Archive for 2021

OPEN THREAD. Proceed as usual.

#JOURNALISM:

BLEG–ACADEMIC LITERATURE EXPLAINING ASIAN SUCCESS: Several years ago, I posted something, I think on Facebook, asking how Critical Race Theorists and Intersectionalists who believe that white supremacy reigns supreme and largely dictates the fortunes of other groups explain the relative socioeconomic success of Asian Americans. One correspondent responded that some of them argue that whites “allow” Asians to succeed because that way they can justify their oppression of brown and black people by pointing to Asian success as refuting white supremacy. I expressed skepticism that anyone who was an actual academic would publish such an absurd conspiracy theory. My correspondent replied with links to two or three articles in academic journals promoting exactly that theory. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find that Facebook post in my archives, nor did a request on FB turn up anything. But I’m sure that this exchange occurred, and I read the articles arguing that Asians succeed because whites “let” them. So my bleg to Instapundit readers is that if any of you are familiar with any such articles, to please send me links, either in the comments or to my email.

WHEN YOU’RE A DEMOCRAT WHO’S LOST THE WASHINGTON POST: Biden falsely claims the new Georgia law ‘ends voting hours early.’

On Election Day in Georgia, polling places are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and if you are in line by 7 p.m., you are allowed to cast your ballot. Nothing in the new law changes those rules.

However, the law did make some changes to early voting. But experts say the net effect was to expand the opportunities to vote for most Georgians, not limit them.

“You can criticize the bill for many things, but I don’t think you can criticize it for reducing the hours you can vote,” said University of Georgia political scientist Charles S. Bullock III. He speculated that Biden may have been briefed on an early version of the bill — “there were 25 versions floating around” — and he did not get an update on the final version.

More here: White House still lying about what Georgia’s election law says.

A leftover from yesterday but one that shouldn’t go by the boards. Not only is Biden consistently lying in interviews about what Georgia’s bill does to early-voting hours across the state, Jen Psaki backed up the lie at Thursday’s press briefing. WaPo fact-checker Glenn Kessler is getting exasperated: “It’s hard for any White House to admit error, especially when the president has three times repeated the falsehood,” he tweeted last night. “But this is becoming a pretty deep hole.”

This is more than just not wanting to admit error, though. This is a full-court press by Democrats to demagogue the new law as Jim Crow 2.0 in order to put pressure on the filibuster fans in their own Senate caucus to push H.R. 1 through. Lying to make the law sound worse than it is remains a key part of that strategy.

In fact, lefties were passing this clip around as evidence of Psaki pwning the Fox reporter, either oblivious to the fact that she was distorting what the law says about early voting or complicit in the lie themselves.

I hope the Democrats are proud of removing $100 million from a Democrat-monopoly city: Cobb County says loss of All-Star game will cost tourism industry over $100 million.

UPDATE:

NEW HYDROGEL cuts muscles’ recovery time from injury in half. “It is a boron-loaded alginate hydrogel, which would be administered with a subcutaneous injection. According to the tests carried out so far -in animal models-, it is capable of regenerating damaged muscle very rapidly -specifically, in half the time it takes for it to regenerate naturally.”

VIDDY WELL, LITTLE BROTHERS, VIDDY WELL: On March 7th, Deadline Hollywood reported, “Pepe Le Pew Won’t Be Appearing In Warner Bros’ ‘Space Jam’ Sequel:”

He starred in the first Warner Bros. Space Jam movie back in 1996, however, Pepe Le Pew will not be showing up at all in the upcoming theatrical sequel Space Jam: A New Legacy on July 16.

With the Looney Tunes French skunk besieged by controversy in the wake of New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow slamming that the cartoon character “added to rape culture,” Deadline has learned that a hybrid live-action animation scene between Jane the Virgin actress Greice Santo and Pepe Le Pew, shot back in June 2019 for Space Jam 2 was left on the cutting room floor.

The Pepe Le Pew character will likely be a thing of the past across all media. Warner Bros. also has no current TV series featuring the skunk and there are no plans to have him appear on Looney Toons, Bugs Bunny Builders, Tiny Toons Looniversary or future projects, sources confirmed to Deadline.

Flash-forward to this today, with the Hollywood Reporter noting, “’Space Jam 2’ Trailer Delights Fans with Robust World of Warner Bros. Characters.” Including those family-friendly favorites…the Droogs from Stanley Kubrick’s brilliant, chilling, and at times repulsive 1971 film, A Clockwork Orange, which was Kubrick’s first film for Warner Brothers:

From It’s Pennywise to the flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz to the droogs in A Clockwork Orange to an agent from The Matrix series, there was plenty to spot. There even appeared to be Mr. Freeze from Batman & Robin.

As Comicbook.com adds, in an article headlined, “Space Jam 2 Includes A Clockwork Orange Cameos, for Some Reason:”

If you’re not familiar with Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 classic, A Clockwork Orange adapts Anthony Burgess’s 1962 novel about Alex, a teenager dedicated to a subculture based on “ultraviolence.” Malcolm McDowell plays Alex in the movie, and in the film’s notorious opening sequence, he and his friends commit acts of wanton violence and rape. It seems odd to include characters from this film — which received an X rating upon its initial release in the United States before being edited down and re-released with an R — in a movie that will, at worst, receive a PG rating.

Look, the kids seeing this movie probably won’t notice the A Clockwork Orange characters while watching this story about cartoons playing basketball with monsters. Even if they do, they have no frame of reference. And yes, there are other characters from adult-focused properties like Game of Thrones and Mad Max in the movie. But the Night King and the War Boys are cartoonish villains that wouldn’t be out of place in a work of children’s fiction. Alex and his droogs are something different.

I can’t speak to Charles M. Blow’s role in cancelling Pepe Le Pew – a Timesman waking up in the morning and deciding to write a column on why a semi-beloved Looney Tunes cartoon character is the epitome of “rape culture” is a bit odd. But it is uber-woke New York Times and Charles “stick that in your magic underwear” Blow we’re talking about.

But the cancelling of Pepe and the inclusion of the Droogs in a movie for kids is making the whole thing start to feel like Warner Brothers is taking a page out of Nike’s publicity playbook. Recall the sacrificial “Betsy Ross flag sneakers” that Nike rolled out in 2019, only have their spokesman Colin Kaepernick publicly denounce during run-up to the Fourth of July. As I wrote at the time, “I think Kaepernick was used as a tool (in every sense of the word) by Nike’s social media and PR gurus to help give the brand maximum attention over the week building up to the Fourth of July.” In the short term, it was a brilliant, albeit cynical piece of marketing,” resulting in Nike’s stock going up by two percent as a result of all of the publicity.

And yes, I’m adding to Warner’s publicity by writing about the Pepe/Droogs kerfuffle. But it is remarkably odd to see the Clockwork Orange droogs, who were the epitome of rape (and looting and killing) culture appear in the Space Jam 2 stands after Pepe was tossed down the memory hole.

Click to enlarge.