RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/coronavirus-political-correctness-concern-racism-misguided/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=right-rail&utm_content=corner&utm_term=first

During today’s meeting of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, the liberal majority voted to issue a statement expressing “grave concern” regarding “growing anti-Asian racism and xenophobia” related to the coronavirus pandemic.

Of course, my conservative colleague Gail Heriot and I oppose expressions of racism, if any, related to the pandemic or otherwise. But we voted against the statement for several reasons. Our biggest objection related to the Commission’s suggestion that referring to COVID-19 with terms like “Chinese Coronavirus or Wuhan flu” is somehow fueling “[t]his latest wave of xenophobic animosity toward Asian-Americans.” This suggestion is consistent with those recently voiced by Democrats and mainstream media (but I repeat myself).

It’s common to refer to infectious diseases by their geographic origin. Examples include Asian flu, Bolivian hemorrhagic fever, Ebola, German measles, Japanese encephalitis, Lyme disease, Marburg virus, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), Pontiac fever, Rift Valley fever, Spanish flu, Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever, and West Nile virus. Spanish flu was probably a misnomer. It may have originated in Kansas. But calling it Spanish flu was never an indication that people hated Spaniards. Nor is there any evidence that the names of any of the other diseases inspired “racism or xenophobia” toward races or ethnicities commonly identified with such regions.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/03/i-am-woman-hear-me-whine-bruce-thornton/

After Elizabeth Warren dropped out of the primary race, the predictable whining commenced from all those supposedly independent, anything-you-can-do-I-can-do-better feminists. The stock clichés filled their complaints: “misogyny,” “patriarchy,” “sexism,” all the usual suspects rounded up to excuse the glaring electoral incompetence of a terrible candidate. As is the case with Hillary Clinton, criticism of a political persona dripping with schoolmarm condescension, self-righteousness, and arrogant disdain is redeemed by transforming these flaws into question-begging slurs like “shrill” and “strident,” and dismissing them as an “irrational prejudice,” a neurotic failure on the part of men to acknowledge her superior talents and  “competence.”

Once again, we see how a movement that started as the removal of barriers to equal opportunity and women’s agency, has degenerated into an identity-politics weapon that strangely reinforces what equity feminism tried to eliminate: The notion that women who are supposedly equal to men are in fact victims still needing protection from men and their stubborn sexist prejudices and “toxic masculinity.” Half a century after feminists started to “roar,” as Helen Reddy sang, they’ve regressed to the whining of the weak.

One manifestation of this incoherence is the return of the once demonized “double standard,” with feminists now employing it to serve their interests. So a Clinton or a Warren should not be criticized by men, at the same time women can be as vicious as they want to their ideological rivals. Just ask any conservative Christian woman like Sarah Palin. An accomplished politician and hunter who raised a Downs child instead of killing him for her own convenience, was viciously demonized and slandered with impunity by her progressive feminist “sisters.” And who can forget what Hillary and her minions did to Bill’s sexual assault victims like Juanita Broaddrick?

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/03/its_all_in_the_stars.html
There is no material evidence to substantiate the case against Harvey Weinstein

As I have previously argued at some length, moral ignominy does not fall within the purview of legal jurisprudence, and personal allegations do not constitute evidentiary certitude. Because a man is a scoundrel with predatory inclinations does not mean we have license to clap him in irons. It means we avoid him like the plague. It means we do not succumb to his blandishments. It means we refuse to accept the gifts and advantages he offers in exchange for our surrender to his wiles and demands. It means, as the theological lore has it, that we do not sell our souls to the devil — or, in Harvey Weinstein’s case, our bodies as well.

It also means that in a court of blind justice deriving from Magna Carta and established over a long evolution, predicated on the concept of “beyond a reasonable doubt” and grounded on factual evidence, Weinstein could not have been found guilty. What we have is a narrative of the acts and machinations of an obviously despicable person; hearsay, revelation, memory, tearful indignation and sundry testimonials do not constitute tangible and objective evidence. Criminal guilt cannot be established on the basis of the statements of the plaintiffs.

In addition, when one reckons that those who claim to have been assaulted or raped by Weinstein did not go to the police immediately after their ordeal when forensic evidence was fresh and may still have been gathered, and that many of these plaintiffs continued to seek out Weinstein’s company with letters of affection and adulation years after the events in question, the issue begins to grow clouded.

As The Washington Free Beacon reports in considerable detail, these prodigies of adoration were legion and, for that matter, were not confined only to women. Men also liked to flaunt their brotherly admiration for their great friend and benefactor. They too have conveniently joined the chorus of denunciation against their former patron and promoter, or have tactfully remained silent.

But in a culture obsessed with sex and the myth of female guilelessness, it is the women who are regarded as oracles. Their charges resonate in the courtroom, yet these consist of circumstantial depositions that are seriously compromised. Moreover, multiple attestations and what is called similar fact evidence  (or “criminal propensity” arguments) provided by corroborative witnesses who are not part of the actual criminal case are, at best, only differentially admissible and do not rise to the level of “beyond a reasonable doubt.”  Indeed, “similar fact” (sometimes known as “similar act”) remains controversial and is highly problematic. Spencer v. Texas (1967) established that such evidence “would violate the Due Process Clause.”

https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/the-tyranny-of-the-marginalized/

By Arthur Milikh, associate director of, and research fellow in, The Heritage Foundation’s B. Kenneth Simon Center for Principles and Politics.

From the New Deal to Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), the Left’s fundamental transformation of America over the past century is astounding. A key to that achievement has been the discipline to hasten beyond recent victories and commence new battles. Today, leftists’ eyes are set on outlawing “hate speech.” In 2018, a New York Times article lamented conservatives’ success in “weaponizing the First Amendment.” “I have come to see,” said a regretful progressive law school professor, “that it’s a mistake to think of free speech as an effective means to accomplish a more just society.” Many conservatives, reluctant to believe what seems unbelievable, do not fully appreciate that the campaign to curtail speech in order to promote social justice is gathering strength and capturing powerful institutions. In the not very distant future, it could succeed.

Every Western European nation and the entire Anglosphere already criminalize hate speech. America is the only holdout. Nevertheless, California, always a leader in the field of misgovernance, has recently expressed interest in doing so. Many of our colleges and universities, of course, already administer Orwellian speech codes. Big Tech, with Twitter, Google, and Facebook leading the way, censors political content for violating stern but hazy standards based on the European model. And the United Nations relentlessly advocates criminalizing words that “dehumanize minority groups and other targeted people.” Without understanding where the desire to censor hate speech comes from, means, or would entail, many Americans are growing comfortable with the idea.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/worst-side-story-11582246801?mod=opinion_reviews_pos1

My sentiments exactly. If the P.C. crowd wants a P.C. musical, let them compose their own music and lyrics and not defile a classic….rsk

Pop quiz, boomers: What’s your favorite musical? If I had to guess, I’d go for “West Side Story.” Not only did the original 1957 production light up the hit parade four times in a row, with “Maria,” “One Hand, One Heart,” “Somewhere” and “Tonight,” but the 1961 film version was a box-office smash that won 10 Oscars and remains to this day a small-screen staple, while regional theater companies all over America continue to stage the show with remunerative regularity. As for Broadway, this fourth revival of “West Side Story” had been in previews since December and is selling out nightly. Nor is anyone buying tickets to see the big names in the cast, because there aren’t any: This is a starless production. No, they’re going to see “West Side Story” because it’s “West Side Story.”

Unfortunately, a suburban mom who goes to Ivo van Hove’s new Broadway revival without knowing anything about Mr. Van Hove’s work in general or this production in particular is in for a very big shock. This is not the “West Side Story” you know and love, and there are some—quite a few, actually—who’ll likely tell you that it’s not “West Side Story” at all. Jerome Robbins’s finger-popping choreography has been scrapped, and the rest of the show is heavily cut (it now runs for an intermission-free hour and 45 minutes, an hour shorter than the 2009 Broadway revival). “I Feel Pretty” and the “Somewhere” ballet are nowhere to be seen in Mr. Van Hove’s production, which takes place not on New York’s Upper West Side in the ’50s but—surprise, surprise—here and now. Oh, yes, there’s no balcony or fire escapes, just a huge empty stage. Instead, the upstage wall of the 1,761-seat Broadway Theatre has been replaced with a proscenium-size projection screen on which are alternately shown scenes of the mean streets of New York and giant live-TV images of the cast in action.