THE PLEDGE

You may have followed the exchange playing out online between some other local bloggers and me recently.

I caught some heat after being the first to comment on a new blog post, where I left a terse little message. Though I didn’t say it directly, my criticism boiled down to this: the blogger had posted some disparaging remarks about somebody I respect without giving it adequate thought or due diligence.

As a result of my comment, some pretty terrible things were said about me, and several bloggers wrote in response, in comments and updates. One of the writers was quite vulgar in his response to me, but no moreso than he had been in the past.

Our little feud actually started about a year ago, when I wrote a post for the Main Street Journal blog. It was a look at the people behind a local radio program, which had been classified as a “hate group.” I opened that post with a caveat saying that I had debated whether or not I should even address the subject, meaning that I had mixed feelings about adding more oxygen to the fire, since they actually seemed to be enjoying the negative publicity. This caveat was wrongly interpreted as being a fear of political repercussions that might result if I were to tick off the “extremists.” And tick them off, I certainly did.

THE TURN

That blog debate I described above happened at… Blue Collar Republican, where I questioned blogger John Farmer’s use of the word “bigot” to describe a member of the Tennessee legislature.

Austin Farley, a BCR co-blogger and former host of the aforementioned radio program, is apparently still smarting from his overwhelming loss to Rep. Jim Coley and alleges that Coley and/or his associates spread some misinformation about Farley’s religion during the campaign.

Farmer made a mistake in advancing these allegations and defaming Coley without proof, or supporting material, or links, etc.

In response to my comment (”What exactly makes Jim Coley a bigot?”), Farmer questioned my memory and Farley started attacking me by questioning my manhood, calling me a “sackless little worm”:

Mick just what makes you a man? I think you would have to have a set of balls to qualify as a man and I don’t think you have them.

That would be an ad hominem attack. A stupid, vulgar, ridiculous, pointless ad hominem attack.

That’s ok. I can take it. Actually, I sort of wear it as a badge of honor, that someone so disreputable could dislike me so much for so little. And sometimes the abuse I receive is fairly entertaining.

THE PRESTIGE

The sad thing is how common this nonsense has become, how Farley’s vitriol is equally matched by another one of my sparring partners on (what most people consider to be) the opposite side of the political spectrum — “Peskyfly” Chris Davis, the Leftist blogger and Memphis Flyer contributor.

Since Farley and Davis share the same love for invective, I just might be well within my rights to start referring to them jointly as Chris Farley — the overweight joker with a few M&Ms shy of a fun size pack, if only it weren’t an insult to the original Chris Farley.

Of course, if you’ve been following along, a nearly identical situation occurred at Pesky’s The Flypaper Theory blog, with me questioning a post and receiving all kinds of hatred in return.

Ironically, my row with Davis has its roots in that very same post at the Main Street Journal blog.

It’s funny how it all weaves together like a cloth mesh shopping bag (now with store logo!).

This is how Davis remembers it:

Who knows when it [our "cyper catfight"] started. We’d maintained a kind of snark-swapping civility until a few months back when he — to an end that defies understanding– decided he and I needed to have a public debate, mano a mano. Which, beyond answering the all-important question of “who is louder, Chris or Mick” just seems laughable. The most recent flare up came after I mocked his latest mancrush (a bigoted, conspiracy-obsessed pig named Glenn Beck, heard of him?).

Now he wonders where the “civility” went? Seriously? Can this be the same Chris Davis who just got done calling civility a crutch used by “jerks who can only win if somebody throws a penalty flag”?

If I leave it at that, though, I suppose the next step is Chris saying he was being “ironic” and that I’m stupid for not catching on. But that’s going to be a tough sell, since everything else in his comment is a straightforward account of our evolving debate.

As for the moment that “defies understanding,” it appears Davis is still unaware that I was making a point by calling for a live debate between us, and that all of his excuses for dodging that debate were undercutting the point he had been trying to make about Republicans avoiding a “debate” in the Senate. I’m astonished that Davis still hasn’t caught onto the fact that I managed to simultaneously rebut his point about Republicans not debating and also make him look like a coward with one shot. Heck, even the Flyer editor got that joke. It’s probably one of the biggest highlights of my blogging career, and the fact that he still isn’t clued in makes it that much sweeter.

Now, as for “who is louder,” I’ll let Davis go ahead and claim that title. Everyone who knows me or has ever had a conversation with me knows that I am “very soft spoken,” always have been, always will be. Davis’ continued insistence that my debate challenge was about controlling volume is just very bizarre.

And finally — on that comment above — what’s with Pesky’s repeated use of “mancrush” to describe my appreciation for Glenn Beck? As an insult, it’s pretty weak. Is that some kind of pseudo anti-gay slur? I don’t get it.

Also, I note that Davis calls Beck “bigoted,” which is the exact word I criticized at BCR.

MICK VS. THE TRINITY

In his (very civil and high-minded) “McShit” post, Davis said, “I can counter in just a few sentences what it took the Mickster a post and a jump to say.”

And yet here we are now and there’s yet another post from Peskyfly, one by “Jeff” and still another by “Kibitzer” Jackson Baker, who also corresponded with me via e-mail. I guess that economy of words hasn’t quite worked out so well after all.

And that means I’m stuck here dealing with all three of them, plus a wonderful visit with mom this weekend, a sick wife, my regular job, my other job, church, friends, some important goals I’m working toward, and everything else. It’s almost obscene that I’m devoting even a small amount of my time to this. But I suffer for your entertainment, and enlightenment. Woe is me.

MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN

Let’s take up Peskyfly’s most recent post first.

Davis writes about his garden and posts photos of the various plants growing there, and of his lovely little children with their straw hats and gardening tools. It’s a great post, to a point, and this part almost stops me in my tracks:

Although I’m about as irreligious as a person can be, I’ve always found my garden to be a place of spiritual reawakening. I was raised to believe that God wanted us to live in a peaceful garden where our pleasures were many, and our troubles few. And but for our transgression against God’s will, I was taught, we would have lived that way forever.

When you treat the Earth like the garden it was intended to be it rewards you with food, flavor, beauty, and nourishment. And when you teach your children how to garden, they learn respect for traditions, and the visual and gastronomic rewards of diligence and hard work. When I work in the garden, especially with my children, I feel very close to this God I hardly believe in. When I pick up trash, find some new use for a disposable product, or choose to walk or bike somewhere instead of driving I know that I am at least hedging my agnostic bets against eternal hellfire by bringing my little part of the world in line with the Lord’s original vision. It’s a silly conceit to be sure, but it works for me.

I’ve never been one to say that Davis is without worth, or that he doesn’t deserve my respect. I actually think he is quite talented, and I’ve praised him several times on my blog and via email. He can be an excellent writer when he wants to be, especially when it comes to theatrical reviews, feature profiles, and that sort of thing. I would never question his humanity, nor would I allow some of his extreme political views or even his baseless attacks on me to obscure my belief that he is a fellow man, a member of God’s great kingdom, and a valuable part of the creation.

I only wish Davis would offer his enemies and people like me that same understanding, and not count disagreements as disqualifications or paint those of us with different viewpoints as racists, bigots, lunatics and “assclowns.” I hope that one day he can debate the issues objectively instead of just calling people names and misrepresenting their points. I’m convinced he would be even more successful in life if he could learn how to do that.

And I wish similar things for myself, because I share some of the same rage. I get mad at people, and I’m bad about putting my politics ahead of my compassion for their spiritual needs.

I am very glad that Chris shared what he did about his view of God and his spiritual pathway, which he shares with lots of people, whether he knows it or not.

It saddens me, though, that Davis disparagingly refers to me as “godly” (with scare quotes). For whatever reason, Davis appears to think of me as some sort of self-righteous straw man, even though I very rarely talk about my faith. When I do write about religion, it’s usually in response to other Christians, or in terms of America’s Christian heritage and God’s relevance in politics or in our laws. I feel confident in saying I’ve never used my faith to browbeat, insult or ridicule non-believers.

I don’t write about religion that way because I think we’re all trying to walk the good path, and we’re all trying to figure out what’s right and what’s wrong. My usual feeling is that I can’t tell anyone else what they ought to be doing since I don’t always know myself. But somehow that’s not the message he’s received.

It’s a pity, but it’s also not uncharacteristic, as Davis applies the same straw-man format in other areas as well. At the end of his post, Davis talks about how I side with “money changers” and those who make “war machines,” all because he thinks I approve of Beck’s Nazi scientist analogy (even though I never said that).

And he employs the same attack when Neil comments and later delivers this smackdown:

The irony is, I basically agreed with you that the Hitler comparison was inapt. Maybe because I didn’t use inflammatory language such as “BATSHIT INSANE” or “NUTS” or “LIES” you couldn’t understand the nuance of what I was saying.

Of course, Davis also presses Beck’s comments into a mold of his liking, even though it goes directly against what Beck actually said in the first place.

We’ll get back into some of that in a minute, but let’s close out this part with his criticism of the image I used in my last post.

…[O]ur Mickster has used characters from The Lord of The Rings to make a very silly visual analogy linking me to Grimer Wormtongue, and Jackson Baker to the enchanted King Theoden. I crap you negative. It would seem I’ve infected Mr. Baker’s obviously weak mind with the wicked notion that Al Gore’s mission to protect our garden planet is good and noble and that Glenn Beck’s comparison of Gore to Hitler was ignorant at best–”Gore/Hitlerian” at worst. Now, after this long horticultural rapture, allow me to uncover the deep irony of Mr. Wright’s posting, and explain how all of this fits together.

Grimer Wormtonge worked in the service of forces who chopped down ancient forests to build war machines. His masters thought the world would be a better place if it looked like this, and this. His enemies in The Fellowship used “Hitler/Gore-like” scare tactics to forge a multicultural union of elves, dwarves, halflings, and good men to fight for a world that looks like this, and this.

Poor Mick, so unable to even construct a visual joke without showing the depths of his shallowness.

The depths of my shallowness? Isn’t that, well… nevermind.

I’m actually quite proud of that visual allusion.

First, Davis would know that I’m well aware of the connection between LOTR and environmentalism, unless he missed this photoshop that I did about a year ago. But it’s fun to watch Davis justify his industry’s paper consumption with a few gardening offsets.

What Davis ignores, though, beyond the mere physical similarities, is the conversation that was happening during that scene, and what King Theoden did immediately after that.

At this point in The Twin Towers, Gandalf the White and other members of the scattered fellowship are warning King Theoden of the coming attack from Sauron and Saruman. They must stand and fight or risk losing everything. But King Theoden is under the influence of a corrupt advisor, who in turn is under the spell of an evil wizard, and they slander the fellowship as “warmongers.”

Even after he breaks free from the spell, a weary King Theoden commands his people to retreat to Helm’s Deep, which actually puts them at greater risk, rather than summoning enough courage to make the wiser choice to stand and fight. And that’s fitting, given Jackson Baker’s recent commentary on the war, in which he laments that victory in the war on terror is neither achievable nor even definable.

The photo is actually sort of a compliment to Baker, if not Davis, revealing my impression that Baker is actually a good man who has merely been led astray, and could come around given the right situation. There’s still hope.

FIND ME A JEW!

As for Jackson Baker’s snide little post, I have only a few quick things to mention.

1. As I said before, “I can’t speak for Beck, and feel no need to defend him.” Therefore, I don’t need to find you a Jew who finds Beck’s comparison apt, though I’m fairly confident that I could.

2. Also as I’ve mentioned before, you can’t point to anywhere that I’ve said I agree with Beck’s comparison. That’s why you can’t quote me, because I haven’t said it. And I haven’t said it because I agree with Neil. My point, which you’re ignoring, isn’t about Beck at all, but rather about you and Davis being lazy in condemning Beck without knowing any of the context, some of which I provided, and that Davis was also lazy as a blogger for copying someone else’s comments, not giving a link, and not advancing the argument any further than others had already done.

3. In an email, you said “I’m not going to debate you on your blog — especially when you’re going out of your way to be unfair and tendentious.” No, you’re not going to debate me on my blog, because you can’t debate me on the points. You’d rather mock me using an alias on Peskyfly’s blog. But could you please point out where I was unfair and tendentious in my last post, the one you commented on? Because the only one I’ve seen who has been unfair and tendentious has been Chris, and the best you can come up with in regards to his stream of slander is “it wasn’t me, don’t blame me!”* and mock disapproval.

4. In your post, you say ironically that you and Davis “mistook what Glen was saying” and mockingly thank me for setting you straight. As you well know, I criticized you for putting words in direct quotes, when in fact you invented those quotes yourself. You replied by saying I shouldn’t confuse your reporting with your blog posting, thinking it strange.

And you surely know that “Kibitzer” commenting on a blog is not the same thing as Jackson Baker reporting a story. Why do you confuse the issue?

As I told you twice before, my point is that, as a reporter, you should know better than to make up quotes, even when you’re commenting on a blog.

But speaking of that great chasm between your blog posts and your professional writing, perhaps you could explain how different those two areas are for anyone who visited memphisflyer.com over the past two weeks and saw my name on the front page with direct links to your posts at The Flypaper Theory? When my name is showing up at your place of work with direct links to things you’ve written about me, you’ve got to admit the dividing line is wearing awfully thin.

Examples:

5. One thing all of you have failed to do is show any curiosity about the argument that Beck made, or betray any degree of understanding once I provided you with details of which you were not aware.

Not only was the original post on TFT thoughtless, lacking in links, lacking in a transcript, lacking in context, and showed you both being too quick to judge, but your response to my criticism and my providing context has actually made matters worse. You decided to attack me. You decided to invent quotes. You decided to ignore the context I handed you. You asked no questions and plodded along with your initial judgment. You got personal. You circled the wagons. You displayed none of your journalistic skill.

As far as Beck’s comparison goes, you ignored everything he said about the science aspect, the crushing of dissent among scientific skeptics, the global warming alarmism, Gore’s naming of his “mass persuasion campaign” and the indoctrination of children in classes, and even the context of Beck’s show, what he had been talking about, what he was preparing for, and what he had been reading — in other words, you ignored everything that could have made Beck’s comparison viable and latched onto 1. the Jew part, which he repeatedly tried to explain off and 2. the conspiracy theory, which you sunk your teeth onto without knowing any of Beck’s supporting thoughts, and even though your own site has engaged in 9/11 conspiracy theories.

BECK NOT POPULAR

The only surprising thing about Jeff’s post is that he managed to outclass Davis. Other than that, same drivel.

That is, except for the update in which he celebrates Beck’s relatively meager cable news ratings.

1. Last I checked, Beck’s cable TV audience is about the same as Chris Matthews’ Hardball audience, which is significant.

2. The comments we’re all discussing happened on Beck’s radio program, which has the 3rd largest audience among talk radio programs.

3. All this eagerness to take down Glenn Beck and insult him is dull, as Beck is easily the most self-deprecating pundit on air. He makes fun of himself constantly. It’s part of his shtick, and part of his charm. So all this is just very unnecessary and unimpressive.

4. If Beck wasn’t popular, and if it was inconsequential, you wouldn’t be wasting your time on it. But he is popular, because he’s a young, hip, thoughtful conservative with a good sense of humor and well grounded by his faith. That makes him a threat to the Left.

And that’s part of the reason I waste my time on this, because the Flyer is somewhat popular and relevant, though certainly not as relevant as family and sleep. Both of which I need to attend to. It’s been a real pleasure.

* That’s actually a Bakerized quote. The real, direct quotes from Jackson’s emails include: “You’re blaming me for what somebody else writes?” and “why are you holding me responsible for that?” and “I’m not responsible for Chris’s statements about you or yours about him.”