The congressman just came off as unprepared. He wasn’t much better than listening to Trump repeat his own generalities.

Yes, he needs to stay “on message”, but he needs to change it up a bit (e.g. check out a thesaurus), and have several examples to point to as support for his case.

Frustrating to listen to him blow an opportunity like that to take on Gingrinch.

Doubt he moved many independent / swing voters, as he probably came across as a “very uptight” conservative, with his repeated worries of what his sons might hear from Trump.

Twins reared apart studies do not indicate as overwheling an influence for heredity as you claim. See this.

As for the “K” vs. “r” argument, we’ve discussed this before and I have read some articles on it, and find it completely unconvincing as applied to humans.

Yep, we are all “meat puppets”. We don’t really have choices, just impulses.

So, why bother going through the illusion of voting? Democracy is meaningless? Freedom is meaningless?

Why don’t we collectively lay back and let Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc. have their way, because what will be will be? Just because THEY make a claim that they know better, or are superior because of their genetics?

Or, why don’t we take out all those lesser beings, like the Neanderthal before us?

All that flys in the face of the fundamental foundation of our society. Either we think all mankind is endowed with equal natural rights and therefore have sovereignty over self, or we don’t, and scrap this whole idea called “the United States of America”.
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Twins studies are just scratching the surface of the nature vs nurture argument, but you use that as the full in justification for this bogus k/y theory for human culture.

Then you leap to the next level of complexity to tie it to culture, using the spurious “correlation is causation” type argument, by talking about “Whites in northern climes…” as somehow it also proves that same bogus k/y theory.

Come on, if we want to classify (write off) the cultures (as if they all had an overriding cultural foundation) of whole groups of humanity based on some genetic theory, it HAS to have much more conclusive proof than just the ideas and possibilities suggested by people with dubious qualifications and weak so-called “evidence”.
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You say it is not racism – I didn’t say that it was (this “theory” is a branch down the eugenics tree – it is not a new idea), you did.

But, since you raised it, I say it certainly smells so, when there really isn’t a solid foundation, as it is grounded more in a belief than in fact.
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I’m not opposed to talking about the science and where that may lead us, but delving into the topic so haphazardly, with such dismal evidence does much to discredit the quality of discussion in these comments section, especially since it is jarringly off topic.

It is also a fast track way to alienate many good people from the case we are attempting to make for conservatism.

blert, you and GB have (and have had) a lot good to contribute. Giving credence to these “theories” are not one of them.

The Romans never were ‘invaded’ by the barbarians, raided, yes.

The barbarians were INVITED in — in every case I can track down.

The screw balls being the Hun — who got their tushes kicked — out all the way back to Hungary.

Rome’s armies never got that weak.

It was Roman culture, economics, ideology, gods, that got so weak that they came to depend upon the, so-called, barbarians.

( A term originally intended by the Greeks to refer to the “easterners” — the guys short on shaving. This tic is understandable in ultra dry climates… and very cold climates.)

1) Deep impulses spring out of the subconscious — and the DNA.

This has been beaten to death via twins research… you know… twins that never lived in the same environment, same household.

Yet, every manner of choice expressed in their lives track each other… foods… clothing… and all else.

2) Whites in northern climes didn’t suddenly decide to become highly moral folks, shunning polygamy, polyandry.

The latter one might recall were endemic to the ancient Romans, Greeks — with the Spartans rating off the scale WRT kink.

Yet, the Hellenic Greek and ancient Roman elites were White Europeans.

So they were White, but still following the impulse to spread DNA willy nilly.

Politically, socially, historically, that reproductive strategy died off with those societies.

The dang barbarians that Rome invited into various alliances — and then stiffed for payment of martial services ( Vandals, et. al.) carried with them hyper “K” value sets.

The Romans and barbarians repulsed each other — morally. Which is why the Vandals left Rome — having stayed not even a week — as that place was no place for the kids.

&&&&&&&

Generations of punishing DNA gene sets — via morality — behavior codes — actually changes the DNA.

Darwin’s selection mechanism can work via social norms, too.

Something that you plainly deny.

&&&&

In today’s urban ghettos, the Big Boy is fathering — via “r” ethics — a very high fraction of all the babies.

A guy that procreates with that abandon is operating upon his impulses — driven by his DNA — and is causing the next generation to be enriched — dramatically — by said DNA.

“K” selection is a losing proposition in warmer climates.

One might take note that Mexicans are flat paranoid that their wives will stray. Indeed, that fear runs all over.

In the Pick Up community — it’s universally accepted that Latino babes are easier to ‘bang’ than many — and that they cheat — A LOT. ( The PUA gringo is in town for two weeks — nails babe after babe — that has a steady boy friend. And yes, they were good Catholic girls, too.

&&&&&

So, America really is becoming like Brazil, a nation in the running, with Venezuela and Italy, as having the hottest women.

&&&&&&&&&&

In an “r” selected society you have a few Big Boys fathering an astounding percentage of the babies — and all of the losers tearing the walls down.

This situation was, and is, the default behavior in man.

It leads to huge populations of desperate people, as internal sexually based strife makes modernity impossible.

{ Cue up countless tales from the Peace Corps about cousins killing off live stock — and more. }

&&&&&&

This is not racism.

This is realism.

Social mores DO operate as genetic selectors.

The feed back loop is slow — but certain.

&&&&&&

Then lay on the re-programmable mind. Nothing stops a fella with a predisposition towards “K” morality from tossing it to the winds — and going all out “r.”

I give you the PUA community.

The reverse is plainly true, as well.

Don’t be a DNA denialist.

Eric Says:
May 12th, 2016 at 1:50 pm

DNW:
“But back to the topic for a moment. what is needed, or what I would personally find interesting, is an actual history of that Gramscian movement in the US.”

See the Scott S. Powell article I linked in my comment at May 11th, 2016 at 2:12 pm.

Powell’s webpage: http://www.discovery.org/p/561

He wrote a book on the subject that answers your question. I haven’t read his book. I’ve only read the 1 article that G6loq recommended. But the article is a recommendation for the book.”

Thank you.

“Big Maq Says:
May 12th, 2016 at 3:38 pm ….That Bill Whittle lends his name to give this r/k theory any credibility is truly sad.”

The R/K selection theory which I have read a bit about, is one of those theories which promises to make a kind of roughly plausible case at first glance but which as far as I can tell, does not clearly specify just what it is claiming in anthropological terms.

Let’s grant for the sake of argument that among the human sub-species if you insist on calling them that, found in varying climes, that different “reproductive strategies” have been on average employed … or better “have developed” as associatively tolerated.

Well the first thing that becomes an issue, if we aim to think of this in the terms of Darwinism, is the stripping away all of the teleological and intentional language.

That means either tossing out words like “strategy”, or carefully stipulating what their use implies. lest we begin to imagine that environmental “filtering”, or opportunism, is a plan or aim.

Then, it seems to me we have to figure out whether these apparently noticed behavioral tendencies within specified populations, are supposed to be inherent and gene linked, or the result of an environmental shaping which has not progressed so far as to produce an organism which not only defaults to some reproductive pattern when allowed, but more or less must act on it in an instinctual manner.

I suppose I could answer these questions for myself by actually reading whatever books are said to feature these arguments, but I got so far as the political “you get more of what you pay for” facet of the whole thing, and stopped there at that pretty much undeniable platitude.

“Conservatism – in a nutshell – embodies the K reproductive strategy – writ large.

Progressivism – in a nutshell – embodies the “r” reproductive strategy – writ large.”

Followed up by:

“If there is ONE key trait that separates Black culture from White culture – it’s that “K” reproductive strategies never worked in Africa.”

And,

“An outstanding insight into white vs black cultures.”

So we stretch a theory that may explain evolutionary genetic “survival” strategies across species (to paraphrase) to explain human culture?
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Woodrow Wilson would have been your best buddy!
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That idea is a derivative of an old one, and is not founded on any other published research, but is put forward by some alt-right guy running Anonymous Conservative Blog – selling a book based on that theory.
https://www.anonymousconservative.com/blog/about-the-author/

He ascribes all kinds of behavior and actual political party ideas to this genetic programming (my words).

That’s about as credible as the “meat puppet’s” (Scott Adam’s) “meat puppet” theory, and “great persuader” masterful pied piperism he ascribes to Trump.

That Bill Whittle lends his name to give this r/k theory any credibility is truly sad.

And, for those who don’t know, Molyneaux is something of a stark mix of alt-right “anarcho-capitalism” (IIRC) on the verge of fanatical.

Guys, if you think this is a refuge for just another branch of eugenics the left so loved at the turn of the last century, you are mistaken.

That type of loose and poor thinking helps lay the foundation for Authoritarianism, is prone to identity politics, and woefully under-rates human capacity to adapt and change – and, ultimately, to choose.

See the Scott S. Powell article I linked in my comment at May 11th, 2016 at 2:12 pm.

Powell’s webpage: http://www.discovery.org/p/561

He wrote a book on the subject that answers your question. I haven’t read his book. I’ve only read the 1 article that G6loq recommended. But the article is a recommendation for the book.