bustardblog

Racism Rules at the Review

Remaining true to its roots is one of the definitions of conservatism, and The National Review's recurrent racist references remind the reader of its segregationist past.

In the May 14th issue, they write:

"Hillary Clinton addressed Al Sharpton's National Action Network, and for the second time when speaking to a black audience (the first was at a Baptist church in Selma in March) her voice got positively...nappy.The normal Hillary is as flat as a menu on an 800 number, but with the brothaz and sistaz she drops her g's and gets the lilt thing workin'."
(emphasis - theirs)

And yes, they were aware of Imus, although of course their reporting on it was quite dishonest.

Eyes on the Lies at Nat'l Review

The April 2nd National Review continues in its great tradition of tolerance and accuracy:

In a piece on diabetes and the United Arab Emirates, it describes the "traditional Arab diet" as "center[ed] on figs, dates and sheep's eyeballs."

The same edition notes the death of Senator Thomas Eagleton, McGovern's first pick as an anti-choice, vice presidential candidate in 1972. It goes on to say that Democrats prevented the anti-choice Governor Casey from even speaking at their convention. It completely fails to note that the anti-choice son of Casey was the democratic party's, and Pennsylvania's, choice for the U.S. Senate last year.

Hate Speech

What is it about the right that loves loony verbosity?  There are a lot of reasons - using word games to hide flatulent arguments is just one of their old gambits.

The wing-nuts are also thrilled to express their honest thoughts and feelings without being "caught."  They love their little code words.  State's Rights?  Cracking Down on Crime?  Their constant desire to utter the indefensible, without having to be called upon to defend it, is a joy only surpassed by a "Southern Strategy."

Thus Jason Lee Steorts, Deputy Editor of The National Review chooses his words carefully in a piece entitled "Dominican Republican" in the December 31 edition of National Review.  In describing  the upper reaches of Manhattan, now populated by immigrants from the Dominican Republic, he chooses the phrase "nigrescent" to characterize "the hours before the cock crows." Never mind that  before the cock crows the sky starts to lighten, not darken, Steorts uses the word "nigrescent" to establish his racist credentials - as if writing for the National Review were insufficient.

The sentence says it all:

I doubt there is any Manhattan neighborhood where you can find more trash on the street of a Monday morning, or where you must endure louder blastings of reggaeton "music" in those nigrescent hours before the cock crows"

The "code" could not be clearer.

Yellow Cheddar, Yellow Derbyshire.

With that smidgen of self-deprecating  humor that he hopes will transform him from pedant toad into charming curmudgeon, John Derbyshire, writes in the latest National Review of the difficulties of life on suburban Long Island. Were you to read it, you'd understand the significant sacrifices that the 101st Keyboarders make for us. Huntington or Basra? They're both damned scary.

It seems poor Mr Derbyshire has to paint his garage. Even worse -  the evil environmentalists want him to properly dispose of the chips of lead paint after  he removes them. 'The Derb' knows that calling lead dangerous is just liberal hysteria, and would happily feed it to his two children, but he is afraid of the New York Secret Police - they're not that different from Sadaam's Security Forces, after all. He then runs into the problem of actually painting the thing.

Operating in the free market seems to make this problematic - his choice is between hiring people he can afford (who won't speak English and who will do a terrible job while they play "Death Metal at you from the radio in a dilapidated, salacious-decal-festooned truck"), and a nice company, one which is way over his budget. Because he is a true conservative, not a Bush neo-con, he wants to stay under budget, while still not having a person of color on his land. (1/4 Acre) He thus comes to the conclusion that he must do it himself.

Then the temperature rears its ugly head - after all; the average daytime temp in Huntington last month was 52 degrees. Far too cold for 'The Derb.'  "I am not short of advice here, only of will, and of tolerance for outdoor work in midwinter."

Last year, I asked you to send additional armor to protect our soldiers in Iraq  This  year, please send 'The Derb' some warm socks. Please. He just can't tolerate it.

James Brown would undoubtedly have left 'The Derb' his cape, had he only understood.

Lying about Lebanon

The Prime Minister of Lebanon has announced that over 900 Lebanese civilians have been killed by Israel's invasion of that poor country. Yesterday, Juan Cole reported a number closer to 500. Whatever the actual number, it is far too many, and an utterly inexcusable response to the killing of 8 soldiers and the kidnapping of two.

The right has done its utmost to muddle the facts on this issue, using strategies that could have been lifted directly from the play book of those who deny the Holocaust. It is as if Hutton Gibson, Dad of Mel and Holocaust denier, was issuing marching orders to Michelle Malkin, Allan Dershowitz, et al.

One of the best ways to sow confusion is to sew doubt. You start by making up facts. Lies.  Sites like Little Green Footballs pointed out that in most Islamic terror attacks "the death toll increase[s] over several days" and asks why in Lebanon, "the trend is exactly the opposite." Although stated as if it were fact, it is not. For example, initial reports of 9/11 spoke of deaths in the tens of thousands.  The number that actually died in that attack was thankfully much lower than initially expected. First estimates are always wrong, that's one reason that they are called estimates.  But, like holocaust-deniers, those who want to trivialize death in Lebanon must create confusion about the number of dead.

Elaborate, 'conspiracy' type theories are essential in rewriting history. Michelle Malkin and Jonah Goldberg are great at implying events in Qana were "staged." Goldberg quotes unamed, unsourced reports that "refrigerated trucks were reportedly brought in before the media could visit the site, perhaps delivering corpses." As if Israel would not know if refrigerated trucks were on the road to Qana. Free and Justice made use of the time honored deceipt: "Reports that Hizbullah staged it [Qana] could not be confirmed nor denied."  Of course, as of this writing, reports that Michelle Malkin has been arrested on numerous occassions on charges of spousal abuse, could not be confirmed nor denied either.  Wing Nuts like the Confederate Yankee are so obsessed by the supposed time lapse between the bomb hitting the house in Qana and the collapse of the building, that one wonders what they made of the shorter, but actual, time between the plane hitting the WTC and its collapse.

It is true that the reported number of civilians killed in Qana has been lowered to 28 dead and 13 missing. When gatewaypundit reports this he justifies the deaths by writing that "Leaflets were dropped on the town weeks before the attacks warning people of the likelihood of violence."  This is of a piece with Alan Dershowitz's despicable argument that some cvilians are more like civilians than others.

I mean if Israel tells you to leave your home, failure to comply with their instructions justifies your death.  But as that radical Voice of America reported long before the Qana attacks," People who want to leave are also having trouble finding fuel for the journey."  Israel had blown up the gas stations.  They also blew up bridges and roads. As the  BBC wrote on the 22 of July

"Israel has ordered the civilians of southern Lebanon to leave their homes and thousands of families are heeding that advice - at least they are trying to. 

But the Israeli military onslaught around the southern city of Tyre is so fierce, the trip is too daunting for many inhabitants.

Even if it were physically easy to leave, it is not easy for a farmer to lose his livestock, and probably his harvest. The Lebanese also fear that Israel will decide to occupy the lannex their land as a part of Israel (as it has done in Jerusalem), give their homes and farms to Israeli citizens (as in the West Bank), and because they fled during an uprising, deny them the right of return to their homes and villages (as you can see in Palestine refugee camps). And of course Israel has "accidentally" bombed a convoy of civilian cars leaving the south.

Despite all of this, we all saw that: All over the ruined streets of southern Lebanon, families from border villages that have been cut off by 20 days of Israeli bombardment are desperately trying to flee, using the respite offered by a 48-hour halt to most air strikes.

Strapping white sheets to their cars in an attempt to stave off Israeli strikes, tens of thousands of Lebanese have fled the south, taking side roads to avoid ruined bridges, driving around bomb craters and leaving many villages deserted.

This attempt to distort the reality of the deaths of innocents in Lebanon is morally unconscionable. Blaming the victim also serves to dehumanize the victim, a trick of which the actual perpetrators of the holocaust were also fond.

Please know that I consider myself a friend of Israel, and I know that the situation today in Lebanon is nothing like the Holocaust. But I also know that when any actions of Israel are defended using the same kinds of twisted tricks that were used to both justify and deny the holocaust, the country has completely lost its way.

 

Shame on NRO's Corner

The Corner was even more fun and informative than usual today. We learned some neat stuff:

• Castro is not God.
• Abu Gharaib was all about Hi-Jinks - not torture.
• The U.S. Supreme Court just doesn't understand how much hard, hard work Bush and the Congress do for us all.

The first point was made by the Son of Lucianne, Goldberg, who wrote today of news he had received that Castro had died. It was left to the ever effervescent K Lo to inform us that Jonah had it wrong once again. But she did point out that someday Castro will die. Can you get more informative than that?

Andy McCarthy gave us the other two bullets.  He wants the House and the White House to come up with a new system to try prisoners at Guantanamo, and for the Supreme Court to respect that "Congress and the Administration took the time and care in the middle of a war to enact" the legislation.

"Took the time...  in the middle of a war?" No President in modern American history has spent more time on vacation than George Bush.  As of ten months ago, Bush had spent 20% of his term on vacation.  And the Congress? As of today, it has been in session for  66 days this year. As USA Today reported: "roll call votes are seldom scheduled for Mondays or Fridays. In the House, they are often postponed until late Tuesday."  And those Tuesdays, which often start at five in the afternoon, make up about 22 of those 66 days. The suggestion that the U.S. Supreme Court should give extra weight to the efforts of our overworked President and Congress is hilarious.

McCarthy asks  that the new quasi-judicial system  "reaffirm that prisoners will be treated humanely - neither tortured, not subjected to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment - as has been U.S. policy."

But what is his definition of torture, of cruel or degrading treatment? Those who died after interrogation at Abu Gharaib, were victims of "hi-jinks," not torture, according to McCarthy. They underwent "unpleasant, coercive interrogation," nothing more.  This is normal for The Corner: Jonah Goldberg says he has "no problem with a little smacky-face with prisoners." It sounds a lot like the way Protein Wisdom's Jeff Goldstein likes to play "smacky-face" with those who disagree with him.

When I read these bits at The Corner this morning, I laughed. But it isn't funny. McCarthy, Lopez, Goldstein and Goldberg all specialize in depicting the other as less than human. I hate having to make this argument; but the fact is that this specialty is the same one at which bin Laden and Hitler excelled. For Osama to portray us, or for Hitler to portray the Jews, as agents of the devil is not terribly disimilar from what those writers/bloggers are doing now.

Yorked.

Mr. Black, currently of Las Vegas, recently referred to something called a Byron York. Unfortunately, my curiosity was piqued, and I went to visit the source. 
I'd like to use words like disingenuous, or ill informed, but I can't. What he writes is so unquestionably a dishonest lie that I have no choice.  Happily, the piece is of such limited import that I hesitate to mention it. Still, it is typical of the distortions by those on the right, and must be dealt with.
York is in Las Vegas "reporting" on the YearlyKos convention. He attended a panel in which reporters were asked not to use the name of participants. York lies and feigns outrage.
He wrote that "Normally, bloggers both left and right believe the more freedom - and the more information - the better."
But the fact is that on both the right and the left side of the blogosphere anonymity is frequently sought, and is generally respected. There are of course exceptions - people on the right who viciously reveal the identity of those with whom they disagree in order to do them harm - MichelleMalkin, Some at NRO, and of course the Paste Eater 's attempt to hurt the honorable Thers.  But even most on the right condemn such despicable behavior. Some of the biggest bloggers on the right have names like Confederate Yankee, The Anchoress, Wretchard. On the left, an example might be Atrios, now known to be Duncan Black, formerly anonymous. Personally, this bustard can think of other examples.
The idea that bloggers on the right are advocates of free information is equally untrue. Probably the two most popular blogs on the right, Michelle Malkin and Powerline, do not allow comments. There is no free flow of information at these sites. On the left, the best known blogs, like Daily Kos, Atrios, and FireDogLake - all encourage very active commenting.
Reaching new lows of distorted reporting York said that "Echoing Vice President Dick Cheney and others who have defended Bush administration secrecy policies, the trainers said they wanted to be able to give candid advice without being quoted by name."
The people at YearlyKos are individuals who are not paid by the public, whose offices are not being supplied by the public, and are not spending public dollars to write public policy. These are private citizens having private conversations, and York's failure to make this distinction simply reinforces and clarifies his intention to deceive.

Bloggers Repent

Tom DeLay's announcement that he will not run for re-election makes it clear that even the residents and neighbors of Sugarland cannot stomach his corrupt ways. If DeLay lacked confidence in his ability to win in his exceptionally Republican district, you know it's because the exterminator in fact "did the crime."  The confession and guilty please by another of his staff members, Tony Rudy, last week was the final nail in the coffin for The Hammer.

So, I'm confident that prosecutor Ronnie Earle will get lots of apologies from right wing bloggers; the ones who said things like:

"The Democrats should be extremely wary of trying to take a corruption angle against Republicans - especially Republicans, like DeLay, who haven't done anything wrong." (Mark Noonan at Blogs for Bush)

"Ronnie Earle's indictment of Tom DeLay is transparently political" (Jonathan R. at gop bloggers.)

Described Earle as a "hyperpartisan Travis County, TX D.A. known for politically motivated prosecutions." (protein wisdom)

"Earle is a notorious Democratic Party hack" (Powerliars)

"an egregious abuse of prosecutorial power. It's a disgrace." (Mark Levin, The Corner)

"this is an out of control prosecutor and a phony charge" (Stephen Spruiell, The National Review)

There are a lot more of them out there. I selected these particular ones because they, like Tom DeLay himself, frequently claim to be have a higher sense of morality than the rest of us.  They won't split hairs as to any legal technicalities regarding DeLay's sins and his betrayal of oaths sworn before God. And so I am sure that they will do the right thing by admitting their errors, condemning Mr. DeLay, and apologizing to Mr. Earle.