Archive for 2018

HERE’S YOUR OPEN THREAD: Enjoy!

SARAH HOYT: CNN is a Trump-hate-aholic and it’s Time for an Intervention.

Just think of CNN as Democratic operatives with bylines and it..nahh, they’re waaay too crazy for it to all make sense.

UPDATE: As appropriate for anything CNN-related, the link was initially an epic fail. It should be working now.

SO SHE’S ADMITTING THAT HER HUSBAND’S PRESIDENCY WAS NOTHING BUT A HISTORICAL PLACEHOLDER? Michelle Obama to frightened Americans: ‘All we have is hope.’

In 2008, Mrs. Obama infamously said, “For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback.”

During the Democratic Convention in July of 2016, she (or her speechwriter) flip-flopped and claimed, “Don’t let anyone ever tell you that this country isn’t great, that somehow we need to make it great again. Because this, right now, is the greatest country on earth.

I guess “right now” meant only when her husband or his designated successor is in the White House, a reminder of what a depressing and nihilistic view of America the Obamas hold. Why, oh why, do keep failing them?

LONGTIME INSTAPUNDIT READERS WILL REMEMBER that I enjoyed Richard Morgan’s Altered Carbon (Takeshi Kovacs) novels. Now there’s going to be a Netflix series. I’m worried about being disappointed, as so often happens when a book you like becomes a TV show, but I’m glad someone’s trying.

And I love how a series that’s about people’s minds being put in different bodies has produced social-justice-idiot complaints of “whitewashing.”

DISPATCHES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: Inside Edina’s attempt to turn their school into a social justice factory.

For decades, the public schools of Edina, Minnesota, were the gold standard among the state’s school districts. Edina is an upscale suburb of Minneapolis, but virtually overnight, its reputation has changed. Academic rigor is unraveling, high school reading and math test scores are sliding, and students increasingly fear bullying and persecution.

The shift began in 2013, when Edina school leaders adopted the “All for All” strategic plan—a sweeping initiative that reordered the district’s mission from academic excellence for all students to “racial equity.”

“Equity” in this context does not mean “equality” or “fairness.” It means racial identity politics—an ideology that blames minority students’ academic challenges on institutional racial bias, repudiates Martin Luther King, Jr.’s color-blind ideal, and focuses on uprooting “white privilege.”

What could go wrong?

RENT-A-DRIP: Experts question safety of ‘IV lounges.’ “People who go to an IV lounge are offered a variety of different intravenous fluids containing a blend of saline, vitamins and medicines targeted to their needs. For example, a hangover IV bag also typically contains anti-nausea medications.”

#JOURNALISM IN 2018:

TRUMP’S SOTU TRIUMPH, DEMOCRATS’ DEFEAT: “At 5,100 words, President Trump’s first State of the Union address was one of the longest on record. But that’s not the only reason Democrats were checking their watches. Trump set aside his bombastic communications style to solemnly deliver the most conservative SOTU since the Reagan era. And it put Dems in an awful pickle,” Jon Gabriel writes at Ricochet. “The modern Democratic Party believes that the American people belong to the government — and fervently wish the rabble won’t embarrass them so. We’ll find out in November which message is more attractive.”

Read the whole thing.

MICHAEL WALSH: In Trump, the Churlish Left Finally Meets Its Match.

As Trump’s approval ratings have risen in the wake of the stock-market rally, strong overall employment numbers, and the much-vilified tax cut, the Democrats’ pipe dream about a coming “blue wave” this fall looks increasingly like a California marijuana-induced notion. Just prior to delivering the speech, Trump had reversed Obama’s grandstanding, never-implemented executive order to close the American military prison at Guantanamo Bay. By the end of the day, the Democratic National Committee had ‘fessed up some disastrous fundraising numbers, revealing they have only $6.3 million cash on hand and are $6.1 million in debt.

And that’s just what happened yesterday.

Read the whole thing.