Lee's Blog

I’ve been thinking about the comment by “Mike in Ontario, NY”, that the TEA Party is merely a cover for white supremacists and racists. What is exceptionally foolish about this comment is that any reasonable white supremacist would oppose the TEA Party and its goals.

One of the points that Walter Williams makes repeatedly is that individuals cannot afford to engage in systematic (society-wide) discrimination. He argues that systematic discrimination has to be enforced by the government, or it will fail.

Dr. Williams points out that, in apartheid South Africa, there were laws restricting the kinds of jobs blacks could hold — and white employers were charged with and convicted of violating those laws. Why did white employers take that risk? Because it was in their individual interest to employ the best available workers in the jobs for which they were best suited. It is only government — which has no concern for the bottom line — which can demand and enforce the inefficiency of refusing to place the best workers in the right jobs.

Likewise, Dr. Williams points to the segregated buses in the South, and observes that the bus companies resisted segregation — they fought the laws requiring segregation, and when they lost, they disobeyed the laws until they were threatened with legal action. Why would they refuse to humiliate black people when the law not only allowed but required it? Because those black people were their customers, and they didn’t want to drive off their customers. Only a government can ignore the bottom line and deliberately humiliate a class of people regardless of the economic effect.

Getting back to the TEA Party, the tea-partiers wish to reduce the scope of government and increase the scope of individual decision-making. This makes systematic discrimination more difficult rather than less, which would not be a desirable outcome for white supremacists.

You may reply that systematic discrimination is illegal in the United States, and indeed that the Federal Government is hostile to the goals of white supremacists. Well sure it is … now. But what basis is there for the Federal Government to be hostile to the goals of white supremacists? What reason is there for systematic discrimination to be illegal?

It has long been thought that the Constitution demands equal rights under the law, but we have seen that the Constitution is, well, less honored than previously. It is not self-executing. If all three branches get together and decide that, say, freedom of speech means freedom to say what the law allows when the law allows it, to those whom the law allows to hear it (McCain-Feingold) … well, there’s not much left of the Constitution, is there?

So what is there to stop the Federal Government from deciding that “equal rights under the law” means dramatically different rights for different groups? Can that happen?

The insane spending currently engaged in by Congress can end only in disaster. I do not know what the disaster will be, though I think Zimbabwean-style inflation is the probable end-game. Whatever the ultimate disaster, with a black President, don’t you think the white supremacists would seize the opportunity — the same opportunity a certain dictator of the 20th century seized — to blame all of the nation’s troubles on a specific racial group? Don’t you think they would be in an exceedingly strong position to take power? And once they were in power, with the nation in turmoil and the precedent established that the rights guaranteed by the Constitution are not in fact guaranteed … how long would equality under the law last?

The tea-partiers want to avert the looming disaster by reining in spending. They want to re-establish the principle that the United States is a Constitutional republic. Why on Earth would white supremacists support the tea-partiers? On the contrary, I would expect white supremacists to be the most enthusiastic supporters of the Federal Government’s race to ruin.

I don’t drop by the Panda’s Thumb very often, but I did yesterday, and I found this gem of an interaction.

First raven quotes a report that many young adults are leaving Christian churches when they grow up, and adds,

What implies this is that xianity is on the skids in the USA. Making creationism a litmus test works both ways. If people have to believe that mythology is real and hating science is a requirement, some will just drop the religion. Mostly the best and brightest.

By my reckoning, based on the ARIS surveys, between 1 and 2 million people leave the religion every year. These days between the xian terrorist MD assassins, the Catholic child rape problem, and the Hutaree xian militia wannabe cop killers, xianity is providing quite the wind at the back for this exodus.

I don’t know about you, but “xian” for Christian strikes me as a deliberate insult. Mind you, I’m not even a believer, but this offends me. Yes, people sometimes used to write Xmas for Christmas, but that initial letter is not an X in our alphabet, it is a Chi in the Greek alphabet and so is correctly used as an abbreviation for Christ. Using a lowercase x is plain and simply wrong since there is no connection between lowercase x and “Christ”. And I think people like raven know that and do it intentionally.

Continuing, raven goes on to quote one (count ‘em, one) Catholic Cardinal saying atheists are “sub-human”. (Well, he’s scum. That doesn’t mean the whole Catholic Church is scum.) raven then adds,

This isn’t going to go over well. The No Religions are now 24% of the US population, 72 million people, the largest sect if they were a sect. Humans have a very predictable response when they are attacked, insulted, and demonized. Right back at them.

Yep, that’s quite true. And the people who are regularly called death cultists and accused of wanting to overthrow the United States, by people like raven, also have that very same very predictable response when they are attacked, insulted, and demonized. But strangely, raven doesn’t grasp that.

Amusingly, a few hours before raven started the comments above, John Kwok observed

The Tea Party Movement started in February 2009. Only within the last few months has it opted to align itself to the Republican Party. So, just on the face of it, I am quite confident that it will resist any “fundamentalist take over”. Most Tea Party Movement activists tend to be fellow Libertarian in their outlook and couldn’t care less about Xian concerns with regards to abortion, stem cell research, etc. etc.:

And, just minutes after raven correctly observed that “Humans have a very predictable response when they are attacked, insulted, and demonized”, Mike in Ontario, NY, responds to John Kwok,

Spontaneous? Grass-roots? Pffft. John, you’re talking out your arse on this one. The teabaggers are being promoted from “below” by white supremacist organizations who are mainstreaming their Xian terrorism via friendly mouthpieces like Faux Noise, Whirled Nut Doily, Dredge, etc. Stop trying to portray the new white power movement as being something actually sensible, credible, or even popular. The fringers are getting a lot of play right now, but they’re just being manipulated with divisive ploys and white suburban race paranoia. Restoring civil liberties? WTF are you smoking, Kwok? You sound like a YEC’er when you speak of the ‘baggers.

Yep, nothing improves dialog like impugning people’s motives without basis, calling them racists without evidence, and consistently using a crude sexual slur to refer to them. And of course they won’t respond in the predictable fashion … right?

In the comments to the previous post, macaroni observes

Maybe Jack is a little afraid of his ability to defeat the “Black Wind” and believes he could win many smaller battles against evil in the future and that it would better serve “mankind” in that way. He just needed something to prod him off his logical thinking. Smile. He who runs away lives to fight another day….. No “Charge of The Light Brigade” for Jack.

That makes sense, but there are three points that argue against it.

First, Glaeken has survived for 15,000 years battling against the Adversary. He isn’t into the “Charge of The Light Brigade”. Granted, he’s telling Jack to act instead of doing it himself, but Jack is his Heir — the one who will take over the defense of the world when he is gone. Glaeken would never tell Jack to charge to his death. He told Jack to perform a physically demanding task that he himself is no longer up to, that’s all. And in fact, as it turns out, there really isn’t any physical danger; the important thing is to keep moving as fast as possible so as to kill the focus of the Black Wind before the mental effect (feelings of depression and futility) is able to stop you.

Second, even if this were a situation where Jack had to leave tens of thousands — maybe hundreds of thousands — to die because he had to live to fight another day (which is a situation that Glaeken might really have found himself in), he should have felt regret. Indeed, if he were not a narcissistic sociopath, he would reasonably have been calling Glaeken names because Glaeken ordered him to leave those people to die. This actually happens sometimes with firefighters and the like, I am told — they know that they cannot save people, but it tears them up not to try.

There is no possibility that Jack would react like the firefighters, however. He made that absolutely clear in a previous book, Harbingers, where he stated that, if Vicky and Gia died, he would leave everyone else in the world, including his supposed friends Abe and Julio, and his beloved sister’s children, to die horribly, and that he would not lift a finger to save any of them. Instead, in that book, he sadistically trapped and killed four of the firefighters who were carrying on the fight that he explicitly refused to join.

Third, there is still the fact that Jack called Glaeken a name because Glaeken pointed out that the people that Jack “loves” — in his stunted, narcissistic fashion — will also die if he does nothing.

Think of this in purely realistic terms. Imagine that Glaeken and Jack are in an apartment building late at night, and they observe a man pouring liquid all around the building. Glaeken says that the man is a known arsonist and that the liquid smells like gasoline, so he must be planning to burn the building with everyone sleeping inside. Glaeken tells Jack to stop the man from lighting the gas, because Glaeken is not able to limp down there and stop him in time. Jack says no, trying to save all those people would endanger his own valuable hide. Glaeken says, “Vicky is at a sleepover in this building.”

Is the natural reaction to call Glaeken a bastard for pointing out to him that Vicky is in danger too? Or to thank him for preventing Jack from making a horrible mistake — leaving Vicky to die with all those others?

I would understand Jack’s reaction (not sympathize or agree, but understand) if Glaeken had said, “Some of those who will die are nine-year-old girls just like your Vicky, just as cute, just as well-loved, with just as much potential that will be wiped away through your refusal to save them.” That really would be emotional manipulation, trying to reach whatever fragment of conscience Jack may possess, trying to show him that there is something going on that he “cannot abide in his sight”.

But Glaeken’s statement simply brought to his attention that Vicky and Gia really were in danger. How could that warrant calling him names? Unless, of course, in Jack’s mind, Glaeken’s statement counts as emotional manipulation because it forces him to actually live up to his claim that he loves Vicky and Gia more than life itself. To him, Glaeken’s statement counts as emotional manipulation because he would rather walk away and let all those people die including Vicky and Gia, and after they were dead he would just shrug and say, “Well, that’s not my fault because Glaeken didn’t explicitly warn me that they were in danger, but now that they’re dead, I don’t ever have to lift a finger against the Adversary.”

So, with all due respect to macaroni, no, I don’t think Jack’s actions are explicable by his thinking this is a “Charge of The Light Brigade” situation.

There are times when I really, sincerely, despise Repairman Jack and wonder why I even read the books. Case in point: “By the Sword”.

At the beginning of this book, Jack is “fund-raising” by enticing muggers in Central Park to try to rob him, then incapacitating them and taking their ill-gotten gains, which he will donate to the Little League. As he leaves the park, he sees a thug about to attack an old man, and he decides to intervene because there are certain things that “I will not abide in my sight”, such as beating up a defenseless old man. The old man in question is Glaeken (the Sentinel who’s been defending the Earth and humanity for 15,000 years), so he handily dispatches the thug by himself, but we’re supposed to think that Jack is an honorable person.

Fast forward to a later scene. The sole surviving member of a murderous cult has just invoked the “Black Wind”, which was demonstrated earlier as capable of killing absolutely every living thing within a very wide distance. The earlier usage was in an uninhabited area and only five people died. This time it is in New York City. Jack and Glaeken are watching from the roof of the next building.

Glaeken describes the action of the cloud, says “more than three thousand will die tonight …. Imagine the terror. Imagine the Adversary’s joy. You’ve got to stop that [person].” Jack whines that he can’t just shoot the guy because it’s too far. “Then you’ll have to go over there.” “Swell.” Jack is unenthusiastic because “Jack didn’t feature entering that place and fighting his way to the roof for nothing.”

Well, you know, Glaeken is 15,000 years old. He’s seen quite a lot in that time. He has senses that perhaps the rest of us lack. He says the guy has to be killed to save thousands of lives. Perhaps Jack should listen to him. But no, Jack continues to whine and ask for explanations as the Black Wind grows. Finally Glaeken points out that the Black Wind may last “long enough for the winds to reach Sutton Square and beyond.” Sutton Square is where Jack’s girlfriend lives.

Jack responds, “”You’re a bastard, you know that.”

No, Jack, Glaeken is perfectly justified in calling you names, but not vice-versa. Jack can’t “abide in his sight” an old man being beat up, but he’s perfectly cool with standing by and watching thousands murdered — thousands of defenseless old men and women, helpless children, the pregnant teenage girl that he believes to be in the basement of the building currently being engulfed by the Black Wind. And he calls Glaeken names? If I used that sort of language, I’d call him a lot worse.

In fact, my only criticism of Glaeken is that, if I’d been writing the book, he would have said, “I’m an old man and I’ve fought the Adversary for fifteen thousand long years. I doubt I can stop this Black Wind but I cannot and will not run from it. I will take the sword and try to stop it. You run away, little Heir, and prepare yourself to be the Sentinel after my death, but run far and run fast, because the Adversary will know I’m dead, and he will be looking for you and yours.”

Why should Glaeken even argue with this utterly selfish, utterly useless “Heir” in an attempt to get him to recognize the need to risk — not necessarily lose but merely risk — his own life to save tens or even hundreds of thousands of innocents. Maybe shaming him would do some good, though I doubt it. He’s too selfish to even worry about losing the favor of the most ancient living being in the world. He’s too selfish to think that he should “give back” a bit to a man who has suffered and sacrificed for him and his loved ones for thousands of years.

Unfortunately, I already know the end of Nightworld. Jack survives.