June 28, 2011

Matthew Yglesias Self Parody Edition

Workhorse liberal blogger Matthew Yglesias reads through my stuff all the time, then responds on his own blog in one of three ways:

- He'll often write the next day about a subject I've raised, but instead of focusing on the juicy stuff that interests me, will figure out some dry, technocratic, politically correct angle that won't get him in trouble.

- Being a logical person, he often responds to my reductio ad absurdum arguments by endorsing absurdity. For example, after I pointed out that a global Gallup Poll found that 165,000,000 adults in foreign countries said that they wanted to emigrate and America was their first choice, which obviously shows the craziness of the Open Borders dogma endorsed by lots of Washington pundits like Yglesias, he responded by calling a couple of times for 165,000,000 more immigrants. 

(This fits into a larger psychological issue troubling Yglesias: having grown-up in lovely, cultured Greenwich Village, but now living in violent, black-dominated D.C., he finds himself homesick for Manhattan [a perfectly natural feeling for a 30-year-old: most people imprint on where they lived during adolescence]. But rather than move home to lower crime Manhattan, where he'd be happier, he instead campaigns obsessively to turn the rest of America into Manhattan through massive immigration and building high-rises and making parking expensive. That, at least, would have the effect of pushing out of the big, expensive cities the African-Americans who beat him up in an anti-white hate crime in May -- after which poor Matt immediately blamed D.C.'s lack of population density!)

- He responds to my pointing out that much of the push for immigration is due to absurd Jewish paranoia about a white gentile majority oppressing them by saying But That's a Good Thing. For example, he normally posts a half-dozen items a week about how They Do It Better in Northern Europe, but today he's worked up over a progressive Dutch proposal for more humane treatment of animals. That's because requiring animals to be sedated as they are slaughtered would inconvenience devout Muslims. It's a slippery slope, you see. If you let those backward, vicious Dutch blonds get away with animals rights, the next things they will try to crack down upon are clitoridectomies, polygamy, honor-killing, wife-beating, gay-bashing, and arranged marriages of adolescent daughters to their first cousins back in the Old Country for purposes of immigration fraud.

Fortunately, in America, the right sort of people dominate discussion. Yglesias writes:
Something that’s definitely nice about the United States is that, though our political culture is hardly unaffected by bigotry or oft-violent nationalism, I’m pretty confident this would never fly here. The equivalent version of the opposition from Christian Democrats on ground of religious freedom would be much more robust, and secular Americans who couldn’t care less about the details of halal butchery still have an appropriate conception of ourselves as a potentially oppressed minority.

Diversity trumps even progressivism. Why? Because massive immigration from backwards cultures, even of Muslims, is self-evidently Good for the Jews. How do we know that? Because the gentiles, who are The Real Threat, think it's Bad for Them, so that's all the proof you need to know.

87 comments:

Anonymous said...

You know, Steve, Yglesias has probably alluded to his neighborhood somewhere online. It wouldn't be too difficult to find out where he lives in D.C. and stand outside with a boombox over your head.

Kaz said...

Ehh I don't even see the the problem with tasering animals before you slaughter them (that's what they do I believe in the Netherlands) in terms of keeping meat halal. All that matters is the animal is not slaughtered after it's already dead, tasering animals only results in ~2% of them dying, which is a fair risk I'd say..

In the end muslims will take whatever you give them, no reason to make any concessions. If they don't like it they can get out.

Anonymous said...

Does M.Y. identify jewish? Does he support Israel?

Anonymous said...

We all know that gentiles were behind the Crows Height riots.

Anonymous said...

Never, I mean NEVER underestimate how paranoid they are about white gentiles. Never.

Anonymous said...

Yglesias is definitely not pro Israel. I think his diversity obsession stems from a We Are the World / Benetton ad ideal rather than some Jewish fear of Gentiles. Being around a bunch of immigrants in the safe gentrified Village reminds him that he's not a racist while living in DC may bring out some more complicated feelings.

Steve Sailer said...

"Never, I mean NEVER underestimate how paranoid they are about white gentiles. Never."

I dunno. I suspect that a lot of the craziness these days, like the Glenn Beck as _potential_ anti-Semite nuttiness, is just caused by the boredom of victory.

Some of it's for the purposes of institutional fund-raising: just as the March of Dimes didn't go out of business when it achieved a polio vaccine, the SPLC isn't going to go to declare victory over the KKK and go out of business. The money is too good.

But a lot of it is just boredom.

Anonymous said...

I am sure there are some paranoid Jews. But in general, Jewish attitudes toward immigration are not that different from the rest of America. For example, a slight majority of Jews approves of the recent Arizona law (this despite the somewhat loaded question.) This is consistent with the rest of Americans.

Anonymous said...

I dunno. I suspect that a lot of the craziness these days, like the Glenn Beck as _potential_ anti-Semite nuttiness, is just caused by the boredom of victory.
Beck only went from standard pro Israel to ridiculously pro Israel (more ridiculous than america's already ridiculous pro Israel stance) when he was suspected of possibly being anti Semitic, because of a list of 10 people who destroyed america (or something like that) 7 or so were Jewish.

Anonymous said...

calling a couple of times for 165,000,000 more immigrants.
and all his liberal followers read this and think it's a great idea?

Is he, and are they, really this stupid?

Anonymous said...

Yglesias doesn't want forcible racial segregation, he just wants them to be priced out of his real estate market. Double benefit for the inner city blacks to be dumped on the suburbs where they can teach those nasty right wingers a lesson.

Anonymous said...

I dunno. I suspect that a lot of the craziness these days, like the Glenn Beck as _potential_ anti-Semite nuttiness, is just caused by the boredom of victory.

I'm not sure if it's simply boredom.

The viability of group-entities, especially those in diaspora, might require this kind of behavior.

The survival of group-entities in diaspora isn't at risk simply from the hostility of others but from their friendliness and openness as well, since that could lead to too much assimilation and thus the non-viability of the group-entity.

Jews are required by the most hardcore Jews (this is assisted by the most hardcore anti-Semites), to see themselves as a monolithic group embodying innocent greatness destined for persecution until they achieve their self-prophesied position as rulers of the world. This isn't necessary simply during times of overt persecution, but in peaceful times as well. They band together more tightly into a group-entity which can then sacrifice parts of itself for the preservation of other parts. The group as a whole remains viable.

Anonymous said...

>Is he, and are they, really this stupid?<

Well, 30 is the new 19.

Luke Lea said...

Isn't it possible -- even likely -- that lobbing against the interests of Euro-Americans (and Afro-Americans and Latino Americans) will eventually become bad for the Jews? Treating the majority as the enemy is not smart politics in a democracy. That should be self-evident.

Luke Lea said...

Michael Lind had a nice piece about this last year:

http://www.salon.com/news/us_economy/index.html?story=/news/feature/2010/07/27/american_people_obsolete

bjdubdbs said...

I recently walked around that neighborhood where MY got attacked. It's basically a bad neighborhood with a bad vibe and people hanging out on the street for no good reason, and then one cafe (Big Bear, I think) full of pale, overweight dudes in hoodies staring at computers. I honestly don't see how anybody could walk around that neighborhood at night, I certainly wouldn't. You only need to get attacked once.

Luke Lea said...

And the Financial Times today has a nice piece on the same subject, Afro-American version:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/40ac7f1c-a0db-11e0-adae-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1QZOhnmJi

Whose side are Ashkenazi Americans on?

Wes said...

Do Jews always know what's good for them? I would argue not always. They have found themselves in some pickles going back thousands of years due to unnecessary conflicts with other populations.

Their fixation on making White Gentiles unhappy and miserable may backfire on them. White Gentiles may suffer, sure, but oddly enough this may not make Jewish lives better -- they may get worse too.

Anonymous said...

I think, in a way, Jews are trying to play Muslim conservatism against Christian conservatism.
Christian Right has long called for more religion in public schools and government--like displaying Ten Commandments outside the courts.
But I've been noticing on Facebook that lots of Christian cons are blowing their tops over incursions of Islam into American schools and government policies.
The very people who've been saying we need CHRISTIAN PRAYER IN SCHOOL are now throwing hissy fits about Muslim programs in schools.

So, how is this game being played? First, Jews support Muslim efforts to make schools and government more sensitive to Muslims. Christian conservatives oppose this as violation of separation of church and state. But in doing so, the Christian Right is essentially making the argument of the ACLU that says there is no room for any religion in schools. So, by opposing Islam in school, Christian Right is unwittingly making a case for no Christianity in schools either.

PS. I believe in separation of church and state, but I would also say certain secular dogmas should be treated like religions and banned from schools since they have nothing to do with critical thinking or empirical knowledge but instead push a certain truist agenda with little or no basis in fact. The gay agenda with all the crap about 'homophobia' is a secular religion. 'Homophobia' is a bogus concept. It is natural and rational for people to be put off by homosexuality, especially the male kind.

Wes said...

Yglesias is definitely not pro Israel. I think his diversity obsession stems from a We Are the World / Benetton ad ideal rather than some Jewish fear of Gentiles.

I don't think being rapidly pro-Israel is always synonymous with acting on behalf of Jewish interests and Jewish culture here in the US. Most US Jews intend to stay here - so they are preoccupied with making the US the kind of place they would be comfortable in - if that means culturcide for Ozzy and Harriet, so be it.

Severn said...

A potentially oppressed minority!

Never mind that the potentially oppressed minority is busy oppressing other people in the here and now. They have to do it, lest they become an oppressed minority in the future.

Daybreaker said...

Luke Lea: "Whose side are Ashkenazi Americans on?"

The same side as their ancestors.

They're amazingly successful, active, brilliant, energetic people. And they are at an all-time high.

There's no reason for them to stop.

And even less reason for them to redefine their existence as being about "being on the side of" other people.

Especially people who are on the way down and out, as White non-Jewish Americans are.

Especially people who are going down, and against whom they have historic grievances, and from whom they have reason to fear harm.

Daybreaker said...

It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests (though it brings them vast success and wealth).

They seem to think it's obvious that if Jews (poor dumb Jews!) knew what was good for them, they'd be all about helping some group of gentiles, like the gentiles who are articulating these assumptions.

It's like a poor man thinking that a self-made rich man is a fool, and that if he was smart he'd give all his money to the poor man.

Anonymous said...

Eh, more Jew-baiting? I am disappoint.

Anonymous said...

"It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests (though it brings them vast success and wealth)."

What's The Matter With Manhattan?

Fred said...

"It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests (though it brings them vast success and wealth)."

The common denominator with the open borders elites isn't being Jewish -- Non-Jews like Steve Case shill for the same policies. The common denominator is that they are elites.

carol said...

"Christian Right is unwittingly making a case for no Christianity in schools either. "

Just as well. Wouldn't it be swell to see school vouchers used for madrassas.

Anonymous said...

Actually, as you've posted before (Or was it VDARE) - the official position of almost all public Jewish organizations is that "Open Borders" is a good thing. (Of course, thats USA 'open borders', not Israel 'open borders').

Matt, in fact, has attacked other Jews for being "Bad Jews" for being against Amnesty and attacking illegal immigration.

I think when pretty much every official Jewish organization (that speaks on political matters) supports open borders, you can pretty much assume they think its "good for the Jews".

So Matt isn't being some kind of wacky, lets turn the USA into NYC, Jewish journalist here.

Mercer said...

" secular Americans who couldn’t care less about the details of halal butchery still have an appropriate conception of ourselves as a potentially oppressed minority."

A Harvard grad who gets paid for opining on the web thinks he is oppressed. I am secular but I don't think I am oppressed for my lack of religion. I think that Yglesias promotes policies that screw white males like myself.

I think Yglesias writings on immigration are laughable but agree with him about allowing taller buildings to be built. His thinking is influenced by Ed Glaeser's book Triumph of the City which I recommend. Glaeser contrasts Houston, which has no zoning and cheap housing, with the blue coastal cities which have rigid zoning and expensive housing.

Off topic

NPR had a story that would interest
iSteve readers yesterday:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2011/06/27/137451481/thats-racist-how-a-serious-accusation-became-a-commonplace-quip

beowulf said...

he responded by calling a couple of times for 165,000,000 more immigrants... That, at least, would have the effect of pushing out of the big, expensive cities the African-Americans who beat him up in an anti-white hate crime in May

He's playing a deeper game, but I'br put the pieces of the Yglesias Yndgame together for you. The plan is for Matt's assailants to be driven out by the new immigrants, like sharks scared off by dolphins (yes, I know "policy by CGI animation" is frowned upon by some).
:o)
http://youtu.be/xxkJrv2UCGo

Anonymous said...

Just so you know, I was reading Yglesias even before Steve published about his crush on Matt.

Luke Lea said...

"It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests"

Marty Weitzman drew my attention to an interesting book, The Fatal Embrace, which showed how frequently European Jewry has done precisely that -- not out of stupidity, of course, but of something even worse: political naivite. Politics, particularly politics in a gentile matrix, is the one thing Jews have had little historical experience with. It's why they were so foolish as to embrace Marx, for example.

TGGP said...

I was ahead of ajc in noticing that the Jewish public's attitude toward immigration is not what you would expect listening to elites. The same is well known to be the case in foreign policy.

OneSTDV said...

I'm seriously starting to consider modern liberalism as evil.

Anonymous said...

"a perfectly natural feeling for a 30-year-old: most people imprint on where they lived during adolescence"

That's certainly true in my case. Is this generally true? Citations? (Cause, I'd like to look into this. It sounds totally plausible to me based on my experience.)

Also, interesting post overall. Nicely done Steve.

Anonymous said...

massive immigration from backwards cultures, even of Muslims, is self-evidently Good for the Jews.

Less immigration and diversity might mean less asset concentration.

High asset concentration secures relative wealth within society, which is a social status advantage that ultimately is simply a sexual selection advantage.

So less immigration and diversity might mean less asset concentration, thus less of a social status advantage and ultimately less of a sexual selection advantage.

Whiskey said...

Here's where you're wrong Steve. Yglesias is not a Jew. He's a post-Calvinist, post-Christian, Progressive. He's the same in all his beliefs as an Irish Catholic friend of mine in his late seventies. Who in turn is not really Catholic, but post-Calvinist, post-Christian. Yglesias would happily see Israel nuked out of existence and Jews in the US sent to prison camps in the name of "diversity."

Its his religion. As long as you understand Diversity/PC as a post-Christian heresy, the power it has is overwhelming. If Yglesias were a Jew, in identity, he'd want a LOT MORE JEWS here and a lot fewer people WHO HATE JEWS. Like say, Muslims. Or Mexicans. Or Africans from Africa.

Anonymous said...

Just as well. Wouldn't it be swell to see school vouchers used for madrassas.
this is the genius of the left, and now, you see, why they want MORE muslims -more muslims -then even the 'christian right' will be calling for secularization and strict separation of church and state.

its what the left as been doing for decades now - create a problem then say the solution is more of the thing that created the problem

Steve Sailer said...

Imprinting? Citations?

Google my big article on golf course architecture. I had some links in there to articles on imprinting at puberty on particular landscapes, although a lot of the links are worn out. The first chapter of the late Dennis Dutton's The Art Instinct draws on my golf course article -- he had an innovative way to put citations in books:

P. 5: Search on: Steve Sailer golf course architecture

Anonymous said...

"the official position of almost all public Jewish organizations is that "Open Borders" is a good thing."

Yep. But the same could be said about almost all public Christian organizations.

Anonymous said...

its what the left as been doing for decades now - create a problem then say the solution is more of the thing that created the problem



Comment of the day.

Anonymous said...

The suicidally altruistic Northern Euro types are to blame too. Who makes Minnesota take in refugees from Somalia? Who decides the Southern Baptists should support amnesty? Why are all the northern Euro countries flooded with welfare abusing Muslims?

Jews can make all the arguments they want for open borders, but they wouldn't be selling if a large percentage of our population weren't dimwitted altruistic fools.

Oh and you'll notice that while there aren't that many Italians in public life, a lot of immigration restrictionists (Arpaio, Tancredo, Tanton, Lou Barletta, Paladino) are Italians. Despite them historically being people of the Democratic party and having come through Ellis Island.

Anonymous said...

"It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests"

Yeah, people (aka Gentiles and right-wingers) are always making this kind of dumbshit argument all the time. Other variants are "why are blacks so naive? if only they'd smarten up, they see that...." or "if only Jews were smart they'd realize that..."

I think they make this argument for 2 reasons. first, they REALLY don't want to admit that Jews/Blacks are looking out for their ethnic group - without regard for anyone else. Safer and much easier to pretend that Blacks/Jews are just good-hearted Americans like ourselves. They're just 'naive' or 'foolish' to push policies that help them and hurt us.

The 2nd reason is the typical nice guy, I don't want to fight, conflict avoidance which many White Gentitles have bred into them.

Anonymous said...

Steve,

What's wrong with my asset concentration comment? It didn't seem offensive or anything. And I edited it down to make it pretty general after seeing it hadn't gone through.

gayle said...

I think we make this all too complex. People like Yglesias take the positions they take because in their eyes the only way one can be sophisticated, urbane, "hip," is to take positions that are diametrically opposed to the positions that are commonly held by people guys like Yglesias think are provincial, rural/country, and thus, "unhip."

It's simply a case of "us" versus "them."

If Middle America types consider an idea, a policy, a behavior, etc. as silly, illogical, harmful, wasteful, destructive, suspicious,etc., then those who hold the "rubes" in contempt for all kinds of other reasons ( the way they dress, their accents, their entertainment choices, their taste in food, the way they spend a holiday, the way they spend their money, their choice of vehicles, etc.) immediately decide to hold the opposing position. God forbid they should share a common belief with the rubes. That would, in their eyes, make them into rubes, and they can't have that, can they?

Simply, people like Yglesias look at the "common" man, and having decided they don't want to be "common," take the opposing positions.


The people to whom being perceived as sophisticated is of the utmost importance are the most provincial people I've ever met.

Sadly, they never see this irony.

NOTA said...

TGGP:

Yep. In fact, the self-identified spokesmen for most groups have only a very tenuous connection with the beliefs of the group in question.

There are lots of reasons for this. Lazy MSM types love to choose one spokesman for a whole group and get "the black perspective" or "the Christian perspective." And of course, since MSM types are mainly wanting silly made-up controversy, Al Sharpton or Pat Robertson fit their purpose far more than some more sensible, normal black guy or white conservative Christian.

Perhaps a bigger problem, though, is that activists are usually self-selected. The sort of people who see themselves as defenders of the Jewish People's well-being aren't going to be all that similar to the average Jew, for much the same reason that those who see themselves as defenders of the conservative movement aren't really all that representative of most conservatives.

And finally, there's the agency problem. Whatever your formal goal, once you're in a position of some authority and prominence based on your role as a defender of the black, white, hispanic, Jewish, etc. races, your personal incentives involve what's going to get you more money, power, access, future jobs, help you raise money, etc. Whatever is best for the Jewish people as a whole, being a loud and visible supporter of Israel in kicking around the Palestinians may be best for your fundraising or your future employment prospects. Whatever is best for blacks as a race, shaking down multinational corporations for donations with the threat of boycotts is personally profitable. And so on.

RS said...

> The common denominator with the open borders elites isn't being Jewish -- Non-Jews like Steve Case shill for the same policies. The common denominator is that they are elites.

That's sort of true (not entirely).

But why does that elite exist, instead of some other possible elite?

RS said...

> Most US Jews intend to stay here - so they are preoccupied with making the US the kind of place they would be comfortable in - if that means culturcide for Ozzy and Harriet, so be it.

I would say there's a pretty significant chance that that won't work out well at all. Like, I don't know, 40%.

If you approximately accept my evaluation, my 40% (or say 20%, or 60%) - then it pretty much follows that your explanation is wrong, or more likely just very incomplete.

Anonymous said...

Ironic that he is a lover of Nordic countries when they are often far less welcoming to immigration than the US has been historically. Even today Denmark and Finland are pretty strict about allowing foreigners into their country, probably second only to Japan and South Korea among industrial countries. Then there is the inconvenient truth that all the Nordic countries except Germany ( Although I guess Turks should be considered white as well ) were pretty lily white during the most intense left wing welfare state building phase as well. Is he Sephardi Jewish or Spanish or both?

Garland said...

I dunno. I still think they're basically right when they think mass immigration and the ethnic dissolution of America is Good For The Jews. I wish I could believe and convince them it wasn't, but they're probably right that it is.

corvinus said...

I was ahead of ajc in noticing that the Jewish public's attitude toward immigration is not what you would expect listening to elites. The same is well known to be the case in foreign policy.

True. I am pretty sure that if you took a sample of white gentiles that was averaged to an IQ of 115, and subtracted out all practicing Christians, their voting patterns would be no different from Jews.

Anonymous said...

Well, in France, for example persecution of Jews (involving beatings, murders, kidnappings etc) is perpetrated exclusively by the descendants of muslim immigrants.The hatred and the physical attacks are far,far worse than anything gentile French ever perpetrated, and it's only set to get worse as muslims come to dominate French demographics.

"Be careful for what you wih for...."

stari_momak said...

Tangential, but it seems like an editress (or two) for 'The Onion' got caught up in a 'flash mob' -- no, not one of the ones in Europe where they do Sound of Music songs, one of ours. Bones were broken. One more attack on a young, hipster urbanist journo by an authentic urban youth and we have a real trend.

Fred said...

"But why does that elite exist, instead of some other possible elite?"

I'm not sure I understand the question. Steve Case is part of the elite because he is a hugely successful tech entrepreneur. Are you asking why he is part of the elite and not someone else? Or why he shares the ideas of other elites?

Peter A said...

"now living in violent, black-dominated D.C., he finds himself homesick for Manhattan [a perfectly natural feeling for a 30-year-old: most people imprint on where they lived during adolescence]"

It's not imprinting, it is simply good taste. What person in their right mind would not prefer Manhattan to provincial, incestuous humid, racially volatile DC? What is ironic about Manhattan is that, despite its image as a decadent liberal place, in many ways it is one of the most real tradition laden places in America. Many New Yorkers have very deep roots and have lived there for generation upon generation - it is a true paleoconservative bastion where people feel part of a larger historical community that transcends the petty concerns of today. DC on the other hand is a city of transient rootless strivers, at least as far as the white population goes. Probably one of the most unpleasant cities in the US.

Anonymous said...

The current elites are totally happy (you can tell by their silence) with the idea of a US population of more than 400 million by 2050. The strictly Homo Economicus wing sees only more consumers; the ideologues (environmental destruction be damned) see only the complete extirpation of the Old White America they hate so much.

Anonymous said...

Don`t ever underestimate the elitism of the natural born elites, I say. Those people are incomprehensible.

Anonymous said...

One reason why the ruling elite is so Jewish in character:

http://mondoweiss.net/2008/08/where-have-all-the-liberal-protestants-gone-replaced-by-neocons-every-one.html
"in the diverse American establishment, Zionists are the only ones with an esprit de corps.” By esprit, he meant a religious understanding, a way of giving life meaning. That religious understanding of course includes Israel–in the same way that fundamentalist Christian understanding includes pro-life and stem-cell research ideas."

Anonymous said...

All those "anti-Israel" Jews seem to have little collective impact:
http://mondoweiss.net/2007/12/james-petras-ha.html
"One reason for the gap between the‘progressive’ polling results and the actual pro-war behavior of the major American Jewish Organizations is found in several of the opinions not cited by progressive analysts but emphasized by the 52 leaders of the major communal organizations (Daily Alert, December 13, 2007). Over eighty percent (82%) of American Jews agree that ‘the goal of the Arabs is not the return of occupied territories but rather the destruction of Israel’. Only 12% of Jews disagree. And 55% to 37% do not believe Israel and its Arab neighbors will settle their differences and live in peace. On the key issue of a compromise on the key issue of Jerusalem,by 58% to 36% American Jews reject an Israeli compromise to insure a framework for permanent peace."

"Given the high salience of being pro-Israel for the majority of American Jews and the fact that the source of their identity stems more from their loyalty to Israel than to the Talmud or religious myths and rituals, then it is clear that both the ‘progressive, majority of Jews and the reactionary minority who head up all the major American Jewish organizations have a fndamental point of agreement and convergence: Support and identity with Israel and its anti-Arab prejudices, its expansion and the dispossession of Palestine. This overriding convergence allows the reactionary Presidents of the Major Jewish Organizations in America to speak for the Jewish community with virtually no opposition from the progressive majority either within or without their organizations. By raising the Israeli flag, repeating
clichés about the ‘existential threat’to Israel at each and every convenient moment,the majority of Jews have bowed their heads and
acquiesced or, worst,subordinated their other ‘progressive’ opinions to actively backing the leaders ‘identity’ with Israel. Their franchise on being the recognized Jewish spokespeople intimidates and/or forces progressive Jews to publicly abide to the line that Israel (sic) knows what is best for Israel’ and by extension for all American Jews who identify with Israel."

"Petras has just about nailed it. The crazy rightwingers are actually speaking in the name of progressive Jews. These rightwingers aren’t fringies. They are supported. They dominate the leadership of Jewish organizations and as I have noted here before, gained support for the Iraq war from an overwhelming majority of anti-Vietnam-war Jewish Democratic congressmen. The Jane Harman type. Which is to say that neoconservatism has been licensed by the larger Jewish community, because secretly or unconsciously that community feels that these guys are standing up for Israel. The neocons are the tough brother-in-law."

Baloo said...

Cultural Kamikazes — Some hate Western Civilization more than they love themselves.

Anonymous said...

Well, in France, for example persecution of Jews (involving beatings, murders, kidnappings etc) is perpetrated exclusively by the descendants of muslim immigrants.
You don't understand how hostile Jews are to us and how they blame US for everything.. Muslims wouldn't be anti semitic if it weren't for the anti -semitic environment - even David Horowitz blames 'the nazis' for the palestinian resistance. Yes it sounds crazy but they are..

The Anti-Gnostic said...

Yglesias doesn't want forcible racial segregation, he just wants them to be priced out of his real estate market.

Then Matt better get on the stick, because the journalist sinecures are drying up fast. I'm sure he's reasonably well-paid now but that doesn't last. And he's in a medium where any lettered person with some marketing experience can grab eyeballs on the web. Then comes a wife, kids, etc.

Like that reporter in suburban DC who went underwater on his house, I'm betting most people in media are living beyond their means. It doesn't seem like a problem when you're 30 and don't have a family and are getting new credit card offers every month. But then maybe Matt will stay single, hip, urban and positive-cash-flow for the next 40 years. Then he dies and his cohort goes extinct as the US splits between Meso-Americans and Red State Protestants. I bet there won't be too many bloggers calling for 165M more immigrants then.

Anonymous said...

"The common denominator with the open borders elites isn't being Jewish -- Non-Jews like Steve Case shill for the same policies. The common denominator is that they are elites."

That's sort of true (not entirely).

But why does that elite exist, instead of some other possible elite?


It's a grand American tradition since the early 19th century. Yes, this divide -- between the pro-open borders elites and the restrictionist commoners -- goes back to that halcyon times when there were no Jews and the WASPs controlled everything.

Anonymous said...

"Oh and you'll notice that while there aren't that many Italians in public life"

Are you kidding? There are LOTS of Italians in public life. In certain parts of the North-East a last name ending in a vowel is a prerequisite for a political career. Most of these pols are libs.

Mr. Anon said...

"Anonymous said...

""It (mildly) amazes me that people continue to assume that Jews are too dumb to notice that what they are doing is not in their best interests (though it brings them vast success and wealth).""

What's The Matter With Manhattan?"

Well said!

Luke Lea said...

Daybreaker said...

Luke Lea: "Whose side are Ashkenazi Americans on?"

The same side as their ancestors.

"They're amazingly successful, active, brilliant, energetic people. And they are at an all-time high.

There's no reason for them to stop.

And even less reason for them to redefine their existence as being about "being on the side of" other people.

Especially people who are on the way down and out, as White non-Jewish Americans are.

Especially people who are going down, and against whom they have historic grievances, and from whom they have reason to fear harm."

*******

I would like to challenge that last sentence: historically anti-Semitism, has been conspicuously absent among the working-class populations of England, Scotland, and Ireland, both in this country and in Europe. This is true even of Germans Americans, who immigrated in the middle of the 19th century. Polish Americans have not been conspicuously anti-Semitic either to my knowledge -- this despite the fact that the Polish nobility "used" their Jewish populations for centuries as instruments of exploitation: as peasant overseers, tax collectors, lone sharks, monopoly managers (mills, saloons), etc.. The only group among whom anti-Semitism was a significant factor were 19th and early 20th century Anglo-Saxon elites, who were in direct competition with Ashkenazi Americans whom they had encouraged to immigrate to America (2.5 million in all) and whom they finally opened up the Ivy League for after WWII and gave them free access to the top rungs of our society.

I would like to address my remarks to the heads of the major Jewish organizations in America: historically Jews were to be a light unto the nations and in many, many ways they have been. Think of the civil rights movement, or the part they played in the organization of working-class Americans in the first half of the 20th century. But more recently we have seen the phenomenon of Ashekenazi alienation from working-class Americans, a largely elite phenomenon no doubt, largely a consequence of their very success at the apex of society. Symptomatic of this alienation was the movie Borat and the enthusiastic reviews and comments it received in the pages of the NYT. Abe Foxman was right about that and should have stuck to his guns.

The Jews have always been a politically weak people. Their God is a God of the weak. And yet they are intellectually, culturally, legally, and economically a very powerful people. So let me put this question to the presidents of the major Jewish organizations in America, some of whom I hope will read these comments:

Who is going to stick up for the American people? Let's set aside blame for the disastrous immigration and trade policies of the last 20 years. What is past is past. But looking forward, what group has the power as well as the motive to give voice to the voiceless?

You want American popular support for Israel, you want access to American shores in case Israel should fail, you want popular support for Jewish Americans in Jewish society, just like I would if I were in your shoes. .I sympathize completely. That said, consider these two questions privately and among yourselves: Is what is good for America good for the Jews? Is what is good for the Jews good for America?

Luke Lea said...

I've been reading The Rise of David Levinski, a surprisingly good early 20th century novel by Abraham Cahan about the Jewish immigrant experience in America. The hero, David Levinski,begins as an ordinary factory workes but then gradually becomes highly successful businessman in the garment trade. Here is an interesting quote that expresses his changing attitudes as he rises in class:

"I became conscious of a sneaking feeling of gratitude to the socialist editor for printing the attack on me. For, behold! the same organ assailed the Vanderbilts, the Goulds, the Rothschilds, and „by calling me "a fleecer of labor" it placed me in their class. I felt in good company. I felt, too, that while I there were people by whom 'fleecers' were cursed, there were many others who held them in high esteem, and that even those who cursed them had a secret envy for them, hoping some day to be fleecers of labor like them. . . A working-man, and every one else who was poor, was an object of contempt to me—a misfit, a weakling, a failure, one of the ruck."

Anonymous said...

I don't think Yglesias is having a proxy conversation with you, Steve. He comments on the news just like you do.

Or, maybe you're right.

The Anti-Gnostic said...

I think Yglesias writings on immigration are laughable but agree with him about allowing taller buildings to be built.

No thanks. Our energy-sucking, heavy-footprint, high-maintenance, one-to-two-thirds-empty buildings are quite tall enough.

The obsession with population density exhibited by a small cohort of SWPL yupsters, gays in particular, is really bizarre. Dick Orlando Florida or whatever his name is is all over this sort of thing too. People aren't meant to live in steel-glass anthills.

Anonymous said...

I am pretty sure that if you took a sample of white gentiles that was averaged to an IQ of 115, and subtracted out all practicing Christians, their voting patterns would be no different from Jews.

Leaving aside the fact that there is no evidence for an average Jewish IQ of 115, that still makes no sense. Why would higher IQ lead inevitably to more stupid voting behavior?

Tanstaafl said...

"The hatred and the physical attacks are far,far worse than anything gentile French ever perpetrated, and it's only set to get worse as muslims come to dominate French demographics."

Who cares? Really. When it gets bad enough they'll move somewhere else and add one more tale to their never-ending litany of woe.

Meanwhile France and the French people will cease to exist. Likewise every other White country.

Howard Hughes said...

"Yglesias would happily see Israel nuked out of existence and Jews in the US sent to prison camps in the name of 'diversity.'"
What? Do you honestly believe that Yglesias would happily see Jews be sent to prison camps?

Always fun to se what lies people cook up so they can stay ignorant and remain in their conformistic bubble.

Mercer said...

anti-gnostic said:
"People aren't meant to live in steel-glass anthills."

Do you think they are meant to spend four hours commuting everyday? That is the result of not allowing more housing near employment centers.

Simon in London said...

anon:
"The hatred and the physical attacks are far,far worse than anything gentile French ever perpetrated..."

Didn't the gentile French ship Jews out to Nazi death camps?

Anonymous said...

And a Jewish businessman I know was astonished that glaciers exist up on mountains,
Jews tend to be remarkably ignorant of anything nature related- they grow up in cultures completely absent of any reverence for nature- if they can turn it to their political advantage - like the seirra club and immigration, sure, but otherwise, they have low spatial intelligence.

I have also personally seen jewish friends remarkably distort rural life - i went to a rural town with one jewish friend (in the north east) and he came back to the city we live in and his description had little or nothing to do with the reality of there (everyone was blond and blue eyed, the police had southern ! accents, etc)

Londoner said...

Yglesias seems like a very earnest young man who has a great deal to say, none of which is interesting or even that strongly felt (apart from advocating high-density cities - the cure for all ills!). What his army of sycophants sees in him is a mystery to me. Perhaps a few more run-ins with the vibrant youths of DC will knock some sense into his high-density head.

As for his Eurocidal tendencies - in his defence I will say that they're probably not *quite* as viscerally felt as they are by many of the tribe - he's no Ignatiev or Wise - but they're clearly still there. It's an atavistic thing.

eh said...

our political culture is hardly unaffected by bigotry or oft-violent nationalism

Yes. In fact, the "culture" is absolutely riven with the aforementioned plagues. So much so, in order to reduce my stress (see Mr Sailer's earlier post) I had to stop paying attention to all the "oft-violent nationalism" I was bombarded with every day.

Anonymous said...

"All that said, the Jews I know - the Jew in the street - are much less in favor of open borders than are the "elites"."

But they don't care about the issue enough to stop giving money to Jewish organizations that the Jewish elites control, or to stop voting for the politicians that the Jewish elites promote. So it really doesn't matter what the alleged "Jew on the street" may or may not think about open borders.

It's like those Jews who mock "the Jewish conspiracy theory" (it's not a conspiracy: it's group psychology; but then they refuse to really read Kevin MacDonald) by saying "why if this conspiracy theory exists, why aren't I rich? Why aren't THEY giving me money?"

Listen, dummy: THEY don't pay you. You pay THEM. That's how the Jewish group evolutionary psychology strategy works: the Jewish elites get all of the little Jews into a sweat in fear over the Goyim rising up in the middle of the night with torches and pitchforks, and then the little Jews write that big check to the ADL, the SPLC, etc and vote the straight left-wing Democratic Party ticket. That's how it works. They don't care if some little Jews are ambivalent about open borders or not. The Jewish elites know how to control their tribe.

ben tillman said...

Do you think they are meant to spend four hours commuting everyday? That is the result of not allowing more housing near employment centers.

No, that is the result of Shelley v. Kraemer and subsequent court rulings and legislation.

And, I've never heard of any prohobotions on the building of housing near employment centers.

Anonymous said...

"All that said, the Jews I know - the Jew in the street - are much less in favor of open borders than are the "elites"."

But they don't care about the issue enough to stop giving money to Jewish organizations that the Jewish elites control, or to stop voting for the politicians that the Jewish elites promote. So it really doesn't matter what the alleged "Jew on the street" may or may not think about open borders.


Change "Jews" to "Americans". Or even "Westerners".

The Jewish elites get all of the little Jews into a sweat in fear over the Goyim rising up in the middle of the night with torches and pitchforks

I have to say that few Jews are half as afraid of Goyim as you are afraid of Jews.

Anonymous said...

Christian Right has long called for more religion in public schools and government--like displaying Ten Commandments outside the courts.

IOW, more religion means more of the right religion, which means more of my religion.
And of course all Christians are deep in their hearts "my kind" or Christian.

That just shows the insular ignorance of the Christian Right whose world consists only of Protestants, Catholics, and Ashkenazim.

In a way, it is a good thing there is immigration (and individualism) just to show these fools there are such things as Muslims, Sephardic Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, pagans, animists, etc. (BTW, the real argument is over the amount of immigration and what types of immigrants are most useful, not the existence of immigration iself.)

Similarly, there is more to Christianity than the little home town Baptist church. How many American Christian Rightists have even met - or heard of - Nestorians, Dukhobors, Maronites, and the like?

The very people who've been saying we need CHRISTIAN PRAYER IN SCHOOL are now throwing hissy fits about Muslim programs in schools.

The very people who say we (the Victorian we) need Christian prayer in school should be starting their own Christian schools. And in many cases, they and their Muslim equivalents are doing just that rather than clinging to the delusion of a non-existent "public".

So, how is this game being played?

First of all there is the outdated belief that the creaking anachronism of the tax-supported 19th-century Prussian factory school is the only way to get the little sprogs educated.

Besides, "educate the masses" is mostly a leftist cause. Why can't the masses educate themselves?

PS. I believe in separation of church and state, but I would also say certain secular dogmas should be treated like religions

How about separation of school and state?

Londoner said...

Here it is: Yglesias's prescription for the rebirth of Detroit:

http://thinkprogress.org/yglesias/2010/06/21/197634/the-regrettably-impossible-alternative-to-shrinking-detroit/

Absolute insanity.

Anonymous said...

It's not imprinting, it is simply good taste. What person in their right mind would not prefer Manhattan to provincial, incestuous humid, racially volatile DC?

D.C. has to be the most boring relatively large city I have ever visited. The weather in summer is ridiculously hot and humid and the working class is all big government lazy, plus is there anywhere to eat in the city? Power would be the only reason to live there, I couldn't imagine what it must have been like before the invention of air conditioning.

Dvid Davenport said...

That is the result of not allowing more housing near employment centers.

Said the Section 8 housing enthusiast.

The Anti-Gnostic said...

Do you think they are meant to spend four hours commuting everyday? That is the result of not allowing more housing near employment centers.

Taller buildings are not the solution. You can make your buildings as tall as you want but as long as they're surrounded with lower population density suburbs, people will move to them. We need more telecommuting and more employers disbursed among the suburbs, not to make filthy, crowded cities even more filthy and crowded.

I sometimes wonder if there's an evo-psych explanation for childless SWPLs like Yglesias. They hope to use immigration rather than reproduction to replicate their gnostic, liberal values. Boy are they in for a surprise.

Kevin said...

Simon in London said...

Didn't the gentile French ship Jews out to Nazi death camps?

***

Nope, it's a sensitive subject even now, but while the Vichy State certainly was not very keen on jews, with discriminatory laws, it had no appetite for shipping them to death camps; to the best of my (relatively fuzzy, admittedly) recollations, until the "National State" got overrun in 1942 and the new collaboration gvt became just a german auxiliary, Vichy had the good taste of responding to german demands by shipping out... foreign jews and apatrids refugees, french nationals actually being left aside, much to the german irritation.
(Btw, same thing for executed hostages, the ones given up by the french gvt, at least before 1942, often were communists who had been arrested prior to the defeat, while they were still... german collaborators).

Actually, France had the second- best 'survival' rate (ca. 50%) for its jewish community, among all german-occupied countries, during WWII, the only 'safer' one being IIRC Albania (but with a much smaller jewish population, though I think it might had actually increased by the end of the war, due to jewish refugees). Italy was not a "bad" place for jews neither, italian fascists having no real grudge against the local jewish community, at least, until the germans took a more direct approach.
Worst were I think the "New Europe" overall, and serbia (with something like a zero perczent survival rate).

If you care about such things, France has/had the most (Israeli-awarded) "Justs", IE french people on the street who shelterd jews on their own initiative.

The "french-as-natural-born-antisemites, Vichy-as-the-quintessial-expression-of-the-french-national-soul" bit is a canard, and part of a revisionnist take on WWII, pushed notably by a clique of post-60's french thinkers (apply scare quotes as needed) of jewish background, most notably the loathable bernard-henry lévy (AKA dominique strauss-khan best buddy) and his infamous "french ideology", which is all about how "moldy" and despisable France is.
This was what the 80's and early 90's were all about.

But, then again, you're - I think - a brit, so, you couldn't let an occasion of french-bashing go to waste, could you?

Sword said...

Sailer wrote: "For example, he (Matt Y) normally posts a half-dozen items a week about how They Do It Better in Northern Europe, but today he's worked up over a progressive Dutch proposal for more humane treatment of animals."

I can not speak for the other countries in Northen Europe, but I live in Sweden and speak perfect Swedish.

Steve - if any of his writings concern Sweden, and you find them difficult to beleive, I can do some fact-checking.

Please respond here.