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Friday, February 14, 2020
Drawn-Out Fight Is More Likely Than Ever for Dems
It looks like it.
From Ronald Brownstein, at the Atlantic:
From Ronald Brownstein, at the Atlantic:
"Bernie’s got good-news bad news. He’s doing well, but he’s not doing well enough to win”: Compared with 2016, Sanders’s coalition in New Hampshire was both more narrow and more shallow, writes @RonBrownstein https://t.co/J0Mm4c0NFK— Peter Baker (@peterbakernyt) February 12, 2020
Senator Bernie Sanders’s unexpectedly narrow victory in New Hampshire underscored the splintering of the Democratic presidential field that was evident in last week’s murky Iowa caucus—and left two of his opponents facing grim questions about their future viability.
Just as in Iowa, the results illuminated the inability of any of the contenders to build a coalition broad enough to span the party or establish much separation from rival candidates. The roughly 26 percent share of the total vote that Sanders captured represents much less than half of his winning 60 percent just four years ago. And similar to former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s performance in Iowa, Sanders won the smallest share of voters ever garnered by a Democratic winner of the New Hampshire primary. (The previous low was nearly 29 percent, for Jimmy Carter in 1976.)
The New Hampshire results confirmed Sanders and Buttigieg as the field’s top-tier contenders and elevated Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, who surged from a fifth-place finish in Iowa to a strong third here after a widely praised debate performance on Friday night. But the outcome may end up diminishing two of the field’s previous leaders more than it boosts the candidates who came out on top.
Former Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who were widely considered the race’s principal contenders for most of last year, were staggered by showings even weaker than anticipated. “I think everyone thought two weeks ago that Biden probably had the best chance of building the coalition that could pull everybody together,” Simon Rosenberg, the founder of the Democratic advocacy group NDN, told me. “And right now, assuming that Biden is weakened, it’s not clear that anyone is going to be strong enough” to amass a coalition that can produce a delegate majority for the convention this summer.
Biden’s campaign says it is ready to fight on in Nevada and especially South Carolina, with its large population of African American voters. But the extent of Biden’s collapse in New Hampshire, where he won less than 9 percent of the vote, has many Democratic strategists questioning whether he can forge a path back to relevance in the race. “I don’t see how he carries forward,” the veteran Democratic pollster Stanley B. Greenberg told me. “I think it’s too much of a repudiation.”
Biden’s precipitous decline will immediately shift more focus to former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg among party centrists skeptical of Sanders. Yet the release yesterday of an audio tape capturing Bloomberg defending in stark language the controversial stop-and-frisk policing tactic he employed in New York City underscores the ideological and racial obstacles he may face as the media and other candidates zero in on his record.
All of this stands in stark contrast to the past four Democratic nominating contests, when the race effectively resolved to a two-person battle after Iowa and New Hampshire. This year, the party faces the prospect of sustained uncertainty not only after the first two states, but even after the Nevada and South Carolina competitions still to come in February—and maybe even after Super Tuesday on March 3, when 14 states will vote.
“We’ll head into Super Tuesday without a lot of clarity and with Bloomberg representing an entirely new dynamic in all of this,” the Democratic pollster Geoff Garin told me. “This race is very, very different, where these first four states are setting the table for Super Tuesday but they are not the main event.”
If anything, the New Hampshire results spotlighted the obstacles confronting each of the candidates...
Bloomberg's Memes
He's spending astronomical amounts of money. And the "meme community"? Pfft.
It's Taylor Lorenz, at NYT, "Michael Bloomberg’s Campaign Suddenly Drops Memes Everywhere":
It's Taylor Lorenz, at NYT, "Michael Bloomberg’s Campaign Suddenly Drops Memes Everywhere":
@CNNnewsroom if you’re going to do a whole segment on my story, quote my sources, and use people from my story, maybe at least mention I broke it? 😒🔪 https://t.co/SYB2Ubd2ds
— Taylor Lorenz (@TaylorLorenz) February 13, 2020
Mike Bloomberg has contracted some of the biggest meme-makers on the internet to post sponsored content on Instagram promoting his presidential campaign.Still more.
The Bloomberg campaign is working with Meme 2020, a new company formed by some of the people behind extremely influential accounts.
Mick Purzycki is the lead strategist of the Meme 2020 project. He is also the chief executive of Jerry Media, a media and marketing company that is a powerful force in the influencer economy. The company’s portfolio includes some of the most notable meme accounts on Instagram. Jerry Media was at the center of controversy last year after a debate around proper crediting in meme culture.
In January, Mr. Purzycki tapped a number of large influencers who he had formed relationships with through his association with Jerry Media. (Elliot Tebele, the founder of Jerry Media, has no involvement in the project.)
The campaign, which began this week, has already placed sponsored posts on Instagram accounts including @GrapeJuiceBoys, a meme page with more than 2.7 million followers; Jerry Media’s own most popular account, with more than 13.3 million followers; and @Tank.Sinatra, a member with more than 2.3 million followers.
The accounts all posted Bloomberg campaign ads in the form of fake direct messages from the candidate.
“Mr. Tank:” an ad on @Tank.Sinatra begins, “I’ve been waiting for my meme for so long that I learned how to make memes myself in photoshop. What do you think of this one?” The message is followed by a photo of Bernie Sanders that has become a meme in recent weeks.
George Resch, a director of influencer marketing at Brandfire and founder of @Tank.Sinatra, has served as Meme 2020’s primary liaison with the meme community.
Mr. Resch has posted two ads so far on behalf of the campaign. On Sunday, he posted an ad in which a fake direct message from Mr. Bloomberg asks Mr. Resch to make him look “cool” for the Democratic primary.
Evan Reeves, a creative director for Jerry Media, was brought in as the head of creative to devise an unconventional campaign, and to build a self-aware ironic character around Mr. Bloomberg...
Great Essay on Walking Away from the Democrat Party
It's Karlyn Borysenko, "After Attending a Trump Rally, I Realized Democrats Are Not Ready For 2020":
What an interesting reflection. "I’ve been a Democrat for 20 years. Here’s what I experienced at Trump’s rally in New Hampshire." by @DrKarlynB https://t.co/m3aC4ZsXKp— Mollie (@MZHemingway) February 13, 2020
I think those of us on the left need to take a long look in the mirror and have an honest conversation about what’s going on. If you had told me three years ago that I would ever attend a Donald Trump rally, I would have laughed and assured you that was never going to happen. Heck, if you had told me I would do it three months ago, I probably would have done the same thing. So, how did I find myself among 11,000-plus Trump supporters in Manchester, New Hampshire? Believe it or not, it all started with knitting.
You might not think of the knitting world as a particularly political community, but you’d be wrong. Many knitters are active in social justice communities and love to discuss the revolutionary role knitters have played in our culture. I started noticing this about a year ago, particularly on Instagram. I knit as a way to relax and escape the drama of real life, not to further engage with it. But it was impossible to ignore after roving gangs of online social justice warriors started going after anyone in the knitting community who was not lockstep in their ideology. Knitting stars on Instagram were bullied and mobbed by hundreds of people for seemingly innocuous offenses. One man got mobbed so badly that he had a nervous breakdown and was admitted to the hospital on suicide watch. Many things were not right about the hatred, and witnessing the vitriol coming from those I had aligned myself with politically was a massive wake-up call.
Democrats have an ass-kicking coming to them in November, and I think most of them will be utterly shocked when it happens.
You see, I was one of those Democrats who considered anyone who voted for Trump a racist. I thought they were horrible (yes, even deplorable) and worked very hard to eliminate their voices from my spaces by unfriending or blocking people who spoke about their support of him, however minor their comments. I watched a lot of MSNBC, was convinced that everything he had done was horrible, that he hated anyone who wasn’t a straight white man, and that he had no redeeming qualities.
But when I witnessed the amount of hate coming from the left in this small, niche knitting community, I started to question everything. I started making a proactive effort to break my echo chamber by listening to voices I thought I would disagree with. I wanted to understand their perspective, believing it would confirm that they were filled with hate for anyone who wasn’t like them.
That turned out not to be the case. The more voices outside the left that I listened to, the more I realized that these were not bad people. They were not racists, nazis, or white supremacists. We had differences of opinions on social and economic issues, but a difference of opinion does not make your opponent inherently evil. And they could justify their opinions using arguments, rather than the shouting and ranting I saw coming from my side of the aisle.RTWT.
I started to discover (or perhaps rediscover) the #WalkAway movement. I had heard about #WalkAway when MSNBC told me it was fake and a bunch of Russian bots. But then I started to meet real people who had been Democrats and made the decision to leave because they could not stand the way the left was behaving. I watched town halls they held with different minority communities (all available in their entirety on YouTube), and I saw sane, rational discussion from people of all different races, backgrounds, orientations, and experiences. I joined the Facebook group for the community and saw stories popping up daily of people sharing why they are leaving the Democratic Party. This wasn’t fake. These people are not Russian bots. Moreover, it felt like a breath of fresh air. There was not universal agreement in this group — some were Trump supporters, some weren’t — but they talked and shared their perspective without shouting or rage or trying to cancel each other.
I started to question everything. How many stories had I been sold that weren’t true? What if my perception of the other side is wrong? How is it possible that half the country is overtly racist? Is it possible that Trump derangement syndrome is a real thing, and had I been suffering from it for the past three years?
And the biggest question of all was this: Did I hate Trump so much that I wanted to see my country fail just to spite him and everyone who voted for him?
Fast-forward to the New Hampshire primary, and we have all the politicians running around the state making their case...
Trump Revs Up Campaign
At LAT, "Flush with cash and confident after impeachment, Trump campaign revs up the road show":
WASHINGTON — Four years after his hostile takeover of the White House, President Trump’s second campaign bears little resemblance to the first — he’s flush with cash, buoyed by an uptick in poll numbers, and brimming with confidence after surviving investigations, an impeachment and myriad controversies that have helped unite once-wary Republicans behind him.
Unlike his slapdash, anything goes 2016 campaign, Trump now can rely on a massive, professionalized apparatus that has helped raise more than $200 million, deployed eager surrogates to early primary states, and built an extensive field operation and advertising network months before Democrats are likely to choose their nominee.More.
He also has found new ways to break political taboos, seeking to overshadow Democratic candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire just before they held their nominating contests and playing with voters’ already frazzled nerves. At a primary-eve rally in Manchester, N.H., the president even urged supporters in the state who were registered independents, and thus able to vote in either party’s primary, to vote for the weakest Democrat.
“My only problem is I’m trying to figure who is their weakest candidate — I think they’re all weak!” he said with a broad grin.
It’s an in-your-face strategy hashed out largely by campaign manager Brad Parscale and, of course, the president, an intense manager of his own brand who is determined to remain on offense and to create the appearance of dominance and popularity that, he hopes, becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy in November.
“He will not give the Democrats a free pass any day of this campaign. They don’t get to have their day where they dominate the news,” said Matt Schlapp, a veteran GOP operative whose wife, Mercedes, works for the Trump campaign. “He’s stepping into their days and talking about why he should get four more years.”
“The more Democrats smear President Trump, the more enthusiasm we see for him and his many accomplishments,” Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, said in a statement.
There is some evidence for that. A Gallup tracking poll from the last two weeks of January, during the Senate impeachment trial, showed Trump’s approval rating at 49%, its highest point ever. And the campaign raised $1 million in online donations for 10 straight days during the trial. More recent polls show the president’s approval number back in the low-to-mid 40s, where it has hovered for most of his term, although his support among Republicans is sky high.
None of that makes his reelection as inevitable as his campaign suggests. He is running well behind the top Democratic contenders, according to a Quinnipiac University poll this week that showed the president losing a hypothetical head-to-head race to Michael Bloomberg by nine points, Bernie Sanders by eight and Joe Biden by seven.
He also trailed Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar by at least four points, according to the survey.
Holy Cow Playmate Iryna!
Man, she's something.
32E TEXT here - https://t.co/M03maYOVmJ pic.twitter.com/DUZg2PTGZv
— playmateiryna (@IrynaIvanova) February 13, 2020
Friday, February 7, 2020
Sea Lion Pup Tried to Cross Long Beach Freeway (VIDEO)
The little guy swam up the San Gabriel river and tried to walk his way out.
At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
Thursday, February 6, 2020
The Big Winner of Impeachment: Partisanship
An excellent piece, at LAT, "News Analysis: Trump’s impeachment and acquittal please partisans on both sides":
News Analysis: Trump's impeachment and acquittal please partisans on both sides https://t.co/3aAONcX2ON w/ @Noahbierman
— Sarah D. Wire (@sarahdwire) February 5, 2020
WASHINGTON — Minutes after President Nixon resigned in disgrace and left the White House in August 1974, Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as president and sought to heal a traumatized nation, declaring, “Our long national nightmare is over.”
Although President Trump was acquitted by the Senate on Wednesday and allowed to remain in office, a similar attempt at reconciliation or closure is difficult to imagine.
Americans are instead left with toxic images from Trump’s State of the Union speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, with Trump refusing to shake House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s outstretched hand, and Pelosi later publicly ripping up the text of Trump’s speech in disgust.
A nation stewing with partisan fury has grown angrier, with Democrats bitter over a president they believe got away with abusing his office and Republicans incensed that he was impeached at all.
The final Senate votes reflected that vast gulf: No Democrats broke ranks, and only one Republican — Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the GOP’s 2012 presidential nominee —condemned what he called “an appalling abuse of the public trust” and voted to convict Trump on one of two articles of impeachment.
Yet many caught in the maelstrom of the last 4½ months — first in a rancorous House impeachment inquiry and then an acrimonious Senate trial — believe their party emerged victorious, exciting passion among their core constituencies.
“The politics in America are so polarized right now that I think both sides probably think they’ve done well politically,” said Tad Devine, who served as a senior advisor to three Democratic presidential campaigns. “They’re talking to entirely different audiences.”
The lack of a consensus has left the long-term lessons of this impeachment unsettled, at least until Trump and Republican lawmakers face the voters in November, and perhaps beyond that.
Nixon resigned before he was impeached over the Watergate scandal after public opinion turned against him and senior Republican senators warned they would vote to remove him from office if he did not leave first. In 1999, President Clinton survived impeachment, publicly apologized, and saw his popularity rise as Americans largely decided he should not be removed for lying about an affair with a White House intern.
But Democrats paid a price the following year when Clinton’s vice president, Al Gore, lost the presidential election to George W. Bush by a razor-thin margin ultimately decided by the Supreme Court.
“In the Nixon case, the president left office ... because of a national bipartisan sense that he should,” said Timothy Naftali, founding director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda. “So there was a resolution of the scandal, as much as you can have in a complex republic. There was a consensus he needed to be removed before the end of his term. That consensus doesn’t exist today.”
No president before Trump has been impeached and then gone on to seek reelection. That gives Americans a chance to weigh in more directly, but it also widens the political and social divisions that have defined the turbulent Trump presidency.
“What’s at stake is not just Trump’s reelection or the future of the Republican Party,” said William Howell, a University of Chicago professor who has written extensively about executive power. “It’s about Congress’ ability to check presidential power.”
Historians, constitutional scholars and Democratic lawmakers say Trump’s acquittal in the Senate has almost certainly weakened the authority of Congress to oversee and provide a check on the executive branch. Even if Trump isn’t reelected, future presidents are likely to cite his precedent in refusing to honor congressional subpoenas, blocking witnesses and evidence, without consequence.
Not only did the stonewalling thwart House investigators during the impeachment inquiry, but the Trump administration has also regularly declined to attend routine oversight hearings in Congress.
“Unfortunately, yes, that’s the precedent and everybody seems to love precedents more than they love laws,” said Brenda Wineapple, author of “The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation.” “Suspending the issue of right and wrong, when people get away with things, it’s incentive to do it again.”
The result, in some ways, is likely to be the reverse of the post-Watergate experience.
After Nixon resigned, Congress moved to sharply curtail the president’s authority and create direct oversight of U.S. intelligence agencies for the first time, among other reforms. But many of those changes have weakened in recent decades as Congress has handed more power back to the White House, giving Trump a freer rein than his predecessors.
Few scholars think Trump’s episode heralds a new “age of impeachment,” as former special prosecutor Kenneth W. Starr argued in his defense of the president. The most zealous partisans on each side often threaten impeachment but seldom muster the political power to force the grueling process.
Pelosi resisted several attempts to impeach Trump before acceding to her base in September when a White House whistleblower accused Trump of seeking Ukraine’s help in smearing Joe Biden, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, while withholding a White House meeting and $391 million in military aid as leverage...
Tuesday, February 4, 2020
Bernie Sanders Internal Numbers
CNN's reporting the Iowa results right now, as are the other networks, no doubt.
Bernie's leading the popular vote totals, but Buttigieg has won more voters around the state, and hence took a larger share of the delegates.
Joe Biden absolutely crashed last night, and I expect he'll bomb in New Hampshire as well. (And Nia-Malika Henderson, on CNN earlier, questioned the strength of Biden's "wall" in the South Carolina primary coming later this month.
I love it.
In any case, at the Intercept, "SANDERS CAMPAIGN’S INTERNAL CAUCUS NUMBERS SHOW THEM LEADING IOWA, WITH BIDEN A DISTANT FOURTH."
Bernie's leading the popular vote totals, but Buttigieg has won more voters around the state, and hence took a larger share of the delegates.
Joe Biden absolutely crashed last night, and I expect he'll bomb in New Hampshire as well. (And Nia-Malika Henderson, on CNN earlier, questioned the strength of Biden's "wall" in the South Carolina primary coming later this month.
I love it.
In any case, at the Intercept, "SANDERS CAMPAIGN’S INTERNAL CAUCUS NUMBERS SHOW THEM LEADING IOWA, WITH BIDEN A DISTANT FOURTH."
BREAKING: The Iowa Democratic Party has released 62% of its caucus results.
Pete Buttigieg leads with about 27% in the State Delegate Equivalent count.
Bernie Sanders follows with about 25%.
More here:
BREAKING: The Iowa Democratic Party has released 62% of its caucus results.— NPR (@NPR) February 4, 2020
Pete Buttigieg leads with about 27% in the State Delegate Equivalent count.
Bernie Sanders follows with about 25%.
More here: https://t.co/glyEmOk8dS pic.twitter.com/Kjej9p4q5y
Democrats Are Decadent and Depraved
It's true.
At the Other McCain, "Disaster in Iowa: The Democratic Party Is Decadent and Depraved":
At the Other McCain, "Disaster in Iowa: The Democratic Party Is Decadent and Depraved":
The way Democrats run their Iowa caucuses is difficult to explain briefly, but the result Monday was clear. Within an hour of the beginning of the complicated process, the totals of the first-round voting began to be reported via social media, and from precinct after precinct came the same phrase: “Biden — not viable.”
Former Vice President Joe Biden has based his campaign on the argument that he’s the most “electable” Democratic candidate, but the voters of Iowa shot a torpedo through the hull of that argument. Due to a technical glitch that delayed the state Democratic Party’s counting process, we still don’t have official results. But by 10:30 p.m. Eastern time Monday, it became apparent to caucus-watchers that Biden was headed for a fourth-place finish in the Hawkeye State, behind Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders; South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg; and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Buttigieg’s strong second-place showing is a big story — the young mayor out-performed expectations — but Biden’s humiliating defeat is much bigger. . .
Superbowl Halftime Show (PHOTOS)
I liked it.
Conservatives got their panties in a wad, sheesh.
At Drunken Stepfather, "SHAKIRA PANTY FLASH FOR THE SUPERBOWL OF THE DAY."
Conservatives got their panties in a wad, sheesh.
At Drunken Stepfather, "SHAKIRA PANTY FLASH FOR THE SUPERBOWL OF THE DAY."
Watch the Super Bowl LIV Live visual album now & relive your favorite moments from the @Pepsi Super Bowl LIV Halftime show w/ @JLo, @Shakira, @JBalvin & @sanbenito, the National Anthem w/ @ddlovato and America the Beautiful w/ @YolandaAdams: https://t.co/TegS1UhgC6 #SBLIV pic.twitter.com/D0vQCHC9Vz
— NFL (@NFL) February 3, 2020
How China Implements Quarantine
What a nightmare.
At NYT, "China, Desperate to Stop Coronavirus, Turns Neighbor Against Neighbor":
At NYT, "China, Desperate to Stop Coronavirus, Turns Neighbor Against Neighbor":
Bounties, informant hotlines, barricaded doors and a lot of harassment: China authorities are doing everything to hunt those from Wuhan. In the process they risk eroding trust, establishing new stigmas and scattering scared carriers of the coronavirus. https://t.co/dfxtc6mJ5n
— Paul Mozur 孟建国 (@paulmozur) February 4, 2020
GUANGZHOU, China — One person was turned away by hotel after hotel after he showed his ID card. Another was expelled by fearful local villagers. A third found his most sensitive personal information leaked online after registering with the authorities.
These outcasts are from Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province, which is at the center of a rapidly spreading viral outbreak that has killed more than 420 people in China and sent fear rippling around the world. They are pariahs in China, among the millions unable to go home and feared as potential carriers of the mysterious coronavirus.
All across the country, despite China’s vast surveillance network with its facial recognition systems and high-end cameras that is increasingly used to track its 1.4 billion people, the government has turned to familiar authoritarian techniques — like setting up dragnets and asking neighbors to inform on one another — as it tries to contain the outbreak.
It took the authorities about five days to contact Harmo Tang, a college student studying in Wuhan, after he returned to his hometown, Linhai, in eastern Zhejiang Province. Mr. Tang said he had already been under self-imposed isolation when local officials asked for his personal information, including name, address, phone number, identity card number and the date he returned from Wuhan. Within days, the information began to spread online, along with a list of others who returned to Linhai from Wuhan.
Local officials offered no explanation but returned a few days later to fasten police tape to his door and hang a sign that warned neighbors that a Wuhan returnee lived there. The sign included an informant hotline to call if anyone saw him or his family leave the apartment. Mr. Tang said he received about four calls a day from different local government departments.
“In reality there’s not much empathy,” he said. “It’s not a caring tone they’re using. It’s a warning tone. I don’t feel very comfortable about it.”
Of course, China has a major incentive to track down potential carriers of the disease. The coronavirus outbreak has put parts of the country under lockdown, brought the world’s second-largest economy to a virtual standstill and erected walls between China and the rest of the world.
Still, even some government officials called for understanding as concerns about prejudice spread. Experts warned such marginalization of an already vulnerable group could prove counterproductive, further damaging public trust and sending those who should be screened and monitored deeper underground.
“We are paying attention to this issue,” Ma Guoqiang, the Chinese Communist Party secretary of Wuhan, said at a news conference there last Tuesday.
“I believe that some people may label Hubei people or report them, but I also think most people will treat Hubei people with a good heart.”
While networks of volunteers and Christian groups have been vocal about offering help, many local leaders have focused efforts on finding and isolating people from Hubei. On big screens and billboards, propaganda videos and posters warn people to stay inside, wear masks and wash hands.
In the northern province of Hebei, one county offered bounties of 1,000 yuan, or about $140, for each Wuhan person reported by residents. Images online showed towns digging up roads or deputizing men to block outsiders. Some apartment-building residents barricaded the doors of their towers with China’s ubiquitous ride-share bikes.
In the eastern province of Jiangsu, quarantine turned to imprisonment after authorities used metal poles to barricade shut the door of a family recently returned from Wuhan. To get food, the family relied on neighbors who lowered provisions with a rope down to their back balcony, according to a local news report.
Scared for the safety of his children as conditions at home worsened, Andy Li, a tech worker from Wuhan traveling with his family in Beijing, rented a car and began driving south to Guangdong, an effort to find refuge with relatives there. In Nanjing, he was turned away from one hotel before getting a room at a luxury hotel.
There he set up a self-imposed family quarantine for four days, until local authorities ordered all people from Wuhan to move to a hotel next to the city’s central rail station. Mr. Li said the quarantine hotel did not seem to be doing a good job isolating people. Food delivery workers came and went, while gaps in the doors and walls allowed drafts in.
“They’re only working to separate Wuhan people from Nanjing people,” Mr. Li said. “They don’t care at all if Wuhan people infect each other.”
To help, he stuffed towels and tissues under the door to block the drafts.
“I’m not complaining about the government," Mr. Li said. “There will always be loopholes in policy. But in a selfish way I’m just really worried about my children.”
Across the country, the response from local authorities often resembles the mass mobilizations of the Mao era rather than the technocratic, data-driven wizardry depicted in propaganda about China’s emerging surveillance state. They have also turned to techniques Beijing used to fight the outbreak of SARS, another deadly disease, in 2002 and 2003, when China was much less technologically sophisticated.
Checkpoints to screen people for fevers have popped up at tollbooths, at the front gates of apartment complexes and in hotels, grocery stores and train stations. Often those wielding the thermometer guns don’t hold them close enough to a person’s forehead, generating unusually low temperature readings. Such checks were worthless, for instance, against one man in the western province of Qinghai, whom police are investigating on suspicion that he covered up his symptoms to travel.
Authorities have used computerized systems that track ID cards — which must be used to take most long-distance transport and stay in hotels — to round up people from Wuhan. Yet one article about the ID system in The People’s Daily, the mouthpiece for the Chinese Communist Party, included a plea to all passengers on affected flights and trains to report themselves...
Impact of the Iowa Chaos
From Jonathan Last, at the Bulwark, an excellent analysis.
It's been a perfect storm burying Iowa in negative coverage, and even the experts are saying the Hawkeye State's special role as "first in the nation" is at risk.
Added: See also AoSHQ, "The Soyciety Pages: Bill Kristol Declares, 'We Are All Democrats Now'."
It's been a perfect storm burying Iowa in negative coverage, and even the experts are saying the Hawkeye State's special role as "first in the nation" is at risk.
Iowa: Ded https://t.co/MTydnoHpQd— Jonathan V. Last (@JVLast) February 4, 2020
Added: See also AoSHQ, "The Soyciety Pages: Bill Kristol Declares, 'We Are All Democrats Now'."
Democrats Are Facing Disaster
There's too much to report on the Iowa chaos (check Memeorandum).
But one thing's for sure, things are going terribly for the Democrats.
For example, Gallup is out this morning with the best presidential approval number for President Trump --- he's at 49 percent approval, and more than 6 in 10 approve of his handling of the economy, a death knell for Democrat prospects this fall, especially if those number hold up.
More at AoSHQ, "GALLUP: TRUMP JOB APPROVAL RISES TO HIGHEST LEVEL EVER, AT 49%."
But one thing's for sure, things are going terribly for the Democrats.
For example, Gallup is out this morning with the best presidential approval number for President Trump --- he's at 49 percent approval, and more than 6 in 10 approve of his handling of the economy, a death knell for Democrat prospects this fall, especially if those number hold up.
More at AoSHQ, "GALLUP: TRUMP JOB APPROVAL RISES TO HIGHEST LEVEL EVER, AT 49%."
Donald Trump’s job approval rating has risen to 49% in a new Gallup poll. https://t.co/aspVxbbTaS— GallupNews (@GallupNews) February 4, 2020
Wednesday, January 29, 2020
'Credulous Boomer Rube Demo'
This kinda of stuff practically guarantees Trump's reelection.
At the Other McCain, "Republicans ‘Punch Back Twice as Hard’ With Ad Targeting CNN Elitists."
More here.
At the Other McCain, "Republicans ‘Punch Back Twice as Hard’ With Ad Targeting CNN Elitists."
This is why Trump won and will win again. pic.twitter.com/KfaLnP1KCt
— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) January 28, 2020
More here.
Trump's Digital Advantage
I love this!
Thomas Edsall, at NYT, "Trump’s Digital Advantage Is Freaking Out Democratic Strategists":
Catholic Vote's 2008 campaign video is here.
Thomas Edsall, at NYT, "Trump’s Digital Advantage Is Freaking Out Democratic Strategists":
https://t.co/TxRBYFkX0F via @Edsall
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 29, 2020
In a blog post published in November, a year before the 2020 election, Brian Burch, the president of CatholicVote.org, a socially conservative advocacy group, announced that in Wisconsin alone his organization had identified 199,241 Catholics “who’ve been to church at least 3 times in the last 90 days.”RTWT.
Nearly half of these religiously observant parishioners, Burch wrote, “91,373 mass-attending Catholics — are not even registered to vote!” CatholicVote.org is looking for potential Trump voters within this large, untapped reservoir — Republican-leaning white Catholics who could bolster Trump’s numbers in a battleground state.
Burch, whose organization opposes abortion and gay marriage, made his plans clear:
We are already building the largest Catholic voter mobilization program ever. And no, that’s not an exaggeration. Our plan spans at least 7 states (and growing), and includes millions of Catholic voters.How did Catholic Vote come up with these particular church attendance numbers for 199,241 Catholics? With geofencing, a technology that creates a virtual geographic boundary, enabling software to trigger a response when a cellphone enters or leaves a particular area — a church, for example, or a stadium, a school or an entire town.
Geofencing is just one of the new tools of digital campaigning, a largely unregulated field of political combat in which voters have little or no idea of how they are being manipulated, in which traditional disclosure requirements are inoperative and key actors are anonymous. It is a weapon of choice. Once an area is geofenced, commercial data companies can acquire the mobile phone ID numbers of those within the boundary.
This is how the National Catholic Reporter described the process in an article earlier this month:
Politically minded geofencers capture data from the cellphones of churchgoers, and then purchase ads targeting those devices. That data can be matched against other easily obtained databases, including voter profiles, which give marketers identifying information such as names, addresses and voter registration status.Such information can be a gold mine.
Burch described what CatholicVote.org initiated in the 2018 election. “We created ad campaigns targeted to mobile devices that have been inside of Catholic churches,” Burch explained. What’s more,
We told Catholics in Missouri the truth about then-Senator Claire McCaskill — that she was pro-abortion, was unwilling to protect the Little Sisters of the Poor, and opposed Catholic judicial nominees because of their religious beliefs. And she lost.If you attend an evangelical or a Catholic Church, a women’s rights march or a political rally of any kind, especially in a seriously contested state, the odds are that your cellphone ID number, home address, partisan affiliation and the identifying information of the people around you will be provided by geofencing marketers to campaigns, lobbyists and other interest groups.
With increasing speed, digital technology is transforming politics, constantly providing novel ways to target specific individuals, to get the unregistered registered, to turn out marginal voters, to persuade the undecided and to suppress support for the opposition.
Democrats and Republicans agree that the Trump campaign is far ahead of the Democratic Party in the use of this technology, capitalizing on its substantial investment during the 2016 election and benefiting from an uninterrupted high-tech drive since then.
Republicans “have a big advantage this time,” Ben Nuckels, a Democratic media consultant said in a phone interview. “They not only have all the data from 2016 but they have been building this operation into a nonstop juggernaut.”
The new technology, Nuckels continued, allows campaigns to “deliver a broader narrative over the top” on television and other media, while “underneath in digital you are delivering ads that are tailored to those voters that you need to influence and persuade the most.”
Catholic Vote's 2008 campaign video is here.
Senator Kelly Loeffler Takes Office Amid Impeachment and Foreign Policy Crises
Just appointed and not observing the normal niceties of Senate freshmen.
At NYT:
At NYT:
New senators typically take their time before jumping into the spotlight. Kelly Loeffler is breaking convention as she works to use the impeachment battle to solidify her place in a party where loyalty to President Trump is the key to survival. https://t.co/GzxI6aAgGg
— NYT Politics (@nytpolitics) January 29, 2020
After 2 weeks, it’s clear that Democrats have no case for impeachment. Sadly, my colleague @SenatorRomney wants to appease the left by calling witnesses who will slander the @realDonaldTrump during their 15 minutes of fame. The circus is over. It’s time to move on! #gapol
— Senator Kelly Loeffler (@SenatorLoeffler) January 27, 2020
Here are my takeaways:@realDonaldTrump’s team undermined your entire “case” in 2 hours.
— Senator Kelly Loeffler (@SenatorLoeffler) January 29, 2020
You failed to get the job done. They proved that. No convincing evidence. Just baseless attacks.
A fair trial happened in the Senate & you don’t get a do-over. It’s time to move on! https://t.co/dPK6qfiuQn
One thing I know Georgians are tired of hearing about? Impeachment.
— Senator Kelly Loeffler (@SenatorLoeffler) January 29, 2020
That’s why I’m focusing on what matters: pro-economy, pro-farmer, pro-woman initiatives -- just to name a few.
Looking forward to another exciting day tomorrow! pic.twitter.com/eL2qGqKYe8
Hospital Masks in Irvine
I tweeted yesterday:
.@Communism_Kills #Outbreak in #TheOC. At least one confirmed case of #CoronaVirus. Drugstores are out of face masks as #Chinese immigrants panic. Avoid exotic food markets and immigrant concentrations. #Wuhan #CoronaOutbreak 😷 pic.twitter.com/Tk03nQItEk
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 28, 2020
Plane Diverted to March Air Force Base
It's a nightmare.
Irvine is Beijing west. All these Chinese immigrants going around with hospital face masks. It's ridiculous.
Might was well be in Wuhan!
At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
Irvine is Beijing west. All these Chinese immigrants going around with hospital face masks. It's ridiculous.
Might was well be in Wuhan!
At CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
Megan Parry's Wednesday Forecast
January in California is a trip.
In the 70s during the day, it gets down to the low 40s in the early morning, brrr!
Here's the lovely Ms. Megan, for ABC News 10 San Diego.
Look at those overnight lows!
In the 70s during the day, it gets down to the low 40s in the early morning, brrr!
Here's the lovely Ms. Megan, for ABC News 10 San Diego.
Look at those overnight lows!
Fear and Anger Among Americans in China
Well, I'd be mad too --- especially at myself for winding up in the China dumpster in the first place.
At LAT, "Americans evacuating Wuhan, China, clear health screening and head to California":
At LAT, "Americans evacuating Wuhan, China, clear health screening and head to California":
BEIJING — A plane evacuating 201 Americans from the Chinese city at the center of the coronavirus outbreak arrived in Alaska and continued Wednesday to Southern California after everyone aboard passed a health screening in Anchorage, where the aircraft had stopped to refuel.Still more.
The plane was the only way out of the besieged city of Wuhan in Hubei province, and Americans clamored for seats.
A couple with a 7-year-old daughter did not receive the coveted call. A 65-year-old man’s phone rang, but he gave up his spot because others needed it more.
There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to who was tapped by U.S. officials to board the flight early Wednesday whisking them away from Wuhan, the epicenter of a respiratory virus outbreak that has killed more than 130 people in the last two months.
For a week, Wuhan has been under lockdown, with no transportation out of the city, as Chinese officials desperately try to keep the new coronavirus from spreading.
The inland city of 11 million, a university and business hub often called the Chicago of China, has become a cauldron of fear, stress and boredom, with overwhelmed hospitals, empty streets and isolated residents afraid to be in the same room with close friends.
It is unclear how deadly the virus is or how easily it spreads. Most reported cases have occurred in Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province, and most patients elsewhere had recently traveled there.
But the tally of fatalities and confirmed cases, as well as the virus’ geographic reach, has increased daily, prompting the U.S. State Department to recommend that Americans avoid traveling to China. Some airlines have begun restricting flights out of the entire country, not just Wuhan.
For expatriates in Wuhan, many of whom teach English at universities and language institutes, the crisis is especially disorienting.
Many are not fluent in Chinese and worry about communicating if they go to the hospital. They share anxieties and questions with each other on WeChat and Facebook forums. On Wednesday, one man posted that he lost his temper at a Walmart cashier who rummaged through a quilt he had just bought, potentially spreading germs.
Americans still stuck in Wuhan have received no word about any future government-sponsored flights. Some are angry at U.S. officials for not doing more to help.
State Department officials could not be reached for comment.
Saturday, January 25, 2020
Mountain House Classic
At Amazon, Mountain House Classic Bucket.
Also, Mountain House Just In Case 14-Day Emergency Food Supply.
BONUS: Jocko Willink, Discipline Equals Freedom: Field Manual.
Also, Mountain House Just In Case 14-Day Emergency Food Supply.
BONUS: Jocko Willink, Discipline Equals Freedom: Field Manual.
Jennifer Delacruz Saturday Forecast
At 10 News San Diego.
Beautiful daytime weather but bundle up at night, brrr!
Beautiful daytime weather but bundle up at night, brrr!
Katie Bell Saturday Selfie
Click on the photo to enlarge:
i named my headache ‘idiots’. pic.twitter.com/Sn9Su1eTTb
— Katie Bell🦋 (@katieeeeebell) January 25, 2020
Joe Rogan Endorses Bernie Sanders, Chaos Ensues
From Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit, "BERNIE SANDERS WELCOMED AS NEWEST MEMBER OF ALT-RIGHT AFTER JOE ROGAN ENDORSEMENT."
And, "JOE ROGAN IS THE WALTER CRONKITE OF OUR ERA."
MoveOn.org, the organization that wanted to "censure" Bill Clinton and "move on" from impeachment, is particularly upset.
And, "JOE ROGAN IS THE WALTER CRONKITE OF OUR ERA."
MoveOn.org, the organization that wanted to "censure" Bill Clinton and "move on" from impeachment, is particularly upset.
We urge Sen. Sanders and his campaign to apologize and stop elevating this endorsement. We stand in solidarity with folks hurt by this.
— MoveOn (@MoveOn) January 25, 2020
Bernie Sanders Surges in Iowa
I hope Bernie wins Iowa, at least for the momentum. He should take New Hampshire easily, as he did in 2016.
With those two states in his victory column, he'll earn tremendous momentum and perhaps force more winnowing of the field.
We'll see.
If it's Bernie vs. Trump in November, it'll be clash of the ideological titans, heh.
At NYT, "Sanders Seizes Lead in Volatile Iowa Race, Times Poll Finds":
With those two states in his victory column, he'll earn tremendous momentum and perhaps force more winnowing of the field.
We'll see.
If it's Bernie vs. Trump in November, it'll be clash of the ideological titans, heh.
At NYT, "Sanders Seizes Lead in Volatile Iowa Race, Times Poll Finds":
DES MOINES — Senator Bernie Sanders has opened up a lead in Iowa just over a week before the Democratic caucuses, consolidating support from liberals and benefiting from divisions among more moderate presidential candidates who are clustered behind him, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll of likely caucusgoers.And more at NYT, can the Dems unite after the primaries?
Mr. Sanders has gained six points since the last Times-Siena survey, in late October, and is now capturing 25 percent of the vote in Iowa. Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. have remained stagnant since the fall, with Mr. Buttigieg capturing 18 percent and Mr. Biden 17 percent.
The rise of Mr. Sanders has come at the expense of his fellow progressive, Senator Elizabeth Warren: she dropped from 22 percent in the October poll, enough to lead the field, to 15 percent in this survey. Senator Amy Klobuchar, who is garnering 8 percent, is the only other candidate approaching double digits.
The changing fortunes of the two liberal candidates, and the secondary position of the two leading centrists, underscores the volatile nature of the Democratic primary after more than a year of campaigning, as voters wrestle with which of the contenders can defeat President Trump. At various times over the past six months Ms. Warren and Mr. Buttigieg had surged in Iowa, only to fall back, while Mr. Biden’s strength has ebbed and flowed here even as he remained at the top of the polls nationally.
But Mr. Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist from Vermont making his second run for the White House, appears to be peaking at the right time: this month was the first time he has finished atop a poll in Iowa, after also leading a Des Moines Register-CNN survey two weeks ago. The Times-Siena poll’s margin of error was plus or minus 4.8 percentage points.
Despite Mr. Sanders’s ascent, the combined strength of the moderate candidates is unmistakable. The poll showed that 55 percent of those surveyed said they preferred a standard-bearer who is “more moderate than most Democrats.” Just 38 percent said they wanted one who is “more liberal than most Democrats.”
A victory by Mr. Sanders in Iowa, where he suffered a narrow loss to Hillary Clinton four years ago, would represent a remarkable comeback for a 78-year-old candidate whose heart attack in October threatened to upend his candidacy. It would also create a moment of high anxiety for establishment-aligned Democrats who are deeply alarmed about a potential Sanders nomination.
Should he prevail in Iowa and face a similarly fractured field of mainstream rivals in New Hampshire, where he also currently leads in the polls, Mr. Sanders could be difficult to slow.
Several voters who backed Mr. Sanders cited the consistency of his positions over the course of his career, and their ideological alignment with his views.
“Bernie’s authentic,” said Austin Sturch, 25, of Evansdale, adding, “Pretty much everything he’s saying — I can’t put it better than he can.”
Still, much here remains uncertain. Iowa voters are famous for settling on a candidate late, and this year is no different; Mr. Sanders, along with the other senators in the race, is pinned down in Washington during Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial and unable to campaign here on weekdays. And the final results could turn on two factors that will not be known until caucus night: the size and composition of the electorate, and the preferences of voters whose first choices are eliminated because of the arcane caucus rules.
If the other leading candidates finish bunched together on caucus night on Feb. 3, it is unlikely any of them will drop out of the race after Iowa. Each of the three top hopefuls trailing Mr. Sanders has the money to compete in New Hampshire, which is just a week later.
And should no clear moderate alternative to Mr. Sanders emerge from the early nominating states, the self-financing Michael R. Bloomberg, who has already spent more than $260 million on advertising and hired more than 1,000 staff members, is awaiting the field on Super Tuesday in early March...
A Major Fear for Democrats: Will the Party Come Together by November? Via @jmartNYT https://t.co/9Z0Pp6TYmD— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 25, 2020
Tuesday, January 21, 2020
Trump Impeachment: The Last Gasp of Progressivism
Following-up, "Impeachment Trial Begins."
And from Mark Tapscott, at Instapundit, "IMPEACHMENT IS THE LAST GASP OF THE PROGRESSIVE ERA":
And from Mark Tapscott, at Instapundit, "IMPEACHMENT IS THE LAST GASP OF THE PROGRESSIVE ERA":
Donald Devine was President Ronald Reagan’s Director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), and is a long-respected conservative strategist and thinker.
Writing today in The Imaginative Conservative, Devine argues the Trump impeachment is nothing less than the end of liberal Big Government’s ascendancy just when progressives thought they were on the brink of final victory:
Thanks to the pervasive political correctness they created, Devine writes, “progressives had assumed their education and mainstream media ‘mocking’ of traditional values had turned America progressive and now Donald Trump had proven they had not. Now with Mr. Trump in office, the last hope to contain the effects could only be by the expert bureaucracy that was the original faith of progressive scientific administration to produce the good welfare state.
“Rather than the elected president representing the people, salvation must now come from the permanent government. In the wake of the impeachment, there was a [Washington] Post op-ed headline actually arguing publicly that ‘bureaucratic resistance is what the Founders intended.’ Another piece by the celebrated intellectual Francis Fukuyama in The Wall Street Journal argued directly that ‘American liberty depends on the deep state.’”
Devine concludes with a warning for the Right that all conservatives ought to ponder with deep seriousness, as the end of the American story is far from written and may yet go in directions that are toxic to individual liberty.
Impeachment Trial Begins
Well, here we go!
The impeachment trial is live right now in the Senate, with Chief Justice John Roberts presiding.
It's pretty amazing.
Mitch McConnell has ice water running through his veins. It's a spectacle!
At LAT:
The impeachment trial is live right now in the Senate, with Chief Justice John Roberts presiding.
It's pretty amazing.
Mitch McConnell has ice water running through his veins. It's a spectacle!
At LAT:
McConnell moves to speed up Senate impeachment trial
— Sarah D. Wire (@sarahdwire) January 21, 2020
https://t.co/HdjP2SfOrc
John Yoo, The Powers of War and Peace
*BUMPED.*
At Amazon, John Yoo, The Powers of War and Peace: The Constitution and Foreign Affairs after 9/11.
At Amazon, John Yoo, The Powers of War and Peace: The Constitution and Foreign Affairs after 9/11.
Sunday, January 19, 2020
Impeachment Has Been Great for Business
The GOP fundraising business, that is. Who didn't see this coming?
On Twitter:
On Twitter:
Axios’ Swan: impeachment backlash helping Republicans build a “formidable” machine for 2020 pic.twitter.com/jyN4QPg3Bd
— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) January 19, 2020
Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley Goes Bald
At Althouse, "'Everything I do is political', says Representative Ayanna Pressley, about revealing that she is, in fact, completely bald."
Her hair, with braids and twists, was a political statement. Now that's all gone.
Her hair, with braids and twists, was a political statement. Now that's all gone.
Happy Sunday! #baldsquad #baldbaddies #baldisbeautiful Thank you for the warm welcome #alopecia nation #hairlosscrew. New year. New decade. New truths. New swag. #theyaintreadyforthissmoke pic.twitter.com/M3ggSNrV9B
— Ayanna Pressley (@AyannaPressley) January 19, 2020
Saturday, January 18, 2020
Maine Leftists Can't Cancel Michelle Malkin
If you've been following along, Michelle Malkin continues to take the conservative fight right to the enemy, with no backing down.
Here's her essay, "Cancel culture strikes again: Banned in Maine."
And on Twitter:
Here's her essay, "Cancel culture strikes again: Banned in Maine."
And on Twitter:
This is so crazy, but we prevail. We are on our FOURTH venue with less than an hour to go. #MalkinBannedInMaine #FreeSpeech #OpenBordersInc #AmericaFirst pic.twitter.com/IkL9LnvKCQ
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) January 17, 2020
Screw you #cancelculture and God bless you, #AmericaFirst citizens in Maine - I will never forget your persistence & patriotism! 🇺🇸🔥❤️💙 @umaineCR @MaineMayorNick @AdrienneMaine https://t.co/aXLJWtyNRB
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) January 18, 2020
In November, I was banned in Boston after speech-squelchers on the left and right forced the cancellation of my lecture at Bentley University, a small private institution. The grassroots activists who had invited me were rejected by every major event venue in the nation’s purported Cradle of Liberty. The tail-tuckers cited security concerns or jacked up their rental fees to make it prohibitively expensive to gather peacefully to discuss—gasp!—ideas.
Lou Murray of Bostonians Against Sanctuary Cities and Jessica Vaughan of the Center for Immigration Studies heroically persisted, pulling together a great event at a private home attended by 100 patriots who risked their privacy, friendships and even their jobs to listen to—gasp!—ideas. (Watch the video here.)
Soon after, a group of conservative students at the University of Maine, a publicly funded school, invited me to bring my nationalist message about who’s funding the destruction of America to their campus. This prompted the College Republicans’ faculty adviser, political science professor Amy Fried to resign in protest. That led to the de-chartering of the CR group. Why? Because I refused to disavow other young students who have asked trenchant, pesky questions at Young America’s Foundation and Turning Point USA lectures about the GOP elites’ support of wage-suppressing, job-outsourcing, Democrat voter-importing policies that put American students, workers and families last.
Many of those students follow a 21-year-old nationalist named Nick Fuentes who hosts a program (for now) on YouTube and DLive in his basement called “America First.” Because I refused to play the gatekeepers’ game of condemning every last joke or chatroom comment or tweet of someone followed by students whose questions I support, Fried believes that no students at her campus under her watch should be allowed to hear what I have to say about, well, anything.
How strongly do University of Maine officials oppose the free association of college students who want to know more about my work? Yesterday, I learned from Portland Sheraton at Sable Oaks general manager Ed Palmer and others that at least one University of Maine official—along with dozens of others cancel culture jihadists galvanized on social media by an anonymous Twitter account called “Support Maine’s Future”—had called to complain about the students and me after they posted an event notice last Friday. I reached out to top administrators, who did not respond by my filing deadline.
I also wrote to Fried, who responded late Tuesday evening: “I never did that. Didn’t happen. Whoever told you I did is incorrect. Thank you for checking, as you received a false report regarding me.”
I responded: “Too bad you didn’t pay me the same courtesy.”
Adrienne Bennett, a Republican candidate for U.S. Congress (Maine, District 2), challenged the school’s bullying tactics: “Free speech is the cornerstone of a free democracy. We are hearing reports that administrators from the University of Maine pressured a private Maine hotel to cancel an appearance by conservative speaker Michelle Malkin. If true, this is a disturbing development from Maine’s public, land-grant university,” she blasted. “All universities—but especially those that receive public funds—have an obligation to foster free speech and free inquiry. I support President Trump’s recent executive order on campus free speech. … I am disturbed that academic elites would interfere to block this speech. For those who disagree with Malkin’s views, the answer is debate and discourse, not censorship.”
My upcoming speaking schedule (for now) includes the New York Young Republican Club (Jan. 16); somewhere, hopefully, in Maine (Jan. 17); Liberty Forum of Silicon Valley (Feb. 11); Michigan Conservative Coalition’s Battle Cry 2020, Troy, Michigan (Feb. 14); Arizona State University (Feb. 26); and San Diego State University (April TBD).
A total of six organizations have now deemed me such a public menace that I’ve been barred from speaking at their venues or events: Mar-a-Lago (canceled by the Trump Organization after complaints by the Southern Poverty Law Center spread by left-wingers at the Miami Herald); Bentley University; the University of Minnesota (canceled at the behest of national leaders of the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow); the New Jersey Right to Life Committee; an Indiana conservative group; and Young America’s Foundation.
Why is this censorship campaign from both sides of the political spectrum happening? University of Maine College Republican Jeremiah Childs astutely observed: “They’re doing this to delegitimize us because we’re popular.” Popular, peacefully expressed ideas that threaten establishment empires in both parties must be stopped. The pretense of free inquiry and association must be propped up by the tolerance hypocrites on the left and the culture warrior poseurs on the right. The illusion of “free speech” must be maintained by the keepers of the gate. Lying is lucrative. Telling the truth, controlled by no one, only gets you grief.
Sara Jean Underwood Photos
She updates her feeds almost constantly, and with some excellent content lol.
At Celeb Jihad, "SARA UNDERWOOD NUDE CAMPING PHOTOS."
At Celeb Jihad, "SARA UNDERWOOD NUDE CAMPING PHOTOS."
Let’s ride🚐 pic.twitter.com/8opQ0eNg2K
— Sara Jean Underwood (@SaraUnderwood) January 18, 2020
Sweet dreams😴 pic.twitter.com/DzMT0xTZRH
— Sara Jean Underwood (@SaraUnderwood) January 18, 2020
Friday, January 17, 2020
Black Americans Deeply Pessimistic Under Trump
Well, more than 95 percent of blacks voted for Obama, twice. If Dems can't maintain those numbers in November it could be trouble for the party.
There is a "blexit" exodus going on, with lots of black conservatives leading the movement to get African-Americans off the Democrat plantation.
I love it.
At WaPo, FWIW, "Black Americans deeply pessimistic about country under Trump, whom more than 8 in 10 describe as ‘a racist,’ Post-Ipsos poll finds":
If 20 percent of blacks vote for Trump in the key Midwest battleground states in November, the Dems can kiss it goodbye.
Lots of folks are talkin' about a Trump landslide. I can't wait.
Still more.
There is a "blexit" exodus going on, with lots of black conservatives leading the movement to get African-Americans off the Democrat plantation.
I love it.
At WaPo, FWIW, "Black Americans deeply pessimistic about country under Trump, whom more than 8 in 10 describe as ‘a racist,’ Post-Ipsos poll finds":
“If I’m in a room with white women, I know that 50 percent of them voted for Trump and they believe in his ideas,” said a university researcher. “I look at them and think, ‘How do you see me? What is my humanity to you?’ ” https://t.co/LP1BCOj0G4
— Eugene Scott (@Eugene_Scott) January 17, 2020
President Trump made a stark appeal to black Americans during the 2016 election when he asked, “What have you got to lose?” Three years later, black Americans have rendered their verdict on his presidency with a deeply pessimistic assessment of their place in the United States under a leader seen by an overwhelming majority as racist.Remember, all polls are questionable in the current era --- because "shy" voters don't want to reveal their real preferences, and that goes for blacks too.
The findings come from a Washington Post-Ipsos poll of African Americans nationwide, which reveals fears about whether their children will have a fair shot to succeed and a belief that white Americans don’t fully appreciate the discrimination that black people experience.
While personally optimistic about their own lives, black Americans today offer a bleaker view about their community as a whole. They also express determination to try to limit Trump to a single term in office.
More than 8 in 10 black Americans say they believe Trump is a racist and that he has made racism a bigger problem in the country. Nine in 10 disapprove of his job performance overall.
The pessimism goes well beyond assessments of the president. A 65 percent majority of African Americans say it is a “bad time” to be a black person in America. That view is widely shared by clear majorities of black adults across income, generational and political lines. By contrast, 77 percent of black Americans say it is a “good time” to be a white person, with a wide majority saying white people don’t understand the discrimination faced by black Americans.
Courtney Tate, 40, an elementary school teacher in Irving, Tex., outside Dallas, said that since Trump was elected, he’s been having more conversations with his co-workers — discussions that are simultaneously enlightening and exhausting — about racial issues he and his students face everyday.
“As a black person, you’ve always seen all the racism, the microaggressions, but as white people they don't understand this is how things are going for me,” said Tate, who said he is the only black male teacher in his school. “They don’t live those experiences. They don’t live in those neighborhoods. They moved out. It’s so easy to be white and oblivious in this country.”
Francine Cartwright, a 44-year-old mother of three from Moorestown, N.J., said the ascent of Trump has altered the way she thinks about the white people in her life.
“If I’m in a room with white women, I know that 50 percent of them voted for Trump and they believe in his ideas,” said Cartwright, a university researcher. “I look at them and think, ‘How do you see me? What is my humanity to you?’ ”
The president routinely talks about how a steadily growing economy and historically low unemployment have resulted in more African Americans with jobs and the lowest jobless rate for black Americans recorded. Months ago he said, “What I’ve done for African Americans in two-and-a-half years, no president has been able to do anything like it.”
But those factors have not translated positively for the president. A 77 percent majority of black Americans say Trump deserves “only some” or “hardly any” credit for the 5.5 percent unemployment rate among black adults compared with 20 percent who say Trump deserves significant credit.
In follow-up interviews, many said former president Barack Obama deserves more credit for the improvement in the unemployment rate, which declined from a high of 16.8 percent in 2010 to 7.5 percent when he left office.
Others said their personal financial situation is more a product of their own efforts than anything the president has done.
“I don’t think [Trump] has anything to do with unemployment among African Americans,” said Ethel Smith, a 72-year-old nanny who lives in Lithonia, Ga., a suburb of Atlanta. “I’ve always been a working poor person. That’s just who I am.”
Black Americans report little change in their personal financial situations in the past few years, with 19 percent saying it has been getting better and 26 percent saying it has been getting worse. Most, 54 percent, say their financial situation has stayed the same...
If 20 percent of blacks vote for Trump in the key Midwest battleground states in November, the Dems can kiss it goodbye.
Lots of folks are talkin' about a Trump landslide. I can't wait.
Still more.
Identity Politics Remains a Political Loser
It's Kim Strassel.
I love this lady!
At WSJ, "Stay Woke, Drop Out: In its wake, identity politics leaves a trail of failed Democratic candidates":
I love this lady!
At WSJ, "Stay Woke, Drop Out: In its wake, identity politics leaves a trail of failed Democratic candidates":
In its wake, identity politics leaves a trail of failed Democratic candidates, writes @KimStrassel https://t.co/auu0EMfEGU via @WSJ
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) January 17, 2020
To paraphrase Santayana, Democrats who refuse to acknowledge Hillary Clinton’s failures in the 2016 election were always doomed to repeat them. Why is their primary field littered with the failed bids of woke candidates? Why is #WarrenIsASnake trending on Twitter? Because identity politics remains a political loser.More.
That’s the takeaway from the rapidly narrowing Democratic field, and smart liberals warned of it after 2016. Mark Lilla, writing in the New York Times, faulted Mrs. Clinton for molding her campaign around “the rhetoric of diversity, calling out explicitly to African-American, Latino, LGBT and women voters at every stop.” Successful politics, he noted, is always rooted in visions of “shared destiny.”
Progressives heaped scorn on Mr. Lilla—one compared him to David Duke—and doubled down on identity politics. Nearly every flashpoint in this Democratic race has centered on racism, sexism or classism. Nearly every practitioner of that factionalist strategy has exited the race. Mr. Lilla is surely open to apologies.
Kamala Harris created the first big viral moment when she tore into Joe Biden, absolving him of being a “racist” even as she accused him of working with segregationists to oppose school busing. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand didn’t hold the race card but ran a campaign about “women’s equality,” attacking any Democrat who didn’t measure to her standards on abortion, child care and violence against women.
Sen. Cory Booker campaigned relentlessly on “systemic racism” and “social justice,” blasting Mr. Biden for his work on the 1994 crime bill and warning the nation of an “all-out assault” on black voting rights in 2020. Beto O’Rourke felt the need to make up for his own whiteness by going all in on reparations for slavery. Julián Castro built his run on complaints about “discriminatory housing policy,” injustices to transgender and indigenous women, and threats to marginalized communities.
Which bring us to Elizabeth Warren’s attempt to rescue her campaign with a Hail Mary appeal to “sexism.” Her campaign leaked in the run-up to Tuesday’s debate the claim that Mr. Sanders, in a private 2018 meeting, told her he didn’t believe a woman could win the presidency. Mr. Sanders denied it. When the inevitable CNN question came Tuesday night, Ms. Warren played the victim and rolled out a rehearsed statistic about the election failure rate of the men on stage. She praised the Democratic Party for having “stepped up” to elect a Catholic president in 1960 and a black one in 2008 and suggested it should do the same for a female candidate today. Sen. Amy Klobuchar cheered her on.
This is the politics of exclusion—and it explains why a field that began as the most diverse in Democratic history is now coming down to a competition between two old white men. Candidates who speak primarily to subsections of the country are by necessity excluding everybody else. All voters want to know what a candidate is going to do specifically for them, and for the country as a whole. And while many voters view issues in a moral context, few voters feel a moral imperative to vote for candidates solely because they are black, or female, or gay. It’s an unpersuasive argument.
Identity politics is also by necessity vote-losing, because it requires accusations. Ms. Warren is getting blowback now after implying that Mr. Sanders is a misogynist, and calling him a liar. Sanders supporters are lacing Ms. Warren on social media with snake emojis and declaring a #NeverWarren campaign. Even if she stages a comeback, she’s alienated a key base of support.
Precisely because Mr. Biden and Mr. Sanders don’t have easy identity-politics cards to play, they’ve focused on broader themes. Yes, they give shout-outs to core liberal constituencies, but Mr. Biden’s consistent argument is that he is the only one qualified to beat Mr. Trump, while Mr. Sanders’s is that America needs to overhaul its economic system. Those are positions around which greater numbers of Democrats can unify...
Annie Lederman Flashes
She's a comedienne.
She's weird.
At Celeb Jihad, "ANNIE LEDERMAN FLASHES."
She's weird.
At Celeb Jihad, "ANNIE LEDERMAN FLASHES."
Didn’t realize Best Buy would be filled with hot guys. Had to act fast! pic.twitter.com/AIgA8ziwSl
— Annie Lederman (@annielederman) January 5, 2020
Gun Control Battle Deepens in Virginia
At the Epoch Times, "Gun Control Battle Deepens as Legislation Advances in Virginia":
Gun Control Battle Deepens in Virginia as new gun laws move thru Democrat controlled legislature. “It’s awoken a sleeping giant.” Hundreds of 2A supporters took the day off work to attend, others drove from hours away to protest new proposed gun laws. https://t.co/8Xsdhc2N0o
— Kari Lake (@KariLakeFox10) January 16, 2020
As 4 bills progress along party lines in Virginia legislature, 2nd Amendment sanctuary movement gains momentum.Still more.
RICHMOND, Va.—Hundreds of Second Amendment advocates converged on Virginia’s state capital on Jan. 13 to oppose a slew of tighter gun control proposals being voted on by newly elected state lawmakers.
The long line of Virginia residents—many wearing bright “Guns Save Lives” stickers—showed up before 8 a.m. in a show of support for their constitutional rights that they say are being infringed upon. Some gun control advocates attended as well, holding signs with slogans such as “sensible gun laws equal less gun violence.”
The rallying crowds did little to stop four gun control measures from advancing in the state’s Democratic-led General Assembly after approval by the Senate Judiciary Committee. The committee passed legislation for universal background checks, a measure allowing localities to ban weapons from some events and government buildings, a “red flag” bill allowing authorities to temporarily confiscate guns from certain individuals deemed a risk, and a law that limits the purchase of handguns to only one per month...
Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Rules Against Norman Varner in 'Preferred Prounouns' Transgender Case
At the Hill, "Judge: Referring to transgender people by chosen pronouns 'courtesy,' not law."
And from Vodkapundit, at Instapundit, "MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: Sanity at Last: Court Refuses to Kowtow to Personal Pronouns Like ‘Xemself, Faerself’":
And from Vodkapundit, at Instapundit, "MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: Sanity at Last: Court Refuses to Kowtow to Personal Pronouns Like ‘Xemself, Faerself’":
On Wednesday, a panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals refused a male prisoner's motion that the name on his order of confinement be changed and that he be addressed by female pronouns on account of his female gender identity. The ruling on personal pronouns sets an important precedent for free speech, judicial impartiality, and the basic meaning of pronouns against the transgender movement's bastardization of language.Still more.
The case involves Norman Varner, a federal prisoner who pleaded guilty in 2012 to attempted receipt of child pornography and was sentenced to 15 years in prison, partly due to his previous conviction on child pornography and his failure to register as a sex offender. In 2015, he claimed to have transitioned to being female, and asked to be referred to as "Kathrine Nicole Jett."
A lower court had denied his motion and he appealed. The 5th Circuit panel ruled that the lower court lacked jurisdiction to consider the request because Varner's motion was not authorized by any statute...
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: The 'Senate's Time is at Hand' (VIDEO)
It's impeachment trial, Day 2.
The Majority Leader skewers the Dems and it's hilarious.
At at New York Times, via Memeorandum, "Trump Legal Team to Add Starr and Dershowitz for Senate Trial."
The Majority Leader skewers the Dems and it's hilarious.
At at New York Times, via Memeorandum, "Trump Legal Team to Add Starr and Dershowitz for Senate Trial."
Thursday, January 16, 2020
ICYMI: Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands
[Re-upping this post as well, as Professor Scruton has passed away, a genuine loss for conservative philosophy, if not Western civilization.]
At Amazon, Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left.
At Amazon, Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left.
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