“I’m sending a giant statue of the digit '2' to Jeffrey B., along with a silver medal.”
“I’m sending a giant statue of the digit '2' to Jeffrey B., along with a silver medal.”
9/30/21
“The idea that we can just have open borders is something that, as a practical matter, is unsustainable.” — Former President Barack Obama on ABC’s Good Morning America (9/28). ABC, however, cut Obama’s comment from the televised interview and instead aired the portion in which he criticizes Republicans over immigration reform.
“If we care about people getting vaccinated — and we should — perhaps it might behoove those in the media, whose job it is to tell the truth about both politics and vaccine efficacy, to take a look in the mirror when it comes to why so many people don’t believe them. Institutional credibility is required to get people to do something like take a vaccine for a disease that does not kill the vast bulk of people who get it. When the institutions have destroyed their own credibility for years, it’s tough to turn it on like a light switch.” — Ben Shapiro, Editor Emeritus of The Daily Wire.
“In urban up-middle class life, any Black person/POC has at least a 50+% chance of getting any white person fired by simply saying: ‘He called me (X slur).’ I doubt this power is only used for good.” — American political scientist Wilfred Reilly, who is Black.
“At this point, the functional definition of “anti-vax” is the same as “grifter,” “white supremacist,” “contrarian,” “misogynist,” etc.: one who questions or defies liberal orthodoxy. That’s how it can apply to those who advocate vaccines. These are not so much words as weapons.” — Glenn Greenwald, after Rolling Stone smeared NBA star Jonathan Isaac for expressly saying he’s not against vaccines, and in fact supports them, but that as a fit 23-year-old who already had COVID, rejects being coerced into compliance against his own reasoned judgement.1
“The nice words you said about them, you should probably share with President Biden, not just with me today.” — CNN’s Jake Tapper in an interview with DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, after the latter had lavished praise on the Border Patrol, describing their “heroism,” and how he’s been “incredibly proud to work alongside them.” The Biden administration has publicly adopted the opposite stance after agents were falsely accused of “whipping” migrants. Biden himself has promised that “they’ll pay.”
“An earlier version... overstated what is known about the behavior of some Border Patrol agents on horseback. While the agents waved their reins while pushing migrants back into the Rio Grande, The Times has not seen conclusive evidence that migrants were struck with the reins.”2 — A “correction” added to an article by The New York Times that resulted in masses of hyperventilating, hyper-moralizing Democrats after the following was misreported: “The images of agents on horseback chasing, and in some cases using the reins of their horses to strike at running migrants...” The Times then stealth-edited the original article so that it now says “Images of Border Patrol agents on horseback waving their reins while pushing migrants back...”
“The scapegoating of rank-and-file agents will likely alienate a workforce that feels it was ordered to show force and then hung out to dry.” — The Atlantic, which called out the Biden administration for focusing on horseback patrols as a way to draw attention away from the larger issue: The administration has taken the legally dubious position of blocking most Haitian migrants from requesting asylum—and in this case, pushing them back onto the Mexican side of a dangerous river from which border agents often have to save people from drowning.
“While liberals — both inside and outside of academia — may derive some comfort from believing that left-wing authoritarianism doesn’t exist, that fiction ignores a significant source of instability and polarization in our politics and society.” — Salley Satel, a psychiatrist and visiting professor at the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University, detailing how for years psychologists have “wrongly assumed” that coercive attitudes exist only among conservatives.
“I’m sending a giant statue of the digit ‘2’ to Jeffrey B., along with a silver medal.” — Elon Musk, after becoming just the third person ever to amass a fortune worth $200 billion, supplanting (again) Amazon founder and rival space billionaire Jeff Bezos as richest person in the world.
“Yes, I know you’re vaccinated, you’re the smart ones.” — New York Governor Kathy Hochul (who replaced Andrew Cuomo). During a recent speech, Hocul announced that she was prepared to fire tens of thousands of health care workers who refused to take the COVID vaccine (in other words, presumably informed health care workers who have decided not to get vaccinated even if it means losing their jobs: 16% of all industry workers in the state), and intends to replace the disobedient health care workers with National Guard officers, many of whom have “lapsed” licenses or are just recently graduated. This is justified, she said, because those who have disobeyed her decree to get vaccinated are not just stupid but have turned their backs on God.
“Everyone criticized us for the punishments in the stadium, but we have never said anything about their laws and their punishments. No one will tell us what our laws should be. We will follow Islam and we will make our laws on the Quran.” — Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, one of the founders of the Taliban, referring to executions the Taliban once conducted in sports stadiums in Afghanistan. He said the Taliban will once again carry out executions and hand amputations as punishment, but perhaps not in public.
110: Number of people shot in Chicago last week (9/19 – 9/25), of whom 19 were killed.
44%: Percentage of unvaccinated people concerned about contracting COVID-19.
58%: Percentage of vaccinated people concerned about getting a “breakthrough case” of COVID-19.
$500,000: Fee that the University of Tennessee paid to cancel its Sept. 17, 2022 football game against Army. USA Today called the move “dishonorable and shameful,” and said that “Anyone who knows college football can fill in the blank to why Tennessee made this decision: The Vols believe they'll have an easier time with Akron than Army, a more competitive opponent that features a triple-option offense that’s tough to endure, especially the week before the Florida game.” In the past two years, Army has taken both Oklahoma and Michigan to overtime.
8: Number of books, out of 10, long-listed for this year’s National Book Award for Nonfiction that are on race/racism (note the graphs I’ve included below).
29%: Percentage of Americans who say they’ve stopped associating with friends and/or family members because of their decision to not get vaccinated.
76%: Percentage of Democrats who think tech companies should take steps to restrict false info online, even if it limits freedom of info.
37%: Percentage of Republicans who feel the same way.
$5 - 5.5 Trillion: Actual cost of the Biden Administration’s infrastructure bill (touted as $3.5 trillion), according to The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. The Wall Street Journal editorial board calls the bill “one of the greatest fiscal cons in history,” one that uses “budget tricks” to disguise the true cost. Buried in the 2,465 pages are numerous billion-dollar grants to unnamed community organizations for vague purposes like promoting “community engagement,” providing “support and advice,” and “creating equitable civic infrastructure.”
18: Date, in October, on which the United States will reach its debt ceiling if Congress does not act immediately to change the trajectory, according to U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
38%: Percentage of Americans who think President Biden is a “very weak” leader (17% think “very strong”).
87%: Percentage of the incoming Harvard class of 2025 who voted for Joe Biden.
6.7%: Percentage of the incoming Harvard class of 2025 who voted for Howie Hawkins (Green Party).
6.3%: Percentage of the incoming Harvard class of 2025 who voted for Donald Trump.3
I doubt that I’m alone in thinking it’s ridiculous to suggest that America suddenly became an overwhelmingly, irredeemably racist country toward the tail end of Obama’s (a Black man, twice democratically elected as president of the most powerful nation in world history) second term in office, which is clearly what the media — then, as now, a liberal hegemony — wanted, and still wants, us to believe because it coincides with Trump’s rise.
This is manufactured racism. And it’s designed to ensure enough voters see the U.S. as divided between the oppressed and the oppressors—a cynical political strategy without regard for the welfare of the country. America has never been less racist, and it’s never been easier to vote, but Democrats would still have you believe that Black people are no better off today than they were during the Jim Crow era.
As I’ve said before, Trump’s traction has absolutely nothing to do with racism and everything to do with a sense of deep frustration with watching the Left bulldoze the country via divisive identity politics and culture war BS.
Trump isn’t a racist, he’s an asshole. An impolite, egotistical braggadocio with an extreme penchant for lying whenever he feels like he no longer has the upper hand. But he’s not a racist. Nor are the 70,000,000+ people who voted for him. It’s nothing but reductive idiocy to claim otherwise, a refusal to either realize or admit that people are far more complicated and nuanced and cannot be reduced to simple blanket characterizations.
I have come to the conclusion that there is no more divisive, toxic, dangerous force in contemporary America than the corporate media.
Anatomy of a fake news story used for distraction: 1) Start with an easily misinterpreted photo that seemingly confirms the collective assumption of progressive opponents of immigration enforcement that the agents policing our southern border are cruel racists. 2) Incite a Twitter mob saying that the photo has captured a tableau of hideous abuse. 3) Add open-borders advocacy organizations and civil-rights groups denouncing the supposed misconduct in the harshest possible terms. 4) Top it all off with a vice president and White House press secretary who have no regard for the truth and are happy to push any narrative convenient to them.
If you can’t understand why the shocking lack of ideological diversity on the vast majority of college campuses in this country is very bad — and even dangerous — than you are part of the problem and should broaden your knowledge of basic human history.