The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.

Considering that Sowell works in academia, at Stanford no less, I’d categorize this quote under “irony,” and that’s being as polite as I can. If I didn’t want to be so polite, I’d call it bullshit fucking hypocrisy. When’s the last time one of Sowell’s “real world” ideas actually got put into practice?

And who’s the pompous dude with the red gown?

Sorry, I couldn’t watch the whole thing, only about half of it. He’s like a low-energy Pammy

Free speech for everyone?

“Sorry, lame argument”

Touché, Bob.

So, that ancient Chinese proverb has come true – we live in interesting times.

I couldn’t get through it either. It’s getting tiresome, really. My local paper carries Sowell, and every article is the same: “I HATE LIBERALS!”

He’s on to me!

If I’m not taking marching orders from Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, I follow the whims of the other major force in the leftosphere, W. Cleon Skousen.

Seriously? Who reads shit like that? Only blowhard conservatives that want to find evidence to support their forgone conclusion.

I did make it all the way through, but the one recurring thought I had was, “Man, it must suck to be this guy!”

Thank you, W. Cleon Skousen, for not letting me be born him.

I like his delivery style — it has all the excitement and energy of the pre-recorded safety instructions they give out as the plane taxis to the runway. And I’m sure his audience is paying just as much attention.

Wait, his quotes from a book written by an FBI mole in 1958 are described as, “the current communist goals.”

You really must hear this rant about the New World Order from the author of those quotes, W. Cleon Skousen.

I think this might be Randall Byrd.
Gotta give this guy a little credit, he’s turned concern trolling into a career.
Limpy, you banned sucka, take notes.

I love the conservative complaint that their ideas don’t get wider audiences because of a vast left-wing conspiracy. Aren’t these the people who believe in the primacy of free markets? If their ideas are so great and their arguments so compelling, wouldn’t Americans seek them out no matter what Professor Poopyhead tells them?

Maybe it’s all the whining and the sense of victimhood. That’s sort of a turn-off.

I was gonna say… Didn’t St. Reagan drive the Communists out of America and destroy the Soviet Union single-handedly?

Also, I like both his assumption that anybody would care enough about his stupidity to stand and turn their backs on him, and his vindictive “I stretched this out” so those standing people would have to stand a little longer.

Nice straw man rant he’s got going….too bad he needs to go back 50 years to find a patsy to play with. I wonder what RW think tank “employs” him? Gawd, all of this lugnuts all sound so bitter. I thought we entered the era of compassionate conservativism when Bush got selected….they’ve owned the results of conservative thinking since 2000, why not list off all of the great accomplishments that this ideology has showered on us?

It’s not Byrd, it’s some putz named Bob Parks.

My first thought was that it was the actor Dennis Haysbert (“24” and “The Unit”), not to mention those awful Allstate commercials. A certain physical and low voice resemblance aside, Haysbert is, IIRC, a staunch liberal.

Bob Parks, on the other hand, is this schmuck.

So, that ancient Chinese proverb has come true – we live in interesting times.

It wasn’t a proverb. It was a curse.

Do you think it’s his robe?

Or just a rental?

Student riots? Abstract expressionism?

Is this video forty years old?

OK, I watched it all. What do I win? A bottle of vodka and a hammer would come in handy right about now…

Considering that Sowell works in academia, at Stanford no less, …

It’s worse than that, bemused.

Sowell is actually a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, which, while housed at Stanford, is a rightwing think tank.

While in academia you need to convince others who specialize in your discipline that your ideas are worthwhile, in thinktankia, you just need to convince people with money and/or power that your ideas are worthwhile. You can succeed even if those who actually know something about your chosen subject think you’re entirely out to lunch.

As for Park’s speech, it’s entirely based on the the “1963 Communist Goals” that appeared in an infamous rightwing conspiracy book (also mentioned by Parks in this speech) Naked Communism by Cleon Skousen, who’s apparently a big deal among the neo-McCarthyite set. Just Google “Skousen” and you’ll see that these supposed Communist Goals are everywhere in the wingnutosphere. They got a big boost early on by being read into the Congressional record in 1963 by Rep. A.S. Herlong, Jr. of Florida.

The supposed Communist Goals make for a pretty hilarious document, which, unsurprisingly, seems to have no source beyong Skousen himself. Protocols of the Elders of Communism Liberalism much?

Gaaah! I couldn’t get it to stop playing over and over! Then I saw the suggestion about the vodka and the hammer. Vodka for me, hammer for the CPU. Blessed relief!

Wow, this guy makes Hot Air look good.

Communism schmommunism. What about the Spaniards?? Remember the Maine!

Thinktankia!

Hee hee…

Umm, I’m gonna steal that. And use it regularly. Without attribution. Just thought you should know…

mike

Didn’t St. Reagan drive the Communists out of America and destroy the Soviet Union single-handedly?

Yep. He walked across the Atlantic and smote the entire Red Army with the jawbone of Pat Buchanan.

“Some of the people I hang with…”

Yeah, I’m going to go ahead and need you to never say that again.

For Christ’s sake, learn what Socialism means! It’s not synonymous with Communism!

Hey, somebody tell him the Locust County public access TV studio called and they want their blue screen back. And what’s with this auto-play shit? I don’t want to hear this asshole talking every time I reload this page.

Oldhead? Oldhead? What the fuck is an oldhead? Oh god, I think I might be an oldhead. The HORROR!!!

Wow, if only I had the capitalist skills of one George W. Bush Jr., whose only ‘success’ in life has been in the very belly of the beast of the Big Gummit monster.

Instead, I’m an angry, dissatisfied, proto-Islamic-caliphate leftist, successfully endeavoring in private enterprise.

Who is this bonehead? Is this “Bob Parks”?

And to whom is this big load of nonsense addressed? Nobody who has actually attended a college in the real world will recognize any of these fantastic, absurd accusations. So I think this thing has to have been targeted at right-wing talk-radio fans whose formal education stopped at high school.

help! he just keeps going!! He won’t turn off!
I was listening to a nice Ravel clip on You tube and couldn’t figure out why someone was talking over it!

Shhhh comrades! Bob Parks is on to us! Be vewwy quiet!

By the way, I’ll be a little late to our black mass. I need to swing by Borders to grab a frappucinno and a new copy of the Communist Manifesto.

I could only make it through about the first 30 seconds. The voice sync was off worse than on HD cable…

I love the prissy sarcasm, the I’m-rubber-you’re-glue body language and posturing. As usual, this shows obedience to the Prime Wingnut Directive: Show the smarty-pants Left who’s *really* cool by smoothly demonstrating your knowledge. Heh heh.

What would he say if you asked for one citation, anywhere, in which “the left” calls the U.N. “the savior of mankind” or whatever hyperbolic crap he claims?

This is not so much a commencement address as it is a sermon: a speech asserting (unproven, unprovable) principles of faith from a self-satisfied nitwit, dealing with things he neither has to nor wants to think about, to an audience he has no ability to understand and no awareness that that’s the case.

These people, like the religious fanatics they court and tolerate, live in a fantasy world, the first (fantastical) definition of which is: Our world is not a fantasy world! We live in the real world and nobody else does!

I think it was my wife who said, “It’s called the Hoover Institute because the place is one big intellectual vacuum.” If it was someone here, apologies (and embarrassment for the Freudian slip).

one George W. Bush Jr., whose only ’success’ in life has been in the very belly of the beast

Was it wrong of me to picture Babs as I read this? Yeah, probably.

Hey, where’d the auto preview go?

Is there a YouTube version?

You can get it direct (or download it) at http://www.nmatv.com/flvideo/30.flv

If you’re using Firefox you can use the AdBlock add-on to block it.

Shit.

Do I have to *rewrite* that whole screed I did a while back about how I actually am a socialist, and I really fucking hate liberalism?

(Don’t worry – I like a lot of liberals….I just think a lot of people who think they are “liberals” are actually on the left.)

I notice he didn’t cover #43 of the ‘current’ “Communist goals”:

“Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government”

Because that marks the list as a load of bollocks dreamed up by some idiotic paranoid right wing racist from 50 years ago.

Or could Parks go so far as to say “colonialism was good! Those damn natives didn’t know what was good for them!”?

“Some of the people I hang with…�

Do some of the people he hangs with also wear robes?

Is anyone else’s gaydar going nuts when they watch this?

wow… quintessence of pompous windbaggery… maybe he’s bitter for not having received better grades in school because he had a problem writing about historical fact compared to conservative fiction…. and evidently he didn’t learn much from having gone to art school….

Bleh, couldn’t make it all the way through. Cleon Skousen and his “1963 Communist Goals” are hilarious, but the comedy is lost if you try too hard to keep a straight face.

and Flaming Leftist- Yes. but he’s conservative. hence the undercurrent of self-hate.

I want to go on record in support of atheist pussy…

I want to go on record in support of atheist pussy…

Or just pussy in general, right? I mean, who doesn’t love pussy? Well, OK, with the noted exception of certain bacon-and-playdoh-adverse persons, but you get the drift…

“My first thought was that it was the actor Dennis Haysbert (â€?24″ and “The Unitâ€?), not to mention those awful Allstate commercials. A certain physical and low voice resemblance aside….”

I guess to people like you, we putzs all look alike.