Hmmm… – Page 47

A bigger liar than Juisseh Smollett

Posted on March 15, 2023March 16, 2023 by Mike

The headline alone gives the game away.

REALLY? Joy Behar of ‘The View’ Claims She Talks to Trump Supporters Who Approach Her at the Grocery Store (VIDEO)

Joy Behar of ‘The View’ claimed on the show this week that she sometimes gets approached at the grocery store by Trump supporters, and that she tries to talk with them.

Does anyone believe that Joy Behar does her own grocery shopping at some supermarket? Perhaps more importantly, does anyone believe that Joy Behar would want to engage in some serious dialogue about politics with strangers who voted for Trump? In a public place? Really?

Joy Behar is one of most anti-Trump hosts on ‘The View’ and even in media in general, and that’s saying something.

This is a woman who pushed the Russia collusion hoax and just a few weeks ago, blamed the people of East Palestine, Ohio for the train disaster there because they voted for Trump.

But now we’re supposed to believe she chats with Trump supporters?

What’s even more un-credible than the entirely specious notion that the chronically deranged Behar would stoop so low as to “chat” with anybody who even looked like they might dissent, however mildly, from Standard Issue, Mark-1 Mod-0 shitlib cant is the very idea that any sane person would even dream of “approaching” this wretched, pinch-faced sow ANYwhere, at ALL, EVER, for ANY reason whatsoever.

Shit, if I was out and about and had to pee so bad my eyes were crossing, my knees were weak, and my teeth chattering I would still be willing to walk a mile or more rather than ask the likes of her baggy ass where the nearest public restroom was.

Judgment Day

Posted on March 14, 2023March 14, 2023 by Mike

Tal Bachman suggests something I’ve been wondering a lot about myself in recent years: so exactly where the hell is the God of the Old Testament, He of the smiting and the scourging and the Great Floods, anyway? What, is He asleep or something?

Dear Old Testament God, Maybe It’s Time For A Comeback Tour

Maybe it’s age, but I’m starting to warm up to the God of the Old Testament big-time.

That’s the one you’re not supposed to like. The one you’re supposed to feel embarrassed by. Even outraged. To hear religion-hater Richard Dawkins (and his tedious hordes of mini-mes) tell it, the Old Testament God is the personification of all cosmic vice. In Dawkins’ words, he is “arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction”.

Let’s see what the Bible says.

God’s first genocide was his biggest and most spectacular: the flood. He created mankind, and—well, it just didn’t work out. “Every intent of the thoughts of (man’s) heart was only evil continually”, Genesis reports. But it was the ensuing evil human action which really sealed the deal for God. In a nutshell, “the earth was filled with violence”. That means, I assume, colossal rates of murder, beating, rape, child molesting, brutal slavery, and more. Human beings had taken an Edenic paradise and turned it into hell on earth. God wanted a do-over. A hard reset.

So, yeah, God killed everyone, minus Noah and his family. Wouldn’t you, if things were that bad? After all, you’d be delivering justice to the wicked, and maybe even mercy to their long-suffering victims. Just thinking out loud here.

As it happens, God covenanted after the flood to “never again destroy every living thing, as I have done”. But—thankfully—his covenant didn’t rule out more selective massacres.

Sodom and Gomorrah, for example, were cesspools of horror. The town fathers had institutionalized the gang rape of male city visitors, normalized rank sexual depravity in general (which I assume included sexual abuse of children), and topped it all off with pride, gluttony, and abominable selfishness. Even surrounding towns began crying out to God to do something. I feel sick just thinking about it.

And obviously, God did too, because he killed the entire populations of both gang-raping, probably child-molesting cities with the Bronze Age equivalent of Fat Man (fire and brimstone raining down from heaven). Why would I feel bad about that?

The common thread in all these stories is that the people God kills are incorrigibly evil. They’re a scourge to humanity. They commit murder, rape, child abuse, enslavement, cruelest tyranny, random beatings—you name the atrocity, they’re committing it. And they’re not changing their ways. They’re committed to doing the wrong thing even after multiple warnings and chances to improve. These are the reprobate types Paul refers to in Romans 1—people who know they’re doing evil, and delight in it. They hate God, they murder, they violate every innocence and trust. And for God, when things get bad enough, there’s just nothing else to do with them but say goodbye.

Follows, Bachman’s appeal to God His Own Self for a return to the old-fashioned, tried and true ways of dealing with such things. To wit:

Hello, God.

I’m just going to come right out and say it: How about a comeback tour?

You fried the sickos in Sodom and Gomorrah. You drowned all those Egyptian slavers. You even wiped out the entire population of the earth, minus Noah and his family. So how about you help us out right now with a special new demographic reset?

I use the word “reset” on purpose. You see, I want to propose you begin your comeback tour by focusing on all the control freak politicians and bureaucrats who exploited a global panic (which they themselves had cynically manufactured) in order to effect a “Great Reset”. These people make Max Robespierre look like Russell Kirk in a coma. They are—even as I type this—still busying themselves trying to destroy every single salutary aspect of human life and community. And while they’ve done all their damage in the name of public health, they’re actually doing it all in service to themselves. For in their false, pagan morality—the kind you always used to say you hated —they are the gods. Not you. They are the ones who will improve us, heal us, bless us, save us. Not you. They are the ones who will rule heaven and earth. Not you. And their moral code, such as it is, is a putrescent stew of all the most noxious, even demonic, ideas imaginable. I can send you a detailed list in a follow-up note, if you’d like.

In any case, the price these control freaks are now extracting for the patronizing, self-serving, technocratic megalomaniac globalist totalitarian “beneficence” we never asked them for, and don’t want, and which they’re imposing on us against our will, is our sovereignty, our most basic freedoms, our humanity, our families, our traditions, our beliefs, our obligations, our identities, our nations, our allegiance, our worship. In short, these people are your enemies. And ours. We’re in this together, God. We’re on the same team.

I could list many more of the most tyrannical, unconscionable impositions. But I’m going to pause here, and just say, once again, that now would be a great time for you to do a comeback tour. Boy, would it ever. These people wanted a Great Reset. How about you “great reset” them all into, shall we say, “outer darkness”? I don’t really care what you do with them (if you catch my drift) as long as we never have to see them, hear them, or be tyrannized by them ever again.

A most hearty amen to all that.

Auto-escalation

Posted on March 14, 2023March 14, 2023 by Mike

Fear not, America: with “Gunner” Joe Bribem on the job, we’re in the best possible hands. If his steady, sure-handed “leadership” can’t see us all safely through this wartime crisis, then no one can.

BREAKING: Russia Goes Kinetic With U.S. in Skies Over the Black Sea, and the USAF Response Is Unbelievable

The conflict between the U.S. and Russia has just gone kinetic. At least, that is what the first reports are saying out of the U.S. government. But the response is emblematic of how woke the U.S. military has gotten.

Initial reports said that the Russians had “intercepted” a U.S. Reaper drone over the Black Sea. Now, the latest report has it that Russia “collided” with a Reaper drone over the Black Sea. Expect that story to change, as first reports are always wrong.

Here’s what we are being told at this moment, however. CBS News was first out of the gate with news that, indeed, the drone — which can be armed to the hilt — had suffered a “collision” with the Russian military jet.

A Russian Su-27 fighter jet collided with an American MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday, the U.S. military’s European Command said. U.S. forces brought down the drone in international waters, European Command said, and the White House called the Russian plane’s intercept of the unmanned aircraft “reckless.”

“Our MQ-9 aircraft was conducting routine operations in international airspace when it was intercepted and hit by a Russian aircraft, resulting in a crash and complete loss of the MQ-9,” U.S. Air Force General James Hecker, commander of U.S. Air Forces Europe and Air Forces Africa, said in a statement.

The response from the Pentagon’s Hecker went thusly: “This unsafe and unprofessional act by the Russians nearly caused both aircraft to crash.” But wait, it got worse.

Global News reported on the Pentagon’s press release about the incident.

In a press release, the U.S. Air Force said that at 2 a.m. Eastern (7 a.m. local time) a Russian Su-27 aircraft struck the propeller of the U.S.’s MQ-9 aircraft, which conducts intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. It was accompanied by a second Su-27 that wasn’t involved in the collision but that U.S. officials said was also involved in “unsafe” conduct.

“Several times before the collision, the Su-27s dumped fuel on and flew in front of the MQ-9 in a reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional manner,” the U.S. release said (emphasis added).

If, in fact, things are getting directly kinetic between the U.S. and Russia over the heightened tensions over the Ukraine war, environmental degradation, though important, is the least of our problems.

Gee, I certainly do hope the madman Putin won’t decide to lob a small-to-medium yield nuke right dead-center onto Mordor On The Potomac, atomizing every last sewer-crawling bureaucrat, government “expert,” cretinous career politican, predatory melanin-enhanced gangbanger, and meddlesome FederalGovCo oxygen-thief therein. Why, that would be just awful. Whatever would we do without all those fine, underpaid, hard-working public servants to watch over and protect us?

Please, Mr Putin, sir, don’t throw us into dat br’ar patch, sir. PLEASE don’t.

As I said, though, not to worry; “Gunner” Joe has the situation well in hand, even if it should come to nooklear com-bat toe to toe with the Russkies. He settled their hash but good once, he can do it again.

MajKongsLastRide

Your feel-good video of the week

Posted on March 14, 2023March 14, 2023 by Mike

Another FAFO Righteous Shoot™.

FAFO of the day 💀

Justified or nah? pic.twitter.com/F1p0IaJmiF

— AZ_Golfer (@AZ_TeeTime)

March 14, 2023

Justified? Yep—especially seeing as how AZ_Golfer posted a follow-up, explaining the backstory.

Man Shoots Stalker In Self-Defense, Video Goes Viral: Here’s The Full Story

Benjamin Backus, a 40-year-old financial advisor, reportedly provided assistance to his ex-felon neighbor, Michael Montanarella, in starting his own business.

However, Montanarella’s alleged descent into heavy drug and alcohol use resulted in him getting kicked out of rehab and developing paranoid delusions.

He believed that Backus was breaking into his home and stealing things, despite the fact that Backus and his son had moved. Montanarella reportedly threatened Backus after showing up at his new home, and even vandalized his property by breaking windows on multiple occasions.

Backus took out a restraining order against Montanarella, but the situation escalated on March 24, 2022.

Backus claims that he went out to warm up his car to take his son to his SATs and head to work, but heard an engine start behind him. He turned around and saw Montanarella drive past him before circling back to throw a rock at him.

Montanarella then allegedly jumped out of the car and approached Backus, who backed up down the road past his house while repeatedly telling Montanarella to stop and get down.

This led to the use of force by Backus, which was caught on camera and went viral.

Again: justified? Oh HELL yeah. More than, in fact; my only question for Righteous Shooter after reading that is, what the hell took ya so long, anyway? He never should’ve allowed Mr Psycho Stalker to get as physically close to him as he did, IMHO.

No redress, no recourse

Posted on March 14, 2023March 14, 2023 by Mike

In Amerika v2.0, we are well past the point of no return. Which leaves us with only the one question left to be answered.

In the movie The Untouchables, written by David Mamet and directed by Brian De Palma, a streetwise Irish cop named Malone tries to educate a starry-eyed fed named Eliot Ness in the ways of Chicago justice when up against an implacable, deadly opponent like Al Capone. The scene has become justly famous for this line: ““He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. THAT’S the Chicago way! And that’s how you get Capone.”

But for our purposes here, what even more important is the exchange between Sean Connery and Kevin Costner that immediately precedes it:

Ness: I want to get Capone! I don’t know how to get him.

Malone: [talking privately in a church] You said you wanted to know how to get Capone. Do you really wanna get him? You see what I’m saying, what are you prepared to do?

Ness: Everything within the law.

Malone: And *then* what are you prepared to do? If you open the ball on these people Mr. Ness you must be prepared to go all the way. Because they won’t give up the fight, until one of you is dead.

Well, that’s the question, isn’t it? In a battle between good and evil, with the law having gone over to the side of evil—as it had in the gangland Chicago of the 1920s and ’30s—what are the good guys prepared to do? With the country-as-founded now being shot out from underneath us on a near-daily basis, how do concerned citizens fight back?

Read this—”Preventing a Disrupted Presidential Election and Transition” from something called the Electoral Integrity Project and weep…

“Integrity,” heh. It is to laugh. And also, weep. “Electoral Integrity” is the very LAST thing these shitweasels really want, or for the matter of it would ever even tolerate.

Some of their thoughts:

The concept of “election night,” is no longer accurate and indeed is dangerous. We face a period of contestation stretching from the first day a ballot is cast in mid-September until January 20. The winner may not, and we assess likely will not, be known on “election night” as officials count mail-in ballots. This period of uncertainty provides opportunities for an unscrupulous candidate to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the process and to set up an unprecedented assault on the outcome. Campaigns, parties, the press and the public must be educated to adjust expectations starting immediately.

A determined campaign has opportunity to contest the election into January 2021. We anticipate lawsuits, divergent media narratives, attempts to stop the counting of ballots, and protests drawing people from both sides. President Trump, the incumbent, will very likely use the executive branch to aid his campaign strategy, including through the Department of Justice. We assess that there is a chance the president will attempt to convince legislatures and/or governors to take actions – including illegal actions – to defy the popular vote.

“Dangerous” it is for sure. One instant solution is to restore Election Night to its one-day, one-vote place in the proper scheme of things. And note for the record that “an unscrupulous candidate” describes Mrs. Clinton’s churlish and criminal response to her loss in 2016 far better than it does Trump’s. As for defying the popular vote, so what? That vote means nothing until the Left finally passes its National Popular Vote Interstate Compact and thus eliminates the Electoral College by unconstitutional means.

Some of their solutions:

Plan for a contested election. If there is a crisis, events will unfold quickly, and sleep-deprived leaders will be asked to make consequential decisions quickly. Thinking through options now will help to ensure better decisions. Approach this as a political battle, not just a legal battle. In the event of electoral contestation, sustained political mobilization will likely be crucial for ensuring transition integrity. Dedicated staff and resources need to be in place at least through the end of January.

Address the two biggest threats head on: lies about “voter fraud” and escalating violence. Voting fraud is virtually non-existent, but Trump lies about it to create a narrative designed to politically mobilize his base and to create the basis for contesting the results should he lose. The potential for violent conflict is high, particularly since Trump encourages his supporters to take up arms.

Except that politically mobilized Trump supporters didn’t take up arms on Jan. 6, and as for “violence,” the patsy protesters had nothing on the Antifa and Black Lives Matters thugs during the Summer of Floyd of blessed but rapidly fading memory, his work on earth here now done.

And that, as it turned out, was perhaps their biggest mistake. As did Trump himself, they badly underestimated not only the fanatical zeal of their Swamp-dwelling adversaries, but also just how deeply, thoroughly rotten the whole system itself had by then become. It turned out to be their undoing, and who really even knows how many of them are even now languishing in the Amerikan Gulag as a result of that incalculably-costly “misunderestimation.”

Yet most of us continue to believe in America; like the movie version of Eliot Ness, we’ve sworn to do “everything within the law” to try and right the ship of state before, like all previous democracies, it sinks beneath the waves of historical reality. As I often say about the imported “critical theory” Left, they never stop, they never sleep, they never quit. They won’t give up the fight until one of us is dead.

So then what are you prepared to do?

Not near enough, apparently. Or not yet, at any rate. But we shall see about all that soon enough, I reckon.

The rain in Spain falls mainly on the insane

Posted on March 12, 2023March 12, 2023 by Mike

By George, I think he’s got it.

Why is the trans movement so focused on children? Why do they want drag queens, commonly associated with sexualized performances, to read books to toddlers? Why do they want kids to go to highly sexualized drag performances? Why are public schools allowing trans ideology to be taught in classrooms instead of academics? Why are schools secretly taking kids to such performances without parental knowledge or consent? Why is trans ideology being planted in kids entertainment? Why are parents being lied to about gender fluidity as if it is backed by science when it’s not? Why are children being groomed for gender reassignment drugs and surgeries? Why are states allowing children to get gender reassignment surgery without parental knowledge? What the hell is going on?

Many would point out the obvious conclusion that the trans movement has a child fetish. Stephen King is himself a rabid leftist who wrote a disturbing child orgy scene into his IT novel. It’s clearly one of the motivators, but I think that trans activism is a little more complex than simply an excuse for pedophilia.

A decade ago this kind of behavior would have been treated as suspect if not repugnant altogether. If adults with gender dysphoria (a rare mental illness) want to act out a personal fetish on their own time then that is their prerogative. However, this is about exposing innocent bystanders with no critical thinking skills to that same mental illness and that same fetish; a captive audience. This is about parents and teachers convincing children to act against their biology so they can use the child as a virtue signal prop. This is what narcissists and psychopaths do, except that it is being sanctioned politically in many states and from within the federal government.

Why? Because it is useful for gaining power. Imagine for a moment that you are a monster, the most disturbed creature you can think of. All you do is thirst for control and the anguish of your enemies and this thirst can never be fully satiated. How would you go about asserting your dominance over the population?

You would have to weaken the citizenry first. You would have to divide them, and what better way to divide them than to drive a wedge between them and their own children. Make the kids a target, bring them to your side or use them as leverage to make parents submit.

You would have to undermine the foundations of the society, eliminate the lessons of history and pervert the pillars that maintain stability. You would have to convince people that vanity and “PRIDE” are virtues rather than failings. You would have to convince people that all behaviors no matter how destructive must be treated as acceptable and that all discrimination no matter how sensible is wrong. And, when all heritage and all principles are erased you are then free to feast, for evil is now good and good is now evil and there is no one left to stop you.

All in perfect accordance with the strategic prescriptions explicitly laid out by Marx, Gramsci, and Alinski. Coincidence, you ask? Yeah, pull the other one. It has a bell on it.

The trans movement is a vehicle for the absorbing of the youngest generation into a political cult. It is part of a much larger agenda to undermine not just the basic tenets of western culture but to undermine the basic structures of moral compass and conscience. Some trans activists may be unaware of the part they are playing; they might even believe that the targeting of children is about exposing them to new ideas of “acceptance.”

That said, I think many of them do have a clear understanding of their actions and many of them are well aware of the consequences of their efforts, and they take great joy in the destruction they sow.

Several supporting links in the first paragraph of the excerpt, not transcribed here because of a surfeit of pure-tee slackness. It’s Brandon Smith, so naturally you’re going to want to read all of it.

Handsome is as handsome does

Posted on March 11, 2023March 11, 2023 by Mike

Naomi Wolfe offers a handsome apology, in full and humble acknowledgement of allowing herself to be played for a stupe.

Dear Conservatives, I Apologize
My “Team” was Taken in By Full-Spectrum Propaganda

The proximate cause of this letter of apology is the airing, two nights ago, of excerpts from tens of thousands of hours of security camera footage from the United States Capitol taken on Jan 6, 2021. The footage was released by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson [https://www.axios.com/2023/03/08/mccarthy-defends-jan-6-footage-tucker-carlson-fox-news].

While “fact-checkers” state that it is “misinformation” to claim that Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi was in charge of Capitol Police on that day [https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2021/07/27/fact-check-nancy-pelosi-isnt-in-charge-capitol-police/8082088002/], the fact is that the USCP is under the oversight of Congress, according to — the United States Capitol Police: [https://www.uscp.gov/the-department/oversight].

This would be the same Congress that convened the January 6 Committee subsequently, and that used millions of dollars in taxpayer money to turn that horrible day, and that tragic event, into a message point that would be used to tar a former President as a would-be terrorist, and to smear all Republicans, by association, as “insurrectionists,” or as insurrectionists’ sympathizers and fellow-travelers.

Let’s be clear and upfront about something here: it was indeed horrible and tragic, but not at all for the risibly-dishonest reasons many diehard Swamp critters still lamely assert. FACT: four patriotic, blameless Americans were wantonly murdered by the authorities, many others beaten and otherwise physically abused, for the “crime” of daring to exercise their First Amendment right to peaceably assemble to seek redress of perfectly and patently legitimate grievances. Horrible, tragic? You betcher. Alas for us all, it’s a lot more than just those two things alone.

There is no way for anyone thoughtful, even if he or she is a lifelong Democrat, not to notice that Sen Chuck Schumer did not say to the world that the footage that Mr Carlson aired was not real. Rather, he warned that it was “shameful” for Fox to allow us to see it. The Guardian characterized Mr Carlson’s and Fox News’ sin, weirdly, as “Over-Use” of Jan 6 footage. Isn’t the press supposed to want full transparency for all public interest events? [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2023/mar/07/biden-medicare-taxes-desantis-trump-2024-live-updates] How can you “over-use” real footage of events of national relevance?

Sen Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Senate minority leader, did not say the video on Fox News was fake or doctored. He said, rather, that it was “a mistake” to depart from the views of the events held by the chief of the Capitol Police. This is a statement from McConnell about orthodoxy — not a statement about a specific truth or untruth. [https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5060662/senator-mcconnell-calls-tucker-carlsons-depiction-january-6-attack-mistake]

I don’t agree with Mr Carlson’s interpretation of the videos as depicting “mostly peaceful chaos.”[https://thehill.com/homenews/media/3887103-tucker-carlson-shows-the-first-of-his-jan-6-footage-calls-it-mostly-peaceful-chaos/] I do think it is a mistake to downplay how serious it is when a legislative institution suffers a security breach of any kind, however that came to be.

But you don’t have to agree with Mr Carlson’s interpretation of the videos, to believe, as I do, that he engaged in valuable journalism simply by airing the footage that was given to him.

And remember, by law that footage belongs to us — it is a public record, and all public records literally belong to the American people. “In a democracy, records belong to the people,” explains the National Archives. [https://www.archives.gov/publications/general-info-leaflets/1-about-archives.html]

You don’t have to agree with Carlson’s interpretation of the videos, to notice the latest hypocrisy by the Left. My acquaintance and personal hero Daniel Ellsberg was rightly lionized by the Left for having illegally leaked the Pentagon Papers. The New York Times was rightly applauded for having run this leaked material in 1971. [https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1435/daniel-ellsberg].

I do not see how Mr Carlson’s airing of video material of national significance that the current government would prefer to keep hidden, or Fox News’ support for its disclosure to the public, is any different from that famous case of disclosure of inside information of public importance.

You don’t have to agree with Mr Carlson’s interpretation of the videos, to conclude that the Democrats in leadership, for their own part, have cherry-picked, hyped, spun, and in some ways appear to have lied about, aspects of January 6, turning a tragedy for the nation into a politicized talking point aimed at discrediting half of our electorate.

Another thing to be clear and upfront about, and to bear closely in mind: Wolf—like Tulsi Gabbard—remains a “liberal” at heart, which can come as no big surprise in light of her chequered past as an “advisor” to both Bill “The Creep” Clinton and Albert “Arnold The Pig” Algore when they, respectively, were running for president. That said, although still not by any means what you’d call red-pilled, she’s at least moving in the right direction for now. And for that, as I’ve argued several times about Gabbard as well, she should be applauded and encouraged, not condemned…at least until True Patriots begin the process of, shall we say, servicing targets, anyway.

It begins

Posted on March 11, 2023March 11, 2023 by Mike

The wheels start coming off of the Biden Economic MIRACLE!!™ bus.

A Blip On The Radar Or The Beginning Of The End?

Despite decades of working in financial services, mostly in customer facing roles where I kissed ass and took the heat for the screw-ups of others, I don’t fully understand what happened with Silicon Valley Bank but when a top 20 bank collapses, it is big news.

As others have pointed out, while SVB is a top-20 bank it pales in comparison to the really big players like Chase and Bank of America. Chase alone has something like $3.2 trillion in assets.

Notice that the bank right below them, Fifth Third Bank where I was a branch manager at a couple of locations, has slightly lower total assets but 1,104 branches while SVB only had 16 branches but more in “assets”. This was a very different kind of bank. Still it is a significant event getting little coverage because Sniffy Man Good is President instead of Orange Man Bad. It was also another opportunity to mock The Wrongest Man Alive, CNBC’s Jim Cramer, who is so reliably wrong you could base your investment strategy just off of doing the opposite of what he recommends (not investment advice, etc)

It is amazing that someone as dumb as Jim Cramer still makes a bunch of money being incorrect.

While I would hesitate to go full Zerohedge and declare this is a harbinger of imminent collapse, it does show us again that the financial system we operate under is a Jenga tower. You can pull a piece out here and there but one of these times a critical piece will come out and the whole thing will fall.

Arthur is correct in his hesitation, but it’s a matter not of statistical inevitability but of simple semantics. The collapse is indeed not imminent; it has already started, is ongoing. Things are going to get much, much worse before they get better, and that’s assuming they DO get better, which is by no means guaranteed. It’s unlikely in the extreme that they will within the lifetime of anyone reading this, that’s my belief.

Read the rest of it; Arthur moves on from the end of my excerpt to do some very astute, clear-eyed analysis of the REAL root causes of the ongoing disaster, which are not so much financial and/or political as they are cultural. He’s right about that, too.

Big trouble update! Not good.

Wall Street’s biggest banks took quite a thrashing in the stock market Thursday as investors spooked the turmoil at Silicon Valley Bank and Silvergate Capital dumped financial shares.

JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Morgan Stanley – the four most valued US lenders – saw $55 billion wiped off their combined market capitalization on Thursday, Refinitiv data show.

JPMorgan, the biggest US bank, alone saw a $22 billion tumble in its market value as its stock slid 5.41% to $130.34. Wall Street heavyweight Bank of America lost $16.16 billion as its share price fell 6.20% to $30.54. Wells Fargo and Morgan Stanley saw their market capitalization drop by $10.3 billion and $6.2 billion, respectively.

Among other major US banks, Goldman Sachs and Citi also witnessed significant declines in their share prices.

The selloff came amid heightened fears of contagion effects from financial distress at Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Silvergate Capital. SVB’s stock crashed 60% Thursday after the company said it would sell more shares to cover a $1.8 billion loss it incurred after completing a $21 billion fire sale of its bond portfolio.

It’s becoming something of a mantra for me, so maybe I should just go ahead and make it an acronym to save myself some typing from here on out: WBBIEB. That is, Worse Before Better, If EVER Better. Pro tip: You will see this material again. And again, and again, and again. Because, y’know, WBBIEB.

The Passion of Big Burly Mike

Posted on March 10, 2023 by Mike

Can you spot the bear-trap the writer of this piece blithely waving away the scarifying possibility of Moochelle running for Prexy in ’24 gets snagged in?

Michelle Obama Is Not Coming to Save the Democrats

I love a good conspiracy theory. Aliens, ancient builders, Bigfoot—I will absolutely click on that headline and read the latest conspiracy, no matter how fanciful or ludicrous. Everyone has a harmless personal foible, right? And in the times we live in now, shadowy government conspiracies and UFOs are no longer just for “The X Files.”

My favorite new conspiracy theory goes like this: the Democrats know they are in big trouble for 2024. They have this addled, dementia-riddled, diaper-wearing octogenarian and his dreadful wife occupying the White House, and he’s become an embarrassment. These days he makes three to four hair-curling, cringey gaffes per week, falls up the stairs to Air Force One every time he tries to trot up them to project American strength and vigor, and has been credibly accused of passing gas in front of the Queen Consort of England. But Democrats can’t abandon him before the primaries because, well, Kamala. So Biden will announce he is running again but will withdraw sometime around the Democratic National Convention so as to clear the presidential field for…

Michelle Obama.

The stench of desperation is hilarious, isn’t it? That’s how bad the field of Democratic presidential prospects is. Democrats must be pretty frantic for someone to have conjured up and floated this rumor. A recent poll indicated 72 percent of Americans don’t want Biden to run again in 2024. Biden will be 82 shortly after the 2024 election. Is this Michelle Obama rumor supposed to give Democrats hope? To keep them from abandoning Biden because just wait, Michelle is waiting in the wings to save their party from Bad Orange Man, or even worse, Ron DeSantis?

Please. I’ll believe aliens taught Bigfoot how to make crop circles in Peru before I buy this one. Michelle Obama hates politics, hates voters, and hates Washington D.C., and not necessarily in that order.

I don’t believe it for a millisecond. Michelle Obama is living her best life right now, the life she has always wanted and felt that she deserved (if her husband hadn’t been a community organizer obsessed with politics who didn’t make any money and forced her to support the family). She’s completely free of the restraint of politics. Now she can say whatever she wants about people she used to have to pretend to like. Polls name her consistently as the most admired woman in America. You think she’s giving any of that up to schmooze and take photos with donors, or hit the campaign trail in Iowa, or spend the night in one-star hotels in Pennsylvania? Not likely.

Maybe so, maybe not. But all the well-known trappings of fame, wealth, and power aside, it would be best not to leave out of our calculations the overwhelming allure of the one enticement that might prove powerful enough to turn even Burly Mike’s big ugly head, creating a 180 degree shift in whatever passes for “thinking” therein, expressible thusly: First Black Female President In US History.

Clarifying counterbattery

Posted on March 9, 2023March 10, 2023 by Mike

Tucker fires back at his maleficent Deep State detractors.

TUCKER CARLSON: We knew there was a reason leaders hid the January 6 tapes

One of the hallmarks of people who are telling the truth, in case you were wondering how to tell the difference, is that people who are telling the truth are calm. (They) don’t wave their hands around and make wild accusations. They don’t need to do that. It’s enough to say what they know and if honest people turn out to be wrong about something they have claimed, they’ll admit it. They don’t double down on false. They made a mistake and that’s okay. It’s not like they’re claiming to be God.

Liars behave differently. Liars are touchy, sometimes to the point of hysteria. They’re hiding something. That’s the whole point of lying and they’re worried you’re going to find out what it is. Liars are fragile because over time, lying makes you weak and afraid and has the same effect on countries by the way.

We’re living through one of those clarifying moments. Actually, we’re thankful for it, where we’re learning exactly who the liars are. On Monday, we showed you unreleased videotape from January 6. It proved, that tape proved, that three of the most important claims our leaders have made about that day were untrue. Their claims were lies. We were not shocked to discover that. We knew there was a reason that congressional leaders had been hiding the tape and that reporters in Washington weren’t demanding to see it. They were lying to us, obviously. That’s why you hide things.

But what was actually surprising, what we can’t quite get over even now, is how they responded when they were caught lying. They didn’t seem embarrassed. They didn’t apologize. They weren’t even curious to learn more about what actually happened on January 6. Let’s see the tape. No, they don’t want to see it. They exploded in rage. And then as liars tend to do, they doubled down.

They told the same lies they’d been caught telling, but with even greater aggression this time. Shut up. It’s midnight, they said, as the sun rose behind them. Who acts like that? Well, sociopaths do and in this case, the sociopaths turned out to be both Democrats and Republicans. The commitment to lying in Washington is far deeper and more bipartisan even than we realize, and we follow this stuff for a living.

Well, sure. Of COURSE they did. I mean, what else would they do? This is who they are, this is what they do.

Now, you sometimes hear people say that the whole partisan system is an illusion and that underneath the manufactured debates, the leaders on both sides are, in fact, secretly united in a common love of money and power and the deception required to get them. And honestly, we can never really bring ourselves to believe that. It’s just too dark. But now we do believe it because we have seen it.

And now—thanks to you, Tucker, and a dogged determination in pursuit of the truth that does credit to the values falsely proclaimed by pretty much everyone else in your fallen, badly-degraded profession—many, many more of us all across the nation have been forced to confront that raw, bruising truth themselves. No small thing, that.

And yet, here’s the thing: Leaders in both parties, the party that (“QAnon shaman” Jake) Chansley voted against and the party he voted for, have said nothing, not one word about the implications of this videotape, the implications not just for Chansley, but for our Constitution and our country going forward.

Instead, oh, how dare you show this? What is clearly exculpatory evidence! Again, it’s not just Chuck Schumer, it’s Republican senators Kevin Cramer, Mike Rounds, Chuck Grassley, John Thune, Lindsey Graham, of course, Congressman Dan Crenshaw, needless to say, Kelly Armstrong, all went after us. We’re not whining about that. We don’t care, actually, but it just tells you everything about the way things actually work. They’re not loyal to their voters. They are loyal to each other, and they’re willing to lie, really lie and crush people. Mitch McConnell, Thom Tillis and BLM superfan Mitt Romney, all weak men – and like all weak men, vicious men – were especially angry.

We invited Schumer on, McConnell, anybody is always welcome to come on our show. If we got something wrong, tell us how. If you think we altered the tape in some way, tell us how.

But they won’t, nor will they answer the most basic question, which is: why should a non, demonstrably nonviolent man, who literally said a prayer of Thanksgiving for police officers on the Senate floor, how was that man ISIS? How was he a domestic terrorist? How is he a threat to the republic? Why is he in jail for four years? Shut up. Pull that show off the air.

They won’t answer any questions, but we have a question, which is: How, in a free country guided by the Constitution, were these people allowed to withhold evidence from Jacob Chansley’s lawyer? How could that happen?

The answer is simplicity itself: first, “fundamentally transform” said country into one no longer anything remotely resembling “free,” via, among all too many other things, rendering said Constitution entirely impotent and irrelevant—incrementally, over not just years but decades. Once that’s done, the rest will surely follow, as night follows day.

Which is precisely what happened. After what I’ll henceforth be referring to as The Carlson Revelations, none but a co-conspirator, a willful ignoramus, or a straight-up, insensate goddamned fool can plausibly deny it any longer. Not without discrediting themselves—fully and for all time, beyond any hope of reform or redemption—as one or the other of those three things.

Bottom line: the facts are in, the evidence before us clear, comprehensible, and abundant. Unpleasant though they are, further debate about those facts is worse than a waste of time—neither necessary, nor desirable, nor even excusable. Such bootless distractions are now the exclusive province of either the ill-intentioned or the just plain stupid, and nobody whatsoever else.

It’s clobberin’ time.

Problematic

Posted on March 9, 2023 by Mike

I must say, this Tweet certainly nailed me to the floor.

What is an unpopular opinion you hold? pic.twitter.com/UalAmLbUIR

— Culture Critic (@Culture_Crit)

March 9, 2023

Errmmm…all of ’em?

Telltale timeline

Posted on March 9, 2023 by Mike

Commenter regitiger over at Sundance’s hang gets down to the real nitty-gritty.

I think most (not all, but a large number ) of people are totally missing what happened…and why this happened on jan 6.

I am going to try my best to outline the events that day…blast past the commonly held assumptions and get right down to the core corruption.

I will present this as a series of questions and answers.

q1: how do you prevent congress from delaying the certification of state electoral votes?

a: it requires a crisis. A crisis that creates an “emergency”…An “emergency” that invokes special house rules.

facts: remember, carefully…focus please…remember…just moments..literally 3 minutes before two representatives issued a vote for motions to suspend the certification the House members were “informed” by capitol police and other “agents” that a protest was about to breach the chambers. It was at this time that key people: pence, pelosi, schumer, mcconnell can be seen being walked out and escorted from the chamber. This effectively halted the Entire Chamber Process.

q2: why was it necessary to halt the chamber process

a2: the crisis was created to eliminate the motion challenges to halt the certification and to begin voting to look into voting irregularities and fraud.

facts: the two motions were completely legal and constitutional under at least two constitutionally recognized procedures…procedures that would REQUIRE the house to pause the certification and then vote to determine whether the motions of suspend could move forward.

q3: what was so important to refuse this motion and the subsequent votes to suspend the electoral certification

a3: it was important to remove that process entirely and continue the fraud and certify the fraud with no detractors on record. This effectively gives no standing for a scotus ruling appeal! understand this. If those two motions, even just one had successfully been voted EVEN IF THE MOTIONS were DENIED IN VOTE, this gives those who presented them with STANDING FOR A CONSTITUTIONAL LEGAL ARGUMENT BEFORE SCOTUS. Understand this.

q4: could this have been done some other way other than creating a crisis/protest?

a4: unlikely…In order to prevent those two motions, requires that speaker of the house, minority leaders, and the president of the congress (vice president of the united states: pence), to NOT BE PRESENT IN THE CHAMBERS. Once the capitol police and other “law enforcements agents” informed the speaker and these three other individuals, pelosi UNILATERALLY UNDER EMERGENCY RULES, suspended the business of the congress. This protest was necessary ..the crisis was created..because there is no other way to suspend the business of certification UNILATERALLY. By creating a crisis…invokes emergency procedures. No other circumstances other than war or mass simultaneous explosive diaahrea can create such unilateral speaker delivered suspension of the certification.

q5: Why did the motions, once that the speaker RECONVENED congress, move forward back again to the floor for votes? Why were members dissallowed to even consider putting forward ANY motions to the floor in when the chamber business was reopened?

a5: the speaker initiated the NEW sessions under special emergency rules. These rules abandon and make it clear that the ONLY purpose of the new session was to EXPEDITE the certification and dismiss all prior regular session procedural rules. This is why those two motions to table votes to consider a debate and pause to the certifications of state vote electors never happened later that evening when the house business was reconvened!

q6: Other than new rules, emergency rules, what other peculiar things occurred when the speaker reconvened?

a6: members were allowed to “vote” in proxy…remotely…not being present…(you can use your imagination about what conditions were placed on ALL members during this time to prevent anyone from “getting out of line”. Also clearly, it was at THIS NEW SESSION that VP Pence, President of Congress, would also have no ability to even consider pausing the electoral certification…because there was no motions of disagreements on the matter. So in a technical legal claim, he is correct that he had no constitutional authority to address any issues of fraud or doubts about electoral irregularities. But this completely dismisses the FACT that congress created rules in this crisis/emergency that never allowed them to be floored!

understand what happened in jan 6…don’t get hung up on viking impostors, stolen pelosi computers, podium heists, and complicit capitol police.

understand the process and what happened and what WAS NOT ALLOWED TO HAPPEN.

this was a coup….it was a very organized and carefully planned coup. VP Pence without a doubt as well as most members of the house were quite aware of how the certification was going to be MANAGED.

it would require new rules to prevent the debate clause from occurring!

new rules that ONLY AN EMERGENCY CRISIS COULD CREATE!

so they created an emergency.

noting: I understand why many people have great interest in debunking the j6 event…I get that. I think it is important to dissect and examine the events of that day.

but please…step back and understand WHY these things happened…examine the chain of events in congress…why those two motions that would have at least paused the certification THAT WOULD GIVE VP PENCE THE CONSTITUTIONALLY RECOGNIZED POWER TO MOVE TO SUSPEND THE ELECTORAL CERTIFICATION AND THEN EXAMINE THE IRREGULARITIES AND CLAIMS OF FRAUD!

at the very center of this coup stands Pence…the same individual who also spoiled President Trump’s first opportunities in the earlies hours of his Presidency just 4 years prior, when he created and facilitated the removal of LTGEN Flynn. I will not spend much time on this thread explaining why LTGEN Flynn was so important to President Trump and why the IC was so afraid he would have advisory power to the President. That I will leave for another day, another time. But understand this clearly: MIKE PENCE WAS AND IS WORKING FOR THE MOST CORRUPT CRIMINAL TREASONOUS PEOPLE IN GOVERNMENT.

protip: if you really want to get a true understanding of this matter videos of protesters walking in the capitol is not going to address them. Actual video and time line records of events and the specific actions taken by the speaker just moments before TWO MAJOR ELECTORAL ALTERING MOTIONS WERE ABOUT TO BE FLOORED. This crisis was developed just in time with a precise coordination to prevent those two motions to be entered into the chamber record. The two motions do not exist. The emergency powers established in the new session made sure they never could be entered. The emergency powers could never happen without a crisis…

I tried to find a way to just run an excerpt instead of lifting the thing wholesale, but couldn’t without disrupting and diluting it too badly for it to make any kind of sense. Seeing as how I think Tucker’s J6 expose amounts to one of the most important acts of True Journalism that’s occurred in my lifetime, I offer no apology for making that call. This needs, nay demands, the widest exposure we can possibly give it; as a blogger of twenty-plus years’ standing, I am pleased and proud to make whatever little contribution I can to this effort.

Yes, it really is, as I said yesterday, a Big Fuckin’ Deal.

The man behind the Fedsurrection

Posted on March 8, 2023March 8, 2023 by Mike

So just who IS this Ray Epps guy, anyway?

Meet Ray Epps: The Fed-Protected Provocateur Who Appears to Have Led the Very First 1/6 Attack on the US Capitol

If you want to see what this walking philosophical paradox looks like in action, here’s a clip of Epps patrolling the very front police lines of the Capitol’s Western Plaza at approximately 3:15 p.m at the height of the day’s mania — nearly two and a half hours after Epps and his “breach team” appeared to coordinate the toppling of the Capitol’s west-side police barricades. This was also nearly a full hour after the US Capitol building itself had already been breached. With Epps’s stated mission of breaching the Capitol accomplished, and hundreds of Trump supporters already inside, Epps’s mission magically switched to calming the crowd down, assuring them “We already made our point,” and ensuring that no more of his apparently fellow officers got hurt that afternoon.

So on January 8, 2021, the FBI begged the public for information regarding the identity of Suspect 16, Ray Epps, and even offered a cash reward.

The public obliged, and in less than three days, Ray Epps was identified as Suspect 16. Researchers corroborated his identity with troves of unassailable direct evidence, including an effective confession from Epps himself to his own local newspaper.

Then, for nearly six months, amidst the biggest manhunt in American history, the FBI did nothing with this information. As the FBI did nothing on Epps, it was simultaneously investigating, arresting, raiding and imprisoning hundreds of completely benign MAGA moms and social media trolls — mostly for minor misdemeanor trespassing charges.

Then, on July 1, between the hours of 3:37 a.m. and 5:55 p.m., the FBI finally took action on Ray Epps. But not to prosecute him, or to announce a sweeping investigation or FBI SWAT raid on Epps’s house for all of his phones and electronics. Instead, someone at the FBI quietly and stealthily purged every trace of Ray Epps from the Capitol Riots Most Wanted database.

Now let’s be clear: Ray Epps was not purged because he was arrested. If Epps was arrested, the FBI Wanted List would have the caption “ARRESTED” affixed to his picture, as you can plainly see is done for all other arrested suspects in the database itself.

Further, the searchable Justive.Gov Capitol Breach Cases database confirms there are no case dockets or filings for any “Epps” at all.

To anyone checking the January 6 FBI Most Wanted List today, “Suspect 16” is just a ghost. Only obsessive, fastidious Wayback Machine users spending hours pouring through archived screenshots could ever forensically confirm Ray Epps was ever really a Wanted Man.

The question then arises: what prompted the FBI’s six-month slumber on Epps, and then their sudden purger on July 1?

Well, they panicked. Two major media reports (discussed below) came out on June 30, each of which touched the Ray Epps “Third Rail” from different angles, and the FBI likely realized it was no longer safe to maintain a digital record acknowledging they ever knew who this guy was. Then, the FBI hoped no one would notice the purged files, or would either politely look away or actively assist with their cover-up.

To anybody even halfway aware of what the FBI really and truly is, that’s eminently believable. Lots, lots, LOTS more at the link—all of it stinking to high heaven, like every other aspect of this whole rotting-fish story.

A big fuckin’ deal

Posted on March 8, 2023March 8, 2023 by Mike

Tucker must be directly over the target, what with all the flack Establishment fucksticks like Shcrewmer and Mitch the Bitch are sending up trying to take him down.

(House Speaker Kevin) McCarthy seems to have a quaint notion that he should follow an agenda other than the one set by leftist media and other activists. He recently provided journalist Tucker Carlson access to Jan. 6 footage. When it was announced, CNN and other leftist groups got upset. But nothing compares to the angry reaction when Carlson showed some of the footage on his top-ranked Fox News program on Monday night. The program showed footage indicating that the Jan. 6 Committee had falsely conveyed the circumstances of Sen. Josh Hawley’s evacuation from the Capitol, had falsely added audio to clips, had not pursued evidence that mysterious protester Ray Epps had lied about his whereabouts, and had concealed evidence that Jan. 6 protesters who had entered the Capitol were not treated as threats.

The media and other partisans shrieked in horror that this footage was being shown to the American people. It burst through the media-enforced narratives about the day.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., took to the Senate floor to call for the censorship of Fox News, where this author is a contributor, and prevention of more footage being made available to Americans. He said Carlson exercising his freedom of the press was a threat to democracy.

As one former White House reporter put it, “It’s frightening to see Senate leaders demand a media company ‘stop’ reporting on the government, police, issues of law and justice.

Frightening indeed. Funny, innit, how this Shcrewmer boll weevil isn’t in the least embarrassed about standing barefaced in the well of the Upper Chamber, pounding the lectern in righteous fury, and demanding that, in order to preserve “democracy”—which, in this country, we AREN’T supposed to have—then SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!!!™ about denying Tucker Carlson’s God-given right to freedom of speech—which we ARE?

As no lesser a light than Thomas Jefferson reputedly forewarned, when the government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. Doesn’t take a professionally-trained meteorologist to figure out which way the wind is blowing here, now does it?

Surely this would be an opportunity for the otherwise weak and feckless Senate Republicans to show some backbone, right? Wrong.

Romney said that showing Americans footage from Jan. 6 meant Carlson had gone “off the rails,” and compared him to Alex Jones. He also went after McCarthy for being transparent with the American people. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., took a break from working on an amnesty bill to tell Raju that Carlson showing new footage of the protest that countered the left’s narrative was “bullsh-t.” South Dakota Sens. Mike Rounds and John Thune, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, and North Dakota Sen. Kevin Cramer also fell for the media campaign against Carlson.

Leading the group was Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. Raju invited him to bash McCarthy. It’s not saying much, but McConnell was at least smart enough to decline that opportunity. But he did take the opportunity to attack a media outlet for daring to say something different than what a police leader said. Really. He said, “It was a mistake, in my view, for Fox News to depict this in a way that is completely at variance with what our chief law enforcement official here at the Capitol thinks.”

Republicans, you have a serious problem.

In the middle of the midterm elections, McConnell went out of his way to sabotage candidates and their voters, once again pushing Democrat narratives about “candidate quality.” McConnell, the country’s least popular politician, did nothing to stop Romney from running a shadow campaign against a sitting GOP senator, fellow Utah Sen. Mike Lee. After he led the Republicans in the Senate to a loss, he responded by helping Democrats pass their $1.7 trillion omnibus bill, cheerleading for Biden’s Ukraine war, and campaigning with Joe Biden.

Instead of punishing Romney for his act of sabotage against fellow Republicans, he punished the victim by removing him from a powerful committee. Other Republican senators have also been punished by the famously vindictive and petty McConnell for not supporting his re-election as Republican leader.

Elon Musk, of all people, said it best when he tweeted of McConnell, “I keep forgetting which party he belongs to.”

Easy-peasy, Elon: the Deep State Uniparty, that’s which one. As for the purblind Pollyannas who still cling to the preposterous belief that anything at all is actually as it’s purported to be by TPTB anymore, they’re unlikely to ever figure it out. They’d like you to know, though, that they’re very interested in that beachfront property in Arizona that’s up for sale. The pig in the poke, too. Also, These Magic Beans.

As for the rest of the Shadow State malefactors, they’re quaking in manufactured outrage to mask the fear. Because, thanks to Tucker, everyone knows…ahem.

Caveat update! My post title above asserts that Tucker’s huge scoop is, to quote the finest senile corruptocrat we’ve ever had as “pResident,” a “big fuckin’ deal.” And that, it most certainly is. It has unleashed a political earthquake; Swamp rats can feel the very ground shifting under their feet from it, and they ain’t liking the sensation even a little bit.

While I do see it as a bona-fide game changer in the long run, though, nobody should be expecting these revelations to be the long-awaited Final Straw, the offense that will at last spark outright revolt and resistance against FederalGovCo. It gets us a big step farther along that road, yes, and it will serve to erase any lingering misplaced faith in the good intentions of their central Leviathan-state among Normals—particularly after they’ve been so blatantly, continously lied to over the last several years.

But it isn’t going to move anyone to start putting heads on pikes, taking up the trusty ol’ blunderbuss for a march on Mordor On The Potomac, or lighting up the torches, I don’t think. Yes, it’s a big fuckin’ deal for sure, but let’s not anyone get their hopes up too high quite yet. It’s a long, dark road we’re walking here, too dark and uncertain to be able see the end of it as of right now.

How to fix it

Posted on March 6, 2023 by Mike

Endorsed, wholeheartedly.

College Should Be More Like Prison
The inmates I teach are serious, disciplined, hard-working students, eager to engage with ideas.

Never have I been more grateful to teach where I do: at a men’s maximum-security prison. My students there, enrolled in a for-credit college program, provide a sharp contrast with contemporary undergraduates. These men are highly motivated and hard-working. They tend to read each assignment two or three times before coming to class and take notes as well. Some of them have been incarcerated for 20 or 30 years and have been reading books all that time. They would hold their own in any graduate seminar. That they have had rough experiences out in the real world means they are less liable to fall prey to facile ideologies. A large proportion of them are black and Latino, and while they may not like David Hume’s or Thomas Jefferson’s ideas on race, they want to read those authors anyway. They want, in short, to be a part of the centuries-long conversation that makes up our civilization. The classes are often the most interesting part of these men’s prison lives. In some cases, they are the only interesting part.

Best of all from my selfish point of view as an educator, these students have no access to cellphones or the internet. Cyber-cheating, even assuming they wanted to indulge in it, is impossible. But more important, they have retained their attention spans, while those of modern college students have been destroyed by their dependence on smartphones. My friends who teach at Harvard tell me administrators have advised them to change topics or activities several times in each class meeting because the students simply can’t focus for that long.

If prison inmates, many of whom have committed violent crimes, can pay close attention for a couple of hours, put aside their political and personal differences, support one another’s academic efforts, write eloquent essays without the aid of technology and get through a school year without cheating, is it too much to ask university students to do the same?

Most of them, yes. They won’t, because they can’t. Never having been subject to much in the way of self-discipline or respect for any sort of authority, up to and including parental; possessed of little to no interest in actual education or self-betterment; born, weaned, and raised sucking down the bitter milk of self-indulgence, unearned praise, overentitlement, and low expectations—it is indeed too much to ask. They have been spared the rod, yielding the results predicted by the old biblical homily. That shouldn’t come as any big surprise, to any parent worthy of the name.

(Via VP)

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