UPDATE II: Mining Mitt’s Apartheid Moment (& The Killing Continues)

Founding Fathers, Labor, Old Right, Political Economy, Republicans, Russia, Socialism, South-Africa

Excerpted from “Mining Mitt’s Apartheid Moment,” now on WND:

“During the final presidential debate, Republican contender Mitt Romney got my hackles up (unnecessarily) with the following invocation of apartheid:

‘I would also make sure that [Iran’s] diplomats are treated like the pariah they are around the world. The same way we treated the apartheid diplomats of South Africa.’

Why unnecessarily? Romney is unremarkable among Republicans. Pushing revolutionary radicalism on the Old South Africa was the goal not only in high diplomatic circles, but among most Republicans.

With a few exceptions.

As I document in ‘Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa,’ ‘For advocating ‘constructive engagement’ with South Africa, members of his Republican Party issued a coruscating attack on Ronald Reagan.’

Reagan favored ‘constructive engagement’ with South Africa, together with a tough resistance to communist advances in the Third World. But political pressure, not least from the Republican majority, mounted for an increasingly punitive stance toward Pretoria. This entailed an ‘elaborate sanctions structure,’ disinvestment, and a prohibition on sharing intelligence with the South Africans. In 1986, the Soviet Union, which had until the 1980s supported a revolutionary takeover of white-ruled South Africa by its ANC protégés, suddenly changed its tune and denounced the idea. Once again, the US and the USSR were on the same side—that of ‘a negotiated settlement between Pretoria and its opponents.’

Senator Lowell P. Weicker Jr., in particular, stated: ‘For this moment, at least, President Reagan has become an irrelevancy to the ideals, heartfelt and spoken, of America.’

South Africa was just one more issue on which Republicans had slipped between the sheets with the fashionable left. Today they are as eager as the next drug-addled supermodel to press flesh with Saint Nelson Mandela and the functionaries who run the dominant-party state of South Africa. That is, run it into the ground. … ”

The complete column is “Mining Mitt’s Apartheid Moment.” Read it on WND.

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UPDATE I (Oct. 27): IT’S ALL ABOUT FACTION. As was noted in “Mining Mitt’s Apartheid Moment,” “…the ANC … is powerless to stop intimidation. In South Africa, the sacked workers are in the habit of killing scabs who want to work.”

Reports RT:

South African police fired stun grenades, rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse striking miners who tried to foil a rally of the nation’s largest union. The miners say the union reached an unfavorable deal with Amplants mine without their consent.
The Anglo American Platinum mine in Rustenburg has announced an agreement to reinstate 12,000 miners fired earlier this month for staging illegal strikes and failing to appear at a disciplinary hearing. The credit for the deal was taken by the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM).
“[Amplants] agreed to reinstate all the dismissed workers on the provision that they return to work by Tuesday,” the NUM announced Saturday, a day after the breakthrough in talks.
But the Amplants workers said they were neither aware of nor happy with the deal.
“We know nothing about it. We were not consulted, we only heard about it on the radio,” Ampants miner Reuben Lerebolo told AFP.

UPDATE II (Oct. 27): The indefatigable Adriana Stuijt (@AdrianaStuijt) tweets out:

“Oxford-educated SA investment company owner Alexander Theo Otten murdered at #Velddrift http://bit.ly/ThZFld”

The International Criminal Court: Good For Thee, But Not For Me

Bush, Crime, Criminal Injustice, Europe, Federalism, Justice, Law, States' Rights

George W. Bush is likely nervous about traveling to Europe lest the International Criminal Court (ICC) put him in the dock to answer for Iraq and other war crimes.

In the spirit of American national sovereignty, Republicans have rejected ICC jurisdiction. As James Orr of the London Telegraph notes, Republicans do not believe the ICC should be supported by America.

Lo and behold, Mr. Romney promised, Monday, to “make sure that Ahmadinejad is indicted under the Genocide Convention. His words amount to genocide incitation. I would indict him for it.”

Is this some new neoconservative trope? And what of the wacky A-Jad’s right of free speech? I was under the impression that so-called conservatives were all for the right to offend, as they should.

Although Bush would likely reject the possibility of the ICC’s jurisdiction over himself, he did not hesitate to call on the World Court to subvert Texas justice.

“W,” who would wrestle a crocodile for a criminal alien, ordered Texas to halt the execution of murderer and rapist José Medellín. Texas said NO, and ended Medellin’s miserable life. (Celebrated in “José Medellín’s Dead; Cue The Mariachi Band.”)

Bush used the ICC to rationalize treason against Texans. Romney hasn’t gone that far. But he seems to be indicating that he’ll join forces with global government when it suits him.

Katherine Fenton’s Typical Whining Womanhood

Aesthetics, Economy, Elections, English, Feminism, Gender, Labor, Republicans

Ridiculous is the imprecision with which conservatives have lashed out at the repulsive Katherine Fenton. She is the “young woman” who questioned the president and his rival, during the second presidential debate, about a non-existent construct: Pay “inequalities in the workplace.” “Specifically regarding females making only 72 percent of what their male counterparts earn.”

Attack her as the specimen of whining womanhood she is, will you? Don’t call her vague names (“”Feminazi,” “Tool”).

Also, go for the execution: Without exception, the clones that keep stepping into the limelight stud their conversation with the same mind-numbing commonplaces and humbugs, delivered in grating, staccato, tart tones of speech and a truncated vocabulary.

“I feel like” is how these women—endearingly called “young women”—preface every utterance; for they feel a lot, but don’t think much.

Yuk.

Is any conservative going to point out how off-putting America’s “young women” sound, irrespective of how pretty they look?

No, because The Thing I’ve described fits most young conservative commentators too. Remember how Laura Ingraham was forced to grovel for lampooning the dense Meghan McCain’s unmistakable moronity and Valley-Girl inflection?

In any event, implicit in Fenton’s question is that the wage discrepancy reported speaks to a widely accepted conspiracy to suppress women’s wages; and that the length of time a woman has been in the work force, her age, experience, education; whether she has put her career on hold to marry and mother—do not factor into the wage equation.

Incapable as these women are of analytical thinking, they cannot comprehend how certain realities factor into the wage equation. To wit, women are more likely than men to have had an interrupted career trajectory and to opt for part-time and lower-paying professions—education instead of engineering, for example.

If your average Republican galvanized economic logic to dispel distaff America’s claims of disadvantage, this is what he’d have said:

“If women with the same skills as men were getting only 72 cents for every dollar a man earns, men as a group would have long-since priced themselves out of the market. The fact that entrepreneurs don’t ditch men for women suggests that different abilities and experience are at work, rather than a conspiracy to suppress women.” (From “Guys Do Double Duty For Feminist Delusions.”)

UPDATED: Romney’s Debate Strategy: Try To Throw Obama Off-Scent (What Was Obama Doing? Winning)

Democrats, Economy, Elections, Foreign Policy, Republicans

Barack Obama has made a strong start to the final presidential debate at Boca Raton, Fla., and is already winning this foreign-policy debate. Where the one man’s policies start and the other man’s policies end is anyone’s guess. What we do know so far is that both Romney and Obama care a lot about women and democracy … all over the world. I don’t.

Romney is being smart in as much as he is throwing Obama off-scent and directing the debate away from foreign policy to the economy. Romney’s foreign policy, after all, offers nothing new.

Later.

UPDATE: FROM MY DEBATE NOTEPAD (transcripts are here):

What was Obama doing? Winning.

Romney took the place Barack Obama had occupied 2 weeks back: that of loser.

While Obama stutters each time he attempts to conceptualize about economic issues, Romney does a similar thing when trying to differentiate himself from the president on foreign policy.

The degree of convergence between the candidates? Romney, like Obama, loves drone action, loves nation building across the globe, bitch slapping China, helping da Afghan women, making foreign aid conditional (rather than eliminating it); approves of state-assistance following bankruptcy procedures and state investment in R & D.

Obama had a nice line (upon which I’ve riffed a bit): “No reason why Americans should die, if Afghans can do their own dying.” Romney was, obviously, a little reluctant. If Americans are not dying in defense of borders not their own—someone must be leading from behind. (All presidents should, in my opinion, lead from behind, unless they are taking the lead on how not to lead very much at all.)

Oh, and with heels, Michelle Obama is as tall as Mitt Romney. On the sartorial front: Mrs. Obama wore a cute dress; so did Ann Romney. (I’m glad Ann took off the red garments. While I love a deep burgundy, red is such an ugly color that it colors everyone who wears it ugly.)