Althouse: "Chakra Con."

July 2, 2010

"Chakra Con."

"It took these latest revelations of sexual impropriety to get anyone to question whether Al Gore - a man who, for years, made one bogus, scare-mongering thing after another - is someone trustworthy enough for us to have listened to. Again: how does that happen?"

68 comments:

Anonymous said...: Sayeth the algore:

OBEY ME OR DIE!; 7/2/10, 12:35 PM
Fred4Pres said...: Goracle: Ignore the man behind the curtain!; 7/2/10, 12:35 PM
Fred4Pres said...: Goracle: I would say little man, but actually he is kinda husky.; 7/2/10, 12:37 PM
Paddy O said...: I'm not embarrassed to say I clicked the link mostly for the pictures.; 7/2/10, 12:41 PM
Anonymous said...: Crack always has striking images.; 7/2/10, 12:41 PM
The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/2/10, 12:44 PM
Anonymous said...: Listen, it's a lot of fun to jump all over the algore,

Nothing's more fun than beating up on a sanctimonious prick.

But, he could be innocent.

The accuser looks to be a piece of work, too.

No saints here.

The accuser is a member of the Birkenstock crowd. That's, as Crack would put it, a cult.

I'll wait it out to decide whether the algore is guilty or not. He'll probably pay her off, so we'll never know.

Who know, he may be guilty of something, and she might be looking for a payoff.

Seems the most likely scenario.; 7/2/10, 12:48 PM
Scott said...: "There is no controlling legal authority that says this was in violation of law."
-- Al Gore, seven times (in one form or another), White House news conference, March 3, 1997 (as related by the irrepressible Dr. K.); 7/2/10, 12:56 PM
LouisAntoine said...: You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

Michael Steele comes out against the war in Afghanistan; 7/2/10, 12:57 PM
Phil 314 said...: Well at least it didn't involve a sweat lodge; 7/2/10, 12:59 PM
A.W. said...: i think this old post by Steven Den Beste is on point, too.

> http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2009/12/06/government-by-wishful-thinking/; 7/2/10, 1:00 PM
A.W. said...: monty

um, i literally don't care what thinkprogress says. they are pathological liars.

quote me a reliable source, and i might care.; 7/2/10, 1:01 PM
garage mahal said...: You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

Does Drudge have the red siren going off asking "WHERE'S NANCY!!??"

LOLZ; 7/2/10, 1:02 PM
Scott said...: @MM: I don't think this is surprising. The Tea Party people in particular seem to think that our endless involvment in the Middle East is a rathole down which we throw our blood and treasure.

Barry O. Carter or Johnson? You decide.; 7/2/10, 1:02 PM
Skyler said...: Monty, that quote is why the republican party is pathetic. It doesn't explain why the democrat party is communist.; 7/2/10, 1:03 PM
Scott said...: er, is Barry O. a Carter or a Johnson? You decide.; 7/2/10, 1:04 PM
Scott M said...: You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

I'm a conservative and I've been of the opinion that the Afghan war has been a waste of blood and treasure since before Obama took office. Quite a few conservatives I know feel the same way. Not quite sure what that does to your meme.

Further, I've not been a huge fan of Steele thus far (ups and downs), but where's the credit the GOP should get for putting a black man in that position to begin with? How about you? Was that a good move on their part?; 7/2/10, 1:05 PM
Right is right! said...: Sorry, but Al Gore is not innocent. He is guilty of pulling one of the biggest frauds on this country of all time. He did so as a way to turn us socialist using the back door.

Just as Al Capone was brought down on tax evasion I think given the evil Gore has been perpetuation it is completely justified to bring Gore down on these rape charges whether they are actually true or not. I got through to Rush Limbaugh yesterday (only the second time I have ever been successful) and made the above argument and he did not disagree with me. I hope you were tuned in.

The woman who is accusing Al Gore could go down in history as the person stopped the bastard dead in his tracks. If that turns out to be the case then we owe her a great deal of gratitude.; 7/2/10, 1:06 PM
garage mahal said...: And I'm surprised Crack [as a New Age Watcher]didn't dig a little further into the Reagans connection with Astrology and the Occult .

In spring of 1988, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater acknowledged publicly what journalists had whispered for years: Ronald and Nancy Reagan were devotees of astrology. A tell-all memoir had definitively linked the first lady to a San Francisco stargazer, confirming speculation that started decades earlier when Reagan, as California’s governor-elect, scheduled his first oath of office at the eyebrow-raising hour of 12:10 a.m. Many detected an effort to align the inaugural with promising heavenly signs. Fitzwater also confirmed the president’s penchant for “lucky numbers,” or what is sometimes called numerology.

There was more to the story than the White House let on. In a speech and essay produced decades apart, Reagan revealed the unmistakable mark of a little-known but widely influential scholar of occult philosophy, Manly P. Hall. Judging from a tale that Reagan borrowed from Hall, the president’s reading tastes ran to some of the outer reaches of esoteric spiritual lore. .; 7/2/10, 1:08 PM
former law student said...: Ah, our old friend Poisoning the Well. But remember, Gore shared his Nobel Peace Prize with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Wouldn't they all have had to sexually assault someone to put climate change in doubt?

Or if one miscreant is enough, we must reinstate the estate tax at once, because ex-Senator Bob Packwood was a primary force behind its elimination. And, per the Senate Ethics Committee (via the NY Daily News), in his Senate office, Packwood pinned a staff assistant "against a wall or desk, held her hair with one hand, bending her head backward, fondling her with his other hand, and kissed her, forcing his tongue into her mouth."

In an Oregon restaurant, he allegedly "ran his hand up the leg of a dining room hostess and touched her crotch area."

He fondled a campaign worker as they danced and forced his tongue into her mouth.

So by Crack's yardstick of "sexual impropriety" = "Untrustworthiness," Packwood's sexual impropriety means he's untrustworthy and therefore not to believed when it comes to the estate tax.

Restore the estate tax now!; 7/2/10, 1:09 PM
LordSomber said...: Some of us never drank the Kool-Aid in the first place.; 7/2/10, 1:10 PM
Scott M said...: Re: Reagan

Ah, Garage, when are you going to grow up and realize the bad behavior by one (in this context devotee to astrology) does not excuse bad behavior by another?

Come on, big guy, join us in adulthood.; 7/2/10, 1:10 PM
MadisonMan said...: I think MM in this thread should be Melle Mel.; 7/2/10, 1:11 PM
Scott M said...: <i.Wouldn't they all have had to sexually assault someone to put climate change in doubt?

No. Last I checked, the IPCC report has enough problems, all on it's own. Thus voiding the rest of your comment.; 7/2/10, 1:11 PM
Right is right! said...: Concerning the New Age vileness that the Hymies in the Hollywood and the mainstream media are pushing it needs to be understood that Christianity is the last bulwark between America and the socialistic society they want us to be transformed into.

Is it any surprise that Al Gore left his wife for Laurie David? I guess it was in the stars. Six pointed stars that is.; 7/2/10, 1:12 PM
John said...: FLS,

You are correct, the fact that Al Gore is a pervert doesn't mean that he was wrong about global warming. One has nothing to do with the other. But it works the other way to. Al Gore has no scientific training and is nothing but a propagandist. He should have never been listened to in the first place.

And sadly, the IPCC has since been revealed to have been a fraud as well. That, unlike Al Gore being a pervert, is relevent to what we should believe about global warming.; 7/2/10, 1:13 PM
HT said...: There is no democrat party.; 7/2/10, 1:16 PM
yashu said...: (Re T.R.-- Oh great, another moby. At least that's my guess. Sigh.); 7/2/10, 1:26 PM
Anonymous said...: So what does Crack want to see happen? Should America just click-and-drag New Age to the cultural Trash Bin, click "empty", and be done??? And then we revert to... what, exactly? Christianity?

It ain't gonna happen.

New Age is too attractive to the masses. They love it! It's got a message of personal fulfillment combined with easy to follow, accessible rituals. Most importantly, it meshes with our modern technological world in all the ways that Christianity has failed to.

This is exactly what Christianity itself did in the Roman world during the first few centuries A.D... The authorities tried to suppress it with varying degrees of severity; but all the while it gained adherents because it provided an attractive individualized solution to the people of the Ancient pagan world.

Christianity wasn't legitimized at all, really, until Constantine put two and two together in the early 300s and realized that Christianity was going to win in the battle of ideas, and that he could use it for his own political ambitions.

Some decades later, Julian's whole Emperorship was dedicated to trying to unwind this. He failed; his last, fittingly dramatic words were reported to be "You have won, Galilean", in reference to the victory of Christ over his Empire.

The Nordic people tried to hold out longer. Robert Ferguson's recent book makes the point that the whole Viking-thang was a violent attempt to hold Norse culture firm against the Christian cultural invasion. But in the end the Nordic people converted too, about 700 or so years after Constantine.

The point: Christianity was impossible to roll back.

Isn't the same dynamic at work now with New Age? What do you do if the tide of New Age turns out to be as impossible to reverse as Christianity was?

New Age might have terrible consequences for society; but it works its magic on individuals, and no amount of talk about New Age's damage on society is going to turn individuals away from it if it works personally for them.; 7/2/10, 1:27 PM
Scott M said...: (Re T.R.-- Oh great, another moby. At least that's my guess. Sigh.)

Ditto. Not even a good one.; 7/2/10, 1:28 PM
garage mahal said...: Ah, Garage, when are you going to grow up and realize the bad behavior by one (in this context devotee to astrology) does not excuse bad behavior by another?

If you read my post I was only noting Crack, the author of the link, included a photo of Reagan without notating he was into astrology and the occult. Coincidentally Reagan won today's poll on best president by a humongous margin. Interesting!; 7/2/10, 1:29 PM
Anonymous said...: (Re T.R.-- Oh great, another moby. At least that's my guess. Sigh.)

Ditto. Not even a good one.

I'll see your 'ditto' and raise you one more.

Tiresome trolls.; 7/2/10, 1:32 PM
Right is right! said...: Dead Julius, what you and others do not seem to understand is that this is not about New Ageism. Instead, New Ageism is a Trojan horse to subvert Christianity and install socialism.; 7/2/10, 1:32 PM
John Stodder said...: My guess is the whole thing will end with Gore and his accuser agreeing that each of them has their own truth. Then they will hug.; 7/2/10, 1:32 PM
John Stodder said...: Is Tidy Righty working with Ezra Klein's legal team?; 7/2/10, 1:35 PM
John Stodder said...: You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

A fair point, MM. Although, AA has since linked to Wm. Kristol's call for Steele to quit.; 7/2/10, 1:37 PM
A.W. said...: FLS

Of course being guilty of sexual assult doesn't make you wrong about everything.

But it does remind you that his man is a human being and a politician. it also might remind us what we rigured out in 2000: he's a fabulist. in that sense, it takes away the halo effect that might have been stifling the rational questions to ask. you know, like if he really believes we are close to disaster on global warming, then why does he waste so many carbons? he certainly isn't acting like its the emergency he claims it is.

as for the IPCC, they have already been discredited. which i think is part of the problem gore is having here. we already know he was selling a lie, but we weren't sure if he knew it was bull when he sold it. this makes us less willing to give him that benefit of the doubt.; 7/2/10, 1:42 PM
Unknown said...: Ann Althouse said...

"It took these latest revelations of sexual impropriety to get anyone to question whether Al Gore - a man who, for years, made one bogus, scare-mongering thing after another - is someone trustworthy enough for us to have listened to."

No, some of us looked at who his father was, some of us remember him establishing himself as a wacko (no offense, Wack) with "Earth In The Balance", and some of us remember how he tried to sell his vote for the first Gulf War. This hardly waited for this particular revelation.

Montagne Montaigne said...

You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

Michael Steele comes out against the war in Afghanistan

Montagne is partaking of those alternate realities again. How many Conservatives here have given a damn what Michael Steele has said in the last, oh, five years?

He's up there in the Rightist pantheon with Lindsey Graham and the Weird Sisters from Maine.

PS Chakra Con?? Bad blogger! Bad! Bad!!!; 7/2/10, 2:30 PM
Right is right! said...: I realize that it is not politically correct to write honestly about the war that is occurring in this country (and really the rest of the Western world) against Christianity. But the reality is that Christianity is the foundation of our society and when it goes in the United States we will be in the same dustbin that that parts of Europe now finds itself in.

So, wishy-washy moderate Republicans have at me. But you know I am right. You also know deep down that you are mere spectators in this great battle for the soul of our country.

Please read Robert Bork's "Slouching Towards Gomorrah."; 7/2/10, 2:33 PM
bagoh20 said...: The great thing about New Age is that it's customizable. My new church/LLC is gonna bring back Droit de seigneur. We welcome young people looking for meaning in life. Please send a photo with your application.; 7/2/10, 2:48 PM
Methadras said...: Gaiaists where looking for their god-head since the one they tried to worship, the earth itself, told them to go fuck themselves and then they found manbearpoodlechakrapig instead. The next time some jackoff accosts your time by telling you that the earth is a living, breathing entity, with a central nervous system, and that it can feel, just punch him in the face. You have my permission.; 7/2/10, 4:40 PM
Methadras said...: Tidy Righty said...

Concerning the New Age vileness that the Hymies in the Hollywood and the mainstream media are pushing it needs to be understood that Christianity is the last bulwark between America and the socialistic society they want us to be transformed into.

Is it any surprise that Al Gore left his wife for Laurie David? I guess it was in the stars. Six pointed stars that is.

Great, another moby anti-semite. Have you been getting your pointers from Garage McFat and C4 too?; 7/2/10, 4:42 PM
Trooper York said...: The sex crazed poodle should know that his indiscretions will force him to face The Wrath of Chaka Kahn!; 7/2/10, 4:43 PM
Methadras said...: Montagne Montaigne said...

You'd think for conservatives the head of the RNC becoming an anti-war protestor would be at least as big news as Al Gore's dink. But it's not even on Drudge.

Michael Steele comes out against the war in Afghanistan

Monty, Monty, Monty, when are you going to learn that no one gives two buckets of shit what you have to say about anything? Besides, Fox carried it, Drudge is late, but since you are the only one that seems to see distinctions without differences, then tell me, how Steele saying that Afghanistan is "probably a lost cause" is actually anti-war? Even if he said he was distinctly anti-war, then how would that somehow make him not a conservative? There are plenty of them that are anti-war, or is that what you are going to hang your hat on? Who is thinking for you, a chimp?; 7/2/10, 4:47 PM
garage mahal said...: Meth
Still nothing on the, uh, sex thing, huh.

Must be pretty frustrating.; 7/2/10, 4:49 PM
Methadras said...: Dead Julius said...

The point: Christianity was impossible to roll back.

That's because the dynamic of Christianity extols saving your soul as it's primary benefit and using that to do the Lords work to better people for it. It's taken a while, but its gelled out pretty well so far.

Isn't the same dynamic at work now with New Age? What do you do if the tide of New Age turns out to be as impossible to reverse as Christianity was?

NewAge bullshit is a selfish endeavor aimed directly at the ego to cultivate the inner narcissist. It's a gimmick without any payback. NewAge bullshit is primarily practiced in the US as it's been summarily rejected with laughter by actual thinking people. Furthermore, it's practice has a tiny fraction of adherents. It can be stamped out because it's a meaningless fad. It's fastfood spirituality and it's used as nothing but a tool for personal, selfish gain.; 7/2/10, 4:54 PM
jamboree said...: Speaking of which I drove by the Los Angeles ISKCON (Krishna) temple yesterday - celebrating its 40th anniversary and populated by the same gaunt, pale teen and 20-somethings it has always attracted. I can kind of understand taking the train for a summer if you're a guy, I suppose, but then I passed by a mousey-haired female (looking all the more like a peahen for wearing the bright saris suitable to another culture's coloring) and it just spontaneously burbled out of me:

You Idiot Girl.

wv: ambicr (friendly bickering); 7/2/10, 5:04 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: Garage Mahal,

"I'm surprised Crack [as a New Age Watcher]didn't dig a little further into the Reagans connection with Astrology and the Occult."

Old News:

I called it The Beginning Of The End Of The Beginning.

And who can when both the Left and Right's NewAge world's collided?

Not me, my friend, not me.; 7/2/10, 6:52 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: FLS,

'Ah, our old friend Poisoning the Well. But remember, Gore shared his Nobel Peace Prize with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Wouldn't they all have had to sexually assault someone to put climate change in doubt?"

Nope. All they had to be is equally weird liars, and they've accomplished that in spades.

As Glenn Reynolds says, read the whole thing.

It's not bad advice for my whole blog, actually, considering the track record I'm racking up for correct calls.; 7/2/10, 6:59 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: DJ,

"So what does Crack want to see happen? Should America just click-and-drag New Age to the cultural Trash Bin, click "empty", and be done??? And then we revert to... what, exactly? Christianity?"

No. How about reality? If you ask me, we haven't given it a fair shot, considering the history lesson you just outlined.; 7/2/10, 7:15 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: John Stodder,

"My guess is the whole thing will end with Gore and his accuser agreeing that each of them has their own truth."

LOL - and scary.; 7/2/10, 7:16 PM
Trooper York said...: Except that the girl has an Inconvenient Truth; 7/2/10, 7:52 PM
blake said...: DJ--

No, New Age is not an analog for Christianity. It's analog for--well, all the other "New Age"s that have come and gone over the eons.

There were a couple in the 19th century, too. Communes, weird health and spiritual stuff, etc.; 7/2/10, 8:35 PM
William said...: Crack Age is new agey in his campaign against New Age philosophies. I sometimes do a few yoga moves. I'm not looking for enlightenment or a higher spiritual plane. They're just a good way of loosening up a lumbar spine that is old ageing faster than any new age beliefs I might hold......Tidy Righty is probably Ezra Klein making a pro active defense of his statement that the commenters here are anti-Semitic. If this were true, would attacking Tidy Righty for his anti-Semitism be a kind of anti-Semitic slam against Ezra Klein.; 7/2/10, 10:40 PM
Fen said...: Ah, Garage, when are you going to grow up and realize the bad behavior by one (in this context devotee to astrology) does not excuse bad behavior by another?

He NEEDS the Tu Quoque. Its how he justifies his own facism: by pretending you do it too.

Pretty much applies to all Leftists. When they start accusing you of shooting your poltical enemies in the street, its time to ready your weapons.; 7/2/10, 10:47 PM
Fen said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/2/10, 10:47 PM
Fen said...: He spoke directly to the delusional, terminally stupid, rudderless collectivists - they turned their lonely eyes toward him and found religion

And this is why we need organized religion - to keep the moronic Left from worshiping a mere mortal. History is full of examples of the carnage that results when taht spirtual energy is displaced.; 7/2/10, 10:54 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: "Crack Age is new agey in his campaign against New Age philosophies. I sometimes do a few yoga moves. I'm not looking for enlightenment or a higher spiritual plane. They're just a good way of loosening up a lumbar spine that is old ageing faster than any new age beliefs I might hold."

William, don't try to play me for an idiot, regarding my field of expertise:

What you're doing is called "stretching", and I bet everyone on this blog, myself included, has engaged in it.

Yoga, on the other hand, is a 5,000 year-old spiritual practice which, when done in the "correct" manner, are designed to make you crazy (or do you think those Indian yogis, covered in ashes, are sane?). There's a whole spiritual cosmology to go along with those moves, many of which Americans are already adopting ("namaste") including meditation - or transcendental meditation - and the rejection of the obviously evil modern world. That it's main proponents for bringing to America were mainly con men and Nazis (who were obsessed with the occult) should give every American pause.

Especially you, William, because you're, both, a fool and an apologist for things you don't even have the intelligence to try and understand beyond the superficial.

Enjoy your stretch, asshole.; 7/3/10, 1:05 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/3/10, 1:05 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/3/10, 1:06 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/3/10, 1:06 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: Sorry about that:

Blogger got buggy.; 7/3/10, 1:11 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: "They're just a good way of loosening up a lumbar spine that is old ageing faster than any new age beliefs I might hold."

I think that explains your warped view of what I do right there:

NewAgers always attack me, question my motives, accuse me of being secretly just like them. Can't question (or break down) the old "ancient teachings" that you, yourself, once accepted, can I? No, no - it must be me who's crazy - when it was you who indulged in the illogical.

It's like "karma," riiiiight?; 7/3/10, 1:23 AM
Kev said...: I think MM in this thread should be Melle Mel.

Heh. When I saw that the title "Chakra Con" led to a post by Crack, I thought that it would be all kinds of fun for Crack to redo Melle Mel's famous "Chaka Khan" rap with anti-New Age rhymes.

(Some college friends and I redid the rap as "Chaka Cod" and the main song "I Feel For You" became "I Fish For You." It's a good thing we didn't actually have access to recording equipment at the time.); 7/3/10, 2:21 AM
Kev said...: On a more serious note, one of my college profs got really into yoga and tried to get all her students into it, in the manner of recent "converts" to all kinds of things (running, dieting, etc.). I didn't bite because the underpinnings of New Age and Eastern religions didn't square with my Christianity.

New Age also had a negative effect on music. In the '80s, New Age music stations began launching, listeners were evidently telling focus groups that they were scared off by the religious implications of the term New Age. Not long after that, New Age music suddenly became known as "smooth jazz," which, while easy to ignore (except on the Weather Channel?), has done s disservice to actual jazz music by displacing it on the sales charts (because the "lite" stuff was always, by its background-music nature, going to outsell traditional jazz by a large margin). This made it even harder for true jazz musicians to get attention, since the New Age recordings started taking up space in the jazz bins at CD stores.; 7/3/10, 2:32 AM
William said...: Although Crack's observation that I am a fool is irrefutable, I would like to further the discussion: It is an empirical fact that Isaac Newton believed in alchemy and astrology. Nonetheless, his work inspired by his wish to validate those beliefs (and make a fortune) laid the groundwork for the negation of those beliefs.... I have, to date, not encountered a single man in life or in history who was not encumbered with a certain amount of foolish illusions. It's just the way we are. We're born into chaos and bad luck, and search for some myth to give meaning to the random moments of terror and prosperity that befall us. Your stance as a Jeremiah preaching against the New Age idolaters gives energy to your insights, and some of those insights are valid. But for all that, it's a stance not a science, and if you hold that pose too long and too rigidly, I would recommend a few yoga excercises to loosen up.; 7/3/10, 12:42 PM
The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/3/10, 9:19 PM
Gene said...: Scott M:
I'm a conservative and I've been of the opinion that the Afghan war has been a waste of blood and treasure since before Obama took office.

Even worse. The longer we stay in Afghanistan the more enemies we have around the world. I just don't see the benefit of spending so much money (and blood) overseas when we have so many people here at home. Staying in Afghanistan gets us nothing.; 7/10/10, 4:03 AM