“The Founders were not really super orthodox,” Charles Murray observed. “They were all nominally Christians, but they wouldn’t pass the litmus test for a lot of evangelicals today. But they were absolutely, emphatically agreed that you cannot have a free society with a constitution such as the one they had created unless you are trying to govern a religious people. If you do not have religion as the controlling force, then the kinds of laws we have could not possibly work.” Without religion, Murray told me, there was simply no “intrinsic motivation” for people to behave morally — and no definition for what constitutes moral behavior in the first place."
Q&A with Charles Murray: Religious Revival That Could Save America | National Review
So many areas of research and information are being damaged by the equity and/or proportionality myth. Every minor subdivision in archeology or biophysics or cytology or even librarianship must now have its search committees focusing on gender and color instead of number of research projects completed or published articles or work record.
Every time I pass a competitive sport event on TV (because I don't sit down to watch), I don't see anyone who looks like me, either on the field, on the bench or even in the stands. I think that's as it should be. And if it's football or basketball, if I didn't know better I would suspect that black men are 90% of the population. But, at least in professional sports, equality rules, not equity.
Thomas Sowell: "According to proportionality dogma, every group in society must be equally represented at work or school according to their percentages in society. If not so represented, the cause must be discriminatory bias and the only remedy is government action in the form of quotas, now passed off as “diversity.” Those who argue this way, Sowell explains, “cannot show us any society—anywhere in the world, or at any time during thousands of years of recorded history—that had all groups represented proportionally in all endeavors.” For example, Sowell cites the National Hockey League.
More NHL players are from Canada than the United States, and more players from Sweden than California, which has nearly four times the population. Therefore, Sowell says, “Californians are more ‘under-represented’ in the NHL than women are in Silicon Valley. But no one can claim that this is due to discriminatory bias by the NHL.” The discrepancies are “far more obviously due to people growing up in cold climates being more likely to have ice-skating experience.”
My favorite senator, Joe Manchin (D) WV, is the man of the hour. He is and has been a great guy for the residents of WV and the USA as a country. He does work across the aisle with ease. His thought process puts his party's issues way down the list of importance, way behind the people of WV and the citizens of the USA. We could have a no better person to be the senator in power that can swing issues for the betterment of our country. He rejects the $15 an hour minimum wage as he realizes this just costs thousands of jobs to disappear for those folks who need these jobs, particularly folks in WV. He realizes the destruction of the energy industry for the supposedly green energy program is not in the best interest of the country and its citizens while killing thousands of high pay jobs. The environmental results of the private sector, increased use of natural gas, and fracking have made huge improvements during the last 3 years in our environment like no other country.
As we move forward addressing our economy and the country's health, Senator Manchin's thoughts will be the dominate mind set. Even though you may not be a member of his party nor a citizen of his state, send him a note of encouragement. Circumstances place him in a position that directs the future of our country. We could not have chosen a better person.
William Lundholm
Florida
Manchin says he doesn't support raising minimum wage to $15 per hour (msn.com)
This really isn't funny, but it may be the funny answer. The question was, on a “health” website, Why is the HIV rate so high among young male Latinos (it's 21% when they are 16% of the population, which actually is a lot better than young black men whose HIV rate is 42% with 13% of the population). There were ten responses from Latinos (with photos): they ranged from immigration policies to no health information in Spanish to homophobia in the Latino community. Only one response mentioned having sex with other men as the reason, and he said, "Latinos are hot and we love sex."
Hugh Hewitt today has a good program on homelessness in California. It's not a new topic for him. Today he is suggesting that Conservatives should take this on as a cause. Liberals/progressives and Democrats/socialists have failed hugely, and are using the issue only to grab more money to solve a problem they really don't want to solve.
He says it is both a humanitarian issue and a property issue. The homeless were better off in the old days (pre-War on Poverty) when there were institutions to house, feed, and care for them rather than allowing them to live on the streets and destroy businesses and homes. Considering how the Left has revealed its hatred for private property, especially in various Marxist groups like BLM, their willingness to let this fester makes some sense.
The Left will always make homelessness an income issue, or a racial issue, and until a transwoman can't get into a women's shelter in San Francisco or Seattle, or the official count once a year, you won't even hear about it. Are they dying of Covid? Haven't heard much about that, but considering the living conditions and the co-morbidities of alcoholism and drug abuse, I would think so. It will look great on those requests for funding to hire more people at comfortable salaries for the non-profits and expanding government agencies.
https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=1928898523917429&ref=watch_permalink begin at about 1 hour with Byron York discussing the failures in California
"Codifying Constitutional Norms" based on what a liberal thinks was President Trump's bad behavior doesn't sound like a good idea to me. Will they codify Biden's bad behavior in China and Ukraine with his family's help? Of course not. Only those presidents who are a threat to Democrats or the deep state. Getting cozy with China doesn't seem to be threatening them.
Gould, Jonathan, Codifying Constitutional Norms (January 19, 2021). Georgetown Law Journal, Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3769465 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3769465
Statements on gender identification and underrepresented voices don't live up to their promises. My comment at a federal agency, "Contact Us" page.
I was reading your IED statement: "“RESOLVE is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in its operations and products. We welcome and actively seek contributions from all backgrounds, ethnicities, races, gender identifications, and areas of expertise to build a fair, balanced, inclusive, and representative knowledge base on violent extremism and beyond. RESOLVE strives to elevate the work of diverse and underrepresented voices through inclusiveness in its membership, contracting and hiring practices, research conceptualization, literature reviews and publications, and capacity building activities.”RESOLVE used to be primarily focused on violent extremism, particularly Islamic. Now through its subgroup, Racially and Ethnically Motivated Extremism (REMVE), it is focusing on so called "white supremacists." As the Biden administration defines them-anyone who supported Trump (not in the REMVE mission statement, but the media has explained that to us for 4 years).
Just as freely elected Adolf Hitler used the burning of the Reichstag in early 1933 as an excuse to become a dictator, the Democrats are using the attack on the Capitol building. They see it as their opportunity to label all of us who either supported Trump (black, white, Asian, Hispanic), or who believe our election rules need to be examined in light of the pandemic induced mailed ballot fiasco, as dangerous. They know better, but it sells well, (so did Hitler's excuse) and it is being used to shut us down on social media. Democrats now in control of 3 branches are joining forces with the oligarchs in Big Tech. They are the ones, not the Trump supporters, who are in dangerous territory, as history shows. Free markets, no new wars, prison reforms, and lower taxes do not define a leader of a free society as a fascist or racist. But stomping on free speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of assembly does. An impeachment with no evidence and no trial certainly does. Racially and Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremism (REMVE) (resolvenet.org)
There are white supremacists, I'm sure, just as there are black power advocates, BLM members, Antifa disruptors and anarchists. But I'd like to see something about how they are funded compared to the billions that BLM has raked in since the Floyd death in Minneapolis and the burning and looting of Democrat controlled cities the past 8 months. They are a miniscule group, and they haven't caused the spike in murders and property crime that the anarchists on the Left have caused. We know the FBI has infiltrated them, that's their job, but where were they on January 6? Creating the problem?
Using ethnicity or religion as an excuse to tamp down legitimate protests is an old, old, trick of tribal leaders, Czars, monarchists, totalitarians, and apparently American presidents.
RESOLVE is not a U.S. government agency, it's an international dot net organization supported by our taxes that is used as a revolving door for various academics and politicians from a variety of nations. It is attached to the much older USIP established in 1984. "RESOLVE is housed at the U.S. Institute of Peace, building upon the Institute’s decades-long legacy of deep engagement in conflict-affected societies." Although I've never made a study of the various peace/conflict resolution non-profits, I suspect we've never had as many wars since these entities sprang up after WWI and WWII. It does "research."
If you have the time, you can click on all the logos (I hate that instead of an easy to read list) of international organizations connected to this 501-C-3, the advisory board, and research council. I'd need some other FBF to work through all them. It's just one "tiny" group now shifting focus to U.S. citizens they don't like and fear.
Racially and Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremism (REMVE) (resolvenet.org)
The obligatory inclusive statement:
“RESOLVE is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in its operations and products. We welcome and actively seek contributions from all backgrounds, ethnicities, races, gender identifications, and areas of expertise to build a fair, balanced, inclusive, and representative knowledge base on violent extremism and beyond. RESOLVE strives to elevate the work of diverse and underrepresented voices through inclusiveness in its membership, contracting and hiring practices, research conceptualization, literature reviews and publications, and capacity building activities.”
I’ll just bet they don’t want my contribution, background, ethnicity, or age—which is not part of this IED statement.
TRUMP’S REELECTION BID:
As Joe Biden himself declared, in a colossal political gaffe: “We have put together, I think, the most extensive and inclusive voter fraud organization in the history of American politics.”
And they did just that.
In 2016, with a 55.7% voter turnout, Trump managed to defeat Clinton with 46.1% of the popular vote (62,984,828) to her 48.2% (65,853,514), but amazingly he managed to win 304 electoral votes to Clinton’s 227.
In 2020, with a 66.7% voter turnout, Biden defeated Trump with 51.3% of the popular vote (81,268,757) compared to Trump’s 46.9% (74,216,722), for 306 electoral votes over Trump’s 232. (Libertarian Party candidate Jo Jorgensen received 1.2% (1,865,873).)
Not since Herbert Hoover lost to Franklin Roosevelt in 1933 has a Republican presidential loss left the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives under Democrat control.
A New York second after the election results were in, Trump protested: “This election was stolen. It was a rigged election, 100 percent, and everyone knows it. It’s going to be that I got about 74 million votes, and I lost? It’s not possible.”
As I noted previously, Trump inspired seven million more Democrat votes than he was able to garner for himself. He energized his opponents, though I should note that in key swing states the numbers were very close.
Fact is, Trump was not wrong about the election being rigged, but his claim about voting-machine irregularities was not how the Democrat Party rigged it. As it turns out, voter fraud was the Demos’ final coup against Trump. But the fraud was perpetrated by way of what I outlined in “The Left’s Bulk-Mail Ballot Fraud Strategy.” The Democrats beat Trump on the ground with their bulk-registration and bulk-mail balloting strategy, including the receipt of millions of votes that were undocumented by any reasonable standard of identification. It worked, and it will work in future elections if it goes unchecked.
Prior to the November election defeat of Trump along with otherwise mixed results, I declared that the Democrat bulk-mail balloting and ballot harvesting programs opened the election to massive fraud. There is no way to adequately verify the identification of those receiving or returning bulk-mail ballots. There is no way to authenticate ballot signatures, which requires a substantial level of expertise.
Recall that the Democrats made reference to the “red mirage” ahead of the November election, noting that initially it would look like Trump had won in some states but that would change when the bulk-mail ballot totals were calculated. That’s exactly what happened.
To fully comprehend the Demos’ fraudulent bulk-mail strategy, consider the following voter regulations as proposed by Nancy Pelosi in House Resolution, the grossly misnamed “For the People Act of 2021.” It is an effort to pass the same HR 1 bill that failed in 2019 — except now there is no Senate majority gauntlet to reject this effort to establish a Democrat majority in perpetuity.
Pelosi’s HR 1 stipulates that the federal government will, contrary to our Constitution, have the power to set universal regulations regarding voter-identity requirements, in order to implement universal bulk-mail balloting. HR 1 asserts: “A state may not require an individual to provide any form of identification as a condition of obtaining an absentee ballot. … A state(s) may not require notarization or a witness signature or other formal authentication (other than voter attestation) as a condition of obtaining or casting an absentee ballot.”
That should alarm every American dedicated to the future of American Liberty.
Despite Joe Biden’s “unity” theme, the Democrat agenda is anything but.
TRUMP IMPEACHMENT CHARADE 2.0:
Unfortunately, given the elevated rhetoric about election fraud, on January 6th, a fractional faction of thugs undermined Trump’s entire legacy and MAGA movement by rioting in our nation’s Capitol building. These badly misguided jackasses were not “Patriots”; they were adherents of a personality cult, which is inevitably and irrevocably antithetical to Liberty. As I have written previously, I hope Trump’s “election fraud” protests and the DC riot don’t overshadow the legitimate concerns about election fraud — but Democrats and their Leftmedia are doing everything possible to ensure that disgraceful event defines Trump and all who have supported his policies.
To that end, the House and Senate are now undertaking another impeachment charade to spit shame and embarrassment on conservatives, particularly those in Congress whose seats will be contested in 2022. This absurd political theater, the unconstitutional trial of a former president, is scheduled for the week of February 8, but Demos will drag out this theatrical farce as long as possible before citizen Trump will be acquitted.
Signaling the asininity of this charade, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, in what competes with the latest Biden gaffes, declared, “Senators will have to decide if Donald John Trump incited the erection.” (Make up your own joke here…)
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts has already removed himself from presiding over this political pretense, which now falls to president pro tempore of the Senate, Patrick Leahy, (D-VT). Leahy administered the oath to Senate “jurors” earlier Monday: “Do you solemnly swear that in all things appertaining to the trial of Donald John Trump, former president of the United States, now pending, you will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and the laws, so help you God?” Anyone repeating those words who does not object to this proceeding is violation of that oath.
And to bolster their impeachment theatrics (which any seasoned security analyst will tell you invites trouble), Washington is still occupied by armed battalions of National Guard troops and armored vehicles manning barricades topped with concertina wire. Additionally, DHS has issued a national terrorism alert to extend the theatrics nationwide! Meanwhile, leftists continue their urban attacks and assaults on police officers at unprecedented rates.
MOVING FORWARD — OUR MISSION:
The Biden/Harris regime declared before the election: “This election is a ‘BATTLE for the SOUL of the NATION.” Post election, it is now a BATTLE for the FUTURE of AMERICAN LIBERTY.
I hope Trump will put whatever voice he has moving forward behind the most capable congressional candidates ahead of the 2022 midterm election — that he will do nothing to further foment division. Fortunately he has indicated that he does not support, and in fact rejects, the defeatist notion of a third party. And, according to his post-presidential advisory team, Trump’s goal “is to win back the House and Senate for Republicans in 2022.”
Despite all the handwringing about political divisions on the Right, that split is over support for Trump the personality. There is no split over support for the Trump administration’s considerable policy successes. As Biden disables those policies with a flash flood of executive orders, and his fellow socialist Democrats reverse policies with legislation, that will have the net effect of further unifying conservatives going into the 2022 midterms.. . “
Mark Alexander, Patriot Post, January 27, 2021 And I’m posting this because sometimes links are delete.
Any conservative that praises Trump always qualifies his words with comments about his character. Matching Joe Biden's abortion plans for American babies against Trump's plans to allow them to live and prosper for me is hardly a character match. Trump always wins.
Mark Alexander, January 27, 2021, Patriot Post:
“What follows is a compilation of observations and references regarding the election, administration, and unfortunately the defeat of Donald J. Trump after one tumultuous term as president by the corrupt socialist Democrat Party regime.
Astoundingly, Trump was displaced by a dullard baked potato, Joe Biden, who has accomplished virtually nothing to make America a better place for those he ostensibly has represented over the course of his almost five decades as a Beltway politician. But as I have argued, the Biden ticket is actually headed by the leftist who will soon replace him, Kamala Harris.
I have divided my observations into several categories in order to be as concise as possible about Trump’s four years as president.
TRUMP THE CANDIDATE:
A quick review of my early columns about primary candidate Donald Trump reveals that my greatest concern was that of his character — it was not comparable in the least to George Washington or Ronald Reagan. Full disclosure: I was firmly in the Ted Cruz camp, with Marco Rubio as a running mate.
Soon after Trump became the Republican nominee in 2016, I contacted a longtime friend who had security responsibilities for Trump and his family, and I asked him what I needed to know about his boss. He said that Trump’s personal interactions with people, be they friends or his employees, are totally different from his public persona — that there was a deep shared respect and loyalty among those who knew him best.
Ahead of the election, I wrote about why I was voting for Trump — as if I would’ve ever considered an ounce of support for Hillary Clinton. I responded to inquiries from conservatives that I was confident that Mike Pence, whom I first met decades earlier, would not have joined Trump’s ticket if he were not confident that Trump would take the country in the right direction. And I was totally confident that Trump would follow through on his commitment to nominate constructionist jurists to the Supreme Court.
Within a month of Trump’s shocking Electoral College victory over Clinton, it became clear that his administration was shaping up to be the most conservative and consequential in decades, what I called a “Reagan revival.” But even so, I still had concern about his “New York values” and wondered whether his presidency would be hamstrung by his brash bravado.
But we praised his administration’s policies, if not his character, from day one. Ironically, in the years that followed, we regularly and simultaneously took fire from those claiming we were either “too pro-Trump” or “too anti-Trump.” I guess that’s indicative of being devoted, first and foremost, to American Liberty above any politician or party affiliation.
TRUMP THE PRESIDENT:
Perhaps Trump’s most obvious leadership “style” was that he was a bomb dropper. As I wrote shortly after he took office in 2017: “The day he arrived in DC, he dropped a bomb on the status quo in Congress and its special interests. He dropped a bomb on the regulatory behemoths and their bureaucratic bottlenecks. He dropped a bomb on the trade and national security institutions and alliances that failed miserably over the previous eight years. And he dropped a bomb on all the pundits and mainstream media outlets.”
The net results of Trump’s take-no-prisoners style is that he left office with an extraordinary list of accomplishments eclipsing those of any president since Reagan.
TRUMP THE TARGET:
No president has ever been more relentlessly assailed by the enemies of Liberty than Donald Trump. The deep-state coup against Trump was not broad but it was certainly deep.
Orchestrated by his predecessor, Barack Obama, whose fingerprints are all over the coup crime scene, in collusion with Hillary Clinton and her co-conspirators who fabricated the “Russian Collusion” charade, the effort to undermine the Trump administration from within was staggering in its callous defiance of the law.
While the cutouts in this operation have been exposed, it is former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan who should be indicted for their roles in setting up the fake FISA warrants that seeded the entire conspiracy.
I’ve taken some shots in regard to my consistent use of “deep state” and “coup,” but the fact is this was a deep-state coup, as the most recent evidence about the origins of Crossfire Hurricane, the early layup for taking down Trump, reveals.
When Robert Mueller’s investigation fell flat, it led to Coup d'État 2.0, the phony effort to impeach President Trump for what Joe Biden actually did in Ukraine. Of course, that effort also failed.
Of course, the Demos’ agenda received 24/7/365 assistance from their Leftmedia propagandists and their Big Tech silencers. Mainstream and social media platforms are the primary propagators of “fake news,” such adulteration being the “true enemy of the people.” And with Biden/Harris in office, now herds of so-called “journalists” are promoting the suppression of free speech, when it is speech that does not comport with their political or social views.
As I have often pondered, consider what the American political landscape would look like if the mainstream and social media platforms were actually politically neutral, or if they actually affirmed the First Amendment.
TRUMP THE MISCOMMUNICATOR:
(Warning: If you are among the small number of Trump supporters who are not capable of reading well-reasoned criticism without emotionally decompensating, skip this section…)
President Ronald Reagan was described by friend and foe as “the great communicator.” However, he disclaimed that attribute, saying in typical humility, “I wasn’t a great communicator, but I communicated great things, and they didn’t spring full bloom from my brow, they came from the heart of a great nation – from our experience, our wisdom and our belief in the principles that have guided us for two centuries.”
Unfortunately Donald Trump was unable to comprehend or exhibit an ounce of the humility which earned President Reagan the great communicator accolade.
Trump’s communications proliferated an unmitigated arrogance never before witnessed in a president. He made all things politically divisive all the time, and he was omnipresent — he never gave his social media accounts a much-needed rest. The Democrats and Leftmedia had Trump’s number; they knew how to trigger him, and they mastered it.
Soon after his inauguration, seeing the communication catastrophe around the bend, I wrote, “Memo to POTUS: Stop Swapping Stupid With Jackasses.” The point was that Trump’s endless cycle of inane insults was a significant obstacle to his agenda, and he can be his own worst enemy and was engendering a meteoric rise in those who hated him.
It was as if he thrived on the “Trump Derangement Syndrome” his social media posts triggered. But the result would ultimately prove to be his most prominent “Achilles Heel.”
While many of his supporters rightly reveled in his blistering attacks against Democrats and Leftmedia talkingheads, too often Trump’s relentless attacks drifted into fratricide, which served only to undermine his leadership. He would have benefited from a broader application of President Reagan’s wise counsel — his “Eleventh Commandment” against fratricidal attacks: “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”
The brashness and brawn that made President Trump an effective bomb dropper dominated his social media bombs and fomented enormous division and hate. With a modicum of self-restraint, he could have gained much more ground with a broader constituency, while still keeping his base fired up. But he never exercised restraint.
As for Trump’s relentless and unmitigated self-aggrandizement, I’m reminded of Aslan’s wise advice to Prince Caspian in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia: “If you had felt yourself sufficient, it would have been proof that you were not.”
But what hurt Trump most was his erratic communications during the course of the ChiCom Virus pandemic this past year. In April I warned, “Mr. President, Don’t Be the Poster Child for CV19 Misery,” but his self-destruction was evident, and the corrupt mainstream media was only too happy to oblige. The media helped Demos hang COVID-19 around Trump’s neck like an albatross.
To that end, a wise friend and a very astute political observer, Cal Thomas, offered this observation: “Last August, Trump was questioned at a White House press briefing about polls showing his popularity was declining. Asked to explain, he responded, ‘Nobody likes me. It can only be my personality. That’s all.’ It was a rare moment of transparency for him.”
Cal continued: “There is still a remnant of old-fashioned values my grandparents’ generation embraced and tried to instill in their descendants. One was not to belittle, demean, talk down to, or call other people names. Trump has consistently ignored that advice. While a large number of Americans still support him and the number who voted for him far outpaced any other Republican presidential candidate, or incumbent president, it wasn’t enough. The reason can only be his personality. Most Americans expect a certain amount of dignity emanating from one who temporarily holds our highest office. Could Trump have achieved all he has without the name-calling? I think so.”
Rarely do I agree with WaPo political analyst Charles Lane, but I agree with every word of this recent assessment: “I was just reminded by how much more his celebrators might have to celebrate if the president had managed to modulate his behavior and behave decently, and speak in a civil tongue even in the face of a lot of criticism — much of which was, inevitably, unfair. He might have been reelected if he had been able to manage his impulses and personality. … Those who are disappointed that he has been defeated ought to consider how much he has been his own worst enemy over the last four years.
If then-President Trump could have mastered a degree of consistency and humility in his ubiquitous communications, I believe he would be in his second presidential term. It was Donald Trump’s election to lose, and he did. He did not lose because of something he did this year, but because of what he did not do over the last four years: listen to wise voices about moderating his caustic and chaotic communications. He would not have lost a single core voter over that moderation, but he did manage to incite a massive groundswell of opposition that cost him — and all of us who have backed him over the last four years — the continuation of his administration’s policies, which have in virtually every area served our whole nation well.
Elections are almost all about personality, 90% the person and 10% the policy. Trump did not understand that his efforts to rally supporters rallied far more adversaries.
Our book club (on Zoom these days) will be discussing "The Candy Bombers" by Andrei Cherny this Monday. It's an absorbing book, and the author is a beautiful, graceful writer and consummate researcher. At first I thought I'd found someone who knew the similarities between Fascism and Communism--the flip sides of the same pancake, but after reading his bio (he's a Democrat and progressive with time in the Obama administration) he seems to be unaware of the dangerous path we're going down. Perhaps because this was published 12 years ago. He's the son of Czech immigrants.
It's frustrating that today's totalitarian Democrats keep referring to President Trump as a fascist, but perhaps they are just the CNN muddle brained social media arm chair historians, since Trump fits none of the check marks for a fascist. Our newest president who seems to be a stand-in for Barack Obama's third term is locked arm in arm with Big Tech--a much better fit the classic definition.
That said, I do remember the airlift that saved Berlin, and America's finest hour, as the subtitle claims. That's how we learned it in school. We were the good guys. I even remember some of the post WWII review Cherny provides and a few of the names who figure in this story, like Lucien Clay and James Forrestal. But I can't imagine how I remember. I was only 6 when the war ended, I didn't go to movies that much in the late 1940s that I would have seen news reels, and my family didn't have a TV. Perhaps we did read about it in American history classes as seniors, about a decade later. In any case, reading about what happened between the closing of the war and the beginning of the airlift in this book can certainly leave a bad taste in the mouth. Americans, and the other victors, were certainly not behaving in "the finest hour" image I learned in school. Germans were starving and dying of malnutrition while the victors were doing little about it, fulfilling Roosevelt's idea that they needed to be punished more severely than what happened after WWI in order to "learn a lesson."
Harry Truman has always been one of my favorite presidents, perhaps because he's the first one I remember. On p. 183 the author describes March 1948 after the Communists seized control in Prague. Truman was in the Florida Keys, and of course, the press was being critical for his being on vacation. Cherny notes a letter he wrote to his daughter, Margaret (another president who confided in his daughter), that "the situation was just like when Britain and France were faced with in 1938-9 with Hitler. A totalitarian state is no different whether you call it Nazi, Fascist, Communist or Franco Spain."
He wrote: "A decision will have to be made. I am going to make it. I am sorry to have bored you with tis. But you've studied foreign affairs to some extent and I just wanted you to know your Dad as President asked for no territory, no reparations, no slave laborers--only peace in the world. We may have to fight for it. The oligarchy in Russia is no different from the Czars, Louis XIV, Napoleon, Charles I and Cromwell. It is a Frankenstein dictatorship worse than any of the others. Hitler included. "
And that's what we're slipping into with the Biden administration. A sycophant media. Hold overs from the Obama administration who've been strategizing for 4 years to take us back to being government dependents. An oligarchy composed of powerful Big Tech companies who are closing down all expressions of conservative thought while the political parties seem helpless to control them.
Also, the inside negotiations and personality conflicts between many key players and the military and the politicians in DC which Cherny masterfully portrays are disturbing to read. I suppose that is common to every government with the petty disagreements, party loyalties, and idiosyncratic behaviors. I just haven't read that much and found it difficult.
There were 3 conventions that summer of 1948--the third was the "progressive" (Democrats) with Henry Wallace, who had been Roosevelt's v.p. in his 3rd term, but was pushed aside (thankfully) by conservatives in the Democrat party. I loved the description of the Progressives in 1948--nothing has changed:
"The delegates were young--the average age was 30 and many were in their teens. 3/4 of the delegates were new to politics (McGovern was 26). 2 out of 5 were labor union members . . . the mood was merry. Each day began with a sing-along of folk music. (Pete Seeger). . . at any moment during the proceedings, there would be numerous huddles on the convention floor forming around young men and women who had spontaneously begun strumming a guitar. . . The party platform called for an increase in the minimum wage, a strong action against racial discrimination, national health insurance, a Dept. of Peace, higher levels of farm supports, guaranteed pensions for older Americans. . ." p. 315
The U.S was already having problems with the Communist threat inside, and Wallace didn't have the slightest complaint about Soviet Communism, but found fault with the American government 's attempt to move against domestic communists. Any delegate at the progressive convention who wanted to slip a word into the platform that might be anti-Soviet, was shut down.
Yes, it does all sound very familiar.Written by a Keystone Pipeliner: (copied from Facebook)
Today is a heavy day. Its hard to believe something I love so much can be taken away by people that have no idea exactly how I make my living. They have no idea the pain and misery and sacrifice that comes with this job.
This job kept me from being a shit bag like alot of the lower class kids I grew up with. This job kept me off drugs and out of jail. This job moved me out of the slums. This job gave me a below average simple man that started with nothing but bad credit and a shitbox truck the ability to rise above alot of my peers. I didn't have to get a goverment loan that I can't pay back for an education I'll never use.
All I had to do is put in my time and give it my best. I worked hard to get where im at. Nothing is free or given on the ROW. You earn it. Every damn bit of it. You work 7-12s no matter the weather. You miss holidays, birthdays, ballgames and all the other things 9 to 5ers enjoy.
Yes the money's good. It's not about the money. It's the feeling you get when you and your buds are ringing wet covered in mud after a 16 hr shift doing a tie in.
It's knowing you belong to something so much bigger than yourself.
Mr President how dare you take that away from me. You a man that has done nothing but live of my tax dollars. How dare you sale all of us out. How dare you shut down whole communities and make us dependent on foriegn oil again.
How dare you take food from our familys mouths.
How dare you sir.
Joe Biden says America hasn't lived up to her promises. If he were talking about "life, liberty and pursuit of happiness," I'd agree with him. He's all for snuffing out lives full of potential before they get a chance to be born, and some after they are born. If he were talking about the percent of black babies who are aborted (more blacks aborted in 4 days than 80 years of lynching) I'd say yes. If he were talking about the miserable showing the "woke" graduates of our colleges and universities infecting the businesses that hire them, I could agree.
But he's not.
If he were talking about the failed politicians returning to positions of power and wealth for over 40 years, politicians like himself, I'd be cheering him on.
But he's not.
He's talking about blaming Trump and the 75,000,000 million Americans Biden's now trying to "cancel" so they can't get jobs in government, industry, academe, entertainment, or any other respectable activity. So if you believe America is great, the way Donald Trump did, with all kinds of possibilities and gifts for the world, if you think America First is a great slogan, the way millions did, get ready for your deprogramming.
Get ready for lectures and workshops and sermons on "anti-racism."
Get ready for self-hate and despising Western Civilization.
Get ready for the truly fascist system the Democrats are putting in place as government and big industry (Big Tech, oligarchies) work together to strip you of your freedom of speech and your freedom of religion while destroying your wealth.
Why not impeach LBJ? Look at all the bad stuff he did, and all the horrible, racist, nasty things he said. The young men he sent to Vietnam. The religious freedom he crushed leading to decades of law suits. The government programs he launched with the so-called War on Poverty that we not only lost, but have spent trillions of dollars lining the pockets of middle class bureaucrats.
Yes, he's no longer president, and yes, he's dead, but for vindictive, partisan, nasty politicians who can't read the Constitution, that should make no difference. They want to make sure he doesn't run again.
The so-called "anti-racism" movement doesn't mean what you think. It means you are a racist and you need to change. It's today's critical race theory, and that's not what you might have learned about critical theory if you were in college a few decades ago. But woke leaders get led astray by non-profits looking for grants and wealthy leaders of organizations pushing to divide our country. Saw this in the OSU news today:
"Chancellor and CEO Hal Paz, MD, shares the significance of the anti-racism movement within our health system and defines the difference between anti-racism vs. not racist. Developed by the ARAP Faculty and Staff Training and Development Action Group, Minute Matters is a monthly series of short videos highlighting an important topic or key term pertinent to the anti-racism movement."
At its root, it is anti-white, anti-America, anti-capitalism and anti-western civilization. You will never not be a racist. The micro charges will just get smaller and smaller and include some really big values.
Are you ready to give up on ‘objective, rational, linear thinking, “ “controlled emotions,” “the scientific method,” and “quantitative research” all defining characteristics of being a racist.
How about such values as “individual responsibility,” or “working hard for success,” or “plan for the future,” or “delayed gratification." You must be a racist.
Do you value “continual improvement and progress,” or "written tradition,” or "personal property ownership?” Oh my, you are such a racist.
Or maybe you think the “nuclear family is the best social unit” for raising the next generation, and God forbid, you believe in Jesus Christ (or any god). You just may be hopelessly mired in White Culture and will require deprogramming. If you voted for Trump, you could lose your job.
I haven't read Dr. Paz's message, and don't want to. He probably needs to save his job from a twitter mob. But if you really are curious about anti-racism, read this one. And if you are an OSU alumni, close your wallet and demand some accountability.
What anti-racism really means and how to talk about it - The Spectator - news, politics, life & arts
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