william.scherk

I like this a lot, Brant, and you give me courage. Me, I think I whittle it down even further, and make conversational, even as a constant companion ready to whisper in my ear. "Use reason. It is the sharpest tool in your kit." And that is about it, my philosophy, and on a good day, my meter pops out at 100 a couple of times, and lolls and bobs aroud 85 for most of the rest. As Ellen put it, class is out, life is on, and it is pretty good, thanks.

It has come to my attention that several comments here have shown a "willful disregard" of a point that Mrs Grundy has repeatedly underlined on the Blackboard. When she invited you to pay for the restraint devices and wooden spoons and her salary and for the facilities and books you need to read, she expected that you would stay in your seat, not fidget, obey Commands and Suggestions on the blackboard. I reiterate. Several of you, unnamed except in the sealed indictment Fedexing its way to Headquarters, I say several of you whom I will not name have willfully disregarded the Point. I will say it again and this time I am going to use underlines, okay? SOME of you have breached the social contract that allows Mrs Grundy to use the internets as a learning annex cum torture centre. This is, again, "WILLFUL" -- even, as the other Crazy Orthography guy might say: !!~~~~Xzounds! __++==- Disregarded The Point Trebly Underlined By Mrs Grundy. (Phil, my dear sweet darling, you know I do not want to ignore you and make you go back in that dank dark box, but honey, isn't there a strong soothing drink you could slug back, so that you do not come off as a finger-wagging schoolmarm for the eleven millionth time? Do we have to throw you on the bonfire or something before YOU get the point, love?) [Edited to be pleasant, but it is not working. You folks are on your own with the Difficult Person. It is dank and dark from here on in for me. I am perhaps a bit more mentally fragile that the bulk of OLers, but I do get a sinky feeling that I might go right bang off my rocker if I continue to engage with Dr Jeckyl and Mrs Grundy. If I can't control my anger and need to vituperate then it is time to pull the plug. Sorry, Phil. I love you and all, but sometimes you just take the form of all that I loathe in discussion, and a hot flush of rage comes over me. It might be the incompetent authoritarianism of your teachings and curse and tortures, it might be echoes of the hideous nightmare in Syria that has so obsessed me these past months, it might be that I am on day five of de-nicotining, but all this angry and confused blather is to say you go back on ignore. Stop poisoning discussion. Bye bye.]

She married her current husband Mr. Hsieh in 1999, so that means at age 25 she already had two marriages behind her. I thought just one prior marriage, a brief one. Are you sure about the "two"? That has me puzzled, too. Here is Diana bitching about "My Name" at SOLOP back in the day (11 November 2006): I count one husband, one family name/surname, and one outlier (Mertz). Do we know who the Mr Mertz might have been? [Edit: while searching for pictures of Diana in a frothy cascade of white sateen at her nuptials, I found this note at Noodlefood -- from 27 January 2006): ]Now, on to Mr Brickell. Who he?

Well, in this particular case because supporting him costs money, and because there are resentments at lording-it-over ways, a paler version of the submerged resentments against Nathaniel in the pre-split days. More is involved than de-corrupting. Ellen Strongly and effectively put -- I agree entirely. Why they should de-corrupt and more seems obvious to me, I am just way too cynical and bitter to expect a thorough cleanse. And Carol, yes, of course, you are right. My apologies, Phil. I just think I have said enough of my own opinion, over to you ....

It should be obvious that I applaud Diana for doing her utmost in the Objective-ish Spring in re McCaskey. Phil among others may not be able to read consecutively and integrate the subsequent bits, but fuck me, does anyone get the idea that I do no tacknowledge the Free Speech Zone that she provided during those heady days? More words on Diana above should make that clear. The vow of silence and hypocrisy is what I call what keeps Phil (banned), me (banned) and Carol (pre-banned) yet not bathed in the streams of righteousness of Diana and welcome to her measles parties, and it is what makes Diana a sectarian poison, in my opinion. She can have done this great thing for the Orthodoxy (allow a little wind to stir the stale Peikoffian effluvia of Sanctorum) while still being a Sectarian Beast, in my mind. Phil, you great boneless lumbering dolt, I am not discussing these things with you, now -- these are my opinions, broadly delivered. Yours may differ sob sob but who is asking you? Not Ellen, obviously. She is addressing me, so, if you have some observations and opinions on the broader issues, put those in the trumpet and blow away into the wind as I do.

Great catch with Morricone and the greatest of the great Spaghetti Westerns. Those soundtracks were very well crafted. True confession: instrumental movie sound-track that raises neck bristles, eye ducts, or other weird physical effects: Theme to Exodus ... I read the book, never saw the Paul Newman movie, was unsurprised to hear this being replayed on top 40 stations during its hit week. It was beyond the valley of uncool, but I understood why this one gutted a few people. But, my heaviest use of music as an emotional lever or other tool, as I posted before here, is the bizarre Celtic Heavy Makeup Disco Afghanistan song by Mozhdah. The language is still a blur to me. I use a play of this song to get in a festive, positive mood -- as I contemplate de-icing or salting or snow-blowing or driveway scraping or slipping my way to the corner store. It works. Now you know me. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZupe-EBAmU

Thanks, George. Your's is a fresh example of why I love reading OL. We really do get questions answered. We really do see good writers and thinkers in play, grappling with the almost inexpressible. We grimace at the massive disarray and stupidity of the lands of man. And then we get another generous slice of good and useful writing from the likes of you. It seems effortless. It is not. Bonus being sometimes Masters explain why and why not, and here you clearly do.

Do you have any assessment of why? Was it because she didn't speak out pro-McCaskey or because she didn't defend Peikoff? Ellen Oh, wait, on second read I see I misread your question. Argh. I meant that there were eighty-response long furious and well-read threads while she weighed the evidences, before her decision to shut down discussion. When those open threads ended, the tang and lure of free discussion moved on elsewhere, and thus Noodlefood slumbers on irrelevant and bland. It is a heartless world, the internets. If there is no bang, there is little buck. It was a moment akin to a moment of the misnomer Arab Spring: would the carapace of lies and delusion and authoritarianism and corruption fall off? Would the Shah be toppled? Would Mubarak be humbled, would Assad reform, would Truth Be Told and Glasnost prevail? Yeah, you did misread my question at first. Your answer still doesn't get at what I was wondering about, but maybe I misunderstood your comment. I took you to be saying not merely that attention to Noodlefood had faded after the stretch where there was debate on the McCaskey/Peikoff issue but that Noodlefood had lost former regular participants. I was wondering if you had a feeling about which side in the dispute the regulars favored. Yes. My feeling is the regulars overwhelming support the inner-reform (Young Turk) of ARI wing. In practical terms, though, the last event in the reform was OK Shut Up for now -- since everyone agreed to not Go There for now and foreseeable, audience shrinks just by virtue of this new climate. Which begs the question in turn of course. Can Diana influence Climate -- and if yes, then by how much and where and who will get swamped and who burnt and so on. I should mention in fairness that Diana has written a couple of times at least that, frankly, her interests and energy are moving in different places besides the blog per se (but bear in mind that I looked at traffic to the entire Hsieh.com empire, not just the blog). I think she may have noted fewer numbers of posts, but also noted she is fine with that. So, in some important measure Diana herself has turned some of the knobs down herself. Noodlefood is not a central discussion forum now. She may retain the right to pulpit the next time something happens in the hierarchy. If and when the Pope dies and all wait for the white puff of smoke or the black puff of smoke, no doubt whatsoever in my mind that DIana will be jostling with everyone else. Back to Tahrir Square, and that brave voice, Diana Hsieh, figger? Me, I do not think so. She really did fence and sign her property, and it said, Agree or STFU or be Shot. Good point and I agree that a new ARI should give thanksbyebye to Harriman, but as you may have noted I am bitter and cynical on these and other issues. I do not think he will even be asked to move out of the Palace marketing area. Why should ARI de-corrupt itself? Why would anyone want to be contaminated by sweeping or touching old shit? I see only further corruption and cultism in ARI.

Too right, this reporting, this elicitation of certain emotions. Curious, George, to gauge or to discover your mood? I love the metaphor but can't figure out the machinery of testing. Your comment reminds me of a line from a stand-up comedian c. 1977, after Debby Boone's "You Light Up My Life" had been playing on the radio incessantly: "I liked that song the first one-thousand times I heard it." Some Schmaltz (like Boone's nightmarish drone) has so many strings and plods along so slowly that emotion is leached out. The horror of Boone was that she was not lit up at all. She was propped up by production, like a singing carcass hanging in a meat locker. As for LOVE lighting up her life, no, that would be like an orgasm in a coma patient, no point, no apparent movement, no corresponding ping of pleasure in the brain. What kind of erotic love could the young Debbie testify to, anyway? All such longings were expunged in production. Another exemplar of this poisonous schmaltz is Rita Coolidge's Higher and Higher song. I called this Music To Iron By, and imagined the video would show the singer reclining like an invalid, looking sadly out windows, coughing into a basin and sighing, yawning, resting. This was a song about Your Love Is Lifting Me Higher, with horns, sass, sex and loins a moving. Rita Coolidge's version was suitable for Funerals, if you know what I mean. Children can nap through it. No sweat is raised, The iron irons, the singer yawns. Oh, I am so Bitter. I must admit that I my eyes water each time I listen to Trenet's La Mer, and this is by no means the only song acting as 'tear-jerker' in my soul. This is lovely to know. Yes, the operation of emotion is so felt in our appreciation of these (amost-awful, sentiment-inducing) things. George says he uses music to gauge, to elicit, emotion. I call this sub-genre of French schmaltz Hello Papa It`s Time To Die (from Terry Jacks bad remake of Brel). They are all about the kind of love words that never get said enough, same with the Howl-In-Your-Face tag-team, even Debbie fixed in goo. The good stuff is just pulling the same string on the monkey as the bad stuff, with differing results. [Ed. -- there is no real poisonous schmaltz, more accurate is probably Ersatz Schmaltz, but what a mouthful. If I am sold a a gigantic sweet confection, don't give me fudge made of styrofoam and guar gum, FFS . Oh what made me so Bitter ]

So, that is all settled now? There are lots of Keys to Success and one of them is an appreciation for knife-edge Schmaltz? Is this the cummerbund of Objective-ish unity, a one size for all life-vest? Are we all squaddies on the Schmaltzers, in our own odd way? In unity, grave and pressing responsibilities, as Elder Smith points out. Let us have another Festival of Schmaltz the next time communications break down and we need a whiff of ammonia to snap out of our whinging, wrist-to-forehead distress and assorted dramatic fainting spells. Merry Holiday Birth, Everyone. May he Live, the New baby. May we feed him schmaltz when he ever so dramatically faints away on all of us. I know exactly which twenty seconds of which video I will instantly post as bracing smelling salts (Fais-Moi La Tendresse`s mutual howling in face Italian finale) when next the wrist flies to the forehead, the lisle-stockinged legs wobble, and the whole awful pretension threatens to crash through the floor killing everyone. We have basically discovered the kind of smelling salts Phil requires to snap him out of it. Let us use it wisely, judiciously in future, but for now rejoice. The dancing, the awful dancing. The lights, the awful lights. The pants, the awful pants. The hynotic throb, the awful throb. Here is my own astringent and awful-enough-to-wake-the-dead smelling salts ...

This is known to be fatal to all but Canadians, George, instantly, unless by chance you have the rare sport of genetics that can spare you a grim expiration. This is the 4XL lady singing with the coal miners. It does not get any more psychotic Canucki Maritimer schmaltz than this. If Phil can take this, he can take anything, he would be invincible.

I know George can get over the death throes induced by so much sweetness, Carol, and I don't think he knows we are secretly pitching all these songs of high sucrose quotient to Phil, the newly born Holiday Child. We must keep him alive, even if it temporarily kills George! Here is the final feeding of the night, again in French so Phil can savour it. This is the fabulous Fais-Moi La Tendresse, which seems a nice Coatesian lament, with Ginette accompanied by the large-calibre Marc Hervieux, whose XXL voice butts up against her XXL voice to thrilling returns at the box office (Hervieux is a Huge Voiced singer with Opera de Montreal and other folks). Fais-moi la tendresse, indeed. Isn't this what the wee boneless lovely needs, more than anything? George, again, step aside. This is full-on Amour = A No Strings Spared French Canadian Over The Top Schmaltz With Extra Fudge. Your entire circulatory system will explode. Neighbours might be injured. Please do not watch to the climax. WARNING. NB. Carol sez it. We do not mind cringing once in a while, in service of our evul Canadian goals of getting along peaceably and making shitloads of money. WHERE oh where is Joel, who comes from Arabophiliac Cape Breton Jewish stock, and who understands the Canucki madness for the hurt and downtrodden and odd that so baffles some Yank observes. Wait until the final moments of the Holiday Child's life. I will, with Carol's assistance, wheel out the electric Rita McNeil Singing At BC Place. This is schmaltz poised so exquisitely over the edge of awful that you think, like George, that you will surely die choking and suffocated, and then you see that all the other 60,000 people are secretly choked up a bit too, and everyone lives after all. Rita McNeil was a stomped on and abandoned single mom with cleft-palate and self-esteem issues who put her big and (conventionally) ugly self alongside her songs. This sounds Democratic Party enough for all OLers to die dead right now, but bear with me for a sec. You see, she was even more bizarrely consocial and demonically altruistic. She wrote a song for a group of singing coal miners (oh, yes, don't think the Maritimers are finished with us yet, oh no) and was put in a large toolshed of a dress with said miners on TV and hundreds of thousands got choked up and talked about it at Dunkin Donuts the next day and a star was born. Seriously. Canadians are crazier than you Americans and you didn't even know it.

George, behind this door, Death. Maybe Elvis and Anne singing Christmas Bells (just like a shot to the head, a guillotine, you are down and over it and done in a snap) or maybe something more awful and compelling, the slow torture of death by Ginette Reno (if she does not kill you, perhaps some Rita McNeil. Now that we know your weak spot. But we want you alive, so do not look. If you must look, do not press play. We need you still.).

How else are we supposed to harvest the potatoes, b'y? -Bud the Spud Now that is gay! Adam, you want gay Maritimer, it is Ashley MacIsaac, kilted, roaring with talent, sometimes brawling, drunken and irate (and still yet a beautiful, inspiring musician). See also this item from the Cape Breton Post -- they got to talk to his mom! Gay as a boot and all man, baby, here givin' 'er at the Olympic opener in Vancouver in 2010. Carol's reference to Bud the Spud is to Stompin' Tom Connor, another Maritimer who is definitely macho A-one straight, but no less odd than dear Ashley, and certainly not gay. We love these kinds of people, nevertheless, Adam, our KDs and our Not-A-Lesbian Anne, and Ashley and Tom and on and on. We even love Ginette Reno.

Brant -- How's that go? -- "But enough about me. Let's talk about you."? Our northern songbird Anne Murray put out this primitive video in oops1968 1973 or so. The direst production but less whiny than your pop song, no? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MinPKn-lwoo Here, a live version, with the oddest pair of Raggedy Andy overalls a non-lesbian performer has ever worn. Anne shows off her glorious contralto. If you don't stop kissing each other I will post an Elvis/Anne duet and you will all be stuck fast in sentimental amber. (She was Elvis's favourite female singer. She is what killed him, her sunniness. She has never even had a vitamin, she is that healthy. Struck him dead on the toilet one day, she did.)

If it matters, I have changed my opinion of you. I once thought you were sloppy and lazy in reaction, but that was just amour propre over at SOLOP when I was ranting on about Bush/Guantanamo/yadda yadda with Michael Moeller. And of course, you took the side of Moeller because, as it turns out, he was mostly right -- Obama did fuck all to repair or revise the awful things I blamed Bush for needlessly introducing, in the end, though I hope he takes on the responsibility of living up to his promises in a second term. I thought you were playing Yeah WSS Is Longwinded And Wrong, Moeller Wins for pets and strokes from LInz and the zoo, but that was uncharitable. You just did not care for my reasoning and fair enough. A couple of other times I have twitted you for getting ahead of the data and you have pulled in horns, and at least half the time I get the sense you know what I am talking about, so all in all, you add lustre to OL, very much. It is not just that you have been around and sat in various founders laps and so on, that you took therapy from the partially-deranged and partially-gifted. It's not that. It's that you are an individual, a (seemingly crusty) gun-toting AZ citizen who tells it like it is, from his front porch, with not a word of bitch or whine in it, not a one. A man who killed in war and hates war and adds caution to the bestial wing of Objective-ish, and who generally would make a Righteous Neighbour in any neighbourhood, so, give yourself a pat, do a little happy dance and celebrate the Holiday Birth with everbody.

I think it's botched and trite Jung, which Jung would have groaned at. But -- spoiler alert -- I doubt I'll get into it. I have puzzled over the Meyers-Briggs designations both generally, and specifically. I have tested out as an INTJ 3-4 times over the years, and being a sophmore-in-high-school level Jung student, have found it interesting at that level as well. It is certainly warmed-over plagiarism of Jung. With that said, the INTJ descriptions almost fit me to a tee, and have actually helped me with self-understanding, especially as it relates to my dealings with younger lawyers that work for me. And, since INTJ's are (supposedly) only 2% of the population or whatever, I also derive a very nice dose of second-hander self esteem from it all... OK. Is it then a nice almost-and-in-a-way correct or not even wrong heuristic that can help you ID your traits? -- and not, as I imagine it, a horoscope for the objective-ish. It is so odd, though, to my eyes, that it does not intersect in marked ways with trait theory today or, more importantly, with all those iterations of the valid and reliable Big Five tests. I would expect MB to fall in line with other findings from the swamps of personality theory, is all. But as of yet I hadn't entered much discussion here on OL on this topic. Maybe there is a thread from the Luxuriam Archivium that can be brought out of the crypt and breathed back into life. Nice to know Ellen might be watching. I think she knows her Jung, you have some examples of MB's utility, and I am the demented obsessive. This could be quite the racket when you think about it. George, you have solved the problem of hot-linking search results, which had defeated me and led to my dementia. Now that you (and Ellen) have shown that it can be done, I think I can figure it out. As far as assuming proper editorial tools over your Corner, that is good. This is a pretty good half-year for you, all in all. So very productive, I wallow like a Kentucky wild boar in comparison. I have been reading your CATO series and relishing your concision and value-for-dollar. On an unrelated point, I was properly spanked for slurring Diana as "uglier" by the week, and in a cowardly flail at support, misrecalled a George comment (could have been Dr Hard-on) on Diana's fuckability. Now that Newt's love map is on the table, could you comment again? Exactly right. I do not need a blog since I do not think much anyway, but I sure enjoy watching other people do it. WSS thinks real great. Who is WSS? Yes, Thanks again, Michael and Kat for keeping all the blog features. I have benefited and recommend everyone who thinks about it, to at least have a poke or two at it. It is more like a blotter than a file, more like a locker than a display. I should mention that readership of the blogs is limited to actual OL members, so it has an additional privacy. It is a fainting room, a place where you can lodge your most insane and petty complaints, pick your nits, blather on. Definitely off-Broadway, but that's why I like it! Yes. I need some advice on moderation myself (see my next Secret Blog Post). Let the man speak for himself, I say... Michael I have had a few laughs in this thread so far, and with this one another. I had to give myself a poke. What have you done with the real Phil? We can tell an imposter a mile off. And if you think we're going to pay a ransom to get him back, you've got another thing coming. No, Dennis, no. No, we must treasure this new little spawn of reason, this Holiday Birth, for the lovely little boneless thing may not survive the harsh nursery that is Objectivist Living. I stress the magic of the Holiday Birth.

You are right. If I introduce Top Ten lists and re-tag old posts. Recycle, re-use, re-marketing. I have been known to use Royal Socialist Federated Canuckistan a couple of times. Would that do? I will look back at this post for the next time I put up a new blog entry. Cunning, we snow-bound cosmopolites, aren't we?

Well, guess who this is and what he is responding to, and what connection this has to what Mrs Grundy has now written on the blackboard, NOT AS I DO, AS I SAY. Whose OX is being gored? For fuck sakes, Phil, get off the horse, you cannot ride at the moment, let others lead the donkey-train for a while ... Yes, this was the last time that my attacks on Mrs Grundy bore live young. A tiny little spawn was brought forth, a chastened, friendly Phil. Without bones, of course, without a lesson plan, this little precious wormy thing died in the nursery. It was a special time ...

Does your sphincter tighten in pleasure when you issue such portents, Mrs Grundy? I see on the blackboard, tightly lined and crabbed, the dicta TEACHER SAYS THEYRE IS AS BIG DIFFERENCE. I see on the blackboard that there is an assignment. Tell the DIfference between THINGS I LIKE NOW and THINGS THAT ARE BAD. Okay, I am done. The difference is WHOSE OX IS BEING GORED. I peeked in your desk for the answers when I snuck in the school last night, Mrs Grundy. I have seen the Ample And Grey porn in the locked drawer. I know you, bitch. So, if you try to tell me that NO, it has nothing to do with oxes, I will press 9 on my cellphone and Principal Proctor will recieve at text message. You know what text message, since by now you have found the little sticky note where your stun gun usually is. That's right. You will be stricken from the Schoolmarm Register. Anyway, Grundy, since I got the assignment correct, may I be unchained and allowed to write my own question on the board for you? Consider your answer carefully while I unchain the rest of the class. -- Here is that Universe of Evul post. Apparently I am still using the exact same tools in the exact same manner. It is the same old shit, WSS on warp speed, with digressions. Some like it, some don't. You, Grundy, being a self-absorbed bitch, don't. Or, er, as we shall find out, It all depends on whose ox is being gored.

Do you have any assessment of why? Was it because she didn't speak out pro-McCaskey or because she didn't defend Peikoff? Ellen Oddly enough, I take her at her word,. more or less. I probably misremember, but as best I can recall without looking, she plainly said it was something like 'unhealthy' to continue, once Peikoff had let out his response. She fairly honestly reported, I think, the exchanges she had with her interlocutors, at the time. That said, I don't know if my perception is accurate or not. It is kind of like questioning a politician. The line or 'line' is quite considered and designed for the public, and may be mostly, or wholly "True" in the political sense. A good politician will speak those words with conviction, will act out his or her sincerity, will wring rhetoric's neck to be properly viewed in terms of probity. My gut feeling is that a consensus emerged among the dismayed (as she clearly was) but loyal; shut the fuck up for the sake of The Church. So, I think she was sincere and truthful (in the exact same way Gingrich is when talking about the gap between what his married penis has done and what he thinks Obamaliberalmonsters want other peoples' married penises to do). It is not hypocrisy, just politics, maybe? What do you think of the motivation, probity (if not the practical outcomes for her blog readership)? Oh, wait, on second read I see I misread your question. Argh. I meant that there were eighty-response long furious and well-read threads while she weighed the evidences, before her decision to shut down discussion. When those open threads ended, the tang and lure of free discussion moved on elsewhere, and thus Noodlefood slumbers on irrelevant and bland. It is a heartless world, the internets. If there is no bang, there is little buck. It was a moment akin to a moment of the misnomer Arab Spring: would the carapace of lies and delusion and authoritarianism and corruption fall off? Would the Shah be toppled? Would Mubarak be humbled, would Assad reform, would Truth Be Told and Glasnost prevail? If it bleeds, it leads. The mummery and muted deathwatch on Peikoff is not particularly exciting, in that sense. I would be interested in your impressions and gut feelings ...

The subject header is deceptive: the truncated quote (without link) is from a long polemic addressed to the person who started this thread. Diana Hsieh is an attractive woman, by any standard -- fit, healthy (except for a thyroid condition in remission that sometimes stills her energy, she is remarkably physical), with shiny hair, shiny eyes, and well-defined purpose. I loathe her self-delusion and her cultism and her righteousness in same measure as I loathe the same thing in other profoundly deluded religious people). When I described her, in my overwrought diatribe, as offering advice on whether to eat the stem end of the pickle first, this was intended as screaming satire, not reportage (I referenced her moronic anti-science groupthink exercise in eating disorder Paleo-Nutcase Dieters Of Objectivism. I also referenced her pay-per-lash self-torture videos, wherein she rants at the screen implacable for up to a freaking hour (and Youtube spanked me very very severely for copyright violation when I uploaded a spoof using her own voice, I might add). You, Phil, wouldn't have a fucking clue about the references, since you are more at home in the garage of self-regard that you are in the Fact Check Suite. She and her husband have a unified budget, I presume. However they manage that is none of my business and I wholly invented that detail for savage effect. I do not give a shit if she is looking for a job or not. She has no need of a job, it seems, as she nickle and dimes her stunned acolytes with her various shills and self-promotions. Good on her for her enterprise. Glad she got off her ass and got things done. Gawd love her for that. Otherwise, I think she is poison for Objectivism because of her hysterical intellectual sectarianism, and her hypocrisy and authoritarianism. Her politics and her personal values, some of them, make my skin crawl. I cannot praise her in any but generic terms. I am glad she is not a citizen of my country, and that she is unlikely to ever come across the border. What she did to Sciabarra, to my eyes, is shameful and destructive and puts her ever in the Crazed Cultish Monster cage. That her blog is in decline, I should think is obvious. Does anyone read it anymore from this readership, beside me? Does anyone attempt to comment who hasn't already been banned or pre-banned? Can anyone cite a single post from the last year while that raised anything but a yawn? Anyone? Anyway, I did check Alexa rankings. The most signal decline or signal of the irrelevant (to Objectivism) nature of Noodlefood is the ratio of ranking to page-views times times spent per page. I have noted this before in a comparison of the major sites that I can't be bothered to look up at the moment (will insert later). As I think MSK noted (will check), the quality of the engagement and depth of engagement of OL readership in comparison to Noodlefood is stark. Off the top of my head, in rough terms, the average OL reader spends close to one half hour per visit as measure by Alexa. On Noodlefood, by contrast, the visitor drops in and drops out. Her numbers here have plunged since her Vow Of Silence and Hypocrisy on the Peikoff-McClaskey Affair in this measure. Since she decided to go mute on moral issues of import to the Sanctorum and Monastery offices, readership slipped and fell and could not get up. More importantly, as I think MSK mentioned in a different take on the data last year, her Bounce Rate is low and sinking nothing to write home about. This is the measure of what a reader does when he or she lands on a site. In OL's case (off the top of my head) the bounce rate is an extremely low 20-odd percent. That means four out of five visitors stay and read. In Diana's case, her bounce rate is roughly 75 percent. Moreover, if you look deeper into the patterns and numbers of search terms that led to Noodlefood, in comparison to OL, you can quickly appreciate why readers of OL hang around and dig deep: nobody gets a Google hit for Noodlefood if they want to read something about Objectivism in particular. OL rules in this measure, across the board, and the obvious reason is apparent when you (like insanely obsessive and nutty me) examine live visit logs (those who understand this know how to get to the link. Hint: 'last click'). On OL, a visitor can come from a search for a particular aspect or event or shibboleth of Objectivism and fall deeply into an impassioned three hour ramble through the marvelous encyclopedia in disguise that has been (self-) assembled by the community. Think of Corners of Insight. Think of some nutty Stephen Boydstun fan. Do a search pretending to look for a Boydstun article or notion or citation, or notable theoretician of Objectivism. Fall into the many-layered splendour of the Palace Of Boydstun here on OL then, imagine yourself that nutty fan luxuriating for hours ... the visit logs do not lie about OL 'guests' and members habits. This place is an enormous place full of immense amounts of intellectual labour, and some of the best writers in the community. Do your own internal OL search and get lost yourself. So, there is that. As for the "ugly" comment, I did not intentionally stress her looks, which are unremarkable (though I think George wrote something frightened about her overbite and his nether regions, I may disremember). There is something palpably ugly about her to my sense of life (I am a Canuck), but it has nothing to do with her overbite or unfortunate horse-style haircuts. I am sure I missed something, and I will perhaps come back and add that when I put the URLs in later, but I want to stress again that I did lurch into Satire, Polemic, Jeremiad, Coffee Jag, Keyboard-Pounding Overkill in the post referenced. Surely no one is going to pick through that wreckage for accuracy and sense of proportion and fair-play (well, dumb question, since you already answered a few accuracy questions and seem a little upset about this test of your probity, William!)? Oh dear. See what happens to a man when he Lets Himself Go, Phil? Sheesh. I shoulda known. Words have consequences. Questions will be raised. Challenges to probity sting. Some questions need answers. I am hoist, dang it all, by my own petard. And Phil, you stupid fuck, the single most popular (judging by fan mail) post I have ever wrote on any Objectivist forum was at the tail end of Diana's Mertz Seafood's fatal alliance with Lindsay Perigod. If you could get your head out of your ass and think, you might remember that you praised that Over The Top Rant for the very same qualities you now tut over. My fucking jayzuss gawd in hebbin above, are you that thick? This was Empress of Evul or something ... it took Diana to pieces for a good cause, and you liked it for its unsavoury atmospherics and gruesome hyperbole, you hypocritical slut.

Barbara Branden, to Phil, in the "Las Vegas" thread wherein she gave Phil some very good advice: Phil has every reason to feel profoundly hurt by his treatment. The only way he could avoid being hurt is to be a total cynic, and to expect nothing from other peoplePhil, from what you've said, the work you've done is too important to be hidden away. Have you considered creating a blog, where you could publish it yourself ad get responses from people interested in the issues? Barbara Branden again, in the same thread: Phil, you have people right here on OL who would like to help, myself among them. Don't lump us in with the people who have disappointed you. Take advantage of offers to help. Perhaps some of us will disappoint you; but perhaps some of us won't. Now, what did Phil have to say to Barbara's kind offer then? Fuck all. What does Phil have to say about Barbara's kind offer today? Fuck all. What did Phil have to say to Michael Stuart Kelly, in a demonstration of his social retardation, in the very same thread? I'll stick an even tougher New York City boy's boot so far up your hillbilly ass that you'll taste shoe leather. What did Phil have to say to Robert Campbell, who also offered to help him get published, and who gave him some sage advice on publishing? What kind of thanks did he give Robert when Robert sent him off a copy of JARS? FUCK ALL What did Phil have to say to James H-N in that same thread, in response to straightforward support and encouragement by James? FUCK ALL What positive, grateful and humble responses did Phil give to other OL posters in that self-same thread, other posters who also encouraged him and offered him every assistance to aid him in achieving his goals? SWEET FUCK ALL How many promises did Phil make to 'follow up' on responses that he noted as somewhat worthwhile -- and needing careful responses: Five -- from MSK, from Stephen Boydstun, from James Heaps-Nelson, from Barbara, from Robert Campbell ... (the old "many interesting points, Dude/ette, which I will answer separately blah blah ..." dodge which we have become accustomed to) How many of Phil's promised responses appeared on OL? NOT A SINGLE FUCKING RESPONSE How many items, mentions or critiques of that storied JARS edition have appeared anywhere on earth under the name Philip Agamemnon Lector Coates, MA? Do you really have to ask? FUCK ALL Finally, just off the top of my head, thinking hard, with every last afterburner engaged, how many times has Phil actually taken any advice that would require him to alter some deeply-rooted and self-thwarting behaviour (as for example, his demented insistence on following circa-1995 mailing-list conventions of referencing discussion posts? Don't look yet. Think really really hard, all the way back to Phil's first bitchy snarky opening sneer here at OL. How many times? Not a single time. How much respect do I have for someone who so consistently shits on people who in good faith try to help him realize his goals?

In the thread titled "Off to Vegas for Free Minds 09 & Freedom Fest," Phil Coates introduced a memoir of his NYC days, in post number 54. This is the kind of story from Phil that I really like: he doesn't bother trying to control the classroom, simply gives his testimony. It was a good thread, full of goodwill from folks like Barbara Branden, who went out of her way to offer her insights and assistance to Phil. In this instance, he blew off everything she said, and evaded all self-responsibility. He sees himself as a Teacher in every instance, and simply will not take advice or help from any quarter. Indeed, to any kind of criticism or challenge, his first impulse is ... Yes, Teacher. One way to regain control of a class is to threaten physical punishment. Oddly, as noted above in a cross-post, Phil has been offered his own Tribune here at OL. Well, the only catch is you are too craven and behaviourally rigid to respond to the original offer. Your ongoing attempts to turn everything into a classroom with you at the Head stains and blisters your efforts. Did you get that, Michael? Phil will never post on your site again. Your weakness and double standards disgust him. Isn't that interesting ...

Emphasis added in bold Yes, Phil was offered his own Corner of Further Insight, his own place at OL (not an OL blog, mind). Phil's response to this offer? Well, searching in that thread, I cannot see that he said anything in response to the offer. An unkind soul might say he EVADED reality. Not mentioned in detail at the time is that a Corner of Insight gives to the author the means to control responses. As with an OL blog, the author has an entire suite of options: no comments allowed, comments allowed only with moderation, comments put through automatically. In each case, the author retains the ability to edit or delete comments. Phil had fuck all to say at the time. I expect he has fuck all to say at present. If there was ever an illustration of an erstwhile Objective-ist who consistently thwarts and frustrates his own interests, it is Philip Algernon Methusaleh Coates.