UNCLE BEN, NEXT? R.I.P. Aunt Jemima, 1889-2020.
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Mrs Butterworth is going to come out as a man now, isn’t she?
Archive for 2020
June 17, 2020
FINALLY: Adobe Flash will finally die on December 31, 2020. “Flash content won’t run at all after end-of-life.”
Flash was such a security nightmare (not to mention a resource hog) that years ago I took to calling it “malware disguised as a multimedia platform.”
WELL, WHEN ALL THE STORES ARE BOARDED UP FOR FEAR OF LOOTERS. . . The Rich Have Stopped Spending And That’s Tanked The Economy. Though I think NPR’s talk of the economy being “tanked” is somewhat myopic. Or maybe it’s just expressing a hope. But the research does suggest that — unlike Obama’s financial crisis bailouts — the benefits of this stimulus have gone to working people:
Researchers based at Harvard have been tracking spending patterns using credit card data. They found that people at the bottom of the income ladder are now spending nearly as much as they did before the coronavirus pandemic.
“When the stimulus checks went out, you see that spending by lower-income households went up a lot,” said Nathan Hendren, a Harvard economist and co-founder of the Opportunity Insights research team.
However, the wealthy are not matching them. “For higher-income individuals, that spending is still way far off from where it was prior to COVID and it has not recovered as much,” Hendren said.
The tourist attractions around here are doing quite well, and I suspect that’s because they’re patronized by working class people who drive to their vacations, and to whom $600 a week on top of unemployment is real money. I hear Palm Beach isn’t so crowded, and the stores on Worth Street are closed.
AS USUAL, GENERATION X IS FORGOTTEN IN THE DISCUSSION: Millennials horrified by vicious insults from younger generation: ‘Why are they so furious at us?’
THEY WANTED THEIR OWN COUNTRY, THEY GOT IT: Police, Fire Reportedly Refused to Respond to Crime in Progress in Seattle’s Breakaway CHOP.
A STRATEGY OF TOTAL ISOLATION IS UNWORKABLE IN THE LONG RUN: ‘Unacceptable failure’: New Zealand brings in military after Covid-19 quarantine fiasco.
New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has branded an “unacceptable failure” a quarantine blunder that meant two arrivals from Britain left managed isolation in New Zealand without being tested for the coronavirus – which they were later diagnosed with.
“It should never have happened and it cannot be repeated,” Ardern said on Wednesday, adding that the defence force would now oversee the quarantine of new arrivals and audit the quarantine process.
Ardern also said she would temporarily remove the compassionate exemption under which the pair were released from quarantine early.
Health officials are tracing 320 people who are regarded as “close contacts” of the women, and they will be urged to get tested. Close contacts could include passengers on their flight to New Zealand and other quarantined travellers at their Auckland hotel, as well as hotel staff and flight crew. The women were now in isolation with a relative, officials said.
You can keep sticking your finger in the dike, but even as an island nation, sooner or later you will fail unless either the disease fades out or you have a highly effective vaccine.
JAMES LILEKS ON ACADEMICS WITH AN APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION:
Historians, detached from history.
Cultural guardians, detached from their culture.
Nothing to defend but the need to defend nothing.
Like I said, I’ve no love for Columbus, but once Toppling Chic is a thing, as they say, the chains come for anyone on a plinth. It’s not so much who they are, as who put them up there. The Past People. The wrong ones.
Update: remember when magazines like Popular Mechanics were about making things?
Read the whole thing.
Related: The Taliban: an apology. “But today’s conversation about statues is not an argument about slavery or colonialism or even minorities more generally. It is an argument about historical objects, and what you do with them as values change. Values always change, and have done so for generations. But over the years, we’ve learned that our commitment to liberalism and free speech was outmoded. We won the battle over ourselves, and learned to see that the Afghan dogmatism that we wrote off as medieval was, in fact, the future.”
ROGER SIMON: Our Elites Suffer From China Envy.
BLM is being coopted, though they don’t realize it. Soon enough they will be dispensed with. Antifa is already considered de trop.
Elites don’t want to “smash the state.” They want to strengthen and formalize it in the Chinese communist tradition for their own advantage. (cf. McKinsey & Company, our most powerful consulting firm, that works with the Chinese on Belt-and-Road and with Governor Cuomo on New York’s “reopening”)
And if China falls apart due to the mishandling of the virus it pioneered, so much the better. The globalists will eagerly replace them, while closely replicating what they have done. As we know, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Read the whole thing.
WHERE DOES HE GO TO GET HIS REPUTATION BACK? Former USC football player wins in court years after wrongful domestic abuse expulsion ruined his career. “”After having three years of my life derailed, I’m gratified that the California Court of Appeals finally reversed my expulsion based on USC’s wrongful, male-biased, witch hunt brought against me. Make no mistake, USC stripped away my educational opportunities and hopes and dreams of playing in the NFL, and this ‘win’ does not erase that.”
DISPATCHES FROM THE MEMORY HOLE: The first vice president of color was a Republican elected over 90 years ago.
NICE: “Black or white, relax and have a beer”: Best friends start a movement in their neighborhood.
My excellent local talk-radio host Hallerin Hill was on yesterday, saying that he was at Jackie’s Restaurant in East Knoxville and it was full of black and white people having a good time and getting along. The media wants you to be divided and angry, he said, but that’s not the truth of what’s out there in America.
THANK A TEACHER: American pride among young Americans at all-time low. The long march through the institutions is bearing fruit.
WHEN YOU CHOOSE THE CULTURE TO APPROPRIATE, AND YOU CHOOSE POORLY:
“The Asante supplied British and Dutch traders with slaves in exchange for firearms, which they used to expand their empire. Slaves were often acquired as tributes from smaller states or captured during war. Some slaves were brought across the Atlantic whiles others stayed in Africa to work in gold fields.”
KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: While Social Unrest Rages On, COVID Still Killing American Small Businesses. “After such a lengthy shutdown, one would assume that the easing of restrictions and reopening of businesses would be a big step in helping the small business people get back on their feet. For many, the shutdown was simply too long to survive. Now, the slow, phased in reopening, combined with strict social distance protocols could be the final nail in the coffin of the businesses that survived the shutdowns.”
