Wednesday, March 15, 2017

How a Selfie of White Neighbors Jogging in Historically Black Leimert Park Reveals the Simmering Tensions on the Places We Call Home

This shouldn't be a thing, but then, leftists are the biggest racists.

At the Los Angeles Times.

More Hailey Clauson (VIDEO)

Following-up from yesterday, "Hailey Clauson Uncovered for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit 2017 (VIDEO)."

At Sports Illustrated:



Campuses Are Becoming Unsafe Spaces for Conservative Students

Seriously not kidding.

At Instapundit, "ANALYSIS: TRUE."

Marine Corps Nude Photo Scandal (VIDEO)

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand's been on a hardcore feminist jihad anyway. These hearings just gave her a platform to spew her PC rage.

At Quartz, "Watch: Senator Gillibrand tears into the marines over why no one’s been held responsible for the nude photo scandal."

And CBS This Morning:



Professor Robert Kelly Viral Children Interruption Video

Well, he's a lucky man. What a beautiful family!

ADDED: At Althouse, "'My real life punched through the fake cover I had created on television'."




Fear and Loathing at MSNBC

Following-up from last night, "President Trump Paid $38 Million in Taxes on More Than $150 Million in Income in 2005 (VIDEO)."

At the Other McCain:


Dutch Elections Today

Following-up from last night, "Immigration Fatigue Defines Dutch Elections."


Viacheslav Morozov, Russia's Postcolonial Identity

Here's a work of political science that might be of interest, especially considering all the leftist fake news about Russia.

At Amazon, Viacheslav Morozov, Russia's Postcolonial Identity: A Subaltern Empire in a Eurocentric World.

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

President Trump Paid $38 Million in Taxes on More Than $150 Million in Income in 2005 (VIDEO)

I saw a couple of tweets on this, but now here comes Legal Insurrection with the story. See, "Rachel Maddow’s career committed suicide live on national TV tonight."

And at Bloomberg, "Trump Paid $38 Million Tax on $150 Million Income, Return Shows."

That's huge tax hit. Huge.

It's an effective tax rate of 24 percent. Sheesh. Didn't Mitt Romney get his effective rate down to 14 percent in 2011? I think President Trump needs a new accountant, lol.

And Rachel Maddow needs to get her head screwed on correctly. This is no bombshell. Trump's paying his fair share in federal taxes. Shoot, he's being over-taxed. Maybe that's why he didn't want to release his returns? He's getting hammered by the IRS.

In any case, Maddow's still as butch as ever. I never --- absolutely never --- watch her show. It's been years, literally.



Also, at the Daily Beast, via Memeorandum, "Report: Trump's 2005 Taxes Revealed."

One More Time, ICYMI: Robert J. Utley, The Indian Frontier

I tried to bump this post, but Blogger is acting all hinky, so I'm reposting it as a new entry.

From earlier today:

*****

I just finished Utley's chapter on the final campaigns of the frontier wars, which concludes with the surrender of Geronimo in 1886.

It's a great book. Marvelously balanced.

At Amazon, Robert J. Utley, The Indian Frontier of the American West, 1846-1890.

One More Time: Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest

I tried to bump this post, but Blogger is acting all hinky, so I'm reposting it as a new entry.

From earlier today:

****

I've got this one on order.

At Amazon, Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest.

The book is referenced by Vine Deloria, Jr., in Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto.

Marine Le Pen Informs Young Woman Reporter: 'Madame, the French people have no confidence in the media. Are you aware of that...?'

Via Paul Joseph Watson, on Twitter:

Welcome to Spring Break, Miami-Style

Heh.

At London's Daily Mail, "EXCLUSIVE - 'We've been drinking vodka and smoking joints. It's really cool': A haze of weed, booze on the beach, twerking and sex in the open – welcome to Spring Break, Miami-style."

Immigration Fatigue Defines Dutch Elections

This is a great piece!

From Andrew Michta, at the American Interest:

No matter the outcome, tomorrow’s parliamentary elections in the Netherlands will widen the divisions between European elites and publics.

As the Netherlands enters the final stretch in its 2017 election campaign, all eyes have turned to watch the political churning in this small but potentially significant EU member state. The intense interest by the international media is warranted; the Dutch election is the first of the “decisive three of 2017” (followed by elections in France and Germany) that many analysts believe will be leading indicators of the evolution of European politics in coming years. This has made the Dutch balloting in effect the first major European referendum on the past three decades’ immigration policy not only for Holland but also for the largest European countries.

Across Europe there has been a lot of polling, theorizing, opining, and (quite frankly) reading of tea leaves about the outcome of this vote. Paradoxically, the actual numbers of this election matter less than the political undercurrents it has brought to the surface. Geert Wilders’s anti-establishment, anti-immigration Party of Freedom (PVV) may still be positioned to deliver a stunning upset, though newer polling suggests a much tighter race. Still, the recent collapse of popular support for the social-democratic Labor Party (PvdA), a coalition partner of the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) since 2012, has made any firm predictions about the outcome a mug’s game. Regardless of whether Geert Wilders’s PVV overtakes or comes a few seats short of current Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s VVD, election day will permanently alter Dutch politics—and the politics of Europe.

The consensus seems to be that, even if Wilders delivers an upset, it is unlikely that his party will be able to enter into a coalition government, and so it will most likely become an opposition party in Parliament. Still, even if the PVV is not able to enter into a coalition, much less form a government, its gains will shrink the center of Dutch politics, making the building of a workable coalition much more difficult. Most importantly, the Dutch election is likely to herald a broader European trend of the center losing more and more ground to extreme left and right political parties. As in the United Kingdom and the United States, the perception that elite policies have failed has spread throughout Dutch society. Wilders’s anti-immigrant message has resonated especially in the aftermath of the 2015-16 wave of migration from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA); the Netherlands has been a prime destination for migrants on account of its generous immigration and welfare policies.

Will the past three decades of multiculturalism and institutionalism continue to define the Continent’s future? This is precisely the question at issue in Europe today. The idea that Europe can in fact become a tapestry of comingling ethnicities and cultures has in only the past couple of years met with hardening resistance, not just in smaller countries like the Netherlands and Sweden but also, and perhaps more importantly, in the largest EU countries, including Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Spain. The gathering anti-immigrant rebellion in Europe has fueled a resurgent nationalism that cannot simply be dismissed as “populism” or “Islamophobia”—the default position of most media commentary. The predominantly Muslim wave of the current migration—including, for instance, the nearly one million MENA migrants that are estimated to have entered Germany in 2015–16—has contributed to the largest mass migration in Europe since the end of the Second World War (and furthermore, for the first time ever, members of the migrant wave predominantly hail from outside of Europe). At the same time, because of low levels of acculturation among these immigrants, citizenship in Europe is not generally seen as the primary identity marker. Public perceptions and differentiation in Europe increasingly focus on ethnic origin and religion. Hence, unlike in the United States, it matters less and less whether the Muslim population is first, second, or even third generation. One in five people living in the Netherlands is an immigrant or a child of immigrants. This is especially important in larger Dutch cities; for instance, in Amsterdam and Rotterdam, close to half of the population has a first- or second-generation immigrant background. For young people, the numbers are even higher, approaching two-thirds of school age children in those two cities. The high concentration of immigrant populations in Europe’s large cities is a pattern repeated across the Continent, from Paris and Copenhagen through Stockholm and Frankfurt to London and Brussels. The progressive balkanization of neighborhoods in these large cities of Western Europe is polarizing politics and raising tensions between the indigenous European population and immigrants and their descendants...
Keep reading.

Illegal Alien Parents Prepare Families for the Worst

At the Los Angeles Times, "Fearful parents sign papers for friends to care for kids in case they're deported":
She saw the news of the raids happening around the country and felt helpless. Scared. She had lived here for more than a decade, following her father’s advice: Work hard and stay out of trouble.

But suddenly it felt as though trouble was looking for her. Lorena Napola worried about her four children. What if she were hauled away? Who would make sure they got to school? To doctors’ appointments? To church?

The questions weighed on her in recent weeks. She saw on the news a mother in Arizona get picked up by federal agents for deportation. Napola thought the woman seemed normal. Unassuming. She was without papers. Like her.

Napola’s friends spoke of rumors: Dark trucks filled with people in dark uniforms raiding nearby neighborhoods. She knew President Trump campaigned to crack down on illegal immigration and now he appeared to be a man of his word.

So she went to see Andres Paredes, a leader at her local Mormon church. Three of her children are U.S. citizens, she told him. Would he care for them if la migra came and she were deported?

Paredes, a quiet man who came to the United States from Peru decades ago, drew up power of attorney papers that gave him authority to make school, medical and other decisions for her children in case she and her husband were deported. Napola felt relief that her kids would be cared for and sadness that it had come to this.

“They are my life,” she said. “They are everything.”

As the papers were signed, Paredes said, his heart broke. He has signed power of attorney with two families.

“It’s a big responsibility,” he said softly. “I’m not sure it’s entirely sunk in yet.”

The fear among immigrants in the United States illegally has reached such a pitch that some have altered their lifestyles, won't answer the door if someone knocks and pay close attention to reports of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions on social media and the news...
Still more.

RELATED: "Illegal Border Crossings Appear to Drop Under Trump."

Amazing what some seriousness of purpose on immigration can accomplish. It's almost like we're enforcing our laws!

Fire in Downtown Los Angeles Fueled by Red Hot Chili Peppers (VIDEO)

Really.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Chili pepper ash and a pungent odor linger at scene of L.A. warehouse district fire."


ICYMI: Alan Taylor, William Cooper's Town

I know, I know.

I've got too many books going at one time!

But I love 'em.

This book is fantastic. I can't recommend it enough.

At Amazon, Alan Taylor, William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic.

A Glimpse Into the Life of a Slave Sold to Save Georgetown

Pretty fascinating.

At NYT:

He was an enslaved teenager on a Jesuit plantation in Maryland on the night that the stars fell. It was November 1833, and meteor showers set the sky ablaze.

His name was Frank Campbell. He would hold tight to that memory for decades, even when he was an old man living hundreds of miles away from his birthplace. In 1838, he was shipped to a sugar plantation in Louisiana with dozens of other slaves from Maryland. They had been sold by the nation’s most prominent Jesuit priests to raise money to help save the Jesuit college now known as Georgetown University.

Mr. Campbell would survive slavery and the Civil War. He would live to see freedom and the dawning of the 20th century. Like many of his contemporaries from Maryland, he would marry and have children and grandchildren. But in one respect, he was singular: His image has survived, offering us the first look at one of the 272 slaves sold to help keep Georgetown afloat.

These rare, century-old photographs of Mr. Campbell help illustrate the story of those enslaved men, women and children. We shared that story with you back in April, starting a conversation about American institutions and their historical ties to slavery that has engaged many readers.

The photos had been stored in the archives of the Ellender Memorial Library at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, La., not far from where Mr. Campbell was enslaved.

Clifton Theriot, the library’s archivist and interim director, made the connection late last year after stumbling across an article in a genealogical quarterly about the Jesuit slaves who had been shipped to Louisiana. He was startled to see Mr. Campbell’s name listed among them.

“I thought, ‘I know this name,’” Mr. Theriot recalled.

He went into the archives and pulled out a small, black photo album from the early 1900s. Mr. Theriot went through the album, page by page, photo by photo, until he found them: three photographs of a bearded, elderly black man with pearly white hair.

Underneath was a handwritten notation. It described the man as having been born in “Moreland” or “Mereland,” probably referring to Maryland, Mr. Theriot said.

And it identified him as “Frank Cambell our old servant 19 when the stars fell.” The fiery meteor shower of 1833 was so memorable that many people used it to date important moments in their lives.

Mr. Theriot knew he was on to something: “I was like, ‘This is the guy.’”

He reached out to Judy Riffel, the author of the article that had inspired his search through the archives. She is the lead genealogist for the Georgetown Memory Project, a group founded by Richard J. Cellini, a Georgetown alumnus, to identify the 272 slaves and their descendants...

Hailey Clauson Uncovered for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit 2017 (VIDEO)

She's wonderful.


Monday, March 13, 2017

Jackie Johnson's Sunny and Warm Forecast

But lots of fog near the coasts in the mornings. I noticed it this morning, in fact.

Here's Ms. Jackie, at CBS News 2 Los Angeles: