MERRY CHRISTMAS:
Archive for 2020
December 25, 2020
HE’S MAKING A SMART GUY’S COCKTAIL: The Enemy Is Fragility. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s thoughtful new strategy. (Bumped — but with a present.)
Planet Earth, for worse and occasionally better, is a world of neighborhood existence — many neighborhoods at peace, many (most?) neighborhoods uneasy and facing tenuous circumstances, too many neighborhoods experiencing outright anarchy and war.
Blame the level of perception, of easy aggregation, for missing this truth. I’ll illustrate with an anecdote. Six years ago, an obstreperous type saw me at a private reception. From across the room, he bellowed: “Austin Bay! Is there any hope for Africa?”
My reply to the bellower — and the 15 or 20 so others present, who were surprised by the bellowing and puzzled by the question: “Which Africa? There are 6,000 Africas. Some Africas are doing quite well.”
The bellower blinked — an encouraging response. By George, he got it.
More:
The term “failed state” had its day in D.C. Beltway discourse. It translated — roughly — as a region that could not or did not protect humans living within its political boundaries. On the ground, it meant scores, if not hundreds, of neighborhoods convulsed by violence.
This is why the U.S. State Department’s new document “U.S. Strategy to Prevent Conflict and Promote Stability” is worth reading and implementing.
The new strategy identifies fragility as the key strategic issue, not failure. “Failed state” implies static rubble that requires centralized rebuilding.
Fragility frames the problem as a dynamic where small changes — neighborhood by neighborhood — can ultimately produce systemic improvement.
Kicker: “Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is a comprehensive thinker. For that reason alone, superficial media will ignore the new strategy. So download the department’s PDF and read it for yourself.”
A present for you — the link to “United States Strategy to Prevent Conflict and Promote Stability.” Yes, I should have linked to it yesterday. Merry Christmas.
RELATED: The cocktail reference. It’s a dynamic way of analyzing complex problems.
MERRY CHRISTMAS:
ANOTHER DEFECTION: “A dissident women’s studies PhD speaks out.“
NO, CHRISTMAS ISN’T A WARMED OVER PAGAN HOLIDAY: If you’ve heard it once, you’ve likely heard it a thousand times – Christmas is nothing more than a pagan holiday taken over by the Catholic Church and turned into something completely different. As The Incarnate Investigation host Jimmy Wallace makes clear, there’s more to the story the critics never tell you.
But wait, there’s more! Philosophy Professor Travis Dickinson asks if Christmas is based on a wildly crazy claim (Hint: Yes, it is). And, as the ever-thoughtful Sarah Hoyt uniquely reminds us this morning: We Americans have put our own unique spin on the appropriate celebrations. It’s part of how we got to be the “land of the Free and the home of the Brave.”
AT AMAZON, Iron Gym Total Upper Body Workout Bar.
MERRY CHRISTMAS:
MERRY CHRISTMAS:
MERRY CHRISTMAS:
PLEASE REMEMBER YOU’RE AMERICAN. IT’S IMPORTANT:
Merry Christmas!
TIME’S UP ALL OVER THE COUNTRY. TIME’S UP: Oregon Patriots Water the Tree of Liberty.
IT IS NOT POSSIBLE, IS IT, THAT WE’RE GOING TO ALLOW AN ENEMY AGENT TO TAKE CONTROL OF THE COUNTRY, AFTER THE MOST BLATANTLY PUBLIC FRAUD IN HISTORY: China, The Iran Deal, and Biden.
If G-d has abandoned the United States of America, fools and drunkards are in real trouble.
DON’T SELL TOO EARLY: On this day in 1878, Louis-Joseph Chevrolet, race car driver, car designer, and co-founder of the Chevrolet Motor Car Company, was born in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Canton of Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Being the co-founder of Chevrolet didn’t make him rich. He sold out to his partner after just four years (who soon sold to General Motors). But his name lives on.
RULES ARE FOR THE LITTLE PEOPLE: Yet another Democrat leader tells people to stay home for Christmas, then announces she will travel to visit her relatives.
IN OCCUPIED LANDS, THERE’S NO LIMIT: One day’s news from the SF Bay Area — how leftist can you get?
WELL, THERE GOES MY WINTER’S NAP: ‘Twas the Night Before 2020 Christmas — a poem by Liberato.
FEWER AND FEWER AUTHORITIES AND INSTITUTIONS THESE DAYS: Whom Do You Trust?
HOW LONG WILL ANYONE EVEN BE ALLOWED TO MENTION THIS STUFF: Things Politicians Like: Alternate Covid Care Facilities.
THE MAL-EDUCATED, MARXIAN LEFT DESTROYS WEALTH WHERE THEY GO. AND IF THEY SUCCEED IN CAPTURING THE MAJOR ENGINE OF WEALTH IN THE WORLD, IT’S GOING TO BE A LONG DARK NIGHT FOR THE WORLD: Wealth “extraction” in San Francisco.
GOOD. WE DO NOT CONSENT: President Trump Demands Congress Revisit $900 Billion Pork-Filled COVID Bailout.
WE NEED A LOT MORE OF THIS: Rural citizens to Gavin Newsom: Kiss my ass!
Remember these words, we’re all going to need them: I do NOT consent.
AND AGAIN, I WANT TO NOTE MY SHOCKED FACE: Georgia state senate: Election “untrustworthy” and should be decertified.