Shorter Kevin McCullough:

Jesus Christ.

I do so love that I don’t have to read that shit. I would never have thought that I’d be a Readers Digest kind of guy. Thank you. Thank you so much.

his aggressive support for the radical homosexual activist agenda in America is a part of the overall picture of who he is.

In this way he may be more “gay” than Clinton was “black” – and by a wide margin at that.

Is this a reference to to penis size?

As a person of Scots-Irish (and other) descent, I was momentarily tempted to read Salena Zito. Fortunately, the moment passed. I’m still curious about the polar bears, but am willing to endure the uncertainty.

That “Shorter Steve Chapman” is total bullshit. What he said was right, and has little to no relationship to your caricature of what he wrote.

90% of Townhall pundits are world class assholes and morons, as no one has made a bigger point of than I have. Steve Chapman (as with Jacon Sullum and usually John Stossel) just isn’t one of them.

Although, dammit, Bubba’s making it powerful hard to resist clicking on McCullough.

Must. Not. Click.

Shorter Kevin: What sort of fag doesn’t hate fags?

Mona — you must be shitting me. If that’s not the *implication* of what he said, especially in the context of where he said it, well, then I’m a libertarian.

I did add a comment to the Nina May thread…90 comments in and nobody’d posted John Sidney McCain III.

George H.W. Bush once called Reagan’s trickle-down theory “voodoo economics”.

Some say black people have been known to practice voodoo.

Barack Bin Obama is black.

Therefore…..ZOMG !!!

Mona — you must be shitting me.

HTML Mencken, I have to say that I pretty much agree with Steve Chapman. Northern Illinois University recently announced, with great pride, that they will bulldoze a completely usable building and replace it at great expense. That is complete bullshit. I for one am sick of the pussies we have become. Whenever we’re faced with a setback, we have to erect about twenty monuments and declare a national holiday in order to “heal”. Fuck that shit. How about we nut up instead?

HTML Mencken said,

March 3, 2008 at 6:47

Mona — you must be shitting me. If that’s not the *implication* of what he said, especially in the context of where he said it, well, then I’m a libertarian.

I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to agree with Mona. There was nothing at all about liberals or punishing psychopaths at all in that article. And neither do I get any “implication” or “context” in that article except that it just happened to appeared on a wingnut site. If it popped up on an op-ed anywhere else, I honestly think no one here would’ve even noticed.

Chapman does make a good point that someone shouldn’t blow $40 million to completely demolish and build a new building just because a shooting happened to take place there. I can see spending a lot of money renovating the building (eg: the library at Columbine High School was completely redone after the shooting). But to wipe it out, especially when the university needs money to renovate other buildings, is completely absurd.

Me — sure, it’s stupid of NIU to do. But I’d rather hear that critique from someone not philosophically opposed to the building’s existence in the first place.

Mort,

We should have just gone over to sxwarren’s place and drunk ourselves into oblivion. (btw, Is it too late for that?)

On the upside, RB, I’m pretty goddamn sure Kevin McC. tried to gay-bash me one night. And only two weeks before I fucked his roommate senseless in Kevin’s bed.

Clarification: I fucked his lights out. I did not fuck him while he was senseless. That would be… well, not nice.

To appease everyone, from now on I’ll do to Chapman what Travis did whenever shortering the dreadful Jacob Sullum: “As a libertarian…”

Would that make things better?

Unless he’s not a libertarian, in which case I’ll retract everything and admit idiocy.

And only two weeks before I fucked his roommate senseless in Kevin’s bed.

All I can say is that I hope you used non-petroleum-based lubricant. About three buckets worth.

Someone should introduce Doug Giles to the .500 Smith.

‘Cause that’s a fun way to get a headache, hurt your wrists and spend two hundred dollars while frolicking in the Not-Real-World of stupid huge magnum revolvers.

A place I have to admit I like to visit.

I just don’t pretend it has any value…

mikey

Nah, he didn’t say that Mikey; he just asserted that Jesus would be packed, not what specifically He’d carry. I stuck the Dirty Harry quote in his mouth to juxtapose the vindictive executioner image with that of the redeeming Christ.

A friend keeps trying to get me to try out his .454 casull. I keep giving excuses…

It’s never too late, PeeJ. Let’s go.

Actually, unicorns really do kick ass:

http://www.pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF103-Nice_Shirt.gif

Casull’s fun, HT. Just make sure you bring a good pair of gloves, real ear protection and concentrate on keeping your wrist locked so it doesn’t break back and Owwww. Let your elbow give rather than your wrist.

But the feeling of power you get pushing that kind of BOOM downrange is quite the rush.

I have a 14 inch TC contender in .35 Remington that serves the same purpose.

Zounds!!

mikey

As a person of Scots-Irish (and other) descent, I was momentarily tempted to read Salena Zito.

Mort, as a person of entirely Scots-Irish descent*, and therefore too damn contentious for my own good, I could not resist clicking on Zito:

As a voting bloc, the Scots-Irish respond passionately to five things: the right to bear arms, the preservation of family, a love of country, a respect for life and success in war…

Let me remind you of some stuff you will not hear from the Scots-Irish Admiration Society, whose mouths are full of meal. (I exempt Webb’s book, because “Born Fighting” is brutally honest about the double-edged “virtues” of our clan.) The so-called Scots-Irish-in-America are the rump of a group of contentious nutters who spent the last 3,000 years or so getting pushed from the heart of the Indus Valley, all across Eurasia, out to the worst bits on the ragged left-hand edge of the known universe. (Historical records are spotty at best, but everything still extant agrees that the Celts were tons of fun at parties, but nobody wanted them as neighbors, because the only thing Celts enjoyed more than staying up all night drinking and bullshitting and fighting and stealing from each other was fighting with and stealing from non-Celts.) Once established in Scotland, Ireland, Brittany, and the various guano-stained rocks strung between the “British Isles” and Scandinavia, our bloodstock was further… enhanced… through many generations of Viking rape and pillage. (The famous red hair? Not Gaelic; Viking. Ditto the Nixonian/leprechaun ski-jump nose and the beady eyes set rather too close together.)

Once Europeans discovered that North America could be used as a dumping ground for undesirables, a great many individuals squatting on lands their economic betters wished to use more profitably for raising sheep** were transported to Teh New World. Some of them ended up in New England, mostly after jumping ship from the cod fleet, or the British Navy, or the slave boats running the infamous Golden Triangle. Many more, in the midAtlantic regions, came over as indentured servants — essentially serfs with an expiration date — for the same sort of heartbreakingly petty Crimes Against Society (stealing food in times of starvation, prostitution, failing to show proper respect) that would get their relatives turfed off to Australia a hundred years later. The “Scots Irish” who survived (escaped) were prominent in the Westward Expansion, because they still couldn’t get along with their more civilized neighbors, and they had no particular qualms against murdering whichever indigenes might be unfortunate enough to be standing between the Bold S.I. Pioneer and a patch of workable turf (or a moonshine still; the leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion were Scots-Irish too.) Along they way, our proud S.I. ancestors interbred extensively with the similarly deported Acadians, with such Native Americans as they didn’t slaughter, and with the toughest and crankiest ex-African and ex-Hispanic (fellow) runaways from slavery and serfdom. They (we) have made a virtue of being able to survive in conditions direly inhospitable, via an eternally combustible mixture of ferocity, bullshit, and the world’s most misplaced sense of humor. A number of the most famous astronauts were Scots-Irish, and when the first space colonies are set up, I’m sure the Scots-Irish will be well represented — especially on the ones set up as prisons or re-education camps.

Zito’s list of voting hot buttons is as romanticized as her history. “[T]he right to bear arms”, absolutely, because we’ve always got at least a few people gunning for us. “[T]he preservation of family”, only in the Hatfield-McCoys sense — we need to keep tabs on which set of siblings/cousins/inlaws are currently incurring our passionate devotion to the bearing of arms. “[A] love of country” translates as a fanatic devotion to whichever set of clan tales & myths we grew up with (cf ‘An Okie from Muskogee’), which same devotion has gotten more of us killed than the damned Vikings and the reprehensible British combined. And of course that much-vaunted “success in war” is completely incompatible with “a respect for life” except for Talibangelical peasant paranoia about being outbred by ‘them’ — good for our masters, bad for our fellows.

And to my fellow Sadlynauts who share the glorious Scots-Irish heritage (Mikey, and I believe HTML): Sorry, guys, but you know I’m not lying. And you’re perfectly free to write your own rebuttals, of course.

* My Scots-Irish father had only three pieces of sexual advice to share, the most strongly stressed being “Stay away from the Italians.” Just sayin’.
** Insert your favorite British-aristocracy-and-sheep joke here.

Casull’s fun, HT. Just make sure you bring a good pair of gloves, real ear protection and concentrate on keeping your wrist locked so it doesn’t break back and Owwww. Let your elbow give rather than your wrist.

Guys, guys! Don’t you remember the wingnuts think we all hate guns and know nothing substantive about them? Are you trying to give them more cognitive dissonance-related headaches?

‘Cause if ya are, please continue. It’s fun.

Let me remind you of some stuff you will not hear from the Scots-Irish Admiration Society, whose mouths are full of meal.

Best comment in weeks. You win the internets…

…for now!

Nooooooow I get it. I always wondered why Boston is such a hub for SecondAmmendment activists, pro-war proponents and anti-abortion zealots…

Also, The RED Sox: coincidence? I think not! (no, not commie red… red like red state, you know, GOP, get it?… oh never mind)

Anne Laurie,
I’m Scots-Irish and, no, you’re not lying. My family falls somewhere between Erskine Caldwell and William Faulkner. One of my more illustrious ancestors got the clan ran out of Alabama for biting a man’s nose off during a bar fight. Another stole a pair of horses from a neighbor and then got so drunk he tried to sell the horses back to the same neighbor. My own grandfather, while being the least sorry of his three brothers, nevertheless managed to drink the family farm – in the family for 100 years – into financial ruin (saved only by the Corps of Engineers). That last one I’m grateful for, though. Farming’s for the birds.

As a voting bloc, the Scots-Irish respond passionately to two things: the right to bear arms, the preservation of family and a love of country…

No. As a voting bloc, the Scots-Irish respond passionately to three things: the right to bear arms, the preservation of family, a love of country and a respect for life…

Let me try again. As a voting bloc, the Scots-Irish respond passionately to four things: the right to bear arms, the preservation of family, a love of country, a respect for life and and success in war…
————————–
This alleged Scots-Irish passionate response to “success in war” is on a par with my own passionate response to Kate Beckinsale. Neither is founded on experience.

This alleged Scots-Irish passionate response to “success in war” is on a par with my own passionate response to Kate Beckinsale. Neither is founded on experience.

Oh, we’ve been very successful at killing other serfs, refugees and tribals for the benefit of History’s Winners, Herr Clyde.

“Or thou canst… raise him to honour in thy Army. He comes of a race that will not pay revenue. A red flame is in his blood that comes out of the top of his head in that glowing hair. Make him chief of the Army. Give him honour as may befall, and full allowance of work, but look to it, O King, that neither he nor his hold a foot of earth from thee henceward. Feed him with words and favour, and also liquour… and he will be a bulwark of defence. But deny him even a tuft of grass for his own. This is the nature that God has given him. Moreover he has brethren… But if his brethren come, they will surely fight with each other till they die; or else the one will always give information concerning the other… ” (R. Kipling, “Namgay Doola”)
Julius Caesar couldn’t make decent Legionnaires of the Celts, but he found them infinitely useful in slaughtering Gauls, Goths, and other Celts. Charlemagne preferred Scots for his personal bodyguards, as did Frederick the Great, and the British nobility have been using the Gaels to kill restive natives, not least among them other Gaels, since at least the time of William the Bastard. The Scots-Irish, as they have become, are probably responsible for killing more poor bastards in the name of better-armed, more organized bastards than any other tribe in human history, with the possible exception of some of the clans in what is currently called Afghanistan. And what have we got to show for it? Green beer, an extensive catalog of maudlin doggrel, and some of the worst American presidents ever (Jackson. Nixon. You-know-who.)

I only say things like that because I know you’ll take them the right way.

I have a 14 inch TC contender

(heh heh) Sure you do, big boy…sure you do!

(just try to remember, it’s not the size that counts, it’s the propellant and the caliber!).

***

Yeah, it must be some kind of a crazy athiest liberal reaction to a school shooting to forgive the shooter and take revenge of the building.

Once again, Anne Laurie nails it. I can count three continents (that I know of) that my Celtic ancestors got chased across. Success in war? Only when they (rarely) stopped fighting each other and lined up to fight their oppressors – who ended up kicking their asses anyway. I mean, crikey, the story goes that in 390 BC they sacked Rome and then proceeded to get drunk, bored and finally wander off (probably looking for more drink).

Honestly, I’m clan proud myself though I also acknowledge that most Celts literally couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery. And let’s not forget all those Scots-Irish that outright embarass us: O’Reilly, MacCoulter, MacBush, O’Donohue, O’Hannity, etc. I notice the one value Zito doesn’t mention which is highly prized by a true Celt: Honesty. I guess that’s just too inconvenient when it comes to politics.

Celts are good fighters when their backs are up against the wall, but that probably comes from having so much experience with their backs up against said wall, as Anne Laurie rightly points out.

For Smut Clyde:

Ximinez: NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise…surprise and fear…fear and surprise…. Our two weapons are fear and surprise…and ruthless efficiency…. Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency…and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope…. Our *four*…no… *Amongst* our weapons…. Amongst our weaponry…are such elements as fear, surprise…. I’ll come in again.

Y’know, as an actual Scot, these “Scots-Irish” folk scare the hell out of me. But then, I’m a Glaswegian, and us Lowlanders have generally been more interested in making money and, more recently, voting for socialists due to a mile-wide egalitarian streak, than having giant clan fights (although Glasgow has an element of religious sectarianism that could be construed as that; it’s not “Belfast Lite” for nothing). I apologise on behalf of my nation for sending over the crazy-arse Highland teuchters to sugh malignant effect.

Clarification: I fucked his lights out. I did not fuck him while he was senseless. That would be… well, not nice.

That would be … Republican.

Per Zito: “Much of our democracy’s values emanates from the Scottish Kirk, a philosophy that embraced a bottom-up populist form of governing made up of councils of peer groups.”

First, any good Sot (I am from the Galloway branch of borderers, who are half-nordic, as Galloway was settled by ex-viking/gaelic refugees after the medieval economy in the Hebrides collapsed during the little ice age) knows:

the Kirk is not a philosophy, dammit, it means ‘Church’! And that church was ROMAN CATHOLIC up and until it became CALVINIST! The POPE was never scottish (surprise!) and John Calvin, was, er, Swiss. Anything dealing with small groups of peers peacefully settling their differences has got to be the story of a different people than the Scots-Irish.

The whole Born Fightin’ story is a lot of hooey. There is not Scots-Irish ethnicity, just a bunch of antisocial peasants stuck between larger powers, and whoever is the crankiest of their descendants at any given time gets to carry the mantle of ornery authenticity for the time being. That Jim Webb, PhD. does not see through a lot of phony 19th century theories of romantic nationalism does not say much for his intellectual powers. It does not say much for his PhD., either.

Dear Doug Giles,

Go to Hell.

Xenos: I actually live in Dumfries and Galloway (American ex-pat) and from what I can see Kirk law as applied in the 17th century on was no fun for anyone involved. Lots of public humiliation, heavy fines and penalties, paying for your own incarceration, etc. and best of all those damn witches:

“In 1659 ten women were accused of diverse acts of witchcraft by Dumfries Kirk Session although the Kirk Session minutes itself records nine witches. The Justiciary Court found them guilty of the several articles of witchcraft and on the 13th April between 2pm and 4pm in the afternoon they were taken to the Whitesands, strangled at stakes and their bodies burnt to ashes. There are many other instances. In 1650 Elizabeth Maxwell, Marion Corsan, Thomas Paton, Bessie Graham, Ellesone Patersone, Janet Dickson and Marion Sprott were all found guilty at Dumfries and were hanged and burnt. Thomas Anderson and John Crosbie were paid for setting up the gibbet. The town watch was paid 9s 3d for candles for the time he spent with the witches “when the hair gouns was upon them” and Baillie Ferguson was paid for the time he spent with the ‘proder’. Wine of course was drunk while the indictments against them were drawn up.

Very often their ‘confessions’ were extracted under torture. The accused were hung up by their thumbs, lighted candles were set to the soles of their feet, hair shirts dipped in vinegar were put on them to fetch off their skin, needles were thrust to the heads in their fingers. A common instrument was the cashielaw, an iron case for the leg to which fire was gradually applied till it became agonisingly painful. Often the witch’s family were tortured in front of her in order to extract the confession. It was the church which inflicted these agonies and it was only after confession had been extracted that the victims were handed over to the magistrates for final disposal. Pricking witches with an iron needle was a favourite method and the Pricker was taught his trade as if it was an ordinary profession. Sleep deprivation or “waking the witch” was also standard practice.” http://www.dumfriesmuseum.demon.co.uk/dumfstory09.html

The hills around my house are dotted with memorials to the Covenanters who were hunted down and shot like dogs for their “bottom up” beliefs. All in all, I’d say there is an especially peculiar brand of religious nuttiness in this part of Scotland that definitely sets it apart (at least historically).

Most people know that the past Iraqi Dictator’s name was Saddam Hussein, and ironically, Hussein is Barak Obama’s middle name.
*snip*
The fact is though, his name is Barak Hussein Obama.
*snip*
That elephant was suddenly slapped on the rear by John McCain when he chastised a surrogate for using Barak’s full name, apologizing for the implications, while those inclined to possibly vote for him were reminded of why they won’t.
*snip*
“ I Barak Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States”?
*etc.*

Um, Nina? You can’t even SPELL HIS FIRST NAME CORRECTLY. Why should we give any credence to anything you say?

My Scots-Irish father had only three pieces of sexual advice to share, the most strongly stressed being “Stay away from the Italians.” Just sayin’.

What were the other two?

Nice Orgazmo reference.

Xenos: I actually live in Dumfries and Galloway (American ex-pat) and from what I can see Kirk law as applied in the 17th century on was no fun for anyone involved. Lots of public humiliation, heavy fines and penalties, paying for your own incarceration, etc.

I had always wondered what the cultural roots of the Homeowners’ Association were.

From McCullough’s column, after quoting Obama on repealing DOMA:

In pledging to do so Barack Obama has now staked out turf that threatens the viability of the next generation of children that could subject them to an operative norm that would contribute to the de-constructing of families as to however one could imagine in one state – and then forcing recognition of that sexual union by its neighboring state regardless of what the citizens of that state say.

Is this English? Because I can make no sense out of those dozens of nested subordinate clauses. A prize to anyone that can parse this sentence!

If I recall correctly, “Scot-Irish” is a uniquely American appelation for an ethnicity that, not to put too fine a point on it, does not exist in the Old Country. After the first wave of Irish immigration in the early 19th century, a second wave hit these fine shores toward the end of the 19th century.

The settled Irish immigrants, wanting to distance themselves from the second wave of Irish, renamed themselves “Scots-Irish” in order to make clear that THEY weren’t like the recently arrived Irish immigrants who were despised by all white Americans. But, back on the British Islands, there simply was no ethnic group called “Scots-Irish.” It was a pure PR ploy invented by Americans and has no glorious history back to the beginnings of time.

It has been a while since I read this, but I believe is in Noel Ignatiev’s HOW THE IRISH BECAME WHITE.

In pledging to do so Barack Obama has now staked out turf that threatens the viability of the next generation of children that could subject them to an operative norm that would contribute to the de-constructing of families as to however one could imagine in one state – and then forcing recognition of that sexual union by its neighboring state regardless of what the citizens of that state say.

There you go.

Sigh. I struck out everything but “Barack Obama threatens children.”

Parsed McCullough:

Obama is planting a lawn that will kill kids who play on it and even kids in the next state over by forcing sexual family de-constructionists to unionize.

Maybe.

Thank you, Annie Laurie, for your wonderful post(s) on Scots-Irish. I read the knuckleheaded post in Townhall and almost responded, but I’m glad I didn’t because your response was so much better than what I could do.

And to my fellow Sadlynauts who share the glorious Scots-Irish heritage

I’m one myself – scion of a proud family of Ulster Presbyterians who came to Pennsylvania in the 1720s and then hied it up to the hills of Eastern Tennessee where they interbred for generations. Which explains certain physical characteristics that repeat in my family. Including the bad teeth, bad eyesight, flat feet and deformed limbs.

The article is just ridiculous – for one thing it assumes that everyone with a drop of Scots-Irish ancestry shares a common cultural heritage, no matter how diluted the line. Which is why she lumps Teddy Roosevelt in with Bill Clinton.

For another thing – “Scots-Irish” as far as the use of the term is concerned is particularly one group of people – those Scottish presbyterians who, having been vanquished by interclannish and interfaith wars, purges, and persecution, emigrated from Scotland to Ulster in the 17th and early to mid 18th century.

The term is not meant to encompass “all Scottish and Irish people” – it’s meant specifically for these groups of emigres. So lumping in the Bill O’Reilly’s with the mountain folk like my ancestors is a falsehood. Those folks had no more in common than did Sicilians and Tyrolians.

Plus – if you use Whatshername’s construct of the term it’s so broad, so intergenerational, and so non-regional that it becomes a demographic nothing. It would be like trying to chart the demographic voting patterns and cultural heritage of Right-Handed People, or Brunettes.

Anyway – thanks Annie Laurie for delving in.

Mmm, fardels bear, I haven’t heard that definition of Scots-Irish (although I haven’t read the book you cite). I’ve always heard the one that I give in my post above – pre-revolutionary Scottish emigres to Ireland who made a second immigration to the US. But I believe in anycase, the distinction is that they were protestant, not catholic.

I posted this at Kevin McCollugh’s blog. I could vote for a secret muslim terrorist but now that he is gay, I’m not so sure.

“ec1009 writes: Monday, March, 03, 2008 12:54 PM
Same to you
Maybe Kevin is the “HOMO”. It wouldn’t be the first time “anti-homo” activists used that tact to draw attention away from themselves. See Craig, Haggert et al. Most people who spend a lot of time thinking about gays tend to be gay.

Maybe there is something more sinister in Kevin’s thoughts like pedophilia or bestiality? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least. It is the case with John McCain according to some people.”

Hum, I thought I was Scots-Irish along with Scots and Welsh. Now I am just confused.

These immigrants come into our country with their weird look, weird language, and weird religion and expect US to conform to THEIR ideas? Hey, they’re lucky to even be here!

I’m telling you – the fucking Irish are ruining this country!

Is this English? Because I can make no sense out of those dozens of nested subordinate clauses. A prize to anyone that can parse this sentence!

No, it is Old High Dogwhistlese, which buries a series of dog whistles in a jumble of random words. In this instance we have:

Threat
De-construct
Force
Family
Children
Sex

Translation: OMG! OBAMA HAS THREATENED TO LET TEH GEHY DESTROY UR FAMILY AND FORCE UR CHILDREN TO HAVE SEXORS!!

You’re welcome.

“Scot-Irish” is a uniquely American appelation for an ethnicity that, not to put too fine a point on it, does not exist in the Old Country. After the first wave of Irish immigration in the early 19th century, a second wave hit these fine shores toward the end of the 19th century. The settled Irish immigrants, wanting to distance themselves from the second wave of Irish, renamed themselves “Scots-Irish” in order to make clear that THEY weren’t like the recently arrived Irish immigrants who were despised by all white Americans…It was a pure PR ploy invented by Americans and has no glorious history back to the beginnings of time.

It has been a while since I read this, but I believe is in Noel Ignatiev’s HOW THE IRISH BECAME WHITE.

The name itself, Mr. Bear, is indeed an American invention. But G is right that the first wave of Irish-based American immigrants included a considerable percentage descended from those anti-social Scots conservatives who Cromwell had condemned “to hell or Connaught” (i.e., to death or exile for resisting English Protestant rule). Via the usual irony of history, many of these staunch bloodthirsty traditionalist Catholics, once stranded in the least hospitable areas of Eire (pronounced “ire”), intermarried with the raggedy local “nobility” of English Protestant remittancers and wastrels. Having learnt the habit of wandering (Romanto-speak for “not owning enough property to keep them from starvation”), some of the newly bastardized McLeods and McClennans took advantage of the improvements in transportation (cargo boats, steamships & eventually railroads) to become migrant workers for the new Industrial Hegemony, travelling between their rented potato patches in Galway and the factory tenements of Liverpool, Manchester, Belfast and Glasgow as the economic seasons changed. This further “enriched” our mutual gene pool via the starving ex-peasantry responsible for the Enclosure Wars and the Corn Riots…

Genetically, the “Scots-Irish” are no more a bloodline than “Hispanics” (or “American Indians”). Anthropologically, we’re the inheritors of endless generations of History’s Losers, people who had nothing they could reliably pass to their children but their stories — and their grievances. The ones most liable to self-identify with the whole sad and ridiculous tapestry of betrayal, incompetence, and exile are those of us who’ve forged the fewest bonds to the Fat’n’Happy mythology of the American Melting Pot (Clinton, Kennedy, McCain, yes; Nixon, Reagan, Bush, no). And therefore the term “Scots-Irish” remains a useful shorthand for the whole fierce, cranky, myth-addicted, antisocial mindset whose ADHD/OCD habits have influenced American history in a great many ways, some of them even positive.

(And I second the recommendation for HOW THE IRISH BECAME WHITE, which should be required reading for every “Scots-Irish” mouthbreather who believes Teh Brown Hordes are irredeemably different than his own proud-heritage-vaunting ancestors.)