The Other McCain

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

Mysterious Explosion in Nashville

Posted on | December 26, 2020 | 4 Comments

This appears to be some kind of terrorist attack:

A bomb planted in a recreational vehicle parked in the deserted streets of downtown Nashville exploded early Christmas morning, injuring three people and creating chaotic communications outages that took down police emergency systems.
The explosion was preceded by a chilling warning that urged people to evacuate the area.
Three people were hospitalized in stable condition Friday evening, and human remains may have been found at the scene, authorities said.
“We have found tissue that we believe could be remains,” Metro Nashville Police Chief John Drake said at a news conference Friday afternoon. The chief said it was unclear if the remains came from someone in the RV.
“The RV was detonated so if it was someone inside, we have no idea,” Drake said. “It was such a large explosion.”
Police were responding to a report of shots fired when they found the vehicle, with an eerie recording playing, Drake said. The voice on the recording commanded: “If you can hear this message, evacuate now.”
Police called in the bomb squad and rushed to clear nearby buildings.
“The officers immediately began knocking on doors and evacuating residents here, not knowing if the bomb was going to go off immediately, or if it was going to go off in the time that was stated,” Drake said. “The officers saved lives today, and their heroism should be noted.”
The blast occurred at 6:29 a.m. local time, before the bomb squad arrived.
The explosion was near an AT&T building, causing disruptions in phone service and 911 systems up to 180 miles away. The Federal Aviation Administration temporarily stopped flights out of Nashville International Airport due to the communications problems.
AT&T said in a statement it was “putting the full force of our disaster recovery efforts into responding to this morning’s explosion in Nashville.”

That the bomb was placed next to an AT&T building suggests that this was the intended target. So who would want to take out this communication facility and why? And why Nashville, of all places?

Also, what about that recorded warning to evacuate the area? This is further evidence suggesting that the bomber sought to destroy the AT&T building, rather than seeking to maximize human casualties, as terrorist bombers normally would. Setting the bomb at 6:30 a.m. on Christmas morning, when the streets were empty, is also evidence pointing in the same direction. But that might be a red herring, an attempt to mislead investigators by creating misleading evidence. The bomb might be an elaborate cover-up to conceal another crime, as police suspected in the case of the Speedway Bomber.

The investigation will obviously begin with determining who owned that RV. Once that is known, the rest of the relevant facts will come tumbling out in a rush. Building an enormous bomb requires time and resources, as well as extensive specialized knowledge. Achieving a timed detonation, as appears to be the case here, is a difficult feat, requiring the bomb-maker to avoid a premature accidental detonation.

If the motive for this bombing is political, what sort of politics? They did not choose as their target a synagogue or a mosque, nor was the target a government building or the office of a political party. The choice of the AT&T building — what does that suggest? AT&T is a gigantic conglomerate that bought out Time-Warner a few years ago. But why would the bomber target the company’s Nashville office? This is a strange puzzle, and I’m sure when the case is solved — probably within the next 72 hours — the story behind it will be quite interesting.

UPDATE: A 63-year-old man is reportedly a “person of interest.”




 

Category: Crime, Tennessee, Terrorism

‘Happy Trails, Hans’: What Is Everybody’s Favorite Christmas Movie Really About?

Posted on | December 25, 2020 | 2 Comments

My brother and I celebrated Christmas Eve by watching Diehard together. The movie suffers from all the usual suspension-of-disbelief problems common to action films — e.g., automatic weapons that fire an impossibly large number of bullets without changing magazines — there is no doubt that Diehard is a Christmas movie. And this is not just my opinion, but has been stated directly by the director John McTiernan.

Strangely enough, while finally settling the debate over whether Diehard is a Christmas movie, McTiernan provoked another controversy, saying that the movie was intended as anti-capitalist propaganda. Although I shouldn’t have to include “spoiler alerts” for a 1988 film — the Bruce Willis character John McClane triumphs over the villain Hans Gruber — a discussion of the plot is necessary to understand the left-wing perspective of Diehard which nobody seemed to notice until it was pointed out by the director. The movie is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp. Wikipedia describes the plot of Nothing Lasts Forever:

Retired NYPD detective Joe Leland is visiting the 40-story office headquarters of the Klaxon Oil Corporation in Los Angeles on Christmas Eve, where his daughter Stephanie Leland Gennaro works. While he is waiting for his daughter’s Christmas party to end, a group of German Autumn–era terrorists take over the skyscraper. The gang is led by the brutal Anton “Little Tony the Red” Gruber. Joe had known about Gruber through a counter-terrorism conference he had attended years prior. Barefoot, Leland slips away and manages to remain undetected in the gigantic office complex. Aided outside only by Los Angeles Police sergeant Al Powell and armed with only his police-issue pistol, Leland fights off the terrorists one by one in an attempt to save the 74 hostages, and his daughter and grandchildren.
The terrorists plan to steal documents that will publicly expose the Klaxon corporation’s dealings with Chile’s junta. They also intend to deprive Klaxon of the proceeds of the corrupt deal by dumping $6,000,000 in cash out of the tower’s windows. Leland not only believes their claims, but also that his daughter is involved.
Leland kills eleven of the terrorists, but in the end he fails to save his daughter, who falls to her death with Gruber after he was shot by Leland. Blaming Klaxon for the terrorist attack, Leland throws the cash out of the window himself. As Leland is leaving the building, the last terrorist Karl, who was presumed dead earlier, returns and starts a shooting rampage, killing the police chief Dwayne Robinson in the process, before Powell finally kills him.

This requires a brief history lesson: What is “German Autumn”?

The German Autumn (German: Deutscher Herbst) was a series of events in Germany in late 1977 associated with the kidnapping and murder of industrialist and businessman Hanns Martin Schleyer, president of the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations (BDA) and the Federation of German Industries (BDI), by the Red Army Faction (RAF) far-left militant organisation, and the hijacking of Lufthansa Flight 181 (known in Germany by the aircraft’s name, Landshut) by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). They demanded the release of ten RAF members detained at the Stammheim Prison plus two Palestinian compatriots held in Turkey and US$15 million in exchange for the hostages. The assassination of Siegfried Buback, the attorney-general of West Germany on 7 April 1977, and the failed kidnapping and murder of the banker Jürgen Ponto on 30 July 1977, marked the beginning of the German Autumn. It ended on 18 October, with the liberation of the Landshut, the death of the leading figures of the first generation of the RAF in their prison cells, and the death of Schleyer.

So what Thorp’s novel imagines is this left-wing European terrorism making its appearance in the United States. Anyone old enough to remember the 1970s recognized that the Hans Gruber character was inspired by Germany’s Red Army Faction, a Communist revolutionary group otherwise known as the Baader–Meinhof Gang (allow me to recommend Hitler’s Children as introductory reading on this subject).

Younger audiences know nothing of Baader-Meinhof and the larger context of violent left-wing radicalism during the Cold War (e.g., the Weather Underground, the Symbionese Liberation Army, the Black Liberation Army) and so the Hans Gruber character makes no sense at all to them. Also, notice that the 1979 novel has the corporate villain as an oil company involved in corrupt dealings with “Chile’s junta,” another historical reference that will be lost on younger audiences who don’t know anything about Augusto Pinochet. Of course, Chile has never been a significant source of petroleum, but never mind that. The point is that the novel’s plot had a built-in anti-capitalist message — American corporations profiting from corrupt deals with foreign dictators — that somehow wasn’t anti-capitalist enough to suit the director of Diehard.

Now, let’s hear from the director on the changes he made:

“Joel Silver sent me the script three, four times. And it was about these horrible leftist terrorists that come into the sort of Valhalla of capitalism, Los Angeles, and they bring their guns and their evil ways and they shoot up people just celebrating Christmas, terrible people, awful. And it was really about the stern face of authority stepping into put things right again, you know? And I kept saying to Joel, I don’t want to make that,” he said.
McTiernan said he used “It’s A Wonderful Life” as a source of inspiration for the direction he wanted the movie to go, primarily its critique on unfettered capitalism.
“I went to Joel. And I said, ‘Okay, if you want me to make this terrorist movie, I want to make it where the hero in the first scene when the limo driver apologizes that he’s never been in a limo before,” he said. “The hero says it’s alright. I’ve never ridden in a limo before. Okay, working class hero.”
“And Joel understood what I meant. And he said okay. And so we started to work on it,” he continued. “And in fact, everybody, as they came to work on the movie began to get, as I said, this idea of this movie as an escapee. And there was a joy in it. Because we were, we’ve had changed the content. And that is how ‘Die Hard’ became, we hadn’t intended it to be a Christmas movie, but the joy that came from it is what turned it into a Christmas movie. And that’s really the best I can tell you about it.”

That’s just . . . crazy.

By 1988, it was entirely commonplace for groups of middle-class teenagers to rent limousines for their prom dates. Making a limo ride a symbol of evil capitalism — a point of honor for the “working class hero” that he had never ridden in a limousine — is a childish gesture. Insofar as the limousine symbolizes luxurious decadence, this is not something that the average American thinks much about, either to resent or to envy.

To a mature and intelligent person, there is no sinister mystery surrounding wealth and the symbolic trappings of wealth. We don’t need a paranoid Marxist conspiracy theory to explain why some people are richer than others and, unless we are suffering from some deficit of self-esteem, we are not awed by the show-off gestures of people who are so crass as to flaunt their wealth. Some people are impressed (and seek to impress others) with name brands, as if a pair of jeans or a purse were inherently more valuable because it was emblazoned with a designer’s logo, and we have a word for such people: Fools.

Did I ever mention that I once worked in the men’s wear department of a major retailer? When you’re getting a 25% employee discount even off the “sale” price of clothing, it gives you some idea of what how much retail mark-up is paid by fools who think they’re getting a bargain on some fancy brand-name merchandise. My shirts were Pierre Cardin and my ties were Ralph Lauren, but I sure as hell never paid the retail price.

Genuinely rich people are seldom ostentatious about their wealth. One of the reasons so many people hate Donald Trump so much — even before he got into politics, they hated him for it — is because he was always so ostentatious, which offends our Christian sensibilities. It is cruel for the rich man to flaunt his wealth in the face of the less fortunate. Envy is a sin, and when someone makes a point of showing off their wealth, they are inspiring sinful resentments in others, much the same as the woman who dresses like a slut is sinfully inciting lust. It is one thing to appreciate the finer things in life, to be grateful for the rewards of success, and an entirely different thing to engage in behavior intended to humiliate others by flaunting in their faces those luxuries they cannot afford.

Is mere accumulation of material possessions the whole purpose of life? Should we evaluate others solely on what brand of shoes they wear?

 

I’ve described this “cargo cult” mentality toward wealth and the status symbols associated with wealth. Even if you work honestly to get rich, it is a mistake — indeed, a sin — to become obsessed with the material symbols of wealth, but we see this most plainly in how criminals ostentatiously display their ill-gotten gains:

After two days of jury trial, an Ashburn [Virginia] woman pleaded guilty [in October 2018] to wire fraud, money laundering, conspiracy to impersonate a federal agent to demand money, and obtaining confidential phone records.
According to court documents and the evidence at trial, Keisha L. Williams, 43, solicited over $5.4 million from more than 50 victims by telling them that she had paid a lot of money for a certain healthcare-related software overseas in Austria; that the software was being held in “escrow” because she still owed taxes, attorney’s fees, and other debt associated with the purchase; and that if they would just give her a short-term loan to get this software out of escrow and bring it to the United States, the software would be a huge success and everyone would be quickly repaid, with interest.
In truth, Williams spent over 95 percent of the victims’ money on creating a lifestyle of luxury for herself, including millions on international travel, retail purchases at stores like Chanel and Gucci, and close to half a million on maintaining her girlfriend.

You can buy a lot of Chanel and Gucci for $5 million, but why? What is it about the pleasure of possessing a designer handbag that would make someone willing to commit federal crimes to get it?

“Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.”

You care so much about impressing other people that you’ll perpetrate a $5 million fraud and spend it on Chanel and Gucci? Fools!

It is likewise foolish of a movie director to turn a limousine ride into a symbolic gesture about a “working class hero,” as if a character could not otherwise be heroic. Only the proletarians are worthy of admiration — that seems to be what John McTiernan meant to suggest with that bit in Diehard about John McClane never having ridden in a limo, but somehow that never registered to me as an “anti-capitalist” message.

Why would a successful movie director go through life carrying around that kind of chip-on-the-shoulder class resentment? I don’t know, and after nearly 2,000 words, I’ve probably not done much to increase anyone else’s understanding of this unfathomable mystery. In other words, I have failed in my purpose as a writer, which adequately explains why I haven’t gotten rich in this whole “journalism” racket. See, this is what people don’t want to admit — personal failure — and therefore construct warped worldviews in which they consider it wrong for other people to succeed. That’s what Marxism is about, demonizing wealth as a way to make people think of their own poverty as evidence of virtue. Such ideologies appeal only to fools, the kind of fools who don’t notice that the action-movie hero has fired hundreds of shots from a machine gun with only a 30-round magazine. But miracles happen at Christmas time, eh?

So I started out writing about Diehard, meandered off into the history of the Baader-Meinhof Gang, then went on an extended digression about the ostentatious display of wealth, and if I wasn’t such a hopeless failure as a writer, I might offer some kind of thoughtful conclusion here. But instead, all I can do is to wish you a Merry Christmas and remind you that the Five Most Important Words in the English Language are:

HIT THE FREAKING TIP JAR!

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!




 

Category: Christmas, Crime, Movies

In The Mailbox: 12.24.20 (Christmas Eve Edition)

Posted on | December 25, 2020 | 1 Comment

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate, and Happy Holidays to those who don’t. Silicon Valley delenda est.

Merry Christmas from Shouko Komi (and some of her friends)!

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: The Good People Of Portland And 911 Response
EBL: Hansel & Gretel
Twitchy: Former (Alleged) Conservative Blogger Mad At Breitbart For Being Mad At NPR For Naming Cardi B’s “WAP” As Song Of The Year
Louder With Crowder: J.P. Sears Hopes You Have A Very Merry Communist Christmas
Vox Popoli: The BBC’s War On Christmas, also, No Place For Fear
According To Hoyt: We Are Not Alone, also, I Won’t Be Home For Christmas
Monster Hunter Nation: Christmas Noun X – The Ghosts Of Die Hards Past
Evie Magazine: Millions Of Men No Longer Want To Get Married… (h/t Red Pilled Jew)

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: All I Want For Christmas Is Apathy
American Greatness: HK Immigration Bill Is Win-Win For Chicoms
American Power: Families On The Brink As Congress’ Christmas Relief Bill Crashes
American Thinker: Why Democrats Should Read The Navarro Report
Animal Magnetism: Christmas Eve 2020
Babalu Blog: Reports From Cuba – A Sad Christmas & New Year
BattleSwarm: Stellarscope’s “Silent NIght”
Cafe Hayek: COVID Lockdowns Will Not Boost Innovation
CDR Salamander: A Waterfront Of Missed Opportunities, also, A Note Of Caution
Da Tech Guy: Tater – Trump Supporters Are Like ISIS Fighters, also, The Latest Coronavirus Stimulus Is A Lump Of Coal In Every American’s Stocking
Don Surber: Watching The Left Go Nuts Over The Pardons, also, How Grinch Pelosi Stole America
First Street Journal: Now Bill DeBlasio Wants To Trample On The 4th Amendment As Well As The 1st
The Geller Report: French Police Arrest Four More Muslims In Charlie Hebdo Attack, also, Pro-Israel Christian Group Torches Warnock In New Ad
Hogewash: Team Kimberlin Post of The Day, also, 52 Years Ago Today
Hollywood In Toto: Shortcut Runs Out Of Gas…Fast, also, Gaslighting – Grauniad Denies Trump Fans Suffer In Hollywood
JustOneMinute: More Pardons
The Lid: Detroit Sues Black Lives Matter
Legal Insurrection: SCOTUS Punts Pennsylvania Case Until After Inauguration Day, also, Trump Vetoes Defense Bill
Nebraska Energy Observer: Endings
Power Line: The President Pardons Stephanie Mohr, also, This Week In Racism – Tiki Bars?
Shark Tank: Loser Pam Keith Files Petition To Disbar Rep. Matt Gaetz
STUMP: On The Bailouts That Didn’t Happen, Part 2
The Political Hat: Twelve Posts Of Christmas (Days 11 & 12)
This Ain’t Hell: Since Christmas Is Nearby, also, Those Who Were Lost Are Being Found
Victory Girls: Christmas Eve – Thankful But Not Silent
Volokh Conspiracy: And We Should Trust You Now, Dr. Fauci, Because…?
Weasel Zippers: Dr. Fauci Admits He Lied About COVID, also, Here’s a Graph Of All The Foreign Countries That Got Money While You Got $600
The Federalist: It’s Not Nancy Pelosi’s Job To Tell Christians What They’re Supposed To Believe, also, Trump Veto Of Defense Bill & Blue State “COVID” Bailout Is 100% On Brand
Mark Steyn: Who Needs All These Words?

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Category: Linkagery

In The Mailbox: 12.24.20 (Afternoon Edition)

Posted on | December 24, 2020 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 12.24.20 (Afternoon Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Going to get caught up today if it kills me.
Silicon Valley delenda est.

The greatest swords(wo)man in Japanese history wishes you a merry Christmas! Got any udon?

OVER THE TRANSOM
Ninety Miles From Tyranny: The 90 Miles Mystery Box, Episode #1210
EBL: And Now A Word From Judy Garland
Twitchy: WaPo Finds That Doubting The Election Results Threatens Democracy, Just Like Holocaust Denial
Louder With Crowder: President Trump Excoriates Congress For Disastrous COVID Relief Bill
Vox Popoli: Banishing The Fake Pope, also, Congress Is Getting Nervous

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: The Only “Foul Play” In The Hunter Biden Investigation Was The Media’s
American Greatness: Under Biden, The Term “Illegal Alien” May Be Illegal
American Power: Death & Denial In California’s Central Valley
American Thinker: The New Phony War
Babalu Blog: Cuba’s Socialist Social Justice As Perceived By Cubans
BattleSwarm: Gov. Abbott Receives Draft Proposal For State Takeover Of APD, also, What Rough Porkulus Shambles Out Of Washington?
Cafe Hayek: Ivor Cummins Documents Orwellian Features Of COVID Lockdowns
Camp of the Saints:
CDR Salamander: Okay, The Navy Likes To Bear Bait
Da Tech Guy: The Best Advice I’ve Heard On The Subject, also, Report From Louisiana – New Orleans Mayor Attacks Christian Singer Lauren Daigle
Don Surber: Michelle Obama Mocks $600 Stimulus Checks, also, Even CNN Calls Out Chris “Maynard G.” Krebs
First Street Journal: A Cure Worse Than The Disease
The Geller Report: Giuliani Bombshell – AZ Lawmakers Likely To Vote Today On Certifying Trump Electors, also, Video Leaks Of Warnock’s Encounter With Police After Beating His Wife
Hogewash: Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day, also, Nothing To See Here. Move Along.
Hollywood In Toto: Did Spotify Blow Millions On A Royal Podcast? also, The Very Worst Movies Of 2020
JustOneMinute: What About Ivanka?
The Lid: Will The Last Person Leaving NY State Please Turn Out The Lights
Legal Insurrection: Red China Demands Biden Return U.S. To Iran Nuke Deal, also,  Netanyahu-Gantz Government Collapses, Israel Heads For Fourth Election In Two Years
Nebraska Energy Observer: Waiting…The Start, On The Verge, The End
Power Line: Relieve This, also, Unity Democrat Style
Shark Tank: Senate Passes Rick Scott’s “Buy American” Resolution
Shot In The Dark: The Spirit Of The Season
STUMP: On The Bailouts That Didn’t Happen, Part 1
The Political Hat: Twelve Posts Of Christmas (Days 9 & 10)
This Ain’t Hell: Escape From New York, also, Air Force Releases 150-Page Report On Racial Disparities That Comes Across As Racist
Victory Girls: Blackwater Guards Get Christmas Pardon
Volokh Conspiracy: Cancelling Portraits Of White Judges In Fairfax County Courtroom
Weasel Zippers: Ten Years For Illegally Streaming Movies Or Porn? It’s In The “COVID” Bill, also, “Experts” Now Claiming Third Strain Of COVID In UK May Be Vaccine Resistant
The Federalist: Eight Of The Craziest Items In the $900 Billion Porkulus “COVID Relief” Bill, also, What Gave Us Joy In 2020
Mark Steyn: Deep State Target, also, Twas The Night Before The Night Before Christmas

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Category: Linkagery

Raphael Warnock: Dindu Nuffin

Posted on | December 24, 2020 | Comments Off on Raphael Warnock: Dindu Nuffin

It is arguably racist to invoke the “dindu nuffin” meme here, but because Raphael Warnock is a Democrat running for Senate, any criticism of him is therefore automatically racist, so it doesn’t matter. It’s probably just a matter of time until we are told Warnock could not possibly have abused his ex-wife because he was an honor student.

However, the ex-wife, Ouleye Ndoye, told police in March that Warnock ran over her foot while the couple were having a dispute over whether their children would be allowed to travel to her grandfather’s funeral in West Africa. Warnock had refused to sign for passports:

“This man’s running for United States Senate, and all he cares about right now is his reputation,” she says to the officer. “I’ve been very quiet about the way that he is for the sake of my kids and his reputation.”
“I’ve tried to keep the way that he acts under wraps for a long time, and today he crossed the line. So that is what is going on here. And he’s a great actor. He is phenomenal at putting on a really good show,” Ndoye said.
Warnock scoffed at her account.
“I barely move, and all of a sudden she’s screaming that I ran over her foot. I don’t believe it,” he said.

 

The question is not whether Warnock did or did not run over his wife’s foot, but rather if this video will have any effect on the outcome of the two runoff elections in Georgia. Polls show both races — Warnock against Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler and Democrat Joel Osoff against Sen. David Perdue — are neck-and-neck. It seems astonishing to me that these races are so close, but then again I still can’t believe Georgia was close enough for Joe Biden to steal it, so what do I know?

Perhaps the demographics of Georgia have changed so drastically, and/or Democrats have gotten so proficient at election fraud, that my native state has now gone irretrievably blue. On the other hand, maybe November was a fluke, and Georgians will repudiate Democrats in January. Either way, don’t blame me — I dindu nuffin.




 

Category: Election, Georgia, Racism

In The Mailbox: 12.23.20 (Afternoon Edition)

Posted on | December 23, 2020 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 12.23.20 (Afternoon Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Sick as a dog yesterday; feeling slightly better today thanks to chicken soup, tea, & drugs. More Fate/Grand Order silliness for your amusement.
Silicon Valley delenda est.

Wow, the fifth emperor of Rome sure looks different than I remember…

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: iPhone Security Problems In The Wild
EBL: Feast Of The Seven Fishes, also, Why Homelessness?
Twitchy: Woman Who Accused Ric Grenell Of “Emboldening Actual Neo-Nazis” Blocks Everyone, Including Grenell
Louder With Crowder: Majority Of Americans Think Nancy Pelosi Is Horrible, Want New House Speaker
Vox Popoli: Christmas Gifts From The VP, also, Red State Revolt

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: Cuba’s Decay At Christmastime
American Greatness: Giuliani Says Arizona GOP Will Attempt To Certify Trump Electors On Wednesday
American Power: Red China Rations Electricity For MIllions
American Thinker: The Biggest Political Blunder In American History
Animal Magnetism: Animal’s Daily Next Step News
Babalu Blog: Fascists Who Call Themselves “Anti-Fascists”
BattleSwarm: Gun News Roundup
Cafe Hayek: Heroes In A Year Of Horrors
CDR Salamander: Sweden Executes An About Face
Da Tech Guy: Social Media Exodus – MeWe, also, A Quick Note To My Fellow Christians & Catholics In Particular
Don Surber: Obama Reveals His Anti-Semitism, also, Concede Only That Trump Won
First Street Journal: Perhaps There Would Be More Catholics In The Pews If We Had More Catholics In The Priesthood
The Geller Report: Constitutional Lawyer Says Law Prohibits Pence From Accepting Electoral Votes From Fraudulently Certified States, also, Rudy Giuliani Says He Can’t Go On Failing Fox News Any More
Hogewash: Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day, also, We Live In Alternate Worlds
Hollywood In Toto: Wonder Woman 1984 – Woke, Wobbly, & The Year’s Most Shocking Dud, also, Hollywood Hate Goes Unpunished…Again
JustOneMinute: Happy Holidays!
The Lid: Activist Prof Says Each Black Vote Should Count Twice For “Reparations”
Legal Insurrection: Minority Leader McCarthy Demands Swalwell Be Cut From Intel Committee, also, Newsom Hints At Longer Lockdown As Bars & Restaurants Sue Over Restrictions
Nebraska Energy Observer: Merry Christmas From Doctor Who!
Power Line: This Week In Wokery, also, Democrats Feel Gloomy Over Election
Shark Tank: Florida Democrats Whine About Marco Rubio’s Bible Tweets
Shot In The Dark: Checked And Balanced
STUMP: COVID Mortality Idiocies
The Political Hat: The Twelve Posts Of Christmas (5-8)
This Ain’t Hell: “A Cadet Will Not Lie, Cheat, Or Steal…” also, CSM Sacked For “Unprofessional Language”
Victory Girls: Joe Biden Will Never Be My President
Volokh Conspiracy: Mother Has Son Tested For COVID-19, Threatened With Contempt Of Court
Weasel Zippers: President Trump Sends COVID Relief Bill Back To Congress, also, Biden Already discussing How Best To Resume Illegal Immigration From Mexico
The Federalist: Joe Biden Says “Our Darkest Days Are Ahead”, also, Dear Democrats – Stop Treating Black Men Like We’re Stupid Or Lose More Votes
Mark Steyn: Here Comes Santa Claus, also, Veinglory In The HIghest

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Category: Linkagery

The Destructive Meaning of ‘Equality’

Posted on | December 22, 2020 | Comments Off on The Destructive Meaning of ‘Equality’

Comrade DeBlasio last week declared: “I’d like to say very bluntly our mission is to redistribute wealth. . . A lot of people bristle at that phrase. That is, in fact, the phrase we need to use.”

The subject, believe it or not, was K-12 schools in New York City. How could anyone view public education as having a “mission to redistribute wealth”? And yet this is indeed what DeBlasio considers the “mission” of his city’s schools. In a remarkable press conference (and by “remarkable,” of course I mean, insane), the mayor spoke of his plan to “more equitably redistribute resources” in the city’s schools: “We can never accept a broken status quo. . . . We can never go back to a past that didn’t work.”

What is so “broken” in the status quo of New York schools? What was it about those schools that “didn’t work” in the past? Well, the outcomes were unequal and, because inequality is unfair (according to “progressives” like DeBlasio) therefore the entire system must be destroyed. This idea is summarized in a headline, “De Blasio to destroy New York’s top public schools to run an experiment in diversity.”

You see that vague goals like “equality” and “diversity” are really just a pretext for destruction, as part of a war against achievement.




 

Category: Education, New York

Ode to SCOTUS

Posted on | December 22, 2020 | Comments Off on Ode to SCOTUS

by Smitty

SCOTUS took a cruise,
What had it to lose?
Beside everything,
That they did bring,
When a ‘berg she kissed,
She should have missed.

As down the vessel went,
A final moment was spent,
With the Captain on patrol,
Seeking hands for damage control.
“It would help our failing crew
If you penguins would turn to!”

“Three problems beset you, sir.
First, you address us as a cur.
Next, you ended your proposition,
With a dreaded preposition.
Last, our labor shan’t be lent,
Lest we set precedent.”

And thus we see the worth,
Of those who after birth,
Fetish principle so much,
They fail you in the clutch.
Whose bloody-minded reason,
Sees not the proper season.

Category: Uncategorized
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