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Another Perspective
President Robespierre
Revolution that eats its children nibbles at Hollywood’s Daryl Hannah, Alec Baldwin, Roseanne Barr.
(Page 2 of 6)
The city of Lyons was seen in the day as “almost the capital of French capitalism” — the 18th century French version of New York City and Wall Street.
Robespierre issued his edict:
The city of Lyons shall be destroyed. Every habitation of the rich shall be demolished…
A “Temporary Commission” was created to judge the entrepreneurs of Lyons. Those suspected of possessing any signs of wealth would receive a “trial.” All private wealth was to be confiscated, “the rich” and others to have their property taken. When a petition signed by ten thousand women begged mercy for their family and friends already now imprisoned, the response was the public execution of sixty of the “prisoners.” Then another 209 the next day. Then three days later another 200. All shot to death with “showers of slugs or grapeshot from a row of cannon.” A proposal was floated that all rich people should be put to death.
Prices rose amid the blood, in direct contradiction to the promise of the Revolution. Lines formed for bread, milk, meat, butter, oil, soap, candles and wood. Which only increased demands to increase the power of the state. The “laws” tumbled forth proclaiming “free, universal primary education” and the establishment of a welfare state. Rationalism was the order of the day, and religion was to be replaced. In Paris, the Cathedral of Notre Dame was momentarily renamed “The Temple of Reason.”
By the time this was all over, with revolutionaries turning on each other with swift judgment, the total number of victims in this swirling madness is estimated to have reached some 40,000.
Eventually, predictably, the attention of the Revolutionaries now busy devouring their own children turned on one of its fathers — Robespierre himself.
He met the guillotine on July 28, 1794. Jacques Roux, the head of the Enraged Ones had preceded Robespierre — the latter having already turned his sights on his one-time political soul mate and imprisoning him over a disagreement of political ardor. Roux committed suicide in prison six months before the blade finally came around to Robespierre’s own neck — when Robespierre’s comrades decided their leader had been found wanting.
Alas for the world, there was more to come from the believers of “economic justice.”
The philosophy of the Nazis, the German National Socialist Labor Party, is the purest and most consistent manifestation of the anti-capitalistic and socialistic spirit of our age.
So wrote the famous biographer of the idea of economic justice in practice, the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises in his landmark book Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis.
Mises noted that the Nazi slogan Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz — the commonweal ranks above private profit — “implies that profit-seeking business harms the vital interests of the immense majority and that it is the sacred duty of popular government to prevent the emergence of profits by public control of production and distribution.” The Nazis applied this “justice” argument not only economically inside Germany itself, it formed the basis of their belief in the need for Lebensraum (living space). Which is to say, the Nazis demanded not only the redistribution of income — but the redistribution of land, of physical living space outside of Germany — and the resources that went with it. They demanded “Nahrungsfreit” — freedom from importing food. Which began the Nazi takeovers of Czechoslovakia, Austria, and eventually on to the rest of Europe. Nazism, says Mises, “was nothing but the logical application of [the tenets of economic justice] to the particular conditions of comparatively overpopulated Germany.”
Mises goes on to note that German academia had for decades previous to the rise of Hitler “eagerly imbued their disciples with a hysterical hatred of capitalism, and preached the war of ‘liberation’ against the capitalistic West.… When the Soviet policies of mass extermination of all dissenters and of ruthless violence removed the inhibitions against wholesale murder… nothing could any longer stop the advance of Nazism.” Adolf Hitler was a “maniac” and “sadistic gangster” but…and this is important to note…he was not the founder of Nazism — he was the product of it. Not only did the Nazis aim to abolish free-market economics, they intended to abolish the laissez-faire production of human beings. They would become the managers of a “breeding farm” intent on “rearing superior men and eliminating inferior stock.” To wit: Jews, gays, the disabled, gypsies, and so on and on.
The mass slaughters that horrified the world, as Mises describes them, were the result of “the logical and consistent applications of doctrines and policies” in a society that had been swept away by socialist doctrine — the doctrine of economic justice.
This, of course, does not touch the murderous reign of the Italian Fascists, their program as adopted in 1919 described by Mises as “vehemently anti-capitalistic.” Nor can one leave out the obvious: Marxism in the Soviet Union as detailed in The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression.
About the Author
Jeffrey Lord is a former Reagan White House political director and author. He writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (142) | Leave a comment
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John Daniel| 10.25.11 @ 7:14AM
The Revolution will be complete when the last left wing politician is hung with the entrails of the last movie star....
Steve G| 10.25.11 @ 8:18AM
Wonderfully put. May I call you "Jack"?
ENOUGH ROPE| 10.25.11 @ 7:46PM
Selfishness, not altruism, motivates advocates of economic justice. Did Robespierre, Stalin, Hitler, Mao and their gangs lead lives of luxury or self-denial?
Alan Brooks| 10.25.11 @ 10:44AM
Vietnam devoured more than the French Revolution times 10.
Doctor Right| 10.25.11 @ 10:59AM
...ladies and gentlemen, presenting Alan Brooks!
KING (err...I meant "QUEEN") of the NON-SEQUITERS!!!
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 11:17AM
Brooksie, you forget Napoleon.
pete66| 10.25.11 @ 1:35PM
Alan the Great.....What do you have to say about Stalin's "Purge" in Rissia....leaves Viet Nam in the dust.
idalily| 10.25.11 @ 2:15PM
Ok, so maybe you should ask yourself WHY. Pol Pot ring any bells?
skip| 10.25.11 @ 2:41PM
Which Octopi Gall Tweet protest are you gracing with your presence?
'Legalized' abortion devoured more than Vietnam times more than 925 - and counting.
robert| 10.27.11 @ 1:17PM
Vietnam is where we stood up to the communist butchers just as we did in Korea, Grenada, El Salvador, the entire cold war. That is the cost of resisting these evil ideas. The cost here will be higher if jerks like you think you will sieze power. I will not be thrown into jail or murdered for you vague scheme of economic justice. You can bet I will use my 2nd amendment rights to the nth degree. Give me liberty or give me death.
jan| 10.25.11 @ 12:07PM
Love it!
play nice| 10.26.11 @ 2:07PM
You'll need a rope. I think you'll find Hollywood as gutless as the pols.
Tina B| 10.25.11 @ 7:24AM
Send in the clowns. . .
Petronius| 10.25.11 @ 10:15AM
Tina
Please. That's the postal supervisor's theme song.
Peppermint Tea| 10.27.11 @ 2:40PM
If life were fair, Darryl Hanna would be worth 100 times Rosanne.
Say Baptist| 10.25.11 @ 7:44AM
I learned about this in Han's Kohens Intellectual History class at CCNY in the late 50's. The quickest source today is Jonah Goldberg's "Friendly Fascism" When will they ever learn?
Walking Horse| 10.25.11 @ 8:04AM
In kindness to those who might look for Mr. Goldberg's book, the actual title is _Liberal Fascism_.
Doctor Right| 10.25.11 @ 8:09AM
And it's a GREAT book, too!
Tina B| 10.25.11 @ 9:26AM
An eye opening book, indeed.
Seek| 10.25.11 @ 12:54PM
"Friendly Fascism" was a book written about 30 years ago by sociologist Bertram Gross. Ironically, from the Left, Gross argued much the same things Goldberg argued in his book. I find both works, by the way, to be exceedingly dishonest.
Nick| 10.25.11 @ 1:55PM
Why? Because they shatter your worldview, Seek?
Liberal Fascism has pages of end-notes. Refute one of them.
DRed| 10.25.11 @ 3:50PM
Is that the book that describes Father Coughlin and Joe McCarthy as left wing?
DRed| 10.25.11 @ 6:44PM
Here's something. Goldberg, in Liberal Fascism, claims that Woodrow Wilson was the 20th century's first fascist dictator, which is just plain stupid, because even if Woodrow Wilson was a fascist, he most clearly was not a dictator.
Nick| 10.25.11 @ 6:57PM
DRed,
Try reading some history and what Wilson did during WWI. He was given Commander-in-Chief powers, with the declaration of war, and he used them to full effect. It's hard to come up with another word to describe what he did during the war, if not dictatorial.
DRed| 10.25.11 @ 8:04PM
I thought the constitution gave the president the powers of the Commander-in-Chief. Anyhow, Wilson was certainly an authoritarian president who shamefully (and I think illegally) stifled dissent during the war, but he didn't dispense with congress, end elections, set up a cult of personality etc. Wilson's party lost control of congress during his second term-that doesn't happen to dictators. This is the problem with Goldberg. He defines fascist so broadly as to render it meaningless.
Nick| 10.26.11 @ 12:03AM
DRed,
It is your definition of dictator that is broad. In America, having control of the entire economy, locking up journalists, and suppressing dissent are considered dictatorial. They are also the powers of a Commander-in-Chief during a time of war. Try reading Vattel's Laws of Nations, which the Founders knew pretty well. They designed the Constitution so that we would have a temporary dictator during a declared war, and Congress would hold the power of the purse.
Nick| 10.25.11 @ 6:50PM
DRed,
It is the book that accurately shows that Father Coughlin was left-wing. It doesn't say that Senator McCarthy was a lefty.
Try reading it sometime.
DRed| 10.25.11 @ 8:12PM
My paternal grandmother, whose right wing bona fides were strong enough that she was a guest at Joe McCarthy's wedding would have fallen out of her chair laughing if she'd heard someone call Father Coughlin a leftist and then she would have thrown you out of the house. Coughlin was a populist, and at one point he supported FDR, but for the majority of his public career he was strongly right wing. (He thought FDR was a commie and identified strongly with Mussolini-ah, I see what you did. I forgot you think Mussolini is a leftist. Everyone's a leftist!)
And I guess you're right. Goldberg wrote that there was 'much about McCarthy that was fascistic' (leftist!) but I guess he didn't call him an outright fascist.
Nick| 10.25.11 @ 11:52PM
DRed,
Your grandmother was a foolish old broad, then. Was Huey Long also a right-winger? Because Father Coughlin was farther to the left than Long. Name someone else who was a supporter of the Polio Prince in the '30s and then suddenly became right-wing? Your ignorance of history is immense.
Also, I don't think Mussolini was a stinking lefty, I know that he was. His father was a commie. He was named after Benito Juarez, the radical Mexican commie. His middle names, Amilcare Andrea, came from two Italian socialists.
I knew these facts before Liberal Fascism even came out. They are readily available to those who are interested in history, and study it. This leaves most liberals out.
Why don't you answer my question to Seek? Can you refute just one of Mr. Goldberg's end-notes, of which there are pages, found in Liberal Fascism?
DRed| 10.26.11 @ 1:59AM
Seriously? Mussolini was a leftist because of his middle name? Sorry Nick, I apologize. I thought you were serious about all this.
Nick| 10.26.11 @ 2:26PM
DRed,
In other words, you can't refute anything in Mr. Goldberg's book. Go study some history, and get back to me, okay?
DRed| 10.26.11 @ 3:17PM
If you studied history written by, you know, professional historians (instead of an openly biased ideologue), you'd find that all of them consider the fascists to be right wing. Because there's a mountain of evidence supporting that. Fascists hated liberals and socialists. It's one of the main principles of fascism. On hand you have evidence of what Benito Mussolini's government did, and on the other you have his middle name. Which should I give more weight to?
Nick| 10.27.11 @ 2:01PM
DRed,
"(instead of an openly biased ideologue)"
Ad hominem. Facts are facts, no matter who writes them, or their political beliefs.
All you have to do is refute any of Mr. Goldberg's facts. With citations and sources, please. Not your mere assertions.
Ned Ferguson| 10.26.11 @ 12:07AM
"Everyone's a leftist!"
Only those who believe that there is no problem more government can't solve, which incidentally includes fascists.
Seek| 10.27.11 @ 3:02PM
Gee, Nick. Do you think I spend all my spare time poring over Goldberg's book verifying the accuracy of the footnotes? At any rate, the big picture is this: Fascism is a phenomenon of the Right. It's not libertarian or throne-and-altar Rightism, but it is a modern variant. It is not, however, and never has been, Leftism, though fitfully the two do overlap.
The author engaged in a good deal of obvious cherry-picking to "prove" the notion that the history of fascism is little more than 20th-century liberalism in drag. The most copious endnotes in the world isn't going to make that thesis tenable. Jonah's a long way off from shattering my worldview.
Mike D.| 10.25.11 @ 7:49AM
Barr is just an vile ignoramus, nothing more needs to be said. Miss Hannah came from wealth built via a Capitalist family business her father started. Hannah Inland Waterways, a large tug and barge company operated on the Great Lakes moving oil products. Her brother Mark took over the business and promptly ran it into the ground, seized by US marshalls and sold. So she's just a typical hollywood hypocrite, nothing more or less.
Baldwin? An Asshole with an anger management problem.
Timothy L. Pennell| 10.25.11 @ 7:58AM
Let's kill all the Rich. The Rich Oil Men. The Rich Corporate Heads, the Rich Bankers and Lawyers and Doctors. KILL THEM ALL!
Who will give us jobs, then? Who will make the things we use every day? Where will we put our Savings, and who will help us when we're Sick?
Have you ever seen a Play or a Movie, where SATAN is portrayed as a Shadowy Figure, who creates his Mischief, by whispering in someone's ear?
JESUS tells us that "The POOR will always be among us", and that it is the Richness of our Souls that we need to concentrate on.
The Ten Commandments tell us: "Thou shalt not COVET". ("Let's TAKE IT from them!") "Thou shalt not BEAR FALSE WITNESS". ("They're not paying their fair share!")
GOD has told us these things with Fire, from HIS fingertips. HE has written them in Stone.
The "Occupiers"? They just shout out what has been whispered in their ears, by people who's job it is, to foment Anger, and Unrest. For, what they want, and what their MASTER desires, cannot be gotten in the Light of Day. It can only be achieved by Deception, and Deeds done in the Shadows. By Lies, meant to fan the flames of Resentment and Anger that began, with but a whisper.
"We are the ones we've been waiting for."
Words said by a Man who's Philosophical Underpinnings, and Core Beliefs, come from a BOOK, Dedicated to LUCIFER.
This year is the Smoke.
Next year, EVERYTHING BURNS.
Count on it.
USSAlabama| 10.25.11 @ 12:06PM
Well, you may sound off the wall to some TP, but maybe not so far as they think:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....e=youtu.be
An admission from one of the Lefty-organizers of OWS states that violence is the goal.
Jeffrey Lord - good article -- I'd say your calling it rightt.
Doctor Right| 10.25.11 @ 8:07AM
Can we please stop referring to this coterie of clowns and ignorant young malcontents as "a movement"???
OWS is not a movement; it is a publicity stunt.
Calling it a movement lends these fools the credibility they so desperately seek but have not earned, just as they desperately seek more and more hand-outs from working Americans, also completely unearned.
The Tea Party is a movement with both qualitative objectives and quantifiable results. The smelly fools in OWS can claim neither.
Mike D.| 10.25.11 @ 8:20AM
We watch the media masturbate every time they describe the childrens crusade lovingly. So lets see what we have here, Nazis, Communists, Anarchists, Losers, freaks, dope smoking hippie wannabees, spoiled brats, eco wack jobs, Wiccins, animal rites nutcases, socialist Communists, communist socialists, Marxists, happy campers, anti-semites, semi-anti-semites, hypocrites and the band played on. Leave anybody out? This is a movement? If the Tea Party uttered or shown .01% of the signs or words this bunch of debris has used it would have been butchered by the government media.
Seek| 10.25.11 @ 12:56PM
There are any number of whackjobs who can be found at Tea Parties, I regret to say.
Skippy| 10.25.11 @ 5:41PM
Well, we can't keep the media away, so they end up at our rallies.
carnot| 10.25.11 @ 6:40PM
gee whizz.....thank goodness whackjobs don't influence elections as massively as the TP did in 2010.
anywho...a BS equivocation on your part.
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 7:27PM
Having been to many TP events I have never seen the behavior that the OWS seem so proud of.
Proud Atheist| 10.25.11 @ 8:24AM
It is a bowel movement.
DTOM| 10.25.11 @ 9:33AM
It's ATROTURF-bought and paid for....
loulou| 10.25.11 @ 10:07AM
By Soros, Inc.
KennesawJack| 10.25.11 @ 11:20AM
And he would be one of the first, if not the first, to go to the chopping block. Sweet, sweet irony.
Walking Horse| 10.25.11 @ 8:10AM
When our version of the Reign of Terror commences, one wonders how many left-wing journalists will call it "unexpected". Just like those who unleashed the original french version, our current generation of useful idiots will find themselves being sacrificed to the flames of revolutionary fervor.
Ayn Rand was absolutely spot-on when she characterized the antecedents to today's OWS movement as a death cult. The same is true in the here-and-now.
TrueBlue| 10.25.11 @ 4:55PM
Recommendation; buy firearms and lots of ammo and prepare a spot away from the big cities. If things get violent they'll escalate very quickly.
Stan Redmond| 10.28.11 @ 12:46PM
The media will run in to overtime mode with all of Obama's sycophants spinning ways to blame republicans and the Tea Party.
RJ| 10.25.11 @ 8:17AM
Barr, Baldwin and Hannah are all pampered, hateful idiots. It is hard to see how they are not aware of their hypocrisy. Jeffrey Sachs on the other hand is an economist. He must know better. In any event, if these people dream of our society becoming another Stalinist Russia, Nazi Germany, Castro Cuba or Maoist China, they should be banished to North Korea where they can live out their lives in the type of society that reflects their values. I am sick of their craziness and anger.
Tommix| 10.25.11 @ 8:20AM
Another great article. I never connected economic justice with the French Revolution, the Nazis and the Stalinists, Mao & Pol Pot before. I never noticed how malevolent an idea it is.
BTW Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz is a rhyming slogan sometimes translated as "Public need before private greed". Sounds like something Rev. Wright would say.
Old Soldier| 10.25.11 @ 9:06AM
I agree - good article with historical perspective on these idiots.
Minuteman78| 10.25.11 @ 2:07PM
I thought it was "if the glove doesn't fit, you must acquit"? Oh, wait, that's the other white-hating a-hole.
Seriously, I'd pay good bucks to see Dennis Miller do a Rant on these OWS losers.
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 8:41PM
You never connected these things before, because they connect in the same manner as parallel lines. Any analogous discussions concerning the sine quo non's of the French of Revolution and the OWS which suppresses the role of the Catholic clergy is charlatanism, which is what the article does. Economic Justice, in the parlance of these protestors, only is intelligible under the precedent of Supreme Court rulings on the status of corporate personhood, initially decided on in the 19th century, and I mean in the American Supreme Court sans clergy. Justice, especially with respect to the bat-guano crazy right winger's notion of due process, requires corporeal violability. An entity recognized by the supreme court of the land, which has rights to make contracts, sue in court, make liens against real AND metaphysical persons, and be protected under the First Amendment just as any other real persons, is not subject to corporeal violability. This is the OWS objection. If there is an analogy to be made to the dynamics of the French Revolution, it's that the peasantry's objection to the nobility's entitlements to wealth, (entitlements invested by the clergy), without the commensurate obligations and responsibilities to society is directly analogous to corporate bodies exercising the prerogatives of shareholders with indiscriminate regard for the real demands/needs of the proletariat, i.e. the middle class.
Dai Alanye | 10.25.11 @ 11:06PM
Let me know when you learn what a paragraph is, then maybe I'll read your rant.
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 7:32PM
does anyone else get tired of long user names that are just so cute
tsd| 10.25.11 @ 8:22AM
and when the chickens come home to roost they tend to crap on anyone sitting below them....please take your seat you moron liberal turds!! In the eye of the liberal, rich is defined as anyone with anything left to take.... unless they are planning on taking mine!
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 8:42PM
Never trust a human being who uses chicken poop and an ellipsis in tandem.
Ted| 10.25.11 @ 8:24AM
One small point: it was not the German National Socialist Labor Party. The proper name was the National Socialist German Worker's Party (in German the initials were NSDAP, which was shortned to Nazis).
And isn't it interesting that the Left always tries to paint the Nazis as a movement on the Right, when in fact the Nazis were a movement of the Left on the Left.......
Merlin| 10.25.11 @ 9:36AM
Just right, Ted.
I read a book a few years back (wish I could remember the name) that compared Stalin and Hitler. It listed the campaign platform of the Nazis. All items the left in the US would support and most that conservatives would oppose. As usual, the left and the media get it exactly backwards.
Drunken Sailor| 10.25.11 @ 10:13AM
They get it backwards on purpose Merlin. You of all monikers should recognize sleight of hand.
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 8:56PM
The Nazis were a right wing movement. There are many parameters under which we can categorize the movement as such. I feel Aristotle would have have little trouble here. A quick checklist:
Violent xenophobic impulses. Nazis, check. Right wing, check. Genetic, linguistic, and, cultural concerns about relative purity. Nazis, check. Right wing, check. Imperialistic ambitions. Nazis, check. Right wing neo-cons, check. Harnessing the powers of industrial culture and strong, federalized government. Nazis, check. Right-wing neo-cons check. And btw, "neo-cons" combines most heinously Greek and Latin word roots, further expanding the limits of right-wing blithe idiocy. Being O.K. with torturing other human beings. Nazis, check. Right-wing, check. Sacrificing future prosperity of a country for the sanctity of industrial-military complex. Nazis, check. Right-wing, check. The only dent in the armor of my argument here is the State of Israel. However, I think we can safely attribute that outlier to the deleterious and bat-guano crazy dynamics of Christian religious zeal.
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 7:37PM
You remind me of my brother, bright lad, well off, and is convinced beyond reason all the left wing crap and naturally AGW. Such a shame.
Other Joe| 10.25.11 @ 8:38AM
An important article - should be widely read.
calvin | 10.25.11 @ 8:47AM
Mr. Lord;
Thank you for the neatly done history lesson.
I appreciate more as time goes by the blessing provided us, in their genius, by the founders, in our Second Amendment.
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 9:03PM
Okay dude, prepositional phrases most often are adverbial, and it is reasonable to say that three at the end here are adverbial. So what is this sentence saying? You have two verbs and one participle which these prep. phrases can limit. The tricolon of prep. phrases syntactically modify "provided," but that is nonsensical. What a bunch of disjointed inferences a reader is supposed to make here. This sentence would get a "D" in my remedial freshmen courses.
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 7:38PM
you really need a reality check.
Vern Crisler | 10.25.11 @ 8:55AM
Good to see someone mention Mises's book on Socialism. Hayek said that book gradually created a new generation of people committed to freedom. I sympathize to some extent with the protestors: given how bad this economy is. However, their solutions (mostly Marxist) would make things infinitely worse (e.g., North Korea). We don't need less capitalism; we need more capitalism.
With respect to the French Revolution, it started well, but then a second revolution took place in which Robespierre and his group turned it into a bloodbath. I don't have much sympathy for the rich or kings or nobility -- they are often the worst offenders against freedom and capitalism, as witness Hollywood airheaded rich stars -- but Robespierre and his crew violated every canon of decency and the rule of law in seeking social justice. Compare with the American Revolution, which was followed by the revolution known as the Constitutional convention -- which did not destroy but protected life, liberty, and property. That is true social justice.
Mike Hawk| 10.25.11 @ 9:08AM
The Bolshevik Revolution was worse. Socialist / Communist/ Islamist Revolutions invariably result in a reign of terror.
Redstateboy| 10.25.11 @ 9:15AM
Great stuff Mr. Lord.. yadda, yadda.. but there 2 things in America halting the Liber-ul take over of this Nation and plunging us in to a Nazi/Communist/Facist-whatever war on Capitalism and wealth confiscation.. 1. The Alternative Media educating the masses and 2. My 20ga Mossberger, my 380 Bersa, along with my Constitutional right to bear em'.
The Equalizer| 10.25.11 @ 9:48AM
I think you better get something a little larger for your "re-education" of these commies if they come after you. You do want those lessons to be understood.
KennesawJack| 10.25.11 @ 11:23AM
20 Gauge isn't much (unless you get some OO Buck for it). Better with a 12 Gauge magnum semi-auto. Anyway, your point is well taken.
WRTolkas| 10.25.11 @ 9:17AM
I don't get it? Here is a group of "uns": unkempt, unwashed, unemployed, unaccountable, unaccommodating, uncontrollable, undemocratic, underachievers, that have been joined by the American Nazi Party and Communist Party the obummer administration and dimocrats and there is no backlash from MSM? I don't get it? What are the Republicans doing?
carnot| 10.25.11 @ 6:45PM
Just the opposite...if you travel to Lefty websites such as Democracy Now....you will find the likes of Amy Goodman whining that the media was omni-present at TP events but nowhere to be found at OWS gatherings. she may be missing the significance here!
PattyMor| 10.25.11 @ 9:19AM
Why aren't they marching on George Soros' house? Or Jeffry Immelt, Bill Gates, Warren Buffoon, George Kaiser, AlGore, Shaq, Sean Penn, Ted Turner, Michael Jordan, Bill and Hill, the Google Boys and all other "selfish" millionaires and Billionaires? Why don't they disgorge their piles 'o cash in the name of the people? Are they too busy getting dual citizenships like Steve Wynn, as a just in case strategy?
Redstateboy| 10.25.11 @ 9:34AM
perhaps.. in the twisted mental view of Liber-uls, (These) Liber-uls you've mentioned.. are "down for the struggle" - don't you just love the intellectual bankruptcy of Liber-uls?
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 11:21AM
Patty:
The folks you name are the ones financing this embryonic revolution. They in effect are paying "protection" to the mob. It is only after the mob comes to power that they turn on their sponsers.
PolishKnight| 10.25.11 @ 12:03PM
If you want to make an ideological leftist nervous, point out that the left bankrolls corporate welfare, wall street, and crony capitalism. They then sputter "That's why we need campaign finance reform!" but in reality, it wouldn't make a difference. The big cash in the form of jobs for their relatives (and themselves when they retire), insider investments and trading deals, etc.
Sadly, Rush Limbaugh is played like a fool when he compares big money CEO's to basketball players to rationalize the big salaries. Rush, the big salaries aren't for their Harvard diploma skills at playing with org charts in MSOffice or structured layoffs, it's because they are the relative of some politician who needs a payoff.
Aside from the useful idiot marxists, most leftists are simply looters. Race or gender entitlement seekers, government union members, and welfare recipients. I laughed when a leftist claimed I was being "selfish". Most of his electorate is selfish and all the things he claims to be against!
To neatly sum up the leftist useful idiot marxist thinking, they like being part of the mob because big government and power, even as a cheerleader on the sidelines, is alluring to them. They love to go to rock concerts and go crazy for some popular performer and travel around as an "ObamaHead" because they're fame and power whores.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 12:54PM
"Fame and power whores" just about sums it up. True believers and camp followers.
idalily| 10.25.11 @ 2:20PM
Patty, I just want them to march on Babs house in Malibu and demand to redistribute her dough. With video posted on You Tube. PLEASE. Pretty please with sugar on top? Oh, and George Clooney's Italian villa.
JimH| 10.25.11 @ 9:20AM
One difference is that OWS consists largely of the white middle class and above playing at revolution. The rabble for the mob does not exist; at least as long as the food stamps and government checks keep coming in. The time to be concerned will be when the parents of the OWS crowd have their houses foreclosed and are laid off from their jobs.
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 9:15PM
Maybe some of the protestors are white, privileged youth who live at home; maybe some are lazy in regard to their careers. But the dismissiveness of the movement that is evident here is wrongheaded; I can think of other establishment type people who were of similar mindset (Ghadafi, Bin Ali, Mubarek).
IMPERIUMSINEFINESINSTRAEFASITA| 10.25.11 @ 9:15PM
Maybe some of the protestors are white, privileged youth who live at home; maybe some are lazy in regard to their careers. But the dismissiveness of the movement that is evident here is wrongheaded; I can think of other establishment type people who were of similar mindset (Ghadafi, Bin Ali, Mubarek).
Tina B| 10.25.11 @ 9:33AM
Kinda reminds me of Patty Hearst - Girl Revolutionary ( till she got back to daddy in the burbs , that is )
PolishKnight| 10.25.11 @ 10:01AM
I remember the admiration many on this forum expressed for Steve Jobs, another wealthy capitalist who prided himself on charging a "cool" premium for mp3 players and digital phones. He griped that evil corporations were offshoring even as Apple did the same with factories and he would never allow a factor to be built near his house.
In other words, all lefties are hypocrites. Heck, leftism is about taking hypocrisy to a sublime art form: "Affirmative action" and "diversity" which celebrate racism while claiming that those who don't engage in it, are racists. Feminism which is women's equality via chivalrous patronage. Environmentalism which simultaneously celebrates an urban lifestyle where leftists get a new iphone ever year. As Ann Coulter points out, the mob doesn't care about logic or even views logic as something that they conquer by sheer numbers.
Sadly, Baldwin, Hannah, and Barr needn't worry. Nobody is going to protest outside of their doors. The Republicans will protect them out of ideology and that's what they count on. Their own mobs are subconsciously aware of the hypocrisy and will never call them on it.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 11:23AM
PK:
You got the point again, as usual. A wise man once said, "If hypocricy were oil, this town (DC) would be Saudi Arabia." It will be when the mob gains power that it turns on those who financed it.
PolishKnight| 10.25.11 @ 11:56AM
Thanks Al. I'll go one step further: Leftists are hypocrites about hypocrisy constantly griping that the right wing are a bunch of religious right prudish hypocrites.
Perhaps that charge had a little merit back in the 80's when I came of age, but now it's a joke I love to call them on. My wife loves Benny Hill (especially the old 60's stuff) but imagine if you were to try to show that stuff on a typical college campus today. You'd get shut down. Look at congressman Wiener. He didn't get kicked out due to pruditry. If he had admitted that he tweeted the photo and was embarrassed, that would have been the end of it. He _LIED_ and claimed that he had been "hacked". That's what made him a discredited laughingstock. Even more conservatives wouldn't have raised an eyebrow otherwise.
One thing I like to ask leftists is simply what they hope to accomplish. Their positions are so hypocritical and conflicting that I don't see what they're aiming for other than simply getting more government power and votes for their party and even then, they'll always have to have the republicans to kick around to blame for the shortcomings of their policies.
That's how you catch them offguard. Don't challenge them on individual points. Ask them what they think they're accomplishing. Then they'll start to sputter. It's like asking someone in a mob what he's doing. He simply hasn't asked that question of himself.
GeronL| 10.25.11 @ 1:43PM
They are teaching 11 year olds graphic sex in NYC schools, we should be more "prudish"
PolishKnight| 10.25.11 @ 3:15PM
Agreed. But if a teacher had a picture of his wife in a bikini on his desk, the left would get him fired in an instant.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 4:17PM
Different story with the teachers' same sex paramour.
Tina B| 10.25.11 @ 6:37PM
Al,
I cannot tell you how right you are, in my county school system at least. I got the feeling the gay teachers had more cache and job security than anyone else. There was something uncanny about it. It was an unspoken understanding, IMHO.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 7:48PM
How sad our "enlightened" society when we consider what once was known as "moral turpitude".
Doug| 10.25.11 @ 7:10PM
I can't, and won't, defend Jobs's uber-leftist views, but you have two "facts" completely wrong about him.
1) As recent quotes from the Isaacson book have shown, Jobs berated Obama for NOT being business-friendly and that he (Obama) needed to make the US job-friendly once again. He NEVER griped about "evil corporations offshoring" jobs. He lamented that the country had become business-unfriendly and thought we should do something about it. (And maybe just as important, he thought that HE (Jobs) could!) Jobs's Chinese contract manufacturers were a result of facing the reality of high US wages and a low-quality work force, coupled with onerous government over-regulation. All of which he strangely seemed to favor via his political leanings!
2) Even if Jobs wanted to build an Apple factory in his Palo Alto backyard, there's no way in hell that the city of Palo Alto would allow it. I'm sure Palo Alto would love the money it would bring in, but Palo Alto is filled with like-minded liberal airheads with a NIMBY mindset. Palo Alto almost ran a Fry's Electronics out of town a while back in the name of freeing up their building's land rather than accept the cash that Fry's brought to the city. In the end, the money won out. Jobs was one of many Palo Alto billionaires, but he wasn't The King of the joint, just as Obama can't "pass legislation" all by his lonesome.
I'll never be able to reconcile Jobs's political inclinations with his business conduct. He voted like a communist, but ran his business like a hard-ass conservative.
Ted| 10.25.11 @ 10:30AM
There are also important differences between the aristocrats, merchants, and peasants that Robespierre et al preyed upon and those in the US...
The "aristocrats," merchants, and peasants in the USA are armed....
Ivy67| 10.25.11 @ 10:30AM
They should all worry about the movement that they are trying to push on the so called rich bankers, but they should read history especially about the Nazies, when Hitler did his night of the long nives. When your usefullness is not needed neither are you.
cicero| 10.25.11 @ 10:55AM
Perhaps a more apt comparison would be to the anarchist movement of the med-19th century that lasted up to the 1st World War. The event of the French Commune comes to mind. In that movement, as in the current one, you had a bunch of wealthy people espousing the cause of what they considered to be the underclass, inciting riots, or participationg in them. They were the bomb throwers and the agitators. Unfortunately for them, in most instances, the "underclass" was not overly interested. Only in France did they get enough to follow them into the guns. Everywhere else, they were pretty much ignored.
Even in America, they tried, but failed. The best example was the Haymarket Massacre, where they tried to peempt a union strike, shot several police officers, only to find that the union members turned on them.
This group will meet the same fate here. Their only allies are the press and the politicoes who will use them for print and fodder.
Petronius| 10.25.11 @ 11:13AM
The one thing that never gets done in these think pieces is what the terms "social justice" and "fairness" really mean coming from the mouths of these economically illiterate overgrown brats. Around my union hall, "social justice" means "nobody should be allowed to be better than Me." "Fairness" equals "My satisfaction at the expense of all others." "Level playing field", is a theoretical diktat which implies that all private enterprises must be subject to the same regulations, handicaps, wage scales, imposts, and benefit provision laws world wide. And the cries of "kill all the rich" is no more than a blind expression of every black hearted lowlife who believes his birthright is to be at the top of the social food chain. Yet they want to kill all those competent people they want to enslave in order to care for their needs. So this all points to who commands "the revolution" and the revelation that it's as phony as the day is long. And it's not about what the mob wants. It's about what they don't want: being obliged to compete with their peers to earn their living. Ergo, gaining wealth is not as easy as falling off the proverbial log or filling one's basket upon an Easter egg hunt, so nobody should possess more than any other. (See the Leveler Papers, 1640.) Yeah, right! Been there. Done that. All three of these regimes were composed of frustrated fools with no sense of value. And their countries remain economic basket cases because their governments today still echo the same sentiments about those industries which deal in the necessities of life. Those which produce luxury goods are thriving like gangbusters in a true market. Our yuppies gladly pay three figures a bottle for Grand Cru Bordeaux and Russian caviar. And the price of stereo gear from MBL of Germany matches what we would pay for a condo in a gated community.
The only revolt unlike the above was the English Civil War. King Charles was beheaded in the end for bankrupting his Kingdom and for tyranny: that is violating His Coronation Oath and disregarding Magna Carta. (Read The Tyrannicide Brief.)
In closing, I refer to a past utterance of that self proclaimed queen of contemporary polemics, Roseann Barr: "We are America's worst nightmare; white trash with money!" 'Tis a pity she never listens to her sordid self. She might do humanity a big fat favor and slash her wrists. Her fortune can be a down payment on the national debt. Maybe the next Congress could enact an idiot tax....
Vern Crisler | 10.25.11 @ 5:28PM
Minor correction: Charles was behead for treason, not for bankrupting his kingdom or for tyranny.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 11:28AM
Once the mob gains power it will turn on everyone and everything that made it possible. Robspierre gave way ultimately to Bonaparte. If we are to avoid that fate this movement must die aborning.
In their lust to recreate the "glory days" of 1969 they fail to understand that nothing admirable came of those days. It was not a time to emulate and frankly, we do not have a Nixon who, for all his faults, mananged to guide the nation through the worst political crisis since the Civil War.
markenoff| 10.26.11 @ 12:27AM
We should bypass the middle parts and go ahead and give the OWS crowd "a whiff of grapeshot".
buckeyeman| 10.25.11 @ 11:39AM
The French Revolution is the prototype for all modern leftist thinking. The appellation "Citoyen" (citizen) presaged the "comrade" of the soviets. The French Revolutionists even changed the calendar from seven day weeks to ten day weeks to prevent the religious from being able to celebrate Sunday.
Much of the chaos that led to "La Terreur" in 1793/94 was the result of centralized economic planning which, of course, was disastrous. One good thing was the creation of my favorite quotation. Robespierre condemned his former friend Georges Danton due to Danton's drift toward moderation. While being carted to the guillotine Danaton's tumbril passed below Robespierre's window. Looking up, Danton shouted "Tu me suivras bientot" (you will follow me soon). And so Robespierre did, within four months.
Perhaps Alec Baldwin's gigantic brain has heard of Georges Danton.
W| 10.25.11 @ 12:55PM
The Revolution in France gave us the terms "center, left, and right," how to use class envy as a political tool, and the creation of the modern secular state.
The French outlawed the Catholic and other churches, killed priests and nuns, destroyed convents and churches, so that there was no other God but the State. This is the formula for totalitarian states such as all the communist countries, and Hitler's Germany.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 1:21PM
...and gave us Bonaparte.
Al Adab| 10.25.11 @ 12:56PM
Baldwin threatened (promised?) to leave the country if Bush was re-elected in '04. Whaaa happened?
Ed| 10.25.11 @ 11:53AM
Gee -- If they burned Roseanne Barr at the stake, the flare would be visible from space!
Petronius| 10.25.11 @ 12:53PM
Not to mention the stench. If Roseann were to be the object of an auto de fe', that would require regulation by the EPA.
Seek| 10.25.11 @ 12:58PM
Howard Stern calls her "Grossanne."
Louis Jenkins| 10.25.11 @ 12:57PM
OWS-what a waste of space. They're blaming the rich man, when our condition has been caused by OBAMA. (The scaffolding would collapse if Barr was to be be-headed.) OWS is mis-guided, inept, and incompetent. They should be down at the White House protesting the mis-management of just about everything.
Sugartown Super| 10.25.11 @ 1:27PM
These folks had their antecedent in the French Revolution in the person of King Louis' cousin Phillipe, duc d'Orleans. He "joined" the Revolution early on, publicly renouncing his aristocratic lineage, and changing his name to Phillipe Egalite' - Phillip Equality. This did not last long of course, and they cut HIS head off too. Although I do not know this as a fact, I can only imagine that his last words were "But I'm on YOUR side!" ...chop.
GeronL| 10.25.11 @ 1:38PM
Amazingly, the rich, the elite and the establishment are supporting this. Do they think they could stop it when its achieved its political purpose?
Crawler| 10.25.11 @ 1:39PM
Quote: "You might call him President Robespierre."
I call the incompetent ideologue much, much worse.
Excellent article, Mr. Lord.
GeronL| 10.25.11 @ 1:39PM
The 1%, the real parasite, is government
Mike 3/505| 10.25.11 @ 2:10PM
Geron,
I fixed this for you...The 21% (Taxes to GDP) is the government. :-)
Regards,
Mike
on Davy| 10.25.11 @ 1:49PM
The President's father was a communist, his political mentor Bill Ayers IS a communist, he has publicly supported these people. They are not just going to go away. Before he leaves office kicking and screaming, there will be blodd in the streets. I spent 25 years in the Marine Corps killing communists, I cannot tell you how disgusted I am to see this happening in America. It's been coming since that POS Roosevelt.
JimH| 10.25.11 @ 1:51PM
Michelle Obama can’t decide if she is Marie Antoinette or Madame Dufarge.
scythe| 10.25.11 @ 6:54PM
Marie Antoinette NEVER said "let them eat cake". Marie Antoinette was smeared, Alinskyfied in order to prepare the masses to accept her brutal murder. What was done to her was what was done to the Jews in Nazi Germany. She was portrayed as something she was not. In fact she was a deeply religious Catholic, so saintly the Church had thought of bestowing Sainthood on her. The French Revolution was a religious revolution in that it supplanted the beliefs of the radicals with the beliefs of the Church. France was once known as the First Daughter of the Catholic Church. The Royal Family were revered and looked up to for centuries. In order for the rabble to destroy what was once loved, they needed to blacken and blaspheme it. Saul Alinsky was a copycat and a piker by comparison. The phrase attributed to Antoinette was instigated by her murderers and spread far and wide so that when their Queen mounted the steps to lose her head the public would accept the horror. They had been lied to and brainwashed. Sound familiar? She was a woman not suited for her position and easily maligned. But a cold, heartless, callous? That was the portrait painted by her destroyers. She does not deserve the calumny.
Peppermint Tea| 10.27.11 @ 2:58PM
She was Hapsburg Austrian
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 8:00PM
Why does this some so familiar.
Petronius| 10.25.11 @ 2:03PM
That's the difference between Hollywood and Chicago
Tom F| 10.25.11 @ 2:27PM
Lets not forget that Alec Baldwin also shills for CAPITAL ONE BANK!!!! I wonder how much he makes trying to convince people to use their credit cards!
PolishKnight| 10.25.11 @ 3:20PM
Haha! I noticed that too.
As "true" marxists know, credit cards hurt small businesses since the transaction fees break them while the customers are given incentives to get "cash back" (cash back from where?) That's why when I go to a small business, I always use cash.
Mike D.| 10.25.11 @ 6:34PM
You mean Arec Barwin? The worlds greatest actor, star of Team America? Friend and ally of Kim Jong Il? That Arec Barwin?
Robert Poynter| 10.25.11 @ 2:48PM
Great article. Shout it loud and clear throughout the land. But, Pol Pot, Mao, Chavez, Castro, Che Guervera deserve honoralble mention.
Print more like this.
scythe| 10.25.11 @ 6:44PM
If Roseanne Barr were to be "eaten" there would be enough there to sustain several large families for at least a year. I love these commie bastards and all their spawns. Come and get it fu--ers. Been waiting for this moment for a long long time. They have been fomenting and festering since the '30's and we here in America allowed them to be portrayed as VICTIMS of Joe McCarthy. McCarthy was the best thing that ever happened to them and they know it. BTW, heard somewhere they are the ONLY PARTY that does not have to show a donor list. Why's that? About time they did. They want a fight? Bring it on. The large pus filled furuncle on our body politic has been in need of a good lancing and draining for generations. SMASH MARXISM EVERYWHERE IN AMERICA.
Strider| 10.27.11 @ 10:48AM
The morbidly obese Michael Moore is also in league with the OWS crowd. Perhaps he's really Roseanne in drag.
Aiken_Bob| 10.27.11 @ 8:03PM
that brings up a pretty ugly mental picture.....
Soljerblue| 10.27.11 @ 2:19PM
It is time, and past time. We're ready.
(Electorally speaking, of course)
CopyKatnj| 10.25.11 @ 7:23PM
Mr. Lord, a very interesting and informative essay. I have emailed it to those that I think would benefit from knowing what is actually going on.
POST American| 10.25.11 @ 10:46PM
--------------------BOTTOM LINE----------------------
"Understand, the Globalists not
only KNOW what they're doing and
what they've done is CRIMINAL
----BUT they know ---WE NOW KNOW."
-ALEX JONES
"Understand, Globalism, Free Trade
(---TREASON) and EUGENICS are
ALWAYS intertwined. ---ALWAYS.
In every way, on every level, the
Globalists are at war with the REAL
culture --the REAL economy."
-ALAN WATT
(awesome online coverage
of the CON)
-------------SO
DON'T be taken in by the antics of the
ROT-child/SOROS/ Rockefeller
funded and directed FAKE
'die--ALL---elect---trick' --uh-- we meant, 'dialectic'.
ALAN WATT will show you how.
------------------HE REALLY WILL---------------------
Dan Mathewson| 10.26.11 @ 1:32PM
So, what's this real culture you keep mentioning?
markenoff| 10.26.11 @ 12:20AM
The difference between the French, Russian and German targets of "economic justice" and the sane here in the US is that we are armed and they are not. I'm well stocked with .223, 9mm, .45 and .380. JHP in the last three calibers. Come and get it.
markenoff| 10.26.11 @ 12:23AM
Did I mention the 12 gauge?
Paul Petersen| 10.26.11 @ 2:06AM
Jeffery nailed it, a great thought provoking and cautionary piece. All members of congress should have it on their required reading list.
Pete
POST American| 10.26.11 @ 3:13AM
----------------BOTTOMLESS LINE-------------------
Required viewing as this latest round
of CFR--ROT-child FED front op
'CAN--DID----ATES' are brought out
----'INVISIBLE EMPIRE'
-----'The OBAMA DECEPTION'
-----'ENDGAME'
-----'The MONEY MASTERS'
4 indispensible documentaries ---ALLLLL
available on Youtube.
NOT a single SAP OP, 'on board' second
to be found in any one of them.
Time to 'EDGE---YOU----cate' yourself
kiddies.
SUGAR POPS n' TREASON OPS
---------------------------------it's HIGH TIME. . .
AgentRose| 10.26.11 @ 9:06AM
Thank you so so much for this work. It is one of the finest you have done.
Bydand76| 10.26.11 @ 11:30AM
Excellent Article sir!
Jim Hlavac | 10.26.11 @ 7:33PM
And once again I contrast this with 40 years of gay protests -- we demand the right to live in peace -- and with you in accordance -- and these heathens wish to dismantle it all. And they will come at us as assuredly as any other. Yes, I'm sure there's a few gays in the Occupy movement, and there are lots of heters -- ergo - gaynes is not part of this movement, but a think apart -- here is where Santorum, Gingrich and Perry should be allocating their resources - while begging us to join the great parade to liberty -- with which we are much more acquainted. :)
thomas walsh | 10.26.11 @ 10:14PM
Thanks for a refreshing history lesson for those who have forgotten!
Soljerblue| 10.27.11 @ 2:14PM
If "he" is, indeed, the reincarnation of Robespierre, perhaps his story will have a similar ending. Electorally speaking, of course.
Hannah, Barr and Baldwin are merely poor carbon copies of nillions like them who've hoped that their public faces and pronouncements could save them when the mob came for them.
Ride the tiger? Sew the wind? Appease the mob?
It all ends the same.
Sue| 11.8.11 @ 8:53AM
Why not an article on the "consequences" of this destruction and how many centuries it took for France to recover? Oops, they never did.