UPDATED (4/25): LETTER: Quite A Few Conservatives Agree That J.D. Vance Is Vile

America, Celebrity, Conservatism, Critique, Intelligence, Literature

Leave a reply

I love my readers. They get it. Writes Mr. K, a longtime reader and a lawyer, about the column, “On The Backs Of Poor Whites? How J.D. Vance Elites Become Elites“:

Thank God. You are the FIRST person I have seen with the courage to call J.D. Vance out for what I also saw when reading his book years ago: His unbelievable willingness to throw anyone, including his family, etc., under the bus also to serve his, ultimately by definition, desire for self-promotion.
And in general, I have NEVER gotten what people saw in that book that elevated it so high. [Indeed. He’s nothing great.] As you kind of say, he found a niche in demand, I guess, that also was not too particular about the quality of what it would celebrate.

As for conservative TV hosts who’ve dubbed J.D. Vance “one of the smartest people around.” That’s hilarious. This says all you need to know about conservatism’s intelligentsia.

James Burnham, Hans Hoppe, Samuel Huntington (A Democrat, actually) of the brilliant, unequaled Clash of Civilizations fame, and Samuel Johnson, Russell Kirk, Clyde Wilson, von Mises, Rothbard, Chris Matthew Sciabarra (what a writer he is!): They all live happily on the shelves of my library, pictured above. It would be sacrilegious—and an affront—to place Vance in their literary vicinity. Stupid, too.

READ: “On The Backs Of Poor Whites? How J.D. Vance Elites Become Elites“:

…Vance is a sellout. Not that they were asked for their take, but the archetypical folks depicted in Hillbilly Elegy contend, justifiably, that “Vance [is] not an authentic hillbilly or an example of the working class.”

Cassie Chambers Armstrong’s Aunt Ruth, for example.

Aunt Ruth didn’t think much of Vance’s endeavor. Her niece is an Appalachian and author of a redeeming tale, Hill Women: Finding Family and a Way Forward in the Appalachian Mountains.

“Hillbilly Elegy’s portrayal of Appalachia,” explains Chambers, “is designed to elevate Vance above the community from which he came … it seeks to tell his story in a way that aligns with a simplistic rags-to-riches narrative. Think critically about how that narrative influences the way we are taught to think about poverty, progress, and identity.” …

UPDATE (4/25): Jeff Deist: “Agreed. For a more thoughtful defense of Appalachia and poor whites this is a great read– by former US Senator Jim Webb.”

NEW ON YouTube: Discussing The Role of ‘Racism’ In The Floyd Trial With David Vance

Crime, Free Speech, Law, Political Correctness, Racism, Reason

Leave a reply

NEW ON YouTube: Discussing with David Vance the role of “racism” in the Floyd trial.

Who the hell writes such a difficult column, as, “Was The Cop’s Knee On George Floyd’s Neck ‘Racism’? No!”

Oh, well. David did really well. (By the way, I’ll also be on with Alex Newman, of the New American, on Tuesday, April 27, at 1:00PM Pacific. I am told that this is when we’ll record the conversation, to be uploaded some days later.)

NEW COLUMN: Losers: Markle And A Meritless McCain. Winner: The Queen

Britain, Conservatism, John McCain, Neoconservatism, Political Philosophy, THE ELITES

Leave a reply

NEW COLUMN is “Losers: Markle And A Meritless McCain. Winner: The Queen.” It is now on WND.COM, The Unz Review and CNSNews.com.

And excerpt:

Fancy that! A member of a meritless political dynasty, The McCains, has panned the duty-bound British monarchy.

There is a revolving door between Big Media, be it the neoliberal CNN or neocon Fox News, and members of the political duopoly. Whether practiced by the Left or the Right; this is indisputably immoral, and a conflict of interest.

To spout received opinion, Fox News has hired Ben Domenech, the unremarkable husband of the irredeemably awful Meghan McCain.

At the conclusion of a wishy-washy Fox segment about the wanton Meghan Markle, the man who had married into the McCain dynasty declared:

“There is nothing more American than hating the British Crown.”

That’s a shallow stance at best. For, if forced to choose between the mob (democracy) and the monarchy, the latter is far preferable and benevolent. This thesis is anatomized in Democracy: The God that Failed: The Economics and Politics of Monarchy, Democracy, and Natural Order, by libertarian political philosopher Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

In his seminal work, Hoppe provides ample support—historical and analytical—for democracy’s inferiority as compared to monarchy:

‘… democracy has succeeded where monarchy only made a modest beginning: in the ultimate destruction of the natural elites. The fortunes of great families have dissipated, and their tradition of a culture of economic independence, intellectual farsightedness, and moral and spiritual leadership has been lost and forgotten. Rich men still exist today, but more frequently than not they owe their fortune now directly or indirectly to the state.’

“[I]n light of elementary economic theory, the conduct of government and the effects of government policy on civil society can be expected to be systematically different, depending on whether the government apparatus is owned privately or publicly,” explains Hoppe.

“From the viewpoint of those who prefer less exploitation over more and who value farsightedness and individual responsibility above shortsightedness and irresponsibility, the historic transition from monarchy to democracy represents not progress but civilizational decline.”

The raw, ripe, rule of the demos has diminished the queen, but has yet to destroy her. Queen Elizabeth might be a member of a landed aristocracy, much-maligned in radical America—but she has acquitted herself as would a natural aristocrat. …

… READ THE REST. NEW COLUMN is “Losers: Markle And A Meritless McCain. Winner: The Queen.” It is now on WND.COM, The Unz Review and CNSNews.com.

America Has More Political Appointees In Its Federal Government Than Any Other Developed Democracy

Debt, Federal Reserve Bank, Government, Political Economy, Politics, Republicans

Leave a reply

“Shut the hell up”: That’s what you say to the next Republican who bleats at you about the GOP being the party of small government.

If GOPers then argue that governments have grown the world over, but the American government is still the smallest: Yet more lies.

Reports the Economist:

America has far more political appointees in its federal government, some 4,000 in all, than any other developed democracy, according to David Lewis, a political scientist at Vanderbilt University. No one ever really stops to wonder whether, if so many roles can sit empty, all these jobs are needed in the first place. [Of course we wonder out-loud; you just don’t listen]

Presidents used to be free to hand out every job in the government. But in 1881 a spurned office-seeker assassinated President James Garfield. His successor, Chester Arthur, signed into law the act creating the civil service and, with it, the seeds of a permanent bureaucracy that would grow from administration to administration, developing many fine public servants along with an unknown quantity of rot.

In the case that Republicans then tell you that the Democrats have, exclusively, presided over the growth of government that, too, is tummy rot.

“Contrary to popular myth,” wrote James Ostrowski, President of Free Buffalo, in 2002, “every Republican president since and including Herbert Hoover has increased the federal government’s size, scope, or power—and usually all three. Over the last one hundred years, of the five presidents who presided over the largest domestic spending increases, four were Republicans.”

“Include regulations and foreign policy, as well as budgets approved by a Republican Congress, and a picture begins to emerge of the Republican Party as a reliable engine of government growth.”

The Evil Party and the Stupid Party are a political match made in hell.

Most ludicrous is that these huckster Republicans still believe there’s a case to be made for “small government.” Have they looked at the debt clock? Do they think the American State will ever again be small; can ever be shrunk?

National debt stands at over $28 trillion. Each individual taxpayer owes $225,000—and while government will just print money to satisfy and procure voters—Quantitative Easing ad infinitum—taxpayers will still be expected to pay-up on pains of imprisonment.

The Small-Government ship has sailed and some Republicans don’t even know it.