Just when you thought the Huffington Post couldn't become any more self-parodying, someone comes along to make it even more laughable:

Despite his background as a comedian, Stephen Colbert is known by many of the authors who have appeared on his show as one of the toughest interviewers in the business. But on July 28, when country music superstar Toby Keith stepped on the set of the Colbert Report to promote his movie, Beer For My Horses, he was greeted by his host with nothing less than reverential admiration. After a jovial, back-slapping sit-down with Keith, Colbert turned the stage over to his guest for a performance of the song that inspired the title and theme of his forthcoming "Southern comedy."

While Keith belted out "Beer For My Horses," Colbert's studio audience clapped to the beat, blithely unaware that they were swaying to a racially tinged, explicitly pro-lynching anthem that calls for the vigilante-style hanging of car thieves, "gangsters doing dirty deeds...crime in the streets," and other assorted evildoers.

Or perhaps Colbert, his audience, and the millions of people who have heard this song since it first hit number 1 in 2003 are simply far more grounded in reality than Mr. Max Blumenthal, who apparently sees a chance to scream "oppression!" behind every rock, tree, and country-western movie and music lyric.

After listing the lyrics to what was until now the uncontroversial lyrics of a song
about a "thirst for justice," Blumenthal whines that:

During the days when Toby Keith's "Grandpappy" stalked the Jim Crow South, lynching was an institutional method of terror employed against blacks to maintain white supremacy.

Though it will doubtlessly come as a shock to Mr. Blumenthal, this song, co-written by Scotty Emerick, is not autobiographical, any more than Keith's "I Love This Bar" is an ode to an illicit man-on-mahogany affair.

The song is entirely fictional and rhetorically set in the Old West, as the imagery of horses, whiskey, saloons, gun smoke, outlaws, and the "long arm of the law" clearly evoked for anyone reasonably grounded in this reality.

Conveniently,Blumenthal glosses over that the lyrics of Keith's song include the all-important words "It's time the long arm of the law put a few more in the ground." This singularly expressed and culturally understood idea of the Old West deputized posse, led by sheriffs and marshalls operating under the color of law and made famous in hundreds of western movies and television shows over decades as part of our shared cultural heritage that Keith is drawing on utterly undermines Blumenthal's creation.

It is a delusion undone, revealing far more about Blumenthal's tortured psychology than Keith's lyrics, Colbert's insightfulness, or America's past.

Mr. Keith has every right to whimsically sing about whiskey for his men and beer for his horses, even as he might suggest that Mr. Blumenthal can (and probably should) take a nice tranquilizer with his merlot.

Perhaps for tomorrow's amusement Arianna Huffington can find a delusion even more spectacular than Blumental's latest—with Naomi Wolf lurking in the background, that is always a possibility—it's that prospect of ever more unintentionally funny, lethally-refined insanity that keep us coming back, time and again.

08/08/08 Update: Toby Keith himself hears about Blumenthal's moronic lynching claims, and tees off:

"It's about the old west and horses and sheriffs and posses and going and getting the bad guys. It's not a racist thing or about lynching. The song was a hit and the words lynch and racism has never come up until this moron wrote this blog."

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 01:44 PM | Comments (36) | Add Comment
Post contains 593 words, total size 4 kb.

1 I find stupidity like this frustrating as well, but I have long ago realized that ANYTHING pro-America or showing even the slightest bit of pride in our shared heritage is going to come under attack from the left. In Gainesville they passed a law to protect the LGBT community from prejudice, end result, a man can walk into ladies restrooms and changing areas freely... the catch? All he has to say is that in his head "he feels" like a woman. Nice huh? Thanks Liberalism...

Posted by: Buffoon at July 29, 2008 02:25 PM (EsVCm)

2 What is this guy smoking? Its a song about criminals getting the justice they deserve. If the Left wants to get bent out of shape they should at least get bent out of shape about what its rally advocating which is the increased use of the death penalty for those deserving. No where in the song does it mention lynching, it mentions hanging which was an approved method of execution for quite a while.

Posted by: Reason at July 29, 2008 02:25 PM (FaCaW)

3 Racist undertones in country songs? Scorn for Colbert selling out? HuffPoo has finally become a parody of itself.

Posted by: BohicaTwentyTwo at July 29, 2008 03:16 PM (oC8nQ)

4 Mr. Kieth sang that bad boy for us at Camp Victory in 2004... the troops (and me) went completely off the chain for it... He's one of the few entertainers who makes a regular effort to come over and see us with the USO... Blu-mental-hal can suck it...

Posted by: Big Country at July 29, 2008 04:10 PM (9dP7o)

5 Did you know that Johnny Cash shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die?

Posted by: Techie at July 29, 2008 04:24 PM (UyfPZ)

6 But when he hears that whistle blowing, he hangs his head and cries... Why? "And I ain't seen the sunshine since I don't know when, I'm stuck in Folsom prison, and time keeps draggin' on."

Posted by: Reason at July 29, 2008 04:30 PM (FaCaW)

7 Now that I think about it, didn't Willie Nelson sing the song to? Now, there's a Bushitler, knuckledragging, Republikkkan if I've ever seen one.

Posted by: Techie at July 29, 2008 04:32 PM (UyfPZ)

8 And Merle Haggard turned 21 in prison doin life without parole. And Stonewall Jackson broke out of the Naqshville jail and Johnny Paycheck robbed a liquor stor in Atlanta and somebody threw their bones in Miller's Cave. I mean it just goes on and on and on....

Posted by: Bandit at July 29, 2008 04:50 PM (D3sAj)

9 While Blumenthal has been hit in the head by Toby Keith's song and is running around in circles screeching "the sky is falling, the sky is falling" there exists an equally disturbing type of foolish person in our society. This foolish person seems to lack the ability or knowledge, perhaps both, to fathom that the reality of life in this mythic "old west" was not as simple as Grandpappy's wisdom would lead you to believe. In fact, neither is the present, much to their disappointment. The Old West was not a western movie where you hung the bad guys because you just saw them do bad things or the hero's dog pees on their leg. A lack of law enforcement, if there were laws, was dealt with through vigilantism. While expedient it lacked the due process we enjoy today and risked hanging innocents. Racist lynchings went way beyond justice into truly heinous, vicious mob violence bordering on ritualistic sacrifice. Blumenthal is Chicken Little but those who are looking at justice through John Wayne movie eyeglasses aren't any brighter.

Posted by: j swift at July 29, 2008 05:08 PM (fMU2X)

10 Hmm...Mr. Blumenthal is probably one of those guys who drove by the old man laying in the street after he got ran over. Or the five people who stepped over the woman bleeding to death in the grocery store after he boyfriend stabbed her. and took pictures, too. Or, those bunch of people who stood around and watched a grown man stomp a two year old to death. That is why these folks are so disconnected from the rest of us. We think "look, bad thing happening, do something." (point of the song, entirely). They think, "oh, that's a shame, somebody should really do something" and don't even bother to call the police. toby's song resonates because people get frustrated with the seeming inconsistant judicial system and what seems to be a societal gravitational pull towards excusing people's behavior. If ol' Blumers doesn't want to hear songs like that, he can turn off his TV and radio. In the end, though, I think ol' Blumers probably hasn't liked Toby since he wrote "courtesy of the red, white and blue". You know, that just wasn't very politically nuanced nor understanding of the great misdeeds that America has perpetrated against the Middle East and other nations. /sarcasm

Posted by: kat-missouri at July 29, 2008 05:25 PM (YLs4U)

11 Not being a big listener of country music, I wasn't familiar with the song so I went over to last.fm to listen to it. I am sorry I missed it when it first came out.

Posted by: Michael Pate at July 29, 2008 05:36 PM (2Km1S)

12 One wonders how vociferous Mr. Blumenthal is about "gangsta rap" and the many crimes, including rape and murder, that are advocated in those so-called "songs." I suspect, he was strangely silent about that issue. After all, he couldn't blame those lyrics on "right-wingers."

Posted by: C-C-G at July 29, 2008 06:50 PM (vCJA9)

13 Toby Keith and Willie Nelson did the song as a duet. Why didn't Blumenthal pick on Willie? Toby Keith has the sense to keep his politics to himself and recognize he is selling entertainment. It's a very entertaining song, not a political message.

Posted by: Retread at July 29, 2008 06:55 PM (sB3Iz)

14 I think the Democrat party used their terror wing, the KKK, very effectively. Ever since the civil war, when the job of the KKK was to keep the blacks in the former slave states in line. However, having grown up in the south, I didn't find lynching that prevalent, in fact I doubt there were any in my neighborhood. We did have plenty of Democrat KKK types knock on our door at election time and inform us of the consequences of not 'voting for the right candidate' though. Perhaps, Mr. Max Blumenthal has some sins he wants to share with the rest of us? The song is just funny, liberals not so much. And I am getting tired of liberal Democrats attempting to brand Republicans with their sins.

Posted by: bill-tb at July 30, 2008 07:36 AM (7evkT)

15 You guys keep on running against the Democratic Party of 1928. It's almost as pathetic as trying to tell me "the six o'clock news" is an Old West reference.

Posted by: Sarcastro at July 30, 2008 01:09 PM (L761i)

16 The song is entirely fictional and rhetorically set in the Old West, as the imagery of horses, whiskey, saloons, gun smoke, outlaws, and the "long arm of the law" clearly evoked for anyone reasonably grounded in this reality. Funny, I don't see anything in the lyrics to support that. The song's narrator puts the lynching "back in [the] day" of his "grandpappy." Even if the narrator is supposed to be older than the songwriters (b. 1961 and 1973), that doesn't get you much past the early 20th century, well within the Jim Crow era (and at best at the tail end of the Old West era). The two overlap substantially, so there's no necessary conflict, but your criticism on these grounds is silly. And there's just no reason to think that the rest of the song is about the old west rather than today. Unless you're under the impression that the 6 oÂ’clock news was a feature of western towns. What, did they use a town crier or something? Also, your strange idea that the phrase "the long arm of the law" is universally understood to reference the posses of the old west is, frankly, absurd. Can you give any support for this? I suspect you pulled it right out of your ass, but I'm willing to be corrected. Oh, and as for the bit about the "imagery of horses, whiskey, etc..." proving the old west setting, you are aware that country singers (and their fans) often use such imagery figuratively? You know, like saying "saddle up" when you're actually planning to drive somewhere rather than riding a horse? You can criticize Blumenthal for making too much of a song if you like (I'd probably agree as far as that goes), but your assertions that the song isn't actually a celebration of vigilante justice and has nothing to do with current events is just bizarre. Maybe you could try a less unhinged style of criticism, without the repeated reference to "delusions". Then again, maybe you should just write what you know.

Posted by: Larv at July 30, 2008 03:01 PM (6YCw9)

17 Mark, I am familiar with the song. I'm not sure what would make you think otherwise. I'm not familiar with the video, but that's pretty much irrelevant. The song predates the video, and videos are (IME) frequently made with only a tangential connection to the lyrics of the song. Are you suggesting that songs are uninterpretable in the absense of an accompanying video? Makes you wonder what music fans did before MTV. Look, songs are written as songs, not videos, and are generally performed without video accompaniment. As such, they can stand or fall on their own merits. Instead of making ignorant deductions about my supposed ignorance, maybe you'd care to supply some of the context I'm supposedly missing out on?

Posted by: Larv at July 30, 2008 04:12 PM (6YCw9)

18 Mark, It is true the song was recorded before the video was made. However, the two are inseparable due to their conjoined release. Um, no, actually they aren't. You even say so: "the song was recorded before the video was made." So they were produced separately, but are nevertheless somehow inseperable (presumably in some non-chronological sense). Is it your contention that they were both written at the same time? This seems highly unlikely, so I'd like to see some support for it if so. Ok, so I watched the video, and I'm utterly confused about what context I was supposed to see. It's sure not set in the old west. Is it that the protagonists in the video are law enforcement, so the song can't be about vigilantism? This seems directly contradicted by the lyrics, which as we've established precedes the video: Take all the rope in texas Find a tall oak tree, round up all of them bad boys Hang them high in the street for all the people to see that Even in the old west, they didn't hang people from trees unless they were in a hurry. You have time for a trial, you have time to build a gallows. Hanging somebody from a tree is, to use CYs words, a "singularly expressed and culturally understood" symbol of a lynching. Even if it's done by a posse, it's still a lynching. Also: We got too many gangsters doing dirty deeds Weve got too much corruption, too much crime in the streets Its time the long arm of the law put a few more in the ground This is at best ambiguous. It does say "the law" and so can be taken to refer to law enforcement. But vigilantes generally see themselves as agents of the law, taking over when legitimate agents refuse to act. Combined with the earlier lyrics, it's hardly delusional to think it's a reference to vigilantism. The actual justice system doesn't generally execute people for "doing dirty deeds" (even if they were done dirt cheap), or corruption, or "crime in the street," unless it's murder. Maybe you read it as a critique of our judicial system and a recommendation that capital punishment be extended to lesser crimes like stealing cars? Look, I don't think it's worthwhile criticizing songs as if the writer meant every word of it. Hyperbole and overstatement are common in most musical genres. I don't really think Keith is actually recommending increased lynching as a solution to society's problems. But that is the plain meaning of the lyrics, and CY is pretending that it isn't, that instead it's just a song about the good old west. Sorry, but it's about vigilantism.

Posted by: Larv at July 30, 2008 06:01 PM (k8PBw)

19 You guys keep on running against the Democratic Party of 1928. Maybe that's because the Democrats haven't updated their policies since about that time...still pushing big government as the answer for every perceived problem.

Posted by: C-C-G at July 30, 2008 06:44 PM (vCJA9)

20 And still trying to paint Republicans with that racist history, pretty much as they have painted nazis -- the contraction of the the German words for National SOCIALISM -- as RIGHT wing, when they were, in fact, far to the LEFT, and had a treaty with Stalin's USSR, until Hitler double crossed them.

Posted by: Bill Smith at July 30, 2008 07:21 PM (LCyEC)

21 Larv - It's a song. Just a song. If you don't like it, don't listen. It must be nice to have so much time on your hands to disect a song.

Posted by: Michael Smith at July 31, 2008 08:24 AM (j1ILX)

22 Larv - It's a song. Just a song. If you don't like it, don't listen. It must be nice to have so much time on your hands to disect a song.

Posted by: Michael Smith at July 31, 2008 08:24 AM (j1ILX)

23 Larv - It's a song. Just a song. If you don't like it, don't listen. It must be nice to have so much time on your hands to disect a song.

Posted by: Michael Smith at July 31, 2008 08:24 AM (j1ILX)

24 Mark, You keep trying to pretend that the song is the video is the song. It isn't. It simply doesn't matter if they were released together, that's just a marketing decision. The video is an interpretation of the song, it isn't the song itself. Otherwise the video director would get equal creative credit. Statements like "the perp in the song/video is a rapist/murderer" therefore make no sense, because the video is not the song. You keep claiming that because the bad guy in the video is a killer, that must be what the song is about, but the lyrics just don't support you at all. "Weve got too much corruption, too much crime in the streets/Its time the long arm of the law put a few more in the ground" Do you think that increased execution of murderers is going to act as a deterrent against corruption? That seems a bit questionable. Put those "old west" words into the context of the old Texas Rangers (albeit romanticized a bit much in the song and video) and you now have the context of "lynching". It happened a heck of a lot more 80+ years ago than in today's law enforcement. Okay, and? The point of the initial criticism (by Blumenthal) was that the song glorifies lynching. That lynching was once more popular than it is today doesn't change that. And I don't care if it's Texas Rangers doing the stringing up, it's still lynching. And you pretty much grant my point in the rest of your comment. The justice sytem isn't killing enough criminals to create a sufficient deterrent. This is exactly the justification most vigilantes use to justify their vigilantism. I assume you saw the Death Wish movies back in the day. Isn't that exactly what Chuck Bronson was doing? You keep claiming that because the bad guy in the video is a killer, that must be what the song is about, but the lyrics just don't support you at all. "Weve got too much corruption, too much crime in the streets/Its time the long arm of the law put a few more in the ground" Do you think that increased execution of murderers is going to act as a deterrent against corruption? That seems a bit questionable.

Posted by: Larv at July 31, 2008 09:23 AM (6YCw9)

25 Michael Smith: It's a song. Just a song. If you don't like it, don't listen. It must be nice to have so much time on your hands to disect a song. Yeah, I acknowledged that in my last comment yesterday. I'm not criticizing the song, I'm criticizing the attempt to pretend it's about something other than what it is. The Dead Kennedys have a song called "Lets Lynch the Landlord." Guess what, I don't think they're actually advocating murder. But it'd be pretty stupid to try and claim that the song's not really about killing landlords. And yes, I do have a lot of time on my hands. Slow days at work this week. Just as a bonus, from Bill Smith:And still trying to paint Republicans with that racist history, pretty much as they have painted nazis -- the contraction of the the German words for National SOCIALISM -- as RIGHT wing, when they were, in fact, far to the LEFT, and had a treaty with Stalin's USSR, until Hitler double crossed them. This may be the stupidest thing I've read this week. Yeah, that's why the Nazis hated the German Communists and sent them to the concentration camps before almost anyone else, because they were just so similar. Seriously, the utter ignorance of history or political science required to say this is mind-boggling. The treaty between the Nazis and the Soviets wasn't a matter of political alliance, it was simple pragmatism: they both hated their loss of territory after WWI, and Molotov-Ribbentrop was a way of regaining possesions in Eastern Europe while avoiding a two-front war for either(the Russians were at war with the Japanese whan it was signed). But no, the fact that Socialist was in the name of the Nazi party is obviously the dispositive factor here. Or not.

Posted by: Larv at July 31, 2008 10:15 AM (6YCw9)

26 Hey, you're not me! Identity theft! I agree that it's enough, neither of us is going to convince the other. I'm just bored and this is a diverting argument. I think it's a serious mistake to view a song/video as a cohesive artistic statement, though. That just isn't how music is made. I also think you're making a serious error in drawing a hard line between the lynching of criminals and blacks or other minorities. The Blumenthal piece that started this mentions the case of a Jewish man, Leo Frank, who was wrongly convicted of murder. When his innocence became obvious and his sentence was commuted, angry citizens broke into the jail, kidnapped him, and lynched him. The rhetoric used by his killers was transparently racist. Now, did they lynch him because he was a "criminal", or because he was a Jew? Maybe you're confident that lynchers are always careful to make that distinction, but I'm not.

Posted by: Larv at July 31, 2008 11:39 AM (6YCw9)

27 Oh, and incidentally, the Soviets and the Japanese were not, in fact, at war in 1939. There had been a series of border skirmishes which the Russians had won (known as the battle of Kalinin Gol, or Nomonhan to the Japanese). Neither had publicized the events, which is why Hitler expected Hirohito to help him when Barbarossa started two years later. The idea that this was part of the Molotov-Ribbentropp pact is, shall we say, in need of support. Also, a brief perusal of the history will indicate that communists sent other communists and socialists to concentration camps with great regularity. Indeed, Lenin stamped the Socialist Revolutionaries out of existence as soon as he was able. This hardly makes the SR's right-wingers (although they were divided into two camps, called "right" SR's and "left" SR's, this was a division about the timing of the inception of Socialism, and thus, similar to the divide between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks. None qualify as conservatives). Thus, the fact that Nazis jailed and killed Communists has nothing whatever do with where exactly the Nazi's belong on the great left-right axis, which is a debate with a great deal more complexity then you seem willing to display.

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at July 31, 2008 01:19 PM (cntKs)

28 Shoot. Lost my first post. The point is, Larv, that Blumenthal looks for Klansmen when none are in evidence. There is nothing in the song that expresses hostility to blacks or glorification of whites qua whites. Yes, blacks were lynched in the Old South. And horse thieves were lynched in the Old West, as were numerous other types of perp. To suggest that the former and not the latter are the focus of the song lacks a serious basis. Ah, but it COULD be about lynching blacks. That's perfectly true. and it COULD be about lynching a crash-landed space alien who looks suspiciously like the one that probed Bobby-Jack's rectum last week. The question is, given the three options: a) the song is about lynching blacks, though the text is not explicit on this b) the song is about lynching criminals, a staple of western music and movies, references to which are explicit in the song and even more explicit in the video c) the song is about vengeance for Bobby Jack's rectum, 'cos the poor fellow ain't sat down for a week without hollerin' which is the BEST answer?

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at July 31, 2008 01:29 PM (cntKs)

29 Andrew, I have no particular problem with your points about the song or Blumenthals column. That's a legitimate criticism of Blumenthal's column. Claiming the song isn't about lynching or has nothing to do with current events isn't. My sole point was that the song isn't "entirely fictional and rhetorically set in the Old West" as our host claimed. I read Blumenthal as disapproving of lynching imagery in general, due to the historical associations with racism and the KKK. I think he makes too much of the song, and I said as much in my first comment. But it isn't crazy to object to a song which glorifies lynching at a time when lots of black people were getting lynched. My sensitivity to such things isn't as great as his apparently is, but it's the kind of thing that people tend to feel strongly about. And my point about the bleed-over between racist lynchings and anti-criminal lynchings stands. As for the Nazi stuff, please. Thus, the fact that Nazis jailed and killed Communists has nothing whatever do with where exactly the Nazi's belong on the great left-right axis, which is a debate with a great deal more complexity then you seem willing to display. Um, the comment I was responding to wasn't the sort that requires a complex discussion of the intersection of Fascism and Nazism and their place in the greater political context of the day. It was, frankly, silly. The Nazis were leftists because the word "socialist" is in their name? The existence of a non-aggression pact is evidence of ideological solidarity? That's just ludicrous. Are you really willing to defend the assertion that the Nazis belong more to the left (far to the left, as Bill says) than to the right? 'Cause that's just crazy, complexity or no. Oh, and incidentally, the Soviets and the Japanese were not, in fact, at war in 1939. Yes, sure, there was no declared war, my apologies for my imprecision. I'm sure you also correct people when they say that we're currently at war, right?

Posted by: Larv at July 31, 2008 03:39 PM (6YCw9)

30 "Um, the comment I was responding to wasn't the sort that requires a complex discussion of the intersection of Fascism and Nazism and their place in the greater political context of the day. It was, frankly, silly. The Nazis were leftists because the word "socialist" is in their name? The existence of a non-aggression pact is evidence of ideological solidarity? That's just ludicrous. Are you really willing to defend the assertion that the Nazis belong more to the left (far to the left, as Bill says) than to the right? 'Cause that's just crazy, complexity or no." The comment may have indeed been a tiresome cliche, but so was your response, which bodes not well for the argument that the other person is stupid and you are not. And yes, I am willing to make the argument that the Nazis were a lot more of the left than people such as yourself are willing to admit. And the more you say, "That's just crazy," the more persuasive you aren't. As to your anti-nitpick defense re: Kalinin Gol, the point is not that the war wasn't declared, its that it wasn't a war. Two skirmishes do not a war make, and even if they did, they were kept secret by the participants (the rest of the world didn't hear about them until after WW2), so their relevance to your point about Molotov-Ribbentropp is entirely non-existent. So, unless you want to trot out that equally tiresome cliche, that I'm being "pedantic", just admit that you were misinformed. No big deal, it happens all the time.

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at July 31, 2008 04:41 PM (cntKs)

31 The comment may have indeed been a tiresome cliche, but so was your response, which bodes not well for the argument that the other person is stupid and you are not. Speaking of cliches, how about "ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer"? You can sniff about it all you want, but I don't feel the need to give an in-depth response to a comment as shallow as Bill's. You say that you're "willing to make the argument that the Nazis were a lot more of the left than people such as yourself are willing to admit." First, you have no idea what I'm willing to admit. Second, that's not the claim I was responding to. I objected to Bill's claim that the Nazis were "far to the left," which is, again, transparently silly. It's not a tired cliche, it's just wrong. As to your anti-nitpick defense re: Kalinin Gol, the point is not that the war wasn't declared, its that it wasn't a war. Two skirmishes do not a war make, and even if they did, they were kept secret by the participants (the rest of the world didn't hear about them until after WW2), so their relevance to your point about Molotov-Ribbentropp is entirely non-existent. The Soviets and Japanese were in a state of armed conflict at the time of M-R, and the Japanese were obviously being courted by the Germans. The Soviets thus had reason to fear the prospect of a two-front war, making my point entirely relevant. Your point that the conflict wasn't known to the rest of the world, on the other hand, actually is irrelevant. Further, I suggest you get cracking on writing to everyone who has referred to this series of "skirmishes" as the Soviet-Japanese Border Wars and inform them that they are incorrect. So no, I wasn't misinformed, just using "at war" as a common shorthand for "in a state of armed conflict." And yes, you are being pedantic. No big deal, it happens all the time.

Posted by: Larv at August 01, 2008 11:58 AM (6YCw9)

32 "Speaking of cliches, how about "ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer"? You can sniff about it all you want, but I don't feel the need to give an in-depth response to a comment as shallow as Bill's." So you freely admit that your answer was stupid. All I need to hear. "You say that you're "willing to make the argument that the Nazis were a lot more of the left than people such as yourself are willing to admit." First, you have no idea what I'm willing to admit. Second, that's not the claim I was responding to. I objected to Bill's claim that the Nazis were "far to the left," which is, again, transparently silly. It's not a tired cliche, it's just wrong." So I don't know what you're willing to admit, but the argument is silly and just plain wrong. You think you're open-minded don't you? Or is this all about what you "feel the need to respond to" again? Mighty convenient, that dodge. Check the next thread. I'm having the same conversation with one Pamela Troy. Enjoy. "The Soviets and Japanese were in a state of armed conflict at the time of M-R, and the Japanese were obviously being courted by the Germans. The Soviets thus had reason to fear the prospect of a two-front war, making my point entirely relevant. Your point that the conflict wasn't known to the rest of the world, on the other hand, actually is irrelevant. Further, I suggest you get cracking on writing to everyone who has referred to this series of "skirmishes" as the Soviet-Japanese Border Wars and inform them that they are incorrect. So no, I wasn't misinformed, just using "at war" as a common shorthand for "in a state of armed conflict." And yes, you are being pedantic. No big deal, it happens all the time." Having gone back to my sources, I am willing to concede this point, as instead of two border skirmishes, as I (mis)concieved, there were several, and starting as early as 1938, then picking up again in May-August of 1939. Thus, your phrase "in a state of armed conflict" is entirely appropriate, and arguing about whether it deserves that status of "war" is angels-on-pinheads territory. It therefore appears that I, and not you, were misinformed. Well done. Having said that, I think the link to M-R is still overstated. I say this because of the Secret Protocol to the Pact, whereby the Soviets took a share of Poland as well as the Baltic States, etc. If Stalin was really worried about having to fight a long and debilitating war with Japan, why on earth would he have stretched his forces in that manner? In truth, I doubt he was, as every fight from the initial '38 clash resulted, accourding to my same sources, in a Russian defeat. Indeed, at the same time M-R was being signed, Stalin was wrapping up his own border offensive, which had ended in an impressive victory. And in September, as his tanks were rolling into Poland, Stalin signed a cease-fire with the Japanese. Moreover, when, at the final Nazi-Soviet negotiation session, which according to Shirer (pg. 71 , "was taken up mostly not by any hard bargaining but with a warm and friendly discussion of the state of the world, country by country, and with the inevitable effusive toasts customary at gala gatherings in the Kremlin," Stalin allowed himself, when asking Ribbentrop about the ambitions of Italy and Japan, to be put off by the latter's "breezy, reassuring answers." Thus, while it can be argued that Nomonhan was certainly in the back of Satlin's mind during the M-R negotiations, they hardly amount to the gun-in-the-back that you suggest. Again, the matter is more complicated than I conceived, and perhaps more than you feel the need to respond to.

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at August 02, 2008 11:43 AM (cntKs)

33 Correction: "every fight from the initial '38 clash resulted, accourding to my same sources, in a Russian defeat," should read "in a Japanese defeat." I regret the error.

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at August 02, 2008 11:45 AM (cntKs)

34 Sorry not to respond sooner, I was out of town for the weekend. So I don't know what you're willing to admit, but the argument is silly and just plain wrong. You think you're open-minded don't you? Or is this all about what you "feel the need to respond to" again? Mighty convenient, that dodge. I have no idea what this is supposed to mean. Bill made a stupid comment, I pointed out that it was stupid. You said that yeah, it was kind of dumb, but that some other theoretical argument might not be as dumb. You never actually made that argument, so I certainly never felt the need to respond. It isn't a dodge, I simply can't be expected to anticipate your points. The last part of your comment seems to argue that although sure, the Soviets and Japanese were fighting at the time of M-R, the Soviets didn't or shouldn't have considered the Japanese a serious threat. I don't think this is at all correct. The militarizing Japanese were in dire need of resources, and a faction of the General Staff wanted to aquire them by seizing large parts of Siberia. Extensive planning for such an invasion was in place by the time of M-R. The Japanese defeat in the border wars may have convinced them that they'd be better off looking elsewhere, but the existence of such plans indicates that the Soviets were right to consider Japan a legitimate threat.

Posted by: Larv at August 04, 2008 12:44 PM (6YCw9)

35 No worries, it's easy to vanish when real life calls you. "I have no idea what this is supposed to mean. Bill made a stupid comment, I pointed out that it was stupid. You said that yeah, it was kind of dumb, but that some other theoretical argument might not be as dumb. You never actually made that argument, so I certainly never felt the need to respond. It isn't a dodge, I simply can't be expected to anticipate your points." I'm afraid you're not describing our conversation on this point accurately. Someone said "The Nazis were leftists, they made a pact with the Soviets, they called themselves Socialists," etc. You said "No they weren't, they killed Communist, and the Soviets made the deal cause they were fighting the Japanese at the time." I pointed out that Killing Leftists does not make one not a leftist. You responded that you felt no need to respond to a stupid argument with a smart one, and that anyone making the claim that the Nazis were leftists is just plain crazy. I responded to this last by pointing out where I was having this discussion, and that statements to just plain craziness is not a hallmark of an open mind or a good-faith argument (admittedly, I did this with a great deal of snark). So, if you're ready to have a bigger discussion, I told you where it was. If not, enh. As to the Secret Border War, yes, likely Stalin and the Red Army were keeping their eyes on the Japanese. But the fact that the Russians won every encounter and had indeed trounced the Japanese in Manchuria on the day before M-R was signed, coupled with the Secret Protocols, means that Stalin had other, Europe-centered reasons for entering into a pact with Hitler. So again, it's not the gun-to -the-head you think it was. But we could argue around this point all month.

Posted by: Andrew the Noisy at August 05, 2008 12:45 PM (cntKs)

36 You said "No they weren't, they killed Communist, and the Soviets made the deal cause they were fighting the Japanese at the time." Now who's describing things inaccurately? The existence of the non-aggression pact was put forth as evidence of the Nazi's leftist sympathies. I pointed out that both the Nazis and Soviets had perfectly good military/strategic reasons for signing the pact, and that there was no need to posit any sort of shared ideology to account for it. Particularly as there is, to my knowledge, absolutely zero support for such an interpretation. If you have any evidence that Stalin and Hitler signed M-R because of a shared political outlook, I'd love to see it. I pointed out that Killing Leftists does not make one not a leftist. Maybe not, but it does seem to indicate that one doesn't feel much ideological solidarity with them. I'll concede that I was dismissive of Bill's comment, but again, it was eminently dismissable as phrased. The Nazis were not "far to the left" in any way, shape, or form. They clearly positioned themselves on the opposite end of the political spectrum from the actual German leftist parties like the Communists and Social Democrats. The Nazis, at least by the early '30s, were unquestionably aligned with the German right, even including the German Nationalist party in their coalition government. Are you really disputing this? I don't think I've been able to pin you down yet on whether you think it's correct to describe the Nazis as leftist. Do you? I'll retract the "crazy" appellation, but I'll continue to say that labeling the Nazis as a movement of the left is utterly without merit. If you think otherwise, you really have to provide some sort of affirmative argument to support your claim. And pointing me to another thread with several hundred comments doesn't really cut it. But the fact that the Russians won every encounter and had indeed trounced the Japanese in Manchuria on the day before M-R was signed, coupled with the Secret Protocols, means that Stalin had other, Europe-centered reasons for entering into a pact with Hitler. So again, it's not the gun-to -the-head you think it was. If you'll read my initial comment on the subject, I think you'll see that I mentioned reasons other than the Japanese threat, particularly the desire to gain territory in Europe. I never said, or even implied, that the Japanese threat was a "gun to the head". You took it upon yourself to claim that this threat was non-existent. It wasn't, and it simply doesn't matter whether Stalin feared actual defeat by the Japanese. Tying up part of his army in the far East would have been sufficient to cause enormous headaches to military planners, especially in a country the size of Russia. I appreciate the invite to join in on the other thread, but I don't really feel like wading through 250+ comments to get up to speed. I'm not that bored.

Posted by: Larv at August 05, 2008 02:38 PM (6YCw9)

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