And If You Haven't Had Enough Racism Yet...

Apparently I should just post things that conservatives (I'm assuming the Final Club guy was conservative- if not, let's just categorize that as probably conservative for now) say and let them speak for themselves. I don't think anything I write could do more to persuade someone to hate conservatism than that Final Club piece and this (which I have no idea why it wasn't published by The Indy...):

Save the Whales, Kill the Babies
The Left's Latest Nefarious Plan: Suicide in the Name of Mother Nature
By Frances Martel

America's environmental lobby has grown desperate. Throughout the 1990s,
when Hillary Clinton was President, foreign policy was the ongoing
background joke to the sitcom that was the American federal government
(memorable one-liners from that series included Waco, universal health
insurance, the Rwandan genocide, and Monica Lewinsky). The Clinton's
interests were difficult to decipher, as their apparent goal became an
assault on the wellbeing of every American and, later, the best interests of
everyone on the planet. Thus went into the books eight years of history,
where the President and his wife (co-President would be a more apt term)
frisked about the White House grounds, creating mischief for subordinates
and interns like a modern-day Zeus and Hera. With the worst interests of the
people in mind, the political environment for the nature crowd was ideal.

Then any environmentalist's worst nightmare came to life.

In the blink of an eye, they became pass=E9, and the influence that had ris=
en
with the fall of the Berlin Wall crumbled at the base of the World Trade
Center. They lost sympathy in the White House and became completely
irrelevant to American concerns. They were relics America was more than
ready to donate to the Clinton Presidential Library's collection.

So, for a few years, they hired mercenary leftists like Jake Gyllenhaal to
star in movies like "The Day After Tomorrow" and played Dr. Frankenstein on
the political corpse of Al Gore, giving his eyes a faux twinkle =E1 la Bill
Clinton and his hips the salacious curves of Michael Moore. They remain
perplexed that, somehow, the invasion of Afghanistan remains more important
than the dwindling population of giant armadillos. They are in awe when the
death of Saddam Hussein in Iraq attracts more attention than the death of
Yan Yan the Panda in the Berlin Zoo.

"Surely this is a farce!" they exclaim to each other, "The vast right-wing
conspiracy has brainwashed Americans into caring about issues that affect
human beings!"

The typically pacific environmentalists have chosen to go out with a bang,
however, and their latest creation, the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement,
might be the last nail in their coffin. VHEMT (pronounced "vehement"- how
clever and revolutionary!) calls for its members to remain childless,
arguing that the damage human beings cause to the environment is so great
that the world would be a much better place without us. And founder Les U.
Knight- again, so clever I don't know whether to laugh or cry- might be one
of the more moderate members of the American extinction crew; he proposes it
should be completely voluntary and occur within a time frame that is
appropriate, while colleagues like author Alan Weisman propose the Chinese
solution: a governmental mandate to prohibit families from having more than
one child.

"Let's unite in peace and love and not make any more kids" sounds like a
great idea for Starbucks poets and basket weavers from sea to shining sea
(Cambridge to San Francisco), but it might take the more sensible populace
of the United States a little time to warm up to the idea. Not to mention
that, upon suggesting this American genocide, they seem to be forgetting a
significant chunk of the American population that will be at a complete loss
when understanding their argument: the illegal aliens. How exactly, I
wonder, will the nature lobby explain to Guadalupe from Mexico, who crossed
the Rio Grande with four children in her arms and another in her womb at age
20, that "as long as there's one breeding pair of homo sapiens, there's too
great a threat to the biosphere," as Knight has been quoted as saying? How
are they going to explain to Guaycoloro from Peru that he needs to sheathe
himself with a condom before ravaging his wife after a drunken night on the
town with his futbol buddies or initiating an extramarital affair with a
minor? Something tells me that Native South American culture is not
particularly well suited to this idea of family planning in the name of
nature, and culture shock is not something that should happen between
residents of the same nation.

If we really want to integrate these scorned and unwanted fiends- pardon me,
completely faultless, angelic, and beloved newcomers, like child molesters
Alejandro Bautista and Ruben Hernandez-Juarez- into our nation, we can't be
touting all these radical ideas that will only alienate them further from
American society. In fact, we should be adapting to the changing times. Any
little alteration in our culture will be a formidable bridge upon which
these undocumented immigrants can cross into our society. Despite the minor
damage we will cause to nature by having more children, the open-arms
approach to immigration that elevating the American population will usher in
is sure to make those that disrespect the meaning of citizenship and come
into this country to commit felonies feel just like they are back home. And
when they acquire the right to vote, maybe they will vote for the reforms
VHEMT and Weisman are calling for.

(Here's the link to the GOP-Open email that contained this gem. The list archives are public, so please don't attack me for confidentiality etc. etc.)

America's New Gap

The NY Times has a pretty fascinating piece on a new demographic gap in the US population, one that pits a growing younger, more diverse segment of the population against an aging, mostly white one.

And this may have interesting implications for national politics:

"That development may portend a nation split between an older, whiter electorate and a younger overall population that is more Hispanic, black and Asian and that presses sometimes competing agendas and priorities.

“The new demographic divide has broader implications for social programs and education spending for youth,” said Mark Mather, deputy director of domestic programs for the Population Reference Bureau, a nonpartisan research group.

“There’s a fairly large homogenous population 60 and older that may not be sympathetic to the needs of a diverse youthful population,” Dr. Mather said."

Some of the new findings:

-while one third of Americans identify as a black, Asian, or Hispanic, they make up half of American children under five. 

- 80% of Americans over 60 are non-hispanic whites

-Minorities constitute a majority in Texas, California, New Mexico and Hawaii

There's also some analysis of the implications of this on education spending, and some more statistics here:

http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?emc=tnt&tntget=2007/05/17/us/17census.html&tntemail0=y

These brown people in the street make it most inconvenient to get to the bank

It is a point of infinite sadness to me that our little corner of the blogging world doesn't have any good analogs to The Corner or Ace o' Spades or The Daily Kitten—that is, amusing heaps of rich cultural offal with which the beautiful Lollerz garden might be fertilized.

And so, if I could find some way to set my RSS reader to "yelp of glee" when RedIvy adds something new, I'd certainly do it.

Shall we gaze upon the latest in Ivy-ennobled conservative baton-twirling?

Harvardmarine observes that May Day is a good time to reflect on the 'rule of law' in America, a point on which I can muster no disagreement, as far too few maypole celebrations have been given the proper administration of police brutality and tear gas in the past few years.

Says the inimitable Victor Davis Hanson:

“The government’s attitude at all levels is to punish the dutiful citizen’s misdemeanors while ignoring the alien’s felony, on the logic that the former will at least comply while the latter either cannot or will not.”

Above: Noted professor Victor Davis Hanson demonstrates that whites can pull off grape picking and ill-fitting sweaty T-shirts just as well as any immigrant.

Adds harvardmarine,

What use are our laws when it is permissible for non-citizens to march the streets, flaunting their strength in numbers, despite their vacuous logic?

For some reason, I am entirely unable to make the three clauses of this sentence cooperate with each other. Our laws are bankrupt if non-citizens can be on our streets? Or only if there's lots of them? Or only if they are poor logicians? What about hordes of foreign tourists in Harvard Yard who arrive en masse in the hopes that touching John Harvard's foot will get their children into a good school? Is that OK?

Maybe it was a rhetorical strategy: ask them "what use are our laws" and then just throw in a string of random qualifiers. Tee-hee: our laws are never of any use! Get it?

Finally, a quiz for RedIvy's three or four readers:

I’ll ask of our writers and readers: If one is to call themselves a Conservative, whom are you critical of in the immigration debate? The governments (US, Mexico, et al) complicit in the illegal activities? The people crossing the border illegally? The business interests that benefit from cheap labor? Or the citizens (in the US, Mexico, et al) that are not outraged enough to protest/take action?

Surely this is not a secret caving in to the fact that we only have a certain amount of vitriol to go around! C'mon: the RedIvy I knew would've blamed at least three if not four of those, and probably would've thrown some hate over at the MSM as well. What's going on? Are we all tuckered out from arguing with Snoop Dogg?

Let Rove's son pick the fruit! Or, Further Angering the Base

"The Corner" blog at the conservative bastion The National Review is reporting that Karl Rove, speaking at a Republican women's luncheon yesterday, let slip this precious soundbite in defending Bush's immigration policy: "I don't want my 17-year-old son to have to pick tomatoes or make beds in Las Vegas."

Needless to say this is not playing well.

Conservative freak-out here: http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NTZhZDdiYmJlNDViYTAwOWExNmUyMmQ5ODlmMWYwYTU=

Applause for Arnold... Let the naysayers pick the fruit!

After quite muscular action on global warming and minimum wage, Arnold Schwarzenegger has announced a rehaul of California's health care system. His plan would require residents to have health insurance-- something 6.5 million Californians lack. (The terminator made this announcement from a hospital where he is still recuperating from a broken leg... he feels their pain. Apparently, he does feel pain). The plan also provides for illegal immigrants, which has California Republicans revolting against their own. Illegal immigration, is of course, the button to push with them. Remember back in March when California Rep Dana Rohrabacher declared: "I say let the prisoners pick the fruit"? Well also on Arnold's list this year is prison reform, with Democrats pushing for shorter sentences for lesser offenders. Now who's going to pick the fruit?