You Southern crackers are going to love this Kunstler rant.
A Look in the Mirror
By James Howard Kunstler
on November 12, 2012 8:57 AM
The verdict is apparently in: if Fox News will replace its current heraldic theme music with a mariachi band, and Sean Hannity puts on a sombrero for his nightly broadcast prayer circle, then the Republican Party will once again rule the land…
…Not – in the immortal word of Borat Sagdiyev.
The so-called Grand Old Party now faces a fugue of recrimination that could end in its demise. The party marginalized itself by becoming an alliance of corporate oligarchs with poorly-educated Southern suburban white trash religious fanatics, both using each other to browbeat the nation into transforming itself into kleptocratic theocracy. There are no more people of good will and intelligence left in that camp, and a blame-fest between its two remaining factions can only lead to a death struggle.
The beginning of the end really came with the death of William F. Buckley in 2008. Buckley labored for years to keep the John Birch Society and its agents out of the GOP’s leadership circles. For those of you unacquainted with this organization, it was a group that coalesced during the early 1950s anti-communist crusade of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy. The Birchers named themselves after an obscure American soldier and Baptist missionary executed by the Red Army in China during the final months of World War Two. The group was founded and funded by Robert Welch, a Boston candy manufacturer (Junior Mints, Sugar Daddy) tormented by conspiracy fantasies. Another founding board member was Fred Koch, father of the billionaire Koch brothers, Charles and David, who have become the latter-day sugar daddies of the Republican Party.
The Birchers retailed all kinds of ideological nonsense that made them the butt of ridicule during the Camelot days of John F. Kennedy and the heady Civil Rights years of his successor Lyndon B. Johnson. (Bob Dylan wrote a song about them in 1962: “Talkin’ John Birch Paranoid Blues.”) Everything perceived to be a threat in a changing society was sold by the Birchers as a communist plot – water fluoridation, de-segregation, even, by a kind of tortured logic, the US strategy in the Vietnam War. Since a Democratic president and congress passed the civil rights legislation of 1964-5, the traditionally Democratic “solid South” revolted almost overnight and eventually turned solidly Republican. (It was also good for business.)
Something else was going on in Dixieland from the late 1950s on. The region boomed economically, partly from luring northern industry down with cheap labor, and partly because so many large military bases were located there – hence the hyperbolic, militant patriotism of a region that had lately staged a violent insurrection against the national government. The region also went through an explosion of air-conditioned suburban sprawl because the southern states were geographically huge and the climate was unbearable half the year. The sprawl industry itself generated vast fortunes and widespread prosperity in a part of the country that had been a depressed agricultural backwater since the Civil War.
Consequently, a population of poor, ignorant crackers crawled out of the mud and dust to find themselves wealthy car dealers and strip-mall magnates in barely one turn of a generation. The transition being so abrupt, their cracker culture of xenophobia, “primitive” religion, and romance with violence came through intact. They were the perfect client group for a political party that styled itself “conservative,” as in maintaining the old timey ways. Toward the end of the 20th century, as the old northern states’ economies withered, and Yankee culture lost both footing and meaning, and poor white folks all over America looked with envy on the glitz of country music and Nascar, and gravitated toward the Dixieland culture of belligerent, aggressive suburbanization, religiosity, and militarism. This cartoon of the old timey ways swept the “flyover” precincts of the nation. Along in the baggage compartment was all the old John Birch Society cargo of quasi-supernatural ideology that appealed so deeply to people perplexed by the mystifying operations of reality. That perplexity was supposedly resolved in a Bush II White House aide famously stating, “We make our own reality.” The results of the 2012 election now conclusively demonstrate the shortcomings of that world-view.
And so the news last week was that a different version of America outvoted the John Birch Dixiecrat coalition by roughly two million ballots. Meaning, of course, that there are still a lot of dangerous morons out there, but also that the times they are yet a’changin’ again. I am personally glad that Mr. Romney lost because he came across to me as a dangerously hollow, not very smart, pre-cooked personality marinated in cant and opportunism. I’m not so delirious either about the victor, Mr. Obama, though he seems a more reliable character in contrast to his vanquished opponent. I think we can rely on him to not prosecute any misconduct in banking for another four years. But, at least, he’s not trying to turn the country into one big prayer circle.
He’s surely in for a rough ride in the four years ahead. There is a sickening, heavy sense of foreboding about the seemingly endless financial melodrama. It leads to the bewildering fork in the road at which the split paths lead to two different ways of going broke: savage deflation or turbo-inflation. Either way, you’re toast. The gross interventions and arrant accounting fraud that pervade global finance, both in government and in private banking, can only lead to perversity and dysfunction in the operations of money that we depend on to remain civilized.
If America were able to look in a mirror now, it would see an image of a sclerotic society, physically run down, strikingly ugly, and sordid in its cultural programing. It would see an armature for daily life – the drive-in Utopia – with very poor prospects for the future. I don’t know if Mr. Obama can get this nation engaged in the great tasks that we have been avoiding for so long: purging corporate money from politics, preparing for post-petroleum reality minus the fantasy that we can just live inside our smart phones, and downscaling and re-localizing economic life. Much of that agenda would seem contrary to the common expectation that Mr. Obama wants ever more government intervention in the economy. The past four years he has seemingly done everything possible to support the status quo – leading a few observers to brand him as a “conservative” – and he still acts like a hostage of the too-big-to-fail banks. I’m not convinced that he’ll act decisively for the right things in the right way on anything. At least he won’t be running for office again and can act perhaps more freely as he will. Anyway, I subscribe to the sentiment that it was a good thing for the nation to re-elect a leader of mixed-race, to show that we mean it about who is allowed to succeed here.
I spent a lot of time in Dixieland this fall. I can report that its era of hyper-prosperity is on the wane. The boom is pretty much over, except for some deceptive last twitchings over in Texas and in the Northern Virginia beltway counties where lobbyists spawn. The failure of the Republican Party this year marks the end of the economic ascendency of the South. Now they will have to contend with the imminent failure of their suburban way of life and all its comfortable trappings. I’ve predicted for many years that the process would drive them batshit crazy. When I was in North Carolina in October, I got the odd impression that I was in a giant car dealership masquerading as a state. That’s just not going to work anymore. But it remains to be seen whether anything will work in any quarter of this big old country.
One interesting thing is shaping up: a beard-growing contest between Paul Krugman and Ben Bernanke to see who can end up looking most like Rutherford B. Hayes.
Roysyl says:
If anyone had any doubts that the wrong side won “The War of Northern Agression” this should cinch it.
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12th November 2012 at 10:29 am
Tator says:
He has no clue about Southerners. All the white trash he keeps referring to are Democrats on all forms of government entitlements.
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12th November 2012 at 10:33 am
flash says:
The Yankee carpetbagger descended on the South to exploit the cheap labor long before the fifties…see cotton mills….but where tossed int the garage heap of overpriced laborer when Nixon opened up Shina to “free trade” in 1978.
And, it was A/C that contributed to suburban in the ’60′s .
The suburban spawl that the POS sackless Yankee portends as the result of A/C was actually due to Yankee Federal meddling in State business in the form of forced integration by massive busing campaigns which destroyed historic families neighborhoods all across the South and created the ghetto blight we now see prevalent in all southern cities.
JHK- I’m not so delirious either about the victor, Mr. Obama, though he seems a more reliable character in contrast to his vanquished opponent.
And, this statement is all you need to know about the rational credibility lisping collectivist shitstain.
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12th November 2012 at 10:36 am
Hollow man says:
So, what does he think Obama is? In mysmall minded southern way, he sure seems like a socialist at best. More likely a communist. We will know pretty quick as he now has a little more freedom to make decrees oops decisions. Does anybody think he will not use a war to occupy minds if things head south,lol, perhaps he will cut spending? He is a dip shit just like the rest of them. There was no great choice. He quit, me too.
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12th November 2012 at 10:47 am
Ron says:
Im not from the south,but not wanting to be part of the union is appealing.Kunsters comments about religion suck.If anyone happens to meet this dirtbag,kick him in the sack and say,Ron says hello.
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12th November 2012 at 10:55 am
Dorkus Maximus says:
Kunstler is no authority on the GOP or southerners. He only knows stereotypes and leftist spin.
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12th November 2012 at 10:55 am
FTL says:
15 States Have Petitioned for Withdrawal from the Union
As of Saturday November 10, 2012, 15 States have petitioned the Obama Administration for withdrawal from the United States of America in order to create its own government.
States following this action include: Louisiana, Texas, Montana, North Dakota, Indiana, Mississippi, Kentucky, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, Colorado, Oregon and New York. These States have requested that the Obama Administration grant a peaceful withdrawal from the United States.
These citizen generated petitions were filed just days after the 2012 Presidential election.
Louisiana was the first State to file a petition a day after the election by a Michael E. from Slidell, Louisiana. Texas was the next State to follow by a Micah H. from Arlington, Texas.
The government allows one month from the day the petition is submitted to obtain 25,000 signatures in order for the Obama administration to consider the request.
The Texas petition reads as follows:
The US continues to suffer economic difficulties stemming from the federal government’s neglect to reform domestic and foreign spending.The citizens of the US suffer from blatant abuses of their rights such as the NDAA, the TSA, etc. Given that the state of Texas maintains a balanced budget and is the 15th largest economy in the world, it is practically feasible for Texas to withdraw from the union, and to do so would protect it’s citizens’ standard of living and re-secure their rights and liberties in accordance with the original ideas and beliefs of our founding fathers which are no longer being reflected by the federal government.
As of 12:46 am, Sunday, signatures obtained by Louisiana, 7,358; Texas, 3,771; Florida, 636; Georgia, 475; Alabama, 834; North Carolina, 792; Kentucky, 467; Mississippi, 475; Indiana, 449; North Dakota, 162; Montana, 440; Colorado, 324; Oregon, 328; New Jersey, 301 and New York, 169. Many more States are expected to follow.
A petition is not searchable at WhiteHouse.gov until 150 signatures have been obtained. It is the originator’s responsibility to obtain these signatures.
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12th November 2012 at 10:57 am
harry p. says:
JHK goes at y’all southerners this week. Some of his depictions may be accurate but many of his biases shine through as stupidity and it is pretty blatant. The GOP failed miserably and there is a good chance the party splinters apart; not a bad thing in my opinion.
Romney would have been horrible but he seems to gloss over Obama’s shortcomings way too casually. He seems to be changing his tune from about a year ago and is “seeing” significant differences between Evil Party R and Evil Party D that just aren’t there.
The religion issue is always tragic to me, too many are blind apologists for whatever faith they profess, be it Catholicism, Judaism, Islam etc. But many who look down on them and exclaim that they think for themselves and are not followers are really nothing more than religious fanatics themselves. Except they choose to worship and offer the human sacrifice of their fellow man at the altar of Government.
I find it funny that he mentions the southern infatuation with aggression and violence. But he is a supporter of big government, and there is no entity more infatuated with aggression, violence and coercion than the government he seeks. For this reason alone Kunstler is a supporter of evil and violence and he himself should take a look in the mirror.
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12th November 2012 at 11:01 am
tayronachan says:
Well, Ron Paul was right about all this mess after all.
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12th November 2012 at 11:04 am
Eddie says:
I miss Bill Buckley too. There was day when Republican pundits had impeccable manners. Boy, did that ever change.
Kunstler isn’t terribly wrong on the South. I think he’s wrong about timing..right now there are demographic changes happening that will prop up parts of the South (like my part, for instance) for a while, barring a full-on collapse scenario.
And not all Southerners are low IQ religious nutjobs, although they are a vocal lot. Like a lot of NYC born Northerers, he confuses the accent with stupidity…they only go together in part of the population.
I’m disappointed that Jim K. didn’t make the right decision and vote for Dr. Paul. I have to take that as an indication that he still supports the socialsist paradigm that’s strangling the country.
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12th November 2012 at 11:04 am
AKAnon says:
“I don’t know if Mr. Obama can get this nation engaged in the great tasks that we have been avoiding for so long: purging corporate money from politics,…”
Flash-I offer this quote to compete with yours re “the rational credibility lisping collectivist shitstain.” JHK must have some mighty fine weed. Or maybe he really meant “…purging corporate money from Republican politics”.
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12th November 2012 at 11:07 am
Colma Rising says:
Sorry, folks, I can’t hide it:
I am laughing my ass off. JK’s a pompous prick but he sure does pen mighty fine, though disguised with a thesaurus, napalm pieces.
Always a Monday morning pleasure to read.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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12th November 2012 at 11:15 am
Screech says:
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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12th November 2012 at 11:15 am
Welshman says:
Thank you Mr. K for my morning NASCAR fix.
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12th November 2012 at 11:19 am
Petey says:
Sure glad that JHK is free of prejudice and eschews stereotypes.
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12th November 2012 at 11:26 am
intj says:
Although I suspect “anti-intellectualism” is alive and well elsewhere in America – here in the South they take particular pride in wearing it on their sleeves.
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12th November 2012 at 11:43 am
AWD says:
What a fucking idiot. Obama should have been elected so we can still show we’re serious about giving people of mixed race a chance? I didn’t know affirmative action applied to elections; apparently so. And comparing all members of the Republican party to John Birchers’ is a liberal’s dream, but utterly incorrect, as usual. Liberals only see the world in terms of extremes; Kunstler is a liberal, and tries to supplant those in the south that have been successful and taken what jobs remain (that weren’t shipped to China yet) from the North.
Kunstler is once again jealous. He’s seen where he lives, upstate New York, turn into the rust belt, and is now of no value whatsoever save the judgement and acrimony dished out by pseudo-intellectuals like himself. Obama is a sham, a joke, and a puppet. He only won by 2 million votes, while tens of millions didn’t vote. He was lucky, and he spent hundreds of billions of tax dollars increasing entitlements, pensions, food stamps, and free shit to buy votes, and still barely won. Fuck Kunstler and his liberal/socialist brethren. NASCAR does suck ass, the same people that go to Wal Mart with their EBT/SNAP cards, but the South isn’t much different than the rest of the country. A douchebag always needs somebody to look down on, especially liberal douchebags.
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12th November 2012 at 11:45 am
AWD says:
There’s no telling where it will end, liberals/progressives running things. Oh yea, it’s been tried already, Socialism/Communism. Hasn’t worked yet. How’s it gonna work this time Kunstler?
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12th November 2012 at 11:50 am
Hope@ZeroKelvin says:
Ya know, it’s really amazing how JHK can travel the country with his head completely up his ass and his brain completely tuned to Libtard Proglodyte Central. It doesn’t matter where he goes, he has EXACTLY THE SAME spin when he comes back.
He should save some of that carbon and just stay at home, sheesh.
He bashes the Southern culture while completely ignoring the filth and violence of the NE’s inner cities, mainly black folks. They happen to have better teeth than the Deliverance crowd as THEY have access to Medicaid dentists.
He has nothing but contempt for people that “arose out of the med” and created prosperity for themselves and their children. WTF? I guess the NEer’s still swimming in the mud of Sandy, completely abandoned by their BLUE state governments will have something to hope for…
He blathers on and on about the John Birchers while completely IGNORING the avowed Communists, Marxists and radicals that infest the Demoncrat party.
He sits in one of the most densely populated areas in the planet, an area supported through the “backwater” agriculture of the South, where goods produced in Southern factories flow, whose gas/electricity comes in large part from the South. HAHAHA! Whatta ya say we just cut y’all off from that Deliverance+NASCAR loving-cretin infested South and see how long y’all last.
Oh, and the South, and Texas, is where all the gun owners are, asshole. Let’s get that “pen versus the sword” issue over right now, wadda ya say.
Fuck, New Yorkers were dumpster diving 48 hours after the lights went out and Staten Island is still a toxic shit hole 2 weeks later.
JHK is such a fucking asshole, I’m sorry. He might have some nice prose but unfortunately his worldview is marked by envy, hypocrisy, ignorance, and a degree of close mindedness and willfull blindness that would make the most ardent Jim Jones follower seem normal.
Country boy can survive, JHK, so stick that in your (ass) pipe and smoke it. We’ll be a hell of a lot better down here while you guys will be freezing your (shriveled )nutsacks off when the wheels come off the Obama Economy in 2013/2014.
Gah, this guy really pisses me off, what a jerk off douch bag maroon.
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12th November 2012 at 12:00 pm
flash says:
HZK. Kunstler get more dick in the north than we he travels the south , hence his preference for Yankee pricks ‘stead of Southern hicks.
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12th November 2012 at 12:18 pm
AWD says:
The Moochers prevailed, JK.
“There is a rational explanation for the President’s reelection which doesn’t invoke a deep or complex meaning. The only way to explain the outcome is in the simplest and direct prose: the moochers prevailed.
Obama’s winning tactic was to do what any respectable man does when he wishes to have something; he bought it. From cell phones and contraceptives to food stamps and unemployment benefits, the Obama administration kept the money flowing to ensure a steady turnout on Election Day. The coup de grâce was painting his opponent as a second coming of Dickens’ Scrooge that was ready to cut the voters from their trust funds.
The campaign made no attempt to hide this tactic. In an online video, celebrity Lena Dunham was tapped to extol the virtues of government-supplied birth control. The advertisement was aimed at a younger generation already guaranteed access to their parent’s health insurance till they turn 26 (and then morph simultaneously into full grown, self-sufficient adults). The video was a great demonstration of the campaign strategy but it was topped by one woman from Cleveland, Ohio who exemplified the public trough mentality on camera. Commonly referred to as the Obama-phone lady, this woman was so enraptured by her “free” cell phone and other welfare entitlements, she was determined to “keep Obama in president” to use her exact words. Though clearly dimwitted, Ms. Obamaphone was a phenomenal orator of the President’s message of goodies in exchange for votes.
Though it worked splendidly, Obama’s strategy was not brilliantly crafted from the minds of experts. It was the same bread and circus routine employed by the Romans and applied to modern demographics that relish in a victim-like mentality. Women, the youth, blacks, Hispanics, and the elderly were all catered to through subtle patronization and outright payoffs. It was the same tactic employed by the Roosevelt administration when the New Deal got underway. As journalist John T. Flynn wrote of the popular 32nd president:
It was always easy to sell him a plan that involved giving away government money. It was always easy to interest him in a plan which would confer some special benefit upon some special class in the population in exchange for their votes.
The 2009 auto industry bailout was Obama’s great tribute to Roosevelt. By infusing two auto giants with the federal government and still maintaining the appearance of their private ownership, the President convinced a majority in the battleground state of Ohio to put him back in the White House. Criticizing the auto bailout was the last nail in the coffin for Mitt Romney’s presidential aspirations.
The wealthy interests the former Massachusetts governor looked to appease were welfare queens in themselves and would likely receive all the state coddling money can buy.
Obama won the election by catering to the worst of all human traits: envy. He demonized the rich while promising to take more of their income and give it out in the form of entitlement payments. Under his presidency, the attitude of the takers will continue to swell as they clamor for more privileges. Anybody who speaks out against the Robin Hood scheme will be called an unconscionable xenophobe and a hater of the poor. The protestant work ethic will slowly be choked into submission through deliberate iconoclasm launched by the political class and their pet media pundits.”
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12th November 2012 at 12:20 pm
flash says:
Screech . I lived in the South for many years and have yet to meet a gender confused redneck, but in my 10 years traverse North , I come across more city bred faggot yankees in a day than in a whole year of traveling the South.
Screech is generally what yankee punks do when they get a rebel boot in their wothless ass.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJG_X9BsQlI
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12th November 2012 at 12:23 pm
TeresaE says:
Screech says: “..iIn the restroom were two characters straight out of Deliverance…Next stop was Hazard in Harlan County. This place gave new meaning the the expression, “We don’t cotton to no strangers ’round here. You best be gittin’.”…fine family of five (doubtless the spawn of the Kentucky duo because of the similar attire and smiles) ) at a Dairy Queen in northern Georgia. Well… you get the idea. It just goes to show that you can’t polish a turd as JHK has suggested….”
Wow Screech, you ever been to Detroit? The south side of Chicago? Gary, Indiana? Parts of Milwaukee, St. Paul, St. Louis, Flint, Grand Rapids, Cleveland, Buffalo?
While you may not encounter as many flannel shirts, overalls, barefeet, or dirt – heaven forbid we get dirty, especially if doing actual work – you sure as hell will get the feeling you don’t belong.
I dare you to go into Detroit and try to hang in a bar on the east side. The customers will be guaranteed to have shoes ($200 Nikes, more than likely), nice clean clothes ($200 track suits and baggy-assed $200 jeans, $150 weekly hair-dos for the gals), but I really, really, really, doubt you will find these upstanding Northerners more accommodating.
The South may be full of rednecks, but most are the most polite, kind, helpful people you would ever meet. Well, if you could open your mind, that is.
I’d rather run out of gas in the middle of Nowheresville, South (and have), than in Gary, Indiana or Buffalo, New York.
You and JHK deserve each other.
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12th November 2012 at 12:36 pm
AWD says:
I’m with HZK.
Who will survive? JK can fire off some nasty missives, but down South, we have real guns.
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12th November 2012 at 12:51 pm
Richard says:
I think I am about done with Kunstler, after reading him every Monday for about four years. His antipay for the South and white Southerners is irrational and childish. He really has no clue, he is after all a Northeast Jewish liberal. WTF does he know about Texas? Fuck off Jew boy is offensive. But then so is this column.
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12th November 2012 at 1:17 pm
AWD says:
Santa Claus Obama
Every time Romney made one of his “let’s get the economy going again” speeches extolling the virtues of hard work he terrified the millions of welfare bums and parasites and motivated them more than ever to stand in line for hours to vote for Santa Claus Obama, their “savior” from having to work for a living. (It’s always the low opportunity cost class that has the “luxury” of spending half a day or more standing in a line).
With Obama’s reelection comes the onward march of American society’s degeneration into that of the lazy, bitter masses forever on the lookout to loot a hapless minority still trying to make an honest living. The coming brave new world will be filled to the brim with self-righteous individuals eager to shuffle around the Earth’s gifts to achieve some kind of equality. In the process, none of them will produce a lick of good outside of satisfying their own disturbed need to dominate. It will be rule of the inept over the capable. Barack Obama will lead the way. He will be replaced in four years with someone that follows the same doctrine. The collective age of the country will continue to collapse till it reaches just shy of an unclothed infant wailing for succor. Except it will be grown men doing the crying and no one around to feed him because the sensible among us has already left.
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12th November 2012 at 1:17 pm
ragman says:
He’s right! Don’t come South this winter with your arrogance and shitty attitudes. Stay up there and clean up what’s left of your sub-standard dwellings. Enjoy the crisp winter nights when the temp inside your houses falls into the 30s. Electrizzidy? Who needs it! You turned away Southern boys that came up to help. Why? No union card! Isn’t that special!
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12th November 2012 at 1:18 pm
John A says:
@Screech: Kentucky is not a Southern state and it was never a part of Confederacy. Yes, Kentucky has its share of unpolished locals, but so does Utah and New Jersey. I lived and worked in Lexington, KY for over two years. Some of the world’s finest thoroughbred horse farms are located there. Live horse racing at Keeneland track was very enjoyable to see and experience. Something special indeed.
Article: Jim Kunstler needs to stick to what he really understands: Peak Oil.
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12th November 2012 at 1:49 pm
Thinker says:
FTL, it’s now up to 21 states petitioning to secede. Caveat: anyone over the age of 13 can petition via the White House website, but a given number of signatures are required before the President will respond to it.
But, it is definitely a sign of a deepinging Fourth Turning. The country is deeply divided and, while those who wanted Obama to win will claim secessionists are “crazy,” this kind of divide is exactly what drives the next phase of the Crisis.
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12th November 2012 at 2:05 pm
Hope@ZeroKelvin says:
@Thinker: I am a bit worried about citizens coming forward to petition this corrupt and venal fed.gov for secession. It seems like you are just giving these black-booted NSA thugs a perfect list to come and pick you up.
Afterall, these guys got Petraeus to 1) resign, 2) be disgraced, 3) be discredited, just because his office made a 1 LINE STATEMENT about Benghazi that contradicted the WH.
ValJar made a visit to the Obama campaign HQ just before the election. She promised the Obamabots that it was “pay back” time. That anybody who opposed the Obama WH was gonna be punished.
What is to stop this government from rounding up all these petitioners under the guise of NDAA????
Better to be well armed and under the radar, if you get my drift.
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12th November 2012 at 2:14 pm
Persnickety says:
Haven’t signed any petitions for a while, for the same reason Hope states. Also, petitioning to secede is rather silly, just up and secede and tell the feds the marriage is over. I continue to give best odds on California doing that first, because it DESPERATELY needs the tax money otherwise going to DC, and it isn’t likely to suffer a military response the way that, say, North Dakota would.
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12th November 2012 at 2:21 pm
Appalachian Trail Deblazer says:
“We only call them ‘DAMN YANKEES’ , when they move down and stay.” Those passing through are Yankees.
When they stay, all they do is bitch about how backwards we are, how poor local gov. services are and how behind the times we are compared to back up NORTH.
They do like lower cost of living, lower home prices, lower utility cost and lower property taxes; however, they “Sun City” residents have started voting for higher taxes for better gov. services. Now it won’t be long before the tail wags the dog.
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12th November 2012 at 2:25 pm
sensetti says:
JHKES
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12th November 2012 at 2:26 pm
JIMSKI says:
and it isn’t likely to suffer a military response the way that, say, North Dakota would.
That’s some funny ass shit right there!
The federal guvment ” owns about 30% of the states. How THAT happened is another topic. Here is a map of California.
http://nationalatlas.gov/printable/images/preview/fedlands/CA.gif
Sure looks like the feds claim a whole buncha fruit and nut ville. Gunna just let em walk ?
Here is North Dakota. Whole lotta nothin. Who they gunna let walk?
http://nationalatlas.gov/printable/images/preview/fedlands/ND.gif
Answer. NONE OF THEM
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12th November 2012 at 2:33 pm
flash says:
If Kunstler took long hard look in the mirror , he would see staring back a wasted worn- out fuck of an old girlieman marxist who never produced anything of tangible value other than skipping around the country spewing his New Urbanism bullshit which propagates the UN Agenda 21 mantra of forcing people off their land , into densely packed cities and designating entire regions of what was once people’s private farms as areas to be prohibited to human traffic.
I do enjoy ready dooky breathe’s vitriol on Mondays, but make no mistake this guy makes Karl Marx look like John Birch.
http://va10thamendment.org/
Agenda 21 Keywords:
Sustainable Development
Smart Growth
New Urbanism
Wildlands Project
Green Zone
Heritage Site
Comprehensive Plan
Bio-Diversity
Social Justice
Globalism
ICLEI
ICMA
Clustering
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12th November 2012 at 2:58 pm
flash says:
Any one of these Southern Belles could stomp a mudhole in Jami’s ass and walk it dry.
Sh%t Southern Women Say
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUFL2GT1-2g
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12th November 2012 at 3:14 pm
Micro-Be says:
I’m Southron born and raised. Not going back, at least not any time soon. I’m not going to hate on the people or the region but what drove me away was that there was nothing to challenge my brain and my soul as well as the existing premium incentive to conform. Nashville can be good for the soul but there is still an entrenched “way of being” that permeates the society. It has a small research community centered around health care, which translates into research into an aging and waste-expanding populace, and the so-called intellectual circles are just more repackaged Marxist dung. Requisite membership in a group seems to be nearly universal in America and I despise the notion that to be whole is to be part of a whole. Say what you will about my insecurities, perceived or otherwise, but having a narrow range of possibilities in which to express one’s self is not freedom, it is merely picking which pre-approved shade of paint goes on the universal body style chosen by people long dead and gone. One is either free to be their self or not, and I was not. This is okay. Everywhere throughout the world there are homogeneous cultures that more-or-less require some sort of membership in order to function socially and I wouldn’t take that away from anyone.
In my opinion Southern people talk a great game about the individual but never play the game the way they talk. They are really talking about the individual within the construct of the Southern culture, which is fine, as opposed to the identity that goes along with allegiance to a distant and leviathan federal government. Southern people are definitely nice but don’t think they aren’t ruthless. One act of “indiscretion” could sink your entire family if the word got out through the grape vine. And once you’ve been given the social Scarlet Letter, well, you’ll see just how nice Southern people are…
Not trying to offend anyone here but the South isn’t a wonderland of hospitality and rainbow flatulence, regardless of what past factors have shaped its culture. It’s nice with a low cost of living (low expectations, really) and the people are generally warm but life is a harsh existence if you aren’t a puzzle piece in the grand culture.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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12th November 2012 at 3:14 pm
Micro-Be says:
Forgot to mention my absolute support for Southern independence.
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12th November 2012 at 3:17 pm
Administrator says:
How did I know that Kunstler’s article would get a rise out of TBPers?
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12th November 2012 at 3:18 pm
flash says:
Micro-be , so you are gay and moved away due to Southern back -hand compliments acknowledging your coming out? Yeah , those can sting, lucky for them Yankees don’t pick up on ‘em.
Bless your heart.
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12th November 2012 at 3:19 pm
Thinker says:
@HZK — sorry I wasn’t clearer. I’m not petitioning and I didn’t weigh in on whether they should be taken seriously or not. I’m merely pointing out the societal/historical context of how 4Ts develop.
That said, I will say it’s refreshing to see this many people quote a passage from the Declaration of Independence: “whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and institute new Government.”
This is how societal mood swings become the next spark.
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12th November 2012 at 3:24 pm
flash says:
Micro-Be -Forgot to mention my absolute support for Southern independence.
OK, Southron basher or not, you’ve been redeemed….watch that mouth when you’re in the South land , though.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSeSR-of9Es
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtOtj8dct_I
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12th November 2012 at 3:26 pm
Micro-Be says:
Flash –
Not gay, was just bored and unhappy in the land of the stripmall and the polo. I have a dislike for Yankees, those damn imperialists, and refuse to live amongst them. No one got physical with me when I lived in the south and voiced my opinion. I’m all for the South living like they want to live but it isn’t a wonderland for me at least.
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12th November 2012 at 3:35 pm
Stucky says:
1. — I hate Kunstler so much he makes me want to be a Honey Boo Boo supporter.
2. — I think Admin should stop posting his articles … why increase that faggot fucks readership? (But that just my opinion and should/will be ignored.)
3. — I’m surprised some southern good ol’ boy hasn’t put a bullet in that faggot fucks brain. I would rejoice greatly by pissing on his grave. (But that just my opinion and should/will be ignored.)
4. — I bet that faggot dot-head in the ‘Asian’ thread, Avinash_Tyagi , creams in his pants reading this shit.
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12th November 2012 at 5:04 pm
Administrator says:
I wish kunstler posted three times a week so I could raise Stuck’s blood pressure.
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12th November 2012 at 5:09 pm
Stucky says:
TeresaE
Have you ever been to Grand Rapids? I lived there for a few years after my divorce, and my younger son lives there now. It’s actually a very attractive city … there are no “ghetto” sections even though it’s about 20% black. Lots of Germans and Dutch. Beautiful parks and gardens. Not a bad place at all. Really.
Just sayin’
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12th November 2012 at 5:19 pm
Stucky says:
Admin
HA! I give about as much thought to Cuntsler as I do to the massive turds I leave behind every few days … and he’s about as relevant.
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12th November 2012 at 5:21 pm
Kill Bill says:
Sadly Kuntsler has dipped into the cookie jar marked ‘generalization’
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12th November 2012 at 5:45 pm
Kill Bill says:
I’m surprised some southern good ol’ boy hasn’t put a bullet in that faggot fucks brain -Stucky
Being born and raised in the south Kunstler doesnt bother me one bit. Not worth the time or trouble to get pissed about.
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12th November 2012 at 5:48 pm
GunRights4US says:
I have two words for the author of this drivel, and they’re not Happy Birthday!
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12th November 2012 at 5:51 pm
Mikey says:
@Admin, Colma
I also love Kunstler’s rants.
There is something magical about a good wordsmith releasing all his bile and venom. Such marvellous turns of phrase.
Also the spluttering, barely coherent objections of TBPers doing the equivalant of “oh YEAH! but you smell of POO” in response
Hot debate. What do you think?
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12th November 2012 at 5:51 pm
Novista says:
It’s a Fourth Turning and the vox populi is making itself heard.
Anyway, if you’re not already on a list, you just haven’t been trying hard enough. There was a lot of talk leading up to the Declaration of independence, too, and when the crunch came, about 10% of the population was behind independence. Just sayin’ …
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12th November 2012 at 6:09 pm
John says:
Cuntsler! Stay up north asshole! And keep the yanks up there that are tired of your taxes and move south! And another thing..stop with the phony “rants” on Obama. We all know you would blow him if you could.
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12th November 2012 at 6:46 pm
flash says:
Micro-Be says:
Flash – I’m all for the South living like they want to live but it isn’t a wonderland for me at least.
Me neither , but it’s better than living amongst Yankees and having to listen to their annoying nasal lisp everyday.
And their food sucks ,too.
But you know I was just yanking your chain, right?
BTW, the good thing about Southerners is once you bitch slap one the next day you’re best friends again.
Not so with Yankees…whip their ass once and ya’ gotta’ whip it everyday.They are like hepatitis C, they never go away.
But , then I’m no people person either. I demand and get a wide berth wherever I go.
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12th November 2012 at 7:52 pm
flash says:
And there’s another thing that sux about damn, Yankees.They aint’ worth a shit at ;paling southern Rock-n-Roll
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3heiZmvxA0
BTW, my rednecks dubs in Western Pennsylvania and Northern NY say if the civil war where fought today , tehy would side with the south. Suck on that Kunstler.
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12th November 2012 at 8:00 pm
card802 says:
A friend of mine was very interested in the JBS, so I sent him this, and he sent me his reply:
“Well, I certainly don’t read all the Burning Platform’s editions, nor do I read or know all it’s editors or contributing editors, but up till now I was pretty heartened by what I read in that someone was willing to put into print what I happened to also feel is really happening in the good ol usa and the world.
Till this guy.
While I’m no “Bircher Apologist”, after all they “sold out” about the time I was 5?, However, if you read their literature, you’ll see that they form the basis for about everything that is the basis for Ron Paul and the Libertarian party.(if you leave out all the conspiracies) Limited Gobblement, A constitutional Republic, Avoid foreign wars/entanglements, States rights etc and so on…………
I grant you that it was Ayn Rand, the capitalist apologist………..ugh, show me a big time principled Capitalist……..no? any more than you could show me a principled Communist) who noted that one of the major flaws of the Birchers was that they were only “against some thing, not for something”. A very important distinction. (every bulwark, fortress, castle, compound, etc will fall before a determined enemy)
As far as saying that it’s good that Romney lost and that maybe BO can now in his lame duck session “get something done”, is pure hasheesh. There’s no difference between the thieves of the Democrats or the thieves of the Republicans. To think that “our gobblement” in any form of current fashion will do anything remotely pro American leaves the writer exposed as a dimwit, a traitor, or a scoundrel.”
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12th November 2012 at 6:47 am
TeresaE says:
@Stucky, yep been to GR many times, my little bro is currently running a tool & die shop in the GR ‘burbs.
Oh, there IS a nice sized ghetto there Stuck. Go downtown, near the Amway Grand (or whatever they call it now) and then walk 3-4 blocks in nearly any direction.
There are neighborhoods down there where firemen do not get out of their trucks to put out fires, nor save people, until TWO armed patrol units arrive first.
I was kicked out of the area by the fire chief. Literally. He called the police chief and I was put on notice that if they saw my car after dark, I’d be arrested – for my own safety. Though this was 20 years ago, there are still many areas where hookers walk and drug-dealers hang, and the kids are at risk while going to school.
But, it is a beautiful – though WAY too snowy – area of the state.
I don’t want to relocate in this state. I want the f* out of it. Between the unions and the bible-thumpers, there is no place for the likes of me here.
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12th November 2012 at 1:43 pm
a cruel accountant says:
Buckley was a warmongering Neocon.
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12th November 2012 at 11:22 am