Shun people for their actions, not their beliefs

[I have a new macro post over at Econlog]

Tom Brown pointed me to a report by David French, on the abuse directed at conservative reporters who stood up for their principles:

I distinctly remember the first time I saw a picture of my then-seven-year-old daughter’s face in a gas chamber. It was the evening of September 17, 2015. I had just posted a short item to the Corner calling out notorious Trump ally Ann Coulter for aping the white-nationalist language and rhetoric of the so-called alt-right. Within minutes, the tweets came flooding in. My youngest daughter is African American, adopted from Ethiopia, and in alt-right circles that’s an unforgivable sin. It’s called “race-cucking” or “raising the enemy.”

I saw images of my daughter’s face in gas chambers, with a smiling Trump in a Nazi uniform preparing to press a button and kill her. I saw her face photo-shopped into images of slaves. She was called a “niglet” and a “dindu.” The alt-right unleashed on my wife, Nancy, claiming that she had slept with black men while I was deployed to Iraq, and that I loved to watch while she had sex with “black bucks.” People sent her pornographic images of black men having sex with white women, with someone photoshopped to look like me, watching.

As you read the article (and you really should read the entire piece) keep in mind that while Trump may or may not be alt-right, it is beyond dispute that his message is extremely popular among the alt-right, and that his campaign chairman previously ran Breitbart, a leading media outlet for the alt-right.

Erick Erickson experienced his own ordeal more than a month before we did. After Erickson dis-invited Trump from his Red State gathering, angry Trump supporters showed up at his house. A grown man yelled at his children at a store, condemning their father for opposing Trump. Erickson wrote in the New York Times that his son is still fearful that Trump supporters will come back to their home.

In March, writer Bethany Mandel related her own experience. After tweeting about Trump’s anti-Semitic followers, she was called “slimy Jewess” and told that she “deserves the oven.” It got worse:

Not only was the anti-Semitic deluge scary and graphic, it got personal. Trump fans began to “dox” me — a term for adversaries’ attempt to ferret out private or identifying information online with malicious intent. My conversion to Judaism was used as a weapon against me, and I received death threats in my private Facebook mailbox, prompting me to file a police report.

Nor are these isolated incidents:

Earlier this month, Mi-Ai Parrish, president of the Arizona Republic, wrote a powerful response to the deluge of threats and bullying prompted by the paper’s endorsement of Hillary Clinton. An Anti-Defamation League report identified 800 journalists who’ve been targeted with anti-Semitic tweets, ten journalists (including NR’s own Jonah Goldberg) who’ve borne the brunt of the attacks, and one — my friend Ben Shapiro — who’s received a staggering amount of hate:

The article is full of many more examples, including death threats.  And for these reporters and their families the abuse never ends.  Some are buying guns to protect their families. We are becoming more like Russia, where it’s open season on reporters.  No wonder the alt-right likes people like Putin and Trump, who have total contempt for a free press.

Trump and his sleazy alt-right supporters still have a 17% chance of winning the election next month. Imagine waking up Nov. 9th into that sort of America.

Yes, the alt-right is only a small share of Trump supporters, and there are crazy people in all ideologies.  But I think it’s fair to say that the conservative opposition to the Trump campaign (especially the Jewish conservative opposition) has been attacked with an unprecedented level of vitriol and abuse. This is not like other elections, and it’s because of one man.

This is even worse than political correctness.  They are just as intolerant as the left-wing campus PC police, and fight for a far more disgusting cause.

An Australian named Lorenzo is one of my most thoughtful commenters.  In the comment section of a previous post on PC run amok, he made the following observation:

The classical liberal tradition is that your worth as a person gave you the freedom to express your opinions.

The underlying PC principle is that your opinions set your worth as a person, which is, of course, exactly the same principle that Mao operated under, particularly during the Cultural Revolution.

Respect people who have different opinions from you, disrespect people who behave like bullies.

 


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78 Responses to “Shun people for their actions, not their beliefs”

  1. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    23. October 2016 at 08:12

    Respect people who have different opinions from you, disrespect people who behave like bullies.

    Also, practise what you preach.

  2. Gravatar of Effem Effem
    23. October 2016 at 08:51

    Reminds me of the far left message inspiring BLM cop-killers…just much less severe. Bad stuff.

  3. Gravatar of Philo Philo
    23. October 2016 at 10:30

    This post is rather one-sided. Do all leftists respect their ideological opponents and refrain from bullying? Aren’t many right-wingers non-offenders?

    On the other hand, the message that we should all be nice and respectful to each other is sound enough. Can’t we all just get along?

  4. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 10:51

    Philo, You said:

    “This post is rather one-sided.”

    As were my previous two anti-PC posts, criticizing left-wingers.

    Almost all my posts are one sided, but I have a more even distribution of attacks on the left and right than almost any other blogger.

  5. Gravatar of Dan W. Dan W.
    23. October 2016 at 10:52

    We already live in an America where one can be fired for believing contrary to Liberal ideology – just ask Brandon Eich. That is the America we are already waking up to. Given Hillary’s anti 1st amendment advocacy, why is Trump the one we are to worry about?

  6. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 10:52

    I wonder how many liberal reporters who endorsed Hillary are having to buy guns because of threats from angry Sanders supporters.

  7. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 10:53

    David French is hilarious. He deserves every bit of what he gets.

    “and that his campaign chairman previously ran Breitbart, a leading media outlet for the alt-right.”

    -Nope. Breitbart is alt-lite, not alt-right.

    “We are becoming more like Russia, where it’s open season on reporters.”

    -Before that, it was reporters’ open season on the general public. That day is coming to an end, no matter who wins in November.

    “Imagine waking up Nov. 9th into that sort of America.”

    -It would be awesome.

    “This is even worse than political correctness.”

    -No. It’s way, way better.

  8. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 10:54

    Dan, I wonder why you are not horrified by that National Review article?

    At least I’m horrified by both the extreme right and the extreme left.

  9. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 10:56

    Harding, I always suspected you were a Nazi. Thanks for clarifying things.

  10. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 11:05

    “Harding, I always suspected you were a Nazi.”

    -I’m not. That’s why I support Trump over Clinton -Clinton uses the more Naziesque language toward Russia.

    Also, “always”? Even before you knew about my support for Trump?

    Sad Clinton is probably going to win. I’m going to try my hardest to stop that from happening.

  11. Gravatar of Jerry Brown Jerry Brown
    23. October 2016 at 11:22

    Ssumner- “I wonder how many liberal reporters who endorsed Hillary are having to buy guns because of threats from angry Sanders supporters.”

    LOL. I hope and think very few of them.

  12. Gravatar of Dan W. Dan W.
    23. October 2016 at 11:25

    Scott,

    I am disappointed by human stupidity and there is far too much of it. What horrifies me is the willful gutting of Constitutional law and one candidate is on record for doing just that.

  13. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    23. October 2016 at 11:35

    I think even Jill Stein has received threats. (She’s also been accused of being a Putin puppet!)

    Technology has made communications and search cheaper. We haven’t figured out how to equilibrate free speech, threats, access to info (doxxing), privacy, etc. The risk is nuts who take advantage of cheap tech to destroy decency shift the Overton window for everyone else.

  14. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 11:38

    Dan, Make that two. Trump opposes the 1st amendment at least as much as Hillary does. He promises to crack down on press criticism of him after the election. Tighten libel laws.
    He wants to go after critics of him—people like me.

    He wants to bring back torture, and far worse types of torture than Bush used. And he wants to use it even if it does not work. And he wants to assassinate family members of terrorists.

    If you are worried about the Constitution, vote for Johnson. He’s not perfect (employer freedoms would be restricted) but he’s far less bad than either Hillary or Trump.

  15. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    23. October 2016 at 11:39

    Scott,

    Harding here provides a perfect example of the difference in our perspectives. I engaged him briefly on some past posts months ago, and quickly determined he isn’t someone I want to converse with. You continue conversing with him, and the above is the kind of contribution you’re welcoming.

    What do you get out of this? Do you get sadistic pleasure in calling people morons and Nazis? Refusing to block people is one thing, but actively engaging them and reinforcing posts like that in your forum is quite another.

    Explain to me how your approach is superior. Are you morally superior for engaging Trumpistas like this, insulting them, and debasing the level of conversation on your forum? That’s better than me ignoring them and speaking of Trumpistas collectively as “animals” who should be shunned?

    No doubt, referring to them as a group as animals is offensive, but is it as offensive as personally calling one of them a moron?

    I have news for you Scott. I know enough about the Cultural Revolution to know that ideological shaming, assaults on careers, shunning, etc. were not the only elements. The worst elements were actually the personal insults slung at people who were surrounded in public squares, which too often also led to beatings, often with the victims dying.

    Your comments on economics are normally way above-average, but you’re very blind to your own biases when it comes to politics.

  16. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 11:40

    Steve, I’m sure all the candidates have been threatened. I want to know if reporters who support Stein receive death threats.

  17. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    23. October 2016 at 11:50

    “reporters who support Stein”

    Do these exist? 96% of reporter donations went to Hillary.

    This is the closest I could find:
    http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/10/04/7-reasons-i-wont-vote-for-hillary-clinton/
    Hey, Clintonoids, Stop Bullying Me About My Vote
    by TED RALL

    To my many friends and readers who plan to vote for Hillary Clinton: please stop bullying me.

  18. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    23. October 2016 at 11:53

    BTW, I agree that the alt-right is awful. I just think we are sliding down the proverbial slippery slope, as a society.

  19. Gravatar of Christian List Christian List
    23. October 2016 at 13:12


    Tighten libel laws.

    Obviously this would hurt Trump the most.


    The Price I’ve Paid for Opposing Donald Trump

    What kind of extremely whiny journalism is that? Trump is being opposed by at least 60% of the American people and 99% of the elite. Nevertheless these whiny guys act as if they are fighting an upfront battle at the Alamo here. It doesn’t get more absurd than that.


    We are becoming more like Russia, where it’s open season on reporters.

    Oh please. You can’t be serious. That’s a belittlement of the quasi dictatorship in Russia.


    I wonder how many liberal reporters who endorsed Hillary are having to buy guns because of threats from angry Sanders supporters.

    There you go:
    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/17/us/politics/bernie-sanders-supporters-nevada.html

    It’s not about reporters but it’s the same whining.

    And I thought Trump was the only one whining so much all the time. I guess I was wrong.

    It bet if you would made serious statistics about this topic, you would see that threats and violence against journalists (and people in general) are way down.

    I bet there’s even an inverse proportionality between threats and violence compared to the whining about it. The more the violence got down, the more the whining increased.

    Imagine politicians like Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and FDR could see this act today. How would they react? Would they just scratch their heads in disbelieve or would they roll on the floor laughing?

  20. Gravatar of Christian List Christian List
    23. October 2016 at 13:17

    I’m not downplaying criminal threats by the way. In the US criminal threats are a serious crime and rightly so. When someone is really making criminal threats against you just document them well and hand the evidence over to the police. That’s it. But these “journalists” have other intentions. They want to discredit the supporters of certain democratic candidates by generally tainting them as criminals. And that’s just lousy journalism.

    Where are the convictions by the way? These “reporters” make it seem like there are hundreds and hundreds of cases, so where are those cases when you carefully look at it? Where are the investigations, where are the trials, where are the convictions? When you go to the bottom of this, it’s really hard to even find a single trial or a single conviction at all.

    These Trump and Sanders supporters are surely stupid, but oh boy they must be professional hide and seek experts committing criminal threats all the time but somehow always getting away with it – in hundreds of hundreds of cases.

  21. Gravatar of Dan W. Dan W.
    23. October 2016 at 13:26

    Scott,

    You say Trump wants to assassinate family members of terrorists. Yea, that’s bad. But our current (Nobel Peace Prize winning) president, has bombed the homes of suspected terrorists with civilian deaths just the cost of waging peace. Would you label Obama extreme and dangerous? Or is it only extreme because Trump says openly what Obama does privately?

    American government policy is morally bankrupt in so many areas and both Democrats and Republicans are the reason for it. Not Trump. He has yet to enact a single government policy! But he’s evil and the incumbents who are already doing all the things we are warned Trump will do are first in line pointing the finger. I have to admit I am impressed by the chutzpah. It is a great and successful diversion.

    Unlike Harding I’m not pro-Trump. I do not see how anyone wishing for the good of the country can vote for Trump or Hillary. That said if one wants to give the middle finger to the “establishment” there is no better way than to vote Trump. A Trump victory yields the trifecta of disappointment to the Democrats, the Republicans and the Media. And it keeps the Clintons and their corruption out of government, which is for the good of the country.

  22. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    23. October 2016 at 13:33

    Scott,

    I continue by asking, where do you draw the line between beliefs and actions? Thiel made a $1.25 million donation to the Trump campaign. That certainly qualifies as an action to me. Am I wrong to write Facebook and other companies to have him removed from their boards?

    If your answer is yes, then what does Thiel have to do for your answer to be no? Does he have to specifically proclaim he favors purposely killing the relatives of terrorists? Does he have to call for putting Jews in ovens? Again, where do you draw the line?

    I would not personally insult Thiel or wish he be physically assaualted or threatened, and I am not directly insulting Trumpistas here, but I think we need to send a bottom-up message as a society that we will not tolerate the sort of candidate Trump is, nor support of him.

  23. Gravatar of Negation of Ideology Negation of Ideology
    23. October 2016 at 13:45

    This awful behavior is part of the reason Hilary is only down 3 points in Texas:

    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-battleground-tracker-hillary-clinton-leads-florida-donald-trump-narrowly-leads-texas/

    I think she should campaign there down the stretch and make this a true landslide.

  24. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 14:01

    “If you are worried about the Constitution, vote for Johnson.”

    -No. If you’re worried about the Constitution, vote for Trump. If you really despise how Trump supports past violations of the Constitution and want to send a message that you dislike both candidates, but support the Constitution, vote for Castle (Constitution Party). Period. Though it’d be better to vote for Trump to give Clinton a more narrow victory margin.

  25. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 14:02

    People, Clinton isn’t going to win Texas. Probably not Iowa, Arizona, or even Ohio, either. Florida, Nevada, North Carolina, and New Hampshire are more plausible.

  26. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 14:09

    Dan W, great comment.

  27. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    23. October 2016 at 14:12

    Dan W.,

    I don’t favor drone assassination either, but I think it’s important to distinguish between a specific intention to kill the relatives of terrorists and collateral damage.

  28. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 14:52

    https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/26521

    Just sayin’.

  29. Gravatar of Scott H. Scott H.
    23. October 2016 at 15:08

    Imagine if Hillary had only a 17% chance of winning. Trump supporters would be getting capped in the streets. The moral righteousness of good people killing NAZIs can be very strong.

    With Trump having only a 17% chance of winning, Clinton supporters can feel confident they won’t need violence to see their candidate win. Never-the-less, under today’s conditions, if I was worried about my well being I would much sooner walk around with a giant “CLINTON” written on my shirt that a giant “TRUMP”.

  30. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    23. October 2016 at 15:21

    Harding- that’s hilarious!

    Brad DeLong pulling strings with Podesta and Tanden to get a job for his kid. Gotta love ‘merica!

  31. Gravatar of Christian List Christian List
    23. October 2016 at 15:23


    if I was worried about my well being I would much sooner walk around with a giant “CLINTON” written on my shirt that a giant “TRUMP”.

    I agree. Guys like David Henderson wrote that they never actually met a Trump supporter. I think Tyler Cowen wrote something similar, too. I can say the same thing: I never actually met a Trump supporter in real life. In my circles wearing a Clinton shirt is the safest bet you can make by far. It’s actually the only bet, wearing a Trump shirt would mean your sure social death. It would be way easier to get away with a shirt of Che, Castro, Mao and Stalin (all on one shirt) than with a shirt of Trump.

  32. Gravatar of B Cole B Cole
    23. October 2016 at 15:33

    Sad to see such vitriol.

  33. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. October 2016 at 15:37

    @Christian

    “Guys like David Henderson wrote that they never actually met a Trump supporter.”

    -Look at the Virginia Republican primary results in 2000 and 2016. These people would have had a difficult time finding a person who supported GWB over McCain, as well. Of course, McCain was shunned by the GOP establishment at the time, but, like Rubio and Kasich, beloved by the Beltway.

    I actually did meet a Trump primary voter in real life, and a Kasich primary voter who plans to vote for Trump.

  34. Gravatar of Christian List Christian List
    23. October 2016 at 15:56

    @E. Harding
    Your email discovery is really hilarious. All people are equal, but some people are more equal…

    I love how he is phrasing this.

    “I find myself somewhat anxious…”

    “May I beg you to reassure me?”

    There’s another one:


    He has just landed in DC and is looking for a public service/NGO job–ideally in public safety and gun violence prevention. I would greatly appreciate it if you would talk to him, and point him in productive directions…

    Ah those public service/NGO job in DC. You gotta love ’em. And you thought your taxes are being wasted on dubious expenditures and rich professor kids. Think again!

    Now I know why B. is a Keynesian. Digging up a hole and filling it up right away again must be at least as useful.

  35. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. October 2016 at 16:13

    Christian, You said:

    “But these “journalists” have other intentions”

    That you could write this after reading the National Review story is just pathetic.

    Scott, You said:

    “Am I wrong to write Facebook and other companies to have him removed from their boards?”

    Yes, you are acting like those fascists who got the Hollywood Ten boycotted. (BTW, the Hollywood Ten’s political views were far worse than Thiel’s.) I thought you were one of those liberals who opposed McCarthyism. I guess not.

    Everyone, It’s sad how politics blinds so many people, on both the right and the left. This comment section is a new low for my blog. Especially Harding’s claim that French deserved it. Just pathetic. One reason I almost never ban commenters is I want the world to see what politics does to people.

  36. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    23. October 2016 at 17:19

    Scott,

    Welcome to the free market. Anyone who expresses opinions customers don’t like faces market consequences. It’s nothing new, it won’t go away, and in my opinion it’s often positive.

    Are you sad over Trump losing business over his ridiculous behavior? Would you stay at one of his resorts or golf at one of his clubs? What’s the difference with Thiel losing business opportunities over his support of Trump?

    Of course, you didn’t address any of my specific questions to you. You’re not drawing your lines explicitly, perhaps because you’re skirting the tough questions. Is there anything any board member can say to make you think that person shouldn’t serve in such capacity, whose products and services you patronize? What if Thiel personally was inciting violence, which is supposed to be illegal? He’s materially supporting a candidate who has clearly incited violence at some rallies. What’s the difference?

    Save us your false modesty and self-rightiousness and point out some instances occasionally where you’re being unreasonable. Self-examination of your political opinions so far doesn’t seem to be strong suit of yours.

  37. Gravatar of John S John S
    23. October 2016 at 18:06

    Freelander, give it a rest. Your finger-wagging is becoming tiresome. Why don’t you go harass Brad DeLong, who spitefully deletes any comment that ruffles his feathers.

    By your “transitive property of Social Justice,” should ssumner also be fired from his Mercatus position due to his unwillingness to censure Peter Thiel to the degree of your liking?

  38. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    23. October 2016 at 18:42

    John S.,

    If you’ve materially added to this comversation, I’ve missed it. I suggest that if you don’t like my comments, don’t read them.

    Since you choose to read them and comment as you do, I can only guess you’re trying to suppress the expressions of my opinions. This will be for naught. I don’t care what you think.

    I stopped reading DeLong’s blog years ago, due to his general intolerance and immature behavior. Particularly, insulting Sumner and others, while deleting his comments is ridiculous. He’s very childish.

    And no, I don’t think Scott’s opposition to having Thiel sacked warrants his firing. However, I would caution him that there have been academic careers ruined over insults in blog posts and in blog comments sections. I’m thinking particularly of Lubos Motl, who’s very solid on the basis of theoretical physics, but a total savage socially online. Granted, Lubos didn’t have tenure or an endowed chair, but I wonder how Scott would feel if someone offended by his direct personal insults showed up at one of his public events, for example, and confronted him during Q&A. I personally would never take my protests beyond this blog, but there are thousands of readers, so situation as,I described isn’t impossible.

    Much more likely, however, Scott is likely turning off readers of his blog he’d rather not turn off, and who will simply silently walk away. And for what? Scott still hasn’t said why he likes to personally insult people here.

  39. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    23. October 2016 at 18:50

    The DeLong Wikileak deserves mention for this specific line: But I find myself somewhat anxious the somebody already in Washington and with better connections might crowd him out…

    In other words, one of the most connected progressives is worried he isn’t connected enough to get a good job for his kid.

    This is like a signed/sealed/delivered sales pitch for Bernie/Trump: we’ve got a rigged economy.

    I also point out the role technology is playing in society:
    2008 was the year college students became pervasively connected to social media (Hope and Change!)
    2012 a critical mass of educated were on social media (and some had quite successful blogs too)
    2016 even the uneducated mostly have smart phones and social media, enabling political participation…the difference is they have few Ivy League (or K street) connections.

    It’s really unfair to dump on Trump supporters, many of whom are hard working but poorly connected and worry what the world will be like for their kids when one of the most connected progressive bloggers on earth is worried his kid will be crowded out of good jobs by the better connected.

  40. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. October 2016 at 22:40

    Scott, thanks for the mention. I heard this today on the radio and they mentioned an alternative phrase for what I used in your other post. I said “RW-PCism” but they used “Patriotic Correctness” which I thought was pretty good. In particular, it was this guy:

    Alex Nowrasteh, an immigration expert at the CATO Institute, who explains that the central issue in Donald Trump’s candidacy is based on something that isn’t true

    Poor Alex gets hammered in conservative crowds and called a socialist and worse and is accused of all kinds of things just because he tries to tell people the facts about illegal immigration, and they don’t want to hear it.

  41. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. October 2016 at 22:59

    Clinton uses the more Naziesque language toward Russia.

    How would you describe Reagan’s “evil empire” statement? How about the language of Truman, Eisenhower, Churchill and Kennedy?

  42. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. October 2016 at 23:05

    … I recall that the Nazis wanted to invade the USSR/Russia, enslave and/or kill and/or exile all the people, and take all the land as part of the Lebesraum policy. I don’t recall Clinton (either one), Reagan, Truman, Eisenhower etc mentioning anything like that.

  43. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. October 2016 at 23:50

    Scott, when Harding writes:

    -Nope. Breitbart is alt-lite, not alt-right.

    He’s actually right about that. Here’s the real Alt-Right:
    http://theamericanvolk.ghost.io/2016/08/31/the-four-pillars-of-the-alt-right/
    Personally I think they should add a fifth “pillar” of their “movement:” Mom’s basement!

    ?

  44. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. October 2016 at 00:19

    … BTW, out of morbid curiosity I followed that particular alt-Right writer (NationalistHero) on twitter. He had a big following and was extremely anti alt-lite (Breitbart & Milo Yiannopoulos). I guess he didn’t like the face Milo put on their movement, going so far as to savage Richard B. Spencer on a daily basis for not identifying Milo as a terrible threat to their movement (because Milo is gay and Jewish I guess). Then one day, about a month back, NationalistHero announced he was addicted to gay porn, was going to “get back to God” and deleted his account. You can’t make this stuff up!!

    So I guess until he overcomes his … ah… problems, I’ll continue to think of this as the face of the Alt-Right.

  45. Gravatar of Student Student
    24. October 2016 at 06:13

    Couple of comments:

    Hardin is crazier than I realized. Calling him a Nazi isn’t an insult it’s the truth. Clinton is being naziesque by criticizing a thuggish regime that represses any dissent and cares only about enriching his inner circle at the expense of everyone else, that represses the press, arrests dissenters… Anyone that isn’t critizing Russia these days is clearly an enemy of freedom.

    I don’t think Sumner is turning of readers by these posts. Based on the number of comments id bet they draw in readers.

    Lastly, the fact that places like Texas and Arizona are within the margin of error while PA and VA are not is unbelievable. Trump is the worst thing to happen to the GOP since watergate (setting aside the fact that trumps working with the Russians to steal campaign information is the same thing).

    How many of the other GOP candidates would have lost to Clinton? Maybe Cruz? Maybe…

  46. Gravatar of Acebojangles Acebojangles
    24. October 2016 at 06:36

    I don’t think that most Trump supporters are alt-right jerks, but what should we make of the fact that 30-something percent of Americans will support Trump even now?

    I have a similar thought about the complaints that, while Trump actually is a xenophobic sexist, the media has unfairly criticized previous Republican candidates as xenophobic sexists. I think it’s true to an extent, but I also think that the 30-something percent of voters who still support Trump were voting Republican in the past few cycles, too. Were they only motivated by “economic anxiety” back then?

  47. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. October 2016 at 06:46

    How many of the other GOP candidates would have lost to Clinton? Maybe Cruz? Maybe…

    I’m thinking Ben Carson is a possibility too.

  48. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    24. October 2016 at 07:17

    When did “alt-right” become code for “4chan morons, stormfront, and anyone else I don’t like, like brietbart, who are clearly all the exact same thing”

  49. Gravatar of Cliff Cliff
    24. October 2016 at 08:02

    Over the last few months the progs have started a campaign to smear anyone outside the Republican establishment as a racist idiot. It’s working. Now, as you say, anyone who identifies by any conservative or right-wing label is automatically a stormfront member and neo-nazi

  50. Gravatar of XVO XVO
    24. October 2016 at 08:03

    @Student

    “(setting aside the fact that trumps working with the Russians to steal campaign information is the same thing)”

    If something like this came out of the mouth of a Trump supporter it would be called a conspiracy theory. No evidence at all, and you call it a fact.

  51. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    24. October 2016 at 08:39

    @Cliff

    Yup. It’s like 4chan has developed this horrible symbiotic relationship with people like Hillary Clinton, the National Review, feminists, etc. Hillary et al get a very handy new label to tar anyone they don’t like with and make them toxic by association. National Review, Jezebel et al get to write Very Serious Articles about the Scourge of Online Harassment, and 4chan gets to watch Hillary talk about Pepe the frog and collect epic lulz. Everybody wins!

  52. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    24. October 2016 at 08:48

    Scott, You said:

    “Granted, Lubos didn’t have tenure or an endowed chair”

    I don’t have tenure either.

    And if I get fired, that’s fine with me. I’ll go somewhere I’m wanted.

  53. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. October 2016 at 09:02

    @Lawrence D’Anna, you write:

    When did “alt-right” become code for “4chan morons, stormfront, and anyone else I don’t like, like brietbart, who are clearly all the exact same thing”

    For example, from RedState writer Caleb Howe
    http://www.redstate.com/absentee/2016/08/26/trump-camp-pretends-theyre-unfamiliar-alt-right/
    From Howe, quoting Posner quoting Trump’s current campaign CEO Stephen Bannon regarding his previous employer Breitbart

    “We’re the platform for the alt-right,” Bannon told me proudly when I interviewed him at the Republican National Convention (RNC) in July.

    Also from Ben Shapiro, former editor-at-large of Breitbart
    https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ben+shapiro+on+alt+right
    But Wikipedia attributes the origin of the term to white nationalist/supremacist Richard B. Spencer:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alt-right
    And now Breitbart’s Milo Yiannopoulos is looking to buy 4chan?
    [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/milo-yiannopoulos-eyeing-bid-4chan-936596]
    I’m sure that infuriates some self described alts currently residing in mom’s basement.

  54. Gravatar of Student Student
    24. October 2016 at 09:26

    1.) DNC hacks used malware and methods identical to those used in other attacks attributed to Russian hacking groups.

    2.) There was an identical command-and-control address hardcoded into the DNC malware that was also found on malware used to hack the German Parliament in 2015. According to German security officials, the malware originated from Russian military intelligence. An identical SSL certificate was also found in both breaches.

    3.) Traces of metadata in the document dump reveal various indications that they were translated into Cyrillic.

    The slim URLs used to obtain Podesta’s passwords were created by one of the Bit.ly accounts belonging to a Russian hacker group. These folks slipped up and forgot to make two of them private. That allowed the security gurus to decode the automatically created URL and they found that each contained the target’s email address.

    By decoding each Bit.ly link created by the accounts, they found a list of targets, giving the firm a macro view of the group’s extensive and varied spear-phishing campaigns, which included addresses in Ukraine, the Baltics, the United States, China, and Iran…

    5.) Paul Manafort, formerly worked as an advisor to Viktor Yanukovych, the Russian-backed President of Ukraine before he was ousted in 2014.

    6.) Donald Trump invited Russia to retrieve “missing” emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign and release them.

    7.) Trump Jr. has stated that Russian money was pouring into Trump investments.

    I admit I exaggerated when implying there was hard evidence linking Trump working with the Russians directly.

    However, it is unprecedented that an american politician would actively seek a foreign governments direct intervention in a presidential campaign. It is also certain they share common interests.

    So while I admit to taking it to far, it’s nothing like saying cruz’s father was involved in the JFK assassination or that Obama is Kenyan, or that their is wide spread voting fraud.

    These things are not the same.

  55. Gravatar of Student Student
    24. October 2016 at 09:28

    Forgot to number four:

    4.) The slim…

  56. Gravatar of Carl Carl
    24. October 2016 at 09:29

    Scott Freelander:
    I don’t want the market to become the continuation of politics by other means.

  57. Gravatar of L D L D
    24. October 2016 at 10:28

    @Tom Brown


    OK, so your contention is that the “alt-right” is basically the Trump-Brietbart camp? That’s kind of weird because I thought the central example of an alt-righter were bookish neoreactionary weirdos like Curtis Yarvin and Nick Land. But OK, I take your point that they’re claiming the label, so lets let them have it.

    
But why are you insisting Brietbart is the same is 4chan is the same as neo-nazis? OK, they have a common set of enemies, but they’re not the same thing at all.

    
Brietbart is a sleazy political tabloid. It’s like a rightwing Gawker.

    
4chan is a nihlistic mob of trolls who just want to get a reaction. Any reaction. They generate the lions share of the online harassment. 4chan cares about nothing but lulz.

    
Neo-nazis do care about things. They care about being really racist and anti-semitic and “white genocide” and whatever other hate and conspiracy crap they can get their hands on.

    
My point is there’s no unifying ideology there. Nothing even sort of like one. It’s just a coalition with a common enemy in the form of Hillary, feminism/social justice, and movement conservatism.

    
It is just far too convenient for Hillary and National Review to get to use “alt-right” to identify anything that’s right-wing that they don’t like with “nazis” Their argument is literally “Trump supporters are awful because they’re nazis, see look at what these 4channers did”.

    OK yes Trump supporters are awful but also your argument is invalid.

    The existence of online harassment is a bad argument against Trumpism in the same way that the existence of riots is a bad argument against BLM and the existence of terrorism is a bad argument against Islam. Yes, [bad behavior] reflects poorly on [broad group], and yes, [other side] isn’t doing [bad behavior], and yes [bad behavior] grows out of some version of [broad group]’s ideology, but in the end the behavior of the most deplorable subgroup of a broad group is not determinative of how we should think of the group as a whole.

    Trumpism is wrong primarily because Trump is a ignorant charlatan and his core message is intolerant, anti-trade, anti-immagrint, and nationalistic, not because 4channers like him.

  58. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. October 2016 at 11:54

    L D,

    I don’t disagree with any of that. I’d only say that I think you’re reading more into my comments than I was actually saying. I think you’re precisely correct, alt-right is a label they’ve chosen for themselves, and I think it will turn out to have been a really stupid move on their part, precisely because of what you mention. Like I pointed out the basement dwellers are horrified that Breitbart, Milo, “AltJews” and Alex Jones (and his side kick Paul Joseph Watson) are saying they’re AltRight. That’s why the Daily Stormer’s Anglin thinks Milo et al are the greatest threats out there. Anglin too went after Spencer because he wasn’t PC enough (PC = “Patriotically Correct” here).

    I certainly don’t think they’re all the same. They hate each other. But that doesn’t explain why Trump didn’t immediately and unequivocally condemn and reject the support of David Duke etc. Why did he hire Bannon? Manafort? Why did Bannon *choose* to associate himself with the AltRight? They didn’t have to go that route, and now IMO it’s coming back to bite them. I’m happy it is. I don’t think it’s because Trump is a secret Nazi. I think it’s because he’s obviously a dope who’ll never bite the hand of someone who praises him because, as Pepe would say, “it feels good.” At least not until he sees what he thinks is a better way to get his ego stroked. But he’s also a scorpion. It’s his nature. I’d guess that if he were to win he’d massively disappoint everybody he sold something to (i.e. his supporters) in accordance with his life long pattern of doing so. He’s not an ideologue, he’s a BS artist and flim flam man. You have to be really really desperate to talk yourself into trusting him.

    I hope he does get a bunch of his supporters to invest in a new media company and that he ends up fucking them all over. It’s the nature of scorpions to do so.

  59. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    24. October 2016 at 12:10

    @Tom Brown

    Well said!

  60. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    24. October 2016 at 14:19

    And the Hobbesian downward spiral continues …

    Scott: thanks for the kind words. (I have various half written posts on my blog on variations on just that subject, partly because events keep suggesting things to me and partly because I have a book contract.)

  61. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    24. October 2016 at 15:08

    I didn’t have an opinion on whether Trump was actually racist when his campaign began, versus merely pretending, but I do think he’s a racist now. Given the stories that’ve come up, like being sued twice by the government for refusing to rent to black people, his father’s participation in a riot on the side of the KKK, numerous stories ex-employees and others have told, and the sum of his conduct in the race make me think he’s actually racist.

  62. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    24. October 2016 at 15:19

    Carl,

    Trumpism went far beyond politics the day he started his campaign and was calling Mexican immigrants rapists. Only idiots and the like-minded would associate with him after that. Some of you live in a fantasy world, truly.

    Thiel is a smart guy, but he’s really, really stupid on Trump. That $1.25 million is certinly not going to help Trump win, and has ruined Thiel’s reputation. Fortunately, many now wouldn’t piss on him if he were on fire. He deserves every negative business consequence he gets, and much, much more.

    Why should Thiel have more protection than the average employee in this country? I wonder how many of you with jobs would walk around work, telling people you support Trump and donated to his campaign. You get written up, if not fired in many places just for bringing up politics in the workplace. We all know how divisive and disruptive it can be, even sans a candidate like Trump.

  63. Gravatar of Bob OBrien Bob OBrien
    24. October 2016 at 20:47

    There are fringe people on the left and on the right who do very destructive things. I happen to believe there are more on the left but I have not seen any good research on this so I could be wrong.

    WILLIAM SAFIRE was right when he said Hillary is a congenital liar and Bill Clinton is most likely a rapist. Donald Trump is a bit nuts. From a personality standpoint, when considering Hillary vs Trump for president,I happen to think Hillary is worse then Trump but I could be wrong here also.

    Since it is a crap shoot from a personality standpoint regarding whether Hillary or Trump will be a better president, I think it prudent to look at the policies they and the Democrats and Republicans are pushing and decide which is best from this. Here I have to give the Trump side a 6 and the Hillary side a 2 on a scale where 10 is the best.

    Maybe Scott has a post that covers the policy comparisons between Hillary and Trump but I have not seen it and I read most of his posts. A policy comparison would make a much better post than this post on the fringe people.

  64. Gravatar of Carl Carl
    24. October 2016 at 20:49

    Scott Freelander:
    Sorry it took me so long to respond. I was engrossed in “The Art of the Deal”…

    It is far better to be able to live around, work with, and trade civilly with people with whom we disagree politically than to have a system that readily satisfies our desire for economic revenge against our political adversaries.

    By the way, I’m voting for Johnson. And a key reason I am doing so is that he is the most civil candidate in his beliefs and his behavior.

  65. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    24. October 2016 at 21:49

    @Bob OBrien

    I was with you with the “I don’t know which one is worse”. I really bought into the Scott Adams theory that Trump was some kind of genius salesman/conman/performance artist, that everything he did was an act to troll the media and get attention. So I said “It’s a choice between a total wildcard and Hillary. Hillary is awful, so maybe the wildcard is better. Maybe not.”

    But then I watched the debates.

    Trump’s performance in the debates was abysmal. It was abysmal in a way that is totally incompatible with the Scott Adams theory. He was petulant and bitchy and out of control of his own actions. He repeatedly spoke out of anger, in ways that were guaranteed to make him look bad, in the most important hours of his campaign.

    He’s not a genius salesman, he’s not a brilliant actor, he’s just a conman with an ego the size of a neutron star that’s riding a wave of disaffection and populist rage that he didn’t create. His insane personality isn’t an act, it’s how he really is.

    He cannot be president.

    If you live in a swing state, please, hold your nose and vote Hillary.

  66. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    24. October 2016 at 22:12

    Carl,

    Johnson seems like a decent, honest person and maybe he was a good governor. I’m not familiar with his New Mexico record.

    But, he doesn’t seem to know the first thing about foreign policy. I think US rivals would eat his lunch. I don’t think non-interventionism is realistic for the US.

  67. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. October 2016 at 23:13

    A few more interesting links.

    1. Politico writer Hadas Gold broke this story:
    http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2016/10/breitbart-liberal-activist-230255

    2. Which led to this:
    http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/jewish-reporter-targeted-with-anti-semitism-by-trump-backer/

    3. Which in turn resulted in this article which is relevant to the topic at hand:
    http://theresurgent.com/stop-letting-racists-jew-haters-masquerade-under-term-alt-right/

  68. Gravatar of Carl Carl
    24. October 2016 at 23:50

    Scott Freelander:
    Johnson is admittedly bad at remembering the names of foreign places and people. That said, I think he’s less likely to have his lunch eaten than either Clinton or Trump for the simple reason that he has clearer principles. It’s damn hard to figure out what principles animate Trump and Clinton’s foreign policies, at least what beneficial principles animate them.

  69. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. October 2016 at 05:55

    Bob, You said:

    “Maybe Scott has a post that covers the policy comparisons between Hillary and Trump but I have not seen it and I read most of his posts. A policy comparison would make a much better post than this post on the fringe people.”

    I’ve done many posts explaining why it’s pointless to look at Trump’s policy positions. He’s been on both sides of almost every single issue, often within a week. He still does not have a tax plan for the voters, two weeks before the election. His advisors admitted they screwed up the last tax proposal, and promised a new one. Where is it? Hillary does have a tax proposal. What’s Trump’s proposed tax rate on pass through entities?

    Before he ran for President he was a pro-partial birth abortion, pro-Iraq war guy who said Hillary and Bill were great people and Bill was a great president and Hillary was a great senator and a great person. That’s what he said when he was free to speak his mind, and did not have to worry about attracting GOP voters. And you want his “policy positions”? Why?

    Recently he said he favored even freer trade than Obama. Is that the sort of “policy position” you had in mind?

  70. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. October 2016 at 05:57

    Bob, Step one is to ask whether each candidate is qualified to be president. Hillary is and Trump is not.

    In that case there is no step two. Trump doesn’t get over the minimum hurdle of being competent to have his finger on the nuclear trigger. He’s mentally unstable. End of discussion.

  71. Gravatar of Bob OBrien Bob OBrien
    25. October 2016 at 09:59

    Scott, Many of my family agrees with you but I do not. I find Hillary more unqualified than Trump. Trump is bad but “mentally unstable”, I have not seen any evidence of this. More important to me is the likely direction each will take the country and here I think Trump is a relatively better choice.

  72. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    25. October 2016 at 12:59

    He’s not “unstable” in the sense of being mentally ill, at least as far as I know.

    But he is an arrogant, impulsive fool with poor impulse control who is likely to substitute his own quick judgments over experts, without bothering to even hear them out or carefully consider their advice. He is likely to pick advisors based on loyalty rather than merit. He is generally over-aggressive in everything he does. This is not the man I want with the nuclear codes.

  73. Gravatar of Bob OBrien Bob OBrien
    25. October 2016 at 15:24

    Lawrence,

    Trump does not seem to me to be a risk with the nuclear codes. He claims to have been against the Iraq war. Maybe he was just neutral. He does not seem to want to confront the Russians. These are not militaristic or agressive positions.

    He did not build a successful company by picking advisors based on loyalty alone. I cannot say this about Hillary. Rudy Giuliani, Chris Christie, Mike Pence, Kelly Conway, Ben Carson, these folks have merit in my book.

  74. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    25. October 2016 at 15:37

    @Lawrence,

    His insane personality isn’t an act, it’s how he really is.

    You might like this from TheResurgent’s Steve Berman. I asked Steve when he changed his mind, and like you, he said it was the debates that settled it for him.

  75. Gravatar of Lawrence D’Anna Lawrence D'Anna
    25. October 2016 at 16:41

    @Tom Brown

    great link.

    “Trump lacks the self-control to become “so presidential you people will be so bored.” He is incapable of doing it. As in “cannot.” No amount of coaching, prompting, begging, teleprompters, speech writers, or threats can make him do it, because he cannot”

    exactly ??

    He could not hold it together and act like an adult for a couple hours on TV when everyone was watching and he knew his best chance was to just convince them he’s sane. The fact that he was incapable of doing that is more telling than everything else. It’s even more telling than “grab them by the pussy”. Any lingering Trump support I had absolutely evaporated after the debates.

  76. Gravatar of Postkey Postkey
    26. October 2016 at 00:56

    Someone who was murdered.

    “27-Year-Old DNC Staffer Seth Rich Shot, Killed in Northwest DC”

    http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Man-Shot-Killed-in-Northwest-DC-386316391.html

  77. Gravatar of Scott Sumner Scott Sumner
    26. October 2016 at 09:01

    Bob, You said:

    “I have not seen any evidence of this.”

    ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????

  78. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    26. October 2016 at 18:39

    Carl,

    It’s wrong to think about Hillary Clinton in terms of principles or hawkishness versus dovishness. Was Churchill a hawk, because he wanted to go to war against Hitler earlier to prevent the larger war? Or was he merely defensive?

    The question is about competence and paradigms. Clinton is the only candidate with foreign policy experience. She also seems to follow the neo-realist paradigm, even if not formally. Her decision-making hasn’t been the best, but at least it isn’t out of paradigm.

    Johnson, Trump, and Stein show no evidence of understanding any IR paradigms. Non-interventionism isn’t a paradigm. It’s a stance. Whether it’s a correct stance depends entirely on the circumstances.

    Clinton seems to be the only candidate who understands there is a competition for shaping the world in terms of interests, and that the US has to play an active role in shaping it toward our interests, and generally toward the interests of freer commerce. Neo-realists, among other things, often recognize that balances of power matter.

    While Clinton voted to seriously disrupt the balance of power in the middle east by supporting the Iraq war, she at least seems to understand that the best we can do now is try to help establish a new balance of power in the interest of regional and even global stability. The instability in the middle east has spilled over into the EU in the form of a refugee crisis.

    Russia has considerable interest in pressing for gains for their client Assad, while helping to feed a refugee crisis that threatens to tear the EU apart, establishing themselves as a player in the middle east to help them encourage OPEC reduced oil supplies, and while, of course defending their naval base there in Syria. Russia also has an interest in triangulating with us against Iran, to prevent a deeper alliance, in addition to trying to separate us from the Saudis, while triangulating with China to disrupt our ability to balance power in Europe, Asia, and the middle east.

    It doesn’t seem many people connect the dots. Putin has a very integrated strategy to divide and conquer in three major regions of the world.

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