Conservative Conversation and Community
Dennis Prager has a really interesting article out, called “What Is Judaism?” Mr. Prager has written and taught on the subject (including two years as a member of the Brooklyn College Department of Judaic Studies). This is how he leads:
MoreIf you’ve ever wondered what Judaism is, here is a list of its principal beliefs. This is not an official list, but these beliefs have been widely held by religious Jews for thousands of years.
Dennis Prager has a great article in The Daily Signal on how the progressive rejection of societal norms is driving their childish antics. Leftists are the only source of their values. Leftists not only believe they know what is right—conservatives, too, believe they are right—but they also believe they are morally superior to all others. […]
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Jim is back! Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America applaud North Dakota Rep. Kevin Cramer for his powerful ad slamming Sen. Heidi Heitkamp for supporting sanctuary cities and for doing so with the right tone. They also hammer Facebook for censoring numerous Prager U videos and labeling them “hate speech” […]
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For this week’s Big Ideas with Ben Weingarten podcast, I had nationally syndicated radio host, columnist, author of numerous books, teacher, film producer and co-founder of PragerU, Dennis Prager, on the podcast to discuss among other things:
You can find the episode on iTunes, everywhere else podcasts are found, download the episode directly here or read the transcript here.
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Its a sad truth that I’ve learned more useful information from PragerU then my 5 solid years at my state’s regional university . It really wasn’t the school’s fault (looking back). I had a get time at school and as I’ve said before, “I was a lot of fun back in the day”. Well, I […]
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The National Anthem kneelers protest America because, racism. Hopefully, they will listen and learn to our good friends at PragerU. More
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Mark 8:36King James Version (KJV) 36 For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? More
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Dennis Prager sits down with Dave at #Politicon to discuss Jews on the Left, free speech on the college campus, why it’s not enough to prevent conservatives from speaking; it is now necessary to prevent conservatives from appearing even when not speaking (the Left’s effort to not allow Dennis to make music in Los Angeles). We also discuss how Leftist intellectuals are in fact not intellectual and Dennis responds to the young ‘man’ who called him a “Nazi” right before our interview. Follow Dennis on Facebook, Twitter and PragerU for their must see videos (500 million viewers can’t be wrong!)
If you are enjoying the series, please subscribe to Whiskey Politics at YouTube and our audio podcasts at iTunes, Stitcher or GooglePlay where your 5-star rating would be appreciated (iTunes especially!) as it helps others find us. In: Little Green Bag, George Baker Selection. Out: Take Five, Dave Brubeck. Produced by Praemonitus Communications, pictures by Thompson Clicks Photos.
I need to take issue with something @dennisprager said in his recent appearance on the Ricochet flagship podcast. He was there as part of the larger conversation around his recent National Review piece about why conservatives continue to attack the President. At 44:48, Prager spoke of his puzzlement about why conservatives fixate on what the President says. Specifically, the President’s tweets. Prager said, “I don’t give a hoot what he tweets,” and explained that it matters what he does, not what he Tweets.
Okay, so here’s the problem with that: We can’t just ignore Donald Trump’s tweets. They matter because each tweet is a public statement by the President of the United States. What he tweets cannot be separated from what he does because public statements are part of what a President does. This isn’t something overheard at a cocktail party or caught on a hot mic, these are public statements the President makes under his own name.
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Last year, Donald Trump’s candidacy presented conservatives a high-stakes proposition. Those who eventually became ReluctantTrump decided that the opportunities the candidate offered outweighed the risks, while those who became NeverTrump determined that the risks exceeded the potential gains. Despite common perception and the (genuine) rancor, the schism was often a close thing. At various stages of the campaign, it wasn’t hard to find nominally pro-Trump conservatives wondering if there was a way to talk a flailing and failing Trump into handing his candidacy over to Mike Pence. Likewise, many nominally anti-Trump conservatives wavered when considering whether they really wanted to sit-out a battle to keep Hillary Clinton out of the Oval Office. Often, the line separating Trump and NeverTrump passed right through the conservative heart.
Four months into Trump’s presidency, this intra-Right fight continues and, in some quarters, has deepened, with people on both sides hurtling insults and accusations of bias at each other. There are several causes for this, but the primary one is the lamentable desire we all feel to vindicate the high-stakes choices we made last fall and most people’s inability to recognize the same in themselves. That, more than anything, is what made Dennis Prager’s recent column imploring former NeverTrumpers to get over themselves so lamentable and frustrating.
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The great irony of politics is that it rewards loyalty with neglect and heaps attention on the uncommitted. Saying your vote can be counted on is a guaranteed way to get ignored, while letting it be known that you’re willing to deal (for the right price, of course) means people will fawn over you. It’s not a good system, it’s just the one we’re stuck us with.
If conservatives ever knew this, we forgot it completely when Donald Trump strode onto the political stage. As I describe in a piece on The Federalist, very nearly all of us — NeverTrumpers, Trumpkins, and ReluctantTrumpers alike — overcommitted ourselves at the outset, losing whatever degree of influence or control we might have had over the Republican nominee.
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I did not see this at Ricochet. The column, by one of our Contributors, appeared on the editorial page of the gosh-awful Leftist newspaper that soils my driveway each morning. This Leftist newspaper has printed more columns by “Republicans” in the past four months than in the previous year, or any previous year, since their founding in 1841. These editorials by “Republicans” have all been disdainful and disparaging of the GOP nominee. This particular example is more of the same. I am writing to take issue with one paragraph:
MoreConservatives, particularly religious conservatives, who have rallied to Trump have squandered their own integrity and tainted the reputation of conservatism. They signed on for all of this when they saluted smartly and, in effect, acknowledged that all that character talk about Bill Clinton was so much gas.
When I worked as an ACT/SAT tutor, I sometimes got to chat with my students after the lesson finished. Given the opportunity, I’d offer the following advice: 1) In choosing majors, consider both what you enjoy learning about and what someone else will pay you enough to do to make a living, and 2) Understand that these need not be the same thing. People who are particularly diligent, talented, and lucky sometimes get to be paid to follow their passions; most folks don’t and very few who do get to do so straight out of school. Moreover, is there absolutely nothing dishonorable or disappointing in using your remunerative work to finance your actual passions. That’s the point about passions, anyway: You’re interested in them even when you’re not getting paid to pursue them.
In a new Prager U video addressed to graduates, Mike Rowe made not only that point, but took it several excellent steps further:
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Yesterday, Dennis Prager wrote a well-reasoned column to those who have declared they can not — or will not — vote for Donald Trump. He addresses the conscience issue, then gives nine reasons why a conservative should prefer a Trump presidency to a Democrat presidency:
- Prevent a left-wing Supreme Court.
- Increase the defense budget.
- Repeal, or at least modify, the Dodd-Frank act.
- Prevent Washington, D.C. from becoming a state and giving the Democrats another two permanent senators.
- Repeal Obamacare.
- Curtail illegal immigration, a goal that doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with xenophobia or nativism (just look at Western Europe).
- Reduce job-killing regulations on large and small businesses.
- Lower the corporate income tax and bring back hundreds of billions of offshore dollars to the United States.
- Continue fracking, which the left, in its science-rejecting hysteria, opposes.
He closes:
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I think he does an excellent, very touching celebration of its meaning: http://www.prageruniversity.com/History/The-4th-of-July-Declaration.html#.VZeZ5_y2Wpo More
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In Still the Best Hope, Dennis Prager argues that American values — roughly, the small-l liberal values that underlie the Declaration of Independence and U. S. Constitution — demand to be exported. Elsewhere, Prager describes these values as the American Trinity: the beliefs in a transcendent God, in liberty, and in the emphasis of culture and values over ethnicity or race. These values, he says, can be adopted around the world and integrated into existing national identities. We can quibble with the definitions and the choice of words, but Prager’s onto something profound here.
While there’s much Americans — or those from Anglosphere countries with similar values — can and should do to help others, the ultimate burden falls on those elsewhere. Doing so often takes tremendous effort and even great courage. July Fourth seems as a good a time as any to honor those who’ve risked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to further the ideals exemplified by the American Revolution.
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That is reason enough for every Dennis Prager listener to join Ricochet! We’re talking millions of people… More
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Here at Ricochet, we’re big on reminding you that our site isn’t like the rest of the Internet: we’ve got smarter, better, conversation than you’ll find anywhere else, without the trolls. Our members have real expertise and their posts and comments can and do get picked up in the broader media, which are two two of the many reasons you should join (use the coupon code “MAY” to get a free month).
But we’re not the only ones doing things right. One of the truly great things that’s come out of the last few years is the explosion of the short educational video. Such things predate the YouTube era, of course, but they were more likely to wind-up on Mystery Science Theater 3000 than to be sincerely recommended to — let alone willingly watched by — friends.
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Discussing a New York Times op-ed by a college professor about how young people are taught that all value statements are matters of mere opinion, Dennis Prager blamed the problem on a lack of religious faith. He went on to say that the kids have the logic, if not the conclusion: without religion, all moral statements have no truth claim:
MoreIf God doesn’t say “Do not murder,” murder isn’t wrong. Period, end of issue… Morality [becomes] just an opinion for “I like” or “I don’t like” if ultimately, there is no moral God in the universe that makes morality real. Without religion and God, there is no moral truth…
George Will’s Prager University video on the regulation of political speech is one of the best the site has ever produced: it’s insightful, slick, and hard-hitting without being explicitly partisan. Watch the whole thing and post it on Facebook; it might get someone thinking. Towards the end, however, Will makes a point in passing that deserved more attention:
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