"Authenticity," *ahem*, Hypocrisy, and Horror

Not necessarily in that order.  Besides, lunch is hinting at me.

• Lance Mannion on what "authenticity" means in Politician Land.

  As I mentioned, the point of “authenticity”, to the extent there is a point beyond giving lazy and bored journalists something easy and amusing to write about, is that an authentic politician is one who shows how well she’s at home in the company of regular folks, that she is to some “authentic” degree herself just like regular folks. Hillary’s reviews on this score are generally poor. The critics regularly find her performances lacking in that kind of authenticity.
  
  But there are millions of women and girls not just in the United States but around the world who believe she’s been authentic in her commitment since she was in college to making their lives better, that she has worked authentically and with passion and success on their behalf, and they love her for it and will vote for her with the enthusiasm the reviewers agree she doesn’t inspire. Millions of men will too. Many of them white working class men. Hard to believe, I know. But it’s true. There are working class white men who love and admire her and going by what the pundits and analysts seem to think working class white men are the most regular folks of all the regular folks.
  
  But that doesn’t make her regular folks. She’s not regular folks. None of them are. They didn’t get where they are and achieve what they’ve achieved by being regular folks. In fact, a good deal of their success is due to their having determined early in life to distinguish themselves from regular folk. They didn’t think of themselves as regular folk. They hoped and worked for a life for themselves better than that.

• "Mandatory for thee but not for me."  The Rude Pundit, being less rude than usual.
• Ralph Nader being strange.  No More Mister Nice Blog with bonus Life of Brian video clip.
• Trump.  (Yastreblyansky, The Rectification of Names)

  On the minimum wage and taxes, he hasn't "moved to the left" either so much as danced around them, changing his positions several times per week, sometimes even per day.
  
  [...]
  
  And then explains everything he's said is only a "suggestion". So it's really just stupidity, and clickbaiting. We really need to get over the idea that there's a parallel between liberal or progressive or whatever on the one hand and conservative on the other. Where the progressive starts with the idea of a problem that needs to be solved, and some people that need some help, and a concept of looking for an appropriate relief through policy, the conservative starts with this sense of aggrieved identity and loss, nostalgia for a time when good people like "us" had power over bad people like "them", and a desire to "take our country back" in which the idea of any particular policy can be no more than a rationalization.

• More from Susan of Texas (The Hunting of the Snark) on income inequality, Megan McArdle vs. Noah Smith debating.
• Climate change effect.  (Lawyers, Guns & Money)
• Arranged marriage conference and the rationale for "underage" betrothal.

  So, let’s review. Young people should marry before age 20. Girls should have breasts, but not be 12. So probably like at least 15. The betrothal, which happens before the official legal marriage, is binding. This way parents can betroth children who may not yet be legally able to marry in their state. The matches should be arranged by the fathers, and ideally the teenage boy’s father should pay a “bride price” to the teenage girl’s family. The young people in question are expected to accept the matches their parents arrange for them, period and full stop, and there is no reason to consult them in the process—it is their duty to accept the arrangement.

• And a little more avoidable fail in Kentucky.  (Zandar Versus The Stupid)

I had better water my stock and boil scramble an egg