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August 2020

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Policing Crisis in New York City-The city is sinking into lawlessness, and the mayor blathers on about ‘sensitivity.’ By Kyle Smith

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/08/new-york-city-policing-crisis-mayor-bill-de-blasio-blame/

O n Tuesday afternoon in Manhattan, cops carried out a routine arrest of an 18-year-old New York activist who is suspected of disabling police cameras by spraying paint on them. The person is suspected of this for very good reason: There are videos starring the perpetrator carrying out the act in question. (Allegedly.) The arresting officers were plainclothes members of the NYPD. The video of the arrest, in which plainclothes officers and uniformed police using bikes as barriers efficiently collar the subject, went “viral,” meaning it became attractive to stupid people who evidently have never seen Serpico or The Wire and insisted this was a “kidnapping” carried out by “stormtroopers,” presumably acting at the behest of Darth Trumper.

Plainclothes officers, in unmarked vehicles, are an essential crime-fighting tool and have been deployed for a very long time. Even a lintbrain such as Mayor Bill de Blasio, or Governor Andrew Cuomo, knows this. Yet what did they both do? Explain to the public how policing works? Of course not. They both denounced the police.

Cuomo was especially obtuse, calling the cops’ actions “outrageous,” because when you’re governor of New York, you’re at a remove from municipal police activity. But de Blasio should know better than to react as he did, which was to mewl support for the leftist street agitators of whom the arrestee was one. De Blasio has been badly burned before for issuing various no-confidence votes in the police force yet he called the arrest “insensitive,” adding that “we’re in a particular historical moment where there has to be sensitivity where folks are understandably worried about what they’re seeing coming out of Washington about the defense of democratic rights.”

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CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The New Old Obama Victor Davis Hanson

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/08/02/the-new-old-obama/

In his latest incarnation as president emeritus and corporate multimillionaire community activist, we are reminded of the earlier Barack Obama of “get in their face,” “take a gun to a knife fight,” and “punish our enemies” vintage. From time to time, Obama ventures from his hilltop, seaside, $12 million “you didn’t build that” Martha’s Vineyard Estate or his tony Washington, D.C. $8 million “spread the wealth” mansion to lecture the nation on all of its racist sins, past and present.

In these outings, he seeks to advise lesser folk on how we can still find redemption (make Puerto Rico a state?), given that his own eight years as president apparently proved that the United States remains hopelessly captive to the spirit of Bull Connor and that a president such as himself—starting out with complete control of the Congress—had no power to change much.

His latest weaponization of the funeral of John Lewis revealed all the Obama signature characteristics.

Fantasy 

Obama knows that the Trump Administration’s use of federal marshals to protect a federal courthouse in Portland from nonstop street efforts to burn it down, along with its occupants, is not analogous to the Democratic Alabama Governor George Wallace, an honored speaker at the 1972 McGovern-run Democratic convention: “[Wallace] may be gone, but we can witness our federal government sending agents to use tear gas and batons against peaceful demonstrators.”

He knows that such protesters in our major cities loot, burn, blind, maim, and occasionally kill people and are hardly “peaceful.”

He knows that asking for an ID at the polls, in the fashion of cashing a check, buying a beer, or getting a prescription filled is not racist (unless he believes that minorities are currently deprived of prescriptions, alcohol sales, or cashing checks), and are not “restrictive,” much less do they attack “our voting rights with surgical precision, even undermining the Postal Service in the run-up to an election that’s gonna be dependent on mail-in ballots so people don’t get sick.”

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MEDIA, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Manhattan Contrarian Gaslighting Roundup Francis Menton

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2020-8-2-manhattan-contrarian-gaslighti

Gaslighting is a form of psychological abuse where a person or group makes someone question their sanity, perception of reality, or memories. People experiencing gaslighting often feel confused, anxious, and unable to trust themselves.

But how does the term apply to political news? To investigate, I got out some issues of the print version of the New York Times to see what among its various pieces might best fit the definition. And of course, I quickly realized that essentially every single article that deals with a big issue of the moment — and particularly any article that is part of coverage of some major issue over the course of multiple weeks or months — absolutely fits the definition of “gaslighting.” And not a very subtle form of the phenomenon.

Let’s try to make a list of the biggest stories of the last several years, the ones that have dominated the front page of Pravda for weeks and months on end. Gaslighting or not gaslighting?

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FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

America Must Choose Between Two Different Paths on Iran By Lawrence J. Haas

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://nationalinterest.org/feature/america-must-choose-between-two-different-paths-iran-165971

“I’m under no illusions about the Iranian regime, which has engaged in destabilizing behavior across the Middle East, brutally cracked down on protesters at home, and unjustly detained Americans,” Joe Biden wrote this past spring for Foreign Affairs. “But there is a smart way to counter the threat that Iran poses to our interests and a self-defeating way – and Trump has chosen the latter.”

On no major global challenge has Washington acted so inconsistently in recent years as the Islamic Republic, though that challenge has not changed in any fundamental way since the 1979 revolution brought a radical theocracy to power in Tehran. The Iranian regime, which is fueled by an expansionist ideology, continues to threaten the United States and its allies, seeks to acquire nuclear weaponry, is developing increasingly sophisticated ballistic missiles, sponsors terrorism, works directly and through proxies to destabilize regional governments, and brutally suppresses its own people.

Through every presidency since the tenure of Jimmy Carter, America’s strategic goal vis-à-vis Iran has been the same: to convince the regime to change course, mend its ways, and become a member in good standing of the rules-based global order. The question that has vexed every president has been whether to try and achieve that objective through pressure (in the form of sanctions and political opprobrium) or persuasion (through collaboration and aid).

Though Washington – across presidencies and even within some of them – has alternated between pressure and persuasion, the starkest change in direction came when Trump succeeded Obama, withdrew from the 2015 global nuclear agreement that Obama had engineered, and abandoned hopes of fostering warmer U.S.-Iranian ties through economic aid and a less hostile U.S. posture. Instead, over the past two years, Trump has imposed a “maximum pressure” campaign of heightened sanctions intended to force the regime to abandon its nuclear pursuits, regional mischief, and human-rights abuses.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

Woke Colleges Are Assembly Lines for Political Conformity The Stakes Are Much Higher Than Most People Realize: Charles Lipson

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://www.mercatus.org/bridge/commentary/woke-colleges-are-assembly-lines-conformity

Don’t be fooled by universities’ incessant chatter about “diversity.” Most are poster children for ideological conformity and proud of it. The faculty, students, and administrators know it. Indeed, many welcome it since their views are so obviously right and other views so obviously wrong. They believe discordant views are so objectionable that no one should express them publicly.

What views are now considered beyond the pale? They almost always involve ordinary political differences. We are not talking here about direct physical threats. Those are already illegal, and universities rightly deal with them. They don’t have to face neo-Nazi marches. Nor is anyone advocating such noxious ideas as genocide, slavery, or child molestation. Speech about those subjects might be legal, but virtually nobody is making the case for them. That is not what the fight for freedom of speech on campus is about. It is about the freedom to voice—or even hear—unpopular views on topics such as merit-based admissions, affirmative action, transgender competition in women’s sports, abortion, and support for Israel.

These are perfectly legitimate topics, and students ought to be free to hear different ideas about them. They are hotly contested topics in America’s body politic. That’s how democracies work. Not so on college campuses, where the “wrong views” are not just minority opinions. They are verboten, and so are the people who dare express them. Challenging this repressive conformity invites condemnation, severs friendships, and threatens careers. It is hardly surprising that few rise to challenge it.

Worse yet, university leaders seldom do. They have a fundamental responsibility to defend open discourse, and they have largely abdicated it. Shame on them. Instead of defending the free expression of unpopular views, they condemn them and flaunt their own virtue. That’s what Princeton’s president Christopher Eisgruber did when he attacked classics professor Joshua Katz, saying Katz had not exercised free speech “responsibly” when he allegedly gave a “false description” of a Black student group. Katz’s own department condemned him, too, though the university finally decided the professor would not be formally punished. They will save the ducking chair for another day.

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

EILEEN TOPLANSKY-STATUES AND TYRANNY

By on August 3rd, 2020

NO URL:

Virtue signaling comes from all quarters about which statues should be destroyed in this country.  Is there a difference between the ISIS wielding fanatics who decimated statues dating as far back as antiquity and the black-clad people who destroy in the name of radical leftwing ideology? Read on and digest the standard leftwing/Marxist imprimatur.

The viral removals of monuments symbolizing racial terror are a corrective to a culture that valorizes violence and embeds false narratives about history into its landscapes. But to what end? The real work of dismantling monuments that embody white supremacy doesn’t end by toppling a few statues — but their withdrawal from the public realm is a long overdue start.

Addressing the fundamental problem of racism in our country will take more than erecting new monuments or toppling old statues. The system that installed statues of Confederate generals and violent police chiefs, and lovingly maintained and protected them, is the same system that built highways through black neighborhoods, invests more money in law enforcement than in schools, and created a surveillance state. These racist symbols are somehow more obvious than statues, yet more surreptitious. As Che Gossett said: ‘Tear down all the monuments to slavery, especially jails and prisons. Removing these visual emblems will be the ultimate accounting.’

For those who do not know, “Che Gossett is a trans femme writer, and archivist. They are currently an archivist at the Barnard Center for Research on Women and a doctoral candidate in trans/gender studies at Rutgers University. Gossett grew up in Massachusetts with their sibling, activist and filmmaker Tourmaline.”  Note  the leftwing use of the pronoun their even though only one person is being spoken about.

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BOOKS Comments turned off

Kansas Should Go F— Itself Author Thomas Frank predicted the modern culture war, and he was right about Donald Trump, but don’t expect political leaders to pay attention to his new book about populism Matt Taibbi

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/kansas-should-go-f-itself

The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism

Thomas Frank is one of America’s more skillful writers, an expert practitioner of a genre one might call historical journalism – ironic, because no recent media figure has been more negatively affected by historical change. Frank became a star during a time of intense curiosity about the reasons behind our worsening culture war, and now publishes a terrific book, The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism, at a time when people are mostly done thinking about what divides us, gearing up to fight instead.

Frank published What’s the Matter with Kansas? in 2004, at the height of the George W. Bush presidency. The Iraq War was already looking like a disaster, but the Democratic Party was helpless to take advantage, a fact the opinion-shaping class on the coasts found puzzling. Blue-staters felt sure they’d conquered the electoral failure problem in the nineties, when a combination of Bill Clinton’s Arkansas twang, policy pandering (a middle-class tax cut!) and a heavy dose of unsubtle race politics (e.g. ending welfare “as we know it”) appeared to cut the heart out of the Republican “Southern strategy.”

Yet Clinton’s chosen successor Al Gore flopped, the party’s latest Kennedy wannabe, John Kerry, did worse, and by the mid-2000s, Bushian conservatism was culturally ascendant, despite obvious failures. Every gathering of self-described liberals back then devolved into the same sad-faced anthropological speculation about Republicans: “Why do they vote against their own interests?”

Frank, a Midwesterner and one of the last exemplars of a media tradition that saw staying in touch with the thinking of the general population as a virtue, was not puzzled. What’s the Matter with Kansas? was framed as an effort to answer that liberal cocktail-party conundrum – “How could anyone who’s ever worked for someone vote Republican?” was the version Frank described hearing – and the answer, at least on the surface, was appealing to coastal intellectuals.

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POLITICS Comments turned off

An Invitation in the Mail for Election Fraud Washington state sent a ballot to my home—which is now in Texas.By Scott Hogenson

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/an-invitation-in-the-mail-for-election-fraud-11596385418?mod=opinion_lead_pos7

Uncertainties over Covid-19 have spurred significant interest in voting by mail. The process differs substantially from absentee voting, which requires a voter to file an application and creates a documented paper trail. Vote by mail is simpler: Ballots are printed and sent to registered voters, who complete and return them.

Consider Washington state. Vote by mail was required in 2011, so the government has had nearly a decade to refine the process. True to form, I received my Aug. 4 primary ballot several weeks ahead of the election date, leaving me ample time to consult my conscience and return my ballot.

The U.S. Postal Service appears to be operating fairly well. I still had plenty of time to vote because the USPS helpfully forwarded my ballot to my new address—in Texas.

Our family moved from Washington state to suburban Dallas in mid-June, but I have been invited to participate in Washington state’s August elections. So has my wife. Given that we aren’t residents of Washington, we won’t vote there. That would be fraudulent. I could probably get away with it, but the little angel on my shoulder shouted down the little devil on the other.

Therein lies but one of a cavalcade of problems with vote by mail.

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HISTORY, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Man Who Conquered Polio-Jonas Salk and American Hero By Clifton Rodgers

By on August 3rd, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/08/02/the-man-who-conquered-polio/

EXCERPTS

Jonas Salk never patented his vaccine or earned any money from his discovery, preferring it to be distributed as widely as possible. When asked who owned the patent to the polio vaccine, Salk answered, “Well, the people, I would say. There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?”

In the news, there were endless historical accounts of the horrors of prior epidemics. I was not old enough to remember the Black Plague or the Spanish Flu. Asian Flu, Swine Flu, SARS and Ebola were terrible, but they hadn’t shut down the world. Suddenly, the “bring out your dead” scene from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” wasn’t funny anymore.

I was old enough, however, to recall the terrors of polio. I remembered how proud the people of Pittsburgh were that they had been part of the making of the vaccine. 

In his 2010 novel—Nemesis—Philip Roth describes the fear of polio that swept through his childhood neighborhood in Newark during the summer of 1944. “Fear unmans us. Fear degrades us,” Roth wrote.

The disease terrified the nation. The lives of millions of Americans were disrupted. Many of the victims were left paralyzed—or dead. 

When—or if—an effective vaccine could be developed was an open question. Sound familiar?

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Rebels Without a Pause-Salvatore Babones

By on August 3rd, 2020

EXCERPT- FROM AUSTRALIA-https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2020/07-08/rebels-without-a-pause/

Global news coverage of the riots, looting and arson that spread across America portrayed the “protests” as a righteous response to racially-tinged police brutality. Murder is murder, and the video footage of police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on the neck of George Floyd is chilling indeed. Concerned bystanders repeatedly asked, then yelled at the police to stop. Floyd already had his hands cuffed behind his back, and there were at least four armed officers on the scene, so it’s unlikely that he could have posed any threat. Chauvin awaits the verdict of a jury of his peers.

Meanwhile America faces the jury of the press corps, which has fallen in love with the mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Frey, an attractive young millennial who in looks, speech and politics resembles nothing so much as an American Justin Trudeau. He is a Democrat—the top five candidates in the city’s Australian-style transferable preference voting system were all Democrats—who campaigned on a platform of (wait for it) police reform. Frey wanted to hire an additional 400 officers in a bid to reshape the force. The coronavirus put paid to that.

In America’s mirror-image political colour scheme, Minneapolis is the bluest of blue cities in a consistently blue state. It is represented in Congress by the Somali-American former refugee Ilhan Omar. After going heavily for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic Party primaries, Minnesota (the state of which Minneapolis is the capital) voted overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton in the ensuing presidential election. If the Derek Chauvin riots (it seems unfair to associate them with the apparently peaceable George Floyd) are a product of the divided America we hear so much about, it’s an America divided between African-Americans and the Democrats who govern them.

Nearly all the cities that have been hit hard by riots and looting are long-time bastions of the Democratic Party. Yet when the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, Joe “you ain’t black” Biden, said in a teary-eyed video plea that George Floyd was a victim of America’s “original sin” of “systemic racism”, the media lapped it up. Biden’s written follow-up statement condemning looting and rioting was less well reported. Not that he called it “looting” or “rioting”. He wrote that “protest” was “an utterly American response” to injustice, but that “burning down communities” and “violence that endangers lives” were not. One out of three ain’t bad.

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