This Far, No Farther

The American Uprising gathers steam

Posted on April 24, 2020April 25, 2020 by Mike

CASTLE ROCK—Sedalia knife shop owner Hal Van Herke on Tuesday posted a Declaration of Business Independence on Facebook saying he would reopen CastleGate Knife and Tool Tuesday in defiance of Governor Polis’ stay-at-home order.

Van Herke’s declaration says in part:

“WHEREAS: Small businesses have carried the burden of this effort more heavily than special interests, large corporations and major banks who once again received preferential treatment and largess from the Federal Government at the further cost of small business tax payers, and

WHEREAS: Non-essential Government, Academic, and Corporate staff continue to remain unconscionably fully paid at the same time that Small Business, the Self Employed and the Unemployed suffer, and

WHEREAS: Our attempts at petition and righteous redress, to Our Government has fallen on uncaring ears, and in some cases has been actively suppressed, and

WHEREAS: We refuse to become second-class citizens, beholden to the entitled class for our safety, freedom, and wellbeing, and

WHEREAS: We have the ability to operate our business in such a manner as to reduce and mitigate the risk to our Community, Customers, and Staff, and to adjust operations in a responsible and balanced manner commensurate with local conditions.”

“I felt like it was important to for somebody to stand up along with other businesses and say we’re not going to be discounted in this and we’re not going to sit back and watch our life’s work destroyed while many of the people making decisions are still being paid their full time salary while they’re sitting at home,” said Van Herke.

Amen to that, brother.

In his declaration, Van Herke quotes President Ronald Reagan’s farewell address of January 11, 1989 in which Reagan says, “I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.”

Amen to that, too. Ain’t it sad how quickly, and how thoroughly, Americans seem to have forgotten that home truth.

(Via Stephen Green)

Update! Defiance: the American spirit.

Shelly Luther, a salon owner in Dallas, is drawing a line in the sand. Behind on her mortgage and no Small Business Association funding in sight, Luther has decided to re-open her business Friday, April 24, in violation of the stay-at-home order in Texas that has closed all non-essential businesses, Inside Edition reported.

“I’m behind on my mortgage,” Luther said. “I know a lot of my stylists haven’t paid their mortgage. It’s either come in and make money to be able to feed your family or stay home and freak out.”

A mother of three, Luther has 19 stylists who make their living at her salon.

“Obviously I don’t want anyone to get sick and I don’t want the virus to spread,” the business owner told Inside Edition. “It will be one of the safer places for people to go rather than going to Walmart or Home Depot.”

And Luther is willing to risk her freedom as an American.

“No one wants to go to jail, but if push comes to shove I’m willing to take that risk,” she said.

Which is the question podcast host Cari Kelemen asked in a tweet.

Noting that Luther’s schedule was “PACKED,” Kelemen asked how local authorities would respond to this carefully calculated violation.

“This morning, a single mom Salon Owner in Dallas, who cannot afford to stay closed another day, is opening her salon ‘ahead of schedule.’ Her schedule today is PACKED with happy women. Will sheriffs be there to arrest her? How will the women with appointments respond if they do?”

That really is the crucial question here, isn’t it? For their own part, the cops ought to know that enforcing illegal edicts carries a price tag of its own.

In my previous column, posted on April 6, I lamented that the actions of some police officers, ordered to carry out some of the sillier or more onerous restrictions attendant to the pandemic, will further erode the already strained relationships their departments have within their communities. As one might have predicted, things have only gotten worse. Since that column was posted, we have seen police officers issuing $500 citations for the crime of attending a drive-in church service, and others arresting an Idaho woman who dared take her kids to a closed playground. Indeed, social media is awash with similar tales, which are all the more insulting to the average citizen when accompanied by stories of criminals released from jail only to re-offend within hours.

With the accumulation of these stories, the populace grows ever more restive at the restraints placed upon them. If the law and civil authority are to be respected, the laws must be respectable, at least to a majority of those on whom they are imposed.

Which brings us back to the police officers in the field and caught between their feckless superiors and a fractious public. There comes a time in every cop’s career when he receives instructions he knows will waste his time and may even be antithetical to his mission to reduce the fear of crime in his community. Often these instructions are relayed by a sergeant who himself is equally dubious about them, but who is obeying orders to disseminate them. When this happens, it is the wise officer who can say, “Yes, sir,” and then go out and do the right thing, modifying the instructions or ignoring them altogether with the sergeant’s tacit blessing. Every good cop, and every good sergeant, is familiar and comfortable with this arrangement.

Chasing people away from churches, beaches, hiking trails, and parks, and arresting those who do not meekly comply, is not enforcing the “law,” it is enforcing the whimsical edicts of people unqualified to craft and issue them. When all of this is over, can the damage be undone?

Doubtful at best, and certainly not easily. Look at it this way: when a trust is betrayed, how willing should the betrayed be to grant it again, at least without a great deal of hesitance and skepticism? Does that sound like a smart move, or a sucker’s bet?

Non-essential update! I didn’t think of this angle before, and I really should have.

Whenever the threat of a government shutdown looms, Democrats and their media allies give us daily doses of how devastating such a thing will be on “non-essential” government workers.

Then they go into overdrive when a shutdown actually occurs: wall-to-wall sob stories giving examples of government workers supposedly harmed even though, everyone knows, those employees will soon be paid. They essentially have a paid vacation.

Now, after weeks of the intentional destruction of the private sector with tens of millions of jobs lost, with businesses and families being devastated and having no idea how they will feed their families and themselves, there are few of those same sob stories, despite real hardship, and here is what we get instead:

If a Republican governor wants to open a state’s businesses, we get attack pieces saying he wants people to die. It’s as if the media were acting as a major participant in encouraging the U.S. to commit economic suicide. For decades, they have sought to weaken the U.S. and remake America.

If most of the media had an honest bone in their bodies, instead of an agenda, they would report that states that did not have a complete shutdown, or stay-at-home orders, had as good results or better results than states that put in the tyrannical, dictatorial orders. They would say there is no proof that the stay-at-home orders and harsh measures caused the flattening of the COVID-19 curve. It appears that most of the flattening has occurred naturally, same as with the normal flu.

That’s a pretty big “if” there, fella. Probably the biggest, most glaring one ever attempted indoors.

Two kinds of people in America now

Posted on April 23, 2020April 23, 2020 by Mike

Them that still has a job and get a paycheck…and them that don’t. Might behoove those in column A to pretend they have a wee mite of empathy and concern for the column B folks who are rightly worried about their ability to feed their newly-strugging families and keep a roof over their heads, I’m thinking.

In a turn of events that should surprise no one, thousands of people across the country have taken to the streets to protest the draconian lockdown measures that have destroyed the economy and millions of lives along with it. Many in the media seem to be perplexed about this development. They are doing quite well, personally — still pulling an income, still able to do cable news hits from their home studios — and they can’t imagine why anyone would be so upset about being asked to stay home and watch Netflix and play video games, as Patton Oswalt put it in a tweet that has half a million likes.

But those who lack the privilege of a media personality or famous comedian may find that Netflix and video games are paltry comfort when they return home after spending six hours in line at a food bank. Agree or disagree with the methods of the protestors, but any reasonable and decent person should at least understand why they are protesting. In the past month, 22 million people have lost their jobs. Plus another several million who didn’t qualify for unemployment or couldn’t apply because the unemployment sites are crashing. Contrary to how Dr. Fauci has characterized it, these numbers represent more than a mere “inconvenience.” Many Americans have lost everything. And not because of some natural disaster or act of God, but because the government has forbid them from going to work.

Illegally and unconstitutional forbidden them to go to work. Let’s not leave that part out. As time goes on, state governors continue their wanton destruction of the economy and impoverishment of tens of millions, the rebellion escalates, and it becomes time to get the torches alight and the tar a-boiling, it will begin to matter.

A woman at a protest in Maryland held a cardboard sign saying she wanted to save her business. “I need to work to live,” the sign read. Democrat politicians would call that woman “selfish.” Talking heads on MSNBC would say she is part of a “death cult.” But it seems to me that she’s just a woman who wants to salvage the business that she has poured her sweat and tears into. And she wants to survive. Both of these seem like perfectly reasonable goals. Disagree with her approach if you want — though, honestly, I can’t see the problem with the approach — but to sneer at her and the other protestors, as so many in the media have done, is morally repugnant.

I would like to propose an unofficial rule for any further discussion of these protests and the lockdowns that prompted them. Before you give your opinion, you should first reveal whether you still have an income. The rest of us would like to know if you are earning an income while you smear your fellow Americans for wanting to earn an income. Indeed, it’s rather striking that the loudest voices in favor of the shutdown are primarily people who have lost nothing because of it. It is bad enough for those who’ve lost nothing to wag their fingers at those who’ve lost everything, but to call them selfish? Well, that level of hypocrisy is just too much to bear.

It is indeed. And there’s no good reason for the people who are toting quite a load already, with little to no real justification, to do so. More from Insty:

It’s no surprise that a major center of resistance to the shutdown has emerged in Michigan, whose Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has shown all the sensitivity of an angry third-grade teacher in administering a shutdown regime that often makes no sense — banning sales of seeds in stores that are open for other purposes, or allowing sailboating but banning powerboating. Her response to the protests, a threat to extend shutdowns further, seems calculated to inflame things further.

People don’t appreciate being lectured and condescended to and bossed around. They especially don’t appreciate being urged to sacrifice by people who make no sacrifices themselves. And that’s a different sort of class divide: When rulers ask for sacrifices without making any, they’re displaying a distinct lack of, well, class.

Sadly, to succeed in their job, our leaders will need to possess humility, empathy and self-discipline. Those traits are in sadly short supply in our leadership class. We will all pay a price for that, though if recent history is any guide, our leaders will pay less than the rest of us.

Yep. But the price our “leaders” and “elites” must pay can rise with shocking rapidity, and if they continue blindly along their present path, they’ll find that the pain of settling accounts might not be limited to the merely allegorical.

Update! We must all pray that Robert Zimmerman is wrong. But deep in our hearts, we know he’s right.

I don’t want to mince any words here. This Great Wuhan Depression was ordered by the governors of our fifty states. It is their economic collapse, through and through. They knew that if they shut down everything for a month or more the economy would collapse, and yet they did it anyway. And sadly, President Trump aided them in this effort by publicly activating the National Guard when requested by them in order to enforce these lock down edicts.

Moreover, I fear that this economic crash will be exacerbated by the accompanying loss of freedom. You can’t turn an economy around on a dime, but if freedom is allowed you raise the odds that things can recover faster.

Sadly, the government edicts, many of which literally nullified the Bill of Rights, have set a precedent that is very hostile to freedom, and one that our governments now appear to be following with enthusiasm. The so-called “plans” being announced by various state governments, many following federal guidelines developed by the Trump administration, all dictate which businesses can operate, when businesses shall reopen, and how people will behave. The idea of letting freedom do the job seems quite quaint to our modern rulers. They would much rather rule as dictators, setting the rules without referring to law or legislation.

Meanwhile, the facts on the ground continue to suggest that the Wuhan flu is not the deadly plague that many politicians and health experts have claimed. With the rate of new cases apparently peaking, we can now make a reasonable prediction of how many the virus will eventually kill (recognizing that for many political reasons some of these numbers have been padded), and find that the numbers will likely end up comparable to a high flu season, and far less than many other causes of death that we routinely take for granted. In addition, there is clear evidence that the lock downs were unnecessary and that our health system was not going to be overrun. In fact, though the data remains incomplete at this moment, the overall mortality rate is actually low this year, when compared to recent years.

Thus, this virus did not warrant the panic that ensued, the destruction of the economy, and the nullification of the Bill of Rights. But yet that is exactly what our elected officials have done, destroyed the economy and nullified our freedoms.

Unless we as citizens take action to oppose this, our country will never be the same, and millions more will suffer as the economy continues its crash, hindered from recovering because we are now no different than socialist Venezuela or communist Russia.

This country will assuredy NOT ever be the same—not least because of how very far down the road to true socialism we had already come before this latest state-mandated, panic-inspired lurch to the extreme Left was perpetrated.

Choices, choices

Posted on April 21, 2020April 21, 2020 by Mike

Our would-be masters will narrow and restrict them as much as possible, until we’re well and truly cornered.

Presently, billions of people around the world are ‘living’ under mandatory stay-at-home orders, purportedly to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. Aside from the question as to whether quarantine is the most effective method for fighting this particular pandemic, what exactly will be required from us before any semblance of normalcy returns?

One possible requirement – aside from being discouraged from ever shaking hands again – is the mandatory participation in a global vaccine program, underwritten by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Big Pharma and an assortment of other people who supposedly have the best interest of the global citizenry in mind. Should we be concerned?

Despite so much uncertainty with regards to the real mortality rate, US medical spokespersons are uttering incredibly irresponsible statements that only serve to instill a sense of fear throughout society. Dr. Fauci, for example, said in the course of his above interview that “I don’t think we should ever shake hands ever again, to be honest with you.” Meanwhile, World Health Organization (WHO) special envoy David Nabarro told the BBC that “some form of facial protection, I’m sure, is going to become the norm.”

Now, judging how the medical experts are preventing entire nations from acquiring herd immunity, together with the media’s refusal to consider the merits of hydroxychloroquine, this leads to what should have been the last resort: a vaccine program, which could very well turn out to be mandatory; a requirement forced on individuals before they are able to participate in any sort of public events again.

This much was suggested by none other than the world’s premier vaccine pusher, Bill Gates, who said in a recent interview that any sort of mass gatherings “may not come back at all” without a wide-scale vaccination program. Some would call that a form of blackmail, used against a desperate people who would do just about anything right now to get back to life as they once knew it. Those days appear far in the future. Just this week, the UK announced that people will have to “live with some restrictions” until a vaccine is developed.

To be clear, few people would question that vaccines have been an inherent good for civilization; they have helped eradicate some of the worst diseases mankind has ever faced, like smallpox and polio. But today things are not so straightforward as simply eradicating a pandemic. Presently, there is a major push being made – with Bill Gates at the vanguard of those efforts – to introduce a vaccine that contains nanotechnology to ‘mark’ and surveil those injected. As just one example, consider the work being carried out by ID2020, a San Francisco-based biometric company that counts Microsoft as one of its founding members. It recently announced it was exploring “identification technologies for infants” that is based on “infant immunization.” In other words, tracking devices embedded inside of vaccines.

While the world would welcome a vaccine that eradicates the coronavirus, many would find it unacceptable to be forced to have a vaccine that contains any sort of surveillance technology. At this point in our battle against a pandemic, which has created millions of newly unemployed, the last thing people need in their lives right now is yet another source of worry. Let’s develop a vaccine against coronavirus, Mr. Gates, but please hold the tracking add-ons.

Don’t you people get it yet? The tracking add-ons are the whole point.

Let a million middle fingers rise

Posted on April 21, 2020April 23, 2020 by Mike

The spirit of American rebellion still lives, and is beginning to awaken at last.

Clearly, the greatest public- heath threat imaginable…a kid on a skateboard. Young people, remember, this is what Big-government statist Democrats do—they take away your freedom. https://t.co/VBCmnZRvfC

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) April 19, 2020

Now get a load of what happened next. Trust me, it’ll warm the cockles of even the most cynical heart.

It may not seem like all that much…yet. But it will be small, seemingly insignificant acts of defiance like this that will snowball into full-on revolt—which is something America has never in its history needed more desperately than it does right now.

Update! Washington state insurrection.

Washington Governor Jay Inslee’s draconian executive orders mandating business closures and stay-at-home status for all residents has been rejected by county commissioners in Franklin County. The motion passed unanimously. Now, the legal battles may or may not begin but in the immediate future, the county is official reopened for business.

“I move that Franklin County end recognition of the governor’s stay at home emergency proclamation that is now deemed unconstitutional. We support the reopening for all builders and small businesses that want to work,” Commissioner Clint Didier said during a meeting Tuesday morning.

This opens the door for other counties and cities to oppose the order based on RCW 43.06.220(4), which limits the governor’s state-of-emergency powers to 30 days unless the state legislature passes an extension.

Well, I gotta admit I didn’t see THAT coming.

Payback time update! Cockroaches get hit with a spotlight, to their great dismay.

Talk radio great Jamie Allman filed a Sunshine law request for the actual emails of St. Louis County residents who’ve snitched on local entrepreneurs trying to make a living. Most of the complaints were unfounded, involving people “turning in” companies that were deemed essential by the county.

But reading the actual complaints reveals just how terrified the media and corrupt academics have made good people. The complainants are truly scared. They believe that Coronavirus kills almost everyone who gets infected. They believe that washing your car, hitting golf balls at a range, or playing singles tennis can spread the disease to many people.

The 900-page file of complaints is, ultimately, sad. What could be more depressing than a mother begging government officials to put her daughter out of work? Or women asking the county to shut down their fiancé’s company?

Well, about the only thing I can think of is the thought of such despicable, craven panic-ninnies getting away with diming out friends and loved ones without paying a stiff price for such perfidy. Doxx the living fuck out of every last one of these diaper-dragging ratbags; if the old “snitches get stitches” bylaw can’t be practically enforced, then public exposure, scorn, and humiliation is the very least they have coming to ’em.

So how’s THAT working out for ya, Bill?

Posted on April 21, 2020April 21, 2020 by Mike

When His (dis)Honor Red Bill DeBalledZero gets a bucketful of dung hurled in his face by constituents repurposing his New York Narc Line for the better, you know there’s still hope for America.

De Blasio’s social distancing tip line flooded with penis photos, Hitler memes
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s critics let him know how they really felt about him ordering New Yorkers to snitch on each other for violating social-distancing rules — by flooding his new tip line with crank complaints including “dick pics” and people flipping the bird, The Post has learned.

Photos of extended middle fingers, the mayor dropping the Staten Island groundhog and news coverage of him going to the gym have all been texted to a special tip line that de Blasio announced Saturday, according to screenshots posted on Twitter.

One user sent the message “We will fight this tyrannical overreach!” to the service and got an automated message that in part said, “Hello, and thank you for texting NYC311.”

“F–k you!” replied @MorganLSchmidt1, along with a meme showing Adolf Hitler and the words “TO THOSE TURNING IN YOUR NEIGHBORS AND LOCAL BUSINESSES — YOU DID THE REICH THING.”

“Start flooding their reporting text numbers with this pics!” the tweet added.

Other profane messages included a photo of a bowl of gummy candies in the shape of male genitalia and a sign saying “EAT A BAG OF D–KS.”

All good stuff, yes, but this next one is probably my own personal fave.

An NYPD source said that “dick pic” photos of real penises have also been texted to 311, and a caller phoned in a tip that de Blasio was seen performing oral sex on someone “in an alleyway behind a 7-11” early Sunday.

YES. More like that one, please. Remember to include a detailed description of the burro Bill was observed blowing with your report next time, too. Thank you.

The inundation of off-color texts was so large the city had to temporarily shut down the service.

“The city has begun vetting everything before dispersing the information to precincts,” the NYPD source said.

And then, after you guys get done with all those, umm, essential services, maybe youse could get back to work doing some actual police work.

Sounds crazy, I know, but it just might work.

At last, the silver lining!

Posted on April 20, 2020April 20, 2020 by Mike

Hey, you never let a serious crisis go to waste. Right, libtards?

President Trump announced on Twitter Monday night he will be signing an executive order temporarily suspending immigration to the United States due to the COVID-19 Chinese coronavirus and the need to protect jobs for Americans.

“In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!”

Ironic, innit, that while governors and local-yokel officials are busy trampling the Constitution underfoot to glom all the power they can for themselves, Trump The Evil Dictator is taking direct, common-sense action to protect the interests of working-stiff Americans whose livelihoods have been at best jeopardized by those same governors and local-yokels?

Are we not men?

Posted on April 17, 2020April 18, 2020 by Mike

On your feet or on your knees.

I am thoroughly disheartened – nay, sickened — by the sheeplike behavior of so many of our countrymen. I cannot believe they think the proper response to “our leaders’” overweening usurpations of authorities never granted is to politely ask for their rights back.

Americans don’t do that. Americans exercise their rights openly and confidently. They don’t ask for anyone’s permission.

Your rights are not permissions. They are yours, not because some “authority” has granted them to you, but by virtue of your membership in the human race. To treat them as permissions is to surrender them, such that any “crisis,” whether real or notional, can be used to nullify them. And there are plenty of wannabe dictators who are grasping at that opportunity — with the support of the left-wing media…

It hardly matters what rights you claim if you refrain from exercising them. That’s how the Second Amendment was gutted. It’s how the rest of the Bill of Rights is being reduced to meaninglessness. And if we permit it to go one millimeter further, we are unworthy of the term “free people.”

It’s not about the economy. It’s not about the virus. It’s not about “science.” It’s about freedom: holding onto the pitiful amount we have left after two and a quarter centuries’ incursions upon it, usually in the name of “crisis” or “safety.”

Free men accept that life entails risk.
They don’t ask their “leaders” to “protect” them.
When “leaders” tyrannize them “for your own good,” they rise up.
Such “leaders” become lamppost decorations, pour encourager les autres.

Are you a free man or a sheep?

From what we’re seeing of late, the answer to that question is far from encouraging. Happily, though, sometimes it doesn’t take all that much in the way of pushback or defiance to force our masters to relent:

Full dressed #Navy Master Chief standing in the water today on Emerald Isle NC after the beach & water were closed. LEO let him go and approx 3 hours later the town of Emerald Isle opened back up the beach & water to the public!#AmericanHero #salute4servinghumanity #MAGA pic.twitter.com/3fIaOjNgGF

— John B Wells 11:11 (@JohnBWellsCTM) April 17, 2020

Good on ya, Master Chief. They may well take us down in the long run, but at the very least we can make ’em work for it.

Update! This may seem to be unrelated, but it strikes me as yet another depressing aspect of the Great Knuckling Under.

Land O’ Lakes drops ‘racist’ Native American image after nearly 100 years
The new label was announced in a press release from Land O’ Lakes in February, though it made no specific mention of removing the Native American image from all products.

The press release shared “the new packaging will show up in a variety of ways, including through a new front-of-package design that features the phrase ‘Farmer-Owned’ above the LAND O LAKES brandmark,” as well as include pictures of farmers and co-op members on the label.

“As Land O’Lakes looks toward our 100th anniversary, we’ve recognized we need packaging that reflects the foundation and heart of our company culture—and nothing does that better than our farmer-owners whose milk is used to produce Land O’Lakes’ dairy products,” said Beth Ford, President and CEO, Land O’Lakes, in the press release.

“As a farmer-owned co-op, we strongly feel the need to better connect the men and women who grow our food with those who consume it,” Ford said.

Is it really necessary to “connect” them beyond having them buy and eat your damned butter? Because if it is, I’m just damned if I can see the why of it. Or how a bunch of mealy-mouthed gobbledygook from some college-kid corporate flack who probably never yanked a single bovine teat in her life is gonna get the job done. Until such time as you can explain those mysterious profundities to me, grab that plunger-handle and get to churning, lady.

But if you think that’s depressing stuff—and it is—wait till you get a load of the backstory.

Did you know that back in the 1950s, when Land O’ Lakes wanted to update their logo, they hired an American Indian artist to do the job. He came up with Mia, the logo we’re all familiar with, to honor American Indian culture and their traditional connection to nature.

I checked into it a little myself, and WeirdDave ain’t just making it up.

Mia first appeared on Land O’Lakes packaging in 1928, and was originally designed by illustrator Arthur C. Hanson for the advertising firm Brown and Bigelow.

Native American artist Patrick DesJarlait, of the Ojibwe tribe, redesigned the packaging in the 1950s to foster “a sense of Indian pride,” the Minnesota Reformer reported.

His son, Robert DesJarlait, told the outlet that the image — which has been slammed by many as “racist” — has become a “paradox” for Native Americans.

“He was breaking a lot of barriers…Back in the ’50s, nobody even thought about stereotypical imagery. Today it’s a stereotype, but it’s also a source of cultural pride,” DesJarlait told the outlet.

As well it might be, too. As Dave says, you can be pretty confident that there were few if any Native Americans among the SJW screechers demanding Land-O-Lakes’ capitulation to mindless PC here.

Puzzling, innit, the way those screechers have managed to “fundamentally transform” a legitimate source of cultural pride into some kind of shameful offense against all human decency. In the end, though, this isn’t really about butter, or marketing, or the Land-O-Lakes mascot, or respect for Indians and their heritage, or even “racism” itself. In the end, it’s really about this:

Regardless of how many times they say it, the far left can't come up with a definition of "systemic racism" that doesn't involve collapsing American society, our system of government and our rights. When she says she wants to "dismantle racist institutions"– she means America. https://t.co/Y3LxoYK6xx

— Dalia al-Aqidi (@Dalia4Congress) April 16, 2020

So is the above gutting of Ilhan Omar-Elmi really related to the topic at hand? You just better believe it is, chum. Because collapsing American society, dismantling America, is ALWAYS what it’s about with the Left—every single time, every single issue, every single word of every single argument. Until you begin to get your head fully around that, you ain’t fighting back, and you damned sure ain’t winning. You’re just chasing your tail, that’s all.

Above the fray

Posted on April 13, 2020April 13, 2020 by Mike

Being “elite” means never having to say you’re sorry.

Take any contentious issue—travel bans, the advantages of masks, the Chinese compromising of WHO, the entire industry of grievance politics infecting criticism of China’s despicable behavior, delayed testing by the Centers for Disease Control and FDA, modeling, the efficacy of antimalarial drugs—and our elite seem unable to admit they were wrong, and wrong with a great deal of costly arrogance.

It is no exaggeration to say that most models that the best and brightest offered the public, from the imported Imperial College in London to those from the University of Washington and many more besides, were not just inaccurate, but quite mistaken in two tragic ways: First, they were accepted as gospel by governments and thus their flawed assumptions became the basis for policies that in many cases may prove counterproductive. Second, the modelers themselves either did not promptly correct their warped inputs, or were not completely forthcoming about their data and methodologies, or blamed their flawed assumptions on others or circumstances beyond imagination, or claimed that their mistakes were in fact salutary—if not sorta, kinda planned—in galvanizing a presumably infantile public to accept draconian measures that it otherwise would not.

I know a plumber and an electrician, both skilled in the pragmatic engineering of pipes and wires, who would not dare to think they could offer a model of plumbing or electrical prediction if they had no idea of the real size of the denominator and were likewise unsure that the numerator was widely accepted as accurate and clearly defined.

When California Governor Gavin Newsom warned that 25.5 million Californians “will” get the virus in the eight weeks following March 18, albeit without his shelter-in-place orders, he was also essentially stating that, at a then 2.6 percent lethality rate for Californians known to have the active virus, about 1 million would die. As I write, 24 days out from his prediction and nearing the half-way point to Doomsday, about 23,000 Californians have tested positive, and either are fighting the disease or have recovered. Since late January, about 650 of 40 million Californians have died from the disease, in a state where well over 700 people die from some cause every day.

If 10 times that number of known positive tests are now actively infected, we legitimately could assume at least 222,000 residents are now active or past carriers. Those who advised Newsom to shut down the world’s sixth-largest economy, including universities like Cal Tech, UC Berkeley, and Stanford, Silicon Valley, and the commerce and livelihoods of 40 million residents, apparently did not factor into their models some possible collective immunity among thousands of Californians who, for months, were on the front lines of arriving flights from China.

Nor did modelers seem to factor in the ability of people to social distance even before the shutdown was ordered, or the fact that a virus that does not kill 95.5 percent of those who are infected, but not frontline health workers or over 60 years old, may be deemed by the public manageable in a way that does not require having multigenerational small businesses ruined, or careers destroyed, or retirement savings accounts wrecked, or key appointments with doctors postponed or canceled.

Elite wisdom, which in its allegiance to the scientific method eventually is likely to find an antidote and vaccination against the virus, still fails us in so many other ways in which it should not, in part also because its high priests rarely face the consequences of their own ideological and scientific pronouncements.

Whatever the end result of this crisis, few at the WHO, CDC or the state health directors are going to lose their jobs in a way the small restaurateurs and Uber drivers most certainly will.

In their boundless “wisdom,” the Ruling Class “elites” seem determined to leave us with pitchforks, torches, and heads on pikes as our only possible recourse.

We’re gonna be making a few adjustments around here

Posted on April 11, 2020April 11, 2020 by Mike

This. This right here.

Recognize Taiwan to Punish China for the Novel Coronavirus
The United States should abandon the one-China policy that has been in place for decades and recognize Taiwan (aka Republic of China).

This would strike at the heart of the CCP’s self-image, humiliating and weakening them in the eyes of the world. It would, in essence, put Communist China in its place and likely even have economic ramifications, making their “Belt-and-Road” initiative less attractive to nations around the globe.

The People’s Republic has always insisted on being the sole representative of China, brow-beating other nations to going along with them with the implication that one day they would either invade or subsume Taiwan anyway.

They acted that way in 1971 when the PRC, upon being invited into the United Nations, insisted Taiwan be ejected from the organization. There could only be one China.

It’s fair play then that recognition for the island nation be accompanied by renewed full membership in the U.N. and its various subsidiaries. This would include the World Health Organization that has behaved so reprehensibly during the pandemic, acting essentially as toadies for the CCP. (WHO must also divest itself of its leadership.)

Taiwan more than deserves it. They have navigated the pandemic with extraordinary skill given their proximity to the source, resulting in only a miniscule 5 deaths in their country of over 23 million. They are also a thriving democracy.

If full US recognition of the RoC accomplishes nothing more than getting ChiCom panties in a wad, that’s plenty reason enough to do it. Red China is a hostile, treacherous adversary. It should be treated like one—given the back of the American hand at any opportunity, disdained and shunned the rest of the time. Tawain, on the other hand, is a solid and valuable ally. It’s high time we began acting as if we do in fact value them.

Trump FINALLY cleaning house?

Posted on April 9, 2020April 9, 2020 by Mike

Mucking out the stalls in the Deep State stables.

President Trump often refers to government waste as part of the Washington “swamp” he has vowed to drain – but the phrase has also become shorthand for bureaucratic resistance to his agenda and policies. Putting inspectors general, or IGs, under the microscope is the latest push in Trump’s post-impeachment purge of government officials whom the president and his conservative supporters say have worked to undermine his agenda and sabotage political appointees’ efforts to carry it out, several sources familiar with the discussions have told RealClearPolitics.

Heightened monitoring of IG investigations and their findings has yet to lead to anyone’s ouster, but key administration officials and Trump allies are urging the president to do some housecleaning and get rid of Obama-era watchdogs sprinkled throughout the administration. Several acting inspectors general appointed during the Obama administration are still operating at key government agencies, including the Department of Defense and the Treasury Department.

“The federal bureaucracy has gone to war with the Trump administration, and their people have targeted and taken out many Trump’s officials,” a former White House official told RCP. “Those who are naturally responsible are the IGs, and they are complicit in their inaction.”

“The IGs, many put in place by the Obama administration, empower the deep state to go after the administration. … It’s absolutely nuts,” the former official added. “If [officials] were scared of the consequences of breaking the law, they wouldn’t go after the Trump administration like they do. That’s why you have the deep state gone wild. No one is watching the watchdogs.”

Note that this article is from March 10th. Now let’s have the author bring us up to date:

Breaking: Trump is firing 7 IGs in one fail swoop, sources confirm to @RealClearNews. Most likely will be the IGs that were appointed by Pres. Obama or beforehand. He wants his own people in those positions now. Trump during his briefing said he has "put in 7 names" for IGs.

— Susan Crabtree (@susancrabtree) April 7, 2020

Good. At the risk of sounding like a broken record here, I’ll say it yet again: By now, there should not be so much as a single Obama stay-behind left in place anywhere in the Executive branch. Period. Hopefully, Trump is thinking of this as nothing more than a good, if way overdue, start.

Trump’s biggest blunder has been to let these ill-intentioned saboteurs keep their jobs; he shouldn’t have, and that mistake has proven very expensive indeed—not just for him and his agenda, but for the entire nation. Cristina reminds us that Reagan, at least, wasn’t suckered by the nefarious Deep State weasels:

Flashback: On day one of his administration president Ronald Reagan fired all IGs. The usual suspects were up in arms but the Reagan presidency went on just fine. Hiring or firing IGs is the president’s prerogative.

On Inauguration Day, Mr. Reagan sent notice to Congress that he had removed 13 inspectors general and two acting inspectors general in 15 agencies.

He said that the discovery of fraud, waste and mismanagement of Federal funds was an ”important priority” of his Administration and that it was essential for him to have the ”fullest confidence” in the ability and integrity of each inspector general.

Why, it’s almost as if the President thinks he might have some kind of influence over the Executive Branch or something, innit? But we know that’s a purely preposterous notion, risible on its very face. After all, no less an expert on the Constitution’s explicit separation-of-powers mandate than Adam Schitt says so.

Schiff: President Trump’s decision to fire Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson is yet another blatant attempt by the President to gut the independence of the Intelligence Community and retaliate against those who dare to expose presidential wrongdoing.

— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) April 4, 2020

Quick civics lesson for partisan-axe-grinding shitlib ignorami: the “intelligence community” isn’t supposed to be “independent,” actually. It is but one subdivision of what is known as the Executive Branch. Its personnel serve at the pleasure of their boss—the President—one of whose job titles is Chief Executive. So in other words, Trump can fire any of ’em; he can fire none of ’em; or he can fire every single gott-damned one of ’em, entirely at his own discretion or whim. For any reason, or for no reason at all. And whichever route he chooses to go, the Congress has not one single gott-damned thing to say about it. Period, full stop, end of fucking story.

Or, cutting right to the chase: Fuck off and die, Shitthead. Five minutes ago wouldn’t be soon enough to suit me.

Making China pay

Posted on April 8, 2020April 11, 2020 by Mike

Glenn kicks around a few ideas.

There are many lessons to be learned from the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. But one is already clear: China needs to be isolated from the civilized world until its behavior improves. We are in the current situation, with deaths and economic devastation worldwide, because China handled this outbreak with its trademark mixture of dishonesty, incompetence and thuggery. Were China a more civilized nation, this outbreak would have been stopped early, and with far less harm, inside and outside of China.

Expecting any Communist dictatorship’s behavior ever to improve, or even moderate, is futile. The iron law regarding the behavior of such nation-states can be easily summed up thus: Commies gotta Commie. Brutality; indifference to human liberty, rights, and suffering; oppression; deceit, double-dealing, and manipulation; and, where said nation-state can manage it, bare-knuckled imperialist aggression and adventurism—these are all characteristics that go with Communism like beans go with cornbread. They aren’t aberrations or curiosities; they’re the fundamental building blocks of every Marxist prison-state.

Multiply all that times ten for China, which also throws extreme paranoia and resentment into the mix—at least some of which is justified by China’s perennial status as whipping boy and/or cash cow abused by pretty much every other major-power nation throughout history—and a good few Oriental cultural beliefs and attitudes of a sort that, before PC speech restrictions were implemented, had been cast in polite company as “inscrutable,” and the somewhat-free world has good reasons aplenty to decouple itself from the thuggish ChiCom slave-state even without considering the Creeping Chinese Crud at all.

This calls for a response.

The response needs to be harsh enough to teach the Chinese government a lesson, which means pretty harsh, as they appear to still think they can brazen this out. Among other things, the United States — and ideally the world community at large — need to sharply reduce economic relations with China. In particular, no one should be relying on them for medicines, medical equipment and other vital goods. (China’s state news service threatened to plunge America into a “mighty sea” of coronavirus by withholding critical medications.) Chinese scientists should no longer have easy access to Western laboratories or universities. Chinese political leaders should no longer find it easy to travel the world.

Fine by me, for whatever good it will do. We should already have been doing all those things anyway, not strictly for purposes of punishing China but also as a matter of simple self-preservation.

Congress should pass legislation stripping the Chinese government of sovereign immunity to lawsuits for COVID-19 damage in the United States. China should be stripped of its leadership roles in international organizations. And finally, Taiwan — a nation that has handled the outbreak better than almost any other nation, but has been excluded from the World Health Organization because its membership would offend the Chinese government — deserves membership in WHO, and full diplomatic recognition from the United States, and the rest of the world.

Diplomatic recognition for Taiwan, along with all the rest of the accompanying goodies? Yes, certainly. But membership in WHO, a corrupt, wholly-owned subsidiary of ChiCom Inc? What on earth has poor little Taiwan ever done to deserve having THAT booby-prize inflicted on ’em?

We should, just as a matter of principle if nothing else, be making the going as rough as we can possibly make it on any and every Communist shitrapy. That, too, is a matter not only of being morally sound and ideologically consistent, but of safeguarding our own national interest. Unfortunately, we have foolishly put ourselves in a very bad position here. Thanks to our enforced reliance on Red China for manufacturing, consumer goods and medical supplies, the underwriting of our national debt, &c, we have now effectively made ourselves the “weak horse” in what was never going to be anything but a dysfunctional relationship. And none of us should be kidding themselves that the ChiCom leadership doesn’t know that very damned well.

Birth of the Resistance

Posted on April 4, 2020April 4, 2020 by Mike

The heart of American liberty still beats in some places, however faint it may have become elsewhere.

Maine’s Franklin County Sheriff Scott Nichols has a strong message for the Governor of Maine, Janet Mills, who issued “stay-at-home” orders with threats of police punishment if not followed. Sheriff Nichols issued a statement on the Franklin County Facebook page saying in no uncertain terms he will not follow the unconstitutional order.

“We will not be setting up a Police State. PERIOD,” he wrote. “The Sheriff’s Office will not purposefully go out and stop vehicles because they are on the road or stop and ask why people are out and about. To do so puts our officers at risk. This is not Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia where you are asked for your papers!”

The sheriff’s announcement comes as a welcome sign to Americans who have been arrested for inane things like praying outside, surfing, or trying to drive to work. Someone has to stand up to the unconstitutional directives that are being handed down daily by government officials and it will fall on the sheriffs to uphold what they know to be their legal and lawful duties, none of which involve trampling the rights of citizens.

“Please use common sense during this executive order. We are more interested in the safety and well-being of the public as well as our officers at this time. With that being said, we are sworn to uphold the Constitution and laws of the State – for any unlawful act/situation, arrestees will be taken into custody and transported for fingerprinting and bail.”

Nichols made it clear that he only intends to arrest for matters of law-breaking, and nothing else. Executive orders aren’t laws. He finished his announcement with words of encouragement for his constituents: “Most of you are doing a fantastic job – we appreciate that! Please look out for one another, especially the elderly and shut-ins. Please be a good neighbor/citizen always showing compassion. Please be kind especially on social media, negativity online only adds to the stress people are currently experiencing.”

Nichols signed this brave decree with his name and followed it with “Of the People, For the People.”

Fancy that: a government employee who fully understands what his job is, and is not. A man in a position of authority who recognizes that there are proper limits to that authority. A man who, in an age when our Constitution is used as toilet paper more often than not, nonetheless respects it as the supreme law of the land, and governs his professional actions with a determination to abide by it. In short, a man who has kept his head when everyone around him is losing theirs.

May God bless the honorable Sheriff Nichols; no matter how many like him there are out there, we’ll never have enough of them. I’d say he oughta be President, but could be that he’s needed more right where he is.

The eternal choice

Posted on April 2, 2020April 2, 2020 by Mike

A primer on Progressivism versus Americanism.

This is the choice before us. Are we to be ruled by experts as if they are our guardians simply because they might be smarter than us in specific fields, or are we to rule ourselves?

The supposed legitimacy of the former approach comes from fear. We are told the world is too complex. We need the experts to guide us, protect us, and save us. We need an elite guardian class to rule over us because we cannot make it on our own. But this cowardice makes us nothing more than slaves, not citizens.

The legitimacy of self-rule springs from our love of justice and our virtue. In our republican system, it requires a commitment to the truth that all men are created equal, and to the proposition that the just powers of government are derived by consent. It requires courage, moderation, friendship, and grace. It is these virtues that allow us to live free, apart from the “chains of despotism” as Madison says in Federalist 55.

The rule of expertise is not politics rightly understood; it is management. There is no deliberation involved. Instead, there is only bureaucracy, administration, and a religious—actually, cultish—devotion to what we now call science.

The rule of the people allows for statesmanship and liberty. Though statesmen might not always be “at the helm,” we the people, as the safeguard of our own liberty, can elect representatives with wisdom and prudence or pay the price when we don’t. We evaluate how well they do, discuss, debate, and then decide who should govern through elections.

Okay, good enough to this point, and right as rain so far. But then he begins to miss the mark just a little bit.

The rule of expertise, while on the surface promising intelligent leadership, is incapable of prudent government. The rule of expertise leads to incompetence, strife, and corruption instead of scientific precision and impartiality.

This is because the rule of expertise is built on a weak foundation. People’s faith in “science” is often misplaced. Most of what we call science is really just scientism—the foolish belief that men cease to be men when they put on white lab coats and begin charting numbers and lines. Scientism overstates what men can actually know. Moreover, the rule of expertise stands or falls on the belief that men are basically good and scientists are immune to the unjust desire to rule for their own benefit.

Regardless, the vast majority of “experts” are useless academics and professional bureaucrats. Their fields of study are full of jargon and credentials that lead to conformity and groupthink. Experts learn early that challenging the authorities in one’s field is risky for one’s career. Whatever thinking is involved quickly devolves into vague, abstract theorizing about ideas that are unable to be proven or disproven and thus do not threaten the ideas of one’s peers or superiors.

Often, what is supposed to be science ends up being just another form of cronyism, and what we call “expertise” ends up being knowledge of otherwise useless jargon and how to navigate a career field. The government bureaucracy that results is incompetent, often harmful, and tyrannical.

This is not to say there are not very smart men whom we can legitimately call experts—men like Dr. Fauci. But even at their best, these experts are incapable of prudence. Their knowledge is specific and precise, limiting their ability to consider circumstances broadly. Their skillset is often highly technical, built on years of experience and careful adherence to established protocols, limiting their ability to consider new solutions. And, besides, they typically confront only one problem a nation faces, not the full spectrum of the problems we must face.

In short, science and expertise can be wonderful things that help us to know what is, but they cannot answer the question of what we ought to do. This is the difference between science and politics. One is about knowing; the other is about acting. Expertise and science are subordinate to the art of politics. Experts make terrible rulers.

And here is where he begins to lose me. Mind you, I don’t disagree with any of the above, either; he’s not wrong, not at all. But the real point of this whole discussion isn’t whether the self-anointed “experts” are more knowledgeable, or more qualified to rule, or even more competent rulers.

None of that matters—NONE of it. The only thing that does—which happens to be the premise central to every word uttered or written down by the Founders—is whether or not one believes in the people’s right to the ultimate say in who will govern them, and in how they will be governed. THAT is the question that truly matters. All else, including the above analysis of “experts” and “science” and skillsets, is just so much idle jaw-jaw compared to that one.

And that right there is where Progressivism “faw down an’ go boom.” THEIR central premise, the idea from which the whole toxic ideology grows like an ugly, noxious, strangulating weed, is that the people should NOT have a say in their own governance. After all, the unwashed masses are not intelligent, not altruistic, not “evolved” enough to be trusted to make proper decisions about such weighty concerns.

No, for their own good they must under the direction and control of superior beings with the vision and moral purity to help them, to protect and provide for them, and to nudge them ever forward along the path to true “enlightenment.” Their base urges must be reined in, all rowdy individualism brought sharply to heel; the moronic superstition that insists on the existence of some mythical “God” educated out of them; their primitive reverence for the old traditions and long-established ways of doing things transformed into the Progressivist’s reflexive acceptance that change—any change, all change—represents real “progress” and can never be anything other than good and desirable.

Only then can the Progressivist dream of shaping and molding the primordial clay into New Progressive Man be achieved. Only through this inspiring metamorphosis from savage to civilized—under the sting of the lash, if need be—can the perfection of man be realized. Only through the Progressivist program can the cave-dwelling, revanchist knuckledragger finally rise to walk erect, then take his place with his fellows to make his due and proper contribution in service to the glorious State.

Of course, there will always be some number of dim, backwards apes who, whether out of stubborness or stupidity, either refuse to be or actually cannot be reformed. No need for our betters to waste a lot of time on determining how to deal with them. There are a variety of options for dispensing with them, from slave-labor camps to gulags to forced starvation to mass graves. Such ignominy is no more than such creatures deserve; they cannot, MUST not, be allowed to hinder Progress.

Nor can the knuckledraggers be permitted to freely express any irrational dissent from Progressivist dogma. The risk of infecting other minds and perverting whole sectors of society by exposure to such blasphemy cannot be tolerated; its potential influence on society is far too insidious to be overlooked. No extremity of oppression could be too harsh in safeguarding the State and The People from such wanton, destructive criminality.

Well, Real Americans say nuts to all that happy horseshit, and to hell with them what’s pushing it. The Progressivists positively HATE us for this defiance, a mad hate that burns so fiercely inside them it blackens the very soul whose existence they deny. Nonetheless, Real Americans would rather not bother ourselves about them at all; we’d be content to just leave them alone, to let them all toddle off somewhere and cherish their doot-brained fantasies to their shriveled hearts’ content.

Trouble is, though, that they will NEVER grant us the same courtesy. Actually, they can’t; Progressivist cant itself commands that they interfere with and harrass us to whatever degree they can manage, until the job of either converting us, subjugating us, or snuffing us out is done.

Since they’re lazy and childish, they’d dearly love to short-cut the whole frustrating process by just crushing us utterly, wiping us right out of earthly existence so’s they can just get on with things. Tragically for them, the puling, mewling pussies lack the stones to actually jump the fuck up. The vegan diets, scrotum-torquing skinny jeans, and general feminization have left them so sickly and weak that they couldn’t physically do it anyway.

All of which means that, much as we’d prefer not to have to waste perfectly good ammunition and put unnecessary wear on our barrel rifling, it looks like sooner or later we’re just gonna have to buckle down and shoot them all in their fucking empty heads. I’ve tried and I’ve tried, really I have, but I just haven’t been able to come up with any other way out of this. They created the problem; they’re responsible for bringing it to our very doorstep and waving it around obscenely at us. And it ought to be abundantly clear to even the meanest intelligence that they will never, ever back off a single inch, damn their eyes. So we’re gonna have to be the ones who solve it, if it’s ever to be solved at all.

“I Used to Think, Are They Really that Evil? Well, Yes they Are”

Posted on March 31, 2020March 31, 2020 by Mike

Welcome to the party, pal.

Mike Lindell, the inventor and CEO of MyPillow, announced Friday his company will convert 75 percent of their production from making pillows into making masks in an effort to combat the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic.

Lindell told Fox News he is working with the Trump administration on the type of masks needed. “Obviously, we specialize in cotton and we found out different materials that they didn’t want — latex. So, finally, we got the final prototype three days ago,” he said. But after Trump invited Lindell to speak at a press briefing in the White House Rose Garden Monday afternoon, verified blue checkmarks and members of the media did not take kindly to Lindell’s remarks to Americans.

Lindell, who just announced his company will produce 50,000 masks a day by the end of the week, was mocked for sharing his faith from behind the lectern, and encouraging Americans to turn to God in this time of crisis.

“God gave us grace on November 8, 2016 to change the course we were on,” Lindell said. “God had been taken out of our schools and lives, a nation had turned its back on God. I encourage you to use this time at home to get back in the Word. Read our Bibles and spend time with our families.”

Lindell audaciously daring to mention God in the course of his remarks was of course just too much for the Evil Left, who viciously attacked him as “insane,” an “awful human being,” and “an embarrassment,” among other such vileness. Happily, their bilious, reflexive hatred splashed back on ’em some.

An executive editor at CNN retweeted a video of Lindell’s appearance with the sarcastic caption, “In case you were wondering what My Pillow is doing in a time of coronavirus.” That’s odd, because Lindell just said he spent three days converting a 200,000-square-foot factory into a facility to produce millions of masks for American health-care workers, so we know exactly what he’s been doing during the public health crisis.

Insty jumps in with one of his simple, pithy slashes: “More than CNN has done. And even if he’d done nothing at all he’d be ahead of CNN, which as usual is mostly making things worse.” He also appends a couple of Twitter responses, of which this one is my personal fave:

Man, if only the My Pillow guy recorded a video of him singing “Imagine” in his bathroom instead of retooling his factory to make medical gear.

Then he’d be stunning and brave.

— Henry (@HMSPitts) March 30, 2020

Lindell went on to an appearance on Lou Dobbs to discuss his belated awakening to Who They Are, What They Do.

Mike Lindell told Lou Dobbs, “I heard Jim Acosta attacked me too and he was just 10 feet from me in the Rose Garden. This is just evil, Lou… CNN what they did to me? I’m sorry, I put out a message of hope to the country that God had given us grace on November 8, 2016 for such a time… I’m appalled by the journalists that I see there. I used to think are they really that evil? Well, yes they are.“

Y’know, most days I truly dread the coming schism—the Great Unpleasantness that will see the country torn apart, riven by another bloody Civil War. And then other days something like this happens, and suddenly I look forward to seeing some of these fucking assholes shot right in their goddamned empty heads.

Religion versus pseudo-science?

Posted on March 30, 2020March 30, 2020 by Mike

The pseudo-science-pimping Left isn’t as anti- or a-religious as they like to think.

All pseudo-science models have one thing in common: They are essentially deeply religious, accompanied as they are by apocalyptic end times scenarios that goad the public into actions fomented by panic and despair. The use of mathematics and charts adds an air of legitimacy to apocalyptic predictions that are almost the exact duplicate of end time scenarios prophesied by cult leaders. Such prophets have used biblical verses, gnostic numerology, guilt and fear to panic their followers into selling all their possessions, buying white robes and heading to the mountains or digging shelters underground in hopes of surviving as the chosen remnant.

In a similar panicked manner, there are those whose disruptive plans are now being put into play while they appeal to “science” and to their higher moral discernment; wisdom that is hidden from the rest of us mortals.

Nothing is more tempting to potential tyrants than utilization of a panic stoked to white heat in order to reinforce and extend state control. The use of partial truth — yes, the virus is real — can be inflated and massaged in order to achieve nefarious ends. Alas, the fact is that the final writhing of a diseased system built on lies can still create havoc. Some ideologues just like to see things burn. Some see ways to profit from societal collapse. Some see the possibility that society can be fundamentally transformed.

We need to consider what will happen if our entire nation is shut down. We need to consider that what is happening in our own country goes far beyond an attempt to take down Donald Trump and is rapidly morphing into hysteria that if unchecked, could change our entire nation beyond recognition.

Don’t look now, bub, but I think maybe it just did.

The coronavirus madness puts before Americans a choice: Revive the progressive/leftist Frankenstein monster or immolate it at last.

Let’s hope America chooses the latter and doesn’t accede to embracing an ideological vision that has long relied on deathly visions of apocalypse now, visions bound to destroy the flawed but redeemable peoples and institutions of the West.

All the while, hope and pray that the panic engendered by an ideological paradigm bolstered by pseudo-science and errant philosophical underpinnings at last collapses; and that true reform and restoration can begin.

And now for something completely different: a look at the brighter side.

Thankfully as a nation this crisis is causing us to reevaluate our priorities: faith, family, community and freedom; and seeing the easy dispatch of liberty also reignites that oft forgotten flickering flame…

Journalists are less important than janitors. Our nations best athletes are healthcare workers rushing to assist those in need. The true heroes are not celebrities, but rather farmers, truck drivers, stock clerks, and supermarket cashiers.

The most valuable businesses do not glitter or present themselves with self-congratulatory award shows; they do today what they have always done to keep our food supply flowing. Perhaps now, at least for a few short weeks, we stop taking them for granted.

Effective right now comfortably invisible workers are recognized as critical priorities; or as the government has official designated them “essential services.” These folks form the network of our lives; they always have, but we didn’t notice. Everything else is less than.

No-one is saying this doesn’t suck; but some people know that standing around bitching about the comparative values of current life in suckdom doesn’t actually accomplish anything.

President Trump is doing what needs to be done; with far more information than me; and in the best manner he can assemble to keep America great. He does this while simultaneously swatting away thousands of piranhas biting at him on an hourly basis.

So again, ask yourself a question: what part are you to play?

Live your best life.

You only have this moment once.

That unlooked-for burst of sunny positivity comes to us courtesy of Sundance, who also steers us to this one:

Truckers are saying “fuck the log rules, I’m hauling” and they’re getting supplies to the stores. People are stocking the shelves all night and letting old people shop first. Folks are buying meals for truckers, who (obviously) can’t go through the drive-ups. Asking ’em what they want, then buying it for them.

Carnival Cruise Line has told Trump “We can match those big Navy Hospital ships with some fully staffed cruise ships”.

GM and Ford have said “hold our cars and watch this — we can make ventilators where we were just making car parts, starting next week” — by re-engineering seat ventilators which their engineers hacked together for a new purpose. In under a week.

In a project with which I’m loosely associated, a very-effective agricultural disease-control agent was re-purposed and re-labeled specifically for Corona-virus control by the FDA and EPA in under ten days, from initial request to distribution.

Restaurants and schools have said, “we’ve got kitchens and staff; we can feed the poor kids who used have school lunch.”

NBA basketball players have said, “Hold our basketballs while we write checks to pay the arena staff.”

Construction companies are saying, “Here are some high-end masks for medical staff and doctors”.

Distilleries are making sanitizer out of distilling “heads and tails” which are normally discarded. Nasty shit to drink, but effective sanitizer.

People are tipping grocery check-out clerks and thanking them for taking the risk.

Local, state, and county governments are taking control of everything the feds cannot do. Some are doing it wrong, but for the first time in decades … they’re doing it. Federalism is re-emerging, and the smallest unit of government is the individual and the family. This, too, is re-emerging after decades of dormancy.

As Japanese Admiral Isokuru Yamamoto said, after Pearl Harbor … “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

I sense this has just happened. We have a wonderful country, the greatest single force for good in all human history. We have closed our borders, with good reason, yet we have top medical people now assisting North Korea in their response to the virus.

Many things have been re-set, and will never be the same.

By microbiological accident, we are living in profoundly transformative historical times.

No denying that. It remains to be seen how that profound transformation shakes out in the end, but we must remain hopeful to whatever extent we possibly can. Horrid as it is, if the current upheaval is what it takes to achieve the aforementioned immolation of the Left at long last, it will have been well worth the cost.

AWWWW update! What the heck, two more feel-good stories—from New Jersey, of all places—below the fold.
Continue reading “Religion versus pseudo-science?” →

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