EVERYTHING IS GOING SWIMMINGLY: ‘Survival mode’: Inflation falls hardest on low-income Americans.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Durham Finally Stops Teasing, Reminds Us Hillary Is a Crook. “The more we have found out about the Great Russia Collusion Hoax, the closer to the top of the Democratic party it has gotten. Now it’s hitting the Mao-jacketed gargoyle who has been hovering up there for decades.”

ANDREW GUTMANN AND PAUL ROSSI: Inside the Woke Indoctrination Machine: After watching 100 hours of leaked video, we now fully grasp the danger of this ideology in schools.

Over the past month we have watched nearly 100 hours of leaked videos from 108 workshops held virtually last year for the National Association of Independent Schools’ People of Color Conference. The NAIS sets standards for more than 1,600 independent schools in the U.S., driving their missions and influencing many school policies. The conference is NAIS’s flagship annual event for disseminating DEI practices, and more than 6,000 DEI practitioners, educators and administrators attended this year. Intended as professional development and not meant for the public, these workshops are honest, transparent and unfiltered—very different from how private schools typically communicate DEI initiatives. These leaked videos act as a Rosetta Stone for deciphering the DEI playbook.

The path to remake schools begins with the word “diversity,” which means much more than simply increasing the number of students and faculty of color—referred to in these workshops as “Bipoc,” which stands for “black, indigenous and people of color.” DEI experts urge schools to classify people by identities such as race, convince them that they are being harmed by their environment, and turn them into fervent advocates for institutional change.

In workshops such as “Integrating Healing-Centered Engagements Into a DEIA School Program” and “Racial Trauma and the Path Toward Healing,” we learned how DEI practitioners use segregated affinity groups and practices such as healing circles to inculcate feelings of trauma. Even students without grievances are trained to see themselves as victims of the their ancestors’ suffering through “intergenerational violence.”

The next step in a school’s transformation is “inclusion.” Schools must integrate DEI work into every aspect of the school and every facet of the curriculum must be evaluated through an antibias, antiracist, or antioppressive lens. In “Let’s Talk About It! Anti-Oppressive Unit and Lesson Plan Design,” we learned that the omission of this lens—“failing to explore the intersection of STEM and social justice,” for instance—constitutes an act of “curriculum violence.”

All school messaging must be scrubbed of noninclusive language, all school policies of noninclusive practices, all libraries of noninclusive books. Inclusion also requires that all non-Bipoc stakeholders become allies in the fight against the systemic harm being perpetuated by the institution. In “Small Activists, Big Impact—Cultivating Anti-Racists and Activists in Kindergarten,” we were told that “kindergartners are natural social-justice warriors.”

Well, social-justice warriors function on the emotional and intellectual level of kindergarteners, so that makes sense.

MARY ANASTASIA O’GRADY: What Canada’s Truckers Know: It’s no longer a liberal constitutional state. A coercive Ottawa rules over daily life.

The truckers, engaged largely in peaceful acts of civil disobedience, call themselves the Freedom Convoy. But they aren’t an organized group with a leader. Some set out from western Canada last month in opposition to a vaccine mandate. Along the way others joined the original pack in person, in spirit—and even in solidarity. On Feb. 8, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported “the tow trucks operators on contract to the City of Ottawa [were] taking a hard pass on requests to haul vehicles out of protest areas, according to the city’s top public servant.”

Note that Mr. Trudeau didn’t say that blocking the Ambassador Bridge connecting Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, is unacceptable. Rather, he declared truckers’ ideals beyond the pale.

Intolerance is ugly. But for Mr. Trudeau, who proudly backs Black Lives Matter, it’s OK in this case because it’s the politically correct variety: He’s denouncing the opinions of a bunch of yahoos.

Coming from a prime minister sitting atop a powerful administrative state, this goes a long way in explaining what has gone from a protest to a movement.

Polls suggest that most Canadians don’t support disturbing the peace or blocking international crossings. Yet a majority are sympathetic to the truckers’ mission, which is to end Covid-19 restrictions and mandates that they believe go beyond the proper power of the state.

A moving speech in November by former Royal Canadian Mounted Police Corporal Daniel Bulford, once assigned to Mr. Trudeau’s personal security detail, described the conflict between government Covid-19 orders and the oath Mounties take to defend Canadian liberty.

Mr. Trudeau likes to invoke “science.” Yet the virulence of the virus is waning, natural immunity is up, and by the prime minister’s own estimates some 90% of Canadian truck drivers are vaccinated. If there were ever any reasons for extraordinary government measures to protect public health, they too have faded.

On Tuesday Alberta Premier Jason Kenney lifted his province’s proof-of-vaccination requirements. “Now is the time to begin learning to live with Covid,” he said. “These restrictions have led to terrible division.” Saskatchewan did the same earlier last week, and Ontario has said it would move in a similar direction.

Meantime, Mr. Trudeau is claiming police powers as if the nation were in the grip of catastrophe. No wonder already simmering resentments about federal overreach have boiled over.

Trudeau, like rulers throughout the West, is too entitled, too arrogant, and most importantly too ignorant of history to understand the risks he’s running.

Plus:

Mr. Pardy told me by telephone last week that he believes “the instincts of small-c conservatives are to protect institutions. But they don’t realize that those institutions are gone. They still have faith in a system of governance already compromised.”

The truckers know better.

There’s no reason to protect institutions that have been corrupted. And that’s pretty much all of them.

GEORGE ORWELL, CALL YOUR OFFICE: Why the word ‘freedom’ is such a useful rallying cry for protesters. The word has become common among far-right groups, experts say.

Based on that headline and subhead, Winston Smith has been working at Canada’s CBC for quite some time.

XI’S GOTTA HAVE IT: Chinese Media Gloat about PRC Influence on the NBA as Enes Kanter Freedom Is Cut.

Unlike Colin Kaepernick or Chris Kluwe, Kanter Freedom is not just a fading player using politics as an excuse for running out of jobs. He was still averaging 14 rebounds per 36 minutes, and, at 29 years old, he should still have some years left as a banger in the paint. Certainly, he’s a guy that a contending team could use — say, a team like the 76ers, who just traded backup center Andre Drummond and could use a guy with a little of the Spirit of 76.

But will his politics — specifically, his outspoken criticism of the Chinese Communist Party — get him blackballed from the NBA? If so, it may be time to start asking which nation the “National” in NBA stands for.

Oh, I think we know.

RAMPANT BIGOTRY IN TECH:

IBM executives discussed in emails how to force out older workers and derided them as “Dinobabies” who should be made an “Extinct species,” according to a court filing in an age discrimination case against the company.

The communications show “highly incriminating animus” against older employees by officials who at the time were in the company’s “highest ranks,” according to the filing Friday.

The partially redacted filing says the emails surfaced in separate arbitration proceedings but it doesn’t reveal the identities of the company officials or indicate when they were speaking. A judge has ordered the release of versions of the underlying documents.

In one email chain, an International Business Machines Corp. official described a plan to “accelerate change by inviting the ‘dinobabies’ (new species) to leave” and turn them into an “Extinct species,” according to the filing. Company officials also complained about IBM’s “dated maternal workforce” that “must change,” and discussed frustration that IBM had a much lower share of millennials in its workforce than a competitor, but said its share would increase following layoffs, according to the filing.

Age discrimination is the most widely practiced form of illegal discrimination in the workplace.

SAY THIS FOR SLOW JOE, HE STAYS BOUGHT: The US is letting China off the hook over its COVID-19 coverup.

America’s death toll from the COVID-19 pandemic, now in its third year, is closing in on one million, with Americans continuing to succumb to the disease at internationally high rates. Both in total case counts and number of deaths since 2020, the United States has led the world. New data show that Americans’ life expectancy in the first year of the pandemic fell 1.8 years — the sharpest decline since at least World War II.

Given the extent of its pain and suffering, the U.S. should have a major stake in unraveling how the COVID-19 virus originated. Knowing the origins of this virus has become imperative to forestall the fourth coronavirus pandemic of the 21 Century after SARS, MERS and COVID-19.

In this light, isn’t it odd that the U.S. government is no longer seeking to get to the bottom of how the virus first emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan? In fact, by relieving pressure on China to come clean on the virus’s origins, President Biden’s administration is effectively letting that communist behemoth off the hook despite the costliest government coverup perhaps of all time.

He’s honest that way, if no other.

THIS IS CNN: CNN says Joe Rogan using the N-word is ‘another January 6 moment.’

The CNN article’s title has since been changed to “Why shrugging off Joe Rogan’s use of the n-word is so dangerous,” but the first two paragraphs of Blake’s writing still encapsulate the idea behind the original headline given to the piece.

“The podcaster Joe Rogan did not join a mob that forced lawmakers to flee for their lives. He never carried a Confederate flag inside the US Capitol rotunda. No one died trying to stop him from using the n-word,” wrote Blake.

“But what Rogan and those that defend him have done since video clips of him using the n-word surfaced on social media is arguably just as dangerous as what a mob did when they stormed the US Capitol on January 6 last year,” he continued.

#JOURNALISM: The Media Blackout of Durham’s Bombshell Report Alleging Clinton Campaign ‘Infiltrated’ Trump Tower.

Well:

HE’S RIGHT:

Plus:

YES. NEXT QUESTION? Did Hillary’s Campaign Plant Fabricated Evidence to Frame Trump? “Indicted Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussman, who was the subject of the aforementioned filing, has already been accused of making a false statement to the FBI by telling them he wasn’t representing any client when he presented evidence to them alleging a link between Donald Trump and Russian bank Alfa Bank.”

WELL, WHY WOULDN’T THEY BE? US consumers are ‘in a deep funk’: What that means for the economy.

As concerns around inflation soar, American consumers’ outlook on the trajectory of the U.S. economy has deteriorated, worrying some experts that negative attitudes could dampen expenditure and put a dent in economic growth.

The University of Michigan’s closely-watched consumer sentiment index fell to 61.7 in early February, hitting the lowest level since October 2011. January saw a reading of 67.2.

Recent declines in the measure have been driven by weakening personal financial prospects amid rising inflation, less confidence in the government’s economic policies, and the least favorable long-term economic outlook in a decade, the University of Michigan said in its latest report Friday.

The reading follows fresh CPI data out Thursday that showed U.S. inflation accelerated last month in the fastest rise since 1982, with prices across a wide range of goods and services soaring further amid lingering shortages and supply chain disruptions.

“Incredibly, the consumer is polling negatively on almost everything when it comes to the economy, and if their confidence doesn’t improve, the economy could be headed towards the cliff of recession,” FWDBONDS chief economist Christopher S. Rupkey said in a note. “We almost have to recheck our figures because the consumer is clearly in a deep funk and if they decide to call it quits then the economic growth we have seen is going to fade fast.”

The growth we’ve seen so far is just the unraveling of some — some — of the damage done by lockdowns and pandemic responses.

Plus: “Notably, the February decline was spurred by a decline in households with incomes of $100,000 or more. Among this cohort, their Sentiment Index fell by 16.1% from last month, and 27.5% from last year, the report said, also indicating the Sentiment Index reflects the onset of a sustained downturn in consumer spending.”

ON SUNDAYS ON MY BLOG I DO A POST PROMOTING MOSTLY INDIE WRITERS:  Book Promo And Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike.

And my commenters engage in a vignette writing challenge that has launched maybe a dozen novels.

I DIDN’T EVEN KNOW STUPID MARXISM HAD A SCENT:  Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s mansion engulfed by foul smell.

THE ENTIRE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, AND THE NEWS MEDIA. BUT I REPEAT MYSELF.

LOOK, IT’S NOT JUST HOW HATEFUL SHE WAS:  CNN analyst walks back comments calling for violent breakup of Freedom Convoy.

It was her breathtaking stupidity.

AND SO SHOULD THESE *SS CLOWNS:  Pelosi’s Private Police Force.

And the one who shot Ashli Babbit should be given to well…. we the people for appropriate punishment.

YES, THE DHS SHOULD BE CONSIGNED TO THE ASH HEAP OF HISTORY:  Thoughtcrime.

I INTEND TO ACQUIRE AND INSTALL ONE THIS YEAR:  Gas Stove Alarmism Fails.

WITH COVIDIOCY FALLING APART, THEY MUST FIND NEW WAYS TO STAMPEDE US:  The Hill goes Full Climate Hysteria.

Only they’re out of ways, and everything they do just makes the lies more obvious.

WE REJECT BRANDON AND ALL HIS WORKS, AND ALL HIS EMPTY PROMISES:  A lot of Americans dislike everything Biden has done.

WE ARE WATCHING THE WORKING CLASS THROW OFF THEIR CHAINS:  The Proper Frame for the Narrative.

Those chains were mostly forged of Marxism.  Sucks for those indoctrinated in Marxism.

OF COURSE THEY DO:  Middle East Studies Association Defends Terror-Infused Palestinian University, While Moving To Boycott Israeli Academia.

They’re evil and insane and like attracts like.

THE ‘BLUE’ STATIST MODEL IS COMING UNGLUED:  Canada-Style Freedom Convoy Protest Goes Global, Reaches Australia and New Zealand.

Be wary, but not afraid.