Archive for 2022
January 9, 2022
AMERICA IS IN A STATE OF MASS FORMATION PARALYSIS:
In December 2020, the authors of an aptly titled paper, “Why Is All COVID-19 News Bad News?”, documented the ways in which the American media chose to cover the pandemic. More specifically, they focused on the tone of the messages being communicated. According to the authors, “91 percent of stories by US major media outlets are negative in tone versus 54 percent for non-US major sources and 65 percent for scientific journals.”
In the US, the negativity appeared to be intentional, with “stories of increasing COVID-19 cases” outnumbering “stories of decreasing cases by a factor of 5.5,” even during periods when new cases were actually declining.
Is it any surprise, then, that the rate of depression, a close relative of learned helplessness, continues to skyrocket? Yes, the pandemic has played a significant role in creating the malaise, but so too has the manner in which the pandemic has been covered by mainstream media outlets. From Russiagate to the threats posed by Covid-19, the American people have, for years, been drip-fed a steady diet of fabrications and fear. Many now find themselves paralyzed, unable to see a meaningful path forward. Paralysis, not psychosis, has gripped the nation.
Earlier: Omicron DEATH!
For a while now it’s been clear the primary objective of most pandemic coverage is to scare the socks off mass audiences. Good news, bad news, boring news, interesting news, news that’s more of a wash in the final analysis, news that’s a net plus overall: it’s all presented as terrifying, more signs of the Apocalypse. There’s no better example than the stampede to advertise the “first death from Omicron” in the United States.
Matt Orfalea does a hilarious job of stitching together an homage to the latest moral panic. So many great little details here, from the “Way Too Early” background to one reporter’s premature death report to the “aggressive Covid vice” imagery, the dramatic Biden-cough, and so much more.
It was the world’s loudest record-scratch when the WHO in the first week of December said the ominous “Omicron variant” of Covid-19 had been detected in 38 countries, but without any known deaths.
Biden and the DNC-MSM just can’t let go of the spirit of 2020. As for the rest of us: Ignoring Them Is the Only Way Out.
Related: ‘So when does the emergency end?’ Justice Barrett asks on behalf of the American people.
Policies that have, objectively, clearly failed.
BRADLEY THOMPSON: Watching the Education Apocalypse in Slow Motion.
January 8, 2022
LIFE IN THE BLUE ZONES: ‘The situation is beyond control’: NYC student says schools are in chaos with the number of teachers calling out with COVID and there is ‘no learning going on’ after Mayor Adams told schools to stay open.
Public education has clearly failed, and should be replaced by vouchers.
NICE: Sailor in Santa Monica Bay Led by Dolphins to Woman Stranded Miles From Shore, Saves Her Life.
The Marina del Rey resident, who just completed his American Sailing Association course, rendezvoused at 9:30 a.m. with three friends at the dock—where he primed them in man-overboard rescue protocol before setting sail. At about 11:30, the voyagers on the bay spotted a pod of dolphins off their starboard.
“We got excited, took a bunch of pictures … and once the dolphins went toward the west of the boat, that’s when I saw this hand,” Koz told The Epoch Times. “I wasn’t even sure, I just thought it was a hand. I definitely knew something was wrong.”
Koz turned to intercept the stranded swimmer, who was barely-conscious, struggling to keep her head above water, but did not want to strike her with the boat. “I tried to pass by her, possibly within 15 feet from her,” he recalled. A female crewmember threw a lifeline as they passed her and made a figure-eight to perform a second pass. . . .
Within seven minutes, a Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACoFD) Lifeguard boat arrived, transferred her aboard, and took her to UCLA’s Ronald Reagan Hospital, Daily Mail reported. She was treated for severe hypothermia and released after three days.
She had apparently gone for a midnight skinny-dip only to be swept out to sea and rendered stranded, managing to stay above water for nearly twelve hours by floating on her back.
I find the water off Santa Monica uncomfortably cold year-round. I can’t imagine wanting to skinny-dip in it. Glad that she had the presence of mind to float until rescue.
At least she didn’t have to worry about shrinkage, despite the cold:
https://youtu.be/vbxWso-FFsw
OPEN THREAD: I’m wearing the shoe til it fits.
I’M EXPECTING AN EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOM: Death star: In cosmic first, scientists observe red supergiant just before it explodes.
TIME TO START BUILDING NICE CLEAN NUCLEAR PLANTS: Chrysler Going Electric By 2028, Airflow EV Introduced.
EGYPTOLOGIST’S ASSERTION THAT KYLE RITTENHOUSE KILLED ‘TWO BLACK MEN’ UNRAVELS LIKE AN OLD MUMMY
I disagreed with the patriarchy-focused explanations that dominated the book on Queen Hatshepsut. I personally feel it wasn’t so much patriarchy that explains much of how the queen was lost to history but was instead the Egyptian love of duality and the need for them to take a different approach to how heirs were chosen. However, Cooney’s 2014 book is still part of my collection because the scholarship in her work was solid, and I enjoyed her perspective.
Afterward, from 2014 to 2017, I often went to her Facebook fan page for Egypt news and updates. To be fair to Cooney, she shepherded many robust discussions that were academically “hot” (specifically Afrocentrism). And while I didn’t agree with her political comments, they were few and far between.
Then came President Donald Trump, and the toxic political posting from Cooney became too much for me to bear. However, I never called for her page to be cancelled nor for her to be fired from UCLA. I did what normally people do: I simply stopped following her work.
I am sure other independent conservatives also made the same choice. Therefore, Cooney was missing out on some valuable “fact checking,” “reason reviewing,” and “alternative facts,” which may have been invaluable in preventing such a mock-worthy mistake.
However, the issue goes beyond Cooney. Where were her editors? Who was doing the “fact checking”? As an author, Cooney is not being well served by academic and publishing communities that are only exposed to right-reviling, Trump-hating, white-loathing, anti-male perspectives.
As a result of this political insulation, the entire level of scholarship in her new book must be questioned.
As Tom Wolfe once wrote, “An intellectual is a person knowledgeable in one field who speaks out only in others.”
QUESTION ASKED: Was the FBI’s Whitmer Chicanery a Warm-up for January 6?
As Scott Adams said yesterday:
RIP: Lani Guinier, 71.
We were saddened to read this morning of the death of Lani Guinier. She was a leftist law professor at Harvard specializing in voting rights. We didn’t know her well. In the 1990s, we played a glancing role in stoking the controversy that led President Clinton to pull her nomination to be assistant attorney general for civil rights. Yet we eventually tried to dial her into the debate on charter revision at New York.
The controversy over Guinier’s nomination to lead the Justice Department’s civil rights division erupted in 1993. It was ignited by a story by David Twersky in the Forward, which we were then editing. It reported on writings by Guinier suggesting that the Constitution required the election of minorities to public office. The Wall Street Journal summed her up in a now-famous headline “Quota Queen.”
The Forward argued that Guinier deserved a hearing in the Senate. In the event, though, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, one Joseph Biden, doomed her candidacy, saying that if she tried to defend her views, she wouldn’t have a shot. Mr. Clinton soon withdrew her nomination. Guinier, who’d been teaching law at Penn, won a plum position at Harvard Law School.
Read the whole thing.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Selling a Used Car? Here are 20 Photo Tips!
If you are selling a used car online, one great way to make your car stand out from the rest and attract more attention is to up your photo game. You don’t need to be a professional photographer to capture compelling images of the car or truck you are ready to sell—a few simple tips can help your photos grab the attention of possible buyers.
You’ve seen the standard used-car photo—the boring shot taken outside a dealership, in a driveway or crowded parking lot, midday, from standing eye level, of a sterile-looking car, with a wide-angle smartphone camera lens. This type of photo won’t help your online car ad stand out. Better photographs will.
In general, you’ll want to approach the photo shoot for the car in the same way you’d approach it for any other type of deliberate (non-snapshot) photography. This requires paying attention to photographic details that others might miss.
Also, ad copy is important as well: The Story Behind That Hilarious Toyota Corolla Craigslist Ad.
When I ran the CarFax for this car, I got back a single piece of paper that said, “It’s a Corolla. It’s fine.”
Let’s face the facts, this car isn’t going to win any beauty contests, but neither are you. Stop lying to yourself and stop lying to your wife. This isn’t the car you want, it’s the car you deserve: The f**king 1999 Toyota Corolla.
Hey, it’s a ‘90s Toyota. You can drop it off a building and it will start:
BEATLES: GET BACK NEWS:
● Disney confirms The Beatles: Get Back to arrive on Blu-ray & DVD on 2/8. “The Blu-ray Disc SKU will be a 3-disc set that includes one episode per disc. Sound for the program will be Dolby Atmos, as can be heard on Disney+. We don’t know for sure whether there will be special features or not, but the package will apparently feature “8 hours of content” which would seem to indicate that only the documentary itself will be included (as it’s 486 minutes long). The packaging will apparently include a set of collector’s cards featuring photos of the band members.” So apparently, it won’t be bundled with a restored edition of Let It Be, unfortunately.
● Beatles’ Famed Rooftop Concert to Screen in IMAX Theaters. Get Back director Peter Jackson will participate in a special Q&A following the concert film’s special theatrical release. “The 60-minute feature will fittingly premiere Jan. 30, 53 years to the day after the Beatles staged their famous final public performance.”
MAYBE FIRING HEALTH WORKERS IN A PANDEMIC WAS A MISTAKE: Hospitals recruiting international nurses to fill pandemic shortages.
‘The Chosen’ Producer Answers Critics: Dallas Jenkins responds to critics of the most successful-ever, audience-funded digital entertainment series, about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Seems there have been some questions about his faith, whether the series is adding to or taking away from Scripture, and if non-Christians are involved in the production.
WHAT COULD GO WRONG? Over 11,000 illegal Muslim migrants arrive in Germany from Belarus.
JOHN PODHORETZ: Sidney Poitier’s life was a testament to the greatest of American stories.
Unschooled beyond fourth grade in the Bahamas, sent to America by his parents at 14 to save him from a life of crime, shot in the leg at 16 during a 1943 race riot in Harlem, Poitier worked hard jobs as a menial laborer and an Army hospital orderly before he happened to spot an audition notice for the Negro Ensemble Theater.
He was dismissed by the NET due to a thick accent and halting reading skills — and thereupon began the process of willing himself into becoming the most important American black pop culture figure of the 20th century.
Poitier sat before a radio and trained his own voice, remaking it until he achieved the indelible sing-song baritone that — a little like Cary Grant’s — sounded like no one else’s on Earth. He got into the theater troupe and made conscious use of a charisma that emanated from him like a pheromone.
Four years later he had his first starring role in a movie — 1950’s “No Way Out.” He was all of 22. And he was playing a doctor. He would do so again, 17 years later, in “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner,” the first major motion picture to feature a black man and a white woman in a romance.
That film was the representative work of one aspect of his career — the aspect in which he served as the representation of black pride and dignity, a person it would be impossible to consider in any way inferior to anyone else.
Read the whole thing.
LAYERS AND LAYERS OF FACT-CHECKERS AND EDITORS, POLITICO EDITION: “SPOTTED: Speaker NANCY PELOSI, Senate Majority Leader CHUCK SCHUMER and wife, IRIS WEINSHALL, Sens. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D-Minn.) and DICK DURBIN (D-Ill.) dining together at Le Diplomate on Friday night. Pic. CORRECTION: The original version of this item misidentified Iris Weinshall, the wife of Chuck Schumer, as Sonia Sotomayor. Our tipster got it wrong, but we should have double checked.”
UPDATE: But not before Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post rushed to defend Sotomayor:
(Updated and bumped.)
THAT’S DIETARY TERRORISM: Woman swaps out roommate’s food with vegan alternatives, ends up charged with a felony. Especially when the roommate turns out to have a soy allergy. . .