Daring to Defy the Mob

“…Oh! You’ve nothing to say 
They’ll drag you away! 
If you listen to fools:  
The mob rules, …the mob rules…”  

(‘The Mob Rules‘ by Black Sabbath; 1981)

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One of my mother’s Top Five Sayings revolved around thinking for ourselves, and it had been drilled into her by the nuns when she was a child: “Right is Right even if NOBODY’s right, and Wrong is Wrong even if EVERYBODY’s wrong“. In other words, don’t let the current popular opinion sway your morals or judgement.

Or shorter: don’t follow the mob, no matter what.

Never in my life has the wisdom of that simple lesson been on more obvious display than recently.

This week we witnessed the Leftist Mob Of Tolerance call for the scalp of Mozilla’s CEO, …and scarier still, we saw them get it. Regardless of this man’s viewpoints on marriage or ANY other highly debated topic, this was an undeserving fate for anyone living in an allegedly Free Society.

But we don’t have one of those anymore, do we?

MSNBC’s Ed Schultz: “Republicans are afraid of me…”

No, no, no: I’m not kidding! Seriously!!

He actually said that!

Here, watch. I’ll PROVE it:

Ann Coulter vs. John Stossel and a room full of Libertarians (VIDEO)

This just showed up on HotAir, and Erika is right: this is like a cage match where you want to root for both combatants.

I come down more on the Coulter side of things, but I need to highlight one important point about the Libertarian youngsters in attendance. They are vastly different from your usual college-aged attendees in such a setting, in that for the most part they are very polite. Compare that to the majority of Planned Parenthood or Global Warming confabs at your local University, where the sights and sounds are NSFW, …at best.

Even though she’s outnumbered approximately 1,000-to-1, Coulter responds extremely well throughout (no surprise there). She’s a bomb-thrower, and doesn’t disappoint here; heck, that’s her career. However, she seems to relish these opportunities, and it would behoove the Republican Party to engage with Libertarians more often in this manner. At their heart, there are more similarities than differences between the two camps, and the sooner they both recognize that, the better.

Ann Coulter, Dennis Miller AND Romney/Ryan: Together At Last!

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What do these folks have in common, you ask? Read and find out….

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I’m up in Chicago on business this week, and I’ve been having conversations with people from all over the political map. The majority of them expressed some level of dissatisfaction with the direction our country is headed, even the ones whose political leanings differed from mine. There were a couple of folks who thought everything was just swell, but they were a little clueless in other areas of their life, as well.

And remember: I’m in Chicago.

Overall there seemed to be a belief that we’re losing/lost our values, and I’m actually not talking about religion or morality per se. People ranging from cabbies to managers to waiters/waitresses all agreed that many of the ideals which made our nation great are gone, or are going fast.

Ideals such as when:

• We were proud of our work ethic.
• We didn’t suffer fools gladly and, maybe more importantly, everyone agreed on who the fools were, too. 
• We believed that charity was our responsibility, not the government’s.
• We always tried to have a laugh or three along the way, despite the fact that life was never “fair”.
• And we got a little goose-pimply at the thought of our country being the best.

The following three videos are not overtly patriotic; well, at least the first two aren’t. However, in their own way, they are (to me, at least) decent illustrations of how our country used to feel, to behave, to think.

I hope you agree.

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At a downtown Chicago eatery last night, I was able to catch just a few minutes of Ann Coulter beating the British out of Piers Morgan on his CNN show. Morgan was his usual snide, supercilious self when speaking with a Conservative (see his interview with Jonah Goldberg if you want an example of what I mean), but Ann reminded me again just why I own all of her books:

she is the single least politically correct public figure in the country, she’s funny, and she’s unabashedly Conservative.

Below is tonight’s interview which thankfully showed up on YouTube almost immediately. Morgan tries time and time again to box her in, and Coulter just refuses to go there. Heck, she throws his attempts back at him, with the distinction being that she uses common sense, logic & facts in her rebuttals, instead of tired, Progressive talking points.

It’s roughly 20 minutes long, but it feels like it’s about 4.

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This video is from Jay Leno’s interview with Dennis Miller back in August. It’s philosophical rather than current event related, with Dennis expressing what the majority of tax-paying citizens feel: that he has no problem helping the truly helpless. Heck, that’s what charity is for. Miller only bristles at being made to feel guilty about not wanting to help those who could help themselves, but won’t.

And for the record, yeah, I feel that way exactly.

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The last clip is, in my humble opinion, one of the best ads that the Romney/Ryan team has made. It’s not topic specific, but more an overall outreach to anyone who is on the fence as to how to vote. They pack a lot into only three minutes, and dress it up with some solid production value to make  it feel like 50% campaign ad, and 50% the “Homerun” scene in The Natural.

Hope you enjoy it, and have a great weekend.

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