How Would Sullivan Know? He's an Ass, Man @ AMERICAN DIGEST

February 8, 2010

How Would Sullivan Know? He's an Ass, Man

Andrew Sullivan: The Atlantic's Breast Expert?

More and more it's becoming clear that Andrew Sullivan must have been abused as a child by some woman in his life at the time. Following that I guess it was open season on the young and unfortunate lad. Still, the child is father to what passes for the man in Andrew's case, and I guess he has to get his six of the best sans safeword daily or he doesn't feel "normal."

The Atlantic's star-class misogynist reveals his bad craziness today in Palin's Triumph. By any measure, it's a masterpiece of psycho-sexual projection. See if you can even begin to comprehend the diseased brain that can blurt out:

She can electrify a crowd. She has the kind of charisma that appeals to the sub-rational. and she has crafted a Peronist identity - utterly fraudulent, of course - that is political dynamite in a recession with populism roiling everyone and everything. She is Coughlin with boobs - except with a foreign policy agenda to expand Israel and unite with it in a war against Islam.

Do not under-estimate the appeal of a beautiful, big breasted, divinely chosen warrior-mother as a military leader in a global religious war.[Emphasis added]

Whew! Even for the accommodating Andrew that's quite a mouthful. One hardly knows where to begin in this paragraph where Sullivan's nature wars with his nurture with an assist from his dubious education. To begin with you've got to love the Father Coughlin reference in which Andrew, a severely lapsed Catholic, grafts breasts onto a dead Canadian priest who promoted Hitler. That's the sort of high and hard inside referencing that signals we're dealing a writer that's "smar-r-ter than the av-er-age bear." Then there's the "Peronist" gambit in which one might think of the historic Evita Peron, except for the fact that when it comes to Andrew the tres-campier Madonna is no doubt first in his mind. (Especially she of the Truth or Dare period.)

Not content to try and get a hand on something with which he's had limited experience, Sullivan stumbles more deeply into the morass of his own mind with a completely phoned-in meditation on Ms. Palin's endowments. I hate to break it to the inexperienced eternal British boy within whom Mr. Sullivan is trapped, but Ms. Palin is simply a normally and pleasantly proportioned female. As such she is, coupled with her other many positive attributes, very attractive. There is nothing either petite or grandiose about her figure. Anyone who has seen a photograph of her in her running gear knows this to be the case. With Lycra all things are revealed. The only place "big breasted" comes into play is on the darkened soccer pitches of Sullivan's own sexual hell. When it comes to an estimate of Ms. Palins conformation, I am confident when I note Sullivan literally "does not know what he is talking about."

Of course all of this is just the standard, factlacking, residual flotsom that bobs about in the drug-laced soup simmering in poor Andrew's seething cranium. But rejoice for it is from that corrupted soup that we get such startling eructations as "divinely chosen warrior-mother as a military leader in a global religious war."

"Dinvinely chosen" is it, Andrew? Boning up on ye olde Joan of Arc, are we Andrew? Out-pythoning ye olde Monty, unfortunate lad?

"Warrior-mother" is it, me boy? I trust she who once and future must be obeyed is long dead. You know that she would have to punish such a naughty boy, don't you?

But lest you think Andrew's little red choo-choo has gone completly round the bend, he pulls it out with the always riveting "military leader in a" (Dare he say it? He do!) "global religious war."

There you have it. Sarah Palin as some armored Carol Doda Amazon singing "Onward Christian Soldiers" as she, along with millions of Israeli cohorts, scales the Western Wall to take back the Temple Mount once and for all. Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition!

All that's lacking to make this "classic" Sullivan dementia is something about his true Moby Dick, Abu Ghraib. But wait. There it is, just below with a Bush reference -- "what happened at Abu Ghraib was wrong." Ah yes, Abu Ghraib. That other attractive/repulsive Sullivan bete noir in which powerful women humiliated naked groveling men. There's something in that scenario that says to Sullivan, "I just can't quit you." It's an implant that needs to be extracted, but that's a job for psychiatric professionals. It would be a long job and I'm willing to bet a shrink could build a beach house for helping Sullivan finally understand the roots of his malignancy and quit inflicting it on the world at large. If I was a rich man I might underwrite it just to spare suffering humanity, but alas I am not. One man, however, could. But should he? He's this man:

Atlantic Owner David G. Bradley:
Believe it or not, this man actually pays Andrew Sullivan. For what is not exactly clear.

David Bradley is the uber-rich DC publisher of the money-hemorrhaging Atlantic who signs Sullivan's paycheck, so I guess he's okay with the constant perverted hate-sotted spew of this pustulant toad. How much longer before Sullivan becomes an out and out embarrassment to Bradley's social and political climbing efforts is anybody's guess.

For the present it's enough to say that as long as Bradley keeps doling out the dosh to Sullivan for his jihad against women and children who plunk his magic twanger, Bradley obviously approves. And that's a perversion that I really can't understand. Maybe he'd do better just paying for Andrew, at long last, to get well; to get clean.

Update: A much more analytical and erudite Leon Wieseltier takes on Andrew Sullivan as "the Buchanan of the left" in The New Republic:

"Sullivan desperately wants the Jews to be good Jews, to be the best Jews they can be. He wants edifying Jews. Don’t they realize that if they fail to edify, they may lose his friendship? The fools! Jews ought to determine their beliefs and their actions apologetically, so as not to disappoint “goyim like me.” This is a common phenomenon in the experience of minorities. They may awaken to their autonomy, but they must not go too far. Gays are abundantly familiar with this sort of phony friendship, as are blacks. “It does not represent the historic mainstream of liberal Jewish society”: but what if the historic mainstream of Jewish society were conservative? A day does not go by that I do not do my humble part to prevent such a transformation from coming to pass, but let us imagine that it does. What, then? Will they all be bad Jews, and “something much darker”? Is the Jews’ claim upon American understanding premised upon their conformity to a particular politics? Is their legitimacy conditional? Sullivan’s more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger tone is cheap. He can keep his sorrow and he can keep his anger.... About the Jews, is Sullivan a bigot, or is he just moronically insensitive? To me, he looks increasingly like the Buchanan of the left."

Worth, as we say, reading the whole thing.

Update: Koster in the comments offers an alternative explanation. Extract:

"Dear Mr. Vanderleun: No. No no no. You are dead wrong, completely off the beam. So are those commenters who attribute AS's writing to any sort of dementia, however caused. The motive behind AS's antics is AIDS-related, but not in the way you think. Nor does any childhood trauma have anything to do with it."

Worth reading the whole thing.

Posted by Vanderleun at February 8, 2010 9:30 PM

Dear Mr. Vanderleun: No. No no no. You are dead wrong, completely off the beam. So are those commenters who attribute AS's writing to any sort of dementia, however caused. The motive behind AS's antics is AIDS-related, but not in the way you think. Nor does any childhood trauma have anything to do with it. Consider:

1. Under present law, AS's HIV infection makes him ineligible for citizenship, or even permanent residence.

2. Let AS go back to Britain, and he is dead. The jihadists have not forgotten, nor forgiven, his howlings against them in the days when AS worshipped Geo. W. In London, he'd be beaten or worse, and he knows this.

3. AS has written that his last visa here will expire in March 2011 unless something changes.

4. There's only one way something can change. Even if the law isn't changed, The One can wave his magic wand (Holder) and AS will stay in this country. Law? What does Sully care for law? Hain't he got the Acting US Atty for Western Mass. under his thumb?

5. The price for this devil's bargain is complete subservience to The One. The pumps the Dutch use to keep their polders clear of water have less suction than AS is using to The One.

6. Let AS gain permanent residency, and he will go haring off on some other idiotic quest, full of pretension and bunk. The One, skilled in such judging, knows this, and hence will keep AS dangling as long as possible. Besides, it's fun: "There's Sarah, Rover. Sic 'em!" It's a joy for The One to watch blind fanaticism in his service. The One reads AS's blog, smirking and nodding his head at every paragraph. David Bradley appreciates this, as does AS. AS is giving Bradley exactly what he wants. AS's skull and crossbones will fly at THE ATLANTIC until The One is canned at theh polls by the plain people, or AS gets permanent residency, whichever comes first.

7. Wieselter is a windbag. I slogged through all 4300 words of his rhetorical artillery, which had the same effect on me as Verdun had on the French. For every ounce of sense, there was five pounds of score settling (AS was Wieselter's nominal boss in AS's NEW REPUBLIC days) and tons and tons of wind. Let Wieselter settle his grudges in a manly way instead this deferred hair pulling and scratching.

Summary: If AS is insane, he's not responsible for his actions, and hence escapes all blame. AS's style has not deteriorated as mental or physical illness or chemical addiction would make likely. Cold calculation drives what he writes. AS is a monstrously wicked man. No need to apply bite size Freudianism or other such quackeries to "explain" AS. Such explanations imply he can be cured. Bah. In the eighteenth century, he would have been stopped long ago when he lost his first duel. Our more civilized age doesn't have such remedies, as the jihadists know.

I reiterate: the best biography of AS was written by H.L. Mencken, viz:

"A demogogue's mind is a beautiful instrument. It can think whatever he wants it to think."

There's AS to the life.

Sincerely yours,
Gregory Koster

Posted by: Gregory Koster at February 9, 2010 9:47 PM

Comments:

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"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.

Perhaps baby Andrew was subject to a deeply demented combination of breastfeeding and abuse. Now his rage and betrayal foam up at every public reminder that some smart, savvy, loving mom isn't "his kind" and doesn't adore HIM.

We all recoil at the garbage-laden wake people like Andrew inevitably trail. If these unfortunates were dogs, we could put them out of their misery. Therapy has limits, and Andrew is probably beyond them.

Posted by: Askmom at February 9, 2010 5:27 AM

My new favorite word: factlacking. Did you coin it, G?

Usage: "Of course all of this is just the standard, factlacking, residual flotsom that bobs about in the drug-laced soup simmering in poor Andrew's seething cranium."

You are the master.

Posted by: Western Chauvinist at February 9, 2010 5:31 AM

"...the Father Coughlin reference...a dead Canadian priest who promoted Hitler."

To clarify, Coughlin was a socialist who condemned President Roosevelt for not being sufficiently left-wing.

Coughlin supported both Hitler and Mussolini because Coughlin himself pushed a leftist agenda that he described as "social justice." (Sound familiar?)

Posted by: pst314 at February 9, 2010 6:22 AM

"Do not under-estimate the appeal of a beautiful, big breasted, divinely chosen warrior-mother as a military leader in a global religious war."

What, exactly, would Mr. Sullivan know about the appeal of feminine beauty, breasts, warriors, religion, mothers, and global-warfare?

Posted by: Mikey NTH at February 9, 2010 11:30 AM

Okay, you've proven to me that The Atlantic has a publisher. But I refuse to believe it has an editor.

"She has literally no serious plans commensurate with the health care crisis..."

"...with populism roiling everyone and everything."

"...but couldn't break down his denial that he had authorized almost all of it (she wants more of it)"

"...attempt to politicize the military as belonging to one party, cooptation of one religion in America..."

As for Sullivan's stock of useless adverbs: it is literally, utterly, totally, incredibly, genuinely, demonstrably inexhaustible.

Posted by: Robert Townshend at February 9, 2010 11:37 AM

It's over the brink into the yawning chasm of insanity -- assuming he has not already tumbled -- unless he enables comments RIGHT NOW.

This is the kind of stuff people don't write if there is a mechanism available through which differing prejudices might offer an inconvenient challenge. They don't write it because they can't.

Your all-purpose Sullivan-response artwork:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/31/Webcomic_xkcd_-_Wikipedian_protester.png

Posted by: Morgan K Freeberg at February 9, 2010 12:31 PM

So now I'm confused: is Sarah Palin the dumbest human women ever incarnated, or a reincarnation of Cleopatra (with a little Lady McBeth thrown in for good measure)?

Maybe Andrew should team up with his spiritual doppelganger, Keith, and launch their own radio show: Obie and Andy.

Posted by: Dewey From Detroit at February 9, 2010 3:51 PM

He should have quit it while he was still a tad sane. But again, it's already too late.

Wat is left is for us to just sit back and watch the final meltdown. It's gotta have some entertainment value... or not?

Posted by: newton at February 9, 2010 3:58 PM

Big breasts = breasts that exist. Apparently.

People are still arguing about the antisemitism thing, which I think could go either way. For instance, one Andrew Sullivan is OUTRAGED by it . . . !

I would so love The Atlantic if it weren't for Sullivan. What, for instance, could Megan McArdle do with two research assistants/co-bloggers? The mind reels.

Posted by: Joy McCann/Miss Attila at February 9, 2010 4:57 PM

Dewey from Detroit: She is in their OODA loop.

OODA loop: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Boyd_(military_strategist)

My take: http://coldfury.com/?p=22203

Posted by: Mikey NTH at February 9, 2010 4:59 PM

Actually, I've been thinking for over a year now that Sarah Palin may just turn out to be America's Joan of Arc.

I define that as an inspirational leader who appears out of nowhere when the situation seems hopeless.

She's already been burned at the stake by the media, so at least she's gotten that out of the way.

Posted by: rickl at February 9, 2010 5:56 PM

The scary thing, Gerard, is that if Koster is right and Andy is "evil, not just insane", then Obama is ferociously evil too. That's going to be a rough ride.

Posted by: Askmom at February 10, 2010 2:50 PM