Into the Filth Part 2 - Happy Holidays and Loosing The Thread

So Dennis Pragers latest article is about how Leftists want to destroy Christmas - what an original idea for an article.  But, as is the point to these Into the Filth articles, lets look at the comments. 

And quickly we see them loosing the thread - moving from a celebration of Christmas to attacking people who don't speak English in public.  This comes from ERIC who certainly makes some calm and reasoned language.

Nope! I for one don't believe any foreigners language should be allowed in AMERICA! First you came here! We didn't go to your country and try to install ENGLISH! SO you should learn English, so you can communicate with AMERICANS CITIZEN. Speak it at home not in public!

I wonder what ERIC would say if he heard some people speaking Navaho - but I feel like I can guess.   At any rate, I find it baffling that this is an extended discussion on an article about how Leftists are destroying Christmas.

Then there is this exchange between Legoge47 and Andy Maxwell.

I like "After Thanksgiving Day Sale" I hope that will catch on rather than "Black Friday." That has a negative connotation to me.

Actually blacks thought it meant that they could freely loot and steal from businesses on the day after Thanksgiving.

OK - now that's pretty blatant.  I should add a disclaimer that although it appears that some hard core conservatives who participate on Townhall are racist or xenophobic - I am sure that there are at least some who aren't racist or xenophobic. 

Fundamental Changes to our Country part 2 or how I learned to despise Dennis Prager

Actually I've always despised Dennis Prager, since I first encountered him, when he was mostly focused on hating Islam and making nonsensical arguments in favor of this belief. 

These day he has a different Jihad - against Leftists, but not Liberals.  So that lets me off the hook right?  I mean I'm a liberal, right?  Not so fast - he quickly includes President Obama and Elizabeth Warren as Leftists which means he probably gets to condemn me too.

The difference between Liberal and Leftist is that Liberals love America and Leftists don't.  Rather because Leftists make common cause with people who are critical of America and are critical of America ourselves (as I certainly have been) - we don't love America.

He then goes into the canard about how we want to fundamentally change America.  Did  Lincoln hate America when he ran as an open abolitionist?  Did FDR when he ran on a new deal?  Did Reagan when he ran on morning in America?   All of these are transformations (two good and one bad in my opinion).  But Prager has a unified theory about what a "real" America is, and it's one that excludes anybody who isn't conservative.

So when Colin Kaepernick knelt during the singing of the National Anthem to protest how many blacks were being shot down by the police in America it shows contempt for America - or his version of America.  Since I want a more racially just America, I thought that what Kaepernick did was admirable.  But wanting a more racially just America shows that I don't love America.  Somehow.

He says that we are critical of America as evidence that we don't love it - but it's a child's argument.  We are critical of what America does wrong because want it to do better.

Also Liberals don't love Christianity or Capitalism so we don't love America - because those two things are the core of America?  Bad luck for members of any other faith in America.

Finally there's this twist of the knife.

Love is, among other things, an emotion. So, here is a question about leftists' emotions: Do any leftists get the chills when the national anthem is played or when they see the American flag waving as the anthem is played? Given their rhetoric, it is most unlikely. 

Well I still do - somehow I'm able to believe in the ideals of America without needing to pretend that it is perfect. 

But then again I'm not a child. 

Equivalence

This is from Dennis Prager's latest article, in which he chides Robert Klitzman for writing an article critical of his country, when he lost his sister in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Asking what America did to elicit the hatred of Muslim terrorists is morally equivalent to asking what Jews did to arouse Nazi hatred, what blacks did to cause whites to lynch them, what Ukrainians did to arouse Stalin's hatred or what Tibetans did to incite China's hateful treatment of them.

It's a little different Prager because you have to take into account power and previous actions. Blacks in the South and Jews in Germany had no power. America has been, since the end of WW2 and possibly before, the most powerful nation on the planet.

Secondly we have actually done some lousy things in the middle east, even if we aren't going to talk about Israel and the Palestinians. We help prop up friendly dictatorships and have been since the days of the Shah.

Prager seems to belong to the "America is the bestest nation on all the earth" belief system; in which criticism of American actions abroad shows hatred of America somehow. His readers pretty much agree.

Hate America First!

It's written in stone. And it's the law of the liberal, progressive, far left.

It's sad how Conservatives look at things sometimes; they seem genuinely unable to understand how one can be critical of something that one loves.

Dennis Prager, Historical Blindness, and the Religion of Leftism

First things first. Dennis Prager's latest article makes this ahistorical comment, that I had to point out.

One of the first books I ever owned -- in high school -- was titled "Danger on the Right." Throughout the world, people are fed the message "Danger on the Right" -- and virtually never "Danger on the Left," despite the left's far bloodier and more totalitarian record.

Allow me to point out a few things - the Red Scares (both the 1920s one and the 1940s/50s one) for one. People were pretty scared of the danger on the left then, weren't they? Let's also comment on the many right wing dictatorships that have imprisoned and executed Leftists and Communists (often with the support of the United States). How do you get away with making such a foolish statement? Perhaps because you assume your readers are fools.

But earlier in the article he makes this fairly common statement.

Liberalism and leftism are religions. While I felt I would be sinning against God when I tasted ham, I was certain I was sinning against both God and man were I to vote Republican.

That is how liberals, not to mention leftists, think: It is a grievous sin to vote Republican (unless the Republican is a liberal). One is abandoning their faith, values, community and very identity.

It is a grevious sin for Liberals to vote for Conservatives. I don't know about the grevious part, but it is a sin, as per this definition "any act regarded as such a transgression, esp. a willful or deliberate violation of some religious or moral principle."

If you are a liberal or leftist, it's because you believe that liberalism/leftism is what's best for the nation. Of course it would be a transgression, if you beleive those things, to vote what you believew ould be bad for America.

Seeing Both Sides of the Issue

Dennis Prager's latest article takes on Liberals for being narrow minded and not seeing both sides of the issue.

A related defining characteristic of the left is the ascribing of nefarious motives to conservatives. For the left, a dismissal of conservatives' motives is as important as is dismissal of the conservatives as people. It is close to impossible for almost anyone on the left -- and I mean the elite left, not merely left-wing blogs -- to say "There are good people on both of sides of this issue." From Karl Marx to Frank Rich of The New York Times, this has always been the case.

. . . This is not true of elite conservatives. Leading conservative columnists, leading Republicans, etc., rarely depict liberals as motivated by evil. Conservatives can say "There are good people on both sides of the issue" because we actually believe it.

This is somewhat laughable, not in the least because of Pragers previous statements.

The American value system and the leftist value system are irreconcilable. If the left wins, America's values lose. If American values prevail, the left loses.

. . . The issue is that if Democrats want to win, they can do so only if bad things happen to America.

And these are just Pragers words. I haven't even brought up beloved Rush Limbaugh and his ilk, who certainly are important in the conservative movement and certainly hate and express hatred of Liberals.

This is related back to the Cordoba Center Controversy; Prager spends the bulk of his article printing intemperate remarks on the issue which suggest that bigotry might explain some of the opposition to the Mosque. Which, of course it does (one need only watch the video of a black man happening through an anti Mosque rally and getting immediately harrassed by the crowd to realize the ugliness of some of those who oppose this Mosque).

However, in the spirit of Pragers criticism, I will concede that while much of the Mosque Opposition is inspired by Anti-Muslim Bigotry, not all of it is. There are good people on both sides of this debate. And a whole lot of bigots on one side of it.

Life's Too Short

Dennis Prager's latest article is about how Liberals hate Conservatives and Conservatives don't hate Liberals. This is proved by the fact that a Liberal Reporter wished that Rush Limbaugh would die. Yep. That proves we are all full of hate.

Apparently liberals hate conservatives because we think they are evil, we have guilty consciences over failing to stand up to evil the way liberals do, and we are angry at Conservatives for keeping us from realizing our vision. Interesting argument.

But wait, don't Conservatives think that Liberals are evil? Aren't Conservatives upset that Liberals prevert the Conservative vision of America? Yes and yes. As for feeling guilty, I suppose some Conservatives might feel guilty at how they consistantly work against the interests of the American Working Class. But, then again, maybe not.

At the end of the day it's hard to believe that Prager writes this with a straight face; but I assume he does. He genuinely doesn't see the hatred expressed by media figures on his side of the fence. He's probably never heard this great quote from Limbaugh.

I tell people don’t kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus – living fossils – so we will never forget what these people stood for.

Still Prager knows his audience; they love believing that all of the hateful things they say mean nothing while the slightest outrageous thing by a liberal is terribly relevent.

Does America have Lousy Health Care?

Hard to say. Apparently a bunch of leftists think that America does have lousy health care. This is the point to Dennis Prager's latest article.

The answer is that WHO doesn't assess health care quality; it assesses health care equality, exactly the way any organization on the Left assesses it. And since the world's and America's news media are on the Left, they report a Leftist bogus assessment of American health care as true.

Yep. But this seems to be an example of Prager trusting his audience to condemn the Left without too much reflection. Because Prager certainly doesn't make any sort of positive argument about the benefits of American Health Care. He underlines two serveys that who America having poor healthcare and dismisses them as Leftist, but doesn't feel the need to make the counter argument.

I suppose because he can't; what Prager and his kind believe about the American Health Care system is that it's great if you have the money to avail yourself of it. And if you don't or are on a lower rent insurance package; one in which you are denied coverage regularly, well that's your own problem. Liberals and many moderates on the other hand judge a healthcare system, at least in part, by how accessible it is. We all share the same air, we all get the same germs. So it's in societies best interest to see that medical care is available to all.

There is a case to be made for what Prager belives; I think he's wrong but there is a case for it. But Prager fails to make this case because, essentially, he doesn't have to. Just elevate the dreaded left and trust his audience to make the right decision.

Dennis Prager and the New Dark Age

Dennis Prager's latest article is about the Gaza incident, in which he reviews all the mean things people are saying about Israel and replying that he hopes they are right. Among other things, apparently the media believes Israel should have let it's soldiers get beaten to death rather than defend itself. I personally think that perhaps, the media believes that Israel shouldn't have dropped it's troops on a ship in international waters.

The reason mankind has to hope that the world, its leaders, its newspapers, its so-called human rights organizations and the United Nations are right about Israel is quite simple: If Israel is the decent party in its war with the Palestinian Authority and Hamas -- and nearly all the world's countries, nearly all the world's media and the United Nations are morally wrong -- what hope is there for humanity? If the world's moral compass is that broken, are we not sailing into a dark age?

This goes back to Pragers simplistic black and white way of looking at the world. Either Israel is completely guilty or completely innocent. And since Prager has already determined Israel to be the good guys, he can't look at the Palestinians issues with anything approaching empathy. The Palestinians, to Prager and many other on the right, are nothing but animals, undeserving of even the modest kindnesses that Israel has given them, fully deserving their repression.

Nazi Nazis

Dennis Prager's latest aritcle is upset at Naxi analogies, particularly when used by liberal jews. And fair enough; Nazi analogies usually provide more fire than understanding. But then he makes this hilarious point.

Third, when Jews on the Left call conservative Americans Nazis, they mean it in its literal sense -- they really do regard the conservatives they compare to Nazis as racists comparable to Nazi anti-Semites. On the other hand, when conservatives use the term, it is meant to signify non-democratic or dictatorial policies, regimes or individuals -- e.g., Seinfeld's "soup Nazi" or Rush Limbaugh's "feminazis" -- not as potential or likely mass murderers.

Get that? Liberals who throw around Nazi mean it while Conservatives who throw it around are just joking - like on Seinfeld! Hilarious.

In fairness earlier he does note that the tea-partiers seem to mean it, and he takes them to task for the pictures of Obama as Hitler.

Pretending to Understand

Dennis Prager's latest article takes on the age old question of why are people liberals in a fairly standard ways. Liberalism/Leftism is a religion - we are converts.

Leftism, though secular, must be understood as a religion (which is why I have begun capitalizing it). The Leftist value system's hold on its adherents is as strong as the hold Christianity, Judaism and Islam have on their adherents.

It's not new to Prager - many have proposed this theory. What's interesting about it are the implications of it.

First of all, Prager suggests fairly strongly that our Leftist religious concerns are irrational and therefore not worth dealing with. There is a gulf between world views that seems unbridgable.

But the implication is - since he clearly points to right wing Christians and Jews as being motiviated by their faith, that both sides are equally irrational? But that is presumably not Prager's intent.

He also trots out the old canard that Leftist Jews and Christians are keen on seeing Israel destroyed. Kind of sad that; a child could see that one can want to see a better situation for the Palestinians without wanting to see Israel destroyed.

At the end of the day, Prager isn't interested in understanding liberals or leftists or in helping his readers understand them. Quite the contrary; he is putting up barriers to ensure that his followers don't grapple with liberalism or leftism in any real way.

More Intemperete Language

This is from Dennis Prager's latest article.

Acknowledge that we are in a non-violent civil war.

I write the words "civil war" with an ache in my heart. But we are in one.

Thank God this civil war is non-violent. But the fact is that the left and the rest of the country share almost no values. The American value system and the leftist value system are irreconcilable. If the left wins, America's values lose. If American values prevail, the left loses.

Again, Obama and Congressional Democrats cut out the Public Option, cut out letting citizens sign up for medicare and didn't even make a real attempt at universal healthcare or single payer. They caved into the right again and again and again. And in return? Civil War.

Makes you wonder if maybe Obama should have fought for a stronger bill. Still a stronger bill might not have passed; so maybe this was the best we could get. But it is discouraging to find a watered down, weak bill such as this described as essentially socialist.

Dirhams rather than Dollars

Dennis Prager's latest article is about how American Democrats don't care about bankrupting the nation because they want to redistribute wealth more than they want to help people. It must be very comforting to know your political enemies are such blackguards. He then notes how Obama is ruining America through the medium of foriegn nations not being keen on the dollar.

As for the dollar, I can bear personal testimony to the decline of the dollar's prestige. I am writing this column in Morocco. In Casablanca, my wife and I and another couple hired a Moroccan driver for the day. And when it came time to pay, the man refused to accept dollars; he wanted to be paid in either Euros or Moroccan dirhams. Yes, dirhams rather than dollars.

I suppose it doesn't occur to Prager that if the takes dollars he's got to convert the prices to dollars, take the dollars, then get them converted back into dirhams.

But if America had real prestige, of course, the driver would be happy to go to all this trouble. Because real prestige means that other nation's drivers are happy to put up with inconviences just for the chance to touch a dollar. Prager should try to pay for a New York cab ride with anything but a dollar and see what happens.

But presumably this ties back to American exceptionalism; while other nations should be grateful to take our dollars, it's just silly to assume that America, the bestest nation on all the earth, would take their micky mouse money.

You Have to Understand the Argument before You Can Refute It

Dennis Prager's latest article asks the question of whether or not America is focused on making good people anymore. He takes the time to note that he, like many conservatives, believes that external conditions do not create bad people, and poverty doesn't lead to crime.

Now, while no one could possibly refute the argument that starving people will steal bread for their families (an act that is morally defensible), the argument that poverty causes crime posits that when poor people in America commit murder and other violent crimes, it is because they are poor.

This is irrational dogma, as much a matter of faith as any theological doctrine. Two simple facts illustrate this: First, the vast majority of poor people, in America and elsewhere, do not commit violent crimes. Second, a large amount of crime is committed by the middle class and even by the wealthy. Neither fact prompts the "poverty causes crime" believers to rethink their position.

This is a lousy argument on a few points, but mostly because Prager doesn't seem to understand what the argument is.

Poverty doesn't make people into criminals; people have the opportunity to choose (Prager is right on this point). What poverty does, to put it in a religious sense, is tempt people to commit crimes. If you are poor, and you don't see any legitimate way out of your poverty, crime becomes a viable escape route. If society seems broken and doesn't flat work for some people, than those people are going to turn to methods outside of society.

Consider for a moment; both Christianity and Judaism consider fornication (i.e. sex outside of marriage) a sin. Lets say, some perverse billionaire decides to just mess with people, so he opens a free whore house. Totally free and safe. Hygienic. Yes, many people would decide not to go to the free whore house. But some would. Over time, many would (particularly as people got the idea that there weren't direct consequences to their actions). The spiritual damage to the community would presumably be great (and, in fairness, there would probably be some direct family damage as well). In that context is it enough for the Billionaire to say "Well some people aren't coming around to my free whore house. And look some people are fornicating with work mates. So you can't hold me responsible for the spiritual damage my free whore house is causing."

That's a pretty sad argument in fact. When you take action to create temptation, you are sinning yourself. And it is perhaps a more serious sin than those who fall into your trap. Consider Jeremiah 5:25-27.

25 Your iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withholden good things from you.

26 For among my people are found wicked men: they lay wait, as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men.

27 As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit: therefore they are become great, and waxen rich.

I think that describes my fictional billionaire pretty well. And, perhaps, that describes us a society. Not all the time and not all of us, but when we are basically happy to let children grow up in poverty, grow up without hope, without dreams, well, maybe that's not the best thing in the world. And it reflects badly on us as a society.

American Exceptionalism

Dennis Pragers latest is about how Obama is ruining his Thanksgiving. Poor Mr. Prager. In particularly he is upset about Obama not believing in American Exceptionalism, which he helpfully defines.

It also includes an abiding belief in American exceptionalism, meaning that America has usually known better what is good for the world than any world body, that America's moral compass is generally more accurate than that of other nations, let alone the United Nations. This is not because Americans are born better or any such nonsense, but because American values have produced a particularly uncynical, idealistic nation, more willing to die for others than any nation in recorded history.

Very good statement of the doctrine of American Exceptionalism.

It does sort of mandate an arrogant foreign policy. We basically tell the rest of the world "Our values are better than yours and we know what's best for you." I'm not sure that's guaranteed to get the best results.

Faith and Irrationality

Dennis Prager's latest article isn't that original. It's an old idea, expressed by both Liberals and Republicans about their political enemies, pretty regularly.

How is one to rationally explain the Democrats' belief that the government taking over another one-sixth of the American economy is a good thing?

The answer is religion.

Given the huge economic failures that the left itself attributes to Medicare and Medicaid and given the economic collapse or near collapse of these systems in other countries, the left's prescriptions can only be explained in one way: The left has made its views a form of religion.

Obviously Prager feels so strongly about his position on Healthcare, he cannot conceive of how anybody could disagree with that position. For example he's not apparently aware that many nations do have functioning health care systems. Nor is he aware of how much more our health care system costs compared to others (or he's studiously ignoring that data). In his mind there is no rational reason to support liberal health care reform - the religion explanation is more charitable than some of the others (like insanity or corruption).

The rest of his article is setting up some strawman arguments for us liberals and then knocking them down and pointing out that anybody who believes that must be illogical, and therefore motivated by mindless dogma.

Strawman

Dennis Prager's latest article takes on the Moral Basis of Taxation. It starts promisingly, acknowledging that Liberal support for higher taxes has its basis in morality, and defending that position. But it falls down nearly immediately by stating that moral principle is simple unfairness.

Left-wing spokesmen, such as New York Times economics columnist and Princeton University professor of economics Paul Krugman, may offer economic arguments for raising taxes in order to lower government deficits, but their real motivations are moral: reducing economic inequality (by redistributing income) and expanding government (because government is the most effective way to help all citizens).

Very simplistic, but then Prager doesn't even really deal with those issues. Instead he offers up five or six problems with the concept of an income tax (presumably he is a fair tax proponent). He is opposed to progressive taxation and doesn't think people who don't pay income tax should get an equal vote (carefully excluding Payroll Taxes and Sales Taxes which almost everybody pays).

My moral argument in favor of an adequate level of taxation is this; it's immoral to let the government fail and it is immoral to shove off onto our children the burden of our own government. If you think the Government should do less, fair enough, lets have that talk. But lets not just throw everything on the nation's Credit Card and hope for the best.

Dennis Prager and Torture

Dennis Prager's latest article takes on the torture question, and he asks nine questions of liberals who want to see further investigations into the torture. He concludes his article with this chilling pronouncement.

If you do not address these questions, it would appear that you care less about morality and torture than about vengeance against the Bush administration.

Oh my. Well, I'd better answer these questions then.

Given how much you rightly hate torture, why did you oppose the removal of Saddam Hussein . . .

We opposed the invasion of Iraq, not the removal of Saddam Hussein. We saw, correctly, that invading Iraq would be a lot more expensive and difficult than the Bush Administration pretended at the time. Legitimately it could and did make things worse for the Iraqis.

Also the abuses at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere were our responsibility; what Saddam did, as awful as it was, wasn't.

Are all forms of painful pressure equally morally objectionable? In other words, are you willing to acknowledge that there are gradations of torture as, for example, there are gradations of burns, with a third-degree burn considerably more injurious and painful than a first-degree burn? Or is all painful treatment to be considered torture? Just as you, correctly, ask proponents of waterboarding where they draw their line, you, too, must explain where you draw your line.

For the record, burning a suspect, whether you give him a first or a third degree burn is still torture. By the same token actually drowning someone would be worse that simulating torture through waterboarding. That's not the point. The point is that we are inflicting pain - and that is torture.

Is any maltreatment of anyone at any time -- even a high-level terrorist with knowledge that would likely save innocents’ lives -- wrong?

Inflicting pain is not the same as maltreatment - this question goes on to bring up the would you torture Osama question. I would oppose torturing Osama bin Ladin.

If lawyers will be prosecuted for giving legal advice to an administration that you consider immoral and illegal, do you concede that this might inhibit lawyers in the future from giving unpopular but sincerely argued advice to the government in any sensitive area?

If a lawyer advises an administration to break the law, as it seems they did in this case, well, than they should be held responsible for their bad advice. Now it might be an honest mistake; perhaps those involved genuinely believe we lived in a dictatorship where the President's word is law. In that case, I'd be fine with an insanity plea.

Presumably you would acknowledge that the release of the classified reports on the handling of high-level, post-Sept. 11 terror suspects would inflame passions in many parts of the Muslim world. If innocents were murdered because nonviolent cartoons of Muhammad were published in a Danish newspaper, presumably far more innocents will be tortured and murdered with the release of these reports and photos. Do you accept any moral responsibility for any ensuing violence against American and other civilians?

OK, so you are saying the release of these pictures will cause violence, and it's our fault? Not the fact that torture happened, but the fact that we revealed it? Well I still think you tell the truth.

If, then, the intelligence community has been adversely affected, do you believe it can still do the work necessary to protect tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands of people from death and maiming?

I believe the damage was done by the Bush Administrations decision to torture, not by the revelations now necessitated by that torture.

Will you seek to prosecute members of Congress such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who were made aware of the waterboarding of high-level suspects and voiced no objections?

If this is accurate, than yes, I would support it.

Would you agree to releasing the photos of the treatment of Islamic terrorists only if accompanied by photos of what their terror has done to thousands of innocent people around the world?

IN other words, make the case to the rest of the world that "Yeah we tortured, but Osama Bin Ladin has done a lot worse?" I'm not sure that is a winning strategy. For one thing, I think people hold the United States to a somewhat higher standard than Osama Bin Ladin.

You say that America’s treatment of terror suspects will cause terrorists to treat their captives, especially Americans, more cruelly. On what grounds do you assert this? . . . Do you think that evil people care how morally pure America is?

This is moderately funny because just a few points ago you asserted that releasing these pictures would cause riots we should feel guilty about. If there are evil people who want to riot, won't they riot anyway, pictures or no pictures?

But in response to the argument the war in terror isn't happening in a vacuum. There might be other military conflicts we find ourselves drawn into, in which case our decisions in torture might come back to hurt us. But even if releasing that information doesn't help in that regard it would still be the right thing to do. What we did, as a nation, under President Bush was both legally and morally wrong, and we need to take responsibility for our actions. And that's the bottom line.

Why don't people hate Communism more?

Dennis Prager's latest article covers Communism vs. Fascism/Nazism, and asks the question we all agree that Nazism is really really bad. So why don't we realize how bad Communism is. He gives his seven reasons; some of which are accurate and some of which are veiled attacks on liberals. He does note that Communism seems to have won, saying "Communism won, Nazism lost. And the winners write history."

However he does leave out a few reasons why Communism isn't seen as bad as Fascism.

1. Conservatives have been muddying the waters since the 1940s and the era of McCarthy. They have tried to equate everything and everyone more liberal than Ronald Reagan as Communist, and hatve warned for years that every liberal/progressive proposal is leading us to Communism. It's a bit like the boy who cried wolf; eventually it stops working. And in so doing it confuses people about what Communism is.

2. Communists are still around and are valuable trading partners. While you can argue that this sucks (and it certainly does) we can't afford to antagonize them as much as perhaps we should. Instead we are stuck pretending they are our friends, which restricts our ability to demonize them the same way we demonize Iran.

But of course the larger point is that whatever high minded principles Prager pretends to, he is of course in favor of reminding us all that Liberals and Progressives are soft on Communism because they secretly favor it.

Dennis Prager Speaks to the Wives of America

Dennis Prager argues, in his latest article, that wives should have sex with their husbands whether they want to or not.

Why would a loving, wise woman allow mood to determine whether or not she will give her husband one of the most important expressions of love she can show him? What else in life, of such significance, do we allow to be governed by mood?

What if your husband woke up one day and announced that he was not in the mood to go to work? If this happened a few times a year, any wife would have sympathy for her hardworking husband. But what if this happened as often as many wives announce that they are not in the mood to have sex? Most women would gradually stop respecting and therefore eventually stop loving such a man.

Not sure what to say to that. Maybe nothing need be said.

Do You Believe in Shame?

Dennis Prager does; he's written a whole article about how much better white American heterosexual Christians are because they can express Shame. Even though they shouldn't have to. Sort of. He starts off mocking black pride and mourning the lack of opportunities for white Christians to really enjoy themselves. I'm not sure about that; it seems like to me we spend plenty of time celebrating white Christians.

Then he trots out an old chestnut.

For a generation, college students have been taught that it is impossible for blacks to be racist because only the racial group in power, i.e. whites, can express racism.

Of course, that is nonsense. A black can be a racist just as a white can be one. A minority race might not have the power to implement racist national policies but that hardly means that no minority group, or any individual, can be a racist.

Prager kind of gives himself away here. Of course a Black person can be surly to a White customer or co-worker. But Black racism against White people has little to no effect on white people other than a few awkward moments (and occasional and deplorable violence). White power over society constantly affects Black Americans.

Prager laments that black people are rarely required to express shame for their racial crimes; the flip side is that every black male is seen as a potential criminal (and let's not forget Arab Americans who have it even worse). When a white guy gets caught doing a horrendous crime, nobody worries that now society will judge white males more harshly.

At the end of the day, Prager pretends like he's writing to America's minorities, but his real focus is White Christian Males who read Townhall, and he's just telling them what they already believe; that they are the greatest.