed and his clothes laid out for the day; he’s a hopeless dresser). Like teens, we are both bad in the mornings—completely non compus mentis until late mornings. Fruit is the best antidote to our fragile morning state.
Costco is the kind of shop that allows one to eat the best for the least. Every single day, irrespective of the season, you can enjoy a fruit bowl packed with kiwi, berries—straw, black, blue and raspberries—orange, grapefruit, banana, pear. I may have left out something. You name it. A five-star hotel would not serve such produce.
Ladies, if you lose the boxes, you’ll easily afford fresh food. Keep your Costco fruit purchase in the fridge, and apportion daily. You’ll find it goes a long way.
My interlocutor nodded. And then asked where in the store she could find berries; she had never been into the enormous cold storage, which is the culinary equivalent of Ali Baba’s cave.

Groovy Over Gravitas: The Unbearable Liteness of Being Reason

Classical Liberalism, libertarianism, Liberty, Political Philosophy, Pop-Culture, Pseudo-intellectualism, Reason

The reason I prefer to describe myself as a “classical liberal” is in order to avoid being equated with libertarians who equate liberty with grooviness. Exemplars are Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch of Reason magazine, who see the Ron Paul surge, in part, as a yearning for the “freewheeling fun of libertarianism.”

The breathy, unsubstantial nature of Reason libertarians was best encapsulated in the essay “Burke vs. Reason,” reproduced hereunder. Although I don’t agree with the writer about everything—his discounting of Ayn Rand, for example—Grace captures the essence of this libertarianism: Groovy over gravitas.

More material, “Reason’s list [of ’35 heroes of freedom’] is based on a false premise.” America is not freer than ever, as Reason’s groovy gush claims. If these libertines are not hip to that reality, then their feel for freedom—never mind their reasoning—is not very good.

What’s left but to groove on?

Burke vs. Reason
By Kevin Michael Grace
| Jan 18, 2004

“Reason” believes that the world has become “groovier” since 1968, the year of that magazine’s founding. Not merely “groovier,” mind you, but “groovier and groovier.” In celebration, it has nominated “35 heroes of freedom,” freedom apparently being synonymous with grooviness. This list, and the reasons given for the selection of the “heroes” therein is sufficient to persuade me that modern libertarianism, at least as exemplified by Reason magazine, is not a philosophy suitable for adults.
What sort of person says “groovy,” anyway? The last time I heard it used non-ironically was by a crooked lawyer in the movie To Live and Die in L.A. He was shot to death directly afterward and quite deservedly so. With its connotations of kaftans, flower power and “The Pope Smokes Dope,” its use today suggests superannuated hippies nostalgic for the Golden Dawn of the 1960s. But Nick Gillespie, Reason’s editor and presumed builder of the Pantheon of Groovy, is in his 40s and was thus barely toilet-trained during the Summer of Love. So the only nostalgia here is for a place that has never existed and never shall: Utopia.
To accuse someone or something of being “utopian” is normally considered an insult, for the reason that various attempts to mandate Heaven on Earth have resulted in the best approximations of Hell men can devise, but Reason thinks differently:
“For all of its many problems, the world we live in is dizzying in its variety, breathtaking in its riches, and wide-ranging in its options. Malcontents on the right and left who diagnose modernity as suffering from “affluenza” or “options anxiety” will admit this much: These days we’ve even got a greater choice of ways to be unhappy. Which may be as close to a definition of utopia as we’re likely to come.”
One would have thought it obvious that “a greater choice of ways to be unhappy” is a powerful argument against license. Certainly Edmund Burke thought so. Burke is considered the father of modern conservatism, but he was a Whig not a Tory, the champion of the American colonists and the people of India against the depredations of Warren Hastings. A classical liberal, in other words.
According to Burke,
“Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites…in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.”
Certainly Thomas Szasz, one of Reason’s 35 heroes, would agree with Burke. But Margaret Thatcher, another hero, would not. “There is no such thing as society,” she famously declared. Reason evidently agrees, which explains the presence on its list of William Burroughs, Larry Flynt, Madonna, Martina Navratilova and Dennis Rodman, who are celebrated for their antinomianism and their intemperance.
William Burroughs is praised for “irrevocably loosen[ing] up Eisenhower’s America. Not only is his fiction (Junky, Naked Lunch, Nova Express) relentlessly anti-authoritarian, he proved that you can abuse your body in every way imaginable and still outlive the entire universe.” Like Rimbaud, Burroughs extolled the “derangement of all the senses”; unlike Rimbaud, his work is mostly gibberish and his literary influence baleful. Burroughs also killed his wife and got away with it, but misogyny is not incompatible with grooviness, it seems.
Which brings us to Larry Flynt.
“Where Hugh Hefner mainstreamed bohemian sexual mores, hard-core porn merchant Flynt brought tastelessness to new depths, inspiring an unthinkable but revealing coalition between social conservatives and puritanical feminists–and helping to strengthen First Amendment protections for free expression along the way.”
Never mind that the First Amendment protects not “free expression” but “freedom of speech.” What is the nature of Flynt’s expression? “Chester the molester,” the depiction of a woman being put through a meat grinder, the reduction of the erotic to the clinical detachment of the livestock buyer and the mortician.
Madonna is praised for leading “MTV’s glorious parade of freaks, gender-benders, and weirdos who helped broaden the palette of acceptable cultural identities and destroy whatever vestiges of repressive mainstream sensibilities still remained.” In reality, Madonna’s career poses the question, How can you Ã?©pater le bourgeois after the burghers have embraced bohemianism? The answer is, You can’t. And so she has been reduced to publicly consuming her children, i.e., the likes of Britney Spears and Christian Aguilera.
Martina Navratilova is praised “as the first superstar athlete to admit she was gay and the first woman to play tennis like a man…she smashed stultifying stereotypes like so many poorly hit lobs.” But Navratilova has cheerfully admitted that even during her prime any one of the 100 top-ranked male players would have beaten her. As for stereotypes, she has firmly established in the public mind the conflation of female athletes with lesbianism. Which is not a good thing, is it?
Dennis Rodman is praised for “set[ting] an X-Men-level standard for cultural mutation. His flamboyant, frequently gay-ish antics place him in apostolic succession to a madcap handful of athletes such as Joe Namath, Rollie Fingers, and Muhammad Ali, all of whom challenged the lantern-jawed stiffness that had traditionally made sports stars such dull role models.” Rodman is a wreck of a man who wasted his talent, trashed his career and serves as a role model only for those that seek to emulate the insane, but what is that compared to the value of “gay-ish antics”?
It is worth noting that Reason’s list excludes cultural figures of eminence. (Unless you believe Rose Wilder Lane, Ayn Rand, Robert Heinlein and Willie Nelson count.) It is not as if America has not witnessed the flowering of great artists since 1968: Tom Wolfe in belles-lettres, Stanley Kubrick in film and Philip Glass in music are three that come to mind. But these men fail the grooviness test. Wolfe and Kubrick are rather gloomy about the human condition. And Glass is a Buddhist, a religion that teaches that desire is the root of human suffering, while Reason teaches the exact opposite.
To be fair, Reason’s list contains a number of worthies: Milton Friedman, F.A. Hayek, Jane Jacobs, Ron Paul, Szasz, Clarence Thomas. But would they celebrate the destruction of all norms and the reduction of people to the level of atoms seeking ceaselessly and exclusively to maximize their utility? I think not.
In any event, Reason’s list is based on a false premise. The world may be freer since 1968, but Reason’s editors do not live in the world, they live in the United States. And only a fool or liar would deny that America is much less free than it was 35 years ago. There is no sphere of human activity that American governments do not seek to regulate–except the sexual sphere. Laws proliferate at such a rate that everyone is a law-breaker. There is nowhere Americans can go when they simply want to be left alone. Just ask Randy Weaver and David Koresh. Meanwhile, the range of acceptable opinion becomes ever more narrow. Just ask Al Campanis, Jimmy the Greek, Trent Lott, Rush Limbaugh, Gregg Easterbrook, et al. The world we live in may be dizzying in its variety, but America becomes less “diverse” with each passing day.
A glance at any newspaper serves to demonstrate that Americans no longer believe in personal responsibility. They have become as children; their woes are always someone else’s fault. “Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites.” If Burke was right, then American liberty is in mortal danger. If the juvenile delinquents at Reason are right, that is as nothing compared to the constitutionally guaranteed right of the cabaret artiste to masturbate in public. To what will Americans listen and to whom? The counsels of the wise and good or the flattery of knaves? Burke or Reason? The future of the Republic rests on the answers to these questions.

Kevin Michael Grace is an unemployed journalist who maintains the website TheAmbler.com.

Oprah's Obama

Democrats, Elections 2008, Politics, Pop-Culture, The Zeitgeist

Before being swept up in it, let’s trace the genesis of Barack Obama mania for a moment. It was started by Oprah Winfrey. I’m not saying he ought to be discounted because his popularity is of the Queen of Kitsch’s making. For one, it’s too late for that. Oprah is a powerful person. However, since the media have taken on her mantle and kept the momentum going, we seemed to have forgotten that Oprah introduced Obama to the public.

Obama is a nice enough man. Whereas most candidates are quite ignoble, he’s merely mediocre. I think he was against the war, which ought to elevate him above The Hildebeest among Democrats. Republicans won’t have worthy candidates, unless Tom Tancredo or Ron Paul decides to run.

In any event, it doesn’t hurt to remember that Obama was launched by the confessional queen and in many ways represents the Oprah-ization of American life, down to his names.

Had he been christened “Barak,” he’d be the namesake of an impressive “military general in the Book of Judges” in the Hebrew Bible. Alas, if his mother intended to so name him, she misspelled “Barak.” If this indeed is the genesis of his name, it would also be emblematic of contemporary America.

Obama’s middle name — “Hussein” — he shares with Saddam and many millions of Muslims. That too provides a snapshot of modern America.

Oprah’s Obama

Democrats, Elections 2008, Politics, Pop-Culture, The Zeitgeist

Before being swept up in it, let’s trace the genesis of Barack Obama mania for a moment. It was started by Oprah Winfrey. I’m not saying he ought to be discounted because his popularity is of the Queen of Kitsch’s making. For one, it’s too late for that. Oprah is a powerful person. However, since the media have taken on her mantle and kept the momentum going, we seemed to have forgotten that Oprah introduced Obama to the public.

Obama is a nice enough man. Whereas most candidates are quite ignoble, he’s merely mediocre. I think he was against the war, which ought to elevate him above The Hildebeest among Democrats. Republicans won’t have worthy candidates, unless Tom Tancredo or Ron Paul decides to run.

In any event, it doesn’t hurt to remember that Obama was launched by the confessional queen and in many ways represents the Oprah-ization of American life, down to his names.

Had he been christened “Barak,” he’d be the namesake of an impressive “military general in the Book of Judges” in the Hebrew Bible. Alas, if his mother intended to so name him, she misspelled “Barak.” If this indeed is the genesis of his name, it would also be emblematic of contemporary America.

Obama’s middle name — “Hussein” — he shares with Saddam and many millions of Muslims. That too provides a snapshot of modern America.