June 27, 2015

My life as an Instapundit guestblogger.


(Click image to enlarge.)





That's all from a comments thread to a post I put up at Instapundit at 5:01 p.m. yesterday titled "MUMMERIES, PUTSCH, AND HUBRIS," which cherry-picked the language related material from yesterday's post — here on the home blog — that went through everything in Justice Scalia's dissenting opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges.

I'm guestblogging this week. I've guestblogged over there many times in the past, but before there were comments, so this time it's different. I think there are some people in there who are ex-commenters of this blog, and some people are keen to tell Glenn that I don't belong there. This kind of thing:

36 comments:

Laslo Spatula said...

Somehow I don't think my comments would sit well at Instapundit.

However, if the Instapundit guest-blogging becomes too much for Althouse I will gladly serve as a guest-blogger here to help shoulder the load.

I like to help people.

I am Laslo.

Louis said...

Althouse for SCOTUS!

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

It's a bottomless pit . . . until it isn't anymore.

Ambrose said...

There is something about gay marriage that brings this out in some people.

Anonymous said...

Some busy censors over there. A lot of the reported comments are pretty tame.

rhhardin said...

The deleters are gay mafia, then?

I'd assume the comments are variations of Althouse doesn't understand male arguments, what with logic and all.

It's all plaid and not black and white to her.

You have to be so careful with plaids.

Not everybody is skilled with zingers, which comes out as incivility.

We are men and women. It almost always matters which we are. Men and women are aggressive. Their regard for each other is clouded by grudges, suspicions, fears, needs, desires, and narcississtic postures. There's no scrubbing them out. The best you can hope for is domestication, as in football, rock, humor, happy marriage, and a good prose style.

``The Neurotic's Dictionary'' _Raritan_ XI:3 Winter 1992 p.103

The choice of "you lost, now love" is pretty idiotic too. They think they lost at tic tac toe because you not only went first and took two moves in a row as well.

You have to show how they lost by what counts as the rules they understood themselves to be playing under.

tim in vermont said...

Commenters at Insty are a different breed. There aren't that many good ones, and the competition to be in the top three affects them too.

I have made the top three several times, usually with a zinger, sometimes not even on point. But comments I consider my best rarely get more than one, maybe two votes.

The odd thing is that I feel more validated when a comment that makes a subtle point gets a vote than when a fine piece of snark gets seventeen up votes.

Real American said...

stop gloating and show some class. you might get a different reaction.

rhhardin said...

I take it that Roberts also thought his colleagues in the majority were pieces of shit, if I read it right, or at least the men were. The women were just being women. You've got to have some there but it makes everything work worse.

Amexpat said...

Funny how the lefties in Madison call you a right winger and the commentators at Instapundit label you a lefty.

Sydney said...

Every reported comment was a criticism of you. Who did all the reporting? It is an unusual amount of reported comments for Instapundit.

rhhardin said...

Althouse is a right winger in allowing right wing speech, as far as lefties are concerned.

In politics, she's a woman.

This draws the ire of logicians.

tim maguire said...

The one accusing you of deleting comments reminds me of Limbaugh haters who've never listened to Limbaugh.

tim maguire said...

Wait a minute, did you really say that Johnny Depp was a better Willy Wonka than Gene Wilder?

Say it ain't so, Ann! (Sorry, but the approximate quote only works if I use the familiar.)

Ann Althouse said...

"Some busy censors over there. A lot of the reported comments are pretty tame."

I participate in the comments to my own posts, responding to people (without insulting them) and the "report abuse" link gets clicked on me!

Amadeus 48 said...

Love ya, Althouse, even when I disagree with ya.
I thought the Equal Protection argument had a lot of moxie; the Due Process argument was out there in Rove v. Wade-land.
I hate it when the Supremes go all Diana Ross on us and start the word processor while they are in touch with their feelings. Kennedy really launched this one from his id. Kagan, Sotomayor, Ginsberg and Breyer just sit there and watch him go. Sigh.

ihasch said...

The decision was a disgrace. Because you have an emotional connection to the subject and perhaps a professional need to comform you won't admit that. It was a very poorly reasoned decision, an affront to the Constitution and a complete insult. Five justice radically redefined a social institution in a blatant abuse of power without any humility or sense of consequence. I have absolutely no issue with same sex marriage (a tedious, frivolous, navel gazing subject) being passed legislatively. But five justices expressing their infinite arrogance with rhetorical buffoonery while straining to seem profound? Same sex marriage is now completely illegimate and this decision is entitled to no deference whatsoever. It won't get any. The myopia of overeach.

Mark said...

Sometimes I very much disagree with your conclusions, but you come by them honestly. I hate to think that trait is getting more rare, but it seems like it. On the other hand, I've been participating on online discussions before they called it the Internet, and it may just be the commodification of commentary.

Amadeus 48 said...

Rove v. Wade??!!? Man, talk about an explosion from MY id!

jr565 said...

I post there from time to time. Usually to tell libertarians they are full of it. I don't know why. Insty makes some point that indicts Obama, yet it always brings up points that libertarians like Insty and others made that were worse (usually around war on terror issues). Since they are arguing at cross purpsoes.
They want to hate Obama, but Insty is pionging out how for example, Obama is letting Iran get away with murder, showing how ineffective Obama is. Yet, Im then reminded of how rand/Ron Paul want us to trade with Iran. SO wouldn't Obama's feckless policy be right up their alley?
If Obama's fecklessnesss leads to the policy that libertarians crave, they shouldn't complain about his fecklessness.
I can do that because I want Iran to be contained. And therefore Obama acting feckless about it makes him a weak president. But if you don't want Iran to be contained, then he's doing a pretty good job, yes? So rather than attacking him, praise him.

Richard Dolan said...

Well, at least the anti-Althousian commenters are reading what you write and reacting to it. Much better than being ignored. In its own way, a response consisting of name-calling and sputtering invective is a back-handed compliment, the sort of response Salia and Bush often got. So you're in pretty good company.

Isn't it also obvious that Scalia has missed his calling --he'd be a terrific blogger, might even give you and Glenn some real competition.

loudogblog said...

I don't like to read the comments over at Instapundit. There are too many hard cases there. I prefer a civil discussion, with some interesting insights and occasional humor. That's what I usually (but not always) see over here.

Anonymous said...

Amexpat said...
Funny how the lefties in Madison call you a right winger and the commentators at Instapundit label you a lefty.

6/27/15, 9:45 AM


She must be doing something right.

(Or should I say "something correct"?)

K in Texas said...

Instapundit used to be much better than it is now, but over the past year, the quality of commenters and comments has taken a nose dive into the gutter.

Rick Caird said...

Why does anyone care about the comments on Instapundit. Glenn is primarily a linker with a tiny bit of occasional commentary. If you feel the need to comment, go to the link.

Gahrie said...

Did anyone call you a splooge stooge?

ihasch said...

And on reflection, I don't even blame the Court. Because we accepted even after unmitigated disasters like Dred Scott that the Court has the final say. Which is ridiculous. The framers didn't believe that. The authors of the Federalist papers didn't believe that. Jefferson. Madison. Jackson. Lincoln. They didn't believe that. Unfailingly people lack the humility, far-sightedness and wisdom to reject the power that you give them. Now it is time to take it away, which just requires a change of sentiment, the recognition that the Court is not the final say and should not be on these type of issues.
And btw, judges are morons. They go to three years of law school. They are not great historians or writers or public philosophers. Just lawyers too dull to appreciate their lack of education and their limitations. (Kennedy pathetically trying to sound profound was all the evidence you need). It fulfills a sense of vanity for legal educators that people within their field have the slightest qualification to render a final judgment on these type of issues. They don't. That is above everyone's pay grade.
I expect Washington to burn in my lifetime. That is a common impulse as you get older I guess. Always going to hell in a handbasket and all. Never happens of course. But boy people are shortsighted.

CatherineM said...

I used to peruse Instapundit every day for links to stories not in the typical news for 10 years and then drifted away. Not sure why, but it became less interesting.

I think he made a mistake turning his comments on. I have been surprised by the vitriol. He seems to attract a lot of males who feel "oppressed."

Freeman Hunt said...

No one reads the comments.

Except commenters.

Freeman Hunt said...

People on Facebook is competing to see who can express the most hatred toward the anti gay marriage crowd. Interestingly, nearly all expressions of hatred must include the word "love."

Freeman Hunt said...

People is. That's the garbage that happens when you change evryone to people. I'm on a pgone and lack the stamina to fix it. Oh, look, I could have fixed it with the same effort I used to type this comment. Humans are complicated.

Henry said...

Just scrolled down the current Instapundit guest postings. A thought-provoking link from Virginia Postrel. Some judicial inside-baseball from Randy Barnet. The rest is a clown car of Jeremiahs. I'm pretty much done with alienation as an blog philosophy.

Known Unknown said...

Wait a minute, did you really say that Johnny Depp was a better Willy Wonka than Gene Wilder?


He was, but that's because the character's motivations are clearer in the remake, and the script is better too.

Wilder was his usual fantastic self, but in a poorly conceived script that even Dahl largely disavowed.

Depp was a man-child detached from society. (Which makes sense considering the Wonka storyline.) He's also the protagonist, not Charlie Bucket. Charlie Bucket may be the film's "hero", but Charlie doesn't change. There's not story arc to Charlie's character, either in the original nor the remake. There's very little change to Wonka in the first one, but Depp is transformed from resentment of his father to accepting the concept of family. There's an actual character arc there.

Also, the original Dahl songs are in the remake, as is the original Squirrel/nuts scene (Not the golden egg-laying goose) The Oopma-Loompa song in the original is not part of Dahl's book.




Henry said...

The best Willy Wonka was the guy in the top hat, here.

At a basic, Hollywood level, I might agree that Johnny Depp was better than Gene Wilder, except for the motivations. Wonka needs to be an old man. For Wonka to work you need a nutter geezer, past caring what anyone thinks of him. Not Johnny Depp. Perhaps Ian Holm. with a beard.

SukieTawdry said...

Instapundit without Glenn is like a BLT without the B. Or the L. Or the T.

President-Mom-Jeans said...

Aww, why don't you cry about it?

Your lawn bitch doesn't get to delete comments there, just report them.