Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Let there be snark.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

This is dead girl, live boy, a goat, two wetsuits and a dildo territory.  oh, and pink furry handcuffs.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

You are here: Home / Politics / Glibertarianism / Under Cover of Darkness Open Thread: CPAC, Milo, and the Limits of Cleek’s Law (Part the Second)

Under Cover of Darkness Open Thread: CPAC, Milo, and the Limits of Cleek’s Law (Part the Second)

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Cleek’s Law: Today’s conservatism is the opposite of what liberals want today, updated daily.

Roy Edroso, at Alicublog:

I see Milo Yiannopoulos’ friends have turned on him. Just kidding — they were never his friends; just a bunch of conservatives and libertarians who took him up because, one, he hated things they also hated (liberals, women, the transgendered, et alia); two, he celebrated things they also celebrated, primarily the vicious, spiteful treatment of anyone weaker than themselves; and three, because he was ostentatiously gay — indeed an old-fashioned caricature of homosexuality straight out of the Liberace playbook — and allowed himself to be associated with them, which gave conservatives and libertarians two things they thought would advantage them in the dreary Culture Wars they’re always pursuing: glamour and victim status…


A Cato conservative explicates:

Depressing reality:

Reader Interactions

33Comments

  1. 1.

    piratedan

    may every last one of them meet this same glorious end…. devoid of the grift they so fervently pursued.

  2. 2.

    Mnemosyne

    In some ways, you almost can’t blame the guy for not realizing that pedo comments would cross the line. After all, conservatives had been telling him for years that the line was a liberal PC construct and he could just ignore it. Now he’s the kid with neglectful parents who discovers too late the one weird thing that gets those parents to beat him instead of ignoring him.

  3. 3.

    Ruckus

    For all the talk about this asshole milo, notice who is pictured in the very first tweet AL posted.

  4. 4.

    Chet Murthy

    @Ruckus: Oh ha,I thought that was AL’s point (improving upon @cascamike’s tweet). I mean, it’s a little premature to say it, but isn’t McConnell’s career sort of “peak Cleek’s Law”? At least the last eight years have been one long exercise in Cleek’s Law, eh?

    ETA: Or, uh, “when it comes to Cleek’s Law, Milo is but an apprentice; *Mitch* is the master.”

  5. 5.

    TheMightyTrowel

    Best thing I’ve read all day on this is by the most excellent Laurie Penny: https://psmag.com/on-the-milo-bus-with-the-lost-boys-of-americas-new-right-629a77e87986#.5dukj650h

    No one quite hits that fine line between scathing opprobrium and acidic ridicule quite like a a Brit.

    Full of great lines, but probably my favourite:

    I have never in my life seen someone so obviously and emphatically asking for a smack in the mouth, and the only reason he doesn’t deserve it is that he wants it too much.

  6. 6.

    jl

    I never figured out exactly who this guy was, or why he was so important to bother with.
    Now, I guess I don’t have to. And all thanks to what looks like a hypocritical right wing smear machine. So, I guess I owe them a favor?
    I’ll have to do something for them.
    If I get a hold of one of their business envelopes with return postage, can I still put a plastic baggie inside with a bunch of pennies in it and mail it back? Does that trick still work?

  8. 8.

    Ruckus

    @Chet Murthy:
    It has been firmly established that there is no peak Cleek’s Law. There might be a point at which they just burst into flames from trying to spin bullshit that fast but that’s not the same thing as reaching say, the peak speed of a theorem. Or in this case how much bullshit can be stuffed in a 5 lb bag. As the vast majority of the bullshit they spin is pure fabrication it actually occupies no space so the theorem is that peak Cleek’s Law can never be reached as the vast majority of their output, while mean, dangerous, disgusting and just plain wrong has no physical properties and therefore the amount of bullshit in that 5 lb bag is limitless. Now if you want to change or adopt a new theorem challenging Cleek, that some arbitrary level fulfills the theorem then it should be possible to reach peak. But that is not what Cleek’s Law is.

  9. 9.

    joel hanes

    there is no peak Cleek’s Law

    It’s an asymptote.
    Republican satisfaction approaches infinity as liberal happiness approaches zero.
    Hippie punching all the way down.

  10. 10.

    Chris T.

    @Ruckus: What?! No peak Cleek!?

    (Didn’t have anything real to say, just wanted to say “peak Cleek” a few times. Peak Cleek, peak Cleek, peak Cleek. There…)

  12. 12.

    Brachiator

    Milo is Ann Coulter in drag. He believed in his own outrageousness and forgot that conservatives fear sex and hate gays. If they really cared about statements like his, there would be thousands more Catholic priests in prison.

    As it is, the next version of Milo will undoubtedly be unleashed upon the world very soon.

  13. 13.

    Brachiator

    OT. Supposedly some big NASA announcement scheduled for 1 pm Eastern Time Wednesday.

    Days of miracle and wonder?

  14. 14.

    amk

    An ugly (in every possible way) kkklown does not deserve so much attention when the real harm is being done on the sly by the real treasonous gopee thugs on every front.

  15. 15.

    Betty Cracker

    @TheMightyTrowel: Excellent essay. Below, Penny describes a phenomenon I’ve come to think of as “weaponized fragility,” for want of a better term:

    Many of them don’t agree with what Yiannopoulos says, let alone what Trump says. They agree with the way he says it, because their life experience does not extend beyond interpreting being criticized as censorship. Yiannopoulos’ brand is all about “fuck your feelings.” But the kids following him around are nothing but feelings…

    These boys will be allowed to forget everything but their own immediate feelings for as long as society allows them, and this society allows straight white boys to dodge personal and emotional responsibility until at least the age of 70. The current man-child president would be Exhibit A, but not every lost boy gets a golden throne. In this culture war, most of them are cannon fodder.

    Sounds about right to me. Good riddance to Yiannopoulos, but we’re stuck with his fans.

  16. 16.

    joel hanes

    @Brachiator:

    Days of miracle and wonder

    This is a long-distance call.

    Remember those?
    Every day is a day of miracle and wonder..
    I just hope I live long enough to piss on Cheney’s grave

  18. 18.

    cosima

    Politico (not providing a link) has a piece about Gorsuch & his allies operating a charm offensive to woo Dem senators.

    It’s so imperative that he be blocked by all Dems — I know that I don’t need to tell you all that, but this is worthy of some activism. Make a list of all of the issues that render him unfit for the Supreme Court, phone your Senator, and let them know about your views.

    The post last night from McTurtle with his hypocritical evil winner/loser remark was a rage trigger for me, so I had to take a mental health break. Just dropping in to mention this.

  19. 19.

    Jeffro

    @TenguPhule: I was thinking the same thing, sort of…if Milo, the Turtle, and this Cohen guy were all standing next to the edge of a cliff, would I settle for being 2/3 happy, or stop to curse God for only giving me two arms?

    Maybe there’s a kung fu move I could use that would send them all flying over the edge? Have to look into that…

    @cosima: right there with you re: the Turtle. He and Ryan make me much madder than Trumpov, most days.

  20. 20.

    Jeffro

    @TheMightyTrowel: Great piece, thank you!

    I’ll be putting this part in bold when I send it out to various RWNJ acquaintances:

    It is horribly ironic that of all the disgusting nonsense Yiannopoulos has said — about women, about Muslims, about transgender people, about immigrants — it is only now that the moderate right appears to have reached the limits of what it will tolerate in the name of free speech. The hypocrisy is clarion-clear: This was never, in fact, about free speech at all. It was about making it OK to say racist, sexist, transphobic, and xenophobic things, about tolerating the public expression of those views right up to the point where it becomes financially unwise to do so. Those suddenly dropping Yiannopoulos are making a business decision, not a moral one — and yes, even in Donald Trump’s America, there’s still a difference. If that difference devours Yiannopoulos and his minions, they will find few mourners.

  21. 21.

    PsiFighter37

    Weren’t these comments out there for a while? I don’t understand why it’s something that is old news that would sink this troll.

    Good riddance either way, I guess.

  23. 23.

    scav

    @Betty Cracker: I’m suddenly struck by how this essential schtick covers Boris Johnson as well (he’s more reflexively polysyllabic when attacked) but the weaponized white-blond entitled boy feelings as essential motiving force is the same.

  24. 24.

    different-church-lady

    @joel hanes:

    I just hope I live long enough to piss on Cheney’s grave

    I’m pretty sure that’s not how the lyrics to that song go. (Although I bet Simon’s the only guy who could make it scan properly)

  26. 26.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Isn’t Milo the kind of guy Martin was parodying with King Joffrey in Game of Thrones?

  27. 27.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @cosima:

    The post last night from McTurtle with his hypocritical evil winner/loser remark was a rage trigger for me, so I had to take a mental health break. Just dropping in to mention this.

    Well, just look at the man. He’s a human reptile in body and sprite. After that such comments are to be expected. And he does look so cute playing with his toy gun.

  28. 28.

    Barbara

    @jl: You don’t owe them anything. This is them exerting the right to decide who deserves to be punched in the mouth for transgressions and you and I are still on the losing side of that decision. What you can say is that this brouhaha has definitively shown that CPAC does not give a flying fuck about censorship or the right to speak freely but was using the execrable Yiannopoulos to weaponize hate speech so that it can continue to draw energy from intimidating if not actually terrorizing people it hates under the cover of the First Amendment. They have now been outed and all they are left with is their unprincipled hate rather than their allegedly principled fealty to free speech. That is more or less one of the things said in the Penny article linked above, but it is so obviously true and it should be repeated. And if they need an example, try to imagine if Milo Yiannopoulos changed his tune and decided once he set foot inside CPAC to start calling southerners idiot rednecks and Christians a bunch of deluded dupes. Let’s see how long CPAC would have continued to maintain that the best antidote to that speech was more speech.

  29. 29.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    I think Milo’s problem is he moved to fast for his audience, One can be sure next year talk of raping underage gay men will be perfectly acceptable for CPAC.

  33. 33.

    Mike G

    good of CPAC to boot from its speakers list this year an admitted sexual assaulter who says racist things & wants to ban the muslims

    They booted Trump?

    You’ll need to be a little more specific, that description could be practically anybody in the conservative (bowel) movement

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