As a result of the CMS article I received a request from Greg Johnson for an interview.  In turn, I requested a QA format because that allows me to think about my replies at leisure, and avoid a few of those inevitable foot-in-mouth moments.  Greg sent the first question this evening, to which I have replied as below.  I am going to build up the interview on this post, as we progress with it.

Question 1: Have you had any dealings with William Regnery? If so, what transpired?

Unusual place to start.  Back in 2007 Tom Sunic suggested that I make an introduction.  At the time I was interested in identifying and bringing together in a virtual but real-time environment a small group of people distinguished by the capacity for originality.  My experience of what passes for the apogee of radical right thinking - I mean foundational philosophy - was that it draws in large measure from the same wells as fascism and National Socialism, and from these ideologies themselves.  Of course, on both sides of the Atlantic there was also a quantity of serious thought given over to interpretation, analysis, strategising, protest, and so forth.  But there was nothing that I could see that was newly culled from a modern understanding of Man and Nature, and that opened out into an expansive and creative enquiry into the truths of who we are and how to live.

In the Anglosphere the thinking was, on one hand, essentially religious, meshing flawlessly with the 20th century fictions of a European spirit of race and mythic destiny, and, on the other, empirical, producing stone-cold certainties about human bio-diversity, sociobiology, gene interests, and so on.  It was (and is) a barren coupling.  I wanted to find some basis for reconciling the unreconcilable ... science and philosophy, truth and beauty, the New World and the Old, because then we might have a foundation on which others could build intellectually.  And we might, if we were lucky, come into possession not just of a reactionary critique of liberalism à la de Benoist but something shattering, something epochal and renewing.

I raised this heady notion with a few people I respect, some of whom are members of CMS.  I offered my own theory that one possible path to reconciliation was to move the philosophy into existentialism and the religion into esoterism ... at all times asking the question: what is true?

Perhaps not surprisingly, what I found was that, by and large, the scientists saw the point quickly.  The few philosophers I was able to talk to would not look beyond the famous “impossibility” of reconciling thought and experience.  It was clear, though, that in reality they were hostile to any threat to the Weltenschauung they had carved out by their own hand from the bedrock of the Western canon.  They were, I’m afraid, telling me that they did not possess the capacity of original thinking.  I believe few original thinkers, even those given to Idealism, would be disinterested in a group endeavour to change the European Mind.

So I let go of the group project and did not take up Tom’s suggestion of talking to William Regnery.  The only point of doing so would have been to use his contacts to potential participants.  Today, I am using MR to encourage an ontological approach to the problem.  It has many critics and disbelievers.  But they are not the ones who hold the key to the future.  Fascism will never be our new thought world, and will never gift us a sovereign and free European life.

The large number of intelligent, well-informed activists of 8 and 10 years ago who were enthusiastically engaged in a variety of preferred forms of activism appear to have closed shop, as I did, when Kevin MacDonald - most honorable star whose writings I was the first to distribute all over the Internet in 1997- and his super-secret CMS group–imposed a “top-down” template that made “creating a new elite” the Goal ... and themselves the Chosen Elite. The need for this “elite” to self-segregate is due to its members’ “higher level of sophistication”, as a well-known Nordicist put it.

… I stopped posting when I learned of the existence of the group upstairs - they could see us, but we couldn’t see them - they were too important to interact with anyone but each other. Apparently our function was to provide fodder for our betters to use in their writings; other than that, we should go off and form groups on our own. MacDonald’s list still exists, but of its 178 subscribers, only half a dozen post; that’s been the case for years. In 2002, CMS had less than 50 members; today it has twice as many. I know from insiders that if a member divulges a word about what they speak of, how many or who they are, anything about them, they’ll be removed. That would, of course, be worse than death. Last year, in my second (and last) brief email exchange with Greg Johnson, I happened to comment, “I support Kevin MacDonald, but not CMS.”  Like a scalded cat, Greg replies, “How do you know about them; it’s supposed to be secret!” - the next day his first article was published there; God forbid that people should not realize he’s an insider.

Any group of people has the right to set themselves up as a secret group and declare itself “elite.” And a lot of people, maybe most, have no problem with hierarchy - across the ocean Jonathan B and Troy S seem to favor it, too. Tom Sunic now refers to “my colleagues” in his broadcast and his new website is invitation-only. A few years ago, Ted Sallis did the same - a great loss to those on the outside who had been learning so much from his writings.

These statements are drawn from two comments on the Hunter thread by the redoubtable and true-hearted lady who comments as MOB.  The charge of elitism for its own sake is a serious one because it implies the relegation of the bond of blood to something worryingly like ... elitism.  It cannot be over-stated that the authenticity and legitimacy of leadership in a nationalist movement rests solely on that leadership’s blood ties to the people, with all that that implies for loyalty and purpose.  Having the smarts to be interested in complex analyses of White America’s political and demographic crisis is not enough.

Five hours after MOB made her second comment another redoubtable figure, Yggdrasil, turned up – for the first time ever on any MR thread as far as I am aware.  CMS, he said, is not a secret organisation but a confidential one.  No elitism or snobbery is implied.  The confidentiality simply serves to protect those involved, or who would be asked to become involved, against persecution and loss of livelihood.  Additionally, Ygg explained, confidentiality protects against (a) government agent penetration, (b) the kook tendency, and (c) the ego factor.

Well, if there is a difference between secrecy and confidentiality, I don’t know what it is.  Obviously, it doesn’t protect against government snooping.  Nothing does.  The best policy, actually, is openness - and pseudonyms where people wish.  As far as not inviting kooks and egotists to participate, fine.  Just don’t invite them.  No need to hide from them.  The hiding makes CMS look, if not elitist, at least putatively masonic.  My guess is that some of those involved also think, if only privately, that they have joined the “elite”.  Why not?  They have joined something, that’s clear - Ygg used the word “membership”.  But membership of what, exactly?  It’s confidential.  And with whom?  Confidential.  For what purpose?  Confidential.

There is something not right here.  I can’t put my finger on it, but it’s there – despite the wide-eyed denials.

I am minded of the Atlanta conference in late-2008 or early 2009, I forget now.  That, too, was confidential.  But when non-invitees enquired as to who was there and what was discussed, the only response was a terse “nothing of substance was proposed at Atlanta”.  Difficult to believe that was true.  I mean, what would be the point of dozens of “elite” American nationalists convening in Atlanta to arrive at a null conclusion?  That would be a huge failure.  Was it a coincidence, then,  when the formation of A3P was announced in January 2010?  Because if not … if Atlanta wasn’t, in fact, a failure ... if a political party was discussed, even in outline with a call for further research or a decision later, when more facts are known ... if that was the case, CMS is guilty not only of “confidentiality” but of lying.

Why?  Did A3P risk a still birth if a little frankness had prevailed?  Are we to believe that “government agents”, “kooks” and “egotists” would have leapt upon the nascent creature and torn it limb from limb?

Well, let’s bust the game open and note now that there are, in fact, only a limited number of nascent creatures White Nationalism can generate to shift the movement from on-line activity to full spectrum political activism.  These are:

a) A political party – A3P looks to be a pretty reasonable beginning.

b) A funding agency seeking long-term relationships with significant doners.

c) A national cultural organisation to reach out and connect to existing “implicitly white” cultural bodies and events.

d) A think tank generating analysis and policy solutions, tasked with informing not only the politics of the movement but the wider political and media sphere (this is not the National Policy Institute, which, sadly, resembles a standard on-line propaganda site no different to Amren).

e) An anti-defamation body – a template exists in ResistingDefamation.org.

f) A media and PR arm tasked with facilitating relations with journalists and opinion formers.  Yes, difficult but necessary.

And perhaps ...

g) A networking arm drawn from all units and, possibly, significant figures without the movement, the aim of which is to measure the performance of the movement and manage it consonant with its historical objective.

That, more or less, is what the secretive folks of CMS can actually discuss.  The political party excepted, they’ve only got to look at how Jewry goes about the task.  The template for success is right there.  They could also borrow some of that Jewish solidarity with and respect for their own people.  Practise what you preach.

by Graham Lister

Of Mere Being

The palm at the end of the mind,
Beyond the last thought, rises
In the bronze distance.

A gold-feathered bird
Sings in the palm, without human meaning,
Without human feeling, a foreign song.

You know then that it is not the reason
That makes us happy or unhappy.
The bird sings. Its feathers shine.

The palm stands on the edge of space.
The wind moves slowly in the branches.
The bird’s fire-fangled feathers dangle down.

Wallace Stevens, 1954

Given that certain philosophical issues (idealism versus materialism) have recently been raised on the blog and are, in my view central to any political practice, I thought I might give my brief and initial views on these topics.

Serious issues are multi-factorial and multi-faceted. Intellectuals, particularly of a certain Enlightenment/liberal type in the so-called social sciences and humanities, tend to want to make a neat division between “facts” and ‘values’. However, values enter into what counts as a “fact”. A large leap is involved in moving from “raw data” to a judgement of fact (even in the hard sciences).

The more complex an historical-cultural event is, and the more important the issues it raises contemporaneously, the less it is possible to sustain a simplified fact-value division. This does not imply that all there is is a conflict of prejudices and biases as data are manipulated to one worldview or another, rather that questions and answers are shaped by experiences, contexts, norms, values, and pre-existing beliefs. All those factors are bound to be relevant in how we judge the issue at hand.

A great deal can, of course, be learnt from those who do not share our presuppositions about both the strength and weakness of our position on a particular philosophical or political subject. For example, there is a whole ecology of anti-liberal positions and arguments, from a wide set of perspectives. Any sophisticated accounting of the problems generated by hyper-liberalism as experienced in our “postmodern” societies requires an appropriate and mature synthesis of these perspectives. One example I have in mind is the excellent critique of the hypocrisy and bankruptcy of the liberally-derived international legal-order by Danillo Zolo (Victors’ Justice: From Nuremberg to Baghdad). It is indeed a vulgar intellectual error to dismiss penetrating and powerful anti-liberal analysis, ipso facto, because one does not share the ultimate values and/or suggested prescriptions of the author.

Yet the image of ecology suggests that plurality and difference do not say all that is required. There are also inter-relationships, coinherence, communication and life-giving forms of unity which need not deny or violate legitimate difference. The outcome of experiencing, understanding, and knowing should be about the wisdom which is concerned for shaping a rich and sustaining individual and collective life; trying to making sense of what these forms of life may look like against a depressing background of continuing inorganic diversity and cultural fragmentation.

It is no accident, as old Marxist hacks used to say, that so much of the post-modern liberal world is profoundly ugly, in both form and spirit, and indeed is proud to be so (for example, in the built environment think of the baleful legacy of the “highbrow” Le Corbusier or the example of the undeniably “lowbrow” contemporary American shopping mall). The fragility of beauty, truth, and goodness – indeed any form of virtue - is aptly demonstrated by both those monstrosities.

Three crucial elements that shape our judgements are the world, self, and language (and the interplay between them). Obviously, this is a very complex subject but I will try to outline a non-reductionist yet materially-grounded account with an everyday ordinary object and demonstrate the multi-faceted phenomenon it actually is.

READ MORE...

Brett Stevens

There are two types of politics in this country: mainstream, for saying things that are socially acceptable, and underground, for saying things that if said on television would bring a wave of condemnation from folks trying to prove they’re better than me or you.

In underground politics, people talk about diversity and political correctness as the destructive things they are. No one dares do that in mainstream politics, although they hint at it and will dance around it because it makes their audience momentarily hope.

Not one mainstream conservative has ever identified himself as racialist.

READ MORE...

Kay Burley is a long-serving news reporter with Sky News.  She has her own three-hour slot each afternoon, and has reported on many major news stories.  She is not a novice, not someone who would be unaware of what is required.  And what is required is very apparent here, in this video of a plainly spiked interview she conducted with a shopkeeper who experienced the London riots.

Kay Burley: What happened?

Big Jim: About ten o-clock I got texts saying that one of my other stores was being raided. I came down. By eleven o’clock there was at least a hundred ... two hundred black youths with hoodies and stuff just rampaging every shop.

Kay Burley: You’re not being stereotypical there?  You’re not sure ... are you sure ...

Big Jim: I was there with a hoodie.

Kay Burley: Are you sure that they were black?

Big Jim: I was ... I was there with my hood ...

Kay Burley: I’m sure they weren’t all black, were they? (inaudible)

Big Jim: OK, then. Let me then to say they weren’t all black. I was the white guy there.

Kay Burley:  Well, there were probably other white guys there as well.

Big Jim: I didn’t see any.

Kay Burley: When we’ve run the pictures they’ll be ...

Hat tip to Road Hog posting at the BNP section of British Democracy Forum

The gay hussar of BBC history, David Starkey, never a man to turn down the opportunity to provoke, has passed judgement on the white looters who so faithfully copied their black gangsta idols last week.  They have become black, he said.  At least, culturally (he had to say “culturally” because anything else would put a spectacular stop to all future BBC programme commissions).  But it was enough.  Cue the attempts by the Jewish presenter and Starkey’s two fellow talking heads, all three of them even more objectionable than he is, to stop the man approximating truth again.

Meanwhile at the Telegraph, Toby Young’s weak-tea support for Starkey has garnered over three thousand comments so far, many of them uncompromising in sentiment and language.  The mods haven’t been able to keep up!  Likewise with Peter Oborne’s piece on the Tottenham riot which has clocked up well over four thousand comments in two days.

It is starting to look like Humpty-Dumpty, the politically-correct bad egg, has been given a good push in the back.

by Graham Lister

It is my opinion that Michel Houellebecq should be on the reading list of any committed non-liberal - assuming, of course, this paragon of nationalist virtue is interested in culture. And I think people who are seriously interested in understanding the grotesque spectacle of post-modern, ultra-liberal, hyper-modernity should be so interested. Cultural values are at the core of self-conception and define the contours of the political imagination.

The malaise facing the West goes far deeper than PeeCee and multiculturalism, even if they can be regarded as the most egregious symptoms of our total embrace of liberalism (that is, liberalism as the foundational paradigm for politics, culture, economics et al, rather than a secondary “corrective” ideology which is how classical liberalism arose).

Unfortunately no-one has a positive agenda to rebalance the West upon a sustainable course. There are of course some excellent critiques of the problems but, as yet, no really credible, putative solution has coalesced into a substantive form.

A comments elsewhere on the blog mentioned the spurning of Houellebecq, and I want to return to that. It strikes me that American nationalists in particular have a very narrow range of “cultural resources” that they bring to their politics. This also is true of many ‘nationalists’ across the board. How many times have the virtues of institutional religion (typically in the ‘Jesusland’ style) been offered as the “solution”, or indeed some bizarre “new”  version of fascism offered up? Pardon the paradox but both are deeply trivial non-answers (for rather obvious reasons). The exhaustion of the already exiguous political and cultural imagination of nationalists is palpable (neo-Nazi techno anyone??? - Jesus wept). There is, sadly, a lack of genuine radicalism or innovative thought – in the true sense of thinking about these issues both deeply and widely, and in being ruthless in the analysis of old assumptions and outdated or discredited shibboleths.

Returning to Houellebecq, he is deeply anti-American in outlook, and this animosity is not without very good reason. It seems that, in general, Americans - nationalists often included - completely fail to understand that their own nation is the most profoundly liberal nation in history. America was conceived as an inorganic “social experiment” in terms of Enlightenment-derived individual liberty. Individualistic liberalism is the true American ideology/religion. To be sure, it is not the only theme in American life but the others have been peripheral to the cardinal (liberal) impetus animating American culture and society. I have encountered very few American non-liberals (a Hayekian liberal who thinks he is a conservative is still a sub-species of the liberal genus). The axiomatic and defining role of liberal philosophy in American society is something that the overwhelming mass of American people, even self-described conservatives and nationalists, have a very hard time understanding. Collectively, America has drunk from that particular (liberal) well more deeply, and for longer, than any European society.

Of course, all of the West has caught the liberal disease which is deeply corrosive to the collective well-being of ordinary Europeans – truly, we are Voltaire’s bastards. To be sustainable, any society must balance the collective interests - those unifying forces that build cohesion and social capital - and the legitimate individual impulses that invariably tend to differentiation and fragmentation. Equally, a balance must exist between the interests and desires of the present generation and those to whom we will bequeath our collective life and national community. That is why post-liberal politics is actually the “radical centre”. It is a fulcrum conceptualised, for me, in more Aristotelian terms. It is not simply the centre as conceived in the conventional political spectrum, which presently represents only relative variations of liberal political philosophy.

A final thought on American nationalist thinking. I note that the ideal of white Zion has been floated on the blog. Nothing ... nothing illustrates the difference being the inorganic, propositional societies of the New World and the organic ones of “old” Europeans. The idea that whites should move to one place is the ultimate in white-flight fantasies, and is a council of despair. No European patriot could possibly think that abandoning our ancestral homelands represents anything other than the nadir of complete and humiliating defeat. 

Why should the British tribes (the Anglos and the Celts) give up our homelands? When I am in the beautiful Highlands of Scotland I reflect on all those generations that lived in this land before me and bequeathed it to us, and I feel deeply connected to the past. What right do we have to surrender our inheritance? Do we really want to run off like cowards scared into self-destruction when faced by some uppity Africans and Pakistanis? Our American friends must try to solve their own problems in a way they judge is appropriate to their situation. However as a European patriot, I for one, will never surrender – anything else is little short of traitorous.

P.S. So we have Houellebecq as a dissector of liberal cultural values, and I would also suggest Ballard and Coetzee in this regard also. But who else might be on the “contemporary literature” reading list for the by no means narrow-minded non-liberal?

These appear to be locals, not the EDL (though they are certainly trying to get involved).

If this catches on, the Establishment will have a heart attack.  Watch for senior Met brass warning against vigilantism.

Hat-tip to PM.