News of the Week for April 4th, 2021
- Riots & Revolution
- Corona Virus
- Gun Rights
- Hide the Decline
- Obamacare
- War & Terror
- National News
- Economy & Taxes
- International News
- Opinion
Riots & Revolution
Oregon man pulls gun on Antifa mob who trashed cars to stop “Freedom Rally”
Dramatic video shows the moment a man pulls a gun on Antifa protesters as they clashed with demonstrators taking part in a “Freedom Rally” near the Oregon state Capitol on Sunday.
Cornell Review: The “Anti-Racist” Religious Fever Must Break at Cornell
“contrary to [Cornell’s motto of] ‘any person… any study’, the plan” for an Antiracism Center “would create artificial identities and then proceed to discriminate against certain students and faculty.”
Chauvin Trial Day 1 Wrap-Up: Opening Arguments & Three State Witnesses
State Witnesses: 911 dispatcher, grocery worker witness, martial arts witness
Chauvin trial day 1
I have been struggling with a bug that has sapped my energy and shortened my day yesterday. These notes are accordingly abbreviated.
Important Eyewitness Testimony at the Chauvin Trial
In the state’s opening statement at Derek Chauvin’s murder trial (which I address in more detail in a column on our home page), prosecutor Jerry Blackwell spoke of how, on the haunting video, the jury could see George Floyd’s neck being pressed in a chokehold by Chauvin “until the life was squeezed out of him.” It turned out that this anticipated the eyewitness testimony of Donald Williams II, a 33-year-old mixed-martial-arts fighter and security guard.
Chauvin trial day 2
Minnesota martial arts practitioner Donald Williams returned to the stand and concluded testimony that began Monday afternoon. He reiterated his observations culminating in Floyd’s death: tremendous pain in Floyd’s face, his eyes rolling back in his head, his mouth open, drooling, gasping for air. All the while Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck, Williams’s “energy” did not let him feel he could intervene. After Floyd was loaded into the ambulance, Williams called 911 believing he had witnessed a murder.
Chauvin Trial Day 2 Wrap-Up: State Focused on Feelings, Judge Scolds Firefighter
Testimony from MMA “Expert,” Bystander Witnesses with Limited Knowledge, & Grumpy Firefighter
Chauvin trial day 3
Firefighter EMT Genevieve Hanson returned to the stand for cross examination by defense counsel Eric Nelson Wednesday morning. Did she show the officers on the scene identification as a firefighter? She did not. Nelson had nothing more for her. With a question or two more from prosecutor Matthew Frank on redirect — she believed George Floyd needed immediate medical attention, but the officers other than Tou Thao didn’t talk to her — she was released.
Chauvin trial day 4
The State opened the day with the testimony of George Floyd girl friend Courteney Ross. She discussed her relationship with Floyd dating to the day in August 2017 that he asked asked her how she was doing when she was waiting in the lobby of Harbor Lights to visit her son’s father. She recalled Floyd asking her, “Sis, you okay, Sis?” She said she wasn’t and he asked if he could pray with her. Floyd was working at Harbor Lights as a security guard.
Chauvin Trial Day 5 Wrap-Up: Poorly Informed Witnesses Provide State with Poorly Informed Opinions
Knowledge of Witnesses Limited Solely to Body Cam Video Provided by Prosecution
Chauvin Trial Day 5 – Hoping for More Technical, Less Emotive, State Testimony
With weeping bystander testimony behind us, hoping for more substantive testimony today
Chauvin Trial Analysis: Opioid Tolerance Issues
Science suggests opioid-addicts with tolerance are more, not less, likely to suffer overdose.
Chauvin Trial Day 4 Wrap-Up: Another Poor Day for Prosecution, Advantage Defense
Medics fled angry mob, Fire was late and in wrong place, MPD Sergeant was uninformed
Chauvin Trial Day 5 Wrap-Up: Poorly Informed Witnesses Provide State with Poorly Informed Opinions
Knowledge of Witnesses Limited Solely to Body Cam Video Provided by Prosecution
Black Lives Matter 2020 Impact Report: Massive Fundraising And Upcoming Focus On Education System
With tens of millions of dollars in their war chest contributed by corporations and individuals alike, BLM plans to vastly expand its influence over every aspect of American life in 2021, including education.
Corona Virus
CDC Real-World Study Confirms Protective Benefits of mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines
Study involved health care personnel, first responders, and essential workers in six states
WHO Will Give The Press Just 30 Minutes To Review COVID Origins Report Before Taking Questions
The World Health Organization (WHO) announced Monday it will only give reporters 30 minutes to review its highly anticipated report on the origins of COVID-19 before taking questions on the matter.
World leaders call for pandemic treaty, but short on details
More than 20 heads of government and global agencies called in a commentary published Tuesday for an international treaty for pandemic preparedness that they say will protect future generations in the wake of COVID-19.
State Doctor Coordinating Nursing-Home COVID Response Took Multiple Hours-Long Testing Trips to Chris Cuomo’s Home
One year ago, right around the time that CNN’s Chris Cuomo was assuring his viewers that we are “all in this together,” he was personally monopolizing the time of a New York state doctor who had been tasked with helping to coordinate COVID-19 testing in nursing homes.
WHO’s COVID Origins Report Reads Like Chinese Communist Party Propaganda
Level of China’s involvement in report is so over-the-top, WHO’s official statement on the report indicated “all hypotheses remain on the table.”
Vermont Governor Gives People Over Age 16 Who Identify As Non-White COVID Vaccine Priority
If you are over 16 and high risk, you can also sign up. But healthy white people must wait.
Vermont limits access to COVID vaccine based on race, which is unconstitutional
Vermont is giving racial minorities and their families a preference in access to the vaccine. As the state’s governor explained on Twitter, “If you or anyone in your household identifies as Black, Indigenous, or a person of color (BIPOC), including anyone with Abenaki or other First Nations heritage, all household members who are 16 years or older can sign up to get a vaccine!”
Vermont Endorses Racial Preferences in Medicine
Is dystopian too strong a word for this, from Phil Scott, Vermont’s Republican governor?
Gun Rights
The Democrats’ Background Check Bill Is Already Tanking
Chuck Schumer and his Senate Democrat colleagues have a gun control problem on their hands. President Joe Biden has already promised his liberal supporters that he was going to get some gun control legislation passed, but even the bill viewed as having the best chance of reaching his desk has been declared “dead on arrival” in the upper chamber. H.R. 8 is the bill that was supposed to expand background checks to a “universal level” and was viewed as being at least somewhat less onerous to Second Amendment supporters. But now, it appears that Schumer and Pelosi won’t even be able to reuse their bogus reconciliation scheme to hammer H.R. 8 through because it won’t even reach fifty votes on the Senate floor. So now it’s back to the drawing board. Schumer is still claiming that he will bring something to the floor when the Senate returns from recess, but what that will turn out to be remains a mystery.
Circuit Court Rules Against Bump Stock Ban
The Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals handed a victory to the Virginia Citizens Defense League and Gun Owners of America this week when it struck down an ATF ban on bump stocks. This case has been rattling around in the courts ever since the mass shooting in Las Vegas brought the question of bump stocks into public scrutiny. Judging by the wording of the ruling, however, it sounds like there may still be a way for the government to ban these specific accessories, but not the way that the ATF went about it when the ban first went into effect. Still, at least for now, the ban is on the shelf, though I’m not sure this actually qualifies as a Second Amendment issue.
Iowa Adopts Constitutional Carry
Iowa has abolished its permitting process for concealed carriers, becoming the 19th state to do so.
Hide the Decline
Environment &
“Green Energy”
Are You Ready For Solar Geoengineering? The U.S. Is But Sweden Isn’t.
The idea behind solar geoengineering is pretty simple. What if we could reflect more of the sun’s energy back into space and thereby reduce the buildup of heat in the atmosphere, sort of like putting mirrors on a greenhouse.
Greenies’ 2007 Court Victory Comes Back to Bite Them in 2021
On Thursday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit dismissed New York City’s lawsuit against Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell, and BP. New York sought to penalize these oil companies under New York State’s “nuisance law” for contributing to global warming by selling fossil fuels — even though the city acknowledged that selling oil was perfectly legal. Ironically, a major court victory for green activists that dates back to 2007 ended up destroying New York City’s legal case, 14 years later.
Obamacare
Government in Healthcare
China generated over half world’s coal-fired power in 2020: study
China generated 53% of the world’s total coal-fired power in 2020, nine percentage points more that five years earlier, despite climate pledges and the building of hundreds of renewable energy plants, a global data study showed on Monday.
War & Terror
China Grabbing Whitsun Reef: ‘Sudetenland’ in Slow Motion
The failure of the Obama administration to defend the Philippines in early 2012, in a confrontation similar to today’s, emboldened China’s regime to adopt an even more aggressive posture in its peripheral waters.
Chinese Propaganda Going Full Tilt Over Xinjiang Cultural Genocide
Chinese state media called for a boycott of Swedish clothing retailer H&M last week because the chain had announced it would no longer buy cotton from China’s Xinjiang region. But as the Post pointed, the announcement by H&M wasn’t new. It had been sitting online for months when it was dredged up by the CCP’s keyboard warriors.
China found using surveillance firms to help write ethnic-tracking specs
Technical standards published by surveillance research group IPVM specify how data should be segmented by dozens of characteristics – from eyebrow size to skin tone
USA’s Darpa plots giant FLYING aircraft carrier like Nick Fury’s Avengers ship
THE PENTAGON is planning to change the face of warfare with the development of flying aircraft carriers.
Iran Rejects Biden’s Offer to Halt Uranium Enrichment in Return for Further “Sanctions Relief”
Iran demands end to “all sanctions” for merely entering into talks with the Biden White House.
Afghan Litigation Risk
You thought that litigation risk was the sort of thing that causes corporate lawyers and human-resources departments to put you through sensitivity training. Now we are learning that it’s a reason for the U.S. military to stay in Afghanistan.
China’s Military Preparing for U.S. Intervention in Taiwan Strait
China is readying itself for American and Japanese involvement in any Taiwan Strait conflict, with recent warplane exercises around the island aimed at displaying its ability to isolate Taiwan from potential support, according to analysts in Beijing and Taipei.
Naval Officer Busted Selling Top NATO Secrets to Russia for Just $6K
Italian secret service agents backed by Carabinieri military police swooped in on a clandestine meeting in a Roman parking garage early Wednesday morning just as an Italian navy officer named as Walter Biot was handing a secret dossier of Italian state secrets and classified NATO documents to a Russian spy who had a reportedly paltry sum of €5,000 ($5,863) in cash ready to swap for the documents.
San Francisco district attorney’s parents were terrorists, not victims
San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin has tried to present his soft-on-crime policies as the result of his upbringing, with both of his parents being incarcerated. But Boudin’s parents were not victims of an unforgiving justice system. They were terrorists.
A Chinese Attack on Taiwan Is Getting Closer
Beijing sent the largest-ever incursion by Chinese jets into Taiwan’s air-defense identification zone last Friday, leading the country’s defense ministry to announce that it would no longer scramble its own planes in response.
Biden Admin Drops Trump’s Sanctions on ICC Prosecutor Who Went After U.S. and Israeli Troops
Secretary Blinken calls Trump-era sanctions on the tribunal “inappropriate” even though the U.S. does not recognize the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.
Inside supersonic presidential jet that can fly at nearly TWICE the speed of sound
THIS is what a supersonic presidential plane that could hit speeds of 1,380mph as it jets at nearly twice the speed of sound could look like.
National
Even wokeism isn’t an absolute defense for stupidity
You have to be pretty stupid to opine publicly about the race/ethnicity of a mass shooter before his race/ethnicity is known. You have to be very stupid to base such an opinion on the obviously false claim that mass shooters are “always” of a particular race/ethnicity. And you have to be world-class stupid to risk your professional career on such an assertion.
GOP candidate accused of pandering after he transforms into cowboy for Texas congressional run
New Jersey boy. Pro wrestler. Republican candidate in Nevada. Dan Rodimer has led many lives, but his latest – a cowboy-hat-wearing, Southern-drawling bull rider – might be the most extreme transformation to date.
Supreme Court Takes Up Dismemberment Abortion Case
On Monday, the Supreme Court announced it would consider the case Cameron v. EMW Women’s Surgical Center, which centers on Kentucky’s ban on dismemberment abortions, also known as dilation and evacuation (D&E) abortions. The Court is not likely to weigh the merits of the purported constitutional “right” to abortion enshrined in Roe v. Wade (1973) and later cases, however.
“The Dam Busters” Face Their Toughest Mission Yet: Surviving Cancel Culture
1955’s The Dam Busters is a brilliant film about stiff-upper-lip British bravery during WWII. Directed by Michael Anderson, it stars Michael Redgrave, Richard Todd, and in early cameo roles, Robert Shaw, and Patrick McGoohan. It dominated the British box office in 1955, and was nominated for an Academy Award for its special effects. And while its climatic action scenes look hokey today, with miniature aircraft that look like they could have been Airfix models, that’s in part because of the massive revolution in special effects the film directly inspired. When George Lucas was planning Star Wars, he took plenty of inspiration from The Dam Busters for his climactic Death Star “trench” battle scene.
Idaho lawmakers push to defund Boise State programs that push ‘extremist ideologies’
Idaho state lawmakers have proposed to cut more than $400,000 from Boise State University.
Trump-Hating BLM Activist Charged for Attacking Asian Women in Seattle
News that doesn’t fit the preferred media narrative
Trump Crashes Wedding At Mar-A-Lago, Rags On Biden Border Crisis
“I just say, ‘Do you miss me yet?'”
Oregon Association of Scholars Calls Out Censorship at Portland State U — PSU Claps Back
The faculty senate at Portland State University passed a resolution equating the publication of course curriculum on social media with the riot at the US Capitol on January 6 and allowing faculty members to identify other faculty members as participating in implicitly racist curriculum even if no evidence exists.
The Dan Rodimer “Fake Cowboy” Ad
Something fun to cleanse the palate on a slow news day. Meet Dan Rodimer, former pro wrestler, native New Jerseyan, and twice a failed candidate for elected office in Nevada.
Baltimore Permanently Abandons Prosecuting Many Types Of Crime
Back in March of last year, Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby quietly began the process of “decriminalizing” a number of low-level crimes such as drug possession and prostitution. The move was ostensibly made to reduce jail populations during the pandemic to prevent the spread of COVID behind bars. (We’ll get to the real reason in a moment.) Now, after a year of refusing to prosecute people for breaking laws that are still on the books, Mosby has declared the project to be such a resounding success that she’s going to make those changes permanent, even if we get the pandemic under control. What could possibly go wrong?
The Problem With The Asian Hate Crime Narrative In Georgia Spa Killings
Something seems really off about this Asian hate crime narrative being pushed regarding the Georgia spa killings. The facts don’t support the narrative.
Governor Bill Lee Takes a Stand for Women and Girls
Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee deserves to be applauded for signing a bill protecting women and girls by upholding sex-exclusive sports. Naturally, the usual suspects will accuse him of attacking “transgender kids.” But this isn’t about transgenderism. This is about sex. And fairness.
Biden names diverse slate of judicial nominees in first effort to reshape federal courts
President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced plans to name a diverse group of judicial nominees to the federal courts in his first efforts to have the federal bench “reflect the full diversity of the American people — both in background and in professional experience,” the White House said.
Carjackings Surge In D.C. – Over 100 So Far In 2021, Including Murder of Pakistani Immigrant By Teens
“According to MPD, there have been 101 carjackings so far this year compared to just 22 at this time last year.”
Will “action civics” prevail in Texas?
“Action civics” is the means through which the left intends to indoctrinate students in radical dogma and enlist them as foot soldiers in radical activism. It has already effectively been imposed by law in Illinois and Massachusetts.
And Then There Were Seven. Next Cuomo Accuser Comes Forward
In 2017, upstate New York was hit by some fairly serious flooding. One of the towns that were partially submerged was Greece, a suburb of Rochester near the banks of Lake Ontario. That’s where Sherry Vill and her family lived and she was somewhat surprised when Governor Andrew Cuomo showed up to tour her property and survey the damage. Then, according to Vill, things took a turn when the Governor sexually harassed her. Vill is now the 7th woman to come forward with allegations of this sort, while the Governor continues to defend his actions as not being sexual in nature. Vill disagrees, and unlike some of the other accusations facing Cuomo, she has pictures to prove it.
Florida’s SB 146: A Wedge for Action Civics
Well-intentioned state legislators in Florida have unanimously passed a civics bill through the upper chamber that is likely to have the very opposite effect as the one intended. The bill, SB 146, authorizes the creation of a civics “practicum” for high school and provides for the designation of certain schools focused on participatory civics as “freedom schools.” Unfortunately, although few of those who supported it will have intended this, the bill is likely to bring leftist “action civics” to Florida.
Arkansas Passes “Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act” To Ban Trans Surgery, Puberty Blockers For Minors
The Arkansas Senate passed the “Arkansas Save Adolescents From Experimentation (SAFE) Act” on Monday, and now it heads to Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson’s desk for him to sign into law.
Mail-In Voting Audit of Montana’s 2020 Elections Finds Significant Number of Irregularities
A mountainous, 2,600-square-mile region with a population of approximately 119,600 does not seem like your prototypical setting for machine politics. Yet a recent audit of mail-in ballots cast there found irregularities characteristic of larger urban centers—on a level that could have easily swung local elections in 2020 and statewide elections in cycles past.
CNN Claims ‘Biological Sex’ Is a Disputed Term: ‘No Consensus Criteria for Assigning Sex at Birth’
In an article about South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem banning biological boys and men from competing in women’s sports, CNN news reporter Devan Cole claims that the executive orders signed by Noem refer to “biological sex,” which he claims is a “disputed term.”
“Insurrection”? Most Capitol Rioters Probably Won’t Face Prison Time
This should have been obvious from the start: Trespassing and disobeying police commands are the only charges likely to stick against most of the Trump supporters involved in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. Most of them just got swept up in the excitement of the moment and certainly were not part of an “anti-government” conspiracy.
‘Time to stomp some eggs’: UNT students threaten to ransack Bible verse Easter egg hunt
Conservatives at the University of North Texas hid Easter eggs stuffed with Bible verses across campus.
Rep Matt Gaetz claims that alleged sexual relationship with 17-year-old girl is part of $25M extortion plot by former DOJ employee and that his dad has been wearing a wire for the FBI
Gaetz has denied allegations he trafficked and had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl
G. Gordon Liddy, undercover operative convicted in Watergate scandal, dies at 90
G. Gordon Liddy, the undercover operative whose bungling of the Watergate break-in triggered one of the gravest constitutional crises in American history and led to the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon, died March 30 at his daughter’s home in Fairfax County, Va. He was 90.
Pro Tip From CNN: “Not Possible” To Know A Baby’s “Gender Identity” At Birth
Can we tell a baby’s gender at birth? After untold millennia of human experience — and the emergence of “gender reveal party” industry to the contrary — CNN’s news section informs us that we should believe them rather than our own lying eyes. In a report on South Dakota governor Kristi Noem’s executive order barring transgendered biological males from competing in women’s sports, Devan Cole insists that telling “gender identity” is impossible at birth
CNN Flunks Biology
Enough already of the question-begging reports asserting that politicians are interested in “banning transgender girls and women from competing on women’s sports teams,” as if motivated by nothing but rank bigotry. Quite the contrary. They are merely trying to uphold sex-exclusive sports in the interest of safety and fairness for half the population (Yes, hello, it’s us again — females).
CNN News Writer Denies the Biological Reality of Sex at Birth
On the menu today: A CNN news writer asserts that we can’t know a child’s “gender identity” at birth, San Diego teachers will instruct migrant children in person while kids in local school districts remain at home, and some good news in a new trial of Pfizer/BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine.
New “Squad” Member: Standardized Testing Is To Different Races As Tree-Climbing Is To Different Species
This reminds me of that Times op-ed from a few years ago by a Latino writer who concluded that he had to break up with his girlfriend because she was white. How can a man be happy, he wondered, when his progressive minority friends keep giving him the stink-eye for his miscegenation with an Oppressor?
University of Nevada denies banning white students from ‘identity-based’ dorms set aside for blacks, Latinos, LGBTQ, and Native Americans
Report on Wednesday claimed University of Nevada, Reno had segregated dorm
Report: Capitol Hill Suspect Described Himself as a “Follower of Farrakhan”
One officer passed away.
Capitol cop killed after suspect with knife rams car into barrier before being shot dead by officers
A CAPITOL police officer has been killed and another injured after they were mowed down by a suspect who rammed his car into a barrier and confronted them with a knife before being shot dead.
LGBTQ+ students sue Dept of Ed to defund their own Christian universities
Pointing to their universities’ Christian statements of faith, students identifying as homosexual and transgender are suing the Department of Education to end the religious exemption to Title IX.
Pass The Popcorn: WA Supreme Court Unanimously OK’s Recall Campaign Against Seattle’s Socialist Council Member
Remember Kshama Sawant? The Socialist politician first made waves eight years ago, just days after her election to Seattle’s city council, by urging Boeing workers to seize the company’s factories for themselves. Sawant later quarterbacked the head-tax proposal that prompted Amazon to leave the city, which the city council later reversed. Sawant spearheaded an effort to cut the police chief’s pay after Chief Carmen Best criticized Sawant’s effort to defund the police department, causing Best to resign in protest. Sawant also led a protest at Mayor Jenny Durkan’s home in favor of defunding the police and protecting the socialists’ seizure of several city blocks in the CHAZ/CHOP, despite Durkan’s home address being protected by a privacy statute.
Pigwarts? Gaetz, Florida Legislators Reportedly Played Harry Potter-Themed Sex Contest In State Legislature
Arresto Cadmentum? This allegation from the New York Post and Business Insider is sooooo outlandish that it might actually be, er … true. According to both, Matt Gaetz and his pals in the Florida legislature used to play a Harry Potter-themed sex context, in which they compared notes for points on their conquests. The more unlikely the target, the more points one scored, according to their sources.
Short Circuit: A Roundup of Recent Federal Court Decisions
Collector’s coins, lucky stars, and a global nuisance.
7% of Americans don’t use the internet. Who are they?
For many Americans, going online is an important way to connect with friends and family, shop, get news and search for information. Yet today, 7% of U.S. adults say they do not use the internet, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted Jan. 25-Feb. 8, 2021.
UC Berkeley spends $25M a year, pays 400 employees to advance “equity and inclusion”
UC Berkeley employs 150 professionals and 250 additional students dedicated to addressing “systemic inequities,” according to a document obtained this week by The College Fix.
Economy & Taxes
Basic Income Programs in Marin County and Oakland Exclude White People. Is That Legal?
The answer mostly hinges on how much the government is involved.
White House dramatically increased tax proposal amid tension over next big spending plan
Some Biden officials worried a large gap between spending and revenue would widen the deficit so much it could risk triggering a spike in interest rates
Even Denmark’s Welfare State Can’t Make Life Fair
Those who advocate a bigger welfare state typically have two goals in mind. One, they want to redistribute money and resources to the less fortunate. And two, they want to facilitate economic mobility: If kids at the bottom are given more money, better schools, and so on, hopefully these investments will improve their chances of making it to the top.
Biden to announce up to $4 trillion infrastructure plan with massive tax hikes
President Biden will outline his massive $3 to 4 trillion infrastructure plan Wednesday, which will create four tax increases worth around $1.8 trillion, the White House revealed.
Biden’s true tax priorities
President Biden is preparing to go to the mat for four tax increases worth about $1.8 trillion to help pay for his infrastructure and social safety net plans, advisers tell Axios.
Liberal Senators Push Biden for $10 Trillion Climate and Infrastructure Bill
Last week, I wrote about how in contrast to Barack Obama after the financial crisis, President Biden isn’t even pretending to care about digging out of the historic debt accumulated during the coronavirus pandemic. Now, as he gets prepared to roll out $4 trillion in new spending, liberal senators are trying to press their luck.
Corporate Taxes Don’t Just Soak the Rich
Biden’s new infrastructure proposal is out. It would dump a lot of federal money into infrastructure and a long list of unrelated priorities, and pay for it by hiking taxes on corporations.
Biden infrastructure plan would boost gun violence prevention groups
Proposal would directly help minorities in low-income communities, supporters say
Pelosi Supports Adding Tax Break for Wealthy Homeowners to Infrastructure Bill
One of the key pillars of Donald Trump’s tax reform bill was placing a cap on deductions of $10,000 for state and local taxes (SALT). Naturally, Democrats from high-tax states were livid. Rich people were actually penalized for living in places like New York and California.
2 California tech companies moving to new facilities in Reno
Two California tech companies have announced plans to bring their businesses to Reno, and local economic development officials say they’re perfect examples of the type of firms they’re targeting as part the effort to diversify the region’s economy.
Bounce: US Adds Nearly A Million Jobs In March, Unemployment Rate Drops To 6%
Job creation bounced back higher than any month since last August, but does that mean that the economy has returned to recovery? Economists predicted a gain of 615,000 jobs in March, but the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the number was 50% higher than estimates at 916,000. The unemployment rate dropped down to 6%, all good signs.
International
Ever Given Ship Freed After Blocking Suez Canal for 6 Days — and Why It Matters
On Monday morning, a canal service provider said the Ever Given container ship — the 99,155-net-ton ship (220,940 gross tons) that measures 1,312 feet by 107 feet by 47 feet — had finally been dislodged after it got stuck in the Suez Canal and blocked ship traffic for six days.
Crews Dislodge Massive Cargo Ship Ever Given From Egypt’s Suez Canal
Ever Given has been dislodged and is on its way to Great Bitter Lake for inspection.
Germany to restore Jewish names to phonetic alphabet
The famous model is the one used by NATO. The German model uses names; those deemed too Jewish were taken out and replaced with others.
What China’s Communist Party Wants: Its New Five-Year Plan
The Chinese Communist Party’s overarching strategy for the next five to fifteen years, apparently, is to accelerate China’s rise by becoming an innovation superpower, technologically independent of the West and dominating global tech.
Boys At Australian School Forced To Apologize To Girls On Behalf Of Their Gender
Young teenage boys at a school in Victoria, Australia, were forced to stand up during an assembly and apologize to girls at the school on behalf of their gender.
Musical notation branded ‘colonialist’ by Oxford professors hoping to ‘decolonise’ the curriculum
Documents reveal that faculty members have proposed reforms to address ‘white hegemony’ in music courses
Classical music under assault in academia
Oxford University reportedly is under pressure to stop, or at least curtail, the teaching of sheet music, musical notation, and even the classical music that was scored upon it. The rationale is that all of this is “too colonial,” and that Beethoven, Mozart, and music in general are “complicit in white supremacy.”
Communist Cuba’s new ration book allows every person one bar of soap every 42 days
Yet another of one of the many glorious achievements of Cuba’s socialist revolution. ¡Vamos Bien!
Heavy metal star takes on Poland’s anti-blasphemy law
In his Warsaw apartment decorated with occult imagery, heavy metal star Adam Darski from the band Behemoth told AFP he has had enough of being prosecuted under Poland’s anti-blasphemy law.
China Kills Off Most Of The Rest Of Hong Kong’s Democracy
The latest news out of Hong Kong isn’t good, though that’s nothing new these days. China has issued yet another mandate regarding elections in the city and they’re clearly not even trying to hide what they’re doing at this point. Under the current system, Hong Kong’s 70-person legislature is chosen under a hybrid system where 35 members are elected by the public and the other half are selected by an “election committee” composed of loyalists to Beijing. Following this mandate, the legislature will be significantly expanded, but even fewer seats will be decided via public elections. Anyone considering running for office on a pro-democracy platform is hearing a very unsubtle message from the Chinese Communist Party at this point.
The European Union: From a Single Market to a Tragic Farce
Five hundred years from now, when historians look back on the COVID era, they will say that America’s “Operation Warp Speed,” under President Donald J. Trump, was a triumph of science and logistics.
Macron’s lockdown backtrack leads to fight for political survival as Le Pen scents blood
PRESIDENT Macron was left isolated and politically adrift, after ordering a third national lockdown on Wednesday.
Opinion
From political correctness to cancel culture
On my walk the other day, I passed a group of six people in their late teens or early twenties. One of them, a female, asked what “cancel culture” means. A guy answered, “it means if you say the politically incorrect thing, you’re gone.”
South Dakota Legislature Rightfully Rejects Governor Noem’s “Maddening” Style and Form Veto
Governor Kristi Noem’s “style and form” veto of a bill protecting girls by ensuring sex-exclusive sports, has been rejected by the majority of the South Dakota legislature who argued that her intervention was not only overreaching but unconstitutional.
A Nice Little Victory in the Pronoun Wars
Freedom of speech for professors and freedom from belligerent student demands won a small victory last week with the Sixth Circuit’s decision in Meriwhether v. Shawnee State University.
Why It’s Time to Treat the Hammer and Sickle Like the Swastika
If someone were to ask you to think of either extreme of the political spectrum, odds are you would immediately picture a swastika at one end, and a hammer and sickle at the other. Regardless of your views of the left-right paradigm, or whether you subscribe to horseshoe theory or not, we (rightfully) tend to perceive fascism and communism as the standard ideologies of the extreme.
Voting Laws: Simplifying Can Become Oversimplifying
In the Washington Post, Philip Bump says that the debate over voting laws “is more complicated than it needs to be.” The only real question worth considering is whether we should maximize the number of people voting or minimize that number. If you support democracy, you’ll be for the federal voting-reform bill the Democrats want, H.R. 1, and against Republican state legislation. If you oppose democracy, you’ll take the opposite positions. And while Republicans and Democrats may be alike in taking stances on these issues based on what voting policies will help them most in elections, the crucial difference is that the Democrats are pro-democracy and the Republicans against it.
The Population Implosion
Tyler Cowen writes about “global depopulation” as the looming existential threat no one is talking about. I recommend you read it.
Why Do I Know Nothing About the Soviet Union?
My ignorance hit me hard in my Jewish 101 class, where one student was the daughter of Russian Jews, but she knew very little about Judaism from her family. I had no idea Judaism has been illegal there, that the rituals and the community had been pressured for generations to erase all traces of religiosity, all traces of difference, any part of themselves that might be Jewish. I’d never heard about any of that.
Master’s Tools
The phrase “master’s tools” as it is relevant within Critical Social Justice dates back to a 1984 essay by the black feminist Audre Lorde, who was attempting to make the case that the “tools” of the dominant system (these would be the “master’s tools”) will not dismantle the dominant system itself (these would be the “master’s house”). Lorde specifically contended that the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. This statement draws upon a rather tortured metaphor to slavery (see also, post-traumatic slave syndrome), and generally insists that it will require using means and methods outside of the dominant system to disrupt and dismantle the dominant system and the oppression it causes (see also, epistemic oppression, epistemic violence, strategic resistance, strategic essentialism, revisionism, radicalism, and identity politics). Among the underlying assumptions in this metaphor is the idea that the existing system is unfairly dominant and requires dismantling (see also, revolution).
How good a judge is Biden’s nominee to the D.C. Circuit?
Joe Biden has nominated Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. She currently sits on the U.S. District Court in D.C.
A Tocquevillian Appraisal of American Sports
My friend Jay Nordlinger has written a very fun column about what he would do if he owned a sports team. Like many of you, I imagine, I find the temptations of his hypothetical too alluring to resist penning a reply. I’d like to take a slightly different approach to the question, however.
Democrats Burn the Dictionary: Why AOC’s Border Newspeak Should Be Ditched
Increasingly, politics has become the art of the euphemism. And it’s not helping solve anything.
Not Everyone Should Be Made to Vote
There is nothing wrong with preferring that not everybody vote in every election, because voting is a responsibility that demands deliberation.
Narrative
The racist/not-racist binary illustrates the role that ideology plays in holding oppression in place, and the ideology of individualism in particular. Individualism is a storyline or narrative that creates, communicates, reproduces, and reinforces the concept that each of us is a unique individual and that our group memberships, such as our race, class, or gender are not important or relevant to our opportunities. This narrative causes a problematic tension because the legitimacy of our institutions depends upon the concept that all citizens are equal. At the same time, we each occupy distinct race, gender, class, and other positions that profoundly shape our life chances in ways that are not natural, voluntary, or random; opportunity is not equally distributed across race, class, and gender.
Celebrate the Real Cesar Chavez on National Border Control Day
“You can’t forget what he taught us by looking at that statue.”
Tony Blinken’s Error of Commission
Somebody hand Antony Blinken the report of the Commission on Unalienable Rights. He needs to give it a look. In his remarks Tuesday presenting the latest Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the secretary of State took a gratuitous swipe at the commission, which his predecessor Mike Pompeo established in 2019 to review the connections between America’s constitutional principles, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and U.S. foreign policy.
Gaetz-gate: Who Would Have Thought . . .
Congressman Matt Gaetz. One way or another, it seems the pairing of that title and that name is not long for this world. Let’s run through a quick timeline of the series of events that have upended this Florida man’s week and career.
Academics Need to Counter the “Lived Experience” Hustle
Leftists have a bag of tricks for debating those who don’t accept their conclusions. They don’t actually involve debate, but instead attempts at browbeating their opponents into submission or at least silence.
Georgia Should Stand Up to Corporate Bullies
Corporations have the right to free speech. They do not have the right to obedience to all of their demands. It is high time that state-level Republicans remembered that.
How Living on a Socialist Kibbutz Reveals the Value of Private Property
Economist Meir Kohn explains how kibbutz life helped him understand the flaws of socialism and the value of property rights.
The Face of Evil
Michel Foucault is the intellectual godfather of the modern Left. I have always found this fact strange, as his theories, to the extent they are intelligible, are obviously wrong. But they formed the basis for such leftist staples as identity politics and sexual confusion, and so, coherent or not, they were welcomed enthusiastically by liberals.
The perversions of M. Foucault
Foucault, who died of aids in June 1984 at the age of fifty-seven, has long been a darling of the same super-chic academic crowd that fell for deconstruction, Jacques Derrida, and other aging French imports. But where the deconstructionists specialize in the fruity idea that language refers only to itself (il n’y a pas de hors texte, in Derrida’s now-famous phrase), Foucault’s focus was Power.
