The Eugene Weekly ran an article today on the Pacifica Forum, covering much of what I wrote about yesterday. However, here’s a nice tidbit I hadn’t heard yet:

[Michael] Williams, who has been monitoring Pacifica Forum meetings since 2003 on behalf of the Community Alliance of Lane County’s (CALC) Anti-Hate Task Force, distributed a leaflet including a comment Pacifica Forum regular Valdas Anelauskas made on the Oregon Daily Emerald website and his critique thereof. Anelauskas’ comment, in response to columnist Deborah Bloom expressing support for the Iraq War, argued that the war was only being fought for the security of Israel and included statements such as, “Even if the author’s name wasn’t Deborah Bloom, after reading your opinion piece in the Emerald (Feb. 7) there is no doubt that it was written by someone who is Jewish. Because only from people of that peculiar tribe can we expect such Talmudic hatred for humanity. There is even a famous saying that wars are the Jews’ harvest. And today it is truer than ever.”

Eva Sylwester, who wrote the article, has her ongoing coverage of the forum archived here.

This Friday, 4 p.m. in the Walnut Room of the EMU, the Pacifica Forum will be meeting to address recent OC coverage of the group.

According to several emails I received, Editor-in-Chief of the Eugene Weekly Ted Taylor sent Orval Etter, the founder and organizer of the Pacifica Forum, an email on Feb. 18 asking him to confirm several details from my story. On Feb. 27, Etter announced that the forum topic of that week was being changed to “Pacifica Forum: Attacks on and in.” (The Pacifica Forum’s immediate reaction when questioned or criticized for its often deplorable content is to claim it’s being attacked).

That Friday, Feb. 29, Jimmy Marr, the delightful fellow who previously called Martin Luther King, Jr. a “moral leper and communist dupe,” read the email from Taylor aloud to the forum. In it, Taylor asked Etter to comment on my question as to why the forum had allowed itself to, as I wrote, “be overrun by complete assholes.” Etter reportedly said this would addressed at the next meeting (March 7).

I will be there, of course, recorder in hand, dutifully capturing all the wackiness. To catch up on the Pacifica Forum, start here. Also, contributing writer to the Eugene Weekly Eva Sylwester has her coverage of the forum archived.

Is anyone really surprised that a white woman living in Eugene, OR has been caught peddling fake memoirs of growing up as a half-Native American orphan, running drugs for the Crips in a Southern California ghetto?

The kind of “street cred” that comes along with a story like that is the wet dream of countless bored, white, middle-class “progressive” types who seem to associate people trapped by poverty, violence, and misery with some sort of authenticity. Remember Ward Churchill’s various chicaneries regarding his military service and supposed Native American heritage? Even more extreme examples include the perverse glorification of the Palestinian “resistance” and breathless assurances that life in Castro’s Cuba is lovely, thanks to 100% literacy and free health care — excuses in both cases proffered by comfy activists much like Margaret Seltzer, who justified her lies by claiming she was “[putting] a voice to people who people don’t listen to.”

If anyone doubts the “authenticity” aspect of all of this, the New York Times excerpts a few bits from her book:

There are “some parts of me that did die in L.A.,” she adds, “and that I’ll never get back, and other parts of me that die daily because I exist away from the city, in a world where people can’t begin to imagine what it was like where I grew up… I made it out of L.A. with what life I had left. ”

Like Ward Churchill’s various pronouncements on the tragedy of Native American history and by-the-numbers declarations of genocide in Gaza by Hamas PR men, Seltzer’s narrative is intended to instill both a sense of shock and reverent awe among the Prius-and-latte set as well as a sense that the world has gone horribly wrong and justice must be restored.

But while her former editor called Ms. Seltzer “very, very naive,” the truth is that Margaret Seltzer was just another comfy charlatan activist who made it her business to profit from the misery of others, supposedly in the service of a “larger truth”.

In case you missed it, the Peer Health Educators at the University Health Center ran a “Safer Sex Menu” in today’s Oregon Daily Emerald. The ad described its safer sex menu as “tasty” and “sure to have something for everyone to enjoy.” It was divided into three categories: Appetizers, Entrees and Desserts. Here’s some of the good, clean fun that the UO wishes upon its students:

• Playing strip poker, strip backgammon
• Petting with no clothes on
• Licking whipped cream off your partner’s body (except for unprotected body openings)
• Making sexy videotapes or playing with a camera
• Talking to each other about safer sex

Wow, the UO is so hip and “with it.” I mean, I really felt like it understood my generation after it advised me to slather my partner in whipped cream. And nothing says kinky like whipping out the ol’ backgammon board. Yeah, baby, I just rolled double sixes. Take it all off!

Today’s cover story in the Eugene Weekly is about the UO Veterans and Family Student Association and their new play Telling. Friend and contributor to the OC Sean Jin is quoted and even has a nice mugshot. (But why so pouty looking, Sean?)

The play consists of veterans telling their stories on stage - life, bootcamp, combat, coming home, etc. Performances run 8 pm Friday, Feb. 8, and Saturday, Feb. 9, and 2 pm Sunday, Feb. 10, at the Veterans’ Memorial Hall, 1626 Willamette. The VFSA is doing a lot of great stuff for veterans on campus, so go check it out.

Apparently, the folks over at the Oregon Voice are all flustered about our making fun of them in the latest issue. (Apparently, the Oregon Voice also has a blog). Here’s Editor-in-Chief of the OV, Tuula Rebhahn:

I’ve always done fairly well with the philosophy of, “Ignore it; it’ll go away.” […] It works for unwanted attentions on the Indigo District dance floor. It works for the mysterious bruises that appear on my knees after said fun-filled nights at Indigo. But it’s not working for the Oregon Commentator, the illustrious campus “Conservative Journal of Opinion” […] [N]ow, we’ve got a whole page and a half in the new OC issue dedicated us, so here I am.

First, the Indigo District? Lame. Second, they just realized this? C’mon, we’ve been making fun of the OV for, like, fifteen years. Third, we make fun of the Daily Emerald on an almost daily basis; in fact, we make fun of everyone, including ourselves. No need to get butthurt, guys. (more…)

President George W. Bush’s final State of the Union address last night was awesome! He even quoted Bruce Springsteen’s “Born In The USA.” How cool is that? Well, he said “made in the USA,” but we all know “W” was rocking out in his head while he spoke.

Highlights at a glance: shedding 151 bloated government programs totaling $18 billion (harrumph); trust people with their own money (harrumph, harrumph); Al Qaeda is on the run in Iraq and this enemy will be defeated (harrumph, harrumph, harrumph); and a well-deserved ovation for Bob Dole. Of course, the nit-picky democrats just had to respond indifferently. (more…)

As I previously reported, the Pacifica Forum held a discussion on Friday titled “Martin Luther King: Communist?” Given the forum’s recent move towards white nationalist conspiracy-mongering, I predicted it would be a smear of the esteemed civil rights leader. Sadly, I was right. Jimmy Marr, a Pacifica Forum regular, opened his lecture, “Martin Luther King: The Man Behind the Media Mask”, thusly:

Look at your calendar. The founder of this country, George Washington does not have a federal holiday in his honor. Thomas Jefferson doesn’t. Abraham Lincoln doesn’t. Neil Armstrong […] doesn’t. What did King accomplish to merit or deserve to be honored above George Washington? Yet every year in January Americans endure the same propaganda blitz when the media go into a kind of almost spastic frenzy of adulation for this so-called Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King.

[…]

But the truth is that he was everything but that and certainly no hero that any American should look up to. To start with, even his name is a fraud.

And he’s just getting started, folks! (more…)

The Pacifica Forum plans to hold a lecture titled “Martin Luther King: Communist?” today (Friday) at 4 p.m. in the Walnut Room of the EMU. The poster for the lecture describes it as “a discussion of whether or not Martin Luther King was a communist and of implications of the answers.”

That’s it. I am beyond disgusted with the Pacifica Forum. (more…)

Speaking of everybody’s favorite money-grubbing, off-campus political group, OSPIRG will be screening Michael Moore’s “Sicko” at 7 p.m. tomorrow in Willamette 100. Guess who has two thumbs and isn’t going? (Hint: I’m pointing at myself with my two thumbs right now). According to the poster, the movie is “a shocking look into the United States health care system.” I don’t feel the need to say too much about this, since the good folks at Reason already gave the film a proper thrashing.

P.S. Who wants to bet the movie will be followed by a high-pressure sales pitch to join the OSPIRG army?

P.P.S. If anyone wants to go for the chuckles, let me know how it turns out.

The Oregon Commentator has been selected as one of the ten finalists in the America’s Future Foundation 2008 College Blogger Contest. Here’s part of the sweet email we got:

Dear college blogger,

Thanks for entering the America’s Future Foundation College Blogger Contest. I’m happy to let you know that you’ve been chosen as one of ten finalists. You are now eligible to compete for the $10,000 grand prize. Contest judges will now regularly monitor your blog through April at which point they’ll announce a winner.

Not bad for a bunch of boozehounds, eh? Here’s the full list of finalists:

• GOP3.com (Marquette University)
• The Oregon Commentator (University of Oregon)
• California Patriot Blog (Univeristy of California, Berkeley)
• The Irish Rover (University of Notre Dame)
• The Critical Badger (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
• The Claremont Conservative (Claremont McKenna College)
• Panther Talk Live (University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee)
• Dartblog (Dartmouth College)
• Surveillance State (Indiana University Bloomington)
• On Life and Lybberty (Brigham Young University & University College London)

The contest will be judged by a group of noted bloggers who you’ve probably ran across if you’re conservative or libertarian and spend any time at all on the internet. Most of them are on our blogroll on the right side of the page, but in the interest of completeness:

• Jonathan Adler of The Volokh Conspiracy
• Radley Balko of The Agitator
• Robert Bluey of The Heritage Foundation and RobertBluey.com
• Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online
• Mary Katharine Ham of TownHall.com
• Megan McArdle of Asymmetrical Information at TheAtlantic.com
• Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit

Congrats to the other finalists, and thanks to the America’s Future Foundation for putting on the contest. We’ve made some basic plans about what we’ll do with the money if we win, but all I can say at the moment is that it will probably be the kind of event that divides history (i.e. pre and post-”that time the Commentator won 10k”). All fiscal conservatives will be invited.

Here’s a good letter to the editor in today’s Register Guard that thin-skulled socialist students should consider: (more…)

The New Republic has all of Libertarianism abuzz over this story which reveals the racist, homophobic and generally crappy material in The Ron Paul Newsletter, The Ron Paul Survival Report, The Ron Paul Freedom Report, The Ron Paul Political Report, The Ron Paul Investment Letter and other publications linked to maverick Republican Presidential candidate. The New Republic has these selections available in .pdf format, so if you are a Ron Paul supporter you might just want to stop now and go take a look.

Paul has released a statement based on this hasty interview with Reason Magazine, in which he dismisses the newsletters as “Ancient History,”  and claims that much of the material was written by others. His campaign has since released this statement, which concludes “For over a decade, I have publicly taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name.”

Needless to say, the “Ron Paul Revolution” is over… or at the very least the name is going to have to change. I, for one, appreciate Paul’s proving to the Republicans that “Liberty matters” over the course of this election, but he wasn’t exactly poised to take the party over, either. In fact, this story will probably be spun mostly by Republicans in order to tar Libertarians with the “wacko” brush, and push them back from the political mainstream. Either way, the newsletters have nothing to do with the ideals of libertarianism, shouldn’t prevent people from embracing elements of Paul’s message even if they can no longer support the man.

Last Fall, an emotionally-charged anonymous letter to the editor to the student newspaper at Lewis & Clark, The Pioneer Log, had several female students calling “rape.” (more…)

So much hogwash to get to, so little time.  (more…)