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Archive for 2018
July 8, 2018
WHAT DO THE PUNTERS IN THE UK KNOW THAT THE NEW YORK TIMES DOESN’T? Have a look at UK betting parlor Paddy Power’s odds on the Nobel Prize. I predict exploding heads.
YEAH, MORE OR LESS: The Left Has Become The Gestapo.
Just look at Philippe Reines.
OPEN THREAD: Yes, this one.
SHOCKING NEWS FROM THE WORLD OF SCIENCE: ACL Injuries Are More Likely When You’re Fatigued.
WOMAN KILLED, MAN IN CRITICAL CONDITION AFTER NERVE AGENT POISONING IN UK: U.K. woman dies after exposure to Novichok, the same nerve agent used in Skripal attack
HEADLINES I NEVER EXPECTED TO SEE: Kim Kardashian Quietly Continues To Prove She’s Serious About Prison Reform.
DC FOR TRUMP 2020 WEIGHS IN: D.C. Residents: NFL Players Should Be Allowed to Kneel, One Calls Anthem ‘Pretty Racist.’
NEVER. NEXT QUESTION? When Will the Left’s ‘Conservative Columnists’ Give up the Gimmick?
Newspapers like the New York Times and the Washington Post aren’t explicitly ideological publications. Even if in practice they lean heavily to the left, in theory they dedicate their opinion pages to debate, discussion, and diversity of opinion. So it makes sense that they’re expected to employ at least a handful of conservative columnists—but right now, that’s not the case. Rubin, Boot, Will and others alike may not be liberals, but they’re not even close to conservative anymore.
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If anything, these writers are passing up on an amazing opportunity to speak to a liberal audience. Instead of constantly bashing on Trump and the GOP, as their colleagues will surely do, they should search for rare areas of agreements, or topics where they can argue a conservative perspective to their liberal audience. Additionally, it’s fine if these columnists have changed their perspective, and now identify as moderate, or even liberals — but it’s time for the false advertising to stop.
As long as the New York Times and the Washington Post continue to pay false homage to intellectual diversity with their faux-conservative columnists, the American people will continue to view the left-wing media with skepticism — and frankly, who can blame them?
This has been going on since at least the Nixon era, if not longer. Back 2006, Jonah Goldberg explored who qualifies as “Respectable Conservatives” in the eyes of the media, in a post at the NRO Corner:
[Here’s] a short rule of thumb for how to tell who is a “respectable” conservative in the eyes of liberals: any conservative out of power or not seen as supportive of those in power. An even shorter rule of thumb would be: conservatives are respectable if they are useful to liberals. Pat Buchanan became respectable, even adorable, among a loose coalition of liberals leftists, from MSNBC’s Chris Matthews to Ralph Nader, when he turned on the GOP establishment. Kevin Phillips, David Gergen and John Dean have been “real” Republicans — though rarely conservatives — for decades because they are willing to confirm the assumptions of liberals. An even more telling example would be the “neocons.” Before the Iraq war, neocons were the nice conservatives, the good conservatives, the idealistic conservatives the un-racist conservatives, according to academics, The New York Times and others. This is not to say that they aren’t nice, good, idealistic and un-racist. Rather, it’s to point up the way in which conservatives become evil as they become influential, relevant, or otherwise inconvenient to liberals. John McCain was touted as a good choice for president by The New Republic and other liberal voices. Today, McCain is increasingly vilified by many of these same voices because, it turns out, he’s actually a Republican.
And now he’s back to being over-the-top praised, both because his plodding 2008 campaign made him Obama’s crash test dummy, and because even after he announced he had a likely fatal brain tumor, he was bashing Trump and even former running mate Sarah Palin. And speaking of Arizona Republicans, note the the update from a reader to Jonah’s post: “Don’t forget the greatest example of your point – Barry Goldwater. A lunatic extremist in 1964, but when he strongly criticized Nixon, he became a conservative elder statesman.”
IT LOOKED LIKE FAKE NEWS, AND IT WAS FAKE NEWS: No, President Trump Is Not Purging The Military Of Immigrants.
SHE ABSOLUTELY SHOULD. RUN, HILLARY, RUN! Is Hillary Clinton secretly planning to run in 2020?
Ignore the naysayers. It’s your turn, damnit!
THIS GOES FOR ABOUT 99% OF #THERESISTANCE: Protest all you like, Susan Sarandon. In effect you work for Trump.
AND AGAIN: Socialist Protesters Confront Mitch McConnell Leaving Restaurant.
The left is really going to hate living under the new rules they’ve created.
TUCKER CARLSON ASKS CORNEL WEST: If Democratic Socialism works, why doesn’t Venezuela have toilet paper?
I’m sure it’s merely a case of bad luck — lots and lots (and lots) of bad luck.
WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: It’s Happening: NASA Is Working on Drones That Could Survive Venus’ Hellish Atmosphere.
Update (From Ed): Given my experience flying drones, I’m prepared to use my land in Texas for test flights this month or next, if NASA wants to send me one to fly in conditions approximating Venusian heat…
AT AMAZON, summer savings on Refrigerators.
Plus, Deals on DVDs.
DEVELOPING: THAILAND CAVE RESCUE UNDERWAY, FOUR BOYS OUT, OFFICIALS SAY.
UPDATE: Right on cue, “Democrat Senator Dick Durbin tries to attack the Trump administration by using the kids who were trapped in the Thailand cave and comparing them to kids separated from their parents at the U.S. border.”
But given that Durbin has compared the terrorist prison camp at Guantanamo Bay to “Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime — Pol Pot or others,” why on earth would he want anyone to emigrate to the nation than runs it?
COURTS GO EASY ON #THERESISTANCE: Portland protest leader Micah Rhodes avoids prison for sex abuse.
GET WOKE, GO BROKE: Intersectional Bookstore Comes to a Dead End.
One piece of merchandise carried a label that read “Trigger warning: gendered and patriarchal language.” The offending verbiage? Instructions for using a feminine-hygiene product.
I attempted to make a small purchase but didn’t have any cash. A sign at the counter declared: “Due to patriarchy we require a $5 minimum on all debit/credit card purchases.” I left empty-handed. A few weeks later, the store announced it was closing: “Patriarchy, white supremacy, capitalism cannot be reformed and ever serve the people. Abolition is the goal.” The final statement doesn’t mention women.
Last Monday, University of Toronto psychologist Jordan Peterson came to Portland as part of his tour to promote “12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos.” Some 50 protesters stood outside the theater accusing him of “transphobia” and misogyny. Their signs—one of them read “infinite genders”—reminded me of the bookstore. One protester told me she was shocked that so many women came to hear Mr. Peterson speak: “It’s just disgusting!” Sure enough, inside were many women, including women of color.
Mr. Peterson has 12 rules, compared with In Other Words’ seven. Perhaps the bookstore would have survived if it had followed Mr. Peterson’s Rule No. 6: “Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world.”
Heh. Read the whole thing.
(Via David Thompson.)
Elsewhere in the intersection of bookstores and the angry left, “Bookstore owner calls police after customer confronted Steve Bannon:”
A Richmond, Va., bookstore owner said he called the police on Saturday after former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon was confronted in his store.
Nick Cooke, owner of Black Swan Books, told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that a woman called Bannon a “piece of trash.”
The woman then left the store after Cooke said he called 911.
“Steve Bannon was simply standing, looking at books, minding his own business. I asked her to leave, and she wouldn’t. And I said, ‘I’m going to call the police if you don’t,’ and I went to call the police and she left,” Cooke said. “And that’s the end of the story.”
Bannon grew up in Richmond, the newspaper noted.
The Richmond Police Department confirmed the call was made but the call was canceled before officers responded.
“We are a bookshop. Bookshops are all about ideas and tolerating different opinions and not about verbally assaulting somebody, which is what was happening,” Cooke said.
Bannon joins a growing list of political figures associated with President Trump who have been confronted in public in recent weeks.
Naturally in response to a bookstore owner trying to create a safe space for all of his customers, Philippe Reines, the Hillary Clinton staffer who stood in for Trump during Hillary’s debate prep, tweeted out the owner’s name, the store’s physical and email address and its phone number, in order to sic the leftwing outrage mob on the store.
WHY THE SURPRISE? THEY ALWAYS SAID THIS WAS THEIR GOAL. Feminism Has Destabilized The American Family.
SALENA ZITO: Will #resistance summer dampen the Democrats’ big autumn?
It appears, at least for now, that the progressive Left rejects the pragmatic approach of the Democratic establishment. It looks like Trump is once again benefiting from Democrats’ unforced errors.
What Democrats do have going in their favor heading into the summer of decision is higher voter turnout for their primary contests this year, and their folks are pumped.
What they can’t seem to settle on is a pragmatic enough message to form a coalition of an enthusiastic base who could vote side-by-side with unhappy Republicans and moderate Democrats.
The base often telegraphs to lost Republicans and moderate Democrats, “We don’t need you,” often bluntly and without apology.
Walking out of the courtroom to face reporters last Thursday, Okoumou proudly wore a T-shirt reading “White Supremacy is Terrorism.”
Resistance activists celebrated her on social media calling her a hero and courageous for her theatrical and illegal protest — if the resistance becomes a summer of theatrics it’s hard to imagine a blue wave taking out as many Republican House members as leadership hoped, squandering an opportunity that was theirs for the taking, and likely fracturing the Democratic Party even more than it already is.
Related: Liberal Outrage Is All The Rage.
All the Democrats have to do is not be crazy, and they can’t even do that.™
EVERGREEN, AND ON SALE FOR CHEAP: Idiocracy on DVD.
HMMMM: The Next American Revolution: #WalkAway.
Democrats who believe that they have a permanent hold on the African-American vote should take a look at how these voters view their position on immigration. A recent Harvard-Harris survey found that African-Americans are the racial group most opposed to unlimited immigration. Whereas 79 percent of whites want to prioritize legal immigrants based on what they can contribute to our society, fully 85 percent of African-Americans hold that view. A party that advocates open borders and the abolition of ICE is going to get fewer and fewer of their votes.
The Democrats are in denial on this as well. They obviously believe that constantly accusing President Trump and his supporters of racism will somehow keep African-Americans on the liberal plantation. These people evidently failed to notice that, after Kanye West signaled his affinity for the President, a Reuters survey found that Trump’s support among African-American men doubled. This isn’t a huge number. But it won’t take a very large number of electoral defections to assure the death of the Democratic Party. But the Democrats and their media enablers remain in denial. As the Post writer quoted above confidently assures us:
There’s little actual evidence to suggest that #WalkAway represents a mass conversion… the#WalkAway hashtag is going Conservative Internet viral on the same hope driving recent pro-Trump support of Kanye West: that the country is on the verge of a mass conversion to conservative thought, a Great Awakening of sorts.
What this young lady, and the political party for which she shills, won’t see is what the Pew survey all but shouts at them. A “Great Awakening” isn’t required. All that is needed is about 5 percent more African-Americans to vote Republican and another 5 to 10 percent to simply stay home. And once they kick the Democrat habit, they won’t backslide. As Candace Owens puts it, paraphrasing Harriet Tubman, “I’ve seen black liberals go conservative, but never seen a black conservative go liberal.” So, let’s hope the Democrats and the “news” media keep dismissing #WalkAway. That means, to quote Reagan, “We win, they lose.”
Read the whole thing.