Robert Sussman Goes To CPAC—(Not Really)

Washington University anthropology Professor Robert Sussman’s attack on Jared Taylor, deconstructed by me in today’s Robert Sussman’s “Tainted Sources”—Playing The Telephone Game Against AMERICAN RENAISSANCE’s Jared Taylor, is part of his larger attack on the “anti-immigrant” movement—Kirkus Reviews said of his book that “Today, since racism is politically incorrect, Sussman maintains, supporters have migrated en masse to the anti-immigration movement…”

So VDARE.com gets a brief mention in his book The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea, page 299, part of an attack on Robert Vandervoort of ProEnglish for associating with us, or on Kris Kobach for associating with him, or on either of them for associating with groups founded by revered grassroots activist Dr. John Tanton. It’s a reference to Peter Brimelow’s much-discussed 2012 speech at CPAC (see Brimelow At CPAC: Al SHARPTON Is Complaining About “Hate”?)

From Google Books

"Besides this session, Vandervoort also hosted the panel at the Conservative Political Action Conference entitled "The Failure of Multiculturalism: How the Pursuit of Diversity Is Weakening the American Identity." Peter Brimelow, founder and head of the White nationalist website VDARE, participated in this panel. Brimelow reflected during the panel that after "Obama's racial-socialist coup," he feared that the United States was doomed to face a "minority occupation government." He called on the Republican Party to focus on becoming the party of white voters by attacking "ethnic lobbies," affirmative action, bilingual education, and "taxpayer subsidies to illegal aliens." Earlier in the session, Vandervoort delivered a rambling presentation from Serge Trifkovic (a conservative commentator who was unable to attend the conference). This paper focused on how the "cult of non-white, non-male, non-heterosexual victimhood" and "multiculturalist indoctrination" was ruining the West and predicted that "the native Western majorities will melt away." [Emphasis added]

There’s no footnote that I can see. It might be on page 300, not visible in Google Books.

“Rambling” was the key word for me—since I didn’t believe Sussman had watched the Trifkovic presentation, this would be someone else’s opinion he was cribbing. So a search for "rambling," "Trifkovic" and "Brimelow" brings us to a piece by familiar VDARE.com critic Brian Tashman of RightWingWatch. Links in original:

Today at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the group ProEnglish organized the panel, “The Failure of Multiculturalism: How the pursuit of diversity is weakening the American identity,” and host Robert Vandervoort thanked CPAC for hosting the panel despite the work of “leftist thugs” who are trying to “shut down freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.” Vandervoort is a former leader of the White Nationalist group Chicagoland Friends of the American Renaissance, a racist magazine published by fellow White Nationalist Jared Taylor. Presumably, Vandervoort was referring to the efforts of the Institute for Research & Education on Human Rights, which issued an alert on his background, and People For the American Way, which called on Republican leaders attending CPAC to denounce another panelist, Peter Brimelow, founder and head of the White Nationalist hate website VDARE.

In 2009, Brimelow reflected on CPAC after “Obama’s racial-socialist coup” and expressed his fear that the U.S. is doomed to face a “minority occupation government.” He called on the Republican Party to start focusing on becoming the party of white voters by attacking “ethnic lobbies,” affirmative action, bilingual education and “taxpayer subsidies to illegal aliens.”

Prior to Brimelow’s talk, Vandervoort delivered a rambling speech from Serge Trifkovic (who wasn’t able to attend) that focused on how the “cult of non-white, non-male, non-heterosexual victimhood” and “multiculturalist indoctrination” is ruining the West. “The native Western majorities will melt away,” Trifkovic’s speech concluded, “Europeans and our trans-Atlantic cousins are literally endangered species. The facilitators of our destruction must be neutralized if we are to survive.”

Steve King and White Nationalist CPAC Panel Warn that America's Greatest Threat is its Diversity, rightwingwatch.org, Submitted by Brian Tashman on Thursday, 2/9/2012

Also, while there might be footnotes, by the academic standards that even first year students at Washington University of St. Louis (where Sussman works) are supposed to follow, there should be a lot more quotation marks around not only what Peter Brimelow was reported to have said, but what Tashman wrote. From Undergraduate Student Academic Integrity Policy | Washington University in St. Louis

1. Plagiarism

Plagiarism consists of taking someone else's ideas, words, or other types of work product and presenting them as one’s own. To avoid plagiarism, students are expected to be attentive to proper methods of documentation and acknowledgement. To avoid even the suspicion of plagiarism, a student must always:

• Enclose every quotation in quotation marks, and acknowledge its source.

• Cite the source of every summary, paraphrase, abstraction or adaptation of material originally prepared by another person, and any factual data that is not considered common knowledge. Include the name of author, title of work, publication information, and page reference.

• Acknowledge material obtained from lectures, interviews, or other oral communication by citing the source (name of the speaker, the occasion, the place, and the date).

• Cite material from the internet as if it were from a traditionally published source. Follow the citation style or requirements of the instructor for whom the work is produced.

So the done thing is to say “What Brian Tashman characterized as a “rambling presentation” from Serge Trifkovic.” (I have no idea if it actually rambled—Tashman may have not been paying attention.) However, the name Tashman doesn’t appear in Sussman's book when I search for it.

Moreover, as I pointed out about Sussman's ripoff of William Tucker's 2002 book, Sussman is stealing, but he's getting it wrong. This is yet another example of Sussman playing what I called the "Telephone Game," whereby Leftist True Believers endlessly repeat each other's smears, improving them in the process.

Thus. Sussman, above, says

"Brimelow reflected during the panel that after “Obama’s racial-socialist coup,” he feared that the United States was doomed to face a “minority occupation government.”" (Emphasis added)

However, Tashman, above, says

In 2009, Brimelow reflected on CPAC after “Obama’s racial-socialist coup” and expressed his fear that the U.S. is doomed to face a “minority occupation government.” (Emphasis added).

Brimelow's actual 2012 speech was, as Tashman, who attended it, wrote, about the public choice consequences of institutional bilingualism: “Canadian Bilingualism & Multiculturalism as it Relates to America“—sort of a non-racially inflammatory subject.

I am somewhat handicapped by not being able to buy an e-book and read the whole thing.

Why hasn’t Sussman published it as an e-book? Is he afraid someone would check it on anti-plagiarism site Turnitin.com?

Email him and ask.

Also Email William Sisler, the Director of Harvard University Press