Proyect vs. Blumenthal

Get your popcorn.

Louis Proyect: "Max Blumenthal Follows Ben Norton Down the Bloody Primrose Path."

We'll see if Blumenthal replies to Proyect. Though he concedes anti-anti-Assadism has been "confined to marginal websites, including some very unsavory ones."

The fear factor is why analysis challenging regime change has been largely confined to marginal websites, including some very unsavory ones

— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) October 3, 2016

Update: He does, sort of.

Cheer on Al-Nusra and bash the left for failing to do the same https://t.co/m6WVl1TvWh #WokeSyriaHandbook

— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) October 3, 2016

Proyect Notices Tulsi Gabbard

whom he calls a "real piece of work."

Politics is a gnarly thing.

Some Items

"[T]he road home takes me through some perfectly astonishing parts of the east side. ...Trust me, though, you never come across a single house sitting on an otherwise empty block often enough to fail to be amazed by it. Parts of the city look like rural Mississippi, complete with chickens and goats, or else feral pit bulls and god-knows-what. It wouldn’t surprise me if someone was feeding a baby dragon back in there."

Has she read Kunstler?

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Louis Proyect reposts his old review of Whale Rider in a discussion of actor Cliff Curtis, one of the movie's stars, who now appears in a film about chess, and, unmentioned by Proyect, Fear the Walking Dead.

Proyect vs. Blumenthal

The things one finds at three in the morning.

Louis Proyect: Thoughts Triggered by Max Blumenthal Tweets About Ukrainian Fascists.

Proyect vs. Orlov

Proyect: The Disinformation Campaign on the Ukraine Gathers Momentum.

Orlov: Reichstag Fire in Kiev. Proyect doesn't even deign to mention Orlov's name.

I don't know much about what's happening there, like most everyone, and one can dispute Orlov's article, but dismissing it as a "pile of garbage" means not bothering to read Orlov's other posts, in which he addresses the post-Soviet collapse, which he attributes to a crash in oil revenues, not the U.S.-Russian arms race.

What "Downside"?

Louis Proyect notes, a little too smugly, that Prince Charles, three years his junior "looks nearly old enough to be my father. Just look at my photo below...".

Of course Prince Charles, who has spent a lifetime outdoors (polo, yachting, etc.), will have weathered skin, compared to Proyect, who has "spent my time indoors pouring [sic] over the Grundrisse, etc."

But Prince Charles has aged into a very distinguished-looking man.

(Grundrisse)

Proyect on the 2013 New York Indian Film Festival

Here.

Louis Proyect's Latest

Two recent posts by Louis Proyect reaffirm why I regularly visit his blog. The first, "The Koch Brothers Hedge Their Bets," takes on fracking and more. And the second is a review of the documentaries American Meat and The Revolutionary.

Louis Proyect: "Thoughts on Harper's Magazine and Intellectual Property"

In which he finds Harper's not as relevant as it used to be. He recommends subscribing to n+1 instead.

Proyect mentions, but doesn't include a link to, this interview with former Harper's editor Roger Hodge, in which Hodge points out problems that potentially spell the end of the magazine.

4 April update: I posted a comment to Proyect's blog. I subscribe to Harper's and Bookforum. Will Harper's go defunct before my sub runs out in Nov. 2015? If I didn't subscribe to either magazine, and browsed them at the newsstand, which one would I be more likely to buy? At this point I'd say Bookforum ($4.95), with its many, many book reviews and edgy writing. Harper's ($6.95) is more of a mixed bag. Its "Easy Chair" and "Anti-Economist" columns are a play for the Washington relevance The Atlantic enjoys, and its choice of Readings is more predictable than what I remember from the `90s, when I first began subscribing. Yet the March issue has a lengthy report on the cost of North Dakota's fracking boom, a review of a biography on P.G. Wodehouse and a feature on adult animation coming of age with the fX show Archer. It's this variety of writing, and a certain remove from the buzz-chasing world of opinion magazines, that are among Harper's strengths.

No one magazine can do it all. What Harper's lacks, an n+1 might have. But n+1 lacks what Harper's has. So I read the (relatively) edgy and stodgy together.

Proyect Mentions Kunstler

I had to give Louis Proyect props for mentioning Kunstler in his post about a woman fighting the gentrification of Williamsburg. Did you know that he interviewed Jane Jacobs in 2000? I hope he can get permission to publish that interview on his own site.

12 March update: I spoke too soon. It turns out the interview is on his site.

14 March update: And Metropolis Magazine, in which the interview originally appeared, is still around at age thirty.

The Best Films of 2012

Some of the best things about Louis Proyect's blog are his reviews and lists of movies, many of which receive no mainstream attention.

Here is his list of the best movies of 2012. And not a mention of Zero Dark Thirty.

But Armond White does name Zero Dark Thirty, as markedly inferior not only to the French movie Unforgivable but also to Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance and Taken 2 in his annual "Better Than" list.

CounterPunch and Swans Fundraising Update

From CounterPunch:

"We’ve been telling you for two weeks that either we meet our fundraising goal of $75,000 over the next three weeks or we'll be forced to drastically curtail the operation of our website.
Hundreds of you have rallied with donations. With two more weeks of our fundraiser to go, we’re more than half way to our target. And now a CounterPuncher has stepped forward with a magnificently generous pledge.

"This CounterPunch supporter will match every donation of $100 or more, to a combined total of $20,000. That means that any of you out there thinking of donating $50 should know that if you donate a further $50, CounterPunch will receive an additional $100. And if you plan to send us us $200 or $500 or more, he will give CounterPunch a matching $200 or $500 or more."

Day 14
Donors: 750
Amount: $50,200
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From Swans:

"FUNDRAISING DRIVE: Thanks to the helping hand of Louis Proyect (see his message below) and the generosity of 13 donors we've raised almost $600 in the last two weeks. This is good news! But it also means that we need to raise another $1,900 before the end of the year. You do remember what Swans is about, right? "In a time of revisionism, faux-semblant, spinning news, and skewed information, Swans is about thinking, questioning, observing, and providing ideas that are lacking in the mainstream media." (It's also about Arts & Culture.) We've been doing it for almost 15 years with authors from many countries who appreciate and agree with our quiet radicalism, our Web exclusivity, and dedication to proper editing. Please help us carry on our tradition of providing you with only original work, not multi-posted stuff you find in most Web publications... Donate now!

"Many thanks to Louis Proyect, Alex Munro, Cecilio Morales, Samuel Bennett, Michael Yates, William O'Connor, Richard Brand, Nick Harlow, John Halle, Raymond Alford, Claudia Resch, Isidor Saslav, and Michael Fahey for their generous contributions."
==
James Wolcott joins the effort on behalf of CounterPunch.

The underlying lesson is that if you have money to spare, donate some to your favorite magazine.

Cockburn vs. Proyect

In his column praising the TEA Party, Alexander Cockburn slags Louis Proyect:

"Who says these days that in the last analysis, the only way to change the status quo and challenge the Money Power of Wall St is to overthrow the government by force? That isn’t some old Trotskyist lag like Louis Proyect, dozing on the dungheap of history like Odysseus’ lice-ridden old hound Argos, woofing with alarm as the shadow of a new idea darkens the threshold."

Proyect responds:

"This is the kindest thing I have heard from a Nation Magazine writer ever since Marc Cooper called me a 'prolific buffoon'. ...
I should add that I spotted Alex’s fulmination not 5 minutes after sending in $25 to the Counterpunch fund-drive."
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As for myself, I'm taking CounterPunch's appeal (below) in stride. As of day eleven, 605 donors have given a total of $32,500. At this rate, CP should meet or even surpass its goal in three weeks.

"CounterPunch needs your financial support! Either we meet our fundraising goal of $75,000 over the next three weeks or we'll be forced to drastically curtail the operation of our website.That’s the bottom line reality for us, every year. We’re not sitting on big reserves. We operate on a very thin margin."

Instead, I'm more inclined to feed Swans. As I learned from another Louis Proyect post, Swans is also holding a fundraiser for $2,500 (a mere 3.33% of CounterPunch's goal).

Some background on Swans.