RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/merrick-garland-list-school-board-elections-justice-attorney-general-11633960883?mod=opinion_featst_pos3

Merrick Garland’s got a little list.

The attorney general is compiling a steadily lengthening register of “society offenders who might well be underground and who never would be missed,” as Ko-Ko, the hypervigilant lord high executioner, sings in Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Mikado.”

Mr. Garland’s list of society offenders is compendious. At the top are right-wing extremists who’ve been officially designated the greatest domestic threat to U.S. security, but whose ranks seem, in the eyes of the nation’s top lawyer, to include some less obviously malevolent characters, including perhaps anyone who protested the results of the 2020 election. Then there are police departments not compliant with Biden administration law-enforcement dicta, Republican-run states seeking to regularize their voting laws after last year’s pandemic-palooza of an electoral process, and state legislatures that pass strict pro-life legislation.

They’d none of them be missed.

Oddly, the list doesn’t seem to extend to the hundreds of thousands of people who have crossed the southern border so far this year and are now presumably at large somewhere in the U.S. without a legal right to be in the country. Nor to those benevolent folk who have reduced several of the nation’s urban centers to crime-infested wastelands.

https://glennloury.substack.com/p/behind-the-new-york-times-megaphone?token=

How does writing for an extremely influential venue like the New York Times affect how you’re perceived? John McWhorter is finding out firsthand, as he continues to put out his outstanding twice-weekly Times newsletter. As you’ll see below, John doesn’t have much time to read through reader reactions. But a recent tweet thread from the historian Thomas Sugrue responding to his column about redlining sparked us to think about the complicated relationship between writer and audience.

Whatever your opinion of the Times, most writers, thinkers, politicians, and academics would jump at the chance to write for them. There’s no more efficient way to get your words and ideas in front of other influential people. But speaking through a megaphone that big naturally leads people to ask what gives you the authority to do so in the first place. An economist writing about the economy or a linguist writing about language may be all well and good. But when an expert in one area steps out of their lane, so to speak, people can bristle in interesting ways.

John and I discuss the complex dynamics of writing for the Gray Lady below. Check it out!

JOHN MCWHORTER: My column was replete with indications that racism still deeply affected the lives of the people—black people—who were redlined, that there was even some racism within who got a loan and who didn’t. I’m not saying that racism played no part. But I’m just saying that to think of socioeconomics as not meaningless and that the socioeconomics was not so insignificant as to be merely parenthetical or merely a footnote, that it mattered, that this stuff is complicated. And I wasn’t chased out of the room for saying this, but some of the response was rather vigorous, and I was especially surprised by Thomas Sugrue. Thomas Sugrue who’s written a really good book.

https://reason.com/2021/10/09/a-different-approach-to-anti-racism/

Chloé Valdary had an unusual childhood. She grew up in a Christian family, but one that celebrated Jewish holy days. She was raised in New Orleans, a city dominated by Catholicism and its symbols, but her church was anti-Catholic. She’s black, but her first steps into identity politics and activism were in opposition to antisemitism. And even with her religious upbringing, it was something an agnostic professor said that provoked her eureka moment.

So it’s perhaps unsurprising that her approach to anti-racism is different from that of best-selling leftist consultants such as Ibram X. Kendi and Robin DiAngelo. Instead of pushing people to feel guilty and complicit in everything from minor slights to systemic racism in workplace trainings, Valdary’s company, Theory of Enchantment, wants participants of every background to learn to be more curious about and compassionate toward those who are different from them. “This attempt to correct injustice is laudable,” she wrote last year in USA Today of the protests over the police killing of George Floyd that erupted across the country, “but the work of anti-racism must be rooted in the moral ethic of love and acknowledge the profound sacredness of human beings.”

Valdary uses popular culture to teach about age-old ideas. Unsurprisingly, many people seem to prefer her positive curriculum over ones that insist they feel shame for having been born and raised a certain race. Valdary is frequently asked to speak at universities and corporations. In July, she spoke with Reason’s Nick Gillespie via Zoom about the problems with most modern “diversity, equity, and inclusion” programs and why she thinks her alternative stands a better chance of breaking down barriers.

Reason: What’s the elevator pitch for Theory of Enchantment?

Chloé Valdary: Theory of Enchantment is a startup. It’s my company, and we teach anti-racism in the corporate boardroom and beyond. We have a very specific approach to this particular practice that combines popular culture, the arts, with a kind of mindfulness understanding of how to fight against and combat prejudice and bigotry.

What is the landscape in corporate offices? Is racism afoot? Is it like a wildfire? Is it a muted smoldering? In other words: How bad is the problem that you’re talking about?

This is actually a challenging question for me. Because on one level, it’s not as if companies are being bombarded with the spirit of Jim Crow, right? That’s not what we’re talking about here. And to that point, as I’m sure you know, there’s been a giant proliferation of diversity and inclusion programs over the past year and a half, due to some of the events of last year.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17856/financial-assault-america

Far more destructive that most Americans could ever imagine, the nation’s multi trillion dollar deficit now being advocated by progressive socialists in Congress would place our future on a collision course with catastrophic bankruptcy.

Which may just be the outcome some in Congress are seeking to achieve.

Democratic Senator Joseph Manchin told Associated Press he won’t support even half of Biden’s multi-trillion dollar progressive wish list. He has been joined by fellow Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema in seeking to avert Washington’s march to become a global pauper. Theirs is a courageous stand and one that will be recorded by historians as last ditch actions taken by a literal handful to prevent America’s self-directed destruction.

We would be wise to… recognize that America’s deficit is more than a number. It is a nation-destroying weapon.

If the tragic day ever comes when America’s global leadership is but a distant memory it will not be because of a nuclear strike, a searing pandemic, or even a crippling cyberattack.

No.

It will be from a self- inflicted mortal wound called “the deficit.”

Far more destructive than most Americans could ever imagine, the nation’s multi-trillion dollar deficit now being advocated by progressive socialists in Congress would place our future on a collision course with catastrophic bankruptcy. Such an event would destroy the very foundation of our financial system, the savings of every hard-working middle class family, and our country’s very ability to defend democracy.

Which may just be the outcome some in Congress are seeking to achieve.