I have done everything within my power to forestall this day. Ammo Grrrll is LOOKING BACK. MOVING ON. She writes:
This will be my last column for Power Line. It’s been a wonderful ride but I am moving on.
On several occasions when I was a standup comedian, Joe and I would find ourselves at a social gathering filled with important lawyers and bidness executives and someone would ask what I did for a living. I would say, “I’m a standup comedian,” and very often the person would say, “Oh, how cute! Do you mean like you entertain ladies’ groups in church basements?” And I would say, “No, I have headlined for seven straight years for six months of the year, seven shows and one matinee a week at The Dudley Riggs Etc Theatre in Minneapolis. That is my home base. The other six months I tour.”
Everybody had heard of Dudley Riggs, an impresario whose enterprises also included an improv theatre which actually predated the famous Second City troupe in Chicago. People would be so impressed that once in a while they even asked a follow-up question before returning to talking about themselves.
Similarly, after I had retired from comedy and moved to Arizona, I was granted the gift of being invited to write a humor column for Power Line after I sent Scott a sample column. People in our Gated Geezer Enclosure would sometimes ask what I was doing for fun. I would say, “I write a weekly guest column on guns and other stuff for a very prominent center-right blog run by four really smart guys, three lawyers and a professor.”
And if the person’s hearing aids were in and working, he might ask the name of the blog. It was amazing to discover when I said Power Line how many people were familiar with Rathergate and the site. INSTANT RESPECT!
The years have rolled by, as years will do, and it is unbelievable to me that I have submitted somewhere between 500-600 columns. (Probably fewer than each Power Line Guy writes in a YEAR…but still…) Unlike with term papers in the many colleges I have attended, I never once have missed a deadline. Evidently, it is possible to mature some in a mere 60 years, give or take. Who knew?
Scott Johnson has been a most gracious and conscientious editor, frequently preventing me from making a fool of myself. His insistence on a certain level of class has also on rare occasions ruined a perfectly good joke or quip that I wanted to include. He has on those occasions remarked, “Susan, that is beneath you,” which, believe me, is a VERY low bar to limbo under. To me, funny is funny.
But he has held me to a standard that undoubtedly improved my writing. That is, after all, WHY entertainers and writers have directors and editors. And why so many people go off the rails without them.
I am grateful beyond my ability to express for this decade-plus opportunity to be a Guest Contributor on Power Line. I have nothing but appreciation for what turned out to be one of the most overwhelmingly positive experiences ever. I am not exaggerating when I say it has been a highlight of my life, right up there with motherhood and the 1987 Twins World Series victory.
People who are looking for gossip and scandal – for the “real reason” for moving on – will be disappointed, for there are no secret grievances. I will follow Power Line for the rest of my life and comment when the spirit moves me.
And what can I possibly say that would express the depth of my affection for my readers and especially my commenters? Joe and I arranged two long, rambling road trips – one going West and then North and the other going South and East – to visit particularly beloved commenters. Which, as I wrote at the time, caused our adult son to say, “Let me be clear. You guys are planning to drive 7,000 miles to visit strangers you met on the INTERNET? Do I need to take your keys?”
Power Line’s family of commenters and “lurkers” are the smartest, the most diverse, the funniest and the most loving and gracious group of humans it has ever been my privilege to know. The Paranoid Texan Next Door thinks so much of the commenters that he has said on multiple occasions, ”I don’t see why you even bother to write a column. Just say, ‘Hey, it’s Friday, what do you commenters have to say today?’”
A final legacy of my time here is one I am quite proud of. I noticed from reading the Ace of Spades site that he called his followers “morons” (which I would guess was an epithet thrown at them from the “approved” bloggers). And that he organized periodic “moron-meetups” in bars and restaurants to get to put faces to names and avatars. And I thought, “What a terrific idea to build Power Line’s brand!” Let’s do it for three days instead of just an evening!
And that led to the four Commenter-Cons, three in Mesa, AZ and the last one this summer in Cragun’s Resort in Brainerd, Minnesota. More fun than a barrel of monkeys, these events were like grown-up Woodstocks, only with no drugs, rare nudity (praise God!) and minimal mud.
The speakers ranged from a famous astronaut (twice!) to a truck-driving novelist to a certain Lieutenant Colonel who used to jump out of perfectly good airplanes to yet another Lieutenant Colonel who hikes Death Valley alone to a singing cardiologist to a National Fast Draw Champion to a man who speaks fluent Korean to a violet-haired, lovely lady scientist who believes that “Life Is An Experiment” and, most recently, to Scott Johnson himself. Plus comedy and music and skits and a traditional final banquet speaker named Anthony who, for some reason, Hates Mayo.
If you missed all of the Commenter-Cons, well, that’s on YOU. It’s not like you were never begged, nay, nagged to attend! But it may not even be too late. Just because I am moving on is no reason why the Commenter-Cons cannot continue. Drawing from both Power Line AND Steve Hayward’s Political Questions Substack, we can get even bigger, better and more fun.
When Steve Hayward approached me with an invitation to join my husband in opining on his Substack, I told him I had been inspired by Bari Weiss’s sale of her platform for $151 million dollars and that I would not sell Thoughts From the Ammo Line for a penny less than that. He counteroffered with “hopefully $100/month apiece when we get up and running and sell enough subscriptions” and I said, “DONE!”
You can ask Joe/Max: I am the world’s worst negotiator. I don’t even deserve to be Jewish. We have a cousin in Israel whom I have observed with my own eyes try to negotiate the price of a restaurant meal – AFTER he had already consumed it. I was mortified beyond my ability to form words, but the proprietor seemed to enjoy the banter.
Once in an Iranian Jewish (Persian) gift shop in Los Angeles, I spied a lovely Star of David and thought it would be very costly. I asked the lady – whose name also coincidentally turned out to be Shoshanna – how much it was and she said, “$50.” Delighted, I said, “I’ll take it, it’s beautiful.” The look on her face told me that I had committed a terrible Mideast faux pas. It was a mixture of pity and sorrow because the fun was in the “hondling.” Determined to bargain FOR me since I was too stupid to do so myself, she said, “For you, today, $45.”
You know how when someone does an enormous life-changing favor for you that “Thank You” just seems silly and woefully inadequate? Well, that is how I feel about this nearly twelve years of writing for Power Line. I am filled with gratitude to all involved – John and Paul and George and Ringo – no, wait, I mean John and Paul and Scott and Steve, and lately, Bill.
And especially and with more love than I can express, each and every commenter who has ever weighed in even once. Thank you. You have made every Friday a joy. My first column garnered 15 comments as I sat pressing “Refresh” all day. Before the new comment rules, it was not unusual to get 600-700 comments, a couple times even a thousand.
God Bless Us Every One – and please stay loyal to Power Line and also come on over and comment in Political Questions on Substack. We have Western Civilization to save. All hands on deck!
