Tucker Carlson and guest spent more than four minutes last night demonizing the metric system as some tyrannical “progressive” takeover of America by globalists from the French Revolution. Seriously.
Carlson opened his segment by referring to the metric system as “the yoke of tyranny.” He also oddly pronounced “kilogram” as “k-eye-logram.”
CARLSON: Almost every nation on earth has fallen under the yoke of tyranny -- the metric system. From Beijing to Buenos Aires, from Lusaka to London, the people of the world have been forced to measure their environment in millimeters and kilograms. The United States is the only major country that has resisted, but we have no reason to be ashamed for using feet and pounds.
Then Carlson welcomed self-described “anti-metrite” James Panero. “I'm taking a stand against the metric system -- the original system of global revolution and new world orders,” he told Carlson.
“God bless you, and that's exactly what it is,” Carlson said. “Esperanto died, but the metric system continues, this weird, utopian, inelegant creepy system that we alone have resisted. How long can we hold out against it, would you say?”
Panero noted that the U.S. “stands nearly alone in the world” with its system of measurement. But “we should stand tall on our own two feet, I say, because it was customary measures that measured out the Industrial Revolution and customary measures that took us to the moon.”
“The metric system, meanwhile, is the product of the French Revolution. It was imposed at the business end of the guillotine,” Panero added ominously.
Now, I am not someone anxious to switch to the metric system but suggesting that going without helped get us to the moon or that adopting it would take us a step closer to “the business end of the guillotine” is ridiculous.
But that’s the kind of talk Carlson loves. “So why are our leaders so anxious that we join the rest of the world?” he asked, giving credence to the fear mongering.
“Because it's assumed to be progressive,” Panero replied. Which is probably the worst thing you can say about anything to Carlson, other than “diverse.”
“Even worse” than that, Panero continued, “The French Revolution went all in for 10. They tried to impose a 10-day week, a hundred hours, a hundred minutes, a hundred seconds. They had a whole revolutionary calendar. Now the metric system with its tens is what remains of their radicalism.”
Although Panero acknowledged a system of 10s "sounds reasonable,” he claimed, “It's not great for measuring things in the real world. There's a reason why our measurement system is twelves, eights and sixties. It comes from ancient knowledge, ancient wisdom from the Romans, 12; from the Babylonians, 60. Why? Because those numbers divide up evenly into thirds, fourths, halves and enables common people to make calculations and to measure their lives without complex arithmetic.”
“I do see the problem,” Carlson agreed. “And I've never heard it as eloquently expressed as you just did. I think you give a lot of us heart to keep fighting against the global tyranny of the metric system and bless you for that.”
“It's that connection to the past that the French Revolution and the revolutionaries have always tried to destroy,” Panero said.
The only thing that would have made Carlson happier would have been if Panero tied the metric system to immigrants.
Watch it below, from the June 5, 2019 Tucker Carlson Tonight, via Media Matters.
“Panero was born December 15, 1975 in New York City, and grew up on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. He attended the preparatory school Trinity in Manhattan. Panero graduated from Dartmouth in 1998, where he majored in classics. In his sophomore year he was appointed editor-in-chief of The Dartmouth Review. "
Hmmmm. Not much in the way of technical qualifications, is there? Surprised???
I really hate to burst their little bubble, but the truth is that almost everything is based on the metric system already…primarily because the USA really doesn’t manufacture much these days but a fatter population. To those with an engineering or mathematical background, the metric system is a huge improvement over the hodge-podge of units of measure known as the “Imperial” system.
How desperate are Tucker and this phony ‘expert’ that they are preaching this issue to a base that is largely old, un-educated and stupid?