What Defund the Police hath wrought

This is the link to article.

Linky Linky Linky

I am pasting the links separately because Blogger's upgrade interface is junk and often will not publish them embedded. 

1.
How the Democrats collude to enable voter fraud, at Powerline
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/06/how-the-democrats-collude-to-enable-voter-fraud.php

One of the most pernicious phenomena of modern times is the collusive lawsuit. This is how it works: a left-wing organization sues a government agency that is also controlled by the left. The lawsuit alleges that the agency is obliged to do something that the agency would like to do, but the Democrats can’t get it passed. Then the parties–supposedly adverse, but actually in collusion–“settle” the case by having the agency agree to do what it wanted to do all along. If all goes well, a court enters an order enforcing the settlement. So the net effect is that a policy that the Democrats couldn’t get passed is now a court-ordered mandate. This happens often.

Read the whole thing, but take your blood pressure meds first. It is absolutely in the Dem playbook for November.

2.
Black Lives Matter Is A Radical Marxist Organization. Who says so? Well, its founders.
https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=44832 and on camera here: https://youtu.be/5J9l6VOxYeE

3.
The sanctification of George Floyd, which is really much less about Floyd than the aftermath.
https://thecritic.co.uk/the-sanctification-of-george-floyd/

Another example of the relation between sentimentality and brutality has been the use of very young children in demonstrations. There are videos of two girls, nine and seven, one making a speech at a demonstration and the other marching in a demonstration, her pretty little face contorted with hatred, chanting a horrible slogan, ‘No justice, no peace’ (a justification in advance of further looting, or worse), and making aggressive gestures.

Clearly they had been put up to all this by their parents. If they had been born in Nazi Germany, they would have rushed up to the Fuhrer to present him with flowers. And no doubt the parents of the little girls, in the pride of their self-righteousness, will continue to indoctrinate them into becoming mental clones of themselves, in the belief that decerebrate rage and resentment are really a manifestation of generosity of spirit.

The little girls themselves, deeply unattractive as they have been made, are of course not themselves to blame. But what kind of fathomless sentimentalism is it that believes that a cause is justified or strengthened by the use of parroting children of nine and seven? It is not what the children parrot that counts, horrible as it might be, but that the children parrot it, that they have been turned (presumably by their parents) into mere instruments.

4.
The New Truth - When the moral imperative trumps the rational evidence, there’s no arguing.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/new-truth-rationalism-religion

Or as Stalin's abject apologist, the NYT's Walter Duranty, said of Joseph Stalin:

But – to put it brutally – you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs, and the Bolshevist leaders are just as indifferent to the casualties that may be involved in their drive toward socialization as any General during the World War who ordered a costly attack in order to show his superiors that he and his division possessed the proper soldierly spirit. In fact, the Bolsheviki are more indifferent because they are animated by fanatical conviction. (The New York Times, March 31, 1933, page 13)

5.
Member of an ethnic minority tells a white BLM supporter that he is oppressed and wants reparations. As in right now, from the white guy's wallet. Pop some popcorn before watching!


And a companion video:


6.
What Happens When the Madness Ends? Since it is by VDH, no excerpt is necessary.
https://amgreatness.com/2020/06/21/what-happens-when-the-madness-ends/

7.
What is your woke breaking point?
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/statues-woke-breaking-point-law-of-merited-impossibility/

In progressivism, only some black lives matter

All the links herein are corrected and will work. No thanks to Blogger.

If you call Planned Parenthood and offer to make a donation to fund abortions specifically for aborting black unborn children, they will accept it. If you tell them the reason you will donate is because there are too many black people in the country today, they will still accept it without protest. 
https://www.facebook.com/liveaction/videos/3140269152701373/

But of course, because Planned Parenthood was formed for that very reason, to kill black people. Just google Margaret Sanger, its founder. Or you can just read why Margaret Sanger's Fans Work to Clean Up Her Racist Past.  
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2020/may/they-have-to-reinvent-her-margaret-sangers-fans-work-to-clean-up-her-racist-past

Then there are these mostly white BLM activists who consent to the claim made to them that some black lives matter and the rest do not. Namely, black people murdered by other black people do not matter. And like Planned parenthood, black persons killed in the womb do not matter.
https://twitter.com/OntWtf/status/1273760666365710338
  

And there is Niger Innis, spokesman for the Congress of Racial Equality, who says that Black Lives Matter  doesn't have a 'd*** thing to do' with saving black lives.  
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/niger-innis-black-lives-matter-agenda-doesnt-have-a-damn-thing-to-do-with-saving-black-lives

More and more black Americans are no longer afraid to speak out publicly against the  real oppressors of black people in America today.  

"These Democrats, and I'm sorry to say this, they hate black people," she continued. "These are the same people who fought to keep slavery in. These are the same people who built the KKK. The Republican Party is the party of the blacks."

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/they-hate-black-people-street-preachers-decry-democrats-outside-seattles-chaz 

Once again:

Reading list for June 17

Trayvon Martin's mother says we need more police. 

Racial equality is so 1960s, say AP and major American newspapers.

The New York Times Recoils at the Predictable Consequences of the Mandatory COVID-19 Precautions It Supports

The American Press Is Destroying Itself, by Matt Taibbi, a bona fide progressive/liberal journalist. 

Suddenly confiscating guns isn’t a Democrat priority when Democrats like the people carrying the guns.

Could be the Bee, but it's real: Tim Kaine Claims America Invented Slavery; Roman Empire and Egyptian Pharaohs Demand Apology

More to be added as I find them and have the time.

Antifa Is Not Fighting For Freedom, But For Communist Revolution
https://thefederalist.com/2017/11/01/antifa-not-fighting-freedom-communist-revolution/

'They Have to Reinvent Her': Margaret Sanger's Fans Work to Clean Up Her Racist Past
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2020/may/they-have-to-reinvent-her-margaret-sangers-fans-work-to-clean-up-her-racist-past

This Leftist Tantrum Is an Information Operation and Trump Is Winning It
https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2020/06/18/this-leftist-tantrum-is-an-information-operation-and-trump-is-winning-it-n2570782

The real enemy of black Americans

Related: 

Read this long review of The Vision of the Anointed - Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy, by Thomas Sowell. 

Comforting Abstractions, by Kevin Williamson

Who is responsible for the mess in Minneapolis? The answer to that question is not unknowable — but it is, in many political quarters, unspeakable.

 

Minneapolis’s municipal government, its institutions, and its police department are what they are not because of the abstract Hegelian forces of capital-H History, but because of decisions that have been made by people. Who these people are is a matter of public record. We know their names: Jacob Frey, Betsy Hodges, R. T. Rybak, Sharon Sayles Belton, Medaria Arradondo, Janeé Harteau, Tim Walz, Mark Dayton . . . the rogues’ gallery is practically inexhaustible.

 

But, oh, the transmuting magic of partisanship! Minneapolis is a Democratic city, with a Democratic mayor and a Democratic city council (0.0 Republicans on that body), in a state with a Democratic governor and a Democratic state house; these are the people who hire police chiefs and organize police departments, who specify their procedures and priorities, who write the laws that the police are tasked with enforcing — Democrats and progressives practically to a man. (Not every member of the Minneapolis city council is a Democrat — there’s a Green, too.) That’s a lot of lefty power, hardly anything except lefty power — but, somehow, the bad guy in this story must be Donald Trump. ... 

...  one of the problems here is the power of police unions, which resist efforts to increase accountability and oversight of their members. There is a political party in this country that is very much committed to increasing the power of public-sector unions, that has worked hard with some success to do that, and that is enormously dependent upon the financial and political support of those unions for its campaign efforts — and it is not called the Republican Party. It’s the other one.

Oh, wait... 

The fiction of the riots

The Sole Justification Offered for the Riots Is a Fiction

Rioters and their enablers claim that the present disorder is justified by an epidemic of police shootings of unarmed black men. But no such epidemic exists.

Harvard economist Roland Fryer conducted a now-famous systematic review of police violence, and found that cops were more likely to use low-level force against black suspects than against white suspects, but no more likely to use lethal force. The racial disparities in the use of low-level force shrank when Fryer accounted for differences in group behavior, but a gap remained between white and nonwhite suspects even after such controls. And the fact that the police are more likely to place their hands on a black suspect, push them into a wall, or shove them to the ground no doubt contributes to the sense of hostility between law enforcement and African Americans.

But the central claim advanced by those defending the riots is not that police are disproportionately likely to use low-level force against black suspects. The central claim advanced by those defending the riots is that “they are killing us,” that blacks are “hunted” by racist police departments and are in danger every time they leave their homes. The evidence simply doesn’t back that up. And as stores are burned and livelihoods destroyed, churches desecrated and precincts set ablaze, evidence is something we must insist on.

As I said earlier, Rioters don't care about George Floyd.

One result: Another black man murdered.

Will there be vigils held for him? Protest marches at the injustice of his death? Enormous media coverage of the particulars? Leaders of the Congress demanding a full-scale investigation?

Will a massive national public outcry demand his murderer be arrested and brought to justice?

To ask the questions is to answer them.

 

Why we can't afford 99-cent gasoline

If you like the very low gasoline prices, even though we are not supposed to drive anywhere, get used to it. Oil's spot price may drop some more, yes (it plummeted today after Thursday's highest-rate increase ever in one day). But production is going to drop. Usually, that means gas prices rise. Not this time. And that is actually very bad news.

Cheap gas and nowhere to go. That's bad.

American oil frackers operate at a loss much below $60 per barrel (depending where they are located). The largest such operation, the Permian Basin, needs about $65 per barrel to make a profit. It straddles Texas and New Mexico.

The drop in oil price was triggered by Russia's refusal to cut production at the Saudis' request. So the Saudis jacked production up to drive the price down and punish the Russians. Well, good luck with that:

After oil prices collapsed in the worst drop in nearly three decades—courtesy of the renewed Saudi-Russia rivalry on the oil market – Russia’s Finance Ministry said on Monday that Moscow had enough resources to cover budget shortfalls amid oil prices at $25-30 a barrel for six to ten years.  

Not coincidentally, both the Saudis and the Russians would like to see America's frackers permanently closed and the United States to return to a major importer of oil, not net exporters as we are right now.

One way or another oil prices will rise. That seems a cloud but actually it is the silver lining. The cloud is cheap oil. Active-rig counts fell this week in the US by 160, year over year, to 722. On the other hand, US oil production remains near an all-time high at 13.1 million barrels per day. Go figure.

And next month may be even more dramatic.

Analysts say that the month of April could see the largest supply overhang in the history of the oil market.

“We now expect the y/y demand loss to peak in April at 10.4 million barrels per day (mb/d), and annual demand to fall by a record 3.39mb/d in 2020,” Standard Chartered wrote in a note.

In the short run, the oil market surplus could reach a peak of 13.7 mb/d in April, Standard Chartered said, with an average surplus of 12.9 mb/d for the second quarter. The inventory buildup could reach a gargantuan 2.1 billion barrels by the end of the year, “stretching the midstream of the industry to its limits,” the bank wrote. That figure represents an upward revision of 50 percent from the 1.4-billion-barrel inventory surplus the bank predicted…just a week ago.

Other analysts have even more dramatic scenarios. Eurasia Group says demand could fall by as much as 25 mb/d in the next few weeks and months. The historic glut means that the world could run out of storage space. “The combination of weakening demand and excess supply is hardly going to be accommodated by onshore storage,” Giovanni Serio, head of analysis at Vitol, told the FT. “At a certain point…we will need to fill all the boats.”

 So severe is the situation that for practically the first time in long memory, "Texas Weighs Curtailing Oil Production for First Time in Decades."

Texas regulators are considering curtailing oil production in America’s largest oil-producing state, something they haven’t done in decades, people familiar with the matter said.

Several oil executives have reached out to members of the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the industry, requesting relief following an oil-price crash, the people said. U.S. benchmark oil closed around $25 a barrel Thursday.

Texas, which hasn’t limited production since the 1970s, was a model for the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, which has sought to control world-wide oil prices in recent decades. OPEC and Russia were unable to reach a deal on reducing output in response to the coronavirus pandemic, which helped trigger the current collapse in prices.

It is unclear whether regulators will ultimately act to curtail production, but staffers are examining what would be required in such an event, the people said.

Oil prices have always been manipulated by producers. Even so, at the end of the day, demand has always been in control. And now the worldwide demand has dropped like an anvil and will continue to do so. The largest users of petro products - shipping and aviation - are harboring vessels and canceling flights. That will likely accelerate.

That said, oil production is going to plummet because, as stated above, we are running out of places to put it. That does not mean that gas prices will suddenly rise. The huge over-supply will see to that. But cheap gas prices are not going to offset the real pain dropping demand will cause: higher unemployment not only of oil-industry workers, but businesses whose revenues depend on customers using oil just to buy or get to their products or locations, such as hotels, tourist attractions, airline workers, dock workers, gas station owners and workers, the list is very long.

I am not an economist by a long shot, but unless we stop our "insane over-reaction," there is going to be a lot of pain to come that 99-cent gasoline will not pay for.

Update: How low can it go? "How Low Can Oil Go? One Forecast Sees $5 a Barrel." Which means that gasoline will be not much higher than free - and yet it will be also more difficult to find because gas stations will be closing at accelerated rates as oil prices plummet.

Covid-19, from a reliable source

I received this from a man, Ken, I have known for many years. He is a retired Master Sergeant of the Tennessee Army National Guard. Since retirement he has been a senior director of emergency management in Tennessee. He said he got this "From a reliable friend in the medical field." Well, I trust Ken.

Here is the man's assessment.
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The virus is encircled by an oily, lipid layer that dissolved on contact with soap. Hence the push for hand washing. The virus enters the body through the mouth, nose, and/or eyes and needs cells with ACE2 receptors to attach. These are found primarily in the heart and lungs. ACE2 (angiotensin-converting enzyme) is a protein associated with both diabetes and HTN, both conditions which place an individual at a heightened risk; 40% of patients with HTN experienced severe infections.

The virus then attaches to healthy cells with that fatty, oily layer and hijacks the cells, making proteins to keep the immune system at bay. The immune system mounts a defense and sometimes attacks healthy lung cells. The lungs fill with fluid and dying cells. This can lead to ARDS which is most often fatal, basically an acute, lethal pneumonia. That's what killing people. It's not unlike the Spanish Flu. That flu attacked healthy individuals and created a "cytokine storm" and people drowned from the fluids in their lungs. We now know the virus is found in the bloodstream, GI tract, CNS, and possibly brain. It can cause damage to the lungs, heart, bone marrow, and liver, possibly nerve cells. Should you survive a severe infection because you're young and healthy, you can expect a 20-30% decrease in lung capacity. What this means is that a flight of stairs will wind you. You can expect lung scarring and damage. We do not know the long term effects as this is an entirely new virus. When a virus makes that first jump from one species to another, it is at its most lethal. That is what we are seeing with SARS-CoV-2.

A new study is out that shows the droplets can "hang" in the air for up to three hours. This may mean the virus is aerosolized which answers the question why it appears to be so contagious when it only has an R0 of 2.4. This study was conducted by NIH, Princeton and UCLA and is not yet peer reviewed. This study also showed the virus is viable on plastics for 3 days; on the glass of cell phones 9 days; and on cardboard for 24 hours.

Contrary to the other four coronaviruses that are endemic in our population, this one does not seem to be susceptible to heat and humidity as we had first hoped. The transmission of the virus will go down come summer, but that is a function of schools' closing for the summer break rather than a response to heat/humidity. There will be an uptick in cases once fall arrives due to the close quarters. This virus is not going away anytime soon. There are three courses a novel virus can take - 1. It can appear, be devastating, and disappear unexpectedly like both SARS and MERS. This one did not do that so this option is out. 2. It can cause a global pandemic and a lot of people will lose their lives or be disabled from the infection. May be happening. 3. It can become endemic in our population like the other 4 coronaviruses we see during cold and flu season and account for up to 30% of our "colds." This is highly likely.

Myths:

1. Keep your mouth moist (another version is to spray your nose with saline) and the virus can't "take hold." Staying hydrated helps your immune system. It does not do anything to the virus.

2. Keep your mouth moist and take sips frequently to "swallow the virus."

3. Drink a solution of diluted bleach and water. No. Do not ever drink bleach. Or take acetic acid or any number of the "natural cures" out there. If there was a natural cure, doubtful almost 6k people globally would have died.

4. Take vitamin C. Vitamin C was a great marketing campaign in the 50s by Linus Pauling. It's such a great campaign, it perpetuates today. It does absolutely nothing for the prevention or treatment of colds/viruses.

5. There are antibiotics for this virus. Antibiotics only work on bacterial infections. We don't know which, if any, antivirals work on this novel virus.

6. I'm young and healthy. If I get it, it won't affect me. There can be long term damage or even organ failure due to the virus. We will not know for many years the extent of the damage.

7. The flu shot will prevent the virus. The flu and this virus are completely different viruses. However, getting the flu shot does two things: decreases your chances of becoming ill from the flu and having a weakened immune system making you more susceptible to the coronavirus and keeps you out of the hospitals allowing providers the time and resources to care for victims of the pandemic.

8. Black people don't get the coronavirus. OMG. NO! This is not only racist, it's completely wrong. Africa has over 100 cases.

9. I should wear a mask. No. Just no. (I can elaborate at length why this is not a good idea)

10. Kids can't get the virus. Not only is this not true, it may be deadly. Yes, children can get the virus and many are asymptomatic. So far, thankfully, there haven't been any deaths in children under 9. Newborns have gotten the virus. We just don't know what the long term effects will be. If you can protect your children, do so.

11. Schools are closed; I can take my child to the museum, zoo, theater, etc. NO. The idea of social distancing is to stay home. Do just that. Stay home. If you do not, people will die. It's that simple.

12. Heat (or cold) will kill the virus. Nope. This nasty bugger is strong and kicking our butts. Neither a hot or cold bath or a hair dryer will kill the virus. (Seriously, WHO, who is using a hair dryer to kill the virus??)

13. Garlic. What? No, of course garlic doesn't prevent or treat the virus. I mean, look at Italy.

14. There are medicines to treat the virus. No, there are no specific meds to treat this virus. South Korea seems to have found a sweet spot with a combo of drugs, but we have no idea if that actually works, how effective it is, long term effects, etc. We are years away from a vaccine.

15. Essential oils. No. Always no.

And the big one - 16. "It's just the flu." Nope. At the worst, its 30x more fatal than the seasonal flu (Chinese/WHO figures) at its best, 10x more fatal (South Korea figures). This is NOT just the flu. Seasonal flu has a case fatality rate (CFR) of 0.6% annually. This virus, depending on which country you run the stats has either a 3.4% CFR or a 1.2% CFR. Both are substantially higher than the flu. For comparison, the Spanish Flu had a CFR of 2.5%.
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Read this, too: Influenza kills more people than coronavirus so everyone is overreacting, right? Wrong — and here’s why

Folks, this virus is bad news. Treat it that way.

Link this, sucker!

What is NATO good for? Well, pretty much nothing, at least right now. As I wrote in 2008,  "What has NATO ever done for us?" The answer is also pretty much nothing (since the fall of the USSR) and I do not take back a word of it.

America is moving rapidly to tribalism, pushed hard on purpose by the Marxist, America-hating revolutionary vanguard. And the very concept of "citizen" is vanishing. Because "Pre- & post-citizens" was written by VDH, you automatically should read it. My own relevant essays are here.

With Soleimani blown to smithereens, what to make of Iran's threats to retaliate? Oh, they will do something, but if they were capable of doing worse, they would have already done it. And with Soleimani dead, they have a huge blank in their murderous-imagination planning because, "Top commander's assassination leaves Iran with very few options to retaliate."

Then read Hussain Abdul-Hussain's thread on why "reporting in the main news outlets NYT and Wash Post is so misinformed (either on purpose or because of incompetence)... ."

Oh, when Trump blew up Soleimani, the Left was unanimous that it was an act of war that was going to start World War 3! Oh, how we long for the good old days when Obama launched 2,800 strikes on Iraq, Syria without congressional approval. And how fondly we remember "Obama's Breathtaking Expansion of a President's Power To Make War." Good times, eh? Good times!

Speaking of war, why was this an act of war:

Remains of the car Qassem Soleimani was riding it. 

... but this was not?

Smoke rises from the reception room of the U.S. embassy that was burned by Pro-Iranian militiamen and their supporters, in Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2020 (Link)

But the chickens come home to roost, even if to a new coop: "Obama official thinks Trump's strategy worked."

Connecting dots for Nov. 4

I posted earlier of how the Gleichshaltung is interested in you. Gleichschaltung is a German word that means “coordination.” Politically, it means "to get every institution to sing from the same hymnal." Gleichschaltung is the political modus operandi of the Left, wherever it springs up - Germany, Russia, China, Italy. 

In America today, it is Socialist-Leftist template campaigning to gain and consolidate their power in the 2020 election. And the preparatory "coordination" is going on now. And so some connected dots thereunto:

The Winter of Our Discontent:

One wonders if the unique American experiment in liberty is already too far gone to save. One must wonder if Lady Liberty is just a zombie, unaware she is dead as she wanders the landscape. Many of our elitist punditry class say that our current separation is due to a stark partisan divide – but in my observation, that separation is at a far more fundamental level and when understood, explains much of our current crisis. 

The separation is due to the segregation of Americans into two groups – the first are people who define their political objectives by their principles, the second are people who define their principles by their political objectives. ...

The latter group, those who define their principles based on their political objectives are historically the most dangerous to a system of liberty and they are always the most susceptible to the seductive siren call of collectivism (which includes socialism, Marxism, and communism) because this is the way collectivism works. Collectivism always begins with an objective, then a plan, then total subservience to the plan.

Everywhere the Left has bent to power, it has never demanded agreement with its goals, actions, or requirements. The Revolutionary Vanguard is very happy for you to give those things, but what they absolutely require is compliance, not agreement. 

I explored this in some detail back in The empty abyss of emotions and feelings: Ignorance is power for rule makers.

Not only is there no such thing as Truth, it is unforgivable even to speak as if there is. You have your truth and I have mine, and can't we all just get along? We are almost at the point achieved by the Brezhnev-era Soviet Union, when everyone knew that they were being fed lies and distortions but no one knew how to do anything about it and the price for trying to do so is much too high, anyway.  So everyone went along because they saw no other avenue.

And it's happening right before us: A Racially “Woke” Agenda Is Now Hardwired in Public Schools.

At Santa Monica High School, students organize and carry out “a systematized campaign” for social justice that can take the form of a protest, a leaflet, a workshop, play, or research project. They demonstrate their mastery of the subject matter by teaching about social justice to middle school students. Students at Environmental Charter High School are assigned to write a ‘breakup letter

with a form of oppression,’ such as toxic masculinity, heteronormativity, the Eurocentric curriculum, or the Dakota Access Pipeline. Students are asked to “persuade their audience of the dehumanizing and damaging effects of their chosen topic.” Students at schools in Anaheim, San Jose, Oakland, and San Francisco are taught how to write a manifesto to school administrators listing “demands” for reforms. [Italics original]  

Those “ethnic studies” classes are not about teaching facts about history. They’re about casting a certain mindset in students, one that will incline them to activism against Progressivism’s designated villains. Murawski quotes Professor Julia Jordan-Zachery of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, who said, “I oftentimes think of ethnic studies as radical social action.” That’s exactly what leftist educators want.

Yes, because compliance is the goal. And it is the only goal.

Changing subjects, let's talk about cell-phone technology. By the always on=-top-of-things David Goldman: 5G policy ‘biggest strategic disaster in US history’

And now, let's talk about money. 

What are the odds the market will crash during your retirement years?

Researchers have devised a precise formula for calculating this possibility

As it turns out, it's a good guide, but it is not "precise." Worth thinking about, though.

What happened to the Babylon Bee? It used to publish funny stuff, not serious commentary like this: Christians Face Clear Choice Between Party That's A Hypocritical Mockery Of Their Faith And One That's Openly Hostile To It.

"It's a really interesting choice," said Christian Tanya Lloyd. "By supporting the Republicans, I'm giving people further ammunition to dismiss my beliefs as an empty cultural pose. At least they like to pretend to be Christian, though, while sometimes it seems like the only thing keeping the Democrats from hunting me down with hunter-seeker drones like from The Terminator is lack of technology."

Always leave 'em laffing department:

And Epstein didn't kill himself.

Mexico and USA - failed states to be?

Mexico is teetering into failed-state status:

A Drug Cartel Just Defeated The Mexican Military In Battle

The idea that a nation of 120 million people with whom the United States shares a 2,000-mile border and ever-increasing economic ties might spiral into collapse has not seriously occurred to the American people. We’ve had a century of relative peace on our southwest border, and aside from dealing with an occasional surge of illegal immigration, we have assumed that it will continue. It will not.

Culiacan should be a wake-up call that the war now underway in Mexico will not stay there, and that we’d better start thinking about what that will mean for America.

 Wall 2.0: Might Have to Put Machine Guns On the Wall (Just in Case)

You may have read the news just a few days back: the Mexican military captured not one but two of El Chapo’s sons in the heart of Culiacán, the Sinaloan capital. One son freed himself—which is to say his entourage and retainers at hand overpowered and killed the soldiers at hand—and then, in a decisive riposte, seized the entire city center of Culiacán to compel the liberation of his brother.

 The forces that emerged were in the literal sense awesome and awful. Heavy weaponry that would be familiar on any Iraqi, Syrian, or Yemeni battlefield was brought to bear. More and worse: custom-built armored vehicles, designed and built to make a Sahel-warfare technical look like an amateur’s weekend kit job, were rolled out for their combat debut. Most critically, all this hardware was manned by men with qualities the Mexican Army largely lacks: training, tactical proficiency, and motivation.

Then the coup de grace: as the Chapo sons’ forces engaged in direct combat with their own national military, kill squads went into action across Culiacán, slaughtering the families of soldiers engaged in the streets.

Same post: "You might think nothing could be worse than ISIS. You’d be thinking wrong."

After about three months of training it was time for the “final exam,” which involved “cutting people up a special way,” Capache explains. Recruits took turns administering a specific, byzantine series of stabs and slashes to a live victim—usually a thief or petty criminal the cartel deemed deserving of such punishment. The first series of ordered knife cuts was meant to torture for information without killing. Then to strike fatal blows. And at last to cut up the body by hand for disposal. — In Mexico’s Drug Cartel Country, a Murderer Who Kills Murderers Tells His Story  Trust me, you don’t want to RTWT  ]

A state entering the preliminary stages of "failed": Yes, antifa is the moral equivalent of neo-Nazis.

Last weekend [in August] in Berkeley, Calif., a group of neo-communist antifa — “anti-fascist” — thugs attacked peaceful protesters at a “No to Marxism in America” rally, wielding sticks and pepper spray, and beating people with homemade shields that read (I kid you not) “No Hate.” The Post reports how one peaceful protester “was attacked by five black-clad antifa members, each windmilling kicks and punches into a man desperately trying to protect himself.” Members of the Berkeley College Republicans were then stalked by antifa goons who followed them to a gas station and demanded they “get the [expletive] out” of their car, warning, “We are real hungry for supremacists and there is more of us.”

The organizer of the anti-Marxism protest is not a white supremacist. Amber Cummings is a self-described “transsexual female who embraces diversity” and had announced on Facebook that “any racist groups like the KKK [and] Neo Nazis . . . are not welcome.” The protest was needed, Cummings said, because “Berkeley is a ground zero for the Marxist Movement.”

As if to prove Cummings’s point, the antifa movement responded with jackboots and clubs — because their definition of “fascist” includes not just neo-Nazis but also anyone who opposes their totalitarian worldview.

And let’s be clear: Totalitarian is precisely what they are. Mark Bray, a Dartmouth lecturer who has defended antifa’s violent tactics, recently explained in The Post, “Its adherents are predominantly communists, socialists and anarchists” who believe that physical violence “is both ethically justifiable and strategically effective.” In other words, they are no different from neo-Nazis. 

Well, the Nazis were socialists, but saying that provable historical fact makes progressives' heads explode.

Italian dictator Benito Mussolini invented the word fascist as the name of his post-World War 1 party, which he symbolized with the ancient Roman symbol, fasces, a bundle of reeds tied together with an axe, used by the Roman magisterium to symbolize the power of Roman law over life and death.

The Roman fasces, symbol of the Italian fascisti party of the early 20th century. 

In 1932, Mussolini defined Fascism for the Italian Encyclopedia. It included this nugget:

The foundation of Fascism is the conception of the State, its character, its duty, and its aim. Fascism conceives of the State as an absolute, in comparison with which all individuals or groups are relative, only to be conceived of in their relation to the State. The conception of the Liberal State is not that of a directing force, guiding the play and development, both material and spiritual, of a collective body, but merely a force limited to the function of recording results: on the other hand, th`e Fascist State is itself conscious and has itself a will and a personality -- thus it may be called the "ethic" State....

...The Fascist State organizes the nation, but leaves a sufficient margin of liberty to the individual; the latter is deprived of all useless and possibly harmful freedom, but retains what is essential; the deciding power in this question cannot be the individual, but the State alone....

Sound familiar? It's almost a transcript of the Democrat debates so far.

Mussolini's street enforcement arm were called the Blackshirts, who were,

...originally the paramilitary wing of the National Fascist Party and, after 1923, an all-volunteer militia of the Kingdom of Italy under Fascist rule, similar to SS in Nazi-Germany. Its members were distinguished by their black uniforms (modeled on those of the Arditi, Italy's elite troops of World War I) and their loyalty to Benito Mussolini, the Duce (leader) of Fascism, to whom they swore an oath. 

Hitler copied the concept with the National Socialist Sturmabteilung, SA, who unofficially were called Brownshirts. In the early stages of the Nazi movement the Brownshirts were simply paid street thugs. Later Hitler put them under military-like discipline and they carried out planned, focused violence against Jews, communists, trade unionists and others.

So who is Antifa? They are the street thugs of the American Left, committing violence against Americans of other political persuasion. As for the Democrat party, if I had a dollar for every time a prominent Democrat or presidential candidate denounced Antifa and its violence, I would be, um, broke.

But Antifa is well funded and its leaders, at least, are paid, according to the LA Times, which also points out that paid protesters are not exactly a new thing in American politics. Most of Antifa consists of "useful idiots," but the ranks of trained and very capable Antifa blackshirts (for black is their preferred color of dress) are growing.

This is simply the socialist-left template. Military theoretician Carl von Clausewitz said that war is a continuation of politics by other means. For socialists, violence is a continuation of politics - but not by "other means," for the Left defines politics in  warring terms: "class struggle," "rising up," "workers' revolution," and such. Politics and violence therefore are not separate activities. Politics is simply a continuum that encompasses both non-violence and violence.

This is why I have maintained for three years that there is a new American civil war coming, no matter who is declared the winner of 2020's election. If Trump wins, organized, pre-planned Antifa violence will erupt the same day. If Warren or another Democrat wins, violence will follow later, as the fascisti victor turns toward emplacing socialist rule over Americans.

Mexico is already a nation at war with itself. It is on the precipice of failed state status. And as Mexico is now, the United States will be in only 13-14 months. I pray we will not come to a sauve qui peut state of affairs.

Update: These, too.

The Rethink We Need to Avoid America’s Collapse, by Robin Burk.

Our Revolution’s Logic, by Angelo Codevilla

In 2010, Claremont Institute Senior Fellow Angelo Codevilla reintroduced the notion of "the ruling class" back into American popular discourse. In 2017, he described contemporary American politics as a "cold civil war." Now he applies the "logic of revolution" to our current political scene.

Rule Number One: Don't be stupid

One would think that in the wake of the horrific mass murders in El Paso and Dayton, that people would understand that everyone's anxiety is elevated about copycat attackers. But apparently, not everyone thinks about that.

Case number one: Panic in Springfield Walmart as man walks around with tactical rifle wearing body armor in Missouri (CBS).

Springfield, Mo. – Police here say they arrested a man who went into a Walmart store Thursday with a rifle around his neck and wearing body armor and military-style clothes, prompting terrified shoppers to flee. Springfield police tweeted that "an armed individual" was confronted and arrested. No shots were fired.

CBS Springfield affiliate KOLR-TV says Lt. Mike Lucas told reporters police got a call about an active shooter at 4:09 p.m. and arrived within three minutes. According to Lucas, a 20 year old put on body armor in the parking lot, then walked inside with a tactical rifle around his neck and a handgun on his side. He had more than 100 rounds of ammunition, according to The Springfield News-Leader.

The manager pulled the fire alarm and people headed for the exits. Smart thinking. The gunman never pointed his rifle at anyone. He did take smart-phone video of the scene (police think he was Facebook live streaming) and then walked out of the store, where he was confronted by a legally-armed former firefighter, who held him at gunpoint until police arrived about three minutes later. Police have neither released the man's name nor established his motive. The police lieutenant at the scene told reporters, "He is lucky to be alive." And he is right. The armed former firefighter who held him at gunpoint police arrived showed remarkable restraint, IMO.

Here in Tennessee there is no such thing as a "concealed" carry permit. The law requires a permit to carry at all, whether concealed or "open carry," which the term of art for carrying a firearm unconcealed.

Not a long time ago I was in a Best Buy where I saw a man - not a staffer - wearing a full-size semiauto pistol on his right hip, not tucked inside his shorts. When he turned I saw he was wearing another one in the middle of his back. And then by gosh he was wearing a third one on his left hip. Fortunately, he was turning to head for the doors and he left the store.

This is not something mentally healthy men do, regardless of having a carry permit or what the Second Amendment says. It was legal, yes (assuming he had a permit, I sure did not inquire) but it was stupid. And there are times when stupidity brings on its own penalty, as the police lieutenant in Springfield implied.

Case Number 2: Florida man who asked Walmart clerk about a gun to kill people was 'making political statement'

In Port St. Lucie - at another Walmart (what is it about dumbbells and Walmarts?) - a man identified as Phil Attey, an anti-gun activist, walked into a Walmart "and asked the clerk about a gun to kill people with."

"Can you sell me anything (or a gun) that would kill 200 people?" When the worker replied, "That isn't funny," Attey said, "I know," and asked again if they could sell him anything that would kill 200 people.

Police were called, but Attey had left the store by the time they arrived, so this APB was put out.

Attey was soon apprehended but not charged since he had not made actual threats and no one was harmed.

He admitted to WPTV the remark was in poor taste, but he was trying to make an anti-gun statement because he saw someone who looked like a white nationalist purchase a gun.

If you know what "someone who looked like a white nationalist" means, then you are ahead of me on that.

Case Number 3: SunTrust Park worker allegedly threatened to ‘blow up’ stadium, ‘shoot everyone there. That's the Braves' stadium.

A man who worked at SunTrust Park is behind bars after getting into an argument with

Jamar Antonio Golfin, police photo

his boss and threatening to “blow up” the stadium and “shoot everyone there,” according to his arrest warrant.

Jamar Antonio Golfin, 30, has been in jail since Saturday on a felony charge of making terroristic threats or acts, Cobb County jail records show.

Golfin, a temporary employee assigned to clean a seating area of the stadium, got in trouble Friday morning for walking off during a break and was asked to leave the ballpark, according to his warrant.  ...

As he was walked out, Golfin ... allegedly threatened to “kill them all” and told his supervisor he “would come back and shoot everyone there,” his warrant said. Golfin also allegedly said he’d be back to “blow up the place.”

Golfin has been charged with "making terroristic threats or acts," according to reports.

You know, when people do or say stuff like this, it makes me believe the reports that the human race is literally getting stupider every year.

Mass shootings, politicians, and what Americans do

In the aftermath of the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton, Democrat candidates, to no one's surprise, have come down hard on police-state measures, starting with banning and confiscating privately-owned firearms.

A favorite demand is to expand background checks—never mind that these mass shooters, and those of recent years, bought their guns legally and therefore passed such checks. Another is an “assault weapons” ban—never mind that “assault” weapons function in the same way as tens of millions of other semi-automatic rifles that would remain in circulation.

But the Democratic presidential candidates went further. It is not enough, they insisted, to expand background checks or limit types of firearms going forward. What is needed is to take guns away and to make it harder for law-abiding Americans to own them. They at least get credit for being more honest about the left’s gun intentions.

Texas’ former Rep. Beto O’Rourke said he is now “open” to a “mandatory” government gun-buying program—a polite way to describe confiscation of entire classes of firearms. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker highlighted his plan to require every American to obtain a federal “license” to purchase a firearm. Responsible gun owners would have to submit fingerprints, pass an interview, and take safety courses to obtain even a .22-caliber long rifle. And they’d have to repeat the process every five years.

California Sen. Kamala Harris has vowed to ignore Congress and impose gun regulations via executive action. She’d ban certain firearm imports and sue gun manufacturers for “negligence,” among other things. As for former Vice President Joe Biden, CNN asked him if gun owners should worry that a Biden administration “is going to come for my guns.” He answered: “Bingo. You’re right if you have an assault weapon. The fact of the matter is, they should be illegal, period.”

And how Americans responding? They are buying more guns, especially "carry" handguns:

Gun sales are surging after the weekend mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, fueled by first-time buyers seeking pistols they can carry with them for protection. ...

We checked in with Hyatt Guns in Charlotte, N.C., one of the nation’s largest, and Marketing Director Justin Anderson explained the trend to us.

“While we have seen a measured rise in sale of certain tactical rifles and accessories this week, most customers are looking for concealed carry handguns,” Anderson said.

“Just this week we have fielded hundreds of calls from people that have never purchased a gun before. Our concealed carry training classes are filling up quickly. People are realizing that even a trip to Walmart isn’t safe these days and they want to be able to protect themselves. Remember that nothing stops a lunatic bent on carnage better than a law abiding citizen with a gun. I continue to urge people to get a gun, get trained with that gun, and carry, always,” he added.

Here are my questions for Democrat candidates who, like Beto and Biden, want prohibition of private ownership of guns, or at least some kinds, to be mandatory. (Eric Swalwell also said he would, and would do so by using the US military if necessary.)

1. Will you obey the takings clause of the Constitution and pay each owner surrendering a gun the fair market value of each gun?
    
2. By "mandatory," do you mean that law-enforcement officers will enforce the ban by force and without consent?
    
1. Last November, Maryland police officers shot to death a man whose firearms they came to confiscate under a "red flag" order. I want to know how many Americans you are willing to see killed and maimed by police in order to successfully ban the guns you say you want to ban.
    
2. By that, I want an actual number, stated somewhere between zero and 327 million, the present population of the country. No weaseling around with, "Well, we do not want that to happen and we hope everyone cooperates," blahblahblah. There will be some Americans who will not surrender the guns voluntarily. Are you willing to see them killed by police because they refuse? If yes, then how many?
    
3. Also, how many law-enforcement officers are you willing to see killed to enforce the ban?
    
4. If you are not willing to enforce the ban by force and without consent, including the deaths of American private citizens and law enforcers, then you do not have a "mandatory" ban, so explain why you use that word to describe it.
    
3. Because you want to mandate bans of at least certain kinds of firearms, explain what is the Constitutional right that the Second Amendment guarantees. Are there any firearms that you pledge zealously to protect the rights of Americans to "keep and bear"? 

Sound of crickets chirping in 3 ... 2 ... 1.

Mass shootings and white supremacy

How many mass shootings occurred in America between July 16 and July 28th, 2019? What was the race of the shooter identified by police?

There were 36 mass shootings across the United States during that two-week period. A white was named as the shooter in one of them. An Hispanic was accused in another one. In the other 34, police identified a black suspect as the shooter.

Violent-crime victims weapons used, Chicago, 2019 so far

All of these shootings were reported in the media, mostly local media only, although the NYT has generally reported them (usually buried in a back page). Here is the list.

The day after the Gilroy shooting, NY Mayor (and presidential candidate) Bill de Blasio was asked by a reporter whether the Gilroy shooting resembled the mass shootings in New York.

"Not all, said de Blasio. “We don’t really count them that way.” 

Why doesn't the Left count them that way? The Chicago Tribune explains that there is no way to politically weaponize black men shooting other black men. But they can weaponize El Paso and Dayton.

Those angry loner white boys with guns, this time in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, have again erupted on the body politic.

And those with eyes to see are reminded that the American culture is ill.

But what of the mass shootings in Chicago, the 55 people shot over the weekend, with seven hit near a park and then eight more not far away?

You might think these are “mass shootings” too, but, in political/media terms, they’re not treated as such. The victims, and in all likelihood the shooters, are black. And Democratic politicians find no political advantage in weaponizing the victims of everyday street violence in a Democratic town. So Chicago’s dead are stepped over by national media and national Democrats on the way to 2020.

Black men killing other black men? That's not news. Middle-class white shooters killing white middle-class shoppers or club hoppers, now that's news!

A clergy colleague of mine wrote me of my observation,

This discussion is beginning to rise among African American pastors, at least in my neck of the woods:  

• There's lots of talk *now* about studies on mass murderers because *white* people are killing folks.
• Why haven't folks been as outraged about gangs?
• Black on black killing?
• Nobody cares about our public schools, where gangs recruit while white folks send their kids to "academies."
• A lot more people have died in urban violence than in mass school killings. Are we not as important? 

It needs to be a both/and where school shootings and urban violence are concerned. But our outrage seems to be selective - and for that, we must repent.

HT: Gerard Vanderleun, who also offers this collage of mug shots of every mass shooter in the US arrested by police from January - July of this year.

Yep, mass shooters are motivated by "white supremacism" all right.

Updates:

"You don't have to be a detective why the liberal media would rather have this story [about the political views of Dayton killer Connor Betts] just fade away. It's not the right kind of mass shooting."

"The Dayton Murderer Is Proof We Need To Take Left-Wing Violence Seriously"

Reuters: FBI finds gunman in Dayton, Ohio, rampage was obsessed with violence

Hollywood Film Depicts Trump Supporters Being Hunted for Sport by Liberals

Universal Pictures is set to release a thriller called The Hunt on September 27, which features left-wing “elites” hunting Trump supporters for sport. 

In the past few days we’ve been hearing a lot about how Donald Trump’s rhetoric is apparently to blame for the El Paso shooting, yet Hollywood apparently lacked the foresight to think that a movie promoting violence against “deplorables” might be in bad taste until after the shootings in El Paso and Dayton, as only now is Universal rethinking their promotional strategy for the film.

"Did anyone see what our ratf**ker-in-chief just did?" one character asks early in the screenplay for The Hunt, a Universal Pictures thriller set to open Sept. 27. Another responds: "At least The Hunt's coming up. Nothing better than going out to the Manor and slaughtering a dozen deplorables."

Update: