In the hopes of encouraging a more civil, and illuminating, discourse, here is another episode of William F. Buckley, Jr.’s “Firing Line”.
Just some sharp wit and sharper remarks between and with William F. Buckley, Jr., Malcom Muggeridge, Peter Ridell, James Galbraith, and Patricia Hewitt discussing the world.
Another “quick takes” on items where there is too little to say to make a complete article, but is still important enough to comment on.
The focus this time: Just a little killing here and a little killing there…
First, a little mood music:
Carrying on…
Much like how “Medical Marijuana” was used to normalize non-medial weed legalization, euthanasia was used to normalize killing people.
“The idea of a nonmedical model for assisted suicide was just pushed again by bioethics professor Eric Mathison. From the assisted-suicide-boosting Thaddeus Mason Pope’s Medical Futility blog (an excellent resource on these issues, reported by Pope objectively):
“‘Eric Mathison proposes a non-medical model of assisted dying.
“‘The current, dominant model of MAID requires patients to get approval from healthcare providers before getting access to assisted suicide and euthanasia. This is problematic for a couple of reasons.
“‘First, there’s a theoretical problem — namely, it’s paternalistic because it requires a healthcare professional to be convinced that the patient is suffering intolerably. And second, there’s a practical problem because there aren’t enough healthcare professionals who provide the service.
“‘In response to these problems, Mathison believes that (1) the only requirement that a patient needs to meet is that they are making an autonomous choice, and (2) that non-medical personnel should be able to assist in their deaths.’
“That’s only logical. Killing/suicide isn’t a medical act. So why should it be restricted to doctors and nurse practitioners?”
Science has advanced to the point where interspecies organ transplants are being used to save human lives via genetically engineered organs:
“Towana Looney donated a kidney to her mother in 1999 only for the remaining one to fail several years later as a result of pregnancy complications.
“The 53-year-old from Alabama has now become the latest recipient of a gene-edited pig kidney — and is currently the only living person with an animal organ transplant — a New York hospital announced on Tuesday.
“‘It’s a blessing,’ she said in a press statement, published three weeks after the procedure at NYU Langone.”
The narrowing of the gap between human and genetically engineered non-human can but inevitably lead to one thing: Genetically engineered kemonomimi girls!
One of the hallmarks of Cultural Marxism and wokeness is the belief that justice can not be attained by treating people equally or even by treating them as individuals. Instead, a “System of Oppression” that is proclaimed to be at the very core essence of society is to blame. The “proof” of this is racial disparity of the “oppressed” group being statistically worse off vis-à-vis the dominant “oppressor” group. This is what has become known as “disparate impact” where “any variance in […] statistics involving race vis-à-vis racial demographic statistics is presumed to be caused by racism.”
But where did this concept come from? Legally, it was invented by the Supreme Court in Griggs v. Duke Power Co. (1971).
Griggs v. Duke Power Co. (1971) is one of the most influential U.S. Supreme Court decisions in employment law. It introduced the concept of "disparate impact," and its implications reach far beyond the workplace. Here's why it was a mistake. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/EvSZJgtjcA
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) January 4, 2025
In Griggs, Duke Power required employees to pass IQ tests or have a high school diploma to qualify for certain jobs. The Court ruled these requirements were discriminatory because they disproportionately excluded black workers, even without discriminatory intent.
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) January 4, 2025
The Court held that practices neutral on their face could still violate the Civil Rights Act of 1964 if they resulted in disparate outcomes for protected groups, unless the employer could show the practice was "job-related and consistent with business necessity."
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) January 4, 2025
This decision shifted focus from intentional discrimination to statistical disparities. The burden of proof fell on employers to justify neutral practices, even when no intent to discriminate existed.
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) January 4, 2025
While there is much to decry about education in America at all levels, there are still many teachers who do understand the subject they are teaching with many even good at it. However, the adage “those who can do while those who can’t teach” is now the law in New Jersey.
“New Jersey Democratic Governor Phil Murphy passed Act 1669 as part of the state’s 2025 budget in June to address a teacher shortage, Read Lion reports. The law went into effect on Jan. 1, 2025. Individuals seeking an instructional certificate will no longer need to pass the Praxis Core Test, a basic skills test for reading, writing, and math that is administered by the state’s Commissioner of Education. Candidates still do, however, need to pass the Praxis Subject Tests that are specific to their degree.
“‘We need more teachers,’ Democratic Sen. Jim Beach, who sponsored the bill, said in May 2024 when the chamber cleared the bill in a 34-2 vote. ‘This is the best way to get them.’”
And who is responsible for pushing this bill? Unsurprisingly, it’s the teachers’ union.
“Just a few months prior, Murphy also signed a similar bill into law that established an alternative pathway for teachers to sidestep the testing requirement. According to Read Lion, the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA), a teachers union that is associated with the National Education Association (NEA), was a driving force behind the bill and called the testing requirement ‘an unnecessary barrier’ to those who want to teach but may not perform well on standardized exams.”
News of the Week for January 12th, 2025
In the hopes of encouraging a more civil, and illuminating, discourse, here is another episode of William F. Buckley, Jr.’s “Firing Line”.
Creators being censored and even punished by totalitarian regimes (or merely repressive institutions) is anything but a new phenomenon. Let us look back half-a-century ago when William F. Buckley, Jr. discussed the intellectual’s responsibilities in the an age of totalitarianism with Stephen Spender.
Another “quick takes” on items where there is too little to say to make a complete article, but is still important enough to comment on.
The focus this time: The Acolytes of Gaia shall ensure your Green compliance… or else!
First, a little mood music:
Carrying on…
In service of Gaia, a tribunal was called to punish those who violate the “Rights of Nature”.
“The tribunal’s website is typical of the anti-humanism that permeates the nature-rights movement. For example, the fundamental philosophy of nature rights — as elucidated at the website, is ‘that the interests of nonhuman beings are of equal importance to human interests.’ So, pond scum, mosquitoes, trees, squirrels, grass, and scallops are equal to us. That’s self-loathing any way you look at it.
“Worse, adopting such a misanthropic approach to environmentalism would have serious consequences to human thriving. For example, forget about heating your home in the winter. Fossil-fuel industries are a primary target. Thus, the tribunal will hold a faux trial to prosecute fossil-fuel industries.”
This “tribunal” in its own words:
“The International Rights of Nature Tribunal will leverage the platform of Climate Week New York to amplify its message and advocate for the Rights of Nature, calling for genuine solutions to the climate crisis. The Tribunal hearing will highlight the fossil fuel industry’s ongoing impacts on frontline communities in the U.S. and worldwide, including ecological destruction and exacerbation of the climate crisis. It will specifically examine the industry’s devastating effects on biodiversity and BIPOC communities.”
There have been many alternatives to the classic “political compass”. Bruce Pardy from the American Institute for Economic Research discusses just such an alternate view to the more familiar political compass, or simple Left/Right graph.
Many on the Right are so hell bent to “fight like the Left” that they’ve adopted the Left’s way of thinking. Some have termed them the “Woke Right”; others object to that term because they don’t share the same utopian endpoint. But substantively, are they more similar than they may seem superficially? Logan Lancing certainly argues as such.
I’ve seen various content claiming that “Woke Right” is a stupid name because “Woke” just means “awakened to and forwarding critiques of social power."
Woke is much more than that. I can't tell if they still don't know that, or they're aware…
Let's define "Woke" again.
🧵
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) December 17, 2024
“Critical Constructivism” is the technical term for Woke. “Critical” for the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt school and offshoots (there’s a million “critical theories” now, Critical Race Theory and Queer Theory being the ones people are most familiar with).
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) December 17, 2024
To quote Woke educator Joe Kincheloe, "Critical constructivism is grounded on the Frankfurt School's formulation of critical theory."
So why Critical Theory?
— Logan Lancing (@LoganLancing) December 17, 2024
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