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I think what you have to do is see why socialist (a clearly bankrupt ideology) philosophies and practices are THRIVING now. What is it about this cultural milieu that gives that bullshit purchase?

I constantly underrate the rat-bastard aspect of parasitism. I don't remember who told me – it might have been you or somebody on Facebook – but he mentioned how a friend of his who was on the dole was an extremely caustic and partisan advocate for the left. Come to think of it, I think it was somebody's Facebook essay. I don't know if this guy stated this explicitly, but I think there was the conclusion suggested (maybe by me) that a guilty conscience can be like a wolf. If you're on the dole, people can be very defensive about it. They can put up a big smokescreen of bluster as they try to justify (perhaps unconsciously to themselves) the side of the dependency aisle they are standing in.

And like I said, I think I way underestimate how common this is. That people run clear past logic and straight to knee-jerk emotionalism and psychological jihad is quite common. Most of us are skilled bullshitters and it’s a useful skill. And such a psychological cloud is understandably a tough nut to crack for any politician. Truth can just tend to snap those psychological doors shut even tighter. So we blame the socialist-secular machine when what really needs to be said is that some people need to stop mooching off of their neighbors and find a job. Maybe Governor Christie will be the first to say this, 'cause it sure as hell won't be Bobby Jindal or even Newt Gingrich. Being a politician means not facing the harsh realities if you can at all avoid it, especially if they are politically disadvantageous.

I'm pretty much of the same mind as you. I see Newt's "secular-socialist machine" as pandering to the religious. It may sound nice to some, but should we really be demonizing the secular? Is that smart? Should we be mangling and abusing the language like the left does? What is it we want then, a theocratic state?

Our American system wasn't just a reformulation of Christianity. It has roots in religion, and unlike the left I don't deny those roots. But it's just a part and there's a vital Jeffersonian secular part as well without which our society wouldn't be the way it is. And without a moral people, same thing. The secular becomes unworkable without the moral element as we're seeing now. When we all become competing plunderers of our own culture, we are no longer a moral people, let alone a wise one.

"Secular" should not be made a dirty word. But politics isn't about truth. It's about manipulating people and getting elected. One in a while you'll get a leader with good intentions. But they are probably far rarer than most people believe. The "common good" these days, once a profound idea, is just a code word for "my good" as everyone competes to steel from everyone else and the slick politicians are there to sanctify it with clever language and deceptive verbiage.

But certainly it is a grand and important question as to what exists in the cesspool of our cultural milieu to spawn such socialist, victimhood, entitlement, and (as is Mark Levin's new take), tribal mindsets, especially living as well off as most of us do in the West. If this were Ethiopia, I can perhaps understand people falling for the Cuntlosis of the world. But this is not Ethiopia. Not even close. Some say the very success of our civilization in making our lives relatively smooth and easy spoils us and has us creating for ourselves unreasonable expectations, thus we are driven on crusades (CO2…yikes) against things that are of no or very little harm. I read an article that contained a great paragraph describing this and I'll quote that tomorrow. I can't find it at the moment.

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Running whining to the government when things get tough. Notice how Bobby Jindal honestly believed his hands were tied and he couldn't make a move to make those sand berms without government approval? Fuck Bobby, stand up, just do it. Give the order. Wait for the bureaucracy to catch up. If government is failing you, don't sit on your ass while they overcome inertia.

God damn right. That's exactly what I was thinking. Do it. Just do it. You can see where even Jindal's mindset is Federal-centric which is the main poison of our times. It's almost a Stockholm Syndrome thing playing out where you have to ask your captors if you can go to the bathroom.

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Whining about securing the border is not securing the border. If you really need it secured, call up the militia. When the government gets wind of that, believe me, they'll act.

That's exactly what they should do.

First and foremost, socialism is a way for people to legally steal from others. Part of human nature is to try to gain any advantage over other that you can. And we humans are not above "polite" thievery. Another word for "spread the wealth" is "pilfer from others." In order to justify this thievery, and in order to live with ourselves and fend off the reality of what we are doing, we must see ourselves as entitled victims. We must see ourselves somehow entitled to other people's property. And the human mind is very clever at coming up with reasons and excuses for why we are not thieves but deserving victims.

And as the left ramps up the class warfare rhetoric and lays the propaganda on thick, it's easy enough for people to believe they are victims. Remember under Bush when unemployment was about 5% and people were going on and on about how horrible the economy was? That was a perception produced by constant axe-grinding, lies, and propaganda by the left.

Competition is the lifeblood of prosperity and capitalism. It can bring out the best in all of us. But there's a side of competition that can bring out the worst. If you can pit class against class, if you can create a lifeboat atmosphere where, even if you don't think of yourself as a victim you see that others are pillaging the store, it's only human nature to try to get your "fair share" too. So the left (with the help of "compassionate conservatives") can turn government from a protector of liberty to a free-for-all as we compete to make sure we get our share of the governmental spoils. That is pretty much the system and the mindset we have now.

To the credit of many Tea Party members, as R. Emmett Tyrrell notes in Revolt of the Masses, theirs is not a revolt to hang onto entitlements. There is real concern (finally) for the solvency of society itself. And there should be.

Fear is a useful weapon of any politician, but particularly of the left. And it's doubtful that socialism could survive without it. The more put upon that we feel, the more likely we are to trade a little more freedom for security, something Ben Franklin, among others, warns us against. That is another thing that drives people to socialism. It's not just misplaced compassion. It's not just a desire to legally steel from others. If you can get people to feel insecure, they may attempt to buy the supposed safety that politicians have to offer in their various entitlements and programs. It's an ongoing scam. Note that the left is constantly in crisis mode trying to ramp up fear and the perception that we are in dire straights. And if there isn't a real crisis, they'll simply invent one. From DDT to the global warming scam (and the global cooling hysteria of a couple decades back), the road is littered with the fear-based schemes of the left that turned out to be baseless and yet were effective for gaining power by instilling a feeling of an urgent need that "Someone must do something!"

Another aspect of socialism is that the very success of capitalism and freedom that leads to our very prosperous and secure way of life can lead to "The Princess and the Pea" effect. When things get really comfy, any imperfections tend to stand out even more. We become like a spoiled child or like that pampered princess in the fairy tale who, even through several layers of mattresses, is so distressed by the single pea tucked under the bottom mattress that she can't sleep. It's unbecoming of a free people to be such wusses, but there you have it. We often are. And the left, who are masters of deceitful Orwellian language and manipulation, even have an answer for this. If you ask people to just buck it up you're being "cruel" and "insensitive."

And this goes to the heart of the false compassion of socialism, for as any mother or father of children knows, little Johnny or Suzie must eventually make his or her own way in the world. And you can't protect them from every scrape and bruise as they go forth into that world. In fact, you will likely create a dependent entitlement spoiled-brat monster if you do. And we have far too many of those right now in society, the product of socialism and the left's trumped-up class warfare agitating. We need to role back socialism and you can be assured that there will be legions of spoiled Johnnies and Suzies who will pitch a fit. But that will be a sure sign of progress….if we can resist the demagoguery of the left as they try to characterize any attempt at fiscal sanity as "trying to starve the children and throw grandma into the street." Brave men and women before our time have stormed the beaches of Normandy or suffered real physical hardships in the cause of freedom. The least we can do is resist the pitches of the snake oil salesmen of the left and finally and forever put a stake through the heart of socialism.

Here's that quote I was talking about. It's from Yuval Levin:

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We who live in the 21st century West have the least messy, least dangerous, least uncertain lives of any human beings in history. We should be very grateful for that, but we should not let our good fortune utterly distort our expectations of life, and we should not react with unrestrained indignant shock anytime the limitations of our power make themselves seen or the cold and harsh capriciousness of nature overcomes our defenses.

One thing for sure, Obama and his Marxist-socialist comrades are absolutely ecstatic about this oil spill in the gulf.

Krauthammer has a good article about the spill.

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First and foremost, socialism is a way for people to legally steal from others. Part of human nature is to try to gain any advantage over other that you can. And we humans are not above "polite" thievery. Another word for "spread the wealth" is "pilfer from others." In order to justify this thievery, and in order to live with ourselves and fend off the reality of what we are doing, we must see ourselves as entitled victims. We must see ourselves somehow entitled to other people's property. And the human mind is very clever at coming up with reasons and excuses for why we are not thieves but deserving victims.

Man, you said a mouthful there. That really is it. That's human psychology in a nutshell. And you notice how violent the reactions are when anybody calls attention to the reality of the situation. One of the most offensive things you can do to people is assault their perceptions and get them to face an uncomfortable truth. Case in point, when you suggest that rather than actually HELPING anyone, you're harming them. That's the kind of thing liberals completely wig out over. They can't accept truths like that. Because it is an affront to their core reality distortion. No, their intentions are good, they just want to help people. They're not racist. They just care.

That false compassion is one of earth's great evils. I call it Kennedy compassion. One of the wealthiest, most elite families in the world. With an image of helping the downtrodden. Particularly retards... after all, one of the Kennedy siblings, Rosemary was afflicted with moderate mental retardation. Eunice was active in "raising awareness" (which means raising money), all SORTS of good intentions and money given to institutions.

The Kennedy foundation had as one of its planks the noble sounding aim of encouraging "habits of thrift and self dependence among the poor." It's a subtle vocabulary thing, but notice how it's not "independence" but "self dependence". And there has always been something uncomfortably aristocratic and downlooking about the Kennedy agenda toward the poor and unfortunate.

And that ended up giving them crazy political power in this society. Way out of proportion to the piddly little help they provided to their charities.

Meanwhile, their foundations played with tax exempt status, there were beach houses owned by the foundation... basically the charity work became a way to increase wealth, not give wealth.

Ditto. What you say has the ring of truth. Leftist "compassion" often looks a lot like Elmer Gantry compassion. Fleece the flock by setting yourself up as morally superior.

I'm not sure how much of Jonah Goldberg's "Liberal Fascism" any of you have read, but there's a lot in there about the whole "social gospel" reformer schtick of the early part of the last century and how Hillary and much of the left today are basically the current incarnation of that movement. No, the Marxist-socialist "Progressives" do not do a lot of god talk, but everything else about it is the same. It's a morally cranky and self-righteous movement that wants to tell the rest of us how to live, whether trying to ban alcohol (which the movement did) or cigarettes and fatty foods as today's "Progressives" want to do. I can't do Jonah's book justice, but it's really one of the best parts of his book as he shows the history of this and the similarity of mindsets and techniques between the old "social gospel" movement and today's hard-driving holier-than-thou "Progressives."

And so it's a bit ironic that Newt names the problem "the secular-socialist machine" when it a socialist machine and even a bit of a social-gospel socialist machine that is hardly strictly "secular" in nature. Seriously. If you read the words of Cass Sunstein, Van Jones, Obama, Pelosi, or any of those cranks, they are infused with the same zeal as the Prohibitionists (and other "social gospel" reformers of the time). They want to stamp out this or that and they will use the overbearing power of government to do it. And it's always a righteous cause. It matters little whether it's God supposedly backing their righteous cause or Saul Alinksy. It's the same thing.

One of the weaknesses of Newt is that because he's deep into religion, he's not at liberty to comment on it. He can't see things through that lens. Me, I can see the good things that religion can bring, but it also brings some bad stuff too. And there are real parallels between the "social gospel" reformers of years past and these "Progressives" of today. Again, I can't do Brother Jonah's book justice in this regard. I hope all of you get a chance to read that one. Many of you may finally understand just how badly you've been bait-and-switched by the left as they pound away at religion (scaring us all into thinking that a theocracy is just around the corner) while they basically take up the same schtick. But without the *label* of religion, many are very easily deceived. Funny how a simple change of language can have so much power. Those on the left agitating and clamoring for a "separation of church and state" are quite correct. But would they understand that such a thing would (thankfully) separate our state from their social agitating and moral prosthelytizing?

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I'm not sure how much of Jonah Goldberg's "Liberal Fascism" any of you have read

My problem is, I am on my second LISTENING of that book, because I got if free from audible.com. And it's great, but I miss so much because I'm usually listening while I work. To really get it, I need to listen while working out, or when I'm doing nothing else. I think I'm not an audio book person. I absorb much more when I read a printed page.

It's like the Hitchens book. I had to listen to it three times. I should have just bought the damn paperback.

I know what you mean. Some of Brother Sowell's books can require enormous concentration, and "Liberal Fascism" is packed full of facts, insights, and astute analysis. I think "Treasure Island" is more suitable to books-on-tape then some of these more intellectual books by Hitchens, Goldberg, etc. Especially with Brother Sowell's stuff, I might have to re-read the same paragraph two or three times to get what he's saying. Books on tape don't really work for me. I need to be able to "stop the tape" and think about a point or re-read a paragraph. But I can certainly understand the utility of them, to be able to drive, for instance, while listening to a book.

I've got Coulter's "How to Talk to a Liberal" book on tape. And, as much as I like Ann (not Anne), it's really tough to listen to her reading her own book. Her personality takes over and I miss what she's saying. I mean, she could read the back of cereal boxes and it would be interesting, but with her I need to read at *my* rhythm and not her rat-a-tat-tat machine-gun style, which is a hoot on TV but a bitch when it comes to books on tape. After 10 minutes of Coulter I feel like Brother Markle. I just want to rip her face off.

Now, I think Ann Coulter I'd get on tape... even at full speed, her stuff is more comedy central than Thomas Sowell. I think I could handle a more rapid fire delivery.

Hitchens is a guy who understands the power of voice and slowing down. He's got a pretty butterscotch voice, and he takes his time, savors words, and it works well. But his stuff is so full of information, that even then, I found myself wishing for the printed page.

Maybe when the third gen iPad comes out, we'll all be reading on those, but I think I'm done with audio books. There have been some I've really enjoyed, like Orson Scott card's Bean series (Ender's Shadow and later)... I think I'd enjoy Edgar Rice Burroughs on tape, because I think 19th/early 20th century fiction was meant to be read aloud. Maybe Harry Potter (still haven't read those).

OK, now for politics. Ask yourself if you believe ONE WORD of what the White House said about the Sestak thing. Me? I go on record saying no. I will bet dollars to doughnuts that it WAS the secretary of the navy job, and if Bill Clinton was involved at all, it was BECAUSE the white house knew it was doing something illegal and wanted plausible deniability.

Snakes. A bunch of snakes. Out, out, out.

Stinks to high hell. And not about a small thing. A felony.

This is a good article on the bankruptcy of the left's take on feminism, but I love encountering a line like this:

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And because the left is, at essence, simply vile, the attacks on Sarah and Ann have been vile.

It boggles my mind what they must have promised Sestak to play ball and save the president's ass. Think about the political leverage he had. On the one hand, he could have singlehandedly brought down the Obama administration... now HE looks so bad, he will probably lose his election for Senator, so it ain't like he's even going to get the power he craves.

I mean, they're all getting too cute with us. Calling in Clinton is like Cherry Jones calling in Charles Logan in the show "24".

I'm watching this unfold with utter disbelief. Sestak's story changed. And they think saying the job was something like an INTERNSHIP (when Sestak originally said it was a high level position)... come onnnnnn. I don't have to tell you that SNL would have had a FIELD DAY with Clinton offering an unpaid INTERNSHIP to Sestak... er, if they weren't on summer break. Good thing.

The other possibility of course, is that in some emergency brainstorming session, they GOT something on Sestak, enough to scare him and muzzle him. But I don't think so. He's not acting muzzled. He's playing along, so it has me wondering what they promised him. What's better than a high level position? What's juicier than US Senate? I can't even guess.

Meanwhile, it's almost WORSE with Clinton involved. For chrissakes, his wife is SECRETARY OF STATE under Obama. Which is why this whole mess reeks of coverup. Worse, it reeks of baldfaced arrogance... of the president.

And when it goes that far up, that means somebody is going to take the fall. And it has to be somebody big. Mmm mmm mmm, who could it be?, I'm looking a little sideways at a certain chief of staff who's name rhymes with BOMB... because it's all gonna explode in his face.)

Oh god, it's funny to listen to Obama's apologists and footsoldiers in the press. Kansas City Star: Sestak job offer scandal deflating rapidly DEFLATING RAPIDLY? Is that code for "turning into a giant mess?" Oh my god, read that article. Talk about grasping at straws. Suddenly everyone in the liberal media is talking about Reagan/Hayakawa (both conveniently dead). Unearthed from a Wilmington Morning Star article from 1981 (Nov. 26) Where Ed Rollins, Reagan's chief political advisor, floated the idea of an administration post for Hayakawa if he'd drop out of a Republican senate primary race, whose candidates included Reagan's DAUGHTER Maureen, Pete Wilson, and Barry Goldwater Jr.

Hayakawa's words from the article:

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I have not contacted the White House in regard to any administration or ambassadorial post, and they have not been in contact with me.

Very different from Sestak, who said the OPPOSITE. That the White House HAD been in contact with him, and floated the offer.

Now the dance is, it wasn't the offer of a JOB, but an "unpaid advisory post" (PUH-LEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZ!), and it was slick Willie who made the offer. Already damaged goods, an impeached president.

But the curious thing is, the Reagan stuff is taking off like WILDFIRE in the media. As if if Reagan did it, it must be OK. No, actually if Reagan broke Federal law, he should have been impeached for it. I don't care how much I liked the guy.

Hannity: on fire over this. Smells blood.

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And when it goes that far up, that means somebody is going to take the fall. And it has to be somebody big. Mmm mmm mmm, who could it be?, I'm looking a little sideways at a certain chief of staff who's name rhymes with BOMB... because it's all gonna explode in his face.)

Yep. I think you called it. Rhymes-with-Bomb is high up enough to maybe silence the issue. But there would be the danger of showing just how high up this felony went. Only the kool-aid drinkers and morons couldn't possibly think it stops with Rhymes-with-Bomb. And if the press weren't really lackeys for a leftist point of view there would be a Woodward and Bernstein who would eventually connect this to the president.

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Sestak job offer scandal deflating rapidly DEFLATING RAPIDLY? Is that code for "turning into a giant mess?"

LMAO. Probably. I'd love to see this turn into a Watergate. Hey, if a felony isn't enough to make heads roll, what is? Are they above the law? Does their supposed moral superiority put them beyond the rules that apply to us mere mortals? Certainly that's how they think. At least Nixon was enough in touch with reality that he knew he was doing something wrong and needed to cover up. And that message has finally gotten to these Chicago thugs. But we're dealing with a religious cult-like thing. These people think they are above the law. That's what could bring them down. Doubling the risk is that they think the press (like this one lackey from Kansas City Star) will cover for them. But they won't always. All it takes is one.

Whenever the left gets caught breaking the law or acting scummy the disingenuous and dishonorable excuse is "everyone is doing it." That wasn't an excuse that held up on the playground, and only among zealots and ideological morons does it hold up. If Reagan did it it was still wrong (although I'd take anything this one guy says with a grain of salt).

Hey, maybe Hitchens is right. Religion ruins everything. But you have to define "religion" as "being so full of your own delusional sense of moral superiority that you shit on the laws, shit on the truth, and shit on everybody else who you see as beneath you." That's a definition I could abide by. Kool-aid drinking ruins everything. If one is little more that a partisan hack, then like Mark Levin says, we're dealing with a primitive tribalism. We become small-minded pricks instead of the inheritors and defenders of a grand Western Civilization based on the equal application of the law, freedom, free markets, the pursuit of knowledge, and the idea that no one is intrinsically better than anyone else. But right now we have a bunch of thugs raiding the store and a press that is out to lunch. I hope they nail these bastards.

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Hannity: on fire over this. Smells blood.

LOL. I love the guy.

Oh mercy, seeing how fast the left gloms on to the talking points about the Reagan thing is fucking funny.

Please, please, liberals... think for a minute. Something like this happens, and instead of defending president Obama, you try to find something bad that maybe president REAGAN did in 1981? Like that's gonna excuse it? All it tells me, is you guys believe this is something really serious, and that b) you believe your own anointed one did something untoward, and is a snake. You run cover for him, instead of hold him accountable.

That's the "end-justifies-the-means" mentality taking over. The Obamanites actually believe that if Barack broke the law, it was for our own good. Or, to further some cause that's so important to THEM that why bother with some pesky laws.

Another guy on fire: Charles Krauthammer. He blasted the Bauer report brilliantly. And pointed out how smarmy it is to release it on the Friday of memorial day weekend. He's analyzed the movements of various key players and has shown it was scurrying panic at the White House to get the story straight (to me, proof of guilt).

Where journalists need to remain journalists is with Sestak himself. He changed his story, he's backing up the bullshit, and there has to be a reason. Why is he playing nice? I think he's gonna fold under questioning, he seems the type. He has a huge chip in the game, so he stands to gain a lot. I'm dying to see what it is. Or what they have on him.

First question out of the mouth of any reporter worth a damn is, did you really think that an unpaid advisory board position was a "high level" position that the administration was offering you?

The second question out of my mouth would be: you said you nearly interrupted the former president to say you weren't interested. You dismissed the idea bing bang boom. Er, but before you were talking about TWO MONTHS of what sounded like negotiations about this. Was the unpaid advisory position really the ONLY job that was floated in front of you?

Third question: why are you protecting the administration here?

Come clean, Joe. You're going to lose the Pennsylvania election unless you do.

The Sestak scandal is a clear breach of the law a fundamental felony. The first defense the media used to cover the Hussein White House was that it was really normal procedure wink wink everybody breaks this law.

The Blogivitch guy the ex-Governor of Illinois is awaiting trial on the same exact sort of offense apparently he was just acting like everybody else. After all it was President Hussein's Senate seat that was being priced out.

It is incredible though that Sestak months ago first mentioned that a felony took place. Nothing but Crickets. What stalled the facts so far was the White House had declared they did an internal investigation which determined nothing out of the ordinary took place. Huh? If this sort of corrupt conduct is normal for the Hussein White House what is the abnormal conduct like.

Liberty...2010.

I'm still dying to know why Sestak is playing ball with them now. I can't think of what they might have possibly offered him, I mean they can't rig the election in his favor or anything, can they?

I clearly don't believe that this unpaid internship was the "high level position" he was offered. And I don't think it was Clinton who delivered the offer. Sestak said it was the administration, and last time I checked, Clinton (Bill, that is) was a former president, which is a private citizen. His WIFE is part of the administration.

Meanwhile, Sestak's body language is all fucked up when he talks about the scandal. He's either hiding something, lying, or they have something big on him. He's a bad liar. The opposite of Clinton. Who is keeping his mouth shut... or rather, he's keeping it open, with a smile, as he totally ignores questions.

It's because this goes right to the top, and we're in full coverup mode. The president can't get rid of Rahm, because Rahm will threaten to blow the lid on Obama for something else. These Chicago guys will eat each other's children.

I wouldn't doubt that Sestak is committing political suicide for the Clinton's. Hilary and Bill have been working the end run into the White House. Shit Bill had people men and women willing to spend lengthy time behind bars for not testifying to protect him.

How did the Hussein White House respond by bringing the Clinton's into the game by claiming it was Bill who spoke to Sestak. Of course Bill spoke to Sestak to set the felony trap to pave the way for Hilary's run in 2012.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: RicoX,

The big news, of course, is that Tipper and Al are separating. I gotta believe this is Tipper escaping a man who has become increasingly bizarre.

The Hussein White House is imploding.

More politicians are coming forward with stories of job offers from the White House to stay out of races. This is a complete utter disaster. We seriously might have to prepare for the prospect of Biden taking over the level of political corruption surrounding this White House.

Right now there are still some thirty five czars appointed by the White House in control of hundreds of billions of dollars that were not vetted in any fashion without any clear oversight by Congress or the courts. This alone is not a government off the people.

This whole situation with Turkey undermining Israel by pulling this stunt sending a flotilla through the blockage of the Gaza Strip is a clear sign just how weak we are in the eyes of our enemies. Turkey has now become a terrorists state.

The blockade was a joint effort between Israel and Egypt. Egypt doesn't want the weapons and rockets flowing into the Gaza strip either as they find their way into Egypt as well undermining the Government. What is happening is not good.

We are stuck with an inept bungling fraud to handle everything that is going on.

Liberty...2010.

Yeah, except it's looking like Egypt is stabbing Israel in the back now.

Beck did a good job of explaining who was behind the flotilla, including some of the usual suspects in this country, who support the terrorist organization "Free Gaza."

Beck had a good monologue at the start of his second hour in this morning's radio program. He quoted Garfield who said something like "The truth will set your free...but first it will make you miserable." It sounds like he'll be doing an interesting series on his TV shows where he gives an idea of what the Founding Fathers would have thought of cap-and-trade and all the other socialist scams Obama and his leftist freaks are trying to foist on us.