The Election Outcome

For John, BLUF:  The next five months are going to be interesting.  Not too interesting, I hope.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

‘Are You Ready For A Trump Victory?’: Michael Moore Sounds The Alarm After Trump Closes Gap In Michigan Poll

From The Daily Caller, by Reporter Katie Jerkivich! 28 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

Michael Moore asked people if they “are ready for a Trump victory” after the president closed the gap against Joe Biden in a new Michigan poll.

“Sorry to have to provide the reality check again, but when CNN polled registered voters in August in just the swing states, Biden and Trump were in a virtual tie,” the 66-year-old filmmaker captioned his Friday post on Instagram, along with a screenshot of the results of a poll showing Biden with 49% and Trump with 48%.

Mr Moore is a pretty bright observer of the scene, so his observation should be a wakeup call for Democrats.

But, for the long range thinkers, what is it going to be like post-20 January.  Yes, there is a small chance the Speaker of the House will slide in, but the odds are it will be either Mr Trump or Mr Biden.  I think the question is what will they do in victory or defeat?  we have former SecState Hillary Clinton saying:

Joe Biden should not concede under any circumstances because I think this is going to drag out, and eventually, I do believe he will win if we don’t give an inch and if we are as focused and relentless as the other side is.

Will either side concede?  More important, after Congress counts the Electoral College vote, will the loser move on?  Or, will it be like the last three and a half years, or worse?  Will the losing side take to the streets to disrupt governmet, or worse?  Will the losing side go for turning out the winning side?  Or will some states secede?  That last has been suggested by Mr John Pedesto if Mr Trump wins.

Hat tip to my Wife.

Regards  —  Cliff

Hausfrauism

For John, BLUF:  Perhaps this is just a lack of common decency, a lack of manners.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Hausfrauism is that unnoticed discrimination against women who stay home and raise children and keep house, without an established outside career.

Hausfrauism allows people who have jobs outside their homes to think that the Hausfrau is without commitments that must be allowed for; available for tasking at the drop of a hat.  No prior planning or scheduling is required, because she is just a Hausfrau.

Regards  —  Cliff

China Butters NBA's Bread

For John, BLUF:  We here in the US have a ways to go to ensure equality and equal opportunity.  China, which controls a big slide of entertainment world wide, due to its big audience share, is much worse.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

The NBA as Protesters

From InstaPundit, by Professor Glenn Reynolds, 26 August 2020.

Here is the first link:

DON’T ASK THEM ABOUT THE UIGHURS:

Razor
@hale_razor

NBA players funded by oppressive foreign police state protest American police.

The NBA is disgraceful.  Worse, the players probably don't realize it .

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Killing of Bobby Fassnacht

For John, BLUF:  it was 50 years ago this last Monday, and it accomplished nothing positive, but created a lot of pain.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

It was 50 years ago today — the Sterling Hall bombing.

From The Althouse Blog! by Professor Althouse, 24 August 2020.

The Blog Post consists of copies of two tweets on the event, from UW-Madison, and the comments. I actually knew Bobby Fassnacht.  He was my Wife's Cousin.  We had just returned from 3+ years in Germany.  It was shocking. He might have had his young son with him.  He had taken him to work before.  Fortunately, not this time.

Our Government treated this more like war than crime.  The "POWs" were released early.  I am, sadly, convinced we learned little.  And not a lot changed as a result of the death of Bobby Fassnacht.  In late 1973 I went back to Southeast Asia, flying missions in Cambodia, which failed to defeat the Khmer Rouge.  As a result I have frequent chances to apologize to my fellow Lowellians that I failed to end the war on a positive note.  One in five here in Lowell are Cambodian Refugees or the descendants thereof.  Including two City Councillors, a State Rep and the Chairman of the Republican City Committee.  And, last term, a member of the School Committee.

Hat tip to Ann Althouse.

Regards  —  Cliff

“Miracle on the Vistula River”

For John, BLUF:  The United States has been intertwined with Poland for our whole history as a nation.  From Casimir Pulaski until today, we have worked together, off and on, and we have provided a home for several million Polish Immigrants.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

American Valor Once Thwarted a Marxist Revolution 100 Years Ago—We Can Do It Again

Here is the sub-headline:

Merian C. Cooper helped to stop the Communist takeover of Europe in 1920. Today another Marxist revolution is surging—in the United States.  We can stop it again by following his example.

From American Greatness, by Mr Sheldon Bart, 14 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus two:

Hollywood mogul Merian C. Cooper, creator, producer, and co-director of the original “King Kong,” was an authentic hero of the August 15, 1920 Battle of Warsaw, which in David and Goliath fashion saved Europe from Communism.  Remembered today in its centennial year as the “Miracle on the Vistula River,” the battle eternally links Poland and America in a historic fight against totalitarian revolutionaries.

Following World War I, the map of Europe was radically redrawn.  Poland, occupied and dismembered by aggressor nations for more than 100 years, was recreated as an independent nation. Lenin and the Bolshevik Party, having seized control of a demoralized and destabilized Russia in a brazen 1917 coup, marched on Poland in 1919, expecting to sweep across its fragile, uncertain borders and export their Communist revolution to Germany and beyond.

A fighter pilot in World War I, Cooper sought to repay America’s debt to the Polish heroes Tadeusz Kościuszko, Casimir Pulaski, and others who risked their lives fighting for America’s freedom in our Revolutionary War.  He recruited nine fellow American aviators and veterans of the Great War to fly with him on Poland’s behalf against the oncoming Bolsheviks.

We were lucky that Marxism as a militant force was stopped from swallowing up Europe in 1920.  The division of Europe in 1945 was very unfortunatde, but at least we were there in force, and held the line, until nations like Poland and Hungary and East Germany overthrew the yoke of Communism.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Playing All the Cards

For John, BLUF:  Foreign Policy is executed at many different levels, including at the covert level.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Iran Paid Taliban Fighters To Attack US Assets In Afghanistan, Leading To Trump Ordering Killing Of Soleimani

From The Daily Caller, Reporter Christian Datoc, 17 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus three:

Iran reportedly paid bounties to a Taliban-backed Haqqani terrorist network for at least six attacks carried out against U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

U.S. intelligence identified the link between Iran and Haqqani following the December 2019 suicide attack at Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, which killed two civilians and injured dozens more, CNN reported Monday morning.

Two Trump administration officials said, according to CNN, that the bounties led to President Donald Trump’s decision to kill former Quds Force General Qasem Soleimani by drone strike in January. Trump cited Soleimani and Iran allegedly planning further attacks against U.S. forces in the region as a justification for killing him.

So it appears that President Trump was right to whack Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani.  Iran, and other nations, should not feel free to conduct unconventional attacks on the United States, its Armed Forces and its friends and allies.  Of course our use of military force should be exercised with constraint, but others should know it is there.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Donald Trump For Ever

For John, BLUF:  It seems some Democrats wish to hound Donald J Trump until he dies, and then some.  Is this a sign of their political maturity?  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Here is a text message:

Rep. Eric Swalwell
@RepSwalwell
· Aug 14

I don’t say this lightly:  when we escape this Trump hell, America needs a Presidential Crimes Commission.  It should be made up of independent prosecutors who look at those who enabled a corrupt president.  Example 1:  Sabotaging the mail to win an election.  ‪#SaveThePostOffice‬

Eric is a swell person.  And i am sure he is a perfect reflection of his district.

both sides need to calm down a little bit.

And, by the way, wasn't the US Postal Service in trouble before Mr Trump was sworn in?

Regards  —  Cliff

The Wrong Path to Justice

For John, BLUF:  The idea that Caucasian success in America was built solely on slavery (the 1619 thesis) will result in a very bad outcome for everyone.  We all need to learn about hard work and sharing the wealth.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Math Professor:  The '2+2=4 Trope ... Reeks of White Supremacist Patriarchy'

From Pajama Media, by Mr Tyler O'Neil, 13 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus three:

In the name of social justice, many Marxists push a kind of absurd brainwashing that denies basic rationality.  This month, a math professor denounced the “MYTH” that math is objective.  She said the “math is neutral because 2 + 2 = 4” trope “reeks of white supremacist patriarchy.”  Ironically, associating mathematics and basic knowledge with white men actually undermines Marxists’ ostensible goal of empowering women and people of color.

Laurie Rubel, a mathematics education professor at New York’s Brooklyn College, tweeted, “the idea that math (or data) is culturally neutral or in any way objective is a MYTH.”

Rubel added, “along with the ‘of course math is neutral because 2 + 2 = 4’ trope are the related (and creepy) ‘math is pure’ and ‘protect math.'”  She claimed this kind of statement “reeks of white supremacist patriarchy.”

“i’d [sic] rather think on nurturing people & protecting the planet (with math in service of them goals),” the professor added.

The people pontificating about systemic racism seem to be be clueless about actually fixing it.  Some police departments have problems.  Hoever, below that is education.  In Massachusetts the MCAS scores tell the story.  A lot of kids go out into the real high stakes test, life, and with low MCAS scores.  But, more fundamental is the damage we have done to the nuclear family, and in particular by our welfare system.  I want to fix the problem, but there are a lot of unserious people who just wish to rant.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Your 2020 Bingo Card

For John, BLUF:  Like most elections, the vote in November 2020 will be important.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

CHANGE CHANGE CHANGE

From According to Hoyt, by Author Sarah Hoyt, 12 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus seven: blockquote>So, who had “Atlantis rises” on their 2020 bingo card?

No, no.  Sit.  Don’t go scouring news sites.  That I know of, it hasn’t happened yet.  But would anyone really be surprised?  How many of us have gotten used to shaking our heads and going “D*mn it, 2020.”

I mean there have been other years that had certain trends before 2016 was a stone cold killer, probably due to the fact that a lot of celebrities hit their terminus at around the same time.  (Even the ones of different ages might have done the same drugs.  Who knows?)

But 2020? We just don’t know what to expect next, and certain government agencies proclaiming things like machines originating in other worlds isn’t helping.

However, the truth is that most of us — if we’re honest — saw a lot of 2020 coming.  Some of it was like a nightmare — I’ve been having a lot of what I call filthy nightmares (the kind you wake up from asking yourself what possessed you, perhaps literally — where you see the disaster coming, but you can do nothing to stop it.

I mean, we knew this would be an election year, so we knew things were going to go completely pants-on-head insane.

But I doubt many of us saw “entire country put under arrest for months over a virus that ultimately is perhaps as bad as a bad flu.”

The problem is this:  We should have seen it coming. Failure of imagination.  It is a problem, particularly when voting.  We can't imagine how our elected official can go wrong.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Virginia Reimagines Public Education

For John, BLUF:  Yes, the disadvantaged need a leg up, but should it be at the expense of other, hard working, students?  How do we have equity across the range of students?  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Woke War on America's No. 1 High School:  Push to 'Segregate by Race and Income'

Here is the sub-headline:

Secretive Virginia Governor's 'Task Force' Threatens Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology

From the blog Asra Investigates, by Asra Q. Nomani, 11 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

Last month, Suparna Dutta spent countless hours researching how her son could safely return to school this fall as a rising sophomore at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, a sprawling campus of classrooms, laboratories and open spaces with names like “Gandhi Commons” and “Einstein Commons,” outside the nation's capital here off Braddock Road.  Little did she know that a secretive “task force” assembled by orders of Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam was quietly meeting to discuss legislating radical changes to the school that would threaten the very future of the school.

Unbeknownst to Dutta — and me, also a TJ mother — Virginia Secretary of Education Atif Qarni, a former teacher, met remotely on Friday, July 24, with a carefully curated list of Democratic lawmakers, state education officials and others in a “Diversity/Equity/Inclusion Group” to make recommendations to the Virginia State Legislature on how to increase the number of Black, Hispanic and low-income students at the state’s 19 Governor’s Schools, specialized public school programs with admissions requirements.  The group met again on Friday, July 31, and last week on Friday, August 7, and is expected to issue its recommendations in the coming days.

Here is how the longish, fact filled post, ends:

For Dutta, the TJ mother, it had been an arduous journey to TJ.  In 1947, her father had crossed the border from Bangladesh to West Bengal in India, fleeing war with just the clothes on his back, then walking miles from his family’s new home in a village to the closest school, enlisting in his teens in the Indian Air Force.  In the summer of 1992, Dutta, then 22, arrived in the U.S. for graduate studies with a supply of rice, lentils and red kidney beans and $250 to her name.

“It’s demoralizing,” Dutta said, “that all the values of hard work and merit that I believed defined America are being turned upside down. It’s depressing.”

Undeterred, Dutta works tirelessly now with other TJ parents — courageous pioneers who fled communism, oppression, poverty and other injustices — to stand up for the values of hard work and merit that brought them to the United States in the first place.

I judge that Governor Newsom has misidentied the problem and is now instituting changes that won't fix the prblem, and may, in fact, make it worse, as did welfare reform in the mid-1960s.

One final though.  Is it time for Virginia to Change its name, as acknowledemen of its racist pass?

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Kamala Harris the Pick

For John, BLUF:  The wait is over and it is historic.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Biden Picks Harris for VEEP per Fox

Regards  —  Cliff

Poland Steps Up

For John, BLUF:  .  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

When Poland saved Europe

From the Blog The Daily Chrenk, by Mr Arthur Chrenkoff, 10 August 2020.

Here is the lede:

A hundred years ago this week, a series of biggest battles that Europe were to witness between the end of the First World War in 1918 and the beginning of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 decided the fate of the continent as much as, if not more than, the Great War itself.  In early August 1920, the newly resurrected, independent Poland saved the Eastern Europe, Germany and possibly the rest of the war-exhausted Europe from the triumphant Russian communism.  As a result of a little known war in the distant corners of the continent, the status quo of the East was preserved for another two decades.  It would take the Second World War for the Soviet Union to expand its empire all the way to the Elbe and (briefly) the Adriatic.  Had Poland not triumphed over the Red Army in 1920, and with Germany defeated and disarmed, no significant military force stood between the Soviets and the English Channel.  History of the 20th century would have taken a different course, and not necessarily a better one.

Little known, but important.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Compassion and Balance

For John, BLUF:  We need to have compassion for our fellow human beings, but that doesn't mean that we wipe out all previous crime in the face of Winnie the Flu.  Some people are carriers of violence and should not be released into the civil population.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Released from jail at height of pandemic, Virginia rape suspect allegedly killed his accuser

Here is the sub-headline:

Ibrahim Bouaichi then shot himself as police closed in Wednesday, leaving him in critical condition

From The Washington Post, by Reporter Tom Jackman, 6 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus two:

The incident in Karla Dominguez’s apartment last October was violent, and it was not consensual, she testified in Alexandria District Court in December.  The man she accused was indicted on charges including rape, strangulation and abduction and jailed without bond in Alexandria.

Then the coronavirus pandemic hit.  Ibrahim E. Bouaichi’s lawyers argued that the virus was a danger to both inmates and their attorneys, and that Bouaichi should be freed awaiting trial.  On April 9, over the objections of an Alexandria prosecutor, Circuit Court Judge Nolan Dawkins released Bouaichi on $25,000 bond, with the condition that he only leave his Maryland home to meet with his lawyers or pretrial services officials.

On July 29, Alexandria police say, Bouaichi, 33, returned to Alexandria and shot and killed Dominguez outside her apartment in the city’s West End.

Not all crimes and crmiinals are the same.  Further, not evereyone has the same cultural understanding  I think we see that playing out in this case.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Don't Know Much About History

For John, BLUF:  In order to be good voters, good citizens, we need to know how we got here.  Otherwise we are like Post Turtles.  For example, 1215 is important to every American, regardless of race, religion or other factor of distinction.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Let’s do another re-write of history, and let’s establish a quota system in the MSM

Or, as Blogger Sarah Hoyt put it:

IN WOKISTAN, AS IN THE OLD SOVIET UNION, YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS.  IT’S THE PAST THAT KEEPS CHANGING

.

And here is the NBC Chicago article on the idea,

Chicago-Area Leaders Call for Illinois to Abolish History Classes

Here is the sub-headline:

State Rep. LaShawn K. Ford said current history teachings overlook the contributions of women and minorities

Here is the lede plus two:

Leaders in education, politics and other areas gathered in suburban Evanston Sunday to ask that the Illinois State Board of Education change the history curriculum at schools statewide, and temporarily halt instruction until an alternative is decided upon.

At a news conference, State Rep. LaShawn K. Ford said current history teachings lead to a racist society and overlook the contributions of women and minorities.

Before the event Sunday, Rep. Ford's office distributed a news release "Rep. Ford Today in Evanston to Call for the Abolishment of History Classes in Illinois Schools," in which Ford asked the ISBOE and school districts to immediately remove history curriculum and books that "unfairly communicate" history "until a suitable alternative is developed."

If we don't know our history we don't know who we are.  Is some of what we know about our history wrong?  I am sure.  However, not wrong enough to stop teaching it altogether.  In fact, given the proliferation of the Howard Zinn textbook, we may actually have more recent students knowing less than their elders.

I applaud the idea of reviewing what we are teaching as history in K through 12.  The idea that we will stop teaching all history, awaiting the outcome, seems like either an extreme political stunt or terrible folly on the part of public education.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

4 November

For John, BLUF:  Given that the use of "Mail in Ballots" promises untold delays in determining the results of the 3 Novembeer Election, one wonders why the President's question about delaying the election is much different in outcome.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Consulting My Magic 8-Ball

From The chicago Boyz, by Sgt. Mom, 3 August 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

So, last week the Daughter Unit asked me when the new civil war would kick into high gear. Note she said ‘when’ not ‘if’ – for we’ve been in a cold civil war for some time now.  I’d say this cold civil war became manifest with upsurge of Tea Party demonstrations in 2009, and has rumbled along all through the Obama administration, building up reservoirs of bitter anger and resentment ever since.  My personal SWAG is that things will get interesting (and even more interesting for certain values of interesting) late in the evening of November 3, 2020, when the polls close and the first election results are reported.

And no, it won’t make a particle of difference who wins; Trump or Biden, or whoever has replaced Biden as the Great Dem Party Hope.  My sidebar prediction is that the higher echelons of the Democrat Party will realize, probably shortly following the party caucus to be held sometime this month, that Joe Biden has finally and definitively lost track of his single remaining marble, and that there is no possible and convincing way that he can be propped up as a viable candidate.  Whoever has the VP nomination will move up to the top of the ticket and one of the remaining hopefuls will be a replacement.  For all we know, the Dem Party higher-ups may even have decided that what the hell, they don’t have serious hope at all for 2020, and are only naming candidates for this year with an eye towards establishing visibility and a track record for 2024.

In any case, on election night, it will not matter a single particle if the winner is Trump or A Dem Candidate To Be Named Later.  The knives will be well and truly out and on both sides.  If Trump wins, the lefty wokerati will be outraged, insane with rage that they have been let down again.  Their fury after Trump won in 2016 will be as a light thunderstorm compared to the Cat-5 hurricane of fury which will strike in cities which have already demonstrated an inclination to tolerate riots and mob action – all egged on [m]by the national establishment press.

I am hoping for no Civil War.  I will not be surprised in the Democratic Establishment replices their Presumptive Candidate Joe Biden sometime before the election.  I do see President Trump having negative factors holding him back, but I see the Democrats suffering from even greater disabilities, the ongoing civil disorder being amongst them.

Hat tip to Ms Sarah Hoyt, via the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff