Larry,
You have seen the Stupid Party at work, egged on by the neocons. Know what will happen with the next Majority Leader? He’ll be ordered to do the same genuflection Lott did on BET. So will every GOP official. If they don’t, the cry goes out, “RACISM.”

Do the neocons think they can do away with racial preferences now? They have legitimized the charges which will be hurled at them every time they say something the left doesn’t like.

The “Open Letter to Senator Trent Lott by Lester Dent” found here is worth a visit to read an exposition of the very thoughts that I’ve had since the Lott episode was manufactured as punishment and revenge by the illiberals of the Washington Post. (and incidentally joined in enthusiastically by the so-called neo-cons)

I have not come across a satisfactory response until I read his contribution. In his analysis he subtly uses a version of that very successful tactic of the left of never being apologetic about anything and to always be on the offensive but unlike them to actually tell the truth and talk sense.

Lester Dent’s article provides the meat to wrong-foot the “offensives” in neatly exposing in a few very succinct sentences their hypocrisy. The stuff @ TownHall.com that I came across by the race paranoid neo-cons (and even Vdare.com) didn’t try and attempt a riposte but joined in the cacophony of heat without light. Buchanan and Francis just didn’t seem to hit the right chords either.. I looked in vain for that vital rapier thrust response.
Nobody, until I read the Lester Dent article came up with saying, hey hold on, “The irony missed…is that the left embraces segregation openly today”. So I wasn’t the only one thinking that then. In illiberal speak “integration” means imposition of edicts regardless of effort, ability or personnel choice and “anti-discrimination” means privileged access on the basis of race or ethnicity”.

Unfortunately Lester Dent’s recommendations don’t match his analysis. Everyone on the Right knows that the anti-white race-haters will use their media monopoly power to undermine and topple anyone who dares to commit a thought crime anywhere, anytime, anyplace. There is no escape from them.

Such people belong to a class which under the Soviet regime were called “apparatchiks” i.e. State or para-state organisation functionaries who are a fusion of politician and bureaucrat, then you go on with your recommendations of capitulation to those irrational, greedy and vindictive forces. “Appeasement” (though I hate to use the word) of dictators will never satisfy them. Give one concession and you are on an endless downward spiral. His reasons and recommendation that Lott resigns seem to belie the analysis of what the hypocrisy that “offensives” stand for.

Lott could have gone on the offensive and counter-charged his accuses with the kind of analysis given by Lester Dent. Democrats don’t stand for some hippie style “Lets all live together man and be colour-blind” stuff. It is vitally important to the apparatchiks that anyone who is seen to oppose them should be crushed.

They are not possessed, as he so accurately say, of any concept of fairness. By kow-towing before the inevitable end the illiberals couldn’t have manufactured a better play if they had tried. It was “grist to the mill” for their supremacist self-image and one more reason for people who oppose the imposition of dictatorship to take the “slough of despond” approach of negative withdrawal rather than refuse to be intimidated and fight back.

Is this situation a mistake in strategy or a reflection of the way things are?

What we have today is the One Drop of Racism theory. If a white person is conscious of any difference between the races or any tie to other whites that enables him to say “us” about whites and “them” about blacks, he’s a racist and racism defines him morally the way obsessive pedophilia would. Further, racism is pervasive, contagious and stupefyingly evil, and must be rooted out wherever it exists. Any suggestion of compromise is so clear a betrayal that it is itself proof of racism or its practical equivalent, insensitivity.

The problem for those who don’t like the One Drop theory is that the media, and the knowledge class as a whole, adhere to it fanatically. Consider the implications of the fact that a commitment to diversity has become the key qualification for leading an institution of higher learning. In a world in which politics happens on TV, and experts define what truth, the attitude of the knowledge class makes the One Drop theory impossible to fight head-on.

There are several reasons for the attitude of the knowledge class. One is that people need a religion, and antiracism functions as a religion. Another is that the One Drop theory demonstrates that popular self-rule is bad and national elites should have unlimited power to control and continually reconstruct everything. Yet another is that the theory is so odd that a variety of mechanisms have evolved to keep it from being called into question.

A consequence of the situation is that every civic-minded American accepts the One Drop theory. To reject it one would have to reject the view that all respectable public authorities agree to be the essence of righteousness and of America itself. How could an ordinary American who generally trusts people, cares about his country and believes in its institutions do so?

Another is that it has become very difficult for practical politicians to do anything but proclaim their profound and unconditional allegiance to the theory whenever race becomes an issue. If you try to make distinctions and limit the effects of antiracism you’ll be called on it and asked to explain your apparent view that a little racism is OK and should be overlooked. Unless you fall into line your conduct will be so shocking as to become yet another smoking gun proving racism.

It may be correct that if all Republicans and conservatives strictly disciplined themselves to speak of these issues in a narrow and analytical way it would thwart the Left to some degree. How realistic is that though? Apart from the difficulty of establishing discipline in a world of political entrepreneurship there’s the problem of establishing the common understandings on which discipline must be based when the issues can’t be discussed.

So what’s to be done? Offhand, I can’t think of anything better than take advantage of the new media and the freedoms the American system does give us. Politicians aren’t in a position to provide leadership on this issue now. In an age of publicity it’s difficult for them to defend the unspeakable. So the job of those who object to current political trends is to make alternatives discussible by developing and publicizing them. If we’ve got complaints it’s mostly up to us to do something about them.

” ‘Appeasement’ (though I hate to use the word) of dictators will never satisfy them. Give one concession and you are on an endless downward spiral.” — Freddie Taylor

Exactly right, Freddie! Do not give in, never appease, and hit back with all you’ve got! The other side are playing for keeps and seeking nothing less than our deaths, figuratively and if need be — if we dare oppose them — literally!

Fight back! Let’s stop being marched like cattle to the slaughter, for once!

“So the job of those who object to current political trends is to make alternatives discussible by developing and publicizing them. If we’ve got complaints it’s mostly up to us to do something about them.” — Jim Kalb

Jim, I had posted my comment on Freddie’s post before seeing your excellent one. Your analysis is excellent and without a flaw. In your closing advice, which I’ve pasted above, you more or less proposed one of the means whereby the “fighting-back” that I called for may take place (it’s exactly what we’re doing on this web-site, for example).

Note that the other side — the left and the left-lite (neocons) — are doing two things at once: opposing our side on this issue with everything they’ve got, AND seeing to it, by forcing the importation of ever vaster numbers of additional demographic opponents of our side, that our side will inevitably dwindle numerically to the point of no return beyond which we lose.

I view the neocons as deadly enemies. They are indistinguishable from any non-Bolshevik leftist.

Even if it’s true that the neocons are objectively enemies, I would like to suggest to Unadorned that it would be best not view them subjectively as such. Such an attitude engenders unending bitterness and anger, and leads to irrational behaviors that have now become very common on the right, such as making the enemy of one’s enemy one’s friend, however evil and disgusting that new “friend” happens to be.

The tendency to view neocons and other ideological adversaries as “enemies” in a personal sense leads to a kind of angry, personal tone—one often sees this at vdare.com, for example—that does not help advance paleoconservatism or any conservative cause by one iota, but only marginalizes them.

As an example, has the angry, personal tone of the Buchananites advanced immigration restrictionism, or only helped get it dismissed by more moderate conservatives who might otherwise be more open to the restrictionist message?

I believe we must challenge and expose the false positions of our political adversaries in a strong yet reasoned and principled way, not fall into the self-defeating trap of viewing them as “enemies.”

” … we must challenge and expose the false positions of our political adversaries in a strong yet reasoned and principled way, not fall into the self-defeating trap of viewing them as ‘enemies.’ ” — Lawrence Auster

That’s excellent advice, of course, and I thank Mr. Auster for pointing it out. The WORST thing would be for any of us to dig our own side even deeper into the hole it’s in, through ill-considered remarks. I stand corrected.

A correspondent wrote:

“You have a point, but I think Lott would have been pushed further; I’m not sure it would have stopped the inquisition. I agree that rushing to defend him from racism and bigotry charges was not the way to go. But, as I say, if they hadn’t done that, wouldn’t the charges have been hurled anyway?”

Even if the racism charge had been hurled, it could have been handled. Consider this scenario. First Lott says: “I apologize for my sloppy remarks that created the impression that I would have preferred a segregated America. I’m not a segregationist, and in my 30 year career in the Congress and Senate have never done anything to bring back a segregated America, as my voting record amply confirms.” Then, if the liberals (or, for that matter, the neocons—who are capable of anything) conceded that Lott was not a segregationist but still accused him of a generalized “racism,” Lott and other Republicans could have come back full blast and said something they’ve never said before: “You liberals want to make everyone believe that any position on race that is not the liberal position is racist. That’s a vicious lie. We Republicans have politely let you smear us on this for the last 20 years and we’re not going to stand for it anymore.” If Lott and other Republicans had said something like this, the whole situation would have been reversed. The liberals would have been put on the defensive and the Republicans would have won a resounding victory over political correctness, instead of, as is the actual case, being made to look guilty and being put on the run.

Of course, this is a fantasy. The GOP’s failure/lack of wit/lack of principles/lack of guts to counterattack against the racism charge is legendary. They simply don’t have it in them. But if they DID have it in them, the scenario I’ve suggested is what they COULD have done, and it would have WORKED.

Reading from the Kalb, Auster and Unadorned posts in the above topic I have the idea that both moderators and most commenters view American politics and both public and private and American society as having gone too, too far left into one world, big government, heterogenous positions, to the detriment of personal liberty and self determination. In this we can all agree.

The problem, as I see it, is that the pervasive nature of over the top leftist postures of U.S. officialdom and media have so disturbed and animated VFTR, that it blinds some to the scope of contrary argument, and engenders a near unanimous broadside of condemnatory knee-jerk reaction. When the vitriole is running high it borders on personal and political warfare within the VFTR community.

Only Mr. Kalb?s post, however, added a possible way out of the linguistic morass that addles most discussion when he said:
?It may be correct that if all Republicans and conservatives strictly disciplined themselves to speak of these issues in a narrow and analytical way it would thwart the Left to some degree. How realistic is that though??

I would add that the issues not be framed in non standard philosophical brackets to avoid present world reality. If you believe in segregation, don?t substitute the phrase segregationism, just come out and say it, narrowly define what you mean and lets have at it..

Realistic or not,Mr. Kalb,s suggestion is the only practical and civilized way of mutual discourse, the defining of labels to give precise meaning to their underlying concepts. Advance announcement of the narrow limits to ones argument, should in rational discourse have the effect of civilizing exchanges. But it doesn?t seem to have worked in the Lott topic in VFTR.

For example: I pointed out that American law was well settled that equal access, for every American, to every public facility is required, and that equal protection of the law for all citizens is also required by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. My conclusion was that Lott?s public statement, perceived as agreement with 1948 segregation was inconsistent with his oath of offive to uphold the constittion (implying a roll back of Civil Rights law already enacted) was inconsistent with his Oath of Office.
From my narrow embracement of the topic, discourse morphed into alternative meanings for the word bigot, the possible neutrality of the word segregation, explanation of the word segregationism,.. etc, finally to a philosophical rejiggering of the terms to salvage dignity from positions gone bad.It would have been better for all but the anger in the posts is still evident even after the end of the issue.

Now ? you all can let the vitriole fly about this post too-Try not to make it so personal that Mr, Auster has to remove it from public view again.

I think one reason Lott et al. were unable to pursue a consistent intelligent line is that to do so they would have to be able to articulate, present and defend a position on race that is different from the liberal one. They would have to hold that there are some differences between the races that should be allowed to have effect, or in any event that the current status of blacks is not a moral monstrosity inflicted on innocent blacks that justifies heroic efforts to transform it. And in the latter case they’d have to explain what’s OK about the lower status of blacks or why blacks deserve the way things are.

The problems of blacks are extremely stubborn. What should the non-liberal position of the Republicans be? That various traditional limitations on what government should do should stand in the way of fixing them? That they’re insoluble and let’s forget about them? That it’s up to blacks to find a way of living that works better for them?

It seems to me that any discussion of race today has to be hysterical because it has to deny the existence of realities that are central to the situation as it exists. The more obvious the reality the more absolute the denial has to be. I don’t see how the Republicans — practical politicians whose effective existence is determined by how they appear on TV — can change that. The best they can do is offer unprincipled resistance. And that approach disintegrates when you get put in the spotlight.

Mr. Kalb or Mr. Auster: Do political movements begin with intellectuals’ ideas? If you think the ideas come first, do most intellectuals agree?

The reason I ask these questions is because of Mr. Kalb’s advice to publicize one’s ideas. If the ideas come first, publicizing the ideas would not be merely one of many tools for change. Publicizing would be a prerequisite to change.

If publicizing is a prerequisite, publicizing is worthy of immense effort.

What happens is a result of a mixture of things. In the case of race relations though it seems to me that ideas are very important.

At present conservatives have no language or arguments that would enable them to present an alternative to the liberal view and argue that the alternative is the correct and moral view. All they can do is drag their feet and try to draw attention to other things. That doesn’t work in the long run because the problems aren’t going to be forgotten or go away.

So in the case of race it seems to me that at present ideas do come first.

Jim Kalb writes:
1. “I think one reason Lott et al. were unable to pursue a consistent intelligent line is that to do so they would have to be able to articulate, present and defend a position on race that is different from the liberal one”
And:
2. “The problems of blacks are extremely stubborn. What should the non-liberal position of the Republicans be? That various traditional limitations on what government should do should stand in the way of fixing them? That they’re insoluble and let’s forget about them? That it’s up to blacks to find a way of living that works better for them”.

As to the first:
The liberal’s adherence to a flawed and over the top definition of racial equality that we heatedly dispute does not make color blind equality before the courts and under American law automatically bad and objectionable.. Even liberals can be right now and then. Broad conceptualization and unclear meanings or tissue thin labels limit intra-conservative discussion resulting in a default of creative input in race based topics. The more specific the topic the better chance to address the issue.

It was and is folly to publicly deny any American full and equal access to every public facility and equal protection under law. After the fact of his resignation, Lott himself said that it was his own fault; that his enemies laid a trap for him and he blames no one but himself for stupidly falling into it. In the world of animals and politics a sign of weakness is often followed by the pack falling upon the weaker member and rending him limb from limb. This is especially so in participatory democracies. Such have been public methods since the world began.

As to the second:

I’m certain that the intractable nature of the black issues complex is disheartening to men of goodwill. Even so, by breaking it down into manageable bits, we may begin to see some light and maybe some encouragement. Lord knows we can use some of both and OUR analysis must precede and be part of our discussion.
.
Which specific problems are we speaking of? We have partially discussed black I.Q. in public accession to colleges with SAT and the Bell Curve quite well if I remember.. Republican platform positions on such issues are always bounded by what will work and be accepted by the majority right now, i.e the realpolitik of present public discourse. Political power is a whole different breed of cat.
Maybe we on VFTR don’t agree on what a non-liberal Republican position IS, much less what it should be.
Paleo…- Neo….-Mainstream….. all disagreeably broad conservative labels that allow us to short circuit our analytical brains and jump right into the “aint it awful” show.

“The liberals’ … flawed … [positions on questions of race don’t] make color-blind equality before the courts and under American law automatically bad and objectionable.” — Sandy

Nobody on our side ever said they did — certainly nobody among the respectable anti-left, and no one whom I’ve ever seen post articles or readers’ comments on this web-site. I’m sure Sen. Lott never did either. So, I don’t understand your point here, Sandy.

“It was and is folly to publicly deny any American full and equal access to every public facility and equal protection under law.” — Sandy

It was and is probably “folly,” as you put it, but more importantly it was and is just plain wrong. (Some things can be folly and be right at the same time.) But again, who on our side has disputed this, Sandy?

Sandy is entirely misunderstanding anything Mr. Kalb said. He was not arguing against equality before the law, but against the modern assumption that substantive equality between the races is both possible and mandatory. Unequal treatment of blacks before the law really hasn’t been an issue since the mid-1960s. But liberals and Bushite conservatives are still saying it’s possible and mandatory to make blacks substantively equal. They keep proposing various schemes and rhetoric to make that happen, and anyone who doesn’t sign on to any and every plank in that agenda is called a racist. (Examples of this type of argument have filled the liberal media since last Friday. Just take a look at the New York Times.) That’s why, if a conservative politician is to defend himself effectively from the charge of racism, he ultimately has to point out that society’s failure to attain total substantive black equality is due, not to white racism, but to the inherent qualities of blacks. Republicans neither understand that truth nor—obviously—would they be willing to express it even if they did understand it. And that’s why, as Mr. Kalb argued, Republicans have no practical choice but to offer unprincipled resistance to the liberal race agenda or simply sidestep the issue.

How liberals and conservatives maintain their earthly existence in the Age of Liberalism:

Liberals make unprincipled exceptions.

Conservatives offer unprincipled resistance.

Sandy wrote that “I have the idea tht both moderators and most commentators view American politics … as having gone too, too far left into one world, big government, heterogenous positions, to the detriment of personal liberty and self determination.”

Sandy, it was an emphasis on “personal liberty and self determination” which got us into trouble in the first place. What if an established religious culture is felt to limit personal liberty and self determination? What if an understanding of the nature of men and women does the same? Or the duties of traditional family life?

This is not, of course, to reject personal liberty and independence outright: both of these have an important place within the Western character. But they can’t be a philosophical starting point for a principled conservative politics. The alternative to a statist left liberalism for us is not a classical anti-statist right liberalism.

I’ve read Unadorned and Mr. Austers posts and so far have not seen a reasoned movement of debate forward.
Unadorned said that no one on VFTR (our side as it was put) previously disputed equality before the law and added that he believed that Trent Lott never did either
I saw no one say in the prior posts:
“Lott put conservative trends and gains at risk by a stupid off the cuff comment” OR: He’s may not be racist but he’s been crippled and will take the party with him if we don’t stop this”. Or: He’s lost all momentum in his personal debate with the left and is a liability now”.

If anyone had made these arguments I would not have had to state the obvious-that because of his words, there was now a country wide perception that Lott believed in the old southern segregation strategy, by the hidden meaning of what he said, that caused a rush of public distrust of his motives for who he was. Conservatives saw the danger and his stupidity. Liberals saw only opportunity to put it to conservatives..
In his political position, any inadvertently telling the truth about segregation as you see it, is the kiss of death. Even if he was totally innocent of any hidden meaning he gave them the chance and they took it. That’s unforgiveable. You have to have power AND KEEP IT to change the things we don’t like.

The topic was never what was actually said on by anyone on VFTR, nor what an elected public figure, Trent Lott ACTUALLY said. The issue before the public, so skillfully articulated by the left, always was what Lott intended or the hidden meaning of his words. Yes, the left- black- caucus minority opportunists jumped on him to damage the Republican party, because he was a member of it, and went on to accuse all the Republicans of “racism”. They always do it and it should be expected.

Mr. Auster restates that the liberals and the Bushites argue that “it is possible and mandatory to make blacks substantively equal by proposing various schemes and rhetoric to make that happen.
He gives no example that we could discuss but is aggrieved that this forces conservatives to defend against charges of racism when failure to obtain total substantive black equality is the result of inherent qualities of the blacks. I understand the sorrow and anger that engenders broad brush sweeping accusations against the perfidy of the left. But standing only as accusation without specifics I cant discuss it. The N.Y. Times editorial page, referred to by Larry, has three entries: one predictable garbage piece by Bob Herbert, the other more erudite and less left-partisan by Linwood Holton 1970-74 Republican Governor of Virginia. And one piece by Brent Staples a black man. We can talk about any or all of them.

Sandy wrote:

“I saw no one say in the prior posts: ‘Lott put conservative trends and gains at risk by a stupid off the cuff comment’ OR: ‘He’s may not be racist but he’s been crippled and will take the party with him if we don’t stop this.’ Or: ‘He’s lost all momentum in his personal debate with the left and is a liability now.’”

It’s become evident that Sandy is not reading, or is unable to understand, things that have been said over and over in these discussions. For my part I’ve said over and over, both in this post and elsewhere, that Lott’s apparent endorsement of segregation was a legitimate problem that he needed to clear himself of and that he had become a terrible liability to the Republican party. Yet Sandy runs on and on in her lengthy posts saying things that bear little relationship with reality.

A further example of Sandy’s failing to read what is in front of her is her persistence in calling this website VTFR, instead of VFR.

I recommend to Sandy that she write fewer words of her own until she’s read other people’s words more carefully.

May I also say that Sandy’s notion, repeated in at least two comments, that we have been speaking out of “anger” and “sorrow,” is way off base and sounds like a typical PC attempt to squelch or discredit non-liberal views. The views put forth here have not been expressions of “anger” but of a lively grappling with contemporary issues.

Mr. Auster
Your reply was petty and nonreponsive.
When you pick out an irrelevant detail from my post such as my use of the term VFTR,(View From The Right) at least quote me correctly.
You also have as little evidence to title me “her” ,as you have to support some of the political opinions I complained of just above.
.

Sandy’s characterization of the postings on VFR as unprincipled expressions of anger I think indicate more about Sandy’s level of understanding of what is being said than about the actual content of the posts themselves. Sandy has expressed disdain for abstract reason before, and perhaps that disdain reflects something more fundamental than a rational rejection of the abstract that Sandy is capable of articulating. Also Sandy clearly sees racial integration, the fourteenth amendment, etc as unmitigated goods and so is manifesting the liberal tendency to dismiss principled opposition to them as “anger” or some other nonrational phenomenon. All of this seems to reflect Sandy’s unwillingness to consider opposition to racial integration as a rational possibility, though, rather than any basic flaw in the posts to which Sandy objects.

I liked these comments, by Steve Sailer, on the Lott affair (and I thought Frum’s NRO smear of Steve as a “racialist,” whatever that is supposed to be, was nauseating):

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/lott.htm

My apologies for the wrong guess as to gender. However, I note that Sandy hasn’t actually said that my use of gender was wrong, only that I made an attribution of gender without evidence, which is true. The Web is an impersonal medium, and since some nicknames, like “Sandy,” are used by both men and women, when it is necessary to use a pronoun for people with such names there’s no way to know for sure which one is correct.

As for the substance, there was nothing petty or unresponsive about my comment. Sandy has complained at inordinate length about other people’s comments without having understood their plain meaning. There is also nothing petty or unresponsive in my criticism of Sandy for attacking the supposed “anger” and “vitriol” in other people’s remarks. There was only one excessively angry comment in this discussion that I recall, about neocons, and the commenter immediately and gracefully retracted it when it was pointed out to him. Characterizing VFR, of all weblogs, as “angry” strikes me as particularly odd given the intellectual (some would say excessively intellectual) tone of this site.

What we have here, it seems to me, is that when people run up against a consistently anti-liberal or non-liberal view, there is no way for them to process it except to see it as as “hostility” or “anger.” This of course is the liberal establishment’s standard view of all conservatives. What it comes down to is an attempt to prevent non-liberal views from being expressed.

Although kind of off-topic, I’d like to take issue with Christianity and see if any of Counterrevolution’s readers disagree with me. If so, I want to know why.

1): Christianity aided and abetted the slaugter of native Americans, the enslavement of blacks, the refusal for years to grant women basic rights (such as the right to vote).

2): The basis of law and morality which the US was built on which had nothing to do with Christianity. Our entire legal system is based on Anglo traditions going all the way back to before christianity made any real impact on Europe. There’s nothing in the NT that emphasizes the worth of the individual. The NT is rife with collectivism and the denial of self.

I am attracted to specifics such as Mr. Auster’s 02:16 AM post for today. In the post, Mr. Auster proposed specific words and phrases that Senator Lott could have used to defend himself. Examples are specific also and help me to understand abstract concepts.

Sandy, was Mr. Auster right or wrong as to your sex? If he lacked evidence but guessed correctly you should praise him for his perspicacity.

Doug, why do you assume that it’s a bad thing to emphasise the collective? A family is a collective, and so is a nation. It’s important to our sense of identity and belonging to have such collectives; without them individuals show very obvious signs of alienation and rootlessness.

Pope Pius XI in a 1931 Encyclical wrote that: “On account of the evil of individualism, things have come to such a pass that the highly developed social life which once flourished in a variety of prosperous institutions organically linked with each other, has been damaged and all but ruined, leaving thus virtually only individuals and the State.”

The pity is that the Christian churches did not more actively counter the kind of individualistic trend that Pius XI identified.