“politically incorrect” guides

regnery publishing, via ILX

The acceptance of the concept of “political correctness” is one of the greatest propaganda victories of conservative media in the last 20 years. I recommend checking out some of the descriptions of titles available from this publisher:

“The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to Darwinism and Intelligent Design
by Jonathan Wells
Paperback – (August 2006) – $19.95

Did you know…most textbooks on evolution are written by Darwinists with an ideological ax to grind? And scientists who try to teach about intelligent design are silenced? But fear not: Jonathan Wells, a microbiologist with Ph.D.s from Berkeley and Yale, unmasks the truth about Darwinism–why it is wrong and what the real evidence is. He provides all the facts you need to challenge the most closed-minded Darwinist. The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to Darwinism and Intelligent Design reveals falsehoods about Darwinism being taught in public schools, persecution of university scientists who see good evidence for intelligent design, the guesswork that founded the famous “ape to man” species chart, and more!”

“The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to Women, Sex, and Feminism
by Carrie Lukas
Paperback – (May 2006) – $19.95

Since the Feminist Revolution, women have climbed the corporate ladder, sent their kids to daycare, and struggled to balance work, family, and the redefinition of gender roles. Many unexpectedly learned the hard way that “having it all” comes at a steep cost—something the feminists never told them. “Feminist groups like to pretend that women can have it all without sacrificing time with families—this is FALSE and most women know it,” claims Carrie Lukas, vice president for policy and economics at the Independent Women’s Forum, contributor to National Review Online, and author of the latest installment of the bestselling series, The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to Women, Sex, and Feminism. Lukas clears the air, busts the myths, and provides the best (but usually suppressed) research on the most important issues young women face, so that women can make better decisions about their families, careers, and futures.”

etc

The Jonestown Death Tape (FBI No. Q 042) (November 18, 1978)

hosted on archive.org

“An audio recording made on November 18, 1978, at the Peoples Temple compound in Jonestown, Guyana immediately preceding and during the mass suicide or murder of over 900 members of the cult.”

To be honest, I don’t really have the nerve or the inclination to listen to this.  But I think it’s amazing that it exists!

“one nation under god”

McNaughton Fine Art

This painting is incredible. The descriptions of all of the characters, as well as Supreme Court decisions (!!!) are even moreso (visit the site and mouseover the picture). I’m pretty sure this guy is Mormon. The response to this on the internet was pretty fantastic, too:

“the process”

due process

This was on BoingBoing the other day, and I almost didn’t check it out. A cult? Why would I be interested in a cult? But I saw that there was a Genesis P-orridge/Psychic TV connection, which seemed odd. I suppose it shouldn’t have seemed odd, but I guess I think of cults as being for people with weak, collective-desiring minds and I hadn’t thought of Genesis as the type. There isn’t really a lot of information on the cult itself in the article, but I was surprised to see how many artists I respect are connected to it- Mick Jagger, Marianne Faithful, Lichens, & Jex Thoth. I’m not sure what to make of it, because a hip fringe cult is still a bunch of religious nonsense. I shouldn’t judge, probably.

salon.com & glenn beck, pt 3

The Making of Glenn Beck
Glenn Beck becomes damaged goods
Glenn Beck rises again

Oof, I just finished reading this in-depth history of Glenn Beck’s life and radio career, and I can honestly say I know more about him than I ever cared to. It’s a rather scummy story, one that might make you feel gross reading it, but at least I now have a better perspective on Beck’s persona and what he is going for in his TV and radio shows.

salon.com & glenn beck, pt 2

Look at that evil motherfucker right there. That’s W. Cleon Skousen, a man who I’d never heard of before today. So why am I calling the dude an evil motherfucker? Primarily its for writing a textbook called “The Making of America”, in which Skousen
“characterized African-American children as “pickaninnies” and described American slave owners as the “worst victims” of the slavery system. Quoting the historian Fred Albert Shannon, “The Making of America” explained that “[slave] gangs in transit were usually a cheerful lot, though the presence of a number of the more vicious type sometimes made it necessary for them all to go in chains.”
That quote is from Alexander Zaitchik’s profile on Skousen, whose philosophy is the intellectual backbone of Glenn Beck’s bizarre beliefs. In addition to Skousen’s racist re-writing of America’s history, Skousen’s faults are many: he was a conservative Mormon who was too conservative for either the John Birch Society or the Mormon church. In the early sixties, he authored a book called “The Naked Communist”, in which he supposedly revealed the diabolical plans of communists who were plotting to take over the U.S. Later, he would write a book called “The Naked Capitalist”, which updated his conspiracy theories to place rich families and corporations as the brains behind this global conspiracy (meaning, if you are a fan of NWO conspiracy theories, maybe you ought to consider the intellectual background of your beliefs). Throughout his career, Skousen was repeatedly rejected by even the most right-wing fringe elements of American society, and his ideas were repeatedly denounced by the FBI, among others. And Glenn Beck has single-handedly revived interest in this Skousen’s reality-free conspiracy theories by promoting Skousen’s book, “The 5,000 Year Leap”, as being the purest distillation of truth about America and the world. Terrifying!

salon.com & glenn beck, pt 1

Holy hell, Salon has really brought the science on prominent right-wing crazyface and owner of fine, fine sweaters (seriously that sweater straight up rules), Glenn Beck. In this article, published today, Glenn Greenwald analyzes the nature of Glenn Beck’s populist fury, and the difficult of presenting it as being either liberal or conservative. The whole article is definitely worth reading, but these passages I found particularly insightful:

“Although [Beck] now parades around under a rhetorical banner of small-government liberty, anti-imperialism, and opposition to the merger of corporations and government (as exemplified by the Bush-sponsored Wall Street bailout), it wasn’t all that long ago that he was advocating exactly the opposite: paying homage to the Patriot Act, defending the Wall Street bailout and arguing it should have been larger, and spouting standard neoconservative cartoon propaganda about The Global Islamo-Nazi Jihadists and all that it justifies.”

“Far more interesting than Beck himself is the increasingly futile effort to classify the protest movement to which he has connected himself. Here, too, confusion reigns. In part, this is due to the fact that these “tea party” and “9/12” protests are composed of factions with wildly divergent views about most everything. From paleoconservatives to Ron-Paul-libertarians to LaRouchians to Confederacy-loving, race-driven Southerners to Christianist social conservatives to single-issue fanatics (abortion, guns, gays) to standard Limbaugh-following, Bush-loving Republicans, these protests are an incoherent mishmash without any cohesive view other than: “Barack Obama is bad.” There are unquestionably some highly noxious elements in these groups, but they are far from homogeneous. Many of these people despised the Bush-led GOP and many of them loved it.”
^ That, btw, is why I’m not very convinced that the tea-party crowd is a viable political threat to health care reform or any part of the liberal agenda.

Really, I could go on and on about the things I found interesting in this article- it’s certainly worth reading in full. So, too, are the articles written by Alexander Zaitchik (which I’ll post about in a moment).

god squad

rambo rabbi training chosen guns

Is it really ok for rabbis to use guns? I wouldn’t have thought so.

sneaky scientologists

I live not far from a scientology center; a few days ago, some scientologists came by in the middle of the night and left this flier, along with some pamphlets, outside all of the apartments in my complex. Despite the fact that I think scientologists are crazy and kind of terrifying, I have to admit that I really like the design of this card. The font and colors are great and my first thought, upon spotting it in the hallway, was that I had to read it. So kudos for that, scientologists. Maybe I’ll scan some of the other literature a little bit later.