Carpool Conversation: Episode 11 Hobby Lobby, Border Chaos, and Movies! #Podcast

This is what happens to the plot.

We've invested in some equipment! Part 1 sounds better, part 2 is getting close to sounding like we actually know what we're doing! (We don't.) We talk about the border chaos, the hobby lobby decision, and Begin Again! Oh and Transformers 4. Mark may kill himself. Enjoy!

Liberal Education: Searching for Problems Where None Exist and Equipping Our Youth For Nothing Productive

From Taki:

Arizona State University, perennial favorite for “nation’s least prestigious school,” is showing America why: students can now earn extra credit in a Women and Gender Studies class for being female and not shaving their armpits. One student—whose parents no doubt consider this either $6,000 (in-state tuition) or $10,000 (if she’s out of state) a year well spent—called her 10 weeks of stubble cultivation a “life-changing experience.” 

...

Women in the less-civilized parts of the world who are forbidden to learn to read or visit the doctor are no doubt emboldened by this simple act of solidarity.

I've always been amused by the liberal idea that a problem exists and must be fixed because Fuck you, that's why. In a country where women have pretty much limitless choices and a culture that is far more accepting of a woman making choices to work or not work or do whatever addle-brained thing comes into her head (such as teaching a gender studies course involving not shaving) than a man who decides to stay at home.

Nevermind those other countries who put their women in hefty bags in the name of some cult-religion that encourages fashion choices combined with high-explosives. Never mind all that. It's America that's oppressive. Oppressive enough that you had to, freely and without fear of reprisal, form a victim/complaint group:

The instructor, Professor Breanne Fahs, doubles as the director of the Feminist Research on Gender and Sexuality Group, or FROGS, an act of not-so-subtle irony or a total inability to sense such. She’s currently hard at work promoting her biography of Valerie Solanas, the insane woman who wrote a book called the S.C.U.M. Manifesto (S.C.U.M. stands for “Society for Cutting Up Men”) and later shot Andy Warhol, causing injuries that almost killed him and would haunt him for life. And don’t forget to check out the FROGS website for a link to an Etsy store selling vulgar apparel promoting something called “menstrual activism,” which apparently involves wearing the crimson curse as lipstick. 

Seriously, we make up problems for ourselves in this country. This article's focus is how education is failing by replacing subjects like Western Literature with Menstrual Studies but I think it's deeper than that. Sure the education system is failing, it's failing because it encourages the young skulls to naval gaze like never before.

And with that, they find all kinds of problems in said naval, and these problems are of dire importance. If they ever looked up, they'd see real problems but that would involve thinking about someone other than themselves. So after 40-60 years, stupid students get stupider, become professors like Breanne Fahs, and even less knowledge is passed down that is actually useful. In the meantime we've got new generations to search ever so desperately for dire problems that are only dire if you live in a self imposed, narcissistic bubble.

Idiocracy is not as far off as you think.

Anthony of Opie and Anthony: Racist. Why? Because Words and Stuff

Anthony Cumia was fired for words and getting beat up. Here's how it went down:

Anthony Cumia gets attacked all the time: Most often for telling the truth about black crime and violence that is stratospherically out of proportion. And how reporters condone it.

On Thursday night, July 3, his bosses at Sirius XM radio fired him for it.

“The decision was made, and Cumia informed, late Thursday, July 3, after careful consideration of his racially charged and hate-filled remarks on social media,” said the suits at Sirius. “Those remarks and postings are abhorrent to SiriusXM, and his behavior is wholly inconsistent with what SiriusXM represents.”

Cumia was typically defiant: “Sirius decided to cave and fire me,” he told his fans in a Tweet. “Welcome to bizarro world. Fired for (something) that wasn't even on the air & wasn't illegal.”

So what happened? 

Cumia says he was out taking pictures—he’s allegedly a photography geek—when he captured a shot of the woman walking under the scaffolding. She’s framed almost in the center of the photo, so it would seem that she didn't accidentally wind up in the shot.

According to Cumia, the woman saw him snap the photo, indignantly stomped up to him, called him a “white motherfucker,” and belted him in the face. On Twitter shortly after the incident, Cumia wrote that he replied by calling her a “&$;;-:”—since it’s six characters and the middle two characters are repeated, I’m going to way out on the banana-tree limb and assume he means “nigger”—whereupon she punched him five more times. Cumia says that about five black males then started hassling him.

He seems to have extricated himself from the situation without any significant loss of blood, at which point he went into full-on Charles Bronson/Clint Eastwood/Travis Bickle mode in the middle of the night on Twitter:

It’s really open season on white people in this day and age. No recourse. Fight back and you’re a racist. The predators know this. Good luck….They run things now. We’re done….There’s a deep seeded [sic] problem with violence in the black community. Try to address it and you’ll be exiled to racistville. But it’s real.

We'll assume the accounts are true. If so, then didn't she start in on the racism? I won't condone Anthony fighting fire with fire, so to speak, but in an emotionally charged situation, stupid things are said. He however was physically attacked. For his words.

From Taki:

...in modern America, it’s considered worse for white people to say or think bad things about blacks than it is for blacks to physically assault whites. 

Indeed. We have seen time and time again that any criticism of the Obama administration is considered racism. Criticize your average non-presidential black person will get you violence in return. Anthony's fault, apparently. He had it coming.

He's a shock jock but he has to watch what he says. I'm all for making better choices in your words and being held responsible for what you say. Sirius can do what they want. But no standard is set for the other side. Blacks regularly defame whites with impunity and none are held to the same standard. So that begs the question, if the media lets blacks get away with bad behavior that whites can't, what does that say about the media's attitude towards blacks? Are they saying that they aren't capable of the same civilized behavior that we hold whites to?

Who's racist again?

#Podcast Announcement For Carpool Conversations

We probably won't get one up this week due to the holiday. However I do have new studio-quality sound equipment on the way so we stop sounding like we are using tin-cans and string. We should resume by July 13. Stay tuned!

Normal People: But Why Is Rush Limbaugh So Wrong With His Comments? HuffPo: Because, duh.

No explanation needed apparently. He's Rush Limbaugh, that's all you need to know, mouth-breather.

Rush Limbaugh—apparently not content with having caused the Sandra Fluke firestorm—waded into the birth control debate once more on his Wednesday show. This time, the subject was the Supreme Court's recent ruling in the so-called Hobby Lobby case.

The Court said that Hobby Lobby and other "closely held" companies cannot be required to cover birth control for their employees. Limbaugh, who supported the decision, said that the issue should have never been up for debate in the first place.

Ok, he must've said something really, really, REALLY bad.

On Wednesday, the radio host weighed in again. He said one listener called him to point out that the federal government does not require employers to cover eye exams or dental work.

"Which is worse, to go blind from lack of regular eye exams or to get pregnant? And again, pregnancy is something you have to do to cause," Limbaugh said. "It doesn't just happen to you while you're walking down the street except in the case of sexual abuse."

He claimed that women treat pregnancy "like a disease" even though it is the consequence of their actions. "And yet, they wouldn't have the problem if they didn't do a certain thing," he said. "It's that simple."

Um, ok. So really? Where's the controversy? They don't treat pregnancy like a disease? I would expand the term "women" to "Liberal women." Actually, just "liberals" treat pregnancy as a disease. I point to Mr. Fingernail as an example.

 His comments come as no surprise considering the infamous remarks he has made about birth control in the past. In 2012, Limbaugh created a firestorm when he called Fluke — then a law student who had testified at a Democratic hearing about the need for birth control — a "slut" and a "prostitute."

That's not quite what he said. At the very least, there was a point he was trying to make, though you can decide whether or not the point was successfully made. The quotes:

"What does that make her?" he asks. "It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She's having so much sex she can't afford contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex."

And

“What does it say about the college co-ed Susan Fluke [sic] who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex — what does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute."

Now we can argue the success of the validity of the point. Personally I think he's not that far off but there is more there. Using the state to get what you want and making others pay for it? We can attribute that to welfare as well, doesn't make them sluts. But the HuffPo presents it like Rush just said something like:

"That slut Sandra Fluke is testifying before congress."

The reason why there was such a firestorm is that the point isn't really that far off. If you are making others pay for you to have all the sex you want, well at the very least it should raise an eyebrow on your behavior.

But we don't want to actually argue the points, we just want to shout people down, demonize them, discredit them, and basically dismiss the person without actually addressing any points. They don't really rebuke his point, just flat out state he's wrong like it's just self-evident. It's more typical hack reporting that I've come to expect from the Huffington Post.

The Left's Nuance Strikes Again

So in the wake of the Hobby Lobby decision to allow companies to decide whether or not they are going to provide insurance coverage to cover abortifacients.

(Not contraceptives by the way. And they still can pay for your abortions, it's called your paycheck.)

Needless to say, this has some of the stupidest arguments I've ever seen. At some point it gets back to how fetus and embryos are not alive or something. One in particular caught my eye. It starts with Sean Davis letting them have it:

You're welcome to argue that human life doesn't begin with a fertilized egg so long as you don't also argue that you understand science.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) June 30, 2014

Which leads to this piece of driftwood forming a tweet:

@seanmdav @EWErickson It isn't anymore than a fingernail is alive on its own.
— Andy Caldwell (@AndyCaldwell_2) June 30, 2014

I had to get in on this.

@AndyCaldwell_2 @seanmdav @EWErickson Aren't fingernails and human embryos different?
— Conservative Yoda (@YodaCon) July 1, 2014

@YodaCon In terms of being alive on there own, no.
— Andy Caldwell (@AndyCaldwell_2) July 1, 2014

Ok, that is the narrowest definition of comparison you could make. Why? So you can get what you want, which is unlimited abortions.

Fingernails = Not Alive on their own
Embryos = Not Alive on their own.
Therefore
Fingernails = Embryos.

This is silliness to the ultimate degree. And I told him so:

@AndyCaldwell_2 Well I guess if we define it by the most narrowest of parameters, then sure. So much for the "nuanced" party. @seanmdav
— Conservative Yoda (@YodaCon) July 1, 2014

But we're dealing with driftwood here.

@YodaCon @seanmdav Ok? So are you agreeing with me?
— Andy Caldwell (@AndyCaldwell_2) July 1, 2014

No. But I'm beginning to think you are the fingernail that we're talking about. Fortunately Sean helps me out and I thank him.

@AndyCaldwell_2 @YodaCon You compared a baby to a fingernail. Nobody is agreeing with you. We are mocking you. Quite openly, as it were.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) July 1, 2014

Well it went on from there but you get the idea. Narrow your argument down to something inconsequential and meaningless and then hang yourself with it. Fingernails are not embryos. He wants us to try to put a fingernail clipping at the same worth as the embryo and they are not. Gold and Mercury are both elements and in a way are far less complex and far more alike than an embryo and a fingernail. Hell they are only one proton off. But Gold and Mercury are vastly different in their properties, their worth, and their effect on a human being. We don't elevate a fingernail to that of an embryo but he degrades an embryo to that of a fingernail.

An embryo's effect on a human being is vastly different than a fingernail's. Only a liberal couldn't see that.

Gary Oldman: Perfectly Ordinary Dude

He's pissed off the various Leagues, Organizations, and Associations which pretty much makes him a normal guy. Oh and he's about the best actor of our generation. But they were able to get him to do the apology thing which is too bad because he didn't really say anything that outrageous. 

By now we all know the (Chinese fire) drill: famous person says something “politically incorrect”; ordinary folks embrace him as a long-awaited prophet, while Big Gay and/or other “community leaders” condemn him; famous person (usually) issues groveling apology, leaving defenders looking and feeling like morons.

These causes celebrities are the Easter narratives of our times, except played in reverse and with (somewhat incredibly) way more swearing and whining. In point of fact, the stupidest thing Oldman said was “I’m deeply sorry,” during a quivering amends-making turn on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

A careful reading of his entire interview reveals a 56-year-old man who’s plumb disgusted with pretty much everybody, from parents and TV producers to the papacy (“Fuck the pope”).

Oldman comes across as “an eminently reasonable man”’ with a “solid perspective on life.” That’s according to a Jewish acquaintance of mine who, yes, worked in Hollywood for years. The “Official Jews” of the Anti-Defamation League, my pal added, were the real villains, drooling “over the chance to force a celebrity into obeisance to them.”

By the way, how come words from an actor elicit more outrage from the Anti-Defamation League than say.. the 3 kidnapped teens in Israel that were murdered? Just wondering.

I've been an Oldman fan for a while but I was somewhat surprised to hear his comments. Not unwelcome, mind you, and good to see a little common sense coming out of an actor instead of the typical empty headed liberalism. And since he isn't an empty headed liberal and has crossed whatever line that guys like Bill Maher or Shia LaBeaf haven't, he's being vilified. Because of reasons. Weepy apologies are necessary. Penance must be exacted to the church of liberalism.

Ironically, Oldman’s remarks regarding Gibson and Baldwin concerned the arbitrary nature of these all-too-frequent post-modern Salems. Why, Oldman wondered, isn’t Bill Maher fired after joking about Hollywood lesbians, while Baldwin loses his MSNBC gig for calling an aggressive photographer a “fag”?

Why indeed? As the Oldman kerfuffle simmered, the increasingly unhinged Shia LaBeouf wound down an evening of misadventure by referring to his arresting officer as a “fag.” The reaction? Arbiter of cool Lena Dunham tweaked the flaky actor on Twitter, but didn’t call out his “homophobia.” (Dunham added with palpable glee that she was “sorry to contribute to celebrity takedown culture but this is the best current event we have!”)

However, just weeks ago, comic actor Jonah Hill yelled “faggot” at a troublesome pap, and was promptly obligated to perform public penance on two different shows. Jezebel.com approvingly deemed Hill’s weepy histrionics “perfect.”

Seriously, take a look at what the left is: a cult. You cannot leave. You will be forcibly returned to the fold if you stray through personal destruction. Some will even call for violence against you if you don't pay proper penance. If you do pay penance, it must be in the cathedral of Oprah or E! or one of the various media denominations.

Free speech? Fuck off. Pay your penance. Bow to our definition of speech. Don't have opinions that vary from what say they should be.