OPEN THREAD: How was your Saturday?
Archive for 2021
March 20, 2021
I’M UNENTHUSIASTIC, BUT OKAY WITH IT IF HE’LL JUST FOCUS ON NASA PORK AND LEAVE THE REAL SPACE PEOPLE ALONE: Widespread support for Nelson nomination to lead NASA.
I CREDIT BREXIT: UK vaccine drive ‘huge success’ after jabbing half of all adults.
Just compare the far-inferior results in the EU.
WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: Scientists use DNA technology to build tough 3D nanomaterials.
WELL, GOOD: Surgical patients allergic to penicillin have another safe alternative. Belief in cross-reactivity between Penicillin and Cefazolin is apparently just an old docs’ tale.
JAMES BOVARD: The Deadly Precedent of the Waco Whitewash.
DISPATCHES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: Get a load of all the “genders” New York University lists on this survey.
VITAMIN D UPDATE: Risk for COVID-19 higher in Blacks in U.S. with low vitamin D, study finds. Nice to see the world of science catching up to InstaPundit on this stuff.
MASSAD AYOOB ON THE CAREER OF Elden Carl.
LA DETECTIVE INTERROGATES THE GOSPEL EYEWITNESSES: J. Warner Wallace spent decades solving old murder cases nobody else could and along the way he developed some impressive skills for judging the credibility of witnesses and evidence. Things get really interesting when he applies those same skills to the eyewitness claims in the New Testament.
While you are there, check out the new HillFaith design that goes live for everybody Monday. The old original design is here for those who like comparisons.
FASTER, PLEASE: Cruises for Americans Are Coming Back—With or Without CDC Blessing.
Crystal Cruises is getting Americans back out on its luxury ships—with or without a green light from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
While most major cruise companies continue to wait for the government agency to establish guidelines for a safe return to sea, the two-ship Crystal, owned by Genting Hong Kong, is taking another route entirely. On Thursday it opened sales for 16 itineraries that sail exclusively around the Bahamas a week at a time, starting in July, allowing American travelers easy access while bypassing all U.S. restrictions.
The trips will only be made available to fully inoculated travelers, who must show their vaccine cards before boarding. They’ll sail from Nassau or Bimini to Great Exuma and several islands not typically frequented by cruise ships—all on the 980-passenger Crystal Serenity, known for such niceties as butler-serviced penthouse suites and complimentary Nobu sushi. Prices will start at $1,999 per person.
“While many of our guests have explored the far reaches of the world, this is a time when people are staying closer to home as the world emerges from a year of not traveling,” says Jack Anderson, Crystal’s interim president and CEO.
We’re getting our second vaccination shot early next month, so we’re pretty excited by this announcement as well.
WE’VE DESCENDED INTO SOME SORT OF BIZARRE HELL-WORLD IN WHICH ANDREW SULLIVAN IS A VOICE OF SANITY: When The Narrative Replaces The News — How the media grotesquely distorted the Atlanta massacres.
We have yet to find any credible evidence of anti-Asian hatred or bigotry in this man’s history. Maybe we will. We can’t rule it out. But we do know that his roommates say they once asked him if he picked the spas for sex because the women were Asian. And they say he denied it, saying he thought those spas were just the safest way to have quick sex. That needs to be checked out more. But the only piece of evidence about possible anti-Asian bias points away, not toward it.
And yet. Well, you know what’s coming. Accompanying one original piece on the known facts, the NYT ran nine — nine! — separate stories about the incident as part of the narrative that this was an anti-Asian hate crime, fueled by white supremacy and/or misogyny. Not to be outdone, the WaPo ran sixteen separate stories on the incident as an anti–Asian white supremacist hate crime. Sixteen! One story for the facts; sixteen stories on how critical race theory would interpret the event regardless of the facts. For good measure, one of their columnists denounced reporting of law enforcement’s version of events in the newspaper, because it distracted attention from the “real” motives. Today, the NYT ran yet another full-on critical theory piece disguised as news on how these murders are proof of structural racism and sexism — because some activists say they are.
Mass killers, if they are motivated by bigotry or hate, tend to let the world know:
The suspected attacker in Pittsburgh allegedly said he wanted to “kill Jews” while rampaging inside a synagogue. Police said the man charged with killing people at an El Paso Walmart told them that he was targeting “Mexicans” that day. And the man who massacred Black parishioners inside a Charleston church detailed his racist motivations at length.
This mass murderer in Atlanta actually denied any such motive, and, to repeat myself, there is no evidence for it — and that has been true from the very start. And yet, a friend forwarded me the note swiftly sent to students and faculty at Harvard, which sums up the instant view of our elite:
Many of us woke up yesterday to the horrific news of the vicious and deadly attack in Atlanta, the latest in a wave of increasing violence targeting the Asian, Asian-American, and Pacific Islander community … This violence has a history. From Chinese Exclusion to the nativist rhetoric amplified during the pandemic, anti-Asian hostility has deep roots in American culture.
And on and on. It was almost as if they had a pre-existing script to read, whatever the facts of the case!
Speaking of which: The Media Got It Wrong: Police Captain Didn’t Say the Atlanta Spa Killer Was Having a ‘Bad Day.’
A moment from the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office press conference on Wednesday quickly went viral: Jay Baker, a spokesperson for the police department handling the investigation into the horrific Atlanta spa murders, said that suspect Robert Aaron Long was having a bad day.
“He was pretty much fed up, kind of at the end of his rope, and yesterday was a really bad day for him and this is what he did,” said Baker.
The comment struck many people as overly sympathetic toward Long, as if Baker was making excuses for someone who stands accused of killing eight Asian-American women in cold blood. A 20-second video clip of Baker’s statement was shared on Twitter by Vox journalist Aaron Rupar and swiftly went viral, earning widespread condemnation. Many saw it as evidence that cops are desperate to discount the culpability of white male criminals. For instance, Kimberlé Crenshaw, a law professor and inventor of the term “intersectionality,” described Baker’s comments as “bone-chilling,” and castigated him for refusing to acknowledge “the misogynistic dimensions of anti-Asian racism.”
A police officer excusing Long’s actions as merely the result of him having a “bad day” would indeed be contemptible. But that’s not what Baker did. In fact, many of the people so infuriated about the quote were misled by Rupar’s edit of the video.
Well, this is the network that frequently brings on Dan Rather to a show called “Reliable Sources.”
(Updated and bumped.)-
20 MINUTES INTO THE FUTURE: Oops, he did it again! Biden refers to Kamala as “President Harris.”
COLOR ME UNSURPRISED: Writing on paper, instead of tablet or smart phone, boosts brain activity.
POLITICIANS DON’T EVEN KNOW WHERE ELECTRICITY COMES FROM: Toyota Warns (Again) About Electrifying All Autos. Is Anyone Listening?
ROGER SIMON: A Revolution Is Brewing (and Necessary) in the Republican Party.
At a recent Republican meeting in a red state, a longtime state senator condescendingly blew off a question about why their Republican-dominated legislature was not following the lead of other states in restricting Big Tech and was thoroughly booed by those in attendance. In fact, they were shouting at him.
If this doesn’t change, it’s almost certain the coming primary seasons will be a bloodletting almost never before seen in the Republican Party. Many leaders, including well known incumbents, will topple unless they respond.
Many people who never before considered running for public office are doing so.
This is a good thing and harkens back to the American founding, although all should be carefully vetted. That someone has been a success in business, the arts or education does not automatically mean they will perform well in public office.
But people should be encouraged to run and the door opened up. Who would have guessed that Donald Trump would have created a boom in the American economy, reducing minority unemployment to record lows, while making the biggest strides in decades toward Middle East peace?
He is not the only American citizen with untapped skills.
But the GOP should not become the party of the New Robespierres in all this, chopping off every head that may have let us down in the past.
We must recognize that people can change and grow. Those elected and party officials who have let us down or been passive are, in many instances, capable of change, of even doing good work for the country if they put their minds and hearts to it.
We just have to make sure they do. If they don’t, we should not hesitate to replace them.
Even Red State superstars shouldn’t be free from scrutiny when they foul-up: Kristi Noem Risks Spoiling Star Power With Potential Veto On Male Ban In Women’s Sports.
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Instead Of Traditional Warfare, Chinese Military Will Now Be Trained To Shout Wrong Pronouns At American Troops.
BIDEN’S EPIC FALLS WHILE TRYING TO BOARD AIR FORCE ONE? Yeah, all the memes are here.
BIDEN CALLS FOR ‘COVID-19 HATE CRIMES ACT’ AFTER ATLANTA SHOOTING, BUT THERE’S JUST ONE PROBLEM: “There’s no evidence the Atlanta shooting was motivated by racism or exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, FBI Director Christopher Wray told NPR, ‘it does not appear that the motive was racially motivated’…This horrific shooting rightly outrages Americans and the suspect should face the full extent of the law for this act of mass murder. Yet the truth behind the shooting remains unclear, and Biden seems intent to milk it for political purposes. What disgusting political opportunism.”
As one of Biden’s former coworkers said, “You never let a serious crisis go to waste.”
JIM TREACHER: Does AOC Care About Kids in Cages Anymore?
Yeah, she had a lot to say about it as recently as a month ago:
But that was a month ago. Since then, she’s been Twitter-silent about it. Considering how rare it is for her to shut up on Twitter or anywhere else, it seems fair to ask why. Does AOC really have no opinion about the border crisis in March 2021? Did she just suddenly stop caring? If it was a problem a month ago, why isn’t a problem now, when things are even worse?
Libs think America is the worst country in the world because we don’t let in everybody who’s desperate to live here. And libs care about it more than anything else in the world, right up until the moment it starts to embarrass the Democrats.
Read the whole thing. I wonder how AOC squares the circle between wanting to make just about everything illegal in the name of “global warming,” except immigration?