God's Own Crunk

Among AmLit dorks, I ride the short bus regarding The Great Gatsby, considered one of the three or four best American novels ever written.

I really liked the teacher who presided over my reading of it in 1991, and I enjoyed it, but it never grabbed me. The curious thing about good lit is that lines can be drawn, dots can be connected, and at some point, shiz gets real. In the last week or so, I”ve read a few pieces connecting these dots, and this chunk from Mark Steyn’s latest brings it home. To wit, time to re-read TGG:

In a post-modern America, the things that Gatsby attempted to fake – an elite schooling – Obama actually had; the things that Gatsby attempted to obscure – the impoverished roots – merely add to Obama’s luster. Gatsby claimed to have gone to Oxford, but nobody knew him there because he never went; Obama had a million bucks’ worth of elite education at Occidental, Columbia and Harvard Law, and still nobody knew him (“Fox News contacted some 400 of his classmates and found no one who remembered him”). In that sense, Obama out-Gatsbys Gatsby: His “shiftless and unsuccessful” relatives – the deportation-dodging aunt on public housing in Boston, the DWI undocumented uncle, the $12-a-year brother back in Nairobi – are useful props in his story, the ever more vivid bit-players as the central character swims ever more out of focus, but they don’t seem to know him either. The more autobiographies he writes, the less anybody knows.

via Mark Steyn: Eternally shifting sands of Obama’s biography | obama, ever, white – Opinion – The Orange County Register.

How Oklahoma history plays into Elizabeth Warren’s Massachusetts Senate battle is a bit surreal, a bit bizarre, and a whole lotta funny. The moral of this story could be learned with a healthy dose of Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler,” for Warren’s sake particularly the part about knowing when to fold’em. Instead, she won’t admit she’s wrong, so she gets to deal with legit, apolitical critiques like this. Good times, very good times.

He’s at it again today, and doing so well that a sock-puppet emerged in his comments. Recall that Jacobson is a law professor at Cornell, not a journalist, yet he seems to be all over this story in a manner that J-Schoolers are incapable or unwilling. Great work.

Over at HotAir, Jazz Shaw writes:

I’m not such a political neophyte as to suggest that this is unique in politics, but the bold faced, brazen machinations and ham handed plotting which have characterized this “evolution” in the President’s position on the subject at hand are rather breathtaking. And I’m not saying that people don’t actually “evolve” in their positions, beliefs or ideology. I know that my own attitudes and beliefs in my twenties were a far cry – in some instances at least – from where I stand in my fifties. Very few of us spring out of the halls of high school fully formed with all of the opinions we’ll hold until the grave.

via Newsweek finally goes where none have gone before « Hot Air.

Shaw’s piece uses Newsweek’s upcoming cover (“The First Gay President”) as a starting point, and I will use Shaw’s analysis as a starting point – meta, I know, but whatevs…

I’ll start by saying anyone who thinks that Fred-6 has “evolved” on this issue is a fool – like me, z’POTUS has believed for some time that gay people should be allowed to get married. His reasoning? Who knows, really, but mine is that the State shouldn’t be in the marriage game in the first place – it should be left to churches and civic groups to do the official bonding. Actually, I say I don’t know what his view is, but I do – he’s used the argument Democrats would normally fell from (“State’s rights”) to ski down this slippery slope (see also: Goldberg, Jonah - Tyranny of Cliches).

Fred-6 evolved his position because a) his Veep, intentionally or otherwise, forced his hand and b) he needs the money. Well, needs is a strong word, but you get my drift.

Of friends and family I’ve asked about this, they said the reaction on Facebook was predictably hysterical, that the various homosexuals on the Feed took to it to celebrate this amazing gesture by a POTUS who clearly represents them, even though when he had the House and the Senate and could do what he want, his silence told gays to go fuck themselves.

I get that there exist people who would never vote for a Republican, no matter who it is. What I don’t get is the need to project ideals that are patently unture and opposed to reality on z’POTUS. He is the first Gen-X POTUS, technically, and I daresay that among college-educated Gen-Xers, regardless of politics, that his views, as judged by his statements and actions on the subject of gay marriage, are alarmingly conservative. That feels funny to write, much less to digest.

I know few actual Conservatives – myself included, my close friends, etc – who have passionate views about this subject – in casual conversations over the years, most seem to come the same vague conclusion that I do specifically ie if gay people want to marry and can find an institution that will marry them, the State shouldn’t stop them.

No, it’s not the same as pedophilia or polygamy or bestiality or any other sexual deviance that usually comes part-and-parcel with arguments against gay marriage. When the last of the Baby Boomers carries influence, this issue dies as well.

So, for z’POTUS, it’s a political issue (of course). Currently, it’s also a losing one. The grand irony is that my generation and the ones younger than mine have few problems with gay marriage, but we aren’t the ones who decide elections. Gay marriage (or amendments to state constitutions prohibiting such) comes up aces at the ballot box, always against … gay marriage.

I hope z’POTUS is prepared to die on this hill, because his view may be popular among various opinion-makers, but it’s a loser.

Posted yesterday at Breitbart, it’s a long explanation of the machinations on John McCain’s campaign team to blame Sarah Palin. This will a) surprise no one, b) change no one’s mind about Gov. Palin and c) still send steam shooting out the ears of anyone who remains flabbergasted that we have Fred-6 as a POTUS because of such tomfoolery.

Read the rest of this entry »

Whitney Pritcher used to write at C4P and is now writing at Breitbart. She’s put together a long piece about Sarah Palin’s governorship, by the numbers, that is pretty interesting in and of itself (although I’m not sure what prompted Pritcher to do this, but no matter…).

Pieces like this are echo-frustrations – they again point to one of the few truly classy, proven leaders on the Right and, by virtue of that, what was done to her because of what she stood for and still stands for to this day. Even when Palin isn’t trying to gain political power, HBO has made one movie about her and is now rolling out a TV series with Palin look-a-like Elaine Benes playing, what else, a Vice President and, yes, it’s a comedy.

/seinfelded

Palin’s written two books, delivered more memorable speeches in four years than virtually every other Conservative political player combined, and penned numerous op-eds on any number of issues. But no, let’s see multimillion-dollar productions directed at what Anonymous sources had to say about her behind closed doors – that’s the ticket.

Anyway:

Today everyone likes to call himself a deficit hawk, but it’s easy to be a budget cutter when you’re broke. Palin was a serious deficit hawk at a time when her state was flush with a massive oil revenue surplus. It takes discipline and strong conservative principles to rein in spending at a time like that. Palin cut spending by nearly 10% during her tenure while reforming government, attracting more energy companies to do business in her state and adding jobs.

In the days of credit downgrades in states across the country and for the country as a whole, Alaska has seen its credit upgraded twice since 2006 due to Palin’s reform of the state employee pensions and Alaska’s oil valuation tax.

via Who Is the Real Sarah Palin?.

Heh:

Not “might” or “may” but rather the president, like the fundamentalists and ideologues he pretends can only exist among his fanatical detractors, knows this for certain. Obama even stated around this time that there was “no disagreement” on the matter of his Keynesian stimulus — even though 200 economists took to the pages of The New York Times in an ad to say otherwise, and thousands of others disagreed.

Obama may be Nostradamus, but counterfactual arguments, fortunately, can be deployed both ways and by anyone. For instance: Doing nothing would have been more effective than doing something stupid. Without the stimulus, we’d be out of this mess already. Passing free market-oriented reforms would have allowed this recovery to resemble the “Reagan recovery” of the ’80s. And so on.

via RealClearPolitics – The Hypothetical President.

William Jacobson writes:

My sense of the talk shows this morning (which I usually don’t listen to but did today) is that the War on Women nonsense is completely dominating the current cycle and will for a long time.

It’s complete and total AxelPlouffe BS, but it’s all the media talks about. The War on Women is working for the Dems, at least in the media.  Romney already is losing the narrative.

via » Pulling Romney across the finish line – Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion.

One point of genuine frustration I have is this absurdist narrative regarding the war on womynz, not only because it is a lie, but more importantly, because it’s men, not women, who are under attack in this country. Some men whine about it, but most of us go on about our way because we don’t like whining, whiners or inane rhetorical “wars.”

I don’t blame Mitt Romney or his campaign on this one. I think Jacobson is correct that the Romney campaign is losing this narrative, but the reason for that is out of their control: no such war exists, yet Donkeys and their media cheerleaders continue to push this meme. It’s beyond the realm of the rational, and how Team Romney is supposed to battle this I have no idea.

What I wonder is whether or not womynz who might be inclined to vote for GOPers actually believe this bullshit? If a majority of womynz in this country actually believe there is some kind of subterranean  ”war” against them, then the majority of womynz in this country are not only stupider than previously imagined, they are even less self-aware than American womynz are globally stereotyped as being ie could the most self-involved womynz on the planet be any less clueless as to the advantages, opportunities, freedom etc men have given them? Apparently, the answer might be yes.

I don’t want Mitt Romney catering to female voters – it’s a losing proposition. If certain womynz need to be promised goodies for their votes, then they’re not worth having and it’s a game GOPers can never and will never win, because the more you give to such thinking, the more you lose people like me ie white male Conservatives who have always worked, don’t take any form of government support, leave other people alone and wish nothing but the same for and from others.

I’m a firm believer in letting the Donkeys/media/et al continue to bleat about said war on womynz – most of the Conservative women I know know it’s bullshit, and they’re not voting for Fred-6 under any circumstance. The smart ones know it’s a lie.

Due to the NFL Draft and the NBA Playoffs, I’m not really paying attention, but the WaPo piece in question is all over my Reader at the moment – I’ll let Karl take it from there, in case you didn’t see it:

Ornstein and Mann next trot out several GOP boogeymen to explain the current apocalypse. They spend the most venom on vilifying Newt Gingrich, who in their telling poisoned the well by building the first GOP House majority in 40 years by scandal-mongering and demonizing his opponents (Democrats never did this before 1994, you know). Gingrich certainly did shine a light on the corruption of the Democratic leadership of the time, including Jim Wright and Dan Rostenkowski, and the GOP did benefit on balance in 1994 from the House banking scandal. However, Ornstein and Mann certainly do not make the case that the Wrights and Rostenkowskis were clean and deserved to remain in powerful positions in the House.

via Let’s just say it: The Democrats are the problem « Hot Air.