Saturday, August 25, 2018
What Happened to the Liberal Arts?
Heather Mac Donald's new book is out on September 4th, at Amazon, The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture.
And see the roundup on Ms. Mac Donald at AoSHQ, "Late Summer Saturday Open Thread August 25."
And at Prager University:
And see the roundup on Ms. Mac Donald at AoSHQ, "Late Summer Saturday Open Thread August 25."
And at Prager University:
Rep. Duncan Hunter Blames Wife (VIDEO)
That's pretty scuzzy. (*Shrugs.*)
At the San Diego Union Tribune, "Rep. Duncan Hunter points to his wife and 'whatever she did' in campaign finance scandal":
Previously: "California's 50th District Now Competitive After Duncan Hunter Indictment?"
At the San Diego Union Tribune, "Rep. Duncan Hunter points to his wife and 'whatever she did' in campaign finance scandal":
Duncan Hunter and his wife Margaret entered — and exited — the federal courthouse separately on Thursday.More.
Rep. Hunter, the Republican congressman from Alpine, rushed to his black suburban as crowds chanted, “Shame. Shame. Shame.”
Margaret left through a different exit. She had her head down. Onlookers said the 43-year-old mother of three looked as if she was about to cry.
A 60-count indictment, filed in federal court in San Diego, accuses the couple of illegally using a quarter of a million dollars in campaign money to fund their lavish lifestyles and filing false campaign finance records with the Federal Election Commission to cover it up.
They pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, falsification of records and aiding and abetting in the prohibited use of campaign contributions.
Congressman Hunter, 41, is well-known in California and on Capitol Hill. His grandfather, Robert Hunter, was a veteran who hosted a popular TV broadcast in Washington D.C. with Republican members of Congress who wanted to give weekly reports on their districts. After moving back to California in the mid-1950s, he developed the Jurupa Hills Country Club and Golf Course, and many surrounding communities in western Riverside, according to news reports.
Hunter’s father, Duncan L. Hunter, held the same congressional seat as his son for 28 years and had a short-lived bid for president in 2008.
By the time the youngest Hunter entered the race for what was then the 52nd District, he had the name recognition of three generations and ties to a massive support network from his father’s previous campaigns...
Previously: "California's 50th District Now Competitive After Duncan Hunter Indictment?"
Friday, August 24, 2018
Ashley Greene in Black Tank Top
At Taxi Driver, "Ashley Greene Braless in See Through Black Tank Top."
Hat Tip: Popoholic: "Daily Addictions – Weekend Edition."
BONUS: at Hollywood Tuna, "Jessica Simpson is Still the Queen."
Hat Tip: Popoholic: "Daily Addictions – Weekend Edition."
BONUS: at Hollywood Tuna, "Jessica Simpson is Still the Queen."
Can Democrats Reclaim Patriotism?
No. Next question?
But see the New York Times, FWIW, "Reclaiming Patriotism for the Left":
As long as Democrats (who are not "centrist") champion and glamorize their most ardent radical factions and agendas, rejection of civil nationalism will remain at the center of their program.
It's a program of self-hatred.
But keep reading.
But see the New York Times, FWIW, "Reclaiming Patriotism for the Left":
When the American left abandons any vision of social patriotism because of the racist ugliness it has come to symbolize, it concedes the American story to the voices of exclusion and avarice https://t.co/5woMt6u0t4
— NYT Opinion (@nytopinion) August 21, 2018
"I sometimes get pushback on my flag display and I tire of pointing out that the rightwing does not own the flag - it belongs to all of us - and we should not surrender it to them," comments JMartin on the Op-Ed, "Reclaiming Patriotism for the Left." https://t.co/FYv2VDUEd6 pic.twitter.com/nFUVJKuxWW
— NYT Opinion (@nytopinion) August 22, 2018
The resurgence of blood-and-soil nationalism around the world seems to prove that appeals to nationhood are too racist, too tribal and too dangerous to be of value. Yet surrendering patriotism to champions of the ethno-state abdicates the fight for the soul and meaning of the American project.This "project" will fail.
The American left, from the center of the Democratic Party to its insurgent challengers, needs a dose of national vision. One of the core lessons of Trumpian politics is that Americans are starved for a meaningful politics of what it means to be American. Getting rid of the vainglorious Trump administration is only a partial solution. The causes of his rise remain.
Call what is needed a reinvigoration of “civic nationalism” or “civic republicanism” (a reference to the ancient political ideal, not the party). This is a revival of the “bond of common faith,” the “bond of common goal,” as Robert Kennedy once put it, which needs constructive outlets if what is left of American democracy is to survive.
In recent decades, progressive forces in the United States have split between two positions, both of which surrender a robust and hopeful sense of national citizenship. On one track can be found a cosmopolitan economic elite that embrace a multicultural world order shaped largely by the politics of corporate globalization. On the other track are radical critics of the racism and imperialism of the American state who often support local community and transnational solidarity but maintain a deep cynicism, even despair, about the American project. Both groups have abdicated the national story to their shared political enemies. What remains is a fervent hybrid of nationalism and anti-statism, an echo of the rebel yell.
The American past, according to the historian Gary Gerstle in his book “American Crucible,” can be understood as a struggle between “two powerful and contradictory ideals” — a civic and racialized national vision. Yet the dissolution of a progressive civic dimension has left us with an unchallenged ethno-racial nationalism.
Globalization has further complicated the problem. In a dizzying world of oppressive economic and political inequality, global trade, immigration and technological disruption, voters seek grounding not in technocratic detail but in place, in time, in tradition and, above all, in the shared fate, history and meaning of the nation...
As long as Democrats (who are not "centrist") champion and glamorize their most ardent radical factions and agendas, rejection of civil nationalism will remain at the center of their program.
It's a program of self-hatred.
But keep reading.
California's 50th District Now Competitive After Duncan Hunter Indictment?
I don't know?
You'd have to have a pretty mainstream Democrat running, and Democrats aren't mainstream, so there's that.
But see LAT, "Rep. Duncan Hunter's indictment opens door for Democrats in Trump country":
You'd have to have a pretty mainstream Democrat running, and Democrats aren't mainstream, so there's that.
But see LAT, "Rep. Duncan Hunter's indictment opens door for Democrats in Trump country":
Rep. Duncan Hunter's indictment opens door for Democrats in Trump country https://t.co/wZjS6l3XZB pic.twitter.com/z1zhaIg90Z— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) August 23, 2018
Republican Dale Weidenthaler shook his head in disgust Wednesday when the conversation turned to Rep. Duncan Hunter.More.
The retired police officer has long distrusted the GOP congressman but voted for him anyway. Now that Hunter has been indicted on campaign corruption charges, Weidenthaler, 61, expects to skip the House race rather than vote for his Democratic rival.
“Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and there’s just too much smoke,” said Weidenthaler, who was sipping a Red Bull on a morning visit to a Temecula grocery store.
The Alpine congressman’s indictment Tuesday has suddenly turned this safe Republican House seat into a competitive race in a midterm election that was already looking grim for the GOP.
It threatens to depress Republican turnout in this largely rural district in San Diego and Riverside counties. The party now has to spend resources on a contest that GOP leaders would have normally ignored.
With Democrats across the nation already portraying President Trump’s Republican Party as a swamp of corruption, the charges against Hunter came the same day that Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight felonies and his onetime campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted of bank fraud and other crimes...
Thursday, August 23, 2018
Adam Housley, Los Angeles-Based Reporter for Fox News, Quits Network Amid Objections to 'Talking-Head Panels' Focusing More and More on President Trump
I still love Fox News. I just don't watch it that much any more, for these very reasons.
At Politico, "Second Fox News reporter leaves amid objections to network: In the Trump era, hard reporting is being crowded out by opinionated panels, current and former staffers say":
At Politico, "Second Fox News reporter leaves amid objections to network: In the Trump era, hard reporting is being crowded out by opinionated panels, current and former staffers say":
"objections to the Trump-era Fox News are widely shared within the network’s reporting corps, according to current and former employees of the network.” https://t.co/WHFgXzFD0i— Jon Passantino (@passantino) August 24, 2018
Another on-air reporter is leaving Fox News over frustrations with the direction and tone of the network, the second in the last three weeks to defect for those reasons.Still more.
Adam Housley, a Los Angeles-based reporter who joined Fox in 2001, felt there was diminished opportunity at the network for reporters and disapproved of tenor of its on-air discussion, according to two former Fox News employees with knowledge of his situation.
Housley believed that as the network’s focus on Trump has grown — and the number of talking-head panels during news shows proliferated — it had become difficult to get hard reporting on air, according to one of those former employees.
“He’s not doing the type of journalism he wants to be doing,” the former employee said. “And he is unhappy with the tone of the conversation of the channel.”
Housley’s objections to the Trump-era Fox News are widely shared within the network’s reporting corps, according to current and former employees of the network...
Kate Upton's Struggles (VIDEO)
Yes, we should all struggle like Kate Upton, lol.
At Sports Illustrated Swimsuit:
At Sports Illustrated Swimsuit:
American Peter Beinart Detained for Questioning at Ben-Gurion Airport Upon Entering Israel
This was a news story a few weeks back.
But Carolyn Glick's putting the kibosh on this self-serving anti-Israel promotion.
See, "Peter Beinart’s latest publicity stunt":
BONUS: Watch, at i24NEWS, "Peter Beinart on His Detainment at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport: Left-wing Jewish American writer Peter Beinart discusses his interrogation by the Shin Bet security services, the latest in a series of such incidents involving leftist personalities, with i24NEWS' Tracy Alexander."
But Carolyn Glick's putting the kibosh on this self-serving anti-Israel promotion.
See, "Peter Beinart’s latest publicity stunt":
There has been a lot of hand-wringing in official Israel over the brief questioning of anti-Israel author Peter Beinart at Ben-Gurion Airport this week. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement on the episode calling it “an administrative mistake.”Keep reading.
Netanyahu added, “Israel is an open society which welcomes all – critics and supporters alike.”
Deputy Minister for Public Diplomacy Michael Oren said Beinart’s questioning is grounds “for an immediate examination of all policy towards the entry of political activists.”
Speaking to Israel National News, Oren said, “Detaining American Jewish reporter Peter Beinart is an example of how acting unwisely causes both strategic and PR damage.
“Beinart is a top-rate American media person. Most of his opinions about Israel disgust me, but he does not support BDS, and in fact defines himself as a Zionist.”
Oren’s position is problematic first and foremost because it is factually wrong.
Beinart is a major supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. Indeed, he is a central figure in the movement. This mere fact renders Beinart’s protestations of Zionism disingenuous, to put it mildly.
In 2012, Beinart published an oped in The New York Times calling for the boycott, divestment and sanction of all Israeli goods produced by Israeli Jews in Judea and Samaria.
His crass insensitivity towards Israeli Jews in Judea and Samaria was striking: “If moderate settlers resent being lumped in with their more ideologically driven counterparts deep in occupied territory, they should agitate for a two-state solution that would make possible their incorporation into democratic Israel. Or they should move.”
Beinart described the boycott as part of an overall political warfare strategy that American Jews should undertake against Israel and its American supporters.
“We should lobby to exclude settler-produced goods from America’s free-trade deal with Israel,” Beinart said. “We should push to end Internal Revenue Service policies that allow Americans to make tax-deductible gifts to settler charities. Every time an American newspaper calls Israel a democracy, we should urge it to include the caveat: only within the green line.”
Even Beinart’s most fervent admirers viewed his call for BDS against Jewish products in Judea and Samaria as a transparent means to facilitate BDS against Israel as a whole.
Jane Eisner, editor of the far-left The Forward newspaper wrote, the “optics of Beinart’s proposal” are “dangerous,” because they provide “implicit support for the broader BDS movement.”
But as has since become clear, that was his goal.
Beinart devotes great energy to mainstreaming anti-Israel activists who reject Israel’s right to exist...
BONUS: Watch, at i24NEWS, "Peter Beinart on His Detainment at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport: Left-wing Jewish American writer Peter Beinart discusses his interrogation by the Shin Bet security services, the latest in a series of such incidents involving leftist personalities, with i24NEWS' Tracy Alexander."
Some Random Woman on Reddit
At Phun, "Reddit User Lucie Fair":
BONUS: "JEWEL’S GOT THEM TITTIES ON OF THE DAY."
Not much to say here...she's an amateur that posts hot pictures of herself on Reddit. Here are some of her shots!Hat Tip: Drunken Stepfather, "MORNING HANGOVER DUMP OF THE DAY."
BONUS: "JEWEL’S GOT THEM TITTIES ON OF THE DAY."
Trump's Supporters Don't Care About Cohen and Manafort Convictions
From Salena Zito, at the New York Post:
Right now the value of Trump to the Trump voter is he is all that stands between them and handing the keys to Washington back over to the people inside Washington. That’s it. He’s their only option. You’ve got to pick the insiders or him. https://t.co/uTuDi7HXcp
— SalenaZito (@SalenaZito) August 23, 2018
Laura Ingraham, Billionaire at the Barricades
*BUMPED.*
At Amazon, Laura Ingraham, Billionaire at the Barricades: The Populist Revolution from Reagan to Trump.
At Amazon, Laura Ingraham, Billionaire at the Barricades: The Populist Revolution from Reagan to Trump.
Herman Melville, Moby Dick
There are dozens and dozens of different published editions of Herman Melville's Moby Dick.
Someone's selling this Signet version I have for $45.69.
Don't buy that one, unless you're a hard-up collector, lol.
Buy this one, the recent Signet version, for just under $6.00.
And thanks for your support! As you know, I've been having a blast with book blogging (and book reading, of course) over this last year or two. It's what keeps me sane, heh.
Shop at this Amazon link for more. And thanks again!
Someone's selling this Signet version I have for $45.69.
Don't buy that one, unless you're a hard-up collector, lol.
Buy this one, the recent Signet version, for just under $6.00.
And thanks for your support! As you know, I've been having a blast with book blogging (and book reading, of course) over this last year or two. It's what keeps me sane, heh.
Shop at this Amazon link for more. And thanks again!
Megan Parry's Fabulous Thursday Forecast
I was down at the beach yesterday and it was all-star weather. Just perfect. People travel around the world to such beautiful locations. Laguna Beach? It's paradise.
In any case, here's the lovely Ms. Megan, for ABC 10 News San Diego:
In any case, here's the lovely Ms. Megan, for ABC 10 News San Diego:
Madison Beer Selfies
At Popoholic, "Madison Beer Selfies Her Ginormous Braless Cleavage Like Never Before!"
And at Taxi Driver, "Madison Beer Cleavage & Cameltoe."
And at Taxi Driver, "Madison Beer Cleavage & Cameltoe."
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