RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://thefederalist.com/2019/05/29/political-correctness-blinds-us-causes-anti-semitism/

“As Evelyn Gordon at Commentary noted not long ago, American Jews might believe that “rightist governments enable anti-Semitism” in Europe, but polls show that Jews feel safer, sometimes by a 20-point margin, in places like Poland, Hungary, and Romania—which, maybe not coincidentally, also have low numbers of Muslim immigrants—than they do in countries like France and Germany, where anti-Jewish violence is spiking.”

The New York Times blames Israel for engendering hatred while downplaying some inconvenient facts.

“Speak up, now, when you glimpse evidence of anti-Semitism, particularly within your own ranks, or risk enabling the spread of this deadly virus,” advises a New York Times editorial that fails to mention the words “Ihan Omar,” “Rashida Tlaib,” “Women’s March,” “Black Congressional Caucus,” or anything about the Democratic Party’s complicity in enabling these people and groups, for that matter.

To be fair, as far as New York Times editorials go, this isn’t the worst. It does, however, engage in the ugly leftist habit of blaming Jews for engendering hatred against themselves while downplaying inconvenient facts about anti-Semitism in Europe.

Earlier this year, the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs pointed out that nearly 90 percent of European Jews have suffered some form of anti-Semitic threat, insult, or assault. Of those polled, 30 percent identified the perpetrator as “someone with an extremist Muslim view,” 21 percent as someone with left-wing political views, and 13 percent as someone with right-wing politics.

https://freebeacon.com/columns/americas-best-defense-against-socialism/

The United States of America has flummoxed socialists since the nineteenth century. Marx himself couldn’t quite understand why the most advanced economy in the world stubbornly refused to transition to socialism. Marxist theory predicts the immiseration of the proletariat and subsequent revolution from below. This never happened in America. Labor confronted capital throughout the late nineteenth century, often violently, but American democracy and constitutionalism withstood the clash. Socialist movements remained minority persuasions. When Eugene V. Debs ran for president in 1912, he topped out at 6 percent of the vote. Populist third-party candidates, from George Wallace in 1968 (14 percent) to Ross Perot in 1992 (19 percent) have done much better.

Keep this in mind when you read about the rebirth of socialism. Yes, Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are household names. Membership in the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) has spiked since 2016. Forty percent of Americans told Gallup last month that “some form of socialism” would be “a good thing for the country.” Media are filled with trend pieces describing the socialist revival. A recent issue of The Economist devoted the cover package to “Millennial socialism.” The current New Republic includes four articles about “the socialist moment.” In March, New York magazine asked, “When did everyone become a socialist?”

https://amgreatness.com/2019/05/23/the-virtues-of-patriotism/

The elections to the European Parliament underway now through Sunday present a major war of ideas between the “Europe of Nations” and the “Europe of Brussels”—between national democratic sovereignty and supranational authority.

On May 13, I participated in a conference in London organized by the White House Writers Group and attended by leading conservative intellectuals and political figures, including Yoram Hazony, Daniel Hannan, Roger Scruton, John O’Sullivan, Nile Gardiner, and Polish cabinet minister Anna Maria Anders, among others. The conference, “Europe at a Crossroads: The Virtue of Nationalism,” for the most part echoed Margaret Thatcher’s famous Bruges speech advocating a Europe of “independent sovereign states” in opposition to a democracy-deficient supranational EU that would “try to suppress nationhood and concentrate power at the center of a European conglomerate.”

Two days before, on May 11, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo addressed the Claremont Institute’s 40th anniversary gala dinner with a spirited defense of the universal principle of democratic sovereignty as central to the new Trump doctrine in American foreign policy. Pompeo declared:

This new pride in taking America’s interests seriously is not just an American phenomenon. Countries all over the world are rediscovering their national identities, and we are supporting them. We are asking them to do what’s best for their people as well. The wave of electoral surprises has swept from Britain to the United States all the way to Brazil.

swtotd.blogspot.com

The word “dependent” derives from the French adjective “pendant,” which means “hanging,” as in “avec les bras pendant” (with arms hanging). We use the word to describe a piece of jewelry that hangs from a chain necklace, a pendant that is dependent on the chain. As well, we cannot forget that the opposite of dependence is independence. Populism is defined as being popular with the people. Its antonym: elitism.

Is democracy in decline? Polity, a widely-used resource in political science, recently determined that only thirty-three countries were fully consolidated democracies. This was a decline of two from a peak in 2006. One of the two was the United States, which was docked, according to a Pew Research report, by two points in 2016 for “an increase in factional competition.” They did not define “factional,” though certainly our politics have become divisive, nor did they point out that “competition” is a positive trait of liberal governments and free market economies. (Belgium was the other country, which saw a decline because of alleged “deepened divisions” between French and Flemish-speaking communities.) Freedom House has also written of a global decline in freedom over the past dozen years, with 113 countries having seen a net decline during that time, versus 62 countries having had a net improvement. Their report, which is available on line, shows that the United States began its decline in 2010 and has continued to do so. 

Throughout history, governments have bent toward liberalism, but never in a straight line. Change is the one constant in all aspects of our lives, and it affects our political systems. Democracy requires constant vigilance, as there will always be those whose lust for power exceeds their respect for values embedded in human rights. Both political parties agree that democracy is at risk, if not in decline. But they disagree as to the cause The media, which is aligned with the left, sees decline as a consequence of a rise in what they term the “far” or “radical” right: In Europe, this would include political parties like National Rally in France, Lega Nord in Italy, Golden Dawn in Greece, the Freedom Party in Austria, Brexit in Britain, Fidesz in Hungary, Law and Justice in Poland and Sweden Democrats in Sweden. In the U.S., it is conservatives in general and Donald Trump’s “army of deplorables,” specifically.

https://thefederalist.com/2019/05/22/trans-activists-silence-science-can-claim-side/

It’s telling that, in order to claim that science is on their side, trans activists need to bully actual scientists into silence about what the data and human experience actually suggests.

According to legend, Galileo defiantly muttered “and yet it moves” after the Inquisition forced him to abjure his Copernican views. Although unverified, this story became a popular anecdote in the history of science, giving voice to the passionate love for inquiry and truth, even in the face of dogmatic threats of violence.

If the transgender movement has its way, we shall soon see many more like Galileo, forced by today’s ideologues and inquisitions to deny the plain truth of science and reason. For example, Ray Blanchard, a leading researcher on human sexuality, was recently suspended from Twitter for the clinically correct statement that “Transsexualism and milder forms of gender dysphoria are types of mental disorder.” After an outcry, his account was restored, but the message had already been sent—thoughtcrime will be punished, even, perhaps especially, if it is true.

This might be dismissed as another Twitter tempest in a teapot, were it not part of a trend of trans activists targeting scientists and researchers who reach politically inconvenient conclusions. Another respected researcher, Kenneth Zucker, was defamed and wrongly fired when trans activists smeared him. Lisa Littman, whose qualitative research identified the phenomenon of rapid-onset gender dysphoria, was vilified and lost a consulting position.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-new-new-socialism/

When I told a friend who works in academia about NR’s renewed attacks on socialism, he shook his head and said: “You’re tearing down a 30-year-old straw man. All the literature on socialism that matters today is post-1989.” And when I asked what makes this New Socialism new, he replied: “It’s all about the internet and social media and people from different places and backgrounds collaborating to erode and bypass existing power structures.”

Sounds great — but by Leftsplaining in this way, he was only showing how far behind the times he is (and no wonder; due to the tenure system, academia is the slowest to change of any major American institution). Internet socialism is old hat; this year’s New Socialism is an Uncle Sam–as–Santa Claus nostalgia act, seen most prominently in the Democratic presidential candidates’ Loud, Proud, Refusing to Be Cowed, At Least Until the Primaries Are Over program of free college, punitive taxation, and DMV-style health care, along with factory workers advocating seizure of the means of production.

Of course, socialism has always been subject to sudden changes, from Lenin’s New Economic Policy nearly a century ago to glasnost and perestroika and “socialism with Chinese characteristics” to the 1990s “stakeholder society” (and I’m sure Jonah could give us a few dozen more). There are as many varieties of socialism as there are of Doritos, most of them just as crunchy.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/05/confessions_of_a_recovering_white_supremacist.html

My name is David Solway and I am a recovering white supremacist. For many years I had no doubt that my supremacy and attendant privileges were morally and historically deserved. But of late I have begun to doubt these assumptions, owing to the tornado of contempt and animadversion that has come my way via the media, establishment politicians on the left, various identity groups, assorted intellectuals, and even former friends.

This has led me to reconsider my principles and beliefs, to subject them to relentless scrutiny in order to discover if there is any justice to the criticism and vilification I have endured, and whether I should modify my convictions and mend my ways. Obviously, I first needed to review these convictions and see precisely what they consisted of before I could arrive at a just conclusion.

It seemed to me that my “white supremacism” comprised some of the following items and elements.

I am white.
I believed that Judeo-Hellenic-Christian civilization, for all its flaws and missteps, was on balance an undeniable boon for mankind, raising vast populations from abject poverty, tyrannical compulsion, and low horizons of expectation and achievement.
I was convinced that Western civilization engendered enormous advances in religious thought, art, philosophical speculation, science, medicine, technology and infrastructure, giving us the presumed blessings and inventions we all take for granted: longer life spans and increased leisure; readily available transportation; electricity; interior heating; viable buildings; a wide range of comestibles; sanitation facilities; clean water; revolutionary surgical techniques; communication devices; labor-saving implements and tools; great painting, sculpture, architecture, music and literature; and indeed, almost everything we touch, experience, eat and drink, look at, wear and enjoy, down to the tiniest domestic objects. The list of such supposed goods is endless and is with few exceptions associated with the energy and resourcefulness of white males of chiefly European descent.
I believed that a free-market economy was infinitely superior to a command economy and that the proof was everywhere to be seen by those who still had eyes to see. What this had to do with white supremacy was never entirely clear to me, but then, the principal economists of merit were chiefly Scottish and English and tended to be men — same for those who pioneered the Industrial Revolution of which we are all the ostensible beneficiaries.

https://amgreatness.com/2019/05/20/president-trump-can-win-on-race/

The good news for President Trump is that most Americans agree with Republicans about race: that we are all created equal and deserve equal treatment and opportunity. The problem is that far too many Americans believe the lie that Republicans, instead of adhering to these basic truths, are racist. President Trump has the courage to express our views on race. We can win on this issue.

Democrats don’t want all citizens to be treated equally. Democrats want people treated differently and according to their skin color. They want group justice. They call it social justice because it sounds better. In their idea of a just America, whites, Asians, and Jews must give up opportunities as a group, and blacks and other people of color must be privileged with extra opportunities and reparations.

By their definition, Democrats claim half the country is racist. Understand this: the Democratic Party’s idea of racism is defined by group identity, not by an individual’s behavior or beliefs. You’re not biased? Doesn’t matter. Utterly reject discrimination? Doesn’t matter. White? You’re racist.

Democrats believe being colorblind is itself racist. Republicans, who believe laws should be colorblind, are by definition racist.

https://quadrant.org.au/

“In order to achieve that “healing” for which Ms Wilkinson has been yearning since Saturday night, all the Morrison government need do is implement the very same slate of Left policies which the electorate rejected. Funny how that works.”

There are many misconceptions about the Left, whose louder advocates can strike those not of their tribe as being possessed by a hectoring absolutism. Don’t agree with what they say? You’re worse than wrong, you’re evil! That’s apt to be the take-home impression of any conservative who has survived a Northcote barbecue or Newtown soiree, but the fact of the matter is that it isn’t always true. Sometimes our Left-inclined fellow citizens can be the very essence of conciliation, good manners and empathy, extending much love and respect to those on the other side of politics.

This happens whenever they lose an election, as TV personality Lisa Wilkinson has just demonstrated. No sooner had it become apparent Labor couldn’t win on May 18 than she was pouring her broken, gentle heart into an open letter to once and future PM Scott Morrison.

“It might be good to start with some healing,” she begins, observing that “we” are all feeling “just a little broken right now”. We? According to the Australian Electoral Commission, some 52 per cent of the voting population has been pretty chipper for the past two days or so.

As I was taught, commonly used  pronouns include I, me, mine, she, he, it, we, they, us, his, hers, theirs.

Yesterday at a delightful lunch in bucolic Connecticut one of the guests announced that he was a “pronoun warrior”-determined to wipe out gender in pronouns.

I asked what injustices, challenges, hurts, offenses, prejudices would be ameliorated by altering pronouns. His response was that I am old and not “woke” enough.

I gently accused him of ageism but he won the argument by denying that he was an ageist….after all, he explained, he voted for Bernie Sanders and would do so again.

We ended lunch on very good terms when I gave him my creme brulee, proving that food is the way to a “they’s” heart.