Scattershots – 19apr18 (updated 24apr18)

George Rebane

Democracy and Morals.  In the 17apr18 WSJ there was an exemplary letter on this topic, and it is posted below.

It is hard to disagree with William Galston’s contention in “The Perpetual Battle for Freedom” (Politics & Ideas, April 4) that in liberal democracies the preservation of freedom for all rests on a bedrock of fair opportunity for all.

One guesses that most people agree with Mr. Galston’s all-for-one and one-for-all sentiments, but we might not find as much common ground when it comes to what is necessary and right to heal our country. As we jettisoned Judeo-Christian values and “bourgeois norms,” our culture embraced behaviors that are impediments to achieving the American dream—at least without a massive helping hand from government. It now is deemed offensive to say that a path out of a cycle of poverty is to have children after getting married, finish high school (and, preferably, college) and find a job. Telling someone that religious faith is linked to happiness and personal generosity also is frowned on. Too many in the afflicted groups cited by Mr. Galston don’t want help from individuals doling out charity out of the goodness of their big hearts. They want help that they feel entitled to from a system that they think has let them down.

It is far easier to address partisan rancor than it is to settle on core values and collective responsibilities in our new secular-progressive culture. I suspect that restoring traditional values isn’t what most progressives have in mind when they define what they know in their hearts is necessary and right to heal our country. Collective responsibility for individuals and individual freedoms for the collective may be an unworkable formula for a secular-progressive society.

Jay Carter, Silver Spring, Md.

Mr Carter draws our attention to a society that just a short time ago would have been deemed unbelievable.  Political correctness expands and mutates faster than Newspeak and global alliances did in Orwell’s 1984.  I want to add to your thoughts the consideration of a democracy as a commons that must needs suffer all the weaknesses that Garrett Hardin described in his 1968 landmark essay The Tragedy of the Commons.

Reckless and criminal parents.  To go along with the above look into progressive insanity that has firmly ensconced itself in our fair land, I draw your attention to another well written summary on today’s draconian principles – enforced by the government gun and prison time and potential loss of your children – that dictate what parents can(not) do with their kids.  And we wonder where all these snowflakes came from.  Here’s an apropos letter from the 16apr18 WSJ.

Let me see if I have this correct: Contemporary American children as young as five years old are considered educated and wise enough to choose their gender, which will have life-altering affects due to the nature of how the brain hard-wires itself at such a young age, yet allowing children of any age the free range and responsibility to simply play up the street from their own home is a prosecutable crime. (“Parents, You Can Stop Helicoptering” by Lenore Skenazy, March 30).

It’s the absolute truth to say virtually everything my parents did to raise me and my four siblings back in the 1960s and ’70s is illegal and prosecutable by today’s standards. Who knew my parents and other adults in those days were so reckless and criminal?

America has become a very sick society, and if the whole of the population doesn’t take a deep introspective examination of itself then the social damage will be too deep to correct. The tragic irony is that all this child-protecting excess in today’s America is having the unintended consequence of creating the exact opposite environment to producing happy, healthy children who grow up to live as well-adjusted adults. It’s tragic.

Kevin A. Capps, Corona del Mar, Calif.

[22apr18 update]  Jonah Goldberg, editor of the National Review and Fox News commentator, has written a new book (see cover image) with an accompanying essay (here) which I just finished reading before ordering the book that comes out this Thursday.  The essay and the book are scholarly extensions of what we have been discussing on RR for over a decade – The death of Western culture, the impetus for a Great Divide, and the assault on the “miracle” of liberal-democracy and capitalism.  For progressives – especially the local liberal worthies who continue believe that all such thoughts are the ravings of the few, the old, the isolated - who really want to know the historical basis for what has rendered us into a polarized nation with no visible means of rapprochement, they should read Goldberg.  There is little/no hope of changing minds, but as we shout at each other over the growing chasm, understanding what the other thinks might be important to know.  (more here and here)

[24apr18 update]  Lack of housing for the homeless concerns the Rev Becky Goodwin in the 24apr18 Union.  After giving us her lifetime resume of good works, she laments the shortage of needed affordable roofs over the heads of Nevada County’s homeless population (indigenous and imported).  Her best advice is to have rental unit owners lower their rents to charity levels so that those needing low cost housing can afford to live there while the landlord loses money (and can’t get rid of his new found ‘permanent’ renters).  Unfortunately, the dear lady shows no understanding of the difference between market-driven low cost housing and government-mediated affordable housing.  She makes no appeal to our county’s governments to roll back regulations on developers who would gladly supply the appropriate low cost housing that would satisfy demand, and perhaps too well.  But we continue to muddle forward with California’s horrendous self-inflicted homeless problem repeating our Board of Supervisors’ mantra, ‘There’s nothing we can do about building regulations.’

The animal shelter kerfuffle.  Placer County is bidding against Nevada County’s contractor Sammy’s Friends to become our next animal care and adoption agency.  Placer County’s facility is in Auburn where you would have to go to adopt an animal should you be so disposed.  I haven’t a clue why we just don’t give the contract to the most distant bidder available so as to minimize the somewhat questionable tendency of some people wanting to bring the mutts back to Nevada County.  I suspect that many of them will be recycled into that ‘catch and release’ program when the adoptive owners go through their ‘Oh s#!t’ experience with their new critter sporting a dubious/unknown resume.  To show the unique tinges of insanity in our new progressive culture, Nevada County stores display at checkout counters about three to four contribution boxes for critters for every one for humans.  I guess that’s because it’s the gummint that’s supposed to help humans, and there’s no one else to keep the unwanted animals out of our gasless euthanasia chambers.

SacBee on the slippery slope to the great beyond.  A correspondent gives us a heads up that this much celebrated liberal rag cannot make it in the capital of America’s socialist vanguard.  The recent round of layoffs cuts through the meat and right into the bone.  Their “job cuts includes (sic) 14 journalists, 12 of whom were represented by the Pacific Media Workers Guild. Another eight positions were cut from the newspaper's production department, said Ed Fletcher, a reporter at the Sacramento Bee and a representative of the guild.”  They have been a ‘woke’ newspaper in the heart of liberal land, and still nobody gives a crap about the pabulum they continue to spew.  All that their former readers want is more ‘social justice’ that is measured by a bigger government check.

Comments

[Don Bessee]

The snowflake culture run amok -

Alon Altman, a senior software engineer at Google, pressured the company to sabotage President Trump’s Android phone, according to new evidence released via James Damore’s class-action lawsuit against the company.
Calling on the tech giant to use the “full economic force [of] Google for good”, Altman also suggested deleting the gmail accounts of Trump, his administration, and his aides for “abuse.”

http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/04/19/google-lawsuit-senior-engineer-alon-altman-wanted-to-sabotage-trumps-android-phone-ban-his-gmail-account/

;-)

[Marillyn Lock-Heed]

,,,utah already made free range kiddies free!!!
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/03/27/free-range-kids-children-can-now-play-outside-without-adult-supervision-utah/461590002/

[scenes]

re: DonB@10:39

https://twitter.com/epsalon

"Dear followers and trolls. A screenshot of internal Google communications by myself has been recently leaked by the alt-right.

I would like to apologize for using the offensive term "blacklist". I should have instead used "remove" or "ban"."

[Don Bessee]

Could this be the beginning of a new dawn of work ethic for late teens?

Wall Street Journal reports:
“It gets very dire,” she said. “We’re willing to branch out.” For the first time, GE plant managers may consider high-school technical training toward the experience required for the jobs, she said. “Then we could bring some of them in as seniors.” [Emphasis added]
Julian Cornwall, 17, a Cincinnati high-school junior with machining skills, fielded 13 job offers. “They seemed really eager,” Julian said of the multiple companies that pursued him. “They’re all just after us.”

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/04/19/american-teens-securing-high-paying-jobs-in-trumps-tight-labor-market-ive-never-had-to-work-fast-food/

;-)

[Walt]

Santa is trying to make a comeback..At OUR expense.
Pure vote buying.
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/04/19/report-democrats-want-to-include-reparations-in-2022-platform/

[scenes]

re: Walt@9:52PM

Here's a link to another article with a picture of the flyer.

http://alturl.com/hkbre

I doubt that even the craziest members of Team Blue at a national level would push reparations very hard, although they'd probably do it at a get-out-the-vote meeting in the right districts.

The idea is cool. Reparations + Medicare for all + free higher education. This last hopefully involves millions of slots for all those super-useful newfangled kinds of liberal arts departments. Our competitors worldwide cringe at the thought of a US where everyone has the opportunity for a Latina Studies degree.

This is where the Cal-50 plan takes hold. With sufficiently high state income taxes, 50% in this case, all of these things could be done in California. A single party state and a willing electorate could pull it off and we would be a step closer to utopia. With a bit higher taxes yet, you could even clean up the poop in San Francisco, although I expect the money would simply flow to where it usually does.

I'd love to hear from a Green Libertarian why California couldn't institute any progressive measure it likes, subject to a few federal laws. Most of the wishlist tends to involve simply taking from Peter to pay Paul, so I can't see the problem. So what's the problem here?

In short, why be mad at Trump and/or the Republicans? Simply institute a state version of these obviously great ideas.

[scenes]

It's probably worth mentioning that this 'Alon Altman' character, mentioned in the post up top, is not a female but is a mentally ill dude.

As a thought problem, imagine if ATT back in the days of it's monopoly (which the Bell offspring still rather have in some ways) withheld service based on it's employees' views of a customer's politics. This would include the President of the United States.

This is basically what we have going on here. The segment of the population that still has some grasp on it's sanity really needs to wake up and see that this is a real conflict, not just a thing played out on editorial pages and few blogs.

[George Rebane]

scenes 727am - Distressing indeed. But I'd like to see you develop your recommendation for "the segment of the population that still has some grasp on it's sanity". Given that the Left is irredeemable (also part of Rebane doctrine), what will it look like when that segment wakes up?

[Bill Tozer]

That’s a lot of legalese to digest, so let’s break it down. What the bill basically says is that anything that can be seen as trying to impact a person’s sexual orientation would be illegal to sell or offer.

This would almost certainly include traditional Christian counseling services and books.

https://100percentfedup.com/just-in-liberal-california-lawmakers-propose-bill-to-ban-sale-of-bibles/

[Bill Tozer]

Chick-fil-A's corporate mission to "glorify God" and "enrich the lives of everyone we touch" leaves The New Yorker scribe terminally heartsick about the "ulterior motive" of its restaurant execs. So do the founding family's commitments to faithful marriages, strong families, Sundays off and the highest standards of character for their employees. The frightened New Yorker critic is especially perturbed by the "Bible verses" enshrined at Chick-fil-A's Atlanta headquarters and by the restaurant's popular bovine mascots -- which he dubs "morbid" and the "ultimate evangelists" -- whose ubiquity on New York billboards and subway corridors is akin to a "carpet bombing."

Notice, by the way, how these hysterical Chick-fil-A-phobes have no qualms about the success of Jewish-owned delis or the spread of Muslim halal food shop operators in New York City who openly pay tribute to their faiths. Imagine a reporter freaking out over Quran verses or Torah citations hung up on a business owner's wall. Welcome to Social Justice 101, where discriminating against Christian-owned business in the name of opposing discrimination is the definition of tolerance.............

If leftists only want to eat and drink at a global fast-food company whose progressive CEO shares their Democrat-supporting, gun-grabbing, open-borders, gay marriage-boosting values, they should stick to Howard Schultz's Starbucks cafes.

Oh, wait...
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/michelle-malkin/2018/04/18/return-feckless-chick-fil-phobes

https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/culture/gabriel-hays/2018/04/19/abcs-scandal-assault-american-values-wrap-season-7

[Marillyn Lock-Heed]

,,,you got it bill,,,chick fillet is another Allāhu akbar,,,glorify God,,,corporation run by religious zealots!!!

[scenes]

re: Marillyn Lock-Heed@8:53AM

Just imagine all the companies you could apply the righteous wrath of the progressive to.

https://www.interstatebatteries.com/about/culture
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1288675/posts
Hobby Lobby
Marriott

re: GeorgeR@7:53AM

I was just thinking about that. I'm afraid that merely appealing to rational behavior does little good. I'd say that the strength of the Left right now is that they are tugging on the same rope, and that rope is a well-developed secular religion. The 'Right', and by that I mean traditional Western culture and not any particular set of economic beliefs, needs to do a better of job of codifying something that is actually worth fighting for.

But, and it's a pretty big one, the 'worth fighting for' needs to be couched in emotional terms. Mass movements aren't built on charts.

The tricky thing about saving the West is that the result could be as ugly as the future the progressives desire. Hitler aside, it's easy to envision a nationalistic, tradition-oriented movement that tends towards militarism. Top-down political systems, whether they are as multi-cultural as the Warsaw Pact countries or mono-cultural as Western Europe was for most of it's history, seem to be the normal state of humanity.

[scenes]

re: Marillyn Lock-Heed@8:53AM

Just imagine all the companies you could apply the righteous wrath of the progressive to.

https://www.interstatebatteries.com/about/culture
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1288675/posts
Hobby Lobby
Marriott

re: GeorgeR@7:53AM

I was just thinking about that. I'm afraid that merely appealing to rational behavior does little good. I'd say that the strength of the Left right now is that they are tugging on the same rope, and that rope is a well-developed secular religion. The 'Right', and by that I mean traditional Western culture and not any particular set of economic beliefs, needs to do a better of job of codifying something that is actually worth fighting for.

But, and it's a pretty big one, the 'worth fighting for' needs to be couched in emotional terms. Mass movements aren't built on charts.

The tricky thing about saving the West is that the result could be as ugly as the future the progressives desire. Hitler aside, it's easy to envision a nationalistic, tradition-oriented movement that tends towards militarism. Top-down political systems, whether they are as multi-cultural as the Warsaw Pact countries or mono-cultural as Western Europe was for most of it's history, seem to be the normal state of humanity.

[Bill Tozer]

Tranny babies: Question: Is giving puberty blockers to pre-puberty adolescents child abuse?...

These professionals are using the myth that people are born transgender to justify engaging in massive, uncontrolled, and unconsented experimentation on children who have a psychological condition that would otherwise resolve after puberty in the vast majority of cases.

Today’s institutions that promote transition affirmation are pushing children to impersonate the opposite sex, sending many of them down the path of puberty blockers, sterilization, the removal of healthy body parts, and untold psychological damage.

These harms constitute nothing less than institutionalized child abuse. Sound ethics demand an immediate end to the use of pubertal suppression, cross-sex hormones, and sex reassignment surgeries in children and adolescents, as well as an end to promoting gender ideology via school curricula and legislative policies.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2017/07/03/im-pediatrician-transgender-ideology-infiltrated-field-produced-large-scale-child-abuse/

Experts on both sides of the pubertal suppression debate agree that within this context, 80 percent to 95 percent of children with [gender dysphoria] accepted their biological sex by late adolescence.”

But affirmation therapies interfere with this process. What data are there about children who are treated with puberty blockers so that natural puberty, with its likely positive effects on their gender dysphoria, is short-circuited? A study from the Netherlands of seventy such children found that all of them went on to embrace a transgender identity—unlike the vast majority of children not given such treatment. According to the American College of Pediatricians (ACP),

This is a cause for concern. . . . To have 100 percent of pre-pubertal children choose cross-sex hormones suggests that the protocol itself inevitably leads the individual to identify as transgender. There is an obvious self-fulfilling nature to encouraging a young child with GD to socially impersonate the opposite sex and then institute pubertal suppression.

http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2018/01/20844/

He took pains to direct his critiques not at transgender people themselves, but at the activists who promote the ideology.

People with gender dysphoria are suffering, Mr. Anderson said, and as many as 41 percent of those who identify as transgender will try to commit suicide at some point in their lives.

“It’s important that our response to them be one of compassion and respect for their struggle,” he said. “But we also need to beware of the harm that activists are doing by promoting their ideology.”

In his capacity as psychiatrist in chief at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, a position he held for 26 years, Dr. McHugh pioneered sex change surgery as a way to treat gender dysphoria. After studying the results, however, he concluded that the procedures brought no benefit to his patients and stopped offering the treatment in the 1970s.

Today, he recommends that patients with gender dysphoria seek psychosocial treatment, and he compares the malady to anorexia and other body-dysmorphic disorders.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/feb/22/transgender-movement-rejected-growing-body-researc/

[Marillyn Lock-Heed]

,,,wow scenes!!! interstate batteries and chickyfillet use the exact same glorify God phrase in their mission statements!!! remember the religious fish bumper stickers!!! born again!!!

[George Rebane]

MarillynL 1019am - What are the common attributes of Muslim extremists (terrorists?) and Christian business owners that make you identify both as "religious zealots", what are these common attributes of zealotry that you see? No need to answer if your 853am was just gratuitous snark.

[Marillyn Lock-Heed]

,,,george,,,glorify God,,,crass commercialization of Christ!!! waiting for comment stream when a corporation in US starts using Allāhu akbar,,,

[Walt]

Another fine example of Proggys.
http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/04/20/fresno-states-randa-jarrar-believes-the-trump-resistance-should-be-hijacking-planes/
"Jarrar lamented the state of progressive activism before speaking fondly of Palestinian plane hijackers."
“I’m tired of being the bigger person. I’m tired of the left being fucking stupid and being like ‘we have to be gentle.’ No, don’t be fucking gentle,” Jarrar said.

And this person is allowed to teach your kids with the taxpayer dollar?

[George Rebane]

MarillynL 1133am - All theistic religions glorify God, and no Christian 'crass commercializes' Christ, there are plenty of secular humanists already doing that. You'll really have to up your game from such sophomoric snippets Ms Lock if you want to have a meaningful conversation here.

[scenes]

re: Walt@12:10PM

Ooof. Good find. The internet does add a permanent memory to peoples' statements.

You know, if General Jarrar wants to bring it on, I'm totally cool with that. She does have a physical similarity to our local ex-editor Mr. Spanky, so at least they're easy to spot.

re: GeorgeR@2:40PM

I wouldn't sweat it too much. You're dealing with people who have created a religion that is really a sort of anti-religion. The traditional West is bad, anything that opposes it is good. It's a rather hard thing to argue with since there are no central concepts, just a kind of philosophical black hole in the middle (I DIDN"T VOTE FOR OBAMA THE SECOND TIME!). There probably needs to be a term invented that describes nihilism to tradition.

[George Rebane]

scenes 319pm - Had no idea I was displaying 'sweat' at all. Sorry it came across that way.

[jon smith]

George 2:40

"All theistic religions glorify God, and no Christian 'crass commercializes' Christ"

Huh?????? One word: Christmas.

[Bill Tozer]

Christ was taken out of Christmas in the public square and government and most retail outlets a long time ago. Santa Claus is coming to town. Seasons greetings.

[jon smith]

Toz 8:26

Give us a break Willy. I'd expect a stupid, full-of-shit statement like that from Todd, but not you. Last time I checked, most retail outlets embrace Christmas with both legs wide open, and for many, the "crass commercialization" of Christ is the make it or break it quarter. Black Friday sales isn't about Martin Luther King. To pretend otherwise is to pretend the sun rises in the north. Ever been to Victorian Christmas in Nevada City where there is a nativity scene in about every booth selling things from magic crystals, to knitted socks, to hot mulled wine?

[Todd Juvinall]

jon smith | 21 April 2018 at 09:19 PM
I expected a moron like jon/linda to diss Christmas like all good secular idiots. Where did you get your info? At th zoo from a cghimp? You truly are a moron.

[Bill Tozer]

Oh jon, give me a break. Mother’s Day was a started by Hallmark Cards and K-Mart sells fake Christmas trees and nativity scenes and Halloween customs and sketelons to hang on the front door. The Jewish put up all blue lights on their homes. Putting up naivety Scenes at the sellers’ booths at street biazzares is hardly just more than lip service. Sure, some are saying they believe in the Christian faith, but...but...but..
You just can’t stomach Christians because you are quick to point out the Christians you have known don’t live up to anything close to Christ’s standards. Hypocrites, the whole lot of then. Remember the Crusades. What would Jesus do? No agrument here. It’s fingernails on the blackboard to you, not me.
Like Saul Alinsky wrote, hold them their morals and standards, something they can never live up to. Impossible. No brainer.
And my slamming Muslims really gets your goat, to the point you feel nothing for the Assyrian Christians’ plight. No problem here. It’s all a neat way to avoid dealing with the deeper issues. Keep looking at the mess and the messengers who carry the mess. They are everywhere and unfortunately, they screw up a perfectly good Victorian Christmas. Gawd, I have hated the holidays and crass commercialism more than you.

Kind of like slamming Beirbart News out of hand. Keeps ya from looking at the black on the page instead of the white. But, I could be wrong.

You are well aware by now, jon, that when life really touches you, as it will, all the neatly packaged arguments and philosophical convictions goes out the window. Just make sure that as you rage against Christians you are not really raging against something else.

[scenes]

"scenes 319pm - Had no idea I was displaying 'sweat' at all. Sorry it came across that way."

'Sweat' in this case doesn't apply nervousness, but simply caring that your point is made.

A proper Stoic attitude is that wrong-headed people are not to be disliked, but gently persuaded. Even then, the persuasion is of a limited duration.

[George Rebane]

Secular Christmas and Easter celebrations are sans Christ, and simply piggyback on a very old tradition of exchanging gifts during certain holidays and observances. Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are examples of how to keep Christ out of Xmas et al - and yes, 'Happy Holidays!' And selling a nativity scene or crucifix caters to a heightened demand that Christians have during those seasons. Should these then be produced (mostly by non-Christians here and abroad) at a loss and just given away?

[Bill Tozer]

In the best news in days (and on topic): the Army has decided to reduce its new recruit target for the year rather than lowering its standard.

No wonder the military is the most trusted branch of government. It would be a stretch that our public schools and colleges would follow suit and stop the decay of standards, but one can hope.

[Bill Tozer]

There is a wrench for every nut.

http://www.oann.com/white-house-to-remove-rule-requiring-care-for-transgender-patients/

[Account Deleted]

Thanks for the link to Jonah's essay. It very much ties in with the series of lectures I've been listening to on YouTube by Jordan Peterson. Being a clinical psychologist, he comes at the subject from the standpoint of how the human mind works as well as how humans have evolved to work cooperatively with each other and how civilizations arose.
He also highlights the rather sudden emergence of 'modern' civilization after eons of rather slow development. Because we as a society have decided to make science our new god, we have thrown off the old gods (stories, sagas, tales, mores, etc) wholesale and find ourselves in a pickle. We threw out the old before we had any idea of how to successfully replace it. He is open to the fact that it can be done, but points out that obviously we not even close. The biggy is the reality of death. We all face it, but now with our new god, we somehow think we can finally beat the devil in a new way. The old religions are thrown out and science will enable us to cheat death. But of course, we can't and our new religion has far less power than the old ways to deal with our mortality. Social chaos ensues. There is far more to it than that, of course. The main gist is something that many have pointed out for years. Technology is enabling a pace of change in society that far outstrips our here-to-for ability as a society to adapt. The answer by a lot of society has been to embrace the post modernism simply because it is 'new' and therefore must be the answer. Politicians and citizens alike firmly believe they can navigate our ship of state into the new dawn when they don't even know how to fire the boilers and maintain the engine.

[Bill Tozer]

Today is National Sex Ed Sit Out Day

Oh boy, a whole list of lubricants....for 6th graders.

https://www.redstate.com/kiradavis/2018/04/18/californias-new-sex-ed-curriculum-roll-out...what-need-know/
———
The names sound so good. Proud Choices, Welcoming Schools, Safe Schools....who could possibly be against that for 6th and 7th graders?

“Planned Parenthood is also behind another curriculum causing concern for parents—Get Real is a sex-education program for sixth and seventh graders. Parents in Cumberland County, North Carolina began to voice complaints about Get Real when it was introduced in their schools, pointing to graphic descriptions of sexual acts and advice for children such as using plastic wrap as a form of protection during oral sex.

According to a Family Research Council account, the Get Real program alarmed parents who objected to its promotion of homosexuality, its encouraging gender confusion among students, and its “jaw-dropping descriptions of various acts.” Interim superintendent Tim Kinlaw agreed, “It just simply was not appropriate for our sixth-grade students.” Parents prevailed, and the program was pulled from Cumberland County schools.

The implementation of these programs and others like them are the motivation behind the April 23 Sex Ed Sit Out. Organizers are providing parents with a letter that may be sent to school principals explaining their protest. “We send our children to school and pay for your services through our taxes so that our children can learn reading, writing, science and history, not how to question their gender or how to have anal and oral sex,”

http://www.catholicworldreport.com/2018/04/20/sex-ed-sit-out-parents-to-protest-sex-and-gender-ideology-in-schools/

And I ain’t even Catholic...

[George Rebane]

ScottO 520pm - Good points, and the questions will get even more desperate as AI approaches peerage with us, and robots can outmaneuver us on the shop floor and in the office. The Left, as usual with socialists, are fighting the last war and with the wrong weapons.

[Bill Tozer]

Jordan Peterson

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JEESNpAu1EU

[scenes]

re: GeorgeR@8:22PM

I'd say there's a few Green Libertarians that are ahead of practically everybody.

They are busy nailing down comfy chairs in all the existing and upcoming AI diversity thinktanks.

(sotto voce) just for fun, I searched for 'diversity AI thinktank' and lo and behold:
http://diversity.ai/

Seriously, there's hardly a sweeter deal than this.

I expect that a reasonable amount of seed money exists for Green Libertarian AI studies. There are a whole slew of organizations that have been taken over by the professional Left for it's own purposes regardless of the views of the founders. See: Pew Charitable Trusts for a canonical example.

[Marillyn Lock-Heed]

Green Libertarians???i thought you were referring to the likes of pot farm investor Boehner!!!

[Bill Tozer]

It makes sense that if the post modernists believe all things are relative, all things are just a narrative, then it stands to reason that morals, science, and all human history is merely a narrative. An unmoored vessel is the narrative of a shipwreck.

An old joke is that Christo Columbus did not know where he was going, did not know where he was when he got there, but at least he got somebody else to pay for it all.

When the individual is no longer sovereign. A bit long (11 minutes).....insanity

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ryjos2DnPjY

[Bill Tozer]

Re: Suicide of the West

Heard a nice long interview with Jonah Goldberg today on the radio. Yep, gotta get the book. Points raised were valid.
As a sidebar and off topic, I always considered Mr. Goldberg the straight man in a comedy duo. Straight up, no nonsense, the opposite of say, a Milo. Wound tight. Well, he was quite reasoned and tempered in his interview, but sprinkled a whole lot of humor on the way. Saw another side of the man, a more complete picture.

Ones I remember were “people say at least Trump is better than Hillary. But that is like being the best gas station sushi in Alabama.”

“When talking with liberals about issues, they are like “Trump put salt on his French fries. Hilter put salt on his French fires!! My reply is if Trump was Hilter, he would have repealed the Affordable Health Care Act.”

“We can have the debate on whether good things have happened because of Trump, or good things have happened in spite of Trump.”

My paraphrase.

“Is the Bill of Rights not enough of a noble cause for the left? That our rights are endowed by our Creator is not a high enough standard? Once that noblest of causes fails, people turn to their human nature, which is tribalism.”

All in all, Trump has exceeded his wildest expectations, but the interview was about 90% about topics concerning The Suicide of the West. Trump was only brought up when questioned. Another who believes politics is downstream of cultture. Gotta get that book.

[Russ]

In addition to Sacramento Bee, McClatchy cutting newsroom jobs throughout West

In addition to 15 newsroom job cuts announced at its flagship Sacramento Bee newspaper Tuesday, The McClatchy Co.’s 10 newspapers in the West will see another 14 news positions eliminated.

The cuts are part of a reorganization that will see staff at McClatchy’s (AMEX: MNI) regional newspapers in the West work in teams to reach out to a larger audience in multiple media formats, said Gary Wortel, publisher of the Sacramento Bee and McClatchy's regional publisher for the West. The company's western group includes five newspapers in California, four in Washington state and one in Boise, Idaho.

https://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2018/04/25/in-addition-to-sacramento-bee-mcclatchy-cutting.html

[Account Deleted]

When we moved here, I paid for an online subscription. I knew they were McClatchy but thought being in Idaho might make them a bit more MOTR. Hardly. Nothing more than a mouthpiece for the DNC. Being the capital city and having a university and a couple of colleges here as well as lib transplants working for Micron kept them alive for awhile. Can't see how they'll last much longer. I can get my local news online for free (radio and TV stations mostly).
Reading a newspaper is a generational thing. I worked swing shift for decades. When I came to work, my route to my desk took me past several trash cans known to contain the Union, the Bee and the Chron. Occasionally a WSJ would be available. Add to that the Sac Snooze and Review. For a while, I even subscribed to the Sunday edition of the Chron. Ah - the 'Sporting Green' and the 'Pinkie'. All pre-internet. Everyone I see these days has their nose shoved in their cell phone screen. I wonder how much longer I'll be able to get my hard copy mag subscriptions?

[Bill Tozer]

Concerning the Animal Shelter kerfuffle, one would be hard pressed to find any issue that brings out the crowds more than animals. Of all the protests and hanging out on the overpass (from Occupy Nevada City to Bush to Trump that I can recall), no issue get folks more riled up and taking it to the streets than animal advocacy.
Remember the Opposum Torture saga? Went on for days, then weeks with demonstrations everywhere from the bridge to the courthouse....they even crammed into th court house like sardines on each and every hearing, Yesterday, hundreds took to the streets in GV and packed the Arts Center in support of Sammie’s Friends. Huge local story and it will fill the local airwaves and local papers with pro Sammie Friends voices of support.

The recent League of Women Voters with HH88 and Dan Millet revealed that Hilary Hodge just does not get it. She is on the wrong side on this one. Send our furry friends (members of the family, actually) to Auburn. Blasphemy!! Who could vote for such a heartless cruel human. Put HH88 in cage and send her to Aurburn. Yeah, government knows best. What a friggin statist.

“Answering a question about the possibility Sammie's Friends would no longer operate the animal shelter, Hodge said the proposal, while unfortunate, is the correct move. She said Nevada County has been derelict in its duties, pointing to what she said was a local shelter that needs upgrades.” ——The Union

WTF? The right move??? Well, voters, that is where Hodge stands, straight from the jackass’s pie hole. What would Hilter do?

Dr. Rebane penned, “Nevada County stores display at checkout counters about three to four contribution boxes for critters for every one for humans.” It does not take a rocket scientist to notice that. HH is an advocate for closing Sammie’s Friends...prematurely. She had the political awareness of Hillary Clinton,

[Walt]

Morn'n Bill,, I see the low flying jets have you up early too.

[jon smith]

GR 8:22-
Peerage?? The last time I saw the word peerage was in David Copperfield. Very contemporary. Todd probably thought you were talking about Malt-o-Meal.

[Todd Juvinall]

MAlt-to-Meal? Absolutely thought that is what he meant. And it sure tastes great. I see JonSmith is back from the park. Any luck?

[George Rebane]

jons 915am - peerage: having peer or equivalence, equal, coequal status, especially when referring to sapient cum sentient agents.

[jon smith]

"Peerage" was in vogue in the 1700's and briefly again in the mid 1800's. You are showing your age.

[Walt]

I know "jon" ,those words are too expensive for ya'.
I enjoy the good Dr.'s 25 cent words.

[jon smith]

Walt, I never took you for a Charles Dickens reader.

[Walt]

I never figured you for one to get a high school diploma.
When did you drop out?
But yes,, I do have some books of higher learning and privilege on the shelf.
I just speak in a language those lower on the socioeconomic ladder can comprehend. (meaning, I stoop to your level)