If history makes people, we’d see a genuinely conservative candidate emerge in 2012, right?  Because conditions for his election are there: a weak incumbent, a restless base and a country ready for change.  While we have a few promising conservatives waiting down the line — I’m thinking Rubio and Ryan — they are not ready quite yet.  Rich Perry made a mess of his campaign — better luck next time.

Here is King Shamus on not having a Ronald Reagan this time around:

I know that there are no Republicans running for President in 2012 who are even in the same galaxy as President Reagan.  Ronaldus Ultra Magnus has been called a once-in-a-lifetime politician.  Modern conservatives are starting to see just how painfully singular Reagan really was in America’s history.

But would Ronnie want us to just let Barack Obama win this election and drag the country even further into a statist death-hole?  No.  Reagan would tell us to do the right thing and vote for the most conservative candidate who can win.  Emphasis on ‘vote’.

Also remember Operation Counterweight to keep the next White House occupant in check.

But if the current lack of convincing conservative leadership illustrates the importance of personality in history, it can be a cause for optimism.  Someday soon we  will have a leader like Reagan again.  Lets not screw things up in the meantime.

There are only two groups that are beating the drums for war in The Middle East – the Israeli Defense Ministry and its amen corner in the United States.

Also that:

The civilized world must win this fight,’ the editors thunder. But, if it comes to war, it will not be the ‘civilized world’ humping up that bloody road to Baghdad; it will be American kids with names like McAllister, Murphy, Gonzales, and Leroy Brown.

Blacks, Hispanics, Pat Buchanan has your back — at least when it comes to Jews.

I’m not sure why any of it should had come as a surprise.  In the ’80s and early ’90s Buchanan wrote a total of 9 columns defending John Demjanjuk — and that’s not counting other Nazi war criminals.  These columns included everything from accusing the Holocaust victims of mass hysteria to Holocaust revisionism.  In 2009 Buchanan outdid himself in a  Human Events column (reprinted by Ron Paul’s buddy Lew Rockwell, among other people) that compared Demjanjuk to Jesus.  Not a surprise either, considering that by then the distinguished paleocon was hosting Holocaust deniers at his website and wrote a book about the, you know, peaceful Hitler.

But I digress.  In 1991 William F. Buckley castigated Buchanan, and although the commentator amassed 3 million votes in his 1992 Presidential run, he fell out of favor thereafter.  During the events leading up to Golf War 2 Buchanan became the “conservative” amen corner of the liberal media.  Back then my gentile co-workers gushed over his “anti-war” editorial for the New York Times as my pacifist Jewish co-workers gulped.  Ten years ago conservatives didn’t consider Buchanan one of our own.  (In any event, why is this isolationist and protectionist a conservative?)

MSNBC hired Buchanan in 2002 because they agreed with him on the Iraq war, which was back then the most pressing issue of the day.  Buchanan’s racist anti-Semitic history was already well-known, and was not an issue.  He came on board because he was not a foreign policy conservative.  Moreover, as Alana Goodman eloquently put:

It always seemed odd that MSNBC, the far-left network, employed one of the most fringey, controversial, anti-Semitic figures on the right. But then again, there was probably a good reason for it. The left still wishes all conservatives were as easy to demonize as Pat Buchanan.

Now that our military is gutted out and foreign policy issues do not animate broadcasters, the liberal network has no use for poor Pat.

As a conservative with a libertarian bend I have no problem with a decision by a private news network to sever ties with a contributor.  I have to disagree with Profrssor Jacobson.  If MSNBC doesn’t want to hire conservatives, it’s their prerogative.  If they use Media Matters’ guidelines to select their lineup, that’s also entirely up to them.

Buchanan’s complains that he’s being “blacklisted” are laughable, particularly considering that he’s a defender of Joe McCarthy.  In any event, here is his statement:

The modus operandi of these thought police at Color of Change and ADL is to brand as racists and anti-Semites any writer who dares to venture outside the narrow corral in which they seek to confine debate. All the while prattling about their love of dissent and devotion to the First Amendment, they seek systematically to silence and censor dissent.

Nothing says “the narrow corral” like Holocaust revisionism.

I find Buchanan’s complaint that the ADL gets to to tell us who is an anti-Semite particularly noxious.  The definition of anti-Semitism should not be left to Buchanans and Mearsheimers of the world.  It’s the ADL’s job not merely to explain what anti-Semitism is, but to make racism and anti-Semitism socially unacceptable.  As a conservative with a libertarian bend I am entirely comfortable with private groups defining our moral standards.  And while the ADL loses credibility when it glides over or ignores anti-Semitism on the left, it’s correct about Buchanan.  Shame on conservative commentators like Sean Hannity for having Buchanan on his show as a regular guest.

Without a hearing, they smear and stigmatize as racist, homophobic, or anti-Semitic any who contradict what George Orwell once called their “smelly little orthodoxies.” They then demand that the heretic recant, grovel, apologize, and pledge to go forth and sin no more.

Is the Holocaust now a “smelly little orthodox[y]”, I wonder?  It’s irrelevant, though, because as I said, if MSNBC had a problem with Buchanan’s anti-Semitism, he would have never be hired in a first place.

Defy them, and they will go after the network where you work, the newspapers that carry your column, the conventions that invite you to speak. If all else fails, they go after the advertisers.

Nice try.  Color of Change did go after advertizes on Beck’s show, but what does it have to do with Pat Buchanan?  He insinuated that his former employer was threatened with a boycott.  In light of him failing to produce the evidence of such threat, I am going to assume that it’s paranoia speaking.

I know these blacklisters. They operate behind closed doors, with phone calls, mailed threats, and off-the-record meetings. They work in the dark because, as Al Smith said, nothing un-American can live in the sunlight.

What kind of conservative demands “a hearing” for being fired?  His bosses made a decision behind closed doors, alright, but Pat Buchanan has no constitutionally guaranteed right to a job with MSNBC.  Traditional stoic masculinity dictates that Mr. Buchanan deals; instead he issued a hyperbolic statement.

The drama queen knows what he’s doing.  With so many decades in the public eye behind him, Buchanan must had noticed that punditry is a high turnover business.  One day you are in, and the next day you are paling around with the Institute for Historical Review.  Seriously, we are dealing with middle brow entertainment here.  Buchanan is trying to generate some sort of controversy by championing his own victimhood.  Cry me a river.

Does refusal to put conservatives on its payroll tell us that MSNBC is kind of lame?  It does, but not so much because they hired Buchanan as much as because said paleocon was their token conservative.  They will go down in history as a news channel that employed a noted anti-Semite for a decade.  I dare them to put a respectable Goldwater/Reagan conservative on the air.

UPDATE: Link fixed.

Mondo’s design was the run away best.  Austin had an interesting idea with Marie Antoinette, but missed some of the instructions, like the thrift store look.

A little biblical, a little Klimt. Never doubt yourself Mondo!

The rest of the designs looked uninspired.  I would like to introduce the designers to a certain ill-matched rich bitch muse.  Take these leggings:

That's your Marie Antoinette reference

This skirt

With a boob belt, though

And because too much can be too much even for a showy Broadway costume, top it off with a simple commissar leather jacket.

Though use one of her shiny blouses underneath, preferably a Pierrot

But better expensive shoes

There are other ways of doing decadence. Give her a stiletto please!

Viola: There is your inspiration!

Now I’m learning via Rat and Rebel Are Right, via the Conservative Hillbilly that the White House launched an online media outlet called the Truth Team.

Does the White House know the first thing about the Soviet Union, or do they just hope that we don't?

Come again?  Vladimir Lenin founded a newspaper called the Truth, or Pravda, which was our #1 source of official information in the Soviet Union.  The main “competitor” in purveying the same info was Izvestia or News.  Hence the popular joke of the era, there is no truth in News and no news in Truth.

A Soviet issue of "The Truth"

So an American President is now following the footsteps of Lenin.

UPDATE: Linked by the Right Way — thank you!

I picked up the version by Max Eilenberg illustrated by Niamh Sharkey.  Illustrations, though whimsical, were maybe a little uninspired — I dunno, something was missing — but I liked it enough to buy without reading.

Nowhere in the book was it mentioned that Cinderella had unusually small feet.  Her shoes simply didn’t fit other women, one of whom had feet smaller then Cinderella.  I told my mom and she laughed: “American women have large feet!”

I wear American 8-8 1/2, which is about average, but in Russia where I grew up they were considered large.  My sister who is about my height wears 6 1/2-7.  So I wasn’t exactly proud of my feet.  Yet I somehow survived and managed to get a graduate degree.

If we can’t trust our daughters to get over the fact that they don’t have the smallest feet, what can we trust them with?

Contraception mandate infringes on our freedoms.  The Catholic church is one example of an organization that objects to being forced to cover the cost of birth control.  But an employer concerned about potential negative effects of long-term use of the Pill, has no way of choosing a plan that does not cover this particular method.

Contraception mandates offer no choices to health care consumers.  Not all women of childbearing age are interested in purchasing contraception.  Many Catholic or Ultra-Orthodox Jewish women are not, and neither are lesbians.  Where are the discounted plans for them?

Nearly every time I turn on the radio, I hear a fire-breathing feminist going on and on about women’s rights.  But artificial birth control is not a right; it’s a good provided to us by the health care industry.  The pharmaceutical companies are not about to take it away from us; what’s at stakes is who will cover the cost.

Unfortunately, some of us women get so greedy when we hear promises of free birth control, that we stop thinking.  A prudent woman will think it through.  There is no such thing as “no-cost contraception” because the Pill, condoms and IUDs all have cost.  Who is paying for it and how?

The government loaded up our insurance policies with all sorts of mandatory coverage requirements.  These requirements drive up the premiums and leave a growing number of Americans without private health insurance, which is pretty scary for us mothers.  Catastrophic coverage with high deductibles makes the most sense for women of childbearing age.  We can pay for our birth control out of pocket — which would amount to — oh nos! — tens of dollars a month.  Witness the table:

Ready to sell out for $10-$50?

UPDATE: Professor Jacobson writes that he (and Glenn Reynolds and Hot Air) were pointing out for quite a while now that the Democrats are framing contraception as a new culture war issue, something that I missed.

Nobody is taking away our family planning at this time; the markets are supplying American women with ever-increasing number of options.  However, I am opposed to giving the monopoly (or near-monopoly) on contraception distribution to a single agency, namely the government.  In such system , politically-connected patent holders of a particular method of birth control will be in a position to lobby the government to push their product at the expense of other methods.

UPDATE: many thanks to Professor Jacobson for the post of the day link!

(H/t Angel.)

This is not Wintour’s first foray into the world of politics; she’s known to champion powerful women.  In 2006 she profiled Aayan Hirsi Ali, probably the single most remarkable woman in the world today.  Pamella Geller ripped the profile to pieces, and Vogue recently featured a book review showcasing Hirsi Ali next to a terrorist.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Looks, brains, character

A half a year before she became the Republican Vice Presidential nominee, Sarah Palin was in Vogue.  A governor of the largest state and a former beauty queen, she was a shoe-in.  Were she a Democrat, she’d probably get another spread in November ’08 issue.

Wintour made some horrible calls.  Last February, she did a piece on Syria’s “First Lady” Asma Al-Assad.  American Vogue forgot to check out Asma’s background, like whether or not her hubby might be a dictator.*  As soon as the article came out, Bashar Al-Assad sent troops to crush a popular uprising, and Wintour disappeared the article from her website.  As a side note, I’m intrigued by Asma’s claim that the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus  is the third holiest spot in Islam.  The usual claim made by the Palestinian propagandists is that the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem is the third holiest.  Can we reach an agreement on which one it is please?

A superb fashion publisher, Wintour champions some of the most creative men in the world, who also happen to be some of the most messed up.  Recall, John Galliano’s “I love Hitler” confession.  Since Wintour never moved to sever ties with the designer (and I’m not saying that she should), perhaps she should not insert herself into matters that are not fashion-related.

Wintour’s political biases interfere with her ability to make an aesthetic judgment call.  Here is what the world’s leading fashionista said in March 2011 on FLOTUS:

She emerged during the campaign as this enigmatic and strong woman with such great personal style.

Say again?

The First Lady of the United States and security detail walk the streets of London. June 2009

I keep hearing that at this point of her career, the sexagenarian editor of Vogue is most concerned about her legacy.  She is notoriously nasty.  She is either out of her depths in politics, likes fellow dictators, or both.  And while her cruelty (or perceived cruelty) is a quality that arguably made her a good fashion editor, there is no excuses for not coming out on the side of political liberty.  Most of all, Anna Wintour shouldn’t let her personal biases get in the way of her reputation for impeccable taste because after all, this is what she will be  remembered for.

…

I realize that this pick-me-up is more of a downer.  I should have wrote about the last episode of Project Runway when the four heavy favorites ended up on the bottom, and Rami, whose blue jacket was the most interesting piece in this episode, was booted.  I suppose the producers figured the show was getting too predictable.

…

*It recently came out that the father of chic Asma, a London-based physician, is a hard core anti-Semite.  Do all self-described “London girls” have anti-Semitic fathers or am I viciously stereotyping Asma?

I’m not sure that even the most explosive video from BO’s past, the one confirming his membership in a terror group, will be decisive in his reelection.  Obama will be running on his record as a President, not his college record.  He can argue that he changed, and if the economy substantially improves (in spite, not because of his leadership), only his die-hard opponents will reject this argument.

Bloopers, the back page humor section, also changed.  Instead of the funnies that allegedly came out of the mouths of prodigious toddlers, Bloopers now features irresistible older kids and discussions of bodily functions.  I can’t say I’m a fan of potty humor, but if this signals a shift away from bragging and helicoptering and to a more free-ranging approach, It’s a welcome development.

Unfortunately, the bulk of Parents content was not redesigned.  No soul-searching articles titled “How Parents Who Follow Our Advise End up with Kids Who Camp out in Some City Square Upon College Graduation — And We Are Sorry” were printed this February.  Instead I read a long feature “Fight for Better Maternity Leave” by Catherine Holecko.

Maoism: Ooow!

Subtitled: “Do you know what Bangladesh, Rwanda, and Afghanistan have in common?  They offer a more generous leave policy than the U.S.  But experts say there is hope for our families.  This is what we can do.”  This can be rephrased to read: “Want to be more like Bangladesh, Rwanda and Afghanistan?  Demand more generous maternity compensation.  Experts say there is hope for the U.S. families: We can still ruin the economy.”

The article was filled with horror stories of mothers who saved their vacation days and pronouncements like this:

Among the world’s worst

Women in the United States are penalized every day simply for having babies.  The country lags far behind other nations in providing parents with both paid and unpaid leave [...]

“[P]enalized every day simply for having babies” — cry me a river!  I don’t subscribe to a linear progressive view of history or the idea that maternity perks are a meaningful measure of family well-being.

I took maternity leave; it would be foolish not too, especially considering that part of the time I was paid for through a state fund with the money withheld from my paychecks.  Thank you state of California, I myself would never figure out how to save.  After the leave ran out (a whopping four months), I quit.  One lesson to learn from maternity leave is that too much is never enough, unless, I suppose, it covers the first 25 years after which the baby will be forced to buy her own health insurance.  Seriously, maybe at the tender age of three she will be ready for part time pre-school, but at that point most women will go for the second child.  Should an employer be required to still keep the mother on the payroll?

I’m amazed at the ease with which many visibly pregnant women are able to find jobs.  Two years ago, a neighbor of mine quit the job she hated shortly before becoming pregnant.   She found another one in her second trimester.  In this recession.  Although she didn’t qualify for maternity leave, was able to negotiate two weeks of leave.  She quit before her baby turned one, when her free-lancing husband started getting more jobs.  Perhaps her former employer needed this level of commitment or her level of expertise offset the limitations imposed by baby care.

If pregnancy is not an issue for the employer, the laws outlawing discrimination against pregnant women are unnecessary.  If her employer would have preferred a worker who can consistently put in 40+ hours a week for several years, but hired my neighbor for the fear of litigation, than she took someone else’s job — and possibly didn’t perform very well.  Job applicants, employers and their customers are potentially penalized for simply coming across a pregnant woman.  In my neighbor’s defense, it’s not exactly her responsibility to make sure that she got her job fairly.  She was just doing what she had to do; applying for jobs.  Legislators, on the other hand, need to stay out of private business.

I see maternity leave as a scam.  I want men and women to be equally employable, easy to hire and easy to fire.  A flexible workforce is good for the economy, and in a good economy jobs are plentiful. With plentiful jobs, mothers who wish to work part time or want some sort of short stints will be able to find them.  Anecdotally, I find that in most families the best case scenario is for mothers to take up to a decade off [full time] work.  How petty a few months of partially paid maternity leave, or even a few years, if you want to be greedy, seem compared to ten years!

Because I love freedom, I don’t want employers to be bullied into hiring pregnant women or to keep employees they no longer need.  I don’t want hardworking husbands to be passed over to hire or promote workers who, for reasons beyond their control, can not be expected to be reliable.  Markets should determine wages and leaves for women of childbearing age.  This is good for society, good for families.

Catherine Holecko who penned the maternity leave article for Parents knows something, but is not divulging, probably because it doesn’t occur to her.  She’s appears to be a free-lance writer.  Her occupation gives her flexible hours and the ability to work from home.  When choosing their future profession, young women will be wise to consider the needs of motherhood.  When I was growing up in the Soviet Union, where maternity leaves were far more generous than in this country (and families were far worse off), it was something that my grandmother often talked about.  Unfortunately, few people in America think that unique needs of woman’s life cycle should in any way determine her choice of career.

Before jumping on the bandwagon to demand  government-mandated handouts, American women need to consider the whole picture.  Do we want a robust economy?  Financial stability for the whole family?  Be able to stay home with kids when they are little?  Then maternity leave fight is not for you, and don’t be fooled by the power-hungry politicians who promise little things here and there and take away your choices in the meantime.