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April 2019

EDUCATION Comments turned off

U Need a Shine? By Peter W. Wood

By on April 15th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/04/13/u-need-a-shine/

In the 1940s, a wave of automation threatened an industry that employed large numbers of low-skilled workers. The rise of the electric shoe-shine machines turned the once ubiquitous street corner shoeshine boy and the higher-end hotel lobby shoe-shine stand into rarities.

At the bristly heart of the corporate takeover, the shinification of American footwear, was the Uneeda Shine Machine Company, of 552 West 53rd Street, in Manhattan.

The mechanics, of course, were simple: a few spinning brushes running off a motor. The genius was in the packaging. The standard Uneeda Shine Machine was the Shine-O-Mat, a sturdy gun-metal box that stood a little taller than a desk and offered amenities such a choice of black or brown brushes, a foot stand for applying polish, and handles in the event that the vroom of the brushes might send the patron careening across the room.

I speak from experience. About 15 years ago I salvaged a Shine-O-Mat from scrap metal oblivion. It is in perfect working order and has traveled with the various chapters of my curriculum vitae ever since. It travels with the same joy of movement that Mount Rushmore might have if it were forced to relocate to Hackensack. The thing was built to stay put—probably to deter thieves and former shoeshine-boys-turned-anarchist-luddites. Or perhaps to ensure that the momentum of the brushes didn’t drive it across the floor.

Silber Shines
I salvaged my Shine-O-Mat not out of an obsessive desire to see my reflection in a pair of Oxfords, nor out of nostalgia for a bygone era of auto-matting. Rather, I was seeking to preserve a relic of a great epoch in academic history. Herein hangs a tale.

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IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

Are There Any Limits to Illegal Immigration? By Victor Davis Hanson

By on April 15th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/04/14/are-there-any-limits-to-illegal-immigration/

The U.S.-Mexican border is essentially wide open.

Why? Because there is a general expectation in Mexico and Latin America that American immigration law is unenforced. Or it is so bizarre that simple illegal entry almost always ensures temporary legal residence, pending an asylum hearing.

A scheduled asylum hearing, in turn, is seen by border crossers as a mere formality to be ignored. The popular perception on the border, then, is to stick one foot illegally onto U.S. soil, and, presto, win permanent residence for you and any family members who wish to follow.

In an age of 500 sanctuary city and county jurisdictions, few illegal aliens believe they will ever be deported permanently, even if they have been apprehended committing serious crimes. There is also a general perception among would-be illegal entrants that prominent Democrats and progressives welcome their massive influxes as useful and will do their best to ensure illegal immigration continues unabated.

There is also the assumption that the greater the chaos at the border, the less likely Congress will take bipartisan action to end it. After all, 2020 is an election year and progressives are in no mood to hand Trump the semblance of a legislative victory. This fact is also known to would-be border crossers.

Illegal alien families sense that they are vital to progressive agendas of fundamentally transforming the country by importing first-generation, loyal constituents—a sentiment that is slowly replacing the prior idea of mostly young men coming to work off the books. In an increasingly tribal America, they expect on arrival to be recalibrated instantly from Mexican nationals without any experience of America into “Latinos” and “Hispanics” with historical grievances against the majority population of United States, to be remedied by reparatory hiring and admission, and facilitated by ethnic operatives.

Some polls in the past have suggested that a third of Mexico’s population would immigrate to the United States if possible. The percentages of would-be immigrants from Central America are likely to be even higher. In theory, 50 million could cross the border in the next two decades, which poses the question: what are the theoretical limits on illegal immigration?

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

The Downward Spiral of Post-Secondary Education By Andrew I. Fillat and Henry I. Miller

By on April 15th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/04/14/the-downward-spiral-of-post-secondary-education/

Something is seriously rotten in our education establishment, especially in colleges and universities. The culprits are the evolution of the educational agenda, the cult of progressivism on campus, and the debt that students accumulate for an increasingly disappointing outcome.

Total student debt as of 2018 stood at approximately $1.56 trillion, and the average student who graduated in 2018 faced a debt of about $30,000. Lending Tree offers a breakdown of the depressing statistics. The average graduate of a private institution owes nearly $40,000, and some 88 percent of graduates are indebted at some level. Students who attend elite colleges without winning scholarships and those who go on to graduate school will almost surely enter the workforce owing $100,000 or more. And these are debts that bankruptcy cannot erase.

Those who enter “professions” such as law, medicine, and business administration can hope to earn enough income to repay the debt. For the rest, the picture is much more bleak. Almost half of those who attended private colleges default within 12 years. Public schools, at least, saddle their graduates with a more manageable burden, so the default rate is more like 1 in 7. But that still represents many people who are experiencing severe emotional strain.

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MEDIA Comments turned off

The Protocols of the Elders of the Washington Post April 15, 2019 Daniel Greenfield

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/273486/protocols-elders-washington-post-daniel-greenfield

The entire Khashoggi case is another reminder of just how thoroughly the media has mainstreamed not only Islamic terrorism, but anti-Semitism. The two beasts tend to go together. Where you’ll find Islamist activism, you’ll usually find anti-Semitism. Legitimizing one requires also legitimizing the other.

At the Jerusalem Post, Seth Franzman dug into Jamal Khashoggi’s Twitter history to find explicit anti-Semitic sentiments.

The late Saudi Arabian journalist, editor and kingdom-insider Jamal Khashoggi, writing on Twitter from 2011 until 2018, said Jews had no roots in historical Palestine, that one must know how to speak to Jews when meeting them, and that Jews were conspiring to divide al-Aqsa Mosque. The tweets, still online as of April 14, show a pattern of anti-Jewish views that even hinted at references to the antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and complained that the West had laws preventing Holocaust denial.

Khashoggi also showed some genuine interest in the makeup of Israel, tweeting in June 2011 about the role of Iranian Jews in the country. In a tweet that same month, he wrote about the “desperation of the Jews to deny the Protocols.”

On September 13, 2012, he tweeted, “If this was skeptical of the Holocaust, America would not allow it to be published, because the Jews succeeded in obtaining a law that would prevent it in America and Europe.” There is no such law in the US preventing Holocaust denial, but Khashoggi used the false claim to attack Jews.

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IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

Trump Proposes to Bus Illegals to Sanctuary Cities A political masterstroke. Matthew Vadum

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273482/trump-proposes-bus-illegals-sanctuary-cities-matthew-vadum

President Donald Trump’s proposal to ship immigration detainees to so-called sanctuary cities –which are Democrat strongholds— is a political masterstroke, if the Left’s wounded animal-like howling is any indication.

With this politically brilliant tactic, the likes of which would never have come from a President Jeb Bush or a President Mitt Romney, Trump continues to demonstrate that he is one of the few Republican presidents in modern American history who actually knows how to fight the Left. He is giving leftists a well-deserved taste of their own medicine.

And what better place to send illegal aliens than to sanctuary jurisdictions? They claim to welcome illegals and provide services for them. Their sanctuary policies, by which they harbor and shield illegals from U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE), are magnets for illegals, giving them incentives to sneak across the border or overstay visas.

The president’s plan only gives sanctuary cities more of what they claim to want.

“We’ll bring them to sanctuary city areas and let that particular area take care of it,” Trump said April 12 at the White House. “They say, ‘we have open arms,’ they’re always saying they have open arms, let’s see if they have open arms.”

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POLITICS Comments turned off

Here it comes: Rep. Tlaib blasts Dem leadershipBy Thomas Lifson

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/04/here_it_comes_rep_tlaib_blasts_dem_leadership.html

The first overt sign of the trouble that lies ahead for Nancy Pelosi and the Democrat leadership with the emergence of a radical Muslim wing of the party arrived Saturday.

Following the discovery of a video clip of Rep. Omar referring to 911 as “some people did something,” the blowback has been fierce, including in deep blue New York City, where the wounds of death and destruction (and lingering health issues among first responders) still are very painful. Rep. Tlaib is not happy with what she perceives as inadequate support for her fellow Muslima in Congress, and extended the criticism on this specific issue by another Twitter user into a broader attack on the party leadership:

Rashida Rashida Tlaib
They put us in photos when they want to show our party is diverse. However, when we ask to be at the table, or speak up about issues that impact who we are, what we fight for & why we ran in the first place, we are ignored. To truly honor our diversity is to never silence us.
Tlaib‏Verified account @RashidaTlaib
To say that Representatives Rashida Tlaib and Ihan Omar have chips on their shoulders would be an understatement. Both women embrace the notion of Muslim victimhood in a party that stokes the grievances of a variety of minorities who are encouraged to see themselves as victims and seek balm in the form of concessions from the majority.

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POLITICS Comments turned off

Mayor Buttigieg’s Promise

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.nysun.com/editorials/mayor-buttigiegs-promise/90647/

Mayor Peter “Pete” Buttigieg’s speech throwing his hat into the ring for president strikes us as the best debut from a Democrat since 2004. That’s when the party’s nominee was introduced at Boston by a young senator named Barack Obama, who stressed the idea of a UNITED States of America. Mr. Buttigieg captured at his launch this evening a youthful optimism that, other than Mr. Obama, our country hasn’t heard from a Democrat since JFK.

Not that we’re unmindful of what happened in respect of the nominee in 2004. Senator Kerry boasted of heroism in a Vietnam war he’d betrayed. He was called out by veterans of the shallow water inland fast tactical vessels known as Swiftboats, which had carried the war to the communists infesting the Mekong Delta. His fellow Swiftvets deemed him “unfit for command” and sank his campaign.

Mr. Obama, though, ended up winning the presidency four years later. He had a thinner resume than that of Mr. Buttigieg, who appeared in arms in Afghanistan and has been six years a mayor. Mr. Obama, though, ran a refreshing campaign, handily dispatching an angry candidate in Senator McCain, only to fail at finding policies as unifying as his early speeches. He set the stage for President Trump.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Ex-Communist Nations Suffer from Central-Planning Woes, Still By John Fund

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/04/slovakia-communist-central-planning-mindset/

Soviet troops are long gone, but red tape and disregard for the rule of law live on.

Bratislava, Slovakia — Thirty years ago, I traveled throughout Europe reporting on the fall of Communism for the Wall Street Journal.

So this year I looked forward to retracing my steps in the countries that kicked central planning to the curb. Most are now full members of the European Union and will elect members to its parliament next month. I wanted to see how things had worked out.

For my first leg of travel this year, I accompanied the Free Market Road Show, a merry rotating group of economists, journalists, and business leaders who for the last dozen years have traveled through up to 45 cities a year holding public forums and attracting media coverage. Their message is simple: The path to prosperity is to enhance the rule of law, lower taxes, respect individual freedom, decentralize government, and limit burdensome regulations. The show’s sponsor, the Austrian Economics Center, believes that the road show has helped shift public opinion toward that view. Certainly the center’s director, free-market economist Barbara Kolm, has prospered. Last year, she was named vice president of the Austrian Central Bank.

Our first stop on the Road Show was a mere 40 miles from the Road Show’s headquarters in Vienna, which evoked a warm memory for me. On New Year’s Eve in 1991, I stood in front of the castle in Bratislava and witnessed the birth of a new nation: Slovakia, which was peacefully separating from Czechoslovakia with a show of fireworks and a 21-gun salute.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

The Theory Behind My Disinvitation If the purpose of speech is to get the better of one’s opponent, why not do it via censorship instead By Harvey C. Mansfield

By on April 15th, 2019

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-theory-behind-my-disinvitation-11555269706

Mr. Mansfield is a professor of government at Harvard and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution.

Recently I was disinvited from giving a commencement address at the small Liberal Arts College within Concordia University in Montreal. My speech was to be on the study of great books, to which that college is devoted. The invitation was a surprise, and the rejection less of one, because I am a white male conservative professor.

Though I teach at Harvard and lecture elsewhere fairly often, I don’t get invitations for occasions when universities put their principles on display. My last commencement address was for a private high school in rural California.My relative lack of celebrity likely made me easier to disinvite. Most universities don’t ask a professor to speak at commencement, figuring that the professors have already had their turn. Students and parents prefer the relief of hearing something not worth remembering on which they won’t be tested.

Still, I had been invited and then disinvited. My reaction was more a sigh than a rush of anger at the manifest insult it was. Having devoted my life to teaching the great books, I was not going to be tongue-tied or at a loss as more specialized professors might be. Each of my classes is a commencement address. Thus the fear about my appearance at Concordia was not that I would speak badly. But what was the reason behind it?

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

Winner in Israel Turns Out To be New Voting Law By Michel Gurfinkiel

By on April 14th, 2019

https://www.nysun.com/foreign/winner-in-israel-turns-out-to-be-new-voting-law/90646/

Who was the real winner in the recent Israeli elections? The answer: the 2014 electoral law. It requires a list to garner at least 3.25 % of the vote to get seats at the Knesseth.

In 2015, the first time it was in force, it helped both Prime Minister Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party and Yitzhak Herzog’s liberal Zionist Union to emerge as the country’s main political forces, with 30 and 24 seats respectively out of 120 — against eight smaller parties, Right and Left, who got from 5 to 13 seats each.

This time, it was even more effective, providing 36 seats to Likud and 35 seats to the Blue-White Coalition, the indirect heir to ZU, and leaving less than one half of Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, to nine lesser lists. In other words, the 2014 law is turning proportional representation into something closer to a bipartisan system. Quite an achievement.

Pundits like to argue about the comparative theoretical merits of the majority system, a feature most famously of America, and proportional representation. More often than not, however, countries just pick up an electoral system for practical reasons.

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