The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

The School of Hard Knocks

Posted on | May 14, 2018 | 1 Comment

Steven Hayward at Powerline catches David Brooks making a point about the educational value of Donald Trump’s background in business:

There is growing reason to believe that Donald Trump understands the thug mind a whole lot better than the people who attended our prestigious Foreign Service academies. . . .
Maybe Trump intuited something about the sorts of people who run the North Korean regime that others missed.

Hard times make hard men. The main problem with most alumni of elite universities is that they have never faced real adversity, or had to deal with people who are ready to use violence to get their way.

What people don’t like about Trump — his boasting, his vulgarity, his domineering personality — are traits developed in an environment where he was dealing with tough men on a daily basis, with his success dependent on his ability to get what he wanted from such men.

Also, as much as I despise David Brooks, he is correct to qualify his praise by noting that it is “impossible to know how things will pan out” in the Korean negotiations, or in any other area of foreign policy where Trump’s tough-guy posture is currently succeeding. We live in a dangerous world, and things could go sideways quickly. On the other hand, what’s the point of being the world’s greatest superpower, if we are not willing occasionally to employ our strength to our advantage? There is no such thing as a 100% guaranteed “safe” policy, but why not at least pursue a policy intended to advance our own national interests?

Here is another problem with the mindset of elite university alumni: They have generally been indoctrinated by leftist professors who do not believe that the United States has legitimate national interests. When I visited Harvard last fall with Da Tech Guy, the moment we stepped out of the MBTA subway station, we encountered a pro-DACA protest on campus. Imagine that! You’re attending a prestigious $65,000-a-year private university and you’re protesting in favor of criminals — people in the country illegally — to defend their “right” to a Harvard education?

The mentality that Shelby Steele described in his book White Guilt, where privileged people don’t think of their privileges as useful or legitimate, exercises its disastrous influence on U.S. policy, where the elite make misguided notions of “social justice” the basis of their preferences. Even if we stipulate their good faith, these people are mistaken in their beliefs, because what the elite think of as a policy of fairness and benevolence, our enemies perceive as symptomatic of decadent weakness. And I don’t think our enemies are necessarily wrong about this.

 

Category: Donald Trump

Israel Braces for Violence

Posted on | May 14, 2018 | Comments Off on Israel Braces for Violence

Religion of Peace™ Update:

After a week of peaking tensions in the Golan Heights, Israel’s defense establishment is bracing for a week of violent confrontations along the border fence with the Gaza Strip and in the West Bank.
With the opening of the US Embassy in Jerusalem on Monday followed by Nakba Day and the beginning of Ramadan on Tuesday, the IDF is gearing up for several days of violence in its most explosive arenas.
Thousands of soldiers from 11 battalions, including from the Nahal and Givati brigades, as well as special forces and intelligence-gathering units, the Armored Corps, snipers and drones will reinforce the troops already deployed.
As part of preparations, the training of regular combat troops has also been paused in order to focus efforts to dealing with the possible disturbances.
Gazans have been protesting along the border with Israel for the past six weeks as part of what organizers have called the Great March of Return, with demonstrators throwing stones, Molotov cocktails and rocks, as well as launching incendiary kites, toward Israeli troops.
But this week’s mass protests are expected to be much more aggressive.
Israel is accusing Hamas of using the protests as cover to carry out terror attacks and says it has identified intentions by protesters to destroy engineering equipment belonging to the army, damage security infrastructure on the fence and attempt to kidnap soldiers.
The IDF is expecting tens of thousands of protesters at some 20 sites along the Gaza border fence. The Southern Command is preparing for masses of protesters, including armed activists and children, to attempt to breach the fence.

Anthony Kliegman at the Washington Free Beacon:

“One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” is one of the worst clichés in the English language. Unfortunately the phrase’s logic is applied all too often to the ongoing violence at the Israel-Gaza Strip border. Just look at Peter Beinart’s recent column on the riots there. “Why are thousands of Palestinians risking their lives by running toward the Israeli snipers who guard the fence that encloses Gaza?” asks Beinart. “Because Gaza is becoming uninhabitable.” And why is the Strip becoming uninhabitable? Because Israel is “denying Gaza’s people the water, electricity, education, and food they need to live decent lives.”
According to Beinart, the ongoing attempts to damage and breach the border security fence to attack Israel, the rocks and firebombs hurled and shots fired at Israeli soldiers, the firebomb-bearing kites that torment Israeli farmers trying to grow crops, the widespread presence of swastikas at the demonstrations, the anti-Semitic threats against Jews, the horrible ecological effects caused by burning tires to blind Israeli border guards — all actions carried out by Gazans — are reactions of victims motivated by resistance against their oppressors. The fact that most of the rioters who Israelis have killed were terrorist operatives, or individuals affiliated with terrorist organizations, is irrelevant, because it gets in the way of this narrative.

The Israelis are civilized human beings. Their enemies, not so much.

(Hat-tip: Sarah Hoyt at Instapundit.)

 

Category: Israel

Rule 5 Sunday: Camille Paglia Approved!

Posted on | May 14, 2018 | 3 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Some weeks, I have to really struggle to come up with an appropriate appetizer for Rule 5 Sunday. Other weeks, ideas just fall into my lap – and so it was this week. I was reading an interview with Camille Paglia in the Free Beacon, and inevitably, they asked her about Kate Upton. This was dumb; anyone who has read Paglia knows she isn’t into blondes, and she didn’t disappoint, calling Mrs. Verlander banal and gawky. Ms. Paglia had kind words for Iman Chanel Robinson, a black Korean-American model for Victoria’s Secret, and who are we to argue with the legendary iconoclastic art professor and critic?

Talk about some Asian fusion…

Ninety Miles From Tyranny leads off with Hot Pick Of The Late Night, The 90 Miles Mystery Box Episode #251, Morning Mistress, and Girls With Guns. Animal Magnetism chips in with Rule Five Fourth Annual Commencement Speech Friday and the Saturday Gingermageddon.

EBL’s contributions this week include Biceps, Letting It All Hang Loose, All She Has To Do Is Ask For Help, Pele The Volcano Goddess, Elizabeth Hurley, Scarlett Johansson, Oh, Jayhawks Cheerleaders, Fitness, and Katja Herbers.

A View From The Beach has From Scary High School, Ashley Tisdale, One Way to Make Your Student Talk Stand Out, The Hot Take on Crabs, That Seems About $114.999 Million Too High, But You Can’t Eat Solars, #HimToo! New York State Attorney General Resigns Amid Abuse Accusations, Monday Morning in Russiagate, Wet T-Shirt Tuesday, Rinky-Dink Russiagate, Some Redskin Cheerleaders Accuse Team of Pimping Them Out and How Siberians Stay Cute.

Proof Positive’s Friday Night Babe is Sibel Kekilli, his Vintage Babe is Linda Harrison, and Sex in Advertising is covered by Elke Sommer. At Dustbury, it’s Nicole Beharie and Lola Falana.


Thanks to everyone for all the luscious linkagery!


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Category: Rule 5

‘The Notion of the Mythical Norm’

Posted on | May 13, 2018 | 2 Comments

Catt is a 19-year-old lesbian with a Tumblr blog. She has anxiety, depression and “also maybe some psychotic symptoms.” She seems to be enrolled in an introductory Women’s Studies course, because she posted an excerpt from a popular textbook, Women’s Voices, Feminist Visions:

Often we tend to think of women in comparison to a mythical norm: White, middle-class, heterosexual, abled, thin, and a young adult, which is normalized or taken for granted such that we often forget that Whites are racialized and men are gendered. Asking the question “Different from what?” reveals how difference gets constructed against what people think of as “normal.” “Normality” tends to reflect the identities of those in power.
It is important to recognize that the meanings associated with differences are socially constructed. These social constructions would not be problematic were they not created against the notion of the mythical norm. Being a lesbian would not be a “difference” that invoked cultural resistance if it were not for compulsory heterosexuality, the notion that everyone should be heterosexual and have relationships with the opposite sex.

It’s rather disconcerting to be told that my wife and daughters are “mythical” and that the existence of white middle-class women is inherently “problematic” because of “social construction.” (Yes, I know this is a misreading of the text, but try to imagine a mentally ill 19-year-old college girl trying to make sense of that stuff, OK?) This particular textbook is edited by two professors at Oregon State University and costs $99 on Amazon, where it is currently ranked #6 among bestselling Gender Studies textbooks. It is commonly assigned as a required text in introductory level university classes, e.g., “Introduction to Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies,” at the University of Pittsburgh, and “Introduction to Women’s Studies” at the University of Maryland.

 

The excerpt of Women’s Voices, Feminist Vision quoted above is from Chapter 2, “Systems of Privilege and Inequality in Women’s Lives” (p, 59) which begins by telling students that one of the universal conditions that all women share is “being victims of male violence.” Furthermore, Professors Shaw and Lee assure students, women are victimized by “cultural expectations” imposed by “power in society” and, after learning “how privilege and discrimination operate,” students will encounter “suggestions for change in both personal and social lives.”

What young women are being taught on university campuses, basically, is that it is wrong to be white, middle-class, heterosexual, etc., because to be such a person is to be guilty of unjust “privilege.” The very idea of being normal is “mythical,” “socially constructed” and “problematic.”

Do parents know what their children are being taught? Are taxpayers aware that universities are teaching young people an ideology that condemns civilization, per se, as “Systems of Privilege and Inequality”?

It should be obvious, after all, that there can be no civilization without laws, customs and social norms reflecting a hierarchy of values. Historically, attempts to remake society according to egalitarian ideology have had catastrophic results — the Reign of Terror in France, Stalinism in the Soviet Union, the Cultural Revolution in China, the “Killing Fields” in Cambodia — on and on, down to the present-day mess in Venezuela.

By attacking “mythical” norms as tools of an oppressive system of “privilege,” the authors of Women’s Voices, Feminist Vision are indoctrinating students with a destructive radical ideology.

Does anyone believe that the mental health of a 19-year-old will be improved by such indoctrination? Do you think these lessons will do anything to help students succeed in the 21st-century workplace? Or do you suppose that the main goal of university Women’s Studies programs is to train women as political activists for the Democrat Party?

 

Category: Education, Sex Trouble

The Anti-American Party

Posted on | May 13, 2018 | 1 Comment

Do Democrats even understand how bad this looks?

Two former Obama administration officials suggested that America’s European allies should punish President Donald Trump for withdrawing from the Iran deal and levying additional sanctions on the Islamic republic.
The European Union and individual European countries are obligated to take aggressive steps to preserve the Iran deal, in order to avoid becoming Trump’s “doormat,” Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevenson argued in an op-ed that ran in The New York Times Thursday. Both Simon and Stevenson were directors on former President Barack Obama’s National Security Council (NSC).
“The European Union could, for instance, announce the withdrawal of member-states’ ambassadors from the United States. Isn’t this what states do when diplomatic partners breach solemn agreements, expose them to security risks and threaten to wreak havoc on their economies? That is, after all, what the administration is threatening to do by courting the risk of a Middle Eastern war and applying secondary sanctions to European companies,” they argued. “Depending on the American response, European capitals might even follow up with expulsion of American ambassadors.”

In order to defend a bad deal negotiated by President Obama, they are advocating hostile diplomatic actions against their own country?

(Hat-tip: Instapundit.)

Scarcely six months ago, on Oct. 30 2017, Democrats led by 10.7 points (46.0 to 35.3) on the Real Clear Politics average of the so-called “generic” congressional ballot question. Last week, a Reuters poll showed the Democrat lead had shrunk to a single point (39 to 38), while the CNN poll showed Democrats up by 3 points (47-44). Democrats’ hope of a “blue wave” in the November midterms have faded, and why? Well, first and foremost, because President Trump’s policies are working — the economy’s booming and foreign-policy successes are everywhere, from North Korea (hostages released) to Iraq, where five top ISIS leaders were captured last week. Democrats and their media allies are unwilling to acknowledge this success, but the American people can see it with their eyes. Americans can also see how Democrats are doing everything in their power to block Trump’s agenda and undermine his administration.

You don’t have to like Trump in order to see that he is trying to keep his promise to “Make America Great Again,” and is succeeding beyond what any of the “experts” predicted. This is a good thing, and Democrats aren’t doing themselves any favors by trying to prevent Trump’s success.

 

Category: Democrats, Donald Trump

Deranged Stalker: ‘When You’re Finding Love, Not Everything Is Perfect’

Posted on | May 13, 2018 | Comments Off on Deranged Stalker: ‘When You’re Finding Love, Not Everything Is Perfect’

 

Just yesterday, I warned (again) that online dating is a bad idea. How bad is it? On “an online dating service for millionaire matchmaking,” according to KPHO-TV in Phoenix, a guy met this nightmare:

A woman accused of sending a Paradise Valley, Arizona man 65,000 text messages tried to explain her actions in a jailhouse news conference, reports CBS Phoenix affiliate KPHO-TV. “I love him,” she said Thursday.
Thirty-one-year-old Jacqueline Claire Ades, of Phoenix, told reporters she met the victim through an online dating service and went out on three dates with him. Police say after the first one, she began sending him thousands of texts, breaking into his home, and showing up at his workplace claiming to be his wife.
“I felt like I met my soulmate and I thought we would just do what everybody else did and we would get married and everything would be fine,” Ades said. . . .
“When you’re finding love, not everything is perfect. This was a journey, and I want to apologize because nobody could never be more sorry.”
Ades said she never intended to hurt or scare the victim and she doesn’t blame him for her incarceration.
“No! I love him!” she exclaimed. . . .
Police say some of the messages Ades sent the victim were threatening.
Among them:
“Don’t ever try to leave me… I’ll kill you… I don’t wanna be a murderer!”
“I hope you die… you rotten filthy Jew.”
“I’m like the new Hitler… man was a genius.” . . .
During the interview, Ades would answer a question or two, then deflect the next one.
She veered from topic to topic, rambling about Einstein, the Dead Sea, the birth chart of Jesus and the symbolism of the markings on a dollar bill.
At one point, she told a reporter, “I don’t want to talk about that. You have negative energy.”
Ades was asked directly, “Are you crazy?”
“No,” she replied. “I am the person that [sic] discovered love.”

While I am not qualified to offer a psychiatric diagnosis, we might colloquially say that she is deranged, demented, wacky, berserk, off her rocker, a few fries short of a Happy Meal and cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs.

How many psychotics are on online dating sites? All of them, maybe, and every time you “swipe right,” you’re rolling the dice. You never know what kind of lunatic could show up for that date. If she starts jabbering about Einstein, astrology and occult symbolism? Run for your life.

Remember: Crazy People Are Dangerous.

 

Category: Arizona

FMJRA 2.0: High Energy Protons

Posted on | May 12, 2018 | 2 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Rule 5 Sunday: Crash Test Girl
Animal Magnetism
Ninety Miles From Tyranny
A View From The Beach
Proof Positive
EBL

Transgender Supremacy: Understanding the Ideology of a Totalitarian Menace
The Political Hat
Proof Positive
Rotten Chestnuts
EBL

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Predator
EBL

FMJRA 2.0: Mexican Radio
The Pirate’s Cove
A View From The Beach
EBL

Notorious Transgender Activist Compares Feminist Critics to Drug Addicts
EBL

In The Mailbox: 05.07.18
Proof Positive
A View From The Beach
EBL

‘Too Valuable’
EBL

Obama’s Legacy Is Still Kicking
EBL

In The Mailbox: 05.08.18
Proof Positive
EBL

Errors of Logic and Rhetoric
EBL

In The Mailbox: 05.09.18
Proof Positive
EBL

How to Argue With a Feminist
EBL

‘Give Me Equality — and Pay My Bills!’
The Pirate’s Cove
Ordinary Citizen
EBL

The Rocky Horror Family Show
Pushing Rubber Downhill
EBL

In The Mailbox: 05.10.18
Proof Positive
A View From The Beach
EBL

The Profound Sadness of Christine Emba
EBL

‘The Immature, Demagogic Phase’
Pushing Rubber Downhill
EBL

Late Night With In The Mailbox: 05.11.18
EBL
Proof Positive

Top linkers this week:

  1. EBL (17)
  2. Proof Positive (7)
  3. A View From The Beach (4)

Thanks to everyone for their linkagery!


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Category: FMJRA Award

Get Stuffed, Senior Chief @MalcolmNance

Posted on | May 12, 2018 | Comments Off on Get Stuffed, Senior Chief @MalcolmNance

by Smitty

I spent some time on Twitter today doing something wildly unusual for me: defending Senator John McCain over the (as yet unproven) allegation that McCain caused the USS Forrestal disaster. I’m no fan of the old war horse, and wish he’d retired a couple decades back.

Yet, Senior Chief, your sanctimonious denunciation of veterans who support Trump was a completely unimpressive strawmanning operation. No one is accusing Trump of being any more of a war hero than Obama, nor are any veterans admiring of Trump’s personal non-prowess, despite your implications. I hope that you were paid handsomely for your activities. Meanwhile, the bad guys are getting wrecked in ways that Trump’s no-talent rodeo clown predecessor could, apparently, not envision. That, for veterans (not on the take from #FakeNews outlets), is enough.

Don’t make me send Allen West over there to help you get your mind right.

Category: Uncategorized
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