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Ruth King

Reactionary ‘progressives’ strike again Ruthie Blum

https://www.jns.org/opinion/reactionary-progressives-strike-again/

A few ignoramuses with rainbow flags gathered on Sunday at New York City’s Chelsea Piers to protest the participation of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in the Jewish Leadership Conference, held annually by the conservative Tikvah Fund. Other speakers at the event included former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Israeli Ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer, former U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor and current Tikvah chairman Elliott Abrams, and a slew of conservative Jewish intellectuals.
The timing, at the height of Pride Month, couldn’t have been better from a propaganda perspective for the demonstrators present and behind the scenes. While countries around the Free World are going out of their way to celebrate the LGBTQ+ movement through parades, public-service announcements and all vehicles that highlight “choice” and “identity,” the very idea that any venue would dare to let DeSantis darken its premises presented a golden opportunity for bitching and moaning about victimhood.

The trouble is that this reactionary method of manipulation to silence all voices that don’t align perfectly with a “progressive” point of view works—at least, on liberals. Afraid to be labeled as Neanderthal right-wingers, the latter cave to pressure at the drop of a threat.
This is how the above conference, titled “Jews, Israel and the Future of the West,” got booted last month from the agenda of its originally planned location: The Museum of Jewish Heritage–A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. The excuse for the travesty was that the institution doesn’t “do politics.” Leaning on this phony assertion, the museum ultimately refused to sign a contract with Tikvah.

The Selfish Californian The Silicon Valley motto should be “I create inequality by hating inequality.” By Victor Davis Hanson

https://amgreatness.com/2022/06/12/the-selfish-californian/

We hear plenty of reasons for the perfect storm that imploded California. One-party, progressive government, of course. Decades of unchecked illegal immigration, without doubt. Years of mass flight out of state of the productive middle classes, certainly. 

But perhaps the most important, but overlooked, reason has been the infusion of trillions of dollars of mostly tech capital into the state. Unimaginable sums of market capital warped politics and led to a top-down, feudal society, run by progressive elites who are shielded from the ramifications of their own toxic ideologies.

More specifically, the common denominator was the emergence in California of a selfish, monied, left-wing political class. In concrete terms, it cared little for others but masked that unconcern with abstract leftism, emulating medieval penance and indulgences to assuage guilt over its enjoyment of sheltered and very good lives. 

California’s recent premier politicians at the local, state, and federal levels—Jerry Brown, Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein, Gavin Newsom, and Nancy Pelosi—all enjoyed wealth and power, whether by inherited money and family brand names, through marriage, or using their positions to leverage lucrative family and personal business with the Chinese. 

Their lifestyles before, during, and after office-holding reflected both their privileges and the vast material differences between their own lives and the millions of Californians who suffered enormously from their utopian bromides. Yet a world away from their homes in Grass Valley, Kentfield, Lake Tahoe, Napa, Pacific Heights, or Rancho Mirage, the rest of the state’s residents who voted for them currently cannot afford a house, a full tank of gas, a chuck steak, or an air-conditioned afternoon.

Nuclear Strategy: The War on Expertise by Peter Vincent Pry

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18611/nuclear-strategy-expertise

Prager and Kaptanoglu apparently think the “U.S. defense establishment” is less qualified than “Those who promote arms control and disarmament” like themselves.

So the philosophy of “a little child shall lead them” is prescribed for the field of nuclear strategy, just as the views of Greta Thunberg are supposed to silence the many scientists who doubt that “climate change” is an existential threat. We live in a time when the “Wokists” are at war with any expertise that contradicts their agenda, a time of unthinking egalitarianism when all opinions are supposed to matter equally (providing they are “Woke”) — and the West may die from it.

College physicists, political scientists, physicians, pediatricians, and their impassioned students who comprise much of the anti-nuclear movement typically have little or no expertise in nuclear weapons and strategy. Yet Prager and Kaptanoglu would substitute their uninformed opinions for those of national security experts who have spent professional lifetimes studying nuclear weapons, theories of nuclear conflict, nuclear exchange modeling analysis, and other disciplines related to nuclear war.

Academics and anti-nuclear activists have only themselves to blame if they are largely ignored by the national security community, because they so often falsely accuse the national security community of bad faith, conspiracies, corruption, and irrationality for disagreeing with them.

Anti-nuclear activists, if they want to be taken seriously, have an obligation to educate themselves on the facts, and to stop exaggerating and stop lying. Examples of five whoppers, and not necessarily the worst ones, that often appear in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists…

The greatest existential threat is nuclear war. An example of one way to reduce the threat of nuclear war: The US should stop Iran from achieving nuclear breakout before it is too late. The US has the capability; the administration might ask the Pentagon to draw up a plan. President Joe Biden’s poll numbers would turn around overnight. The world does not need Iran, the country that Secretary of State Antony Blinken referred to as the “largest state sponsor of state terrorism,” possessing nuclear weapons. Unfortunately, thanks to Biden, anti-nuclear activists already have an outsized and unwarranted influence on national security policy that threatens to undermine the credibility of U.S. nuclear deterrence, and ironically make nuclear war even more likely.

The book Guide To Nuclear Deterrence in the Age of Great Power Competition, edited by Adam Lowther, belongs on the shelves of every policymaker and citizen who wants to be well informed about U.S. nuclear strategy and deterrence; rising nuclear threats from Russia and China; and what the U.S. must do to survive. The book includes chapters from 22 national security experts, many of whom served in senior Defense Department positions, and made significant contributions to deterring a nuclear World War III and ultimate victory in the Cold War.

The Green New Deal crashes into the rocks By Mark C. Ross

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/06/the_green_new_deal_crashes_into_the_rocks.html

What a surprise!  Carbon-based energy is much more important than we were led to believe.  A slight reduction in domestic resource development has sent seismic shock waves throughout our economy.  Bottom line: Folks are often willing to go along with calls for sacrifice… unless and until they are made to really suffer.

Michael Crichton’s next-to-last novel, State of Fear, is about politically motivated weather exaggeration.  The real meat, however, is in his epilogue.  It is there that he explains how the perceived intelligentsia is particularly susceptible to fads and hoaxes.  His prime example is Eugenics, the early 20th-century movement to prevent the further “mongrelization” of the human race and the increase in the numbers of “inferior” beings.  Margaret Sanger founded Planned Parenthood to further this cause. Adolf Hitler went even farther in his pursuit of the same goal. These so-called smart people were either unaware of, or failed to grasp, the basic biological principle of hybrid vigor (heterosis).  It so happens that reproductive mingling between previously isolated gene pools tends to produce healthier, more vital individuals by bringing new DNA combinations into the mix. 

The obvious question is: how will this all play out?  The corrupt news media will likely go even farther in its over-the-top hysterical portrayal of ordinary weather events, trends, and hiccups.  As in Crichton’s novel, what used to be a typical seasonal phenomenon – hurricanes — are now being portrayed as cataclysmic events, even though the last 140 years have seen no significant trend up or down in frequency.  And yet, the EPA claims the opposite, even though most of its sources show stability instead.  That’s what you get when you rely on corrupt government scientists.  Meanwhile, the damage being done by suppressing the use of carbon-based energy will continue, though defections from this dogma have begun, out of obvious necessity.

Congress Must Hold Hearings on Biden Administration’s Domestic Terror Ties Forget Jan 6. Where’s the investigation into Democrat domestic terrorism? Daniel Greenfield

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/06/congress-must-hold-hearings-biden-administrations-daniel-greenfield/

A few weeks after the Buffalo mass shooting, another domestic terrorist attack occurred in the upstate New York city. CompassCare, a pregnancy care clinic guiding new mothers away from abortion, was firebombed by the pro-abortion hate group, Jane’s Revenge. The group has been linked to the firebombing of at least two other pro-life offices and organizations last month.

Its threatening graffiti included the warning, “If abortions aren’t safe, then you aren’t either.”

“We demand the disbanding of all anti-choice establishments, fake clinics, and violent anti-choice groups within the next thirty days,” the Jane’s Revenge communique threatened. “We are forced to adopt the minimum military requirement for a political struggle.”

While Congressional Democrats are moving ahead with their Jan 6 hearings which seek to falsely blame Republicans and conservatives for the Capitol riot, they have no interest in allowing similar hearings about the ongoing campaign of domestic terrorism by their leftist allies.

Instead, the Biden administration is giving a pass to even the worst offenders.

The Biden administration’s DOJ decided to reduce a plea for Colinford Mattis and Urooj Rahman, two radical lawyers who were handing out and throwing Molotov cocktails during the Black Lives Matter race riots, from 10 years in prison to 18 months.

A Conservative Professor Fights UCLA’s Bias – and Wins For student favorite Keith Fink, the fight was about principle, not vindication. Mark Tapson

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/06/conservative-professor-fights-uclas-bias-and-wins-mark-tapson/

It is a given today that our so-called institutions of higher learning are hostile to political conservatives, not only students but the minority of professors who openly lean Right. Even Progressive academics can find themselves targeted by Cancel Culture for minor or accidental transgressions against woke dogma. The punishment can range from “mere” ostracization, to a hopelessly smeared reputation, to the loss of one’s job – usually a combination thereof. It’s ugly and totalitarian, which is why any moral victory against the Left’s ideological intolerance is a blow for freedom of speech and political balance in the classroom.

Keith Fink – a successful attorney, legal commentator, academic, and author –was a Communications Studies lecturer at the University of California Los Angeles from 2008 until his forced departure in June 2017. His courses on “Race, Sex & Politics: Free Speech on Campus;” “Free Speech in the Workplace;” “Entertainment Law;” and “Arguing Contemporary Social Issues” were among the students’ most popular ones at UCLA. But Fink is politically conservative and an ardent, fair-minded advocate for truth, so a confrontation with the school’s Progressive administrators was inevitable.

Canceling Honors Classes in the Name of Equity Reducing humankind to the lowest common denominator of the least competent. Jason D. Hill

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/06/canceling-honors-classes-name-equity-jason-d-hill/

Like ineradicable fungi spreading across a diseased body devoid of inoculants to fight it off, there is a growing educational malfeasance taking root in many of our nation’s public schools that few seem to have the moral courage to speak out against. Honors Programs are being eliminated or are being considered for elimination on the premise that they discriminate against the non-gifted, most of whom fall into minority groups. The elimination of such programs is being defended in the name of equity and recognition.

The theory behind the “deleveling” of subjects such as English, social studies, biology, math and science, and history is to give all students the opportunity to engage in rigorous instruction. In the highest-performing school district in Rhode Island, Barrington High School has been in an uproar over the cancelation of such courses. Many of them have since been restored.

The school had been moving into a “one universal design for learning,” or one curriculum for students of varying abilities. The “universal design” is seen as a way to offer equal access to a rigorous curriculum to traditionally under-represented groups.

In San Diego at the Patrick Henry High School, more than 150 parents protested the school’s decision to eliminate eight advanced and honors courses from its offerings, including advanced English, History and Biology. The school’s principal, Michelle Henry, announced a more equitable program that will be part of a district pilot of “Honors for All.”

The Democrats’ Politicized Gun Control Script There’s far more at stake than gun-control laws. Bruce Thornton

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/06/democrats-politicized-gun-control-script-bruce-thornton/

For those of us of a certain age, we know that every time some psychopath shoots up a school and murders students, the Democrats will respond with their clichéd demagogic script. Exploiting the natural horror and pathos of such events, the Donks will trot out all the usual gun-policy suspects, the majority of which would not have prevented most of the attacks.

But that’s not really the point for Dems. Their aim is to smear Republicans and conservatives for political gain. With a mid-term shellacking looming, the recent attacks in Buffalo and Uvalde have the Democrats shamelessly politicizing those tragedies more than usual in order to distract voters from the Biden administration’s manifold failures.

Such attempts must be called-out and vigorously countered, for there’s more at stake than gun-control laws: the long progressive program to weaken our unalienable rights, especially the Second Amendment.

The roster of “solutions” to the problem of school shootings is a catalogue of failure and irrelevance. Background checks are a favorite, but if, like the Uvalde school shooter, there is no criminal record or paper-trail documenting that a purchaser poses an immediate danger, a background check is useless. Moreover, according to a National Institute of Justice’s mass shootings database, most mass killers steal their weapons––80% of them from family members––instead of legally buying them.

Biden Administration To Provide Grief Counselors At All Gas Pumps

https://babylonbee.com/news/biden-administration-to-provide-grief-counselors-at-all-gas-pumps

WASHINGTON, D.C.—In a move to help alleviate pain at the pump, the Biden Administration has announced a $1 billion initiative to provide grief and trauma counselors to stand by at all gas pumps across the nation.

The plan will fund licensed therapists and psychiatrists to stand at the ready at gas pumps from New York to California to comfort people mourning the loss of hundreds of dollars every time they fill up their tanks.

“There, there. It’s gonna be OK,” said one grief counselor as a woman filled up her VW at a gas pump in California. “Times like these can be difficult to cope with, but we can survive Putin’s Price Hike if we look deep within ourselves for strength and guidance. Now, let’s try some breathing exercises.”

Another woman in Ohio burst into tears after paying over $3 for gas for the first time in her life.

“Shhh, shhh, it’s OK, honey,” said one therapist, stroking her hair. “You’re going through the stages of grief. Soon, you’ll learn to live with $10 gas. You literally won’t even remember when gas was as cheap as it was during the Trump administration.”

Is It Unethical To Buy A Vehicle Powered By A Lithium Battery? Ronald Stein

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/06/13/is-it-unethical-to-buy-a-vehicle-powered-by-a-lithium-battery/

With numerous State Governor’s having issued executive orders to phase out the purchasing of gasoline driven cars within the next decade or so, and the automobile manufacturers efforts to phase into only manufacturing EV’s here’s some food for thought about the lack of transparency about “Clean Energy Exploitations”.

The top image below is an oil well, where 100% organic material is pumped out of the ground, taking up around 500 to 1000 square feet. Then it flows in pipelines safely transporting the oil to refineries to be manufactured into usable oil derivatives that are the basis of more than 6,000 products for society, and into transportation fuels needed by the world’s heavy-weight and long-range infrastructures of aviation, merchant ships, cruise ships, and militaries.