The point of having an invitation-only closed email list is to let people say and hear in private the insightful things that it would be bad for their careers to say and hear in public.
Yet, the liberal reporters and pundits on the JournoList closed email list apparently view their list as an opportunity to exchange with each other exactly the same ignorant eye-rolling, the same politically correct inanities that they spout in public, just with more bad language!
Mickey Kaus has some leaked emails, and Your Lying Eyes absolutely nails the analysis.
Yet, the liberal reporters and pundits on the JournoList closed email list apparently view their list as an opportunity to exchange with each other exactly the same ignorant eye-rolling, the same politically correct inanities that they spout in public, just with more bad language!
Mickey Kaus has some leaked emails, and Your Lying Eyes absolutely nails the analysis.
My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
Posts
44 comments:
Matt Duss chimes in: "Funny -- under Peter B. (no idea whether this extends to Frank, though
I imagine so) using the term "illegals" was verboten, for obvious
reasons." Funny indeed. But what "obvious reasons"? What are these "obvious reasons" wink wink?
"I guess Marty didn't get the memo."
"Get the memo" suggests enfored PC groupthink is what we're talking about . . .
"Or, well, you know." Or what? Is this a knowing wink wink at the groupthink?
"Also, and this is slightly orthogonal to the topic, but Marty's post
demonstrates the accidental danger in praising Latin American
immigrants as driven and hard-working. Logically it makes sense"
By the "logic" of PC groupthink, I suppose. What about empirically?
"but
it's also easy for people to draw the false conclusion that anyone who
doesn't immigrate is therefore lazy and stupid."
Again, all that matters is the "logic" of PC groupthink . . .
Mr. Duss both acknowledges the groupthink ("Didn't get the memo" and "for obvious reasons") and at the same time announces his fealty to the enforced PC line . . .
What interested me about the Peretz characterization of Mexico and the Journolist reactions to it was that Peretz bent over backwards to avoid attributing Mexican failures to race in its real ancestral sense, blaming instead a host of cultural factors like Catholicism, work habits, political institutions and violent habits, yet he was still called a racist by the commenters. What do you have to do to pass muster with these folks?
The point of having an invitation-only closed email list is to let people say and hear in private the insightful things that it would be bad for their careers to say and hear in public.
You're projecting. I see that Brad DeLong and Matthew Yglesias are there. For these people, the purpose is probably more to avoid the trouble of purifying comments, as DeLong does, or putting up with "trolls" (people who post hatefacts), as Yglesias does.
Somewhat more legitimately, there are lots of just plain dumb people who will throw in their 2 cents on public forums. Sometimes you just want to have a discussion with your fellow uber-SWPL PhDs without the unwashed masses lowering the tone.
I doubt these guys have an unorthodox bone in their body. They're the ones who define orthodoxy.
If you look at those things which you are really really REALLY discouraged from saying, they are usually things which are true. And this is a fine example.
If Peretz had said something which was plainly factually incorrect then his critic would have used facts and reason to rebut him. Charges of "racism", nine times out of ten, are attempts to shut up a person who is speaking a forbidden truth.
Last thought - damn, I wish some of the girly-men at National Review could summon up the courage to say what Peretz said. It's hard to believe that this was the flagship publication of American conservatism just a few short years ago. These days they stand athwart history saying "Which way you headed? I'll run on ahead of you."
This discussion is strictly confidential. Until you say something I don't like. Then you will be outed.
The dissing of Keith Olberman strikes me as strange. Professional jealousy, I suppose.
I must say that the apparent intellectual quality of those "prominent liberal journalists" seems remarkably low...
Perhaps that explains why the commenters on most of their blogs seem so much sharper and more knowledgeable than the journalists' own postings.
And also why Brad DeLong is such a notorious deleter of comments which calmly point out the flaws in his half-baked reasoning.
"The point of having an invitation-only closed email list is to let people say and hear in private the insightful things that it would be bad for their careers to say and hear in public."
What sort of things would it be bad for a liberal to say in public, career wise?
This sort of thing is obviously most useful for conservatives because there are so many important topics which are taboo.
I don't think the point is to have an insightful discussion, but rather to have an exclusive, members-only clubhouse.
Marty Peretz:
Well, I am extremely pessimistic about Mexican-American relations, not because the U.S. had done anything specifically wrong to our southern neighbor but because a (now not quite so) wealthy country has as its abutter a Latin society with all of its characteristic deficiencies: congenital corruption, authoritarian government, anarchic politics, near-tropical work habits, stifling social mores, Catholic dogma with the usual unacknowledged compromises, an anarchic counter-culture and increasingly violent modes of conflict. Then, there is the Mexican diaspora in America, hard-working and patriotic but mired in its untold numbers of illegals, about whom no one can talk with candor."
The first thing that came to mind was my pet term that shows absolutely no sign of catching on: liberal white supremacy. Not Peretz, obviously, but his detractors at JournoList. I haven't read the Two-Minute Hate yet, just Lying Eyes' set-up, and the quote. But I don't have to. I know what's coming next; Liberal White Supremacy, which is the only way I can explain the absolute refusal on the part of liberals to take sentiments like Peretz' seriously. The Great Big White Man can never be harmed by anything the little brown man does, so liberals are secure to play their insipid status games, where they prove they aren't the kind of white trash threatened by LBMs. Of course, like everything else in liberalism, Liberal White Supremacy is a perversion of an underlying truth.
P.S., as for tropical work habits, Lying Eyes might look into the siesta (not saying he'll find anything, but that might be a good place to start looking).
Oh and Steve, you're probably unclear on the concept. The list is there to escape the prying eyes of the Hoi Polloi, not to come up with anything new.
:)
Liberalism has metastasized. New refinements are welcome, but wholly new ideas, and actual criticism (!) are not.
The Juicebox Mafia needs to get its talking points straight. Maybe they need to tune in to even more NPR. I was listening to "Travel with Rick Steves" last year and was enlightened by the following two points.
1. Mexicans are very hardworking!
...30 minutes later in the show, host now fawning over different guest...
2. Mexicans aren't very hardworking because they embrace a healthful balance of family, work and free time and reject the uptight Anglo norms of punctuality!
There's no reason liberals shouldn't be able to repeat whichever of these two points suits the situation best...who's going to call them on their incoherence? No one who hasn't already been marginalized.
Drone strike on Koolaid factory.
Reminds of the time the speaker
mike was left on in the CA legislature when one party was having a free-wheeling private discussion,
unknowingly broadcasting to the entire building and 500 "squawk boxes" that enable staff members, lobbyists and reporters to listen in on legislative meetings.
Hearing what people really think in private isn't pretty but telling. And very different.
Shapers shapeshifting so to speak, changelings in the temple.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Open mike picks up faction's talk of profiting from a crisis
http://tinyurl.com/hrau
"You have to go on and be crazy. Craziness is like heaven."
-Jimi Hendrix
That's because modern liberalism is nothing but a status game- competitive altruism. The social reality has usurped the real- all the negative side effects are just that, side effects.
I like this writer a lot:
http://www.amerika.org/2009/social-reality/conservatives-are-satan/
http://www.amerika.org/2009/social-reality/liberal-bias-in-media-and-government/
"The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers." - T.J.
Most journalists are very ignorant, but not very bright or honest (is that really surprising news?), and they seem to crave acceptance and approval - this goofy P.C. club is just a symptom.
I think some of them are very clear on the concept. For them the concept is to excoriate even the mildest "racism", which pushes that super-special form of it called "anti-semitism" (eg. criticizing the ethnic nature of the JList cabal) ever farther beyond the pale.
Whenever I'm reminded of the reality-denying that modern liberalism requires (which is all the time), I think of Washington DC. Not the federal government, but the city itself. The city is so racially and geographically demarcated like an A/B test writ large. Tens of thousands of do-gooders flock to the city to work for NGOs and the like, but still cannot publicly acknowledge or admit to themselves the stark contrast between its two halves. When I lived there and nonchalantly brought up district issues (i.e. corruption, failing schools, crime etc.) they gave wishy-washy answers. It's true, political correctness makes people dumb.
but they're right, noticing things about Mexico is racist.
You're starting from a false premise, Steve. As these leaks prove, there's no such thing as a truly private e-mail list. Anyone with a prominent position or who works for a very PC organization would be mad to make politically incorrect remarks under his own name in such a venue.
Maybe these guys all believe 100% of what they're saying, but the modern secular faith of liberalism absolutely requires the responses we see, regardless of their private opinion.
In other words, you can't tell anything about a prominent person's opinion on a "sensitive" topic from what he says in public, with "public" including any venue where his words will be recorded and potentially leaked.
This is just the way things are in contemporary Western society. I thought everybody knew that already.
Pat Shuff said:
Open mike picks up faction's talk of profiting from a crisis
http://tinyurl.com/hrau
I followed the link. Here' a quote: "It seems to me if there's going to be a crisis, the crisis should be this year," Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg, D-Los Angeles, said during the meeting.
They were talking about relatively small-scale California stuff, but it reminded me of something bigger: the current worldwide crisis exploded into the public consciousness during the Wall Street crash which happened in the first week of October, 2008.
The Wall Street crash was always going to happen, but when? If it happened a year into Obama's term, that would have been awful for Obama. A year before the end of Bush's term - good for Obama. October of 2008 - triple jackpot for Obama.
If Obama's folks sat around dreaming about when they'd have preferred that crash to happen, what period would they have chosen? Right, October 2008. There is a reason they don't call them April surprises.
By the way, I don't have any data to support this. Just my (cynical or realistic or crackpotty) hunch about how such things would normally work. Lots of people in Big Finance supported Obama. I remember seeing Soros on TV gushing about him, for example. Of course it needn't have been Soros.
As the quote above shows (as if proof was needed), there are certainly people around who're cynical enough to want to do such things. And it would have benefited a lot of them both politically (their guy's chances of election went up) and financially (if you know when the market's going to crash, you can make a killing in shorts). For me the only unanswered question is if it was technically possible for one or for a few Wall Street operators to pull it off. The greater the number of conspirators, the bigger the chance that the plan would leak, so this couldn't have involved a lot of people.
I don't know enough about Wall Street to judge if a handful of people could have plausibly done it.
Having typed all this, I feel like one of those JFK or WTC conspiracy nuts, but what can I say, I really think that this was sort of, kind of possible.
"What do you have to do to pass muster with these folks?"
Don't question the faith.
"I don't think the point is to have an insightful discussion, but rather to have an exclusive, members-only clubhouse."
The point is to keep up the orthodoxy by threatening excommunication. Keep that dirty business inside the church and present a unified front to the outsiders.
Regarding the Mexican-American issue, some of these journalist might enjoy a recent book by H. E. Baber entitled "The Multicultural Mystique: The Liberal Case Against Diversity" - http://www.amazon.com/Multicultural-Mystique-Liberal-Against-Diversity/dp/1591025532
Lots of heretical, anathema comments at that linked blog, Your Lying Eyes. There are lots of comments there that would never make the grade at the isteve blog.
Those people must be cavemen to think such thoughts and make such heretical connections concerning "the tribe". Such thoughts would never be allowed in 99.999999% of the so-called alternative press.
Doesn't open-and-shut-case "anti-semitism" include any reference to a Jewish conspiracy/cabal behavior and isn't it also extremely illegal everywhere in the Western world? Isn't it super illegal behavior? Shouldn't I/you/we be arrested immediately and then deprived of any professional career at slightest hint of this particular thought crime?
Still - whatever Abe Foxman and Morris Dees say - I have questions. Is there actually a "tribe"? Does it exist? Is "the tribe" powerful? Is "the tribe" acting in a conspiracy against anyone not in "the tribe"? Does "the tribe" seek global hegemony? Is global hegemony the basis of "the tribe's" religious literature?
Why don't you explain it all for the little people, Steve. It's so confusing for us unimportant rabble.
Why on earth would lefties need a private email discussion list? I've never heard of a leftist losing a job over their beliefs.
Svigor:
While they check out "siesta," they might try "manana."
Mr. F. Le Mur:
It's much worse than you represent
with that quote.
It's been 29 years this month since I've touched a newspaper or news magazine. Previously, I'd probably read a couple a day since I was in elementary school.
Oddly, enough, I quit reading all fiction when I was 12. Didn't have anything against it--it just seemed like a useful cut-off so I wouldn't spend all my time reading. So, I've read almost no fiction of the 20th century. Just as well--we all get enough misimpressions just living without
stuffing ourselves full of those of others, whether or not done deliberately. We (people) seem to desire entertainment to such degree that those with the will and ability can just "load us up."
Anonymous: If Obama's folks sat around dreaming about when they'd have preferred that crash to happen, what period would they have chosen? Right, October 2008. There is a reason they don't call them April surprises.
By the way, I don't have any data to support this. Just my (cynical or realistic or crackpotty) hunch about how such things would normally work. Lots of people in Big Finance supported Obama. I remember seeing Soros on TV gushing about him, for example. Of course it needn't have been Soros...
I don't know enough about Wall Street to judge if a handful of people could have plausibly done it...
You know, a few months ago, I would have said that you were nuts.
But I keep seeing the same names [and the same kinds of names] over and over and over again.
Does anyone know anything about this alleged $550 Billion draw-down at 11AM on Thursday, September 18, 2008?
Did it really happen, or is it just an urban myth?
There's no doubt that Soros is out there bragging about how much money he's making in all of this.
But I don't know whether Soros alone could have pulled it off [to time it the way it would have to have been timed].
Soros & the Saudis & the Kuwaitis & the Chicoms, maybe - acting in concert.
Nick Sarkozy said...
My dear husband, I am here to inform you that despite rumors in certain, shall we say, lively corners of the blogosphere that you are in fact not Jewish.
I also want to alert you that as President of the French Republic you are free to start your own blog anytime if you do not like the comment moderation policies of Monsieur Sailer.
"Anonymous said...
Having typed all this, I feel like one of those JFK or WTC conspiracy nuts, but what can I say, I really think that this was sort of, kind of possible."
I believe that Oswald, acting alone, killed Kennedy. I believe that nineteen arabs, supported by Osama bin Laden and his organization, flew airplanes into the World Trade towers, causing them to collapse. And I think that the October Surprise scenario you described is entirely plausible. It's not crazy. Just because most conspiracy theories are untrue, does not mean that all of them are untrue.
"Anonymous said...
Having typed all this, I feel like one of those JFK or WTC conspiracy nuts, but what can I say, I really think that this was sort of, kind of possible."
I believe that Oswald, acting alone, killed Kennedy. I believe that nineteen arabs, supported by Osama bin Laden and his organization, flew airplanes into the World Trade towers, causing them to collapse. And I think that the October Surprise scenario you described is entirely plausible. It's not crazy. Just because most conspiracy theories are untrue, does not mean that all of them are untrue.
Anonymous said...
Pat Shuff said:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The SF article was rather watered down compared to more explicit
articles of the time. Basically the legislators were discussing if forcing CA into default/bankruptcy would play to their advantage.
There was no apparent concern about default being a good or bad thing for CA, for the people of CA, for the future etc. I swear, at least some politicians would strangle their own grandmother or drown a grandchild if somehow politically advantageous. They also displayed no real understanding of the ramifications or long term consequences of a default, either to CA, the muni market or the nation. It had no standing amongst political priorities.
Regarding current conspiracies,
I think the rampant fear and panic in the markets is an uncontrollable
beast, the markets are larger than men or groups acting in collusion,
and any concerted act would/could spin off in any uncontrollable direction. An individual stock or narrow, illiquid market (say tungsten) can be manipulated at least temporarily for an ill-gotten gain.
While they check out "siesta," they might try "manana."
Never put off until tomorrow, what you can put off until the day after tomorrow.
:)
Anonymous: Last thought - damn, I wish some of the girly-men at National Review could summon up the courage to say what Peretz said. It's hard to believe that this was the flagship publication of American conservatism just a few short years ago. These days they stand athwart history saying "Which way you headed? I'll run on ahead of you."
That was the funniest thing I've read at iSteve since "Oh HELL NO! OH HELL NO!!! Not in MY house...".
Man, that one still makes me laugh.
Anonymous: but they're right, noticing things about Mexico is racist.
Which is precisely the problem*.
BTW, speaking of questions of intellectually honest "racism" & the panty-waists at National Review, Jonah Goldberg is trying to dance the tightrope two-step in this morning's post.
*Given our society's current working definition of the word "racist".
I'd argue for an entirely different definition, but I just spent half an hour yesterday chatting with some [otherwise pretty hot] grad student chick about the meaning of the suffix "phobe" when attached to the prefix "homo", and realized that even trying to talk about basic grammarian-semantic tautologies with these people is simply hopeless.
The religion of nihilism is just too deeply ingrained in their neurons - my impression of the phenomenon is akin to what the Darwinists would derisively dismiss as Lamarckism.
Anonymous: Regarding current conspiracies, I think the rampant fear and panic in the markets is an uncontrollable beast, the markets are larger than men or groups acting in collusion, and any concerted act would/could spin off in any uncontrollable direction.
Yeah, but make one small substitution in that assertion, so that it reads thusly:
the practice of journalism is larger than men or groups acting in collusion, and any concerted act would/could spin off in any uncontrollable direction
The entire point of this discussion is that THERE REALLY IS A STAR CHAMBER AT WORK HERE.
These NYC nihilists really do get together behind [virtual] closed doors, talk amongst themselves about what the official NYC nihilist party line is going to be, then depart and head out into the real world with a united front and an identical set of talking points to disseminate in their coordinated propaganda.
And if the NYC nihilists can do pull it off in the journalism world, then who's to say that they can't pull it off in the financial world, as well?
BTW, if you guys had read Sebag Montefiore [Part I, or Part II, The Prequel - you can also throw in a little Chang & Halliday for good measure], then you'd know that this is EXACTLY how they behaved 100 years ago in pre-Soviet Russia [right down to the Axelrods who were Mensheviks working with Joseph Djugashvili in Czarist Georgia in 1905].
While they check out "siesta," they might try "manana."
Never put off until tomorrow, what you can put off until the day after tomorrow.
Aren't we getting our stereotypes a little cross-eyed here?
These days, the main criticism of Latin immigrant workers is that they are TOO hardworking and productive, hence employers prefer them to the native-born, endless laws and political pressure notwithstanding. This drives down wages for the domestic working class.
It was the OLD stereotype of Mexicans that they were lazy and "manana" oriented.
Similarly, in the 1950s Japanese imported products were derided as cheap junk that broke easily. That did a U-Turn by the 1980s...
Let's!, classic post. Juicebox mafia is a new one to me.
I get the same impression when I catch Rick Steve's too. He makes vast generalizations about groups of people but he's not a bigot somehow. Oh! He only disses American's. Funny how they probably buy most of his books. I'm sure he's a big hit with the SWPL crowd.
RKU, the stereotypical natures of the two main components of the Mexican population are very different. The Spaniards are reasonably intelligent, lazy, gregarious and loud. The peasant Indians are hard-working, unassertive, quiet, and clearly not as intelligent. What you see in them depends on what part of their mix you're looking at.
What about your listserv? Any worries of leaks? How free is the conversation, really?
The most notable thing about JournoList is how boring and pissy it is.
Lucius Vorenus said...
And if the NYC nihilists can do pull it off in the journalism world, then who's to say that they can't pull it off in the financial world, as well?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I think the JournoList is an influential group of opinion shapers that by joining forces
get more of their flavor of KoolAid
out into the marketplace for imbibing by those predisposed
and thirsty for it.
In following financial markets and reading market histories I don't find shadowy cabals pulling levers behind the scenes. There is certainly endemic, systemic conflictions engendering biases.
The source of repetitive wide scale, collective ripoffs is herd mentality. Everyone buying into the latest flavor du jour, from small private investors to big money managers to congressmen, presidents and central bankers.
And media.
Variously..dotcoms, Nifty Fifty,
earlier eras...railroads and radio.
Rationalizations for nonsensical valuations fill the airwaves and print space before the crash, the dénouement. There seems to be a pattern here, a serial bubble blowing, a 'business cycle.'
Discovering the wonder of the Web at fingertip mid-Nineties, people were predisposed to The New Economy, to believe in it, from investors to politicians. Nobody conspired it all. At the end of the dotcoms the accounting fraud was as rampant as the mania, the valuations as hyperbolic as the magazine covers, the losses and destruction of capital, savings and lives of lesser magnitude but similar to the present credit debacle.
If the immensely rich and powerful were arranging it all
then how come the American billionaire oligarchs, controlling vast real estate, media, financial empires largely lost it all, becoming poor billionaires. They stupidly leveraged their wealth betting on the smartest guy in the room, themselves, on margin, and got wiped out. At least the oft touted wealth disparity has narrowed thus mention has disappeared. And the rich who 'pay no taxes' and buy all this government won't be.
Thus the printing press, just another form of taxation, nonprogressive, as is cap & trade, collected at the gas pump, electric and heating bills,
and every consumer purchase because of the energy component. All none the wiser. The JournoList
ninnies are aiding and abetting the marketing and selling of this nonsense not because they are closet Bolsheviks but because they are ignorant, incompetent and products of the higher education system. And don't get out much.
These days, the main criticism of Latin immigrant workers is that they are TOO hardworking and productive, hence employers prefer them to the native-born
You're confused. Employers prefer them because they cost less. E.g., they carpool (vanpool?) without car insurance, don't pay taxes, don't care about health insurance, live twelve to a house, have little to no path for redress, etc.
So they don't need what Americans consider to be a living wage. (The same Americans who DO pay taxes, and thus to educate the border-jumpers' kids, for their medical bills, etc.)
Get it now? I don't think anyone really wants amnesty. Amnesty would mean devaluing these wage slaves.
I've actually worked around these cats. They like to show up late, take a day off (Monday, usually) about once every two weeks, bum money for lunch every day (so they have enough for booze and pot on the weekends), bum rides, etc. That, and scam the welfare services and whatnot. What I find most insulting is that not being a citizen or having any documents is an ADVANTAGE to them in many ways. E.g., they have to be paid under the table, so the government doesn't get to steal the sweat of their brow every payday.
Similarly, in the 1950s Japanese imported products were derided as cheap junk that broke easily. That did a U-Turn by the 1980s...
The problem with that analogy is it ignores the wage-slave motive behind open-borders. See, IF these people ever assimilate and trend up to American norms (not likely - Mexicans are not Japanese), the Swipples and the elite won't want them anymore, and they'll import more ignorant peasants from Mexico to do the jobs "Americans and 3rd generation Mexican-Americans won't do." In other words, if you free a slaveholder's slaves without outlawing slavery, he'll just go looking for fresh slaves.
FYI: Howard Kurtz [bless his little heart] has more on the behind-the-scenes internals of how sausage is made:
The Media Elite's Secret Dinners
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 27, 2009; 7:54 AM
washingtonpost.com
...As the journalists hurled questions and argued among themselves, Emanuel said: "This feels a lot like a Jewish family dinner"...
...Among those in regular attendance are David Brooks and Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, Gene Robinson and Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post, NBC's David Gregory, ABC's George Stephanopoulos, PBS's Gwen Ifill, the New Yorker's Jane Mayer, Vanity Fair's Todd Purdum, former Time managing editor Walter Isaacson and staffers from Bradley's Atlantic and National Journal, including Ron Brownstein, Andrew Sullivan and Jonathan Rauch...
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