What Can the Right Say?
While the President's words at the Tucson memorial rally were welcome, as they certainly seem to have defused - for now, at least - the unbridled anger on the left, there is nevertheless a discernible degree of disingenuousness in his message*. For nothing the President said contradicted the prevailing understanding that civility is defined for the left by how the message is delivered, but for the right it is the message itself. In other words, entire arguments on the right are out of bounds, but on the left only violent language can be uncivil.
For example, could a conservative make the following argument regarding immigration?
On the other hand, could a liberal make this kind of argument?
And so this is the quandry the right finds itself in - it cannot communicate its message to voters since the message itself is verboten. And so it must rely on proxy arguments that don't necessarily make a lot of sense. For example, proclaiming loudly and forcefully to be against illegal-immigration, but all for legal immigration. But when the left counters with "Then why not just declare them legal - problem solved" - the conservative is left sputtering about rule-of-law. His real argument - that the Hispanic population is simply too large and we can't afford as a nation to allow it to continue to grow rapidly - must be muted, as making this argument will lead to his banishment from public discourse. Why? Because any venue that hosts this argument will be immediately subject not just to a withering public flogging, but to boycott by sponsors and anyone associated with the host.
* How do I know Mr. Obama is being disingenuous? Here's his review of Murray and Herrnstein's The Bell Curve. Despite the authors' dispassionate and masterful review of the known facts on intelligence, Obama relegated the book to "dubious science" of the kind long advocated by "racial supremacists", meant to appeal to a "white America [] ready for a return to good old-fashioned racism" and "in an ugly mood" who "resent any advantages, realor perceived, that minorities may enjoy."
Similarly, his Attorney General accused white Americans of being a "nation of cowards" for refusing to discuss race. But he wasn't calling for any kind of open dialog - one of his pre-conditions is that the discussion be "nuanced" - i.e., full of obfuscation and misdirection.
Similarly, in his attempt to be civil in his latest column "A Tale of Two Moralities," Paul Krugman states that "the real challenge we face is not how to resolve our differences — something that won’t happen any time soon — but how to keep the expression of those differences within bounds." He then goes on to frame the yawning gulf between right-and-left as an unbridgeable dispute over tax policy! Taxation is about the only topic on which the right gets to argue with some passion - perhaps because everyone hates paying taxes. Republicans are routinely lambasted as the "party of greed" as a result, but again who isn't greedy? Unfortunately, that results in the Republican party being essentially focused with near single-mindedness on cutting taxes, since that's about the only issue they can really promote with gusto.
For example, could a conservative make the following argument regarding immigration?
Immigration from Mexico and Central America should be discouraged as the track record of Americans with ancestry from these countries is typically sub-par. Mexican-Americans have low rates of high-school graduation; have incomes significantly below average; have higher crime rates; have very high rates of illegitimacy; and have poor measures of civic responsibility (e.g., low voting rates, high rates of gang membership).No, I don't believe any conservative could make that argument in any kind of mainstream forum - only in unaffiliated blogs could such an argument be made, despite its dispassionate tone and reliance on published facts.
On the other hand, could a liberal make this kind of argument?
Opposition to immigration is rooted in xenophobia. Immigration opponents are motivated by nothing more than hatred - hatred for anyone who threatens their imaginary Leave-it-to-Beaver world. But that world is a fantasy, and these racists will eventually find themselves fossils in a changing world that will have no patience for their demented, hateful intolerance.Yes, I think they could - and have quite often, and this kind of argument is perfectly acceptable in mainstream venues, despite it's completely fact-less content and its vituperative tone.
And so this is the quandry the right finds itself in - it cannot communicate its message to voters since the message itself is verboten. And so it must rely on proxy arguments that don't necessarily make a lot of sense. For example, proclaiming loudly and forcefully to be against illegal-immigration, but all for legal immigration. But when the left counters with "Then why not just declare them legal - problem solved" - the conservative is left sputtering about rule-of-law. His real argument - that the Hispanic population is simply too large and we can't afford as a nation to allow it to continue to grow rapidly - must be muted, as making this argument will lead to his banishment from public discourse. Why? Because any venue that hosts this argument will be immediately subject not just to a withering public flogging, but to boycott by sponsors and anyone associated with the host.
* How do I know Mr. Obama is being disingenuous? Here's his review of Murray and Herrnstein's The Bell Curve. Despite the authors' dispassionate and masterful review of the known facts on intelligence, Obama relegated the book to "dubious science" of the kind long advocated by "racial supremacists", meant to appeal to a "white America [] ready for a return to good old-fashioned racism" and "in an ugly mood" who "resent any advantages, realor perceived, that minorities may enjoy."
Similarly, his Attorney General accused white Americans of being a "nation of cowards" for refusing to discuss race. But he wasn't calling for any kind of open dialog - one of his pre-conditions is that the discussion be "nuanced" - i.e., full of obfuscation and misdirection.
Similarly, in his attempt to be civil in his latest column "A Tale of Two Moralities," Paul Krugman states that "the real challenge we face is not how to resolve our differences — something that won’t happen any time soon — but how to keep the expression of those differences within bounds." He then goes on to frame the yawning gulf between right-and-left as an unbridgeable dispute over tax policy! Taxation is about the only topic on which the right gets to argue with some passion - perhaps because everyone hates paying taxes. Republicans are routinely lambasted as the "party of greed" as a result, but again who isn't greedy? Unfortunately, that results in the Republican party being essentially focused with near single-mindedness on cutting taxes, since that's about the only issue they can really promote with gusto.
posted by ziel | 1/14/2011 07:06:00 PM
18 Comments:
Someone should just come out for an immigration moratorium. Isn't 310 million people enough? How much more congestion is necessary? How much more farmland must be paved over? More population inevitably means fewer open spaces- which (at least for the traditional American majority) have value in themselves.
But for obvious reasons no one on the left will call for this and the GOP is a prisoner of "pro-growth" business interests.
Those who don't want to just give up might consider some small state with initiative and referendum that might be amenable to electing one house of the state legislature by low-threshold PR. A small start-but everything else seems like p*ssing in the wind.
See: http://www.examiner.com/immigration-reform-in-national/gop-already-disappointing-those-who-want-border-immigration-enforcement
http://federaleagent86.blogspot.com/2011/01/disappointment-yes.html
This comment has been removed by the author.
An immigration time-out would be a better phrase. Same idea, sounds less threatening.
Re: icr
The idea of an "environmental" approach to immigration reform has been tried- see "Immigration Gumballs":
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5871651411393887069#
Unfortunately, FAIR wound up being called a "Hate Group" by the SPLC. Roy Beck was described as being a man who has a "crazy uncle" (referring to other immigration restrictionists), because the left is simply, virulently, anti- white, and in essence, anti- western civilization.
I'm afraid that until there is an even larger amount of interracial violent crime that directly affects the elite and their children, to the point that it can simply no longer be ignored, the situation will not improve- and then there will be a sudden, violent change in opinion, with all that that might entail...
The elite can, for the moment, isolate themselves. Heck, the elite in countries like Brazil can isolate themselves from crime, and Brazil's crime rates are much higher than ours. True change may only happen once we're on the brink of anarchy!
This is why unskilled-immigration must be made into a fiscal issue, rather than a social issue.
Anonymous 1 : thanks for that video, and confirmation that reasonable and fact-based arguments are verboten in mainstream discussion.
Anonymous 2: Fiscal arguments run into the free-market-economics buzzsaw. An alternative would be an "unholy alliance" with labor, but labor has been co-opted by the pro-immigrationists. Linking up with the more craft-oriented unions (electricians etc.) might work, but big labor is going after numbers, and more unskilled legal immigrants helps those numbers.
"Fiscal arguments run into the free-market-economics buzzsaw."
Those can be easily defeated with a little concerted push. The free-market case for for importing day-laborers who evade taxes, collect benefits and vote for higher taxes is weak.
Facts already support our case, and the American people are not stupid on fiscal issues. If you keep telling them statistics about unskilled immigrants paying less taxes and using more government services, many will believe you.
I am not saying it is certain victory, just our best shot.
Anon January 16, 2011 10:11 A.M.:
“Unfortunately, FAIR wound up being called a ‘Hate Group’ by the SPLC. Roy Beck was described as being a man who has a ‘crazy uncle’ (referring to other immigration restrictionists), because the left is simply, virulently, anti- white, and in essence, anti- western civilization.”
True. I call the white Left the New White Racism, but unlike the old white racism, the new version supports genocide against its own race…as long as leading anti-white racists (Frank Rich, Noel Ignatiev, Tim Wise, et al.) are themselves spared.
“I'm afraid that until there is an even larger amount of interracial violent crime that directly affects the elite and their children, to the point that it can simply no longer be ignored, the situation will not improve- and then there will be a sudden, violent change in opinion, with all that that might entail...”
For 50 years, people have been waiting for that “worse is better” argument to bear fruit. But during that time, most whites have instead had their will worn down. Deviancy has continually been defined down anew. The New White Racists and their black and brown supremacist allies have gotten stronger in numbers, and in methods of soft totalitarianism (outlaw judges; de-policing towards black and brown criminals; hyper-policing towards whites; criminal justice affirmative action; diversity training in all institutions; anti-white propaganda from pre-K through graduate school; the MSM’s war on white America; etc.).
And the totalitarianism is hardening. Whites like Jeremiah Munsen are being imprisoned simply for engaging in symbolic speech that is protected under the First Amendment. Meanwhile, non-whites who engage in the same symbolic speech are not being prosecuted, or even named by authorities who cover for them.
“The elite can, for the moment, isolate themselves. Heck, the elite in countries like Brazil can isolate themselves from crime, and Brazil's crime rates are much higher than ours. True change may only happen once we're on the brink of anarchy!”
See above.
I can’t say what must be done, because it would get you shut down, Ziel, and might even get me arrested.
Until now, I’ve always been able to say what’s on my mind online, but the other day a supportive reader pushed one of my buttons in a personal e-mail, and forced me to confront where things are headed. He talked about what it would take to stop America’s slide to a situation like that of South Africa or Zimbabwe. I had to admit that he was right. I’ll have to leave the particulars of our correspondence to your imagination.
(cont'd.)
And then I heard a non-racially oriented economist talk about the coming anarchy, when the dollar ceases being the world’s reserve currency, and inflation here spirals out of control. The speaker was that Stansberry guy, who is selling his financial services, but I’d read about the problem for a few years now, from Good Craig Roberts. (That’s as opposed to Bad Craig Roberts, who seems to have meanwhile taken over Roberts’ personality, and has him sounding like Kevin MacDonald, which is why I almost never read him anymore.)
Seeing more racist atrocities is not going to gradually bring about a change in the consciousness of 200 million whites. During the 1960s and ‘70s, whites got to see enough black racist atrocities for a lifetime. Now the national media suppress stories they once told, and any white who publicly complains about them experiences terrible things, and/or is silenced.
I haven’t been published under my own name for pay in New York City since 1996. (I had nine pseudonymous articles published in New York dailies in 1998-99. I didn’t dare tell the editors who I really was. At work, I'd find fliers in my CUNY college's English Department denouncing me.) I haven’t had a letter published under my own name in the NY Times since 1997. (From 1990-1997, the paper had published my letters prominently in the Sunday Magazine and the Week in Review.) A couple of months ago, I sent a pseudonymous letter complaining about black racism to a little local newspaper. The editor wrote back, saying “I think I know who you are” (I’m sure he did!), that my letter was “too racist” as written (never mind that he’d published psychotically racist letters from blacks), and that in order for him to publish it, I would have to tone it down, present myself in his office, and prove my identity.
I kid you not.
Look at Oregonian “reporter” Betsy Hammond. Two years ago, she tried to get a VDARE reader fired from his job. The man had written her about the violent black racism he had experienced in Atlanta in a letter using his real name, and mentioning the firm he worked for. She contacted his employer and sought to whitemail the latter into firing the reader!
Some whites are going to have to see other whites doing things, and choose sides. Like I always say, you may not care about race war, but race war cares about you.
Nicholas - true, I didn't even go into what a private citizen might safely say - loss of one's livelihood being a very real possibility as a result of impolitic pronouncements. Which is why anonymity is so important in the blogosphere, and why there are those who are so eager to take it away.
A simple economic argument that skirts PC racial issues is easy: importing people into a country with a declining economy and a high unemployment rate is a very bad idea. The argument is unanswerable and instantly understandable even to those of limited intellectual acumen (supply and demand and all that).
An excellent post.
Three quick points:
1. Reason conservatives or "conservatives" don't/can't use non-tax related arguments is because so many of mainstream conservatives are actually right liberals who bought into virtually all liberal assumptions.
Lawrence Auster at View From Right blog frequently writes on the theme that virtually all American punditry is liberal, no matter leftist or "conservatives".
2. No need (for now) to use perfectly good but non-PC arguments. There are excellent low hanging fruit arguments available.
Dutch Boy outlines one very well.
Another one is a horrible impact of unregulated and unlimited immigration on health care and education of native poor minorities.
3. Statistics on immigrants, most of it quite negative should be included as often as possible in various context.
It is shocking how ignorant so many well educated non-leftist Americans with good political instincts are in respect to immigration and race issues. Anything that should lift that veil of ignorance is a good thing.
Mass immigration is a policy of hate-motivated genocide (is there any other kind?) against whites. If you're not willing to call it what it is and fight it on those grounds then you're just not going to oppose it, period. It means you've already accepted the white-people-have-to-go philosophy behind the policy (or at least the idea that their disappearance is no big deal) and it then becomes simply a matter of arguing about the pace of the program, which in fact is where "conservatism" is now.
The individual who said you only have to point out that mass immigration is a bad economic idea is fooling himself. Modern immigration policy has never been tied to economics or unemployment figures. It's never been tied to what it might do to the poor or blacks. Those pushing it don't care about economics. As I said, it is a policy of dispossession and genocide against whites and as such is spectacularly successful. Why would the elite want to stop one of their few successful social programs?
We're witnessing the demise of America, the demise of Western civilization, and the final extermination of the people who built those things. Keep those facts in mind when you talk about "What Can the Right Say?" The only thing stopping them from saying things is their greed, they've made a conscious decision to profit on the bones of their people, to collaborate for money. You don't think that all these fat cat Republicans and Conservatives believe in multiculturalism do you? That George Will believes in "creedal nation"? It's more corruption than fear that motivates them.
When small groups of white men (2, 3, 4) gather, wherein you are not dependent on those same white men for your economics, you need to drop at least one HBD truth/Race Realist in each of those conversations without fail. And don't apologize for your truth and reality based views.
If you are economically dependent on one or more in your group then it needs to be taken case by case.
MDR
The whole situation looks like a fun-house-mirror-photographic negative of "To Kill a Mockingbird".
A crime occurs, but innocents are blamed by the lynch mob. In the latter case, we actually have the killer who did it, and he's seemingly a leftist. Grandiose theories are being concocted to blame his rampage on the innocent party (which is comprised of millions of of people btw).
Why do conservatives need to buy out some newspapers and TV networks again?
Anonymous said . . .
I'm afraid that until there is an even larger amount of interracial violent crime that directly affects the elite and their children . . .
This won't happen. To see why, consider the question: "Unskilled immigration causes wages of security guards to a) increase or b) decrease."
Immigration from Ireland and Italy should be discouraged as the track record of Americans with ancestry from these countries is typically sub-par. Italian/Irish-Americans have low rates of high-school graduation; have incomes significantly below average; have higher crime rates; have very high rates of illegitimacy; and have poor measures of civic responsibility (e.g., low voting rates, high rates of gang membership).
And they drink too much.
Seriously - not sure those assertions are true - but if they were, that would be a valid argument. In fact, in 1925, we did just what you propose - we heavily restricted immigration in response to the problems immigrants were causing. Most likely as a result of this moratorium, Irish and Italian Americans performance has improved substantially from what it was.
Alcoholism is no doubt a negative impact of Irish immigration - prohibition was a response to that. And of course organized crime has been a particularly painful remnant of Italian immigration. There are very good arguments for restricting immigration from many countries. All these arguments - fact-based - should be welcome in our discourse, not suppressed.
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