This is the second of my daily reading/writing journals, a new routine of season 2 of the 13 Weeks Radical Reading Reading Regimen. Each morning I will juxtapose two book excerpts with the day’s headlines and try in the afternoon to make sense of the chaos of the day’s news. Click here for Monday’s entry: ‘We Ought to Defeat Capitalism With Its Own Weapons, Comrades…’

Dawn Book Reading:

What is America 2.0? Our failing welfare state model enacted by FDR and expanded by all Presidents since, now dying slowly as the next model prepares to overtake it. An Excerpt from America 3.0‘s introduction by James C. Bennett and Michael J. Lotus:

Quote of the Day #1: “The government sector is in a state of decay reminiscent of the Brezhnev period in the Soviet Union, with apparatchicks with no new ideas repeating the same cliches and the same failed policies, seemingly unaware that their system was doomed.”

And from page 2:

Quote of the Day #2 predicting a 2040 Millennial Lifestyle: “They suffered unemployment and underemployment in their twenties, and now that opportunity is opening up again they are making the most of it. Tempered by hardship and enduring frustration, some have retreated into immersive virtual entertainment, which is the synthetic nirvana of the time, replacing drugs for many. But most have grasped with gusto for delayed dreams in the real world.”

Morning News Round Up

Lead PJM Stories Today:

Roger L. Simon: The Zimmerman Trial as Media Pornography

Whatever his or the president’s proclivities, this trial should never have happened. As we now know, with the prosecution’s case wrapped, not only is there no evidence to prove Zimmerman guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, there’s virtually no evidence to prove him guilty at all. Farce indeed.

Bridget Johnson: Spitzer on Re-entering Politics: People Forgive More Than They Used To

Spitzer aims to join an NYC ballot that already includes fellow sex-scandler Anthony Weiner running for mayor.

“I think my sense that the public has a capacity to forgive that’s grown and I’ve understood that from what I call my walking down the street poll sensitivity. Anybody who’s in politics interacts with people, and even though I’m not in politics, obviously, I’m well enough known so I talk to people. I enjoy that process,” Spitzer said.

“When you talk to people, you understand their emotions. I see that forgiveness and willingness to give folks a second chance and obviously the examples you just gave are evidence of that. Whether that will transfer to me is an open question. Every case is different. And that is why there’s massive uncertainty, risk, and as there should be, and is rightly the case that there’s risk,” he continued.

Michael Ledeen’s Faster Please: The Information Revolution and the Snooping State

One of my favorite bits of wisdom about the modern world goes “the information revolution happened and the information won.” We’re drowning in information. We can read most any newspaper and watch most any TV program anywhere in the world at any hour of the day or night. We can find out what so and so thinks about most anything, and we can even check to see if he has changed his mind over the years.  We can also find out virtually anything we want to know about a person’s health, income, job, diet, religion, reading habits…whatever.  I’m not talking about the IRS or the NSA-acting-as-FBI-proxy;  these data are all over the place, from Utah to Canada to Googleland (don’t forget that “Google is Hal”). (h/t James Burt, who commented on the MIT Technology Review site).

The good news, so to speak, is that there is so much information, our abilities to sort it out are overwhelmed.  Paradoxically, we’ve probably got more to worry about from the Department of Education than from the National Security Agency.

We are rightly enraged to discover that the IRS snoops into the reading and prayer habits of Obama’s political opponents, and that the NSA-acting-as-FBI-proxy intercepts and stores all the phone calls and emails it can get its virtual claws on.  But it’s not just the national security agencies and the tax men that do this.  Companies trying to identify likely customers do it.  They also do it to real and potential competitors.  Hackers do it, sometimes for their own excitement, sometimes on commission.  And “educators” do it too, even to kindergarteners.

Bob Owens: Deconstructing the Trayvon Martin Narrative: Nothing Left to Argue?

Andrew C. McCarthy’s Ordered Liberty: Our Friends the Saudis and Their Moderate Sharia Decapitations

Philippe Karsenty: No First Amendment Here: French Court Finds Me Guilty in Al-Dura Affair

Roger Kimball: Family Fun? You’ll Need a Permit for That

Today’s PJ Lifestyle Stories:

Did you know Canada has a Texas? Each Tuesday Kathy Shaidle is going to provide some Canadian education…

Kathy Shaidle: Come Hell or High Water: Calgary Stampede Goes On Despite Disaster

Chris Queen: History Channel, This Is Why You Can’t Have Nice Things

Becky continues to provide tips and advice for the great spots to visit in D.C.:

Becky Graebner: Rediscovering Washington, D.C.: Acting Like a Tourist and (Surprisingly) Liking It

In an odd coincidence I actually had a lunch that resembled this post that I found waiting for me after I got back…

Bryan Preston: How to Make the Best Corn-on-the-Cob You Will Ever Eat

Theodore Dalrymple: Can Advances in Medical Technology Make Us Less Healthy?

A Few Relevant News Headlines From Around the Web Today:

Ben Shapiro at Breitbart News: Broward County Sheriff Prepares for Post-Trayvon Verdict Riots

Alana Goodman at the Free Beacon: Rebel Yell:Rand Paul aide has history of neo-Confederate sympathies, inflammatory statements

A close aide to Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.) who co-wrote the senator’s 2011 book spent years working as a pro-secessionist radio pundit and neo-Confederate activist, raising questions about whether Paul will be able to transcend the same fringe-figure associations that dogged his father’s political career.

Paul hired Jack Hunter, 39, to help write his book The Tea Party Goes to Washington during his 2010 Senate run. Hunter joined Paul’s office as his social media director in August 2012.

From 1999 to 2012, Hunter was a South Carolina radio shock jock known as the “Southern Avenger.” He has weighed in on issues such as racial pride and Hispanic immigration, and stated his support for the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.

During public appearances, Hunter often wore a mask on which was printed a Confederate flag.

……

“Some say Rand is not Ron because he is ‘willing to play them game,’” Hunter continued. “That’s exactly right. That’s the point—to play it, influence it, and win it as much as you can. The neoconservatives certainly do, to their advantage.”

Hunter has also said that Rand Paul holds the same foreign policy views as his father, Ron Paul.

“The philosophy hasn’t substantively changed [from Ron Paul to Rand Paul]. The methods and style most certainly have.”

However, a spokesperson for Paul said Hunter was not speaking for the senator.

Hunter also discussed Paul’s intention to take non-interventionism into the “mainstream” in a comment to libertarian website the Daily Paul in January.

“I see, finally, a Republican willing to take the more sane, non-interventionist message into the mainstream in a way that can stick and possibly become policy,” said Hunter.

“Ron started this whole thing,” he added. “Rand is taking it to the next level.”

Again however, Hunter said does not think Rand Paul is a non-interventionist when asked by the Free Beacon.

Jonathan S Tobin at Commentary: Anti-Semitic Hate for Kids … and Adults

It is shocking that the official media of the group that Kerry considers a partner for peace would be broadcasting hate and using children to do it. But, of course, as anyone who follows the PMW website regularly knows, there is actually nothing unusual about the PA acting in this manner.

The PA media has broadcast a steady diet of hatred against Israel and Jews since its inception after the Oslo Accords brought it into existence with numerous examples of them employing children and broadcasts specifically aimed at youngsters to do so. One of the great tragedies of the last 20 years has been the way Israel’s supposed peace partners have sowed the seeds of future conflict by inculcating their youth with doctrines that treat Jews as subhuman monsters with no rights or claims upon the land that both sides claim as their own.

There will be those who will argue that similar hatred exists among Israelis, as occasional incidents inside the green line and so-called “price tag” attacks on Palestinians in the territories indicate. But the difference between the two sides is actually illustrative of the way Israel has embraced the hope for peace while Palestinians have not.

The point is hatred of Jews by Palestinians is something that is officially endorsed by the Palestinian Authority while hatred of Arabs is incessantly condemned by the Israeli media and the government. Jewish prejudice against Arabs exists, but only as the actions of a minority, while mainstream Palestinian culture endorses hate. While Israeli schools adopted curricula seeking to promote “peace education,” the Palestinian schools still use textbooks that are filled with the same kind of vile delegitimization seen on PA TV.

Enough of the daily darkness? Me too. Time to come up for air.

And Some Headlines and Videos from the World of Entertainment, Arts, Technology and Culture:

David Shapiro on piano:

[jwplayer config=”pjm_lifestyle” mediaid=”53133″]

Encouraging developments on intergalactic travel, via Charlie Martin today at PJ Lifestyle:

[jwplayer config=”pjm_lifestyle” mediaid=”53134″]

Random Dude Eats Random Food: The Fried Pickles and Tavern Burger at Drake’s in Indianapolis

Media Bistro Vs BuzzFeed Over Offensive “Egyptian Revolution with Jurassic Park Gifs” Piece

Grand Theft Auto V trailer, hat tip Deadline Hollywood:

[jwplayer config=”pjm_lifestyle” mediaid=”53135″]

“Tempered by hardship and enduring frustration, some have retreated into immersive virtual entertainment, which is the synthetic nirvana of the time, replacing drugs for many. But most have grasped with gusto for delayed dreams in the real world.”

From the Archives:

From Spengler in 2006 at Asia Times: Jihad, the Lord’s Supper, and eternal life

Why is self-sacrifice always and everywhere the cost of eternal life? It is not because a vengeful and sanguineous God demands his due before issuing us a visa to heaven. Quite the contrary: we must sacrifice our earthly self, our attachment to the pleasures and petty victories of our short mortal life if we really are to gain the eternal life that we desire. The animal led to the altar, indeed Jesus on the cross, is ourselves: we die along with the sacrifice and yet live, by the grace of God. YHWH did not want Isaac to die, but without taking Abraham to Mount Moriah, Abraham himself could not have been transformed into the man desirous and deserving of immortal life. Jesus died and took upon him the sins of the world, in Christian terms, precisely so that a vicarious sacrifice would redeem those who come to him.

What distinguishes Allah from YHWH and (in Christian belief) his son Jesus is love. God gives Jews and Christians a path that their foot can tread, one that is not too hard for mortals, to secure the unobtainable, namely immortal life, as if by miracle. Out of love God gives the Torah to the Jews, not because God is a stickler for the execution of 613 commandments, but because it is a path upon which the Jew may sacrifice and yet live, and receive his portion of the World to Come. The most important sacrifice in Judaism is the Sabbath – “our offering of rest”, says the congregation in the Sabbath prayers – a day of inactivity that acknowledges that the Earth is the Lord’s. It is a sacrifice, as it were, of ego. In this framework, incidentally, it is pointless to distinguish Judaism as a “religion of works” as opposed to Christianity as a “religion of faith”.

Afternoon Reflections

Read all of Alana Goodman’s piece about Rand Paul’s neo-confederate employee. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Rand Paul is the Barack Obama of the Right. He is a paleo-libertarian, anarcho-capitalist, anti-American radical just pretending to be a mainstream, patriotic Tea Party American. Rand Paul’s Jeremiah Wright is his father Ron Paul, who filled him with even more antisemitic conspiracy theories and tolerance of anti-American hate than the President’s deranged mentor.

If Rand Paul can’t even be trusted to judge the character of his own staff then how can he be trusted to judge how to handle America’s enemies?