Right Wing Nut House

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This article originally appears on The Moderate Voice

First in a series.

This post by Julian Sanchez started an internet conversation/debate on what he calls “epistemic closure” on the right.

Reality is defined by a multimedia array of interconnected and cross promoting conservative blogs, radio programs, magazines, and of course, Fox News. Whatever conflicts with that reality can be dismissed out of hand because it comes from the liberal media, and is therefore ipso facto not to be trusted. (How do you know they’re liberal? Well, they disagree with the conservative media!) This epistemic closure can be a source of solidarity and energy, but it also renders the conservative media ecosystem fragile. Think of the complete panic China’s rulers feel about any breaks in their Internet firewall: The more successfully external sources of information have been excluded to date, the more unpredictable the effects of a breach become. Internal criticism is then especially problematic, because it threatens the hermetic seal. It’s not just that any particular criticism might have to be taken seriously coming from a fellow conservative. Rather, it’s that anything that breaks down the tacit equivalence between “critic of conservatives and “wicked liberal smear artist” undermines the effectiveness of the entire information filter. If disagreement is not in itself evidence of malign intent or moral degeneracy, people start feeling an obligation to engage it sincerely—maybe even when it comes from the New York Times. And there is nothing more potentially fatal to the momentum of an insurgency fueled by anger than a conversation. A more intellectually secure conservatism would welcome this, because it wouldn’t need to define itself primarily in terms of its rejection of an alien enemy.

Predictably, conservatives don’t like being compared to Communist Chinese. But in that one brief passage. Mr. Sanchez has crystallized one of the major problems with modern conservatism; what I term its “negative feedback loop” of information exchange. Epistemic closure, by any other name, is an echo chamber effect; a disease that afflicts both sides but that, for some reason, is especially virulent on the right.

But Sanchez goes beyond the obvious to posit the notion that the very reality inhabited by the right is a Matrix-like construct, created out of the resentments and false assumptions made by conservatives about the world around them. There is the objective reality of Zion and then there is the Machine World that sort of looks like Zion but is the result of bearing a false consciousness about the way the world truly works.

The result? A herd mentality that brooks no criticism lest the sleepers awaken to their dilemma and realize all is not as they have imagined. Where for years they have believed Zion was the dream and they were living in the real world, they simply cannot make the psychic leap of faith and logic to embrace the same reality the rest of us accept. Hence, their ill treatment of apostates and total dismissiveness of liberal critics.

It is hard to argue with a lot of that. Even Jonah Goldberg accepts some of Sanchez’s critique:

Now, I think there’s some merit to what Sanchez says here. As the recipient of lots of email from people who insist I’m an apostate to conservative orthodoxy and from lots of people who insist I’m a leading enforcer of conservative orthodoxy, I have some appreciation for both the reality and the mirage of what Sanchez calls conservatism’s movement toward epistemic closure.

But what I find rather astounding and perplexing in these sorts of autopsies or vivisections of conservatism are how so many people claim there are problems for conservatism that are in fact simply facts of life for all human associations and movements. It’s like a physician describing the anatomy of Belgians as if they were somehow different from Ukrainians.

Jonah is right - up to a point. His problem is one of degree. The level of epistemic closure in, for example, the Catholic priesthood is far less a denial of objective reality than that found on the American right today. The Matrix like world inhabited by talk radio hosts and listeners, where Barack Obama is not just wrong but deliberately trying to destroy the country, has no counterpart in any other milieu of which I am aware.

The level of hysteria regarding Obama and the Democrats on what passes for the mainstream right is truly astonishing. Are we really “that close” to becoming a Marxist dictatorship? Is health care reform the end of American liberty? Is Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals really a liberal playbook being followed religiously by Obama on how to take over the country? Is the Obama administration a “regime?” Is it a “gangster government?”

This is but a sampling of the reality propounded on a daily basis by the cotton candy conservatives on talk radio, and eagerly lapped up by conservative listeners in the tens of millions. This, and worse, is written daily on conservative blogs and websites, reinforcing the reality as it is recognized and delivered by Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and other big names on the right.

The light of knowledge and objective reality cannot penetrate the screen set up by the gatekeepers of information trafficking because to do so would obviate their own cockeyed view of the world. The closed circle grows ever tighter around adherents as they deliberately shut off opposing perspectives, even when offered by those who are putatively on their side. To protect themselves from straying too far from the reality they have invented, they skewer critics - even on the right - with charges that they are liberal, or RINO’s, or their motivation is born out of jealousy and hate for the successful puindits who promulgate their warped worldview.

Jim Manzi:

I started to read Mark Levin’s massive bestseller Liberty and Tyranny a number of months ago as debate swirled around it. I wasn’t expecting a PhD thesis (and in fact had hoped to write a post supporting the book as a well-reasoned case for certain principles that upset academics just because it didn’t employ a bunch of pseudo-intellectual tropes). But when I waded into the first couple of chapters, I found that — while I had a lot of sympathy for many of its basic points — it seemed to all but ignore the most obvious counter-arguments that could be raised to any of its assertions. This sounds to me like a pretty good plain English meaning of epistemic closure. The problem with this, of course, is that unwillingness to confront the strongest evidence or arguments contrary to our own beliefs normally means we fail to learn quickly, and therefore persist in correctable error.

Case in point; try telling an inhabitant of this alternate reality that Obama is not a socialist, that the government has taken over only a tiny slice of the economy, and that if you value the meanings of words, you would desist from trying shoehorn the president and the Democrats into a definitional construct that is false from the word “go.”

“Obama lover” would be the first response, followed quickly by “RINO.” There currently isn’t a vocabulary on most of the right that would encompass dealing with internal criticism of this kind. The very nature of criticism has been turned on its head as ideological bona fides must be established before the critic is accepted. Thus, the echo chamber remains secure and the negative feedback loop intact.

It will take a national leader of the stature of Reagan to break through this morass and restore some semblance of objective reality to movement conservatism. The Republican party may triumph at the polls in November, but it will be no thanks to the mainstream right who have embraced a worldview that is at odds with what most of the rest of us know to be true.

My first article is up at David Horowitz’s FrontPage.com where I look at the real motive behind Bill Clinton’s sudden interest in political speech inciting violence:

A sample:

Mr. Clinton’s concern for the quality of our nation’s political discourse is touching, if not a little curious. Apparently, the avalanche of hate, violent rhetoric, and invective against President Bush for 8 years didn’t pose much of a danger in his mind. Otherwise, he would have said something, right?

During the Bush years, major figures on the left referred to the “Bush regime” as “fascist,” while insisting that the president was trying to set up a dictatorship. Mr. Bush was regularly hung in effigy at protest rallies, and something of an “assassination chic” arose where the killing of the president became a parlor game for some of the president’s more hip critics.

I don’t recall Mr. Clinton — or anyone else on the left for that matter — raising the specter of political violence as a result of that fantastically exaggerated, hateful rhetoric. Few, if any in the mainstream media raised an alarm that such unscrewed looniness would incite or enable some left wing kook to act out his violent impulses. Not even as the left en mass were screaming about Bush “destroying the country” did we hear a peep from the former president about “demonization” of Bush by his liberal allies.

The point being, Mr. Clinton is engaging in an effort to silence and delegitimize critics of President Obama by hinting at violence that hasn’t occurred yet. He is, in effect, setting the stage for a massive backlash against the right and tea partiers if, God forbid, some nutcase were to listen to the voices in his head telling him to kill people and act on those impulses. If this were to occur, we would once again be treated to the entire left playing amateur psychologist and trying to guess the insane person’s “motivations.” The fact that most crazed gunmen don’t need any outside stimuli to perpetrate their crimes is beside the point. Even the idea that the fringe right character plotting mayhem cares what some internet blogger has to say about Obama gains currency when the left engages in its politically motivated hunt for blame.

I don’t discount the idea that speech can lead to violence entirely. I detail the Warren Commission’s efforts to quantify the extraordinary hatred directed against Kennedy in the months leading up to the assassination. Did Oswald feel enabled by the level of vitriol directed against JFK? In the end, the Commission took the politically expedient route and only made passing mention of the idea.

But it is nuts to equate the atmosphere in Dallas with anything having to do with opposition to Obama today among mainstream conservatives. Clinton is trying to cut off debate while setting up a huge backlash against the right if any nutcase decides to act out his radical impulses in a violent manner.

Read the whole thing.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, I welcome Rich Baehr of The American Thinker, Fausta Wertz of Fausta’s Blog, and Charlie Martin of PJ Media to talk about the mid term elections and other hot topics in the news.

The show will air from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

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You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, I welcome Monica Showalter of IDB, Stacy McCain, Jazz Shaw, and Dan Rhiel for a look at Obama’s choices to replace Justice Stevens on the Supreme Court, as well as other hot issues making news today.

The show will air from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

Also, if you’d like to call in and put your two cents in, you can dial (718) 664-9764.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, I welcome Steve Green of Vodkapundit and Rich Baehr of the American Thinker as we examine the president’s new nuclear policy as well as kick around some political news.

The show will air from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

Also, if you’d like to call in and put your two cents in, you can dial (718) 664-9764.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, I welcome Dan Riehl, Charlie Martin, and the triumphal return of Jazz Shaw from the Dart Wars to talk about the aftermath of the Healthcare debate and what’s in the future for Obamacare.

The show will air from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

Also, if you’d like to call in and put your two cents in, you can dial (718) 664-9764.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, we’ll stretch the show to two hours and bring in some of the smartest bloggers and writers out there. Rich Baehr and Ed Lasky of the American Thinker, Stephen Green of Vodkapundit, and Monica Showalter of Investors Business Daily will fire up and let it fly about all things health care reform.

The show will air from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

Also, if you’d like to call in and put your two cents in, you can dial (718) 664-9764.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio.

Tonight, I welcome Larrey Anderson and James Lewis of American Thinker and Monica Showalter of IDB to talk about the delusions held by Democrats about health care reform and the status of the process as the bill moves toward passage.

The show will air from 7:00 - 8:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

Also, if you’d like to call in and put your two cents in, you can dial (718) 664-9764.

Adam Gadahn, the first person charged with treason by an American court in 50 years, has been captured in Pakistan.

Gadahn was arrested in recent days, two officers who took part in the operation told The Associated Press. A senior government official also confirmed the arrest. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.

IF YOU WERE NOT AUTHORIZED TO RELEASE THE INFORMATION WHY IN GOD’S NAME ARE YOU CONFIRMING IT FOR THE PRESS YOU NINNIES!

An intelligence source confirmed the report to NBC News, adding that Gadahn was detained in Sohrab Goth, a suburb of Karachi, and was later moved to the capital Islamabad.

The arrest is a major victory in the U.S.-led battle against al-Qaida and will be taken as a sign that Pakistan is cooperating more fully with Washington. It follows the recent detentions of several Afghan Taliban commanders in Karachi.

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Indeed, but whose custody is Gadahn being held? If ours, that’s super good. If Pakistan’s, not so good. We have no extradition treaty with Pakistan and the thought of the government doing any favors for the US would send thousands into the streets protesting. That’s the main reason Pakistan won’t turn over the Afghan Taliban leaders to us - at least, that’s the story they’re sticking to.

Allah (from 2/20):

It’s so hard to tell what’s kabuki and what’s not in these Pakistan/Taliban stories that I’m half-inclined to stop blogging them altogether. For instance, is this proof that the skeptics are right, that Pakistan’s holding the Taliban’s number two as a bargaining chip vis-a-vis Karzai? Or is it just propaganda aimed at the anti-American Pakistani population, with Islamabad fully intending to hand over Baradar et al. to the U.S. in the guise of “deporting them to Afghanistan”? Or could it be that Pakistan’s technically telling the truth about not handing them over while secretly allowing U.S. interrogators full access to the prisoners, a la some European CIA “black site”? (The Times story that broke the news about Baradar claimed that American agents are part of the team that’s questioning him.)

I strongly discount the last, and the Pakistanis have already refused to hand over Baradar to us. The Pakistan Supreme Court ruled earlier this week that Baradar and his friends won’t even be sent to Afghanistan:

The Lahore High Court also banned extraditing four other unnamed Taliban chiefs reportedly seized recently, the BBC reported.

The order was in response to a petition filed by a rights activist to prevent the detainees from being sent abroad.

“The high court has ordered that none of the leaders should be handed over to the (United States) or Afghanistan,” Tariq Asad, a lawyer handling the petition, told the BBC.

“The court has also said that none, other than Pakistan intelligence or security officials, should be given access to the Taliban leaders,” he said.

Details of Baradar’s capture “remain murky,” The New York Times wrote at the time. But officials said that it had been carried out by Pakistan’s military spy agency the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence with CIA operatives helping out.

Apparently, we can’t even question the terrorists anymore.

Even if the operation to capture Gadahn was carried out by the CIA, the fact that the arrests took place on Pakistani soil probably means similar treatment by the courts for the traitor.

So NBC’s ridiculous claim that Gadahn’s capture should be “taken as a sign that Pakistan is cooperating more fully with Washington,” is blowing smoke. A Leopard can’t change its spots and the ISI will not change its nature. While there are some high ranking ISI officers who are friendly with the CIA and cooperate, the organization itself is a fiercely nationalistic arm of the government and sees helping the Americans in any way as a betrayal of Pakistani values. There were almost mass resignations in the military when the Pakistani government was considering accepting the American aid package that contained caveats for where the money must be spent. Congress ordered the cash be used to bolster anti-terrorism capability while the military wanted to use the money to kill Indians by improving their abilities in the Kashmir. The heart of the dispute was that the Pakistani military did not wish to be seen as an American puppet force. A political crisis ensued that threatened the government at one point.

How this capture of another high value target will play out remains to be seen. The fact that Gadahn is an American national might make a difference. But given the sensitivity with which the government has shown toward these situations, I wouldn’t bet on it.

UPDATE: Maybe not

Massive confusion in the press now as one Pakistani intel guy sourced by CBS News says that it is not Gadahn:

Earlier it was reported by Pakistani media that intelligence agents had arrested Adam Gadahn, the American-born spokesman for al Qaeda, in an operation in the southern city of Karachi.

It was further reported by the Associated Press and Reuters that Gadahn had been arrested, sourcing security officials.

CBS News was told by sources in the Pakistan government that it was Gadahn, even after U.S. officials refused to confirm it was the California native for whom a $1 million reward has been posted.

Now, CBS News’ Farhan Bokhari in Islamabad writes that earlier reports the detained individual was Gadahn proved false. According to a Pakistan security official who spoke with CBS News on condition of anonymity, the arrested individual is in fact “a Taliban militant leader who is known as Abu Yahya.”

The official said evidence compiled from an interrogation of the suspect and information exchanged with U.S. officials verified the man’s identify.

The reassessment only added to the confusion surrounding the arrest of a man earlier described by other unnamed Pakistani security officials as Gadahn.

“In the light of our latest information, I can say, this is not looking like Gadahn. But it is still the arrest of an important Taliban militant,” said the Pakistani security official who spoke to CBS News late Sunday.

In the AP story linked above, the reporter quoted a “senior government official” that it was indeed, Gadahn. In addition to AP, Reuters, CBS, the New York Times, and the Washington Post independently confirmed that it was Gadahn.

I am going to eat a huge steak dinner, purposely not watch the Oscars (we will watch LOTR Return of the King instead) and then go to bed.

I hope they have this sorted out by morning.