FLASHBACK: “Our ancestors seemed better about coming-together and forgiveness than we are, but then, they understood the costs of not doing so much better than we do. May that last, at least, remain true.”
Archive for 2020
May 28, 2020
TO BE FAIR, HE’S A DEMOCRAT AND THEIR EXPERTISE IS WRECKING ECONOMIES, NOT FIXING THEM: De Blasio’s cluelessness on reopening NYC is ultimate failure of crisis leadership.
Hospitalizations are down 90 percent from their COVID peak. The rest of the state is open or set to open — and a million city residents have filed for unemployment.
It’s been clear for weeks that the city needs to start reopening as soon as possible — and that the day was getting ever closer. Yet Team de Blasio is still figuring out the basics of how to do it — with no clue on key issues such as the subway.
He also insultingly claims that small businesses can “hang on” just fine.
Meanwhile, de Blasio has been busy setting up advisory panels — including a racial-inequality panel led by his wife — and spending millions on consultants who plainly haven’t helped resolve anything.
Wouldn’t it make sense to worry about a “chief diversity officer” after you ensure that the city can function?
New York has suffered through de Blasio’s for 6 ¹/₂ years, but its underlying strengths allowed it to pull through. But now the city has to rely on his “leadership” amid a crisis of the first order — and so is facing utter disaster. We are, unfortunately, learning the true price of an inept leader.
Well, he’s what New Yorkers voted for, and now they’re getting it good and hard.
DISTURBING THOUGHTS FROM A FRIEND ON FACEBOOK: “At this point China may be like Wilhelmine Germany in 1914 after the mobilization orders went out. The Plans are being executed. To stop before a predetermined victory condition, such as the surrender of Taiwan, risks the collapse of the military and the economy and the destruction of the regime.”
This is disturbing, but I think it’s different: I think China is stirring up trouble on its borders to keep its neighbors off-balance and its military busy, because things are worse in China than they’re letting us realize.
SELECTIVE MERCY: No Clean Slate for Karens! Progressives demand a second chance for perpetrators of violent crimes, but they consider one unwoke comment to be unforgivable.
OPEN THREAD: Take the worst of this quirky world, roll it up in a ball.
FOX NEWS PANEL EPICALLY MOCKS EX-DNC CHAIR DONNA BRAZILE AFTER SHE CLAIMS ‘THERE’S NO FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHT TO LIE.’ “‘I can say I’m 6 feet tall. Are you going to have me arrested?’ Gutfeld responded. ‘What would happen to politicians, Donna? If you couldn’t lie, you’d have no politics.’”
MINNEAPOLIS POLICE KILLED GEORGE FLOYD, THEN FAILED TO PROTECT PROPERTY OWNERS FROM RIOTS. “Police departments exist, at least on paper, in order to protect people’s rights and people’s property. Over the past couple of days, police in Minneapolis have proven unable to do either.”
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): From the comments in the Open Thread:
Police kill man over 8 minutes on a public street.
Police retreat to their precinct and shoot into crowd with less-than-lethal bullets
Police abandon city to people they angered.
Next up, police demand pay increase.
Abolish qualified immunity and this will go away.
FACEBOOK IS RIGHT. TWITTER IS WRONG:
In pushing Twitter towards the role of publishing, journalists and Jack Dorsey have handed Donald Trump an enormous gift ahead of the election. Republicans will find there are plenty of votes to be won from people who fed up of being scorned, derided and evening censored by the media.
Mark Zuckerberg understands that media credibility lies with news organizations themselves, not him, and if there is to be any corrective course, that action must be taken by journalists. Adapt or die. Jack Dorsey seems determine to appease the news organizations even if it imperils his company.
Read the whole thing.
AMY KLOBUCHAR LIKELY OFF BIDEN’S BINDER FULL OF VEEP PICKS: Klobuchar declined to prosecute officer at center of George Floyd’s death after previous conduct complaints.
UPDATE: “Whether or not Klobuchar made the right call in refusing to prosecute Derek Chauvin or in refusing to prosecute other police officers in excessive force cases, it seems likely this connection will bump her off of Joe Biden’s shortlist. Especially after his infamous ‘You ain’t black’ comments, Biden cannot afford to alienate black voters any more than he already has,” Tyler O’Neil writes at the PJM Mothership.
JUST SAY NO: Gov. Whitmer asks Washington to help state’s budget.
MY PREDICTION IS, A YEAR FROM NOW THERE WON’T BE MUCH DIFFERENCE: Here’s what gyms will look like after the coronavirus.
WHAT THE EXPERTS WERE SAYING THREE MONTHS AGO: Top disease official: Risk of coronavirus in USA is ‘minuscule’; skip mask and wash hands.
THE ENEMY WITHIN: Motion backing Hong Kong blocked after campaign by Chinese students at Warwick. The Chinese Government takes it for granted that Chinese students studying abroad will do its bidding. You should assume it knows what it’s doing.
CALIFORNIA, NEW YORK HEAD ONE WAY, TEXAS AND FLORIDA THE OTHER, BETTER WAY: Data tells the story.
SOME SPACE DEEP BACKGROUND: Op-ed: Unleashing the Dragon – the NASA bargain behind this week’s SpaceX launch.
MINNESOTA GOVERNOR ACTIVATES NATIONAL GUARD TO CONTROL RIOTING IN TWIN CITIES.
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): This looks bad, and the press will do its best to spin it as anti-Trump, but my prediction is that it’s worth 50,000 votes for Trump in Minnesota.
Meanwhile, the real wrongdoer is Amy Klobuchar. “Before she became a senator and a top contender for former Vice President Joe Biden’s vice presidential spot, Klobuchar spent eight years as the Hennepin County attorney, in charge of prosecution for Minneapolis. And while in that position, Klobuchar declined to prosecute multiple police officers cited for excessive force, including the officer who kneeled on Floyd’s neck as he protested.”
“I GUESS THE FIRST RIOT WILL START AT ONE OF MARTINA NAVRATILOVA’S MANSIONS:” Tennis great Martina Navratilova declares that it’s ‘time to riot everywhere!!!!’
UPDATE: Now deleted; Navratilova responds: “To all those who have an issue with me calling for riots everywhere- please look up the many definitions of riot. This is not a call to any violence whatsoever- for example this a definition of riot ‘an unbridled outbreak, as of emotions, passions, etc.’ So simmer down!!!”
Have an “an unbridled outbreak of emotions, passions,” but “simmer down” she said, with three exclamation marks.
DON SURBER: Mueller shows the FBI needs disbanding.
JIM TREACHER: WaPo Now Directly Creating Ads for Biden Campaign. “I’m not a journalist or a lawyer, so I can’t speak to any ethical or legal concerns about the second-biggest newspaper in America openly collaborating with one of the candidates during a presidential campaign. I assume it’s all above board, or WaPo wouldn’t have approved it. If they want to look like they’re directly working for Biden’s campaign, that’s their business. It’s not like they have much of a reputation left to destroy anyway. Nobody really believes WaPo is unbiased and impartial, least of all the people who are paid to say WaPo is unbiased and impartial. They all want Biden to win, because they’re all Democrats.”
Well, this isn’t all that new for the WaPo: Ben Bradlee: A cautionary tale of Kennedy’s courtier. “Not content to write glowing accounts of Kennedy’s campaign, Bradlee also gave JFK private intel on the opposition. In May 1959, after covering a speech by Democratic rival Lyndon Johnson, Bradlee wrote a confidential strategy memo to Kennedy assessing Johnson’s performance and offering advice on convention plans.”