Home » The book review section: fanning anti-Trump paranoia

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The book review section: fanning anti-Trump paranoia — 32 Comments

  1. Years ago I read a book on the psychology of political correctness (PC) and the author pointed out that when you become PC you have to deny reality and believe in fantasy. The PC believe they are victims of oppression and persecution. They are big on victimhood. Obama was always playing the victim card. He was never responsible for anything, but always an innocent bystander. This belief is in victimization is commonly called paranoia.

  2. As I’ve said before this is just a part of the politicization of everything. Sports, music, movies everything has to be politicized. More and more I find myself taking mental note of sites and writers that are hysterical and making a concerted effort to avoid them.

  3. Ok, I get that there actually are these circle dance yearning types in the world.

    And that they apparently inhabit human-like bodies.

    But what’s the motivation?

    Can some description more informative or revealing than that, say, they are genetically programmed to do it, or say that they psychically scarred in such a way, that they feel compelled?

    Who are these people; and what do they get out of it? What planet are they from, anyway?

  4. Da####n
    LOL

    I give up. Sluggish keyboard. Maybe too many windows open. The gods of the Internet are trying to tell me to take a break …

  5. The obligatory slighting reference to Trump, no matter what the ostensible subject may be, brings to mind contemporary British novels. Since, oh, 1985 or even earlier, I am convinced that not even the coziest of cozy mysteries could get published without a slighting reference to Thatcher or to the “ruinous” effects of her policies.

    They’ve been doing it for thirty years. So don’t expect the Trump-bashing will stop any time soon.

  6. I saw the same tendency years ago when I first moved to Seattle. There the local moonbat rag, The Stranger, was deep in Bush Derangement Syndrome. So much so that the reviews of local restuarants frequently had slams against Bush between the appetizer and the dessert courses. A real mental disease.

  7. When the internment camps fail to materialize, when the air is still breathable and the water still drinkable, when elections are held and power transferred, it will all be due to their brave, brave resistance.

  8. ” . . . Trump is a totalitarian about to take our rights away any moment. . . ”

    This from people who’s agenda is State, State and more State.

  9. We’ve been there before with the Orwell 1984 connection — during the Reagan years:

    John Rodden, who has written 10 books on Orwell, said this is not the first time sales of “Nineteen Eighty-Four” have surged since it was published. He remembers when sales went up in the early 1980s, which Rodden says was not just about the approach of the year 1984, but also driven by “similar anxieties about a new administration”—when Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, he “was looked upon by many liberals and radicals as a warmonger.”

    “[Reagan] was even called ‘Big Brother,’ though few remember that,” Rodden said. “And some of those same fears are happening now, even though we don’t have a superpower confrontation.”

    It’s interesting that in Britain anti-Thatcherism has not died out, but here in the U.S. some Democrats, like Obama, have even taken to praising Reagan.

  10. Since the last wave of feminism took over and then the other groups, nothing much been the same in terms of lots of things… but they were used and they defend things so that none can say they were used, and now, their power base, and more is starting to collapse as the countries that imported people to make up for the lack of kids are all apart..

    in case you havent noticed, all the female phobias are up front and center as normal and everyone is pseudo paranoid… why? cause women are more fearful and lower risk takers (and often have to be enabled by another to act).

    afraid of masculinity
    afraid of fear
    afraid of words
    afraid of bully
    afraid of being judged

    just expand the list and rate them and you get to figure out that all this is is the prjection of the dominant groups world view… which is racist, phobic, over cautious, likes fads, etc.

    trump is just the latest after twerking…

  11. When your can do no wrong messiah, the most poised and perfect human-god, is replaced by the brash real estate developer and brand name marketer; it really is unbearable for these fragile beings. Next, I am waiting for Trump to decree Skynet has gone operational.

  12. Eric J.
    When the internment camps fail to materialize, when the air is still breathable and the water still drinkable, when elections are held and power transferred, it will all be due to their brave, brave resistance.

    Wins Comment of the Thread Prize!

  13. Ha! If you think the NYT’s book review is something, check out The New Yorker. David Remnick has gone insane.

  14. DNW wrote (3:21pm):

    Who are these people [who yearn to join a circle dance]; and what do they get out of it? What planet are they from, anyway?

    They’re from earth and they’re very common. IMHO, what they hope to get from becoming one with a group (ie part of a circle dance) is release from the difficulties and responsibilities of being an adult human:
    1) Freedom from loneliness;
    2) Freedom from having to think for yourself;
    3) Freedom from having to act for yourself;
    4) Freedom from having to take responsibility for your decisions and actions;
    5) Freedom from the responsibility of individual labor: somehow, The Group will provide or at least make work more palatable when performed as a Group, and
    6) Feedom from unfairness and feelings of inferiority — since everyone in The Group is the same and is treated identically.

    The essence of leftism is collectivism, a mass circle dance in which the amazing synergy of government (it is hoped) shall vastly exceed the aggregate contributions of millions of citizens, making everyone happy and fulfilled by providing 1) through 6) above.

    How is this possible, given that government tends to be a stupid, inefficient, blunt instrument? Kundera explains: “Circle dancing is magic.”

  15. Eric has at least half the equation in his observation that the failure of today’s dire predictions will be seen as successful waging of war on the part of the leftists.

    But that does not address the motive for the people who are telling us that the entire country is going to hell in a hand basket because of Trump. I think there are two explanations.

    1. Because a small group of people benefits from the breakdown of civil discourse. I nominate George Soros for one of the ringleaders and financiers of this cabal, but I emphasize that there are probably equivalent effort on both sides, that the true intellectual ringleaders might be very much under the radar, and that Soros is just the easiest evil-doer to single out.

    2. The other reason is less evident unless you belong to several mailing lists and have seen the endless fund raising solicitations rolling in since Trump was inaugurated and the Russian hacking story gained widespread circulation. Ever since that time fundraising has picked up with the most apocalyptic predictions: that Trump was going to put people in prison labor camps, that gays would suffer untold misery, etc., on the one side, and that Trump would be impeached and none of his cabinet would receive Senate consent on the other.

    Perhaps some of the dire predictions are based on reality, but I betray my personal bias by pointing out that the predictions on the left, including from the mad harridans of California, are so over the top that I find it hard to believe anyone would be convinced. Then I see Facebook friends from the left raising concerns that, indeed, Trump will put gays in prison camps and so on. Betsy DeVos was a lightning rod for a while, and now the EPA is the latest.

    If you shake your head in amazement at the gullibility of the left, imagine the horror stories on the right are equally as far-fetched. That is how I comfort myself — by telling myself that gays will not be put in prison camps and Trump will not be impeached, and the fundraising letters just go in the trash.

    I hope I am right on both counts.

  16. That kind of political “boilerplate” is familiar to anyone who read Soviet and East German periodicals in the ’80s. I’m pretty sure a veterinary discourse on dental care for cats had to include some praise for The Party and the brilliant far-seeing mummy at its helm….

  17. Jenk,m you are spot on . The same stilted language is seen in all the Left’s pronouncements

  18. There has been an unprecedented, acutely phobic response to Trump. This is the first time, in a long time, that the establishment(s) feels threatened by a pro-native, anti-social justice adventurism, pro-science, and anti-monopoly representative of the People and our Posterity. He even threatens to tear down the veil of privacy obscuring the trans-human Choices carried out in the abortion chambers. Positive progress.

  19. I used to read the Times’ reviews to learn about the world and its history. Then came the novels by women. At least half of each Sunday’s reviews had to be about books by women, most of them novels. I now read the weekend review section of the Wall Street Journal, which is, as I have said before, an education in itself.

  20. When I used to read the NYT book review section, it seemed in love with its own opaque, pretentious, superiority. Now, as Neo-neocon describes it, it sounds all the worse.

    I prefer the Claremont Review of Books.

    There is a huge fallout from breathing (reading everywhere) derogatory commentary in and out continuously, as here with Trump, as is done to Thatcher, etc. This creates a kind of common knowledge, a shared belief that generously spills onto the uninformed. The shared mass hatred is so toxic to our cohesion as a society, a culture doesn’t hold together real well if they despise one another’s beliefs.

    My disrespect for the media lies in its destruction of our shared culture. There will only be tiny, partisan, circle dances, now that the media (may they rot in perdition) has fractured our society’s commonality of striving and purpose. Americans’ pulling loosely together towards prosperity, peace, and letting each other be, has been hammered out of existence, thanks to collective corruption of the people in media.

  21. I was in the San Francisco Bay Area last month and both of the bookstores I walked into had big displays at the front of the store that were very much like what you describe.

    At Book Passage at the Ferry Building, one of the books on display on the virtue-signaling table was It Can’t Happen Here, and the staff note was “we fear it already has.”

    As if there had been a coup or something.

    A Leftist dream-world coup that didn’t disrupt their businesses and under which there is no penalty for speaking out against the evil totalitarian.

  22. The Kundera quote reminds me of the movie Citizen Ruth. Very moving, thoughtful movie that takes abortion as its theme and makes some important human points that usually get lost in the shuffle. Laura Dern turns in an astonishingly good performance — her character is largely unsympathetic, which in this unusual script is part of what makes the movie work.

  23. I admit I enjoy reading the newspaper comics, or at least I used to enjoy most of them. Now that proportion is more like “a few” of them. Nothing is so sad as seeing a cartoonist with a good pen and a knack for light humor and entertainment gradually succumb to the pressure to be edgy and hATE tRUMP. Pretty soon I won’t have to bother opening the so-called “funnies”, since it seems we are losing about one comic every week or so to the idiot side You must think your art is pretty lame if you have to chase an audience by mouthing the same lines as every other hack, and come to think of it, you are probably correct.

  24. The New Yorker manages to be worse than the Times.

    Every issue of the weekly magazine and every daily on-line version is damp, wet with the editor’s (Remnick) incontinent anti-Trump obsession.

    I can understand that some people are obsessed. What I refuse to accept is a person’s deliberate contempt for his responsibility to produce a readable magazine, one that at least tries to maintain a semblance to the standards established over the years.

    Remnick should drop the obsessiveness or quit the job, acquire a robe and a placard and start marching on Broadway’s sidewalk.

    I won’t cancel my subscription but I will not be renewing.

  25. They all keep saying they want diversity – and change – but when these things materialize in reality they’re all frenzied and distraught. Like these are bad things.

  26. Jayne Says:
    March 21st, 2017 at 8:58 am
    When I used to read the NYT book review section, it seemed in love with its own opaque, pretentious, superiority. Now, as Neo-neocon describes it, it sounds all the worse.

    I prefer the Claremont Review of Books.

    There is a huge fallout from breathing (reading everywhere) derogatory commentary in and out continuously, as here with Trump, as is done to Thatcher, etc. This creates a kind of common knowledge, a shared belief that generously spills onto the uninformed. The shared mass hatred is so toxic to our cohesion as a society, a culture doesn’t hold together real well if they despise one another’s beliefs.

    My disrespect for the media lies in its destruction of our shared culture. There will only be tiny, partisan, circle dances, now that the media (may they rot in perdition) has fractured our society’s commonality of striving and purpose. Americans’ pulling loosely together towards prosperity, peace, and letting each other be, has been hammered out of existence, thanks to collective corruption of the people in media.
    * * *
    emphasis emphatically added

    Claremont’s reviews are fantastic, especially if you don’t really want to take the time to read the whole book (so many books, so little time…).

    I have noticed the same oppressive left-dominant zeitgeist in everything: news reports, books, magazines, concerts, sports — it is very hard to push against the suffocating blanket of Those Who Are Right And Insist That We Agree. That may be one reason conservatives gravitated to Trump (and to Milo Y before he flamed out): you have to yell 10 times as hard as you really want to, when the other side is always dialed up to 11.

  27. Jayne wrote:

    This [pervasive disparaging MSM stories about Trump, Thatcher, etc] creates a kind of common knowledge, a shared belief that generously spills onto the uninformed. The shared mass hatred is so toxic to our cohesion as a society, …

    Americans’ pulling loosely together towards prosperity, peace, and letting each other be, has been hammered out of existence, thanks to collective corruption of the people in media.
    ——
    Well said. Despite the polls reporting high levels of distrust of the media, the MSM still retains the power to do what Jayne describes.

    So much of what’s wrong in this country begins with the malevolent influence of the MSM. ALL ROADS LEAD TO THE MSM.
    ——-

    I figured the left would dislike a Trump presidency, but didn’t anticipate this level of all-out psychosis. Reminds me of a 3 year old kid throwing full-body tantrum in a public place: lying on the floor, ear-piercing screams, legs kicking, arms flailing, face contorted, head banging …

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