Accepting a lie in place of the truth will do bad things to you. I once advanced the thesis that if a man should accept even one fact as absolutely true, it would compel him to accept all the rest of objective reality. Herbert Spencer believed this as well: I asked one …
Category: The Left
Aug 05 2021
Power Centers
Time was, the Left was a purely political phenomenon, and was viewed as such by non-Leftists. That time has passed, for a simple reason: it didn’t get the Left what its masters want: absolute and unchallengeable power. So it changed focus. Today, if you want to know where the Left is concentrating (or will …
Aug 02 2021
The Paramount Social Principle
Way back when the world was, if not new, still only gently used, I wrote a rather melancholic piece about the loss of trust. It evoked a range of reactions from “C’mon!” all the way to “It’s even worse than you think, Fran.” But I was mostly right. Where I failed was in noting …
Jul 18 2021
How To Say “Repressive Tolerance” So Anyone Will Understand!
Twitter may be more poison than nutrition, but every so often a gem appears there: If you’re unfamiliar with Marxist theorist Herbert Marcuse’s concept of “Repressive Tolerance,” you could: Read his 1965 essay; Use the “capsule” formulation above; Simply shrug and say “I don’t care what Marxist theorists say or think.” My …
Jun 30 2021
The Fear Weapon
Allow me to lead off with a snippet of an old essay by humorist P. J. O’Rourke: Something is happening in America, not something dangerous but something all too safe. I see it in my lifelong friends. I am a child of the “baby boom,” a generation not known for its sane or …
Jun 17 2021
A Profile In Courage
Facts that are not frankly faced have a habit of stabbing us in the back. – Sir Harold Bowden I resist the impulse to call any living person a saint. As Simon Templar, played by Val Kilmer in The Saint, put it, “You have to be a very good, and usually very dead …
Apr 21 2021
Capturing The Moment
Were you under the impression that the United States is not currently in a state of civil war? Minneapolis City Council Candidate and Former City Employee Encourages Rioters to Burn Down Wealthy Neighborhoods Right On Cue: Portland Rioters Go On Destructive Rampage After Chauvin Verdict, Police Actually Intervene BLM Minneapolis: ‘I Don’t Want to …
Apr 18 2021
There Is No Time
Today will be a very busy day for me, for reasons beyond the scope of this rant. And so, as befits the Grand Ironic Tradition we faithfully maintain here at Liberty’s Torch, I have far too much to write about. Worse, I must begin by reposting an old piece: one which first appeared fifteen …
Mar 23 2021
Abuse and Aggression Disguised as Empathy
Weaponized Empathy is probably the chief cultural problem of our time. Empathy is used to justify all manner of atrocious behaviors on the part of Neo-Marxists. For instance, racism is perfectly justifiable if applied to a white person. You may stereotype and demean someone so long as their skin color is pale enough, and any …
Mar 16 2021
Getting It Through The Thickest Heads
I have a graphic of which I’m particularly fond: It’s critical not to appear weak. Weakness invites disrespect. Weakness shown to an enemy invites a savage attack. Even if you’re secretly strong behind a facade of weakness, inviting disrespect is bad policy. Tempting an enemy to attack is lunacy. This is hardly rocket …
Mar 06 2021
A Warning
It’s gratifying and more to see the proliferation of alternatives to Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. However, there’s a need for vigilance. Robert Conquest’s Second Law of Politics tells us why: Any organization not explicitly right-wing sooner or later becomes left-wing. This law describes a state reached by a process Conquest did not …
Mar 02 2021
A Jewel From A Cesspool
Once in a great while, even that festering stew of hatred-soaked Leftists we call Twitter will yield up a gem: I could not have put it better. The Left, after all, was the source and bastion of racism during the Jim Crow years that followed emancipation. A Leftist’s natural inclination is toward force, …
Feb 27 2021
Mask Slippages Dept.
There are days when the cleavages become all too clear…when the battle lines are too bold and bright for anyone to dispute that there’s a war on. Today is such a day: La Mesa, California Trustee Charda Bell-Fontenot told fellow board members that in-person school learning is “a very white supremacist ideology.” She …
Feb 26 2021
The Truth Crisis
Today’s miseries are founded on a single central problem. It’s not a new problem, even for the United States. We’ve seen it in many contexts and guises, here and elsewhere. It’s the problem we must solve if we’re to restore any semblance of normality to American public discourse. I once ranted about it …
Feb 22 2021
I’d Thought There Were No Surprises Left
As usual, I was wrong: Disney has decided that “The Muppet Show” — featuring Kermit the Frog, Fozzie Bear and Miss Piggy — contains “offensive content” and can now be seen only on an adult account. When viewers open the streaming service, which made five series available last Friday, viewers are greeted …
Feb 16 2021
Fossil Fuels And The Tyrants Among Us
Aspiring tyrants’ hostility to the fossil fuels has a long history. It goes back to the early Twentieth Century at least, and has never lapsed since then. Mind you, it’s a political hostility rather than a principled one. The point is power over others. You can tell by this: the rationale for opposing …
Feb 09 2021
The Sacrament Of The Hour
For a long time, I’ve referred to abortion as “the sacrament of the Left.” Having an abortion, or having had one in the past, is one of the ways a woman establishes her bona fides as a trustworthy (?) leftist. (Men who are responsible for pregnancies terminated via abortion receive a “derived” form of …
Fran’s Recent Novels
Margaret’s Recent Novels
