Openly Crossdressing DoE Official Busted for Stealing Woman's Luggage at Airport

Really in no way surprising.

Judith Curry on Climate Change: "There Is No Emergency"

Though I don't really deserve an opinion, I'm currently inclined to think she's right about everything she says here:

Biden Ed. Dept. Official: DEMOCRACY IS TEH YT SUPREMASOMETHING

So this is the kind of person determining the trajectory of the education of just about every kid in the USA.

Carolina 65 - Iowa State 70

No surprise, really. They haven't looked like the best team in the country yet this year. Certainly not, say, a Texas against Gonzaga. But it's early. They haven't had a team to really shine against, yet, either. Still would have won if they'd have kept it together late in the game. Losing actually may have been a better outcome for them in the long run. But that's an easy thing to say from the outside.

Not to take anything away from Iowa State--to whom big props. Nice win.

IC say.

Consolation 3rd-place game on Sunday vs. Bama.

Carolina 89 - Portland 81

NGL, all these closer-than-they-oughtta-be games have me somewhat concerned.

Miranda Devine: "CO Gay Nightclub Massacre Shows Dems' Hypocrisy"

I almost didn't read this, thinking there'd be nothing new here. But actually, it's pretty damn good.

I don't know what's to be done. I mean these are ordinary kinds of problems about political disagreements and obsessions, groupthink, echo chambers, media-politician feedback loops and whatnot...but the now-radical Democrats are very seriously afflicted. They've really pulled up the ladder and locked themselves into their own fantastical, ridiculous, hermetically sealed worldview. People who oppose their delusions with facts and sound reasoning--e.g. Chris Rufo, James Lindsay, Matt Walsh...all are merely vilified, not refuted. Walsh's main crime seems to have been pushing some leftist "experts" to answer the question "what is a woman?" The villain! Of course the American left is no longer liberal--vilification and shrieking has replaced argument. And Michelle Goldberg...what a train wreck. I mean, she was never great, but it seems to me that she used to at least try. Now she's one of the more wacked-out propagandists at the NYT. Which is, of course, saying something...

Anyway: worth a read.

"18 Months: A Memoir of a Marriage Lost to Gender Identity"

Lots of people know this. 

But this sounds like an interesting book--though the review is probably enough for me.

I treat this stuff all straight, as it were. That is: I usually treat it as if all the participants were sincere. Because what's most important is that gender ideology is incoherent. Crazy. Absurd. 

And you can't demand that others say--let alone believe--false things about you because you want them to.

But most everybody knows that the participants in all this are largely or mostly mentally unstable or insincere or deluded or something else or all of the above. 

Review worth a read.

Colorado Springs Shooter Is Right-Wing No Oops Nonbinary Bullied By Right-Wing No Oops Forget All That Stuff About Not Questioning "Identities"...

No link. Just watch the news about this stuff. First he was automatically--of course--a right-wing "stochastic" terrorist. Then he turned out to be a "nonbinary" "they"... Of course the cops dutifully began referring to him by his "they"s.... Then the PMSM began to do the very much verboten--questioning his declaration of his "identity" and pronoun preference. 

   Of course you can't make x be F by declaration or fiat if Fness is a factual matter. Some legal stuff is like that. But basically: if you can make something so by merely saying so, then you're talking about a fiction. You can make a fictional character something by fiat (though not even then under all cases). But that's not the way real things are. 

War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Censorship is Free Speech

Reynolds on Musk/Twitter.

The Erasure of Women from Online Pregnancy Literature

We're in The Upside Down. Or the Twilight Zone. Or maybe a Lovecraftian universe:

Election Fraud Claims on Both Sides

BREAKING: I made a vid showing election fraud claims from both Dems & Repubs. In no way did I advance or endorse any of the claims. For documenting this history, YouTube just deleted it, blocked me, & gave me a strike—a step toward deleting my entire channel. @TeamYouTube 🧵/1 pic.twitter.com/MLWxlFZKOX

— Matt Orfalea (@0rf) November 18, 2022

Carlson: Gender Ideology is a Cult

Holy Christ. This is unbelievable--especially the bit about deploying the legal system against people with the temerity to speak the truth:

CBS Concludes Hunter Biden's Laptop is Authentic...Two Years Late

After they saved Biden's campaign, the MSM is starting to fess up about the laptop.

Why? 

Some say they're "getting out in front of the story" before they can be outright busted for still being in denial.

Others say that the MSM denied it to get the outcome it wanted in '20 and '22...but now it's time to make sure Biden doesn't get any ideas about running again in '24.

These explanations are compossible.

The Climate Reparations Scam

If you spend enough time reading stuff on the contemporary left, here's something you eventually realize: with great regularity, the bottom line of their screeds is: pay me.

   Its really, really common for individual lefties to include their Patreon or PayPal or whatever...not in the way ordinary people do, as a way to support and show appreciation for their work...but as part of an explicit assertion that whites, men, straights, etc. owe them. There's nothing at all surprising about the demand for climate "reparations." I'm sure there are demands for colonial reparations. Honestly, I've long expected demands for reparations to women. Actual women as I'd now have to make clear. Though reparations for transes can't be far behind. Who am I kidding? Those would be ahead of actual-woman reparations in the current climate. Even aside from the fact that (actual) women always come at the bottom of the Great Totem Pole Of Oppression. (An obviously racist or whatever metaphor...) 

   I generally don't personally tend to focus on debunking criticisms like Lefties don't really believe woke bullshit--they just want power. Or Wokies go woke in order to CYA so they don't get accused of racism* like non-wokies do. Or Woke is a grift. Rather, I think a lot of them are serious. And I'm interested in taking them at their word and showing why their view is crazy. But there's an awful lot of truth in those other criticisms as well.

Brett Weinstein on Evergreen and How the Left Operates

One important point he makes (I'd figured this out at some point, but it kinda got shoved to the back of my mind in all the prevailing chaos): the left redefines terms to lower the threshold for their application...but then treats them as if they retain their old meanings once someone has qualified for application under the new criteria. See: 'racist.' You are now a racist for doing all sorts of innocuous things--or merely because you live in a society with allegedly racist institutions. But then once you've been tagged as racist, you're treated as if you were an actual racist by the ordinary definition--someone who treats people unfairly on the basis of race, or at least holds racially biased beliefs. 

   This is, with some modification, similar to the fate of 'woman' on the left. Their rhetorical approach went like this:

"Some women are male."

"No they aren't.
"Just use the word 'woman' that way to make them feel better. Why won't you just say the words? Why are you so hung up on words?" 

"Ok, I'll call them women."

"They're women! You admitted it! So they can use women's restrooms and locker rooms, and play women's sports. And lesbians and straight men have to be interested in them sexually. Why are you biased against some women???"

   Here's a tip: 

   It's never just about the words.

Bill Barr: Trump Will Burn Down the GOP; Time for New Leadership

IMO a must-read.

I agree with ever word of this piece.

The only place I differ with Barr is personal and historical, not substantive: he was smart enough to support Trump in 2016; I wasn't.

As depressing as the situation is, it's exciting for me in an epistemic way: I came to almost all these conclusions on my own, and I developed admiration and respect for Barr more-or-less independently. So it's exciting to me that someone I really respect seems to be confirming my conclusions. 

Though I've read Barr's memoir, so there was probably some interaction between my views on Trump and my respect for Barr.

   Alright. Enough of that. The point is: I (currently, at least) enthusiastically...and yet regretfully...agree with Barr. Trump was a swing-for-the-fences, desperation candidate. He's really surprisingly good substantively--which most people neither know nor really care about--but a disaster personally. And those personal characterological facts matter. His temperament and demeanor--while sometimes admirable--are generally catastrophic. He's still better than the left--the collective character, temperament and intelligence of that faction are disastrously awful. But I don't want to go down that rabbit-hole here.

   Trump had his chance and did a great service to the country. As I've often said--and as Barr basically says--if he'd been 10% less Trumpy, he'd be President today, and we'd have been spared the catastrophe that is the Biden administration. But he isn't and we weren't. And now we absolutely have to win--and it's well within our power.

   As Barr says: time to move on.  Trump will try to play spoiler, of course. We're still living with the consequences of conservatives' desperate 2016 gambit.

CBS News is Very Stupid

LOL they issue a pious, nonsensical announcement that they were pausing activity on Twitter "out of an abundance of caution," citing "uncertainty" on the platform. Buuut...uncertainty about what? Elon Musk nuking censorship? Trump possibly coming back? 

CBS does realize that Twitter isn't a physical place where violence might happen...rght? 

What exactly is the danger in question?

Idiots.

Orange Man Back!

ORANGE MAN IS BACK on Twitter pic.twitter.com/lwcSsQJDGM

— Woke Archive (@WokeArchive) November 20, 2022

Court Strikes Down Florida's/DeSantis's "Stop Woke" Act; or: I'm an Idiot

link

I'm a damn idiot.

I speed-read that thing--in my defense, I had to read a lot of such pieces of legislation--and I could have sworn it was just aimed at indoctrination--e.g. mandatory "training" that's actually about forcing students or employees to sit there and listen to leftist political opinions said at them. 

I even defended the bill--in public.

So who's the asshole now?

More importantly: gosh I really hate these cutesy titles for bills. I mean, the truly nefarious misrepresentations (e.g.: The Patriot Act, The Inflation Reduction Act, Don't Say 'Gay') are obviously worse (though that latter is, of course, not the official misleading name--it's a misleading name coined by the other side). But I hate the cutesy ones, too. 

FBI Finds No Nuclear Secrets--Nor Anything Else of Particular Import--in Mar-a-Lago Raid

The slime and retreat tactic again.

Loudly proclaim that Trump is horrible and has done something horrible. Quietly retract the accusation later--and only after the lie becomes impossible to sustain.

Least Surprising Story of the Day: Dems Want Citizenship for All 11 Million Illegal Aliens "Or However Many...There Are Here"

link

It's around two or three times that many...but no, regardless.

Build the wall.*

*Actually, expand and upgrade fencing. But at this point I'm too pissed merely to say it that way.

Trump and the "Fact-Checkers"

link

I saw a presentation by three journalism profs recently on "misinformation." It wasn't as biased as I expected it to be, but, of course, the "misinformation"/"disinformation" rhetoric was introduced as a new vector for criticizing conservatives. One of their recommendations to the students in attendance was: see what fact-checkers have to say about things. I argued that the fact-checkers are typically no more objective than the first-order journalism organizations of which they're typically a part. E.g. the WaPo "fact-checker" is really just more WaPo--ergo radically left-biased.

   It needn't be that way. Fact-checking could be a noble endeavor, in which the fact-checkers make a special, diligent, and solemn effort to be more objective. Because: effort matters in this context. Trying makes a difference. Also, people could be chosen who have a demonstrated record of objectivity. 

   But that's not how they do it. The "fact-checking" is just as hysterically anti-Trump as the first-order journalism. The "Russiagate" page at FactCheck.org is all anti-Trump, much of it outright bullshit. And Russiagate was something about which Trump was undeniably right. 

   Anyway. This is part of the Really Big Lie: the massive network of groupthink and propaganda formed by the progressive left, that engulfs even institutions like academia and journalism that are supposed to be dedicated to finding and disseminating the truth. It's horrifying if you look right at it for too long.

Another Brick in the Blue Wall of Fraud?

link

   I don't believe that Democrats are stealing elections. Not, at any rate, by printing fake ballots and hacking voting machines or whatever. 

   However, after the last six years, including especially Russiagate, we know that they'll lie and cheat, subvert Republican Presidents, conspire, create elaborate hoaxes, and are willing to thwart the will of the people. No one thought they'd go so far as they went during Russiagate. It's still difficult to believe they did. And their power is so great that Durham wasn't even able to secure convictions--individual Democrats on the juries simply refused to convict despite incontrovertible evidence. (Though that latter is perhaps a somewhat different problem.) 

   But Democrats are rigging elections--and setting up the system so that outright fraud is easier to conduct.

   They're doing so by not only permitting--but now mandating--sketchy methods of voting like dropboxes,, ID-less in-person voting, and spammed and unverified mail-in ballots. A party that's proven its unhingedness and dishonesty is in the process of engineering an unreliable and easy-to-game voting system. I would have been against this sort of thing even when I was a Democrat. 

   One of their arguments is basically the nefarious disparate impact argument--demanding voter ID prevents more nonwhite voting than it prevents white voting. That argument is almost always bad, but here it's equivalent to: secure elections are white privilege, bigot.

   The Pubs, have, as usual done their bit by flying off the handle in a more-or-less random crazy direction, claiming that it's massive Illuminati satellite hacking or whatever. Trump and the Pubs ignored the unfolding disaster before November 2020 and then made up a bunch of crazy shit afterward. I kinda expect the same thing again in '24. 

   Not that I know what to do about any of it.

   Because I don't.

Men Are Better at Everything: Fat Dude Wins "Miss Greater Derry" Beauty Pageant

LOOOOL

   The point of this madness is that the leftist ideology of pervasive oppression must be the main--and only--consideration in every activity at every moment. Whereas, in Sane World, humans engage in different activities with different goals, in Clown World, there is only one goal: mitigating oppression. Or is it: punishing the oppressor? Well, whatever. So, previously, we used to study astrophysics...with the aim of learning about astrophysics. Now astrophysics must be "antiracist" / "social justice" / "DEI" / whatever. Because otherwise it's racist. Or whatever. So all research and teaching into and of astrophysics must subordinate its traditional ends to the promotion of postpostmodern leftist political and cultural ends. Currently, in our imperfect state of leftness, this means: injecting some popomo leftist brainwashing into every class and every grant proposal. But this is merely because normies refuse to think about this psychopathy critically. In fact, an astrophysics class that is only "antiracist" part of the time is racist the rest of the time. Doing astrophysics at all is verboten. I realize consistency is unwelcome among extremists. But that's the logical endpoint of the road we're on. Injecting a bit of leftist propaganda into everything we do simply isn't enough. If you ever do anything other than working to tear down Sane World and replace it with Clown World, you're a racist, Jack.

   Now, beauty pageants aren't astrophysics--you can write that down--but it's the same principle. To be social justicey...well, you know what has to be done. So counting beauty at all is racist (and misogy-whasis...and homowhatsis...and "trans"whatsis...) Everything turns into the Victim Olympics. Let the fat dude win, or your racist. So every activity becomes the same activity. There is only one goal. Resistance is futile...everything will be assimilated...

Trump Launches '24 Campaign

facepalm

Well, I guess we kinda deserve this.

I shudder to think what the country's going to look like after another six years of Democrat control.

Republicans Will Win the House

[insert sigh of relief here]

Freddy deBoer: The Agony of the Radical Democrat

Uhhh...

I've seen good stuff from deBoer.

This though...

I mean, how much more radical does he think the Democrats can get? 

They're already throwing their weight behind climate apocalypticism and the whole load of postpostmodern hard-left political fantasies: "trans"/gender ideology--including the brainwashing and sexual mutilation of children, hard-left race-crazy--including BLM and CRT--, anti-free-speech-ism, Lysenkoism...that whole radioactive stew of antiliberalism. 

Answer: deBoer is a socialist. He's not behind the Woketarian social agenda. He wants to wreak economic destruction on the USA instead. (Note: he doesn't think of it that way, of course. He's a reasonable guy making honest errors.) 

I wonder: does deBoer not understand that climate apocalypticism is thinly-veiled anti-capitalism? I mean, if I were a socialist, I'd be pushing some version of the Green New Deal. Though...the Biden administration already has. It passed a pro-socialist bill masquerading as a climate bill masquerading as an inflation bill. We should call it the Red New Deal. Bahahaha! I mean, seriously. Because that's what it is. 

He thinks that the Pubs "court" the radical right more than the Dems "court" the radical left...but the Dems are the radical left now. Only a radical could be dissatisfied with the trajectory of the Dems. They're absolutely rocketing leftward, shedding people like me who aren't tribally committed to them. I expect the radical left will never be satisfied. deBoer isn't really representative because he's an economic lefty. But I think he might be representative in this relevant respect: the radical left is, basically, never going to say: that's enough change. I.e.: that's enough destruction. 

Democrat Election Denial

 

I did it. I stupidly complained about the 2004 results in Ohio. 

I still don't understand the Bush v. Gore decision, and still semi-disagree with the GOP's main argument that counting "pregnant" and "hanging" chads was "subjective." But, as I admitted then, Bush won. As soon as we got a full recount (by the media, actually), it became clear that Bush won by a couple of hundred votes. So I got that goin' for me.

More denialism, suggestions of violence:

How the Two Parties Accuse Each Other of Being Wrong

Republicans: "You Democrats are wrong and full of shit."

Democrats: [Academic left + activist class + tech billionaires meet in Gstaad to produce a strategy, send it to U.S. agencies through "the usual channels," administration + universities + social media platforms roll out new "Misinformation/Disinformation" strategy; sent back through universities for idea laundering; Democrat administration creates new "Strategic Office of Misinformation/Disinformation Strategy," issues 100-page report...]: "The Sciencetm shows Republicans are wrong and full of shit the primary source of mis- and dis-information in the contemporary world."

Drum: If You Hate the Culture Wars, Blame Liberals [sic]

I say: progressives.

But this flirts with no-true-Scotsmanning...

Charts:

Noah Carl: Cancel Culture at U.S. Universities

Elite, blue state universities are the worst.

This Weekend's Stupidest Argument of All Time: "Is It Time We Ditched The Word 'Gardening'?"

This really is one of the dumbest posts I've seen in...well...I mean...now, in the age of Wokeness, I see so much stark, raving stupidity that...I guess really it's only been about a week... But that's actually saying a lot In These Trying And Unprecedented Times...

   Anyway. This would make a kind of a good little CT exercise, actually. 

   Aside from the fact that it's too stupid to pay attention to...

   Also: Betteridge's Law of Headlines confirmed once again: any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word 'no.'...

Men Sweep Prize Money in NYC's "Non-Binary" Category

What are the odds of that?

Banning Legos as a Means to Leftist Re-Education

These people are insane:

   An ordinary person might recognize this as child’s play. But the social theorists at Hilltop saw something else: “The children were building their assumptions about ownership and the social power it conveys — assumptions that mirrored those of a class-based, capitalist society — a society that we teachers believe to be unjust and oppressive.”Pelo and Pelojoaquin continue: “As we watched the children build, we became increasingly concerned.”
   So they banned the Legos and began their program of re-education. “Our intention was to promote a contrasting set of values: collectivity, collaboration, resource-sharing, and full democratic participation,” they write.
   Instead of practicing phonics or memorizing multiplication tables, the children played a special game: “In the game, the children could experience what they’d not been able to acknowledge in Legotown: When people are shut out of participation in the power structure, they are disenfranchised — and angry, discouraged, and hurt. … The rules of the game — which mirrored the rules of our capitalist meritocracy — were a setup for winning and losing. … Our analysis of the game, as teachers, guided our planning for the rest of the investigation into the issues of power, privilege, and authority that spanned the rest of the year.”
   After “months of social justice exploration,” the teachers finally agreed it was time to return the Legos to the classroom. That’s because the children at last had bought into the concept that “collectivity is a good thing.” And in Hilltop’s new Lego regime, there would be three immutable laws:
   ‐ All structures are public structures. Everyone can use all the Lego structures. But only the builder or people who have her or his permission are allowed to change a structure.
   ‐ Lego people can be saved only by a “team” of kids, not by individuals.
   ‐ All structures will be standard sizes.
   You can almost feel the liberating spirit of that last rule. All structures will be standard sizes? At Hilltop Children’s Center, all imaginations will be a standard size as well: small.

GWU Student Newspaper Abases Itself for Asking a Politically Incorrect Question About (Trans)Gender Ideology in Debate Between Dems and Pubs

Pathetic.

Mary Harrington: "A Sex War is Coming"

link

Women tend to be farther left than men, hence to vote Democrat far more often.

One hypothesis about academia's death spiral is that it has been caused or at least influenced by the increased number of women. Clearly women are, on average, more supportive of the cult of Woketarianism.

Why No Red Wave?

Dunno.

Immediately after Dobbs, I said I was worried that roughly this might happen--worried that the abortion issue would fire up the Dem base. Is that what explains this failure?

Dunno.

Of course there's also the spreading Republican obsession about alleged voter fraud. Dems are cheating--but by doing things like illicitly rewriting election laws, ballot-harvesting, keeping polls open for weeks, refusing to require identification, allowing indiscriminate mail-in voting, Zuck bucks... Despicable--but not fraud per se, as I understand it. And not exactly stealing. But instead of focusing on these real problems, the Trumpistic right just shrieks about stolen elections. 

The right now seems to be losing it, too. Not to the extent that the left has lost it--but that's setting the bar too low.

I'm pretty damn concerned about the direction of things.

The Crazy Party Keeps the Senate

Very, very bad news.

Elizabeth Warren is a Loon

What a loon.

6/8/20: Never Forget

 

Keith Ellison Wins MN AG Race

An absolutely terrible decision/outcome. 

Hope you guys up there like crime!

Pence: "My Last Days With Trump"

This is simultaneously damning of Trump and revelatory of the guy's humanity, IMO.

Republican Party Staves Off Red Wave

Oh, Bee.

So right, yet again.

Andrew McCarthy Right On Target Yet Again: "The Silver Lining Of A Dismal Performance" in the Midterms

Whether he's right about Liz Cheney and the Capitol riot hearings...well, I refrain from judging about that. I suspect he's right, but I'm too disgusted by that whole thing--on both sides--to make anything like a reasoned judgment about it. But, like others, McCarthy thinks the silver lining is the undermining of Trump's influence. And that, I think, is right. But the impressive bit is McCarthy quoting himself from a year and a half ago. This is the bit that's just exactly right IMO:

If Republicans are going to have any chance of stopping the ruinous Democratic reign by winning in 2022 and 2024, they must stop relitigating the lost presidential election of 2020. Trump will never let that go, but Republicans have to. Keep in mind: across the nation [in 2020], down-ballot conservative Republicans significantly outperformed Trump — whereas in Georgia, Trump single-handedly cost Republicans the Senate seats they needed to stop Biden’s demolition of the economy and conveyor-belt appointment of woke-progressive judges and bureaucrats.
Donald Trump cannot win the presidency again. He is popular in a number of places, but poison in most others. The former president will never again have what he’d need to win a national election: the reluctant support of doubters who, for the sake of stopping Democrats, were willing to take a chance on his flawed character. Had it not been for Trump’s bizarre post-election performance, culminating in the disgraceful Capitol riot, congressional Republicans would be in a position to stop Democrats right now. . . .
The reasons for Trump’s political rise and the many positive aspects of his presidency hold important lessons for Republicans. But those positive aspects mainly involved enabling conservative advisers and subordinates to implement policy — often against his instincts, which are not conservative. The future of the party has to be conservative. If the future is Trump, it will no longer be the conservative party, and it will be in the wilderness for a very long time.

Yes, I'm sick of the TDS crowd. Trump has never been nearly as bad as they think he is. But he was, IMO, never personally fit for the office. Supporting him was always a desperate gamble, forced on us by the catastrophic rise of Woke insanity, and its takeover of the Democrats--and its spread to all our institutions. The gamble almost worked. In fact, it did work in many ways. But, to quote Sowell, there are no solutions, only tradeoffs. The blue reavers succeeded in thwarting the democratic decision of the voters, largely neutralizing Trump's presidency, largely with the Russiagate farce. Which many on the left refuse to give up, despite the results of the Mueller investigation. Not only did they manage to largely neutralize Trump's election, they succeeded in driving him over the edge. Like many others, I'm sickened by the madness on the left. But Trump, always marginal, always a gamble, always a tradeoff, blew everything up after losing the 2020 election. He's now become near-pure liability. Now he's basically pure win for the blue team. I think our most likely future involves him trying to torpedo DeSantis or whoever gets the '24 nomination. He's already lost the red team the Senate once, and may have done so again. Like Bill Barr, it's hard for me to imagine not voting for the GOP candidate in '24, no matter who it is. But I pray to the powers that be that it isn't Trump. He had his shot. It's sickening what the left did to him and to the country. But what's done is done, and that's the hand we've been dealt.  

   And, yes, election denialism has been common among Democrats for decades. And they've fomented and supported terroristic riots that are at least as bad as the Capitol riot--which was almost universally denounced by Republicans. But, as is often the case, Trump took it to the next level. He didn't directly incite violence on January 6th, but that's not the right standard for a President. He laid the groundwork for it, and that's so far over the line that...well, I don't even know how to finish that sentence.

   Anyway.

Biden: Musk's Relationships With Other Countries Worth Looking Into

Can the Dems get more loathsome?

JFC.

How about looking into Biden's relationship to China? We know there's smoke there.

The Dumbest Post of All Time?: Julie Shaw "Ph.D.": Men Are More Violent Because Society

"Why Are We Not Outraged That Prisons Are Filled With Men?"

You've gotta have a Ph.D. in psychology to be this stupid.

   However, I've long said that, by the left's own lights, they ought to see the fact that men are more often shot by cops, arrested, convicted and imprisoned as proof of anti-male sexist oppression. They think that any racial disparity has to be the result of racism. So the same should go for--etc.

But, of course, they are not bound my mere Western logic! A foolish consistency--or any consistency--is the hobgoblin of THE RAZIZT MIND, RAZIZT!!!!111 It's always easy to make up some ad hoc exception if you're shameless enough--immune to the ravages of cognitive dissonance... They're all-purpose consistency dodge is that WHITE MALES ARE THE DEVIL AND CANNOT BE DISCRIMINATED AGAINST. BIGOT.

   But, anyway: the stuff about testosterone in that post is largely red herring. Fine. I neither know nor care about whether testosterone is what it's thought to be. But whatever it is that causes men to be, on average, more assertive and aggressive...well it's real, and it's biological. 

   And as for men being "taught to be violent"--no. Most of us are taught just the opposite. My brother and I were in no way exceptional--we were taught never to use violence unless attacked, or in the defense of the innocent. 

   I mean, seriously. The author of that post is just not very smart...and does not seem to have ever met any humans, nor to have any acquaintance with their ways.

No Red Wave: Bad Night For the Pubs

This is obviously not good.

DeSantis Flips Miami-Dade

That's big.

"My Fellow Progressives: We Need to Stop the Gaslighting on Crime"

Holy crap--when you've lost Ana Kasparian...

Blue Team Freakout: MSDNC Edition

Alright, this is the only one of these I'm going to read today. 

Of course it's always hysteria with these people. Everything's apocalyptic. It's all drama, all the time.

And of course their new line is, basically: voting is anathema to democracy...

The red team is, by far, the lesser evil these days--so I'll be voting accordingly.

New problems will arise. But that's always the way it is.

Reason: The Lab-Leak Deception

link   They're still lying about the origin of the Wuhan virus, still hiding the improper links between e.g. Fauci and government funding of research, and still producing frankenviruses with--it seems--no clear benefit.

   There has to be some confusion because none of this makes any goddamned sense.

Politico: The Schism in the Millenmial Left

Pretty interesting inside-baseball stuff about a struggle in the Democrat party. Turns out your blue options are basically:

(a) Woketarians

(b) Socialists.

Final paragraph:

Progressives, in other words, have won battle after battle for the soul of the Democratic Party. But instead of consolidating their gains and taking the fight to the Republicans, they keep waging war, McElwee says, with their own side. “The left doesn’t know how to win with dignity and grace. Do you know how many cryptocommunists are now working for the Biden administration? How many former Bernie Sanders staffers who are pretty f---ing deep in the White House’s policy nexus? The revolutionary socialist phase has kind of faded for the left,” said McElwee. “But the flip side of that is that a lot of those people have infiltrated to the highest levels of Democratic politics.”

Guize Violent Crimez Not Up Juzt Teh Murderz!!1

Oh, Bulwark.

As others have noted, murder rates are the most reliable crime statistics.

Climate Hysteria and Anti-Capitalism

Anti-capitalism is at the core of the illiberal left.

Paul Pelosi Attack

Lots of people on the right are insisting that the story doesn't make sense. Admittedly, it's odd. But I don't hear anything in it that isn't fairly plausible, given that the assailant was/is crazy. Sounds to me like Pelosi largely had the situation under control by the time the cops finally got there, and it was their presence that finally set the assailant off. 

Turley: Democrats, Not Democracy Are In Danger This Election

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This is consistent with their current general view that you either unquestioningly accept every plank in their warped, surreal, Twilight-Zone platform or you are literally Hitler.

   The surprising thing is not that they're about to get their collective ass handed to them--it's that so many people are still going to vote for them. I mean, even ignoring everything else, if you don't draw the line at brainwashing and sexually mutilating children, where, exactly, is left to draw it?

The Contemporary American Left in Yet Another Nutshell: Twitterdammurung Edition

I tediously point out:

(a) It's always hysteria with these people.

(b) The blue team has actually done much, much worse for a long time without a peep from you (Russiagate and Laptopgate just to name two).

(c) Yeah, the guy who made the electric-car and spaceship company is "out of his depth" at Twitter. (Also he did all that PayPal and whatnot stuff--which probably didn't prepare him to run the world's premier snark and liberal tears site...):

Here's what's going on at Twitter right now: It's a nightmare.

Employees are sounding the alarm about how it could make getting reliable information on this site during Tuesday's elections impossible.pic.twitter.com/OChS8ZYK8k

— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) November 4, 2022

The Pacific's Missing F-15s

Interesting.

Totalitarian Shill Says: If Republicans Win Elections It's The End Of Democracy

So the faction that's been trying to brainwash America with antiliberal cultural Marxist pseudoscience now wants us to believe that Republicans winning elections spells the end of democracy...

You really just can't make this shit up.

Heather Mac Donald: Preening Over Preferences

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Pelosi Story Update: Seems Like Initial Reports Were Right--Ergo the Blues Are Righter

Sounds like the crazy dude really was hunting for Nancy Pelosi, and really did intend to harm her. He also sounds like a crazy righty--despite the fact that he's apparently, historically, been a crazy leftie. So the common thread is: crazy.

   All the echoes of January 6th nonsense still sounds like nonsense--but I suppose we don't know yet. Perhaps he was directly motivated by stuff relevant to the Capitol riot. But all the strained attempts to draw some line from one to the other through "Where's Nancy?" are still stupid. 

   I used to say this stuff during the Obama years: the right says enough crazy shit with the aim of stirring people up that they can't act that surprised when people get stirred up. And the crazies--generally lone wolves--will likely get stirred up first. So you say: "Obama is intentionally trying to destroy the country" or "Obama is the Antichrist"...well...both of those things provide a helluva lot of support for Somebody should do something about that Obama guy. So if someone draws the obvious inference, how are you surprised? I have the same kind of objection to Trump's pre-riot bullshit. Sure, he said he wanted a peaceful protest. But so much other stuff he said made violence a plausible response that I'm not sure how much it counts to say "hey let's have a peaceful protest" at the last minute.

   Sure, the left does this stuff too. They've officially adopted a whole slew of crazy views that justify a whole slew of crazy actions...and then they defend and endorse the actions, too. See e.g.: the mostly peaceful social justice riots for peace and justice. They foment hatred of whites, hatred of men, hatred non-progressives, hatred of cops, hatred of the USA. They outright defend and support Antifa. And that's just the tip of the iceberg...

   But that's not the topic here and now.

   Now...has the right really gone beyond the pale re: their rhetoric about Pelosi? I'm sure they have, though no example comes to mind. Have they gone beyond the pale to a greater-than-normal degree by the standards of American politics? Well, I don't know. They haven't been as vicious toward her as the left has been toward Trump... Though she is a woman... That matters, but maybe shouldn't. And maybe doesn't matter here. But anyway: we can't use Trump as the bar--the way he was treated was just nuts.

   Eh, that's all I got again.

   I don't know.

   

The Paul Pelosi Attack Seen From The Right And The Left

The left, as usual, has its talking points out, front and center: the Pelosi attack is a reminder and a consequence of the January 6th Capitol riot. And/or both had the same source: conservatism, MAGA, white supremacy, blah blah blah. Partially they really believe this. Partially it's a last desperate attempt to stave off the allegedly coming red wave. They always seem to be in a doxastic superposition of states: they sort of believe, sort of want to believe, sort of aim to achieve political ends.
    The right, as usual, doesn't buy even the minimal official account of the story, and is busy producing theories: the attacker was Pelosi's gay lover...drug deal gone bad...whatever. ('Conspiracy' in 'conspiracy theory' now basically just means 'wacky,' so...) Not that suspicion is crazy, I assert, after Russiagate and Laptopgate. It fits the m.o. of the left... We can't trust what the MSM tells us about such things. They're thoroughly blue, and will do whatever they think they can at least temporarily get away with if it will help the Dems. And temporarily getting away with something is basically permanently getting away with it when you're the media. Even if busted later, you just squelch the story.

   I wouldn't bet, but if I had to I guess I'd bet that the minimal story is basically right, and this dude broke into the house--he's apparently crazy, after all. A lot in the story doesn't add up, but, as Actual Justice Warrior points out, some of the puzzling bits can easily be explained away as fog-of-battle stuff. "He says his name is David and he's a friend" Could mean:

1. He's a friend; his name is David

or

2. He says/said both of the following:

a. His name is David

b. He is a friend.

The former is fishy. The latter isn't.

 

Anyway. That's all I got.

[Oh and: the red team point about broken glass being outside the house: I think that's just the way at least some glass breaks. I don't think it means that it was broken from inside.]