Category Archives: elections
dumb stuff, elections, feminism, music, pop, propaganda, rants
Le Tigre and Feminism's Cult of Government Worship
In case you still harbored the delusion that feminism was some kind of edgy, contrarian ideology, the original purveyors of 90's Riot Grrrl feminist electroclash, Le Tigre, have returned from the dead to destroy all doubt. In this sad attempt at cultural relevance, these would-be "rebels" become full throated propagandists for corporatist, neocon-approved Hillary Clinton.
That's right. Apparently, cheerleading for the woman who has voted for wars which have killed tens of thousands, taken money from Islamic regimes, and actively undermined her husband's rape accusers is super feminist and like totally empowering. She's a Democrat, she has a vagina, and she'll be the first womyn in the Oval Office, so set aside all those petty right-wing conspiracy theories, PYGS!
If you can even make it past the knife-to-the-skull intro, the song is nothing more than a moronic and childish pander-fest. Filled to the brim with idiotic clichés, feminist straw men, obligatory talking points, and canned Trump hate, the song achieves new heights in cringe.
Apparently, neither Le Tigre or Pitchfork are all that interested in feedback on this song because the voting buttons and comments have been disabled.
Way to stand behind those feminist convictions, SYSTERS.
current events, elections, politics, POTUS, rants, US Constitution
Don't Vote Third Party, Proles. It's Counter-Revolutionary
Jef Rouner doesn't want you to vote third party.
He suggests that it's the equivalent of thoughts and prayers, but he is projecting. He is the sanctimonious scold. Voting for either major party is the very epitome of thoughts and prayers. You have no control over what these people do once elected. You're voting for a collection of promises and a bunch of rhetoric. No political promises are ever kept, and even laws that get passed do not achieve what the politicians claim.
There is no "work" involved in going into a voting booth and checking a box. He's not writing laws, and I doubt he has the slightest inkling of what's contained in a single federal law or regulation. Yet he's saying he is somehow responsible for the outcomes because he checked a box in a voting booth. He is complicit in the sense that he paid mindless obedience to the system.
Mr. Rouner wants to take credit for the ACA. Does he accept responsibility for the premiums which have increased for average citizens because healthy young people aren't singing up to subsidize the older and sicker? Does he accept responsibility for all the money wasted on failed state level exchanges?
Or how about his passing mention of Obama's drone program? Doesn't the mass murder of thousands kind of nullify any claim on a moral high ground? The invasion of Libya, anyone? The militarization of the police? Arms sales to Middle Eastern regimes? The ongoing impenetrable mess in Syria?
Since he seems so keen on conflating the individual with the State, how about those achievements, Mr. Rouner?
He invokes the 12th Amendment as the source of the two party duopoly. Since this only codified the process by which the President and Vice President would be elected, this seems little more than an appeal to tradition.
I don't have any objections to anyone voting third party. If you find their ideas compelling, then go for it. The idea at the center of the American idea was individual liberty, and that should include freedom of political thought.
It's true that the system doesn't favor third party candidates at the federal level. It is possible to pull off being an open socialist or libertarian at the local level and win, and there are examples of both.
I would argue that the real work of the political process is the battle for ideas, and the current system crowds out any vigorous debate of ideas. For Mr. Rouner to suggest that "nothing Stein or Johnson says matters" completely diminishes and downplays the power of ideas. Third party candidacies are good for the country in the sense that they are vehicles for trenchant criticism of the system and the advancement of unconventional and heretical ideas. Between the two third party choices, there's a little bit of both. I also find Jill Stein's agenda utterly abhorrent, but I appreciate some of the criticisms she's leveled at Hillary. Despite the fact that Gary Johnson is not the most inspiring champion of libertarian philosophy, it's refreshing that at least one candidate is promoting actual liberty.
Slavery notwithstanding, the American system of government was meant to enshrine property rights and the liberty of the individual. The idea behind federalism was to decentralize power and disperse it throughout the states. I also contend that this is why the 2nd Amendment makes reference to militias. It was meant to be a bulwark against the greatest threat to liberty: a standing army.
But we're very far away from that idea, and I vigorously dispute that casting a vote for Trump or Hillary represents anything virtuous. There is no "change from within" to be made. Even if you dedicated yourself to a single issue, it has the potential to consume your entire life if you allow it to. The federal government is an overgrown behemoth populated mostly by self-interested hacks who are more interested in preserving their fiefdoms than doing anything that serves the "Public Good".
By portraying participation in government as the only path to affecting change, he's contributing to an ever diminishing sphere of individual liberty. Mr. Rouner is destroying the possibility for voluntary, organic solutions between citizens and promoting a culture of servitude. He correctly claims that leadership and accountability are virtues. By promoting a vote for the system, he's promoting the least accountable people on the planet. The American spirit was born of skepticism of government power, not obedience.
The only sanctimonious cunt who's trying to browbeat his readers into voting for this corrupt two party duopoly is Jef Rouner.
books, communism, economics, elections, Marxism, politics, POTUS, socialism
Thomas E. Woods: Bernie Sanders is Wrong
We're living in dark times, and just about everyone can give you his version of evidence that civilization is on the brink of collapse. For some, it's Donald Trump. For others, ISIS. Choose your preferred harbinger of the End Times.
For me, there is one person who's proven that we've reached an absolute nadir and earned my deepest contempt. The one man who provides the clearest evidence of a total collapse of American principles in politics and culture is the presidential candidacy of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
After spending his entire adult life as a political parasite espousing openly Marxist views and sympathies towards brutal Communist dictatorships, Sanders is currently enjoying his fifteen minutes of fame as The Principled Democratic Socialist Who's Sticking It To The Fat Cats. Despite his highly dubious legislative record which includes support for Clinton's Kosovo bombing campaign, the 1994 Crime Bill, four Iraq War appropriations bills as well as the notorious boondoggle known as the F-35, Sanders enjoys a largely unquestioned reputation as a politician of spotless virtue and courage. Fortunately, intellectual titan and all around champion of liberty Tom Woods, has assembled a collection of transcripts from his indispensable podcast which systematically dismantle Sanders' carefully crafted edifice of would-be moral rectitude and misguided policy prescriptions.
Sanders' platform is not even remotely new or innovative, and if anything, is comprised merely of more expansive and bloated versions of pet projects that have been incubating within the Left for decades. What's actually new about the Sanders phenomenon is that he's packaged them into a unified political agenda and is presenting them on a national stage as ideas which belong in the Democratic Party platform. This is especially interesting and noteworthy given that Sanders has spent his entire political career in DC officially as a self-described Independent, but as a "democratic socialist" in public.
Naturally, Sanders and his supporters have gone to great lengths to distance themselves from the undeniable legacy of misery, repression, and economic dysfunction that's been the hallmark of every socialist regime in history by condescendingly handwaving away any comparison between Bernie's vision of socialism and the repressive dictatorships of past and present. Bernie doesn't want Venezuelan socialism, he wants the nice version of DEMOCRATIC socialism like they have in Scandinavian countries! By invoking the welfare states of Northern Europe, Sweden and Denmark in particular, as irrefutable evidence that socialism is benign and benevolent, Sanders and his loyal Berners consistently and fallaciously argue that these are, in fact, socialist success stories AND that Sanders' magical campaign promises will produce a comparable or greater outcome here without so much as a shred of evidence on which to base the ludicrous claim or the slightest concern for potentially adverse effects of implementing such an agenda.
Of course, these promises and glib pronouncements are either pathetic, manipulative delusions or outright falsehoods and distortions of reality. Tom Woods' magnificent little book walks you through his entire agenda point by point and succinctly illustrates exactly why Bernie Sanders is Wrong.
The book is divided into four sections which cover the central pillars of his agenda: Sanders' designs on implementing European-style welfare state policies, government subsidized renewable energy, minimum wage, and income inequality.
Woods starts off by letting out the gas in the hot air balloon of Scandinavian welfare state idolatry. Johan Norberg lays out a century's worth of historical context around Sweden's economic rise which includes a period of 50 years of laissez faire policy which created the prosperity for such a generous welfare state in the first place. The decline in Sweden's overall prosperity after the implementation of the welfare state is never mentioned by Sanders or his supporters, nor are the policies which are friendlier to business. Norberg also discusses the ways in which the advent of the welfare state destroyed cultural bonds of trust that were forged over decades of organic social cooperation and market driven policy in a country that was, in fact, a white, Nordic monoculture. A fact that's conveniently omitted by multiculturalists. Woods chose to limit the scope of his excerpt to Sweden's economic history and development, but this section could have been further strengthened by some mention of the failure of immigration policies and the collapse of social cohesion which has been hastened by force feeding the population feminism and multicultural social justice politics.
Professor of Economics from Aarhus University, Christian Bjørnskov, unpacks the seemingly ubiquitous myth of Denmark as "the happiest country in the world." Naturally, the Berners will chalk this up to the size of the welfare state and government mandated benefits, but Bjørnskov provides some sobering perspective. The benefits conferred by the welfare state do not contribute to an individual's active pursuit of happiness, but simply become baked into the expectations of each citizen that aren't consciously chosen. Subsequently, it breeds a higher level of entitlement amongst the population as well as a disincentive to produce. Bjørnskov makes a very interesting point about how state mandated 52-week maternity leave creates an artificial incentive for women to become mothers and often diminishes their future employment prospects. He concludes with some fascinating data about how the welfare state disincentivizes actual charity as well as some intentionally neglected liberal policies, like those found in Sweden, which are friendlier to business than the US.
Robert Bryce and Alex Epstein take a sledgehammer to the deathless progressive claims of the necessity of government investment in renewable energy. Bryce argues that if environmental protection is a priority, then the density of the energy source must be the primary measuring stick. Outrageous calls for a 20-fold reduction of fossil fuels are little more than a death sentence since renewable energy sources are not even remotely close to filling present or rising energy consumption needs. Epstein tackles the issue from both the moral and empirical perspective and elucidates some critical points that are absent from climate change alarmist script. Environmentalists consistently agitate for minimizing human impact for non-human life while ignoring positive metrics for humanity that are the direct result of cheap and plentiful fossil fuels.
Of all the progressive policy myths which have been the most durable, the minimum wage has enjoyed an extraordinarily long life. Like everything Sanders says, it has tremendous surface appeal because it gives the illusion of expanding prosperity, but the opposite is true. Former DOL economist, Diana Furchtgott-Roth swings a wrecking ball of truth against Sanders' flimsy claims. The arguments against minimum wage will be familiar for those who actually investigate economics for 5 minutes, but as the appeal of Sanders attests, rationality and logic has yet to prevail. If you're truly concerned about the welfare of the poor, then don't criminalize work for low skill laborers whose labor isn't worth $15 per hour, and most of all, don't try to sell low skilled labor as a lifelong career path. The fact that Sanders is peddling minimum wage as a centerpiece of his economic platform shows how bankrupt his agenda is. For Sanders, creating wage floors on low skill labor and subsidizing college education without regard for what a student actually studies will somehow magically create prosperity.
Loyola University professor, Thomas DiLorenzo, adds some additional historical insight into the racist origins of minimum wage while bursting the mythology of labor unions as drivers of upward economic mobility. Progressive era business owners didn't want to have to compete with firms who could hire cheaper black labor, so they agitated for minimum wages to price them out of the labor market and inhibit black economic upward mobility. By using the club of the State to criminalize non-union labor, unions make the market less competitive and only enshrine a culture of entitlement and mediocrity.
Another gaping hole in the Sanders platform mentioned briefly in the book is his disregard for the skill gap that already exists within the US labor force. While Sanders touts his confiscatory plans for subsidizing every art history and gender studies degrees for middle-class Americans, he ignores the 5mm jobs that are unfilled largely due to a shortage of skilled labor. Apparently, it's more important to subsidize college so kids can study The Communist Manifesto and agitate for safe spaces than prepare them for adulthood with marketable skills.
Among the most revelatory chapters is the interview with physician and entrepreneur, Dr. Josh Umbehr. Dr. Umbehr runs a concierge medical practice modeled on a Netflix/Costco-style membership which covers the general practice medical services people actually need. For a monthly fee, people can gain access to any general practice medical care they need including home, office or online consultations. He explains how opting out of the ACA's bureaucratic straightjacket allowed him pursue a business model that lowered costs, increased access and provided a better value for all of his patients. Just like virtually every other scientific profession, he encountered an antagonistic attitude towards business throughout his education, but ultimately rejected the false dichotomy.
Mark Perry from University of Michigan takes another swing at the seemingly indestructible myth of the so-called gender wage gap. Aside from equally laudable takedowns of this talking point by Christina Hoff Sommers, Claudia Goldin and seemingly countless others, Sanders, the feminist media/academic industrial complex and the Tumblrista Brigade won't let this die. It doesn't matter that women consistently choose different career paths that are less strenuous and less remunerative. It doesn't matter that the Equal Pay Act of 1963 is already law. It doesn't matter that women work fewer hours in aggregate. It doesn't matter that motherhood plays a major role in a woman's career choices and ambition. Sanders flogs this meme because it sounds good and scores "Equality" points with his base.
Scott Winship, Don Boudreaux, and Grant Phillips round out the book with some excellent discussion of free trade, inequality, and rising living standards resulting from capitalism. Sanders focuses solely on metrics that invoke outrage, greed, and envy while ignoring the affordability and accessibility of technology and consumer conveniences that were inconceivable to previous generations. The schism between unskilled labor and the acceleration of automation is an issue that warrants further discussion and scrutiny since it tends to validate arguments for universal income and the imminent arrival of the post-scarcity economy amongst the Berners.
Even if one sets aside all of the failures of morality and logic inherent in Sanders' agenda, his pursuit of the Democratic presidential nomination seems both deeply opportunistic and fully at odds with his carefully cultivated pretense of principled independence. Beside the fact that he's carefully avoided throwing any hard punches at Hillary, he's only embraced the Democratic Party after assiduously avoiding identification with the Democratic Party throughout his entire career in Congress. Why should the Democrats embrace Bernie-come-lately as the leader of their party? If he really saw himself as a political maverick, why would he hitch his wagon to the DNC unless he had no real intention of clinching the nomination in the first place? He blames it on "the structure of American politics", but not only is this a whiny cop out, it's contrary to his previous public statements about the necessity of a third party. It seems he's only interested in enjoying his cult of personality on the taxpayer dime while tilling the soil for a more overtly socialist tenor in Democratic Party politics.
Bernie Sanders' candidacy perfectly epitomizes the classic socialist con game; lots of soaring appeals to secular morality, manipulative declamations around "equality", and promises of bread and circuses which mask a naked hunger for power fueled by a blatant ignorance of and contempt for basic economics. Despite everything, Sanders' reputation is seemingly beyond reproach to his loyal Berners. By carefully omitting his partisan support for the central bank, warfare and police state and maintaining rigid message discipline, Sanders has very skillfully avoided deep scrutiny from most of the media. The truth is that Sanders doesn't have a single original idea in his policy toolkit, and his entire agenda should be called by its true name: soft Bolshevism. Thanks to Tom Woods' excellent little book, he is exposed as the contemptible, parasitic fraud that he is.