The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

The Death of ‘Black Rabbit’

Posted on | March 24, 2022 | Comments Off on The Death of ‘Black Rabbit’

Say hello to Czyz Deonte Harrison and, while you’re at it, you can also say good-bye, because he was shot to death by Houston police last month after he fatally shot an off-duty deputy constable. The photo above is the last selfie Harrison posted to his @hoodlumcityfcg (Hoodlum City Fight Club Global) Instagram account, showing him trying on clothes in a menswear shop called Casanova Collezioni at the PlazAmericas mall in southwest Houston, Texas. The mall is about a mile away from the storefront where Harrison ran a small gym, a business he launched in September 2020. The date of Harrison’s death — Feb. 23 — was his 35th birthday, and he had apparently gone to the mall with the intention of buying himself some clothes as a birthday gift to himself.

Unfortunately for everyone involved, when Harrison went to check out with his purchases, his credit card was declined. Harrison became irate and started a disturbance. Someone called mall security, which was being worked that day by San Jacinto County Deputy Constable Neil Adams, a part-time job that the 62-year-old lawman was getting ready to quit, having told his wife that the situation at the mall was becoming too dangerous. Harrison “sucker punched” Deputy Adams, took his gun and shot the deputy multiple times. Houston police were called and when officers located Harrison, he charged at them with what they thought was a knife, but turned out to be an ice pick. Harrison was fatally shot.

Click here to watch YouTube video of the police bodycam.

KHOU-TV reported: “Harrison is no stranger to the police. He’s got a criminal history that goes back at least a decade. Court records show convictions for evading arrest, weapons and drugs.”

Perusing his multiple social media accounts, you find that Harrison referred to himself as the “Black Rabbit,” which nickname might have suggested a speedy and elusive boxer, but if he ever actually won a match, I couldn’t find a record. He was only five feet tall, which obviously put him at a disadvantage in boxing. He was 0-1 in September last year when he fought Omar Urieta, losing by a TKO in the first round.

Keep in mind that the “Black Rabbit” had been operating a gym “created by fighters for fighters” for over a year prior to getting knocked out in his second match. If you were going to train as a boxer, wouldn’t you seek out a gym run by somebody who had actually won a fight at some point?

There’s a lot of craziness apparent in Harrison’s Instagram postings. Four days before his death, he posted a 23-minute video to his @super_czyz account in which he (a) smokes some fat joints and (b) reads a book titled Metaphysics of Astrology: Why Astrology Works. And when I say he reads the book, I don’t mean he reads it aloud. He starts out by firing up his joint then issuing a greeting: “Peace, love, compassion and action. It’s really going down, know what I’m talking about? Shout out to God.” Then he sits there toking weed and just flipping through the book until, about 15 minutes in, he reads aloud a couple of sentences about Venus and Mars. What was the point of that video? I don’t know, but as evidence that Harrison was losing his grip on reality, it’s suggestive.

On the other hand, his grip on reality was never very tight.

Like, he was supposed to be running a business — a gym “for fighters by fighters,” with rent and other bills to pay — but instead he seems to have spent a lot of time just posting nonsense on Instagram.

Like, here’s a 51-minute video he posted last November, which begins, “Hey, man, positive vibes for whoever’s watching this, for whatever reason they’re watching this, positive vibes! Don’t waste your time, all your energy and resources, f**king with people, especially when whatever you do going to come back on you anyway.” That video had a total of eight views before I clicked on it. One of the basic principles of business is, time is money. So what value was created by posting that rant, which almost nobody watched? Wouldn’t it have been more productive for Harrison to be doing something else with his time? All of which is to say, it’s no mystery why his credit card got declined, is it?

Scroll down far enough in his IG feed, and you find a mishmash of health and fitness, motivational memes and Afrocentrism. Why this guy who never won a boxing match thought he could succeed in running a gym is as mysterious as why he imagined anyone would want to watch videos of him — a convicted felon — talking about “positive vibes.”

So now a deputy is dead, and “Black Rabbit” is likewise dead, because he flipped out when his credit card got declined at the mall.

Crazy People Are Dangerous.




 

Category: Crime, Texas

In The Mailbox: 03.23.22 (Afternoon Edition)

Posted on | March 23, 2022 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 03.23.22 (Afternoon Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Silicon Valley delenda est.

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Prosecutors HATE Self-Defense
EBL: My Brilliant Friend
Twitchy: Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) Whines About “Unfair Treatment” Of Biden’s SCOTUS Nominee
Louder With Crowder: Ron DeSantis Proclaims Emma Weyant Rightful Champion Of The NCAA
Vox Popoli: Red China Signals Its Side, At Least His Feelings Are Safe, and The Satanic World Order

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
Adam Piggott: I Agree With Vox
American Conservative: The Mariupol Theater Bombing
American Greatness: Over 120,000 Students & Families Have Left NYC Public Schools In The Last Five Years
American Power: Groomer Teachers Are Absolutely Determined To Discuss Their Sexual Fetishes With Your Kids
American Thinker: John Bolton Inadvertently Reminds Us Why We Need Trump
Animal Magnetism: Animal’s Daily Lying Liars News
Babalu Blog: Miami Federal Court Deals Major Blow To Cruise Companies That Sailed To Cuba, also, Cuban Protester Escapes To U.S. After Being Sentenced To Five Years In Prison
BattleSwarm: Coming Food Shortages? Doubt It, also, Tornado Hits Round Rock
Behind The Black: Today’s Blacklisted American, Musk Says Starship Will Be Ready For First Orbital Launch In May, and Scientists Say Enceladus’ Tiger Stripes Come From Underground Ocean
Cafe Hayek: The Julian Simon Supply Curve
Chicago Boyz: Woke Democrats & Environmentalists Will Scare Off Our Allies
Da Tech Guy: My 6th Law Of Media Outrage Postscript, Pope Francis Nails It for A Change, and Even Better Than Better Than No Coffee At All At McD’s
Don Surber: Mo Dowd’s New Crush Is Zelensky,  The Year Globalism Stood Still, and The World Fears NATO, Not Putin
First Street Journal: Fear Is The Career Killer, also, So Who Failed Here?
Gates Of Vienna: “Compulsory Vaccination Is An Act Of Disenfranchisement”, The Nothing Tree, and Pope Francis Expresses Support For Zelensky
The Geller Report: Here Are Some Of The Joe Biden Scandals Inside Hunter’s MacBook, also, SEC Unveils Sweeping Climate Requirements For Public Companies
Hogewash: Sonification – 5005 Exoplanets, 20th Century Warfare Vs. 21st, and Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day
Hollywood In Toto: UnWoke Disney Employees Have Had Enough, also, How Fresh Avoids That Woke Feminist Trap
The Lid: “Gun Violence” – The Killer That Doesn’t Really Exist
Legal Insurrection: Woke Politics Infecting America’s Courts & Law Schools, California Struggling With Community College Enrollment Collapse, and BYU Students Who Blew Whistle On “Revealing Whiteness” Assignment Threatened With Discipline
Nebraska Energy Observer: Of Sliderules & The American Way, also, Don’t Weep For Me, Weep For Yourselves
Outkick: 2022 Woke All-Star Challenge – The Play-In Round, NBC Columnist Argues “Lia” Thomas Should Be Celebrated Like Jackie Robinson, and #4 Seeded Arkansas Facing Godzillas From Gonzaga
Power Line: We’ve Always Been At War With Eastasia, How To Make Crime Vanish, and Bushrod League
Shark Tank: Rubio Team Calls Out “Radical” Demings
Shot In The Dark: It’s Time, Columns I Didn’t Finish, and Sometimes Paranoia Is Just Perfect Awareness
The Political Hat: Saying The Quiet Part About Anti-Semitism Out Loud
This Ain’t Hell: Music Teacher Escapes Ukraine, Joins SC Daughter, Why Is Russia Using Hypersonic Missiles?, and Creepy Porn Lawyer’s Case Dismissed
Transterrestrial Musings: The Dumbest VP In History, also, The Silence Of The Lambs
Victory Girls: Judge Jackson – Child Porn Sentence Guidelines Are Harsh, Outdated
Volokh Conspiracy: Illinois Town Issues 62 Tickets To Elderly Couple For Having Lawn Chairs In Their Front Yard
Watts Up With That: More Confirmation Of The Infeasibility Of A Fully Wind/Solar/Storage Energy System, also, The Mysterious 2022 Monarch Butterfly Report
Weasel Zippers: Triple Vaxxed Bad Orange Woman Has COVID For Second Time In Four Months, Judge Jackson Defends Leniency For Child Porn Offenders, and Dem Rep Cori Bush Says Democrats Can’t Be Afraid Of Talking About Defunding Police
The Federalist: Nobody “Implied” Judge Jackson Was Nominated Because Of Her Race – Biden Stated It Proudly, Seven Times The Babylon Bee Reported History Before It Happened, and Democrats Smear Josh Hawley For Revealing Democrats Don’t Care If SCOTUS Justices Love Pervs & Hate The Constitution
Mark Steyn: Red China’s Proxies, also, Time & Money

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Category: Linkagery

In The Mailbox: 03.22.22

Posted on | March 23, 2022 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 03.22.22

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Got back late from a medical appointment in Las Vegas last night and didn’t have time to do a catchup post this morning or this afternoon, so I’ll have to try and catch up tomorrow. Nothing wrong; quite the contrary, my primary care doc says I look healthier than I ever have since he’s been seeing me. It’s just that I have a lot to do and only so much time in the day.
Silicon Valley delenda est.

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Domestic Violence Rarely Ends With The Abuser Dead
EBL: Save Ukrainian Refugee Women, also, Clarence Thomas, Get Well Soon!
Twitchy: “OK Boomer”, also, Daily Beast’s “Politics Guy” Says It’s a Good Time To Remember All The Stuff He Got Wrong During The Kavanaugh Hearings
Louder With Crowder: Bad Orange Woman Can’t Shoosh Reporters’ Questions About Hunter Biden Fast Enough
Vox Popoli: Cracks In The Narrative, The Champions Of Democracy, and The Laptop Is Real
Stoic Observations: The Empire Of Luxury

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
Adam Piggott: Father Stu
American Conservative: Our Suicidal Moment
American Greatness: Biden’s Handlers Are Preparing To Eject Him (And Kamala), also, A Trump-Hating Backer Of Biden’s SCOTUS Nominee Is Married To The Top J6 Prosecutor
American Power: Russia Has Empowered Neo-Nazi Factions In Ukraine’s Army, also, Gen. Petraeus – “Russia’s Command & Control System Has Broken Down”
American Thinker: The NYT Has Signaled The End Of Biden’s Road, also, A Great Reset Is Already Underway In Utah
Animal Magnetism: Goodbye, Blue Monday
Babalu Blog: The 19th Anniversary Of Cuba’s Black Spring, also, I Guess That’s Why People Don’t Trust Them Any More
BattleSwarm: Why Russia’s Economy Sucks, also, Russo-Ukrainian War Update
Behind The Black: SpaceX Launches Another 53 Starlink Satellites, Pushback – Judge Rules University Officials Can Be Held Personally Responsible For Firing Prof Over Politics, and Colorful Mars
Cafe Hayek: Beware Drawing Parallels Between COVID and Smallpox, also, Change The Design
CDR Salamander: Amphibious Operations In The Russo-Ukrainian War
Chicago Boyz: Worthwhile Reading & Viewing, also, Heuristics for Ukraine (And Other Places)
Da Tech Guy: The United States Of Mid-Life Crisis, The NYT, Hunter Biden, & My 6th Law of Media Outrage, and The 2020 Presidential Election Was Not Free & Fair
Don Surber: Public Supports “Don’t Say Gay”, Crate Training Our Kids, and Only 29% Of Democrats Say They’re Better Off With Biden
First Street Journal: NYT Says “America Has A Free Speech Problem” Without Admitting They’re Part Of The Problem
Gates Of Vienna: Dispatches From The Killing Fields, Ukraine – Field Test Of The Great Reset, and Somalis In Sweden Consider Ukrainian Refugee Women Fair Game
The Geller Report: Justice Clarence Thomas Admitted To Hospital With “Flu-Like Symptoms”, Leftists Bray For His Death, also, Democrat “Intelligence” Experts Refuse To Apologize For Lying About The Hunter Biden Story
Hogewash: An Infrared Web, Just Passing By, and A Briefly Famous Star
Hollywood In Toto: Mel Gibson Is The Anti-Bruce Willis In Explosive Panama, also, How All-American Dog Is Defying The Odds
The Lid: Federal Judge Blocks DC Schools From Vaxxing Kids Without Parental Consent
Legal Insurrection: “Latinx” Activist Groups At Duke Issue Demands To Combat Microaggressions, Metal Shortages & Escalating Costs May Short-Circuit Green Energy Schemes, and Parents Revolt Against Political Activism At Atlanta’s Westminster Schools, File IRS Complaint
Nebraska Energy Observer: Random Obervations, also, The Sunday Post
Outkick: Tennessee Lands Massive Commitment From Five-Star QB, CNN+ Talent Rex Chapman Pays Tribute To Dead Coach (Who Is Still Alive), and Woke Pat Forde Remains Silent On “Lia” Thomas Winning National Title Over His Daughter & Her Olympic Friends
Power Line: The Post Computes This, Take 2, Fake News Today, Fake News Tomorrow, Fake News Forever, and Looney Tunes At ESPN
Shark Tank: Crist Touts UFCW Endorsement
Shot In The Dark: The Unthinkable, also, From Cornerstone To Stumbling Block Part 3
STUMP: Drug Overdose Deaths Part 3
The Political Hat: Mississippi Vs. Critical Race Theory
This Ain’t Hell: Rear Admiral Creepy, With Friends Like These, and Bizarre Ways To Violate The UCMJ
Transterrestrial Musings: Complete Lack Of Self-Awareness, also, The Left’s War On Academic Achievement
Victory Girls: The Ohio Senate Race Mess, also, Trans Cult Cancels The Babylon Bee On Twitter
Volokh Conspiracy: Judge Allows Subpoena Of Facebook COVID “Misinformation” Blocking Records
Watts Up With That: Good News For Polar Bears & Seals, also, “This Is Madness”
Weasel Zippers: More From Hunter Biden’s Emails, RNC Plans To Register New Voters At Gas Stations, and WTH Is Kamala Talking About?
The Federalist: Democrats Admit J6 Committee Is All About The Midterms, Dear Elites Chasing 100% “Clean Energy” – Your Ignorance Is Showing, also, How Twitter Contributed To David French’s Self-Destruction
Mark Steyn: Waiting For Gundown, also, Our Love

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Category: Linkagery

What Counts as ‘Russian Disinformation’?

Posted on | March 22, 2022 | Comments Off on What Counts as ‘Russian Disinformation’?

Everybody’s having a laugh at the New York Times which, attempting to smear conservatives as purveyors of “Russian disinformation,” prompted Candace Owens to point to how often the Times (and other liberal outlets) have reported on the same facts that are now called “disinformation.” (Hat-tip: Instapundit.) Just the other day, for example, I noticed that it is now considered “Russian disinformation” to mention that Ukraine has a neo-Nazi problem.

Neo-Nazis and the Far Right
Are On the March in Ukraine
— The Nation, Feb. 22, 2019

The author of that article, Lev Golinkin, is a Ukranian-born Jew, and The Nation is a left-wing journal that is certainly not pro-Putin, so why are we now required to ignore this information?

[In 2012] Ukraine’s Maidan uprising ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, to the cheers and support of the West. Politicians and analysts in the United States and Europe not only celebrated the uprising as a triumph of democracy, but denied reports of Maidan’s ultranationalism, smearing those who warned about the dark side of the uprising as Moscow puppets and useful idiots. Freedom was on the march in Ukraine. . . .
Post-Maidan Ukraine is the world’s only nation to have a neo-Nazi formation in its armed forces. The Azov Battalion was initially formed out of the neo-Nazi gang Patriot of Ukraine. Andriy Biletsky, the gang’s leader who became Azov’s commander, once wrote that Ukraine’s mission is to “lead the White Races of the world in a final crusade…against the Semite-led Untermenschen.” Biletsky is now a deputy in Ukraine’s parliament.
In the fall of 2014, Azov—which is accused of human-rights abuses, including torture, by Human Rights Watch and the United Nations — was incorporated into Ukraine’s National Guard.
While the group officially denies any neo-Nazi connections, Azov’s nature has been confirmed by multiple Western outlets: The New York Times called the battalion “openly neo-Nazi,” while USA Today, The Daily Beast, The Telegraph, and Haaretz documented group members’ proclivity for swastikas, salutes, and other Nazi symbols, and individual fighters have also acknowledged being neo-Nazis.

Far be it from me to draw conclusions about political events on the other side of the world on the basis of stuff I read on the Internet. Maybe this “ultranationalism” in Ukraine is misunderstood, and maybe negative reports about the Azov Battalion and other alleged neo-Nazis in Ukraine really are “Russian disinformation.” The point is, we don’t know, and maybe it doesn’t matter — like, if you’re fighting off a foreign invasion, do we need to impose a litmus test on who’s doing the fighting?

Is Ukraine corrupt? According to the New York Times‘ own reporting from 2018, the answer is, “yes.” Is Ukraine more corrupt than Russia? Probably not, and I don’t think Ukraine is more “ultranationalist” than Russia, either. So why is the New York Times now attacking Candace Owens and others for talking smack about Ukraine? In a word, politics.

Democrats seem to have the idea that smearing Republicans as Putin stooges — traitors! enemy agents! — is the way they’re going to avert a bloodbath in the midterm elections. And the New York Times is doing what it always does, producing Democratic Party propaganda.




 

Category: New York Times, Russia, Ukraine

Key Victory for Ukraine?

Posted on | March 22, 2022 | Comments Off on Key Victory for Ukraine?

If you look at a map of Ukraine, the strategic importance of Makariv becomes obvious. Makariv is on the intersection of a major north-south highway (T1019) and another highway (T1015) that heads west to Radomyshl. Furthermore, Makariv — about 40 miles west of Kyiv — is just north of the intersection of T1019 and the major east-west highway (M06) that connects Kyiv to Zhytomyr, Lviv, Lutsk and Poland. So reports of a Ukrainian victory in Makariv are important:

Ukraine said it retook a strategically important suburb of Kyiv on Tuesday, while its forces battled Russian attempts to occupy the encircled southern port city of Mariupol. . . .
Explosions and bursts of gunfire shook Kyiv, and heavy artillery fire could be heard from the northwest, where Russia has sought to encircle and capture several suburban areas of the capital, a crucial target.
Early Tuesday, Ukrainian troops drove Russian forces from the Kyiv suburb of Makariv after a fierce battle, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said. The regained territory allowed Ukrainian forces to retake control of a key highway and block Russian troops from surrounding Kyiv from the northwest.
Still, the Defense Ministry said Russian forces partially took other northwest suburbs, Bucha, Hostomel and Irpin, some of which had been under attack almost since Russia’s military invaded nearly a month ago.

(Hat-tip: Jazz Shaw at Hot Air.)

Again, look at a map, and you can see why Bucha, Hostomel and Irpin are crucial battlefields. Irpin is closest to Kyiv, and also within artillery range of the M06 highway, so that by controlling that town, the Russians are able to deprive Ukraine of using the most direct route to bring in supplies from the west. The Russians want to push south from Irpin, to cut off that route and encircle Kyiv from the west, while the Ukrainians want to push the Russians back northward. Pushing the Russian invaders out of Makariv is part of the overall strategic picture in terms of keeping the supply routes of Kyiv open. And, of course, killing more Russians.

As mentioned last night, Russia’s casualty rates are nearly 10 times what the U.S. suffered in the worst year of the Vietnam War. Mere control of territory is now less important to Ukraine’s survival than their ability to inflict further losses on the Russian invaders. The “fierce battle” that drove the Russians out of Makariv almost certainly added to the death toll for Putin’s army. The Ukrainians have wiped out entire regiments of the Russian army, and killed a half-dozen of their top commanders, and the higher the price the Russians are made to pay in blood, the more likely they are to decide that their invasion is a bad bargain.




 

Category: Military, Russia, Ukraine

From Bad to Worse for Russia in Ukraine

Posted on | March 21, 2022 | Comments Off on From Bad to Worse for Russia in Ukraine

This is a strange story: Supposedly, a pro-Putin tabloid in Moscow published (and then deleted) an official tally of Russia’s casualties in Ukraine — nearly 10,000 killed and more than 15,000 injured/wounded as of Monday. Do the math, and they’re suffering casualties at the rate of about 400 KIA and 650 wounded daily. This is slightly higher than previous Western estimates, although less than what Ukraine has claimed. Yet the word “staggering” is the perhaps the best way to describe Russia’s losses. By comparison, during the worst year of the Vietnam War, 1968, the U.S. had around 16,500 troops KIA — about 45 per day. Russia’s losses in Ukraine so far have been nearly 10 times as high.

Another six months of this and Russia won’t have an army anymore.

(Hat-tip: Instapundit.)




 

Category: Military, Russia, Ukraine

The Problem With ‘Equality’

Posted on | March 21, 2022 | Comments Off on The Problem With ‘Equality’

 

In the mid-1970s, in an attack on [Wilmoore] Kendall, [Harry] Jaffa published an article, “Equality as a Conservative Principle,” the very title of which served to mark him as a latter-day Jacobin in the eyes of many conservatives influenced by Edmund Burke. (“Believe me, Sir, those who attempt to level never equalise. In all societies consisting of various descriptions of citizens, some description must be uppermost. The Levellers, therefore, only change and pervert the natural order of things,” etc. — Reflections on the Revolution in France.)
Jaffa has the obnoxious habit of denouncing as “nihilists” all who dispute his particular philosophy, which can best be described as an eclectic (or, perhaps some would say, peculiar) stew of Plato, Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas and Abraham Lincoln. Considering that both Kendall and [his ally Frank] Meyer were close associates of William F. Buckley Jr., it is difficult to understand why their antagonist Jaffa was embraced by Buckley, but he was.
— from “Angelo Codevilla, Conor Friedersdorf and the Straussian Time-Warp,” The American Spectator, July 18, 2010

We keep having the same arguments about “equality” because so few people bother to study the arguments we’ve already had. Another factor is that many of the people involved think of themselves as being so intellectually and morally superior to the rest of us that our opposition to their enthusiasm for Equality (with a capital “E” denoting its status as a religion to some people) makes it unnecessary to rebut our arguments. We’re all just a bunch of ignorant bigots in the eyes of the High Priests of the Cult of Equality, and therefore our objections can be ignored or dismissed as expressions of hateful prejudice.

It should not be necessary for me to explain what is wrong with Equality — why a fanatical cult-like devotion to this abstract ideal is harmful and erroneous — because such eminent thinkers as Burke have already made the argument with such clarity that no honest and intelligent could fail to grasp the point, and yet here we are in 2022, dealing with David French.

Dear God, how I wish we could all resolve to ignore that fool, but someone quoted him in the Hot Air headlines, and there goes my whole morning. Whatever else I might have blogged about must be laid aside so I can administer the kind of bitch-slapping he deserves.

While I hate to keep my quoting myself, it’s helpful to illustrate how persistent the egalitarian error is when I show you that I was arguing about this more than 13 years ago in January 2009:

Are men and women equal in the fullest sense of the word? If so, then equality implies fungibility — the two things are interchangeable and one may be substituted for the other in any circumstance whatsoever. (La mort à la différence!) Therefore, it is of no consequence whether I marry a woman or a man.

The fantastical project of yesterday, which was mentioned only to be ridiculed, is to-day the audacious reform, and will be tomorrow the accomplished fact.

This is why so many of those who would defend traditional marriage find themselves unable to form a coherent argument, because traditional marriage is based on the assumption that men and women are fundamentally different, and hence, unequal. Traditional marriage assumes a complementarity of the sexes that becomes absurd if you deny that “man” and “woman” define intrinsic traits, functions, roles.

Insofar as any two things are different, they are not equal. This is a fundamental principle of mathematics, and its application to human affairs seems logical enough that further explanation should be unnecessary. And yet, there goes David French:

For those who haven’t followed, a trans woman named Lia Thomas just won the women’s 500-yard freestyle championship, and the race wasn’t close. Before this year, Thomas raced as a man in both high school and college. While competing as a man, Thomas was a fine swimmer, but nowhere near the NCAA championship level.
Here’s where I am on the dispute. In the vast majority of life circumstances, I do not believe that a trans person should face discrimination because they are trans. But there are limited circumstances where biological realities mean that some distinctions are not only wise, they protect other classes of Americans from both unfairness and intrusion on their rights. . . .

Where to start? Permit me to risk the accusation of transphobia by saying that a man is a man and woman is a woman and that anyone who thinks otherwise is in the throes of “strong delusion.” For French to say that those who suffer from such a delusion should be treated as if they actually were what they think they are — i.e., that the rest of us are obligated to play along with this make-believe, or else be accused of wrongful “discrimination” — is a perfect example of how hopelessly confused French has become. He imagines himself to be a defender of the True Principles™ of conservatism, a belief every bit as delusional as the belief that Will Thomas is now a woman named “Lia.”

If you’re going to be a conservative, you have to accept the reputational damage you will suffer as a result of character assassination by liberals who need little or no actual evidence to accuse you of racism, sexism or some other prejudice. Sic semper hoc — “Now listen you queer, quit calling me a crypto-Nazi or I’ll sock you in the goddamn face and you’ll stay plastered,” as Bill Buckley replied to Gore Vidal. The Left’s habit of trafficking in ad-hominem smears as a substitute for argument was noted a century ago by Ludwig von Mises:

Marxism criticizes the achievements of all those who think otherwise by representing them as the venal servants of the bourgeoisie. Marx and Engels never tried to refute their opponents with argument. They insulted, ridiculed, derided, slandered, and traduced them, and in the use of these methods their followers are not less expert. Their polemic is directed never against the argument of the opponent, but always against his person.

It does not behoove a conservative to waste much time denying such smears, and it’s always a bad idea for a conservative to go out of his way to show how “not racist” (or “not sexist,” etc.) he is. This is the real root of French’s problem; he fears that actually being against whatever liberals demand would injure his reputation as a pious Christian. While I don’t want to get into a theological discussion here, French seems to think that bluntly telling liberals “no” is sinful, and thus he twists himself into knots of self-contradiction by, on the one hand, ceding every premise of liberal syllogisms (e.g., transgender people are “valid” substitutes for whatever it is they pretend to be) while trying to deny the conclusion of their arguments (e.g., Will Thomas should be an NCAA women’s swimming champion). Conservatives are generally too polite to question the bona fides of leftists — considering it rude to doubt their sincerity — but I was born and raised a “yellow dog” Democrats, so I’m under no illusions about this. Democrats really only care about one thing — winning — and they don’t consider any political tactic to be unfair, so long as the result is Democrats winning. This is why political conflict in America is so often one-sided, with the GOP trying to fight by the Marquis of Queensbury rules against Democrats who roll like the Crips vs. Bloods.

Returning from that digression, however, when I speak of egalitarians as having a religious devotion to Equality, this is scarcely an exaggeration. Consider this passage of French’s argument:

To understand my reasoning, let’s go back to the founding and guiding texts of the American republic — texts that don’t just create specific legal doctrines but embody a particular biblically-informed morality about the dignity and worth of all people.
The founding declaration can be quoted by heart: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Note that this sentence proclaims not just people have equal status (equality isn’t enough), but also possess inherent dignity, which is recognized and protected through our unalienable rights.

As with so much of what French writes, the question is, where to begin? As more eminent writers than I have explained, the lofty prose of the preamble to the Declaration had a specific authorial intent — in particular, appealing to Whig sentiments in England — that attenuate the claims of egalitarians who view it as a promise of a utopian ideal that we are obligated to pursue as a matter of federal policy. You will often find this “all men are created equal” phrase from the Declaration compounded with the phrase “a more perfect Union” from the preamble to the Constitution to create a sort of Permanent Revolutionary Mandate, by which we are compelled always to measure ourselves against some imagined ideal condition of Equality, and to pursue whatever crazy measures are necessary to achieve this “perfect Union” — immanentizing the eschaton, as Eric Voegelin would say. This is an error based upon a misreading of the Constitution. Why, after all, were the delegates representing “We the People” gathered in Philadelphia in 1787?

The faults of the Articles of Confederation had become manifest, and the “Union” of the several states was so imperfect that it was universally agreed that something had to be done to fix these problems, or else the whole thing might go flying asunder. In avowing their intent “to form a more perfect Union,” the authors of the Constitution were merely saying that they meant to make possible a greater cohesion of the different states under a common government. This is why, for example, that they specified that “regulation of interstate commerce” as a federal power, because under the Articles the different states had been slapping tariffs and other trade restrictions on their neighbors. Many of the other provisions of the Constitution, including the federal assumption of debts from the War of Independence owed by the state governments, can be viewed in this light, i.e., as seeking to bring about greater unity (i.e. “a more perfect Union”) than was the case under the Articles.

David French is worshiping in the Temple of the Cult of Equality, and thinks of this political idolatry as “biblically-informed morality,” so that those of us who fail to join along in singing his peculiar hymns to the Fourteenth Amendment are just a bunch of retrograde sinners. While I could go on fisking his argument for hours, I’ve already wasted most of the morning on this project, and it’s now past lunchtime, so I’ll let the commenters chew over the rest of it. In the bowels of Christ I beseech you, can we agree to ignore David French from now on?




 

Category: Constitution, Intellectuals

UKRAINE: Most Shocking News So Far

Posted on | March 21, 2022 | Comments Off on UKRAINE: Most Shocking News So Far

Multiple outlets are reporting that an elite Russian airborne regiment, the 331st Guards, has been wiped out in the fighting near Kyiv. Both the regimental commander, Col. Sergei Sukharev (pictured above) and his deputy, Major Sergei Krylov, have been confirmed by the Russians as killed in action, which lends credence to the otherwise unbelievable claim that an entire regiment of paratroopers is now hors de combat.

Among other things, this report gives a sense of the severity of the Russian army’s logistics problem in Ukraine. We must conclude that Russia simply lacks the transportation capacity to reinforce their front-line troops, because otherwise this regiment would not have been wiped out. Of course, such a devastating loss for the Russians is also testimony to the skill and tenacity of the Ukrainian forces, who can now boast of having beaten Russia’s best troops. If the 331st Guards can’t survive in Ukraine, what will be the fate of Russia’s less elite units?

This is certainly not the only bad news for Putin’s invading army:

Ukraine, with the help of Belarusian railway workers, have dealt a devastating blow to Vladimir Putin’s war plans. On Saturday, Belarusian railway workers carried out the “largest act of sabotage” on train lines leading into Ukraine, making it impossible for the Russians to resupply by train. This follows unverified reports of Ukraine battalions also blowing up train lines between Ukraine and Belarus.
The railway sabotage comes as supplies and morale among Russian troops continue to sink.
It is also a major blow to Russia, which had moved many of its troops and military equipment into Ukraine through Belarus since the invasion began.

Because an army in the field requires tons of food and other supplies daily, the wrecking of rail lines in their rear will make the Russian logistical problems in Ukraine even worse than they already are, particularly in the area near Kyiv. Meanwhile, in the southern theater of the war, the commander of Russia’s Black Sea fleet was killed in the fighting near the besieged port city of Mariupol.

The only proper adjective for Russia’s losses is unsustainable:

Entire regiments wiped out? Multiple generals killed in combat? This makes me think of the Battle of Franklin, in which the casualties included 14 Confederate generals (six killed, seven wounded, and one captured), and after which Hood’s army essentially ceased to exist. But that devastating Confederate defeat came near the end of the war in 1864, after more than three years of fighting, whereas Russia is experiencing these dreadful casualties after only three weeks.

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Category: Ukraine
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