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Every day, VDARE.com strives to be your leading source of immigration news and information in the fight to keep America American.
This new Book Club offers our readers the chance to dive deep into the issues gripping our world today: immigration, national identity, human biodiversity and the defense of western civilization. Books will include a heady mix of dissident classics, unheralded gems, and buzz-worthy new releases. Let’s get reading!
Author Virginia Dare
Can a movement win if it has the right tactics but the wrong target? The story of the American Conservative Movement after the Cold War suggests that it can’t. The American Right has chased tangential issues, acted as controlled opposition, and operated more like a business than a serious movement partially because it didn’t know what it was fighting. Conservative radio host Jesse Kelly deserves credit for trying to point to a real target, suggesting some productive means to fight the enemy, and having a clear view of the stakes. Unfortunately, he may be wrong about who it is that really threatens America and what they really want. America is being torn about by tribes who fundamentally aren’t part of the country and never want to be, not simply people who want a different economic system. As Paul Gottfried might put it, we aren’t threatened by “Communists,” because we are actually facing people to the left of them.
Still, Kelly deserves credit for rejecting the complacency and triumphalism in American political thought. “I wish I could tell you that our nation stands at a crossroad…” he says in his June, 2023 best-seller The Anti-Communist Manifesto. “But that’s not the case. America chose a path long ago. Now we stand within sight of the journey’s dark end.”
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
James Kirkpatrick writes:
The ideological origins of what we now call wokeness are a common topic for conservative authors. Pat Buchanan’s The Death of the West is probably the most important for an entire generation, and I credit it with starting my political career. However, Richard Hanania’s book The Origins Of Wokeis valuable because it attacks the problem from a different angle — that of policy. He argues that power and law set up rules and an ideology (notably surnding the supposed value of diversity) was essentially invented to justify it.
The value of the book is not just in its strategic perspective, but also in its detail. Hanania goes into the specific regulations and court decisions that support our entire way of life. “Way of life” is no exaggeration; he argues that essentially all conduct is illegal under civil rights laws, leading to a complete abandonment of limited government and self-rule. Americans really are not free to discuss political issues outside the private home. More than this, any business faces an existential threat from civil rights legislation that can be used whenever the government wants to destroy a rival or political figure. Certainly, this is what Elon Musk is facing, with sudden civil rights lawsuits against several of his companies.
Hanania also gives us a guide for practical action, naming specific policies that conservatives could target. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court has already blown it when it comes to affirmative action, which somewhat undermines his argument. However, the point is that it is possible and realistic. It can also be done without simply repealing the Civil Rights Act, which is probably politically unfeasible.
Paul Kersey and I discuss this important book, as well as Hanania’s idiosyncrasies. Our advice — don’t take the insults against conservatives or immigration patriots too seriously. The issue is too important, the book is too valuable, and we have work to do. To quote Ronald Reagan, it’s amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t care who gets the credit.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
James Kirkpatrick writes: Border Hawk’s Dan Lyman and Paul Kersey join me to discuss Christopher Rufo’s America’s Cultural Revolution: How The Radical Left Conquered Everything.
Rufo is probably the most effective single conservative activist in the United States today, helping to create an actual movement against Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs in education. What he’s accomplished is rare because he doesn’t back away from describing the Left as it is. His book is probably the most powerful analyses of Leftist activism since Pat Buchanan’s The Death of the West.It is an essential introduction for conservatives confused about just how this country was reduced to the sad state it is in today.
I’ve often thought that the most important truth about Right-wing activism is that “those who know, can’t, and those who can, don’t know.” In other words, to truly understand the Left, you must be familiar with the history of its leading theorists and activists. But knowing what is truly at stake is not compatible with mainstream American politics. With a compliant media, it is simply too easy for a system that is fundamentally controlled by the other side to marginalize patriot activists and make them look crazy or extreme. Facing this, the temptation is to actually become extreme, because a vanguardist solution looks like the only way forward in the face of such an overwhelmingly hostile Regime.
Rufo is the exception. He remains connected to the mainstream and is politically effective, though he doesn’t soft-pedal (much) on what is at stake.
At the same time, it may be that he’s already peaked. He remains committed to a colorblind, meritocratic vision that simply has no mass appeal outside white conservative circles. At the same time, Conservatism Inc. leaders are eager to simply be rid of the fight. Rufo’s recent shot in City Journal at VDARE.com [No to the Politics of “Whiteness”, August 30, 2023] and what some call “white identity politics” must be seen in this light.
It could be an attempt to keep his movement firmly within the mainstream, but the problem is that the very Leftist activists he criticizes and their media mouthpieces are the ones who determine what is mainstream and what is not.
For this reason, I view his attack on us (and the late Sam Francis) as worse than a moral crime, but a mistake. It gained him nothing.
The panel discusses these and other ideas — thank you for your attention and we will have more soon.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
During my time within Conservatism Inc., there were a number of honorable exceptions to the “movement”’s usual pattern of marking time and making a living while America burns. Jack Cashill is one of those exceptions. His new book will hopefully make a major impact on the debate surrounding race in the United States.
Untenable: The True Story of White Ethnic Flight from America’s Cities tells the story of white flight from the white perspective, explaining why Americans left their communities and the untold wealth and social capital that they had built up over generations in order to escape the “Great Society.” It’s a story that we are all living with today. For those of us who grew up in the suburbs, it’s a story that literally shaped our entire lives.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
James Kirkpatrick and Paul Kersey talk to Heather Mac Donald about her book When Race Trumps Merit How the Pursuit of Equity Sacrifices Excellence, Destroys Beauty, and Threatens Lives
See, earlier, John Derbyshire’s Heather Mac Donald’s WHEN RACE TRUMPS MERIT — A Triumph Of Quantative Journalismand ANN COULTER: Heather Mac Donald’s WHEN RACE TRUMPS MERIT — No Biggie, Just the End of Civilization.
And compare, much earlier, When Quotas Replace Merit, Everybody Suffersby VDARE.com editor Peter Brimelow in Forbes, February 15, 1993.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
VDARE Book Club members will be getting some extra content over the next month because of a delay — a now resolved personal issue I had to deal with. For now, I'd like to invite everyone to listen to Paul Kersey and myself discuss this month’s selection, Peter Wood’s 1620: A Critical Response to the 1619 Project.
The book is necessary but not sufficient — typical of movement conservatism, even the best of it. Wood rather effortlessly dismantles the ridiculous historical claims about the 1619 project. Yet what does fact matter against a powerful, redemptive myth? Clearly, the 1619 Project took off because many people wanted to believe in it, not just because The New York Times promoted it after the Russia hoax fell apart.
Mr. Kersey and I go into a lot of important territory on this one — I encourage you all to listen. And remember, you can message me.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
For the February 2023 Book Club selection, James Kirkpatrick interviews Paul Kersey on what he calls the revolutionary year of 2020, when a new America conquered the institutions, cullture, and government of the old. Of course, it did this when the avatar of the old America, Donald J. Trump, was ostensibly in power. How did this transformation take place? And what is likely to happen next?
It’s a revolution captured in real time in Fiery But Mostly Peaceful: The 2020 Riots and the Gaslighting of America by Julio Rosas.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
After our recent discussion with Scott Greer on the politics of immigration reform, we look to the recent past with Losing Control: How a Left-Right Coalition Blocked Immigration Reform and Provoked the Backlash That Elected Trump by Jerry Kammer. I must warn you — this book may make you tear your hair out. You can see the countless times where the immigration issue could have been essentially solved, but ethnic tribalism on the left and corporate greed on the right combined to make sure America’s national interests were put last. Still, it’s worth seeing how the predictions and happy talk of immigration enthusiasts were disproven by reality repeatedly.
Unfortunately, we’re now in a situation where even the pretense of rational discussion of the immigration issue is a thing of the past. Open borders has become something close to a theological injunction for progressives, while conservatives have been morally cowed. Of course, actual Americans are still angry about what’s been done to their country at the hands of an uncaring elite. It’s that breach of faith between rulers and ruled that led to the rise of ’45 – and as the 2024 presidential campaign gets underway, it’s an important reminder that we are still in the Age of Trump.
For VDARE.com readers, there is some triangulation by Kammer that you may find exasperating, including the casual smear of the website as “white nationalist.” He also writes that he wishes the Center for Immigration Studies didn’t associate with Jason Richwine, as this made it easier for the Southern Poverty Law Center to call CIS a “hate group.” This misses the point; if groups like CIS and others would stop conceding moral legitimacy in these debates, “hate group” designations or other complaints would have no meaning. Still, this aside, it doesn’t destroy the importance of the book or its continuing relevance.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
This month’s VDARE Book Club selection is Losing Control: How a Left-Right Coalition Blocked Immigration Reform and Provoked the Backlash That Elected Trump by Jerry Kammer. However, before we look to the past, we should look to the battles that are going on now.
Should immigration patriots actually support Kevin McCarthy becoming Speaker of the House? Should we even bother working with the GOP — or should we give up on the system entirely? The highly respected analyst Scott Greer (IQ 187) takes a quick break from his Highly Respected podcast to join us for a Book Club members only interview. When it comes to practical, realistic analysis of what’s happening on the Hill and how patriots can respond, it’s hard to beat the analysis coming from arguably the most important rising voice on the American Right.
Don’t miss it.
Available formats: mp3
Author Virginia Dare
James Kirkpatrick and Tom Piatak on Sam Francis’s legacy.
After discussing The Machiavellians by James Burnham, we follow up with his greatest student, the irreplaceable Sam Francis. The closest thing we have to synthesis of Francis’s work is Leviathan and Its Enemies (now available in paperback as well as hardcover).
This is a strange time because in many ways the Managerial Class is stronger than ever. Political opinions are dictated by media powers. The populist spirit exemplified by the Trump campaign in 2016 has largely failed at a national level. It’s unclear whether Republicans — any Republican — can win any more at the national level.
At the same time, arguably more people than ever can see through the system. Despite the top-down nature of Narrative control, the Internet still allows for more open discussion and organization. It makes it easier for the System to crack down, but also makes it easier to notice.
American conservatives generally don’t talk enough about the nature of the System we live under and how it functions. It’s not the constitutional republic envisioned by the Framers. It’s something different. Leviathan and Its Enemies is the first step to understanding what it is and how it might be combatted.
Available formats: mp3
Author James Burnham
I had a great discussion with Academic Agent on James Burnham’s "The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom." We dug pretty deep into the foundations of political philsophy, including the question you need a metaphysical Ideal to rally your followers — or just should stick to practical considerations. Academic Agent probably needs no introduction to many of you, but if you aren’t following his lectures and courses, he’s one of the best content creators, thinkers, and teachers out there.
James Burnham’s role within the American right is likely to become more important than ever. He’s getting a bit of a second wind as conservatives today rediscover his work, especially as we seek to deconstruct the false reality leftists and their media allies have created. However, as AA points out, there is a bit of a dark side to Burnham — and it’s not for nothing that he’s called the first neoconservative.
Available formats: mp3
Author Unknown
This month’s book is Back of the Hiring Line: A 200-Year History of Immigration Surges, Employer Bias, and Depression of Black Wealth, by Roy Beck.
Cheap labor kills civilizations and peoples. We hear all the time about the racial “wealth gap” and the systemic oppression supposedly responsible for the plight of African-Americans, but what is not discussed is the role of mass immigration in reducing black wages — purposefully, deliberately, and sometimes maliciously. Somehow, the racial reckoning never gets around to this.
Available formats: mp3
Author Winston Churchill
James Kirkpatrick:This is our concluding episode on Sir Winston Churchill’s four-volume history of his ancestor, the Duke of Marlborough.
We read history because certain things really don’t change. The competition for power, the depravity of human nature, the nobility people can find within themselves in the worst circumstances, and the shared national history that connects us to our ancestors are all with us today. Churchill’s biography of his forebear is one of the most powerful illustrations of these truths. Whatever his political successes or failures, there’s no denying his talents as a historian and his artistry with our beautiful English language.
Listen to my discussion with VDARE.com editor Peter Brimelow below.
Available formats: mp3
Author Sir Winston Churchill
James Kirkpatrick: Our July Book Club selection is Book Two of Sir Winston Churchill’s Marlborough: His Life and Times. The full work is traditionally presented in a four-volume set.
I talked with Peter Brimelow about Marlborough’s military career, one of the most brilliant in recorded history, and the parallels between Marlborough’s career and the recent Trump administration.
Why is this book so important? What justifies it being explored over three months? I give three reasons.
First, as Leo Strauss argued, it is “the greatest historical work written in our century, an inexhaustible mine of political wisdom and understanding, which should be required reading for every student of political science.” You may disagree with that, but frankly, I don’t.
Second, as Peter Brimelow noted in 2019: “[In that era], prosecution was simply an occupational hazard of public life. Now, again, America is moving back towards the criminalization of policy differences.” Indeed, that may understate the case. Even guilt by association, as in working for a certain political figure, is enough for one to face legal trouble.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Sir Winston Churchill
Earlier, by James Kirkpatrick: Thoughts On Winston Churchill’s MARLBOROUGH: HIS LIFE AND TIMES and by Peter Brimelow: Manafort, Marlborough, And Robert E. Lee: Criminalizing Policy/ Personnel, Differences — U.S. Politics Regressing To The Primitive
James Kirkpatrick: At VDARE.com Editor Peter Brimelow’s urging, I recently read Winston Churchill’s biography of his great ancestor John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough. One of the great captains of history, Marlborough is not well known in the Anglosphere today.
I discussed the continuing (and somewhat ominous) relevance of this book with Peter Brimelow on Thursday, June 23, and the full podcast is available to all Book Club members below. This discussion focuses on Book One. In July, we will focus on Book Two. In August, we’ll do Books Three and Four.
UPDATE: The headline originally said "Book Two". That was an error. Our apologies to members.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Julie Kelly
Apologies for the delay in posting this, caused by technical glitches.
The Democrats are heading into what could be a truly catastrophic midterm elections cycle for them as inflation continues to outpace wage growth. Curbing inflation will probably involve raising interest rates even further, which might deal the final blow to an already staggering stock market. In the worst case, we might be approaching stagflation.
If elections are truly about "the economy, stupid," then the Democrats are in deep trouble.
For that reason, the System appears to be doubling down on January 6 hysteria even though most Americans don’t seem to really care about it. Reporters care though. They are dreaming about the prospects of convicting Trump of, well, something, and doing deep hit pieces on the home towns they've left.
For that reason, it’s more important to explore this topic than ever.
Available formats: mp3, docx
Author Colin Flaherty
Earlier: VDARE Book Club — Don’t Make The Black Kids Angry
The late Colin Flaherty had a far larger impact on mainstream discourse than any journalist will ever be willing to admit. He was one of those rare creatures, an actual reporter. Developing a nationwide network of people who tracked the crimes that the Main Stream Media was desperate to cover up, he had a massive presence on YouTube and social media, at least until he was censored. Even afterward, Flaherty’s followers would spread his findings, building something close to an entire subculture.
The strength of this underground phenomenon came about because of a simple, unfortunate truth. This is that almost every American has a story about black crime or the ways high crime rates in "diverse" cities have changed our lives. Many of us had parents or grandparents who lived in great American cities that never recovered from the historic crime wave of the late 1960s and the so-called civil rights movement. Many more have left cities recently because of the rise in crime after the MSM promoted Black Lives Matter.
James Kirkpatrick talks with Paul Kersey about the late Colin Flaherty and his great book Don’t Make The Black Kids Angry. Login to listen to the whole thing.
Available formats: mp3, docx
Author Steve King
Full podcast posted below! Members, log in at the top right of the screen & access your content by clicking the "mp3" button below. Thank you for your support!
This month’s selection for the VDARE BOOK CLUB is Congressman Steve King’s Walking Through the Fire: My Fight for the Heart and Soul of America. Rep. Steve King was one of America’s greatest immigration patriots in Congress. He deserves a great deal of responsibility for the growing America First movement. He was betrayed by his own party and many so-called conservative activists, who worked in tandem with liberal journalists to have him purged.
One wonders if Steve King’s most important actions are still ahead of him. To that end, we are looking forward to reviewing and analyzing this new work. His book takes on the liberal media, immigration, cowardly Republicans, and Never Trumpers. In the end, one begins to suspect that they are all functionally the same thing, driven by the same destructive, anti-American animus.
Book Club Members can listen to the MP3 and download discussion questions below.
Available formats: mp3, mp4, docx
Author Dario Fernandez-Morera
Full podcast posted below! Members, log in at the top right of the screen & access your content by clicking the "mp3" button below. Thank you for your support!
In this interview, F. Roger Devlin and James Kirkpatrick speak on Dario Fernandez-Morera’s "The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise."
While this book may seem like ancient history, it addresses a subject of vital importance. In fact, it challenges the main premise of mass immigration into the West. The myth of a multicultural, prosperous, and egalitarian Andalusia is used to justify mass immigration by Muslims into Europe today. However, Andalusia was a typical Islamist polity, with Christians and Jews held in subjugation. White slavery, violations of women’s rights, and aggressive (and religiously mandated) wars of expansion were typical features.
Andalusia is also the basis for a more insidious myth — that the only reason the West has access to the classics is because Muslims preserved them for us. In truth, the West had continuous access via the Eastern Roman Empire — until, of course, that was destroyed by the Ottomans.
So too was the nascent Visigoth civilization in Spain destroyed by the initial Muslim invasions. This is perhaps the most tragic part of the book, because it highlights something that has been entirely lost. Though the civilization was far more advanced than that of the conquerors, it suffered from a flaw we can relate to today — self-centered, decadent elites willing to sell out their people and civilization for short-term advantage. In the end of course, they lost everything.
And so will we, if we don’t act. But the first step is to arm yourself intellectually and understand your own identity. This book, and this discussion, is a good place to start.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Joseph Cotto
Full podcast posted below! Members, log in at the top right of the screen & access your content by clicking the "mp3" buttonbelow. Thank you for your support!
James Kirkpatrick interviewed Joseph Ford Cotto, author of Runaway Masters: A True Story of Slavery, Freedom, Triumph, and Tragedy Beyond 1619 and 1776 as well as Under the Crown and Stripes. Both are definitely worth a read, but the discussion was about the former because it is an extremely relevant story to the racial problems and conflicts America suffers from today.
A video sample of the discussion is here, for the full conversation download the MP3.
Available formats: docx
Author Laura Loomer
Discussion questions & full podcast posted below! Members, log in at the top right of the screen & access your content by clicking the orange "docx" and "mp3" buttons below. Thank you for your support!
This Book Club selection is former Republican congressional candidate Laura Loomer. She is one of the most deplatformed people on the planet, and her experience is instructive because, let’s face it, anyone could be next. It’s something everyone needs to be aware of, especially as the Left expands the number of people who are considered "extremists."
Available formats: mp3, docx
Author Anne Wilson Smith
Discussion questions & full podcast posted below! Members, log in at the top right of the screen & access your content by clicking the orange "docx" and "mp3" buttons below. Thank you for your support!
In November, the VDARE.com Book Club Presents: Charlottesville Untold: Inside Unite The Right by Anne Wilson Smith.
Just in time for the Charlottesville trial (follow Jason Kessler’s live updates here), we encourage you to read Wilson Smith’s invaluable compilation of primary sources where the defendants, and the words and actions of the mob that attacked them, speak for themselves.
Even those readers who carefully read the independent Heaphy Report have something to learn. Charlottesville Survivor writes in his review, CHARLOTTESVILLE UNTOLD: Why Terry McAuliffe, Not Jason Kessler, Should Be On Trial:
…Smith’s book is especially valuable because it provides further evidence that UTR organizers scrupulously tried to avoid violence. In short, the wrong people are on trial right now — state and local officials should be forced to answer for their unconscionable actions. [emphasis added] And the “mainstream” conservatives who didn’t speak up at the time enabled the deplatforming campaign that ultimately took down President Trump himself.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Serge Trifkovic
Discussion Questions & Member-Exclusive Full Podcast posted below!
Members, please log in in the upper-right corner of the page and click on the orange "docx" and "mp3" buttons below to download your content. Thank you!
Twenty years after 9/11, Afghan refugees will soon be swamping your hometowns. (You can find out exactly where on this map here. Note: The acronym HIAS on the map as undefined stands for Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society.)
In preparation, the VDARE.com Book Club is reading The Sword of the Prophet by Serge Trifkovic. (Make sure you are signed up for the VDARE.com Book Club here by Wednesday, September 15th to win a copy in our raffle!)
Dr. Trifkovic is the author of five books, a professor of international relations at the University of Banja Luka, Serbian Republic & Foreign Affairs Editor at Chronicles Magazine.
The Sword of the Prophet: The politically incorrect guide to Islam; History, Theology, Impact on the World, is a direct, unapologetic look at the rise of Islamic fundamentalism as the greatest danger to Western Civilization.
This most recent influx of Afghans is not only costly economically, but is an existential threat to the Historic American Nation. Muslim immigrants do not want to assimilate. In fact, Jihad by immigration is so well understood, it has its own term, Hijra [Roll Over, JIHAD — There’s Also HIJRA, Muslim Conquest By Immigration, by Martin Witkerk, VDARE.com, March 28, 2017].
Hijra has already shown gains in Europe. In her post on Sunday, Ann Corcoran of Refugee Resettlement Watch noticed this study from a few days ago where 39% of France thinks Islam will be the dominant religion in that country in a few years.
This is a religion that supports honor killings, stoning women, and death for apostasy. Bonus: while the U.S. abolished slavery in 1865, you can find Muslim immigrants engaging in literal slavery today, in San Diego.
If we care about America, if we respect women, or oppose slavery, we must say an emphatic NO to Hijra — not here, not today, not ever.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Andrew Morrison
This August, the VDARE.com Book Club is going to the border with former Border Patrol agent Andrew Morrison. East Into The Sunset [buy here!] is Morrison’s first-person account of his first twenty years patrolling the Rio Grande Valley.
While many of his memories highlight problems within the Border Patrol which result in the lack of enforcement, he keeps a sense of humor and shares some “true tales of actual competence in the Border Patrol.” They’re all wildly entertaining.
New podcast available! Author Andrew Morrison joins our host James Kirkpatrick to answer your questions and more. Followers can view the publicly available segment here. Book Club members can download the full episode by clicking the "mp3" button below.
Happy reading!
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Charles Murray
Book Club Members, access your discussion questions by clicking the orange "docx" button below. Enjoy!
This July, get ready for James Kirkpatrick’s Hot Take on a Hot New Book in a Hot New Month — Facing Reality: Two Truths About Race In America by Charles Murray.
Murray thinks we don’t like his book. [We do! Please note heroic arm in photo above, ready to defend raising these topics: Race, IQ, and Crime.] Maybe with enough encouragement from you readers, we can get him on our Book Club Podcast!
We’re comfortable in saying we have more integrity than Steve Schmidt of the Lincoln Project [they’re still around?], or the NYT, when it comes to book reviews. [Check out our reviews by John Derbyshire, Roger Devlin, Steve Sailer, and Jared Taylor.]
What will you think? Send us your thoughts.
Available formats: docx
Author Tom Wolfe
Book Club members: NEW! Podcast with Steve Sailer & Discussion questions available below! Download both by clicking the orange "docx" button and "mp3" button. Play podcast in a player by simply clicking the play button.
Earlier (2013) by Steve Sailer: The Hunt For The Great White Defendant: A Reading List
For our May-June choice, the VDARE.com Book Club will be discussing Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities. Join here before May 7th to be included in our raffle for aFirst Edition signed copy! Our winner will be announced and discussion questions posted Friday, May 7th.
The morning after the Chauvin conviction, we opened the email bag to find this short note from a friend “Time to read The Bonfire of the Vanities.”
Written in 1987, Tom Wolfe’s novel named the “mania for the Great White Defendant” — the hunt for a white, preferably man (although white women may also qualify), with reckless disregard for evidence or obvious demographic trends.
To quote directly from the book:
An assistant D.A. in Major Offenses has started calling Abe Weiss “Captain Ahab,” and now they all did. Weiss was notorious in his obsession for publicity, even among a breed, the district attorney, that was publicity-mad by nature. …
Every assistant D.A. in the Bronx … shared Captain Ahab’s mania for the Great White Defendant. For a start, it was not pleasant to go through life telling yourself, “What I do for a living is, I pack blacks and Latins off to jail.” It wasn’t that it was morally wrong … It was that it was in bad taste. So it made the boys uneasy, this eternal prosecution of the blacks and Latins.
… The press couldn’t even see these cases. It was just poor people killing poor people. To prosecute such cases was to be part of the garbage collection service, necessary and honorable, plodding and anonymous.
Captain Ahab wasn’t so ridiculous, after all. Press coverage! Ray and Jimmy could laugh all they wanted, but Weiss had made sure the entire city knew his name. Weiss had an election coming up, and the Bronx was 70 percent black and Latin, and he was going to make sure the name Abe Weiss was pumped out to them on every channel that existed. He might not do much else, but he was going to do that.
Preceding the O.J. Simpson trial, Trayvon Travesty, Duke Lacrosse Team Hoax, and now Ahmed Arbury and Chauvin shenanigans, Wolfe satirized and predicted the legal problems of a multicultural America.
Steve Sailer, VDARE.com’s biggest Tom Wolfe fan, wrote:
“…in his 1995 book, Overcoming Law, judge Richard A. Posner retracted his initial dismissal of Wolfe’s novel:
The Bonfire of the Vanities has turned out to be a book that I think about a lot, in part because it describes with such vividness what Wolfe with prophetic insight (the sort of thing we attribute to Kafka) identified as emerging problems of the American legal system … at a bizarre intersection of race, money, and violence, an intersection nowhere better depicted than in The Bonfire of the Vanities, even though the book was written before the intersection had come into view.
For our email friend, in good company with many shocked but silent others, the Derek Chauvin case represents the unnerving climax of this intersection. We are all Derek Chauvin, and Captain Ahab has finally found his man.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Andy Ngo
Book Club members, access your discussion questions below by logging into your account and clicking the orange "docx" button below. The full version of our podcast with James Kirkpatrick where we answer your questions is downloadable by clicking the "mp3" button. (You can share the publicly available portion with friends here.) Enjoy!
In the alien invasion movie Independence Day,the beleaguered President of the United States, hoping he can forge some kind of a peace which will at least allow the survival of the human race, pleads, “What is it you want us to do?” The alien’s response is simple. “Die.”
— James Kirkpatrick, “DIE!”: The Unlimited Radicalism Of Antifa — Enforcer For Democrats (And, Tacitly, Conservatism Inc.)
Over the summer, we witnessed domestic terrorists known as Antifa rioting day after day across the country with no consequence. Despite our opinion at VDARE that the answer to rioting is ruthless coercion, the Trump Administration failed to enforce law and order and, as James Kirkpatrick predicted, lost the election [give or take fraud].
Worse, Biden’s pick for attorney general Merrick Garland refuses to acknowledge Antifa violence as domestic terrorism. And anyone who dares defend themselves against rioters will end up like the Proud Boys or Trump Supporters, denied bail and serving more prison time than actual murderers.
But there’s hope: Andy Ngo’s new bestselling book Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy, punches back. Through evidence, primary sources, and political theory,
“Ngo shows that far from being just an 'idea,' as President Joe Biden would have us believe, Antifa comprises highly organized groups of dedicated activists with an extreme political agenda and a commitment to violence. But Ngo also shows, perhaps less consciously, that Antifa operates with de-facto backing from the Ruling Class, including Main Stream Media journalists, the principal enforcers of the current order. “
— James Kirkpatrick, “Andy Ngo’s UNMASKED: Antifa — Not “Anarcho-Communism,” But Anarcho-Tyranny”
Ngo is a powerful voice against Antifa violence and, last June, launched an ongoing lawsuit against Rose City Antifa and others involved in assaulting him when he was attacked an independent journalist.
This April, we’ll be digging into Andy Ngo’s investigative work and accepting reader questions for our next podcast. We hope you’ll join us!
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Phyllis Schlafly
UPDATE: We’re thrilled to announce Ed Martin, president of Phyllis Schlafly Eagles and former Missouri Republican Party Chair, as our special guest this month on the VDARE Book Club Podcast! Ed Martin worked closely with Mrs. Schlafly and is the co-author of Mrs. Schlafly’s last book, The Conservative Case For Trump. Book club members, click the orange "mp3" button below to download the full episode! (Click here for the public segment of the podcast to share with friends.)
Phyllis Schlafly is one of the most important and accomplished movement conservatives in American history. She was a sound advocate of sensible immigration patriotism until her death, continuing to pen columns at 90-years-old. Michelle Malkin referred to her as the “godmother of America First.”
The title, A Choice Not An Echo, is a direct reference to 1964 Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater’s famous declaration, “I will not change my beliefs to win votes. I will offer a choice, not an echo.” But Goldwater faced enormous opposition by moneyed Northeast elites whom Schlafly refers to as “the kingmakers.” Today, we might use the terms Conservativism Inc., or the “donor class.”
Schlafly offers examples of how these “kingmakers” artificially limit the scope of choice Americans have in presidential candidates by limiting the distribution of information on some and reporting favorably on their favorite.
What would Schlafly think about Big Tech censorship? Or “room-service journalism” on the Biden-Harris administration? If she were alive today, she might discover A Choice Not An Echo is just as relevant today as it was in 1964.
Book Club members can download discussion questions and further reading materials by clicking the orange button below. Thank you for supporting VDARE!
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author John Derbyshire
UPDATE: 2/3/2021: John Derbyshire and James Kirkpatrick answer your questions and more in our podcast! Members can download the full audio episode below by clicking the orange ".mp3" button. Thank you for your support!
January is usually a refreshing time of reflection, resolutions and new beginnings. But so far, the news of 2021 is profoundly depressing. The Tech Totalitarian crackdown against patriots and the sitting president after the events of January 6th are reminiscent of Charlottesville fallout, except on a greater scale — even the sitting President now banned from at least 17 services (including Spotify of all things) [All the platforms that have banned or restricted Trump so far, by Sara Fischer and Ashley Gold, Axios, January 11,2021 and Opinion divided over Trump’s ban from social media, by Alex Hern, the Guardian, January 11, 2021].
Considering these two themes of 2021 — pessimism and reflection — we at the VDARE Book Club thought now is the time to bring back our celebrated pessimist, John Derbyshire (writer at VDARE.com and author of We Are Doomed), to engage in some reflection on The National Question.
You might say, “I am too depressed!” But John Derbyshire’s pessimism should not be confused with despair. Instead, in From the Dissident Right, Derbyshire offers frank, realistic discussion around the question, “Who Are We?” The answer lies in an honest discussion of race, ethnicity and identity.
As we enter February, John Derbyshire will appear with our host, James Kirkpatrick, on a Book Club exclusive podcast to discuss The National Question, how America sees itself, and how patriots have been fighting the intellectual battle to keep America American since he coined the term “Dissident Right.”
An excerpt from our discussion questions:
1. Regarding America’s possible futures, John Derbyshire says on p. 173 “The USA may thus stagger along indefinitely with a patched-up version of the present ethnic spoils system.”
Another possible future is on p. 175 – Derbyshire predicts totalitarianism, especially with “mass self-censorship.”
Do you think we’re about to make that transition, especially now, after events at the Capitol on January 6th, that politicians are talking about a domestic terrorism law that could apply to just about anyone?
2. I’m [James Kirkpatrick] known as the notorious pessimist, but John Derbyshire literally wrote a book called We Are Doomed.
What about you? Do you see a general decline of the West in Spenglerian terms [see The Decline of the West by Oswald Spengler], as something that is just unavoidable? Or is there already potential for something new to emerge?
Book Club members: click the orange buttons below to download your content!
Available formats: docx, docx, mp3
Author Michelle Malkin
In her 2019 expose Open Borders Inc., Michelle Malkin predicted this moment:
“It may seem paradoxical at this pivotal moment in American political history, with a president in office who is more vocal than any other on fundamental issues of sovereignty and self-determination, that America First voices are being stifled… But it makes perfect sense. Globalists are doing everything in their power to deny President Trump reelection in 2020.” p. xxi
Of course, this is now happening. Unlike the elected executive office, globalists, NGOs, and other unelected organizations with extraordinary finances wield enormous power. The president himself is censored on social media — arguably election interference [Allum Bokhari’s Deleted: GOP, Trump Learn The Hard Way — Laura Loomer Was Right!, by James Kirkpatrick on October 15, 2020]. And by the way, who’s funding these ballot harvesting schemes?
The fearless Michelle Malkin tackles the Soros-question, now verboten, naming ten categories of organizations receiving Open Society Foundations grants that are working to dissolve national sovereignty. But she doesn’t stop there. Her findings expose the SPLC "Hate Machine," Antifa, Hollywood, and the "alphabet soup" of NGOs working to undermine our country.
In November and December, read with us here! As Malkin says, "Follow the money, find the truth."
Part I and II available for download below:
Available formats: docx, docx
Author Steve Sailer
BONUS: Our podcast is up! Steve Sailer answers your reader-submitted questions on a podcast hosted by James Kirkaptrick. Check out Kirkpatrick’s summary of the discussion here. Click here to enjoy on Bitchute! Or click the orange .mp3 button below to download!
At this point, it’s universally accepted that the Democrats are presenting “Harris Administration together with Joe Biden” this November.
So, the VDARE.com book club wants to know: who is Kamala Harris?
Who does Kamala Harris think Kamala Harris is? (See earlier: Ann Coulter On Kamala Harris: How Do I Tell My Friend She’s Not ‘African-American’? and Kamala Harris — A Barely-Black “Immigrant American”?)
For insight, we’ll find out what Obama thinks about who Obama is by reading America’s Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama’s ‘Story of Race and Inheritance,’ in which Steve Sailer unpacks Obama’s autobiography Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance.
Book club members, click below! for discussion questions and further reading from our own James Kirkpatrick.
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Byron M. Roth
September BONUS: Prof. Byron Roth and James Kirkpatrick appear on a book club exclusive podcast to answer reader questions. Thank you all who participated! Download MP3 below.
By now, readers of VDARE.com are acutely aware of the many Perils of Diversity.
To name a few:
But now, the VDARE.com Book Club invites you to dive deeper and read with us Professor Byron M. Roth’s Perils of Diversity: Immigration and Human Nature.
Lauded by John Derbyshire as “a comprehensive, well-documented survey of all the issues,” Perils of Diversity makes sense of our current immigration disaster from a scientific, data-driven perspective.
Professor Roth’s book is only becoming more relevant. Itwillhas come to blood. So, it’s time to arm ourselves with arguments and facts. Grab a friend (or several!), download your book club content, and get reading!
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Samuel P. Huntington
In August, we invite you to ask "Who Are We?" with James Kirkpatrick, thoughtfully reading the late Samuel P. Huntington’s follow up to The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order titled Who Are We?: The Challenges to America’s National Identity.
In his seminal work The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, Samuel Huntington argued provocatively and presciently that with the end of the cold war, “civilizations” were replacing ideologies as the new fault lines in international politics.
Now in his controversial new work, Who Are We?, Huntington focuses on an identity crisis closer to home as he examines the impact other civilizations and their values are having on our own country.
We'll be asking:
“America did not begin in 1775, 1776, or 1787. It began with the first settler communities of 1607, 1620, and 1630…” p.40 “To describe America as a ‘nation of immigrants’ is to stretch a partial truth into a misleading falsehood, and to ignore the central fact of America’s beginning as a society of settlers.” P.46
Should we have a “1607 Project” as an alternative to the “1619 Project?” If America didn’t begin purely as a political project but is a settler society, what are the implications for American national identity and immigration policy.
and many more …
If you've subscribed to the book club, you can click the document buttons below to download your content.
Available formats: docx
Author James Kirkpatrick
Throughout the month of July, we'll sit down (virtually) with James Kirkpatrick to discuss his much anticipated first book, Conservatism Inc.: The Battle for the American Right.
In the podcast below, James Kirkpatrick is joined by John Derbyshire to read and discuss your questions.
If you've subscribed to the book club, you can click the document buttons below to download your content. Enjoy!
Available formats: docx, mp3
Author Lawrence Auster
For the month of June, we'll be reading the late Lawrence Auster’s magnum opus, Our Borders, Ourselves: America in the Age of Multiculturalism.
If you've subscribed to the book club, you can click the document buttons below to download your content.
We'll be asking questions such as:
Auster documents that there were those who supported the 1965 Immigration Act because they didn’t expect a massive change in America’s demographics, but also those who deliberately sought such a change, and achieved it through subterfuge. Do you believe the demographic change that took place in America was intended or was it an “accidental revolution?” and …
“A liberal is a person who sees his way of life being destroyed and concludes that he deserves it,” writes Auster. He identifies several roots of liberal guilt, including fear of non-whites, an inability to imagine an alternative, and above all, a response to the failure of social programs to achieve racial equality. The guilt “came from whites’ sickening realization that the dysfunction of racial animus that characterized black America could not be cured by anti-poverty programs and from whites’ urgent moral need to attribute those black ills to some agent other than the blacks themselves.”
Do you accept this analysis, or does white guilt come from other source? Should whites feel at least some sense of guilt for aspects of American history, such as slavery? Finally, is there a way to overcome this feeling of collective guilt or are whites doomed to feeling this way until they are destroyed or marginalized?
Available formats: docx
This is a content archive of VDARE.com, which Letitia James forced off of the Internet using lawfare.