william.scherk

I found a lot of funny things in the saga of Rush Limbaugh and the slut/prostitute, pill-popping parasitical sex-worker, Ms Fluke. First up is that Rush seemed not to understand how female contraception works. I got the distinct impression that he thinks The Pill must be gobbled before every sexual encounter, and therefore Ms Fluke was the equivalent of yo momma the crack ho, needing a fix of state-stolen liberal fuck-drug to make it from one sexual encounter to another. Fucking hilarious to listen to him reaming out a woman for daring to talk about contraception coverage, a woman who would not touch him with a bargepole. Yuck. Second, Rush missed the context of the Fluke witness. While the (since-defeated) tag-on "Blunt-Rubio amendment" to a Senate transportation bill was leading up to a vote** , a House committee (Republican-led) was taking testimony on the principle underlining the point of the Blunt amendment to the transportation bill.** So, a Democrat on the committee noted in passing that there were no women selected to testify before the committee, no women witnesses. Only men were debating and offering sage advice on the suitability of legislative instruments like the Blunt amendment.** All the Republican candidates at the top of primaries in the nation support the Blunt amendment.** Of course, knowing what the Blunt amendment** is was apparently beyond Rush and his research team. A canny PR move (or sleazy PR stunt) by the Democrats to show that legislative instruments like the Blunt amendment** (like the pending bill for transvaginal mandated ultrasound before any abortion; like other instruments being prepared or imposed by Republican state government. Like demanding insurance companies allow employers to pick and choose which "immoral" medicines and procedures to ban or de-list or hobble with additional mandated procedures) -- what does Rush think? What does Rush think about these issues of interest to women in both parties (and Independents)? Well, that a woman who tells him and us that the Catholic university she attends requires her to buy student-insurance while denying her contraception-covering policies (her choice is limited) is a slut. She thinks that Georgetown should not be able to rewrite her policy under Obamacare# to exclude oral contraception coverage (as she pointed out, the whore, some 15% of women use the pill to regulate ovarian function and to prepare for pregancy in women with dysfunction in their reproductive hormone levels). Rush thinks she can only be a prostitute and that if she insists Uncle Sam subsidize her crazed sorority gang-bang lifestyle, she should post the resulting sex acts he paid for on the internet (that he misunderstood that Fluke already pays for her insurance through her student fees and levies, for fuck sake, is funny or not, depending on the ox being gored). It makes Santorum's sectarian big brother bullshit on contraception stand out, too. Romney gamed this issue, first pretending to be all Presidential, saying contraception within a marital relationship is not an issue he would get involved with (later that day he clarified that he, like all four front-running Republicans, supported the Blunt amendment**). The other two are FOR restrictions on abortion, contraception, religious exceptions from (present and future) mandates in ANY state and under FEDERAL law. They all SUPPORT personhood laws. One of them fully SUPPORTS a constitutional ban on abortion. This is hideous pandering to the religious nutjobs in their confederacy. Would Ayn Rand be able to vote for one of the current crop of panderers to the Falwell crowd? Maybe, but I wonder. Funny thirdly is, in a sad way, that Rush's misstep led to longstanding advertisers severing their relationship with this show. It is not good for him. Not good to hear so many Republicans backing away from him, deploring and condemning and rebutting his rhetoric. It puts on the spot those Republicans who still support religious exception law and state mandated procedures for women (I should note that one amendment to the Virginia bill that failed to pass was a tit-for-tat procedure. If women had to be vaginally-probed by ultrasound before the state would consent to her having a vacuum abortion or D&C or other procedure in a clinic -- and women would be offered the pictures -- the amendment would subject men to a prostate exam. Fortunately for the nutjobs in Virginia, there is not a great number of women in their legislature ...) Funnier still for some is that Rush Limbaugh felt the need to issue a personal apology to Fluke. Really funny for some hardball Democrats is the shit sticks and that they will use this shit to fling at their opponents: Republican call ordinary women SLUTS AND WHORES ... YOUR DAUGHTERS and SISTERS yarrrrggggh yadda yadda ... Not funny if you are a Republican -- Rush's personal attacks on the slut/whore/prostitute/wants-to-get-paid-for-sex-on-campus/dirty little Democrat plant/"Georgetown co-ed should post sex videos for taxpayers heh heh heh and I am on my fourth wife heh heh heh" can only lead to a setback among women voters in the undecided column. Michael, I have pointed out before that it is bad politics to go against 50% of the electorate on an issue that is so basic to individual freedom (in the context of present society, not utopia) -- 98% of women use the commonly-prescribed forms of hormonal contraception. American medical insurance policies overwhelmingly include this where they provide drug coverage. (I should not need to mention that my country has basic health protection mandated by the Canada Health Act, but provinces and other federal regulation provides most women in Canada with access to hormonal treatments through extended health policies, as a benefit of public/private insurance.) So, is it funny that Rush Limbaugh personally trashed a woman in the worst possible terms (whoring slut prostitute) for speaking up against the overwhelmingly male witnesses who wanted instruments like the Blunt amendment** passed into law in the USA? No, not if you support the defeat of Obama in November, in my opinion, reading the political winds. Rush is enough of a voice of the right to have influence. In this instance he attracted condemnation from the Republican party -- who felt it necessary to separate themselves from his kind of ick factor rhetoric. Even the House speaker thought it necessary to deplore Rush's personal attack. They do not want all women who oppose instruments like the Blunt amendment** to be thought of as whores. Why? Well, because that roughly means half of voters are potential, if not actual, whores. I do not think Democrats will be afraid to taint the Republican party with Rush's comments from this point forward in the campaign. The issue, the underlying issue that all the Republican male witnesses testified to, is an employer's right to dictate which medical procedures or prescriptions will be offered or denied to women based on "religious" line-item-veto over insurance policies of people (women!) like Fluke. I gotta ask for Kat's take on Rush's whore comments ... I don't know. Do other folks here support a Blunt amendment and therefore scathe Fluke? Or do they deplore the crude comments that will now be stuck to those who carry the flag against Obama? Polls on this issue are not pretty already. Santorum and Gingrich and Romney do not poll well with women -- the taint of the contraception issue may further degrade their support across the board. Looking at today's Marist polling in Virginia and Ohio‡, the last thing the Republicans need is to have something like Rush and the Blunt amendment stuck to their shoe (Virginia, surprise surprise, is engaged in furious debate over state-mandated transvaginal whoopee). Obama, judging by today's poll, would crush all four leadership hopefuls in the states in contest today. Now, I can understand an argument that states that no universal mandate should be imposed in any condition (like federal mandate of emergency care at state-supported facilities, a hidden cost of American health-care). Newt Gingrich, for example, can argue that it is supremely important that Catholics (and other 'faith community' be able to deny contraception benefits to students, employees, etcetera, and that a federal mandate that simply assigns to insurance companies the command that they offer no 'contraception' banning policies in America is wrong and offensive to liberty in principle. I can understand that argument (SLUT!). What I do not understand is Newt saying the issue is not about 'access to contraception' -- that this is not being argued. From a woman's point of view it is the issue that raises questions about Republican intentions regarding women's health and universal mandates. What reassurance do those uncertain women get from Republican authorities ...? In my hideous northern brainwashed way, I support the Flukes of America who want to speak about access and their opposition to religious objection carte-blanche to fiddle with her medical coverage. I may not be fully convinced of federalist arguments for universal coverage, but when we look at the 'civilized world,' contraception is part of basic family planning, as a tool of emancipating women in the developing world, as an instrument of women's autonomy with their own bodies, and the decision to make such matters medical and social. It is one of those things that in some people's minds is part of the kind of world they want to live in, where access is easy and confidential to 'family planning.' In my country, right or wrong, these are no longer political decisions (for example, we have no abortion law. If my sister wanted the morning-after pill she can get one free today). This certainly can be horrifying to a certain utopian view, free or low-cost pills as a tool of social engineering at a local, state, federal and international level. I understand that horror too, but it is a reality whose horror is already fully on us. I guess I will have to own up to be a lusty supporter of sluts, whores, and prostitutes like Fluke, if not a whore myself. ___________ #Obamacare is worse than Stalin, agreed, but if it is a portent of grim future overlordships of universalism, think about what Supreme Court would do to interpret law that mandates no co-pays and no deductibles of insurance policies for contraceptive across the board, taking the decision on contraceptive coverage out of the hands of the religious institutions and placing it firmly in the insurance industry's mandate. The companies could care less, they will adjust rates according, but what do women actually think and want from their institutions right now on these issues of contraception and reproductive health? ** I may have to spend a few hours (maybe days) doing a search for information on the Blunt amendment. I may pause to read of the Virginia governor's support of the transvaginal ultrasound mandate, and other legislative intrusions and pecking away at abortion availability in Republican strongholds. It could be weeks. I should perhaps presume that everyone knows what needs to be known about the Blunt amendment to the transportation bill in the Senate. I know you may have to hold your nose sometimes in American politics, that you may have to pretend to not notice the stink when someone lets off a big smelly one, but I do think this tends to harm the campaign against Obama insofar as the campaign may be connected to Rush. There is a reason behind the disapproval and rejection of casting contraception debates in those terms. Would we tolerate one of our own here being called a whore for speaking her mind on this issue, whatever her political stripe? Is that the new normal in issues of female reproductive medicine in this election cycle/ I hope not. I think not. ‡ In Ohio – where President Obama’s approval rating stands at 45 percent – he leads Paul by 10 points among registered voters (48 to 38 percent), Romney by 12 points (50 to 38 percent), Santorum by 14 (50 to 36 percent) and Gingrich by 15 (51 to 36 percent). In Virginia – where his approval rating is 51 percent – his leads are even bigger: 17 points over Romney (52 to 35 percent), 21 points over Paul (53 to 32 percent), 22 points over Santorum (54 to 32 percent) and 26 over Gingrich (57 to 31 percent). "Obama is reaching the percentages he won in 2008 – 51 percent in Ohio, 53 percent in Virginia – while Republican voters so far have failed to coalesce around their candidates" -- http://firstread.msn...nd-neck-in-ohio

Great stuff, George, and highlights for me the Passion Play aspect of grand Objectivism. It always struck me odd that objectivish people could not be happy with a small o, as with small c conservatives, skeptics, a small r rational thinker, pragmatist, realist, irreligionist. But no, go for the capital O, get the books, tapes, magazines, pins, shibboleths and pennants. Use your telephone to listen to the experts in Irvine. I cast my mind about looking for another philosophy that features the behavioural repertoire of Objectivist/m. How does a believer in jayzuss become a Fundamentalist or Methodist or Unitarian? Is it how catholic tastes become Catholic, or how liberal appetites and humour lead to being Liberal? He's a Marxist, she's a Marianist, they are Trotskyites, they belong to the FLN, she and he are both Objectivists. I am atheist. She is a feminist by nature. I do remember a philosophy class chum in college. He and I and a third were the wiseacre brains of our class. We explored the philo-buffet on offer. Buddy one chose utilitarian as a stopgap, since he had been raised in an unsophisticated hard-drinking lumber town and buddy two decided to become a Mason. He said it was easier than any other philosophy (he was entranced with Derrida's boney prose and Nietzsche's superdupermachobrainiacman) and you could always find a connection anywhere on earth. The spiritual mumbo-jumbo he was willing to mouth for the benefits of membership. We were a fraternity of three, browsers with no particular committment to anything but ranting at each other. I can imagine a fraternity of Nietzscheans, even a convocation of Peirce-ists, in ermine robes in some dull leafy college town, even devotees of Dewey and his decimal system prowling their clubhouse. And Foucault, we know, has a following today, a zany following as deep as it is wide. But, are there Foucaultivists? do any other moderns command a tribe of self-identified -Ivists? This ongoing part of objectivist reality still baffles me. Just by making it a System the philosophy may attract the kind of folks who tend to be joiners, of movements/sects/factions/teams/parties, rather than necessarily philosophically-minded fellow-travelers. Thoughtful free-market Shriners at best in terms of impact, not yet like the Masons in terms of scope and penetration. Perhaps Objectivist worlds lack a ring and apron and symbol bestowed upon novices. Maybe by borrowing some of the ineffable from earlier Ists and Isms and Ons and Ians, some of the regalia and secret handshakes and bestowals of rank, Objectivism can add punch and appeal. But without a actual ecclesiastical/professional hierarchy of ordained, who would be the granting authority? Until religious objectivists become a strong or dominating sect, there will be no equivalent to baptism or other rite of membership, dang it. I was first a Benthamite, then at age 7 switched allegiance and became a little atheist. It wasn't until I read my second book by Susan Haack that I became a Haackist. Does any of this sound like a built-in bug of 'objective'-ism writ large as it might be a bug in any 'officializing' movement/grouping/community of thought? Must it inevitably collect cultists and simpletons as magnets collect filings?

What does it it mean to forgive, and how does one get there? to grant free pardon for an offense? It has to be Objectivism? Otherwise, yeah. Pardon is not the same as forgive. And self-forgiveness is part of understanding the difference between errors of knowledge and (when you did bad). Can an amoral monster forgive himself? He does not need to, since he does not feel wrong. Can society 'forgive' or can an executive 'forgive' on our behalf? Sometimes they have to. Here in badlands socialistic canuckistan we stopped hanging 60 years ago. That doesn't mean there weren't some guys that got falsely imprisoned. Though their necks did not snap, they got done in for years. When they finally got out, you know they had a dollar figure in mind for their experiences. A real pardon from our government inevitably costs big money. It is best to get it right the first time, especially where you kill killers. Your last point is about submission. The next last about nursing a self-grievance. The second cautioned against the cruelty of shunning he who has atoned or been punished to the fullest extent of the law (or social code), the first cautioned against racking guilt. Guilt does seem to call for atonement, amends, fines, punishment, whether directed by self or other. Ultimately a social infraction costs less than high treason on the scale of crime and punishment. But atonement, although deeply embedded in christian/jewish/muslim religion and ceremony, is again human. It is that which guilt impels you too, once understood as guilt. I hear you objecting to a harsh and unbalanced self-sentence of guilt, a self-hounding or self-denigrating dead-end. Nursing this kind of self-sentence is not healthy. And if once in a while one must submit to the social order, it is only for that moment or hour. As for shunning, I too consider it a cruelty, especially when practiced by religious sects. If that stubborn dead person in our lives never admitted to an error, no, those kinds of grave personal breaches must wait. I recall my mother stubbornly hating her dead father every morning with coffee before work, in a slow seizure of unforgiving morning after morning. I reasoned with her that giving up her mental time to going over the long list of charges was not going to serve any useful purpose, only make her feel angry, anguished at injustice, distressed. I sold it to her that forgiveness is most importantly for oneself, that she would vanquish the crime by living free of its distressing effects on her. By not giving up the time to the criminal in thought, one weaned off the anguish. By reaching a little bit for forgiveness, one might turn the corner on a haunting, and no longer feel the angry injured ghosts in our minds. I mostly convinced myself at the same time, of course, which has been salutary. I only fail to forgive gross malice and thoughtlessness, that that verges on sociopathy and lack of empathy for human suffering. Michael raises this point effectively. I believe in a civil, secular version of atonement, and generally let my conscience be my guide. Opening one's heart often lets it flush out its burdens and its clots, and also invites a corollary unburdening in the other hearts involved. I try to choose the right time for an apology. An apology followed by forgiving is a wonderful human thing ...

There is some real fine cogitating going on in this thread. I hope to return to the topic, but here are my own Coatesian cogitations, following closely on previously noted points, addressing Stephen and StudioD mostly with my questions here. Are the two men speaking of the same thing? Moreover, are the two giving advice to a judge, prosecutor, victim or malefactor? Peikoff cites a dictionary, Branden supplies the context. LP: I looked up “forgiving” in the dictionary and here is what it says: to grant free pardon for an offense. NB: Let's suppose a person has done something that he or she knows to be wrong, immoral, unjust, or unreasonable: instead of acknowledging the wrong, instead of simply regretting the action and then seeking, compassionately, to understand why the action was taken and asking where was I coming from? and what need was I trying in my own twisted way to satisfy? — instead of asking such questions, the person is encouraged to brand the behavior as evil and is given no useful advice on where to go from there. I referred to Dictionary.com and Merriam-Webster online. Each gave a strangely different take. FORGIVING LP: to grant free pardon for an offense MW: willing or able to forgive; allowing room for error or weakness <designed to be a forgiving tennis racquet>; eg, a person with a forgiving nature; First Known Use 1623 Dict: disposed to forgive; indicating forgiveness. eg, a forgiving soul; a forgiving smile. | tolerant; eg. The mountain is not forgiving of inexperienced climbers. Peikoff most likely looked up forgive, not forgiving the adjective, which means tending to forgive. FORGIVE MW: stop feeling angry or resentful toward (someone) for an offense, flaw, or mistake, other synonyms for remit - Dict: grant pardon for or remission of (an offense, debt, etc.); absolve | to give up all claim on account of; remit (a debt, obligation, etc.) | to grant pardon to (a person) | to cease to feel resentment against: to forgive one's enemies | to cancel an indebtedness or liability of, eg, to forgive the interest owed on a loan | to pardon an offense or an offender | to cease to feel resentment against (an offender) : pardon <forgive one's enemies> Peikoff seems seized of the verb Forgive as simply pardon, a forgiveness granted only by an injured party. His operating connotation includes in its remit the sometime synonyms Excuse - - Absolve ... if not Condone Contrasting statements of Peikoff and Branden highlight the non-intersecting arguments, examples and conclusions. They have not identified a common problem. Where their words do intersect, as at Evul, the two seem to be traveling in different directions and considering two different edges of a larger moral problem I would call accuracy in judgement. Yes, a rational/moral calculation. I see a problem here in identification, and a Peikoff giving reliance to a default classification of Evul a classification that must extend to the personal realm, although not mentioned even in passing: self-forgiveness. It could be that Peikoff fails to consider the 'action of grace' by which we forgive ourselves and lessen personal distress, or that his moral axe falls only in from a judge's perspective, never as a defendant (this to my eyes is a dangerous self-deception. One ought include the perspective of self to fully render a social/moral problem). Here I alternate Branden and Peikoff to show more sharply how their interests in judgement and forgiveness contrast. NB: You don't teach people to be moral by teaching them self-contempt as a virtue. LP: someone did something wrong, and you take the attitude that well, it's in the past, I have no negative feelings, morally it didn't happen. This is possible. As long as it doesn't imply something evil in the person and it's not something major. NB: . .Errors of knowledge may be forgiven, [Rand] says, but not errors of morality. Even if what people are doing is wrong, even if errors of morality are involved, even if what people are doing is irrational, you do not lead people to virtue by contempt. LP: Eg, Bob told me a secret and I inadvertently told Harry. Bob was annoyed but he let it go. He decided it wasn't deliberate. It wasn’t , not a major thing and Bob didn't think I was evil. So I asked Bob if him would forgive me and he said yes. NB: You do not make people better by telling them they are despicable. It just doesn't work. LP: But ... something that involves evil, then to forgive is to give a license to evil. NB: The great, glaring gap ... is the absence of a technology to assist people in getting there, an effective means for acquiring these values and virtues, a realistic path people can follow. LP: The idea of forgiving your enemy is possible only if you want to sacrifice your values. NB: One of the tasks of psychology is to provide a technology for facilitating the process of becoming a rational, moral human being. LP: If you think life is worth throwing away, which is what the Christians did when they started preaching that. NB: [Objectivism] does tell you you're rotten if you fail to get there. LP: One of the worst evils of Christianity is this idea of forgive your enemy. To turn the other cheek is a license to corruption. It makes a virtue of sanctioning evil. You can't have a more corrupt morality than that. In examples of forgiving and non-forgiving, the gulf is broad. Branden's example is singular, a man (perhaps himself, perhaps an objective-ish Everyman, every human who has failed, self-deceived, falled short of moral perfection. What can this human do for himself, Branden seems to be asking. Peikoff's examples are sorted into one offence of spilling a small secret, and asking forgiveness for this wrong action. Not a hint of immorality or breach is given. In the other examples the dial turns hard to maximum evil, evil so evil it does not even need to be fully described. Branden says it is too easy to label oneself a moral failure or as Evul, wheras Peikoff seems to enjoy slapping the label on others. Now, if we consider the personal ramifications, if we read over their conversation above and consider that each is speaking to the other about Branden's deception of Ayn Rand or his efforts after redemption. ... ... or if we consider a Branden pleading with a Peikoff to do no more damage to young students of Objectivism (like McCaskey?) or to open up fresh Objectivish psychological investigations. In my reading of Branden is always the break with Rand, and with Peikoff, too, this central betrayal. One day this will mean less unto vanishing and we will compare and contrast what they said in the context of their lives. But, me, I am a Big Tenter. What does it it mean to forgive, and how does one get there? to grant free pardon for an offense?

She's spiking SOLO's readership because people from here who weren't paying any attention to SOLO are looking to see what happens. This sounds right, for a few reasons. Fresh hot vituperation sometimes spurts and flows, related to the large eruption in 2005, Perigo banished to solo passion with a few bitter cronies, MSK a-building, Joe Rowlands and the couch people sagging deeper into dullness. Is there an internal rule of Objectivist partings-of-the-way, that any break or subordination comes with nasty effluvia? I know that when Comrade Doctor Diana was having her McCaskey false labour pains, even the normally slumbering Facebook community of Objective-ish came alive, seething and spitting, not to mention all the gnashing and gurning in the usual places. From time to time wounds from the first SOLO open up, too. When schisms happen (even small peevish ones), I think a lot of folks do go gander, see who gets punished, see who wins or loses anything of value. Heads thump into a basket, threads get expunged, commentators fall through the trapdoor and are gone. Human drama in all its splendour. This time our zany Janet got sloppy, unwise and arrogant, got Linz riled, got sharp-toothed Creatures of the Swamp lumbering up onto his beach. He got even more riled at George from the Swamp's unanswerable take-downs -- and when Darren added his own gifts of vituperation, our Linz -- like our Phil, like any aging martinet with waning powers of persuasion -- performed the inevitable self-thwarting fit of amok. Another whack of the hatchet. Another thump in the basket. Through it all our sweet bemused Janet rowing in circles, unable to form a credible tale of the people with whom she interacts, unable to discern personality, motivation, or decency in her interlocutors, rowing sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes pausing to shout abuse at larger more purposeful boats. Just think, six years and some months ago, we might have been able to fill a giant ballrooom with folks of the original SOLO. MSK, Perigo and Rowlands might have been able to croak out a few pleasantries about each other on mike from the dais. Barbara may have downed a few Martinis and dished in a corner of the balcony. Even Diana might have stood at the bar slugging vodka and moose milk and heckling. As our host notes, aren't we happy to help SOLO get some extra eyes while the lava flows. -- by the way, I think Ghs should receive a Carol-crafted award for his pithy response to Janet's mumble scary mumble very slow swamp fuck she is delivering to mumble mutter victory blah. It raised the hairs on my nape. From the Swamp we came, to the Swamp we return, teeth sharpened anew. The first Swamp award must go to George H Smith for some fine work this week both in and out of the Swamp. When he does this to Unreason (I must use it somewhere as my avatar):

I agree with your assessment. Darren is a very astute type, who instantly spots the weak points in a debate opponent's argumentation. His 'emotional' intelligence seems to be somewhat underdeveloped though. He kept insulting LP, with the insults increasing in coarseness as the debate progressed. No forum owner would have tolerated that. Darren was downright cruising for being banned. It struck me that Claude/Aristotle/Darren did show a kind of bad faith. Whatever his smarts and his immersion in topics of interest, he did not engage with the front-line. His sneers about evolution were not delivered to evolutionists, and his epic fails in supporting design arguments come precisely from his insults and refusal to engage with those actually debating such issues. He haunts the Objective-ish purlieus but even there he does not do what many others like me do, identify himself. So now, like Janet, he is reduced to five posts a day here, to Dissent at RoR if not banned, at SOLO, unlike Janet, he is no more. Having myself been made no more at SOLO a couple of times, may he suffer the pain well ... if anything may soothe him is that although he is excluded from the "most open" site in the objectivish universe, he still has the real world open to him. He can join ongoing ruckuses at all manner of places where ID idiocies abound or are eviscerated, whether Uncommon Descent, Panda, Pharyngula, or the hundreds of other forums devoted to arguing the fine points of dreary ID. The cloak is what annoys me. If he was always Darren from Greektown, why did he not name himself in RoR as later at SOLO? And if he indeed is the Mystery Greek Aristotle of OL, then why did he not self-identify as aka Claude Shannon. So many of us here use our real identities (or like 9th and Jonathan, explain their akas), it seems strange to not only evade identifying oneself, but using guises. What point? Why should an Objectivish person have to go toe to toe with an ID adherent. The real opponents who put in the labour are at other places. "Darren" rarely quotes from rebuttals or critical responses to hoary old ID bullshittery, nary a word taken from real arguments is quoted beyond a soundbite, so I long ago looked past the arch and sneering tone. Of course, Lindsay tolerated him for a long long time, as he was often a very engaging debater offside his obsessions and nastiness of approach. I personally do not like to engage with folks as nasty and abrasive and chauvinist as Darren. I considered him one of the obsessed one-eyed kooks of SOLO, albeit one with a large cerebral cortex, verbal facility, and rightfully proud of some success in the world, and for some success in pricking a few balloons on some subjects. Ultimately, the behaviour of Darren/Aristotle/Claude is under someone's control, and it is not us. I find the implacable chauvinism of a Darren to be uncongenial, always in a tone of attack and rather relishing denigration and insult for its own sake. So, I hope if Darren is represented here in one already standing account or another, I hope he takes the opportunity to enter discussions that interest him -- if not to answer questions about the Evul of SOLO or the Awfulness of the tormenters and censors. Better yet if he takes his learning and immersion in ID issues to places where he can get a strong argument back. Too bad he finally descended into nastiness and subverted his own message and platform. If indeed it was bad faith to go after Perigo in such personally-denigrating terms, then who can say he did not bring it on himself. Funny how all the mini-purges and exclusion zones in the Objectivish online worlds commands attention. Does it put any Objectivist principles in action or is it just housekeeping? Some of what must attract some folks to Rand -- her polemical writing passages, her tone of righteous anger and a certain pointed and oft-powerful vituperative edge -- some of this is ugly in the hands of a fan or former fan. Taking her outrage and insulting asides made against Mystics and Dewey and other devuls on the one hand -- stirring, satisfying punctuation on a ruthless argument against that which she finds odious -- this is good stuff, as they say. But when nasty lesser lights get down to and below Rand's occasional excesses of condemnatory rhetoric, ugly minds and hearts show ugly results. Not that Darren gets belligerent and nasty when drunk (as once was said about the Emperor hisself) but that he plays with folks he considers stupid kids, zombified also-rans, addled fools under tutelage, third-rate minds trapped in ordinary bodies plagued by dreams of superhumanity. If Darren was and is so grand and correct on certain themes, why harry only the Objectivish? and why should the Objectivish carry the load of response for the entire scientific community that finds Darren arguments specious, uninformed, avoidant of counter-arguments. On the whole, I found Darren like a lifeguard at the toddle pond all angry at the waterwinged screamers. If he didn't like the water and the talent there, surely he could get a better gig at a bigger and smarter and more challenging adult beach.

9th, you are my lighthouse. Thanks for keeping us informed. Meanwhile, added to the straightforward Hsieh the Paul takedown, a Stott-like angry fawn says a lot about a kind of restlessness with Uncle Grandpa that gives me a bit of hope for the Objectivish of tomorrow. And if the valiant good doctor comrade sets against the good ship Uncle Lollipop, better. In my wildest dreams, though, the multiple factions take residence for some week in Vegas -- a mix of media circus, politico funders, peace meetings and expansion plans. All the honchos, all the lobbyists, the writers, the opinionistas, the fellow travelers from Fox, the Rushies and the Tea Partyite Objectivish and atheist Republicans for guns, the gifted, the thwarted, the craven, all the bullshit artists, all the writers and gladhanders and reverends and factionalists. At some lone hotel, the Summit of delegates from each of the splits. Unity and Forward to Victory once we cremate Uncle Grandpa. The old unappealing vanguard shall be replaced by a young unappealing vanguard. There, square in the middle, the luscious, brainless-baby food farmer and mother of none, Doctor Comrade. New empires, new universes of advancement. I do not know why she makes me feel listless, though, ultimately. She is so perky and certain and properly exercised and nourished and morally correct. Could it just be down to my long steep in the collectivist tea of British Columbia that I cannot more easily fall for her blandishments? I am sad and confused about my lack of connection to the Doctor and the Comrade, especially as she positions herself for Leader of Tomorrow. I just do not believe enough in Reason I guess, sob sob.

Yours must be folded into the bigger pool of predictions. Mine was the same as yours, except where noted. See what the current predictions look like, the dang shifting average of the pooled predictions: http://uselectionatl...T/2012/pred.php

I feel bad for the Republicans in a way. If the economy keeps expanding, if consumer confidence continues to rise, if unemployment drifts down by November, the writing is on the wall for the two GOP front-runners. The polls are ugly now, and they will be uglier after one billion dollars of Obama campaigning with the mantle of office upon him. And a popular wife campaigning for him. Santorum seems like a kooky councillor next to Obama. His smuttiness and concern with stranger's genitalia is repulsive. He just has too many wrong and stupid social fixations that he turns off women. Romney is too slick and dodgy and a bit too smarmy. At the game of smarm and charm and fake genuineness, in 'connection' with people, Romney just cannot do it next to Obama. Obama at his very best just enunciates timeworn but glorious American buzzwords like freedom, equality, justice. In Romney's mouth these things do not sing. . Up here in Canada we do not have a simple two-party right/left split. The right and the left cut different ways in different provinces, and at the federal level there are three parties (five with two runt parties, Bloc and Green). And not having primaries, the parties can toss their leaders out whenever they need to or think they need to. In the States the endless elections and non-formalized party Leader position between contested conventions makes for unsteady footing for your leaders. Republicans carry an extra handicap this election because Obama just has to cover his ass; only the Republicans have to thrash it out. With such a selection as the Robot and the Catholic Nutter, Republicans lose big time in November. The personal negatives on Romney are too high for him to knock out Obama, and Santorum simply cannot get enough women to vote for him to hope for a tie with Obama because of his abortion stand. Santorum will be defeated, as would be Gingrich, who is just too old and sleazy for most voters -- even for those who like his politics. So, sad for the Republicans if either of those three goes head to head with the Prez, I figger. Too bad for those who do not want a Democrat in the White House till 2016, . Why can't the convention be a bit deadlocked, and do some real horse-trading and politicking, like the old days? Broker it, states tussle, committees yammer, delegates hammer out a platform and vote up the Winning Team. undefined

Yes, how the pork glistens and sparkles and crackles over the fire. Them varmints make good eating. Dearest Carol, the truck is stuck. It says you are a sociopath. It needs a tow-line to get out of the ditch. But it insists that it's not IN a ditch and keeps revvin the engine and getting sucked in deeper. So ... The boys at SOLO are not nice, and Janet, bless her soul, is acting a bit tribal. Even if they would leave her on a beach to die, she thinks we would not leave her -- we would stalk her, kill her, and eat her. So, perhaps all parties and all missions of mercy should cease organizing, as Brant suggests, and we let the agitation and histrionics take a natural course. Most kooks wind down. Dear Nurse, don't worry about the lady in 2B.

Michael: "so many" er...that is a completely vacuous and unsupported statement my friend. So, I am assuming that is an attempt at humor...? Gays are varmints. Seems the sheriff got a little bit sleazed and the story is not as dire as it seems. Gays and atheists, suspect somehow, ya see? Ya wonder, ya know? They should all come outta the dang closets, specially the Mexcan. They're varmints.

Say what? What do you need me to do? Wake up Riggenbach and tell him he has three months to live (until the party). Besides that, just succinct musical punctuation.

I have solved one of my problems. How to help Janet not get her thread closed down. I figure George can get away with posting to SOLO since he is a personage. So, I follow him out the door at SOLO in re Janet with a cheery introduction of a blog where I can put Janet's DELETED posts back up one by one in tribute. At the moment, there is but a one hour window to become an adminstrator or writer at the new blog. Janet of course, as a possible future leader of the JPNP, along with current leader WSS, Carol, PDS and provisionally Tony. You may nominate yourself to the collective writer pool right now by copying the values below, or just send me an OL message backstage. I have the Logo almost done. I want to get a stamp done with the logo, and also have a stencil done for out cupcakes. I still have not heard from Riggenbach. All our plans hinge on him and Ninth Doctor. I hope we can pull together for the sake of the party. Here is the background bare bones of the logo. To come are the cupcakes and other symbols (thank you Adam for the all-seeing eye). Long live DELETED! See the antics at "Nontelleckchewal Terrist" -- http://nontelleckche...t.blogspot.com/ + +++

William, I thought of asking you not to do this on OL as I don't like the idea of the forum being used as a repository for leftovers from a hostile venue, but I reflected on it. My suggestion is to post it on a new thread in The Garbage Pile. I believe that would satisfy the overlap tightrope of all the different vanities involved. This is not a mandatory suggestion, of course. You are free to do as you wish. But if the thing later degenerates into a nasty mess, The Garbage Pile is probably where it would end up, anyway. Glad I asked. The full thread is far too long for a Blog post, anyway -- and way, waaaaay too long for a real thread here, even if in the Dump. If anyone wants it, the whole mangy thing, I can zip the files and send an attachment (Hi Janet!) -- the files would open a local HMTL content/web page in browsers. On the 'cupcakes' issue, I am baking tonight.

Oh, good. I'm glad you did that. I have copies of some of it, but I'd like to see how the whole discussion developed. There is a certain amount of philosophic interest to me in the back-and-forth between Angela and Janet. Plus there's a post (one which I copied) in which Janet describes some early perception research when she was a student. I'd like to find references to that research if any of it was published. I don't know if she said anything further about it elsewhere in the thread, since I didn't have time to read all the posts. Ellen I published a portion at my blog here, in a post "The most open Objectivish forum?" Only OL members have access to it. I will also post the entire thread in a blog post, if nobody minds. It is a bit fudgy in terms of format, but the road to inanity is clear ...

http://i.imm.io/gUoe.png http://i.imm.io/gUp3.jpeg http://i.imm.io/gUoi.jpeg http://i.imm.io/gUoz.png http://i.imm.io/gUpA.jpeg http://i.imm.io/gUoj.jpeg

Sure enough. It looks like Janet's attacks on Michael were no longer sufficient for Linz to tolerate her craziness. . Ghs I saved the whole thread with the Firefox extension 'Scrapbook' and will put it up on the web in all its creaking glory (for aficionados of kook only). It tells us something about the "most open" forum that Lindsay promotes. Just remove the entire thing! That'll open things up ...

That seems like a good idea. I think perhaps a dead faint or two should be performed as well, and maybe even a re-staging of The Vapours. I hope those cupcakes are ready soon. Where is Church Lady when you really need her?

Clicking the link there still takes me to the dark page giving "Selene" as the blogger. Likewise, if I click the link in the sig. line to one of Seymour's posts. However, if I paste "http://intellectualterrorism2.blogspot.com" (sans quote marks) into my browser, I'm taken to an active, cluttered site. I may have the solution. Here is what I did: -- right-click each of the two links, and copy the two link-locations in a text file. -- this is the result: http://intellectualterrorism2.blogspot.com/ http://intellectualterrorist2.blogspot.com/ I just opened the page source for both blogs and couldn't find anything that would explain this in the header section. There are some minor discrepancies, but nothing at my level of knowledge I could detect that would explain it. Check two links above. I think that Janet may have inadvertently given the wrong address for the Intellectual blog. One says Terrorist, the other says Terrorism. See http://intellectualterrorism2.blogspot.com/ and http://intellectualterrorist2.blogspot.com/ Both look the same in the auto-shortened (OL) format for HTML links ... Click the black thing at the bottom once you are finished clicking Multiquote. All the quoted items end up in the reply window ready to be harassed and terrorized.

Suddenly, I can dream of matching funding from Elections Canada! Well, first we have to get five MPs into the Commons. Okay, so we need a name, logo, presiding officer, and an accountant, and that's about it. We can start fundraising tea/golf/beer parties at any time. Wow, we have three members of the Janet Play Nice Party (oh, and we might need to translate that to French, for Grandpa Foux-Cault). I know -- we have enough members to have a leadership race, a brawling old-style tub-thumper of a race. I have decided to resign, effective immediately. I will stand for leader in a democratic election only. Leadership is now wide open. I have approached a SuperPac consultant whom I can only name as "Adam" to offer electoral advice in exchange for cup cakes ... My first official statement as candidate: "We need party money. I will do anything for a party, within reason. I suggest an outreach campaign. Carol, can we put a price-tag on those cupcakes and sell outside IGA until we get enough good beer for Jeff Riggenbach?" My platform is Tea, glorious tea, untaxed tea; Beer, glorious beer Snacks, glorious snacks Handshakes, loud voices and laughter A nap room for those who over-do it Golf, glorious golf War stories

Not at all. I just like calling Janet Seymour, and helping her get a bit tougher. I also referred to you and Daunce/Carol as one of the boys. If annoying, another apology goes to Janet, to help her get used to a tough crowd at a basically neutral -- if cynical -- game. Only if you go full on zany kookiepants do you get the crowd to turn on you. But if Janet understands that it is a tough crowd, but yet still more homely than SOLO, she might stick around and relax with 'the boys.' We do try to play rationally/conversationally, not always adversarially. I know it is hard for some niceties from such a muckmouth as me, but hey. William, the bitchy and annoying self-appointed border patrol/peacekeeper. Wild dog after irrational notions. Lonely, thwarted leader of the "Janet Play Nice" Party.

Yikes. So, nobody takes the Hong Kong dollars ($50) off me. Such hooey from the red-button man. Scherk is vicious as Lindsay is kind. And Scherk did not use the word vicious, but sloppy ... As for Seymour's missing blog, I wish someone would fess up, and for faux selene to put up a post or shut it down and release the address back to our Seymour. I asked in my SOLO comment in that ugly italic 1200-pixel wide thread that Seymour remove a portion of her comment wherein it was not possible to determine which were my quotes (the whole ugly was a paste from an editing window of OL, rather than a worked-up comment. It was a splodge riddled with nested partial attribution). I had suggested first that Seymour put back in the italic, warning him that Lindsay did NOT like gross formatting errors that fucked up his front page (like making the whole front page/landing page italic from Seymour on down). Seymour commented then that he would fix the italic, after this warning, but then decided against and sneered back at Lindsay. And then the Emperor of the "most open Objectivist forum you'll find anywhere" turfed the whole thing, and here you are, Seymour. Are we going to have to reach for your hand at all road crossings now?

[in repair for gross formatting errors]

So obviously self-thwarting, I just gape sometimes. This is another gaping moment. The thing is, Seymour has steeped too long in a delightful jest. The piquancy and richness of the French language itself --as instrument of rhetorical power -- whatever its shitty, addled, woo-infested essentialist philosophy -- is a lovely instrument. So, it is okay to read Foucault. Grown men read Foucault. More men have read Foucault than have eaten quiche. So let us not be cruel. If Seymour exults in sophomore pleasures once more, the banter and woozy oratory of frat house knees-ups, great, more than great. It is a little bit Whatever Happened to Baby Jane singing My Heart Belongs To Daddy in her garish dotage, sure, but what the heck. It is good entertainment. Seymour, I welcome you back, humbled. At SOLO, they play the hard-ass game; at OL, a softer style of a different game. Some are snakes. Some have venom. Some bite. You got a bite. Many here have been bitten. Yes, be conversational, go a step further back in time before a tone snide. Maybe, oh why not, all the way back to before you discovered boys. Mexican boys, sunshine, grass, horses and tacos, and administering psychoanalytic woo on said horses, and sand, too, and water. I think I will like this new, more addled but more charming Seymour. I wonder why exactly entire that thread obliteration at SOLO. My bet (50$HK) is on the italic issue as casus belli -- but otherwise that Seymour had indrawn a few too many snarks from WSS, Brant, MSK (even delicately de-Seymoured) -- add too a stupefied reluctance to comment upon the eruption of OL by all the other reactionaries and dry drunks, all this impinged upon Lord of Wee Distant Universe. It was a matter of good faith or discourtesy for Perigo, a bit of an Ick Factor to the Nth for Perigo, an unwelcome infestation, fiends -- all this besides the technical foul of runnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnon lines and refusal to close the code. Seymour will blunder and we will blunder, each time anew as we all further continue along the freeway of discussion, keeping an eye on swervers and honkers and aggressors and ruthless punishers. We here at OL at our best are kind to seekers and admirers after Ayn Rand, whatever our stripe or age or obsession, truly and more rightly than the authoritarianism at Hsieh, OO, RoR, FANS, HBL, etc. He who reigns at SOLO is more wicked than most for his sectarianism and his bile. Few are more Imperial and nasty against dissenting discourse. So, here we all are at OL, Seymour, hosted, hooted at and sometimes gently chided by MSK, acknowledged as vastly more fair and just than yon distant tyrant and red-button enthusiast at SOLO. We perhaps should have warned you. Phil comes and goes here. You may come and go here, but as MSK has explained quite pertinently, he does not red-button people in a pique. So, you can feel at home here, and say what you want. For a while, Seymour, we daily paralyze your ability to communicate after five outbursts. When your outbursts subside, this treatment will be discontinued. Xray was once paralyzed daily by Imperial Majesty, like you. But she did not have to serve the entire 99 million year probation. She was an early release, and surely so shall you be, as you retract your fangs and settle down to measured rants like the rest of us, fun, engaging rants, well-constructed rants, copious rants. It is a different game of kind here, Seymour, really, and virtually. Peace can be had with a few step-downs. We really are nice behind our fangs here. We are the red-buttoned and the ranted about, the excluded (here I include other petty tyranny of rectitude), non-mainline & skeptical, natural friends for insights about The Language Of Power. Here is rebellion against oppressive diktats of culture and church and university and orthodoxy and vainglorious history and so on -- truly we are all daughters of this kind of maternal line embedded in our cells. George H Smith is cultured enough to mark and pay attention to Foucault, among polite others, so you really can kindle a discussion of points of mutual interest and productive insight for the rest of us stupefied onlookers. So, Stand Down, Margaret, sort of, Seymour. If you stand down just a little I promise further apologies, and even virtual flowers, virtual chocolates and best wishes. (Brant, I said respect you more, with all that implies. I just turn into a large mad hound when I think I sniff Wrong. I turn very northern. Beastly. Ask Carol) Speaking of Carol, Seymour, there really isn't anyone nicer than Carol here. She is an official odd treasure of OL, ever more fearsomely Down Home maritimer big-hearted Canuck, a real love who only hates authoritarianism and butchery and death cults. If only you know why I post such outliers like videos of Ginette Reno. We really are fearsomely, freakishly, nice. Shake a few hands, drop a few tears, be eleven again and be winsome, and try to make friends with the rest of the boys here, even Carol. Even the toughest of the boys, like Ellen and Me and PDS and Ninth and others who have hurt you. Okay, Seymour? I might even explain the shameful secret behind my reference to Adult Party Pants. Think Japan. Think Karoake. Think tattooed men with steel teeth and implanted knobs on their foreheads. Tattoo-eyed murderers, Seymour, in fiction, not in truth, not in fact but fact grossly distorted, not like these chocolates here.

I think the thread ought to be blocked or deleted, given its effect -- as you note -- of spreading the defaming gossip re Foucault. Ellen Ellen, in the grand scheme of things, what will remain of Foucault will not be this rumour. I am sure much worse has circulated and much worse will circulate later. The simple trope of "knowing infection" is already out there. If that mythical internet search turns up the Mexican boy bullshit, it will also turn up the rest of the thread and the corrections. I am sorry Michael -- when I composed my post, the original Brant post had 'deleted' in its body. I may have made an error, but I try to report honestly. Thank you for chiding me. I feel all chided now. SOLO has some intriging new-to-me habitués; all harmless cranks, it seems. Even our Seymour the Slophound is only slightly more bitchy, outraged, snide and out-to-lunch-till-dawn than he is over here, as befits the general SOLO distemper.