The Wall Street Journal - c/d?

-- walter kranz (kranz_walte...), May 11th, 2005.

Well, I don't think he was supposed to be "from the left" so much as anti-religious right, and I don't particularly care in this case.

And as far as bad news, I don't necessarily mean that its economic outlook was rosy, just that it gave the impression of taking a more calm, measured approach. Emphasis on "gave the impression" of course.

The division between the editorial group and the reporters is actually a physical one; it's like two different offices. The divide is, or was, informally referred to as "The Great Wall of China" for its impermeability.

In the Consumer Price Index article mentioned above, there was a suggestion, sort of slipped in there, that the administration just might have the motiviation to manipulate the inflation numbers downward a little in order to justify smaller social security payouts.

BTW, whatever you think of Hitchens, that riposte to the religious Republican right was a bullseye, best thing he's written in 10 yrs.

Douglas otm. It is probably the most well written paper in the country.

and those portraits are gorgeous.

I have never understood why conservative entrepreneurs are so all-fired pious and Bible-thumping, let alone why so many of them claim Jesus as their best friend and personal savior. The Old Testament is bad enough: The commandments forbid us even to envy or covet our neighbor's goods, and thus condemn the very spirit of emulation and ambition that makes enterprise possible. But the New Testament is worse: It tells us to forget thrift and saving, to take no thought for the morrow, and to throw away our hard-earned wealth on the shiftless and the losers.

1. Forget thrift and savings: Personal savings at an all-time low, drawn down along with home equity to support ever more cavalier spending and ever expanding personal debt. Check.

2. Take no thought for the morrow: See above. Also, fiscal and trade deficits as far as the eye can see. Check.

3. Throw away our hard-earned wealth on the shiftless and the losers: Massive repatriation of foreign earnings and capital-investment tax givebacks for corporations. Steel subsidies and farm subsidies. Check.

Rasheed is pointing out that the republicans don't practice the fiscal discipline that Hitchens is preaching. Like Hitchens' hypocracy is a big surpirse.

The point is that all of these talking points (the religious ideals, the conservative ideals) are nothing but a linguistic smokescreen. Right-wing christians, republican politicians and Christopher Hitchens will say what ever they have to say to sell their ideas to the American people.

I disagree. I think he clearly believes that rhetoric but I suppose I would have to dig up some examples to prove it.

2) Rasheed Wallace is pointing out that, actually, the line does accurately describe the conservative viewpoint, if we look at who the real "shiftless" and "losers" are in our society.

Yes, this I agree with although it flew over my head the first time.

or that those who run the corporations are the virtuous ones, since thru their hard-work and discipline, they've become successful, and since they are hard-working, disciplines, moral people, they're obviously the best ones.

So you get lines like VP Dan Quayle at the 92 Repub Convention asking why the best people are "punished" with actually having to pay their taxes, etc.

Which brings us back nicely to the WSJ edit page's bit about low-income "lucky duckies" who don't have to pay income taxes.

We get it at the office and I read it fairly regularly. I've always felt its important to know the enemy. (this is also why I watch COPS)

he's not preaching fiscal discipline, he's being sarcastic (ie when he says "losers" he means "the kinds of people conservatives and libertarians call losers") (i know he calls himself a libertarian now so maybe this is his hypocrisy actually, but he's a cultural libertarian not an economic libertarian)

(i've never actually seen him take a line on economics, it doesn't interest him much i don't think) (if walter can find a quote to make me wrong on this i'd be interested - astonished actually)

that said, i think his pitch here is over-complicated* and poorly written (poorly written as in overwritten - his style has degenerated a lot overt the years, it's way too archly florid these days, and half his ironic gags don't come off unless you bring a whole bnuch of historical snadwiches to the picnic): a lot of stuff he's written that i find much more alien to my way of thinking abt eg the war has been MUCH better written, tidier and more trenchant

*over-complicated bcz he has to be selective abt xtianity himself - ie the bit he likes (which appeals to his vestigial socialism: being good to the poor being a good thing) he can only invoke protected by irony

This is mostly true if you're talking about economics of the arcane maths variety, but I'd wager that he's probably very interested in political economy -- he read the PPE at Balliol, after all -- and that his notions about all that inform his thinking even if those notions never overtly surface in his prose. The only direct comment about economists I've ever seen from him is the "priests and warlocks of pseudoscience" bit on the dust jacket of Doug Henwood's Wall Street: How It Works and For Whom.

if economics were a decider for him, he'd have broken long ago or not at all

(besides he loves to show off abt what he knows - if he spent a lot of time reading up on economics we'd definitely know about it)

Because of COPS, I now know that if I ever steal a car and the ignition won't turn over, I should try looking for a BAC tube to blow air thru.

now all i need to do is commit a convoluted murder and become fictional

I'll admit that I don't know what the hell Hitchens' position is. He doesn't like the religious right and you say he's a cultural libertarian so are you arguing that his sole allegiance to the right is based on foreign policy? To me the foreign policy issues are inseparable from the underlying economics. And I think Hitchens doesn't want to make the economic arguments clear because he's meant to be attacking the left as a supposed "former leftist."

At any rate, I don't have much time for a writer who refers to Ayn Rand and Leo Strauss as "important conservative thinkers" but thinks that anti-war liberals are "making excuses for jihad and treating Osama bin Laden as if he were advocating liberation theology."

I'm sure his friend Paul Wolfowitz is one. The point is the language Hitchens uses. People like Rand, Strauss and all of the neoconservatives in the administration might be criticized, but they're given the benefit of the doubt and calmly called conservatives. Liberals on the other hand "make exuses for Jihad." I mean come on! It's clear who he's shilling for.

(I'm sure there's a special ring in Dante's hell for someone like Hitch, who happily spins rhetorical webs in the defense of bombing children.)

his orwell book is good (well, except the last chapter, which is a pointless takedown of some pomo nobody)

his two collections from the 80s ("preparing for the worst" and "for the sake of argument") both have some great pieces in them

Possibly. Or maybe it's a reminder to the right that all of that religious nonsense is for the unwashed masses, not the business elite. Just a little reminder that it's fine to preach it but don't start believing it.

to me the foreign policy issues are inseparable from the underlying economics also - but not to hitchens; he reads iraq in terms of tyranny not oil; the kurdish liberation struggle not neo-imperialism

He might sell the war in those terms but do you really think he believes it?

calling Ayn Rand and Leo Strauss "important conservative thinkers" is a neutral description here - he's not pro either of them himself

Kind of like how he's not really a Republican himself? He'll criticize them for this or that but in the end he supports their objectives.

shakey i really hate to just repeat pro war shit to you, but uh let's not too misty eyed abt the 13 year medium-intensity air war (no matter how many it may have kept alive) that showed not sign of ever ending (not that the current situation has any more big exit signs, mind)

i absolutely totally think he believes this - i really totally do not think this is a front for some secret never-stated pro-business agenda

yeah, there's no pro-capital secret agenda here (ffs!) if anything (as mark pointed out) hitchens' line on the war is all to easy to read.

(fwiw, I have not read any pre-9-11 Hitchens. maybe I'm missing something, but y'know "9-11 Changed Everything!TM" so I can't say I have much interest in that material...)

(and I am not "misty-eyed" for the 13-year medium-intensity bombing campaign - why would you think I supported THAT? You bring that up as if that strategy was the lone option to invading Iraq which is, frankly, bullshit.)

x-post

someone shd really quiz him abt that

if i wanted to be really REALLY cynical abt his move away from the left i'd say it's cz he got bored by the bad writing and indifference to the kind of cultural discussion he has a slightly-too high opinion of his own dabbling in

Which is the Straussian philosophy put into action. And Hitchens played a part in it. I don't buy that his writing is not meant for the left because his personal history and his denunciations of religion for example specifically attract people on the left to read and talk about his work.

as far as the 90s go: there really is no gulf war "2", it's the same long thing, the no fly zones to keep the shia and kurds alive (after the fact) had to exist in perpetuity, the sanctions, everything... we didn't go back to iraq, we had never left. all this 'regime change' stuff was about not doing the police work anymore, abt changing the situation instead of sitting on it forever, ie who is being policed?

look this is just abt logic, not anyone's position on anything. no need to flex yr antiwar-ness at me, i get it.

xpost i don't know strauss at all. i thought his point was that political climates affect how people think and behave?

I see your point (obviously nothing that comes out of Bush's mouth is ever going to be too complicated), tho I *do* think Hitchens' justifications for the war were rhetorically elaborate, cuz that's generally what he does. It's his style - he couldn't help but bolster the pro-war case with a lot of apparently well-reasoned moral and historical imperatives.

"Ancient texts, he argued, have two layers of meaning--the exoteric (i.e., ostensible) meaning and the esoteric or real meaning, which one can tease out only through patient study of hints and silences. Often the two meanings are completely at odds. The ancients were compelled to write in this opaque way, Strauss held, because vulgar minds would have rebelled at the plain truth."

from http://www.straightdope.com/columns/031212.html

http://www.alternet.org/story/15935

http://citypages.com/databank/23/1146/article10878.asp

I would revise/correct it here and there, but the point about religion stands: This is his great subject.

Well, that's it. No way I'm renewing my subscription now.

I love how this thread turned into "Hitchens, C/D?" I don't understand what's mystifying about Hitchens' positions; anyone's who's been reading him since the late eighties knows how he feels about fundamentalists of all kinds, especially when one group of them issues a fatwa against a close friend for writing a novel. You don't have to agree with him (I don't), but he's honest.

Also, he's been against the Bush administration on a NUMBER of issues: values, Katrina, "mismanagement" of the war, coddling Putin. I mean, he's the prototypical one-issue voter! He took a risk -- "I will support this war even though I find its prosecutors repulsive" -- and lost. This may come as a surprise to Shakey, but there it is. It's why I initially supported the war.

mark s OTM for most of the thread.

As for today's breaking news: no surprise, but extremely depressing. There was a great New Yorker article about it published a few weeks ago. If I find it, I'll post it.

Yeah, it wasn't surprising after the way things had been developing. But it is always sad to watch someone overcome integrity with sheer power.

The WSJ will always be classic. Even Pinch couldn't fuck it up.

Murdoch owned the Village Voice during its late 70s/early 80s heyday, so who knows?

Coffee machines are stationed throughout the floors, and the annual coffee budget runs $100,000.

dud . . . but does anyone happen to have a link to the text of thomas frank's final "tilting yard" column yesterday? it's behind a paywall and no way am i paying for that. either way, really glad he's going to 'harper's,' to be lewis lapham's permanent replacement i think? i wonder if the journal's gonna pick up another token non-lunatic now to take tm's spot or just let the op-ed section become one big perfect echo chamber

Was pleased to see this:

http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2011/09/26/why-the-rich-pay-40-of-taxes/

This is bizarre! WSJ has been buying copies of itself to boost circulation figures through some labyrinthine scheme:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/oct/12/wall-street-journal-andrew-langhoff

loll

Ha! DIAF WSJ

http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OG-AD253_Scalia_NS_20141202185210.gif http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OG-AD248_Grumpy_NS_20141202171652.gif

<3

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CnQ6oR7UEAAuo2e.jpg:small

POT-SMOKING AGITATORS BURST INTO MY OFFICE
We all must stand against political violence. But some in Congress are egging it on instead.

By Andy Harris
Oct. 3, 2018 6:59 p.m. ET

I was physically confronted Tuesday by aggressive, pot-smoking agitators at my Capitol Hill office. They attempted to shove open a private door, throwing their shoulders into it and injuring my wrist in the process (thank goodness not seriously). Some from the crowd were arrested. Also thankfully, my staff and innocent bystanders weren’t injured. But it could have been much worse.

This aggression, by people who disagree with my opposition to the legalization of recreational marijuana, demonstrates a growing problem with political discourse today. Violence should have no place in politics. We’re all Americans. We’re entitled to express our opinions, but we must draw the line at physical aggression.

My parents fled communist Eastern Europe, where people were harassed, imprisoned, or shot for their political views. They instilled in me a deep-rooted respect for differing opinions offered in a civilized manner. When people substitute physical intimidation for deliberative debate, our democratic system starts to break down.

A masked, smoking demonstrator in Sao Paulo, April 26, 2014.
A masked, smoking demonstrator in Sao Paulo, April 26, 2014. PHOTO: LEVI BIANCO/GETTY IMAGES
In the past few months, we have seen officials in the Trump administration harassed in public. We have seen senators chased out of private dinners with their spouses, and presidential nominees shouted down and subjected to death threats.

Unfortunately, some of my colleagues approve of such behavior. This summer, Rep. Maxine Waters advised her constituents: “You get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.” She and the left are getting exactly what they sought. The crowd in my office followed her advice.

Where does it end? Tweeting about the altercation that took place at my office Tuesday, Majority Whip Steve Scalise said it best: “Assaulting anyone because you disagree with them is NEVER acceptable.” I couldn’t agree more. Mr. Scalise knows all too well how encouragement of violent harassment can end: Last June he was shot and critically wounded during a congressional baseball game. The gunman was apparently motivated by hatred of Republicans.

I am happy to work with people who disagree with me. I have sponsored legislation to facilitate research into the potential value or harms of medicinal marijuana. My cosponsors include Democrats and Republicans, and some of Congress’ leading marijuana legalization proponents. I have discussed this issue in detail with researchers, grass-roots advocacy groups, university leaders, law-enforcement officers and regulatory-agency personnel.

Some of the people who unpeaceably assembled in my office have participated in, and disrupted, my town halls by talking over other constituents. I won’t allow them to violate the rights of constituents who seek a real dialogue. I’m honored and proud to represent these hard-working people. They, and all Americans, have the right to speak their opinions freely. I also won’t allow trespassers to suppress my voice as an elected representative.

We must return to civility. We need to be able to agree to disagree, and express our disagreements through the democratic process. The need for civil discourse is greater now than it has ever been.

Mr. Harris, a Republican, represents Maryland’s First Congressional District.

btw here's the protest:

https://i.imgur.com/D2Sm8xx.png

and here's the photo they're running with this story:

https://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/B3-BY415_Harris_M_20181003163202.jpg

my god the violence

https://i.imgur.com/rbvR9BC.png

weedheads BERST into jery office

https://www.wsj.com/graphics/new-space-race/?mod=djemDailyShot&mod=djemDailyShot

if you are willing to forget how bad the WSJ is, the graphics in this piece are pretty damn good.