don’t trouble trouble

You never give up, do you, Lester?

Actually, I’m glad you posted a comment, because I tried repeatedly to respond to your last comment on Part 1 (urging me to draw a cartoon about Muslims so that you could post it on a Shia message board), but the comment system kept failing.  Here’s what I was trying to post:

Lester, no need for me to draw a few stick figures (I’m not much of an artist).  Simply post the text of my April 2002 <i>Chronicles column, “Through a Glass, Darkly,” or links to my blog posts and articles on Islam that I’ve published here on Taki’s Top Drawer, and on VDare, and on the Chicago Daily Observer.  They’re all easy to find.</i>

Oops.  Messed up the HTML formatting.  Ah, well--you get the point, Lester.

You’re right, it’s hard to imagine why anyone would want to publish a cartoon that makes fun of islam.  what problems could possbily arrise from that?

would NOT want rather

Men without chests, Lester.  That’s why the West is doomed.

At least some of us will go down fighting, with laughter on our lips.

I read the comment by Mr. Richert on how men with character and courage will resist and die if necessary: “Men without chests, Lester.  That’s why the West is doomed.

At least some of us will go down fighting, with laughter on our lips.”

Does Mr. Richert really believe that?  He should just look at the Vietnam generation and just how very few of the present-day conservative chattering class could be bothered to fight.  Cowardice is not an exclusive property of the left, but is quite common on the right among those who are all for beating the hell out of people, but want to avoid any danger.  They want others to do the flogging while they and their kind and kin remain safe.

Any significant change for the better will require courage, but I doubt if it will come from keyboard commandos.  The American right cannot support any periodical willing to openly challenge the great lies and myths of the New York literati.

Mr. Earley, I’m not sure what your point is.  If you believe that I’m including the “conservative chattering class” and “their kind and kin” in “some of us,” then you’re not familiar with my work.

drawing a comic making fun of “burquinis” is like saying “you got reemed up the ass on this phone bill!” to someone who was recently raped.  It’sj ust something yuo obviously don’t do.  pick your fights, don’t jsut lash out

Lester, are you deliberately obtuse?  Because that’s the only reason I can come up with to explain why you would think that the point of the comic was to make fun of burqinis.

Heck, ahiida.com ought to send a nice big thank you to Breathed.  They couldn’t possibly afford to buy this kind of advertising.

Do yuo happen to see what buchanan wrote abuot the cartoon contreoversy?  I’m not going to fight the neo cons wars for them

Ah, now we’re getting somewhere, Lester.  It’s not that you’re afraid of the Muslims; it’s that you’re siding with them.  That, I can understand.

Mr. Richert wrote: “Mr. Earley, I’m not sure what your point is.  If you believe that I’m including the “conservative chattering class” and “their kind and kin” in “some of us,” then you’re not familiar with my work.” Mr. Richert should check out the bloodlines of the staunch commie haters at the maganize where he works.  They came up short when dues were to be paid.

Richard Earley

I’m afraid, Mr. Earley, that you’re still being awfully cryptic.  You do know where I work, don’t you?

Mr. Richert,
I not only know where you work and your magazine, but we talked some time ago.  I had wanted to place an advertisement for my book, War, Money and Memory: Myths of Virtue, Valor and Patriotism, in your magazine, Chronicles.  Aside from deriding the prevalent American belief that we fought well in both European wars of the 20th century and were regarded as the saviors of the world, I broached the ultimate American taboo.  I documented who has done the fighting and dying in American wars.

What disturbed you most was my publicly confirming the widely held belief that Jews have evaded American wars.  I cited facts long in the public domain.  Yet you almost screamed that my advertisement and the contents of the book did not meet the standards of your magazine.  I asked why harsh facts explaining their absence from American battlefields was not more widely known and discussed.  You continued to scream.

If the connivance of Jews to escape American wars would be known to the public, I suspect the present morass in the Middle East could have been avoided.  By the way, the Israel firsters continue to duck this war.  You may have noticed they are not shy in having others fight for Israel.

Richard Earley

Mr. Early, we have different memories of the conversation.  In fact, your advertisement did not meet the standards of our magazine, purely on production values.  And I never raised my voice, much less “screamed.”

But let’s put two quotations together from your last two comments:

“If the connivance of Jews to escape American wars would be known to the public, I suspect the present morass in the Middle East could have been avoided.”

“Mr. Richert should check out the bloodlines of the staunch commie haters at the maganize where he works.  They came up short when dues were to be paid.”

And again, I’ll ask, Mr. Earley: What exactly is your point about the people I work with?

An elite to be defined only in a monetary sense prevails in America and cares little for its people.  The citizenry have been denied participation in the civic culture.  As noted by Christopher Lasch, an academician who was of Christian, leftist tendencies, the privileged do not think of themselves Americans in any important sense and are deeply indifferent to American national decline.  It is a question if the elites think of themselves as Americans at all.  Patriotism does not rank high in their hierarchy of values. “Multiculturalism”, on the other hand, suits them to perfection.  Meritocracy has no use for chivalry or valor and maintains fiction that it owes its position to intelligence only.  It has little sense of ancestral gratitude or obligation to the past.  Even a republic of letters, perhaps expected from an elite with a large stake in higher education, absents itself from their frame of reference.

The present meritocracy has no use for chivalry or valor and maintains fiction that it owes its position to intelligence only.  It has little sense of ancestral gratitude or obligation to the past.  This self-described aristocracy of talent retains many vices of the past aristocracy without any of its virtues.  Their “compassion” requires sacrifices of others.  No sacrifice will come from them, most especially one requiring physical courage.

You asked my views on the people you work with.  Your chief Dr. Thomas Fleming wrote: “Everyone knows of the Mylai massacre, but such incidents were a routine occurrence in Vietnam.” These killings did not occur every day and were far from being ordinary.  The greatest massacre of the Vietnam War occurred during the Tet Offensive of 1968.  Some 5000 South Vietnamese were butchered by the VC and NVA.  Yet Fleming will not acknowledge this murder on the order of 10 times greater than that at My Lai.  Your leader has bragged of his evasion of military service during the Vietnam War.  Yet his pretense of moral superiority is not to be commented on.  I will guess he is a coward and smug liar of the first order.

Paul Gottfried, an editor of this site and fixture of the chattering right when seeking a Jew somewhat reliable, read the manuscript of my book and then asked me to rewrite it.  I replied if my documenting the cowardice of Jews in American wars from the Civil War to the Gulf War of 1991 bothered him.  I commiserated somewhat by explaining that I agreed with Solzhenitsyn that the truth is invariably bitter and does not set one free.  I received not one word in response, only a pathetic attempt at a grin.  Later he told me he lost my manuscript.  I had to doubt that a manuscript overflowing into two shoe boxes would be forgotten or lost.  I asked if he had sent it to the ADL.  Once again no answer.  Gottfried did have his tale backed by two stalwarts of your magazine, Ralph Raico and Bill Kaufmann.

One last name is that of Chilton Williamson.  He had read pertinent parts of the manuscript, but declined to assist.  He replied he was not up to an ensuing confrontation. 

Changes to alter this society for the better will require courage.  I find it lacking in reputed conservatives. 

I never heard any concerns over “production values”, whatever they possibly could be.

Richard Earley