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December 2021

HISTORY, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Pearl Harbor 80th anniversary brings memories, tributes – and a lesson Lesson of Pearl Harbor is to be vigilant not only for the unexpected but also the expected By Walter R. Borneman

By on December 8th, 2021

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/pearl-harbor-80th-anniversary-memories-tributes-lesson-walter-borneman
“As we honor those who gave their all 80 years ago, the need to adapt before the next attack remains the greatest lesson of Pearl Harbor. The aircraft carriers and air power that changed warfare in 1941 are still key components of American military might, but our enemies employ other weapons. Terrorism on unprecedented levels brought about the devastation of 9/11. Digital attacks on infrastructure and networks are evidence that keyboards more so than aircraft carriers are already fighting the next wars.”

The attack on the United States fleet at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, 80 years ago today, remains one of the most traumatic events in American history. The date is a generational landmark comparable to the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the horrors of Sept. 11. America changed overnight.  

Eighty years later, the Pearl Harbor tragedy is still highly personal. It continues to touch the families of the 2,403 servicemen who lost their lives and the many more who survived that Sunday morning. At a national level, the legacy of a country first surprised but then remarkably united still resounds. 

Many at Pearl Harbor found themselves on the front lines not out of patriotic pride or personal desire to see the world, but out of economic necessity. They were children of the Depression and the $5 or $10 most sent home out of monthly incomes of $36 for a seaman recruit helped to feed younger siblings. Less concerned with national strategies, their personal goals were a few dollars in their pockets, more letters from girlfriends and living to see another sunrise. 

Of a crew of 1,500 on the battleship Arizona, 1,177 sailors and Marines, including a rear admiral and the newest recruit, perished. Among the 78 men with a brother aboard, only 15 survived the attack – a staggering 80% casualty rate. The lucky ones lived with enormous personal grief and sometimes, profound survivor’s guilt. 

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Clueless Joe Biden Can’t Grasp Any Of The Crises He’s Created

By on December 8th, 2021

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/12/08/clueless-joe-biden-cant-grasp-any-of-the-crises-hes-created/

Has any administration been caught off guard on so many fronts as the Biden administration?

It was shocked by the Taliban’s rapid takeover of Afghanistan. It was surprised by the surge in energy costs, the spike in inflation, and the depth of the supply chain crises. It hadn’t planned on a massive flood of illegal immigrants. It didn’t think COVID would still be around. It expected job growth and the economy to be stronger than it is. It didn’t foresee the sharp rise in crime.

Judson Berger of National Review Online had it right when he quipped that “the Biden administration sure is ‘surprised’ a lot.”

Just yesterday, the head of President Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, Cecilia Rouse, admitted that the White House didn’t expect a prolonged supply chain crisis. The administration “just didn’t fully appreciate that the supply system, the supply chain, wouldn’t be able to process through the elevated demand for durable goods,” she said.

These are just the surprises that team Biden has publicly admitted to.

What’s even more troubling is that Biden’s policies are (at least partly) to blame for every one of these crises. Worse still is the fact that Biden and his Keystone Cops cabinet are clueless about how to deal with any of them.

Take the nation’s ongoing supply chain crisis. Today, the Los Angeles ports are as clogged as they were before Biden announced his “solution.” The Marine Exchange of Southern California reports a backlog of 94 container ships as of Tuesday – right about where it was before Biden stepped in.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

De Blasio’s Vaccine Mandate Looks Unlawful The Supreme Court has approved only far milder measures. By Eugene Kontorovich

By on December 8th, 2021

https://www.wsj.com/articles/de-blasio-vaccine-mandate-looks-unlawful-shots-covid-19-private-employees-new-york-bill-11638916746?mod=opinion_lead_pos6

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio this week announced that all private-sector employees in the city will be required to be vaccinated against Covid-19 by the end of the month. The mayor calls his plan “Key to New York,” and its function is to lock hundreds of thousands of residents out.

The constitutionality of Mr. de Blasio’s mandate will turn primarily on Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905), in which the Supreme Court upheld a smallpox vaccination law. The justices held that state governments have the power to exercise “self-defense” against infectious disease on behalf of the community, so long as the measures were “reasonable” and not “arbitrary.” But Mr. de Blasio’s measure goes far beyond the holding or reasoning of the precedent, to say nothing of the past century of constitutional doctrine.

Jacobson involved smallpox, which before its eradication was one of the most fearsome diseases known to man. It killed 30% of those infected. It disproportionately affected children and commonly left them disfigured by lesions. Covid-19 is serious, but it’s in a different league.

The town of Cambridge imposed a one-time fine of $5 (equivalent of roughly $160 today) on those who refused vaccination. The details of Mr. de Blasio’s scheme haven’t been announced—he promises “guidance” next week. But if it resembles President Biden’s federal mandates, it will impose mounting, ruinous fines. It isn’t the mild inducement the court upheld in Jacobson—it is pure coercion.

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HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

China Will Soon Lead the U.S. in Tech Beijing pulls ahead in 5G and artificial intelligence, while catching up in semiconductors. By Graham Allison and Eric Schmidt

By on December 8th, 2021

https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-will-soon-lead-the-us-in-tech-global-leader-semiconductors-5g-wireless-green-energy-11638915759?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

Central Intelligence Agency Director Bill Burns announced in October that the agency is establishing two new major “mission centers,” one focusing on China and the other on frontier technologies. This action reflects his judgment that China is the “most important geopolitical threat we face in the 21st century” and that the “main arena for competition and rivalry” between China and the U.S. will be advanced technologies. The question Americans should be asking is: Could China win the technology race?

A new report on the “Great Technological Rivalry” from Harvard’s Belfer Center answers: Yes. The report isn’t alarmist but nonetheless concludes that China has made such extraordinary leaps that it is now a full-spectrum peer competitor. In each of the foundational technologies of the 21st century—artificial intelligence, semiconductors, 5G wireless, quantum information science, biotechnology and green energy—China could soon be the global leader. In some areas, it is already No. 1.

Last year China produced 50% of the world’s computers and mobile phones; the U.S. produced only 6%. China produces 70 solar panels for each one produced in the U.S., sells four times the number of electric vehicles, and has nine times as many 5G base stations, with network speeds five times as fast as American equivalents.

In the advanced technology likely to have the greatest effect on economics and security in the coming decade—artificial intelligence—China is ahead of the U.S. in crucial areas. A spring 2021 report from the National Security Commission on AI warned that China is poised to overtake the U.S. as the global leader in AI by 2030.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

An Education in the American Idea Mike Sabo

By on December 8th, 2021

https://realclearwire.com/articles/2021/12/07/an_education_in_the_american_idea_806633.html

The American Idea podcast looks “to restore an understanding of the history and principles that show us what it means to be an American,” says Ashbrook Center executive director Jeff Sikkenga.

Presented by Ashbrook, the podcast “explores America’s Founding principles and their effect on American history and government.” Sikkenga notes that it “elevates lively and thoughtful conversations with renowned academics and public figures based on questions rooted in the fundamental documents and debates of America.” It’s what he calls “the Ashbrook way of teaching and learning.”

This approach, he says, transcends “accidents of time, place, class, and gender to pursue the truth with others through conversation.” It is an old idea of education, stretching back at least as far as Socrates and summarized in the Jeffersonian principle that “Almighty God hath created the mind free.” It’s neither about simply amassing information nor being subjected to indoctrination – rather, it amounts to a joint effort by teachers and students to pursue truth.

Greg McBrayer, the podcast’s executive producer and associate professor of political science at Ashland University, cites evidence from “study after study” showing that students “lack a basic civic understanding.” Unfortunately, he says that “few universities are filling in the gaps.” He points to a recent ACTA study that found “only 18% of American universities require a foundational course in U.S. history or government.” The podcast aims to correct this flaw by bolstering American civic knowledge.

Hosted by Sikkenga, conversations are centered around key American documents and speeches including the Declaration of Independence, Frederick Douglass’s “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?,” Calvin Coolidge’s speech on the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration, and Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural.

The America Idea podcast’s 16 episodes have featured Ashbrook’s own Christopher Burkett, John Moser, Jason Stevens, and McBrayer, and affiliated scholars including Lucas Morel, Joseph Fornieri, and Donald Drakeman. The most popular episodes feature journalist Mollie Hemingway, and, just recently, a special conversation with former Vice President Mike Pence.

Sikkenga calls hosting Vice President Pence a “great honor and a delightful surprise.” He notes that Pence was a “history major as an undergraduate and even wrote his senior paper on ‘The Religious Expression of Abraham Lincoln.’” Pence “knew a lot about American history and principles and clearly has thought about how to bring them to bear on contemporary political issues.”

The podcast’s producer and director – himself an Ashbrook alumnus – Tyler MacQueen reflects on the unique opportunity to speak to someone “who held the same office as John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and George H.W. Bush.” He reports that nearly half a million people – many of whom have not heard of Ashbrook previously – have listened to or watched the Pence conversation. (Episodes are available on Ashbrook’s YouTube channel.)

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