Regular folks are packing heat --- and this is in far-left Los Angeles, dang.
At Fox News, "Would-be robbers shot by armed shoppers in Los Angeles: Victim in Los Angeles was standing in a parking lot when the would-be robbers rolled in."
Commentary and analysis on American politics, culture, and national identity, U.S. foreign policy and international relations, and the state of education - from a neoconservative perspective! - Keeping an eye on the communist-left so you don't have to!
Regular folks are packing heat --- and this is in far-left Los Angeles, dang.
At Fox News, "Would-be robbers shot by armed shoppers in Los Angeles: Victim in Los Angeles was standing in a parking lot when the would-be robbers rolled in."
And cases in Los Angeles shot up 240% month over month.
I was up in Burbank shopping on Sunday, and I forgot L.A. County reimposed the mask mandate. I stepped into the Barnes and Noble up there and the woman at the counter wouldn't help me without a mask. I'm darn lucky I had a couple in the car, but damn I had to huff it back out the the parking garage to retrieve one. The O.C., so far, ain't going with a new mandate, and thank the Lord for that, sheesh.
At the Los Angeles Times, "California coronavirus hospitalizations hit highest point in months as Delta spreads":
A spate of new coronavirus infections is striking California’s healthcare system, pushing COVID-19 hospitalizations to levels not seen since early spring — lending new urgency to efforts to tamp down transmission as a growing number of counties urge residents to wear masks indoors. Statewide, the number of coronavirus patients in the hospital more than doubled in the last month, and the numbers have accelerated further in the last two weeks. Even with the recent increase, though, the state’s healthcare system is nowhere near as swamped as it was during the fall-and-winter surge. And many health experts are confident that California will never see numbers on that scale again, given how many residents are vaccinated. But with the continued spread of the highly infectious Delta variant, which officials fear could mushroom in communities with lower inoculation rates, the next few weeks are key in determining how potent the pandemic’s latest punch may be. The recent increases confirm that nearly everyone falling seriously ill from COVID-19 at this point is unvaccinated. “This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. And so, if you care about getting back to normalcy once and for all, please get vaccinated,” Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters Tuesday. Still, L.A. County Health Services Director Dr. Christina Ghaly said Tuesday that “the individual consequences of a choice not to get vaccinated can be dire for that person and his or her family and friends.” Ghaly said seeing a continued stream of COVID-19 patients, the vast majority of whom are unvaccinated, triggers a range of emotions in healthcare workers who have long been on the front lines of the pandemic: frustration, sadness and “some level of disbelief that, after all of the pain and suffering that we’ve all seen … there’s still people who either don’t believe it or don’t believe that it can affect them.” The highest-risk Californians — notably the elderly — have been vaccinated at high rates. But the numbers drop off for younger segments of the population, and children under the age of 12 still aren’t eligible to be vaccinated. “I think sometimes the mentality is that people think, ‘Well, I’m not going to get that sick. I’m going to be OK. I’m not going to die from COVID; I’m young; I’m healthy,’ ” Ghaly said. “And I can tell you, hopefully that’s the case, but that’s not necessarily the case.” From June 22 to July 6, the daily number of COVID-19 patients hospitalized in California increased from 978 to 1,228, a nearly 26% bump, state data show...
Still more.
A new prime minister was sworn in today.
At the New York Times, "A New Day in Haiti? Many Haitians Have Their Doubts":
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Gerard Lovius falls asleep at night on the floor of an empty classroom to the sound of gunfire. He and his shellshocked neighbors started living there a month ago, after gang members invaded his home, sending his terrified wife and three children running to the streets and leaving him with nothing: no money, no possessions, not even a cellphone. On Tuesday morning, Mr. Lovius was back at his job as a street cleaner, tidying up before the day’s stately memorial for Haiti’s assassinated leader in the Champs de Mars, the capital’s main square. President Jovenel Moïse would soon be laid to rest, and the sparring members of his government had just reached a truce, vowing to lead the country anew. But there was little peace in Mr. Lovius’s life. “We have hope only in God,” he said, hauling a wheelbarrow of trash up the street. Haiti’s leaders have called the political truce a new chapter, a historic turning of the page that, in the words of the interim prime minister, shows “that we can actually work together, even if we are different, even if we have different world outlooks.” But for many in country, it does not seem like a change. The list of cabinet ministers published in the government’s official gazette featured several familiar names from Mr. Moïse’s governing party, including the new prime minister and the new foreign minister, both of whom had been angling to take over since the president was killed. “This is a provocation,” Pierre Espérance, the executive director of the Haitian National Human Rights Defense Network, said of the party’s control of the new government. “It means the crisis will continue, insecurity will continue, and the gangs will continue.” He argued that Mr. Moïse was a victim of his own rule, a leader who “died because of the insecurity his party created.” Two years ago, violence and furious demonstrators condemning corruption and demanding the president’s ouster locked the country in place — keeping the sick from hospitals, children from school, workers from rare jobs and people in the dark in areas where electricity stopped flowing. Gangs have become more brazen since then, controlling large parts of the capital, attacking at will, kidnapping children on their way to school and pastors in the middle of delivering their services. “The country is going to remain in the same condition, unless they get their heads together,” Rosemane Jean Louis, said shortly before the memorial began and the new government took office. “We have no security. We are hungry. We are in misery.” Ms. Jean Louis recounted how she had casually said goodbye to her son, 24, one day last year, not knowing it would be the last time. With a smile, he had grabbed a piece of candy from the pile of treats she sold outside their home, then continued on his way to meet a friend. He made it a block, she said, before being shot dead by gang members in front of a church. “I didn’t even find his body,” said Ms. Jean Louis, 61, tears falling. “They took it with them.” Crime, kidnappings, gangs, security: the words streamed from Haitians across the capital as dignitaries paid their respects to the assassinated president on Tuesday and his successors took the helm. Even as rival politicians made claims and counterclaims to replace Mr. Moïse, residents were still in the streets protesting — often because they felt certain that their new leaders, whoever might prevail, would not care about them.
The place is in bad shape.
Keep reading.
She makes a good point on Cuba, and how folks are "finally waking up" to Marxism.
She's up first.
Watch (she speaks from the beginning):
This isn't the first time, apparently.
And dang! I'm gobsmacked, sheesh.
She's only 19! They say she's the most successful model in the world. Pfft. Of course, she's Cindy Crawford's daughter. How's that for white privilege!
See, "Girl Interrupted: The Education of Kaia Gerber":
“For a long time, I thought my face and my body had more to say than I did, because that’s what people thought of me,” Kaia Gerber says. At only 19, Gerber is one of the most successful models in the world and so, to many, a highly controlled, highly burnished product sold to millions on Instagram and beyond. On the gorgeous early-spring day when she and I meet at the reservoir at the foot of the Hollywood Hills, which we are set to loop around, accompanied by Gerber’s enthusiastic rescue mix Milo, her manner is preternaturally poised, that of a remarkably tall and beautiful child who has learned early in life how to talk to adults. Who is Kaia Gerber, really? With a smile or a glance, a well-placed word or a keen observation, she will signal that she is thinking hard about that very question—and beginning to come up with some answers. “I always wanted to be good and easy, not to make trouble,” she says, “but when you do that, you sometimes end up losing your voice.”
Gerber is aware that she has been lucky during a merciless year. She’s had her parents’ house in Malibu, for one thing. “We have a sort of compound with a garden, and a big lawn, and the beach that we could go to every day,” she says. “I’m not blind to the fact that we’ve been incredibly blessed.” Gerber and her brother, Presley, who is two years her senior, have grown up in the seemingly picture-perfect circumstances of Southern California royalty. Their parents are the entrepreneur Rande Gerber, who counts among his endeavors the Casamigos tequila brand, founded with good family friend George Clooney, and Cindy Crawford, one of the most iconic American supermodels of the past half century, whose likeness to her daughter has been a popular subject for clickbait listicles ever since Gerber began modeling. Still, emotionally speaking, Gerber’s last months have been ones of change and transition. “I was always so concentrated on work, and suddenly that was gone. And so for the first time, I could no longer focus on everything outside,” she says. “I was forced to go internal. Work was always a really easy excuse not to do that.” She was only 13 when she began modeling—shooting for Italian Vogue with Steven Meisel and posing alongside Presley for a CR Fashion Book portfolio by Bruce Weber. As her career kicked into high gear a couple of years later, Gerber transitioned to an online course load at Malibu High, the local public school she and her brother both attended, walking distance from Zuma Beach, where kids would tote surfboards to class, as if in a real-life version wof a Beach Boys song. She became an instant runway sensation. “When Kaia started to model, she jumped right into it, loved it, and immediately wanted to do everything,” Crawford tells me by phone from Malibu. “I was very protective at first, and I traveled with her to fashion month. But Kaia has her head on straight.”...
No doubt it's pretty easy to "keep your head on straight when your parents are SoCal "royalty." Damn. *Eye-roll.*
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BONUS: Tim Bouverie, Appeasement: Chamberlain, Hitler, Churchill, and the Road to War.
From Buck Sexton:
Much of the recent attention on Critical Race Theory (“CRT”) has been a result of the increase in Zoom teaching during the COVID-19 school shutdowns. Parents became aware of the kind of identity-politics indoctrination forced on their kids. Students who hadn’t even reached high-school age were being told that they were part of systematic oppression based on their skin color. It has been known for a long time that academia is riddled with CRT nonsense, and college campuses have been demanding that students worship at the altar of “Diversity and Inclusion.” But corporate America has also been infiltrated with similar politically correct brainwashing. The Marxist rot of CRT has spread into the executive suites of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world. Case in point: Raytheon Technologies. It’s the second-largest defense contractor in the world, with around 181,000 employees and revenue over $56 billion in 2020. It’s not the kind of place one might expect to be nagging employees about “checking their privilege” or “confronting historical oppression.” This is a place that makes missiles that blow people up, among other things. Yet thanks to an industrious think-tank scholar at the Manhattan Institute named Christopher Rufo, we know that when Raytheon isn’t coming up with new ways to drop bombs on the Third World, its employees sit through some of the most absurd and offensive racial sensitivity training imaginable. Rufo got his hands on the actual training materials from Raytheon’s version of CRT training. He writes in City Journal about some of the most insane PC training modules, such as when:“Raytheon asks white employees to deconstruct their identities and identify [their] privilege. The company argues that white, straight, Christian, able-bodied, English-speaking men are at the top of the intersectional hierarchy – and must work on recognizing [their] privilege” and step aside in favor of other identity groups. According to outside diversity consultant Michelle Saahene, whites “have the privilege of individuality,” while minorities “don’t have that privilege.”Divisive Diversity Deconstruct their identities? Intersectional hierarchy? These are Leftist absurdities, but they have to be taken seriously in so far as they’re part of a vast and growing “diversity and inclusion” complex. There are frauds who travel around from company to company to preach this nonsense, and they’re shockingly well-compensated and culturally influential. In fact, there’s real power now behind CRT. As anyone who has been called into human resources at a Fortune 500 company for a “sensitivity” issue will be able to tell you, the HR policies of major companies now reflect the philosophy of CRT. Employees are expected to abide by the ever-changing dictates of these Diversity Czars or face the consequences. These expectations even extend to the way colleagues are allowed to speak to each other...
The activists arrived outside the Wi Spa in Westlake Saturday morning, some prepared for the worst. Several wore bike helmets and vests with extra padding. N.W.A.’s “F— Tha Police” and Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” filled the air. They were met by far-right extremists who over the last few weeks had turned a debate over transgender access at a Korean spa into a rallying cry. It didn’t take long for the dueling protests to dissolve into disarray. By the end, the LAPD had used projectiles and batons and arrested 40 people — mostly for failure to disperse. Several said they sustained injuries at the hands of police. “I knew it was going to be violent. I didn’t know it was going to end up like that,” said Jessica Rogers, a 31-year-old who had come to document the event and support transgender rights and was among those arrested. In the aftermath, the police are facing questions about whether officers used excessive force. But the incident has also exposed the power of a viral video given widespread attention in the right-wing press and social media. The spa has become the latest hot spot for clashes between far-right groups and the left in L.A., kicked off by the video taken by an irate customer in late June. The video showed a woman arguing with Wi Spa employees after she said she had seen a customer with male genitalia in an area that is reserved for women. The Wilshire Boulevard facility has some gender-separated areas with changing rooms and Jacuzzis. The footage was quickly amplified by an international network of right-wing activists, pundits and media outlets, including Breitbart, the Gateway Pundit, RealClearPolitics and TheBlaze, a publication founded by Glenn Beck. Message boards where anti-trans activists gather, including Mumsnet, saw thousands of comments. The spa told The Times Monday that they are required to follow California law that prohibits businesses from discriminating against customers based on race, gender, sexual identity or expression. “Like many other metropolitan areas, Los Angeles contains a transgender population, some of whom enjoy visiting a spa,” it said in a statement, adding that the spa “strives to meet the needs and safety of all of its customers.” Brian Levin, director of the nonpartisan Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at Cal State San Bernardino, said the protests are indicative of a “democratization of hate” that has allowed far-right groups with a variety of ideologies to come together around flash-point events after they are amplified online and in conservative media...
Still more.
And notice how leftist media outlets like L.A.T. always label mainstream conservatives as "far-Right." *Eye-roll.*
Man, and she's been vaccinated too.
BREAKING NEWS: Vaccinated Pelosi aide tests positive for COVID after contact with Texas Demshttps://t.co/YGocobVEf1
— Fox News (@FoxNews) July 20, 2021
Absolutely spectacular:
PREVIOUSLY: "Richard Branson and Crew Go Weightless on Historic Virgin Galactic Space Flight (VIDEO)."
As states across the country impose new rules on the teaching of history and race in schools, a messy, drawn-out battle over a Mexican American studies program in Tucson could offer a preview of what’s to come.https://t.co/5QBI9CjGit
— Coalition for Academic Justice at UArizona (@CAJUArizona) July 17, 2021
Carol Roth, The War on Small Business: How the Government Used the Pandemic to Crush the Backbone of America.
Follow "Big Hair" Carol on Twitter.
Carol Roth asked yesterday what was the best Stevie Wonder song of all time?
I'm not the biggest fan, but I'd say his best song is "Isn't She Lovely?," or at least that's the one I most enjoy hearing.
Man, the dude can jam on the harmonica!
Watch and listen:
"Stand by Me. "
Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit "AND THE ROLE OF EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN WILL BE PLAYED BY…: Liberals’ Knives Come Out for Nate Silver After His Model Points to a Trump Victory..."
R.S. McCain, "'Jews Are Dead, Hamas Is Happy, and Podhoretz Has Got His Rage On ..."
Ace, "Georgia Shooter's Father Berated Him as a "Sissy" and Bought Him an AR-15 to 'Toughen Him Up'..."Free Beacon..., "Kamala Harris, the ‘Candidate of Change,’ Copies Sections of Her Policy Page Directly From Biden's Platform..."