RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://thespectator.com/topic/why-democrats-back-the-wrong-side-of-80-20-issues/

“80-20” issues have become a catchphrase recently. Most voters on those issues favor one policy by overwhelming margins and oppose the other. The “winning side” may poll anywhere between 60 and 90 percent, depending on the issue, but they are all conveniently grouped under the same label of “80-20.”

These lopsided issues have three striking features. First, there seem to be more and more of them, especially on contentious social issues and law enforcement. Second, the same constituency that supports the 20 percent side of one issue frequently supports the 20 percent side of other issues, even those that are substantively quite different. Once an issue is depicted as “progressive,” for example, it generates that support. The result is that a series of issues have overlapping support, forming a coalition. Third, although elected officials (and candidates for office) might be expected to shy away from supporting issues with only 20 percent support, today’s Democrats have actually backed most of them. Support has been most vocal from the party’s progressive (far-left) wing, but center-left Democrats have rarely opposed them, at least openly. In a party that has gradually moved leftward, even moderates are wary of being caught opposing progressives. The rare exceptions come in “purple” states and congressional districts (that is, districts where the general electorate could vote either Democrat or Republican).

The easiest way to see how these leftist support groups overlap on multiple issues is to ask yourself, “Do you think the people who oppose closing the Southern border also oppose Israel?” The answer is obvious. They do. Support for open borders strongly predicts opposition to Israel.

Once I know someone supports open borders and opposes Israel, it’s not hard to predict her position on transgender women in men’s sports or school choice. Although those issues are strikingly different substantively, a voter taking the 20 percent position on one of them is very likely to take the 20 percent position on the others. The result is an activist progressive coalition that encompasses all these issues and more.

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2025/06/16/minnesota-shooter-vance-boelter-apprehended-n4940833

The manhunt is over. Vance Boelter—the suspect in the shocking assassination-style shooting of two Minnesota lawmakers—has been taken into custody. Authorities say he was arrested in rural Sibley County, Minnesota.

Boelter shot and killed Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark early Saturday morning at their home in Brooklyn Park. State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, were also targeted in a similar attack at their home in Champlin.

The Sibley County Sheriff’s Office told Fox News that Boelter “verbally” identified himself to authorities Sunday evening.

The Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office posted a photo of his arrest, calling it “the face of evil.” “After relentless and determined police work, the killer is now in custody,” the department said. “Thanks to the dedication of multiple agencies working together along with support from the community, justice is one step closer.”

BCA Superintendent Drew Evans said Boelter was being pursued on both federal and local warrants. “There is information that led us to do the searches…in Sibley County,” Evans said, adding that Boelter’s vehicle and a hat were found nearby.

Evans urged anyone in the area to stay alert. “If you see anything suspicious,” he said, “please contact police.”

The manhunt is over—but the investigation into Boelter’s motives is just getting started.

https://amgreatness.com/2025/06/15/june-14-america-on-parade-and-on-edge/

I write on June 14, a full-docket news day. You’ll have heard some of the news. For one thing, June 14 is Flag Day in the United States, an opportunity to rally ’round and ponder the significance of its history and iconography. After all, “the Stars and Stripes” is not merely a heraldic description: it is also a distillation or epitome of a sentiment, a world view, and a political achievement.

June 14 is also the birthday of Donald Trump, the President of the United States. Given his celebration of an “America First” MAGA political program, it seems more than coincidental that he should share his birthday with a national holiday called “Flag Day.”

Ditto the fact that June 14 was the date of Trump’s big military parade in Washington. The date was chosen to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the establishment of the United States Army. Sclerotic legacy outlets like The Atlantic (“The Shame of Trump’s Parade”) and The New York Times are throwing one of their signature snits about the parade. It’s just like military displays in the Soviet Union and other authoritarian states, they say.

I take the opposite view. I think the parade is both a salutary celebration of the army and a condign expression of American national pride. As the commentator Irving Kristol put it in the 1990s, “There is nothing like a parade to elicit the proper respect for the military from the populace.” I agree.

Moving from the sublime to the ridiculous, I note that June 14 was also the day on which some 2000 protests were scheduled to unfold across the nation. What were they protesting? The official title was “No Kings.” The protesters, you see, were claiming that Donald Trump was acting like a king by deploying the police power of the state to deport illegal aliens and to protect the immigration officials tasked with the job. Were the organizers harkening back to the origins of the Roman Republic in 509 BC when Brutus, avenging the death of Lucretia, declared that never again would Rome be ruled by a king? Maybe. It’s possible.

Probably not. In the event, the protests seem to have attracted a motley crew of aging boomers, paid professional protesters, disaffected academics, and confused teenagers.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/lockheed-martin-civil-rights-law-bonuses-race-merit

Many believe that masculine industries, such as military and defense, are naturally immune to left-wing race and gender ideologies. This is mostly a myth. These institutions are organized according to prestige and profit—and when those signals point to “woke,” industry leaders have dutifully followed.

Take America’s largest defense contractor, Lockheed Martin. As we have previously reported, after the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, Lockheed adopted radical DEI policies and, in one instance, required white men in leadership positions to attend a racial reeducation program and atone for their “white male privilege.”

Now, a whistleblower has come forward to claim that Lockheed executives were so committed to DEI policies that they awarded some year-end bonuses based on employees’ skin color, rather than performance—in open violation of civil rights law.

The story began in December 2022, when the whistleblower was preparing recommendations for the aeronautics division’s year-end bonuses. The whistleblower was proud of the work the team had done to calculate awards. But soon after the bonuses were submitted for approval, higher-ups told the whistleblower that there was a problem: the “Comp Adder” list, which named recipients of bonus compensation, had too many white employees on it.

Santiago Bulnes, a vice president who now leads engineering on Lockheed’s F-35 program, wrote an email to the whistleblower. “I got a call from [human resources director] La Wanda [Moorer] last night regarding diversity stats on comp adder,” Bulnes, who did not respond to a request for comment, said. “They took a run at getting your few approved and we’re told that we need to fit in the box. I asked her to send you the list of diversity names to simplify the task of finding the best in the group.”