EDUCATION, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

This has been the year of epic derangement When the public is absent, corporate wokeism faces no corrective from the real world Rod Liddle

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

https://spectator.us/year-epic-derangement-cornell/

I wonder if British universities will follow Cornell’s innovative approach to ensuring students are protected from wretched viruses? The American institution has received plaudits for its rigorous regime. Students who refuse to have the flu vaccine will be barred from the Cornell libraries and other campus buildings — or, at least, they will if they are white. ‘Students of color’ can decline to receive the vaccine. Why?

Cornell explains: ‘Students who identify as Black, Indigenous, or as a Person of Color (BIPOC) may have personal concerns about fulfilling the Compact requirements based on historical injustices and current events.’ The university authorities give a little more detail about what those concerns might be: ‘Recent acts of violence against Black people by law enforcement may contribute to feelings of distrust or powerlessness.’ So, white kids must be tested and vaccinated or face being kicked out, while black students are invited to register their preference for exemption, largely on the grounds that George Floyd was killed by a policemen in a state 1,000 miles away.

I offer up this little vignette as almost the perfect postscript to 2020, the Year of Epic Derangement, seeing as it brings together the cringing, self-flagellating lunacy of white liberals when faced with people who have a different skin color, and this virus of ours, under whose suffocating shroud so many other lunacies have been allowed to flourish. I think if I were a black student at Cornell who contracted flu from another black student who had filed for exemption, I would sue the college on the grounds of a failure of duty of care and, indeed, unadorned racism.

That’s the alternative hypothesis, I suppose — that the college is actually run by the Klan and they want as many black people to die as possible. It is difficult not to feel an enormous sympathy for the US’s black population, as this sort of stuff ratchets up the loathing among genuine white supremacists and meanwhile they are treated as needy infants by the liberal left. One day black Americans will shrug off the yoke of victimhood imposed upon them for reasons of political expediency by the Democrats. This is already beginning to happen, in fact, much as it is with Hispanic voters.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Sydney Williams; An Optimist’s Lament

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

http://www.swtotd.blogspot.com

On August 4, 1944, the Grüne Polizi, along with the Gestapo, raided the “secret annex” of an abandoned office building complex in Amsterdam where Anne Frank and her family had been hiding for over two years. Less than three weeks earlier, on July 15, 1944, Anne wrote in her diary: “It’s really a wonder that I haven’t dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything, I still believe people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness. I hear the ever-approaching thunder, which will destroy us too. I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.” Ultimately, peace did come. The Nazis were defeated, and Europe has been free of wars for seventy-five years – the longest period in its history – thanks to the people of the United States. But peace came too late for Anne Frank. Less than a year later, she was dead at age fifteen, probably of Typhus, in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Nazi-held Germany.

One marvels at Anne Frank’s outlook, when bleakness enshrouded her environment and hoped dimmed for millions caught in the Nazi’s web and in a world gone dark. As we reflect today, in far better circumstances than were hers, is there not a lesson for us, in our pandemic, fear–filled world?

Optimism is a state of mind. Perhaps a dream over reality, or naïveté over cynicism? In retrospect, Anne Frank’s optimism appears innocent or guileless. Yet, she lives on through her Diary of a Young Girl, because in spite of everything she experienced she had the vision to see that sunlight would return and the world would move on. In her optimism, she was wise, for the two – optimism and wisdom – are linked. Optimists draw from the ancient classics, the birth of Christianity, the Enlightenment, the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, the Industrial Revolution and the recent victory of democracy over socialism. All have helped man’s condition to improve. Individual freedom, democracy and free-market capitalism have lifted multitudes from poverty and early death. Optimism, it should be remembered, does not mean nostalgia for an earlier time, but the expectation of enhanced prospects for a better future.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Happy New Year, Reality Denial Edition Francis Menton

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2020-12-31-happy-new-year-reality-den

On the last post a few days ago, several commenters raised the subject of the popular and long-running TV series Law & Order, particularly as to the race of the perpetrators of the crimes. The show purports to be based on actual incidents, and tries to give an impression of basis in reality. On the episodes of that show that I have watched — admittedly not a large sample — the perpetrator of the violent crime has seemed almost always to turn out to be white and, for that matter, rich. But are the show’s producers intentionally skewing the reality of the race of perpetrators of violent crimes? And if so, by a little, or by a lot?

I decided to look around to see if I could find some relevant statistics. It turns out that several researchers (if you want to call them that) have gone through collections of these shows to compare races of crime perpetrators to actual crime data. As suspected, the difference is staggering.

Here is a July 2015 piece with the title “Manufacturing white criminals: Depictions of criminality and violence on Law & Order,” from a journal called Cogent Social Sciences. The authors reviewed several seasons of L&O, and compared the races of the perpetrators of the crimes in the episodes in those seasons with actual New York City police data for the same years. Stripping out a lot of social science mumbo jumbo, here are the results for two of the years:

1992. In New York City, there were 51,490 arrests for violent felonies, of which 5,567 (10.8%) were white, 27,976 (54.3%) black, 16,096 (31.3%) Hispanic, and 1,851 (3.6%) Asian/other. On L&O season 3, covering the same year, the perps were 15 (65%) white, 2 (9%) black, and 6 (26%) Hispanic.

1995. In real NYC data, there were 49,549 violent felony arrests, of which 5,332 (10.8%) were white, 27,405 (55.3%) black, 15,169 (30.6%) Hispanic, and 1,643 (3.4%) Asian/other. On L&O season 6, the percentages were 26 (79%) white, 3 (9%) black, and 4 (12%) Hispanic.

Other years showed virtually identical patterns. To summarize, on L&O whites are over-represented (compared to real-world data) among perpetrators of violent crime by a factor of around 6 to 8, while blacks are under-represented by also a factor of around 6 to 8. This is not some small random mismatch, but rather a very intentional effort to paint a wildly distorted view of reality.

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

If enough senators challenge the election results, Trump wins By Andrea Widburg

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/12/if_enough_senators_challenge_the_

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) officially stated that he will object to the Electoral College vote count to be held in the Senate on January 6.  May this courageous man be the first of many senators to take a stand against the overwhelming evidence of election fraud.  If neither candidate wins enough Electoral College votes on January 6, Trump should win — and it’s all in the Constitution without the need for any strained statutory interpretations.

Let me start with an overview of what happens on January 6.  It’s crucial to appreciate how this can end if Hawley is joined by several senators who refuse to certify Electoral College votes achieved through manifest fraud.  I’ve culled this information from Petr Svab’s excellent article at The Epoch Times (hat tip to Dan Bongino):

The Twelfth Amendment to the Constitution is the primary authority for events on January 6.  The Electoral Count Act (3 USC §15) plays a role, but, thankfully, that act is probably unconstitutional in one very specific and important way.

Under the Twelfth Amendment, the president of the Senate (i.e., Mike Pence) opens the certificates sent from the states, “and the votes shall then be counted.”  That’s all that the Constitution says about the vice president’s role.

Meanwhile, 3 USC §15, enacted in 1887, after prescribing details for conducting the count, says members of Congress can object.  If one House member and one senator object, that triggers a separate vote about the objection by both the House and the Senate.  If both House and Senate agree there’s a problem, the challenged electoral votes are gone.

CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Democratic art of magical thinking Roger Kimball (From October 20)

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

https://spectator.us/democratic-art-magical-thinking-biden-2020/

I should clear up one thing straight away. I do not believe that Joe Biden is guilty of magical thinking. Magical thinking, though specious, is a form of thinking. It is a truth universally acknowledged that Joe Biden is not guilty of thinking of any kind, ergo, Joe Biden is not guilty of magical thinking. Quod erat demonstrandum.

But Biden’s supporters? Well, that is another matter altogether. There you see a wild efflorescence of magical thinking.

What is magical thinking? It is the irrational belief, rampant among primitive peoples and those exposed to too many woke college seminars, that our thoughts influence or ‘constitute’ reality.

In the present case, we see Biden’s supporters telling us, and through telling us, telling themselves, that their candidate is ahead in the polls and is therefore likely to win the election in November.

They omit to say that their polls are fantasy polls: that they are of registered, not likely, voters, that they oversample Democrats or suburban women, that they fail to factor in the phenomenon of the shy Trump voter, who fully intends to vote for the President but is not happy about advertising it to random pollsters.

Among some architects of this fantasy, there is a strategy. The idea is that by claiming something is true one can influence opinion, at least at the margins, and up the odds of its becoming true. In itself, this is not irrational. If you hear something often enough, not only do you remember it, you also begin to believe it.

That, anyway, is the theory. How does it work in practice? Pretty patchily, I’d say, and for confirmation I offer the spectacle of the late evening of November 8, 2016. Remember all those shattered faces at the Javits Center, home of the Hillary victory party that never was? There they were, etched with grief, moist-eyed, mute or maundering, sown with an incredulity that had not yet degenerated into rage. You saw something similar among the talking heads at CNN, MSNBC and the other major dispensers of Democratic propaganda. This couldn’t be happening. Recall the sad/funny footage of Ben Rhodes that night. It was a grief observed. ‘I, I can’t even…I c-can’t…I, I mean I c-can’t…I c-can’t put it into words…I don’t know what the words are…’

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

JANUARY 6 WILL BE VICE PRESIDENT PENCE’S BIGGEST DAY IN CONGRESS PDF

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

BY HONORARY JOSEPH E. SCHMITZ

_https://everylegalvote.com/assets/pdfs/January_6_2021_Will_Pence_s_Biggest_Day_in_

Joseph Edward Schmitz (born August 28, 1956) is an American lawyer, former inspector general of the United States Department of Defense and a former executive with Blackwater Worldwide. After working as a watchdog at the Pentagon for three and a half years, Schmitz resigned to return to the private sector.

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Notable & Quotable: Electors ‘It’s not that partisans of one side or another are more prone to accept conspiratorial claims.’

Posted By on January 2nd, 2021

https://www.wsj.com/articles/notable-quotable-electors-11609537132

A Dec. 31 Twitter thread by law professor Jonathan Adler :

Having dealt with Ohio 2004 election truthers for many years, I find the revisionism about Sen. [Barbara] Boxer and the 31 House members who voted to reject Ohio’s electoral votes to be quite irksome.

One reason is that many of the arguments we hear this year—alleged statistical anomalies, sinister tabulation machines, etc.—are the same arguments folks made about Ohio in 2004, it was just different people making the same (absurd) claims.The biggest difference is that the 2004 objectors were largely on the fringe (though the ranking member on House Judiciary continued to push the conspiracy theory for years). In 2020, the President is on board, and party leaders are too quiet out of cowardice. It’s not that partisans of one side or another are more prone to accept conspiratorial claims. It’s that in 2020 political “leaders” have abdicated their responsibility to show leadership and check such tendencies within their tribe.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

NEW YEAR GREETINGS FROM RUTHFULLY YOURS-

Posted By on January 1st, 2021

T’WAS NEW YEAR’S EVE AFTER MONTHS OF DEPRIVATION

THERE WAS SCANT FUN OR JOY OR NATIONAL JUBILATION

THE DEMS TURNED AND TOSSED IN  THEIR BED

WITH VISIONS OF INDICTMENTS CAUSING THEIR DREAD

IN THEIR HEARTS THEY KNEW TWAS A TAINTED ELECTION

WITH A PATHETIC CLOWN AS THE ULTIMATE SELECTION

GLUM AND DISAPPOINTED I TRIED TO SLEEP

WITH SOME HOPE AND RESOLUTIONS TO KEEP

WHEN SUDDENLY I HEARD AN ENORMOUS CLATTER

I RAN TO THE WINDOW TO SEE WHAT WAS THE MATTER

FROM EVERY SINGLE CORNER OF OUR VAST NATION

PROTEST CAME IN EVERY MODE OF TRANSPORTATION

DONALD TRUMP JOINED THE RALLY LOOKING SERENE

WITH A BAG OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS INCLUDING VACCINE.

“KEEP AMERICA GREAT” PROCLAIMED THE CROWD

“YOU CAN’T STEAL ELECTIONS” I HEARD LOUD AND PROUD

WITH HOPE IN MY HEART AND A GLIMMER OF CHEER

I WISH YOU ALL A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR .

RSK

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Patrick Byrne: China Is Taking Us Out From Within BY LI HAI

Posted By on December 31st, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/patrick-byrne-china-is-taking-us-out-from-within_36

Patrick Byrne, founder and former CEO of Overstock, said that China is “taking us out from within” during an interview with Dr. Jerome Corsi on Monday.

“The greatest way to fight a war, in the Chinese way of thinking, is not to have to fight at all. That’s what they’ve done here,” Byrne said.

Byrne studied Chinese history at Beijing Normal University from 1983 to 1984. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Chinese studies from Dartmouth College.

“Though we spend a trillion dollars a year between our military and our intelligence, national security circles … that trillion dollars we have and we’ve built, you know, things that can stop all their planes and their missiles and all kinds of things. But we missed the one they use, which is not a fight at all, not firing a bullet or missile at all, but taking us out from within. And that’s what’s going on.”

Byrne pointed out that the Chinese regime is engaged in “a slow coup.”

“It’s a revolution. The stages of such a revolution are very well mapped out. We understand this. It’s demoralization, disorientation, crisis, then normalization: those four steps.”

“The demoralization is what happened this year with COVID,” Byrne continued.

“The disorientation is this kookiness we’ve been seeing for about six months,” Byrne said, referring to Antifa, the Black Lives Matter movement, and other things, such as buildings and police stations being lit on fire, and people being harassed for their political views while out dining.

“That’s all to disorient you. It’s to tell you, ‘You are not living in the America you thought you were living in,’” he said.

“The crisis is, clearly an imposter president has been stood up,” Byrne added in reference to the contested election results.

He asserted that Beijing only needed to secure six counties to steal the election.

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Stunning turn of events in PA may lead to Trump victory By James Arlandson

Posted By on December 31st, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/12/stunning_turn_of_events_in_pa_may_lead_to_trump_victory.html

On Dec. 28, Pennsylvania lawmakers concluded that “Numbers Don’t Add Up, Certification Of Presidential Results Premature and In Error” 

President Trump tweeted about it:

“Breaking News: In Pennsylvania there were 205,000 more votes than there were voters. This alone flips the state to President Trump.”

The key paragraphs from the PA lawmaker’s two-page statement:

A comparison of official county election results to the total number of voters who voted on November 3, 2020 as recorded by the Department of State shows that 6,962,607 total ballots were reported as being cast, while DoS/SURE system records indicate that only 6,760,230 total voters actually voted. Among the 6,962,607 total ballots cast, 6,931,060 total votes were counted in the presidential race, including all three candidates on the ballot and write-in candidates.

The difference of 202,377 more votes cast than voters voting, together with the 31,547 over- and under-votes in the presidential race, adds up to an alarming discrepancy of 170,830 votes, which is more than twice the reported statewide difference between the two major candidates for President of the United States. On November 24, 2020, Boockvar certified election results, and Wolf issued a certificate of ascertainment of presidential electors, stating that Vice President Joe Biden received 80,555 more votes than President Donald Trump.

The PA lawmakers have done their job (so far). Now what is the next step? These lawmakers need to recall the slate of electors and tell House and Senate that the election results cannot be ascertained in their state. They should probably hold a vote that overturns the certification of the awful election. The bottom line is that the slate of electors is not permitted to vote on Jan. 6. 

This reasonable and fair action may have a domino effect on the other embattled states, whose lawmakers should follow suit. If this happens, Trump will win in the Electoral College (I had erroneously stated that if no one reaches 270 votes, then the House decides.) Instead, the Twelfth Amendment states:  “[T]he votes shall then be counted…  The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President[.]”

But will PA legislatures, where the real power resides, do this? And will the other embattled states do the same? If so, then Trump (rightly) wins: 232 to 222. This is the best, constitutionally speaking, and probably the only real option remaining for Trump.