Sunday, June 12, 2016

Kaitlyn Juvik Braless Protest

No bra? No problem.

At Heat Street, "Bra-Less Teen Is ‘Sexually Harassing’ Other Boys And Her Teachers":
The latest edition of People Magazine offers readers a slobbering human interest story about Kaitlyn Juvik, an attention-seeking Montana high-school student and Lena Dunham wanna-be (both in her penchant for showing off her body parts and her misunderstanding of feminism), who is eager to clear a few things up: Boys don’t matter. What does matter—really the only thing that matters—is Juvik and her feelings and personal comfort.

Juvik claims comfort was the main reason she tossed her bra aside and headed to school. She made several people uncomfortable, including, she claims, a teacher. Called to the principal’s office, Juvik was told she was in violation of the dress code (her school’s dress code actually doesn’t mention underwear…because I suspect school administrators thought parents might take the on the role of explaining how civil society works).

And now, Juvik’s crying foul—taking a page from the feminist handbook on first world problems (that only rich, white teenagers…like…totally get) and claiming she’s a victim of leering boys (and even a pervy teacher). Predictably, Juvik says she wants to start a “national discussion” about “the body shaming and sexualizing of women” because we haven’t been having that conversation for decades already.

Yawn. Wouldn’t it be nice if just once, a high-school student wanted to start a conversation about math, or science, great literature or real issues facing women…like the systematic rape of Yazidi women in Iraq and Syria. But no, let’s talk about bras and other nonsense...
More.

She's a high-schooler. High school kids are idiot, lol.

Summer Reading [BUMPED]

I'm off for ten weeks.

I don't go back for the fall semester until August 29th. My oldest son just now said, "That's pretty crazy!"

That is, lol.

I'll be doing a lot of reading, enjoying some beer and baseball, and perhaps taking a couple of smallish trips (maybe Las Vegas, or at least Harrah's Rincon resort, which is fabulous).

In any case, here's some reading material for folks, via Amazon.

See, Wayne Batchis, The Right's First Amendment: The Politics of Free Speech & the Return of Conservative Libertarianism.

And Judy Wajcman, Pressed for Time: The Acceleration of Life in Digital Capitalism.

More, from Robert Lieber, Retreat and its Consequences: American Foreign Policy and the Problem of World Order.

Newt and Callista Gingrich, Rediscovering God in America: Reflections on the Role of Faith in Our Nation's History and Future.

Know your Marxist enemies, with Danny Katch, Socialism . . . Seriously: A Brief Guide to Human Liberation.

David Boaz, The Libertarian Mind: A Manifesto for Freedom.

I'm currently reading, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left.

BONUS: Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter S. Onuf, "Most Blessed of the Patriarchs": Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination.

Sebastian Gorka, Defeating Jihad

I posted a link to Gorka's book in April. Now's a good time to give it another plug.

At Amazon, Sebastian Gorka, Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War.

Orlando Nightclub Shooter Called 911 to Pledge Allegiance to ISIS

Following-up from previously, "Jihadist Omar Mateen Massacres Dozens in Orlando: Obama Pushes Gun Control Narrative (VIDEO)."

There's more at Memeorandum, at NBC News.

And from Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit, "AFTER ORLANDO TERRORIST ATTACK, USUAL SUSPECTS SPOUT USUAL NARRATIVE":


Jihadist Omar Mateen Massacres Dozens in Orlando: Obama Pushes Gun Control Narrative (VIDEO)

I was on Twitter at 5:00am when the news was breaking. Some folks were tweeting suspicions about Islamic jihad, but I wasn't going to speculate. When I woke up at 9:30am, the identity of the killer had been released: Omar Mateen, who called 9/11 during the siege to pledge allegiance to Islamic State.

And still, Barrack Hussien refused to even mention the words "Islam" or "Muslim," only to spew hateful far-left talking points about "easy access" to firearms.

It's a nightmare.

Memeorandum has the big roundup, "Omar Mateen, Terrorist Who Attacked Orlando Gay Club, Had Been Investigated by FBI."

And on Twitter:


'Game of Thrones' at Mitt Romney Election Summit in Utah

Romney needs to just go away.

He lost twice already. He's not making a good name for himself here.

At WaPo, "Romney loyalists’ divisions over Trump spill out into the open at Utah summit":
PARK CITY, Utah — Mitt Romney warned that a Donald Trump presidency could normalize racism, misogyny and bigotry in the national conscience. Businesswoman Meg Whitman compared the presumptive Republican presidential nominee to Adolf Hitler. House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) was asked, uncomfortably, how he could explain his endorsement of Trump to a young child.

Then came Trump’s boosters, awkwardly imploring about 300 business executives and GOP establishment donors and strategists gathered here for Romney’s annual ideas festival to unite for the fall campaign. In a stroke of defiance, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus declared that Trump and the GOP would win in November “with or without you,” according to attendees.

So went the three-day Romney-hosted E2 summit that concluded here Saturday in this luxurious mountaintop resort. The confab put on stark display the Republican Party’s moral and philosophical divisions over its new standard-bearer and underscored the difficulty that Trump and allies such as Priebus will have to consolidate forces at the start of a general election in which Democrat Hillary Clinton is favored.

Anthony Scaramucci, a New York financier who was one of Romney’s top funders in 2012, came to Park City seeking to galvanize his old friends to help him raise money for Trump. He likened the atmosphere here to the hit HBO series “Game of Thrones.”

“I feel like Jon Snow, trying to get the Wildlings to team up with the kings of the castles,” Scaramucci said.

Recalling what he told Romney loyalists, Scaramucci said: “Your father just got slayed by your uncle, whom you don’t really like, and your uncle is now in charge. You’ve got the White Walkers descending from the north and they’re coming to hunt you and all the living. What do you do? Do you fight with your uncle or band together and fight the White Walkers?”

Romney made clear he would rather fight his uncle, figuratively speaking. The 2012 GOP presidential nominee was emotional here Saturday as he delivered an impassioned case against Trump. He said the business mogul’s campaign rhetoric — the latest example being his accusations of bias by a federal judge because of his Mexican American heritage — is so destructive that it is fraying at the nation’s moral fabric and could lead to “trickle-down racism.”

“I love what this country is built upon, and its values — and seeing this is breaking my heart,” Romney told summit attendees, according to the Associated Press.

Trump punched back at Romney at his Saturday rally in Tampa, calling him “poor, sad, Mitt Romney” and a “stone-cold loser.”

Scaramucci and other Romney associates supportive of Trump, including Ron Kaufman, a longtime RNC member from Massachusetts, have pleaded with Romney to tone down his opposition in the interest of party unity.
More.

I blogged Anthony Scaramucci's WSJ op-ed earlier, "Here Are Four Things #NeverTrump Doesn't Get."

Friday, June 10, 2016

Anonymous Superdelegates Declare Clinton the Democrat Nominee Through the Mass Media

Politico had this back in February, "Sanders supporters revolt against superdelegates."

Too bad their revolt didn't come through.

Here's Glenn Greenwald, at the Intercept, "Perfect End to Democratic Primary: Anonymous Superdelegates Declare Winner Through Media":

LAST NIGHT, the Associated Press — on a day when nobody voted — surprised everyone by abruptly declaring the Democratic Party primary over and Hillary Clinton the victor. The decree, issued the night before the California primary in which polls show Clinton and Bernie Sanders in a very close race, was based on the media organization’s survey of “superdelegates”: the Democratic Party’s 720 insiders, corporate donors, and officials whose votes for the presidential nominee count the same as the actually elected delegates. AP claims that superdelegates who had not previously announced their intentions privately told AP reporters that they intend to vote for Clinton, bringing her over the threshold. AP is concealing the identity of the decisive superdelegates who said this.

Although the Sanders campaign rejected the validity of AP’s declaration — on the ground that the superdelegates do not vote until the convention and he intends to try to persuade them to vote for him — most major media outlets followed the projection and declared Clinton the winner.

This is the perfect symbolic ending to the Democratic Party primary: The nomination is consecrated by a media organization, on a day when nobody voted, based on secret discussions with anonymous establishment insiders and donors whose identities the media organization — incredibly — conceals. The decisive edifice of superdelegates is itself anti-democratic and inherently corrupt: designed to prevent actual voters from making choices that the party establishment dislikes. But for a party run by insiders and funded by corporate interests, it’s only fitting that its nomination process ends with such an ignominious, awkward, and undemocratic sputter...
Greenwald's pretty excitable, and never forget he's a regular demonizer of Israel, etc., but he raises a good point nevertheless.

I can't stand the superdelegates. Would Hillary have won the nomination without them? Who knows? But had Bernie Sanders gone for the jugular early in his campaign, holding nothing back, and tearing into every corrupt, scandalous, enabling outrage that is the Clinton political machine, he might well have been crown the Democrat Party standard-bearer. In the end, that's probably the bigger story.

And remember, Donald Trump's under no such constraint. His challenge will be finding the zone while eviscerating the hulk shell cankles Clinton.

RELATED: At Truth Revolt, "Bill Clinton's Ex-Lover Describes Meeting Hillary: 'Lumpy, Thick Calves, Hairy Toes'."

Illegal Alien Valedictorian Larissa Martinez (VIDEO)

She's apparently been accepted to Yale.

Hey, good for her, but one can't help thinking that the so-called "disadvantaged" are nowadays the ones with the most advantages and social prestige.

At PuffHo, "Undocumented Valedictorian Takes Down Trump In Epic Speech."

More at FOX 4 News - Dallas-Fort Worth, "North Texas valedictorian reveals she’s an undocumented immigrant."

And I saw another woman, Mayte Lara, posting about her hot legs and undocumented status on Twitter. She's since deleted her account. No doubt she got death threats, and understandably so. These people are ghouls.

More at the Texas Tribune, "Valedictorians Draw Attention for Saying They're Undocumented (Video)."

Bill Clinton Bagged Millions from World's Largest For-Profit University (VIDEO)

From Professor Jonathan Turley, "The Clinton University Problem: Laureate Education Lawsuits Present Problem For Clintons [Updated]":

While largely ignored by the media, the Clintons have their own university scandal. Donald Trump has been rightfully criticized and sued over his defunct Trump University. There is ample support for claiming that the Trump University was fraudulent in its advertisements and operations. However, the national media has been accused of again sidestepping a scandal involving the Clintons that involves the same type of fraud allegations. The scandal involves a dubious Laureate Education for-profit online college (Walden) and entails many of the common elements with other Clinton scandals: huge sums given to the Clintons and questions of conflicts with Hillary Clinton during her time as Secretary of State. There are distinctions to draw between the two stories, but the virtual radio silence on the Clinton/Laureate story is surprising. [I have updated the original column with some additional thoughts, links, and clarifications for readers).
Keep reading.

Death of Free Speech in Europe (VIDEO)

Via Theo Spark:



Lindsey Pelas Busting Out of Her Bikini

At WWTDD, "Lindsey Pelas in a Bikini."

Kate Upton's Birthday

She's 24-years-old. Still fabulous.

At Sports Illustrated:


She doesn't get photographed topless very often, which is a shame.

PREVIOUSLY: "More Kate Upton 'Sexiest Woman'."

Yankees Sweep Angels (VIDEO)

I've pretty much given up on my team. They're 11 games back in the American League West.

There's still hope mathematically, but they've got too many injuries, especially on the pitching staff. Even the hot All-Stars, Mike Trout and Albert Pujols, along with the awesome Kole Calhoun, aren't enough to carry the team into contention.

I'll be tuning in, but once the Angels are eliminated from playoff contention I've got to focus my loyalties elsewhere, probably the Dodgers and the Giants.

In any case, the Yankees pounded the Halos this week. It wasn't even close.

At LAT, "Angels get swept in the Bronx":

All of them silent, the Angels dressed themselves, shoveled in their dinners, loaded their suitcases, signed their checks for the Yankee Stadium clubhouse attendants, and boarded a bus.

If all went according to plan, they’d land at LAX after 2 a.m. PDT, bus back to Orange County, drive home, and then show up to Angel Stadium 10 hours later to play another ballgame.

It is a particularly grueling part of the Major League Baseball schedule that the Angels are occupying now, made worse by their abject struggles during a four-game series against the New York Yankees and, of course, the fact that this season’s result already seems rendered. They lost four straight in the Bronx, including by a 6-3 decision Thursday night.

Jhoulys Chacin pitched wonderfully for four innings and then terribly for one inning, the fifth. That determined the game’s outcome. He walked leadoff man Didi Gregorius, then lamented it later. With one out, Chris Parmelee, a heretofore anonymous man who dominated the Angels this series, singled through to left field to knot the score,1-1.

Jacoby Ellsbury singled, Brett Gardner walked, Angels pitching coach Charles Nagy visited the mound, Carlos Beltran doubled, Alex Rodriguez hit a sacrifice fly, and Brian McCann doubled. The Yankees had five runs in a dozen minutes; Chacin did not have his release point, varying wildly within his normal delivery.

He stayed in to start the sixth inning before the Angels turned to their taxed bullpen.

Closer Huston Street handled the eighth even though the score was the opposite of a save situation...
More.

The hard-copy newspaper article is subtitled on the inside pages, "Angels might be running out of time and options."

How Millennials Can Still #FeelTheBern (VIDEO)

Bernie Sanders won't drop out.

At NYT, "Bernie Sanders Still Presses Battered Campaign Toward Washington Primary."

I suspect some folks on the left are getting pretty angry by now. He's a thorn in the establish Democrat Party's side.

But for a different take, see Jeremy Stern, at WSJ, "How Millennials Can Still Live Bernie’s Dream":


They backed him over Hillary Clinton in greater numbers than they backed Barack Obama over John McCain. But now, millions of millennials are left licking their wounds after the defeat of Bernie Sanders, the greatest progressive hero since the president he wanted to replace.

Many of them recoil at the thought of supporting Mrs. Clinton, a liberal but one with insufficient anticapitalist bona fides. For now, the Bernie-backers’ dream of grafting Scandinavian solutions onto American problems is dead.

Or is it? Despite some recent budgetary setbacks, a long-running American experiment in socialism is still going strong, and yet somehow it remains one of the country’s best-kept secrets.

The federal experiment involves 1.3 million Americans—less than 1% of the population, but 75% of the participants are themselves millennials, so Bernie’s supporters should feel right at home. Unless they feel like they’ve arrived in socialist heaven. Consider:

These lucky few, including their spouses and children, receive free single-payer health care. Pre-existing conditions? No problem. Prescriptions? Generally free.

Bernie only proposed free college for all; that’s already a reality for these young Americans. Local elementary schooling for their children is also tossed in at no cost. Vocational training? When do you want to start? And put your wallet away.

What’s more, the federal government provides these participants with generous living allowances. On top of their normal salaries, they collect a monthly allowance for rent or mortgage payments, an allowance for moving costs incurred when their job location changes, and an allowance for gas consumed when driving for work-related purposes. There’s even a clothing allowance. Oh, none of these allowances is taxable. Did I mention that tax preparation services are also free?

In case you thought it couldn’t get any more Nordic for these chosen few, they get 30 days of paid vacation a year in addition to the usual 10 paid federal holidays. That’s 40 days of paid leave every year—more than in the Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and Canada.

These Americans are also eligible for a lifetime pension. If they enter the program after high school, they can start collecting their retirement—half the dollar amount of their final salary, every year for the rest of their life—at age 38! Not even Bernie thought of that. The amount they collect is calculated annually according to the Consumer Price Index and the effects of inflation, so the pension payments increase each year as the cost of living rises.

Speaking of salaries: No gender pay gap here. A male who occupies the same position with the same experience cannot earn more than his female colleague. That’s the rule, not subject to the whim of a paymaster.

So come on over, disappointed young Bernie fans....

Welcome to the U.S. Armed Forces!
Heh.

You gotta love it!

Now let's see how many Bernie Bros (and Sisters) sign up?

Gawker Media Files for Chapter 11

People are thrilled about this, especially Louise Menshch, lol.


And from Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit, "QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED":
Shot: Was It Wrong for Peter Thiel to Fund Hulk Hogan’s Gawker Lawsuit?

Chaser: Gawker Media Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy.
More at Mediagazer.

Thursday, June 9, 2016

Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands

I mentioned Scruton's new book previously.

It came by mail today.

See, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left.

My son "graduated" from middle school today. We attended the promotion ceremony this morning. It was pretty awesome, actually. Especially the pledge of allegiance on the blacktop basketball court, with probably 1,500 people all reciting the pledge together. That felt good. It really did, especially given the nature of the times. I felt for a moment that the old, great patriotic outpouring for the America of our classic political culture was a blast from the past. I felt perhaps focusing on politics so much all the time makes one miss (under-appreciate) those times when we all share out national identity together, in this case while experiencing the joy of our young ones reaching a milestone in life.

It made me feel good.

In any case, the Scruton book's awesome.

I'll have more on it later.

Roger Scruton photo fools-frauds-and-firebrands_zpsdqui8dq5.jpg

A General Election Focused on Gender (VIDEO)

Clinton's speech the other night was a little much.

I mean, sure, the first woman nominee of a major party in U.S. history. It's a big deal.

But the Democrats just go overboard breaking the civil rights barriers. I just about keeled over in 2008 when Obama was elected. And the media overkill is a nightmare.

In any case, at LAT, "Analysis: Clinton, finally breaking the glass ceiling, ready for a gender battle with Trump":

In a political season filled with promises of revolution, something revolutionary happened: A woman has claimed a major party’s presidential nomination.

That historic occurrence, overshadowed somewhat by everything else that has happened in an election year that has wildly defied expectations, will shape the general election clash to come. It sets up a November battle between presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump that will tread heavily on issues of gender.

Clinton seized on history Tuesday night as she claimed the Democratic nomination during a campaign celebration in New York. She opened with an allusion to what she had memorably called the nation’s “highest, hardest glass ceiling” — the one separating women from the Oval Office.

Clinton seized on history Tuesday night as she claimed the Democratic nomination during a campaign celebration in New York. She opened with an allusion to what she had memorably called the nation’s “highest, hardest glass ceiling” — the one separating women from the Oval Office.

Exactly eight years ago Tuesday, as she departed the 2008 presidential contest, she said her campaign had knocked millions of cracks in that ceiling, one for each vote received in her losing effort.

“It may be hard to see tonight, but we are all standing under a glass ceiling right now,” she said with a grin Tuesday at the refurbished Brooklyn Navy Yard with a ceiling literally made of glass. “But don’t worry, we’re not smashing this one.”

Issues of gender will dominate the general election for at least two reasons. It will be the first time a woman has led a ticket in a presidential general election, and the two candidates already have been jousting over women and their roles.

In recent days, Trump has questioned Clinton’s very presence in the race.

“She doesn’t even look presidential,” he complained via Twitter as Clinton delivered a foreign policy address scathing in its criticism of the Republican.

The primary campaign has been loaded with such allusions to gender, and there’s no reason to think that will change in the months before the general election...
She's a known quantity with super high negatives. I don't think she's going to get as free of a pass as "The One" did in 2008. Still, the media going to boost Hillary and attempt to destroy The Donald as a racist, misogynist Islamophobe. It's just they way journalist operation. They're Democrat operatives with bylines.

More.

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

Race, Sex, and Ethnicity of Judges Makes a Difference in Judging

Here's the front-page story from the Los Angeles Times a couple of days ago, "Donald Trump's attack on judge and other racial comments stir trouble for the Republican Party."

Apparently, Trump's so-called "racist" attack on U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel is the final disqualifying indignity of the 2016 campaign. It's as if Trump hadn't uttered a controversial statement since launching his campaign a year ago. All of a sudden, this is the end of the line. Both left and right, Democrats and Republicans, have now joined hands in a bipartisan denunciation of the GOP nominee. Some folks are even talking about a revived "Never Trump" movement, which includes yet another push to deny the nomination to the New York businessman at the convention.

Normally, a Republican presidential candidate has to run against not just the opposition party's candidate, but the leftist Democrat Media Complex as well. As Glenn Reynolds pointed out today, every four years the GOP nominee's smeared as the second coming of Adolf Hitler. This year's no different in that regard. What's different now is that the GOP nominee's also running against the Republican Party establishment itself. Sure, Reince Priebus backs Trump and has pledged to put the party's full resources toward the general election. The fact is, though, with this Curiel business former establishment Trump supporters are now pulling the rug out.

In any case, it's a tempest in a teapot, frankly. Trump's not doing anything the left doesn't do all the time. Indeed, Trump's just taking a page of the leftist playbook.

See, AoSHQ, "On Race and Judges, Trump Isn't a Racist nor a Conservative — He's a Standard Issue Liberal":
There's no part of a minority that's expected to rule in solidarity with his race?

No particular racial mode of thinking a minority brings to the table?

That would be a shock to these liberals:
"It's impossible not to be disgusted at someone who could benefit so much from affirmative action and then pull up the ladder after himself. "
-- Liberal Maureen Dowd making the standard liberal criticism of Clarence Thomas -- that he's a race traitor insufficiently biased towards members of his own race.
Did Jake Tapper call Maureen Dowd a "textbook racist" for that bit of demagoguery?

Of course not.

Did Paul fucking Ryan?

I doubt it.

He sure didn't remember objecting to it when called upon to comment upon Trump's similar race essentialism. Guess it didn't make much of an impression on him then.

Incidentally, Clarence Thomas is a figure of hate for the left because of his relative uniqueness.

Therefore, in the minds of liberals, most black judges are sufficiently solicitous of the political interests of their own races.

Again-- any upset from the liberals over this liberal idea that judges of color are supposed to "look out for their own"?

None.

This "Thomas pulls the ladders up from other blacks (which most black judges don't do)" critique is of course not original to Dowd -- nothing is original to this tired, sad hag. It's standard issue liberal cant.

None of which is ever objected to by our liberal media masters.

Indeed, Clarence Thomas is attacked for his race quite frequently, on bizarrely unrelated grounds.
The left is renewing its venomous, racist attacks on Thomas in the aftermath of his dissent in the Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling in favor of gay marriage.

Actor George Takei smeared Thomas as a “clown in blackface.” The Huffington Post called his dissent “beyond ridiculous” and tarred him as a hypocrite for opposing a court-created “right” to gay marriage:

“Clarence Thomas is married to a white woman — something that would be illegal today, if it weren’t for the Supreme Court’s historic Loving v. Virginia ruling.” As if his personal life is fair game.

Last Friday, in another low blow, New York Times reporter Adam Liptak portrayed Thomas as a lightweight whose opinions are cut-and-paste jobs from briefs submitted to the court.
Do Hispanics have a different style of judging than whites -- a different set of inputs leading to a different array of outputs?

Yes indeed they do, says liberal Justice Sandra Sotomayor.
In 2001, Sonia Sotomayor, an appeals court judge, gave a speech declaring that the ethnicity and sex of a judge "may and will make a difference in our judging."
In her speech, Judge Sotomayor questioned the famous notion -- often invoked by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and her retired Supreme Court colleague, Sandra Day O’Connor -- that a wise old man and a wise old woman would reach the same conclusion when deciding cases.

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life," said Judge Sotomayor, who is now considered to be near the top of President Obama’s list of potential Supreme Court nominees.

Her remarks, at the annual Judge Mario G. Olmos Law and Cultural Diversity Lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, were not the only instance in which she has publicly described her view of judging in terms that could provoke sharp questioning in a confirmation hearing.

This month, for example, a video surfaced of Judge Sotomayor asserting in 2005 that a “court of appeals is where policy is made.” She then immediately adds: “And I know — I know this is on tape, and I should never say that because we don’t make law. I know. O.K. I know. I’m not promoting it. I’m not advocating it. I’m — you know.”
Indeed, President Obama himself has suggested that minority judges like Sotomayor may bring something to the bench that whites can't bring -- "empathy."
Still more.

Deal of the Day: Save on Select Kingston and HyperX Computer Products

At Amazon, HyperX Cloud II Gaming Headset for PC & PS4 - Gun Metal (KHX-HSCP-GM).

Also, Kingston Digital 32GB Data Traveler 3.0 USB Flash Drive, Red (DTIG4/32GBET).

More, INSANITY Base Kit - DVD Workout.

Still more, Beachbody Fuel Shot for the Body Beast Program - 3 lbs 30 Day Supply.

And ICYMI, Clinton Romesha, Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor.

BONUS: Andrew Roberts, The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War.

Donald Trump Promises New Attacks on Hillary Clinton as GOP Race Ends (VIDEO)

The the full speech from last night at the clip.

And at the Wall Street Journal:

BRIARCLIFF MANOR, N.Y. – Donald Trump, sidestepping the firestorm that has engulfed his campaign in recent days, marked the end of the GOP primary season Tuesday by escalating his attacks on Hillary Clinton, raising questions about her ethics and promising to give a “major speech” as early as Monday to discuss “all of the things that have taken place” with the presumptive Democratic nominee.

“The Clintons have turned the politics of personal enrichment into an art form form themselves,” Mr. Trump said speaking to supporters as the polls closed in New Jersey, one of five states voting Tuesday.

He made no mention of the controversies that have been roiling his own party for the last two weeks over his criticism of a federal judge handling litigation against Trump University.

Hoping to quiet the firestorm that has pitted Mr. Trump against most elected officials in the GOP, he had earlier in the day issued a statement saying he had been “misconstrued” by critics who said he was racist because he accused U.S. Judge Gonzalo Curiel of being biased against him because he is of Mexican descent. Mr. Trump did not apologize or recant his attacks despite wide criticism from allies and adversaries alike, but he said he would not discuss the case any more.

He stuck to that intention at the Tuesday evening appearance at his golf course in the suburbs of New York, as he prepared to celebrate primary victories in New Jersey, South Dakota, Montana, New Mexico, and California on the last day of the long, unpredictable primary season.

He took no questions from reporters; his speech was short, focused on Mrs. Clinton and uncharacteristically scripted for a man famous for his off-the-cuff performances. He read the speech from a teleprompter, less than a week after deriding Mrs. Clinton for using the device to present a major speech of her own attacking Mr. Trump as ill-suited for the Oval Office.

For a man struggling to unify his party after a long, divisive primary season, he chose one of the most powerful tools available for galvanizing Republicans: attacking Mrs. Clinton just as she was at last ending her own primary battle against Sen. Bernie Sanders...
Good for him.

Keep reading.

Sports Illustrated Summer of Swimsuit (2016)

Here's an eye-opener for all of you late-risers, lol.


Here's Today's Jackie Johnson Weather Forecast

I missed getting to this last night because of the election.

In fact, I didn't even blog. I just watched the returns on Twitter and TV, heh.

At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:


Hillary Clinton Shifts to Far-Left as She Claims Party's Nomination

This is interesting.

Back in the 1990s, the Clintons claimed to be centrist "New Democrats" opportunistically, so they could win. Inside there's always been an Alinskyite Marxist collectivist waiting to break out.

At the Wall Street Journal, "How Hillary Clinton Shifted Leftward":
When she stood before New York Democrats and launched her first campaign for office 16 years ago, Hillary Clinton was unabashed about her centrist credentials.

“I’m a New Democrat,” the first lady said in announcing her Senate bid. Her husband worked for a decade to move the party away from its liberal roots and win over independent voters. Now Mrs. Clinton touted that third-way philosophy, too.

“I don’t believe government is the source of all our problems, or the solution to them,” she said.

Today, a transformed Mrs. Clinton campaigns again, this time for president. On a swath of domestic issues, dragged along by a rapidly changing party and a surprisingly tough primary opponent in Sen. Bernie Sanders, Mrs. Clinton has moved to the left, sometimes reversing her positions and in other cases changing her tone in significant ways.

Mrs. Clinton has undone her longtime opposition to gay marriage. She apologized for her 2002 vote authorizing an invasion of Iraq. She backed off support for charter schools. She called for an end to the “era of mass incarceration,” a rebuke of her husband’s 1994 crime bill.

Under intense pressure from Mr. Sanders, she came out against the Keystone XL pipeline, a project that as secretary of state she said she was inclined to approve. She opposed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an Asian free-trade agreement she had predicted would be the “gold standard,” but that was opposed by labor unions, most Democrats and Mr. Sanders.

And on Social Security, Mrs. Clinton all but abandoned her longtime interest in a bipartisan compromise aimed at extending the program’s solvency and adopted liberal promises not to cut benefits.

On Tuesday, eight years after Mrs. Clinton conceded the 2008 contest, she celebrated victory in her quest for her party’s presidential nomination, a historic achievement making her the first woman to run on a major party ticket. Primary voters cast ballots on Tuesday in California and five other states. Mrs. Clinton went over the top a day earlier with commitments from party leaders who are convention delegates, according to an Associated Press tally.

Now Mrs. Clinton is set to face Republican Donald Trump this fall, and being seen as more liberal may not help in wooing crucial independents and working-class voters. Further, her changing views may feed a perception among some voters that she is untrustworthy, as it did among many Sanders supporters.

“I don’t feel she’s genuine, to be honest,” said Bill Losch, 63 years old, of Las Vegas, a Sanders delegate. “She’ll do whatever she needs to do to be elected.”

Democrats in and out of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign say her shifting positions reflect new facts and show her willingness to adapt while sticking to core principles...
More.

Tuesday, June 7, 2016

Clinton Romesha, Red Platoon

This looks excellent.

At Amazon, Clinton Romesha, Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor.
“A vitally important story that needs to be understood by the public, and I cannot imagine an account that does it better justice that Romesha’s.” —Sebastian Junger, journalist and author of The Perfect Storm

“Red Platoon is sure to become a classic of the genre.”—Hampton Sides, author of Ghost Soldiers and In the Kingdom of Ice

The only comprehensive, firsthand account of the fourteen hour firefight at the Battle of Keating by Medal of Honor recipient Clinton Romesha, for readers of Black Hawk Down by Mark Bowden and Lone Survivor by Marcus Luttrell.

“‘It doesn’t get better.’ To us, that phrase nailed one of the essential truths, maybe even the essential truth, about being stuck at an outpost whose strategic and tactical vulnerabilities were so glaringly obvious to every soldier who had ever set foot in that place that the name itself—Keating—had become a kind of backhanded joke.”

In 2009, Clinton Romesha of Red Platoon and the rest of the Black Knight Troop were preparing to shut down Command Outpost (COP) Keating, the most remote and inaccessible in a string of bases built by the U.S. military in Nuristan and Kunar in the hope of preventing Taliban insurgents from moving freely back and forth between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Three years after its construction, the army was finally ready to concede what the men on the ground had known immediately: it was simply too isolated and too dangerous to defend.

On October 3, 2009, after years of constant smaller attacks, the Taliban finally decided to throw everything they had at Keating. The ensuing 14-hour battle—and eventual victory—cost 8 men their lives.

Red Platoon is the riveting first-hand account of the Battle of Keating, told by Romesha, who spearheaded both the defense of the outpost and the counter-attack that drove the Taliban back beyond the wire, and received the Medal of Honor for his actions.
Shop here.

And thanks so much!

Bernie Sanders Leads Among Eligible Voters in California

Today's election day, finally.

Here's Cathleen Decker, at the Los Angeles Times, "Analysis: Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton in a tight race in California as the campaign batters her popularity":

Hillary Clinton’s popularity has slumped in California under an unrelenting challenge from Bernie Sanders, who has succeeded in breaching the demographic wall Clinton had counted on to protect her in the state’s presidential primary, a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll has found.

As he has done across the country this primary season, Sanders commands the support of younger voters by huge margins in advance of Tuesday’s primary — even among Latinos and Asians, voter groups that Clinton easily won when she ran eight years ago. Many of his backers come from a large pool of voters who have registered for the first time in the weeks before the election.

Yet, Tuesday’s outcome remains difficult to predict, precisely because of the untested nature of Sanders’ following. That portends an intense fight in the final days of the campaign.

The Vermont senator has battled Clinton to a draw among all voters eligible for the Democratic primary, with 44% siding with him to 43% for Clinton. That represented a nine-point swing from a USC/Los Angeles Times poll in March, in which Clinton led handily.

But among those most likely to vote, based on their voting history and stated intentions this time around, Clinton led, 49%-39%, in the new poll. Her standing is bolstered by the reliability of her older supporters, who have a proven record of casting ballots.

She also leads convincingly among registered Democrats; 53% of likely Democratic voters supported her, to 37% for Sanders. Throughout the year, she has carried party members in every state but Sanders’ home state of Vermont and next-door New Hampshire, where he won in a landslide.

As he has elsewhere, Sanders benefits here from party rules that allow registered nonpartisan voters — known in California as “no party preference” voters — to take part in the Democratic primary. Among nonpartisans who were likely to vote, he led by 48%-35%.

Sanders’ chances of victory rest on big turnout of voters who typically don’t vote in primaries and who — in the case of the nonpartisans — will have to navigate complicated voter rules to request a Democratic ballot.

“His base of support is young voters, low-propensity voters and [nonpartisan] voters. Not only does he have to turn them out by election day, but he has to educate all those nonpartisan voters” to request a Democratic ballot, said Dan Schnur, the poll director who heads USC’s Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics.

“That’s not to say he can’t pull it off, but this may be the biggest voter mobilization challenge California has seen in many, many years.”

For all the threat the primary represents, Clinton, who likely will clinch the Democratic nomination even before Californians’ votes are counted, retains most of her strength in a general election contest against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

Trump has contended in recent days that he could make a run at California in November, but the poll showed that to be implausible, at best...
More.

And ICYMI, "Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)."

Quoted in LBCC's Viking Newspaper

Following-up from last night, "Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)."

The college newspaper contacted me for some comments on Clinton's visit. My colleague Charlotte Joseph was contacted as well.

Here's the piece, "Political-Science Professors React to Hillary Clinton Rally":
Professor Charlotte Joseph said in an email Sunday, June 5, she considers herself a “swing voter” and is supporting Clinton due to her vast experience in foreign and domestic policy. She said, “It is a fantastic opportunity whenever any candidate comes to our campus.  It allows our students and the entire college community a chance to hear challenging ideas and to evaluate how these fit with their own beliefs.”

Joseph said, “It provides an educational opportunity that most people never get the chance to see.  Most of us get our information from the television or the internet, in sound bites. We rarely have the opportunity to hear a speech from beginning to end. Hopefully, this will be the first of many such events at LBCC because of the uniqueness of our college and student body.”

Although he is registered to vote in the Republican primary, Professor Douglas said in an email Monday, June 6, just hours before Clinton’s speech that he doesn’t identify as Republican or Democrat.

Douglas said, “The 2016 election has generated tremendous excitement, more than usual, in my experience, especially in California, where our primary is expected to be decisive. So, it’s great that students can participate directly in the political process by attending a campaign rally. The event brings the campaign home to those who’re already interested and makes it a personal, potentially life-changing experience to see and hear their candidate close up.”

Douglas also said he expects Clinton to receive a lot of media coverage and believes if Clinton were to lose in California, then the Bernie Sanders campaign would receive “enormous momentum and could put pressure on the Democrat National Committee to weaken the rules of the party’s super delegates.”

Why Millennials Are Least Likely to Vote

Millennials have a lot of latent political power, but they're the slacker generation. I doubt they'll overtake older Americans in participation any time soon.

At the O.C. Register, "Why millennials, now totaling 69.2 million, are least likely to vote."


Bill Whittle's Firewall: Transgender Bathrooms and the Progressive Synthetic Injustice Machine

Here's the inimitable Bill Whittle, "The Bathroom Wars":


Monday, June 6, 2016

Jackie Johnson's Cooler Marine Layer Forecast

Thank goodness for the mild weather. Folks were waiting for hours in line yesterday for the Hillary Clinton rally. It wasn't too bad after all.

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



Hillary Clinton Rallies Supporters at Long Beach City College (VIDEO)

The college just announced the Clinton visit on Friday, which was relatively short notice.

I wasn't all that thrilled about it, especially since the original announcement said that doors were open at 2:00pm (for a 4:00pm event), and that was going to cut into class time.

It turns out the timeline was pushed back two hours, with doors scheduled to open at 4:00pm (for a 6:00pm event). That wasn't too bad. My 12:45pm American politics class saw pretty much regular attendance. My 2:20pm international relations class was less than half attended, but no matter. I had a brief presentation planned anyway, and I distributed a handout last week, in any case.

Students elsewhere around campus were complaining, though. It was a big event that caused some distractions for students not interested in the campaign. They just wanted to study.

I don't see a report on the rally anywhere. Everyone's talking about the AP story announcing the Clinton's got the delegates to clinch the nomination.

I'll update with more later.

Meanwhile, some video and tweets:




Young Blacks Aren't Enamored of Hillary Clinton

Here's the age divide among black voters, at LAT, "Among some black voters, a generational divide on Clinton vs. Sanders":
The president of the New Frontier Democratic Club made his hard pitch for voting for Hillary Clinton inside the South Los Angeles community room.

She will lead the charge for racial equality and fair pay for women, Mike Davis told the two dozen black men and women last month. She will fight for black families, he said, stretching his hosannas for the former secretary of state for a good 10 minutes.

Can we just take a vote to endorse Hillary, someone in the crowd said. “Let’s vote,” Davis agreed.

James Scriven Sr., 79, raised his hand high along with everybody except for two holdouts: Scriven’s two sons, Tabari, 39, and James Jr., 41.

To their father’s mild displeasure, they were feeling the Bern.

 “He has new ideas that will help the economy and create jobs,” Tabari, of Inglewood, said of Bernie Sanders. “Young people are trying to better themselves through education, but student loans are standing in the way.”

With the California primary set for Tuesday, polls suggest the race between Clinton and Sanders has tightened, although she still appears to hold a lead.

A poll of black voters in California commissioned by the African American Voter Registration Education Participation Project conducted by Evitarus found that 71% of 800 likely voters surveyed supported Clinton. But among the black voters younger than 40, half said they would probably vote for Sanders, compared with 34% for Clinton. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

His sons’ support for Sanders did not sit well with the elder Scriven, who like many blacks has an enduring affection for Clinton’s husband.

“Bernie is not going to win,” Scriven said dismissively. “They will be voting for Hillary Clinton in the presidential election.”

Despite her overall lead with blacks, Clinton did not neatly inherit the love many felt for Bill Clinton, who famously played a soulful saxophone on “The Arsenio Hall Show” in 1992 and whom novelist Toni Morrison later dubbed “the first black president.”

If significant numbers of younger African Americans vote for Sanders, that could play an important role in a primary that Dan Schnur, director of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at USC, said could be tight.

“There is no question that Sanders can win the California primary,” Schnur said. To do so, however, he would need an unusually large turnout of young voters,  including young minority voters like the Scriven brothers.
Keep reading.

John C. McManus on D-Day

His top five D-Day books, at WSJ, "FIVE BEST: John C. McManus.

Mentioned there, Jonathan Gawne, Spearheading D-Day: American Special Units in Normandy.

McManus's book is here, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.

Plus, Cornelius Ryan, The Longest Day: The Classic Epic of D-Day.

And thanks for shopping through my Amazon helps. It helps me afford my own reading obsession!

BONUS: At WSJ, from Stacy Meichtry and Marion Halftermeyer, "Last of Surviving D-Day Veterans Battle Time to Bear Witness."

Remembering D-Day: Then and Now

From Christopher Kelly, at RealClearHistory:

Seventy-two years ago, on June 6, 1944, Allied troops waded ashore on the beaches of Normandy to liberate Nazi-occupied Europe. The night before, on June 5, American airborne forces had landed on the western flank of the invasion area near Sainte-Mère-Église, while British airborne forces secured the eastern flank and Pegasus Bridge. They jumped out of C-47 Dakota transport planes, through darkness and into glory. Some arrived by glider. Private John Steele of the 82nd Airborne landed on the steeple of the church at Sainte-Mère-Église. He managed to survive by playing dead.

Today a visitor to Sainte-Mère-Église can observe a mannequin representing Steele hanging from the church tower. Inside the church is a stained glass window of the Virgin Mary surrounded by American paratroopers.

On Utah Beach—all of the landing sites had code names—56-year-old Brig. Gen. Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (the oldest son of former president Teddy Roosevelt) landed about a mile away from his intended target. When asked whether to re-embark the 4th Infantry Division, he simply said, “We’ll start the war from right here!” Prior to the landing, Omaha Beach, also known as Bloody Omaha, had received an abbreviated naval bombardment from ships such as the battleship Texas lasting only 35 minutes. The bare stretches of beach offered no cover for the American invaders as German machine guns from fortified gun emplacements swept the beaches.

The U.S. Rangers, who had trained earlier on the cliffs of Dorset, scaled the sheer cliffs of Pointe Du Hoc while being shot at by German soldiers. Their mission was to destroy artillery pieces targeted on the landing zones. Their commander was Lt. Col. James Rudder. Unknown to Rudder’s Rangers, most of the artillery had already been moved by the Germans. They held their position for two days in the face of fierce counterattacks by the Germans' 916th Grenadiers. At the Ranger memorial at Pointe du Hoc, one can still see massive craters created by the Allied naval bombardment.

The Canadians stormed ashore on Juno Beach. James Doohan, who later played Scotty on Star Trek, was among the Canadian soldiers that day. Sword and Gold beaches were reserved for the British forces. A small contingent of French commandos joined the British on Sword and helped capture Ouistreham, destroying the casino there. One French officer who had previously lost at the tables was not sorry to see the casino in ruins that day.

With the D-Day landing, the Allies, in spite of the vast size of their armada and the relative openness of their societies, achieved a remarkable strategic surprise over the Germans. On June 6, Rommel was in Germany celebrating his wife's 50th birthday. Hitler was persisting in the mistaken belief that the Normandy invasion was a feint and that the real blow would be struck at Pas de Calais...
Keep reading.

Sunday, June 5, 2016

Bernie Sanders Campaign Divided Over Next Step

Democratic pollster Doug Schoen had a great piece at the Wall Street Journal the other day, "Clinton Might Not Be the Nominee."

The scenario he lays out rests on Bernie winning California on Tuesday, which would give the Vermont socialist tremendous momentum heading into the Democrats' July convention in Philadelphia.

But Tuesday's Democrat primary's too close to call, and personally I'd be surprised if Bernie wins (although that would be great).

But we'll see. We'll see.

Meanwhile, here's WSJ, "Bernie Sanders Campaign Is Split Over Whether to Fight on Past Tuesday":
A split is emerging inside the Bernie Sanders campaign over whether the senator should stand down after Tuesday’s election contests and unite behind Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, or take the fight all the way to the July party convention and try to pry the nomination from her.

One camp might be dubbed the Sandersistas, the loyalists who helped guide Mr. Sanders’s political ascent in Vermont and the U.S. Congress and are loath to give up a fight that has far surpassed expectations. Another has ties not only to Mr. Sanders but to the broader interests of a Democratic Party pining to beat back the challenge from Republican Donald Trump and make gains in congressional elections.

Mr. Sanders in recent weeks has made clear he aims to take his candidacy past the elections on Tuesday, when California, New Jersey and four other states vote. But the debate within the campaign indicates that Mr. Sanders’s next move isn’t settled.

For now, Democratic officials, fund-raisers and operatives are getting impatient, calling on Mr. Sanders to quit the race and begin the work of unifying the party for the showdown with the Republican presumptive nominee.

Orin Kramer, a New York hedge-fund manager who has raised campaign funds for both President Barack Obama and Mrs. Clinton, said with respect to Mr. Sanders’s future plans: “I would hope people would understand what a Trump presidency would mean and act accordingly—and ‘accordingly’ means quickly.”

A strong showing in New Jersey on Tuesday, before California results even come in, could help Mrs. Clinton reach the 2,383 delegates needed to clinch the nomination. Her total includes hundreds of superdelegates—party leaders and elected officials who can back either candidate. Mr. Sanders is hoping that defeating Mrs. Clinton in the most populous state later Tuesday might give superdelegates reason to drop her and get behind his candidacy. Those superdelegates have given no indication they will shift allegiances.

Even so, Mr. Sanders isn’t backing off. In an interview that aired Sunday on CNN, he stepped up an attack on Mrs. Clinton involving the Clinton Foundation. Echoing a critique made by Republicans, Mr. Sanders said he has “a problem” with the foundation accepting money from foreign sources during her service as secretary of state.

In a news conference Saturday in California, Mr. Sanders indicated he would battle for superdelegates all the way to the convention.

“The Democratic National Convention will be a contested convention,” he said...
More at the link.

And here's that CNN interview, with Jake Tapper, "Sanders sees 'conflict' in Clinton Foundation..."

Kim R. Holmes: Leftists Now Doing 'Mopping Up' Operations in Fundamental Transformation of America

I've been aggressively recommending Holmes's book, The Closing of the Liberal Mind: How Groupthink and Intolerance Define the Left.

It turns out he's done an interview with Ginni Thomas of the Daily Caller, via Mark Tapscott, at Instapundit, "IS THE LEFT CLOSING IN FOR THE KILL ON AMERICA?"
If that strikes you as an unbalanced question, consider that the guy posing it is Kim Holmes, a former Assistant Secretary of State and a long-time foreign policy expert at the Heritage Foundation. Holmes new book – The Closing of the Liberal Mind: How Groupthink and Intolerance Define the Left – lays out all of the disturbing facts.

Holmes sat down with Ginni Thomas of the Daily Caller (yes, and the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas) to explain why he believes the Left’s various contemporary outrages constitute “a mopping-up operation and they’re going in for the kill.” Rather than merely dismissing this as another despairing old conservative, you would do well to read and hear Holmes make his case.

Out June 28th: Gary J. Byrne, Crisis of Character

Folks were tweeting out Drudge Report's shout-out to the book yesterday.

See, Gary J. Byrne, Crisis of Character: A White House Secret Service Officer Discloses His Firsthand Experience with Hillary, Bill, and How They Operate.

John C. McManus, The Dead and Those About to Die

I woke up at 6:30 and my newspaper wasn't here yet, so I laid in be and read John C. McManus's gripping account of the D-Day invasion, The Dead and Those About to Die: D-Day: The Big Red One at Omaha Beach.

He's also the author of The Americans at Normandy: The Summer of 1944 — The American War from the Normandy Beaches to Falaise, and The Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II.

Tomorrow's the 72nd anniversary of the Normandy assault. The old-timers are quitting the scene. I recently looked up the remaining soldiers from the "Easy" Company from Band of Brothers, and just about all of them have passed away, including Major Richard Winters, who died in 2011.

John McManus photo 11416146_10207257961630330_1719533279755933975_n_zpskox6vwkn.jpg


I'm Endorsing Hillary Because I Don't Want to Be Killed

Lol.

It's the Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams, via Instapundit, "My Endorsement for President of the United States."

Click through at the link. He's hilarious.

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Cartoons."

Branco Cartoon photo Ven-Bern-600-LA_zpsiarefouo.jpg

Also, at Theo Spark's, "Cartoon Round Up..."

Cartoon Credit: Branco's Cartoons.

Saturday, June 4, 2016

Radicalism and Identity Politics at Oberlin

It's not just Oberlin.

American academe is cancerous.

But Oberin's been in the news a lot this past few weeks, and it gives us a glimpse into our deeply troubled future.

From Robert Stacy McCain, at the Other McCain, "Oberlin College Is Decadent and Depraved":


It is impossible to exaggerate just how awful “elite” education in America has become, and difficult to explain why it is so bad. William F. Buckley Jr.first described the degenerate tendencies of modern elite education in his 1951 classic God and Man at Yale.

As I have summarized the book’s core insight, “Buckley saw that Yale, originally founded as a Christian school, had quietly abandoned Christianity and adopted a new religion, liberalism.” The outlines of this problem were clearly apparent to Buckley at Yale while Harry Truman was still president, yet academia did nothing to halt the decay of moral and intellectual standards, so that when university campuses erupted in riots in the 1960s — young radicals terrorizing their liberal elders — conservatives could say, “We told you so.” Liberals can never admit they’re wrong, so the lessons that should have been learned from the ’60s were ignored, and meanwhile the radicals were burrowing into the academic bureaucracy. Beginning in the 1990s, a series of purges swept through higher education. The humanities and social sciences were eviscerated and corrupted by the proponents of “critical theory.” If any student wished to learn anything about history without a Marxist filter, he had to do so by reading old books, as all the recent “scholarship” was devoted to reinterpreting the past through a prism of race/class/gender.

Meanwhile, in the name of “multiculturalism,” the curriculum was restructured, admissions criteria were altered and hiring policies were systematically biased in order to create a statistically acceptable representation of “diversity” on elite campuses. We should note, by the way, that the pursuit of “diversity” in admissions was never difficult at community colleges or second-tier state universities. It was only at the top-tier state schools (e.g., the University of Michigan and the University of California-Berkeley) and at highly selective private schools (e.g., the Ivy League) that admissions quotas became controversial. Many in academia accepted and promoted the idea that all ethnic groups had a “right” to be proportionately represented in the student body (and on the faculty) of universities, so that “underrepresentation” was considered proof of discrimination and social injustice. Equality of opportunity was not enough, equality of outcomes was demanded, and this egalitarian mission required the destruction of moral and intellectual standards in academia. Higher education has become a pervasively dishonest enterprise, a corrupt racket wherein parents, students and taxpayers are systematically swindled in order to provide lucrative employment for administrators and faculty whose income is dependent upon the illusion of “prestige” surrounding such schools as Oberlin College.

How bad is it at Oberlin? Nathan Heller of the New Yorker risked a visit to the lunatic campus and here are a few excerpts from his article...
Still more.