Hey Guys
I miss the old TAS crowd. Come visit me at The Agenda!
This is pretty shameless. I’ll make up for it by writing some terrible microfiction.
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Commenting is closed for this article.
I miss the old TAS crowd. Come visit me at The Agenda!
This is pretty shameless. I’ll make up for it by writing some terrible microfiction.
Commenting is closed for this article.
and i thought you were downsized during the recession by conor friedersdorf!
— razib · May 6, 12:28 AM · #
This is pretty shameless! But always good to see you, Reihan!
— scritic · May 6, 12:57 AM · #
What makes you think we haven’t visited? I don’t see any place over there to leave a calling card.
— kenB · May 6, 01:04 AM · #
Reihan, you are still as interesting to read as I ever. I read you religiously on the corner. And I am a commie liberal agnostic!! The one thing I miss is being able to commment on your posts.
— Joseph · May 6, 01:25 AM · #
So I read through a screenfull and I have to say the lack of comments is a real drawback. I have all these important things to say about separate but equal schools and the limits of policy and how to deal with the unreliable social sciences (here’s a hint on that one: think zen) but no where to say them. To read your posts and then have these important notions magmatize up from the core of my genius and then just vibrate there in my forebrain is way too frustrating. I’m going to have to go out into the swamp now and track pine martins for a couple hours, or I won’t be able to sleep.
— cw · May 6, 02:29 AM · #
If you were Reihan blogging on NRO, would YOU want commenters?
I suppose that NRO deserves some small credit for including Reihan, and I’m glad Reihan has a paying gig working on a well-crafted blog. But isn’t the contrast of Reihan’s nice reality-based conservative blog vs the otherwordly batshit insanity on the rest of the site just about one of the strangest situations out there?
— Steve C · May 6, 05:48 AM · #
Steve,
There are actually a lot of thoughtful, non-hackish writers at National Review. Admittedly, Reihan is my favorite too, and on occasion I point out some batshit insanity, but I don’t think it’s the norm for the majority of writers at the magazine.
— Conor Friedersdorf · May 6, 06:19 AM · #
Reihan’s NRO blog is awesome. For fans of the old-school TAS, it’s a little jarring to read such sustained wonkiness with no rap lyrics, stories about out of control gynoids, or paens to gorgeous brilliant women Reihan knows from school, but the wonkiness is eclectic, insightful, and thought provoking. It also does a good job of fighting epistemic closure by picking up and examining interesting posts from leading lefty bloggers.
— J Mann · May 6, 01:41 PM · #
If you look at the politicians and policies the NR has supported over the the years you will see that they are basically, when taken as a whole, an organ of the modern american conservative party (macp), which is essentially the republicans, the same way those little magazines used to be organs of the communist party. And when they are not pandering directly to the crazys, they are supporting the people pandering to the crazys. SO all in all the NR is harmful to the cause of sane politics and functional governemnt.
Obviously that’s debatable, but I’m pretty confident I would win any quote war.
On the other hand, people (and their hairier predicessors) have been involved in partisan politics for millions of years. It’s just one part of life, no reason to get too het up, right? Except that partisan politics is about allocating the goodies (food and women) and if you lose you don’t get to eat the tasty stuff (or at all), which can be pretty frustrating (disasterous). On the third hand, humans have made a lot of progress in designing and implementing political systems that allocate the goodies fairly. Here in America, for instance, if you are willing to work hard there is a very high chance that you will be able to access enough resources to live a nice comfortable life. But then again the MACP (and it’s defacto organs such as NR) seems to often be biased against the sytematic improvements that made this situation possible, or at least they tend to pander to people who feel this way.
So maybe we should get SOMEWHAT het up about entitites like the NR, becasue our goodies are—to the degree that they and their ilk are successful in thier mission—at stake.
— cw · May 6, 02:16 PM · #
While I’m all caught up in this, i just want to observe that—in my opinion—the conservative movement as we know it has essentially adopted the philosohy of guys like Burk and Hyak etc. as cover for thier historic program of grabbing and then clutching as tightly as possible to thier bossom whatever resources and privlidges are withing reach.
IFor example I jsut read some quote somehwere from I think Burke about how conservativeism is a temprement and thus anti-ideology and pragmatic… Can any of that be applyed to the MACP? OF course not.
— cw · May 6, 02:29 PM · #
Hands off my bossom, buddy!
— J Mann · May 6, 03:43 PM · #
Well….Dark Master….conservatism screwed itself on two major fronts…..what has changed is cultural and demographic evolution. TAS and Big Hollywood want to “take culture back” …the late lamented Culture Eleven understood that it is all about teh Culture. …now white christian conservatism or….perhaps we should say White JUDEO-CHRISTIAN conservativism (ha ha ha.) is completely disenfranchized from mainstream american culture.
In the interest of maintaining the status quo republicans alienated the darker skinned for perpetuity (imho).
dig medved
“The math here is brutal and eye-opening. If Obama in 2012 wins the same percentage of the combined black, Asian and Hispanic vote that he won in 2008 (82 percent), then in order to beat him the GOP candidate would need to win an unimaginable 65 percent of all white voters—whose numbers include such stalwart Democratic constituencies as gays, atheists, Jews and union members.
The 65 percent threshold represents a far higher percentage than Ronald Reagan won in his landslide against Jimmy Carter in 1980, or even his history-making 49-state re-election-sweep against Walter Mondale in ‘84.
Since white voters won’t comprise larger portions of the electorate in future races, and since no Republican could compile a big enough white majority to win the election on those voters alone, that leaves only one possible path for GOP victory: more competitive performance among Hispanic, African-American and Asian citizens.”
I guess Theory of Evolution WAS your biggest enemy all along.
I wonder what would have happened if Culture 11 had thrived and prospered…and NRO had wasted away.
I knew that would NEVAH happen when you guys dug up Palin.
Palin was the harbinger of your doom….you all knew exactly what she was….how you could not?
But you thought you could use her like some sort of tasp.
hubris.
she used you, fools.
and she is the disease that is turning your party into homogeneously old white angry judeo-xian “proud ignoramuses”.
look at the comments on this Hawkins thread
can’t turn off the racebaiting, IQbaiting and anti-elitism can you?
Question: Who is stupid enough to believe this?
“So why is the GOP doing so poorly?
Republicans believe it should be all about the issues, while Democrats push culture. They tell minority groups that Republicans hate them, and it works — despite the fact that it’s entirely false. They also tell minorities that their ethnic identity is tied up in voting for the Democratic Party.”
Answer: Only the conservative base.
— matoko_chan · May 6, 05:21 PM · #
wanna save your party?
take down Palin.
She can’t run for president, she can’t even hold an open presser.
She can’t debate Obama ……she couldn’t even debate Biden without a script and no follow-on questions.
She knows this, you know this, even her fluffer Continetti knows this.
Just tell her to declare.
You can do it Reihan.
Expiate your sin of pretending she was ever fit to be president.
Or go extinct.
idc.
— matoko_chan · May 6, 08:23 PM · #
haw haw haw
— matoko_chan · May 6, 08:29 PM · #
Maybe I should try reading your other blog in order to get the song “I am a Pizza” out of my head. We’re getting ready for preschool promotion concert.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2Zwvyhms8c
— Joules · May 6, 11:05 PM · #
guess what im seein’ in my quantum crystal ball, Reihan, cher.
Crist is going to win.
you an Frum an NRO spit on Crist in favor of Rubio.
“that conservatives are buzzing about Marco Rubio, the youthful former Speaker of the Florida House. A fluently bilingual 37-year-old Cuban-American evangelical from a blue-collar immigrant background with an ex-cheerleader wife, four children, a deep belief in the healing power of tax cuts, and square-jawed all-American looks, Rubio is a caricature of the ideal 21st-century Republican.”
dayum…where have i heard this kinda bullshytt pimpage before?…..oh yeah…the dimwitted demogogue you summoned from Alaska.
im sick of people telling me how smart you are…..you’re a dumbass.
Crist isn’t Lieberman…hes Dede Scozzafava with balls.
And Rubio is THE TEA PARTY CANDIDATE.
teabaggers represent 2% of the electorate, and they are flaming out waaaay before november.
and every time I hear you and the NRO twodigits say “taxcuts” I throw up a little in my mouth.
NSFW
— matoko_chan · May 6, 11:57 PM · #
Sorry Reihan, but I already know what NRO’s “Agenda” is. Tax cuts for the rich, governmentally-sanctioned repression of gays, endless foreign wars to enrich military contractors and secret CIA torture prisons.
— Travis Mason-Bushman · May 7, 01:02 AM · #
So Reihan, I took up your gauntlet registered for NRO, and got this when I tried to comment on your post about California’s state government:
“In order to facilitate the proper policing of comments by National Review Online, commenting for The Agenda is not available at this time. The form will return during its regular availability window, from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. EST.”
Well, no wonder nobody’s commenting. Are we really supposed to fit our comments around NRO’s working-hours schedule?
Does nobody on your coding team know what a moderation queue is?
— Travis Mason-Bushman · May 7, 01:17 AM · #
Could you keep the quelliist from turning this into Kos 2
— ian cormac · May 7, 01:28 AM · #
Wait a minute. Now it seems like you can comment on Reihans blog. Was that always there?
— cw · May 7, 02:58 AM · #
well yah, ima quellist.
and this is NRO
The skeletal grip of a corpse’s hand round eggs trying to hatch.
— matoko_chan · May 7, 03:52 AM · #
Send the envoys
— ian cormac · May 7, 05:01 AM · #
“There are actually a lot of thoughtful, non-hackish writers at National Review. Admittedly, Reihan is my favorite too, and on occasion I point out some batshit insanity, but I don’t think it’s the norm for the majority of writers at the magazine.”
Yes, the magazine. Though I’d say it’s 50/50 or less – I consider Lowry and Goldberg hacks, just to calibrate.
But I said NRO – I think ultra-insane bubble hackfest is a totally fair description for 90%+ the O part.
I’m trying to come up with an analogy for Reihan in relation to the NRO backdrop, but I’m at a loss. He skillfully avoids commenting on the real story of conservatism literally all around his blog – he speaks another language, intelligently responding to the interesting issues of the day. Laudable and bizarre.
— Steve C · May 7, 06:43 AM · #
manolo blahnik
— manolo blahnik · May 7, 08:10 AM · #
“intelligently responding to the interesting issues of the day.”
and that is sillie is too….he barfs up Palinism, taxcuts and vouchers just like the rest of the intransigent troglodytes and intellectual prostitutes there.
he just does it so silkily and cleverly that it makes it fun to read, inspite of the wholistic dearth of empirical content.
— matoko_chan · May 7, 12:43 PM · #
When Culture 11 died on the same day Breitbart’s disinformation tool Big Hollywood sprang to life, intellectual conservatism died.
NRO just doesn’t know it yet because the tiny little second brains in their dinosaur hips are still trying to control the narrative.
If you and your cohort don’t start a revolution Reihan, evolution is going to finish you off, and you will wither into irrelevance like the Whigs.
no, ian, not the envoys….this is a job for the Vangard.
This much must be understood: Revolution requires Sacrifice.
SANDOR SPAVENTA
Tasks for the Quellist Vanguard
— matoko_chan · May 7, 01:01 PM · #
I had noticed that most people had left this blog, except Friedersdorf and Matoko. Most days, I check to see whether Manzi wrote anything, and then move on.
— y81 · May 7, 01:22 PM · #
Hi y81,
Yeah, the golden age (Menanshi, Salam, Douthat) is gone, and the silver age (Jacobs, Millman, Manzi) is fading. (No offense to bronze age writers – keep up the good work!)
— J Mann · May 7, 01:47 PM · #
yeah, you should read Big Hollywood and HotAir, y81.
more your IQ level.
— matoko_chan · May 7, 02:32 PM · #
I’m looking forward to the Iron Age here at TAS (when blood will spill and the meadhalls ring with songs of bold men and heroic deeds).
— cw · May 7, 05:08 PM · #
lawl.
can Reihan’s introductions of comments to the NRO format be the first step in a intellectual barbarian insurgency?
— matoko_chan · May 7, 05:24 PM · #
rawr…I love the Iron Age!
NO MORE MISTER POLITE GUY!
The death of civility at NRO where dissent turns into the clash of claymores and gladitorial combat!
Where barbarian intellectuals grapple fiercely and swing morningstars to prove their points!
Can we please see Dr. Manzi and wimpy old pot-bellied geezer Mark Levin in a steel cage death match?
If they wear wrestling tights and leather harnesses I can guarantee Mark’s facebook friends will flee him like scalded cats.
OTOH Dr. Manzi bears a striking resemblance to Vin Diesel in Pitch Black…..no contest.
— matoko_chan · May 8, 12:57 AM · #
lawl….fake comments.
Nice one Reihan.
he pranked you, sukkahs.
— matoko_chan · May 8, 01:00 AM · #
Anyone what matoko is talking about,
— ian cormac · May 8, 01:42 AM · #
yeah, you should read Big Hollywood and HotAir, y81.
more your IQ level.
— juicy couture · May 8, 03:10 AM · #
What’s the ratio of “thoughtful” posts to thoughtless comments below which one would consider the blog dead (or at least eligible for hospice benefits)?
PS And I admit many blogs (where both posters and comments are thoughtless) are like those in the “Sixth Sense”, they’re dead but they don’t know it.
— c3 · May 11, 12:11 AM · #
well…..I loved Culture 11. I was still a registered republican then, and people actually had interesting and conflicting ideas and arguments and thoughtful discussions.
I keep expecting some of that here…..my bad.
Culture 11 seeded out into the web….but instead of transforming the blogs they went to…..the Culture 11 bloggers succumbed to whatever nutty ideology and style/protocol the host blog had….they got borged.
Culture 11 failed in that it was not transformative of intellectual conservatism.
Unless Dr. Manzi has something of substance TAS is just Conor writing apologia for conservative failmemes and fluffing NRO….there used to be a lot of Reihan and Ross pushing the Palin crack…inshallah we never have to put up with that again……oh and Suderman’s blindman groping of mainstream american culture.
TAS has pretty much devolved into bloggers giving wet sloppy mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to an intellectually moribund conservative ideology.
OTOH…..where else do intellectual conservatives go?
— matoko_chan · May 11, 02:22 PM · #
To Zombie Contentions?
Behold Homo conservitus honorabilus aka CK McLeod…..a vanishing species.
The Highlander is at least brave enough to take comments……something no soul can claim about Jonah Goldberg.=
Which reminds me…..Reihan Salam Fake-Comment Watch.
6 days and counting.
— matoko_chan · May 12, 08:38 PM · #