Archive for 2024

February 6, 2024

February 5, 2024

HOUSE TO VOTE ON MAYORKAS IMPEACHMENT: In a bit of a political puzzler, House Republicans are charging forward to bring two articles of impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to the full House of Representatives for a vote Tuesday.

The House Rules Committee cleared the way Monday evening by adopting a closed rule that means there will be no floor amendments. But there is huge doubt about the outcome because two Republicans — Tom McLintock of California and Ken Buck of Colorado — are all-but-certain no votes.

That means Mayorkas may survive Tuesday’s vote. Then will begin the serious second-guessing of Speaker of the House Mike Johnson’s decision to push for the vote so quickly. More in my Epoch Times report from the scene.

Posted at 10:49 pm by Mark Tapscott on Feb 5th, 2024

OPEN THREAD: Monday, Monday.

Posted at 9:30 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 5th, 2024

UNCANCEL WOODROW WILSON? HOW ABOUT HELL NO.

There is no recognition or discussion in Frum’s defense brief of this central aspect of Wilson’s thought and legacy. I doubt Frum is even aware of the critique, or if he is, he does not take it seriously or think it worth trying to refute.

For a thorough antidote, see William Schambra’s fine extended treatment of Wilson and the recent conservative response to him in his 2007 lecture at the Heritage Foundation entitled “Revisiting Woodrow Wilson’s Progressivism, America’s transformation, and the conservative response.” Or R.J. Pestritto’s indispensable book, Woodrow Wilson and the Roots of Modern Liberalism.

Chaser: One especially fun quotation that Frum includes that ironically undermines his case is from Arthur Link, Wilson’s most devoted biographer. Here’s Frum’s account:

Arthur S. Link, who edited 69 volumes of Wilson’s papers and wrote five volumes of biography, paid Wilson this tribute: “Aside from St. Paul, Jesus and the great religious prophets, Woodrow Wilson was the most admirable character I’ve ever encountered in history.” [Emphasis added.]

This is precisely why I have always referred to him as “the missing Link.”

Flashback: The Hater’s Guide to Woodrow Wilson. “I come now not to explain Wilson, but to hate him. A national consensus on hating Wilson is long overdue. It is the patriotic duty of every decent American. While conservatives have particular reasons to detest Wilson, and all his works, and all his empty promises, there is more than enough in his record for moderates, liberals, progressives, libertarians, and socialists to join us in this great and unifying cause.”

Posted at 8:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 5th, 2024

HMMMMMM: Apple’s ‘Vision Pro’ Is the Infancy of Technology That Society Will Soon Revolve Around.

In 2022, I wrote about how the big players in the tech industry are attempting to be the first to reach the building of a virtual reality world where people can work, play, interact, go to school, hold meetings, and live with each other seamlessly. At this time, the concept is called “The Oasis,” based on a book called “Ready Player One” (now also a movie by Steven Spielberg) written by Ernest Cline.

The concept of “The Oasis” is so seductive that Mark Zuckerberg has been racing to its creation, even going so far as to rename his company “Meta” and put a lot of time and effort into developing VR technology and interactivity with the “Oculus” and the “Metaverse.” Something very similar happened in the book for the company that developed The Oasis. It’s even rumored that Zuck hands out the book to the employees who work on the Metaverse.

Why race to The Oasis?

Because whoever controls it effectively controls the world.

Whoever creates the dominant VR realm will become a central business hub for corporations worldwide. Billions of people will don their headsets and haptics to go to work, hang out with friends, go on adventures, watch professional sports, movies, or shows, tour museums, go to class, play video games, and more. As Cline wrote in his novel, so huge will this virtual world be that it will even have its own political system.

It will totally change the way we live, work, and socialize, and the company that gets there first will become so powerful and wealthy that it’s hard to fathom it.

The only thing holding these companies back right now is just that the tech necessary for this kind of thing hasn’t been perfected yet…but it’s getting closer all the time.

Apple, for instance, just proved that it has actually made some real progress, at least in terms of the visual aspect of it with its new Apple Vision Pro.

Last week, Apple released its commercial for the product, attempting to show off what it can do, but it frankly fell short of getting the message across despite the show-and-tell looking like something straight out of a sci-fi movie of the near future. However, one of the Apple Vision Pro’s users uploaded their own demo of the product, and you can see just how impressive this tech actually is.

Star Trek debuted on NBC in 1966. Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey first hit theaters in 1968. Walter Cronkite was showing the future of household computing on his 21st Century TV show in 1967. Which means we’ve been conditioned for nearly 60 years to the idea that we would be sitting and typing in front of video screens working and communicating with others. Star Trek’s tricorder and 2001’s flat panel newspads conditioned us as well that some of these screens would be small and handheld. With the exception of a few elderly luddite holdouts, nearly everyone today has a cell phone, and thanks to 15 years or so of updates, by now most of these phones have some “smart” capabilities such as cameras, texting, and apps. Tim Berners-Lee’s World Wide Web is accessible in some form from virtually every type of computing device, from desktop PCs and laptops to iPads and iPhones to the Roku box for TV sets.

But Apple goggles are in their infancy. According to Fast Company last year, the original goal was to sell glasses, but,“One Apple insider told [Business Week] that the company is at least four years away from delivering a smaller ‘glasses’ design. A number of miniaturization breakthroughs are needed to fit powerful chips and battery power inside the smaller-form factor, industry sources have told Fast Company.”

The key word there for battery power is eventually being “inside.” As for now, though: The One Part of the Vision Pro That Apple Doesn’t Want You to See. Apple’s latest series of Vision Pro demos carefully obscures one important hardware feature.

So what, if anything, will be the killer app for early adopters that could make the concept stick, even if it makes today’s early adaptors feel like 1980s laser disc buyers, when players for the five-inch DVD finally rolled out in 1996?

UPDATE: Apple Vision Pro Turned the Real World Into a Black Mirror Episode Overnight.

“The good news is that there’s very little chance of that sci-fi dystopian future coming to pass anytime soon. The viral content around the Vision Pro so far is just that: Content made by professional posters that is purposefully outlandish and provocative in order to get a reaction.”

Posted at 8:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 5th, 2024

WE ALL WERE LIED TO: Gaza was a modern developed city before October 7th.

I was recently released from reserve duty in Gaza, after serving 100 days in the IDF. Since the world can’t see firsthand the things I saw there, I feel I have to share.

For years, well before October 7th, we’ve heard about how terrible life is for the poor, oppressed Gazans. How anti-Israel activists and media outlets claim the Gaza Strip can be compared to an open-air prison. This became the standard, accepted narrative about life in Gaza, promulgated by Al Jazeera and international human rights groups. But now, having experienced it myself, I can confidently tell you that we were lied to.

This won’t be all that shocking a development for many longtime Insta-readers: A Taste of “Concentration Camp” Gaza: Roots Club.

Posted at 5:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 5th, 2024

GLEICHSCHALTUNG: Amazon Bowed to White House Pressure to Suppress Books Skeptical of COVID-19 Vaccines.

Amazon yielded to pressure from President Joe Biden’s White House to suppress books that opposed COVID-19 vaccines, according to documents reviewed by The Daily Signal.

The House Judiciary Committee obtained the emails, which demonstrate the White House’s pressure on Amazon to suppress “anti-vax books” and the company’s decision to take action against the books.

Amazon employees strategized for a meeting with the White House on March 9, 2021, openly asking whether the administration wanted the retailer to remove books from its catalog.

“Is the [a]dmin asking us to remove books, or are they more concerned about search results/order (or both)?” one employee wrote.

It’s so odd, considering that the CEO of Amazon also owns a newspaper whose motto is “Democracy Dies in Darkness.” But wait until the Biden administration discovers who was a vaccine skeptic back in 2020: ‘I will not take his word for it:’ Kamala Harris says she would not trust Trump alone on a coronavirus vaccine.

Posted at 5:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 5th, 2024

I HOPE NOT BECAUSE I DON’T WANT TO WORK WITH THE GUY WHO PLAYS JEFFREY DAHMER: No, you don’t need to be disabled to play Richard III: Actors don’t need to share the ‘lived experience’ of their characters. “It’s called acting for a reason.”

Everyone knows this, except for the morons who have taken it upon themselves to recast our social mores in their own, moronic, image.

Plus:

As Laurence Olivier famously said to a strung-out Dustin Hoffman on the set of Marathon Man (after he’d stayed awake for 48 hours straight to simulate the torment of his character): “Why not try acting dear boy?”

It’s a thought.

Posted at 5:00 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 5th, 2024
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