Monday, May 23, 2011

“MR. & MRS. BUTTONS” : THE MYTH OF BLEEDING-HEART LIBERAL COMPASSION

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I am afraid Americans have lost their manhood and their valor. Oh, here and there there are still some signs of it, but we are getting womanish. The small comforts and cozinesses of life are now beginning to be of the utmost importance to us, and the little amusements. ... Men have forgot how to be brave, stern, masters of their government, their families, and their lives. ... Now men want safety and happiness.
~ Taylor Caldwell
(from her book “Ceremony Of The Innocent”)

Taylor Caldwell rocks! Liberals suck beans!
~ Yoey O’Dogherty
General manager, ACME Bean Farms

The following excerpt comes from the book ON GROWING UP TOUGH by Taylor Caldwell. My thanks to the Babylon Today website for posting it.

My introduction to Taylor Caldwell came years ago via the book 20th Century Heroes, a compilation of profiles originally published in The New American magazine. In the chapter on Caldwell, we learn that she “considered it a sport to fire back at leftists”. It seems that Taylor Caldwell was the original Ann Coulter. Woo-Hoo!

And now for the excerpt:


















Recently a flowery young "Liberal" male with flowing hair and flowing hands - and a flowing tongue, too - demanded of me that I explain why and when I became a "Conservative". He wanted to know how I got this way.

Frankly, I couldn't remember just how and when, and I went home musing to myself. I searched my memory and soon it all began to click in my mind, episode after episode - all of them very painful one way or another. There are doubtless a hundred psychiatrists around who will find the following recounting of those formative experiences very interesting.

HEART FOR THE POOR
It all began, doctors, when I was a child. A "Liberal" aunt of mine, who had never herself been in need of anything material, had a deep passion for the Poor, from whom she was very careful to keep far, far away. While we still lived in England, where I was born, Auntie would frequently gather together outworn garments which her family had discarded and prepare them for the Women's Guild of our local Anglican Church. She would sit before the fireplace, I recall, and singing some sad Scots or Irish ballad in a very moving soprano, she would carefully snip every single, solitary button off the clothing.

I was very young indeed when this practice of Auntie's suddenly seemed outrageous to me. "Auntie," I demanded, "what will the Poor do for buttons?"

Auntie had very remarkable hazel and glittering eyes, and they usually glittered on me unpleasantly. They did so now. "They can buy them," she snapped. "They're only tuppence a card."

I pondered. If people were so poor that they had to wear other people's cast-offs then they certainly were too poor to buy buttons. I pointed this out to Auntie. She smacked me fiercely for my trouble and then began to shriek.

"A wicked, wicked girl!" screamed Auntie. "She has no Heart for the Poor!"

My uncle, hearing Auntie's shrill cries, stormed out of his studio and demanded to know what was the matter.

Auntie pointed a shaking, furious finger at me. "Your niece," she said, "doesn't want me to give these clothes - these poor old worthless rags - to the Poor!"

I was standing up now, having recovered from Auntie's blow. "If they're rags," I said, reasonably, "why should the Poor want them, anyway? And she's taken off all the buttons."

"Impudence," bellowed Uncle, who like Auntie was a flaming "Liberal" and also very fond of making a great show of loving the Poor (whom he had never met). And he grabbed me and soundly thrashed me on the spot. I am afraid I didn't ardently love those relatives after that, which was sinful, of course. But from that day on buttons had a special significance for me. I noticed that other of my "Liberal" relatives removed buttons from the garments they were preparing for the Poor, though I never discovered them patching these same old garments.

One rich relative did answer my cynical question about the button snipping with the brief reply, "It's thrifty, and I suppose, Janet, that's something you'll never be." I made it a point of learning all about thrift - and the lessons were all about me, too - and it never appealed to me thereafter. Thrift is an estimable virtue, I have heard, but somehow when I encounter thrifty "Liberals" - and they are inevitably tight with their own money - I always seem to see those buttons being snipped off the clothing for the Poor. I often think of the old little poem written by some Englishman who ought to be immortalized:

To spread the wealth the communist's willing:
He'll tax your pennies and keep his shilling.

To this day I find myself referring to male and female "Liberals" as "Mr. Buttons" or "Mrs. Buttons," among the less invidious names I employ when I am in form.

If you talk to most liberals, they’ll tell you that conservatives are insensitive, callous and selfish. To their own detriment, leftists tend to believe that those on the right simply don’t care about the less fortunate. While this doctrine has been embedded in left-leaning gospel for decades, research and reality paint a very different picture — one that has perplexed many of the left’s self-proclaimed “compassionates.”

American researchers have taken a pretty clear and concise look at this issue and the case is closed: Conservatives out-give and out-volunteer the opposition. Don’t believe me? Examine the facts.
~ Surprise! Conservatives Are More Generous Than Liberals

Although liberal families' incomes average 6 percent higher than those of conservative families, conservative-headed households give, on average, 30 percent more to charity than the average liberal-headed household ($1,600 per year vs. $1,227).
Conservatives also donate more time and give more blood.
~ Conservatives More Liberal Givers

The only debate is whether conservatives give 30 percent more to charity than liberals, as Arthur Brooks, author of "Who Really Cares," claims, or twice as much as liberals, as a study by Google indicates.
~ Study: Conservatives More Generous Than Liberals

It turns out that this idea that liberals give more…is a myth. Of the top 25 states where people give an above average percent of their income, 24 were red states in the last presidential election.
~ Who Gives And Who Doesn't?

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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4 comments:

  1. I too was thinking "Sounds like an Ann Coulter predecessor" but you said it. Ann always hits back, she's never shy, she's always got her ducks in a row,and she always cracks me UP doing it. Anyone who's THAT funny with their ire deserves a medal.

    The button thing is mind-boggling...WHY did they need the buttons so bad? Frankly if I'm giving used clothes to the poor (usually they're in no shape to do so, but it's happened) I FIX them as opposed to WRECKING them first! Even if I've been (as I usually am) wearing them with holes and buttons missing. Cutting off all the buttons is just...so rude. My doctor runs a free charity clinic and across the street is a food bank and donated clothing give-away (my GOODNESS do they have a TON of stuff there! The food is usually old and often not really good for eating, but the clothes are phenomenal) and I'm pretty sure they don't even accept stuff that has the buttons ripped off or holes in it. Everything there is in pretty pristine shape. Salvation Army only takes stuff in good condition, but they sell it, not give it away.

    I just find it as distasteful as the author does; it's pretty gross.

    And yes, the left is perfectly generous...with other people's money. We know that.

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  2. ANNIEE ~
    >> . . . I too was thinking "Sounds like an Ann Coulter predecessor" but you said it.

    As The Good Book says, there's nothing new under the sun. Ann was not this country's first "Coulter" it seems. Caldwell/Coulter - Coincidence?

    And Caldwell was not just blowing smoke: she WAS a tough bird! She once fought with an armed intruder in her home. She didn't exactly win the confrontation - got pistol-whipped for her trouble - but she damn sure didn't just roll over and play dead.

    When she was a schoolgirl in America, and one of her "Progressive" teachers told the other students that they should not look down on the Black girl in class, because it was not her fault she was born a "Negress"; and that they shouldn't castigate their Jewish classmates, because it wasn't their fault they were born Jews; and that they shouldn't hold it against Caldwell that she was born in England, the country which the Americans revolted against, Caldwell picked up a book and threw it at her teacher, hitting her in the face with it.

    The chapter on Caldwell in "20th Century Heroes" says it was ironic, because she would grow up but continue "throwing the book at leftists" - only later in the form of books she herself would write. Life is just so funny sometimes, isn't it?

    Anyway, yeah, Caldwell was the original Coulter. I love 'em both.

    I have occasionally disagreed with Coulter, but she's the toughest man in America today (only because Caldwell died in the 1980s).

    ~ D-FensDogg
    'Loyal American Underground'

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  3. "Caldwell picked up a book and threw it at her teacher, hitting her in the face with it."

    You go, girl! Haha!

    I, too, disagree with Coulter on some things, but she always makes her case well, and she does it with humor and style. It's fun to read even when I don't agree! And it's fun to watch people like the View nags trying to beat her up and not succeeding, as she asks them time after time to deal with substance and not tone. Idiots. (And Hasselbeck's no better; all she did was give Coulter the stink-eye the whole time Ann was on the freaking show.) I'll never understand why some conservatives dislike her so much - though it's clear why the left doesn't. In no way does Ann make conservatives "look bad"; only people who are determined to see it that way. If only we could get her to stop saying "liberal" and start using "leftist" - after all, we ARE the real liberals. It's time to reclaim the word, and I don't want to qualify it with the word "classical" anymore. Sure, I'm not conservative, as I disagree with most social conservatism (nothing wrong with the morality; I just think it's a personal thing and shouldn't be a matter of law) but I sure can relate to many conservatives more than any moron on the left - it's like willful ignorance, which I have no stomach for.

    And this all brings to mind two incidents - when leftards whipped pies at Coulter and when a Muslim whipped shoes at president Bush.

    Thing about those incidents was, both displayed a *stunning* ability to duck in a heartbeat - in fact, Bush took it to nearly Ninja levels, impressing even some leftists with his cat-like reflexes. Also, it was very funny that in the case of Coulter, the perps were busted and charged with a felony. Justice is served!

    All of which reminds me of the Randi Thoades (sp?) leftist who got attacked outside a bar and had her nose smashed all to hell. When that happened, she immediately pointed the finger at the right, but alas, she jumped the gun, and it turned out to have nothing to DO with politics - not that people miss a chance to smear the right. When Coulter got hurt and had her jaw wired shut, the left laughed their asses off at her, claiming they were glad it was her mouth, as it would shut her up for a while. Such kind-spirited people. Much as they laughed their asses off when Limbaugh went deaf, and when his drug problem was revealed.

    Not that I'm above some schadenfreude myself, mind you. But I never claimed to be nice.

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  4. ANNIEE ~
    I think you should forget about reclaiming the word "liberal". You'll get that word back at the same time joyful people get the word "gay" back.

    Not a-gonna happen.

    I use the words Liberals, Leftists, Socialists, Fascists, Morons, and Arseholes pretty much interchangeably.

    While I will on very rare occasions (when I'm being especially sloppy or when I'm especially Jim Beamed) refer to myself as a Conservative - but I always later regret it. In truth, the only political label I accept for myself is "Constitutionalist".

    >>...I'll never understand why some conservatives dislike [Ann Coulter] so much - though it's clear why the left doesn't. In no way does Ann make conservatives "look bad";

    Actually, in a way, I think she DOES make them look bad, and that may be why they don't like her.

    She makes them look bad by comparison because she is just so much sharper, funnier, and deadly when she takes aim at liberals. She makes the conservative men seem like little girls, because she ain't afraid to roll around in the mud with the Libs, while the wussy male conservatives (and the other female conservatives) all wanna play nice with the Marxists and act all civilized 'n' shit!

    Ann's got no use for "patty-cake", and while her counterparts are trying to have a "dialogue" with the Left, Ann's busy turning the Left's olde-tyme tactics against them, kicking asses and taking their milk nickel.

    In short: I loves me some Ann Coulter.

    I tried again today to post some comments on that "other" blog (read between the lines), but it still won't let me. I'm very unhappy about that.

    ~ D-FensDogg
    'Loyal American Underground'

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