RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/who-guards-the-race-guardians/

Recently a black man named Tyre Nichols was savagely beaten by five Memphis policemen, and died a few days later of “extensive bleeding caused by a severe beating,” according to the preliminary autopsy report.

Typically such an event is met with nationwide protests and riots marked by arson, vandalizing, and looting. The usual race-baiters, attracted by black blood, exploit the crime in order to promote their own interests as racialist tribunes, or to get publicity for some ideology and its supporting “evidence,” like the sketchy, counter-factual “systemic racism” that drives police to target unarmed black men for murder, even though for decades police shootings of all ethnicities have declined considerably.

In this instance, however, the protests were muted and localized. More pertinent, the five policemen were black men, a fact that require some sophistic rhetorical gymnastics in order to argue that this murder bespeaks systemic racism or lingering “white supremacy,” for which protestors find arson and vandalism somehow effective. It also didn’t hurt that the five were fired and charged with second-degree murder with dispatch, taking away another sham motive for riots–– the accusations of impunity or cover-ups that long investigations and delayed filling of charges invite.

This disaster no doubt has many causes: poor training, lax hiring standards, “equity” and “diversity” imperatives, for example. Police departments are finding it harder to recruit more police to replace those who have quit, despite six-figure salaries and signing bonuses. The problem obviously can be traced to the “defund the police” movement and the perception of many likely hires that they will be demonized and second-guessed, and their bosses in city government won’t have their backs. That treatment is not likely to attract people to a dangerous occupation that requires you to wear a target on your back every time you show up for work.

Yet the “systemic racism” explanation is too politically useful to forgo, and so the current heinous crime by black cops must be subject to this one-size fits all argument. But what the purveyors of this weapon forget is that dubious theories like “systemic racism” in the end are patently harmful and insulting to black people, as all arguments based on determinism compromise the full humanity of all peoples.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/the-disturbing-truth-behind-chinas-spy-balloon-penetration/

What are the motives and significance of the Chinese spy balloon penetration of U.S. territory, and why now? First the backstory:

China’s military capability may soon rival that of the United States. What holds back Chinese President Xi Jinping from moving militarily on Taiwan are two things:  First he may think that time is on his side, with Biden’s America in decline and a perception that a two-year window remains for action. Second, what holds Xi Jinping back is of course his concern that if the invasion fails, he would be removed by the CCP.

So, Xi continues to build Chinese military power capabilities while the U.S. deteriorates, and he bides his time while studying and calculating the range of responses from the U.S. that China would face from such an invasion.

The Chinese projection of power against the United States is shaped by two priorities. First, is their commitment to what is known as unrestricted warfare, one part of which emphasizes using multinational, non-state, and supranational organizations to counter the U.S. Toward this end, the Chinese now control the U.N.’s World Health Organization (WHO), which provides China with a proxy front to impose an unprecedented medical tyranny far exceeding the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns and controls. The second priority is the age-old Chinese military strategy that emphasizes  “the supreme excellence of breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.” Even if the Chinese cannot match the U.S. military because of U.S. export controls on high-end semiconductors and advanced AI technology, Beijing believes their level of control in the U.S. can continue America’s demoralization and division—potentially leading to collapse. Said another way, China is delaying military action in hopes of breaking America without fighting.

As for engaging the U.S. militarily, Xi and his advisors study America’s past. They know the U.S. military’s masterful logistics can deliver swift  and decisive enemy defeat, such as the Bush administration’s victory in the Gulf War in 1990-1991. But the Chinese also note the fecklessness of the Clinton and Obama administrations that followed, in which two U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed;  Egyptian ally Hosni Mubarak was abandoned; the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya was destroyed, and ISIS appeared invincible after two and a half years of U.S. military engagement.

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/02/07/has-the-state-of-the-union-ever-been-worse/

Joe Biden will ramble through his second State of the Union speech tonight and will tell us that all is well. But just like the blundering president, this nation is ailing.

Three years ago, before our miserable “leaders” made the worst public policy decision in history and told us to hide in our basements, nearly half of Americans thought their country, while politically divided, was moving in the right direction. Inflation was low, as were energy prices, and employment was high. The economy had been growing steadily until it was interrupted by panicked policymakers (most of them Democrats). The country was at peace, and the only people who were talking about war with Russia or China were those who suffered most from Trump Derangement Syndrome. A Gallup poll taken early in 2020 found that nearly nine out of 10 Americans felt good about their personal lives. The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom ranked the U.S. at 17th in 2020, (eight places higher than in 2022).

Americans have noticed that life has since changed. Our I&I/TIPP Poll taken last week shows that more than three in five (61%) says they are not better off than they were two years ago. Only a third, most of them, predictably, Democrats, say they are better off.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll completed last week produced similar results: 41% say they are worse off financially since Biden took office. The scale of discontent is not as large as it is in our poll, but the ABC News/Washington Post poll shows that the dissatisfaction has grown sharply under Biden: At the same time in the Trump presidency, two years in, only 13% said they were worse off than when he was inaugurated.

Back to 2022: The portion of those who say they’re better off under Biden has fallen to 16%, the lowest figure the poll has recorded since the recession of the late 2000s.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2023/02/06/russiagate-hoaxer-says-u-s-shouldnt-be-hyperventilating-over-chinese-spy-balloon-n1668201

James Clapper, Obama’s former Director of National Intelligence, who helped push the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, insists that Americans shouldn’t be “hyperventilating” over the Chinese spy balloon.

“I think the bigger issue here … is, you know, we don’t expend too much crisis energy, if you will, on hyperventilating over an air balloon,” Clapper told CNN on Saturday. “When you think about the crisis spectrum, the invasion of Taiwan or, God forbid, a nuclear confrontation, so I think we need to sort of put this in perspective.”

While many on both sides of the aisle have been critical of Joe Biden’s inaction over the balloon, Clapper joins the list of left-wing partisans in seeing it as a good story for ol’ Joe.

“I think the administration’s response has been measured, I understand the outcry for this affront to our sovereignty and all of that, but satellites are going by every day and collecting, and I think the issue is how high is sovereignty,” Clapper said.

“I’ve had some personal experience with using balloons for intelligence, and they are inefficient and difficult to use because of what’s happened to the Chinese, and that is, controlling them,” Clapper added.