Archive for 2019

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Rich Libs in Silicon Valley to Host ‘Poverty Simulation’ — will be held in Cupertino, site of Apple headquarters.

The event will take place on Nov. 2 from 10 a.m. to noon at the Cupertino Senior Center. During the two-hour simulation, participants will “work to overcome barriers to social services, live off insufficient income, and encounter unforeseen economic obstacles along the way,” according to the City of Cupertino website.

The poverty simulation will be hosted by the city and two local nonprofits, West Valley Community Services and Step Up Silicon Valley. The latter group describes itself as a “social innovation network focused on reducing poverty.”

Cupertino, site of Apple headquarters, has a median household income of more than $150,000—well above the national median of $60,000. Users of the popular social-networking website Twitter, which is headquartered about an hour’s drive away in San Francisco, have noted the absurdity of rich, tech-industry liberals who have turned a once-great city into an unlivable hellscape in turn having little to offer in terms of actual solutions beyond a “simulation” designed to allow its rich, liberal attendees to publicly express their opposition to poverty. Good for them.

Curiously though, there seems to be little effort to roll back what Thomas Sowell dubbed “the housing price of liberalism” in the Bay Area. As Sowell writes, “Much as many liberals like to put guilt trips on other people, they seldom seek out, much less acknowledge and take responsibility for, the bad consequences of their own actions.”

UNRULY BRITANNIA: A fascinating article by British conservative (and ex-libertarian) philosopher John Gray on the state of British politics. Lots of read-across for here as well. I thought this summary of the left especially accurate:

The technologists of power are today’s true rationalists. That superior intelligence is found among the practitioners of populism is a fact of our time. When liberals talk about reason they mean a mishmash of ideas they picked up at university. Scraps of Rawls, Dworkin and Thomas Piketty, together with a smattering of modish conspiracy theories, form the folk wisdom of the thinking classes. Rationality means deferring to this ragbag of ephemera and ignoring enduring truths about the deciding forces in politics.

Supporters of Brexit will be particularly pleased by Gray’s analysis of the Remainer alliance, and by his conclusion that Brexit will happen.

CHRISTIAN TOTO: Bret Easton Ellis Pins ‘Trump Effect’ on Media’s ‘Joker’ Attacks.

Reporters warned for weeks that “Joker” would inspire real-world violence, coaxing an army of incels to rise up in fury. Media outlets puffed up microscopic incidents at movie screenings after that narrative collapsed.

Ellis sees through their charade.

“It’s a kind of puffed-up moral superiority and a shocking hypocrisy,” Ellis said about the media’s “Joker” coverage. He compared it to the way reporters share news about all things President Trump.

It’s one sided, inaccurate and hyberbolic.

But it generates pageviews and pushes the preferred narrative, so facts and reason be damned.

ADVICE ON WRITING SCIENTIFIC PAPERS FROM CORMAC MCCARTHY. Wait, what? Yep, that’s a thing: “For the past two decades, Cormac McCarthy — whose ten novels include The Road, No Country for Old Men and Blood Meridian — has provided extensive editing to numerous faculty members and postdocs at the Santa Fe Institute (SFI) in New Mexico.”

GOING… GOING… Turkey May Go the Way of Venezuela.

Mr. Erdogan wrongly assumes that the cunning and aggression that brought him political success internally will also work internationally. This explains his unleashing thugs on the streets of Washington, abducting Turkish citizens accused of coup plotting from multiple countries, attempting to smuggle dual-use materials to Gaza, illegally drilling for natural gas in Cypriot waters, and shooting down a Russian jet fighter, among other bellicose actions.

Mr. Erdogan’s foreign-policy ineptitude has alienated other governments. Europeans seethe when he threatens to send 3.6 million displaced Syrians their way. Israelis despise him for a vitriolic anti-Zionism that compares them to Nazis. Egypt’s president hates Mr. Erdogan’s backing of the Muslim Brotherhood. Mr. Erdogan’s abject apologies haven’t compensated for shooting down the Russian jet. China hasn’t forgotten Mr. Erdogan’s accusing it of genocide against the Uighurs, despite his silence now.

When the candidate from Mr. Erdogan’s AKP party twice lost the Istanbul mayor’s race this year, most analysts saw this as a “political earthquake” and a “stunning blow” to Mr. Erdogan, but he remains as dominant and dangerous as ever. A ruthless ideologue, his continued rule could bring to Turkey the political repression, economic collapse, hunger and mass emigration that plague Nicolás Maduro’s Venezuela.

There’s a lot of ruin in a nation, true, but Erdogan has been at it for a long time.

FLORIDA MAN FRIDAY: Molesting Olaf Doll Is Right on Target. “This week’s adventures include a bikini-clad vape thief, insane tractor violence, and what not to do with your extra bees.”

THIS IS CNN: Jeff Zucker And Brian Stelter Beclown Themselves At CNN Event.

Zucker said of his network’s competitor that it is not a news organization, it is state-run TV. He also that it is conspiracy TV that is doing a disservice to the country. He scolded Stelter for daring to suggest that even some of what Fox News presents is actual news. Mind you, this is the same guy who booked two dozen speakers for this event and couldn’t manage to find one Trump supporter who isn’t in the administration. So, I guess while not state TV, CNN is just Democratic Party TV.

Asked what he thought was the biggest thing CNN does wrong, Zucker had no answer. When Stelter provided one, namely that they use the term “Breaking News,” too often, he begrudgingly agreed, but basically sloughed it off as something everyone does. That is how blameless he envisions the product he creates. The panel finished with Zucker explaining how important it is to the world that CNN be strong.

One question that Stelter — CNN’s media critic, mind you — did not ask the guy who signs his paycheck is what if anything he knew about the accusations of sexual assault among NBC employees while Zucker was a top executive there. That seemed kind of an odd thing for Stelter to leave out, given that he had a reliable source on the story right next to him. But, whatever, right?

By the end of the half hour, I can honestly say I had experienced the smarmiest, most self-congratulatory, dishonest, and squirm-inducing discussion I have ever had the displeasure of witnessing in person. It was like watching Bill Clinton and Stormy Daniels discuss their unyielding dedication to chastity.

Heh, indeed. Read the whole thing.™

Related: You Think CNN is Bad? CNN-International Might be Worse!

Those Americans who’ve been overseas over the past couple of years know full well that about which I’m talking. Those who’ve not need to realize the CNN-I is carried in many if not most hotels around the world and is considered by a lot of people to be the “window into” the US. (Not by me!) You cannot believe what a HORRIBLY distorted picture is presented of America and of American policies by CNN-I! What CNN is doing in America in their all-out attack on President Trump and in the process to destroy America is mirrored in their international programming, which has changed drastically in the past 3 years from eclectic international coverage (like BBC or Al Jazeera) to 24/7 shrill anti-Trump pure outrageous propaganda. Even CNN founder Ted Turner has complained in the past about the radical incompetent hateful propaganda monster that CNN has become.

The late Roger Ailes had CNN-I’s number 15 years ago:

MOLLIE HEMINGWAY: GOP Has A Choice: Fight Anti-Trump Coup Effort Or Surrender Government To Democrats.

Some Republicans can be counted on to sit there and take it. This approach entails allowing Democrats to hold secret hearings where they handpick snippets to leak to a compliant media in service of setting a narrative. After the leaks are published by the compliant corporate press, these Republicans can impotently push back on some of it.

The other approach is to learn something from the previous few years. Trump’s surprising election was followed by attempts to delegitimize the Republican victory in 2016 by claiming it was due to “fake news,” desperate efforts to overturn the Electoral College, anti-Trump riots in Portland and D.C., the Clinton-directed claims that Russia “hacked” the election, the Russia collusion conspiracy theory, the release of the completely ridiculous dossier alleging that Trump was a Russian agent, the whisper campaign that the truth of Trump’s collusion was so bad that he might not be inaugurated. Yes, all this was before the inauguration.

Do yourself a favor and read the whole thing.

NOTHING TO SEE HERE. MOVE ALONG. Clinton ally Blumenthal sought to stop publication of Russia probe book.

A source familiar with the matter told Fox News that Blumenthal claimed the book – “The Plot Against the President: The True Story of How Congressman Devin Nunes Uncovered the Biggest Political Scandal in U.S. History,” by Lee Smith – was defamatory.

“Blumenthal tried to stop it from being published,” the source told Fox News, saying the Hillary Clinton confidant sent threatening letters to Smith and publisher Center Street, a division of Hachette Book Group.

Fox News reached out to Blumenthal, who did not immediately respond.

The book, which is scheduled for release Oct. 29, includes allegations about the origin of the Russia probe and the involvement of Democratic operatives with the unverified anti-Trump dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele. The source said that the publisher’s legal team found Blumenthal’s legal claim “meritless,” and they intend to release the book as planned.

I just pre-ordered a copy.

YOUR DAILY TREACHER: Kathy Griffin Thinks Old White Men Are Conspiring to Ruin Her Career.

This might be the only time she’s ever made me laugh. Unfortunately for her, she’s being serious.

So there’s a conspiracy of old white men keeping Kathy Griffin from working. That’s one theory. Another theory — and I know this might sound crazy — is that Kathy Griffin isn’t funny anymore, if she ever was. Maybe she was barely tolerable even before that whole mess, and ever since, she’s just become a bitter old crank. Perhaps she’s a deeply unpleasant narcissist who finally wore out her welcome, and most people have moved on.

Just a theory!

That’s pretty far out on a limb, but read the whole thing anyhow.

ROGER SIMON: Durham Investigation Going Criminal a Disaster for the MSM.

To those of us who have been watching this spectacle from the beginning, this was inevitable.  After all, where’d the Mueller/Russia probe come from in the first place?  Since there was absolutely no there there, it makes no sense that it wasn’t a fraud from the outset.  Who started it? Who are the treasonous/seditious culprits who conspired to overthrow an election? Well, we should soon be finding out, although we can make some educated guesses.

But we do know absolutely who collaborated in the crime, who were the accessories to and in some cases the instigators of this most heinous plot in American history….

… the mainstream media!

They were the more than willing conduits to lies leaked to them by a long list of truly dishonest, unpatriotic Americans — some inside our intelligence agencies and no doubt some foreigners as well.

Needless to say, read the whole thing.

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:

Shot:

When contacted by THR, a representative for Weinstein said, “Harvey Weinstein was out with friends enjoying the music and trying to find some solace in his life that has been turned upside down. This scene was uncalled for, downright rude and an example of how due process today is being squashed by the public, trying to take it away in the courtroom too.”

—“Women Confront Harvey Weinstein at Actors Event, Asked to ‘Shut Up’ and Leave,” the Hollywood Reporter, yesterday.

Chaser:

“You know what? It’s good that I’m the fucking sheriff of this fucking lawless piece-of-shit town.” Weinstein said that to Andrew Goldman, then a reporter for the New York Observer, when he took him out of a party in a headlock last November [circa 2001] after there was a tussle for Goldman’s tape recorder and someone got knocked in the head.

—As quoted in “Nasty, Brutish, and Fat: Of Hobbes and Harvey Weinstein,” John Podhoretz, Commentary, October 2017.