Ann Althouse Says the Rare Thing I Sorta Agree With. So She Earns Her Gold Star.

(Before we go there, is it confirmation bias if you admit that fact, from the start? Hmmm. That might be deep. Or it might be bullshit. Moving on . . . .)

My words, not hers, but Althouse is wise to Herman Cain attempted scam. Mostly. She would not and did not say it as I would, that he's some jigging and jiving black on black racist lawn jockey, and a flim-flam man who would and could make Elmer Gantry gasp, for the audacity of his deceit. But she's seeing him for what he is at core, and objectively what his campaign essentially is: a charade.

Mostly she's been going after him for the silly emptiness of his 999 plan. She deconstructs that pretty well Here.

And I specifically compliment her for calling minstrel math man for employing a seemingly cynical numerological trick there. Kudos for seeing through his bullshit. Now if she can make it to the next level of awareness, that Cain is not an outlier for a GOP candidate, but a perfect (but histrionically shameless) example of what is typical for the wing nuts/GOP, she might be on the path to political enlightenment. Now if only she manages to stumble on the bloggers and legit journos who have deconstructed all the lies that the wing nuts believe and come to the realization that its not just the 999 plan for which there's no there there, but that is the full reality of the GOP? Well I am not expecting it to happen. But hey. The guy over at Little Green Footballs had an epiphany. Why can't she?

One parting half crack. Usually I think her rhetorical question kind of thinking is for lack of a better word, childish. But I guess sometimes it's leads her brain in the right direction. It did for and about Cain. But I will here now answer some of those questions.

First Question: " This is not a conservative instinct. It's radical and daring. It seeks to excite us about change. There's some crazy emotionalism in it. Who would buy that? Who would be impressed that the 9s line up so perfectly?"

Answer: A wingnut.

Second Question: (Oddly enough asked by her in her previous post about Cain, from the first question) "Why are people so impressed with Herman Cain?"

Answer: Because what he is selling is some kind of crazy emotionalism that wing nuts will gladly buy. Wing nuts are impressed by such stupid, vapid plans and arguments.

And even if that is the pat way of saying it, I will go another level here. Thing about wing nuts, particularly the anti intellectual, anti elite, anti educations slobs, is they don't want the world to be a complicated place. They don't want to accept the reality (even if not too deep down they know it's true) that they are too fucking stupid to get much about government and politics. Never mind science, engineering, or finance (imagine the typical tea bagger trying to understand bond convexity or the basics of the derivative market?)

They want the world to be simple. So they will gladly buy up what the flim-flam man is selling, cause it reduces complex systems and ideas down to a cutesy sound bite of meme. Or meme of a sound bite. Either way it's pandering to their low brow snobbery. And I say that is the worst kind of snobbery there is. Being proud of being ignorant is bad. Voting for people because their ideas are as ignorant as yours, or worse, is so much worse.